Posted on 07/14/2008 9:22:13 PM PDT by goldstategop
The most effective of all morality-based arguments for same-sex marriage, the one that persuades more people than any other argument, is the one that equates opposition to same-sex marriage with the old opposition to interracial marriage.
The argument, repeated so often that it sounds incontestable, is this: Just as parts of American society once had immoral laws that forbade whites and blacks from marrying, so, today, society continues to have immoral laws forbidding men from marrying men and women from marrying women. And just as decent people overthrew the former, decent people must overthrow the latter.
Thanks in large part to widespread higher education -- the higher the educational level, the more one is likely to hold this view -- vast numbers of Americans believe in this equation of sex (gender) and race.
But the equation is false.
First, there is no comparison between sex and race.
There are enormous differences between men and women, but there are no differences between people of different races. Men and women are inherently different, but blacks and whites (and yellows and browns) are inherently the same. Therefore, any imposed separation by race can never be moral or even rational; on the other hand, separation by sex can be both morally desirable and rational. Separate bathrooms for men and women is moral and rational; separate bathrooms for blacks and whites is not.
The second reason the parallel between opposing same-sex marriage and opposing interracial marriage is invalid is that opposition to marriage between races is a moral aberration while opposition to marrying a person of the same sex is the moral norm. In other words, none of the moral bases of American society, whether religious or secular, opposed interracial marriage -- not Judaism, not Christianity, not Judeo-Christian values, not deism, not humanism, not the Enlightenment. Yes, there were religious and secular individuals who opposed interracial marriage, but by opposing interracial marriage, they were advocating something against all Judeo-Christian and secular norms, all of which saw nothing wrong in members of different races intermarrying (members of different religions was a different matter).
On the other hand, no religious or secular moral system ever advocated same-sex marriage. Whereas advocating interracial marriage was advocating something approved of by every religious and secular moral tradition of America and the West, advocating same-sex marriage does the very opposite -- it advocates something that defies every religious and secular moral tradition. Those who advocate redefining marriage are saying that every religious and secular tradition is immoral. They have no problem doing this because they believe they are wiser and finer people than all the greatest Jewish, Christian and humanist thinkers who ever lived.
But as objectionable as hubris is, false comparisons are worse. And there is no comparison between different races and the different genders. There are no inherent racial differences; there are significant differences between the sexes. To the extent that racial groups are different, they are only because their cultures differ. But a black man's nature is not different from that of a white man, an Asian man, an Hispanic man.
The same is not true of sex differences. Males and females are inherently different from one another. We now know that even their brains differ. And those differences are significant. Thus, to oppose interracial marriage is indeed to engage in bigotry, but to oppose same-sex marriage is not. It simply shares the wisdom of every moral system that preceded us -- society is predicated on men and women bonding with one another in a unique way called "marriage."
Comparing the prohibition of same-sex marriage to prohibiting interracial marriage is ultimately a way of declaring the moral superiority of proponents of same-sex marriage to proponents of keeping marriage defined as man-woman. And it is a way of avoiding hard issues such as whether we really want all children to grow up thinking it doesn't matter if they marry a boy or a girl and whether we really want to abolish forever the ideal of husband-wife based family.
Those who wish to redefine marriage for the first time in Jewish, Christian or secular humanist history may offer any honest arguments they wish. Comparing the prohibition of same-sex marriage to prohibiting interracial marriage is not one of them.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
The fundamental issue is that there is no “Right to Marry”.
Marriage has classically always been an obligation taken on by couples prior to engaging in activity that might reasonably be expected to produce children.
Homosexual activities can reasonably be expected NOT to produce children.
Therefore there’s no obligation for homosexuals to marry, and certainly no “right”.
And based on what you are saying, a homosexual relationship does not have as much importance to society as a heterosexual couple. So it makes sense to treat the homosexual couple differently under the law, since the underlying relationship is not as important. Yes that hurts the self esteem of the liberal community to say that, but it’s true.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
When a practice is shared by 99.44% of all human societies, there's almost always a good reason for it. Any claim that such a practice isn't necessary should be met with extreme skepticism.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
Further, it's very desirable that a child have an identifiable mother and father. There's a simple reason that polygyny (multiple wives) is much more widely practiced than polyandry (multiple husbands): even if a man has sex with a dozen wives, there will be no doubt is to the identity of any child's parents; if a woman had sex with a dozen husbands, however, there would be no way of knowing which children were fathered by whom.
Incidentally, the rules about adultery are asymmetric for essentially that reason. If a married woman sleeps with a man not her husband, she prevents her husband from knowing which children are his. By contrast, a married man who sleeps with an unmarried woman in no way prevents his wife from knowing which children are hers.
I agree. My point was that a marriage is not just a joining of two arbitrary people who happen to be heterosexual. The fact that there is exactly one male is key. If gays want to figure out how to have marriages with exactly one male, fine. I've never heard of them seeking that, though.
“The fundamental issue is that there is no “Right to
Marry”.”
I’ve pointed that out twice, and both times, the other side pointed to the “pursuit of happiness” right.
A better analogy is opposing same-sex marriage vs opposing human-animal marriages.
I had a very old man sitting at a neighborhood starbucks comment about my dog. He said too bad we are so concerned about pedigree dogs, but not pedigree people.
I was stunned.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
Prager bump.
bookmark
Bingo! Prager does it again!
The Gay-stapo is -- for the time being -- focusing on adults who have been together for decades, pushing white-haired male and female homosexual couples to the front of the line to be wed. The dirty little secret is that the In re Marriage Cases decision has laid down the groundwork for taxpayer-funded undermining of the fact that there is a ninety-plus percent chance that your offspring has normal sexual desire (that is to say, of course, opposite sex).
When the time comes for your children to learn about puberty and reproduction in a California school (since parents long ago yielded rights to sex education of their own family to their local union government educators), another lesson will be required: "Kids, you might be gay already but don't know it yet because you haven't tried it. And whoever says there's something wrong with it...well, they're the type of person that thought there was something wrong with interracial couples too."
In addition, the notion that there is something inherently normal about being born a child of a mother and father HAS to be jettisoned to protect the feelings of the kids who were the result of -- shall we say, less traditional methods of reproduction.
Scare tactics? Hardly. Anyone who remembers the Massachusetts "Fistgate" scandal of the late nineties and the legal kitchen sink Gay-stapo attorneys successfully used to suppress evidence of the outrage from public ears knows I am not overstating the case.
I put an (older) liberal professor relative into fits of conniption once as he was lambasting the conservatives for denying same-sex marriages.
“Why not a man and a dog?” I asked.
He claimed my argument was specious. I demanded that he answer. I wouldn’t let him off the hook...
“Because!” he protested, “we’re talking about humans, not animals!”
Ok, I said, how about a man and a boy? Does that meet your standard?
“No!” He was really getting angry.
What’s the problem? I asked. Is it consent? Is it because the dog and the boy can’t consent?
“No!” Again, he was really angry.
I pointed out to him that we didn’t disagree that there was perversity in the marriage argument. We just disagreed where we ought to draw the line.
Man, that guy was *very* angry at me about this discussion.
Man, that guy was *very* angry at me about this discussion.
That's because you exposed him. People who support same-sex marriage don't want to go down that road because when you show them how far things could go when you take them to their logical conclusion, they begin to realize that they have opened the door to possibilities they can't even stomach.
As I posted on back in June on Patterico.com:
I am dead serious about this hypothesis. I have read the opinions in the case, and if this situation actually occurred, the precedent has been set, and Gavin Newsom -- after forcing the issue of marriage of gays that led to same-sex marriage -- couldn't stop it from happening.
Try this on for size: Two pairs of legal-age identical twins — two men, two women — go to City Hall in San Francisco and ask for a marriage license. For what reason would they be denied?They are of the same gender? BUZZ! That doesn’t matter now.
It’s “frowned upon?” BUZZ! So what? So was interracial and same-sex marriage.
They could have children that might be deformed? BUZZ! They can’t produce children without a womb or sperm of an unrelated person. It’s a non-issue.
It’s illegal? BUZZZZZZZZZZ! It is to laugh.
Thank you, Mr. Prager...you know, I got so angry at the thought that someone would even suggest such an argument... If there are democrats that really feel this way, for the continuance of their very lives, they need to keep their mouths shut.
I honestly don't know the depth of my reaction if someone suggest, to my face, that my marriage to someone who isn't Caucasian is equivalent to homosexual marriage. If there were ever "fighting words" those would qualify.
Some of these liberal-tarians forget, it is THEY who advocate “separation of church and state.” Let's cram it right back down their throats...
It was landmark U.S. Supreme Court precedent Reynolds v. United States in 1878 that made “separation of church and state” a dubiously legitimate point of case law, but more importantly; it confirmed the Constitutionality in statutory regulation of marriage practices.
"Laws are made for the government of actions, and while they cannot interfere with mere religious belief and opinions, they may with practices. Suppose one believed that human sacrifices were a necessary part of religious worship, would it be seriously contended that the civil government under which he lived could not interfere to prevent a sacrifice? Or if a wife religiously believed it was her duty to burn herself upon the funeral pile of her dead husband, would it be beyond the power of the civil government to prevent her carrying her belief into practice?So here, as a law of the organization of society under the exclusive dominion of the United States, it is provided that plural marriages shall not be allowed. Can a man excuse his practices to the contrary because of his religious belief? [98 U.S. 145, 167] To permit this would be to make the professed doctrines of religious belief superior to the law of the land, and in effect to permit every citizen to become a law unto himself. Government could exist only in name under such circumstances."
Genesis ruins the illogical and non-biological arguments of homosexual monogamy. In a secular sense, homosexuality is an idolatry of perversion. It is in no way an anatomical function of the human organism, but a phantasmagoric creation from within the mentally disturbed human mind, a social psychosis, naked and on full exhibitionist display.
This is the whole crux (pun intended) of their attack on creationism - - they are really frustrated by Genesis, but cannot destroy the axiomatic state of procreant human biology, it does not fit their religious agenda.
Homosexual monogamy advocates seek ceremonious sanctification of their anatomical perversions and esoteric absolution for their guilt-ridden, impoverished egos.
Neither of those will satisfy their universal dissatisfaction with mortality or connect them to something eternal. With pantheons of fantasies as their medium of infinitization, they still have nothing in them of reality, any more than there is in the things that seem to stand before us in a dream.
Homosexual deviancy is really a pagan practice (and a self-induced social psychosis) at war with the Judaic culture over what is written in the book of Genesis (1:27, 2:18).
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