Rauch: "A woman without a uterus".

Posted by Chairm.

Jonathan Rauch is the author of the pro-SSM book, "Gay Marriage". There are SSMers in the blogosphere who attempt to imitate Rauch's SSM argumentation -- or at least some bits and pieces of it. I think that we might as well consider Rauch in his own words.

Below are snippets from one of the more elaborate attempts to invoke the Sterility Strawman.

Biologically speaking?

What about heterosexual couples in which one or the other partner is sterile? There are millions of them, and they are no more capable of procreating than my [same-sex sexual] partner, Michael, and I are. Some people are naturally infertile, some men and women have had themselves sterilized, some women have had hysterectomies, and of course women past menopause are infertile. Biologically speaking, a homosexual union is nothing but one variety of sterile union, and no different even in principle: a woman without a uterus is no more open to procreation than a man without a uterus.

Rauch misleads by comparing 'homosexual couples' and 'heterosexual couples'. The limit of two does not logically apply to one side of his comparison.

Biologically speaking, human fertility is based on the complementarity of opposite sexes. The absence of the other sex creates a difference in kind, not a difference in degree. Two sexes versus one sex. The scenarios provide a comparison between fertility and nonfertility.

[Click here to read the rest of the blogpost.]

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Biologically speaking, homosexual orientation is not an impairment of human fertility. Not for the individual nor for the "union" or "couple" or a parade of persons of the same sex. Rauch means to use "homosexual union" as proxy for a particular type of same-sex scenario: but any scenario that lacks the other sex is nonfertile and is never infertile nor fertile. It does not become sterile. It is constantly nonfertile. The number one determines that. The number two does not change that. Neither does homosexuality nor heterosexuality. A scenario that lacks the other sex is nonfertile whether or not the individuals are homosexual or heterosexual or othersexual. A lone individual is as nonfertile as a roomful of individuals of the same sex -- regardless of sexual orientation. This is true of all same-sex scenarios even if the individual(s) would be fertile with the other sex.

Note that Rauch will switch back and forth between the "union" (or couple) and the individual. This is very sloppy of him. If it reflects his thinking, that sloppiness is a fatal flaw in his arugmentation. If it reflects his deliberate misuse of language, then, his rhetoric is designed to mislead rather than enlighten.

Rauch misleads by deftly using rhetoric to reposition homosexuality as a biological marker for infertililty. He is really comparing the lack of the other sex with an actual disability. He attempts to recruit the "woman without a uterus". In so doing he invokes, however vaguely and automatically, the notion of a biological basis for homosexuality that is supposeldy the equivalent of the biological basis for human fertility.

Rauch pivoting in circles on a 'fundamental point'.

It may sound like carping to stress the case of barren heterosexual marriage; the vast majority of first-time hesterosexual newlyweds, afterall, can have children and probably will. But the point here is fundamental. There are at least as many sterile heterosexual couples in America as homosexual ones, and every one of them is allowed to marry. If the possibility of procreation is what gives meaning to marriage, then a postmenopausal woman who applies for a marriage license should be turned away at the courthouse door. What's more, she should be hooted at and condemned for breaking the crucial link between marriage and procreation, for stretching the meaning of marriage beyond all recognition, and for reducing the institution to frivolity.

Chairm: His fundamental point should not be obscured by his carping. Read on and search for it, but please note the following.

Rauch asserted that the absolute number of sterile married couples is no more than the absolute number of homosexual couples. Or did he mean the other way around? It is a fanciful assertion either way.

Note his quick switch from couple to individual as he now recruits the postmenopausal woman. And his switch from the general (the meaning of marriage) to the particular (the individual entering marriage).

Put more starkly.

Their real position is that the possiblity of procreation defines marriage when homosexuals are involved, but not when heterosexuals are involved. To put the point more starkly, sterility disqualifies all homosexuals from marriage, but it disqualifies no heterosexuals. So the distinction is not pro-creation (much less pro-children) at all. It is merely antihomosexual.

Chairm: His fundamental point is that homosexuality is a form of sterility. Society does not prohibit on the basis of the individual's sterility so society should not prohibit on the basis of the individual's homosexuality.

But, of course, there is no homosexual criterion for ineligiblity to marry. Just as homosexuality is not infertility nor is it sterility.

In fact, the existence of millions of mixed-orientation marriages disproves Rauch's fundamental point. As does the existence of the children of such marriages. As does the vast majority of those children residing in same-sex housholds who migrated from the previously procreative relationship of mon-dad parents (usually husband-wife union or unwed cohabitation). If the absolute count of particular types of situations matters, as per Rauch's own remarks, then, he has invoked proportionality as a legitimate consideration. He does not pursue it very well nor very far.

Rauch begins and ends with an emphasis on homosexuality. His fundamental point is another assertion of the primacy of gay identity politics in his SSM argumentation.

He has much more to say on this topic.

Manufacturing the insane strawmen.

[M]arriage is about children but not only about chidren. It is also about happiness, security, safety, prosperity, good health, sound mind, altruism, personal growth, sex (the elderly have it, too), and -- did I almost forget to mention? -- love. A state which takes no interest in helping citizens and communities secure these benefits is a very shortsighted state indeed -- which may be why no such state exits. I have never heard of any jurisdiction anywhere which either conditions marriage on fertility or imagines that doing so would be a sane public policy. (Write me if I'm wrong.)

Rauch has said nothing that would differentiate the type of relationship he has in mind, when he favors a gay subset of nonmarriage, such that this type merits special treatment on par with marital status.

He does suggest that same-sex sexual behavior is meritorous and worthy of preferential societal regard. He also suggests that it would be insane for the government not to provide benefits based on "love". He clearly is referring to same-sex sexual love.

Recall his fundamental point: there is no prohibition based on the individual's sterility. And yet is there such a prohibition based on an indivdual's same-sex sexual behavior or "love"? Nope.

To be charitable, Rauch depends on the reader automatically switching from the individual back to the societal meaning of the type of relationship he has in mind. To avoid confusion, he should be explicit about this back and forth movement between the particular and the general. I do not believe he is a lazy writer nor a lazy thinker and so, with regret, I believe this to be a deliberate rhetorical device.

Tap dancing with the indispensable strawman.

To exclude homosexuals, people who hold to the possiblity-of-procreation line cannot just say that procreation is one of a number of justification for marriage. They have to say it is the only justification, or at least the only one worth bothering with, because all the rest -- providing caregivers, domesticating young adults, bolstering economic security, looking after chidren -- can apply to homosexuals. But then,having said that the possibility of procreation is the only rationale for marriage, they immediately sabatoge even that rationale by refusing to apply it to sterile heterosexuals. Here is where the possiblity-of-procreation argument turns destructive: in its fixation on excluding homosexuals, it leaves no consistent rationale for the privileged status of heterosexual marriage. Its advocates tear away any coherent foundation which secular marriage might have -- precisely the opposite of what they claim they want to do. If they have to undercut marriage to save it from the homosexuals, so be it!

Chairm: No, we do not have to say it is the only justification. Rauch is mistaking the shorthand used for the actual meaning of the defense of marriage.

But he continues to describe the type of relationship he has in mind and in so doing he does not differentiate it from the rest of nonmarriage.

The core meaning of marriage is not a "fixation on excluding homosexuals". The special reason for special status is the combination of sex integration and responsible procreation. That's the general idea. It is the marriage idea. But it clearly is not Rauch's SSM idea.

Throughout his book, Rauch tears away at the coherency of this foundational social institution. He does this with a symathetic nod, here and there, to marriage as social institution, but ultimately he undercuts it with narrow and legalistic "gotacha" claims and hyperbolic loopholes.

Worth, meaning, and Rauch's worst idea.

The resulting message is not just peculiar, it is antimarriage. If you say that marriage without the possiblity of procreation isn't worth having, you also say, "We don't care if people who can't conceive kids shack up instead of marrying. Their marriages are worthless anyway. We don't care if they divorce, either. Their commitment is meaningless from society's point of view." I can't think of a worse message for marrige. Or a sillier one.

Mercifully, the possibility-of-procreation crowd is only kidding. In my years of discussing same-sex marriage, I have encountered only two people who seriously suggested that, in an ideal world, sterility should be a bar to marriage. [...] Everyone else either squirms or changes the subject.

The subject is not sterility falsely applied to homosexuality. The subject is marriage, as a social institution, which Rauch would gut of its core meaning. Marriage, thus abandoned, would become a diminished, and desinstutitonalized, social construct. Then it would match the SSM idea.

On balance, it is true that childless marriage is a type of arrangement that is of considerably less concern, societally speaking, than procreative marriage. But marriage integrates the sexes and that's no small matter. Childless marriage entails more societal concern than one-sexed scenarios. For that matter, the gay subset of one-sexed scenarios that Rauch favors is no more worthy of protections than the rest of nonmarriage.

Please note: I referred to "childless marriage" not to marriages. Rauch would confuse the general with the particular on a case-by-case basis.

And, no, marriage defenders do not say that types of relationships outside of marriage are worthless; nor that various types of nonmarital commitment are meaningless, least of all where vulnerabilities are created by the lack of (or diminishment of) sex integration and responsible procreation. There are many types of procreative and nonprocreative types of nonmarital arrangements that are as worthy, or more worthy, of protection as is Rauch's favored subset of nonmarriage. The pro-marriage view is deeply pro-child in regard to the defense of the core of marriage and in regard to extending protections to vulnerable families outside of marriage. Sexual orientation is not a disqualifier.

Rauch blandly puts nonsense into the mouths of marriage defenders precisely because he cannot think of a worse message. "Mercifully" he does not mean it but merclessly he knowingly presents a strawman argument for the sake of his polemic.

The remainder of his remarks on this topic look an awful lot like Rauch squirming to elide the actual disagreement regarding responsible procreation and sex integration.

For now, I'll leave it up to my fellow Opiners and our readership to respond to what Rauch says next:

Rauch's selective compassion.

Even if you believe nonprocreative marriage cannot be as good as procreative marriage, that is no reason to ban it, much less to ban it inconsistently only for homosexuals. Softening the argument, in that sense, only sharpens the blow, because it heightens the contrast between the sympathetic and supportive treatment that barren heterosexual marriages receive and the flat legal prohibition of homosexual marriages. When I see a heterosexual couple who have made a successful marriage despite being unable to have children, I see their devotion as, if anything, all the more admirable. Anyway, the last thing I would think to do is disparage their marriage as frivolous or unworthy, and I can't imagine regarding it with hostility. Why treat homosexual unions with any less compassion?

Rauch's all or nothing.

Another squirm: "But all homosexual unions are sterile. Only some heterosexual ones are. For heterosexuals, barreness is the exception. For homosexuals, it is the rule." Again, no help, unless you think homosexual individuals don't matter as much as infertile heterosexual individuals do. After all, postmenopausal women are also a barren class -- and a large one. No one lumps them together and says, "None of them can procreate. We have to shut them out to defend the link between marriage and procreation." Imagine if infertile heterosexuals all developed a birthmark on their foreheads, making them easily identifiable as a class. Would anybody favor barring them from marriage? Would anyone even think of it?

Arbitrariness is eschewed but embraced.

Just because procreation is a purpose of marriage doesn't mean that only fertile couples should be allowed to marry. Infertile couples, including gay couples, should be allowed to marry. Infertile couples, including gay couples, should be allowed to marry, too. But it appears that, with all this talk of procreation and marriage, we are just wasting our time. The real reason homosexual couples can't marry is that their marrying would violate the very definition ("essence") of marriage, which is that . . . only heterosexual couples can marry! At long last, who knows how many words later, we are back where we started: at "because I said so" or "because God or nature said so" or, really, "because you just can't."

Chairm: Overall, I think the worst message, and the silliest message, that Rauch thought-up was that "biologically speaking" a gay man is a woman without a uterus.