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 Sunday, October 23, 2005
Mere Words/Maggie Gallagher
If social institutions are cognitive in essence, then words matter a great deal. Words classify in ways that organize the structure of thought. One of the readers of Volokh.com suggested as much by asking "Why don't we redefine the word couple to mean either two people, or three people?" What would happen if the government ordered a change in the word "couple" so it now means at least two, but possibly more? Possibly we would all just laugh at the government. (This must be what people who can't see any "mechanism" for how officially changing hte meaning of a word can matter, mean. SSM will be about access to the government institution but the private undersandings will remain intact, because the law can't touch those. ). Even so, one can envision that because law has a certain weight and power, this official revision would cause a certain amount of static, or interference in everyday life. Every time the government said "couple" you'd have to do a kind of mental double-shift to retain your meaning while understanding its. One thing SSM would certainly do: Make the older conjugal understanding of marriage a merely private understanding. This in itself is a powerful mechanism. 
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"One thing SSM would certainly do: Make the older conjugal understanding of marriage a merely private understanding. This in itself is a powerful mechanism."
Yes and no. Yes, redefining "marriage" will very likely make _some_ ideas harder to think and to express. No, as usual, you're giving waffly generalities that don't stand up when you consider details. A moment's thought suggests that all the things that you would need to say and have people believe to achieve your stated goals will be just as easy to think and express as as before. You can still say "People who are planning to be biological parents should be married and stay married to their co-biological parent for the good of the kids" and it takes no more words than it did before. You will of course have to step carefully to say things like "Kiddies, Doug and Dave are 'married' according to the government, but it's important you realize they're not _really_ married, not in the sight of God." But frankly my dear, I don't give a damn.
They would not be married in the light of human reasoning.
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