[eropple]

> a large number of opponents to same-sex marriage have expressed acceptance of same-sex civil unions

Some folks express that, yeah. I do not believe it is an honest position in the general case and have suspected since the jump that that's a move of the goalposts designed to appear more reasonable than they are, ready to be dragged back further as they are approached.

[pekk]

What I think happened is that gay rights activists realized they would get better standing to fight for equal rights if they called it marriage. That was a successful tactic and I'm not quibbling with it. But I know there are people who would have been pacified as long as it wasn't the word marriage because I have talked to some of those people. If those people also are afraid of gay people in their hearts, that's terrible - but it actually doesn't equate to opposition to civil unions that are only a boring legal matter as opposed to the sexy, apocalyptic "attack on marriage."

[tommorris]

Civil unions would have been a nice compromise 20 years ago.