This is philosophy bites with me, David.
Edmonds, and me, Nigel Warburton.
Philosophy bites is available at www.philosophybytes.com.
Philosophy bites is made in association with the Institute of Philosophy.
In a few countries, same sex marriage exists.
In many, it is illegal.
But in some jurisdictions, though members of the same sex can't get married, they can have what's called a civil partnership.
Is this discriminatory?
Isn't civil partnership, to all intents and purposes, identical to marriage?
Is there any philosophical, any rational reason to prohibit people of the same sex from tying the marriage knot?
Les Green is a law professor at Oxford University.
Les Green, welcome to philosophy Bites.
Thank you.
The topic we're going to focus on is same sex marriage.
Now, this is often discussed as gay marriage.
Is that synonymous term?
No, it's not a synonymous term.
Ordinarily, of course, people of the same sex who enter a marriage are both homosexuals and usually homosexuals of the same sex, but they needn't be.
In our present regime, a gay man can marry a lesbian or a gay man can marry straight women.
And in our civil partnership regime, two straight men can enter a civil partnership.