Posted on 03/09/2004 11:03:15 AM PST by DameAutour
In a recent discussion concerning homosexual marriage, a conservative said "I really don't care since it doesn't impact my marriage". This comment reminded me of those who say that the solution is to "get government out of marriage altogether" or "make all marriages civil unions". They believe that the issue is one of policy and linguistic technicalities. But in reality, the social impact on our civilization is much more profound.
For homosexual marriage will effect not only your marriage, but your entire family structure. It will effect the culture and values of your community and ultimately, that of your children.
When marriage no longer means "the committed union of one man and one woman", it can come to mean virtually anything. How does that effect you? Do you say that you will know the value of your own marriage no matter what? But marriage is not just about your love. Otherwise, there would be no need to get married at all. Marriage is a public testament to your commitment. Even in the days before churches or the government were so intimately involved in marriage, witnesses were still required. Marriage has always been a public affair.
When you stand before the public and say, "I am married to this person", what will that mean?
When feelings are elevated above morality and sound reasoning, the effect can be devastating. There must be always be a balance between emotions, sound judgement and moral behavior. Emotions join people together and strengthen the social compact. Rationality promotes objectivity, debate and the logical thinking necessary to propel us forward. And objective morality keeps our actions grounded in a higher plane and our expectations elevated.
But the push to change the meaning of marriage ignores sound reasoning and antiquates societal morality. Proponents of homosexual marriage give little thought to the consequences of their actions, and this should give any conservative pause. Their morality is subjective and relative, and "feels good" means "good". If this is how the establishment of marriage is to be refashioned, what else will be sacrificed on the altar of pleasure?
Will hedonism be the most important philosophy of the new Western civilization?
Years ago, no-fault divorce and painless annulments were introduced to the American people. When Britney Spears marries and destroys a marriage in the span of a weekend, it cheapens the institution of marriage even for those who really did mean "til death do us part". Their children see that marriage is just a fun thing to do when you're in Las Vegas. Because of no-fault divorce, immorality no longer meant anything when it came to the dissolution of this committed union. Now it seems morality will mean nothing in the joining of this committed union.
When the moral weight is stripped from the fiber of your marriage, can you really say it wasn't effected?
If marriage means whatever our feelings want it to mean, how do you convey that to your children? How do you impress upon them the significance of marriage when you can't even tell them what it means because the definition keeps changing? What reasons will you give them for getting married at all, if the decisions and sacrifices they make as part of that committment won't even be acknowledged by their own government? If the neighbors to your right have a "group marriage" while the neighbors to your left have a "homosexual marriage", then what does that make your marriage? Are all unions equal in meaning and significance? And since "equal" doesn't mean "the same", what will you say when the divorce rate skyrockets as a result of "homosexual marriages" that will last an average of 2 years? How will you teach your children the true meaning of marriage when every TV commercial, school book and pamphlet will undermine it? With all the confusion will you even remember what marriage is?
If marriage loses its importance and significance, how can you say it wasn't effected?
Not to a homosexual. Not when a homosexual says, "I am married to this person".
"More significantly, a mere 10 percent of even these most committed gay men mentioned monogamy as an important aspect of commitment (necessarily meaning that even many of those men in the sample who had undergone "union ceremonies" failed to identify fidelity with commitment). And these, the very most committed gay male couples, are theoretically the people who will be enforcing marital norms on their gay male peers, and exemplifying modern marriage for the nation. So concerns about the effects of gay marriage on the social ideal of marital monogamy seem more than justified."
-- Stanley Kurtz
Same as it always has: commitment.
Is that what marriage means, commitment? It used to mean the lifelong commitment between a man and a woman. But divorce already took away the "lifelong" part, and most people who get married today won't stay married to the same person. "Homosexual marriage" will take away the "between a man and a woman" part (and do even more damage to the "lifelong"), leaving you with "some kind of" commitment for "some amount of time", presumably, as long as the two people love one another. And of course under hedonism, "to love", means "to have passion for and derive pleasure from the other person's company", and who knows how long that lasts. Even a word as simple as "committment" is going to mean something less than you intend.
What kind of "committment" is it? Not so straightforward anymore, is it? "Homosexual marriage" will become "same-sex marriage" and even friends and roommates will do it, after all, who says you have to have sex with someone in order to marry them? Especially since procreation will be divorced from marriage. How committed will marriage be, really?
| What We Can Do To Help Defeat the "Gay" Agenda |
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| Homosexual Agenda: Categorical Index of Links (Version 1.1) |
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| The Stamp of Normality |
Proponents of homosexual marriage give little thought to the consequences of their actions...
Actually, they've given it a great deal of thought over the years:
In Their Own Words: The Homosexual Agenda:
"Homosexual activist Michelangelo Signorile, who writes periodically for The New York Times, summarizes the agenda in OUT magazine:
...to fight for same-sex marriage and its benefits and then, once granted, redefine the institution of marriage completely, to demand the right to marry not as a way of adhering to society's moral codes, but rather to debunk a myth and radically alter an archaic institution... The most subversive action lesbian and gay men can undertake --and one that would perhaps benefit all of society--is to transform the notion of family entirely." "Its the final tool with which to dismantle all sodomy statues, get education about homosexuality and AIDS into the public schools and in short to usher in a sea change in how society views and treats us."
The American Child After Same-Sex Marriage
What "Gay" Marriage Will Mean for our Children
Yet I don't see anyone pushing for an amendment to end no-fault divorce or quick annulments.
If marriage loses its importance and significance, how can you say it wasn't effected?
I can say my marriage wasn't affected, and that's all I care about. Even if the neighbors are gay and the others are polygamists, my relationship with my wife remains the same and we will pass those values of commitment on to our children. All of you can play around with definitions all you want.
Do you remember the site? That is against the law and someone has recently been convicted for it. Take down the web address and visit your local prosecutor. If it was within about the last month, I'll show you how to find it in your browser's history and how to look up the owner of the domain or site if possible. Mail me if that fits your situation.
My girls are coming up to web browsing age, and I want as many of these people as possible behind bars before they start.
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