Real conservatives support gay marriage

[bikinisquad3000.livejournal.com]

As you'd expect, the recent passing of gay marriage in New York caused a flurry of op-eds and analyses. For my money few were as interesting as this one, in which the author methodically lays out the argument that opposing it is, in fact, anti-conservative.

The government doesn't grant us rights; they aren't a gift of the state. The people grant the state enough power to circumscribe rights necessary to a functioning society, no more.

Marriage is a bundle of rights - rights of inheritance, visitation, adoption, and other legal benefits. It's a contract, and opponents of SSM have yet to present a coherent, compelling argument to deny those contractual rights to same-sex couples. It would therefore be a profound violation of conservative and constitutional principles to deny them.

Marriage is also a religious sacrament, and there's the problem. Opposition to SSM is almost entirely religious. Homosexuality is offensive to many religious people, and by extension they consider it offensive to God.

And it may be. Leaders of my own church consider homosexual behavior to be a grievous sin, and I won't argue with them on that point. I'd point out, however, that it would be appropriate to deny same-sex couples the right to marry in our churches and temples. It would be inappropriate to make civil contracts contingent on religious codes of conduct.

Religious rites are the province of God; contracts are the province of Caesar. Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and unto God the things that are God's.

If we wish to ensure that marriage remain a holy sacrament, we should perform marriages without asking for the blessings of Caesar. Let the state create contractual unions between couples. Let the church bind them in holy matrimony. Don't require churches to recognize contracts as holy, and don't require the state to recognize sacraments as contracts.

My opinion of this piece is probably not a horribly worthwhile one to hear, simply because I'm too close to the issue and it's already beyond debate from my point of view. I'm not a conservative, and I am about as directly affected by this law as humanly possible—already engaged, even. Obviously I'm fully in favor of it, and any argument from any perspective that I see in favor of it (that makes sense to me) I will be able to read and understand, but I will not know what it's like to read it as someone who hasn't already completely made up their mind on the issue, or who would be more convinced by a legal/constitutional argument than anything else. I'm not a disinterested third party or the target audience for this op-ed, in other words, and not in the optimal position to analyze arguments for it that approach the issue from such a different angle than mine (arguments against it are another matter). Because of that, I'm very interested to hear others' thoughts on this.


P.S. I'd also urge you to read the comments over there, as many arguments against gay marriage are presented and then rebutted by the author.

P.P.S. I do know a common response to something like this would be "what about civil unions, then," so might as well nip that in the bud in the OP. Personally? I know not everyone in my position would agree because of the principle, but if it came down to it I'd care more about the real-life effects than the word, so fine, whatever works. Unfortunately they don't work. Civil union laws are a compromise based on an importance attached to the word "marriage," but as it turns out that's the very thing that prevents them from working. They're not called "marriage," so even if they grant the same rights on paper (which is rarer than you'd think), in real life people tend either to be confused by them, to not to take them seriously, or both. The results range from annoying to genuinely tragic, with an increased burden on the courts that prevents them from standing up to even the most unemotional cost/benefit analysis. But don't take my word for it. The relevant stuff begins near the bottom of page 4.

Comments

[bikinisquad3000.livejournal.com]

You can cohabitate for life, have a ceremony to celebrate the decision and get no additional government benefits just by not getting legally married, no? If it were compulsory that would be one thing. (Or does a church not host a ceremony unless there's a license? If that's the case ignore me.)

[bikinisquad3000.livejournal.com]

I don't think it's an invalid point of view at all, either, just unfeasible. We're kind of past the point of no return on that. And as an argument against gay marriage (not saying that's why you expressed it) it stinks.

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]

Too idealistic, and the easier route compared to just standing for whats right in the current climate.

[brockulfsen.livejournal.com]

The problem isn't with Government, which took up and consolidated the scattered sectarian registration of marriage. Calling it a license seems to be a US thing.

If married/unmarried status only had importance within the Temple of The Cult of Thrud, that would never have been needed. Unfortunately the idea of being "a married couple" has been used as a given in many government and commercial situations.

Who is a relative for visitation/access rights in emergency departments or intensive care? Who is a co-parent when it comes to pick the kids up from school, or scouts or music lessons? Who can claim their partner's body from the morgue? All these situation privilege marriage.

In Australia recent years have seen heterosexual and same sex defacto couples gradually granted marriage-like status. This has lead to all sorts of issues. For example, elderly gay couples who missed out on a lifetime of tax breaks and commercial benefits and extra retirement benefits given to a married couple now find themselves on the significantly reduced "Couple" rate of Old Age Pension.

There is too much baggage surrounding legally binding couplehood to remove the state from the equation. However I'd suggest that they register various kinds of "civil union" and remove the word marriage from almost all legislation. If someone wishes to marry, they go to their temple and participate in the rites of their cult. I would require that a marriage not be allowed unless there is a valid "civil union" registered and approved. This is to protect the young and the vulnerable from cranks, fraudsters and sexual predators, which is a valid interest of the state.

[dwer.livejournal.com]

there are states that will consider you to be common-law married after a certain point.

[a-new-machine.livejournal.com]

Well, we do a lot of that. Take away any government incentives to incorporate, and what we have is essentially a contract between however many people join the corporation. The problem is that the government incentives are hugely important. Some things are very difficult to create contracts for that will override challenges from family members or the like (adoption rights, medical power of attorney, visitation, etc.) and those are a part of marriage, as an institution. I know you were probably referring to the tax incentives and the like, but really, the benefits of marrying are broader than that. You can't just say "Oh, well you can accomplish most of this via contract," because you really can't, at least not as effectively.

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Ok, that's a very cool user icon ;) Love those colors.

[a-new-machine.livejournal.com]

That's because you're programmed to love orange and teal. (http://theabyssgazes.blogspot.com/2010/03/teal-and-orange-hollywood-please-stop.html)

[raichu100.livejournal.com]

+1

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

I've always been puzzled why the party of small government will not trust government to regulate business but does trust government to regulate a deeply personal matter that intrudes into people's lives.

[kylinrouge.livejournal.com]

The simple answer is that it's never been about 'small government' for them.

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

Or more that it's necessary to co-opt social conservatives to vote against their economic interests in order to further a neo-liberal economic agenda.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Well, yes, that much is obvious. The truly fascinating bit is how they try to rationalize it so it is.

Marriage registration

[brockulfsen.livejournal.com]

Way back when the Established Church (ie only legal one) recorded Marriages in their ledgers. If any question arose as to the status of the relationship between Mary and John, it could be answered by digging through dusty books.

Then people started moving long distances to cities where the book of their home parish was inaccessible. Around the same time religious diversity started to become and issue.

Inheritance; moral hygiene laws; contracts; huge areas of the law considered marital status as significant. Something had to be done, so the State stepped in to hold a central record of marriages and other significant life events.

Somewhere along the way a certain degree of protection of the vulnerable and various crank concepts like racial purity slithered in and so it went from a registration of a legally significant fact to the State regulating the institution of marriage.

In some places and times the regulation was minimal, not already married, old enough and of sound enough mind to understand what they were doing, not entering into a fake marriage to claim some benefit or privilege. In others it was intrusive.

I'd like to see the word "Marriage" given by the state to the churches, let the babies have their bottles. Hold back the registration of domestic partnerships and the protection of the vulnerable to the state.

Of course under such a reform I look forward to making popcorn and watching the fun when a Gay friendly church starts Marrying (Oh Noes!!!) same sex couples.

Re: Marriage registration

[bikinisquad3000.livejournal.com]

Thanks for that! It fills in a gap I was wondering about myself.

[mrbogey.livejournal.com]

I do... not... care about gay marriage.

[a-new-machine.livejournal.com]

It's not the top item on my list of shit to fix, but it is a fair section of the population being denied equal access to a very important civil institution. And it's pretty much painless to implement, to boot.

[mrbogey.livejournal.com]

Eh...it's a social licensing thing. Whatever people in localities wish to go with.

[bikinisquad3000.livejournal.com]

It must be nice to have the choice!

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

Civil union laws are a compromise based on an importance attached to the word "marriage," but as it turns out that's the very thing that prevents them from working. They're not called "marriage," so even if they grant the same rights on paper (which is rarer than you'd think), in real life people tend either to be confused by them, to not to take them seriously, or both.

This is why gov't needs to not be involved in any marriage of any kind, and that all it can legitimize is a civil union, since that's what it does now anyways. Then we can deal with the social standing issue as the separate problem that it is.

[bikinisquad3000.livejournal.com]

That would be nice, but I can't see how we would do that without it taking an insane amount of time and effort--there are many laws, regulations, etc. that mention "marriage" and "marital status" and they'd all have to be rewritten. Plus, there would be the issue of people already legally married; either they have to have their own documents and statuses changed or we'd have to deal with a lengthy period in which it and [insert new term] are interchangeable. And that would be happening at the sane time we'd be retraining our entire culture to understand what "marriage" now means in legal terms, instead of having it mean more or less the same thing with a wider eligibility, and this is a culture that couldn't adapt the metric system. I think the ship has sailed on that, in other words.

Edited to add an adverb.

Holy crap, no. Edited to add "in legal terms," which was "legally" when I wrote the first "edited to add." I'm done failing now, heh. Apologies.

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

A single bill that says "In all legal documents and laws, the following shall be true: all references to 'marriage' are now changed to be 'civil partnership', all references to 'married' are now changed to be 'partnered', all references to 'marital' are now changed to be 'civil partnership', and all references to 'spouse' are now changed to be 'partner'." That should be adequate verbiage for the first step.

I think there are enough people that understand that government marriage and religious marriage are not the same thing that it won't be as difficult as you think. Since the main problem is that people think religious marriage when they say "marriage" and it's the gov't marriage part that's added in, I think most will be glad for the clarification as it will agree with their thought process already.