This article does a good job of casting light on the debate raging regarding homosexual marriage: it's not always about hate. It is about preserving something valued.
Richard Thompson Ford is the author of Hate and Marriage, published in Slate Magazine.
6 comments:
that's an interesting article, I'm glad you posted it. I agree that calling a gay marriage a "marriage" undermines straight marriages for what they are. A significant value is lost. The writer captures that fact very well.
Positive arguments just seem to work better. For example, when "anti-abortion" became Pro-Life, it gained a lot of ground...until the other side became "Pro-Choice," that is. That's what this reminds me of. He's saying, don't think of it as anti-gay. Think of it as Pro-Marriage.
All the more interesting because he seems to be pro homosexual marriage.
The only reason why people feel that calling a gay marriage "marriage" undermines straight marriage is because of societal norms created especially by religion. It has even taken some gay people in Massachusetts time to "realize" that marriage is something they can write into their futures.
But just because our brains have been pre-programmed to think a certain way doesn't make it right. Why is a significant value lost to the marriages of heterosexual couples? This question needs to be answered, and with religion aside, please.
I'm sure White people during the civil rights movement felt the same way about giving the same rights to Blacks: "giving equal rights to Blacks devalues our humanity, for we are White people who not only compose the majority, but are somehow superior". Remember that this kind of superior thinking was also based on societal normals created by Christian beliefs.
There are several things you say that I agree completely with. For example, just because our minds (preference for the immaterial) hold beliefs does not justify that belief.
Just for clarification, do you disagree with the article? Do you believe that all disagreements over this issue boil down to prejudice? Because I'm not sure how there can be dialogue if that is the case.
Actually, I cannot find any way of seeing homosexuality as morally OK, regardless of religion. And arguments for same sex marriage being so completely unprecedented in the history of humanity I feel justifiably skeptical in regards to the institution.
The fact of the matter is that I hold (along with most (almost all) humans at most times) that a necessary element of marriage is an opposition of gender. Eliminating in the public realm an essential element of that institution is to eliminate that institution (tautologically).
Perhaps that explains to some degree a secular opposition?
Devil's advocacy: women's rights is pretty unprecedented in history...
I think the best arguments against the institution of homosexuality are pragmatic: i.e. it further lowers our birth rate. If a person likes sex for the sake of its pleasure then homosexuality is an even better way to go, since there is absolutely no possibility of creating an offspring. So, there is no external constraint to keep people's sexual desires in line with what's good for society as a whole.
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