5 ms·

It’s fascinating living in a country whose legal system treats vowing before God to stay with someone exclusives until death as absolutely meaningless but will

by User23 3y ago

It’s fascinating living in a country whose legal system treats vowing before God to stay with someone exclusives until death as absolutely meaningless but will treat a smiley face picture as a legally binding statement.

stonogo 3y ago
Marriage doesn't have to involve God, and securities fraud doesn't require "legally binding statements" to execute. Once you take away the hyperbole, there's not much left to examine here, except to ask what is fascinating about it.
gumby 3y ago
Why, because it’s rational? A visual expression can be produced in court. A verbal promise is binding n some US jurisdictions (e.g. California) but hard to litigate when you can’t subpoena the witness. Also in a contractual matter (such as marriage), if the “exchange of value” or guarantor is entirely mythical how can such an agreement be binding? It’s not like the injured party can collect from the guarantor. That’s why some contracts require a payment of a dollar (e.g. patent assignment to your company) so it can be “for value received”. Now if you’re a cryptoweenie I suppose you’d say that the “fiat dollar” is just as mythical…good luck litigating that.
NikolaNovak 3y ago
Oh boy lots to unpack! * If we subscribe to principle that "legal system impacting everyone equally" and "personal religious beliefs" should be separate (and I do!:), then "vowing before God to stay with someone" should indeed be "legally absolutely meaningless", unless you also enter in a bespoke legal contract, understood by both parties to be such, with details on what happens when two parties want to terminate the contract, jointly or individually. Basically, if you want to talk "legal contract", let's talk legal contracts, which are rarely truly inescapable and have well established means of binding and exit. If you want to talk divine commitments, by all means, but that's really between you and your divine being of choice, and it is my understanding that most divine systems handle such cases appropriately (whether by eternal damnation or multiples of readily-available virgins, et cetera:). Just, let's not mix them up to make some vague points. * "Smiley Picture" and "funny written scribble" (a signature) have similarities. We readily in most legal systems accept "if I use a funny written scribble to really really mean something, no take-baksies!", then what's the real difference to smiley picture? * Or put it another way, what are the first principle under which a signature should count for something, or a written expression, that a emoji, used to convey same meaning, should not? I.e. if I ask "will you deliver to this contract", and you text back "Yup!" or thumbs up emoji, what is the difference? https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/thumbs-up-emoji-costs-sask-farmer-82-thousand-1.6898686 https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/thumbs-up-emoji-...
ohdannyboy 3y ago
We have an entire legal framework revolving around the dissolution of marriages and the surrounding issues. Its kind of a big deal (and has nothing to do with God, who the government does not enforce contracts for). Churches can (and do) enforce the "until death" vow part by treating divorcees differently within their organization.
dang 3y ago
"Eschew flamebait. Avoid generic tangents." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
Kerb_ 3y ago
Could be in part because of the separation of church and state, and that monogamous pairings under organized civil legal systems has existed far longer than your God and already had routines in place for dissolution of said pairings, especially in cases where one partner is harmful to the other, despite fantastic and ritualistic promises and vows.

by User23 3y ago

stonogo 3y ago

Marriage doesn't have to involve God, and securities fraud doesn't require "legally binding statements" to execute. Once you take away the hyperbole, there's not much left to examine here, except to ask what is fascinating about it.

gumby 3y ago

Why, because it’s rational? A visual expression can be produced in court. A verbal promise is binding n some US jurisdictions (e.g. California) but hard to litigate when you can’t subpoena the witness. Also in a contractual matter (such as marriage), if the “exchange of value” or guarantor is entirely mythical how can such an agreement be binding? It’s not like the injured party can collect from the guarantor. That’s why some contracts require a payment of a dollar (e.g. patent assignment to your company) so it can be “for value received”. Now if you’re a cryptoweenie I suppose you’d say that the “fiat dollar” is just as mythical…good luck litigating that.

NikolaNovak 3y ago

Oh boy lots to unpack! * If we subscribe to principle that "legal system impacting everyone equally" and "personal religious beliefs" should be separate (and I do!:), then "vowing before God to stay with someone" should indeed be "legally absolutely meaningless", unless you also enter in a bespoke legal contract, understood by both parties to be such, with details on what happens when two parties want to terminate the contract, jointly or individually. Basically, if you want to talk "legal contract", let's talk legal contracts, which are rarely truly inescapable and have well established means of binding and exit. If you want to talk divine commitments, by all means, but that's really between you and your divine being of choice, and it is my understanding that most divine systems handle such cases appropriately (whether by eternal damnation or multiples of readily-available virgins, et cetera:). Just, let's not mix them up to make some vague points. * "Smiley Picture" and "funny written scribble" (a signature) have similarities. We readily in most legal systems accept "if I use a funny written scribble to really really mean something, no take-baksies!", then what's the real difference to smiley picture? * Or put it another way, what are the first principle under which a signature should count for something, or a written expression, that a emoji, used to convey same meaning, should not? I.e. if I ask "will you deliver to this contract", and you text back "Yup!" or thumbs up emoji, what is the difference? https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/thumbs-up-emoji-costs-sask-farmer-82-thousand-1.6898686 https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/thumbs-up-emoji-...

ohdannyboy 3y ago

We have an entire legal framework revolving around the dissolution of marriages and the surrounding issues. Its kind of a big deal (and has nothing to do with God, who the government does not enforce contracts for). Churches can (and do) enforce the "until death" vow part by treating divorcees differently within their organization.

dang 3y ago

"Eschew flamebait. Avoid generic tangents." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

Kerb_ 3y ago

Could be in part because of the separation of church and state, and that monogamous pairings under organized civil legal systems has existed far longer than your God and already had routines in place for dissolution of said pairings, especially in cases where one partner is harmful to the other, despite fantastic and ritualistic promises and vows.