There Are Good Secular Reasons to Disallow Same-Sex Marriage

Without further ado, let's break down Pro's argument. "If there is no way that marriage ought to be, then how can we say that any given marriage policy is just or unjust?" By judging its effect on the society. There's no need to presuppose an objective nature. This shows a recurring theme in my opponent's argument: humans are unimportant, or less important than institutions. Notice the question itself doesn't concern itself at all with the implications on people, but rather with the implications against marriage itself. Any justice that sacrifices the well being of humans for that of institutions is no justice at all. "How can restrictions on who can enter into a legal marriage be bad if marriage is just something we invent?" We invented drivers licenses. Is it that any restriction to drivers licenses cannot be bad? How about if we restrict one gender? That's bad because the consequences are bad. My opponent is unconcerned for the welfare of the country in his argument. ". . my opponent thinks that bans on interracial marriage were unjust -- but suppose everyone in a society were to agree that such bans were necessary." This builds a strawman. What I have argued is that society has a very large benefit to gain by having same-sex marriage, and that there are large detriments to banning it. The same would be true for interracial marriage and thus under both of our positions, banning interracial marriage would be wrong. My opponent hasn't argued against this point, but instead has tried to protect a concept at the expense of real people. My opponent has continually asserted what marriage is supposed to be, insisting on his own definition. Until now, I've resisted declaring a definition as I do believe marriage should be flexible given the needs of the society, but a definition can be given which allows for all the necessary flexibility. Marriage is "the state of being united to a person as husband or wife in a consensual and contractual relationship recognized by law". This is quite similar to my opponent's definition only it does not state that marriage has a special link to children; there is no reason why it must be. The State should incentivize childbearing\rearing, but nothing compels them to do it specifically with marriage. Just like my opponent has agreed that marriage can have other purposes beyond those things, marriage can still be an institution that does not have a necessary or intrinsic link to children while still being used towards that end. Just like drivers licenses are not "an institution with a special link to shipping commercial goods", it does not mean that they cannot be used to that end, or that the government can't incentivize people acquiring them for that purpose. "he has given no argument to the extent that there is no such thing as an objective nature to marriage." Actually, I argued that marriage has been a constantly evolving construct since its inception (therefore if it does have an objective nature, we have no way of knowing what it is), but even without that, the burden to call something an objective never-changing construct lies with my opponent, who has failed that burden spectacularly. Pro's entire argument rests upon his definition. Yet he gives us no reason to think that his definition is better or more accurate than any other. Since marriage has been changing and evolving since its inception, he can't appeal to tradition nor to any transcendent principle since this is a secular debate. Just like all of the other invented concepts we have, we have found numerous uses for them, and therefore an object nature to these constructs is unnecessary to use them. So I issue a challenge to my opponent: Why should we consider your definition of marriage to be the true objective nature of it, if we were to assume such a nature existed in the first place? What precludes it from being my definition? Since my definition does bear upon the public good moreso than Pro's, by his own logic my definition is perfectly acceptable. "the claim is that conjugal unions are naturally suited toward raising children" I did include that straight people can be terrible parents, but I also said that unions\relationships are not naturally suited to anything. What determines the nature of a relationship or marriage is what the participants decide to orient it towards. A straight couple can orient it towards traveling around the world, just the two of them, and a gay couple can orient marriage towards raising a family. Pro ignored this argument and built a strawman. "[Gay] marriage is unjust not because of any consequences that it may bring about, but because it promotes a false model of human sexuality. I don't care whether same-sex marriage harms anyone; I care about getting marriage right." My opponent has completely undermined any possible case he had in the above quote. He has exposed quite willingly that his arguments are not at all secular. He has said, consequences be damned, he will protect marriage. This is a secular debate, secular being "of or pertaining to worldly things or to things that are not regarded as religious, spiritual, or sacred" [1]. Yet, my opponent is treating marriage as anything but worldly, anything but sacred. None of his arguments, by his own admission, apply to the resolution of this debate, for a secular argument is concerned with this world and my opponent is not at concerned with it. "Same-sex marriage is unjust not because of any consequences that it may bring about, but because it promotes a false model of human sexuality." Homosexuality is not a false model of human sexuality, as it is a perfectly natural phenomenon that does not harm anyone [2][4]. Also, sexuality is really only "involvement in sexual activity" [3], one can no more have a false model of sexuality than you could have a false model of running: you are either running or you aren't. Even harmful sexuality is still true sexuality, though homosexuality isn't harmful. I'll tell you what is harmful, calling homosexuality a false model of human sexuality, or even connecting it in such a way [4]. Since I have shown that homosexuality and gay marriage does not promote a false model of human sexuality, again my opponent's own reasoning refutes his argument. His reason for calling gay marriage unjust just doesn't apply, and neither does his argument. "You cannot know that society is being harmed with respect to some institution without assuming some idea of what that institution is." We can define what marriage is and apply that definition without making it so the definition is eternal and unchanging. What makes a good football team today is not what made a good football team 80 years ago. Like society, the rules, culture, and environment changed. This argument is based on a misunderstanding of a very basic principle. "Harms are always defined in relation to a state of proper well-being. Hence we first need to know what marriage . ." Again when talking about harms, he speaks of harms to marriage. Not people, not society, not worldly things. If gay marriage truly harmed society, he would be able to actually point out where. He would be able to show a negative effect on our society. Fewer adoptions? Lower physical health? Heavier social burden for foster home care? Oh I'm sorry, those are the negative effects of not having same-sex marriage. My opponent has ignored my argument that a relationship's orientation is determined by the participants. My opponent has ignored my pointing out his argument is nothing more than tautologically stating heterosexual should be the only ones allowed to marry because they are heterosexuals. He has displayed his argument as not being concerned with the worldly; not a single argument he has made has anything to do with promoting a secular argument against gay marriage. The resolution hasn't even been attempted to be affirmed. [1] http://tinyurl.com... [2] http://tinyurl.com... [3] http://tinyurl.com... [4] http://tinyurl.com...