User talk:Ragazz

Please note: I have posted to articles under the IP address 76.102.68.34. I am not in violation of

ease up on the bias, just a little. I know it may be difficult but just take a deep breath before editing an article and just think before you type, it isnt fair to the readers to contribute misleading and false statements - Linestarz (talk) 10:24, 13 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

False statements? Such as?Ragazz (talk) 10:26, 13 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The idea that you correlate pederasty with SSM, despite them being world's apart. One is contractual and usually involved no consent, the other dealt with mutual relationships. If you're going to be biased just be a little less obvious - Linestarz (talk) 11:53, 13 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Now you're changing the subject. You accused me of making "false statements." That is slander.Ragazz (talk) 12:21, 13 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Perhaps it's all in good faith Ragazz, even people with good faith get confused. If we do include various changes which you put forward (and I'm not again), then I'll be more than happy to include the various comparisons. -- Historyguy1965 (talk) 21:48, 13 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Sure, no prob.Ragazz (talk) 18:18, 13 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

hey, I see you're interested in using the talk page often to protect the current edit, feel free to check it out now and see my new entry regarding my proposed additions, hopefully your passion in preserving edits can be shown in answering questions, thanks! -- Historyguy1965 (talk) 06:27, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

It's not about me, and it has more to do with protocol than content. I will check out your suggestions. Please don't change anything until there is a consensus between at least several editors.Ragazz (talk) 06:31, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Just noticed your comment on my page, believe me, you're certainly not the first person to lecture me on how liberal and fair you (think) you are. I understand you guys all do this for Jesus, and that lying is a sin right up until it contradicts your faith, then lying is okay. The problem I have with your edits is 100% of them are anti-gay in one way or another, the idea that you constantly put clarification tags on SSM and can't even explain to me what a marriage means (unless you insert your person opinion of it) is comical. Of course, that's not nearly as surprising as noticing that most of the editors in the SSM are heavily religious and extremely anti-gay (religious and anti-gay - say it isnt so!) , yet spend 24/7 editing articles to skew their favor. Kind of sad really, but I digress -- Historyguy1965 (talk) 16:55, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Historyguy, your comments above violate

WP:AGF, in addition to your edit-warring on the marriage articles and your incivility and bad faith assumptions on article talk pages. This is a warning that if it continues, I will ask an uninvolved administrator to handle it. If you haven't read the two guidelines above, I suggest you do so so that your repeated violations of them doesn't make it a surprise when you are blocked if you continue in this manner. -->David Shankbone 17:15, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply

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I see you were offended Ragazz by my comments, my apologies as I have a passion for accurate information. I will no longer comment on your profile as it does nothing anyway -- Historyguy1965 (talk) 19:24, 16 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Blogs are, for what it's worth, almost never considered reliable sources for anything but the opinion of the blogger. Peer-reviewed academic journals are generally, on the other hand, among the best possible sources out there. I have now added the page in question to my own rather long watch list, and will try to keep up with developments there as other factors permit.
The things which might be useful for getting additional input on the article and any proposed changes to it would be to file a

I'd need to see direct evidence of the matter in question. In general, user talk pages are allowed a little more leniency than other pages, although that isn't necessarily written in stone, as sometimes people need to vent some steam. I'd probably have to say the same thing regarding "collusion", because that term can be kind of hard to define. So, if you can tell me where the material in question is, that would help a lot. In general,

Wikipedia:Wikiquette alerts and similar pages are probably the best place to go first, but it would help me a lot in deciding what to recommend to know specifically what the situation is. John Carter (talk) 16:20, 19 September 2009 (UTC)[reply

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• I think Ragazz has been very helpful to the discussion, and his reasoning is top-notch and he has been very willing to compromise when given good arguments. -->David Shankbone 16:23, 19 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks guys, it's been good working with both of you as well. And David, being that I'm here to learn about the topic as well as to contribute, I'm especially lucky that you're here. Although I feel the POV of the article is a bit biased towards the pro-SSM side in a few aspects when compared to mainstream neutral sources (New York Times, CNN, etc.), it doesn't seem to be intentional as far as I can tell. Ciao Ragazz (talk) 04:21, 22 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The operative word is "unfounded", and you didn't provide any evidence on way or another. As a single statement, my guess is "no". If it were to recur, without clear evidence, that might change. John Carter (talk) 21:10, 13 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I honestly am not really sure. I think something like that might be possible, but the process I'm thinking of involves a lot of work from a knowldgable administrator, and I'm fairly sure that, at least in this regard, I'm not knowledgable enough to do it myself. I've asked a question regarding this at the help desk, Wikipedia:Help desk#Question regarding possibility of "claiming" contributions made when one has forgotten to sign in. With any luck, we'll get a response from someone who knows a bit more about it there soon. John Carter (talk) 21:47, 4 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The only real option they offer is to, if you notice that you added something while not signed in, to go in and change the signature from that of the IP to your own, or maybe add something after the IP signature to indicate that you "claim" the IP's contribution, but that's about it. Personally, I think the best way to go would be to just remove the IP signature and replace it with "~~~~ - forgot to sign in" later. I think that's about it, though. Sorry. John Carter (talk) 22:10, 4 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I doubt if it's a sock. We have a lot of IPs who don't choose to create an account if they don't figure to use it that much, and this IP has edited other LGBT related content before this most recent burst of activity. In a case like this, I might add one of the welcome templates from

The citation at the end of the section in the domestic partnerships is specific on the long-term care point, as is this document from a couple months back, page 3: http://federalworkforce.oversight.house.gov/documents/20090708125906.pdf

Essentially, due to federal law, California can't have a federal-tax-free long-term care insurance program for opposite-sex couples if it allows same-sex couples to enroll in the program.

Another way of saying this is "CalPERS has many aspects, it's not just a long-term care plan, and of those plans, long-term care is denied to domestic partners but not to married couples."

Hope this clears up the matter! Have a great day! --Joe Decker (talk) 22:53, 6 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

That's unfortunate, I didn't realize that. Wait, what? So in re Marriage Cases would have cancelled out straight couples' LTCI because of DOMA? That's crazy! Is that what you mean? Sorry, I'm a little slow sometimes. I did try to google it, sorry for the misunderstanding. Thanks.

Ragazz (talk) 12:30, 7 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

No worries, glad to be able to clarify things, it gave me an excuse to dig up more citations and double-check my own work. Your question about LTCi is interesting. It's not quite that bad, as I understand it. It is not that "In Re" would cancel opposite-sex couples LTCi, it's that allowing same-sex couples (under marriage or domestic partnership) access to CalPERS LTCi would trigger a preexisting federal provision that would change the tax treatment of everyone insured under CalPERS LTCi, essentially making opposite-sex couples pay federal taxes on that benefit (or not getting a deduction for it, something like that), whereas now they don't have to. In short, if same-sex couples are allowed in state law to have equal access to LTCi, straight couples with CalPERS LTCi pay more federal taxes. (Same-sex couples would also see that higher rate, but the point is that straight couples would see a change.) As California worked to make more and more of it's laws about DP "equal to" marriage, legislators came up across that federal taxation trigger, and decided to exclude same-sex couples from access to LTCi since it would ruin the tax treatment of that coverage from opposite-sex couples. It would not surprise me to see this eventually litigated, but it's probably not (I'm guessing here) a very politically pragmatic way to pursue legal equality. (What a mess!) --Joe Decker (talk) 23:30, 8 October 2009 (UTC) (inserted a clarification --Joe Decker (talk) 23:33, 8 October 2009 (UTC) )[reply]

Thanks for taking the time to explain. I wish they could have given gay couples that coverage. Then again, imo everyone should be provided real coverage for that matter, then maybe we wouldn't have to squabble over these things. :( I'm just crossing my fingers I guess.Ragazz (talk) 07:48, 9 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, I have no idea what your talking about. Please pay more attention.Ragazz (talk) 20:16, 7 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed with Blanchardb, please use your head more when making edits to articles, it makes you a much better editor . Oh and, haha, just read your user page, you know the one about making edits in good faith? lol, but seriously, I think it's still possible to make biased edits and still believe you're doing so in good faith. What I like to do is re-read the changes I've made (or see) and quickly analyze it from the perspective of someone on neither side, it works wonders! -- Historyguy1965 (talk) 16:38, 8 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

How's the SSM going? Do you need any more opinions?:P

Nice try. But if you mischaracterize me and make inaccurate statements about my editting to an admin right under my nose, I will defend myself. Have you noticed that none of the other regular editors have a problem with me? Calm down and take the advice that others are giving you.Ragazz (talk) 23:49, 9 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for asking regarding this.

I have four problems with the second sentence, "These unions had varying degrees of similarity with modern marriages, and with contemporary heterosexual marriages."

The first is a balance question; it seems to accept that whatever the heterosexual union was at any give place and time, that was marriage. In the midst of a debate where much of the claim is that thus-and-such cannot be marriage because it doesn't fit in with a specific definition, to blanket grant the term to heterosexual unions that vary greatly and predate the term seems to be awarding half the battle to that side without foundation. As such, the sentence would be better off ending with "heterosexual unions".

The second is an accuracy statement. "Contemporary" means "at the same time", and while that is an axis for concern, it's not as though family unions were (or are) the same across all cultures at a given time.

The third is simply that we want to compare to marriage-the-institution, not to a given set of marriages, so we want the singular.

The fourth is a that "similar" is a comparative, so something is "similar to" something, not "similar with".

So all in all, I'd recommend that it be "These unions had varying degrees of similarity to modern marriage, and to contemporary forms of heterosexual union within their cultures." (And even that sounds a little clumsy.) - Nat Gertler (talk) 20:51, 9 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, and I should also note that I am not commenting on the factual accuracy of the statement; the whol ancient history question involves too much research for me to really dive into at this point. - Nat Gertler (talk) 21:08, 9 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Great! Thanks so much. Could it perhaps be less clumsy if it were broken up into two sentences?Ragazz (talk) 23:51, 9 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think that breaking it into two sentences would help much, but switching the order of the clauses mght ("These unions had varying degrees of similarity to their cultures' contemporary forms of heterosexual union, as well as to modern marriage.") - Nat Gertler (talk) 00:19, 10 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hi,
You appear to be eligible to vote in the current