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The Undeniable Logic of Protecting Traditional Marriage

September 13th, 2010

The Internets strike again:

It always astonishes me how baldly people against same-sex marriage can continue forward despite the blindingly obvious logical fallacies inherent with their position. That somehow, gays getting married will ruin the definition of marriage, when a two-thirds divorce rate, sham marriages, spousal abuse, adultery, and so many other ills among heterosexual marriage apparently are not as difficult as problems–at least not so bad that these people would suggest banning marriage for those who cause these problems. No, it’s just the gays, apparently, that need to be stopped.

That the form of “traditional marriage” can be defined as “one man, one woman” when for so much of history it was not, or that its purpose can be defined as being for procreation, when for so much of history it was not. Words like “tradition” and “procreation” seem like excuses, terms of convenience, ways to define marriage so as to specifically exclude gays, rather than to sum up a consistent view of the institution. If I do not intend to have children, should my marriage be banned? Or as a heterosexual, do I get a bye?

Sadly, they do seem to be right in one sense: historically, in the United States, at least, marriage has often been defined by exclusion, as a way of shutting out those people and practices that the “less progressive” disapprove of. (Shhh! We can’t call them “bigots,” that’s intolerant.) Slaves were not allowed to marry (even though they were one-man-one-woman and usually bonded with procreation as a result), and interracial couples were not allowed to marry (same note in this case as well). One consistent tradition of the institution of marriage as defined by the “less progressive” has been its use as a social weapon, reserving it only for those we want to include in our little club.

Which is how Jesus intended it.

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  1. Roger
    September 14th, 2010 at 04:46 | #1

    much as I love the message of the video, I am perplexed by the media… I’ve seen several of these computerized “3D” stick figurish creations (Legos come to mind) now – complete with synthetic voices and I just don’t get it. I think the text by itself would argue the point better – so would a few panels of comic strip – even done primitively (e.g. xkcd.com)… and certainly getting a couple of decent actors to read the lines would also be effective (affective?). The fact that I’ve seen several of these from several sources suggest that maybe I’m the one who is out of step… Perhaps I’m slowly becoming a dinosaur… (first texting, now this).

  2. Troy
    September 14th, 2010 at 06:13 | #2

    ^ This is just the first generation technology of something that will be VERY cool someday.

    What you’re seeing is a web service that converts text to video . . . You just send them text and they give you the video performance! Magic!

    Granted, it sucks now but compare the Atari 2600 to the PS3 and project where this will be 30 years from now . . . pretty damn cool, where actual real-world actors will be perfectly captured.

    Computers moving into natural language processing — creation and understanding — is the future frontier of this century. It’s a very hard problem but some day someone smart will start cracking it.

  3. SOUSA-POZA
    September 14th, 2010 at 16:42 | #3

    I think all these semantic battles about the real meaning of marriage are quite trivial -and never ending. The key is to get governments out of the marriage business: ALL marriages should be civil contracts between two consenting adults and be governed by the same laws as any civil contract, period.

  4. Troy
    September 15th, 2010 at 02:24 | #4

    ^ does the state have any interest in limiting who signs these contracts?

  5. SOUSA-POZA
    September 15th, 2010 at 02:45 | #5

    Troy, the same interest it would have in any other legal contract: adults in possession of their faculties and the like. Whether they are homosexual or heterosexual is none of its damn business.

  6. SOUSA-POZA
    September 15th, 2010 at 04:59 | #6

    Further: the contract wouldn’t have to be for life. It could be for an agreed number of years, renewable if so wished by both parties. Chances are that divorces would become cases of force majeur only, and there would be no need for acrimony in contracts that are not renewed. The whole episode would have been forethought: there would be no false pretences nor wishful thinking on anybody’s part.

  7. Troy
    September 15th, 2010 at 06:38 | #7

    Well, I was thinking of other forms of domestic partnerships.

    Polyamorous, siblings, etc. I guess anybody living together should have the legal standing of a recognized partnership if so desired?

  8. SOUSA-POZA
    September 15th, 2010 at 15:50 | #8

    Not really. Like any civil contract, it would be subject to the limitations imposed by the law.

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