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[Michael Williams <michael AT metalab.unc.edu>]

On Fri, 20 Feb 2004, Lee Haslup wrote:

> but equal is not equal" reasoning.  Second, there are good, 
> purely-secular reasons for granting special status to marriage as the 
> union of a man and a woman.  From a secular point of view, marriage is a 
> social institution designed to encourage a stable environment for the 
> rearing of children -- a provision for the reproductive potential of the 
> union.  Its trivial benefits may be granted, in some part, to the 
> current generation but the intended beneficiaries are the next.  Given 
> that the institution looks to the next generation, in order to claim 
> exclusion, someone would have to claim that his or her parents were not 
> one man and one woman. 

I find it laughable to describe benefits as important as healthcare, 
inheritance and partner benefits as "trivial."  Also, the argument that 
marriage is primarily an institution geared towards rearing children is, 
even if true from 10,000 feet, simply hilarious.  Tell that to my 
countless relatives who were childless their entire lives, or married or 
remarried well past child-bearing age.  However, if you really cling to 
that as a reason for marriage, I might point out to you that Paula could 
well choose to raise a child with her partner.  Wouldn't you rather that 
child have a "stable environment?"

Really, though, the whole idea that marriage is suddenly this pristine 
institution that must be preserved on its high pedastal is just 
ridiculous.  Your points are well-made, but you're dreaming.  I have more 
than one ex-brother-in-law who defiled the institution of marriage /way/ 
before I even had a chance to enjoy its benefits.  If marriage is suddenly 
so well-defended and so highly regarded by all those who live within its 
graces that its borders must be defended at all costs against the 
onslaught of outsiders, then it must have gotten a patch job pretty 
recently.

Note that I'm the offspring of one man and one woman who have been happily 
and passionately wed for nearly fifty years.  I know that a stable 
environment for child-bearing is best.  I agree wholeheartedly.  But I've 
seen enough marriages that never involved even one little fleshloaf and 
enough marriages that exploded like an outhouse full of dynamite to know 
that it is ridiculous to pretend that "our families" are under some sort 
of assault, or that marriage = child-rearing.  The majority of straight 
people my age (late 20's) who have gotten married lately or are getting 
married soon are doing so with zero desire for children.  They just want 
to be married.  The world would benefit from /more/ relationships like 
that of my parents, not fewer.

> Yes of course, you are correct that they are seeking equal "rights" in 
> the sense that they seek to compel other people and the community at 
> large to treat them as if they were "married."  The special benefits 

I seek to compel the country to treat me like a real, adult human being, 
capable of deciding on my own how to enter into a consensual relationship 
with another adult.  Is it bad and wrong of me to compel others to treat 
me equally?  If so, then I guess I'm bad and wrong.  The history of 
social change in our country is, in every instance, the story of one 
group or another having to compel the rest of the society to view them as 
human beings.  You say it as though we have a gun to someone's head and 
are saying, "If you don't let us in, the kids are gonna get it!"  
(Please feel free to reference "Blazing Saddles" for an example.)  In 
fact, it's just that hint, that whiff that passes in the air, of hysteria 
that tends to taint any defense of marriage as a heterosexual act.  It's 
as though something you possess now is threatened, that we will 
take something from you by being granted the right to wed, like we're 
stealing your yard gnome and taking it on a world tour.  

You sound very reasonable, and that's extremely nice.  But you sound 
worried that I or anyone else would try to compel the rest of society to 
treat us equally and that this is something entirely new and terrifying, 
when it has never happened any other way for any other group.

> couples and their anticipated offspring.)  The gay marriage types are 
> seeking their "fair" share of benefits intended for someone else.

I particularly like the quotes around "fair."  You're an intelligent 
person who's willing to discuss this and disagrees with me, so I'm going 
to bite the bullet and ask:  what's unfair about letting me get married?

> For the social institution of marriage to be most useful it needs to 
> have fairly simple rules.  Most people know what a "man" and a "woman" 
> are and infertile couples, childless couples, elderly couples, etc. can 
> still support the institution by observing its customs. 

Finally, someone tries to let in the childless and old!  What about my 
getting married doesn't support the institution by observing its customs?  
Is it that I /can't/ have children?  That's the problem I find in any 
argument that marriage must be preserved for the sake of the children it's 
intended to produce:  it either cuts out heterosexual couplings that don't 
involve children or it contradicts its own reasoning by letting them in 
but failing to explain how letting them in is better than letting gay 
couples in, as well.  If you want others to support the institution by 
observing its customs, which is a brilliantly written way of putting it 
and nicely includes people like my childless sister who was married twice 
but would sooner have gouged out her eyes than bear fruit, then let others 
observe its customs.  It's a faulty argument as it stands, now, though, 
because it runs:

--marriage is for straight people to have children, thus gays can't get 
married
--but marriage is a social institution which should include those who 
can't have children but want to observe its customs
--but gay people want to observe its customs
--but marriage is for straight people to have children, thus gays can't 
get married

> It makes you not a member of the Religious Right.  Most people aren't.  
> The "Religious Right," to the extent that they exist at all, are the 
> useful idiots used by the secular left to delegitimize protest against 
> their attacks on common sense, common understanding, and at times, 
> common decency. 

That's funny, I thought they were the baby factory for the secular right, 
but heck, what do I know?

-- 
http://www.compoundx.org                                "I am...
Michael Williams                                     I am the...
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