Why not Gay Marriage?

That’s the title of a booklet and DVD authored by Glenn Stanton and being offered by Dobson’s Focus on the Family group. The booklet promises 10 persuasive answers to the question.

Now since they want $15 for the DVD and booklet combination and I’m not about to provide any funds for Dobson, I had to go looking for a newspaper report on the thing to give me an idea what it says. The best I found was from the Baptist Press (BP) News in Nashville which, given it’s not exactly what I would call an unbiased party, gave a very neutral journalistic description of some of the questions and answers. Among the questions BP says are included in Stanton’s booklet are:

-- How will my "same-sex marriage" hurt your marriage?

Stanton answers "It hurts my marriage by teaching my children that their gender does not matter. As a father, I will never, never allow that to happen."

You will excuse me but I don’t see where gay marriage, which would be practiced by at most a small portion of the population, says any such thing. Even if it did, how could it possibly have any impact against the literally thousands of signals we get daily from parents, peers, siblings, teachers, role models, television, magazines and Hollywood that gender DOES matter.

Personally I think the reverse issue, that we’re teaching our children that gender matters way too much, is the bigger problem.

-- Could "gay marriage" lead to polygamy?

Stanton points out that some gays live in multiple partner relationships now and claims that if we accept gay marriage "There is no logical stopping point."

My reaction to the first point is so what? There were group sex communes in the 60’s and they didn’t bring the world to an end nor were they ever viewed by society as anything but an aberration. There will always be a tiny percentage of the population that will engage in what the rest of us consider a bizarre life style. Most of us learn to ignore it.

As for the “no logical stopping point” argument, this is the old slippery slope logical fallacy. The fact is there are stopping points. In a previous post I pointed out the biggest difference between gay marriage and other alternative life styles such as polygamy and group marriage. While homosexuality appears to be at least partially rooted in genetics and not in a free lifestyle choice, the alternatives are clearly lifestyle choices. I can therefore easily justify recognizing one while condemning the others.

-- Is it healthy to subject children to experimental families?

I assume by “experimental” families Stanton means other than one man one woman families. Well I have two news flashes for you bubby. First ALL families are experimental because no two families are identical.

You need proof of this? How about the fact that 50% of all heterosexual marriages end in divorce? I might also point out that evangelical Christian families have a higher divorce rate than the average. I’ve been married for 34 years and I’ve raised three children and you want to lecture me on family values?

The second news flash is while, as you properly point out, Social Science hasn’t had enough time to study the effects of growing up in a male – male or female – female parent household, it has had enough time to study the effects of growing up in a NO PARENT household and those effects are not terribly comforting. I find it hard to believe that being raised by two mommies or two daddies could possible be worse than being raised by no mommies and no daddies.

Often gay couples adopt, love and raise children that no one else will take, minority children, children with health problems or children born with drug addiction. You will excuse me again but I don’t see you Focus on the Family folks lining up to adopt these kids. I wouldn’t have the courage to do it myself but many gay couples do and I say more power to them. A loving home, even one that you think is aberrant, is a lot better than growing up in a state institution.

What the other questions may be I don’t know, but as for “persuasive,” only if you’re either already a believer or not too bright. Oh, wait a minute, aren’t they the same thing?

When I started this blog I promised myself not to use a certain word regardless of how deserved it might be. Therefore, all I have to say is, dear Mr. Stanton, go perform a reproductive function on yourself.