News Articles on Gay Marriage

One of the first I find is an article about British homosexual unions having a failure rate of less than one percent. I'm not inclined to give this statistic much weight, given that the numbers were drawn from a 2 year period, starting when such unions were legitimized. If the average first marriage lasts about 8 years, we wouldn't necessarily expect to see breakdowns in gay marriages right away.

The news is apparently more grim in Sweden, where homosexual unions are 50% more likely to break up within an eight year period.

But then, in Denmark, it seems that gay marriages are out-performing heterosexual marriages.

In general, is skimming around the web, it seems that jury is still out on how well homosexual unions succeed. Since such marriages are only a very recent phenomenon, or because so few nations keep track of statistics in this regard, it is very difficult to make any conclusions. I personally would not be surprised to see gay marriages ending in roughly the same percentage as normal marriages.

Why? Because anymore, marriage is about legitimized sexual acts, not about true devotion to another person coupled with the life-giving aspect that produces family. When the sex aspect is what it is all about, who cares if your partner is male or female?

Not Surprising at All

It seems that the premiere couple leading the gay marriage march are filing for divorce, and in fact had been separated since 2006. (Fox News has the story here.)

Now, I know this is just one story, but it seems to me that it says something that the people who fought hardest to marry are now filing for divorce. It kind of makes the whole endeavor seem pointless, doesn't it? I mean, if you're going to get together with someone for a couple of years and then slip apart and get together with someone else, why fight for marriage?

Of course, we know that plenty of heterosexual marriages fail, as well, but that doesn't somehow validate what's going on here. What is needed is a strong understanding of what marriage is about. It isn't about legitimizing your sexual relationship with a person, and it isn't about tax deductions or social acceptance or anything like that. It is about a commitment to, for the rest of your life, devote yourself fully to another person.

I don't think very many people in the whole gay marriage debate understand this.

Day Without a Gay Bust

So it seems that the "Day Without a Gay" protest drew little attention and few participants. Apparently a few people have commented that, given the bad economy, it simply wasn't prudent to strike, that such a an effort would have a backlash on the gay community.

That explanation doesn't seem to work, to me. Maybe I'd be a bit more ruthless in this, but a poor economy would, to me, be the best time, so that the message hits home hardest. But then, I suspect that maybe the reason the protest didn't find wide participation is because, in contrast with similar protests by blacks and Hispanics, homosexuality doesn't manifest visually in terms of unalterable traits. While I'm willing to concede to the theory that "homosexuality is not a choice", nevertheless homosexual actions do involve choice. One can choose to engage in homosexual sex, or one can choose to refrain. One can choose to be "flaming", or one can choose to appear no different than any other random Joe on the streets.

The problem the gay movement is having, I think, is this. The black movement truly and honestly dealt with discrimination that targeted something blacks simply could not change. Moreover, blacks were fighting to be recognized as far more than just a skin color. Those in the gay movement, though, are largely discriminated against for their behavior (and not their sexual preference per se). What this amounts to, then, is that in order to equate their struggles as being discriminated against as something that they are, they have to reduce themselves to nothing but gay, and I don't think most people with homosexual tendencies want to completely subsume themselves under a single label.

To simplify, because the onus is on the behavior, not on an unchangeable trait, people in the gay movement have to make that behavior an unchangeable part of their being, essentially make "gay" the sole qualifying detail about themselves. They have to reduce themselves to a single label in order to make this discrimination fit, and I would conjecture that the human mind find such a reduction of self unappealing.

Wyoming's Attitude Toward Homosexuals

Check it out here. 10 years later, I still know nothing about Matthew Shephard except that he was a practicing homosexual and was killed by a couple of drunk people who took exception to his homosexuality.

What gets me about the article is how it immediately introduces a mother worried about whether or not one of her children might be homosexual, and how after Shepard's tragic death, she realized that homosexuals have as much value as anyone else.

The problem with the description of this mother's change of opinion is that it makes the mistake of confusing two issues. The first is the potential for self-serving, sinful behavior that occurs when one seeks sexual pleasure outside of a loving, committed marriage; the other is the value and dignity inherent in each human being, regardless of behavior or sexual orientation.

I have homosexual friends, and I value their friendship greatly. Their choices to live in an actively homosexual lifestyle are not choices I can condone. There is no contradiction here, and no homophobia. It is one thing to think a friend's behavior is harmful; quite another to despise him in entirety for it.