If Gays Get Married What Will I Do?

Maggie Gallagher of the National Review has decided to issue some short term predictions for states that will allow same sex marriage in response to Steve Chapman request:

"But with the experiment looming, some opponents seem to be doubting their own convictions. I contacted three serious conservative thinkers who have written extensively about the dangers of allowing gay marriage and asked them to make simple, concrete predictions about measurable social indicators—marriage rates, divorce, out-of-wedlock births, child poverty, you name it.""Yet none was prepared to forecast what would happen in same-sex marriage states versus other states."

Gallagher:

"In gay-marriage states, a large minority people committed to traditional notions of marriage will feel afraid to speak up for their views, lest they be punished in some way."

So what. How would these people have expressed their views prior to the state allowing gay marriage? Perhaps this minority's views are wrong and the invisible pressure of the majority's views should silence them. If they really want to express their views about marriage they should continue to marry people of the opposite gender.

Gallagher:

"Public schools will teach about gay marriage."

Do schools teach about marriage now. I really don't know or remember being taught about marriage.

Gallagher:

"Parents in public schools who object to gay marriage being taught to their children will be told with increasing public firmness that they don't belong in public schools and their views will not be accommodated in any way."

Again do they teach marriage? I'll assume they do teach it for the sack of this exercise. In the lesson on marriage wouldn't gay marriage be a part added the lesson on straight marriage. Do lessons on marriage currently teach about heterosexuality? If they do teach heterosexuality in schools now and people can learn to be gay or straight why do we have so many homosexuals? There must be schools teaching homosexuality for many years. What about the gay married couples who don't want "traditional" marriage taught? Perhaps we should stop teaching about marriage.

Gallagher:

"Religious institutions will face new legal threats (especially soft litigation threats) that will cause some to close, or modify their missions, to avoid clashing with the government's official views of marriage (which will include the view that opponents are akin to racists for failing to see same-sex couples as married)."

Is there no distinction between civil marriage and a religious marriage. Any legal action against a church or other religious institution to force the services for which they don't agree is not acceptable, but is this really a concern. I have a straight cousin that was denied marriage services in a church because they had not fulfilled all the sacramental rights required for marriage. The rights of straight people to marry is a long standing matter but my cousin did not sue the church, why would gay people? Even if people did sue I think a court would throw out the case quickly. I would assume over time there would be churches and other institutions that will begin offering service to gay couples for simple economic reasons.

Gallagher:

"Support for the idea "the ideal for a child is a married mother and father" will decline."

I am not sure if this bad in itself. I do understand the ideal state being a mother and father but how does that translate to gays would make bad parents. If it is because they will raise gay children just stop now.

So Gallagher really doesn't give any predictions as to how gay marriage will change society beyond the tired statements of her irrational fears. She is correct that "a project to document institutional change should be done in a serious way." I look forward to her serious predictions on this matter.

All I want to know is how do we determine if acceptance of gay marriage is ending civilization or if society's norms are just progressing in a neutral way? Sphere: Related Content