Seth's World

I’m an atheist. Yup. I don’t go to a church and I have an opinion about the existence of a God. I don’t think any opinion changes much in terms of my ultimate afterlife in heaven and hell because I don’t think those places have vacancies. Because those like thoughts of Brittany Spears in her Rolling Stones outfit from back in the day are vacuous things that are not meant to be real.

Despite all that, I’ve got to live with folks who have different opinions than I do. They have to live with me. We need a way to get into our debates and our arguments and a way to walk away when the round is over. Like a sport, we should be able to train, compete, and then leave it on the court. There’s no being right without risking being wrong. Read that again. There’s no being right without risking being wrong. At least, I’ve never felt that way about truth.
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I get tired of the smug way people brush off Wikipedia in debates. I know that Wikipedia isn’t a primary source of information. But it offers a serious trade off for people who would buy a physical set of encyclopedias which are also not primary sources of information.

The argument typically goes “Anybody could edit Wikipedia so it could say anything.” But in addition to having more abilities to edit the material, they also have more people confirming the data. And when something is wrong, the fix is a click away. Wikipedia will even lock articles that seem to be getting vandalism.
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I spend a lot of time arguing against current forms of marriage. I’m jaded. I’ve been divorced. My parents are divorced. My brother has two divorces. I don’t even see divorces as failures. I see divorces as a good thing because those are relationships that didn’t kill you.

I am romantic and there are a lot of things I am willing to do for my significant other. In support for choose your own relationships, I can imagine having multiple significant others for which all these things would apply. But right now I have one significant other and this is about the things I would do for her.
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My girlfriend likes the idea of marriage. My exwife and the former fiance before that both said “yes” to marriage. I’m going against traffic on this issue. I think marriage is objectively pointless and I think the commitment people want out of it actually doesn’t exist. I’m going to make that case here.
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You’ve heard this phrase or seen this bumper sticker. “Be the change you wish to see in the world.” Sounds nice and motivational and generic. Fine, I get that bumper stickers have to sport soundbites because of the limitations of the medium but I want to take a few minutes to address how I might approach such a topic.
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People have many issues to deal with. We are living longer than ever. We are more aware of our unhealthy behavior than ever. Traditional relationships are weaker than ever. People includes both the people in need of health insurance and marital benefits and the people providing partner benefits such as insurance and medical care. The world is changing underneath our feet. While gays wait for marriage rights and traditionally married couples wait for tax benefits instead of penalties, businesses can lead the way in customizing the care they offer to their clients. You don’t have to wait for legislation to serve your patrons. Hospitals should let patients decide who is important to the patient instead of deciding for them. Insurance should let the customer decide who they are covering instead of limiting them to a single spouse, financial dependents, and children. That’s called service.
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