Supreme Court [declines to hear] same sex marriage cases.[plus further developments (Ed.)]

[Hector_St_Clare]

@Budget_Player_Cadet

Okay, I’m going to just grant you that it’s always been liberals trying to make these changes (which is probably a mistake, but whatever). Can you please tell me why this change was a bad idea? Can you please tell me what’s wrong with this idea? Marriage permanence is really dumb. If two people stop caring about each other, forcing them to stay together “for tradition’s sake” is monstrous.

Banning divorce entirely, wouldn’t 'force [anyone] to stay together." Separation is always a possibility, and has been for centuries. What used to be the case, back in the day, is that you would not have the right to remarry, as long as your first spouse was living. Hell, if remarriage was banned you could even shack up with anyone you liked, you just wouldn’t be able to call it a marriage. And of course you could continue living together with your spouse and banging your paramour on the side.

As for what that good that would accomplish, Chesterton points out in one of his essays that the whole reason we (used to) revere and honour marriage is precisely because it was permanent, and when you take away the permanence you also take away what gives (or gave) marriage much of its meaning.

@Budget_Player_Cadet

This has never been an argument. Where does this even come from? At no point was the intent to have children a necessary contingency for marriage. Was this ever a change in the law? I don’t think so.

Let’s consult the Anglican marriage service here:

“duly considering the causes for which Matrimony was ordained. First, It was ordained for the procreation of children, to be brought up in the fear and nurture of the Lord, and to the praise of his holy Name. Secondly, It was ordained for a remedy against sin, and to avoid fornication; that such persons as have not the gift of continency might marry, and keep themselves undefiled members of Christ’s body.
Thirdly, It was ordained for the mutual society, help, and comfort, that the one ought to have of the other, both in prosperity and adversity.”

Let’s also look at what the Catholic Church has to say on the matter.

Vatican: For Catholic marriage to be valid, couples must be open to children...

Yup, openness to children is a requirement for a valid Catholic marriage.

Children (specifically, the assurance of paternity and the delegation of responsibility for parenting) is the primary reason that marriage exists, in European Christian cultures. Not ‘love’. Why is it my business if a particular couple loves each other or not, and why am I supposed to care?

Wait, this was a liberal idea? The point of two-income households was not “give women freedom”, it was “make more money”. Because the cost of living was going up. You seem to be drastically missing the point.

@Budget_Player_Cadet

You know what’s interesting? Not a single one of the things you brought up here are the things liberals appeal to when discussing a change in marriage. Not one. We usually bring up how it used to be between one man with property and another man with property’s daughter (i.e. his property). Or how it was then between one man and one woman of the same skin color. Not how divorces used to be harder to get, or how the role of the woman changed. Because, and here’s the key point, those changes liberals actually bring up? They are things nobody in their right mind could claim as bad. Moving from “women are property” to “women are equals”? A huge, fundamental shift in what marriage is and means, and one which only an utter monster would consider bad. You have no idea what you’re talking about, and your argument makes absolutely zero sense. It neither matches the historical record of why such moves were made, nor does it explain why they were bad things, nor does it even have anything to do with the arguments liberals make today.

1. There’s nothing ‘traditional’ about ‘skin colour’ requirements for marriage, at least in Christian societies. I’m really baffled where you are getting this. Bans on interracial marriage were a modern innovation, established in the 17th century, and only in a few countries (France, the United States, South Africa, and some others), and had just about zero support in Christian tradition.

Anti-miscegenation laws

2. Married women were never considered ‘property’ in Christian civilizations. They didn’t have the same rights as their husbands, but neither did children, and certainly no one would describe children as property.

3. It’s true that marriage has shifted, in the minds of many, from having a distinct leader and a follower, a superior and a subordinate, to being a supposed ‘partnership of equals’. You’ll of course pardon me if I don’t view that as a good thing, and view it as part of the breakdown of authority in the liberal west.

Gay marriage is a result of the way that we (or many of us) have come to view marriage, and so it’s both inevitable and (in a sense) the fair thing to do. I don’t oppose it, as a legal matter. But don’t expect me to approve the modern construct called ‘marriage’ which has largely replaced the older idea.