Debating Gay "Marriage"

Whenever I debate gay "marriage" on this blog or elsewhere, I avoid using religion- or bible-based arguments, because, while these are persuasive to me, I have yet to see the supporter of gay "marriage" who gives a fig about what God says, let alone trusts either the Church or the Bible to accurately report what God says.

Instead, I make a very simple argument based on the needs of society. It's clear and undeniable that heterosexual relationships and homosexual relationships are fundamentally different. This is evident in the fact that all homosexual relationships are sterile, while most heterosexual relationships are fertile. That is, heterosexual couples may produce children, but homosexual couples cannot.

And it is because of the implacable need for another generation of children, properly raised to be good citizens, that society extends recognition and benefits to committed heterosexual couples, under the institution of marriage.

Presented with this argument, proponents of gay "marriage" never fail to note, quite tediously by now I might add, that not all heterosexual couples are fertile. Some are too old, some choose not to have children, some are medically infertile. On this basis, they claim that heterosexual couples are not fundamentally different from homosexual couples; and yet it remains the fact that heterosexual couples may produce children, and homosexual couples cannot. And for this reason they remain fundamentally dissimilar from each other.

Some like to say that homosexuals have the same right to marry a person of the opposite sex as heterosexuals have. This is true, but it is so far beside the point as to be taken as an insult by most homosexuals. I mention this because homosexuals have a similarly off-point and insulting argument: that if homosexuals are denied marriage on the grounds that I have described, because no homosexual relationship is fertile, that infertile heterosexual couples should likewise be denied marriage on the same grounds: that no infertile heterosexual couple is fertile.

This either stupid, insulting, or revealing of the true goal of the gay "marriage" movement, which is to destroy marriage altogether; it depends on how much thought has been given to it by the person making this trite argument.

For future reference, I put the answers to that argument here. There are two:

First, non-fertile heterosexual couples are so either due to medical reasons, or because of their own choice.

Of those who plan at the time of their wedding not to have children, some will change their minds, and some will have children despite their choice not to have children. So not all voluntarily non-fertile couples will remain non-fertile.

Too, those who are believed at the time of their wedding to be medically infertile may prove fertile after all, either spontaneously or because of medical treatment for their infertility. It is the rare case in which people marry with the certainty that they cannot have children.

So even those who are thought to be non-fertile may prove fertile after all. And it's exceptionally difficult to know in advance which those will be.

It is therefore in the interests of society to encourage and reward marriage even among heterosexual couples who are believed to be non-fertile, because they often produce offspring.

And second, those of us who are opposing gay "marriage" are defending the status quo, which has been the case in virtually all human societies throughout all recorded history. If the gay "marriage" advocate has suddenly become the advocate of fertile marriages, then he must abandon his own agenda. He cannot with intellectual honesty play both sides against the middle.

Changing the definition of what constitutes a marriage is a very big change in society. It is very clear that there are large risks involved, but the burden of proof that the rewards will be worth the risks falls on those who advocate the change. Thus far, their effort has been a poor one, always taking the form of arguments that are reducible to either ad hominem attacks, contempt for traditional morality, or petulant demands for what they want.

I have yet to see any gay "marriage" advocate even attempt to explain credibly in what way gay "marriage" will improve society for anyone but gays.