Once gays are married, how do we handle the divorce proceedings?

[kentuck]

I have no idea if gay relationships last longer than heterosexual ones or not but my guess is that there would be some divorces and separations, just as with a man and a woman? Would these be handled any differently than that which is followed by todays' laws and standards, where the woman sometimes gets an advantage over the man in some courts. At least, that has been the way they have ruled in the past. Any ideas on how we should handle the divorce proceedings once the marriage issue is settled?

[arewethereyet]

1. same old expensive way the rest do

(on a lighter note) kind of makes one wonder who would want to bring on the expense

[TexasMexican]

2. The husband will get cheated

but which one?
:crazy:

[ElsewheresDaughter]

3. same way we always handled all divorces....make lawyers richer

[kentuck]

4. One partner makes 100k per year and the other makes 15K..?

And they have an adopted child. Do they split the property and who gets custody of the child? Why in he world would gays want to get into this mess :)

[E_Zapata]

5. the exact same way........they get all the glory and all the grief

that marriage/divorce affords.

[KoKo]

6. That's an interesting thought. It might apply to some gay couples who

adopt roles, but others may just work out together who gets the house and car. But, custody battles would be different, I would think. Since Courts try to favor the Mother, if they can, it does mean that some role would have to be assigned in a gay marriage in case a divorce occurred and there was a child custody battle.

It might mean, though, that the laws would have to be changed to get rid of any rules which favor mothers having custody over children because it would discriminate against one side or the other in a gay marriage with both being of the same sex. I wonder how this has worked in situations where couples have surrogate mothers birth their babies, or where there are adoptions and the birth mother is known. It certainly will complicate things legally.

Interesting, because I've not heard any discussion about this anywhere. But, I might have missed it.

[salinen]

7. we?

let them handle it.

[kentuck]

8. A generic "we" meaning the present legal system and as in "we",

the people. A nation of laws. Who do you mean "them"? How do you let "them" handle it??

[sandnsea]

9. Equitably

How cool would that be? Maybe we'd all learn a few things on fairness. Hurry up, gay people, start getting divorces so we can analyze that!

(kidding)

[kentuck]

10. There's an old saying...

Be careful what you wish for...you just might get it. :)

But in reality, gay people would never get divorce.

[atre]

11. Uh, please see the Equal Protection Clause

The Court has read into the Fourteenth Amendment a principle that government classifications based on gender are subject to heightened scrutiny. Please see cases like Craig v. Boren, which held that it works both ways (laws that classify genders to benefit females are also generally invalid).

The only reasons that women- in practice- still tend to get custody and alimony is 1) they tend to be the primary caretaker and 2) they tend not to be the primary breadwinner.

The fact that female spouses tend to be successful in divorce proceedings has absolutely nothing to do with their gender.