"Gay" marriage is a very thick, thin edge of the wedge and goes to prove that Government should get out of it. An age old tradition has power because it is age old. Fiddle with it and it burns.

It is no use defining it as you will oppress someone. The Government can set up an adequate contractual environment and let the parties themselves sort out the ceremony. I can see Traditional marriage, Gay marriages, Group marriages (polyandrous, polygyny, poly androus/gyny), varieties with rubber dolls, animals and whatever. Why care.

Yet more bigotry on display, you can't hide it, Christian religious world view is on display here nothing else. Even the hate of love is displayed, which is the main driver for fundies.

Many societies in the world have very different marriage rules then us. Many have very different family values then us. Those societies function pretty well, certainly to the point were we can in no way wage our moral finger at them. Not that that would stop your average foam at the mouth Christian.

All we have to do is look at our closest relative in the animals kingdom to get an idea of how we lived for the majority of time we have been around. Marriage is a modern construct that can be what ever we want it to be.

The Gay can do what they like, except play with the word marriage. If the gay win that word they will be the only ones holding the title.

The usual control freaks posting here really do need to get a life! One of their own!

Those who would compel another (who gave you the right) to live an endlessly unhappy lonely life; or worse, cause them to prematurely end it, purely out of misguided misconceptions of pulpit pounding moralists; and or, a stone age belief system, are the real villains here; and need to get out more; and focus on living life as their conscience or the man or woman in the mirror dictates!

That's how you live a moral life!

What other folks do is not up to you!

Even if someone appointed you a moral arbiter in the house of Lords, Your worship!

No one is asking anyone else to go against their fundamental nature; or belief system, except perhaps the author and those who agree with him or her?

If you want to have a plebiscite to decide this issue for once and all time?

BRING IT ON!
Rhrosty.

This is a fine article, well argued.

The author’s case takes some convoluted twists, but is essentially a rehash of the familiar circular argument, that gays should not marry because marriage is between a man and a woman. Eric is at least honest in recognising that marriage in modern western societies no longer works as it used to:

- It is possible to have sex without having kids. It is even possible to have kids without having sex.

- It is possible to raise children successfully without being married, and it is possible to have a successful marriage without raising children.

- Divorce and single parenthood are no longer necessarily causes of social stigmatisation and poverty.

- Gay families are already raising children. Allowing gay couples to marry will not alter this.

Eric may lament changes in the nature of marriage and families, and the “cult of love”, but that horse has well and truly bolted. And paradoxically, if he’s right then there can be no remaining reason for excluding gays from modern marriage, even if there was a case for the paradigm of marriage that Eric laments.

Hi Cobber

Please don’t assume that Christians are automatically against same-sex marriage. Recent surveys show a majority of Christians favour it, though not by as large a majority as the rest of the population:

http://www.smh.com.au/comment/even-among-christians-there-is-strong-support-for-samesex-marriage-20150604-ghh2v

The current situation has nothing whatsoever to do with the "death of 'God'".
Indeed most/all of the really dangerous people in todays world are advocates of back-to-the-past traditional religiosity. Witness the troubles caused all over the world by right-wing traditionalist advocates of Christian-ism, Juda-ism,and Islam-ism.
Such traditional religiosity was of course always defined by those who either won the culture wars of their time and place, and/or had the political power to define and control via either religious or secular law the acceptable norms of behavior in their time and place.

Laws which outlawed either Protestantism or Catholicism in various times and places. Laws such as those against the absurd concepts of "blasphemy" and "heresy". Laws against apostasy. Laws which called for the imprisonment and (even) execution of homosexuals. Laws in some places in the USA where the only acceptable method of sexual intercourse was the "missionary position". Laws which made it a crime punishable by death for miscegenation -witness the Ku Klux Klan. Laws which made it compulsory for everyone to pay taxes which were then given to the "official" state religion(s).

Meanwhile, although her work applies specifically to the USA the work of Stephanie Coontz via her books Marriage A History; The Way We Never Were; and The Way We Really Are, take the wind out of the sails of the back-to-the-past traditionalists.

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Dear Eric (the author),

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You wrote:

« … over the past two hundred years or so in western countries, "love" has become the preferred mechanism for sorting men and women into couples in preparation for marriage … But before that, things were quite different … As a social institution, the purpose of marriage was to provide the nucleus of the family. »

“Nucleus of the family” ? Coming from a declared “historian” such as yourself, that is a euphemism, my dear Eric. Quoting Stephanie Coontz, an historian on marriage, the BBC indicates :

[ For the Anglo-Saxons and Britain's early tribal groups, marriage was all about relationships - just not in the modern sense. The Anglo-Saxons saw marriage as a strategic tool to establish diplomatic and trade ties …

This all changed with the differentiation of wealth. Parents were no longer content to marry their children off to just "anyone in a neighbouring group". They wanted to marry them to somebody as least as wealthy and powerful as themselves, Coontz says. "That's the period when marriage shifts and becomes a centre for intrigue and betrayal."

During the 11th Century, marriage was about securing an economic or political advantage. The wishes of the married couple - much less their consent - were of little importance. The bride, particularly, was assumed to bow to her father's wishes and the marriage arrangements made on her behalf. ]

Wikipedia indicates :

[ Historically, in most cultures, married women had very few rights of their own, being considered, along with the family's children, the property of the husband; as such, they could not own or inherit property, or represent themselves legally.

"Coverture" was a legal doctrine whereby, upon marriage, a woman's legal rights and obligations were subsumed by those of her husband, in accordance with the wife's legal status of “feme covert”. An unmarried woman, a “feme sole”, had the right to own property and make contracts in her own name. ]

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Might I add that it is a common feature in the animal kingdom for males to compete for the right of access to females for mating purposes.

The instauration of marriage civilised this process.

Political rulers used marriage to create strategic alliances and consolidate their political power.

The aristocracy, the elite, the wealthy and other privileged classes used it, and continue to do so, in order to avoid natural dispersion and depletion of their earthly estates and privileges throughout succeeding generations.

The clergy seized on the institution of marriage as a means of increasing their influence and control over their "flock" of submissive "sheep" and its future progeny, thus assuring the prosperity and perpetuity of their religions.

As for marriage based on love, allow me to observe :

Love, defined as "unconditional selflessness" (Jeremy Griffith) or "to will the good of another" (Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas), is rarely, if ever, a motivation for marriage. What most people mistakenly call "love" is usually some form of "emotional gratification and/or sexual attachment, attraction, admiration, devotion, sense of achievement or well-being, harmony, friendship, personal pride or form of narcissism, a passing fancy, an instinctive impulse, or some other self-serving urge...".

Few are capable of true love or even aware of the correct meaning of the word. Love and marriage are , of course, totally independent of each other:

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=14890#256883

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