Views from the Abyss #47: Same-Sex Marriage—Prove Me Wrong

Q. Aware as I am that you have had to carefully research all sides of the debate by yourself, due to the impossibility of having a civil conversation, I can’t help but feel you’ve been a little harsh in your attitude towards same-sex marriage. What would it take to prove you wrong?

A. Harsh is not the word I would use. I’m starting to think I’m the only sane one left.

But I see what you’re getting at. And it’s for that reason that I would, as always, invite my loyal readers to come and prove me wrong. Bring facts!

And because I’m such a super helpful guy, here are two approaches you might want to take:

Method 1

First, you have to appreciate that I have not lived in the Western world since the last century, and I have also never lived in a time where somebody’s sexual orientation was stigmatised anywhere other than the playground (where literally anything is worthy fodder). When I left the West, it was well understood that marriage was between a man and a woman, everyone was perfectly happy with that, and there was no talk of changing it (none that was particularly well publicised leastways). For same-sex couples, there was such a thing as a civil union, which was able to open those last remaining doors that may otherwise be shut.

Fast forward two short decades, and to even suggest that marriage is between a man and a woman is to be name-called at best, physically attacked, stalked, and fired from your job at worst. 

Social attitudes do not naturally change to that extreme in that short period of time without a very specific catalyst, especially in light of the complete absence of any kind of public discourse. If you can tell me what that catalyst was, then it might cause me to update my thinking.

There are of course two other possible explanations that would require no catalyst. 

One is that support for same-sex marriage is nowhere near as strong as the more vocal corners of the internet would suggest. That would raise the question of why so many politicians are so keen to push through legislation, but it wouldn't be the first time they've misread the prevailing attitudes of the people they represent.

The other is that the whole Western world is undergoing a serious bout of mass hysteria.

I'm suspecting it's a bit of both, but if it's either to any extent, then you may have better luck convincing me with method 2 below.

Method 2

For as long as marriage has existed as a State sanctioned legal contract, it has been very specific about who is eligible—one consenting unmarried man and one consenting unmarried woman, both of sound mind. Most of those aspects are not unique to Western countries. You will need to first establish why marriage exists as a State sanctioned legal contract in the first place, then establish why this very specific criteria was outlined from the outset, before finally establishing what specifically has changed in the past few decades that renders this criteria no longer valid.

Beware the following pitfalls:

■ Persecution of Homosexuality

“Of course same-sex marriage wasn’t allowed in the past—homosexuality was thought of as some kind of abomination, and its practitioners were persecuted! Society no longer views homosexuality that way, so it makes sense that the marriage eligibility criteria should be updated to reflect this."

There are a number of issues with this approach.

First, it doesn’t take into account countries and cultures that do not have a history of persecuting homosexuality, but still have the same criteria for marriage eligibility.

Secondly, a country that has a history of persecuting homosexuality would especially not need to specify that criteria, if preventing same-sex marriages was the intent. The idea that same-sex couples could form a stable relationship was not mainstream thinking until fairly recently. Moreover, if a same-sex couple had attempted to marry during the persecution eras, they would most definitely not have been considered to be of sound mind.

Yet moreover still, homosexuality was legally persecuted—getting married to somebody of the same sex would have been a surefire way to get found out, arrested and subsequently jailed and/or neutered.

In short, there would be no reason to specifically exclude same-sex couples, so the reasoning behind specifying an opposite sex coupling is far more likely to be related to the nature of marriage itself.

■ No-Fault Divorce

“Since no-fault divorce has been a reality, divorce has skyrocketed, and the sanctity of matrimony is pretty much meaningless. At this stage, why not just let them marry?"

Ah yes, the old 'in for a penny, in for a pound’ appeal. The observation about no-fault divorce is certainly a strong argument for an ending of State regulation of private relationships, but the rather uncharitably paraphrased ‘It’s already broken, so it won’t matter if we break it a bit more’ approach as a matter of legal policy never works out well, and it’s a very weak line of reasoning. You would do yourself no favours bringing it to this discussion.

■ Hospital Entry

“Now that same-sex partnerships have become mainstream, there are situations where without same-sex marriage, somebody could be hospitalised, and their life-partner won’t be given access to their hospital bed. That doesn’t sound very fair to me."

It doesn’t sound very fair to me either. The hospitals should probably revise their access policies. Don’t they know what year it is?

So there we have it. Come at it then—prove me wrong!