One of the nuttier arguments against same-sex marriage — and there’s a hotly contested battle for that distinction — is that gay people already have the right to marry. If they want to, they can marry someone of the opposite sex, just like anyone else.
Of course, that’s exactly what gay people have been doing since marriage was invented. Marriage is such an attractive institution that many, if not most, LGBTQ people throughout history have entered into it the only way they’ve legally been allowed: by marrying someone of the opposite sex. Those marriages then typically involve one gay person and one straight person.
Let’s call this “traditional gay marriage”.
So what kind of unions does traditional gay marriage create? Usually, ones built on a foundation of lies, where one partner believes the other is totally committed to them, and the other is just looking for some sort of societal approval they’d never get by being true to themselves.
It stands to reason that people in traditional gay marriages are more likely to cheat, because neither of them is likely to be sexually satisfied within the marriage. Even if everyone involved is faithful, they’re bound to get frustrated. The straight spouse may someday realize he or she deserves better, or the gay spouse may someday come out of the closet, bringing the marriage to an abrupt and painful end.
Gay marriage foes claim to be very concerned with children, but what kind of family does traditional gay marriage provide for kids? They’ll never really know who one of their parents truly is, and they’ll have to live with the tension between two people who really weren’t a match made in Heaven. That could manifest as anything from chilly passive-aggressiveness to physical and emotional abuse. How will they figure out what love is, or what they should be looking for in a mate, when the role models in their own home are so dysfunctional?
There’s no way to know how many straight marriages have been ruined by the legalization of same-sex marriage, though most people would put the estimate around 0. Traditional gay marriage, on the other hand, has led to countless divorces, scandals, broken homes and surely therapy bills totaling higher than the national debt.
If you still think traditional gay marriage is a good idea, ask yourself if you’d wish it on your own son or daughter. Would you want your daughter marrying a closeted gay man, or your son to shack up with a woman who’s always wishing he could be someone else? Because that’s the world you’re advocating when you want to put an end to same-sex marriage. Plenty of those gay people are still going to get married, and they might just marry you or someone you care about.
Now look at the alternative. When gay marriage is legal, fewer of those fraudulent marriages will exist. LGBTQ people will see that they don’t have to stay in the closet and deceive someone they care about in order to reap the benefits of marriage. They’ll know that they can marry the person they love and society will treat them just the same as any other couple. They’ll even be able to have kids, like my husband and I and so many other gay couples do, if that’s something they’re interested in. There will be no more incentive for traditional gay marriage, and people will have less reason to worry that their spouse is more interested in convenience than mutual affection.
The Supreme Court is hearing arguments on legalizing same-sex marriage today, and I hope they’ll hear something like this, because the world before legalized gay marriage was never as perfect as the gay marriage opponents would make it seem.
To them, I say this: If you’re really worried about gay people weakening the sacred institution of marriage, stop telling them to marry straight people.
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