I haven't joined previous threads on various aspects of (homo)sexuality and society, but having commented in this recent thread, and thinking back over what I wrote here, I wanted to add a couple more thoughts and ask a question.
By saying Warner's definition of traditional marriage could apply in most respects to same-sex unions, I did not mean to imply that all or most gay couples should aspire to those ideals, etc.
In particular, in my critique of the section on partners in a marriage 'naturally complementing' each other, I did pull a bit of a rhetorical trick in converting 'man-woman' to 'person A-person B' (though I stand by my conclusion). However, it is clear that Warner does ascribe a special complementary relationship to man-woman combinations, that I think he would not recognize in a man-man or woman-woman relationship (even though his exegesis does nothing to prove it, in particular the Monday Night Football reference, which reduces 'masculinity' to so trivial a level).
In other words, he seems to say, the biological gender of the partners in a relationship does endow the relationship with some inherent "rightness," "suitability," "potential," or something.
If you believe this (outside of strict religious edict, personal revulsion, or mere custom), what is that something? And can it be expressed in a way that is universal?
Is a prohibition against a man marrying an 8-year-old girl, his own mother, or a chair, the same as a prohibition against a man marrying a man?
I ask myself: Are there man-woman couples where the partners are very similar in temperament, upbringing, outlook, style? Where the man has many traits that might be considered 'feminine'? Where the woman has many traits that might be considered 'masculine'? (Whatever those are.) What is left, in such a case, to define this essential, natural, complementary quality? I cannot bring myself to believe it is solely genital geometry -- nor do I believe most opponents of SSM put the essential burden on genital geometry. So what is it?
My other question follows from this, in a sense. Look at a serious, committed love relationship from the standpoint of the partners themselves. What has drawn them together? What is the nature of their devotion? In what proportion is their mutual attraction physical, intellectual, spiritual, emotional, etc.? In what ways do their similarities and differences of character bolster, challenge, and enhance one another?
Surely we can agree that even among successful man-woman partnerships the answers to these questions vary astronomically. And yet any man and any woman can say, "we love each other enough to get married," and their family, friends, and the state generally take it on faith that they know what the heck they are talking about.
Only their therapist or priest or equivalent counselor digs into the questions I ask above, and usually only by invitation. Buddies may say up their sleeve, "I don't know what she sees in him," or "This will never last." But the essential right to lay claim to a bond of love that is worthy of lifelong commitment under the law is not questioned.
What is different if a man says the same of a man, or a woman of a woman?
Again, setting aside direct religious edict; 'custom'; personal revulsion: How can you trust my gay friend, when he claims a love of that sort, any less than you trust my sister when she announces her intention to marry the man she's been seeing? In the astronomical calculus of all nominally worthy relationships -- the giant to the midget, the spinster to the Chippendale hunk, the great-grandfather to the Playboy bunny, the college professor to the football player, Jew to Arab, black to white -- what essential, universal, invariable code says, "That love, that devotion, cannot qualify as 'marriage.' Two such partners as yourselves cannot by nature express or enjoy the same quality of bond that society seeks to endorse through the marriage institution, and agreeing that the definition of the institution includes you will render it meaningless."?
[ October 27, 2005, 01:31 PM: Message edited by: John Van Pelt ]
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
Exactly. Only the two adults involved know themselves and the other person enough to really say whether or not they are in love, whether they want to spend the rest of their life together, and dedicate themselves to each other in front of their community. For someone who doesn't know them to suggest that they know better than the two people involved whether or not they 'really' love each other, or what their salutary qualities are in regards to whether or not they would be good parents, is the height of hubris and profoundly ignorant on the part of the person making such judgements.
What is extraordinary about Warner's essay is that he speaks from ignorance. Not being gay, how does he know what 'gay love' is like, or not like? Indeed, inasmuch as love is totally subjective, who can say whose love is real and whose love isn't? They can't.
The idea that marriage isn't about love is monstrous, as it removes the individual totally from the equation and makes them into nothing more than a social cypher to be used or discarded at a community's convenience. Who are we if not what we feel and want?
Even to say that people who don't love each other should stay together for the sake of the children assumes love for the children, bringing love and individual commitment to each other back as the prime reason of marriage.
Posted by KarlEd (Member # 571) on :
I was holding off, waiting for a reply from someone who disagrees, but before I leave work I wanted to say how much I really appreciate John's post.
I've been told, even here at Hatrack (though that was years ago), that my relationship cannot be as fulfilling as the speaker's straight relationship. It saddens me mostly because it indicates a gulf of perception that I have no way of bridging. I can't understand it as anything other than a flat out refusal to consider the possibility of experience outside of one's own. It all strikes me as so hopelessly juvenile. Like the kid on the playground who constantly claims "My dad is better than your dad."
Posted by JaneX (Member # 2026) on :
*applauds*
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
Lovely post, John.
Posted by twinky (Member # 693) on :
I remember that, Karl.
Posted by KPhysicsGeek (Member # 8655) on :
John, that was a very good post. I know my wife was raised in a family where "traditional gender roles" were blurred. Who did she go to for solace with boy trouble and other emotional problems? Her dad. Who was the "enforcer" parrent on rules and pushed her to try harder? Her mom. I don't think it hurt her in the least. Our family will also have the roles at least partially reversed as we plan to have me be a stay-at-home dad for a while after we have children. I think it is good to point out the idea of traditional masculine and femanine roles in the family is becoming outdated. Their are deffinately roles that parrents need to fulfill to make sure children have the best chance to become healthy adults, but I don't see the need to assign those roles to either a male or female.
Posted by John Van Pelt (Member # 5767) on :
Thank you for the compliments.
I guess I take it as given, then, that the fieriest opposition to SSM is based in the categories of reaction that I explicitly removed from the debate (for argument's sake): Custom; religious decree; and personal revulsion.
And I think we can add to those what Karl neatly summed up as 'refusal to consider the possibility of experience outside of one's own.'
I know the following oversimplifies, but this breaks down to four positions:
We shouldn't allow it because it's never been allowed
We shouldn't allow it because God said it's wrong
We shouldn't allow it because I hate it
We shouldn't allow it because I can't imagine anything good about it, and the people who are insisting on me trying to do so, are pervs whom I wouldn't trust with my ... oh wait ... do you mean homosexuals are everywhere? And live fulfilling, trusted lives as professionals in every branch of society?
As Emily Litella (Gilda Radner) used to say on SNL: Never mind!
BTW, I recognize that, as a debate on 'public policy' -- as opposed to a logical debate on an issue on its merits, -- that vastly different factors come into play; and that the law has to find a way of reflecting the mores of the citizenry.
It is a tough problem -- some opponents do sincerely hold the objections I lampoon above; my problem (with many such issues) is that it becomes increasingly difficult to even conduct the debate while those are smoke-screened by talk of 'weakening the institution of marriage,' which is just so much claptrap.
I'd much rather confront someone who says 'I am a citizen of this state, and this would be against my religion' or, 'I find gay people repugnant and I don't care to encourage them.' Then at least we could have an honest discussion.
Posted by firebird (Member # 1971) on :
John, thank you for your tread. I really enjoyed reading it.
KarlEd, that saddens me so much that you have heard that.
Before I answer your question which I'm interpreting as 'is there any justification that man-woman relationships are superior to single sex relationships', I just want to say that I am very much in favour of SSM.
The argument that I have heard goes as follows. Men and women are fundamentally different due to the number of 'eggs' they create. Men can spend their sperm reclessly while women must guard theirs jealously for the right mate. This simple physiological difference, leads to many behaviour difference (a good book on this is Jared Diamond: Why is sex fun?).
As sames saex couples will therefore have fewer behavioural differences to overcome, their relationships must be easier.
If you have the contention that marriage is about making an extention of self and embrassing someone different than you so that you grow as a person then and easier relationship must be inferior to harder relationship.
I personally think the argument is claptrap. Many people chose relationships from their own class, race, geography, political opinion, socio-economic status ... and we do not call these inferior. In fact those against SSM are often (in my experience) also against cross racial relationships.
I would also hate to think that an advanced civilisation was choosing policy based in the assumption that Humans are only their genetic code and no more!
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