NOTE: I originally wrote most of this article more than a year ago, but never got around to completing and publishing it. Now that gay marriage is in the news, both in Maryland and nationwide due to President Obama's "flip-flop-flip" on the issue, I decided to revisit and complete this. It is of necessity long, because I am trying to address the issue as comprehensively as possible and respond to many of the claims made by gay marriage advocates. I have two main goals in writing this. The first goal relates to conservatives and religious people who are uncomfortable with gay marriage but may not be able to articulate why and may be reluctant to take a stand. I hope this article will help them to realize that there are good public policy reasons to keep marriage between a man and a woman and encourage them not to back off in the face of accusations of bigotry from the left. The second goal is to convince any supporters of gay marriage who may read this that there are good reasons for our opposition to gay marriage and that we are motivated not by hatred or the desire to deny gay people basic civil rights, but by our desire to preserve an institution that benefits children and society and to protect religious liberty. I don't necessarily think that this article will change the mind of someone who believes strongly in gay marriage, but I think if that person is honest and fair-minded it will convince him or her that there is a clear case against gay marriage that is not based on bigotry and hatred.
The other day, I glanced at a letter on my dining room table from my state delegate. He was talking about all the supposed "accomplishments" of the 2011 session of the Maryland legislature. One of the items he mentioned was the issue of same-sex marriage. Even though same-sex marriage narrowly failed to pass the House of Delegates this year, my delegate considered it a great triumph for equality that the legislation came so close to becoming law. He even included a quote from Martin Luther King, Jr.: "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice."
This got me thinking about how thoroughly social conservatives are losing the battle over marriage in this country. Everyone knows that the key to winning an argument is framing the debate in terms favorable to your position. No matter how strong a case you may have, it is next to impossible to win an argument when you are fighting on your opponent's turf. In this case, gay rights activists have succeeded in convincing a sizable percentage of the American population that gay marriage is a fundamental human and civil right guaranteed by the Constitution, and to ban it is to deny equality to millions of Americans. In almost any debate on this topic nowadays, the onus is on defenders of traditional marriage to prove that they are not the hate-filled, discrimination-loving bigots that they are assumed by default to be. Indeed, most of the time the media calls the issue a debate over "marriage equality." Talk about loaded definitions! Obviously, no one wants to get stuck on the side of inequality, which explains why support for traditional marriage from many conservative quarters has been tepid at best.
I think it's important to take a step back and think about the actual institution of marriage -- what it is, why it exists, why it is important to society. In my view, understanding these points is a critical first step to discussing whether changes are needed in the definition of marriage. Instead of allowing our opponents to pick the battleground, we have to redirect the focus back to these critical questions.
The other day, I glanced at a letter on my dining room table from my state delegate. He was talking about all the supposed "accomplishments" of the 2011 session of the Maryland legislature. One of the items he mentioned was the issue of same-sex marriage. Even though same-sex marriage narrowly failed to pass the House of Delegates this year, my delegate considered it a great triumph for equality that the legislation came so close to becoming law. He even included a quote from Martin Luther King, Jr.: "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice."
This got me thinking about how thoroughly social conservatives are losing the battle over marriage in this country. Everyone knows that the key to winning an argument is framing the debate in terms favorable to your position. No matter how strong a case you may have, it is next to impossible to win an argument when you are fighting on your opponent's turf. In this case, gay rights activists have succeeded in convincing a sizable percentage of the American population that gay marriage is a fundamental human and civil right guaranteed by the Constitution, and to ban it is to deny equality to millions of Americans. In almost any debate on this topic nowadays, the onus is on defenders of traditional marriage to prove that they are not the hate-filled, discrimination-loving bigots that they are assumed by default to be. Indeed, most of the time the media calls the issue a debate over "marriage equality." Talk about loaded definitions! Obviously, no one wants to get stuck on the side of inequality, which explains why support for traditional marriage from many conservative quarters has been tepid at best.
I think it's important to take a step back and think about the actual institution of marriage -- what it is, why it exists, why it is important to society. In my view, understanding these points is a critical first step to discussing whether changes are needed in the definition of marriage. Instead of allowing our opponents to pick the battleground, we have to redirect the focus back to these critical questions.
