Provocative, thanks for posting:
However, while the author(s) make some valid points, I am not sure I buy the notion that “the pill” separates marriage from procreation - defacto. I would suspect, though I’ve never seen the stats, that in most marriages where there is some birth control practiced, there is also procreation. The two are not mutually exclusive concepts over the course of time.
Thus I don’t think same sex marriage is caused by this deterioration in real marriage. A factor? No doubt. But the gaystapo was going to do what they were going to do regardless.
We can debate whether each of these is good or bad. But marriage has been under assault for years. We can't say no fault quickie divorces are acceptable but gay marriage isn't. It all weakens marriage.
The problem goes back much further than the pill.
It goes back to allowing divorce.
I’ve said for a long time that the power of a woman to control her fertility was the most revolutionary event in the last 250 years, maybe in the history of our species. And the key word is control. Yes, people who use birth control also procreate but the issue remains, who decides, the couple or God?
When my wife and I got married, we were young, stupid and broke. We used “The Pill” to ensure that when we had children we were mature, wiser and solvent. Yeah, I can see the whole fabric of society collapsing if EVERYONE did that.
One of the most profound arguments for keeping marriage between a man and a woman is the history of marriage “rights” or “privileges,” however you want to label them:
Because the union could result in a child, special considerations applied.
In unions that cannot biologically produce a child, they don’t apply, because the couple has a choice in adoption or technologically assisted conception.
Simple but perhaps thought-provoking in relation to the argument in the article.
Every technological intervention into the natural progress of sex produces unseen but vast changes to the culture.
Contraception was the edge of the, well not the cliff, but it was a more precipitous slide than just a “slippery slope” and it is irreversible short of a tremendous religious wave sweeping over society. If such a wave were to come, though, I think a real early days sort of Persecution would begin in earnest.
There have been many factors that caused the demise of TM, but equating it to homosexual marriage was the curb stomp.
Sorry, but reaching a bit on this one... Contraception has been part of the human experience as long as humans have been able to figure out ways to use it. I forget the name of the plant, but there was a plant that was literally harvested to extinction because it was known for its contraceptive properties: http://www.jstor.org/stable/29774642?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents alligator dung, honey, 1/2 a lemon and various other techniques have been documented as used for such purposes all the way back to at least 2000BC.
Sure the pill may be far more medically reliable, but birth control is hardly something that is new in the history of marriage and human sexuality.
Indeed!
Contraception promised sex without consequences.
Because it is not perfect it necessitated abortion and undermined fidelity and marriage.
I disagree. Marriage is still necessary to protect the ability to raise kids. Group health ins, shared retirement, etc.
It may not be fashionable, but protecting the environment to raise kids is still necessary.
Well, then.
We should just abandon the concept altogether!
NOT APPLYING THIS TO YOU!!! - but the tone of some posters almost seems like a “since I’m not having any fun, you can’t either” type preachiness...with some absurd logic stretches to make their point.
In the case of marriage the start of the slippery slope was the 1930 Lambeth conference in which for the first time in history contraception was accepted as moral by a major religion. (The fact that people did it long before is irrelevant. Sin has always been with us, but this was the first time this particular sin was declared to no longer be a sin.) It accelerated in the 1950s and 1960s with no-fault divorce, and the final "tipping point" came in 1968 with the definitive rejection by both clergy and laity of Humanae Vitae, with the clerical rejection being the fatal turn.
Events since them have simply been the inevitable consequence of that tipping point, as clearly enumerated in that remarkably prescient document itself.
Every non-Catholic Christian who rejects birth control within marriage is invariably conservative, that I have observed. There don’t seem to be any pastors that think birth control within marriage is bad but also accept things like female clergy, abortion and ‘gay marriage.’ On the other hand, try finding a liberal of any faith that does accept those other things but also finds birth control within marriage unacceptable.
All of one side is invariably and absolutely fine with bc within marriage, and in fact actually hate the fact that there are faiths like the old order Mennonites, Amish, Catholics and independent types who aren’t. The other side is split.
Freegards
Stupid.
Contraception was around long before the sixties. In fact it has been around almost as long as there have been humans.
So no, sorry but a pill invented in the 1900's did not redefine marriage.
I know everyone is running around trying to find some way to make nicey-nice with the homosexuals by inventing reasons why they should not be opposed but try again.
Is procreation the main reason God instituted marriage? NO
Which was first? The Pill or Playboy? The Pill is simply a method of birth control. The philosophies that brought about the damage we see today has already beginning as publications of such doctrines became commonplace. Look up an essay called The Origins of Political Correctness for a good history on that matter.
Personally even 50 years after it was approved I think The Pill should only be used short term between planned pregnancies and after the number of desired children is reached. Afterward the couple would be wise to opt for a safer more permanent method. If I were a younger man would I want my wife on The Pill for 10-20 years? No, I don't believe it is safe to do so. Would I want to endanger her life if the doctors said it's time to stop having kids due to her health? No. I would opt for sterilization instead.
I also do not agree with the notion that procreation is the sole reason for marriage that should determine if it is allowed or denied based solely on the ability of procreation by either spouse. Children are a blessing from the marriage that some may be blessed with and others not. There's plenty of kids to go around if the government didn't make adoption of foster children needing stable homes an impossibility. GOD created woman from man for man because GOD saw that it was not good for man to be alone.
The Lord blessed my twice with loving wives. Faithfulness to each other was never a question in either marriage. I had a good teacher who taught me to be a man. My Dad. Dad's got replaced by LBJ's Great Society when government took over the roll as provider for the family. How does media and entertainment portray Dad? There is the problem. This nation was brainwashed and it wasn't in pill form.
We redefined marriage when we gave it a tax break and made it a basis for government benefits distribution. Of course other groups wanted in on what they saw as a nifty scam after that.
not everybody marries to pro-create. nor can everyone do so.