"Here's the key principle. Society gives benefits to marriage because marriage gives benefits to society. And therefore the burden of proof has to be on the advocates of same-sex marriage to demonstrate that homosexual relationships benefit society. Not just benefit the individuals who participate but benefit society in the same way and to the same degree that heterosexual marriage does. And that's a burden that I don't think they can meet."
(Peter Sprigg, Family Research Council)
I believe that Same Sex Marriage will not only benefit society in the same way and to the same degree as Opposite Sex Marriage, but that Same Sex Marriage will offer something good to society that Opposite Sex Marriage cannot provide. Here are three benefits of gay marriage:
- Gay couples provide an example for unity, equality, and compromise within marriage because they share tasks differently.
Because it's impossible for two people of the same sex to rely on traditional gender roles within a marriage, gay couples are by nature more creative in how they divide up tasks. Their circumstances are likely to create a relationship in which both parters are equal. Society will benefit by learning how to foster equality within marriage.
- Marriage makes people more productive. The more people are married, the more productive society becomes.
Marriage is good for individuals, and what is good for individuals is good for society. If people are happier, more successful, and more stable in their personal lives, it will improve the quality of life for everyone in the community. Besides, married partners care for each other. If a gay person cannot care for himself, and his partner isn't allowed to care for him, then society is responsible for him. Equipping gay people with the ability to care for each other alleviates society of a burden it would otherwise have to shoulder.
- Gay couples provide healthy, nurturing homes for orphaned, abandoned, or abused children.
There are so many children who are born into or thrust into circumstances where they don't have a family to care for them. Heterosexuals cannot meet all of their needs. Foster care is an overburdened system. We need more families that can adopt children, and sanctioning gay marriage will do just that.
So I will gladly welcome the burden of proof for how gay marriage will benefit society, because I know that it will.
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3 comments:
Pointed, direct, thoughtful, and artfully spoken as usual, Dan. You write almost as well as you paint.
And Amen.
Good points, but you missed some distinct benefits that the breeders would never embrace as, in fact, benefits. For example, same-gender marriages rarely produce large families that overburden school systems (and thus raise taxes for all while reducing the caliber of education for all). Nor do same-gender marriages produce the volume of children that would strain resources and negatively impact the environment. Breeders often use the argument that same-gender marriage is wrong because we cannot procreate; it seems to me that enough procreation is already taking place. Same-gender families often "pick up the slack" from breeders who create throw-away babies. But those arguments would be anathema to those who view us as deviant beasts.
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