I naturally hold the view that government should not be involved in the question of marriage at all. Gay people shouldn’t be sanctioned in their marriages by government, and neither should straight people.
I went to a Gary Johnson rally about a month ago where he said that he is for marriage equality because getting government out of marriage is too difficult - too many laws to rewrite. It sounded reasonable, though I doubt it changed my mind on the issue.
Two nights ago, my dad told me why he would definitely vote no on marriage equality. I believe that his stance is a very valid one that makes use of good institutional analysis:
Voting yes to marriage equality solidifies the power of government over the family. Even if it’s just tax cuts, something we like, it sends a message that government is allowed to make such decisions of what is considered marriage/family and what is not. This introduces a whole new type of slippery slope argument that no one talk about in the gay marriage debate. It’s not about people marrying their dogs or cars - I couldn’t care less. It’s about government gaining even more power over the family structure. If government can “regulate” marriage, why not create a Department of the Family? Why not pass laws exactly how parents should raise their children? After all, they have the authority to decide what marriage is and they already have a tax code which manipulates social policy by artificially increasing incentives of marriage (more precisely, it increases disincentives to be single).
After hearing his viewpoint, I am even more against government defining marriage. But his argument makes a specific case why the very process of government “allowing” gay people to marry is a threat to freedom. It gives government the illusion that the family is theirs to control.
Your thoughts? On second thought, it could be argued that government should then not give tax cuts because that reinforces the illusion that they have the legitimate power to decide who gets to keep how much of his own money. Hm… Thoughts?
Okay. I bring that up because I see a lot (not necessarily all) of the gay-marriage issue being about whether the law is to honor all marriage contracts or not. As I understand it, the law by-and-large in the US will not honor marriage contracts between homosexuals.
When you say “marriage contracts” are you referring to a typical marriage that is certified by an agent of the state? Like the marriage that basically everyone has? You wouldnt be talking about two homosexuals who draw up a contract and sign it themselves and try to enforce it on each other in court later, right?
Oh, now I see your point. Well no, I don’t know of any instances of the latter. But as I understand it, the state certification is basically done for legal witnessing purposes. So I see no reason why that shouldn’t be done for homosexual couples who want to enter into the same kind of mutual agreement as heterosexual couples.
Again this goes back to the knife-edge difficulty of left-wing sectarianism vs right-wing opportunism with how we approach social change as a ideologically motivated group.
I’d like to qualify by saying that I don’t think there’s necessarily a right answer, for any answer depends on forecasting the future and on question of strategy generally.
I think we could support any movement in laws towards the direction of freedom with the caveat that we’ve got to keep the ideal of pure freedom in mind and at the forefront of our plan as the ultimate motivator not to lose sight of.
So, while I’d agree that government has no place in deciding marriages and its influence in the realm should be rejected legally, movement towards that ideal could be supported while remaining true to the abolishment objective.
It is not a betrayal of the ultimate goal to support movement towards that goal. It’s only betrayal to bury the ultimate goal in favore of step-goals.
Thus, the libertarian should feel free to, for instance, support lower taxes and lower spending as movement towards an abolished government, and should reject concepts like tax-cuts needing to pay for themselves via new taxes and the like.
I think Wheylous’ dad is correct, its done to control families. What if people had to get married in a church, or they couldnt get health insurance for their spouse? Can you imagine the amount of indirect influence churches would have?
because I dont like the state deciding what is and is not a family. This isnt a political position for me, its actually culture and religion. And as long as the state is doing things, it should do them as fairly as possible. BUT this is NOT a case of discrimination. The state doesnt certify “unions between couples” except they throw the gay ones away. The state certifies procreative unions as permanent, requiring the state’s procedures and final approval for dissolution. They dont decide if youre going steady or not, they affirm that youre stuck raising kids together until further notice.
the problem is that marriage confers benefits, the aforementioned health insurance among them. Homosexual couples consider it discriminatory that they arent allowed to receive these benefits. I do see their point, and it does seem unfair that in a free and open society, there would be these barriers that prevent people from living there lives when they arent hurting anyone. So I’m sympathetic, but the real problem here is that they are misunderstanding the situation. This isnt a value-free government, or a free and open society. Those benefits to marriage were put in place to encourage marriages, specifically nuclear families. When the gays realize that, they become more militant because they have an awakening similar to anarchists where they realize the xtent of the oppression they are under, its probably worse for some of them because they got fooled for a second, gay people on tv, gay politicians, they thought maybe things were changing. btw I meant “militant” in a non-aggressive sense. Because my next point is
this is one of the things that is causing the public sphere to crack up, and it emphasizes the need for nonviolent free association and exchange of ideas. Because we know that the state cannot decide what should and shouldnt be a family, that is just one more thng they should stay out of.
Your dad has a good point. Also, Johnson is wrong that the current law exemplifies “marriage inequality”. Technically, gay people can get married just as straight people can under current law: a gay man can marry, he just has to marry a woman; a gay woman can get married, she just has to marry a man. His argument is unsound. (I know this isn’t the salient point of your thread; just puttin’ it out there.)
Neodoxy - of sorts, yes. He is more like a semi-radical individualist who believes in property rights. So I would label him as a paleo-libertarian, but I think he doesn’t like labeling himself.
QC - I guess this touches upon the idea of “universality”, which, I believe, is fundamentally impossible.
The government already defines families in many ways. Christians oppose gay marriage because there is a re-definition, so to speak. I don’t know if ‘definition of family’ is ambiguous or part of the debate. But it seems like an ad hoc rationalization only.
And it ‘regulates’ them: you can’t feed your kids paint chips or batteries for lunch, or kill them. Or probably lots of other stuff.
I have one question. Is your dad legally married? There’s nothing wrong with this position, but if you’re personally enjoying the benefits of legally-recognized marriage, while denying the same benefits to gays because of your anti-government worldview, surely you can see the hypocrisy of that.
Gays can get married. They just cant marry someone of the same sex.
Its like I have a govt secured home loan, and you ask if I’m comfortable denying the benefits of cheaper secured credit to people who want boats. Yes, I’m comfortable with that. Lets get rid of the benefits I enjoy as well.
It’s funny that you mentioned your dad’s argument. I was all gung-ho to vote yes for the assisted suicide question and the legalizing marijuana question in MA. But when I started actually reading the questions, I realized that the government was just going to take more control over the situation. I decided that I couldn’t support either way, so I abstained from any questions on the ballot after all.
It was such an eye opener for me. I’m all for taking whatever we can get towards the goal of liberty, but some of these “baby steps” are really 1 step forward and 2 steps back.
I don’t think it’s a particularly good argument. How does restriction of gay marriage (or any action) by the government, desolidify the power of the government? If the government proclaims that two men or two women can’t get married, doesn’t that also send a message “that the government is allowed to make such decisions of what is considered marriage/family”?
Suppose that the government prevents a class of people from doing a certain action X. That action is perfectly harmless and might even increase total utility. Given that it’s unlikely that the government is going to get out of the business of regulating this action, why should a libertarian (someone who values freedom) want the government to continue to restrict that class of people from doing X? Whether the government restricts or permits that action, it’s still exerting it’s power. There is no desolidifying.
Well no, I don’t know of any instances of the latter. But as I understand it, the state certification is basically done for legal witnessing purposes. So I see no reason why that shouldn’t be done for homosexual couples who want to enter into the same kind of mutual agreement as heterosexual couples.