an old bit about gay marriage

Contention one:

Marriage, from the perspective of government, is a contract between adults, providing for stability within a home. marriage did not begin as a union based on love or even mutual individual benefit; it began as parents selling off their children for the mutual benefit of 2 families, 2 villages, 2 empires, etc. there is no difference here, outside an invented morality which came later, as to who those entering said marriage are, man and woman, man and man, woman and woman. in fact, the chief advance, arguably, we have made in regards to marriage is not in pretending it has some larger (be it moral, spiritual or what have you) meaning, but in taking children out of the picture; that is, we don't arrange (for the most part, anyway) for those too young to make such choices for themselves to be stuck in binding relationships that will last them the rest of their lives. Taking morality out of the picture, we have marriage as a simple contract, but this one affecting the domestic sphere instead of the commercial (or the earlier, pre-capitalist incarnation thereof) or political

Contention two:

It makes no difference to the government, objectively speaking, who is married to whom, as long as the union provides underlying stability for the greater society or, more specifically a foundation for the raising of children capable of participating in our society. Individuals, taken without gender or sexuality, are mere numbers to the government, data without inherent value or meaning. Equality in marriage (or outside marriage, in all interactions or contracts) serves to enable more stability, which is what the government wants. a more stable society has more opportunity for progress elsewhere. Less adherence to antiquated notions of morality that themselves only replaced even more antiquated notions detracts from a sense of modernity in American society.

Contention three:

Polygamy, then, must even be allowed, just as business contracts are allowed between more than two individuals, so long as the resulting marriage creates a stable home. Unfortunately, most of the multiple marriages that do happen in this country—because it is illegal and irregular—arise out of a religiously styled, paternalistic subset of our culture. allowing for actual multiple marriages—which would certainly not suddenly result in everyone having one--would put more potential stability in the raising of children and would help rid us of the current version you get with polygamist wives gaming the system for welfare while the men hoard over them and their children like lords over property.

Contention four:

Our 2-person marriage ideal is similar, in this country anyway, to our 2-party political system. Two parents of 2 genders may lead to a potential stability in stagnation, just as constant back and forth between Liberals and Conservatives leads to a relatively stable society stuck in old ways of thinking. What we don't get is variety. What we don't get is new ideas, new ways to raise children, or practice politics, ways that take us outside the box. So, this relatively young, upstart of a country is already old and set in its ways, especially when it can act (or allow action) in direct opposition to the rights of its citizens.

Contention five:

We are stuck on gay marriage when a greater thing to turn against, if we value stability and marriage so much, is bad marriages. An abusive husband is a greater affront to marriage than any homosexual ever has been. The divorce rate is a greater affront than the separate-but-equal treatment regarding gay marriage and civil unions. As decided in Brown v Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, separate-but-equal is "inherently unequal."

What we can hope is that such blatant bigotry in multiple states (31 now, if I recall correctly), even in the supposedly progressive California, will be the spark to ignite a larger debate on the subject, and prop 8 and the repeal in Maine and all the others will be struck down finally by the Supreme Court as the backward, and all too subjective yearnings of a populace that should know better. a mandate for bigotry does not cause it to cease being bigotry. It simply provides if not an official stamp of approval, then evidence of a horribly blind eye.

The problem is the presumption that the religious people own "marriage." marriage predates them and exists outside of them (particularly in its use as metaphor for the combination of various things). Politically speaking, it would seem easier to bring one smaller group forward than move one larger group backward. That is, it is a less drastic step to allow homosexuals to participate in marriage than to ask the religious people to have to move (arguably) backward to have civil unions only. If they want to invent some new religious term for their union, they are welcome to it, but marriage was not created for religious reasons and does not belong to them.

Outside of the terminology, though, the notion is a sound one. If marriage is to be a legally recognized contract, which it is, then it should be the same sort of contract for everyone entering into such a contract.