Letters: View about marriage is challenged

In a letter in The Advocate published May 15, Charles Allen cited his perception of historical roots for society’s creation of the marriage contract (“Marriage was for the children!”) and then stated firmly that “since it is impossible for same-sex marriage to produce … offspring, using the term marriage for such a union is detrimental to the very meaning of the word and corrupts the purpose of the state’s right or responsibility for such a contract.”

Consider the implications of that assertion. People who are married to opposite-sex spouses but not able, for a variety of unwelcome biological reasons, to produce offspring, apparently, are “detrimental to the very meaning of the word” marriage. The clear implication of the assertion is that the state must insist on a positive fertility test before issuing a marriage license and if no offspring is produced within a reasonable time (usual legislative hedging language) should dissolve the failed contract to avoid its corruption. Adoptions don’t count in this last consideration; same-sex couples can and do adopt children just as lovingly and reliably as do opposite-sex couples.

Society has developed legally restricted privileges not dependent on procreation but associated nonetheless with marriage: for example, common-law inheritance by spouses and visitation in critical-care health facilities. Seemingly, society has a long history of not requiring ability to produce offspring as a condition (or even a first expectation) for marriage.

I do not doubt that Allen is genuinely concerned about providing children “the security of a family.” But to contend, as he does, that aim is the only one associated with “marriage” or that it can be achieved only by opposite-sex parents is contrary to experience and “tradition that has fared society well.” The long tradition of marriage has included the creation of stable, secure families that more often than not include children. Until recently it has excluded same-sex couples, but that exclusion is not based on logic.

JAMES G. TRAYNHAM

retired professor

Baton Rouge

Comments

1) Comment by phil - 22/05/2012

I love my dog, I love my mother, I love my father, I love my sister. However, that love does not translate into a right for me to marry any of them. This argument that tries to exclude the subjects of normal sex and having children inside of a loving marriage between a man and a woman is just an attempt to confuse the real issue. The real issue is that homosexuals do not have normal sex and cannot ever have a normal marriage and therefore marriage between homosexuals should always be prohibited. If homosexuals just want to love each other without having their "sex" outside of marriage, then great. I can still love, my dog, my mother , my father my sister, etc too.

2) Comment by beabea - 17/05/2012

Yes, great letter, thank you. But even with the procreation argument shot down as effectively as Prof. Traynham does here, I'm afraid the bigots will just find another rationalization. But thankfully the percentage of the population they comprise, is shrinking at an accelerating rate as more and more people get to know gay couples and their children, and realize civil marriage equality is not only NOT a threat to themselves, but is profoundly important to _real people_ (as opposed to the caricatures they had feared, who turn out to bear no resemblance to actual flesh-and-blood families headed by same-sex couples).

3) Comment by DMJ - 17/05/2012

Well put, Mr. Traynham.

4) Comment by lovemykids - 17/05/2012

Thanks James.