So, What Is Marriage?
Yesterday, I placed the debate about same-sex marriage within a larger historical context focusing on concern for marriage. Today, I want to home in on the question of what marriage is. This is the question that most proponents of redefining marriage to include same-sex relationships keenly want to avoid, to shuffle offstage as soon as it’s brought up.
Those who would redefine marriage employ two evasion techniques. First, they might appeal to historical inevitability as a reason not to have to answer the question of what marriage is—as if it were a moot question, already decided. My Heritage Foundation colleague Andrew T. Walker and I respond to some of those claims at National Review this morning.
The second evasion technique is to appeal simply to equality—“marriage equality,” after all, has been good sloganeering. But it’s sloppy reasoning.
Why? Well, every law makes distinctions. Equality before the law protects citizens from arbitrary distinctions, from laws that treat them differently for no good reason. But in order to know if a law makes the right distinctions—if the lines it draws are justified—you have to know the public purpose of the law, and the nature of the good being advanced or protected.
Just ask yourself: If the law recognized same-sex couples as spouses, would it still fail to respect the equality of citizens in multiple-partner relationships? Are those inclined to such relationships being treated unjustly when their consensual romantic bonds go unrecognized, their children thereby “stigmatized,” their tax filings unprivileged?
This isn’t scaremongering. In 2009, Newsweek reported that there were over 500,000 polyamorous households in America. And prominent scholars and LGBT activists have called for “marriage equality” for multipartner relationships since at least 2006.
And in any case, the question is more fundamental: Once one jettisons sexual complementarity—the bodies of men and women go together—what principle can one offer to limit civil marriage to monogamous couples? For that is the only way to answer the charge that withholding a “fundamental right” from even just one multiple-partner household isn’t a grave injustice.
Again, to know when the lines drawn by a marriage law are arbitrary—when they violate equality—we have to know what marriage is and why the state promotes it. Tomorrow’s post will examine that latter question; today we focus on what marriage is.
Consider a favorite analogy of supporters of redefinition: Laws defining marriage as a union of a man and woman are unjust—fail to treat people equally—exactly like laws that prevented interracial marriage.
Such appeals simply beg the question of what is essential to marriage. They just assume exactly what’s in dispute here: that gender is just as irrelevant as race. It is true, of course, that the color of two people’s skin has nothing to do with what kind of bond they have. But the sexual difference between a man and a woman is central to what marriage is. Men and women—regardless of their race—can unite in marriage; and children need moms and dads—regardless of their race. You can’t know either fact, though, without at least a rough idea of what, essentially, makes a marriage.
My co-authors and I present arguments for marriage as the union of husband and wife—and against objections to that view—in our new book, What Is Marriage? Man and Woman: A Defense. As we argue there, marriage is a uniquely comprehensive union. It involves a union of hearts and minds; but also—and distinctively—a bodily union made possible by sexual complementarity. As the act by which spouses make marital love also makes new life, so marriage itself is inherently extended and enriched by family life and calls for similarly all-encompassing commitment: permanent and exclusive. In short, marriage unites a man and woman holistically—emotionally and bodily, in acts of conjugal love and in the children such love brings forth—for the whole of life.
This understanding—and only this one—explains the key features of marriage. If marriage isn’t founded on a comprehensive union made possible by the sexual complementarity of a man and a woman, then why can’t it occur among more than two people? If marital union isn’t founded on such sexual acts, then why ought it be sexually exclusive? If marriage isn’t a comprehensive union and has no intrinsic connection to children, then why ought it be permanent?
So to those who take the opposing viewpoint, the challenge is to find a coherent set of answers to these questions:
- If equality and justice require recognizing all marriages, where do you draw the lines? What sets marriage apart from other interpersonal relations?
- Given your answer above, why ought marriage be a monogamous relationship?
- Given your answer above, why ought marriage be a sexual—and sexually exclusive—relationship?
- Given your answer above, why ought marriage involve a commitment to permanence?
- Putting it all together, how do the above answers explain why marriage is, beyond all this, something the state should regulate at all? (More on this question tomorrow.)
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Comments:
Jan '11
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
Well, not exactly; that's a bit of a contradiction. Why would a society create marriage as a way to grant women rights when it was society that had denied them in the first place?
Not all, but quite a few anthropologists argue (and it makes sense to me) that marriage came about because women had to spend time raising children, therefore they could not provide for themselves. The obvious solution was to hold the person who impregnated her to be responsible for them. Marriage is how society holds men responsible. That's why it began as a family matter, then a clan matter, and only later did it involve the state.
I'm not willing to argue that holding men responsible is no longer necessary.
Nov '12
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
Barkha Herman
You are correct about establishing paternity. So, now, you can do a genetic test for that. Again, marriage as an institution that needs protection by the Government has outlived it's use.
Well, establishing paternity isn't the only aspect of marriage that pertains to children. You've neglected the "protecting" part, which would entail providing and nurturing. Knowing who the father is only establishes whom needs to be performing the necessary fatherly duties. Marriage as a public institution seeks to encourage and facilitate the long term, intimate commitment and presence required to fulfill those fatherly duties.
And, quite importantly, the state involvement in serving these purposes is utterly non-coercive. The institution of marriage has always been completely voluntary and optional. This is why I find arguments against state marriage on libertarian grounds so bizarre. Surely the opportunity to opt out of marriage and establish any number of other romantically based living arrangements is all one committed to personal freedom can ask for. You speak about government involvement in marriage as if it creates some onerous and mandatory burden on individuals which is thereby inappropriate. That simply isn't the case.
Edited on December 11, 2012 at 7:54pmFeb '11
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
I think we'll be waiting an awfully long time. Proponents of traditional marriage have asked and answered these questions on Ricochet so many times that many members are tired of it already. Unfortunately, it's exactly those fatigued members whose answers I'm most interested in seeing.
Jun '12
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
Rawls
Pseudodionysius
Yes, much like global warming and the DSM IV manual's inclusion ofMultiple Personality DisorderandDisassociate Identity Disorderas a legitimate psychological disturbance.
Got it. · 4 minutes ago
Nice quip.
Now how about you come back with a direct, fact-driven argument.
(Btw, the Earth is verifyably getting warmer. Evidence of such is overwhelming. Now, whether it is caused by mankindis another issue—one we're not here to discuss on this particular thread.) · 1 hour ago
A lot of people don't like it, but this study is reason enough to question the "settled" nature of the debate over the effects of sams sex parents on children:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0049089X12000610
Jul '11
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
Mollie Hemingway, Ed.
Barkha Herman
From a Government point of view, IMHO, it is a contract (stated above).
So is a lease. That doesn't tell us anything at all about what it is.
A marriage is ... what?
A lease is a contractual arrangement calling for the lessee (user) to pay the lessor (owner) for use of an asset.
A marriage is a contractual arrangement that .... what?
Also, Ryan's questions are at the end of the post. Those are the ones I was curious to read responses to. · 45 minutes ago
A lease can be entered between any number of people. There are no restrictions. However a marriage is a very exclusive contract that is only allowed between man and woman - one couple at a time. This is why it is discriminatory.
I understand that you want to put more "value" on marriage than a mere contract; but from a Government (legal) point of view - that is all there is to it.
Jan '11
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
Ryan T. Anderson, Guest Contributor:
I would draw the line at any two adults who are not already part of the same nuclear family.
My reasons are as follows:
...
* Like Dennis Prager, my objection is less about genetics, and more to do with encouraging the sexualization of sibling or parent-child relationships.
Jul '11
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
Israel P.
You cannot seriously believe that voting predates marrying! · 46 minutes ago
Marriage "laws" being the term in question. I am speaking Magna Carta, European laws. We could go into Bantu law if you like or that of Hammurabi - but I don't think they apply to this conversation.
Link here.
Jul '11
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
Seriously? Then why does the Government pay single girls to have babies out of wedlock?
Feb '11
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
Tom Meyer
This is why I have no problem excluding incestuous* marriages or marriages that include minors. I can't cite a study, but I'd bet large sums of money that providing societal sanction to these relationships would be exceedingly harmful. I do not think the same applies to SSM.
...
* Like Dennis Prager, my objection is less about genetics, and more to do with encouraging the sexualization of sibling or parent-child relationships. · 2 minutes ago
How about two brothers and a sister? That should cover all the bases without Prager's inter-generational problem.
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
I'm with Mollie, would like to hear some answers to the questions; at the very least to the simple question: what is marriage?
But in the meantime, I'd like to respond to sloppy appeals to social science. Some on this thread have followed in the footsteps of Judge Vaughn Walker. In the case that overturned Proposition 8, he declared that “children raised by gay or lesbian parents are as likely as children raised by heterosexual parents to be healthy, successful and well-adjusted. The research supporting this conclusion is accepted beyond serious debate in the field of developmental psychology.”
Loren Marks reviewed all 59 studies that the APA relied on in its brief embracing the conclusion that there are “no differences” in outcomes for children from same-sex parenting. Marks’s conclusion:
So much for a conclusion “accepted beyond serious debate.”
Edited on December 11, 2012 at 8:20pmSep '12
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
I'm with Mr. Anderson, so I don't recognize redefined "marriages" as marriages. The problem is that the culture and politics are against us, as soon the law and state will be.
The history of marriage varies a bit between cultures, but one aspect of marriage has always obtained until just recently: Your community defined and recognized your civil status, and to varying degrees enforced it. This did not change until the last century or so.
Modernly people are free to define what marriage is to them. It's about love, commitment, self-fulfillment, many say. Big weddings with the bride at the center of attention, say others. Grooms write their own marriage vows with their putative brides, glad to be free of stern traditional vows. And everyone seems to accept the de jure marriage as if it were more than just a superficial rendering of the traditional one. And let's not forget no-fault divorce.
So, marriage is about the definition, recognition and enforcement in culture, society, polity and law of an indispensable human institution. If most people are willing to recognize marriage according to novel and individualized definitions, then marriage will eventually become a meaningless motley.
Edited on December 11, 2012 at 8:25pmJan '11
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
Ryan T. Anderson, Guest Contributor:
2. Given your answer above, why ought marriage be a monogamous relationship?
Because monogamous relationships are:
Ryan T. Anderson, Guest Contributor:
3. Given your answer above, why ought marriage be a sexual—and sexually exclusive—relationship?
Because most humans (rather uniquely among animals) have a strong desire-bordering-on-need for regular sex. Marriage has shown itself to be a very effective way of channeling this desire in a productive, beneficial, and safe direction.
Edited on December 11, 2012 at 10:26pmJan '11
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
Israel P.
Tom Meyer
This is why I have no problem excluding incestuous* marriages or marriages that include minors. I can't cite a study, but I'd bet large sums of money that providing societal sanction to these relationships would be exceedingly harmful. I do not think the same applies to SSM.
...
* Like Dennis Prager, my objection is less about genetics, and more to do with encouraging the sexualization of sibling or parent-child relationships. · 2 minutes ago
How about two brothers and a sister? That should cover all the bases without Prager's inter-generational problem.
Not following you; Prager and I object to both intra- and inter-generational marriages within families.
Jun '12
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
Ryan T. Anderson, Guest Contributor:
Loren Marks reviewed all 59 studies that the APA relied on in its brief embracing the conclusion that there are “no differences” in outcomes for children from same-sex parenting. Marks’s conclusion:
So much for a conclusion “accepted beyond serious debate.” · 6 minutes ago
Edited 4 minutes ago
Let us remember that several years ago, an article in the APA's Psychological Bulletin pretty much diagnosed conservatism as a mental illness.
Is the "science" "settled" on that one too?
Feb '11
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
Barkha Herman
Seriously? Then why does the Government pay single girls to have babies out of wedlock?
Government doesn't "pay single girls to have babies out of wedlock". Not yet, anyway. Maybe we'll start that when marriage is gone and we're not reproducing fast enough to replace ourselves.
More seriously, your statement is false; it ignores what you and I both know to be the true intent, ie to help people in need. Now, we likely agree that this is a poor way to help people and that government is a poor vehicle for doing it, but it muddies the water to frame the issue so incorrectly. Not only that, you seem to be demanding some level of perfection where none is possible. Sometimes government, all of us personally, act counter to our interests or other actions.
Jul '11
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
Ed G.
Government doesn't "pay single girls to have babies out of wedlock".
Link.
Jul '11
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
Ryan T. Anderson, Guest Contributor: I'm with Mollie, would like to hear some answers to the questions; at the very least to the simple question:what is marriage?
So much for a conclusion “accepted beyond serious debate.”
Your questions at the end of your essay are based on the false premise that marriage as relates to Government is anything more than a contract. Hence, I have no answers for that.
Also - say we all agree that the best way to rise kids is with one man and one woman. Does that mean that we MUST abandon all "non-best" ways to raise children?
Must we force widows to get married?
Must we prevent nuns from raising children because it's not a one man one woman situation?
Just because something is "best" does not mean we prevent all other methods of doing something.
Jul '11
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
Israel P.: Someone here will inevitably say "If marriage is all about children, why have it for infertile or elderly couples!" (I wrote "say" rather than "ask" for obvious reasons.)
So let me tell you in advance what I heard a rabbi say to a newly wed couple only three days ago. The first chapter of Genesis speaks of creation of man and woman and includes one commandment - be fruitful and multiply.
But the second chapter tells a slightly different story. It is not good for a man to be alone and G-d creates woman from his flesh. The man then proclaims
Nothing there about multiplying. Just simple addition, one plus one equals one.
Makes sense in a religious context, not in a Government one. This is why they should be decoupled. If you have God's sanction, why are you looking for one from the Government?
Nov '12
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
Barkha Herman
If you have God's sanction, why are you looking for one from the Government?
State marriage doesn't exist to sanction a relationship, at least is shouldn't. It exists because there are benefits the state can provide to facilitate and promote the care of children in the types of relationships that produce children.
Aug '12
Re: So, What Is Marriage?
Ryan and the libertarians are talking past each other. Ryan is arguing from the idea of nature. He has an essentially teleological view in which we can reason from what man is to what he is supposed to be. Therefore our bodies tells us something important about who we are and what we should do. The libertarians think that "choice" and "will" separated from any objective measure should rule. Therefore marriage is whatever we want it to be. The libertarian is essentially a philosophical dualist (at least on this issue) who abstracts from the body.
Ryan thinks a choice is good because something good is chosen. The libertarians think a choice is good because the choice is non-coercive. As the libertarian view has won the field, the Ryan T. Anderson's are left fighting a rearguard battle.