A comment was posted on an entry from last August that — once you get around the bizarre grammar — seems to want to find a scientific basis for marriage, because same-sex couples can’t bear children together.
I would like people to stop balming the bibile and church making decisions about gay marriages wake up. The facts is that we have male and female and the female is the ones who bares children with a male to populate the world. If it was meant for same sex marriages then anyone could concieve a child but this is not the way the body is made. Science can explain why it takes a man and a women to make a marriage. The same way it takes a man and a women to make a child. I am tired of people stating the bible is only for certain people and that marriages should only be dicussed in church. Take a big look at our population and think how and where all the people came from. It can only happen with the opposite sex. Our bodies were made for these reason I will always say marriage is between a man and a woman. I believe in Jesus Christ,the church and the bible which do state that a marriage is between a man and a women but take a look deeper and the answer is right there. We grow to too concieve children when eggs are fertilized by a man. the same sex can not do this so it is not right.
I kind of stared googly eyed at this one, trying to figure out just how to carefully word my response to this illogical comment, a comment that defies understanding, a comment that wants to meld biology with artificial man-made contracts. This is the best that I could come up on short notice, and there’s still a lot more pouring out of my brain. The problem is that I sometimes can’t edit myself or boil everything I feel into a coherent argument.
Hmm. I wish people would stop balming the bibile, too. It’s getting slippery.
Your argument, aside from being difficult to figure out grammatically, doesn’t take fact into account. It’s true that two different sexes are required to procreate. But this is a biological fact that has absolutely nothing to do with marriage. Marriage is a contract between two people that was created by man and society as a whole. It’s not something that is a biological imperative, and there’s nothing scientific about marriage. The human race is completely capable of reproducing without marriage.
The idea that marriage is required to have a child is ridiculous. That’s a moral judgement, not a scientific one. If you can somehow get the weak minded to realize that “marriage” is a concept created by man and not a natural imperative, the entire argument falls apart.
It’s sad that every argument advanced by the religious right against same sex marriage and for traditional marriage, from procreation to government benefits, seems to omit the one most important ingredient in marriage: two people in love.
As part of a married hetero couple who has absolutely no intention of having children, I guess I don’t fit into your commenter’s realm of reason. I think you send him over and maybe I can pelt him with birth control pills.
What about the couples who marry but can’t conceive? Should their unions be annulled since they biologically can’t fulfill this person’s narrow definition of marriage?
People who want to see a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage offer a variety of off-base reasons:
1. The amendment sends a positive message to children about marriage and family by enforcing traditional values.
What is a traditional family? In America, families consist of two-parent homes, single-parent homes, unmarried couples, nuclear families, extended families, singles with a close-knit group of friends, divorced families, stepfamilies and adopted families.
Do we want the government deciding who we should marry and make our family? If we allow the powers that be decide by Constitutional decree that we are only allowed to marry the opposite sex, what’s to stop the government from forcing us to marry only the opposite sex of the same race, the same religious belief and the same background? What kind of traditional message will that send to our kids?
2. The amendment protects the sanctity of marriage between a man and a woman.
So the institution of marriage is tainted if folks of the same sex marry? This makes same-sex couples sound like mutants. A hundred and fifty years ago, blacks were considered less than human. They had fewer rights simply because the government judged them by the color of their skin. You’d think history would teach us to be more tolerant, but here we are, in 2004, and the prejudice continues.
Speaking of sanctity, how pure and prosperous is a modern American marriage between a man and a woman? More than half of all marriages in the U.S. end in divorce. Some marriages even take place on television, with the participants wedding each other for fame and money.
3. “The Bible” says marriage is between one man and one woman.
Translation: Don’t let those sick homosexuals get the same rights as the rest of us God-fearing folk.
According to the First Amendment, the government may not interfere or dictate matters of religion. Nor has Christianity been declared the supreme faith of the United States.
Religion has nothing to do with a legal marriage. You can get married at a county courthouse or in a Las Vegas chapel and both services would be just as legally binding as getting married in a church.
4. Allowing gays to marry gives governmental sanction to the abomination that is homosexuality.
The Supreme Court already did that when it struck down the Texas sodomy law.
In this country, people are free to be as open-minded or as ignorant as they want, regardless of a Constitutional amendment. But recognizing every marriage will give all couples equal legal protections, rights and responsibilities.
Without this recognition, same-sex couples cannot:
* obtain spousal health insurance
* receive tax breaks afforded to other married couples
* adopt together
* care for a child when one parent dies
* receive death benefits
* visit their partner in the hospital
* make previously determined medical decisions
Marriage is more than a piece of paper. It’s a formal announcement to the world that two people have pledged to join their futures together, legally, morally, romantically and spiritually. They’ve pledged to become a family. The decision to bind yourself to someone who truly understands you goes far beyond religion or tradition. It’s the power and strength of humanity itself, and it should not be shunned simply because it’s experienced by people of the same sex.