Well, we have survived another Mother’s Day. But what is the holiday really all about, besides an excuse to sell chocolates, flowers, greeting cards and a bit of guilt? Why should we “celebrate” motherhood, when motherhood itself is under attack, or at least, undergoing some kind of cultural renovation? (more…)
PERSPECTIVES: Gay Men Only?
By Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse
Equal, but…
“Kids Do as Well with Same Sex Parents,” the headlines screamed. I crossed swords with Judith Stacey, one of the authors of this most recent study, at a debate at Bowling Green State a few years ago. I asked her point blank if she believed men and women were completely interchangeable as parents. In front of that very friendly audience, she said absolutely: the gender of parents doesn’t matter. And so she says now, in this new article the media loved. But midway through the article, her argument shifts from a “no difference” argument to my favorite definition of feminism: men and women are identical, except women are better. Her article ends with an intimation that I believe tells strongly against same sex marriage. Redefining marriage will create a cultural climate that will drive men out of the family, and lead to the belief that the only good man is a gay man. (more…)
by Jennifer Roback Morse, Ph.D
This article was originally pubished at National Catholic Register, March 22, 2010, under the title “Conferral of Parenthood Does Not a First-Class Citizen Make.”
“Domestic partnerships make us second-class citizens. We want marriage, just like everyone else.”
This is the constant refrain of the marriage-redefinition advocates. Drawing a legal distinction, any legal distinction, between same-sex couples and opposite-sex couples is unfair and amounts to ill treatment of the same-sex couples. But does this argument really hold up? (more…)
Logical Fallacies Used By Courts to Justify Same-Sex Marriage Validate a Slippery Slope
Abstract:
Scholars have dismissed the argument that same-sex marriage will lead to marriage of three or more, saying it is merely the logical fallacy of the “slippery slope.” They have also offered various arguments against polygamy to show that same-sex marriage is not a slippery slope. However, none of the arguments against polygamy are very compelling, especially after Lawrence v. Texas, and the polyamory movement renders most of them moot. Further, state courts that have established same-sex marriage rights have refuted arguments that the central purpose of marriage is related to procreation and child-rearing, as proponents of traditional marriage have argued. In doing so, these courts have committed logical fallacies that not only justify same-sex marriage, but that also justify marriage of three or more. Thus, the marriage-of-three argument is a non-fallacious slippery slope because it predicts a likely outcome of an initial action.
Most legally-cognizable arguments defending traditional marriage suggest a link between marriage and both procreation and childrearing. According to the defendants in Perry v. Schwarzenegger, the federal case challenging the constitutionality of Proposition 8, “[t]he central purpose of marriage… had always been to promote naturally procreative sexual relationships and to channel them into stable, enduring unions for the sake of producing and raising the next generation.”[1] Advocates of same-sex marriage often deny this alleged central purpose of marriage and point to other benefits and purposes of marriage to justify their argument that the law may not exclude two men or two women from marrying. (more…)
Same-Sex Marriage is not Miscegenation: Why Loving does not Figure in the Marriage Debate
I. Introduction
Loving v. Virginia[1] was a landmark decision in American family law. In it, the U.S. Supreme Court struck anti-miscegenation statutes adopted by Virginia as a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution and simultaneously invalidated all such statutes then in force in at least fourteen states across the country.[2] Within four years of the decision, a homosexual couple from Minnesota cited Loving in support of their assertion that Minnesota’s refusal to allow the couple to marry similarly violated the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment.[3] The U.S. Supreme Court dismissed the case for lack of “a substantial federal question,”[4] thereby rejecting petitioners’ argument that the preservation of marriage as a legal relationship between one woman and one man is analogous to the invidious racial discrimination demonstrated in the Virginian statutes at issue in Loving.
Still, almost forty years later, proponents of same-sex marriage continue to assert that the Loving precedent applies equally to both situations.[5] This attempt to analogize the fight to legalize same-sex marriage to the judicial precedent invalidating prohibitions against interracial marriage addressed in Loving fails on multiple fronts; this Note will examine three points in detail. (more…)
