Gay marriage

Hello everyone. In this outing I will show CON’s case to be a failure.[1] I will then fend off his objections to my own remarks. Procreation and the purpose of marriage (CON C1) CON says the state has an interest in the marriage for the ends of procreation and (as homosexuals can’t procreate), it has no motive to license gay marriage. Three refutations: 1: The state isn’t interested in marriage for the sake of procreation. If the state was interested in ensuring procreation or whatever, it should act there, and not on something that maybe-maybe-not leads to it. Further, state’s behaviour to marriage makes no sense on ‘ensuring procreation’ grounds. The state has no interest in whether the couple has sex – you can remain in a celibate marriage; it has no interest in fertility – those provably sterile can marry; and it has no interest in children – people who will always use contraception can marry. Despite the state being happy to marry all of these sorts of unprocreating couples, CON (and sundry conservative commentators) urge that it shouldn’t marry gay couple - because they can’t procreate. Absurd! 2: Gay marriage won’t harm straight procreation. Even if the state’s interest was in procreation, it would need to be shown that licensing homosexual marriages will harm this interest. The opinion of a conservative judge is inadequate to demonstrate a causal relationship between gay marriage and reduced fertility.[2] 3: Marriage is not solely about procreation. In an already crowded planet, with many children in care, the state should have an interest in good child care, not procreation. Gay marriage will help, not hinder, that. Marriage does not follow some narrowly tailored interest in procreation. It is a cluster of legal concerns that enshrine family relationships, whether an archetypal nuclear family or just a couple. Homosexual couples (with or without adopted children) warrant parallel legal recognition. I aver gay marriage angers conservatives not because of their pretended fears about the collapse of heterosexual procreation, but because marriage signals esteem and approbation towards couples they prefer to despise and marginalize. They are wrong (factual sense) on these pretended concerns, and wrong (moral sense) on their real motivations and animus. Gays get AIDS so they shouldn’t get gay marriage (CON C2) A case study of such animus is manifest in CON’s second claim. The argument is transparently beneath the contempt of reason, and this is best demonstrated by stating it fully: 1) MSM are more likely to get HIV. (factual premise) 2) People who get HIV are generally immoral, undesirable, or otherwise dirty. (The ‘HIV stigma’ premise) 3) Gay men are generally immoral, undesirable, or otherwise dirty. (From (1), (2) and arrant over-generalization – not all MSM are gay, and most gay men don’t have HIV.) 4) People who are generally immoral, undesirable, or otherwise dirty don’t deserve to have their marriages legally recognised. (The ‘marriage as a token of moral approval premise’)[3] 5) Homosexuals should not have their marriages legally recognized. (From (3), (4) and more over-generalization – lifetime risk of STIs, including HIV is lower for lesbian women than heterosexual women). What about polygamy? (CON C3) CON notes that often movements can spread (gun control, gay marriage). This has no bearing on the argument – if indeed gay marriage is a good idea, we should want it to spread widely. CON then talks about polygamy. I can’t see anything wrong with consensual polyamorous relationships (polygamy or polyandry, or n man + m woman), so I’m happy for their relationships to be legally recognised (I’d speculate that some of the legal artifice might not translate well into many-partner settings, but that is only a motive to provide an appropriate parallel legal structure that does the trick). As slippery slopes only work if you can show what you’re sliding to is bad, this argument has no merit.[4] Economy costs/benefits (CON C4, My fifth reason, and CON R3) CON thinks that legalizing gay marriage will cost money. He supports his case by remarks by a couple of law-makers and some back of the envelope calculations. I think legalizing gay marriage will gain money, and quoted the Congressional Budget Office’s report on this issue. I aver my evidential support is better than CON’s. CON might find the bit on income revenues (gay couples will be net contributors over the next 10 years as various bits of law which stop a ‘marriage penalty’ of increased tax burden fall out of the statute books), and outlays (as many of these programs look at spouses income, unmarried gay couples who became married would often cease to qualify). Equal protection under the law (my first reason) CON argues no one is denied power under current laws. This can’t be right. Homosexuals are denied the power to marry someone they love. ‘Only’ being a partner, and not married has all manner of other effects with inheritance, hospital visitation, and more. Plainly these relationships suffer a legal penality vis-à-vis heterosexual ones, and such penalization must be justified or corrected. Satisfying the desires of homosexuals (my second reason) CON makes an inapposite complaint about this reason implies a right to gay marriage. That is false: I might not have a right to sweeties, but I quite like them, and I am made happier with them being provided.[5] Welfare (my third reason) CON responds to the welfare points by saying how talking about cohabitation rights and civil unions. This is just inapposite – such recognition is patchy (these things aren’t throughout the US) and generally inferior in degree of legal benefit to marriage, and so there remains a welfare penalty (supporting authorities given above are explicit in recommending marriage as beneficial to homosexual welfare, and not civil unions etc.) CON has not engaged with my evidence that gay marriage will improve gay welfare. Esteem (my fourth reason) PRO’s ‘you’re confusing homophobia with SSM bans’ applies to my third reason (and it’s not me linking them, rather the data showing an increase in mood disorders and other mental illness in those areas with gay marriage bans after those bans happened.) PRO’s actual objection is again inapposite. If legislation can make the well being of a traditionally harmed minority better, and to ‘make up for’ past outrages, then that is an excellent pro tanto reason for doing it, and maybe even sufficient in the absence of countervailing costs.[6] Drug legalization has nothing to do with anything. The story so far CONs arguments against gay marriage have either been deeply flawed (procreation, slippery slope), contradicted by reliable authority (economy), or paroxysms of naked prejudice (HIV). In contrast, my reasons are cogent and supported by good data, and CONs replies are confused and non-responsive. [1] Thanks to CON for pointing out that he was CON, and not PRO. Mea culpa! [2] I’d be pretty unsurprised if it turned out gay marriage countries/states showed lower fertility than those that banned it, but that’s because gay marriage countries/states tend to be wealthier and healthier, and that correlates with being pro gay marriage. [3] Note with amusement how this directly contradicts CON’s C1 about licensing of marriage being about procreation. [4] See this nice article on the practical ethics blog of Oxford talking about polygamy: http://blog.practicalethics.ox.ac.uk... [5] Con’s back up for his inapposite complaint is that law recognises no such right. But obviously the terms of the debate are normative – should there be gay marriage, not whether or not there is -, so he needs to show there should be no such right. [6] Of course, other reasons might outweigh this. Like I could have said ‘the states interest in procreation isn’t good enough to ban same sex marriage, for the states interest and equality and dignity should trump it.’ Happily, I didn’t need to, as this reason has no merit.