Belmont Club: If Tomorrow Comes

Richard Fernandez over at Belmont Club finds that the inverted family tree of the western world is "baked into socialism from the beginning". And it reads as a fitting epitaph for marriage if it turns into nothing more than an equally protected welfare channel.

And that is precisely what the welfare state consisted of. Living for today. Social security is a perfect example. It was never a “fund”; it was never anything more than a payroll tax moving money from young workers to old workers. For it while it seemed to work, but only because the West was running on the legacy of a generation that believed in tomorrow and had sacrificed its life and youth in World War 2 to secure it. The “living for today” lifestyle resulted in the spectacular party some may remember at the end of the 20th century: an era that valued unlimited sex, unlimited welfare, and sacrifice for God and country not at all.

Taxes and Marriage (Why the poor are penalized)

Despite what you may have heard, when it comes to taxes and benefits, it generally pays to be married. But that's not true for all couples from MSNBC November 2010

51% of married couples paid less tax jointly than if they had not been married, according to a 1996 Congressional Budget Office analysis. The average amount these couples saved: $1,300.
42% of married taxpayers paid more by filing jointly than they would have if they'd remained single, the office said. The average penalty: $1,380.

The people who faced the most egregious penalties, as a portion of their income, were the working poor, according to tax expert Edward McCaffery, a law professor at the University of Southern California and the author of "Taxing Women." A husband and wife who each earned $10,000 could end up with a marriage penalty of more than $4,000.

Those low-income couples still face the potential for a tax penalty, said Mark Luscombe, a principal analyst for tax research firm CCH. That's because the earned-income credit, a tax break designed to keep the working poor out of poverty, can be less for a two-earner household than for singles.

Family Scholars Blogger says: Curse them because they don't deserve any respect at all.

Corruption of public discourse, part 2.

Barry Deutsch has been guest blogging at the Institute for American Values' Family Scholars Blog. He is also known as the blogger, Ampersand, and has crossposted blogposts at both FSB and his own blog, "Amptoons", and comments under his own blogposts at both sites. He also moderates those discussions.

Here is his stated view of those with whom he disagrees in the conflict between the SSM idea and the marriage idea:

"There is no reason any particular person needs to be polite to them if they don't want to be. I treat them with respect 1) because my personal preference is for conversations in a respectful tone, 2) because I think some lurkers are more likely to find a respectful tone persuasive, and 3) I have a talent for maintaining a respectful tone.

"But that's just me. If someone else, on their own blog space or whatever, wants to curse people like Mr. [Robert] George out in every way they can, I don't object to that. Especially if that person is lgbt, then I think it's entirely understandable if they don't accord Mr. George or his fellow thinkers any respect at all"

[Comment by Ampersand, December 21, 2010 at 7:47 PM on his blogsite, Amptoons. ]

www.amptoons.com//2010/12/21/what-is-marriage/comment-page-1/#comment-196297

Here Mr. Deutsch has excused ad hom attacks. He clearly invoked gay identity politics as superseding civility.

Mr Deutsch also happened to overstate his preference for a respectful tone. His heavily biased performance as a moderator speaks louder than the sound of his patting himself on the back. He also plainly states that the appearance of a respectful tone in his blogposts, comments, and efforts at moderating amounts to a merely superficial display and thus an insincere ploy that is used to thinly disguise true animus. Whatever talent this bespeaks, it is not one conducive to productive civil discourse in which disgreements are aired, where opponents seek common understanding of one another's views, and where misunderstandings or misrepresentations are generously and thoughtfully reconsidered. It encourages bad faith commentary and the impugning of motives of those who'd disagree with Mr. Deutsch's barely-under-his-breath disrespect for fellow commenters and bloggers.

With his excuse making and promised support, he has, in effect, invited his fellow SSMers, especially in the name of the gay identity group, to make the personal attacks that his precious tactical pose supposedly guards against.

Just because Mr. Deutsch admittedly acts in bad faith and disguises his animus with an admittedly thin veneer of respect does not mean that Mr. George and other like-minded citizens do as Mr. Deutsch would and does. This is an example of the SSMer who imagines himself above reproach even as he encourages disrespect and incivility. He'd smear or have others do it for him and then stand back, arms folded across his chest, his chin thrust upward, nodding approvingly.

Perhaps that is the best that Mr Deutsch is prepared to do. His devotion to the cause and his reliance on gay identity politics might have shackled his hands and his mind. Or perhaps not. I invite him and his fellow SSMers to do better. Much better. I invite people on all sides of this contentious conflict of ideas to do much better. I will endeavor alongside those who'd accept that open invitation. Here at Opine or elsewhere.

Our Opine motto is one that may be tough to adopt and even tougher to live up to in the heat of the contest but it is our guiding light.

"Defending marriage on the firm ground of reason and respect for human dignity."

To those SSM supporters who believe and think that they defend marriage, thusly, the invitation ought to be irresistable.

* *

The motto of the Family Scholars Blog is very compatible with ours: "Engaging the key debates."

See: FamilyScholars.org

The priorities in the District of Columbia?

D.C. divorce bill for same-sex couples set for vote in ‘early’ 2012

Mendelson’s bill states that “An action for divorce by persons of the same gender, even if one or neither party to the marriage is a bona fide resident of the District of Columbia… would be eligible for a divorce in the city if the following circumstance apply: “The marriage was performed in the District of Columbia; and neither party to the marriage resides in a jurisdiction that will maintain an action for divorce, provided that it shall be a rebuttable presumption that a jurisdiction will not maintain an action for divorce if the jurisdiction does not recognize the marriage.”

Wonder if someone will challenge it? I guess to solve the problem, it should allow any couple to be eligible just not one of the same gender.

Meanwhile according to an article from the New York Times in 2009, the District of Columbia's out-of wedlock birth rate is upwards of 59%, the highest in the nation.

Also in the District of Columbia, a father may not be on the birth certificate unless he is married or established by other legal means.

"5. Why should I establish paternity?If you are the child’s biological father, the reasons you should establish paternity include the benefits it will give your child:
Father’s name on the birth certificate. If the parents are not married, the father’s name cannot be on the birth certificate unless paternity is established.
Identity. When a child knows who he or she is, and has the sense of belonging that knowing both parents can bring, it gives the child a head start.
Medical history. Knowing the medical histories of both parents can help doctors better treat the child.
Inheritance and financial benefits. If paternity is established, a child can inherit from both parents. The child can also receive money or other benefits through each parent from programs such as Social Security, veteran's benefits, pensions and health care.
Support. A child has the right to food, clothing and a home. A child supported by only one parent often does not have enough money to meet his/her needs."

14. My child’s mother and I are not married or in a registered domestic partnership, but we are getting along, and I help to pay for things the child needs. Why should we establish paternity?
...paternity needs to be established because without it neither you nor the child will have the full benefits of being father and child.
You will not be seen as the child’s father by the outside world. You will not be identified as the father on the child’s birth certificate, and the child will not be able to have your last name. Schools and hospitals will not provide you with information about the child. The child will not inherit from you, or receive benefits through you such as retirement benefits. You cannot go to court to ask for visitation or custody of the child.

Positive Images in the Community

"5 Reasons Why and 3 Reasons Why Not to Get Married" from BlackandMarriedwithKids.com

#4 OUR COMMUNITY NEEDS YOU

There are children now who don’t know what healthy marriages look like because they don’t know anyone who’s happily married. When these children don’t see successful marriages in front of them they are forced to lean on the negative depictions offered by the media. These images that are laced with age-old stereotypes wouldn’t lead anyone to choose marriage so they instead leave our children with thoughts of no hope when it comes to having great relationships because they think this is just, “how it is.”

I'm not black, or a minority, I'm white. See my post on Suburban Progressives though, to understand why I relate.

Blood is thicker than water

Blood is thicker than water.

But how are blood relationships made?

The SSMer as Burden Shifter

In a comment section at FSB a pro-SSM commenter made the following very weak response to a problem created by his own SSM argumentation.

Chris said that SSM is inevitable and -

"Eventually you will have to adopt an argument for why incestuous marriage should be banned even while SSM is legal. I suggest you start working on that argument now."

Putting aside the lack of self awareness displayed in that comment, consider the sheer stupidity of the arrogant attempt to shift the burden from the SSMer to the marriage defender.

The argument in favor of societal regard for the core meaning of marriage has long-been an excellent argument against incestuous marriage. Marriage is two-sexed and not sex-neutral. Its core meaning: 1) the integration of the sexes, 2) the provision for responsible procreation, and 3) these combined as a coherent whole. The boundaries of eligibility and ineligibility are drawn around this core which sustains and justifies the societal preference or special status for the union of husband and wife. Relatedness is clearly entailed in the two-sexed nature of marriage and that has been coherently expressed in marriage law. The line drawn against incestuous marriage is not arbitrary.

The SSMer's goal of inducing societal disregard for that core (the marriage idea) can only mean that the SSMer by dint of insisting on an alternative idea (the SSM idea) must assume the burden of the would-be reformer or agent of change. The SSMer carries the burden of justifying the SSM ban on some same-sex scenarios. If he shirks that responsibilitity then he has belied a lack of faith in the capacity of the SSM idea to provide its own argument against incestuous SSM.

Thusfar SSMers have asserted an arbitrary imitation of the marriage boundary and have failed to show how such a copy-paste arises justly from within the same-sex scenario; that copy-paste is from something the SSMer has rejected as unjust so he needs to make an independent attempt to justify the SSM ban based on relatives - which of course is subject to the pro-SSM terms of argumentation. If those terms are good enough to make SSM inevitable then they are good enough to legalize incestuous SSM. It is up to the SSMer to differentiate the eligible same-sex scenario from the ineligible before imposing a ban. Not after. Before.

The SSM idea is not my idea. Chris cannot fairly shift his burden to me. But he has just admitted to his hoping to kick the can down the road. It was a feeble attempted kick that has left the can untouched and unmoved. The SSMer will keep tripping over it. That is his problem, not mine. It is a profound problem he would knowingly dump onto society and so make it someone else's problem. That exemplifies the arrogant stupidity of SSM rhetoric and argumentation. Perhaps Chris will show that his reasoning can be better than that. I hope so.

It is reasonable to ask the SSMer to justify special treatment for that subset that he'd favor. Given the homosexual emphasis that Chris has insisted upon, he is on the hook for justifying that bias. Most of the same-ex category is not gay and not homosexual. Most of nonmariage is populated by types of relationships that are not homosexual and not gay. Why would he decenter these people from his agumentation and rhetoric?

Removed from consideration, part 3

In an earlier blogpost I observed that SSM argumentation provides the best arguments against SSM. This irony is something with which the SSM campaign has yet to come to terms.

Unknown, a pro-SSM commenter in our comment sections, made comments recently that effectively dismissed from consideration the mutual attraction between those who'd SSM. Instead Unknown has brought up conduct and societal approval and disapproval of conduct.

That switch from attraction to conduct is tut-tutted by the typical SSMer who objects to civil discussion of the argument that same-sex sexual behavior is immoral behavior. The SSMer conflates attraction with behavior and places group identity above and beyond the reach of public morality. The difference between feelings and conduct and between group identity and conduct must be obscured, deliberately and belligerently, according to the SSMer. This blindness, the SSMer insists, must be imposed by government.

This is not because the SSMer has won the moral argument. Refusal and inability to engage substantively is the retreat itself. But then the SSMer claims victory behind the facade of neutrality. The retreat is real but the SSMer shifts to an attack on the person who would dare observe the fact of retreat. Then with open disregard for the actual moral argument, the SSMer, having chosen to flee rather than make a counter argument, proceeds to declare that the moral argument has been run out of town and those who refuse to submit or at least appear to submit must not be welcomed in the public discourse on marriage. Submission is the price of admission.

All this posing and fleeing and ad hom attacking is because the SSMer is not equipped with a counter moral argument -- one of approbation of same-sex sexual behavior. While it is undoubtedly a tactical retreat from a moral battle that the SSMer must fear to lose, the SSMer would rather shift ground from marriage to something else anyway. Hence the homosexual emphasis.

While the SSMer will flee engagement on the moral argument, the defense of marriage does not depend on the moral argument against same sex sexual behavior. Instead it hinges on the justness of societal preference for the congual relationship of husband and wife. But the SSMer will strike the pose of one who defeated the moral argument against same sex sexual behavior; supposedly the retreat to moral neutrality is recast as bold charge up to the moral high ground from which the SSMer can claim to have rose above pesky disputes of morality. The effort to brazen it out follows a script that features the assertion of the supremacy of gay identity politics.

These tactics are meant to remove from consideration the moral basis for laws and policies that express the societal regard for the core meaning of marriage. Marital status is a special status in our culture and in our legal tradition. SSMers have conceded as much in courts in which the pro-SSM arguments have been made.

Prominent among those arguments is the attempt to assert a moral equivalence between the man-woman basis of marriage and the racist basis for the defunct laws against inter-racial marriage. This is used as "moral dynamite", as FSB blogger David Blankenhorn has put it. That is indeed the way that SSMers consider it and, thus, they hurl the 'bigot' and 'hate' bombs from ground they claimed as morally neutral.

The racist analogy is presented by the SSMer with the pretense of a moral analogy but it fails in terms of moral reasoning. It fails in terms of plain legal reasoning. But it provides tactical cover - like a bombardment - that distracts from the lack of a moral argument in favor of same-sex sexual behavior.

SSMers invest much import in the notion of "the same sex couple". When asked what they mean by this turn of phrase, the typical SSMer will become agitated and insist that it is self-explanatory. Other than the count of two, what is meant by 'couple'? Not romance, surely, since romance is not a legal requirement. Not mutual attraction of a sexual kind for that is not a legal requirement for SSM.

It means just a count of two. And that is an arbitrary count since the same-sex scenario is not intrinsically limited by the number two.

Also it is not intrinsically a sexualized type of relationship. Unknown has already acknowledged that much in his understanding of the law he envisages for SSM.

This stands in contrast to marriage law which is based on the sexual type of relationship between man and woman. The lines of eligiblity are drawn around that which is intrinsically two-sexed because it is sexual and around that which is sexual because it is two-sexed. The union of husband and wife is not sex-neutral in marriage law.

And so the SSM argument depends on injecting into the discussion an emphasis on homosexuality or more pointedly an emphasis on the group identity they would prefer society to refer to as 'gay'. Indeed the SSMer will use "same-sex couple" in lieu of the more obvious "the homosexual couple" or "the gay couple" and makes repeated comparison with "the heterosexual couple".

But two heterosexual persons of the same sex are ineligible to marry. Two homosexual persons of the opposite sexes are eligible to marry within the boundaries drawn around the core of marriage. Some two-sexed scenarios are ineligible because of societal regard for th man-woman basis of marriage. Societal regard for the core meaning of marriage justifies and sustains both the special status of the union of husband and wife and the limits on eligibility. The SSM idea is based on societal disregard for that.

The SSMer wants society to regard gay identity rather than marriage itself. But gay identity is not a window into the social instutution of marriage. It is something extrinsic to marriage.

The marriage law is already neutral on homosexuality. But the SSMer insists that society regard homosexuality with favoritism and, on that basis, remake marriage law.

Once again there is the pose of having retreated to neutral ground in which favoritism is removed from consideration. Yet despite the lack of a homosexual criterion for eligibility to SSM, the SSMer will insist that the basis for SSM in law would be same-sex sexual attraction and same-sex sexual romance and, indeed, the societal approbation for acting on those feelings.

But the legal arguments in favor of establishing SSM in law contradict such a basis.

And so the SSMer dodges the actual disagreement regarding the marriage issue and instead returns to the homosexual emphasis. The issue of gay identity is outside the marriage issue. But gay identity is central to the pro-SSM issue of licensing of - and governmental preferential treatment of - same-sex sexual attraction, same-sex sexual romance, and same-sex sexual behavior - i.e. the conflation that is gay identity.

The pro-SSM song and dance is assert-retreat-smear-ellide-deny. The issue of marriage law is the core meaning of marriage. The issue of SSM law would be gay identity politics. The arguments in defense of marriage reference marriage but the arguments that push SSM reference gay identity and little else. Along the way the SSM cause attacks the marriage idea, promotes double standards, and would remove from consideration the moral basis for marriage law.

Removed from consideration, part 2

In a previous blogpost I noted that the proffered reasoning of an SSMer, Unknown, regarding eligibility to SSM had readily removed from consideration the feelings of mutual attraction that would differentiate the friendship type of relationship and the homosexual type of relationship.

There would be no legal requirement for such feelings, not for ineligibility and not for eligibility, and so attraction could not provide a legitimate basis for establishing SSM in law.

However, Unknown thought that there must be more to it than mere feelings of attraction. Perhaps it would be acting on such feelings? That is, when it comes to related people --

"Simple disapproval of the conduct might even uphold the law [against incestuous marriage]."

But what conduct? It cannot be the act of showing up to SSM, surely.

It must be something that would be approved for both the friendship and the homosexual type of relationships but disapproved for the type of relationship that Unknown had in mind when considering the example of sisters.

It cannot be the act of feeling attraction. It cannot be the conduct that defines friendship nor can it be the conduct that defines the homosexual relationship.

Here Unknown referred to standards of constitutional analysis, as he understood them to apply to the explicit prohibition on some related people who'd show up to marry; and that this understanding would supposedly extend to those who'd SSM.

And this is where SSMers struggle to differentiate the example of the SSM ban on two sisters and the homosexual emphasis in the pro-SMM arguments. Before trying to reason against eligibility to SSM, Unknown needed to justify the establishment of SSM in law.

In comments Unknown has not yet specified the definitive conduct that might justify a ban. But he did specify disapproval of conduct as sufficient. Unknown must state the conduct that would justify the SSM ban on some same-sex twosomes and which, at the same time, would justify establishing SSM in the law in the first place.

Removed from consideration, part 1

Not for the first time, an SSMer has left comments that demonstrate that the best arguments against the SSM idea are the arguments for SSM.

Unknown is a pro-SSM commenter (aka Christopher, from the comment sections of FSB, I think) who said that friends would be eligible to SSM because the male friend and female friend --

"have been able to [marry] in the past. Same as it has always been. So this scenario is removed from consideration"

That is, marriage and SSM would be governed by the same lack of a prohibition against friendship.

Accordingly, the mutual feelings of attraction that bring together the male friend and the female friend and which define the relationship as friendship would neither disqualify nor qualify those who'd show up to marry. Likewise, feelings of attraction that define the homosexual type of relationship would not be subjected to a feelings test (nor an attraction test) in the law that would set eligibility and ineligiblity for those who'd SSM.

This precludes establishment of SSM in law based on criteria that might differentiate feelings of platonic friendship from feelings of sexual friendship. Feelings of attraction could not provide legal justification for eligibility nor for ineligibility - not on a case-by-case level and not on the level of the type of relationship.

Unknown went on to demonstrate that the argument for the SSM idea relies on the group identity - 'gay'. There is this homosexual emphasis which conflates attraction, behavior, and group identity.

More on this, shortly.

History of Genealogy and Finding Your Roots

History of Genealogy from Family Chronicle

A nice overview of different cultures and the manner they record family ancestry, through church records and oral traditions.

Also Henry Louis Gates Jr. is producing another series on ancestry in America, titled 'Finding Your Roots'. There was a recent profile of him in the NYT Magazine.

Gates’s belief in the complexity of American culture has only been reinforced by the genetic research that has informed his recent books and television programs. In them, Gates explores the lineage of Americans like Chris Rock, Meryl Streep, Yo-Yo Ma and Tina Turner. Using genealogical and historical resources, he traces their family stories as far back as he can. When the paper trail runs out, he resorts to DNA tests.

"They fear divorce."

Fear of Divorce Keeps Young Couples from Marrying from PsychCentral

Demographers at Cornell University and the University of Central Oklahoma surveyed couples who live together and found that two-thirds, or about 67 percent, of the respondents admitted to concerns about dealing with the social, legal, emotional and economic consequences of a divorce.

Why Not A Marriage Tax?

Why Not A Marriage Tax? from the blog Discriminations

h/t Instapundit

A good read, and a healthy discussion in the comment box there.

In case anyone still cares what marriage can prevent

From Wikipedia 'Poverty in the United States'

Income levels vary along racial/ethnic lines: 21% of all children in the United States live in poverty, about 46% of black children and 40% of Latino children live in poverty.[38] The poverty rate is 9.9% for black married couples and only 30% of black children are born to married couples (see Marriage below). In 2007,11% of black women aged 30–44 without a high school diploma had a working spouse.[39][copyright violation?] The poverty rate for native born and naturalized whites is identical (9.6%). On the other hand, the poverty rate for naturalized blacks is 11.8% compared to 25.1% for native born blacks suggesting race alone does not explain income disparity. Not all minorities have low incomes.

Devastation of divorce

"Devastation of divorce" from Deseret News (Utah)

The Census Bureau found that 28.3 percent of all custodial parents live with incomes that qualify as below the official poverty level. But as sobering as this is, it is more alarming to consider that parents who undergo divorce see their chances of falling into poverty double. Those custodial parents (most often women) who do fall into poverty tend to rely on child-support payments for 62.6 percent of their income, on average. This makes the failure to receive these funds devastating.....Even children who are not poor before a divorce find their incomes dropping by 50 percent after the divorce as parents establish their separate homes.

"I'm Headed For Divorce -- Even Though I'm Not Even Married Yet" by Natasha Burton (Huffington Post)

My aforementioned divorced parents (a.k.a the people who've made me unmarriageable) didn't have the kind of split after which birthdays and holidays were jointly observed. Whether I switched off or celebrated twice, for most of my life I've chosen one place -- one parent -- over the other. My mom and dad each created their own, very separate lives, which I assume is pretty standard operating procedure when you're no longer married.

I don't want to copy the past and copy the whole thing, it is so worth the read. Trust me.

They Seem To Have Skipped Over Something

Currently making the social networking rounds is the graphic found at this link. Supposedly, it is "How to Explain Marriage Equality to an Idiot"

Tired of hearing the rightwing nutjobs claim that if gays and lesbians can get married, soon people will be marrying their dog or their toaster? Here's a handy dandy chart to help you patiently explain the obvious differences.

Good use of "handy dandy", too. Extra points for that.

Notice what's missing?

The common question asked by people who, like every great civil rights leader in history, like every major religious tradition, like every person involved in writing and adopting the Constitution, and like every President up through this writing, understands that marriage unites a bride and a groom, is "If we change marriage laws to include homosexual relationships, why not polygamous relationships, incestuous relationships, pedophiliac relationships, relationships with animals, and relationships with inanimate objects?"

The text and the graphic completely ignore polygamous and incestuous relationships. I can only guess as to why. Here are my guesses:

1. These people want those relationships to get marriage licenses, too.

2. They realize the same justification they use for neutering marriage licenses also applies to polygamous and incestuous relationships.

Of course, we all know it is ridiculous to compare same-sex relationships to heterosexual polygamy and incest. After all, the latter two kinds of relationships have been historically recognized as valid marriages.

Oh, and by the way, homosexual people can get married, whether they want to or not. What we're opposed to is equating nonmarital relationships, including brideless or groomless relationships, to marriage, not "gays getting married".

Regarding adults marrying children: There are organizations pushing to lower the age of consent, and organizations that advocate the "rights of children" in a way that would also support a child being legally able to consent to marriage over the objections of their own parents.

Regarding "marrying" animals: There are governments seriously considering recognizing some (non-human) animals as persons. Why wouldn't such persons have the right to marry other persons?

And yes, some people have "married" inanimate objects.

The point is, the marriage neutering activists, like the marriage defenders, believe that marriage means something and that whatever doesn't fall into that category isn't marriage. It is a dispute of definitions, not a matter of hatred. The definition that marriage unites a bride and groom has been the universal definition through all of the cultural differences. Two men can't consent to marry each other any more than they can consent to an ash tray being food. Without both a bride and a groom, it isn't marriage, and that some governments have recently said otherwise only shows those governments to be defective, along the line of a government that would label water as cow's milk. One bride, one groom IS marriage equality.

We have our own graphic for people having a tough time understanding this.

The meaning of marriage in context

The context of my support for marriage is how hard marriage can be, but how important it is to work at the marriage.

Someone in my circle of acquaintance recently asked, when the magic is gone what can a child expect the adults to do? I remember when things were really difficult with my wife, everything seemed so out of control. Nothing I did seemed to work, and I couldn't compromise anymore.

But when I looked at my children, I knew they felt the same way I did about my parents. I knew they wanted us to be in love again. I also knew they didn't ask for this, they were our relationship right there. I can see my wife in their faces and in their personalities just as much as my wife could see me in their faces and personalities.

Because they lived on as our relationship, our relationship needed to live too. It all deserved to be kept intact. And sure enough the answer was the right application of love, tolerance, and responsibility for each other. The only reason things felt out of control is (I'm sad to say) we just never learned how to do that properly, I guess.

I'm glad I Iearned that lesson, its changed a great many things about my life and how I live in it. And I think that is what people mean by marriage as a great institution of civilization. For me the only thing that had the undeniable reality that like a rock could not be worn away with all of the storms our lives were going through was my children and considering who they are, and our relationships.

And it is because I've found that rock, that I want everyone to build their marriages on that rock too. That is, I'm convinced, what marriage really means. That is its real context. While first comes love, then comes marriage, then comes baby in the baby carriage, its what that event will mean for the rest of your life that is the real context of marriage. It is the love people will find even when the magic is gone, and then the magic returns.

That won't save every marriage because not all marriages can be saved by just one person's effort. Luckily my wife saw the same need I did, and it will save every marriage where both people see it and work towards it.

Romney Asks About a Veteran's Service, Gets Marriage Neutering Plea

The "mainstream media" continues to give an unwarranted amount attention marriage neutering advocacy. See this article by Maeve Reston in the Los Angeles Times.

New Hampshire voters pride themselves on vetting and testing their candidates, and Vietnam veteran Bob Garon waited for more than two hours at a Manchester diner Monday to get Mitt Romney's views on the proposed repeal of New Hampshire's law [neutering] marriage.

I appreciate all who have served honorably, but has Romney made a secret of his positions?

Eventually Garon, who is 63 and [has a "marriage" license with another] man, got his chance for a one-on-one exchange. Noticing Garon's black Vietnam veteran cap, Romney sat down beside him and tried to strike up a conversation about his military service as reporters and cameramen crowded around the booth.

"I've have a question for you," Garon said, cutting off the former Massachusetts governor’s attempt at chitchat. "New Hampshire has some legislation kicking around about the repeal of [neutering of state marriage licensing]... All I need is a yes or a no."

But he wanted more than a yes or a no; he went on to talk about benefits, completely ignoring the fact that spousal benefits were set up to aid in the formation of sex-inclusive families that naturally created the next generation of citizens in a way that recognized the fact that there would usually be a division of labor between the spouses. Specifically with military personnel, it was expected that the wife would be taking care of the children while the husband was off at war or training or anything else related to being in the military.

Garon talks about equality, but his argument appeals to military service. Not all people do or are even able to serve in the military, so Garon supports, apparently, treating people differently depending on what they do – which is exactly what the bride+groom requirement in marriage licensing or federal recognition of marriage does.

A Gay Reader Writes… (not from Opine)

I'm a regular reader of 'Bad Catholic', a blog by a Catholic. The blog recently had several posts on the subject of marriage, in regards to defining between two people of the same sex.

This one is a short essay, 'Why Gay Marriage is a bad idea". Touching not upon any religious teachings, but the social science that individuals do very well when raised by their mother and father in a healthy committed relationship (marriage). It's heavily cited, from scholarly articles pointing that both a person's mother and father are vital to the well being of the individual. Hence the reason for a government's interest in marriage.

Another is a response, 'A Gay Reader Writes',

I am a gay man, who would desperately love to have children (God has given me a great love for kids, which is why I’m a teacher), but I refuse to allow myself that privilege, because I firmly believe a child needs a biological mother and father raising them. My 14 years experience of working with children confirms your conclusions: kids need both biological parents raising them! Yes, obviously there have been exceptional circumstances where single or divorced parents produce fairly well adjusted kids, but that takes a great deal of hard work, something I don’t often see in parents of any kind

Once you let go of all the name calling, it becomes apparent marriage defenders aren't basing their values on bigotry or hate.

The Generous Marriage

Is generosity better than sex? That was at one time the title considered for this article.

Generosity helps all relationships, that part of the story isn't new or surprising. At the heart of the report is probably my favorite overall marriage scientist, John Gottman. I'm convinced there is no one on earth who's studied, or knows more about marriage relationships than him.

But marriages aren't all relationships. There is something more about marriage that makes an investment in that relationship mean even more to everyone around you...

A Bad Idea Delivered With a Slick Presentation is Still Bad

A response to Zach Wahls' fallacious appeal in Iowa...


A comment was left in response to the video:

You bigot!

Why won't you support legitimizing my particular eating fetish by redefining food to include cinder blocks?

People think I'm weird for what I eat, because they don't consider cinder blocks to be legitimate food.

By law, cinder blocks cannot be labelled as food. This is codified discrimination against those of us who like to eat cinder blocks! If the law included cinder blocks as food, then people would have to accept that me eating cinder blocks is exactly the same as them eating other kinds of food. But as it stands, I am being denied my basic civil right to call what I love to eat, "food" and have the state sanction it as such. Where is the equal protection under the law?

How does me eating cinder blocks affect you and your eating preferences? Why should it matter to you whether or not the definition of food includes cinder blocks? Nobody is going to force YOU to eat cinder blocks.

Why should the law stigmatize me and others like me because it doesn't include what we love to eat into the category of food? I demand the laws be changed so that food includes cinder blocks!

Look, I have a good job, I'm articulate and intelligent and I'm a productive member of society. I turned out pretty good, didn't I? Therefore, my particular eating fetish should be legitimized by redefining food to include cinder blocks, because it obviously hasn't hurt me!

The decline of fatherhood and the male identity crisis

"The decline of fatherhood and the male identity crisis" by Ray B. Williams in Psychology Today

Overwhelmingly, the portrayal of men and the male identity in contemporary western societies is mostly negative. Men today are extensively demonized, marginalized and objectified, in a way reminiscent of what happened to women. The issue of the male identity is of crucial importance because males are falling behind in school, committing more suicides and crimes, dying younger and being treated for conditions such as ADHD more than females. There has also been a loss of fatherhood in society as artificial insemination by anonymous donors is on the rise. Further, medical experiments have shown that male sperm can now be grown artificially in a laboratory. There has been a rise in divorce rates where in most cases, child custody is granted to mothers. Continuous negative portrayal of men in the media, along with the feminization of men and loss of fatherhood in society, has caused confusion and frustration in younger generation males, as they do not have a specific role model and are less able to define their role in society.

We didn't have to swing the pendulum to the other extreme. A woman's relevance and importance isn't dependent on making a man irrelevant and unimportant.

Looking for the primary source of homeless children and fatherless homes

I keep reading this factoid that cites the U.S. Census Bureau that "90% of children who are homeless or runaways come from fatherless homes."

Any help finding the primary source on that?

Where to start in neighborhoods with low rates of marriage and high rates of father absenteeism

Metro invests $4.8M to teach how to be dads

The theory is simple: Give kids a stable father, and they’ll stay in school and out of jail. But building fathers isn’t cheap. In North and East Nashville — neighborhoods with the highest rates of single parenting in the city — it’s going to cost $4.8 million over three years.

In many communities families are already fractured, and for my progressive friends realize stability is a big issue for children and emotional support can be limited in families.

“Most men build a better relationship with their children within the first 60 to 90 days,” said Gilbert Coleman, the program’s director. “If we keep our guys out of incarceration from not paying child support, we save the city about $28,000 a man per year.“Most social services have always been for the mother and the child, but when you look at the statistics, we are leaving the men out of the picture.”

A lot of damage is done over the decades, we can't always reunify each family, but we can still do a lot for men if marriage is not an option. We can't strengthen marriage without stopping the hemorrhaging.

Is parenting classes really the most ideal public policy to get men to be fathers? Of course not. It's valuing marriage!

Why then are we so afraid to say it, ahem, to make good judgment of what is just?

Well I just said it.

Renee Aste

Lowell, Massachusetts

"Non sexually integrated" is not the opposite of "integration of the sexes"

In a recent discussion, a commenter referred to the "non sexually integrated" marriage.

This was an earnest attempt to represent what I had actually said. But it was a misrepresentation -- even if in error rather than deliberate calculation.

Integration of the sexes is at the core of the social institution of marriage. It does not standalone. It is combined with the provision for responsible procreation. Both are essentials of the marriage idea. This is what gives marriage its coherency -- as a social institution of civil society.

Splintering that core into bits and pieces may be useful for those who'd replace the marriage idea with something else, as SSMers are wont to do, but, as with dissecting a frog, it tends to kill the living thing under the knife.

An individual can, on his own, become sexually integrated. That is, he can integrate his sexuality (and here I am not limiting sexuality to talk of sexual orientation) into his personality as a whole. Yes, there are mature adults who are not sexually integrated. But that is not what I was speaking about.

But we can start there and make a point: To become sexually integrated is to become a whole person. The marital relationship, as a type of relationship, it is made whole by integrating the sexes (and here I am not limiting integration to sexual behavior).

Marriage, as a type of relationship, unites the sexes -- that's understood by enforcement of the legal requirement for participation by both sexes in each conjugal union. That is an essential from which much else follows. And this is not a standalone, as I said, for it is intertwined with procreation: the set of principles and practices that comprise reponsible procreation begins with the first principle that each of us, as part of a procreative duo (again a whole procreative unit), is responsible for our offspring. Uniting the sexes in a sexual type of relationship is part and parcel of the societal preference for the unity of motherhood and fatherhood.

SSMers would rather search for exceptions (and dwell on apparent rather than actual exceptions) instead of seeing the coherency of the whole. The way that social institutions become undone is through the loss of coherency. Put simply, if marriage is made to mean everything, then, it would mean nothing.

Yet the exceptions rule SSM argumentation.

Some marriages do not beget children. Ahah! The provision for responsible procreation is not an essential, they declare. Some marriages use third party procreation technologies. Ahah again! The unity of fatherhood and motherhood is not an essential, they assert. Some marriages are sexless. Ahah once more! Integration of the sexes is not an essential, they announce.

But when discussing the marital type of relationship we are not pecking through the millions of grains of sand that comprise the beach; or the countless drops of water in the sea. We are not defining marriage on a case-by-case basis. For to approach it that way is to treat marriage as something other than a social institution. It is missing the forest for the trees. It is not how reasonable lawmaking is done, either. It is not how one conducts a rational exploration of a social good and the potential for a conflcit of goods.

When it comes to sex, the SSM campaign's argumentation and rhetoric makes it irrelevant -- except for the arbitrary emphasis on homosexuality and gay identity.

The marital type of relationship is not accorded its special status because it is definitively heterosexual. Categorizing sexual orientation is not a consideration: there is no homosexual criterion for ineligiblity and no heterosexual criterion for eligibility. Marriage is neutral, already, on this aspect of the SSMer's complaint against marriage law.

Yet SSMers demand that the homosexual type of relationship be granted a special status on par with marital status precisely because of the homosexual emphasis. Not because of equality of persons but rather because of a demand that gay identity politics -- elevating group identity -- must take precedence over the core meaning of marriage itself.

SSMers try to dodge this problem in their approach. They work slavishly to make marriage mean less and less. They trivialize marriage. They heap scorn on the very notion that we are discussing a type of relationship that entails a core meaning, essentials, that differentiate the it from other types of relationships -- before labels are attached and before a licensing scheme and special status are accorded it.

No, marriage is just what the law says it is. And the law is wrong to say it requires the man-woman combination. That's the extent of their thinking, really. They smother this with generous servings of homosexual emphasis and identity politics.

When husband and wife unite sexually, they become a single unit -- a procreative type of unit -- and thus are related one to the other. When, as is customarily happens, they conceive children together, they are clearly related as mother and father of their offspring. If unconsummated, the marital relationship is subject to annulment; if the unity is infringed upon, it is subject to adultry as grounds for dissolution; if extramarital procreation occurs, the marital presumption of paternity is subject to a legitimate challenge. These are connected by the same two-sex sexual basis of marriage.

The nature of human procreation is two-sexed, not sex-neutral. The fact of relatedness has a bearing on eligilbility. Societal concern for integration of the sexes (and thus the natural formation of the family) and provision for responsible procreation (and thus showing preference for the natural family as a simple matter of justice for children) justifies, however imperfectly some may claim it to be, the boundaries of eligiblity based on degrees of consanguinity and affinity.

No man can impregnate another man. No woman is impreganted by another woman. No one-sexed arrangement can sexually consummate as a marriage with coital relations. Same-sex sexual behavior is irrelevant to the marital relationship. The lack of the other sex is highly relevant, however, regardless of what an all-male or an all-female arrangment might do, or not do, sexually.

But the search for exceptions is what SSMers do when they are uncomfortable dealing with the actual disagreement that is at the heart of the conflict between their SSM idea and the marriage idea.

Infertile couples! Marriages that do not produce children! Besides, there is no legal requirement that the husband and wife engage in sexual behavior together! These exceptions and that lack of compulsion can only mean that fertility is not an essential and that children are not essential and that sexual relations is not essential.

Ooops. If the sexual embrace is not essential, whence arises the homosexual emphasis in the pro-SSM complaint against the marriage law?

SSMers routinely treat marriage as a sexual type of relationship. And they assume, against their own guidance, that SSM would be a sexual type of relationship. Well, marriage is a sexual type of relationship as per the sexual basis for consummation, annulment, adultery, and the marital presumption of paternity. These are coherent sets of legal expressions, and cultural expressions, of the core meaning of marriage; the two-sexed sexual basis justifies the marriage law and justifies the boundaries drawn for eligibility.

But SSMers will shrug and say that most SSMs would be sexual even though there is no legal requirement for that. And not requirement for homosexual orientation, to boot. But by saying "most" they concede there must be exceptions. They just don't care about the exceptions. And yet exceptions destroy the general shrug -- or rule -- according to pro-SSM guidance on how to think about these things. Their own argumentation would contradict their emphasis on homosexuality.

Either this guidance is profoundly flawed and ought to be discarded, as I think most reasonable people would agree, or it is intrinsic to the case against the marriage idea and for the SSM idea. Well, SSMers will attack the marriage idea with unreasonable notions, left right and center, and think themselves very competent in guiding society on how to regard the marriage law. I do not think most of them have the intellectual honesty to concede how unreasonable is their approach, since that has rewarded them in some jurisdictions. So they'd rather be expedient and stick with the unreasonable guidance that brought them to the dance.

However, that would render SSM a nonsexual type of relationship, at law. It destroys their supposed objections to SSMs between consenting related adults -- for same-sex sexual behavior is deemed an illegitimate basis for lawmaking on marriage. They couldn't make it mandatory even if they wanted to. And sexual orientation is also deemed an illegitimate basis for lawmaking -- so the SSM law cannot be shaped to favor this or that sexual orientation and yet that is what the SSM campaign demands on behalf of homosexuality and gay identity.

SSM is a sexual type of relationship, obviously, SSMers will insist; but the lack of a legal requirement and the many exceptions that do not fit "most" SSMs stands against treating SSM as a sexual type of relationship, at law. The tradition of romance does not save their homosexual emphasis on same-sex sexual romance; pro-SSM guidance has rejected tradition as a legitimate basis for lawmaking on SSM.

In a future blogpost I will discuss how the SSM idea is segregative both in terms of sex and in terms of sexual orientation. For now I will close by observing that the defense of a social institution is inherently more challenging that the attempts to deconstruct it. To destroy coherency, and then to announce the gates are busted down, that's the strategy of the SSM campaign. Some of the more common attempts are immature repetitions of "why not?" and others are earnestly and radically reductionist. Given the many contradictions and splits within the pro-SSM side, it takes mountainous heaps of gay identity politics to cover up the cracks in the SSM idea itself. The SSM idea lacks coherency in the first place.

But if marriage, at law and in the culture, were to lose its coherency, what would replace it? Well, the SSM idea, shorn of its homosexual emphasis and its heavy reliance on gay identity politics, is simply a call for instituting provisions for designated beneficiaries. That is not defined by sexual orientation; it is not definitively sexual either; and it is far more just than bending the law to the demands of identity politics. And, not unsurprisingly, it is a form of nonmarriage that can exist, and has long-existed, concurrently with the special status accorded the marital type of relationship.

Yet, for the SSM campaign, what gives the SSM idea at least the superficial appearance of coherency is something extrinsic to the call for treating various types of nonmarital relationships with equal compassion and assistance in their own right. The assertion of the primacy of gay identity politics is the thing that glues together the incoherent bits and pieces that comprise the argumentation and rhetoric of SSMers in courtrooms, legislatures, and other public forums -- including those in the blogosphere.

A "non sexually integrated" person can become sexually integrated outside of marriage -- and without engaging in sexual behavior for that matter; but the marital type of relationship cannot remain "marriage" without integration of the sexes.

The SSM idea

When SSMers propose an alternative to the marriage idea, they also assume that they can appropriate the word, marriage, to name the alternative idea and, thus, they hope to make it impossible for society to talk about, think about, and show preference for the social institution of marriage.

They seek to appropriate all that arises from that foundational social institution; they do not show how their SSM idea has the merit for souch a blatant switch; they do not feel they need to justify the replacement of the marriage idea with their SSM idea. They just arbitarily claim the word, marriage, and its special status; but they do not offer the reasoning that would sustain that special status, much less justify the status in the first place.

They hope, I suppose that society will be hoodwinked long enough to lose the very thing that SSM would piggyback on. Once it is lost, the SSM idea will be all that is left to support the special status of marriage; and the SSM idea is just not up to the job.

When the ability to name something is taken away (in this case through the heavy hand of Government moved for the sake of identity politics), we lose the ability to even think about that now un-named thing.

This is a deliberate strategy of the SSM campaign, of course. Hence their desperate and angry and intolerant demand that they and only they control the language of the contest between the marriage idea and the SSM idea. Indeed, they balk at the very notion that there is an SSM idea. Apparently this same-sex type of relationship has always been a type of marriage and society did not know it until now.

The absurdity of the homosexual emphasis is plain as day. As absurd as that emphasis is, it is far more absurd to lose marriage to it. The hawkers of gay identity politics are not really looking at marriage for they are motivated by the gut-level desire to assert the supremacy of gay identity politics over all of society -- marriage being the current political and cultural vehicle they'd hijack.

My head hurts...

From Eatliver.com

The corruptive influence of SSMers on public discourse, part 1

In the comment section of a blogpost by Barry at FSB I have left the following remarks:

David Blankenhorn and Maggie Gallagher who have written extensively on the social institution of marriage have each used the supposed jargon, “the marriage idea”. It is one and the same as “the core meaning of the social institution of marriage,” as a fair reading of their work shows.

The SSM idea is simply the idea set against, and thus in conflict with, the very thing that David and Maggie have articulated. David has referred to the conflict of goods, for example.

Maligning me unfairly is not good form, Barry et al. Your blogposts and your comments are filled with jargon and so you expect to frame the discourse to suite yourselves. That, too, is poor form on your parts.

I made those remarks in response to the attempt of SSMers there, including Barry and Fannie (two pro-SSM bloggers guesting at FSB), to belittle the observations I made regarding the conflict between the marriage idea and the SSM idea.

Barry would brush me off with the following:

Chairm, FSB has a rule: “Please limit your comments to 3 per post to help foster conversation among all readers.” I habitually waive that rule for all comment-writers on my posts, but I don’t waive it for you.

In my experience, as we’ve seen on this thread, you tend to dominate the discussion to such a degree that it becomes difficult for other discussions to flourish. Furthermore, your comments are long and so full of opaque jargon that I worry your comments may discourage other people from participating.

Please do not post any further comments on this thread, and in the future please limit yourself to no more than three comments on any of my threads.

It is his comment section so he can do as he likes, of course. However, readers will note that there are pro-SSM commenters there who have already left more than three comments. La Lubu, Christopher, and Barry.

Jargon-filled? Dominating? Discouraging participation? The SSMers there, particularly Barry, might take a look in the mirror at themselves and reconsider their abuse of language, their reliance on misrepresentations, and their belittling and mocking attempts to dismiss the real argument that stands against their SSM argumentation.

Sometime ago, Barry wrote a "gotcha" type blogpost in which he brought up "cis-gender" theory as somehow debunking the writings of Robert George et al on marriage's core meaning. That blogpost of Barry's is a startling example of the jargon-filled, domineering, and dismissive approach that features prominently in SSM rhetoric, far and wide. He was answered with a proper dressing-down.

I'll look for the links to that exchange. No doubt Barry is most proud of his part in it. Heh.

The Marriage Idea, part 6

Gene Edward Veith writing in World Magazine, 2004:

Homosexual marriage has contributed to the dissolution of marriage as a significant institution in Scandinavian cultures primarily by contributing to the notion that marriage need have nothing to do with having children.

[...]

Today’s gay activists in Scandinavia, having gotten everything they wanted., now admit that their case for homosexual marriage—particularly that allowing gays to marry will encourage a monogamous lifestyle—was only a tactical argument. The goal, says Mr. Kurtz, citing two prominent gay thinkers, “was not marriage but social approval for homosexuality.”

They achieved that goal, but now there is little social approval for marriage.

The Marriage Idea, part 5

David Blankenhorn writing in First Things, 1997:

It would be hard to exaggerate the symbolic importance of this shift toward self-composed vows. The old vows were created by society and presented to the couple, signifying the goal of conforming the couple to marriage. The new vows are created by the couple and presented to society, signifying the goal of conforming marriage to the couple. The two approaches reflect strikingly divergent views of marriage and of reality itself.

In one view, the vow is prior to the couple. The vow exists on its own, exerting social and sacred authority that is independent of the couple. In this sense, the vow helps to create the couple. For in making the same promise that others before them have made, and that others after them will make, the couple vows on their wedding day to become accountable to an ideal of marriage that is outside of them and bigger than they are.

In the new view, the couple is prior to the promise. The vow is not an external reality, like gravity or the weather, but instead a subjective projection, deriving its meaning solely from the couple. From this perspective, the couple approaches the vow like a painter approaches a canvas. Rather than the vow creating the couple, the couple creates the vow. As a result, each marriage becomes unique, like a painting or a snowflake.

[...]

A reality in which the marriage is larger than the couple is replaced by a reality in which the couple is larger than the marriage.

Of course, many of the motivating ideas behind the new vows are understandable and even admirable. Couples want to avoid hypocrisy. They want the ceremony to be dramatic and personally meaningful. In part, the new vows represent a practical response to the growing phenomenon of mixed-tradition marriages.

But the essence of this change reflects a dramatic shrinking of our idea of marriage. With the new vows, the robust expectation of marital permanence shrinks to a frail, often unstated hope. Marriage as a vital communal institution shrinks to marriage as a purely private relationship. Marriage as something that defines me shrinks to something that I define.

Finally, as the idea of marriage gets weaker, so does the reality. In this sense, the new vows are important philosophical authorizations for our divorce culture. They are both minor causes and revealing results of a society in which marriage as an institution is decomposing before our eyes.

The Marriage Idea, part 4

Maggie Gallagher, Weekly Standard, 2003:

Marriage is the fundamental, cross-cultural institution for bridging the male-female divide so that children have loving, committed mothers and fathers. Marriage is inherently normative: It is about holding out a certain kind of relationship as a social ideal, especially when there are children involved.

Marriage is not simply an artifact of law; neither is it a mere delivery mechanism for a set of legal benefits that might as well be shared more broadly. The laws of marriage do not create marriage, but in societies ruled by law they help trace the boundaries and sustain the public meanings of marriage.

In other words, while individuals freely choose to enter marriage, society upholds the marriage option, formalizes its definition, and surrounds it with norms and reinforcements, so we can raise boys and girls who aspire to become the kind of men and women who can make successful marriages. Without this shared, public aspect, perpetuated generation after generation, marriage becomes what its critics say it is: a mere contract, a vessel with no particular content, one of a menu of sexual lifestyles, of no fundamental importance to anyone outside a given relationship.

The marriage idea is that children need mothers and fathers, that societies need babies, and that adults have an obligation to shape their sexual behavior so as to give their children stable families in which to grow up. Which view of marriage is true? We have seen what has happened in our communities where marriage norms have failed. What has happened is not a flowering of libertarian freedom, but a breakdown of social and civic order that can reach frightening proportions. When law and culture retreat from sustaining the marriage idea, individuals cannot create marriage on their own.

The Marriage Idea, part 3

From the US Supreme Court case, Meister v. Moore, 1877:

For, certainly, no legislation can be supposed more wholesome and necessary in the founding of a free, self-governing commonwealth, fit to take rank as one of the co-ordinate states of the Union, than that which seeks to establish it on the basis of the idea of the family, as consisting in and springing from the union for life of one man and one woman in the holy estate of matrimony; the sure foundation of all that is stable and noble in our civilization; the best guaranty of that reverent morality which is the source of all beneficent progress in social and political improvement.

The Marriage Idea, part 2

From a New York Post interview of David Blankenhorn, 2007:

QUESTION: What is your central thesis?

ANSWER: The primary purpose of marriage is to ensure that the male and female, whose physical union made the child, are the social parents for the child, are there for the child and there for each other.

In every case of children in same-sex couples, that child is by definition missing either a mother or a father. Gay marriage would require us to move away from that birthright - not just for the children in gay and lesbian households, but for all children.

Gay marriage moves away from marriage as a coherent institution that has public purposes. Marriage becomes a word that we give a private committed relationship - sex doesn't necessarily have anything to do with it, or procreation or bridging the male-female divide.

[...]

QUESTION: How should we approach use of third parties in procreation - surrogates and donors?

ANSWER: I think we should walk away.

We seem to be headed in the direction of the individual adult right to a child, which takes us very close to the notion of children as commodities. That couldn't be more different from the traditional religious notion of children as a gift; or a more direct violation of the principle that marriage is based on. Only adoption is consistent with the marriage idea and the idea of children's rights.

The Marriage Idea, part 1

Maggie Gallagher writing in the Louisina Law Review, 2002:

Every known human society has some form of marriage. In every complex society governed by law, marriage exists as a public legal act and not merely a private romantic declaration or religious rite.

As Kingsley Davis summed up the anthroplogical evidence: “Although the details of getting married—who chooses the mates, what are the ceremonies and exchanges, how old are the parties—vary from group to group, the principle of marriage is everywhere embodied in practice . . . .”

As a practically universal human idea, marriage is about regulating the reproduction of children, families, society. While marriage systems differ, marriage across societies is a public sexual union that creates kinship obligations and sharing of resources between men, women, and the children their sexual union may produce.

[...]

Yet a distinguished legal scholar in a major family law journal simply assumed that the functional equivalence of cohabitation and marriage was self-evident, once the cocoon of sentiment was stripped away by a hardheaded rationalist like himself—so deeply ingrained in certain circles has the idea become that marriage is no more than a piece of paper that delivers certain legal benefits.

In the larger sweep of history, despite significant countercurrents, this view of marriage-as-emotional intimacy is gaining ground. One view of marriage is that it is a personal right of the individual, created by the individual, for purposes which the individual alone defines. When two individuals happen to have desires and tastes for each other that coincide for a lifetime, that is beautiful. If not, it is simply no one else’s business.

[...]

Marriage as a universal human institution is, as I have stated, consistent with a variety of attitudes towards alternative intimate and sexual relations, from stigma to tolerance. But if we lose the idea that marriage is, at some basic level, about the reproduction of children and society, if our law rejects the presumptions that children need mothers and fathers, and that marriage is the most practical way to get them for children, then we cannot expect private tastes and opinions alone to sustain the marriage idea.

[...]

Marriage is an institution in crisis. Close to half of new marriages end in divorce. A third of our children are born out of wedlock. The majority of children, at current estimates, will experience a fatherless or motherless household. Making substantial progress in reversing the trend toward family fragmentation will require that law and society reject the deepest presumptions driving postmodern family as an ideological and legal construct: the idea that marriage is essentially a private choice created by and for the couple; that children do just fine in whatever family forms their parents choose to create; that babies are irrelevant to the public purposes of marriage.

[Footnotes removed.]

Winning which argument?

Here are a few of Barry's ill-considered thoughts from his latest blogpost at FSB.

There’s a big split between the intellectuals and non-intellectuals on the anti-equality side of the debate, but not so much on the pro-equality side.

And:

Well, I think it has a great deal to do with why the pro-equality side is winning this argument. The core argument against marriage equality isn’t the secular argument skillfully articulated by David and Elizabeth; it’s that God doesn’t want gay people getting married. That’s an argument that has less and less salience with each new generation of Americans.

* * *

How tiresome of Barry.

SSMers can't win the religious argument; and SSMers can't win the moral argument. That is lost ground for the likes of Barry. So he turns to the ground he thinks he can find his greatest advantage.

But the intellectual argument destroys the SSM argumentation quite readily. This explains Barry's exagerated attempt to marginalize the secular case against SSM.

I left comments with other observations there. I may add more here when I have some time.

What? It's not irreconcilable differences or incurable insanity?

Kris Humphries Seeks Annulment from Kim Kardashian, Claims 'Fraud'

"There's a clear conflict if one spouse is seeking a divorce, but the other wants an annulment," says family law attorney Scott Weston, who is not involved in the case. "A judge will have to decide which to allow, which could take many months."

"She always wanted an annulment but attorneys were against it so she's happy that both parties agree now," says the source.

In his Superior Court filing, Humphries marks the box reading "nullity of voidable marriage" and checks as the basis the box saying "fraud."