Jonathan Rowe, in his response to Andrew Sullivan and Robert P. George, begins by tackling the "procreative sex" issue, quoting George's argument and Sullivan's response. He does point out, quite rightly, that George has not proposed an alternative in civil law to accommodate same-sex relationships, but really, I think, gives George too much latitude by quoting a proposal from the Witherspoon Institute, where George is a fellow (but apparently did not participate in the preparation of this paper):
It’s true that George, understandably, doesn’t propose a policy for gay couples in his limited space op-ed. However, if I am not mistaken, elsewhere I think he has proposed/endorsed such. At least, his intellectual disciples Ryan T. Anderson and Sherif Girgis have in this piece written for The Witherspoon Institute, where George is a senior fellow:
[U]nions recognized by the federal government would be available to any two adults who commit to sharing domestic responsibilities, whether or not their relationship is sexual. Available only to people otherwise ineligible to marry each other (say, because of consanguinity), these unions would neither introduce a rival “marriage-lite” option nor treat same-sex unions as marriages. Their purpose would be to protect adult domestic partners who have pledged themselves to a mutually binding relationship of care. What (if anything) goes on in the bedroom would have nothing to do with these unions’ goals or, thus, eligibility requirements.
Once again, it's underplaying the significance of committed, exclusive love relationships between two persons of the same sex, equating them to an arrangement "available to any two adults who commit to sharing domestic responsibilities." So you can have a series of "arrangements" with roommates. That aspect of the proposal seems to elude Rowe completely: something tells me that deep in his psyche is the idea that gays are somehow emotionally incomplete.
This is a key flaw in Rowe's stance, and one that Sullivan addressed. Once again, however, Rowe misses the point:
One thing that amazes me about this debate is how willing we are to argue over symbolism, even when tangible privileges/rights aren’t at issue.
The point is, it's the symbolism of marriage that is of overwhelming importance. That's been recognized by the courts in Massachusetts and California, and it seems to me that it should be quite obvious to anyone who has the least understanding of what marriage really is. I find the assumption that a civil institution is devoid of symbolism to be quite singular.
Rowe does hit the core of the argument as advanced by the right:
Social conservatives may accuse gays of being fanatical for refusing anything short government endorsement of “marriage,” even when they have all of the same privileges, rights and responsibilities (under a sexually platonic civil mechanism). However, the same charge can be leveled against Dr. George et al. His position asserts that a key purpose of government is to promote morality (not necessarily defined by the Bible or church dogma, but the natural law, which, coincidentally, perfectly parallels traditional biblical morality and church dogma of many conservative Jewish, Christian, Mormon and Muslim denominations). And that means it’s okay for government to be nice to gay couples, allow them to enter into partnerships that grant them rights and whatnot. But it’s not okay to give them these rights/privileges under a mechanism that might symbolically intimate gay sex is okay.
Let me state right here that "natural law" is a religious concept. It is, in fact, a completely man-made construct that has no relationship to the way nature actually works. It's an Abrahamic moral code with a false moustache. And Rowe has hit the heart of the right's position here: they won't tolerate any civil institution that deviates from their concept of "morality."
Rowe then proposes the libertarian solution (which is not new and has been proposed by all sorts of people):
On the gay marriage issue, I argued using James Madison’s Memorial and Remonstrance as an analogy here. On disputed issues of “the good” that fall outside of governments minimal purview of enforcing our rights to life, political liberty and property, government should just stay out of it and leave issues up to individuals and private groups.
That means privatize marriage, everyone gets that two person civil union for which The Witherspoon Institute argues and individuals and private groups, not government decides what is “marriage” just as they decide what is true “religion.”
It's really not so unworkable -- in fact, that's the system in place in France, although it's still limited to heterosexual couples. In practical terms, making the shift from our present system to something this logical (yes, it's logical, that's why they do it in France) is going to meet huge resistance from the right, I promise you: in addition to hating anything that deviates from their somewhat primitive understanding of "morality," they want the government to reinforce that understanding in civil law. That's the entire thrust of the so-called "social conservatives."
OK, so Rowe's post wasn't worse than George's. Chalk one up for Rowe. To be quite honest, I have no problem at all with Rowe's proposal, except for the obvious practical hurdles of actually implementing it. Fortunately for me, I happen to subscribe to a religion that welcomes same-sex unions. However, considering some of the ritual activities involved in a traditional handfasting, I think I want to be married in the summer. During a heat wave.
This is the post of Sullivan's that Rowe is responding to. I do want to highlight one point that Sullivan brings up, because I think it has bearing on the religious nature of the insistence on male/female relationships as the only legitimate ones:
But if non-procreative sex can consummate a heterosexual marriage, then why not a homosexual one? I covered all this at length in Virtually Normal, and it comes down in the end to an assertion that heterosexuality be privileged in civil law because it is the norm. Buried behind this is an unscientific notion - derived from Aquinas - that the universe is somehow perfectly gendered into two opposite and complementary halves. No one with any knowledge of contemporary biology or evolution could agree with this. (Emphasis added.)
Strangely enough, Paganism, which not only recognizes the dual nature of the universe, but has incorporated it into its basic beliefs, has also come to recognize (with the exception of some die-hard Gardnerians) that this duality is also innate to a greater or lesser degree in each individual. It's a function, I think, of the realization that the universe is a continuum, not a set of dichotomies. Consequently, most Pagan traditions that I'm aware of understand that two men or two women can incorporate in their relationships both masculine and feminine aspects. (And I must say that the idea that certain traits are "masculine" or "feminine" makes less and less sense to me as time goes on.) I've noted before that certain followers of the Abrahamic faiths -- fundamentalists and literalists -- have a distinct problem with metaphor. This only points it up. And of course, there's the basic problem of those monotheisms, that they do typify the universe as a set of dichotomies and not as the continuum that we are beginning to understand that it is.
Sullivan goes on to hammer George on his lack of provision for same-sex couples under civil law, and quite rightly so.
Beneath the elegant philosophical language is a blunter message to George's gay fellow human beings: be straight or go away.
And of course, we're not going to go away.
(Another note: since I'm indefatigable on this issue, look for me to come back with commentary on the piece from The Witherspoon Institute.)
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