Does Same-Sex Marriage Damage Culture?

Or, does it damage anyone else’s marriage? I’ve often heard that intelligent, liberal people do not think government should intervene to maintain any of the old norms of marriage—just let people marry as they see fit. If same-sex couples want to live together in a marriage relationship, what difference does that make to me?

But…government does claim to have an interest in defining (or un-defining) marriage.  Advocates for same-sex marriage use the 14^th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution (the equal protection amendment) to justify a marriage redefinition. So, why, we must ask, does and should government take such an interest in defining the marriage relationship. There are several reasons. On the face of it, there seems to be some rationale for redefining the marriage relationship because of the 14^th Amendment; but we need to take a closer look at this social move.

Could it be that government is interested in who loves whom or to whom one person is attracted. That seems unlikely. After all, people can live together and cooperate in any way they wish in America. And…nobody goes around snooping into bedrooms to see what kind of sex is being practiced. I do not believe that government is interested in advocating any kind of romantic norm. The government’s job should be to assure everyone that under the 14^th Amendment that all MARRIED people have equal protection under the law.

The question under consideration is first of all, what is marriage? If the thing the courts are protecting is not marriage, at all, then it should not be calling it marriage and imposing some arbitrary privilege or obligation on that entity. I will argue that same-sex hook-ups are not marriages at all, regardless of the fact that the members of the dyads might love one another.

I must digress for a moment and talk about a closely related idea; below, I will get back to the central idea of this essay. For now, let us discuss the outcomes of single parent families. At one point in America, virtually every child was given the gift of a married mother and father. Today, 40 percent of all Americans, including 50 percent of Hispanics, and 70 percent of African Americans are born to single moms—and the consequences for those children are quite serious. Single parenting is dangerous to kids and it is damaging to society.  

President Obama has stated: “We know the statistics: that children who grow up without a father are five times more likely to live in poverty and commit crime, nine times more likely to drop out of school, and twenty times more likely to end up in prison. They are more likely to have behavioral problems or run away from home, or become teenage parents themselves. And the foundations of our community are weaker because of it.” As the marriage culture collapses, child poverty rises. Crime rises. Social mobility decreases. And welfare spending—which bankrupts so many states and the federal government—takes off. These are the reasons that governments should be interested in the state of marriage in America.

When a baby is born, the mother almost always remains nearby; but in present-day America, fathers are not nearly so much of a permanent fixture—they disappear from the scene. This leaves little boys bereft of a role model to show them how to constructively express their aggressive instincts while avoiding doing actual damage to others. Thus…boys grow up and perpetrate violence in society.

What government should be doing, it seems to me, is protecting our society from the malignant effects of the incomplete homes caused by single parenting situations.

So now…let’s look at what marriage is. Marriage has several characteristics: monogamy/exclusivity, permanency, male/female complementarity, and biological reproductivity. The last quality is obvious to all and needs no further discussion. Same sex couples cannot reproduce children.

Monogamy/exclusivity has been a front page quality of marriage since the beginning of mankind. Married people do not like to have their spouse philandering around with outside sex contacts. But studies in the Netherlands have shown that “committed” homosexual couples have an average of eight sexual partners (outside of the relationship) per year. This is much more outside sex activity than is seen in heterosexual marriage relationships.

Likewise, same-sex marriages do not exhibit permanency of relationship. A high percentage of married couples remain married for up to 20 years or longer; many, for the rest of their lifetime. On the other hand, the above-mentioned study in the Netherlands showed that the average duration of a homosexual relationship to be 1½ years.

Complementarity in marriage between a man and a woman is obvious. However, in same-sex marriages, constructive fathers are often absent. Two mothers cannot show little boys how to grow up as constructive adult men.

There are social costs of redefining marriage to include same-sex couples. This is like adjudicating fist fights in the street and calling them “discussions,” then justifying them by calling them “freedom of speech,” thus, protecting persons’ rights to fist fights under the 1^st Amendment—freedom of speech. Of course, they are not speech, at all—they are something entirely different. Likewise, same-sex marriage is not marriage, either. I don’t know exactly what to call same-sex marriage, but that entity does not manifest the essential characteristics of marriage outlined above. Same-sex marriage is not marriage, and government has no business calling it such.

Same-sex “marriages” cannot be considered to be normal marriages—no matter what our politically correct government says. True marriage has certain qualities outlined above; and anything less cannot be considered to be a true marriage. Calling something a marriage that is not a true marriage damages real marriages; and they fail to protect and nurture children.

Anyone wanting to learn more about the farce government is perpetrating on the American people with its defense of supposed “same-sex marriage” should read the book, What is Marriage? Man and Woman: A Defense by Ryan T. Anderson.