Recently on Facebook I had an ongoing debate with a friend from college regarding gay marriage. It started when he wrote as his status, in relevant part:
"And my daughter informs me that she doesn't have my grandbaby in her tummy because she isn't married yet. She also says "girls marry boys, and boys marry girls." Smart kid!"
I just couldn't resist taking the bait, so I engaged. What resulted was several weeks of back-and-forth discussion, ultimately ending in his unfriending me. Which really didn't bother me too much, considering his views on the human condition and the whole religion/politics thing. Since there were several people watching the debate on my page (and his), I wrote a post-mortem expounding on my thoughts. Thought the Kos community might like to see them, too. There they are, right over the fold!
Today I'll expound on my idea of why it is illegal and unconstitutional for the US government to deny gays the right to marry, in the simplest possible terms.
On the basest level, denial of gay marriage is gender discrimination. Look at it this way: two people live in a state where gay marriage is not legal, and they go into a city clerk's office looking for a marriage license. One of them is male, the other is female. Both of them, let's say, want to marry a third individual; say, Blaine, for the sake of argument (since women seem to have been lining up to claim his singleness before he specified that he is, in fact, married!). Yet each one wants to be the only spouse--we're not talking about polygamy here--and each specifies that on the application. Both individuals are of legal age of consent, neither are already married, and both are mentally competent to enter into a legally binding contract. One of them will be denied. And the only reason that that one person will be denied is because of of that person's gender. There is no other reason. And that, my friends, is called gender discrimination and it is rightly illegal in this land of the free.
There are arguments from the opposition stating that marriage is not a right, it is a privilege (Blaine even goes on to remind me that this is a privilege that we deny to minors, mental incompetents, other species--implying that thus it makes it OK to deny the privilege to gays. Into which category, then, do gays fall? Minors haven't reached the age of consent to enter into a legally binding contract, incompetents are legally incapable of entering into that contract, and other species are--well, other species. Which of these reasons apply to people who want to marry someone of the same gender?). There is some debate on that, but really that argument is beside the point. Whether or not marriage is a right, being free of governmental discrimination based upon gender is certainly one.
There are further arguments that marriage carries with it a certain "essence", and opening marriage to gays will change that essence. This argument is fraught with error, but regardless, it is also beside the point. The essence of marriage varies greatly depending on who you talk to, each person's religious views, each person's backgrounds, outlook, desires, etc. For some it is about a spiritual and emotional bond binding two people together in an intimate and loving way. For others it is a religious tradition, a way to explore sexuality without offending one's deity. For some it is about financial gain; others emotional stability. For some it's about having children; for some it's about producing a reality TV show. For still others it is about obtaining citizenship. For almost everyone, though, it is a mixture of these, and many other, "essences" of marriage that cause them to tie the knot. Thus, there is a plethora of reasons people get married, ad it is not for the government to decide which of these reasons is the right one (in short, which is the true "essence" of marriage). The courts have consistently held that the government has no interest in limiting the scope of marriage between two consenting adults who are capable of understanding the contract they are engaging in--it's not about procreation, or creating the "perfect" family unit; in fact, no court has ever found that the government has any valid interest in limiting marriage beyond limiting it to two people of legal consent.
I want to digress for a bit here to respond to something that Blaine observed, wrongly. In one of his last diatribes to and about me, he accused me of viewing marriage as only a legally binding contract. That is not true. However, I do hold the view that if government is going to be involved in the marriage business at all (in and of itself a bad idea, but one that is unlikely to go away), it must limit its involvement and interest to that level. There are many, many reasons that people get married, and it is not for the government to issue judgments on which of these are valid and which are not. The fact is that I hold marriage in the possibly esteem; an intimate, loving, bond between two individuals that transcends all other human interactions. But that, too is beside the point.
Other arguments regarding gay marriage stem from religious standpoints, and this is where things get really messy. In fact, it was the religious aspect of my debate with Blaine that caused the end of it. I'd made the point that the drafters of the Constitution had left the term "Creator" undefined, and posited the rhetorical retort that it could've referred to the Flying Spaghetti Monster. This really got Blaine's panties in a knot, and he went into an arrogant frenzy which ruined the debate for me--it was no longer fun. More on that chapter in the other portion of this story. But that fact of the matter is that the government is enjoined from making policy and passing laws that favors one religious tradition over any other. Period. That's what religious freedom and freedom of religion is all about. Freedom from religion is not, as Blaine posited, about keeping religious people from holding public office or readily espousing their views in public debate. What it IS about is ensuring that the government does not pass laws based upon a certain religious tradition to the detriment of others. Blaine claims that the first amendment is about keeping the government from mucking about in religion, but not the other way around. But how can the two be separated? When religion mucks about in government, it's manifested by the government's passage of laws or implementation of policy that reflects that religion's values. And when the government does this, when it grants the status of law of one religion's traditions to the detriment of another's, it is mucking about in religion. If the government were to limit marriage to one man/one woman because that's what the God of the Bible commands, then it is granting that religion a special status. In a land of religious freedom, we cannot allow this to happen. This is not a theocracy, regardless of the faiths (or lack thereof) of the Founders. In a word, get over it. Anyone who will argue otherwise will have the entirety of the Supreme Court's history to contend with in order to make their point. Can't be done.
Gay marriage will not ruin traditional heterosexual marriage. It will not open the slippery slope to bestiality, polygamy, fire or brimstone from the heavens. It will mean that this country will be closer living up to its potential in treating all of its citizens with equality and respect. And, in the final estimation: if you don't like gay marriage, marry someone with different junk in their undies.