Twist on Gay Marriage

Law Professor Ann Althouse, blogging on the article discussed below uses the headline "Winning the right to marry is one thing; being forced to marry is quite another".

Columbia University Law Professor Katherine M. Franke gives us this Opinion Piece in The New York Times.  The thrust of this column is that homosexuals who are in relationships in states without same-sex marriage have been getting things like medical benefits for their partners, but if those states pass same-sex marriage laws the rules that apply to heterosexual couples will apply equally to homosexual couples—without marriage, no benefits.

I think this is the core of her thoughts:

Of course, this means we’ll be treated just as straight people are now.  But this moment provides an opportunity to reconsider whether we ought to force people to marry — whether they be gay or straight — to have their committed relationships recognized and valued.

This is asking for a whole new definition of relationships.

What is interesting is the argument that Civil Unions are not adequate is directly opposed to this idea of having other forms of relationships recognized and valued.

In my own mind the decision to change the relationships rules needs to be part of a serious debate about what families bring to the community.  Chief Justice Maggie Marshall was pretty flip about the sociology of this in the Goodwood decision.  If we make changes without actually looking at the whole issue, painful as it might be, including the implications of out-of-wedlock births for the children and their future, and the future of the children's children, we will repent for a long time, as our civil society slides downhill.

NB:  As I type Fox Network announces that the New York Senate has approved same-sex marriage.

Here is her over the top punchline:

As strangers to marriage for so long, we’ve created loving and committed forms of family, care and attachment that far exceed, and often improve on, the narrow legal definition of marriage.  Many of us are not ready to abandon those nonmarital ways of loving once we can legally marry.

The problem is, equal rights should mean equal rights.

I didn't give a link to the Althouse blog because while the Professor's comments were quite reasonable, most of the commenters, up to where I stopped reading, were pretty dismissive of the OpEd.  Put another way, a surprising lack of debate.

Regards  —  Cliff