IS THIS ABOUT HOMOSEXUALITY? Eve (sorry for length)

A recurring theme in some of the pro-SSM posts replying to this question has been: Okay, we know you guys don't like SSM, but what's your alternative? What is your "official policy toward gay people"? Here's a somewhat scattershot reply to that query.

1) I admit I'm unsure of what SSM opponents are being asked to provide. We differ among ourselves about what we'd advise homosexual couples to do, but, just for a couple examples, some SSM opponents (like Elizabeth Marquardt) support civil unions. Others, like me, support expanding and strengthening freedom of contract to allow homosexual couples--and single people--to allocate certain benefits and responsibilities to people they trust, on a case-by-case basis. (SSM supporters have achieved a lot of success convincing people that the denial of these rights and responsibilities is wrong--the most popular example here is hospital visitation--but the arguments in favor of letting a homosexual partner make medical decisions for an incapacitated beloved apply just as well to a sister or a best friend.)

At any rate, supporters of SSM have rejected these alternatives for the perfectly valid reason that... they're not marriage. That's fine--it's pretty much the definition of "supporter of SSM"! But it does leave me a bit in the dark about what kind of "positive policy" SSM supporters are asking opponents to offer.

2) Perhaps cultural support of and honor for homosexual relationships are what's being asked for. That's a question better addressed by the people whom David Barnes and Mark Barton have dubbed "liberals," but I do have two comments on it. First, Patrick Hart argues that opposition to SSM "regards [gay couples'] relationships as 'other,' interchangeable with friendships, family ties, etc." I've ranted enough about my desire to get Americans to take friendship more seriously, so I'll just say that I don't think our culture denigrates ties to close family members. I think homosexual relationships could be treated as equal in cultural honor to (not the same as) sisterhood, or a more accurate and exalted understanding of best-friendship, without SSM. I'm not a Barnesian liberal, but this seems to me to be the cultural approach such liberals should prefer.

3) Second, I strongly take issue with the belief that marriage exists so the government can bless and praise your romantic relationships. Supporters of limited government and/or extensive privacy rights really shouldn't approve this intrusive understanding of marriage. If marriage is about whether two adults are sweet on, or loyal to, each other, it is none of the government's business. That is, obviously, some of what marriage as a cultural institution is for; but it's insufficient to justify government intervention, just as the fact of committed, loving friendship is not enough to justify government licensing of friendships. Civil marriage exists precisely because society needs children raised well, and children--the unconsenting third parties who often result from the intimate fun and fumblings of men and women--need mom and dad.

(Supporters of SSM often argue that this creepy "Uncle Sam likes your personal life!" view of marriage is the one held by many or most heterosexual couples. I don't see how that's an argument for SSM rather than an argument for renewing a more embodied, lush understanding of the human person and a more limited understanding of government.)
posted by Eve at 2:19 AM VOTE

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