Is Marriage Government’s to Define?
California's Prop 8 under attack
With Monday’s 9th Circuit Court of Appeals decision to place a stay on a trial judge’s overruling of California’s Proposition 8, which banned same sex marriage, the social media has been tweeting debates that range from the intriguing to the patently absurd.
Here, hopefully, is an intriguing one.
We hear from the proponents of same-sex marriage that homosexuals are entitled to “equal rights”.
I agree.
I don’t believe there is any rational person among us who would seek to deny any individual the same protections under the law that are afforded any other citizen.
The idea of “gay rights”, however, has always baffled me. Inherent in the term is the idea that rights are awarded based on prerequisites. “Gay rights” makes no more sense to me than “blonde rights” and implies that heterosexuals have some sort of “special” rights that homosexuals do not share.
According to same sex-marriage advocates, the “right” of traditional marriage is being protected by the State while those who seek same-sex marriage are being denied that “right” and are thus discriminated against.
I don’t see it that way at all. Even with current laws that specifically deny same-sex marriage, there is not one right being granted a heterosexual that a homosexual does not also possess.
To wit:
A male can marry a female. It doesn’t matter if that male is homosexual or heterosexual; the same right to marry a female exists for both individuals. No special right is being granted the heterosexual that the homosexual does not also share.
The homosexual will claim that he can’t marry the person (another male) that he loves and wants to marry and is therefore being discriminated against. The problem here is that the homosexual is left attempting to define a “want” as a “right”.
While having the same right to marry a female as a heterosexual male, the homosexual is now demanding his “want” to marry another male, something that his heterosexual counterpart can also not currently do.
Thankfully, we do not place the burden on ourselves of guaranteeing other people’s wants. Society would crumble if it did. I “want” a nice yacht and a BMW, but it is by no means my “right” to have them.
To the contrary of the denied right argument, new so-called “hate crimes” legislation actually begins to grant special protections and preferred class status to many minority groups, including homosexuals, in excess of what their majority counterparts are awarded. Odd how we don’t find proponents of gay marriage fighting “hate crimes” laws based on the same argument of equal protection under the law that they mistakenly apply to marriage law.
I digress.
To be clear, I support a government that establishes protections for voluntary contracts entered into by two consenting adults. If two men or two women desire to legally share in each others fortune or debt, grant medical decision making power to each other, or establish any other coequal status amongst themselves, I have no problem whatsoever with this. Contract protection is indeed one of the few proper functions of government. The act of sexual intercourse should also not be regulated against when it is being carried out by two consenting adults.
Marriage, however, has a standing definition that was around long before the United States Government. It neither depends on the government for legitimacy nor should acquiesce to a popular movement to change its definition. It is not government’s to define.
It is this definition that same-sex marriage proponents are attempting to change, and this is where I believe the debate comes to its core.
On a fundamental level, the proponents of same-sex marriage believe the term “marriage” is left to government to define. Those in opposition mostly believe that marriage is a social contract between a man, a woman, and God. Government definition and intrusion need not apply.
That is what is at play here.
Those that believe marriage is a religious edict take offense to a government that seeks to change its definition.
In a manner of speaking, it would almost be a violation of the First Amendment for government to do so.
An equivalent would be government attempting to rename Hanukkah because the country’s citizens simply thought they liked another definition better. Laughable, right? Yet that is essentially what the proponents of gay marriage are fighting for.
My solution offered to homosexuals?
Stop rocking the boat and demanding that religion itself change its definitions just for you. What have you accomplished other than peeving off a large number of people and possibly making actual discrimination, which sadly does exist on a person to person level, a larger problem?
Come up with your own word to describe the legal union of a same-sex couple. Call it whatever you want. Take pride in it!
I will defend your right to establish whatever government guaranteed contract that you want, with whomever you want. It would have all the legal equivalency as a marriage contract as far as I’m concerned, it simply wouldn’t share the vocabulary.
Relieve the stress of attempting to change an entire faith’s definition by just coming up with your own word. Then feel absolutely free to take exception when Tom and Suzy want to muddy the waters by stealing your word and it’s meaning.
Seems fair to me.
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