Posted on 06/03/2004 11:36:17 AM PDT by xsysmgr
Incredible read. Kurtz just eviscerated the gay-marriage platform. It's remarkable how 99% of the pro gay-marriage articles in major U.S. news outlets make only peripheral reference to similar institutions abroad - usually only to acknowledge their existence, and not their successes, failures, or consequences. Sadly, no opposition arguments of this caliber are going to be popping up in op-ed sections all over the country.
These are the kinds of arguments that will sway the portions of America who are indifferent or undecided on the topic of gay marriage. Cold analysis and fact are far more persuasive than religious or political rhetoric.
what do you expect from a country that invented the idea of making women pay for half the cost of going on a date
This is a bit of a stretch. Gays are what, 3% of the population? The weakening of marriage is terrible of course, and the promiscuity, misery and disease of the gay lifestyle speaks for itself; but I think the author is confusing causation and correlation, or even confusion cause with effect. There might be a better explanation out there for the dissolution of marriage in the Netherlands. Perhaps the decline of Christianity?
An interesting read. However, I can't shake the feeling that Kurtz's "analysis" of various explanations is biased to support his conclusion that "gay marriage" is to blame. Perhaps he's right, but his dismissals of the other possibilities don't really seem as clear-cut as he makes them out to be.
It more than the gay population. It's a message being reinforced daily throughout the population. In Oregon, our papers reinforce it daily.
| What We Can Do To Help Defeat the "Gay" Agenda |
|
|
| Homosexual Agenda: Categorical Index of Links (Version 1.1) |
|
|
| Myth and Reality about Homosexuality--Sexual Orientation Section, Guide to Family Issues" |
later
BTTT
No culture prior to this one (Western) recognized homosexual marriage; it is an experiment and will end at length, unless Islamists succeed in toppling European democracies. That will still be a tragic end for Western civilization, but it will be much quicker. It will also guarantee the end of homosexual marriage for many decades, if not centuries, to come.
In other news, Kurtz has found that the enactment of homosexual marriage in the Netherlands has led to a drastic increase in cell phone usage.
Correlation is not causation, no matter how much sophistry you apply.
Careful there, td. It's true that you cannot assume that correlation always implies causation. However, in cases where there is causation, it would be stunning if there were not correlation.
I think in this case Kurtz has got it wrong -- "gay marriage" and the increase in "co-habiting births" (or whatever he calls it) are both caused by some third underlying factor.
My guess? Secularization is the leading culprit. It's disappointing (but not surprising, given his apparent bias) that Kurtz dismisses it. After all, he uses Holland's "religious past" as an explanation for so many other things.
There might be a better explanation out there for the dissolution of marriage in the Netherlands. Perhaps the decline of Christianity?
Perhaps. However note that the author said:
"Whether or not you agree that gay marriage has helped to cause this decline, it is already evident that gay marriage has done nothing to strengthen marriage as a whole."
Pro-same-sex-marriage supporters have stated that homosexual marriage would only strengthen traditional marriage. Yet there is no evidence that same sex marriage has strengthened marriage in the Netherlands.
How quaint.
I was listening to a sermon on a Christian radio station last night. The speaker was advocating that the Biblical concept of marriage be mandated by law, which I disagree with, because I believe in separation of church and state. But anyway, he said that we must legislate the Biblical form of marriage, which he described as "one man and one woman forever."
It struck me that we lost the "forever" part of the concept a long, long time age. I don't go back that far. Did conservative Christians work as hard against making divorce easy as they are against same sex marriage? Divorce is forbidden in the Bible as clearly as homosexuality.
Sophistry like attacking straw men? Did you see Stanley Kurtz insisting that this observed correllation settles the matter? Because I saw a few lines under the section labeled "Causation," that said otherwise:
Although pinpointing cause and effect raises particular challenges when studying the intricacies of human social life, there are now at least strong indications that Dutch gay marriage has contributed significantly to the decline of Dutch marriage.
Strong indications of significant contribution is the claim here. What's more...
Perhaps there is an alternative explanation. But it is up to those who wish to argue that gay marriage has not undermined marriage in the Netherlands to provide a more plausible reason for the last seven years of Dutch marital decline.
An admission that there may be an alternative explanation. But those who support this stuff ought to be asked to offer one. And there's this....
Of course, social-science evidence is seldom definitive. We can and should call for more research, and I hope other family scholars take up the question in a serious way. But at a minimum, we ought to be able to achieve a consensus on what has not happened in the Netherlands: There is no evidence to support the Rauch-Sullivan hypothesis — namely, that gay marriage will help strengthen marriage as a social institution.The "conservative case" for gay marriage appears just plain wrong. In Scandinavia and in the Netherlands, marriage has substantially weakened in the years since registered partnerships and formal gay marriage have been debated and enacted. Whether or not you agree that gay marriage has helped to cause this decline, it is already evident that gay marriage has done nothing to strengthen marriage as a whole.
The entire concept of "The 'conservative case' for gay marriage" may seem odd to you, but it has been something Mr. Kurtz has written about and debated for the past few years. The "conservative gay marriage" main proponents' (principally Andrew Sullivan and Jonathan Rauch) core argument is that the "civilizing effects" of marriage will have many positive social impacts which will benefit society when marriage extended to same-sex couples. Among the benefits they repeatedly claim is that it will strengthen traditional marriage, rather than weaken it. This argument is at least tacitly entertained, if not enthusuastically accepted, by great numbers within the Republican Party.
Kurtz has written about this topic for years, and this is hardly his sole argument. It is, instead, still more evidence in a long series refuting the claims of his pro-gay-marriage opponents.
Kurtz further explains his motive with this:
Who has the burden of proof here? I would argue that the burden lies with the advocates of radical change to the existing definition of marriage, one that no society we know of has embraced, to show that this kind of social experiment will do no harm.
That's basic conservatism, going back to Burke. Rather than ignoring correlations willy nilly, in some logical-positivistic attempt at social re-engineering, put the burden of proof on the radicals.
That said, we can certainly see that before "gay marriage" can be accepted, it is first necessary to re-define "marriage" as nothing more than a sex-based voluntary living arrangement.
The traditional definition of marriage has had a religious connotation in just about every culture, which is why I'm inclined to tie the decline of traditional marriage to the decline in religious practice (i.e., "secularization.")
I find it interesting how advent of "gay marriage" and other forms of sexual libertinism brings to mind the Old Testament passages concerning Israel's long-running tendency to fall back into Ba'al worship, which was marked by sexual license not unlike what we see today.
"There might be a better explanation out there for the dissolution of marriage in the Netherlands. Perhaps the decline of Christianity?"
Well, I think that the reverse is true as well, that the push for gay marriage causes a decline of Christian faith. Look at the effect that it has already had on mainstream Protestant denominations-- it's threatening to split the Episcopalians in the US (along with the gay clergy thing), and the Anglicans in Canada. That sort of divisiveness and contentiousness, no matter the cause, turns people away from the church. Plus, in my view, it just has to be one or the other-- either the bible is right that homosexuality is a sin, or the gay lobby is right that it should be celebrated, even celebrated in the name of civil rights. The more that people are led to believe that the bible is wrong, even evil on this issue, the more doubt it introduces to Christian faith, since God CANNOT be evil.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.