Take a cursory glance at this blog and you’ll notice that I often write about homosexuality. The issue of gay marriage in particular has received a lot of discussion here—and not all of it well-informed.
I find the case for gay marriage to be far more compelling than the case against, but I think some of my fellow gay marriage proponents overstate the weakness of the opposing view. Objections to gay marriage are often summarily dismissed as religious, bigoted, or a combination of the two. This is unfair.
Religion and bigotry animate a lot of the opposition to gay marriage, no doubt. But there is, in my estimation, at least one viable secular argument against gay marriage—that is, an argument that doesn’t make an appeal to faith or prejudice. Here is the abbreviated version:
All consenting adults should enjoy the right to enter into any relationship, be that relationship polygamous, incestuous, homosexual, interracial, etc.. It does not follow, though, that the government should treat all relationships equally.
Some relationships are simply more beneficial to society than others. The government, then, should incentivize relationships according to their societal utility.
As far as the government is currently concerned, marriage is the most important relationship. Why? Procreation.* Procreation is vital to the state’s continuance and growth, because children are the next generation of workers and taxpayers. This gives the state a compelling interest to incentivize procreation with benefits like additional tax deductions or legal rights. What makes heterosexual couples uniquely eligible for these benefits is that they—unlike gay couples—can procreate.
None of this is to say that gay couples aren’t entitled to many of the same rights their procreative heterosexual counterparts enjoy. There are plenty of reasons why the government should promote committed homosexual relationships. To name just one reason: Several studies have found that gay couples make extraordinarily competent adoptive parents. Still, by virtue of their inability to procreate, gay couples contribute less to society, and thus should receive less from society.
So where procreation is the criterion for full marriage benefits, it makes sense to deny those benefits to gay couples. And not just gay couples, mind you, but also heterosexual couples that are unwilling or unable to procreate.
*Note that procreation may not always be the state’s most compelling interest in relationships. If overpopulation becomes an existential threat, governments may actually incentivize relationships that produce fewer, if any, kids. China, for example, has already gone to great lengths to curb its population growth.
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You really want to make the ability to procreate a test to see who can get married?
What do you have against women who have gone through menopause, or men and women who for other reasons are sterile?
An analysis of same sex marriage begins and ends with our Consitution, and a careful reading of it will reveal that there is no homosexual exemption to the due process and equal protection clauses.
I am not arguing that procreation should be criterion, only that if it is, it would make sense to deny certain benefits to gay couples and non-procreative heterosexual arguments.
It’s a legitimate argument.
I don’t find it quite compelling, since it assumes that the role of government recognition is to incentivize (is that a real word?) procreation, when I don’t believe that it is the case. In the eyes of government, marriage is seen as a contract, and if it weren’t for taxes, I don’t think the government would have ever gotten involved.
In fact, if the government wanted to better society through marriage, they’d do well to encourage procreation-free marriages while encouraging adoption. Gay couples are much more likely to adopt – and what better way to help children without parents than to match them with parents without children?
Kudos for trying to take it on from the opposite point of view, though. I know some atheists who are socially conservative, and I find this sort of thing a worthwhile exercise.
First off, kudos for trying to walk a mile in the other shoes. But, your argument sucks. And, it’s invalid.
You’ve made a classic logical blunder. You’ve conflated relationships that can procreate with the act of procreation itself. And, then followed it with another blunder – equating the converse.
If a government wishes to increase procreation, then it’s sufficient to say “The guardian of any child receives a $25,000 check at its birth and $10,000 for each birthday after that until the 18th.” This is exactly what Denmark is doing to prop up its failing birthrate. And it’s working, too.
Second, to incentivize procreation, the relationships that can procreate have nothing to do with it. Nearly every single child abuser and neglectful parent is heterosexual. This is both by absolute numbers (duh) and by relative numbers.
Third, lesbians in committed relationships can and do have children via artificial insemination, sometimes with gay friends as the donors. This isn’t a modern invention, either. So, gay couples can (and often want to) procreate.
To sum up, if you want to incentivize procreation, the worst way to do it is to dis-incentivize something else. As my father always said, KISS.
Sure, if procreation is the criterion for state-recognized marriage, then it makes sense as you said “to deny those benefits to gay couples. And not just gay couples, mind you, but also heterosexual couples that are unwilling or unable to procreate.” This is something I’ve often said while defending gay marriage. Because this is obviously a crazy system to set up. Seriously, how could it possibly work? Heterosexual couples make a promise to procreate, and then … what? Is there a deadline? What if they get pregnant and there’s a miscarriage? What if it’s always, “we’re going to wait another year or two, we’re not ready for a baby yet but want one in the future”? Is the state really going to check up on people and break up all their property agreements and shared health benefits and other legal arrangements if they haven’t produced babies by the end of some legally-mandated baby-making window? It’s so absurd and disgusting.
And of course, you still have to establish that procreation is the only reason for legally recognizing marriage … which is far from obvious.
At first blush, the argument seems like a good one, but upon closer inspection it fails at its basic premise.
The argument claims that government should provide inceptive for lifestyles which are beneficial to the society. I personally don’t believe this is the role of government (it being outside of the realm of the bare essential tenets government IS responsible for, namely “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”), but for the sake of clarifying the logical flaws in the argument, let’s grant that premise.
Even if the first premise was valid, the argument would fail in the next step: deciding what is beneficial for society. The argument claims that the mere act of procreation is the most beneficial act one can do to “help” society, when the exact opposite is actually true. We have an overabundance of children who are not cared for, children who create a taxing demand on the foster care system, on the juvenile delinquent centers, on the welfare system, and ultimately on the prison system. The act that is truly the most beneficial to society is to provide caring homes for these children to be raised in–homes that will keep these children off the street and out of jeopardizing situations. That is the true act that should be incentivized, if anything–not the mere act of natural “procreation”, which with advances in modern science and medicine means less and less. As noted above, a lesbian couple can utilize artificial insemination, and a gay couple could use an egg donor and surrogate mother. The list goes on and on, but I hope I’ve illustrated some of the ways the argument fails at its basic premises
(And all of this doesn’t even glance over the horrifying possibilities of a 1984-ish police state that could be ushered in by requiring proof of procreational potential for all marriages in order to determine which ones are somehow “legitimate”)
All great responses. I’m share many of your criticisms of this argument. My purpose was not to make a compelling argument against gay marriage (again, I support gay marriage!). Rather, I just wanted to get people thinking about a secular argument against marriage that, if you buy into certain assumptions (like ‘the government should incentivize certain behaviors’), makes some sense.
My biggest objection to setting up a system where procreation is the primary criterion is, as someone noted, that such a system would require a ton of bureaucracy. So it’s more pragmatic to let gay couples marry. Perhaps the government should just get out of the institution of marriage altogether.
Jon,
Great article. Nice of you to take our side once in awhile
I think this is the argument pro traditional family folks have been making for some time.
I think there are a few arguments in the comments section that reflect a bit of group think from the left. Allow me to provide an alternate point of view.
Two points:
1. The government does a ton of things to encourage behavior in a certain way. This is principally pushed by the American left (so I find it ironic that you all object to it on this one issue). It is where we get cigarette taxes, tax deductions for charitable contributions, tax-free municipal bonds, and most of our tax code.
Most recently it is why we passed a law that fines people who don’t have health insurance. It is also why Al Gore (and, I assume most of your readers) want to raise energy taxes.
These social controls get libertarians and far right ideologues up in arms and eventually lead them to vote for Ron Paul. They are the underlying motivation of the “tea party” movement who would like to get rid of such “social engineering”.
My point: if you really object to social engineering, then you aren’t a liberal to begin with.
2. I would say there is a solution that your commenters aren’t seeing, and it is ironic because it is our current policy.
We encourage heterosexual marriage knowing that it can, naturally, lead to procreation, even if we don’t force them to do it. We leave it at that, knowing that heterosexual marriage also has other benefits (you claim most, if not all, of which can also incurred in gay unions).
Is this indirect benefit inconsistent with how the government operates in other “social engineering” projects? Absolutely not.
-We are now forcing people to buy health insurance, but we aren’t forcing them to get preventative care (which is the object of the government’s incentive).
-We provide a tax deduction to people for donating to charity, even if that charity is not something that actually helps our country in any way. (check out some of the advocacy groups that are “charities”)
-We provide a mortgage tax deduction because home ownership is good for a stable society, but we don’t limit it only to people who are living within their means (read: those who won’t default and are actually helping society with the purchase).
And on it goes…
My long-winded point is that traditional marriage is entirely consistent with our government’s other actions (most of which are encouraged, supported, and funded by pro gay rights folks) even without the police state stuff.
Tyler, let me first say that I don’t object to the government incentivizing certain behaviors (although I understand libertarian trepidations about this). When I say the government should get out of the marriage business, I am more meaning the business of issuing ‘marriage’ licenses. The government can still incentivise procreation via, say, child tax credits, but I think it’s inconsistent to deny gay couples the title ‘marriage’ when sterile couples enjoy the title.
Now, this assumes that procreation is the sole criterion. I know, currently, that it is not. The primary reason why gay couples are denied the title marriage is tradition, not procreation. The reason I focused on procreation for this article, though, is just that I find it a more compelling secular argument than tradition. I wanted to be as charitable to the anti-gay marriage position as I could be.
One last clarification…I’m alarmed by the idea that traditional marriage for procreation reasons must require a police-state-like atmosphere.
It is short-sighted group think to claim it. Hence, I gave examples of broadly applied “social engineering” plans used by government where the societal benefit is hoped for by not forced on people.
“The primary reason why gay couples are denied the title marriage is tradition, not procreation.”
The legal briefs social conservatives use tend to focus on procreation.
Interesting post.
I am not sure that promoting a general type of relationship that can procreate would necessarily mean exclusively benefiting those that can and will. Under this argument, tax benefits for married couples is a general policy to promote stable households for child rearing, and make it a bit easier for a married couple that wants kids to afford the prenatal costs. Sure it is a bit broad, but this seems a pragmatic necessity. Any other system that attempted to determine procreational intent and physical viability would just be too difficult and costly. Most government policies operate like this. Not all married people will/can have children, but all married couples have a bit of incentive to do so.
(I am sick of the pro GM argument that sterile couples shouldn’t marry, it is an oversimplification of a more general policy, and a weak argument in the case for gay marriage)
And I am not sure procreation is the only reason traditional marriage is reinforced. Marriage provides social stability, and less strain on the government. In today’s society, an economically sound family with children usually requires 2 working parents, or one parent who works, and the other who is dedicated to child rearing. To go it alone requires expensive daycare services, and often government assistance. Further, children from single parents are more likely to be involved in crime, and further strain the penal system. This goes along with J Wilson’s point. Marriage incentives promote good child rearing.
Now as you mentioned this does not necessarily exclude gay couples who can have their own children or adopt. But there is a legitimate rational for why the government has such incentives, and why it might be unfair for a gay couple who has neither means nor intent to gain the exact same monetary benefits (just like it might be wrong for a straight couple to do so). The problem is that you need a preemptive policy to help cover prenatal costs. You can’t rely entirely on after the fact policies like the dependent tax breaks or child tax credit, which ensure that only procreative parents get the benefits.
Lastly I agree that “government should just get out of the institution of marriage altogether.” Marriage is a religiously charged term. Government or voters could define civil unions how they please to gain all the benefits mentioned above, without as much of the controversy, and let the churches define who they think should be married.
I think the greater problem with this argument is that it places more importance on quantity than quality. Gay couples are more likely to have children on purpose (they basically have to), and so their children will be wanted. They will probably not have more children than they can afford to raise.
We already know that the children of gay couples are just as well-adjusted as the children of straight couples, and we also know that the children of gay couples tend to be more tolerant and accepting.
Married people tend to accumulate more money, making it more likely that they will be able to provide higher education for such children. So letting gay men and lesbians marry only increases the likelihood that their children who are already more open-minded will also become well-educated, and contribute their knowledge and insights to society.
Wouldn’t society benefit more from promoting relationships that produce well-adjusted, tolerant, accepting, well-educated offspring, more than promoting relationships that will simply produce more offspring?
I had no idea how to approach this beforenow Im lcoekd and loaded.
I think then, that if it were a criterion, the government would benefit by giving more benefits to people with children, since glbt people can also have children…. Oh, wait, the government already does that…
Right, to an extent. LGBT people can raise kids, just as their heterosexual counterparts, but the government still doesn’t give them the benefit of the title “marriage” and the legitimacy that title affords.
That last section rang with a dash of satire in my ears…
Slightly an echo of Carla, but here goes:
I’ll admit that it’s not a bad argument and it figures you’d be the only person to give me a non-religious argument against same-sex marriage, Jon.
Still, I think it’s unfair to argue that they contribute less to society because they are unable to procreate. Ignoring the fact that they find ways around that problem (ie sperm donors and surrogate mothers/egg donors), I still think they contribute a great deal to society. Given the fact that our system for orphaned/adoptable children is fairly broken, I think opening the gates of adoption more widely to “extraordinarily competent parents,” (legalizing marriage is a big step to this) is not only a fantastic idea, but an obligation to our children trapped in the system. If extraordinarily competent parents want to rescue a child from a broken system in order to provide a stable and loving home, by all means let them. I’d say that’s just as big, if not a bigger contribution to society than a heterosexual couple reproducing. The fact is, they could be altering that child’s future away from a path to prison, parole and back to prison.
Also, I’d like to argue that the ability to procreate does not generalize well as being a “contribution” to society. Too many couples procreate, only to have abortions, put the baby up for adoption or have it be born with a substance addiction. Too many parents abuse and neglect their children, or just use them to get a welfare check. These parents, while bringing bundles of potential into this world, are not contributing, but taking.
Lastly, the whole “procreation” thing just says to me that if I wanted to contribute, I’d be a sister wife. You know how incredibly fond I am NOT of polygamy.
It seems that with all the advances in health science, we have sufficient population that perhaps procreation is not the main issue that govt should tackle (though there could be an argument for increasing our population to offset the overflow of baby boomers retiring). It seems that what our society so desperately needs is stability, which marriage offers. For a multitude of reasons, ranging from more liberal notions of sex to scientific knowledge of sexual orientation, we have become more accepting towards our LGB brothers and sisters (I leave out the T cause it’s a whole different issue). We still have not, as far as I can tell, allowed for a real and substantial cultural narrative for gay couples like we do for straight couples. Allowing for gay marriage will do wonders in helping gay and lesbian relationships enter the main stream (lol, I can hear the “It’s the gay agenda!” cries in my mind as I suggest this) and create some sort of cultural ideal that allows for stability.
The root of this argument is not to create a larger population, you are suggestion this as a means to the maximization of utility. Saying that people respond to incentives is basic economics, but if you are going to ground an argument in economics you are overlooking several key factors in my mind:
1) An increase in the number of taxpayers largely benefits the government, not society. More taxes does not necessarily lead to a societal benefit to say the least.
2) Stating that the government should de-incentivize heterosexual unions that can not procreate makes little logical sense. Yes, one of the parties can choose to find another companion if their significant other does not have the ability to procreate; however, this also has its string of issues including the abandonment of children who may have been produced earlier in the relationship. Also, by the same token, once the female is no longer physically capable of procreating, should the government no longer recognize their marriage and thus insist the male fine a new mate with which he can continue to produce tax payers? You may not have meant to make this extrapolation, but, in either case, I’m not following.
4) How do you determine which couples are actually going to procreate? Do you have them make a scout’s honor promise? This doesn’t seem practical unless you want to give them a short-term deadline which isn’t all that satisfying.
5) Barring same-sex and ‘sterile’ couples leads quite directly to a substantial loss of benefit to society. Perhaps you are overlooking that individuals falling within one of these two categories make up a significant portion of the population. I would argue that when weighing the marginal benefit of that notion against the recognition of all relationships regardless of procreative power, the latter tips the scale. Which leads me to my next point.
4) Monetary and legal protections that come with marriage are not enough to incentivize the vast majority of the gay community to enter into a heterosexual relationship. You would need to create added pressure (e.g., make homosexuality illegal). The dissatisfaction that they would get from this type of relationship is still greater than the satisfaction of having a legally recognized union with someone they are not attracted to. I don’t think I need to quantify this because I think it’s safe to assume that mixed orientation marriages are rare and are often for religious reasons. In the end, you are not driving a greater number to enter into relationships capable of procreation, you are simply penalizing those that don’t. Heterosexuals are definitely driven to marriage for its benefits, but the exodus ends there. Taking added measures to ban same-sex relationships would do little to maximize societal benefit.
Personally, I find the religious argument more compelling than this one.
Precisely because the secular argument I made leads to the complications you mention, I think the government should allow gay marriage. I don’t mind that this secular argument fails. Really, I’m glad it does! Again, I support gay marriage.
Jon, you poser.