For lack of a better word, I’m going to call the opponents of gay marriage in the United States “conservatives”.

Obama won. Hooray. Proposition 8 in California, and similar measures in other states passed. Not so good. For those not in the know, Proposition 8 and the other measures all say something similar “Marriage in this state shall only be between a man and a woman” or words to that effect. Since there was no constitutional reason to limit marriage to heterosexual couples, the only option was to change the state constitutions, and perhaps eventually the U.S. Constitution. Apparently this is the conservative’s strategy to protect this cornerstone of our civilization from the evil homosexual agenda to redefine marriage.

But what exactly are they protecting? Today’s idea of marriage, where boy meets girl, they fall in love, their love is made legitimate and sacrosanct with a religious / civil public ceremony, after which the couple begins to have sex, create children, and remain monogamous / monoandrous till death do them part, is so uncommon, both now and historically, that it is more the exception than the rule. There are, and have been many examples of marriage across time and cultures that involve polygamy, polyandry, homosexuality and out-of-wedlock sex. The conservatives might respond that they’re not talking about some crazy eastern traditions, they’re talking about good old judeo-christian marriage, right here in North America.

We should examine this. Though the conservatives might think otherwise, their version of marriage has changed as well, though they can hardly blame this on gays wanting to marry.

Americans are famously free. The ideals behind the American revolution, of individual liberty, freedom from oppression, freedom of religion, and egalitarianism have permeated American society since its founding and affected and influenced its social institutions to varied degrees. Slavery is gone, divine kings are out, state sponsored religion and churches are out (*) . Marriage, especially the traditional judeo-christian marriage that the conservatives go on about, is the last bastion of patriarchal privilege and acceptable inequality. Traditional judeo-christian marriage has been defined by rigid hierarchy, preservation of power and property, women in labour, and child labourers. Women and children, subordinate to the state, and to men, for the purpose of propagating power and populating their domain.

In other words, marriage was defined by sex, and the sexual reproductive functions of the male-female coupling. When people talk about defending traditional marriage, they are talking about defending limited, traditional roles, which deserve to lose their credibility and appeal. Fortunately, over the last several decades, this is exactly what has been happening.

Americans don’t do well with limitations. As I mentioned, they are famously free, and long before gay marriage became an issue, the meaning of marriage began to change to conform to the meaning of America. Over the last few decades, most people’s perception of marriage has changed from a limited role of reproduction into a full-fledged expression of individual desires for life, love and happiness that come together by finding and joining a partner in an intimate and lasting relationship. Most of us have grown up with this world view of marriage, so it can be hard to realize how new and modern this understanding of the purpose of marriage is. Though intimate sexual relations are certainly part of this relationship, they are no longer the reason for marriage. The only difference between a heterosexual couple and a homosexual couple is the sex part. When people say that same sex couples shouldn’t be allowed to marry, they tacitly admit that to them, marriage is primarily about sex, a limited definition that dimishes marriage. When marriage is about life, love, and happiness, it makes sense that everyone, straight or gay, will make the commitment, and it makes sense for society to allow them to do so. If the traditional definition of marriage is failing, its because marriage for sex is no match for marriage for love.

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(*) Though some might argue that tax breaks for churches are a government subsidy. Topic for another day perhaps.

Notes:
1. Much of what I’ve said in this post applies to marriage in other cultures and communities, including, sadly, India and Indians, whose moral zeitgeist hasn’t progressed as far as the United States’ yet. However, since this post is about gay marriage in the United States, I haven’t really touched on that.
2. A Disclaimer: I first heard much of the information about the history of marriage in the United States in a podcast by the Centre for Inquiry, a couple of years ago. I may have quoted some of that podcast from memory.
3. An interesting aside: Most of this post was composed and hand written on a piece of paper while sitting by Oscar Wilde’s grave.