Bizzaro World Belle: She Compellingly Opposes Same-Sex Marriage

You know, every now and again I start to feel sorry for Maggie Gallagher. I think, well, people of good will can be opposed to gay marriage; it's not their fault that Gallagher is incapable of mustering any premises, or conclusions, or even any convincing Burkean hand-waving. It's wall-to-wall camel snuff porn. So, a little early Fitzmas present for Gallagher and co.: the best arguments I can muster against same sex marriage. (Needless to say, I favor same-sex marriage. Actually, if we're being honest here, I don't much care about the legalization of polygamy. Insofar as I oppose polygamy, it is on the grounds that the societies which practice it are profoundly anti-feminist (is that strong enough to say about southern Utah or Saudi Arabia?) and regard young women and girls as property. If this could be solved, and men and women wanted to enter polygamous or polyandrous marriages free of any coercion, then, big whatevs. The "it would be too complicated for the courts to unravel" argument can be refuted as follows: tax law.) That said, let Bizzaro World Belle convince you that same-sex marriage is a bad, bad idea:

UPDATE: I have responded to commenter Uncle Kvetch's quite legitimate complaint above.

Many who wish to establish a right to SSM have mocked the anti-SSM arguments that harm will come to society if SSM is enacted. What is the mechanism, they ask? This sidesteps the fact that it is not incumbent upon those who would maintain the status quo to prove a harm; rather, the responsibility to provide a compelling argument falls entirely on those who would enact a radical change to our laws and traditions. They must prove that there will be no harm, or that the harms to society will be outweighed by gains in liberty for some individuals. Likewise, many SSM supporters have accused SSM opponents of hypocrisy, on the grounds that we are not currently waging war against divorce. What could be motivating us besides anti-gay animus? Both these complaints are wrong-headed, and in the case of the latter, the taint of hypocrisy falls altogether on those who support SSM.

Consider: before the legalization of no-fault divorce there were "progressive" supporters of change arrayed against conservative defenders of marriage. What sorts of things did the divorce proponents say? They argued that the right to an easy divorce would not affect married couples in general, but only that small subset who were trapped in terrible marriages. To the conservative defender who worried that all marriages would be weakened by this change, they had a ready response: "don't be silly. The state of my marriage does not in any way depend on what some small number of other couples may do, and if yours does I dare say it may be on shaky ground already. Some people can divorce now, after all, even if only with difficulty, so it seems ridiculous to argue that the mere existence of divorced couples will infect our society-wide conception of marriage."  (Sound familiar?) And the result? So far from being the last resort of troubled couples, divorce has metastasized so widely through our society that nearly half our marriages end in divorce.

At this point the conservative defender would complain about harms to children, that tired old refrain, and in response, the "progressive reformer" offered nothing more or less than a lie (or, if we are to be very charitable, a deeply mistaken claim). "It harms children immesurably to be part of an unhappy family. Divorce will be painful for these children, but less so than the home lives they currently endure."

No honest student of the intervening years can agree. Divorce is profoundly harmful to children. Hundreds of thousands of children have been scarred by this pain since the spread of no-fault divorce, with grave effects on their own ability to have happy marriages. Children are self-centered. They do not care if their parents are happy, or sexually satisfied, or personally fulfilled. They only care that their home life be moderately quiet and that mommy and daddy are there to tuck them in at night. Allusions to what children might suffer in truly abusive marriages are red herrings; the previous laws already considered abuse a legitimate cause for divorce.

What would a more truthful argument in favor of no-fault divorce have looked like? Just this: "the happiness of the individuals who form the married couple; their personal fulfillment; their continuing sexual satisfaction--these things are paramount. Whatever the harm to children, whatever the harm to society, the institution of marriage must be remade into one which promotes the personal fulfillment of its two members above all else. In the past, the creation of a home for children was the prime purpose of the institution. We propose a radical change, which places the sexual and emotional well-being of the two atomised members of the couple first and foremost."

Divorce has already seriously harmed the American institution of marriage. This harm cannot be undone. To argue that defenders of marriage cannot oppose future harms is specious. Imagine that you are a medic who has stabilized a fellow soldier with a chest wound. You shoot an enemy soldier who is about to shoot your soldier-patient. Would it be at all convincing for him to complain indignantly as he lies on the ground, his weapon just out of reach, "I was only going to shoot him in the foot! A wound like that wouldn't kill him unless a lot else went wrong. Why weren't you focussing on that other wound? Are you prejudiced against people who want to shoot other people in the foot?"

I argue that the extension of marriage to same-sex couples would represent a further, more dangerous change in the meaning of marriage. The trend towards regarding the personal fulfillment of individuals as the goal of marriage has already harmed our society in ways that even pro-SSM reformers can acknowledge. If we grant to a couple who are definitionally incapable of producing children the same status as a traditional married couple, we are taking this harmful trend to a new level, one which may destroy the institution as we know it. Now, you may argue that recent advances in reproductive technology, or future exspansive liberalization of our adoption laws, make this distinction moot. Nonetheless, just listen to the arguments that same sex marriage proponents themselves offer. They are about individual rights. They are about personal fulfillment. They are about liberty. They are not about children. They are not about the health of society. They take the new social ideal of marriage as a route to individual happiness, an ideal which has already caused incalculable harm to family life, as a basis on which to build ever higher towers of selfish personal gratification.

What of the fact that marriage has undergone countless changes in the history of our culture, and exsists in various permutations in other cultures? I grant it. You may argue that marriage in Western European culture, and subsequent American culture, has often amounted to nothing more than a mechanism for property transfer, where the bride was herself the property, or served as a proxy for land or gold. I grant it. Yes, things have changed for the better. Does this mean that I must agree with every proposed change, whatever its nature, for ever and ever, world without end? Can it not be the case that good things happen, and then bad things might happen, and people object to the bad things?

In truth, those who are on the very weakest ground in this debate are those who, like Andrew Sullivan, support SSM but regard polygamy as out of bounds. Polygamous marriages are practiced throughout the world; they also form the prehistory of today's Judeo-Christian monogamous marriages and are well attested in the Bible. When SSM proponents argue that emotionally healthy children can be raised in same-sex homes they are asking us to take it on faith. Why should we be willing to experiment with children's lives? When proponents of polygamous marriage argue that healthy children can be raised in such homes, they have millions of healthy children to offer as evidence: children in Africa, in Indonesia, and so on.

When we come to consider the historical case for SSM we confront feeble precedents. Should I be swayed by the ability of some North American native tribes to accomodate passive homosexuals in their tiny social groups by redefining them as women? Or by the fact that Thai people don't utterly despise male cross-dressers? Or by the fact that in societies such as Ancient Greece, in which sexually mature girls and women led such cloistered lives that the only outlet for male sexual passion was adolescent boys, such sexual encounters were only moderately severely discouraged? This is thin gruel indeed, and the most passionate SSM proponent must admit it. Even in Taliban-led Afghanistan, where the penalty was being crushed to death under a mud-brick wall, homosexual sex was fairly widespread. Could it have been because the only women many a sexually mature man would ever see were either his sisters or a fleeting, shapeless passer-by, even her eyes hidden by a fabric grille?

Yes, humans have had homosexual sexual encounters throughout human history, in every society. Such encounters have always been most prevalent in settings where men had no access to women: prison, the British Navy, and so on. But, there has always been a very small number of men, and a vanishingly small number of women, who preferred homosexual sex above all. Yes, I freely grant this. Now, you must grant to me that although this has always been the case, almost no human society, ever, has legitimized homosexual marriage on the same basis as heterosexual marriage. Maybe, just maybe, they were on to something?

Finally, let us consider this. However progressive you may be, it will certainly happen in the future that someone will propose a change to societal institutions of which you disapprove. How not? For example, in a future world of cheap DNA analysis and greater understanding of human genetics, it may be genuinely possible to identify those who carry a gene or group of genes for irrational violent behavior. It may even be the case that some groups in society are found to possess this genotype in a higher proportion than other groups. Now, let us imagine that reformers call for society to mobilize in an effort to prevent the carriers of these harmful genes from reproducing. Do not forget that the original calls for eugenics came not from fascists but from progressive reformers such as Sanger who also fought for the reproductive freedoms you hold dear.

Or this: imagine that advances in neurological imaging and greater understanding of the human brain leads scientists to conclude that children pass a significant milestone around their seventh birthday, a milestone which enables them to make informed decisions about their future happiness in a way younger children cannot. Now, imagine that pro-liberty reformers want to use this discovery to argue that the absolute age of consent for sexual encounters be lowered to 7, or to the age at which a scan of the child's brain shows this crucial change, whichever comes first. You are a crusty curmudgeon of 65 at this point. What arguments do you have? (You may object that this change is particularly unlikely given our current panic about child sexual abuse. Was white panic about interracial sex any less acute in 1945? What do you imagine that a far-left reformer of 1945 would say if she were told that her current proposed societal changes would lead, in only 60 years, to widespread legal agitation for homosexual marriage?)

"I don't care about your brain scans, children can't give meaningful consent to sex with adults!" Now you are an anti-science conservative who is unable either to understand new discoveries about the mind, or to grant that the conception of who is a "child" is something fluid and subject to societal revision. Are progressives not likely to smirk at you? Consider: adult humans have had sex with pre-pubescent children in every society, at all times, even when the punishments are severe. There have always been people whose whole sexual identity consists in a desire for pre-pubescent children; these people have willingly risked death to satusfy these desires. Is this not a natural part of human sexuality?

Now you say, "here are all these people who have suffered grevious harm as a result of child sexual abuse! How can you seriously propose to offer up more children to the Moloch of this perversity?!" And the progressives of the day say, "if it comes to that, I can let you talk to adults who began their sexual lives as children and are all the better for it. The problem with child sexual abuse is not the child sexual part, but the abuse part. There are many adult victims of forcible rape who bear emotional scars and are unable to form intimate relations with others, but you do not consider this an argument against consenting adult sex!" And now you say...what? I imagine you fall back on some Burkean hand-waving, convincing or not as is your talent for it. Are you still not right and they wrong?

Progressives may rightly oppose slippery slope arguments because they believe something will stop the slide. But what is that proposed mechanism, if not Burkean conservatism: a core of values, an unstated repugnance, the wisdom of crowds? Every progressive must grant that there will come a time, sometime, when Burkean hand-waving is enough, when the bottom of the slope looms large and deep. And I ask, if not now, when?

Comments

[Mandos]

Wow Belle the White House should hire you or something.

OK OK I'm sorry.

[belle waring]

I'm totally qualified to be on the Supreme Court, too.

[Kieran]

I was half-way through drafting a post like this, after reading Gallagher and Leon Kass, but now I can abandon it as this does what I had in mind, only better. Like I said about Kass, "the sad thing about this sort of thing is that the entry of women into college and the workforce since 1945, the sexual revolution, and the increase of geographical mobility really are huge social changes. They really have had tremendous consequences of all kinds for individuals, families and whole societies." This means there really is room to make a plausible anti-SSM argument. It's a pity that we're going to have to rely on the likes of Maggie Gallagher and Clayton Cramer to make it.

[Jeremy Osner]

Man oh man, this is what you spend your time on when you could be creating fish-cake recipes for us? :-)

On the "no society has ever legitimized homosex relationships", I hear this a lot, and it just occurred to me to wonder, leaving aside Greece and Rome, which other people have written about: what about Sodom? Anyone know if there's any historical research into the biblical description of Sodomite society?

[LizardBreath]

And the real question: what hideously perverse sexual acts constitute Gommorahmy?

Belle-- You're very, very frightening. Please don't ever start working for bad people.

[Russell Arben Fox]

Belle, this is perhaps the second best post I have ever read against SSM. I think the reason why you can make this argument as persuasively as you do is because you avoid the trap which so many of those who come out in opposition to the legalization of gay marriage fall into: they start talking about "nature." I know why they do it: a lot of them are Catholics steeped in natural law theorizing, and a lot of the rest are Protestants and Mormons and Jews who have been hypnotized by the bright glare of that theological spotlight. But nonetheless, it's a terrible road to take. Once you start arguing about homosexuality and its place in our culture in reference to the "nature" of homosexuality or the "nature" of marriage, then you're obliged to explain how it is that a theologically, teleologically natural grounding supports all that one's culture does. (Like allow infertile people to marry, or allow for legal use of birth control, and so on.) It can't be done, not without doing far more damage to liberalism than any modern could possibly want to see done (and I say that as a sincere critic of philosophical liberalism), and not without imposing an ontology of social life that make a mockery of history (or force us to engage in a weird theologizing of history along the way). In the end, opponents of SSM have to stick with such communal matters as traditions and roles; as you put it: "a core of values, an unstated repugnance, the wisdom of crowds."

Sorry for the long comment; as someone who favors coming up with some legal category that would include gay civil unions, but who opposes gay marriage, and who thinks that no-fault divorce has turned out to be a far worse blight on our society then anything gay marriage might add to the mix anyway, I've thought several times over the last couple of weeks of trying to come up with a contribution of my own. You've removed the need. My thanks, even if it is a thank-you you'd rather not receive.

(Oh, and the best post I've ever read against SSM? This one, written by Noah Millman, a conservative Jew, who similarly makes a case premised almost entirely upon the tutelary function which exclusively heterosexual marriage norms have in helping men and women maintain a decent society. I think I agree with just about everything in it.)

[Russell Arben Fox]

Belle, this is perhaps the second best post I have ever read against SSM. I think the reason why you can make this argument as persuasively as you do is because you avoid the trap which so many of those who come out in opposition to the legalization of gay marriage fall into: they start talking about "nature." I know why they do it: a lot of them are Catholics steeped in natural law theorizing, and a lot of the rest are Protestants and Mormons and Jews who have been hypnotized by the bright glare of that theological spotlight. But nonetheless, it's a terrible road to take. Once you start arguing about homosexuality and its place in our culture in reference to the "nature" of homosexuality or the "nature" of marriage, then you're obliged to explain how it is that a theologically, teleologically natural grounding supports all that one's culture does. (Like allow infertile people to marry, or allow for legal use of birth control, and so on.) It can't be done, not without doing far more damage to liberalism than any modern could possibly want to see done (and I say that as a sincere critic of philosophical liberalism), and not without imposing an ontology of social life that make a mockery of history (or force us to engage in a weird theologizing of history along the way). In the end, opponents of SSM have to stick with such communal matters as traditions and roles; as you put it: "a core of values, an unstated repugnance, the wisdom of crowds."

Sorry for the long comment; as someone who favors coming up with some legal category that would include gay civil unions, but who opposes gay marriage, and who thinks that no-fault divorce has turned out to be a far worse blight on our society then anything gay marriage might add to the mix anyway, I've thought several times over the last couple of weeks of trying to come up with a contribution of my own. You've removed the need. My thanks, even if it is a thank-you you'd rather not receive.

(Oh, and the best post I've ever read against SSM? This one, written by Noah Millman, a conservative Jew, who similarly makes a case premised almost entirely upon the tutelary function which exclusively heterosexual marriage norms have in helping men and women maintain a decent society. I think I agree with just about everything in it.)

[horus]

I guess the best argument against SSM is one that doesn't actually say anthing about SSM.

If you replace "SSM" with "getting my hair cut" and left everything else the same, the argument would be just as sound, since nothing in the argument is specific to SSM.

On the other hand, with the part at the end about DNA profiling and child brides, you do make an important point (if I understand you) having to do with the lack of an objective definition of what is moral. So I wouldn't propose to support SSM becuse same sex relationships are moral in any universal sense. Rather I would argue that since same sex relationships are considered acceptable by our society (prejudice notwithstanding), we can extend the right of marriage to those relationships.

[Richard Bellamy]

The relevant distinction between "no fault divorce" and "polygamy" on one side, and "same sex marriage" on the other side, is that divorce and polygamy laws change the nature of YOUR marriage -- the divorce makes it easier to end it, and polygamy removes the implied "no dating" rule for marrieds. (If you are married, and your spouse goes on a date, they are no longer being unfaithful -- just test-driving potential additional marriage partners).

Same-sex marriage -- contrarily -- has no actual impact on YOUR marriage. (I guess technically, it makes it more likely that your spouse will leave you to marry a same-sex partner, but that's a vanishingly small change, considering that it is almost as likely to happen already, without SSM).

The best argument against SSM, oddly, would be the slippery slope to no-fault divorce laws! If marriage is about "fulfillment", then when you are no longer fulfilled, you should no longer be married.

Now, however, at the bottom of the slippery slope, we are realizing that we left a few wickets standing further up.

[Dan Simon]

Uh, Belle, have you not seen this widely-discussed Jane Galt posting?

[alex]

I merely wish to express my deep admiration for this:

It's wall-to-wall camel snuff porn.

The world is a better place with this sentence in it.

[SamChevre]

Belle,

Very good argument; certainly more comprehensible (or recognizable as an argument) the Ms Gallagher's.

Another very good argument against SSM is this from Eve Tushnet.

Key quote: Homosexual relationships don't interact with the hardest parts of a marriage culture the same way heterosexual relationships do. Some of the hardest parts, homosexual relationships don't need as desperately: for example, the part about not having sex with anybody out of wedlock. Other "hardest parts" bring with them corresponding rewards that are less available to gay couples: for example, if you stick by your children's mother through thick and thin, it might be really painful but she's the mother of your children, and the reward of contact with one's own children is pretty huge.

It's worth noting that many of the outspoken opponents of SSM are also vocal opponents of no-fault divorce (notably, Ms Gallagher).

[Andrew Edwards]

I used to say I'd never heard a good argument against gay marriage, let alone one I agreed with.

The former is no longer true, although the latter still stands.

Good work.

[Uncle Kvetch]

Some of the hardest parts, homosexual relationships don't need as desperately: for example, the part about not having sex with anybody out of wedlock.

What is this based on, SamChevre?

Other "hardest parts" bring with them corresponding rewards that are less available to gay couples: for example, if you stick by your children's mother through thick and thin, it might be really painful but she's the mother of your children, and the reward of contact with one's own children is pretty huge.

Gay couples are already raising children, both biological and adopted. Why is it any different for them?

[Richard Bellamy]

One wonders whether there might be a grand compromise somewhere where SSM is permitted in exchange for the tightening up of divorce laws, including ending most "no fault" divorces.

I can't, personally, imagine whether or not any liberal or conservative groups or leaders would support that sort of compromise -- my first guess is that neither would.

It makes for an interesting through experiment, at least.

[SamChevre]

Uncle Kvetch--those are Eve Tushnet's comments, not mine.

[Jim Treacher]

Personally, I'm all for it.

[Glenn Bridgman]

There is a flaw that underlies this type of excercise, a flaw that has permeated pretty much the entire SSM debate. Belle has constructed a surprisingly compelling argument here, given that she is playing the devils advocate. However, the *type* of argument that she uses is a policy argument, designed to argue that policy A is better than policy B. This is de rigeur among UMC liberals and intellectuals of various stripes--for them(and by them I mean the culture that Belle and 95% of the readers of this blog inhabit) a political argument is a policy argument by definition. However, in the wider American political scene, this equivilence does not neccesary hold. A policy argument implies the weighing of the various possibilities and deciding which one is best, but this requires seriously considering the alternatives as at the very least feasible. When argument is considered to be "right," this whole framework goes right out the window--consider the arguments about how "marriage is defined as between one man and one woman." Someone who is proffering that argument isn't seriously considering SSM, even if only to later discard it. Insofar as Anti-SSM people make policy arguments, it not always, but usually is only designed to provide a figleaf to certain intellectuals or high profile people, especially those who tread in waters where policy arguments are the norm. This is why you see Burke invoked with such consistancy. Burkean arguments allow you to speak out of both sides of your mouth. The "policy" argument half of it usually talks about how policies can't be considered in the abstract, and regardless of whether X is wrong or right , it is possible for the implementation of X to cause great suffering and disorder, so we should be cautious about making changes. The other half is essentially that the organic whole of the society is not only neccesary, but *right*, and thus should not be changed. Many anti-SSM articles combine these two halves, allowing them to maintain the appearence of legitimacy while still saying all the right things to the base who isn't interested in real policy arguments.

I should not that this type of distinction is essentially sociological, a feature of the current population of conservatives in power. There is nothing especially intrinsic to it with regards to conservative political philosophy. There other areas where left-liberals fall into similar traps.

[jim]

The problem with this argument (and the reason that anti-SSM campaigners don't explicitly make it) is it proves too much. Not merely does it oppose SSM, but also opposes (easy) divorce. And merely saying, "[t]his harm cannot be undone" doesn't undercut its effect. Of course the harm can be undone (or future harm prevented). Just abolish no-fault divorce. But it won't be.

You say, "divorce has metastasized so widely through our society that nearly half our marriages end in divorce" like it's a bad thing. But most people don't think it's a bad thing. Or at least they don't think the (easy, relatively cheap) divorces of people they know are a bad thing. Typically they think the marriage that was ended by the (easy, cheap) divorce was the bad thing -- youthful error, rebound affair taken too far, whatever. Good thing she can get out of it and get on with her life.

The reason Maggie Gallagher waves her hands around instead of linking easy cheap divorce to SSM is she knows, despite her own views on divorce, that saying SSM is the same sort of thing as easy cheap divorce would make people favour it.

[Uncle Kvetch]

Uncle Kvetch--those are Eve Tushnet's comments, not mine.

I understand that, Sam--but you cited those comments approvingly, which led me to believe that you agree with them. Tushnet baldly asserts a qualitative difference between homo & hetero relationships without offering a sliver of evidence. So I thought I'd ask: what am I missing here?

More generally, I have to say that this whole exercise is leaving me feeling ever-so-slightly queasy. I really don't understand the burning desire among so many of my "allies" in the pro-SSM camp to come up with better anti-SSM arguments than those that have been proferred to date.

Will Belle next be writing an eloquent, reasoned defense of the Japanese internment during WWII, just to show Michelle Malkin how it's done? Or is SSM such a uniquely abstract subject that it can be batted around every which way without cost, like a high-school debate team topic?

[SamChevre]

Uncle Kvetch,

I wasn't trying to be flippant--just wanted the source of the quotes to be clear. They are in the context of a several-page argument, and her grounds for arguing them are more thoroughly explained there than I will explain them here.

That said, here's my argument in support of Eve.

On "homosexual relationships not needing as desparately to oppose sex outside wedlock". One of the big purposes of marriage law has historically been to manage child-bearing and child-care. Homosexual relationships simply do not pose the same chance of children; an affair does not run the risk of producing unwanted and inconvenient children.

Relatedly, I know of no SSM advocates who are firmly committed to an ideal of "sex only within committed lifetime relationships." From Andrew Sullivan to my lesbian friends, NONE of the advocates for SSM that I'm aware of think that is a desirable ideal for homosexual couples.

On "gay couples having less incentive to stick together due to being less likely to have children," I would consider that self-evident. My observation is that gay couples may have children, but it is less common for them than it is for straight couples. Further, I know of no gay couples with children that were unplanned results of their passion for one another.

[Uncle Kvetch]

I know of no SSM advocates who are firmly committed to an ideal of "sex only within committed lifetime relationships." From Andrew Sullivan to my lesbian friends, NONE of the advocates for SSM that I'm aware of think that is a desirable ideal for homosexual couples.

Fine. How does this possibly contribute to the argument against SSM? Tushnet doesn't say; can you?

My observation is that gay couples may have children, but it is less common for them than it is for straight couples. Further, I know of no gay couples with children that were unplanned results of their passion for one another.

Fine. How does this possibly contribute to the argument against SSM? Tushnet doesn't say; can you?

[SamChevre]

Uncle Kvetch, Eve explains why those points are important in great detail and at great length. Have you read her series of posts?

To summarize, two key goals of marriage are to ensure that children are born within committed relationships, and to keep relationships with children together. Neither of these goals are as important for same-sex marriages. Thus, the social recognition that these are the primary goals of marriage (as opposed to the satisfaction of the married coupel) is weakened by SSM.

[Uncle Kvetch]

Sam, thanks for your patience--I'm not being deliberately obtuse here.

Yes, I did read Tushnet's piece, and it's clear to me that she's of the "it's all about the children" camp. And until such time as the members of that camp can explain why straight couples who remain childless (by choice or otherwise) should be entitled to benefits denied to committed same-sex couples, I will continue to find that argument singularly unpersuasive, if not downright offensive.

[Cala]

Will Belle next be writing an eloquent, reasoned defense of the Japanese internment during WWII, just to show Michelle Malkin how it's done? Or is SSM such a uniquely abstract subject that it can be batted around every which way without cost, like a high-school debate team topic?

One would presume, however, that the point isn't just to pat Belle on the back for formulating a good argument, but to find compelling ways to respond to it. We could keep torching strawmen, of course, and there's an endless supply of camels from Gallagher, but having the position set out clearly will allow for better arguments against it.

The 'camels?!? wtfuckityf' line gets tiresome after a while.