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May 18, 2005
Gay Marriage - Asking the Wrong Questions
Recently on the local talk radio station, one of the desk jockeys, Jason Griffin, who supports gay marriage was asking callers if gay people getting married had personally affected their marriage in particular. His callers said no.
Griffin’s approach is interesting and effective, but I’m afraid it’s logically flawed for two reasons.
First of all, people calling in to a conservative leaning talk radio show who are already resistant to gay marriage are probably not going to be the ones who would feel the effects of society’s redefinition of marriage. They most likely already have a clearly defined definition of marriage in their heads that is not so dependant on society’s whims as others’ may be. Obviously they are willing to defend that definition, both against Griffin and against things that happen around them.
Secondly, the question assumes a rather simplistic view of peoples’ objections to gay marriage. No opponent to gay marriage who is saying it would affect marriage as an institution is seriously suggesting that once two gay people get married, other marriages across the country will immediately drop dead for that reason and that reason only.
That would be like a doctor reading a study that says rheumatoid arthritis suffers are 10% more likely to have consumed lots of red meat, and then telling each patient that comes in that they got the disease because they ate lots of red meat. Diseases of the body are a little more complicated than that, and so are diseases of marriage.
Can you imagine someone objecting to the doctor telling people to eat less red meat because the doctor can’t come up with an example of someone who ate a steak and then woke up with rheumatoid arthritis the next day? There may be other reasons to not agree with that plan of attack, but the one given here ain’t one of them.
Any societal occurrence that affects traditional marriage, for good or for bad, takes years to show its effects in any statistically significant way and even then it’s going to be pretty hard to measure because of all the other factors that also have influence. Does this mean that we, as a society, should stop asking ourselves what possible effects, subtle or not, any change might have? I think not.
Marriage as a societal institution isn’t a right, it’s something society has around to benefit itself. If gay marriage supporters actually want to change peoples’ minds, they need to stop insisting that marriage is a right and refusing it to them is outright discrimination, and instead try to convince the public that gay marriage helps society. And “well, it doesn’t really hurt anyone” just isn’t going to cut it. It’s absurd to say that gay marriage will have absolutely no effect on marriage itself. Indeed, the only question that should be up for debate here is “how.”
This all reminds me of the flurry of commentary from supporters of gay marriage after Britney Spears’ 55 hour marriage.
We will lose marriage in this nation," without constitutionally limiting it to heterosexuals, warns Family Research Council president Tony Perkins. The Traditional Values Coalition, meanwhile, sees "same-sex marriage as a way of destroying the concept of marriage altogether."It would be far easier to take these claims seriously if gay-marriage critics spent as much energy denouncing irresponsible heterosexuals whose behavior undermines traditional marriage. Among prominent Americans, such misdeeds are increasingly ubiquitous.
Exhibit A is musical product Britney Spears's micromarriage to hometown pal Jason Allen Alexander. The 22-year-olds were wed on January 3 in Las Vegas. Clad in sneakers, a baseball cap, ripped jeans, and a navel-revealing T-shirt, the vocalist was escorted down the Little White Wedding Chapel's aisle by a hotel chauffeur. Spears and Alexander, who wore baggy pants and a zippered sweater, soon were wife and husband.
Almost as soon, their marriage was annulled. Clark County Judge Lisa Brown accepted Spears's request and ruled that "There was no meeting of the minds in entering into this marriage contract, and in a court of equity there is cause for declaring the contract void."
The revolving-door couple's 55 hours of marital bliss were based neither on love nor shared commitment, but because "they took a joke too far," explained Spears's label, Jive Records.
I hardly think that any social conservative was happy or even ambivalent about this, or the hundreds of other daily examples of the denigration of marriage in this society. But to suggest that gay marriage is a-ok because at least it’s not as bad as a 3 day Vegas marriage is ridiculous. Should the parent of a child with brain cancer stop making him wear his seatbelt?
It's also a logical fallacy to suggest that because someone is not as vocal about subjects similar to their pet causes, that their arguments can just be dismissed out of hand. In fact, there is actually legimate reason for conservatives to object more to gay marriage than Spears' marriage. Spears is actually admitting to the public that her marriage was a mistake.
I note that this commentator and his peers didn’t go around asking people if Spears’ marriage affected their own marriage before assuming that it would affect traditional marriage. Some things are just obvious.
Posted by illuminaria at May 18, 2005 12:33 PM
Comments
But to suggest that gay marriage is a-ok because at least it’s not as bad as a 3 day Vegas marriage is ridiculous. Should the parent of a child with brain cancer stop making him wear his seatbelt?
Conservatives use the same twist in "logic" to insist that gay marriages will lead to polygamy, incestuous marriages, bestiality, and the End Times. Yet somehow we are supposed to take one argument seriously and not the other.
Those that have discussed the "Brittney Spears" marriage are simply pointing out the hypocrisy of straight people who have ignored, trampled, & devalued the institution of marriage for the last 50 years now getting all huffy because gay and lesbians have found something worthy in it to seek after all.
If straight people had wanted to "defend marriage" they could simply make it tougher to get a divorce, if not outlaw it all-together. They have had plenty of opportunity to do so, and yet have chosen not to.
Those opposed to "gay marriage" may eventually come up with some half-way sounding lucid and logical arguments against it, but so far their results have not been very impressive.
And given the sheer amount of venomous emotion that pours out of conservative pundits when discussing the matter, it's difficult not to come to the conclusion that the opposition is based on a gutter-level emotional response, rather than thoughtful dispassionate reasoning. This is why I believe the description of such people as prejudiced is both fair and accurate.
Posted by: Patrick at May 19, 2005 12:10 AM
Patrick you foolishly equate belief in a morality dictated with by a higher power (or indeed an arguable natural morality dictated by the natural law of tab A into slot B) with a gutter-level emotional response.
It's not a gutter-level emotional response for me to say that I believe that the institution of Marriage as I understand it was dictated and sanctified by the God of Abraham and Jacob. Likewise if I state that the same God was quite clear regarding the rules, conditions, responsibilities, and prohibitions for both Marriage and all sexual conduct.
To assume that one holding these beliefs came to them through a gutter-level emotional response rather than through thoughtful dispassionate reasoning is not only foolish, it's concretely ignorant and deceitful when one considers how much study and thought have been dedicated to the study and understanding of these religious precepts.
I said 'deceitful' above, and it most certainly is. By placing yourself opposite of those you decry, you equate yourself as a person of 'thoughtful dispassionate reasoning'. A person with far less intellectual capacity than you claim is capable of seeing that your argument is out of joint with accepted fact.
Yes, a great many do accept these beliefs with a gutter-level emotional response, but on the whole, these beliefs are outlined, explained and modeled to those folks by those who have undertaken the study and internal seeking to reach and then teach them.
Ironically, some of the greatest thinkers of recent history started out in your neck of the woods. They undertook to use 'thoughtful dispassionate reasoning' to prove the foolishness of such beliefs. Their 'thoughtful dispassionate reasoning' led them in the polar opposite direction. It's the presence of Intellectual Honesty in people such as these, Clive Staples Lewis, Josh McDowell, Strobel, etc that led them conclude that they were the ones who were being foolish.
Dispassionate? Oh here, I challenge you. What is worth engaging in dialog over that two people are not passionate about? You claim that your conclusions and your desire to bring others to your side are dispassionate. I say horsefeathers! If you were not indeed passionate about your argument, I would not desire to respond, and indeed would have no respect for you. This however is not the case. Likewise myself and Illuminaria are passionate about our beliefs and conclusions. You are a creature of passion. If you strived to analyze and make conclusions over issues while remaining dispassionate, you will already have failed, as you were passionate enough in your desire and effort to make the attempt.
Prejudiced? My holding beliefs different than yours makes me prejudiced? The fact that you apply such negative blanket statements to 'conservative pundits' shows that you yourself are prejudiced if one applies your definition.
I disagree with your statement that people are, "getting all huffy because gay and lesbians have found something worthy in it to seek after all." That's tripe, and you know it. Gay and lesbians have always found something worthy in marriage... if not the acknowledgement of their union (which they most desire), than the perceived benefits afforded to those who are married. They've always wanted that, and nobody can blame them. Marriage is indeed, "A Good Thing (tm)". The possibility of gay marriage actually being a reality now is ONLY because we've let marriage become so soiled 'in the past 50 years'. However your claim that it was allowed to happen, and that they could have just made it 'tougher to get a divorce if not outlaw it all-together' is just absurd. You know for a fact that the ground lost in the last 50 years to moral relativists and humanists was lost only with long nail gouges in the woodwork. The political/social climate has changed over those 50 years to make it impossible to win the fight against the devaluing of marriage. It's those same changes in the political/social climate that make it even possible for gays and lesbians be given the time of day when they fight for inclusion in this realm. Fifty years ago, it would have been a, "What color is the sky in your world?" response, and today it's a lot closer to, "Oh, I see your point." I myself do not oppose civil unions for those who wish to see their commitment to a long-term (dare I say, Life Long?) stable and beneficial treated with the same respect as the marriage of others when seeking loans, government and health benefits, property rights, and the like.
The ironic thing is 50 years ago, gay and lesbian couples may have desired marriage (Though I fairly strongly believe that 50 years ago they were more concerned with not being the victims of insult and injury and discrimination, and likely saw little value in the institution of marriage available to the jerks that hurt them. That's human nature), and now today they may get it. But what are they getting? They are not getting the marriage of 50 years ago. They are getting a cheapened bastardized version of it, and the marriage of 50 years ago is but a memory or pipe dream that even they will mourn the loss of.
Posted by: Thistledowne at May 19, 2005 05:36 AM
By the way...
Anticipating a possible counter response, I will say that you've no right to lump me in with the "God hates gays" morons. To class me in with these folks and then discount my beliefs (which I've reached through 'thoughtful _passionate_ reasoning, thank you very much.) would be a prejudicial action on your part... an action you've already taken by lumping all those on the right together as 'conservative pundits'.
Why is it that the least minority has the loudest voice in a grouping, and why is it that the vast majority is thought to hold the beliefs of those in the vocal minority despite their protests to the contrary.
I'll tell you why. Intellectual dishonesty and prejudice. You know that such is not the case, but it would damage your position to acknowledge it, so you choose not to.
Posted by: Thistledowne at May 19, 2005 05:49 AM
Patrick, straight people are not unanimous in their views, and it's a bit disingenuous to accuse "straight people" as a group of hypocrisy because they simultaneously allow easy divorce and dislike gay marriage. Might it not be that the people who like easy divorce and dislike gay marraige are not, in fact, the same people? No doubt, there's some overlap, but I would imagine that people, like me, who are opposed to gay marriage would be less supportive of liberal divorce laws than those who are supportive of gay marriage.
Furthermore, I don't consider straight people's asserted hypocrisy "for the last 50 years" very plausible when aimed at every single person who opposes gay marriage, considering that I, for instance, haven't been around for 50 years. Maybe I was being hypocritical before I was born, but I doubt it. I would be more than happy to support pretty restrictive divorce laws (along with reasonably liberal annullment laws) given the opportunity. But that opportunity isn't there.
Posted by: Brett at May 19, 2005 02:13 PM
There are regular comments that "divorce should be harder". Why not make marriage "harder"? In most states a blood test, $50 and two people to sign is all it takes. Getting a divorce? Lawyers, custody battles, lots of money. Any ideas about how to make marriage "harder"? How about required counseling? a pre-nuptual agreement? Watching a movie? Something !!!
Posted by: Rob at May 27, 2005 08:57 AM