Instead of begging for the basic right to marry, gay couples are now demanding it. In San Francisco, they are simply getting married as an act of civil disobedience. And that is also happening across the country. This will alter the debate - as will the actual existence of marriages in Massachusetts in May. The debate will become how to tear gay couples apart, how to demean and marginalize them, rather than an abstract debate about theories of marriage. And as these couples begin to feel what marriage is like, as they experience what civil equality actually is, they will become emboldened. Just as those who refused to leave segregated lunch-counters began to deepen their sense of moral outrage and conviction, so the act of getting married - something heterosexuals simply assume they have - is empowering. When Massachusetts becomes the first free state for gay citizens, the movement will explode. I predict thousands of couples from all over the country and the world will arrive to claim their dignity and rights - and this experience will help transform the argument. I've always believed that if we could get every gay man and lesbian to fully internalize their own equality, to get past the brutalization that society has wrought upon their souls, nothing could stop us from achieving our dream. Now the process is accelerating. Already consciousness has been changed. Already the very idea of equal marriage rights is in the minds and souls of a new generation. And when the religious right try to strip us of those marriages, and force us back into second-class status, then we will see something else: resistance. We are on the verge of the next phase of this civil rights movement: when we become the change we want to see in the world.

The issue of gay marriage is one of the most divisive in the United States. It pits arguments for basic civil rights against deeply held religious beliefs.

In South Korea, Dr. Moon said in a telephone interview, there was no advertising for egg donors and no payments. The 16 women who donated the 242 eggs were "personal contacts," he said, declining to elaborate.

The state Senate passed a bill Thursday that could make it tougher to get a divorce in Georgia. In a 33-21 vote, the Senate approved a 120-day waiting period for couples trying to get a divorce if they do not have children and 180 days if they have children. Senate Majority Whip Mitch Seabaugh (R-Sharpsburg), who authored the bill, said its intent is to strengthen families and save the state money. "When you look at divorced women, they are five times more likely to end up in poverty," Seabaugh said. "This is an opportunity to live apart and see what happens." Seabaugh said the longer waiting periods give couples a chance to cool off and think about reconciliation. "The longer the waiting period, the fewer the divorces," Seabaugh said.

"Using the mathematical model, we can predict dissolution or divorce with 90 percent accuracy over four years," says Kristin Swanson, an adjunct research assistant professor of applied mathematics at the University of Washington. The leader of the team, psychologist John Gottman, has been working out marriage formulas for some 15 years. His team will discuss its findings Feb. 12 at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Seattle. To get a better handle on the interactions between husbands and wives, the researchers blended mathematics and psychology, two fields that normally don't have much to do with each other. "Before this model was developed, divorce prediction was not accurate," Gottman says in a statement, "and we had no idea how to analyze what we call the masters and disasters of marriage -- those long-term happily married and divorced couples." After studying hundreds of videotaped conversations between spouses, the researchers came up with a mathematical formula to gauge the stability of the relationships. Observers watch the chats and give each person points -- or take them away -- depending on how they react to their own emotions and those of their spouses. "Something like showing contempt would be scored a negative-four, while making your partner laugh would [be scored] a plus-two," Swanson says. After the conversation is over, researchers plot the points on a chart. "You'll see something that looks like a Dow Jones Industrial Average of positives and negatives," she says. According to the researchers, the marriage is in trouble if the ratio of positive-to-negative interactions is less than 5-to-1.

In a political and legal challenge to California law, city authorities officiated at the marriage of a lesbian couple Thursday and said they will issue more gay marriage licenses. The act of civil disobedience was coordinated by Mayor Gavin Newsom and top city officials and was intended to beat a conservative group to the punch. The group, Campaign for California Families, had planned to go to court on Friday to get an injunction preventing the city from issuing marriage licenses to gay couples.

Arons hinted Wednesday that the separation may be partially due to Ken's reluctance to getting married. All those bridal Barbie dolls in toy chests around the globe are really just examples of Barbie's wishful thinking, he explained.

Many gays and lesbians plan to wed. Many others will not. Some want to marry as a legal protection or as the only nondiscriminatory way to validate their love. But marriage is also seen as a flawed institution, as a conservative step backward, unwinding years of work to redefine notions of family. "There is a difference between liberation and equality," says Joan Tronto, a professor of political science at Hunter College who was active in the women's liberation movement and has no intention of marrying her partner of 10 years. "Politically it is easier to say, 'Let us in. We're just like you.' But it takes away some of the radical edge." The difference in attitudes often falls along generational lines. Charles Martel, a Boston psychotherapist whose clients include many gay couples, says marriage seems natural to younger couples, especially those with children. Meanwhile, older clients, many of whom fought to restructure the definition of family in the 60s and 70s, are more mistrustful.

The pressure on legislators was intense. "Nothing has matched this," said Representative David L. Flynn, 71, a Democrat from East Bridgewater and the oldest serving member of the Legislature, referring to the avalanche of e-mails, phone calls, and letters he has received. "This is the number one firestorm by far."

Ms. Brown also adds, "When a program offers services to men and not to women, that's indisputable discrimination." I don't remember: did NOW Legal Defense fight the Violence Against Women Act for that same reason?

Patricia Levin, executive director of Community Services for Children Inc., said Friday that its program to promote marriage does not deny job counseling to mothers. It provides job counseling to women through another part of the agency, she said. ''No one has ever been refused or excluded from services here because of their gender,'' Levin said. The NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund filed a civil rights complaint this week with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services alleging that Community Services for Children violates the U.S. Constitution and federal anti-discrimination laws. In the complaint, NOW Legal Defense cites the grant application of the Family Formation and Development Project, operated by Community Services for Children. The application says the project provides job training and placement services to fathers but not mothers. But Levin said the agency offers such services to mothers using grants provided through its Head Start programs, which are aimed at children and families. ''It's just nuts,'' she said. ''Can you imagine going after a Head Start program for discriminating against women?'' The Family Formation and Development Project offers a 12-week course emphasizing the importance of marriage for unmarried low-income couples. It also provides job training and placement services for fathers. The project is funded with a $177,000 grant from the Department of Health and Human Services. The grant application lists as an objective that 90 percent of the participating fathers be employed by the end of the grant period. No objective is mentioned for mothers. The project meets the goals of the Bush administration to promote marriage. NOW Legal Defense, which works to advance equality for women, is concerned that the program emphasizes that men should work and women should stay at home and be dependent on men. Levin, who has been executive director since 1972, said her agency has never before been the target of a civil rights complaint. In fact, she considers herself a feminist. ''If there was a feminist march down the middle of the Lehigh Valley, I'd probably be leading it.''

A group of state lawmakers wants to curb divorce rates by requiring premarital counseling, extending waiting periods for licenses and offering incentives for marital education programs. The package of 16 bills was unveiled Tuesday. "We need to do more in our state to promote strong marriages and families and protect children from the negative effects of divorce," state Rep. Joanne Voorhees, a Wyoming Republican, said in a statement. "Marriage is a serious decision that requires cooperation, communication and responsibility." The legislation would encourage couples to undergo at least four hours of premarital education or counseling. If they don't, the waiting period for a marriage license would go up to 27 days from three, under the bills. A tax credit of up to $50 would be offered to cover the cost of premarital or marital education or counseling that focuses on strategies to strengthen or preserve marriage. The sessions would have to be at least four hours and be conducted by clergy or counselors, therapists or other professionals in this area. The bills also would require divorcing parents to have a parenting plan in place before the divorce is finalized. They also would be required to complete an educational program on the effect of divorce on children.

Considering how little would change if people of the same sex could marry, you have to wonder why this issue has such power. It's got nothing to do with wages or war. It's not about the deficit or the distribution of wealth. It doesn't involve the question of when life begins. In short, there's no material reason why gay marriage should be such a megillah. But like so much else in American politics today, this is not a matter of substance.

For the next year, a reporter who formerly covered the book publishing industry will cover people who are cool. Not the Republican Party or the Bush administration. No, it's really cool people. In an announcement earlier this month, Times national editor Jim Roberts said that the new cool-beat reporter "will examine cool forces in religion, politics, law, business and the media -- a job that will take him across the country and make him a frequent presence in Washington." "His coverage will cut across the political campaigns this season," Mr. Roberts continued, "but we expect that much of what he does will transcend the race itself and delve into the issues and personalities that drive -- and sometimes divide -- really cool people."

Recently I had lunch with Mr. Roberts (in a really swingin' bistro in Manhattan) and asked him to explain the new position in a bit more detail.

Q: I think this move is way cool. Could you explain the philosophy behind it?

A: We want to keep our readers guessing, challenge their preconceptions, just like really cool modern artists do. For example, consider a front-page story with a headline suggesting that the article is on Topic A. Some literal-minded readers might assume that the article itself focuses on Topic A. But when our cool reporter is on the job, the story won't be about Topic A at all, but instead will be about Topic A as viewed through the prism of analyzing what is cool. That's the core innovation.

Q: Won't this new way of reporting confuse the readers?

A: They'll eventually figure it out. At first, this innovation may make the stories seem really ... weird. Like, you thought you were going to read about a congressional hearing on health care costs, and what you actually read is paragraph after paragraph about what the people in the hearing room were wearing, and who said that so-and-so is really cool. But we feel that our reader are sophisticated enough to catch on.

Q: How do you define who and what are cool, and who and what are not?

A: That's another major innovation. Basically, the shift is from objective to subjective. Republican, Democrat, male, female, North Dakota -- those are examples of objective categories. No one is going to disagree about who and what are in them. But consider the idea of "cool." It's basically subjective. That's what, from our point of view, is so completely cool about it. We get to write story after story in which we (sometimes with no warning!) simply toss out the old objective descriptions in favor of one master description that means essentially ... anything we want it to mean. For example -- trust me, we've done this already! -- we can turn out a long, page one story that consists almost entirely of either: a) quoting people who tell us on the phone that they are very cool; or b) just us calling people cool because we determine that they are, you know, pretty cool. Consider: "Cool" is an almost infinitely elastic category. It is also a culturally contested term -- some people struggle to be known as it; others struggle to avoid being called it; and others think the term is phony and irritating because it tends to obscure at least as much as it reveals. Finally, like the term "middle ground," the term "cool" is inextricably linked to where you, the one who is describing, are on the spectrum. Wildy subjective, totally freeing! These facts make this whole adventure for us ... really hot. We'll go places that we were never able to go before.

Q: In terms of the state of the nation, why focus on cool? Why now?

A: Haven't you read Thomas Franks' The Conquest of Cool? Cool is a real movement out there! If affects politics, life, same-sex marriage, everything! We think we owe it to our readers to tell them LOTS about cool. Cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool. From now on, nearly everywhere you look in our paper, it's gonna be cool.