The Human Case Against Same-Sex Marriage
Same-sex marriage deconstructs our understanding of humanity.
When four justices from Massachusetts's Supreme Judicial Court declared unconstitutional what all human civilizations throughout time have seen as quite beyond question -- that marriage is about men and women -- they did something far more radical.
The Court actually reduced the beautifully complex nature of male and female to mere sperm and womb. They said to you, madam, that your femininity exists only in your eggs. They said to you, sir, that your masculinity is found only in your sperm. They have reduced who we are -- in the deepest part of our humanity -- to our sheer biological reproduction. And though we haven’t met personally, I trust your gender is a bit more integral to who you are than that.
The court’s mistake is confusing one primary difference in same-sex and opposite-sex couples – the ability to create new life without outside assistance – with the difference in same-sex and opposite sex couples. The Massachusetts Court found the State’s defense of traditional marriage lacking because it relies on the social value of procreation. In explanation, the court recognizes the ability to create new life as “the one unbridgeable difference between same-sex and opposite-sex couples…” The court then says that current marriage law “identifies persons by a single trait and then denies them protection across the board.”
Do you get that? This court has reduced your participation in your marriage, as a male or a female, to sperm and egg. The court would have us believe your wife’s only essential value as a woman is her womb or your husband’s, his seed. That, they say, is the only unique thing we, as gendered-beings, bring to the table. Everything else, the court would have us believe, is “bridgeable.” And that, they conclude, is why a ban on same-sex marriage is wrong. Does anyone still believe gender is merely social construction?
Think about your relationship with your spouse…or your parents. There is much more happening there in the female/male dynamic than just procreation. To understand how the value of male and female exists outside of reproduction, think about how different your workplace would be if it consisted only of males or females. And smart money wagers it wouldn’t be much of a place to work regardless of which sex held it. And why do so many people shell out big dollars for “Venus and Mars” seminars if there’s no real differences to understand? Males and females bring deep and necessary things to each other. It is through the profound value – and mystery -- of male and female that we understand and experience much of the power of our collective humanity.
The power of sex differentiation is the real active ingredient of marriage and this is exactly why this model has favor over other domestic options in all societies through history. It is the only social institution that brings the necessary qualities of male and female together in a respectful, cooperative, relationship, where the two distinct parts of humanity complete and complement one another. But the Massachusetts’s Court, and same-sex family proponents say none of that really matters. Women don’t really need men, husbands don’t really need wives and children don’t really need mothers and fathers. If we do need a spouse or a parent, really anyone for whom we have loving feelings for will do. It’s all just a matter of personal choice.
But can we really say that any of us can play the role of husband or wife, regardless of what nature has endowed us with? Can we really believe that a child will find all she needs from a mother in two loving, nurturing men? Can that child find what he needs from a father in two strong, compassionate women? And this gets us to why same-sex families are actually cruel – they intentionally deny every child they touch either their biological mother or father – all in the interest of fulfilling adult desire.
Anthropology tells us no human society, ancient or modern, primitive or civilized has ever sustained itself with a buffet-like family model – just pick what suits you. Whether this is done in an effort to serve “fairness” cannot soften the consequences. We cannot escape that male and female matter. And so, in redefining marriage, the court and same-sex marriage proponents diminish all of our humanity by saying we are only generic persons randomly equipped with either sperm or eggs. This deconstruction will not be without profound and painful consequences.
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