Balkinization: The decline of marriage?

The decline of marriage?

Andrew Koppelman

In USA Today last week, Robert George and Ryan Anderson lament the past ten years of LGBT policy. They argue that the legalization of same-sex marriage, which they tirelessly opposed, is the logical consequence of “the erosion of marital norms in the wake of the sexual revolution — with the rise of cohabitation, nonmarital childbearing, no-fault divorce and the hookup culture.” The shift destabilizes heterosexual marriage: “If it isn’t a comprehensive union inherently ordered to childbearing and rearing, why should it be pledged to permanence?”

This is a familiar theme in opposition to same-sex marriage – a cause that they still haven’t given up. But the marital norms they defend are alive and well. Those norms evidently have a more robust basis than they are willing to concede.

Rod Dreher, in the American Conservative, echoes their concern: “We are well on our way to the dissolution of our civilization via the dissolution of the traditional family.” The rise of divorce at will, same-sex marriage, and the acceptance of transgender people show that “Over this past decade, we have collectively forgotten what marriage is, what family is, and we are well on our way to forgetting what men and women are.”

George, in a follow up today on Public Discourse, argues that the proponents of same-sex marriage won because they “a campaign of intimidation, smearing anyone who opposed their agenda as a bigot and a hater.”

They are actually conflating two different claims. One, undoubtedly correct, is that marriage is inherently heterosexual. George elsewhere elaborates that idea: “What is unique about marriage is that it truly is a comprehensive sharing of life, a sharing founded on the bodily union made uniquely possible by the sexual complementarity of man and woman, a complementarity that makes it possible for two human beings to become, in the language of the Bible, one flesh and thus possible for this one-flesh union to be the foundation of a relationship in which it is intelligible for two persons to bind themselves to each other in pledges of permanence, monogamy, and fidelity.”

That idea persuades fewer and fewer people. This is not because those who believe it are intimidated, but because, as George concedes, “even some conservatively oriented people seem to find themselves stumped” when asked why infertile heterosexual marriages are better than same-sex marriages. Increasing numbers of Americans, especially younger ones, including adherents of sexually conservative religions such as Catholicism, Mormonism, and evangelical Protestantism, can make no sense of the ideas George has to offer. That’s not a criticism of George’s claims, which deserve to be addressed on their merits. It is simply a fact.

The second claim is that without that idea to hold them together, the norms that constitute heterosexual families are bound to collapse. George and Anderson fear the end of “norms of monogamy, exclusivity and permanence.” They write: “We seek to preserve marriage—the real thing—because of the profound respects in which a flourishing marriage culture serves and benefits all members of the community, beginning with children.” Dreher fears civilizational collapse: “family formation, and dissolution, has been inseparable from the rise and fall of civilization,” and “Our task as traditionalists (cultural conservatives, Christians, Jews, Muslims, what have you) is to fight hard politically and culturally to create the structures within which the memory of family, and of God, can be sustained.”

That second claim does not follow from the first, and it isn’t true. It is indisputable that in contemporary America, families have become more fragile, there has been a surge in divorce and single parenthood since the 1950s. Those numbers are down a bit in recent years. But among the prosperous educated elites who are most likely to hold the ideology of sexuality that is deplored by George, Anderson, and Dreher – the top 20% of the income scale - divorce rates haven’t changed much since the 1950s.

It appears that family fragility has less to do with the philosophy of sexuality than socioeconomic status, and particularly the economic instability that Americans inceasingly face. But whatever the cause of these developments, it isn’t sexual liberationist ideology.

George and Anderson also make a third claim, that the advocates of gay rights will inevitably persecute those who disagree: “once a campaign that used to cry “live and let live” prevailed, it began working to shut down Catholic adoption agencies and harass evangelical bakers and florists. This shows it was never really about “live and let live” — that was a merely tactical stance.” Perhaps that’s true of some gay rights advocates, but quite a lot of us really mean it. Dreher’s desire to isolate a saving remnant during what he takes to be the coming dark age strikes me as misguided, but in a free society, Dreher’s – and George’s, and Anderson’s - ability to live as they like shouldn’t depend on my opinion. And the ability of gay people to live as they like shouldn’t depend on anyone else’s opinion either.

Posted 2:56 PM by Andrew Koppelman [link]