Friday, December 12, 2008

Clearing up questions -- and a regret

My sister responded to one of yesterday's posts. The bits in question were:

* Our definition of marriage has changed radically over the years and our current definition is less than 100 years old.
* What about "be fruitful and multiply?" Doesn't that prove that since gays can't procreate they can't marry? Infertile straights get married all the time and gays have access to international adoptions and reproductive technology (besides, with 6.5 billion people we must have kids?).

My sister wrote:

Down at the bottom of this lady's summary you state that the definition of modern marriage is only about a hundred years old. What is that definition? And does it say that ALL able bodied people must be married???
Just wondering.

The current definition of marriage is based on love between the two people rather than the husband owning the wife. The article said that into the 1970s there were still states that had "head and master" laws which gave the husband the right to decide where a family will live and whether the wife could have a job.

The article doesn't say that all able bodied people must be married, though I understand some Fundies believe that. However, one of the big arguments against gay marriage is that they can't procreate. The response to that is that marriage is much more than procreation. And my comment, not in the original article, is that with 6.5 billion people in the world we should be worried about too much procreation, not too little.

At the end of that original post I included a pie chart that showed most of the country is Christian and that large portion complaining, "We're being oppressed!" On reflection I think the graphic is not accurate for two reasons. The portion allocated to Christians probably includes many people who say they are Christian but otherwise do not act on their faith. Secondly, not all Christians are claiming oppression from the culture. I should have left it off.

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