There are a lot of people speaking up against the burgeoning move to expand marital law to all those couples in our society who want it. But the wave continues to rise. Yesterday alone, governments in Seattle and Asbury Park added their voices to the mix and, locally, the San Jose City Council will discuss recognizing marriages performed elsewhere as qualifying for married benefits packages.
Writing in the NY Times, Don Browning and Elizabeth Marquardt attempt to make the negative argument by separating it from purely religious concerns but, while their use of the English language is quite elegant, the two go on for hundreds of words without saying anything definitive. In other words, more hot air. The core of their essay is the following quote:
Even in ancient secular systems, legal marriage was seen as a way to help society regulate and achieve a complex set of desires and goals: sexual activity, procreation, mutual help and affection, and parental care and accountability.
But looking at that sentence closely, one has to wonder which part does not apply to homosexual couples and does apply to all heterosexual couples. All apply just as well to all couples except, perhaps, procreation and even that is not simple; the authors do mention that many homosexual couples are raising children and it is certainly quite simple for any of them to have children either through cooperation with a member of the missing gender or adoption.
Accordingly, this open-minded heterosexual’s search for a substantive rationale opposing legal recognition of loving unions will have to continue.
BillSaysThis 