Why One Friend is Voting Yes on Prop 8

I am sure that many of you are wondering how it is even possible that a Stanford student could vote Yes on proposition 8. Let me explain. My personal belief is that marriage is not a contract between two people. It is not right. Marriage is a vital institution that shapes the rights and obligations of parenthood and affects and shapes society in profound ways in regard to how parents view the obligation of parenthood and their rights and responsibilities as fathers and mothers.

Why would society even control and regulate a relationship? Why would we let the government intervene into such a personal aspect in our lives? It is because society has a deep vested interest in marriage. It channels the sexual attraction between man and woman, which could lead to procreation, in a socially desirable way; that of a family unit where they are bound to provide and protect for the offspring which result from their sexual union. It was not created as a contract between two people to devote themselves to each other, rather society has created the institution of marriage so that a man and a woman set aside their personal objectives and goals to produce a family which they protect and are bound to the offspring that they create.

Society has a vested interest in marriage because it is in that union between man and woman in which children are created and brought into the world and we should be very concerned about how the children in this world are raised, taught, and cared for. The UN charter on children's rights states that all children have a right to be raised by the parents who brought them into the world; Marriage ensures that this is the case and holds parents responsible for how their children are raised and taught.

The genderless marriage paradigm is radically different in its aims and teachings and the two cannot exist concomitantly, for it would define marriage as a union between two people lacking the power of mutual procreation, thus stripping marriage of its function of regulating how we are bringing children into the world and forming their identity. The adoption of a marriage paradigm in which its primary concern is the two married partners is one I cannot support.

I love my gay friends and family. It is horrible how much persecution and discrimination homosexuals have suffered. I do agree that one benefit of allowing same-sex couples to marry would be a reduction in this persecution and discrimination. I believe that homosexual and heterosexual couples should be afforded the same rights as everyone. I empathize and understand that it is a rational and reasonable thing for same-sex couples to want the status that marriage affords. I believe, though, that the costs of redefining marriage are too great. I fear a society in which people think marriage is a way to pursue happiness, fulfillment, and selfish pursuits and dodge their parental and spousal obligations; Sadly this is already too often the case, but if we break the link between marriage and procreation this second best scenario will be institutionalized.

“The man-woman marriage institution is:

1. Society’s best and perhaps only effective means to secure the right of a child to know and be raised by her biological parents (with exceptions justified only when they are in the best interests of the child).

2. The most effective means yet developed to maximize the private welfare provided to children.

3. The indispensable foundation for that child-rearing mode that correlates with the optimal outcomes deemed crucial for a child’s, and therefore society’s, well-being.

4. Society’s primary and most effective means of bridging the male-female divide.

5. Society’s only means of transforming a male into husband-father and female into wife-mother, statuses and identities particularly beneficial to society.”

(from Stewart, Monte Neil, Marriage Facts, Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy, [Vol. 31 No. 1] pp. 321-322, http://www.marriagelawfoundation.org/mlf/publications/harvard%20facts.pdf)

Finally, I know that marriage is sacred, ordained of God, and gives to fathers and mothers, not rights, freedoms, and privileges as some would believe that marriage accords, but rather the solemn and powerful responsibility of “rear[ing] their children in love and righteousness, to provide for their physical and spiritual needs, to teach them to love and serve one another, to observe the commandments of God and to be law-abiding citizens wherever they live. Husbands and wives—mothers and fathers—will be held accountable before God for the discharge of these obligations.”

(from The Proclamation to the World, by Gordon B. Hinckley as part of his message at the General Relief Society Meeting held September 23, 1995, http://www.lds.org/library/display/0,4945,161-1-11-1,00.html)