Why not just invent a new term [for gay marriage]?

Great Debates
1

Women as priests?, Gay marriages? and I’m sure you can think of many more. But to many such terms are oxymoron. Marriage has always been a union between a man and a woman, why do so many want to change the definition? Why can’t they come up with their own term, which they would be able to define it however they want?

i.e.
Wurrel = Union between 2 people of the same sex in a committed relationship.
And just have a law stating that people who are Wurreled have the same rights as those who are married?

Also the Pope said that women will never be priests. So why not just come up w/ a position w/ the responsibilities of a priest but will be filled by a female and call it something else?
Why do such groups feel the need to change long standing definitions, and to many corrupt the definition in the process?

2

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Do you have to be a Catholic to be a priest?

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Definitions are not fixed. They change slowly with the generational, regional and cultural context. Sometimes they change quickly but in either case they change sucessfully as long as popular understanding allows them to be useful tools for communication. IMO your question is actually pretty disingenuous; there is no “they” out there with insidious designs to “corrupt” the language.

I think it’s still pretty obvious what is meant if a person is a “priest” regardless of gender. Similarly it causes no confusion to me if I am to understand that two people are “married,” regardless of gender the nature of the relationship is understood.

This sounds more like a thinly veiled attempt for you to express disatisfaction with both gay marriage and women priests.

3

It seems to me the folks opposing gay marriage because they should have all the same right but some other word are being self contradictory.

If the term ``marriage’’ is meaningful, then denying it to gays is denying them something meaningful, that they could not get by coming up with some alternate term.

Whereas if gay folks should be perfectly happy using some other term, then it seems that the word itself is meaningless, so why is it a big deal if they use it?

4

A “marriage” is a committed union of two people that has historical meaning behind why it’s been an enduring custom, while patria potestas, fealty and suzerainty, heir-fosterage, and many another social custom has come and went.

If two men or two women chooses to covenant that they will be true to each other in a lifelong relationship founded in their love for each other, with or without children they adopt or somehow engender, well, it walks like a duck, swims like a duck, quacks like a duck…

So, according to you, we should call it an anseriform because it doesn’t match the duck of your dreams?

The three gay couples I know online and the one I know in real life differ from my wife and myself, our sons and their wives, and the straight couples we know only in the gender of the partners – they behave in much the same ways, show caring on a day to day basis in much the same ways, etc.

And, with no insult to Catholics and their special claim to onetruechurchhood intended, the Pope has no right to decide who may or may not be a priest – only who can exercise their priesthood in churches that accept his authority.

(Obviously that quote is U.S.-centric, and not intended to exclude women priests of the Church of England, Anglican Churches of Canada annd Australia, etc.)

To be a priest means to be ordained by a bishop in the Apostolic Succession for the preaching of the Word and administration of the Sacraments according to the order and custom of your church. Anglican bishops, by and large, ordain women to perform that ministry. Why call them anything but?

As for “corrupting the terms,” well, the following is not intended as a serious accusation, but as a “put yourself in their place” exercise:

“When I make a post, kanicbird, from my words of wisdom flows the pristine light of truth, as is self-evident to all who read it. When you make what you call as post, on the other hand, it is clearly nothing but low-intentioned trollery. How dare you call what you do “posting” – you demean the term by using it!”

I trust you see the arrogance and self-righteous attitude that pervades that quote (which, obviously, I did not really mean!). If my marriage and my church’s priests are deserving of the term and your marriage and priests aren’t, then there’s a pretty close parallel to that same arrogance and superciliousness underlying the comments.

HTH

5

I think Kanicbird is on to something here. in fact, I think he (she?) has hit it right on the head (as regards gay marriages, anyway)

The big brouhaha about is that homosexuals want access to the same rights and benefits that married couples have, but are denied that because “marriage” is suposed to be between a man and a woman, and many people fear that allowing homosexuals to marry somehow cheapens or desecrates the concept of marriage. This is similar to those who feel threatened by Darwinism.

It seems to me that there are two aspects of marriage. The first is the legal one, wherein the union is recognized and rights and benefits are bestowed in a strictly legal/civil manner.

The second aspect is affirmation of the union in a religious light, with the whole ceremony, the priest/rabbi/shaman, the wedding cake, and/or the platter of chopped liver in the shape of a swan.

I think that those opposed to gay marriage are thinking of the latter, while its proponents are thinking of the former.

So, as Kanicbird suggests, just don’t call it a marriage- call it…I dunno…something else…but make a simply legal affair bestowing the rights and recognition that is only fair to anyone in a committed relationship.

As far as female priests are concerned, well, I don’t have a dog in that fight.

6

Marriage has also been traditionally been a union between two children or between a child and an adult. Should we continue down that path simply because it was “always” that way? Times change, mores change, societies change. If you wish us to retain our roots, perhaps we should pick mates by bonking them over the head and dragging them back to the cave (yes, cartoonish, but you get the point).

Personally, I’m glad to slavery is over and women can vote. Perhaps someday we’ll look back on the ban on gay marriage with the same disdain.

7

Azael although many definitions are flexiable and change over the years, some words are based on concepts. IMHO Marriage is one such concept, and the word for it may change but the definition will always be the same.

I have no problem with gay unions, I do with the term marriage being applied, but would not oppose equal treatment under the law, and have no problems with a woman have the full responsibilities (and benifits) of a priest, actually it might bring some life to the dry masses.

viking and polycarp I see your point. The term marriage is meaningful, while the term Wurrel (the made up term I proposed to define a ‘gay marriage’) is not. You do make a good point, but just because a word that is somewhat close to what you are doing has a long standing honerable definition does not mean you should use such a word for this other union. If ‘gay marriages’ are to become ‘part of the mainstream’ you have to start somewhere, and if it is to be a lasting term then Wurrel WILL become just as honerable as marriage.

bizzwire sort of but I must take issue with:

Legally I think it should be allowed, But where I differ is I have no problem with a ‘gay marriage’ having a ‘traditional wedding cerimony’ or a ‘traditional reception’, as long as their beliefs allow it (or those of the performers of the ceramony allow). I just think that the term marriage should not be used for such a union and wedding should not be used either.

8

Well, true. But if we call a duck a duck, as Polycarp put it, then gay folks can be just as honorable as we are, right now. Why should they have to wait for a few generation for ``wurrel’’ to start meaning something.

I could see this argument if, currently, wedding and marriage referred to a union sanctified by either the One True Catholic church, or even by any religious orginisation, while civil unions had some other term applied to them. But this is not the case. If heterosexual atheists and agnostics and whatnot can have a civil wedding and be legally married, whether or not the church agrees with it, then so should homosexuals of any religious persuasion. If the Church refuses to recognise it, then they should be in the same boat, both legally and semantically, as anyone else whose wedding wasn’t sanctified by a priest.

9

This line of argument makes no sense to me. Consider:

“Straight” is a meaningful term, and we “deny it” to gay people.

“Gay” is a meaningful term, and we “deny it” to straight people.

“African-American” is a meaningful term, and we “deny it” to white people.

“White” is a meaningful term, and we “deny it” to black people.

“Man” is a meaningful term, and we “deny it” to women.

“Woman” is a meaningful term, and we “deny it” to men.

Words are labels that we put on things, on phenomena that actually exist in the real world. To have clear communication, different things need different labels.

Consider my last two examples. The use of the word “person” has increased a lot lately, but it will never completely supplant the words “man” and “woman”, because those words are useful to us in describing two things that are different.

Now, if you accept as an axiom that men and women are different in fundamental ways, then an inescapable corallary is that a relationship between two men is fundamentally different from a relationship between a man and a woman is fundamentally different from a relationship between two women.

Please note, “different” does not mean “better” or “worse”. Just different. And if two phenomena in the real world are different, then I consider it a good policy to have two different words to describe them.

Notwithstanding that, I don’t think it will be the end of the world if the “official” state sanctioned use of the word “marriage” becomes diluted to mean more than a union of one man and one woman. But I don’t think that will be the end of the issue. The use of language can’t be truly changed from the top down. The people who speak the language have to agree to it.

I think what happened with Coca-Cola is an instructive analogy. Remember “New Coke”? They changed the formula, but continued selling it under the old label. And people refused to accept it, even though as a matter of law the trademark belonged to the Coca-Cola corporation, and they could do what they wanted with it.

Coca-Cola reached a compromise with it’s customers, under which they would continue to sell the new formula Coke under that label, but make the old formula available under the title “Coca-Cola Classic”. I see something like this happening if gay marriage becomes the law of the land. Watch for the coining of the term “marriage classic” or “covenant marriage” or some such thing.

10

While I don’t have any problem with the notion of gay marriage, I agree with Weird Al that using the term for same-sex marriages has some semantic difficulties. Particularly, “husband” and “wife” refer specifically to male and female persons. A parallel set of terms, such as wurrel and wurrellees, would solve that dilemma. Spouse also solves it, but I’ve never liked the term. It has an unpleasant sound to it.

11

The analogy does not hold. If there were no gay people, anywhere, then straight'' would have no meaning. On the other hand, if there were no gay people, anywhere, then married’’ would still mean something, because it’s opposite is single'', not gay and in a long-term committed relationship’’

In a society where there were no black people, the term ``adult’’ would refer to a white person who is no longer a child. Does this mean that, should a black family move in, they should be denied the use of the term adult because it traditionally refers to white non-children, and told to come up with their own term?

12

I agree with you regarding spouse, as it doesn’t sound very enthusiastic.

Husband is used to denote one’s male partner, and wife is used to denote one’s female partner. Given that, husband and husband, or wife and wife would work just fine. There’s no confusion as both husband and wife require qualifiers, i.e., whose husband or wife we are discussing, thus eliminating any possible confusion. If George and Dick were married, and George referred to his husband, or you referred to George’s husband, it would be obvious that we were both referring to Dick.

Where’s the problem?

13

I fail to see the problem. If two gay men were to be married, then they would both have a husband, and they would both be a husband.

Why is there a need to invent new terms for something like gay marriage? Just because marriage has traditionally been thought of as only occurring between a man and a woman? Maybe we should stop gay men from talking about their boyfriends, too. After all, the word “boyfriend” has traditionally referred to a guy that a female is dating.

If your appeal to tradition doesn’t include words like “boyfriend” or “girlfriend”, then why should it include words like “marriage”, “husband”, or “wife”? What is the difference?

14

Just an aside, in poligamy, when lets say there is a man married to 2 women, are the women wifes to each other?

15

Weird Al makes a useful point, but one with a dysfunctional analogy.

The terms which he advances are used to make useful distinctions between, say, gobear and scylla oreither of them and Jodi.

To say that only men were lawyers in the 1800s (Ms. Woodhull to one side) and hence Bricker and minty green are lawyers, while Jodi is a lawyeress, is introducing a distinction that need not be made – they are engaged in a profession on putatively equal grounds, and the extraneous fact that Jodi is a woman has no applicability.

The question to be answered is, is there a difference in kind between what gobear and gopartner mean by saying they’re married, and what my wife and I mean by it, or whether there’s any difference between the Rev. Patrick O’Malley and the Rev. Hilary Whitbread do in their clerical roles that warrants a distincton between them distinguishing one as a priest and the other not.

Either a “worrel” is different in some substantive manner from a “marriage,” or it is not. If a “worrel” is different, then if I were gay, I would not settle for it, but want the full rights of marriage. If it is not, why invent a different term for it.

16

Polycarp the difference is that ‘low-intentioned trollery’ already has a negative conotation and although I don’t think trollery is a actual word, it is close enough to troll which is very negative when it comes to postings. I proposed inventing a new word that the group using the word can come up with it and define it. So if I got to chose the term of my posting, I could choose the term ‘wisdom from the ages’ and define it how I want.

In this case i chose a new word as NOT to have a + or - conotation.

because there is no term, so no choice in the matter. Just as I’m sure marriage started 1000’s of years ago.

I am aware of many Catholic chuches, the nost notable, but not the only, is the Roman Catholic Church, but I am not aware of the One True Catholic Church.

Anyway The issue is the term, not the legal standing, I would support same sex unions having the same rights as opposite sex couples, just lets be honest about the terms.

17

There’s a perfectly good term: “Marriage”.

There’s no reason that one should not use “marriage” to describe the union between to men or two women. Tradition is not a valid reason. The only reason that “marriage” was used traditionally to label a union between a man and a woman is because homosexual relationships were historically frowned upon to the point that such a union never needed to be named in the first place. However, the only difference between your definition of a “marriage” and your definition of a “wurrel” is the sexes of the parties involved, and I don’t see that as being reason enough to invent a new word, just like there was no new word invented when it became more common to have male nurses or female lawyers.

I am being honest about terms. This “wurrel” of yours is exactly the same as marriage in every single way except for the sex of one of the participants. When it became common for women to play basketball, we didn’t invent the word “basketessball” to describe the sport, because the sexes of the participants really don’t matter. I contend that the sexes of the parties involved in marriage don’t matter, either, and thus “marriage” is a perfectly good word to describe a union between people of any sex.

This whole “appeal to tradition” argument of your doesn’t really hold any water.

18

Yes, let’s. Let’s be honest enough to recognize that the only concrete reason for denying the term “marriage” to gay couples is to marginalize them; to say “This is ours, it is precious, and you can’t have it.” The argument that marriage has a traditional meaning is a red herring. There’s no reason why our actions now need be determined by old meanings of words. (What’s the traditional meaning of the word “gay”?) Just maybe we need to progress, to recognize that the old definition is inadequate.

Marriage is not about making babies: the infertile are allowed to have marriage. Marriage is not even about sex: the impotent are allowed to have marriage. Marriage is not about what’s written in books of religion: atheists are allowed to have marriage. Marriage is about family, about community, about love. And I say that the fact that two lovers happen to have matching genitals is a poor reason for foisting the old “separate but equal” treatment on them.

19

As Joe Random says, there is a perfectly good term, marriage. You have yet to explain why the gender of the participants is key to the meaning of the term, rather than incidentally included because traditionally, things were one way.

So to be honest about terms, marriage has traditionally been a long-term, monogamous, committed, formalized, till-death-do-us-part relationship, sanctioned by the church, between a man and a woman.

Now, we’ve seen that the ``sanctioned by the church’’ part isn’t really critical, because once the whole separation of church and state thing happened, civil unions are still called marriage. We know there are things like open marriages out there, so perhaps monogamous isn’t strictly necessary, either. I’ve heard of divorces happening on occasion, so maybe the till-death-do-us-part isn’t the defining feature, either. I’d say that the burden of proof would be to prove that the `between man and woman’ part is in fact the key feature that distinguishes married from not married, rather another aspect that, while traditionally part of marriage, is not neccesarily critical to the meaning of the term.

So, let us suppose it isn’t, and we’re left with long-term, committed, formalized relationship.'' You are arguing that this fails to capture the traditional meaning of the word, whereas long-term, committed, formalized relationship between man and woman’’ does. I’d say if you wanted to appeal to tradition, you’d have to argue for the full definition above, which I don’t feel like typing out again. And while I think that argument is a valid and self-consistent one to make (without saying I agree with it), it is also one that has already been lost long, long ago.

20

Do my partner and I have to invent a new word to describe anything we do together? Traditionally, going out on a “date” has been done by a male and a female, so we can’t use that word. Traditionally, “kissing” has been done by a male and a female, so we can’t use that word. Traditionally, “sex” has been done by a male and a female, so we can’t use that word.

But in fact, we date, kiss, have sex, go shopping, watch tv, visit friends, and do thousands of other things that most other people also do. At no time does anyone require us not to use the same word that everyone else uses.

We have the right to use the word “marriage” because that’s the word that most accurately describes what our relationship will be when it’s legal, for exactly the same reason that our shoes are called “shoes” and our cats are called “cats.”