Ruth Institute Blog

The response to my post, A Word on Terminology has confirmed my intuition that I am correct to abstain from using the term “same sex marriage.”  Three things have led me to conclude that my instincts are correct about this:

1. The wailing, weeping and general indignation meeting being held all around the Left side of the Blogosphere.

2. My friend, Bill May, of Catholics for the Common Good, confirms my opinion. (I always listen when Bill talks.) He pointed me to a tract that his organization has written on the subject, a tract which I highly recommend to all Regular Ruth Readers, Friends with Wrong or Right Ideas.

3. Finally, and most importantly, in the aforesaid wailing and indignation, advocates of the redefinition of marriage have, perhaps inadvertently, revealed just how radical they really are.  See for instance, comment #12, which states  in part: Read more…

Governor Rick Perry was quoted as saying:

“Our friends in New York six weeks ago passed a statute that said marriage can be between two people of the same sex. And you know what? That’s New York, and that’s their business, and that’s fine with me….That is their call. If you believe in the 10th Amendment, stay out of their business.”

As I said in my earlier post, there at least two bad ideas embedded in this statement attributed to Gov Perry.  I’ve already dealt with the first problem: the states’ rights” position is not really available any longer.  The second bit of foolishness is the claim that because “our friends” in NY redefined marriage, no one else has any right to say anything against it. It is highly dubious that those responsible for redefining marriage are “friends” to anyone else in the country, or to the people of New York.

According to the New York Times, marriage was redefined in NY through a combination of backroom deals, arm-twisting and loads of money.  Read more…

You may have noticed that I do not use the term “same sex marriage” very often.  In fact, I am making a conscious decision not to use the term at all any more.  I think the term gives away too much ground to our opponents. Continually using the term makes it possible to believe that such a thing as a marriage between people of the same sex is possible.

I don’t use the term “square circle” because such an entity is not possible.  Likewise, I think it is not possible for two people of the same sex to be married to each other. So, I use another term that I believe is more accurate.

I use the phrase “redefinition of marriage” or “so-called same sex marriage,” or in a pinch, “genderless marriage,” depending on the context.

Even “genderless marriage” is questionable because it is naming something that is an impossibility.  Gender is essential to marriage.  The move to make same sex unions the legal equivalent of opposite sex unions requires that gender be removed from the understanding of marriage. If this legal movement to redefine marriage succeeds, it will be creating something entirely new. Nothing will be left of marriage but the name, as I have said in articles and lectures called, “The Institution Formerly Known as Marriage.”  But at least the term “genderless marriage” calls attention to what is at stake in the debate.

What do you think?
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Read more about genderless marriage at Marriage-Ecosystem.org:

Genderless Marriage

Governor Rick Perry made news with his comments about the definition of marriage at an event in Aspen:

“Our friends in New York six weeks ago passed a statute that said marriage can be between two people of the same sex. And you know what? That’s New York, and that’s their business, and that’s fine with me….That is their call. If you believe in the 10th Amendment, stay out of their business.”

Now, I have been involved in the marriage debate long enough to know that people often take words out of context, distort their meaning, and flat out lie. Whatever Gov Perry may have said or intended to say, the sentiments attributed to him are actually pretty common.  So, without passing judgment on Gov Perry, let’s take this opportunity to analyze this statement. As it happens, these very common sentiments fit nicely into my continuing series: “Intelligent Replies to Idiotic Comments.”

There are at least two idiotic ideas embedded in this statement attributed to Gov Perry.  First, the idea that the marriage issue is or ought to be a “state’s rights” simply doesn’t  work. Read more…

A friend sent me this quotation by GK Chesterton from the early 20th century.

(Suppose) There exists … a certain institution or law; let us say for the sake of simplicity, a fence or gate erected across a road. The more modern type of reformer goes gaily up to it and says, “I don’t see the use of this; let us clear it away.” To which the more intelligent type of reformer will do well to answer: if you don’t see the use of it, I certainly won’t let you clear it away. Go away and think. Then, when you can come back and tell me that you do see the use of it, I may allow you to destroy it.”

This paradox rests on the most elementary common sense. The gate or fence did not grow there. It was not set up by somnambulists who built it in their sleep. It is highly improbable that it was put there by escaped lunatics who were for some reason loose in the street. Some person had some reason for thinking it would be a good thing for somebody. And until we know what the reason was, we really cannot judge whether the reason was reasonable. It is extremely probable that we have overlooked some whole aspect of the question, if something set up by human beings like ourselves seems to be entirely meaningless and mysterious. There are reformers who get over this difficulty by assuming that all their fathers were fools; but if that be so, we can only say that folly appears to be a hereditary disease. But the truth is that nobody has any business to destroy a social institution until he has really seen it as an historical institution. Read more…

“But same sex couples already have children!”  This is not, strictly speaking, an idiotic comment, since it is a statement of fact.  However, I want to call your attention to the exasperated gasp (EG for short) that usually accompanies this comment.  The EG is designed to intimidate the listener into believing that some deeply important conclusion follows instantly and obviously from the observation that same sex couples already have children in their homes.  The Exasperated Gasp is supposed to convey that the whole issue is a done deal, and we shouldn’t offer any resistance to further social change.  Let’s examine this. What exactly is it that supposedly follows automatically and obviously?

Same sex couples should be encouraged to have more children.  No, that doesn’t follow.  You’d have to make an argument to support that conclusion.

Same sex couples will continue to have more children, no matter what the law does or doesn’t do.  No, that doesn’t follow either. As a matter of fact, the law can, if it chooses, make it quite difficult for same sex couples to share parenting rights.

Same sex couples have children the same way opposite sex couples do. No, that is manifestly untrue. The Exasperated Gasp is meant to divert attention from the fact that same sex couples can only have a child if someone gives them one, or at least one of the gametes needed to create a child. Same sex couples need assistance from the legal, social and medical establishments in order to give birth to children, and to have legal parenting rights to those children. No where in the Exasperated Gasp is there any explanation at all, or even any attempt at an explanation, as to why anyone ought to assist same sex couples to achieve their reproductive goals or whether anyone has a moral duty to assist them.

Same sex couples should be allowed to marry so “their” children can have all the benefits of marriage.  No, this doesn’t follow either.  This assumes that the “marriage” of a same sex couple will work in the same way as the marriage of a man and a woman. This is highly doubtful. We already know that in terms of economic behavior, male couples are different from female couples, and both are different from married couples. We also know that separation rates (ie divorces) are different for male couples and for female couples and both are different (higher, like way higher) than for married couples.  We have no reason to assume that  same sex “marriage” will function in the same way, and convey all the same benefits to children, as natural, conjugal marriage does.

So, to answer our opening question, What exactly is it that supposedly follows automatically and obviously?  Answer: Absolutely nothing follows automatically and obviously.  The points that we are meant to infer are either not obviously true, (and hence require an actual argument) or not true at all.

The true statement, But same sex couples already have children!” accompanied by an Exasperated Gasp, is either an intimidation tactic, or another idiotic comment.  Take your pick.

On my radio program on Monday, I will be interviewing Don Feder, talking about Demographic Winter and the World Congress of Families Summit in Moscow. Tune in on-line at www.catholicradioofsandiego.com to listen.  Or listen live in the San Diego area on AM 1000 KCEO.

All you Lefties: tune in and find out if concern about Demographic Winter is really racist. Maybe you’ll catch us saying something mean, and you’ll be a hero to all your Lefty friends!

Red diaper baby David Horowitz is an expert on the mentality of the Radical Left. In his pamplet Barack Obama’s Rules for Revolution, (which I highly recommend, by the way) David makes the following point:

An SDS radical once wrote, “the issue is never the issue. The issue is always the revolution.”  In other words, the cause-whether inner city blacks or women–is never the real cause, but only an occasion to advance the real cause, which is the accumulation of power to make the revolution.

I would add, whether the cause is the redefinition of marriage or the expansion of entitlements for homosexuals, the issue is never the issue: the revolution is the issue.

Exhibit A: This April 2011 story, from Radio Netherlands, Read more…

“Nothing so terrible has happened in Massachusetts or Canada, so let’s just have same sex marriage.”

Marriage is the social institution that connects generations to each other. Redefining marriage changes the basic structure by which the generations relate to one another, including who counts as a parent.  We will not experience the most significant consequences of redefining marriage in the first five years. The most significant consequences may not be the most immediately obvious. It will take a full generation, a full thirty years or more, before society will feel the full impact of redefining marriage.

People  making this argument  don’t understand the full social significance of marriage.  They are ignorant of how social systems actually work.

“Nothing so terrible has happened” is truly an idiotic comment.

Issues Etc host Todd Wilken’s last question to me was, “If you had 30 seconds to talk to HHS Secretary Kathleen Sibelius, what would you say to her?” (This was regarding the requirement (which is simultaneously silly and offensive) that all insurance carriers provide contraception with no co-pay.) I simply said,

“You need to go to confession, girlfriend!”

I did my issues etc radio show on this today, and we talked about it on my Monday night Catholic Radio of San Diego program: “Health insurance plans must cover birth control as preventive care for women, with no copays, the Obama administration said Monday.”

Later in the article, we learn:

a government study last summer found that birth control use is virtually universal in the United States, according to a government study issued last summer. More than 90 million prescriptions for contraceptives were dispensed in 2009, according the market analysis firm INS health. Generic versions of the pill are available for as little as $9 a month. Still, about half of all pregnancies are unplanned. Many are among women using some form of contraception, and forgetting to take the pill is a major reason.

This new rule mandating insurance coverage of contraception with no co-pay is evidence of the condom-ist ideology, rather than a serious attempt to solve any serious problem.  This culture is already saturated with low cost contraceptives. Cheaper pills will not make women stop “forgetting” to take their pills.

Many ”unplanned” pregnancies are coming about for some reason other than lack of access to contraception, like the women want their babies.  The concept of “unplanned”pregnancy is meaningless.

Mrs. Mendelson just gave birth to their fourth child yesterday.  The ever irrepressible Ari wrote on his facebook wall: “Thinking of various, creative and brazen ways to trick, fool or deceive my new daughter. She was, after all, born yesterday.”
(Everyone please note: this is a joke.  Don’t get upset! Betsy has full authority to suppress comments from anyone who takes this too seriously!)

All kidding aside, congratulations to all the Mendelsons!

Yet another story blaming gay suicide on society’s failure to conform to the desires of the Sex Radicals and Gay-ists.  So I wonder, did you know:

divorce doubles a man’s risk of suicide, but does not particularly affect women’s propensity to commit suicide? (Augustine Kposowa, Journal of Epidemiology and community Health, 2000; 54: 254-261)

Swedish adolescents living in single parent homes were twice as likely to commit suicide as adolescents in two parent households?  (Odds ratio: 2.43 for girls, and 1.83 for boys.) ( Ringback, et al. The Lancet, Vol 361, 25 January 2003.)

Why don’t we take the suffering of these adults and children seriously?

I’ve noticed that writing about symbols is a sure way to generate a lot of hate mail from my “feel the love” Friends With Wrong Ideas. But here goes anyway.

Regular Ruth Readers have heard me say many times that “equality” is not a stand-alone concept.  The term “equality” needs a referent:  who is equal to whom and in what context?  If you don’t specify those basic parameters, the concept of equality means exactly nothing. It is similar to saying “mine’s bigger,” without saying “what exactly of yours are we talking about?” or “bigger than what?”

Evading this elementary problem of context is the heart of the rhetorical strategy of the advocates for so-called marriage equality.  I have argued elsewhere that the “marriage equality” concept is nonsense.  I’m convinced that treating same sex couples identically at law with opposite sex couples will create new forms of inequality in all the relationships that depend on or derive from marriage.  Fathers of the children in lesbian relationships won’t be equal to other fathers; children of same sex couples won’t be equal to other children.  And most recently, we’ve shown on this blog that biological mothers in sexual relationships with other women will not be treated equally with other mothers.

This is why “marriage equality” is impossible. The newly redefined institution either won’t be really equal for everyone, or it won’t be marriage.

But this is a complex set of arguments.  They are time-consuming to explain and not easily amenable to sound bites. This is a big disadvantage for our side.  But, as it happens, one of the leading marriage redefinition groups has come up with the perfect symbol for making this very point. Allow me to explain.

In mathematics, one never sees an equal sign standing all by itself.  An equal sign will have something on either side of it, as in “2+2” on one side of the equal sign, and the numeral “4” on the other.  Or, one might see a scientific law or formula using an equal sign, such as f=ma or MV=PQ.  But an equal sign standing alone, with nothing on either side, means exactly nothing: a pair of horizontal lines of no special significance.

This naked equal sign is the perfect symbol for marriage “equality:” both are meaningless concepts. Both fail to specify the terms that would allow the concept to contain any meaning.

This is why I am grateful to the marriage redefinition organization that gives its supporters equal signs for bumper stickers.  I’m sure they think they are striking a symbolic blow for “marriage equality.” But in fact, they are driving around with their mathematical and logical ignorance “proudly” on display.

We have just confirmed that Catholic Radio of San Diego will be broadcasting live from the opening event of our ITAF conference. We are very excited about this development. Live broadcasts make the event more fun, and they make for good radio. The host that evening will be Hugh Largey. We expect that I will do a short interview, at least one of our faculty will do an interview, and probably some of our student activists. So come on down to Point Loma, or tune in to Catholic Radio of San Diego, 1000 AM KCEO.

Note: This post was researched and written by Mr. Austin Muck, second year law student  at SMU, and legal intern for the summer at the Ruth Institute.  Dr J  

Recently the Supreme Court of Ohio appropriately decided a case that protected the constitutional right of parents to determine what is in the best interest of their children.  Subsequently, the Columbus Dispatch published an article putting the decision in negative light.  The article left out key facts of the case in order to portray it as an infringement on parental rights of same-sex partners.  In the case, Mullen decided to have baby, a decision supported by her girlfriend Hobbs.  However, the women split two years after Mullen had the baby.  Immediately after the split, Hobbs, with no biological relation, sought partial custody of the child.   Hobbs claimed Mullen relinquished her sole custody, because several documents— that were later revoked—listed Hobbs as the “co-parent in every way” and because Mullen held her out as a parent.  However, Mullen consistently refused to enter into or sign any formal shared-custody agreement when presented with the opportunity to do so.  This is a fact the article fails to mention.  Read more…

Now that we lost a big one in New York,

I have an idea: let’s all the social conservatives stand around in a circle and criticize each other.  NOT! I stumbled over two separate social conservatives criticizing the Catholic Church in New York for not doing enough, here and here. These articles were mostly repeats of a New York Times article, with virtually nothing in the way of original reporting. (Why we should repeat the talking points of our enemies is beyond me.)  Others seem to think that if we could just get the arguments right, we might have won. I don’t agree with that assessment, in spite of the fact that I spend a lot of effort trying to craft the best possible arguments.  

The very same New York Times article which the critics of the Church Read more…

Critics of the Catholic Church claim that the Church wields authoritarian control over all its members. The Pope and the bishops ruthlessly suppress all dissent, debate or disobedience.

To those who think this way, I have two words: Andrew Cuomo. 

Andrew Cuomo, Governor of New York, lives in the Governor’s Mansion with a woman to whom he is not married. The Catholic Church holds that he is living in a state of mortal sin.

The Catholic Church holds that marriage was instituted by God in the Garden of Eden, and that marriage is the lifelong union of a man and a woman, ordered toward the procreation and education of children and the mutual good of the spouses.

Andrew Cuomo pressured the legislature of New York to change the definition of marriage to the union of any two persons, instituted by His Divine Self in the Garden of Albany, ordered toward no particular purpose at all. 

If the Church were the ruthlessly conformist authoritarian institution she is taken to be, you might think someone in authority would have something to say to Andrew Cuomo.  He is an excellent candidate to be asked to go elsewhere to meet his spiritual and religious needs, such as they are.

No one in authority has made this rather obvious suggestion to him. Perhaps some ordinary New York Catholics ought to politely ask him to get lost.

In my previous post, rebutting the Libertarian Party of MN’s position on same sex marriage, I mention that I have written about why the government can’t really get out of the marriage business. It is interesting to me how common this argument has become.   I think lots of people just wish this whole topic would go away, and they hope that privatizing marriage will somehow make that possible.  Rather than restating all my arguments, I’m going to repost and relink to some of my articles. Suffice to say, that I don’t think the argument for privatizing marriage works.

Here is one called, Privatizing Marriage is Not the Answer to the Same Sex Marriage Debate.  Comment away!

The Libertarian Party of Minnesota has taken a position on the proposal to place a marriage amendment on the ballot for the voters of Minnesota.  I am taking the time to rebut this paragraph because this kind of argument has become all too common, even among those who have every desire and intention to expand the scope of government.  You might think this would give Libertarians pause, but, that is another story.

Here is what the LPMN has to say:

The proposed Gay Marriage Ban would expand government control and restrict the freedom of consenting adults to live their own lives as they choose. Libertarians believe that marriage is a private matter between individuals. We believe that marriage is a fundamental human right, and that all personal relationships, including marriage, should be at the sole discretion and agreement of the individuals involved, as well as any family, friends, or religious institutions they may choose to involve. Government has no business restricting or interfering with marriage. This ban would create a caste system by dividing society into two classes: those who are permitted to marry, and those who are not.

Let’s start at the beginning:

The proposed Gay Marriage Ban would expand government control and restrict the freedom of consenting adults to live their own lives as they choose.  Actually, affirming that marriage is the union of a man and a woman does not affect anyone’s ability to “live as they choose.” It affects people’s qualifications for the rights and responsibilities associated with a social and public institution. Same sex couples can live together, invest and spend money together, probably share parenting, and of course, do anything they want in their bedrooms.

Libertarians believe that marriage is a private matter between individuals. This statement has multiple meanings, and so is nearly Read more…