[Vision2020] Same sex marriage

[Kenneth Marcy]

On 7/15/2012 8:03 PM, Donovan Arnold wrote:
> Ken writes,
> "Marriage has to do with, among other things, with whether people have 
> social permission to procreate. Same-sex marriage implies such 
> permission is not granted to individuals within that relationship."
> No it doesn't. People in same sex marriage have children, and are 
> allowed to have children.

Two people of the same sex physically cannot procreate. In order for 
such a couple to have children, assistance of a person outside of the 
marriage is required. Sexual relations by married persons with someone 
other than a spouse is adultery, so by legal definition, same-sex 
couples do not have permission to procreate within the standard 
definition of marital fidelity, which presumes opposite-sex couples for 
reproductive purposes.

Notwithstanding the truth of the nitpicking legalese, the fact of the 
matter is that some same-sex couples have legitimate children from 
various sources. Some were adopted, some came to a marriage from one 
spouse's previous relationship. Others were conceived from sperm donors, 
and yet others the old-fashioned way with previously arranged permission 
of both spouses to one another.

The point is that special procreative permissions are needed by same-sex 
couples that are not needed by opposite-sex couples to avoid adulterous 
entanglements. Same-sex spouses may be happy to grant such permissions, 
but a highly overpopulated society working to curb population growth may 
not agree by default. Whether or not that is fair, equitable, and just 
vis-à-vis heterosexual couples is an ongoing discussion topic.

> And finishes with,
> "How romantic. And in many cases, how unrealistic. Over the centuries 
> marriage has more often been an arrangement implementing social 
> practicalities rather than love. Given the intractable societal 
> burdens of overpopulation, societal concerns may well trump personal 
> preferences for multiple reasons -- food sharing, housing sharing, and 
> many facets of more efficient societal use of many limited resources."
> <[snip]>
> Marriage should be a statement that two people want to be together, 
> for no other reason than they want to be, not because of social 
> engineering.

Some of the oldest literature in any human canon deals with marriage 
mores and social responses to them. For example, in the Western canon, 
the Greek Odyssey considers the relationship between the returning King 
Odysseus and his wife Penelope. The nature of the relationships between 
men and women, legally, socially, and otherwise, have changed since 
those days and conditions, and likely will continue to change as 
humanity faces, or refuses to face, continuing changes in our physical 
and social environments. To the extent these messages encourage 
intelligent open-mindedness while searching for workable contemporary 
solutions, they may have some value.


Ken
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.fsr.com/pipermail/vision2020/attachments/20120715/d050c55e/attachment-0001.html>