Someone needs to put this on a poster.

I think this was a George Carlin bit (not quite sure who the comedian was), but yes - it raises some excellent points. And if anyone's REALLY interested in doing some background research into marriage, read "History of the Wife". Good stuff.

It's absolutely true, though. We should return to the Biblical definition of marriage. Marriage should be between one man and as many women as he can afford to buy.

"2) Gay marriage will encourage people to be gay, in the same way that hanging around tall people will make you tall."

AHAHAHA, thanks for that. I lol'd greatly.

As my younger sister would say, awesomenesserriffic.

Marriage is a sacrament. Recognized by most major religions. I thought feminists were for women's rights -- marriage protects those of women and children. If we demean marriage, then we're on our own. Besides, if marriage between gays is legalized, then why not polygamy, where young women are routinely victimized? Sorry, but I don't buy the liberal ideas here. Civil unions, okay. Marriage, no.

ilovepalin- "Besides, if marriage between gays is legalized, then why not polygamy?"

WHAT?!?!
There is no similarity to polygamy and same-sex marriage. They're on two vastly different levels.
Polygamy is having MULTIPLE wives and is FORCED upon young girls. Gay marriage involves only TWO people of the same sex who CONSENT to marry. Where on earth are you seeing the connection?!?!

ilovepalin - Marriage is a sacrament according to you. The US government does not deal in sacraments, it deals in legal unions. As of right now, the legal union and the religious sacrament have the same name, but please do not let that fool you into thinking they are the same thing. You go to the judge and get a marriage license, and then you go to the preacher and he performs a religious ceremony. They are not the same thing, nor should they be.

Personally, I think the best solution is to simply completely remove the word marriage from legal discourse. Government handles legal/civil unions, and religious institutions handle marriage.

Oh my goodness, h*yaforchoice, that is EXACTLY what I've been saying all along! I think we should all simply have civil unions, and then if you choose to have an extra religious ceremony, that's completely up to you, but the government should have NO part in it. My sister and brother-in-law were married in a hotel courtyard by a justice of the peace - how come they get to say they're "married?" My husband and I were married in a state park by an ordained minister, but only because he was a close friend of the family. We are both atheists. So how come we get to say we're "married?" Government should have NO say in the religious side of the equation.

ilovepalin: get BACK under your bridge. *poke*

Anyway, hilarious post. XD

Umm... how does marriage protect the right of women and children? And how would that change if gays were allowed to marry? And how do gays marrying "demean" marriage? If you are going to make those kinds of statements you need at least something to back it up.

There is no similarity to polygamy and same-sex marriage. They're on two vastly different levels.
Polygamy is having MULTIPLE wives and is FORCED upon young girls.

Polygamy is not always forced on young women. For some people, it is simply three or more consenting adults. The Warren Jeffs' version of polygamy isn't the only model.

Oops, I'm sorry. I mean for the quote to be in italics. This is why I should not post in the mornings. *smile*

There is no similarity to polygamy and same-sex marriage. They're on two vastly different levels.
Polygamy is having MULTIPLE wives and is FORCED upon young girls.

Polygamy is not always forced on young women. For some people, it is simply three or more consenting adults. The Warren Jeffs' version of polygamy isn't the only model.

If we legalize polygamy then we should legalize polygyny. That's all I'm saying. *shrugs*

ohk yah im sorry but what exactly rights am I not having protected right now not being married and all. Not to sure my unmarital status is disadvantaging my access to my rights in any such way.... or that having a man legally attached to me should increase my accessibility to my rights

Is this making the e-mail rounds yet? Hey, I'm all for legalizing polygamy in the case of consenting adults, as long as polyandry is also legal.

In my current country of residence, polygamy is legal, restrictive laws applied to it.
There was a lot of debate a couple of years ago about a rule banning polygamy only for civil servants, so I had lots of opportunities to throw this idea into conversation.

Predictably, I got a lot of blank stares and flustered assertions of how "unnatural" that would be. My response, If you're so sure women don't want multiple husbands then you have nothing to worry about. Legalize it just to be fair.

(More blank stares)

Ha ha. Luv it. There is no logic behind most of the anti-gay "arguments."

Wow, it took me a second to realize you were kidding. This really sounds like some people I know....

Hi,

I don't want to offend anyone, and I certainly don't want to contribute to the rampant homophobia in our society that leads so many gay teenagers to drastic measures, even suicide.

Yet, I do want to say, I am concerned about gay marriage. For a long time, I supported the idea, but over the last couple of weeks, I find myself backing away from it.

While I agree with many of the points about the hypocrisy of the anti-gay marriage movement made in the list above, (e.g., that people like Britney Spears completely demean the concept of marriage and yet we don't restrict her from participating in the institution), I wonder how our society can continue to make the argument that a man and a woman ought to get married before they have children, if we no longer even believe that a man and a woman are the only people who should even HAVE children. If 2 women or 2 men can have kids with society's go-ahead, then why not just one woman? What moral argument can we make to say a man needs to stand by his family and protect them? This is an important question to ask in an era when something like 25% of non-Hispanic white kids and 70% of black kids in America are born out of wedlock.

The truth is, while traditional conceptions of marriage have a long history of being used to uphold patriarchal norms, these conceptions also confer obvious advantages to women (and society) at the same time, by attempting to place a lot of social pressure on men to own up to their sexual responsibilities.

I am not saying I know the answer. I just wanted to point out that even though a lot of people who oppose gay marriage do so out of pure bigotry and hypocrisy, I think there are legitimate concerns that need to be considered.

A person's capacity to love another person and the right to have that relationship legally recognized and protected has very little to do with the "social pressure on men to own up to their sexual responsibilities." Yes, too many children do not have enough caring adults in their lives, but that should not infringe on the rights of the LGBT community.

Hi evergeneva,

Hmm... I'm not sure I agree, although again, I know I don't have this all sorted out yet in my mind. I do worry about the morality of excluding gay people from the institution of marriage, esp. as someone who accepts that homosexuality is a natural biological condition.

Yet, my feeling is that increasingly the social pressure on couples to get married before having children and then raising children in that loving environment is eroding. As I said before, in the black community, 70% of children are born out of wedlock, and (although this isn't talked about as frequently in the media) the numbers of Hispanic and non-Hispanic white children born out of wedlock is going up pretty dramatically. But why? Studies I have seen, at least in regards to the black community, show that women want to get married, and yet it is the men who desert them, or at best, send a hardly adequate check for child support.

Separate from this discussion, of course, is the issue of gay marriage. Yet, it seems to me if society is willing to say 2 men can get married and by extension have children together, then why can't just one woman by herself? And if we say it is okay for a woman to have a kid by herself, then there goes the pressure on men.

Or are we going to start putting equal social pressure on both straight and gay couples to get married prior to having children? That seems silly. I, for one, would rather have one mom than two dads, and I'm sure a lot of people (esp. girls) would agree with me.

Again, I don't know the answer. I'm just explaining what is on my mind.

For the record, since there seems to be a bit of confusion:

Polygamy is the practice of having more than one spouse at a time. When the term comes up in the news, or in anthropological contexts, or whatever, it generally does refer to one man having multiple wives. But that's just because that's the way it's been historically. Technically the word is gender-neutral.

Polyandry is specifically the practice of having more than one husband.

Polygyny is specifically the practice of having more than one wife.

Each word refers only to the gender of the spouses of the person it's describing -- not of the person himself/herself. So either a man or a woman can be a polygamist, a polyandrist or a polygynist. If I had a dozen spouses I'd be a polygamist. If I had a dozen husbands I'd be a polyandrist. If I had a dozen wives I'd be a polygynist. If I had half a dozen of each I'd be all three.

What they would be to each other is a little murkier. The words we have are tailored to describing the "central" figure in the most familiar scenario -- the man with multiple wives. It's not as though traditionally women were considered wives to each other as well as to a shared husband. And it's not common, at least as far as I've heard, to refer to the wives of a polygamist man as polygamists as well. So we're already at a bit of a loss as to what to call them. But if we were to introduce policies today that legalized polygamy, I suppose -- I would hope -- that they would allow for a mutual arrangement between several people. So I'll leave it up to other, more linguistically inclined people to figure out what the hell would make sense in that situation. I only know what I know.

Thanks Misspelled, I should have been more careful with the specific language. However, while the general debate here revolves around "polygamy," they really do mean "polygany," since it is not legal for a woman to have more than one husband.

Sorry, misspelled polygyny... Batting a hundred on the terminology here, ain't I?

poetry lover,
Social pressure to marry before having children (whether on a straight or queer couple) does not insure that they will be good parents. I think that "getting married (or staying together) for the kids" is not healthy to the couple, nor for the children in that environment.

I venture to say that whether or not queer couples have children, when they do, it is a very deliberate choice because two monogamous men or two monogamous women can't accidently get pregnant.

Both marriage equity and having children are social issues, without a doubt. But marriage equity is also a legal issue because the law currently discriminates against a group of people for one particular reason.

I know that you are still trying to work things out in your own mind, but as a queer multi-racial women of color who will be marrying my male partner next year and that was raised by a single mother, I urge you to think about it further and really question yourself.

Ask yourself will continuing to deny a group the basic civil right to marry make a difference in how society influences child-bearing and rearing? Is it sexist and/or homophobic to say that if queer couples are allowed to marry that it will negatively impact how children are raised? What are the differences in the personal/moral issues regarding having children in or out of wedlock and the legal issue of marriage equity? What are your own biases?

Only you can answer these questions for yourself...

poetry lover, you make no sense.

"Separate from this discussion, of course, is the issue of gay marriage. Yet, it seems to me if society is willing to say 2 men can get married and by extension have children together, then why can't just one woman by herself?"

Do you live in some magical America where there are no single parents? One woman CAN have children by herself, and that happens all the time... I have NO idea what that has to do with 2 men or 2 women deciding to get married.

Hi evergeneva,

Thanks for your thoughtful comments. I esp. like your point that gay parents may actually prove better parents on average, given that they have to make an active effort to have a child in the first place.

From this conversation, I am beginning to wonder now what marriage is really for. If we are willing to concede that society at large cannot say which family structures are preferable to others (i.e. we can't say a biological mother and biological father can necessarily offer a better family structure than a single mother or two fathers, etc.), then I don't know why we even need marriage.

Perhaps all marriage really is is two people deciding to spend their lives together, and can't they decide that separate from the state?

My feeling is that we should either have conventional marriage or no marriage; I don't understand the point of gay marriage.

Medusa,

I'm not really interested in responding to snarky blogposts, since it seems to me that the people who write them are not interested in furthering a discussion but only in trying to hurt/humiliate people with whom they disagree.

I think that all homosexual should have the right to get married. I'll even venture as far as to say polygamy (polyandry and polygyny included) should be legalized.

As far as gay marriage is concerned, if any two people would like to get married, let them. It is not up to anyone but them. If a person doesn't agree with a couple’s choices and thinks gay marriage is sinful and wrong, than fine. However, under no circumstances should that person, or anyone with similar beliefs be able to take away the right from other people.

It's the same for polygamy. It personally doesn't sound appealing to me at all. I could not see myself practicing it, and I find it demeaning and morally incorrect. However, there are some people who are comfortable with it. As long as it is consensual, who is anyone else to tell you no?

poetry lover,

I appreciate you adding your thoughts on the subject here - I think you're doing a great job of encouraging an open and honest discussion about homosexuality and the issues that surround it.

However, I have to respectfully disagree with your opinion. When you said in your last comment that there should be conventional marriage or no marriage, I think you were on the right track, but I still don't think it's right to exclude homosexuals from marriage. I think that marriage (I'm referring to government issued marriage licenses here) should be open to all who apply. As Trixie84's post points out, if we can allow Britney Spears' short-lived marriage fiasco to take place, why can't we allow to consenting adults who love each other to marry - regardless of gender or sexual orientation? I believe that marriage, in whatever realm you're referring to, is an institution that should be open to anyone who wishes to enter into it.

I have a bumper sticker on my car that says this:
"Don't like gay marriage? Don't marry a gay person!"

As a straight person who has never had to wonder whether my marriage would be legal or not, I would like to offer up this perspective: What if the tables were turned? How would the straight majority react if it were gay people voting on THEIR right to marry?

Just something to think about.

Hi screenname,

As I read it, your argument is that while society probably ought to not have the institution of marriage at all, as long as we DO have it, it is wrong to exclude gay people from the institution. I understand, and am sympathetic with this argument in some ways -- esp. since I realize we live in a messy legal system where legal discrimination against gay marriage might imply (to some judges) that it is also legal to discriminate against gays for housing, employment opportunities, etc.

So I kind of agree. And yet, it just seems to me that state-sponsored marriage is not an inalienable right the way that freedom of speech or religion is. I'd argue people have a right to BE with and sleep with whomever they want (among consenting adults, of course), but they do not have an innate right to have their romantic relationships accorded the special status of "marriage" by the state.

As we have seen in this comment thread, the argument for permitting gay marriage (i.e., that consenting adults have a right to be married by the state to whomever they please) also suggests that polygamous lovers should be allowed to marry. Yet I disagree. Currently, polygamous lovers have the right to enter into personal/spiritual lifetime commitments with each other, and I think that is enough. For the state (i.e. society) to say to polygamous lovers, "We will officially recognize your marriage" is, in my mind, equivalent to the state saying, "We think your relationship offers an important and valuable family structure for your potential children," and I disagree with such a proposition.

Jess argues that even though polygamy, to her, seems "demeaning and morally incorrect," society doesn't have the right to deny polygamous lovers the right to marry. Yet, I'd argue as a society we have to think about the children raised in that family structure. It's hard to believe girls could grow up with a healthy sense of self in a family where their dad was the "rooster" to three or four wives.

That said, I'm not implying homosexuality is morally equivalent to polygamy (it's not, in my opinion).

Still, I think the only reason we have state-sponsored marriage at all is because society wants to acknowledge that certain romantic relationships offer optimal family structures for kids to be raised in. But if society no longer wishes to regard any family structures as necessarily preferable to others, then we should just get rid of the whole system, rather than invite non-traditional pairings/groupings to join.

Great post and interesting thread...

Regarding poetry lover's concerns - gay parents, like straight parents, can be nurturing, loving, kind and can raise great kids. Perhaps you are concerned about the lack of role models of the opposite sex in the family, as you said you would feel uncomfortable with having two dads - many gay couples recognize that their can be a difficulty for a child to relate at difficult points, i.e. teenage years, and have sisters, friends, godparents, aunties, etc, involved in their childrens lives.

Me and my partner have been together for two years and I would like to have the choice of being able to marry her some day. My mother had a beautiful wedding, my sisters can have extravagant marriage celebrations, all my friends get to wear white and announce their vows...why can't I? I find it demeaning for my relationship to be discriminated against, it feels as though my relationship with my partner is somehow beneath the heterosexual relationships of my sisters and friends.
I should have the right to be free to make a promise infront of all my friends and family in the traditional way with the person I love.

From a hetero-normative perspective, it might not seem like marriage is a big deal and that it is enough that gays can be together without getting married, but you must try to look at the issue through the eyes of someone who truly wants to make a lifelong commitment to the same sex partner they love. Personally, I agree that marriage is sacred, and therefor I would honor my commitment and be truly dedicated to upholding my vows. As Screen name pointed out, how would you feel if you were told you can be with the one you love, but you can never marry them?

Poetrylover,

First let me say that I greatly appreciate the open and intelligent dialogue going on here. Let me also say that I must completely disagree with many of your positions.

Discrimination against anyone by my government simply because of who they are is absolutely not okay with me regardless of the relative degree of importance of the particular right. Education is also not a listed inalienable right and still the Supreme Court decided that it was unconstitutional for certain people to be required to go to lesser or even just "separate but equal" schools simply because of who they are. (Obviously, for this argument to hold any weight, one must take for granted that one's sexuality is not a choice, and you may or may not believe that.)

Also, your last couple posts lead me to believe that we may fundamentally disagree in the role of government to begin with. I do not happen to believe that the role of government is to make judgements on some sort of ideal family structure. That is quite the slippery slope. Aside from that, those judgements have much more to do with economics than the number and gender of the adults in a household. The plain fact of the matter is that the majority of children raised in non-abusive, upper middle class and higher households in neighborhoods with good schools will turn out just fine regardless of whether or not they have 1 mom and 1 dad.

For me and many others, the issue has very little if anything to do with ideal family structures and everything to do with legal rights. When the government recognizes the marriage of two people, they are not just saying "now you have created an environment in which you can raise healthy children," they are also saying "now you can visit each other in the hospital and enjoy tax breaks among other things." In other words, now you're in the married club and you can get the benefits that come with membership.

I apologize for the novel, but it is something about which I feel very strongly. It's more than just loving someone and not being able to marry them. It's about not being able to enter into a loving, affirming marriage and gain the rights and privileges that go with that if you happen to be a gay or lesbian person.

It's an oldie but goodie. Thanks!

Poetrylover and all,

I think we are missing an important part of the discussion. Marriage is a government issue because through marriage individuals get benefits. Benefits meaning perks, bonuses, good stuff. And much of this is irrespective of whether or not the couple has children. Marriage is no longer (or maybe never was) a government institution simply to support the rearing of children, so why can't same-sex couples have these rights as well?

And if the next response is to have civil unions, those don't equal the same rights either but still creates a separate class - meaning a group is being discriminated against. Civil unions don't work because that language is not known in the broader culture but was something made up by Vermont legislators who were too scared of using the word marriage. A good example is visiting a spouse in the hospital after an emergency. Without a government-recognized marriage, same-sex spouses are not considered immediate family. If you try civil union partner instead, people don't know what that means, even in the states that have them. And visiting a partner in the hospital has nothing to do with whether or not a couple has children.

So as long as the government bestows privileges such as that to married people (whether or not they have kids), I see no argument against same-sex marriage besides homophobia.

I have thought about these issues for awhile now, and I'm glad for this thread because it is helping me gain coherence in my thoughts.

Marriage and civil unions offer those involved the ability to make legal decisions for the spouses/couples involved as next of kin, for example taking someone off of life support. The relationship is acknowledged by the government, and dissolution of the relationship allows the government to step in and force those separating to have continuing obligations to each other.

I agree with the poster who stated that we should have only civil unions in the eyes of the government, and that marriage, with all its various traditions, should be left to the church.

I believe that legally recognized relationships should not be limited to people of opposite sexes, or even to just two people, provided that all those already legally bound agree on the addition of a new person, much like a business partnership.

Sadly, I can already picture that kind of outcry this solution would cause, if the government abandoned marriage.

Still, I think the only reason we have state-sponsored marriage at all is because society wants to acknowledge that certain romantic relationships offer optimal family structures for kids to be raised in. But if society no longer wishes to regard any family structures as necessarily preferable to others, then we should just get rid of the whole system, rather than invite non-traditional pairings/groupings to join.

Whether anyone thinks it's "optimal" or not, gay couples are raising children, and that isn't going to change, except to become even more common over time. Marriage provides certain protections to those children which would not otherwise be there, such as not having to get into nasty custody battles with homophobic grandparents if the biological parent dies, among many others. Denying marriage rights to gay couples causes harm to children of gay parents, ergo, gay parents need marriage rights.

And that's not even getting into the fact that all the studies that have been done suggest that children of gay parents turn out fine, and that if anything, lesbian parents may have a slight edge, so there is no evidence that heterosexual parents form a more optimal family structure for kids to be raised in.

So many interesting comments! Thanks, allybally, for sharing your perspective, as someone who is personally affected by this issue. I understand your point about wanting to have a beautiful wedding celebration like everyone else. I am beginning to see marriage means many, many things: it means a beautiful celebration, it means the expectation of a lifetime commitment, it means certain benefits conferred by the law, it means certain social expectations concerning children, and more... I wonder if these issues should/could be parsed somehow.

The reason I began to back away from gay marriage is complicated. But basically my feelings began by thinking about the struggles many women in the African-American community face, and which many white women are beginning to face. I was thinking about that shocking and enduring statistic of 70% (or now a bit less at 68%) of African-American children being born out of wedlock, and I began wondering: Who are these mothers? Why don't they demand something (commitment, marriage) from these men before consenting to have their children?

When I began to look into the issue, I found that most African-American women who have children out of wedlock are young and very poor, and in fact DO want to get married but are unable to convince men to do so. Because human beings don't live in a vaccuum (as civil libertarians often imagine), we are deeply affected by one another's choices. In the African-American (and increasingly, in the white) community, the fact that so many women will have men's children without demanding anything from them in returns turns into a vicious cycle. It becomes that much harder for any woman to demand a commitment from a man, because he can just go be with one of those other women who aren't so demanding. Without being too crude about marriage, the situation is a bit like what happens in capitalism when employees aren't unionized; the situation just gets worse and worse for the employees, or in this case, for women.

So I began to think: Well, what would be the optimal situation here? And it seemed to me, in a perfect world, it would be easy for these young women to convince their boyfriends to commit to them and move their relationship to marriage prior to having children. But I don't know how we can create that world if we as a society are not willing to say in a clear and moral voice that marriage is the optimal foundation for having children.

And while I agree with h*yaforchoice that economic conditions are pivotal, I'm sure there is not a single mother on the planet who would tell you her job would not have been easier with a partner around. If this is true even for upper-middle class women, it has to be a hundred times more true for poor women.

My feeling that it is really important for society to be willing to say, "Marriage is the optimal foundation for having children" is the reason why I am backing away from gay marriage, although I'm still not completely averse to the idea, and will most likely vote "no" on the upcoming Florida DOMA amendment.

As for legalizing polygamy, on the other hand, I have no doubt in my mind that that is a REALLY bad idea. Again, if people lived in a vacuum, it wouldn't matter, but in fact, what you will have is large religious (e.g. certain sects of Morman and Islamic) communities living together in small towns, where all of the families are polygamous - or more accurately, polygynous. The daughters born into those communities may privately want to be with just one partner, but they will find it exceptionally difficult, if not impossible, to convince a man that he should be willing to accept marrying her and only her. (Why should he, if he can have several women at one time with the other girls in the community?) Rather than fight a losing battle, that same girl will most likely learn to accept the