Who better to tell Arizonans how to conduct their marriages than the polygamy capital of the U.S.?
Posted by: Donna
Mark tells me that legions of LDS volunteers from Utah are pouring into our state to get out the vote for Prop 102. Well isn’t that special? Per my titular nod to the irony of it all, are there not more pressing issues in the Land of Big Love?
I took a brief cruise on the ‘nets in search of some insight of what might motivate certain Utahans to rescue their neighbors to the south from the horrors of Adam and Steve. In particular, I’d like to know how the anti-gay marriage advocates of Salt Lake City justify denying same sex couples the multiple legal and social benefits that accrue to marriage based on the notion that marriage should be reserved for procreation. As a straight woman with no desire to have children, and knowing many married childless hetero couples, I don’t understand how heterosexual marriages sans procreation are not an equal threat to the institution. Why not forbid post-menopausal women or infertile persons to marry, since it’s all about the kiddies? My search led me to this beauty: The Divine Institution of Marriage. Those good Elders helped to enlighten me as to why my reprehensibly barren womb ought not foreclose my entitlement to a marriage license.
It is true that some couples who marry will not have children, either by choice or because of infertility, but the special status of marriage is nonetheless closely linked to the inherent powers and responsibilities of procreation, and to the inherent differences between the genders. Co-habitation under any guise or title is not a sufficient reason for defining new forms of marriage.
Hey…whoa! Hold up! Now I’m all confused again. I got the ‘inherent differences’ thing down (don’t want to confuse the younguns about which parts the mommy person and daddy person are supposed to have) but what’s the deal with “co-habitation under any guise or title” bit? Don’t plenty of straight folks shack up too? Isn’t that sort of redefining the role of marriage too? Y’all Elders might want to reconsider how far you’re willing to go letting the heteros get all choose-y about when and whether to marry and procreate. Just kidding, I know you guys are on the case! The treastise I linked to from the LDS site is rife with how much God wants His special emissaries to police people’s personal lives.
Lest you think I’m singling out Mormons, I’m not. One can find similar manifestos on gay marriage from nearly every mainstream Christian denomination. Speaking of which, it’s interesting to see how the internecine sectarian squabbles of movement conservatives (Catholic vs Evangelical Protestant vs Mormon) are put aside when an important battle of the culture war looms. Homophobia uber alles.
2 Comments
Comments RSS TrackBack Identifier URI
Leave a comment
I’m tired of a minority dictating the world. By definition marriage is the union of one male and one female. The legal chaos changing that definition is limitless. Two men one child, two women two men, why should anyone be limited? Sorry I’m not ready to give up the structure and laws that are in place to protect the majority. This should not even be a moral debate this is about not clogging up the courts with more nonsence.
Sidney, I happen to believe in protecting the minority from the tyranny of the majority. And if, as you say, this is a pragmatic and not a moral debate, then why can’t the opponents of gay marriage stop quoting the Bible to justify their position?