Because most philosophies that frown on reproduction don't survive.

Tuesday, August 27, 2013

Gay Marriage Weakens Marriage, And That's Considered a Plus

One is treated, every so often, to the "conservative case for same sex marriage" in which it is rosily imagined that if we only redefine marriage so as to be agnostic as to the sexes of the people involved, the wider world will start treasuring chastity and fidelity a lot more. I've never found this particularly persuasive. It seems to me that the push for same sex marriage has much more to do with a demand for full recognition (we want everything they have) than any intent to abide more the sort of moral norms with which marriage was once associated. After all, in mainstream culture the idea that marriage demands chastity before or afterwards is something of a punchline these days anyway.

Be that as it may, this line of argument I recently read from an old acquaintance who is very much of the pro-gay-marriage side of things struck me as instructive:
But the real reason I support gay marriage these days is simple: it's for the sake of women. And for the sake of straight men, too.

I've seen marriages poisoned by the usual hetero script; I've had friends who stayed in severely abusive marriages because they felt it was their "wifely duty;" and of course I've seen my women friends (of any orientation) battered and tortured and constrained by the traditional view that men are superior and women are inferior.

So along comes gay marriage. Quite visible these days -- and what is it that people see? A way that people interact with each other that is DIFFERENT. Where are the "wifely duties" in a gay marriage? Who is "the man" in a lesbian partnership? By simply existing, gay & lesbian marriages disrupt the status quo. And the status quo, to my mind -- with its millennia of abuse and rape and discrimination -- could use a little disruption.

So I support gay marriage because it shows that the traditional "man and his little woman" pattern of relationships isn't the only way. Which is beneficial for women because it means they might not stand for this shit any more, and is beneficial for men because it means they can lay down the burdens of being "tough" and "manly," with all the violence and disrespect that the culture expects of such roles.

All these are sweeping statements, of course, and gay marriage itself is imperfect. But that's the long and the short of it: I support gay marriage for the sake of women, and for the sake of the men who oppress those women, because it's the only way they've known to live.
Now, I don't find his portrayal of relationship dynamics at all persuasive. He wants to read people who stay in bad relationships "too long" as being somehow oppressed by a cultural paradigm of marriage, when what I think is actually going on here is the relationship equivalent of people's drive to send good money after bad. We want our relationships to work out. Even when they're going badly we keep holding onto the idea that maybe, with just a little more time, just a little more work, it'll all come right. People in same sex relationships do this just like people in opposite sex ones do, and I don't think that knowing that there are marriages out there with different sex roles is going to hasten people toward abandoning relationships that they've built history and hope around.

However, the thinking about the desirability of breaking up the dominant marriage paradigm is something that I've read elsewhere as well. Keep in mind, one of the key beliefs in this new modern synthesis about sexual relationships is that they can take whatever form consenting adults want them to take. This is why many gay marriage supporters also support giving legal recognition to plural marriages.

If you don't believe there's anything particularly binding about what has in the past been the normative cultural understanding of marriage, then weakening it isn't a problem. Indeed, it's desirable, since sticking with one type of relationship might keep you from embracing something else that would make you happy. Here as in so many other places in our culture, we see choice set upon a pedestal as a near idol. If by breaking down social expectations and norms, we can give people more options in forming relationships, that will be seen as a good thing.

The key issue, I think, is whether human nature exists, and whether sexual relationships have an objective form, a way they are supposed to be.

The modern view quoted here seems to hold that there is not a necessary form that sexual relationships may take: anything that makes you happy. So if societal expectations can be broken down such that you are more free to move on to whatever makes you happy, so much the better.

I think this is incorrect. There is a way that we are supposed to be, and when we deviate from that form we will generally make ourselves less happy, not more so. As such, having social expectations which guide people towards following that pattern is a good thing, it helps people avoid mistakes which will only make them unhappy.

Either way, though, I think it's important to be clear that for those who take this modern view of relationships seriously, the social acknowledgement of an ever wider variety of relationship as "marriage" is intended to weaken marriage as a social institution. Because from that point of view, a shared social understanding of what a marriage should be is a restrictive barrier which potentially keeps you from finding just the right kind of relationship for you -- not a social buttress that helps provide you with strength from outside.

18 comments:

August said...

I think the real weakening of marriage comes from giving the state much of a say in it. The definitions and legal manipulations of marriage come about for the benefit of the lawyer class. As such, I suspect some sort of faux monogamy shall continue to be a part of marriage. The courts need there to be one clear breadwinner and one clear 'victim'- for they make their money in the forced transaction between the one and the other. Multiple parties mean multiple claims, thus reducing the lawyer's take.

Anyway, that person's take on marriage was dreadful. I have seen lesbians be shockingly thuggish- apparently this is attractive to young, stupid girls. They are and can be violent, even abusive by my standards, to their supposed love interests. Meanwhile there are enough obviously feminine men out there for me to wonder if the person who wrote this doesn't fall into the liar or fool category.

I have plenty of reason to believe based on observance alone, that same sex relationships likely have a higher incidence of abuse within them than heretosexual relationships do.

Kyle Cupp said...

"There is a way that we are supposed to be, and when we deviate from that form we will generally make ourselves less happy, not more so."

Do you expect, then, that same-sex married couples will generally be unhappier than, say, same-sex individuals who remain chaste? Or, in general, unhappier than they would have been had they remained chaste?

Darwin said...

August,

I don't find it persuasive that the breakdown of marriage in society is orchestrated by the legal profession, although there are certainly lawyers who take advantage of the fact that the breakdown is happening.

Kyle,

Do you expect, then, that same-sex married couples will generally be unhappier than, say, same-sex individuals who remain chaste? Or, in general, unhappier than they would have been had they remained chaste?

Not necessarily, though sometimes.

The form that I'm referring to is of the permanent, monogamous relationship between a man and a woman. I think that what we would see is that, in general, couples in same sex "marriages" would be less happy than those in real marriages. This is because some of the things that we naturally desire out of marriage (such as having children together) can only actually happen when we're acting according to that natural form rather than contrary to it. And it's why we see people going to great lengths to try to overcome those things which an unnatural relationship cannot achieve through reproductive technology, etc.

Kyle Cupp said...

"I think that what we would see is that, in general, couples in same sex "marriages" would be less happy than those in real marriages."

What happens if this doesn't come to pass? If SSM couples appear, in general, to be just as happy as married couples, would you change your views?

Jenny said...

I question any conclusions drawn from the premise that major problems in modern marriages include women trapped and burdened by unreasonable wifely duties and overbearing men longing to drop the facade of being tough.

Look around. Marriage hasn't been in that state for 40 years if it ever was.

Darwin said...

Kyle,

The sentence you quote is expanded on by what followed:

This is because some of the things that we naturally desire out of marriage (such as having children together) can only actually happen when we're acting according to that natural form rather than contrary to it.

Given the way I framed that, I can see two ways of understanding your question:

1) What happens if it turns out that same sex couples have children together (naturally) as often as opposite sex couples? -- I'll be expansive and say that if human biology changes in this radical way, I will change my view as to the morality of same sex marriage.

2) What happens if same sex couples report that they are just as happy as opposite sex couples, despite the fact that the biological realities of human sexuality mean that they can never have children together, etc. (whether because they don't want children or because they are using adoption or advanced artificial reproduction techniques)? -- This gets into all kinds of problems of how one defines and measures happiness. Often, in the social sciences, this is done by asking people "are you very satisfied, somewhat satisfied, neither satisfied nor dissatisfied, somewhat dissatisfied or very dissatisfied with your marriage", but obviously that's going to measure happiness in a very subjective way. People's answers are filtered through the lens of the range of experiences they have had, and also through what they perceive themselves to want. I think it would be fairly hard for someone to change my views on this topic by pointing to survey-based happiness or satisfaction research comparing same sex couples to opposite sex couples, because I think it would be difficult to address my claims by that method.

Darwin said...

Jenny,

Agreed.

bearing said...

Part of the problem in the discourse surrounding this issue is the failure to distinguish between saying that the notion of same-sex marriage weakens "marriages," and saying that the notion of same-sex marriage weakens "marriage."

My marriage is not, I believe, one iota weaker because of anything the government does to legitimize or delegitimize any unions, or by what name they are called. None of those other people are involved in my marriage. I am sure the same is true for a large number of other valid marriages, natural and sacramental. That has never been the strongest argument.

Since the purpose of marriage properly understood -- both by Christians and traditionally by states which have defined a civil marriage -- is to make stable homes in which children can be raised with all the basic things they need, a better question is whether this purpose is strengthened or undermined. The Christian case is that fathers and mothers are not interchangeable, that a father and a mother are each part of the basic needs of the child, and you could make a secular case for the same. You could, on the other hand, make a secular case that fathers and mothers are not so important.

But people are not really making that case; instead they seem intent on ridiculing the notion that marriage has a primary purpose at all, other than self-expression and maybe some tax and insurance advantages.

mandamum said...

Dr. J (Jennifer Roback-Morse) points out that Engels, back in "Origins of the Family, Private Property, and the State" says that strong marriages are actually a microcosm of the capitalist oppression:


"In the old communistic household, which comprised many couples and their children, the task entrusted to the women of managing the household was as much a public and socially necessary industry as the procuring of food by the men. With the patriarchal family, and still more with the single monogamous family, a change came. Household management lost its public character. It no longer concerned society. It became a private service; the wife became the head servant, excluded from all participation in social production. Not until the coming of modern large-scale industry was the road to social production opened to her again – and then only to the proletarian wife. But it was opened in such a manner that, if she carries out her duties in the private service of her family, she remains excluded from public production and unable to earn; and if she wants to take part in public production and earn independently, she cannot carry out family duties. And the wife’s position in the factory is the position of women in all branches of business, right up to medicine and the law. The modern individual family is founded on the open or concealed domestic slavery of the wife, and modern society is a mass composed of these individual families as its molecules.

"In the great majority of cases today, at least in the possessing classes, the husband is obliged to earn a living and support his family, and that in itself gives him a position of supremacy, without any need for special legal titles and privileges. Within the family he is the bourgeois and the wife represents the proletariat. In the industrial world, the specific character of the economic oppression burdening the proletariat is visible in all its sharpness only when all special legal privileges of the capitalist class have been abolished and complete legal equality of both classes established. The democratic republic does not do away with the opposition of the two classes; on the contrary, it provides the clear field on which the fight can be fought out. And in the same way, the peculiar character of the supremacy of the husband over the wife in the modern family, the necessity of creating real social equality between them, and the way to do it, will only be seen in the clear light of day when both possess legally complete equality of rights. Then it will be plain that the first condition for the liberation of the wife is to bring the whole female sex back into public industry, and that this in turn demands the abolition of the monogamous family as the economic unit of society." (II The Family; 4. Monogamous Family)


She has suggested (or pointed out?) some people who look to same sex pairings as a way to undo this built-in "class struggle" in the relationship. This sounds like an alternate stating of that thesis - but Engels is at least honest about the breakdown of marriage as the goal.

Kyle Cupp said...

You claim that there is a way things should be and when we deviate from that form, we will generally make ourselves less happy. However, you also express skepticism about the methods of measuring this happiness. Is your theory then not testable? If so, do you think this is a problem? If not, then how would you demonstrate a causal connection between deviation and unhappiness in people's real lived experience?

Darwin said...

You claim that there is a way things should be and when we deviate from that form, we will generally make ourselves less happy. However, you also express skepticism about the methods of measuring this happiness. Is your theory then not testable?

I don't think it's rigorously testable through empirical experimentation, no. It's not an empirical theory. I think that what I'm saying is knowable and discernible from experienced reality, but that's different from being testable in the sense you seem to be thinking of.

If so, do you think this is a problem?

No.

Darwin said...

Mandamum,

Interesting. I hadn't read that before.

Darwin said...

Bearing,

Though the interesting thing here is, my acquaintance was actually trying to make the case that same sex marriage does weaken marriages, though apparently only marriages that he thinks should be weakened because they're bad marriages and women need to get out of them.

As to whether it would actually serve this function...

I think that's a matter of some dispute. The "conservative" supporters of same sex marriage claim that recognizing both marriage and same sex marriage as valid social institutions, people will increasingly see marriage as the acceptable form of romantic/family unit and so they'll get married and stay married and provide stable social units.

Personally, I find that hard to credit, because the same sex marriage movement seems to come with a deep cultural/moral belief that all types of relationships (exclusive, open, permanent, temporary, whatever) are okay so long as people are engaging in them willingly. This foundational belief seems to underlay the belief that it's unfair not to call same sex relationships marriages if the members want to call them that. And to the extent that the victory of same sex marriage means its supporters forming the cultural consensus, I have to assume that this means that the belief that all types of relationship are fine so long as you want them would also become more common. It seems to me that this would be bad for stability, children, families, etc. and would be likely to result in more relationships that break up -- not just same sex relationships but relationships in general.

It would be hard to prove this out, however, since there are a lot of other social and economic reasons we could expect to see relationships become less or more stable in society.

Kyle Cupp said...

"I think that what I'm saying is knowable and discernible from experienced reality, but that's different from being testable in the sense you seem to be thinking of."

Okay. Then how would you analyze experienced reality to show someone skeptical of your theory (deviation leads to unhappiness, SSM is deviation...) that it is true?

For example, let's say, a few decades from now, SSM is the norm and we have a sizable amount of gay couples in SSM to get some fairly reliable statistics. Let's also say that SSM couples divorce at a rate double or triple heterosexual couples. Would you reference this huge difference as, if not proof of your theory, suggestive of it?

Darwin said...

Okay. Then how would you analyze experienced reality to show someone skeptical of your theory (deviation leads to unhappiness, SSM is deviation...) that it is true?

I would point out that one of the key things that we often year SSM advocates say they want to have marriage for (rearing children together) is something which can only actually happen naturally between people of the opposite sex -- and that to the extent that the historical nature of marriage is very much intertwined with the ways in which cultures develop social institutions for the raising of children, same sex couples are effectively aping an opposite sex couple structure. The mere fact of going after something that looks somewhat like "marriage" suggests a desire for what is, at root, unachievable between people of the same sex.

That doesn't mean that those individual people would be happier with someone of the opposite sex. Clearly there are cases where their desires simply don't work that way. But as a result, they have a desire for something that can never really be satisfied.

For example, let's say, a few decades from now, SSM is the norm and we have a sizable amount of gay couples in SSM to get some fairly reliable statistics. Let's also say that SSM couples divorce at a rate double or triple heterosexual couples. Would you reference this huge difference as, if not proof of your theory, suggestive of it?

I might point to it as mildly suggestive, but it would not be something I'd put much emphasis on. It's very hard to do that kind of comparison well, and I'm sure that there would be lots of people eager to point out that there are all kinds of reasons we shouldn't consider the comparison valid.

Anonymous said...

All the data that is extant shows SSM couples are more unstable and that very few SS people want to marry monogamously at all and even fewer want to have children together and raise them. Without the confounding factor of people raising children from heterosexual relationships to inflate the numbers, SSM advocates would struggle even more greatly to make their ridiculous and deceitful case.

This data is all available on wikipedia references on SSM by nation and state (for the USA). The reality is already known. SSM advocates have an investment in pretending we don't already have the information.

cminor said...

While it doesn't account for every case (as your acquaintaince points out, some people stay in toxic relationships much longer than the dictates of good sense would suggest.) I'd say that on average willingness to stay in a marriage is, in our age of easy divorce, a good indicator of marital happiness. I've read that the data from countries that have had SSM a decade or more indicate that same-sex couples do divorce at a significantly higher rate than opposite-sex couples. They also avail themselves of marriage at lower rates to begin with. And August may be on to something; though reporting is low some studies suggest that same-sex domestic violence is at least comparable to the opposite-sex variety.

My two bits' worth is that anybody who thinks some social construct is going to "civilize" behavior in anyone who doesn't wholly of his/her own accord submit to its rules (particularly in the face of increasing dispute over what exactly those rules are) is looking at humanity through fuschia-colored glasses. Ditto anybody who thinks externally altering such a social construct will somehow solve an only tangentially-related social ill.

Btw, while I don't think this will help you with Kyle, I think what you're expressing in your responses to him is in keeping with the Darwinian (not you) view of things. After all, we do exist in large measure (from that standpoint) to further our genetic line.

Gail Finke said...

bearing wrote: "My marriage is not, I believe, one iota weaker because of anything the government does to legitimize or delegitimize any unions, or by what name they are called."

Everyone always thinks that his successes or failures are due to himself and his circumstances alone. However, the truth is that the general breakdown of an institution weakens it for everyone. Divorce breeds more divorce, serial co-habitation breeds more serial co-habitation, single motherhood breeds more single motherhood, and the ills that come from those things hurt the people involved, the people around them, their extended families, and of course their children. It becomes harder for everyone to form and maintain a stable marriage and family, to train children how to do so (children who, in any case, will be increasingly likely to marry other people who DON'T know how to do so), and the problems of poverty, heartbreak, criminal behavior, delinquency, etc are legion. But because everyone wants freedom to do as he or she pleases, we all pretend these problems don't exist, and the successful ones think anyone can do what they did, and don't see how much more has been demanded of them and how so many others who need the help of social norms and support are not able to manage.

It's naive to think that making marriage mean even less than it does now would have a good effect.