Marriage rites

The injustice of same sex marriage

The drive for legal recognition, under the marriage laws, of the relationship between same sex couples continues apace with the Greens pushing it to the top of their agenda at their first opportunity. From the distorted thinking of Human Rights bodies the lack of the opportunity is seen to be discriminatory; same sex couples should enjoy the benefits enjoyed by married heterosexual couples given the bond they feel for their same sex partners. I have no doubt that same sex couples might feel a union yet I dispute that objectively it is a union that exists between them. The union I am talking about is a true biological union. Objectively same sex couples cannot be said to enjoy a biological union. I would go further and say that to confer the right of marriage on same sex couples is to do an injustice to married heterosexual couples.

I suppose the reasons for this push are two-fold. The first is to gain the financial benefits given by law to married heterosexual couples. The second, I suppose, is to get an external blessing from society at large that says “what you are doing is OK.” Many of the economic benefits enjoyed by heterosexual couples that marry are embedded in our past. When a man and a woman marry they enter into a bond that is biologically complementary. Through their exclusive sexual bond over a period of time the woman eventually conceives children and gives birth. Children are a sign of the biological union. This results in great joy but it also imposes great burdens on the couple. The mother must feed her child and the child has to be looked after and educated by the couple. This restricts economic activity, particularly by the wife/mother, as well as imposing costs. So when men are the major bread winner, or are the exclusive bread winner, it is right to enact laws to reward the couple and to ensure the security of the female partner after the death of the husband. The birth of children is a common good for society that arises naturally from the heterosexual bond in marriage and the number to be born of a couple is unknowable.

In the case of same sex couples there can be absolutely no children from the “union”, it is impossible. Further, both members of the same sex couple can remain in the work force without suffering any economic losses. There is no need to educate anyone and no children are produced for the good of the society. They may want children but to do so they must enter into an agreement with a third person, someone who would cooperate with them. The third person must provide either an egg or a sperm. The third person might even have to provide a body and a womb to obtain a child. This would be quite an enterprise relying on agreements entered into and all set for particular times so that a child is conceived and born. In contrast the heterosexual couples conceive out of their own loins with no third party and from them flow children.

These situations cannot be seen as equal and I think that it is an injustice to equate the two. The heterosexual couples take the risk of conceiving at any time, the same sex couples arrange the conception and birth of a child with a third party, if they want even one child and no further children can naturally come. The heterosexuals accept their children as they come and wear the costs, the same sex couples require a third party so as to arrange the conception of a child but only if they so choose. The same sex couples ride on the back of the heterosexual couples that accept the consequences of their sexual union. Same sexual couples do not accept the consequences of their sexual “union”.