Arguments Against Same-Sex Marriage

[Ryan Thunder]

...And your idea of making the world "better" is to compound all our problems of poverty and ignorance with a population crash? Or do you honestly not get the part where the fact that children raised under condition X have a 2% higher risk of suffering effect Y doesn't automatically mean "parents living in condition X are unfit to have children?"

Err; that guy's a moron, but we do need to drastically reduce our population, in general.

[Simon_Jester]

I think you guys are being trolled here, this guy can't be for real.

Eh, fuck. You're probably right. Between this and the absurd jerkoff fantasies about building his own Orion drive ship (where he always seems to know just enough engineering to know what he wants, but never enough to grasp the price of it, no matter how many times it's explained to him)... yeah. Too crazy-stupid to be real.

Err; that guy's a moron, but we do need to drastically reduce our population, in general.

Yeah, but banning large categories of the population from having children at all is a shitty way to do it, because it provokes rebellion against the policy.

If you really want to do draconian population control (and there are reasons to want that), your model is China's one child policy. Not "as many as you want in group A and none in group B."

Moreover, adoption by anyone should be actively encouraged, because you want to minimize the total number of children, and allowing people who want their own but can't produce them to adopt minimizes the risk that they'll produce additional children for their own.

[Starman7]

Pointing out the studies which involve single-parent families or homosexual couples in countries with massive prejudice problems is a common fallacy. Every legitimate study yet has shown that same-sex couples raising children in tolerant environments is on par with or slightly above heterosexual couples, with the increase most likely attributed to the fact that it is very, very difficult for a homosexual couple to get accidentally pregnant. If a woman in a lesbian couple does get accidentally pregnant... there will be some serious explaining to do.

Furthermore, if you are going to advocate "perfect parents only", I would strongly support adoptions: adoptive parents, owing to the fact that a planned family is generally a more stable environment.

Also, can anybody link me to a study involving transgendered parents? I know about the literature for homosexual couples, but I haven't heard of any on transgendered parents.

[Hamstray]

Simply put, in a perfect world, every child would be born in a middle-class or higher nuclear family with two loving parents of the opposite sex. Unfortunately, it's not a perfect world, but just because we can't make the world perfect doesn't mean we can't make the world better.

Instead of trying to fabricate a presumably perfect (also unrealistic) environment you should let society be able to adapt. If you choke all diversity no wonder you will mostly get children which best fit into those conditions as reflected by the studies you rely on. There are children which do just fine without being raised in a nuclear family and more of them will evolve if you just let them.

[Simon_Jester]

Pointing out the studies which involve single-parent families or homosexual couples in countries with massive prejudice problems is a common fallacy. Every legitimate study yet has shown that same-sex couples raising children in tolerant environments is on par with or slightly above heterosexual couples, with the increase most likely attributed to the fact that it is very, very difficult for a homosexual couple to get accidentally pregnant. If a woman in a lesbian couple does get accidentally pregnant... there will be some serious explaining to do.

Furthermore, if you are going to advocate "perfect parents only", I would strongly support adoptions: adoptive parents, owing to the fact that a planned family is generally a more stable environment.

Also, can anybody link me to a study involving transgendered parents? I know about the literature for homosexual couples, but I haven't heard of any on transgendered parents.

I don't know, but thinking about study design...

You would probably have to control for a number of factors to get it right. Just off the top of my head, age at transition and whether the parent transitioned before or after they began to raise the child would be the big ones.

[Serafina]

Also, can anybody link me to a study involving transgendered parents? I know about the literature for homosexual couples, but I haven't heard of any on transgendered parents.

I don't think so, mostly because transsexual parents are incredibly rare. Transsexuality in general is already rare, and those transsexual who actually have children are even rarer - and transsexuality is still a big hurdle for adoption.

Either way, i see absolutely no reason why transsexual parents should be any worse than non-transsexual parents.
The danger of being social outcasts is there just like it is with homosexual parents, and likely larger, but that's about it.


Generally, you will have the following constellations of families with a transsexual parents:
-A lesbian/lesbian couple where one is a transwoman. In that case, the child can biologically be theirs, either because it's from a stage of their partnership before transitioning or because the transwomen froze sperm before transitioning (i did the latter myself btw.)
-A gay/gay couple. Much like above, only that it's much harder to do it after transitioning - generally impossible, since you would have to pass on hormones in order to do so.
-A heterosexual relationship where one child is from a former relationship or where the child is adopted.

In the end, it doesn't matter. Like with (other) homosexual couples, the children are much more likely to be planned (accident is only a slight possiblity here, and only before transition). That is always good, though it doesn't make them inherently better parents. But there is nothing that makes them inherently worse either.

[Zinegata]

The only real argument against Same-Sex Marriage is that it defines marriage as a something that can be "whatever society wants it to be".

Which opens the door to allowing stuff like polygamy, incestual marriages, or downright batshit crazy stuff like people marrying housepets.

And opens the door for extremists on the other side to claim that "Marriage is between a man and a woman and that's final!"

Because all of the above wackos are part of society, and thus have a say on "whatever society wants it to be".

That being said, even Bill freaking O'Reilly is pro Same-Sex marriage. He's even cool with kids being adopted with gay couples. I don't really see the religious crazies winning this one.

[LionElJonson]

Simply put, in a perfect world, every child would be born in a middle-class or higher nuclear family with two loving parents of the opposite sex. Unfortunately, it's not a perfect world, but just because we can't make the world perfect doesn't mean we can't make the world better.

...And your idea of making the world "better" is to compound all our problems of poverty and ignorance with a population crash? Or do you honestly not get the part where the fact that children raised under condition X have a 2% higher risk of suffering effect Y doesn't automatically mean "parents living in condition X are unfit to have children?"

Of course any given set of parents might be as good as any other, but when you're dealing with policies on the scale of a country, you're going to have to deal with things in a statistical fashion due to the nature of the beast. That said, you need not inflict a population crash to achieve the results that would improve things. Simply implementing a tax hike on the undesirable parents for every child beyond the first for every category of undesirability and a tax break on the desirable parents for every child beyond the second for every category of desirability would probably be more than enough.

Cutting child support and alimony benefits (save in the case of abuse) would probably help as well, since they'd remove a considerable portion of the financial incentive to have a divorce.

This is basic logic. You cannot go from "X works better" (even if you could prove that on the subject of parenting, and I don't think you can) to "only X should be allowed." You have to prove that X causes harm, real harm, harm over and above the kind of harm that sheer blind luck can cause.

Of course not. That said, you can go from "X works better" to "we should encourage X" is entirely reasonable, though.

Otherwise, you're just being a malicious bastard whose indifference to both basic logic and the suffering of real people causes you to advocate hideous nightmare policy that it's just as well you lack the political ability to get implemented.

When you're implementing policies on a national scale, you have to be indifferent to the suffering of individual people, since you've got the good of the entire country to look after. If you can make the people of your country X% better off on average, you're doing your job, even if some portion of the country is worse off as a result.

[Simon_Jester]

Since you have yet to show the slightest scrap of evidence that these "policies on a national level" of yours would be even a slight improvement, and since I can think of many ways for them to make matters worse, I find your argument that you should be indifferent to suffering because it will be better for the nation to be a foul lie, beneath contempt.

[Shroom Man 777]

He is a person who is impeding the happiness of many same-sex couples and other homosexuals and some such.

I say LionElJohnson should be prohibited from marrying and should have his ovaries removed, just in case.

[Twoyboy]

The only real argument against Same-Sex Marriage is that it defines marriage as a something that can be "whatever society wants it to be".

Which opens the door to allowing stuff like polygamy, incestual marriages, or downright batshit crazy stuff like people marrying housepets.

And opens the door for extremists on the other side to claim that "Marriage is between a man and a woman and that's final!"

Because all of the above wackos are part of society, and thus have a say on "whatever society wants it to be".

And even that's a pretty shitty argument. Marriage is a social construct, of course it's whatever society wants it to be. But that doesn't mean the lowest common denominator in any society gets to determine the policy. As a society if we have no desire to tread down that slippery slope, then we can choose to stop at any point.

And it's a dishonest argument in that it intentionally tries to get people to relate homosexuality to incest and bestiality in their minds. The fact is we can introduce same sex marriage and, knowing that it is NOT immoral in any way, shape or form, still choose to ban these practices.

[Twoyboy]

When you're implementing policies on a national scale, you have to be indifferent to the suffering of individual people, since you've got the good of the entire country to look after. If you can make the people of your country X% better off on average, you're doing your job, even if some portion of the country is worse off as a result.

Ok, I also agree that he's trolling now. That's one of the least thought out opinions I've ever come across.

[Akhlut]

The only real argument against Same-Sex Marriage is that it defines marriage as a something that can be "whatever society wants it to be".

Which opens the door to allowing stuff like polygamy,

If everyone who is being married agrees to it, what's the problem? We already have contracts in existence with three or more parties, so why not marriage? It won't be for everyone, but, then again, marriage between two people isn't either.

incestual marriages,

How incestuous are we talking? Several nations and national subdivisions allow for first cousin marriages (which, on their own, carry only a marginal increase in harmful birth defects), and anything beyond that, genetically speaking, is only as harmful as marriage to any stranger. And one can limit marriage outside of immediate family due to the fact that such relationships are often harmful and have a much higher chance of resulting in birth defects.

or downright batshit crazy stuff like people marrying housepets.

Non-human animals cannot enter a contract as one of the signatories, so, this is a red herring.

Because all of the above wackos are part of society, and thus have a say on "whatever society wants it to be".

Marriage, being a social construct, is just what society wants it to be.

[Zinegata]

*sigh* Again, people just focus on the "anti gay marriage stuff" instead of what I actually wrote.

So I will repeat my position. Again. And not mention anything that compares same-sex marriage to any other form of marriage because people who discuss this issue are so defensive.

The only problem with same-sex marriage is that it reminds people that marriage is "whatever society wants it to be". Unfortunately, some people have crazy ideas about what marriage is supposed to be. Like people who say the only valid marriage is a marriage between a man and a woman.

Now, these crazy people are also part of society. Hence, according to the "whatever society wants it to be" rule, these people also have the right to demand that marriage conform to THEIR vision.

In the current climate, this isn't dangerous. America is more or less okay with Same-Sex Marriage. Heck, Bill O'Reilly of all people is for it.

The problem is if these crazies (or any form of crazies) ever take power. And they claim that they will redefine marriage as being only a man and a woman because "They represent society, and marriage is whatever society wants". Thus, one of the strongest arguments for same-sex marriage becomes one of the strongest arguments against with.

Which is why it's best to also have other arguments as ammunition (i.e. "Do not get in the way of people's happiness").

Because society can be a major jackass.

[Simon_Jester]

The problem with this argument is that it can be applied to any form of social change: it's too dangerous to change the system because that would remind people that the system can be changed as is not an eternal, unalterable verity! And then anything could happen, and we can't let that happen...

I'm not sure that can be used reliably as an argument.

[Hillary]

Now, these crazy people are also part of society. Hence, according to the "whatever society wants it to be" rule, these people also have the right to demand that marriage conform to THEIR vision.

Why do they have that right? They have the right to believe this is the case, but not to demand it. Under your logic, loonies who think left-handed people should be burned at the stake have the right to demand that.

[Serafina]

Zinegata, your argument is basically a slippery-slope fallacy.
Because your argument is "introducing gay marriage shows that society can changes it" rules, and that could lead to horrible changes" while ignoring how or why or if these changes would occur.

Also, society is made from individuals, but that doesn't mean that every single individual represents society.
Some people can demand a complete ban of all marriage (yes, those people exist), but that doesn't mean that society will do it.
It's far more sensible to determine what harm or good a change will do to society, than to fight against the possibility of change itself.

[Zinegata]

The problem with this argument is that it can be applied to any form of social change: it's too dangerous to change the system because that would remind people that the system can be changed as is not an eternal, unalterable verity! And then anything could happen, and we can't let that happen...

I'm not sure that can be used reliably as an argument.

Finally, someone who actually addressed my argument

Yes, it can be applied to any form of social change, and it's always a valid point for a simple reason: Change is not always good.

Therefore, the merits of the change itself should be explored. Arguments should be formulated based on the merits of the change. For instance, legalizing same-sex marriages should prove to be a boon to help orphaned kids find a pair of loving parents.

But a lot of people who discuss this issue (and I'm not saying they're here) simply retort to saying "Nothing says we can't do it." That's not good enough. Because if the crazies take over, they can also say "Nothing says we can't do it" either.

[ray245]

The problem with this argument is that it can be applied to any form of social change: it's too dangerous to change the system because that would remind people that the system can be changed as is not an eternal, unalterable verity! And then anything could happen, and we can't let that happen...

I'm not sure that can be used reliably as an argument.

Finally, someone who actually addressed my argument

Yes, it can be applied to any form of social change, and it's always a valid point for a simple reason: Change is not always good.

Therefore, the merits of the change itself should be explored. Arguments should be formulated based on the merits of the change. For instance, legalizing same-sex marriages should prove to be a boon to help orphaned kids find a pair of loving parents.

But a lot of people who discuss this issue (and I'm not saying they're here) simply retort to saying "Nothing says we can't do it." That's not good enough. Because if the crazies take over, they can also say "Nothing says we can't do it" either.

Why do we need to prove a benefit before we legalise something? If something does not have a tangible harm, there should be no reason to ban it.

[Zinegata]

Why do they have that right? They have the right to believe this is the case, but not to demand it. Under your logic, loonies who think left-handed people should be burned at the stake have the right to demand that.

Yes. That's the point. If you entirely rely on "it's whatever society wants it to be", loonies who think left-handed people should be killed can in fact demand it as they are part of the society.

Plenty of societies in the past have done pretty evil things, and it was "okay" because their society said it was okay.

Which is why you need to introduce other arguments into the fray. Like the morality of killing people over extremely silly things.

[Zinegata]

Zinegata, your argument is basically a slippery-slope fallacy.
Because your argument is "introducing gay marriage shows that society can changes it" rules, and that could lead to horrible changes" while ignoring how or why or if these changes would occur.

Not exactly, although yes it may seem like the slippery-slope fallacy. I get where you're coming from.

My main point is that you can't rely on that argument alone, because it can be used against the original proponents.

[Serafina]

Why do they have that right? They have the right to believe this is the case, but not to demand it. Under your logic, loonies who think left-handed people should be burned at the stake have the right to demand that.

Yes. That's the point. If you entirely rely on "it's whatever society wants it to be", loonies who think left-handed people should be killed can in fact demand it as they are part of the society.

Plenty of societies in the past have done pretty evil things, and it was "okay" because their society said it was okay.

Which is why you need to introduce other arguments into the fray. Like the morality of killing people over extremely silly things.

You will never be able to prevent a lunatic majority from doing that. Not with 100% success, at least.
That's because there simply is no mechanism to prevent change. All you can do is create sensible guidelines for it.

But that's not what you are arguing for, rather you are arguing for preventing all change in order to prevent bad changes. But that's just impossible, and therefore useless.

My main point is that you can't rely on that argument alone, because it can be used against the original proponents.

As i just said, neither can you rely on your policy. And your policy also causes a great deal of harm, since it prevents necessary and positive changes as well.

[Zinegata]

Why do we need to prove a benefit before we legalise something? If something does not have a tangible harm, there should be no reason to ban it.

Because not all laws are just.

I'm certainly not a fan of certain crazy laws that advocate burning women alive for perceived infidelities, for instance.

Again, this is what I'm warning against. You can't just say "We legalised it so we don't need to justify it!". What happens when loons draft something that overturns same-sex marriage and simply go "We legalised it so we don't need to justify it!"?

[Twoyboy]

*sigh* Again, people just focus on the "anti gay marriage stuff" instead of what I actually wrote.

So I will repeat my position. Again. And not mention anything that compares same-sex marriage to any other form of marriage because people who discuss this issue are so defensive.

The only problem with same-sex marriage is that it reminds people that marriage is "whatever society wants it to be". Unfortunately, some people have crazy ideas about what marriage is supposed to be. Like people who say the only valid marriage is a marriage between a man and a woman.

Now, these crazy people are also part of society. Hence, according to the "whatever society wants it to be" rule, these people also have the right to demand that marriage conform to THEIR vision.

In the current climate, this isn't dangerous. America is more or less okay with Same-Sex Marriage. Heck, Bill O'Reilly of all people is for it.

The problem is if these crazies (or any form of crazies) ever take power. And they claim that they will redefine marriage as being only a man and a woman because "They represent society, and marriage is whatever society wants". Thus, one of the strongest arguments for same-sex marriage becomes one of the strongest arguments against with.

Which is why it's best to also have other arguments as ammunition (i.e. "Do not get in the way of people's happiness").

Because society can be a major jackass.

*sigh* Another person who thinks their argument is somehow new and not just a reworded version of very much debunked ideas.

Marriage IS whatever society wants it to be. So saying there's a problem reminding people of something that is true is pretty dumb. If you have a problem with it being true in the first place, that's a very different argument.

Now, having said that, saying "but what if the crazies get hold of the idea" IS a version of the slippery slope fallacy, as everyone above pointed out. It's not just because it can be applied to any form of social change, but because it can be applied with or without change to any society at any time. In fact, by far the best way to ensure it doesn't happen is to continue to apply rules to society that are moral and fair... such as allowing gay marriage.

"Nothing says we can't do it" IS a good enough argument if there is NO harm to society. Otherwise you are banning things willy-nilly and this is a good way to destabilise society in the first place.

For example, let's say you had a society where adoption was illegal. So every mother is FORCED to raise her children. You one day put forward the idea of adoption. But it is opposed because if we allow mother's to let someone else raise their child, the crazies will want to be able to take people's children without asking, or sell them for organs, or fling them from a catapult... is all sounds kind of stupid when you're talking about something we all take for granted, doesn't it?

[Zinegata]

majority from doing that. Not with 100% success, at least.
That's because there simply is no mechanism to prevent change. All you can do is create sensible guidelines for it.

But that's not what you are arguing for, rather you are arguing for preventing all change in order to prevent bad changes. But that's just impossible, and therefore useless.

*sigh*

No, I'm saying change should be reasoned. In your terms, they should have guidelines.