HERE’S a worthwhile piece by W. James Antle, III in The American Spectator about same-sex “marriage” in New York. I strongly disagree with his statement that “the momentum is decidedly in favor of New York-style matrimony,” but he makes the important point, stated many times before but never enough, that modern divorce paved the way for homosexual “marriage” and that there are grave implications for all families as the bond between children and their biological parents is trivialized by same-sex unions. When law does not enshrine the role of the biological parent, there is ample room for family courts to step in and define what a parent is. Antle writes:

[E]ven in today’s society, severing marriage from its last links to biology will have its consequences. After the initial euphoric rush down the aisles subsides and the backlog of license applications clears, most New York gays and lesbians will likely enjoy the social status their new right confers without ever exercising it. For as the gay libertarian writer Justin Raimondo has argued, “That’s because [gay marriage supporters] have never explained — and never could explain — why it would make sense for gays to entangle themselves in a regulatory web and risk getting into legal disputes over divorce, alimony, and the division of property.”

It will be mostly heterosexuals marrying under a new set of rules where biological parents waiving all rights to their children is as much a part of marriage’s basic design as connecting parents and children. Perhaps that’s appropriate, since heterosexuals have made the new definition of marriage thinkable.

                                                  — Comments —

Diana writes:

Antle’s article is the best analysis of the debacle I have read so far. I would take issue only with one line: “This is the result of democratically enacted legislation, not judicial fiat.” While technically correct, the legislation was a result of chicanery and naked intimidation. But a writer has only so many words, and it was indeed passed by what passes for a legislature.

Most importantly, the writer focuses on the central and key consequence. I quote:

“It will be mostly heterosexuals marrying under a new set of rules where biological parents waiving all rights to their children is as much a part of marriage’s basic design as connecting parents and
children.”

Indeed, this is the nub. You and I have corresponded about this, and I note that someone else has caught it too. Too much of the debate on SSM has hinged on silly arguments like, “Now I can marry my dog.” I even think that the apprehension that SSM will lead to polygamy, while a worrying possibility, misses the point. The real point here is the creation of a class of children who BY LAW are bred to be alienated from one biological parent. This will change everything, our case law, our conception of what it is to be a parent.

Somewhere along the line, this will boomerang against mothers more than fathers, just as the pro-choice abortion argument created 163 million murdered fetuses, murdered because they were female. Unfortunately, the only way people will learn this is by bitter experience.

Laura writes:

In the case of Lisa Miller, a Vermont court awarded an lesbian who had no biological or adoptive tie to a child sole custody.

Jesse Powell writes:

New York’s legalization of same-sex “marriage” making me think about the history of marriage; how we got to where we are now. 

At first, say about the 1850s, marriage was a commitment for life; the ideal environment to raise children in, indeed the necessary and only legitimate environment to raise children in, and the way a man organized his life to create his children and meet the needs of his children. Women rarely worked, the woman being financially supported by the man was assumed. 

I think the first weakening of marriage came with married women entering the workforce. A married woman working by itself is a violation of sex roles and indicates the man not fulfilling his duties as a husband. Slowly, over time, the assumption of paternal custody shifted to an assumption of maternal custody after a divorce. 

The next weakening of marriage was the advent of no-fault divorce, when marriage was no longer seen as a lifetime commitment except in extreme circumstances but was instead viewed as a commitment ideally for a lifetime but in reality only to the extent that both parties agreed. 

Now we have looming over the horizon, and already reality in several states, “gay marriage” where the differences between the sexes themselves is no longer viewed as being important and with moral value. 

One observation I’d like to make; the number of children living in gay male households compared to gay female households is much greater than the number of children in single male households compared to single female households. To use the data from California given by the 2010 census, the ratio of children in gay male compared to gay female households is 0.62 to 1 while the ratio of children in single male compared to single female households is 0.26 to 1. This is not due to there being significantly more gay male households than gay female households; 64,625 versus 60,891 respectively. It appears that the woman being the primary caretaker of the children is a bias more derived from heterosexual relationships that have failed than it is a proclivity or preference of women versus men when looking at homosexual relationships that are still intact and the child has to be “imported” into the household through one means or another.

Laura writes:

I’m not sure what can be gleaned from that last figure you give. First, it’s from California, which has a longtime homosexual population that is not necessarily representative of homosexual populations elsewhere. Second, those who would identify themselves as part of a homosexual household would likely be older on average than those who would comprise the “single male” category and more likely to have children from prior marriages or relationships.

Alissa writes:

Please follow and like us: