Gay marriage no slippery slope
As per our usual custom, last Sunday my family was enjoying the Sunday morning Christian music playing on an Atlanta radio station. This morning, however, a message from Right From The Heart Ministries came on that caught my attention. The week’s message, available at the group’s website www.rfth.org, was about the ever-sensitive issue of gay marriage. The message was that gay marriage will create social chaos because if gays are allowed to marry, “how then can modern man deny a man the right to marry two or three or four wives-especially since Islam’s Koran teaches this is okay?” With these few words, Right From The Heart Ministries juxtaposed homosexuals and Muslims, using the audience’s ignorance of Islam to condemn homosexuality.
Today, Islam is perhaps even more misunderstood than before September 11. Aware of popular perceptions of Islamic societies in turmoil and chaos, Right From The Heart’s message implicitly creates an illogical bridge between turmoil in the Middle East and an Islamic teaching on marriage. Moreover, Right From The Heart omits the reasons why Islam permits men to marry multiple wives. Mohammed lived in a time when many women lived in poverty with their children, divorced or widowed by their husbands. Marriage provided a way for society to take care of these women and their children. Islam encourages men to marry widows and divorcees so that these women may live better lives. Rather than explain the issues of social responsibility in seventh century Arabia, Right From The Heart used fact to paint a corrupt image of Islam.
Having created this corrupt image, Right From The Heart uses it to argue that gay marriage will lead to social instability. According to the message, legalizing gay marriage will lead to legalizing polygamy and even incest. Right From The Heart fears that permitting gay marriage will undermine the traditional heterosexual family structure. But isn’t the traditional nuclear family largely a thing of the past? Sociologists tell us that traditional families make up less than half of U.S. families, outnumbered by single parent and other non-traditional families. Why are there so few traditional households? Just like seventh century Arabia, the reason is divorce. Today, rather than men divorcing their wives without cause, women are free to divorce their husbands who frequently give ample cause. Therefore, to protect a social stability based on heterosexual marriage is to protect something that no longer exists.
Traditional families are not dead; there will always be men and women who love each other and are committed to each other for their entire lives. While these special relationships should be celebrated, they are no longer the ‘basis for western civilization’ that conservative Christians make them to be. These relationships are special for their love and lasting commitment, not because they are a societal norm. Heterosexuals do not hold a monopoly on love. It’s time to realize that homosexual couples are just as capable of forming deep, life-long relationships as heterosexuals. It is this level of commitment, this level of devotion and love, that creates stable, healthy families. It’s time that we recognize, celebrate, and legally ordain all such relationships, regardless of the sex of the individuals involved. Rather than putting us on a path to embracing incest, legalizing gay marriage will promote the family values its opponents espouse.
Brandon Holcolmb
Graduate Assistant
The Colonnade
Posted by Colonnade Archives
on Oct 22 2004. Filed under Opinion.
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