Yes, I've also noticed this topic was absent in this group until now.
Anyway
Technically I'm not voting, living in Dubai means its alot of work to vote and previously the Dubai Consulate was open on polling days and now no longer is for security reasons and since then most expats I know here don't bother voting anymore.
What would I vote, well I moved to the Yes more so in recent times, why?
The term "Marriage" is not fixed in time on its meaning despite John Howard trying to give it a time based definition 13 years ago. Traditionally, if that's what most want to refer to the meaning or Marriage was transfer of the ownership of the woman from her father to her husband. In many parts of the world it still means this. In Australia up until 70's or 80's, women needed permission from their husband or father to do a number of things including contraception etc etc and she took her husband for better or worse and the church didn't budge on this statement regardless of how he treated her. As my mum said, many a woman sat there with their priest talking of how to leave their husband while wearing a black eye and the advice was, you are doing something wrong, just love him. So I for one won't be taking the advice of any institution that indirectly supported domestic violence.
Agree with the basic meaning of "Marriage" in how its applied to many thing today and that is that its a union of two unspecified entities as the term "marriage" is frequently used outside two humans tieing the knot. So for me two humans is enough of a definition and their sex is their business and for me irrelevant.
Its also not like many of the so called Traditional Marriages were this Utopian relationship often made out. Divorce rates exceeding 50%, 25% of women choosing not to have a baby, at least one partner being unfaithful exceeding 75%, before the age of DNA testing, 10% of UK children were calling the wrong person Daddy and didn't know it.
With regard to the Bible and other religious texts. Like our beloved Constitution, their documents written more than a few generations ago need to be updated in time to reflect changes in Technology, Understanding, Legal System, Culture, Mother Nature, Science etc. We have seen the growing number flaws and out of date concepts in our Constitution and in particular the USA's Constitution on the right to bare arms and these documents are barely 120 to 250 years old respectively. Surely a book written 1400 to 2000 years ago is likely to have even more out of date concepts?
