Hi Max Atkinson,

Thanks for the kind words. They're truly humbling. It's great to see an author contributing to discussion threads too.

Chris C,

Just adding to your first para, it is Hegelian Dialectics and 'the end justifies the means'.

Dishonest and powerful.

Phanto
How can you gain peer acceptance by lying to a pollster? Those surveys are always anonymous, so your peers don’t know what you told them.

You say “the change in legislation will give them nothing they cannot already attain without such a change.” Well, it will give them the right to marry the person they love. That may be “nothing” to you, but as someone who has been married for 30 years, it is not “nothing” to me.

Dustin
The discrimination issue is not a straw man. If we passed a law saying that redheaded people could not marry, that would be discrimination, even though that would also be an eligibility matter embedded in the law, and even though it would only affect a “small number of people”. I accept that treating people different is not necessarily discrimination, and that not all cases of legal discrimination are unfair or wrong (the law treats children and adults differently for good reason). But I am arguing that, in this case, the law is both discriminatory and unfair.

And the definitional defence of traditional marriage is indeed circular. It is precisely the definition of marriage that is at issue. There’s a good discussion of this issue here:

http://volokh.com/posts/1130939774.shtml

My argument that marriage has already changed was directed at your contention that biological duality is the “essence” of marriage. Marriage is not an enduring constant, but a thing whose meaning and purpose changes with culture and context. The changes we have observed in our own culture, and the diversity of arrangements that have been deemed “marriage” in different times and societies (including same-sex marriages), demonstrate that it has no immutable “essence” (for the diversity of marriage practices, see Elizabeth Brake’s “Minimizing Marriage: Marriage, Morality, and the Law”).

You say marriage was never “intended to address” gay couples. Historically, marriage was a pragmatic alliance that secured the accumulation and orderly inheritance of property and gave a socially sanctioned context for sexual activity and child-raising (see Stephanie Coontz, Marriage, a History: How Love Conquered Marriage). Marriage is no longer necessary for any of these

“Well, it will give them the right to marry the person they love. That may be “nothing” to you, but as someone who has been married for 30 years, it is not “nothing” to me.”

Well that is a slap in the face to the millions of couples who are not married! It is also nothing to them. It is something to you though. Your love is better than their love just because you are married? I have seen some pretty ugly marriages and some truly beautiful relationships where the couple were content with their love and did not need a piece of paper to prove anything. It is the love that counts and not the certificate and who are you to say who experiences more love?

If being married adds so much to the relationship then how do you explain why so many people no longer get married? Are you somehow better than them? Are same-sex couples who want to marry better than those who do not or are they just more insecure? If love is the only thing that matters then there is no point in getting married at all. No one ever got married because they love each other – they already love each other before they got married. They do it because of social convention, to ‘’legitimise’ their children (another social convention), to get benefits from the government and those things you mentioned at the end of your post.

Society has moved on and the only people who want to get married are those too insecure to stand up to social convention or so insecure that they need some useless certificate to hold claim over their partner.

AJ Philips:

“Why should you or I care what motives drive their push for equality?”

Because you would want to be sure they have no ulterior or sinister motive that you are supporting.

They are not just pushing for equality – they are pushing for marriage equality. Only a fool would push for equality when it has no benefits attached to being equal. So presumably they see benefits in having marriage equality. Everyone interested in the debate assigns motives whether they are voiced openly or not. Opponents of same-sex marriage are often labelled ‘homophobic’ and so the use of that word implies that they have a motive and that it is a dislike or fear of homosexuals in general. The push for equality, as you have said, creates a better society so the motive is to work towards a better society.

No one argues that equality as a value is a good thing but equality only has value if it gives something to a group which they do not already possess. The question is what does government sanctioned marriage give to same-sex couples which they do not already possess?

There is no point in having something which gives you nothing in return except for a piece of paper which also give you nothing in return – it is just a piece of paper.

“ then equality is a reason in itself given its demonstrable benefits and lack of downfalls.”

So equality has to give demonstrable benefits. Equality is nothing without these benefits. Equality is just a social construct meaning the equal distribution of some rights but rights give you something – like the freedom to move from place to place or to attend the ballot box. What are the demonstrable benefits of a marriage certificate?

cont.

cont.

“...society as a whole accepts committed same-sex relationships as valid too.”

Why would same-sex couples need this or even want it? Why does it matter what society thinks of your personal relationship? It is no one else’s business. A great many opposite-sex and same-sex couples do not care what society thinks so they don’t bother to get married.

“That's a lot of authority....”

Why would I presume you speak for the whole movement? It sounds like you are being evasive.

“... I don't care if the government is involved in marriages or not.”

Don’t you think you should care if you are going into bat for same-sex couples? If governments should not be involved then it is a pointless pursuit. If they should be involved then why do you think that is? What else do you write about that you don’t really care about?

” But so long as they are, they should not discriminate against same-sex couples.”

If governments are involved and it is irrational for them to be so then you think it is logical for them to be involved in even more irrational behaviour by including same-sex couples?

“This whole 'What is the government doing in the marriage business anyway?' argument is disingenuous.”

It is hardly disingenuous if one of the parties that need to co-operate in order to bring about same-sex marriage is the government. Would you go to the dentist without checking if he has a right to be involved with your teeth?

“It only really became an issue when same-sex couples stated demanding equality.”

Well that might be true but it does not make it any less relevant. Government involvement in people’s lives should be always under question and if events occur that bring that into question more readily well that is ok.

“Wouldn't it look petulant to abolish any legal recognition of marriage simply because same-sex couples wanted the right to marry too?”

That would not be the reason they would do it. They would do it because it was no longer reasonable for them to do so.