The Last Stand

From Chapter 3 of 'Marriage:The Dream That Refuses To Die' by Elizabeth Fox-Genovese:



"The demands for same-sex marriage flow logically from the moral tenor of our culture, and nothing in that culture arms us to resist them. Above all, having first acceded to the primacy of the individual over any semblance of a group, we are now capitulating to the non-negotiable demands of sexual desire. Nothing, in this climate, could be further from the dominant cultural sensibility than the idea that sexuality per se and pro se offers a woefully impoverished definition or measure of the individual. As our culture has loosened the bonds of sexual repression that allegedly thwarted the development and happiness of individuals, it has increasingly succumbed to the notion that no sexual desire can be denied. If you couple this assumption to the notion that marriage exists only to serve the interests and comfort of the individual, you are left with few weapons against the advance of same-sex marriage.

In an ominous development, the largest corporations, according to Business Week, are beginning to understand and adjust to this trend. Some are now offering benefits to a variety of domestic units and, in the process, are effectively displacing marriage as a special relationship or union. The consequences of this tendency, combined with our “me, me, me” cultural ethos, will soon end in the destruction of marriage. Oh, marriage will survive as one “lifestyle” choice among many, but as no more than that. And, make no mistake, that form of survival will amount to destruction, which is precisely the goal of the activists who are fighting for the legalization of same-sex marriage.

Many Americans, who come to see same-sex marriage as just another step in marriage’s evolution, will accept the public pronouncements that they are doing no more than supporting “fairness” by extending some valuable benefits to people of the same sex who happen to love each other and wish to live together without shame or stigma. What could be more innocuous? But for the hardcore activists, the real goal is the destruction of marriage as the union of a man and a woman. They aim to discredit all forms of authority — especially God and nature — that dare to tell people how to lead their lives. In the view of queer activists, desire, like love in Carmen’s “Habenera,” knows no law — nor should any be imposed upon it.

In the current climate, the appeal of their position is not hard to understand, especially since most of those who accept it do not begin to understand its implications. If anything, the defense of same-sex marriage looks like yet another logical step in the gradual increase in freedom for all members of society. And since activists, the courts, and the media overwhelmingly encourage this deception, we may readily understand that many people may come to see same-sex marriage as another blow against outmoded and illegitimate forms of authority — a blow for freedom and equality. Buying into this view, however, they will remain blind to the ways in which they are playing into the hands of vast governmental and economic powers. The freedom for gays and lesbians to marry will decisively contribute to disaggregating all of the remaining social institutions that provide the foundations for any collective resistance against political and economic domination.

Contrary to many prevailing views, marriage is not the seat of oppression but rather the last best ground for resistance against it. In binding men and women into loving relations and shared purposes, marriage acknowledges the reality of sexual difference even as it works to bridge that difference and lay a foundation for a vital and, yes, grown-up social life."

(h/t dawnpatrol)