Not sure if I’ve yet written my opinion here on same-sex marriage, but this story has flushed me out. As you might surmise, I am not enthused on changing an institution which has served Western civilization well for six-thousand years; and changing the definition of said institution would require for me some fundamental reasoning. This is not a willy-nilly decision; after all the traditional marriage and the family unit are the very atoms of our civilization.
It is, in fact, this institution alone which is responsible for women rising in equality within our culture. I exaggerate, right? Well look at any polygamous society, and you will find women treated as chattel. It was the great wisdom of Judaic law that not only said there is only one God, but also men must honor only one woman. Not multiple wives and not other men. But one woman. This was the very beginning of the Western culture, and to revert to a less-civilized time where there is free-range in marriage is not civilizing at all.
Really, everyone, including those who favor same-sex marriage, have their own definitions on what should qualify as a marriage. If I asked a same-sex proponent if they believed brothers and sisters should marry, or if we should be able to have multiple wives or husbands, they are likely to say no they shouldn’t. So the argument isn’t who is more inclusive, because if there is such a thing as marriage, by definition it must be exclusive in some aspect to have any meaning at all. The question only is whom should be excluded.
For me, seven-thousand years of history is good evidence that this institution should be preserved as is. Shouldn’t society promote marriage as an ideal; an ideal unit between men and women raising children with both sexes to guide them? Do not men and women have very different natures to offer children? Isn’t this, after all, how children are biologically meant to be raised, regardless of how many great gay parents there are, (and I know there are plenty)? For me the answer is yes, for the question is not whether your co-worker would make a good parent with their partner; its rather what should society promote.
Changing the definition has consequences beyond this debate. For example, I have asked heterosexual proponents of gay marriage would they be promoting the homosexual and heterosexual lifestyles equally to their children? After all if you want society to promote these marriages, shouldn’t you be promoting them to your own children. Typically I have only received incredulous looks from this question, and dismissals as if I’m being absurd or silly.
No, as it turn out, I’m not being silly at all. In Massachusetts, where same-sex marriage is legal, we have this story last week of a teacher in Lexington, reading to her class of 2nd graders the story “King & King“, which tells the fairy tale of a prince falling in love with another prince. Frankly, I would never read this story to any 2nd grader; perhaps that makes me a bigot or close-minded in the minds of many; but actually its not that at all, I just want to protect an institution which has in its hands our very future. Redefining it any way, and promoting that redefinition to our children is a radical change which should be strenuously debated and, for me, ultimately opposed.
7 responses so far ↓
1 The Reticulator // Oct 2, 2007 at 2:22 am
I have asked a question about this many times which has yet to get any kind of an answer (and I usually ask it where thoughtful homosexual people are present): Why is it that although homosexuality has existed for many centuries, and in some cultures it has even been more or less accepted, it is only recently that there has been a push for homosexual marriage? In my limited reading on it, I see where homosexuality has usually been hostile to marriage if it has had any opinion on it at all.
But why this big push in recent years, and never before that?
2 Bernie Dvorak // Oct 2, 2007 at 10:49 am
Dave,
That teacher should be fired immediately!
3 DaveD // Oct 2, 2007 at 11:04 am
Reticulator…I believe I know why there is a push now; until very recently homosexuals were unable to have families, it was simply scientifically impossible. Now it is quite possible, and quite prevalent in the homosexual community. Marriages, after all, raison d’etre is to raise children, so historically there was no pressing underlying reason for homosexuals to seek to change the institution.
4 M. Ahmadinejad // Oct 2, 2007 at 10:24 pm
We don’t have homosexuals like in your country. We don’t have that in our country. In Iran we do not have this phenomenon.
5 Be a Good Daughter // Nov 5, 2007 at 4:08 am
Cool post.
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Bye
6 Anon // Nov 12, 2007 at 8:32 pm
This does not seem to be a rationale argument to me. That something has served Western civilization well does not mean there shouldn’t be progress. To me, the argument comes back to equal rights and personal freedom. I am strongly for both of those concepts. So while I am personally a bit homophobic and anti-gay, it seems wrong to prevent people from having the same rights as the rest of us.
The argument that marriage has been around for thousands of years and served us well is absurd. Not flying served us well for thousands of years. Do you agree with changing mass from being said in Latin? Do you agree in the ban of contraception? Two things with two thousand year histories – shouldn’t some things change? How about slavery? – that predates the written word and lasted to medieval times (and began again in the renaissance) – obviously it was a cornerstone to many flourishing western civilizations.
Marriage is an atom of our civilization. How about divorce? – that was illegal in Ireland until 1995! Why allow divorce – if marriage is so fundamental to our society? Why allow chapels in Las Vegas? Why not have a long holding period and exams and qualifications if the institution is so important? The divorce rate is 45% – is that the atom of our society’s problems?
I thought you were a defender of the West and a challenge to our self-loathing. Is this progress a mistake?
I would love my children to only go to school with other children of nuclear families with married (for the first time) parents. I certainly think there is some impact of the divorced, separated, single parent, non-gay families etc. on our “ideal” children and I’m sure it’s not good. Do you think the “promotion” of “non-ideal” non-nuclear families has a negative impact on children? Perhaps we could have different schools for the ideals and for the non-ideals.
Do we current promote the traditional nuclear non-divorce family and tainted non-ideal family equally? I don’t plan on promoting the homosexual lifestyle to my children anymore than I would promote the couple that got divorced or had a single parent raising a child but I also won’t be pointing a finger as detriments to our society.
There is also a rights issue entangled with the ideal institution. I hadn’t really thought much about this issue until this last weekend. I happen to attend a dinner with a gay couple I had met previously. They’ve been together for 9 years in a committed relationship and have lived together for 8. One is foreign born. He can’t get a visa so he needs to move back to the UK for a year and will need to find a new job and live thousands of miles from his partner. Of course, as homosexuals, they can’t marry and thus can’t qualify for a green card that way. Why should they be deprived of this right, while I could meet a girl today, marry her tomorrow and help her get naturalized even if we divorce in 4 years?
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