Same-sex marriage

One of the hotly disputed issues in the most recent election was California’s Proposition 8, which proposed to allow same-sex marriages. I always found it odd that gays had such a strong desire to marry, though on reflection perhaps I shouldn’t have. The institution of marriage, as I see it, allows couples who choose to cohabitate and otherwise share their lives to claim that their union has been sanctioned by an authority. That authority is either religious or governmental. I have no issue with having your union religiously sanctioned, if that is meaningful to you. But that is not what the gay community is seeking. If all they wanted is an imprimatur of religious authority, the debate would have been confined to the religion(s) in question and would not have become a political hot button. It follows, therefore, that it is the government’s eyes in which they want to legitimize their unions. I have long found this desire odd, not only when applied to gays but in general.

Quite simply, the decision to be together, or not, is none of anyone’s business but the couple’s, and no government has any moral right even to express an opinion on two people’s choice to be together, much less pass legislation that can in any way affect that choice. Unfortunately, engendered initially by the authority governments have historically derived from religions (long and fascinating story there), for centuries governments have done exactly that. From what I understand (I admit that the minutiae of relevant laws is not my forte), most states in the US today confer some legal benefits on married couples to which non-married individuals are not entitled. Whether related to taxes, property rights, or something else, it is these benefits that groups which are not allowed to marry in the legal sense, such as gays, are seeking. The argument is that not conferring these benefits, or even a possibility of attaining them, on certain groups, is tantamount to discrimination. It goes without saying that unless you believe that the government continues to derive its authority from some divine source, it is way out of line in concerning itself with marriage. What I find deeply sad is that there isn’t a greater outcry against this shameless moral, philosophical and, in many cases, practical intrusion into people’s private lives. The very idea of a legal marriage, i.e. a union of two people recognized by the government, is tantamount to discrimination – against single people. It is incomprehensible to me why the unmarried – a far larger groups than gays – are not clamoring for this discrimination to be redressed.

So why in hell did J. and I get married three weeks ago then? A topic for another post.