a non-sexual view of marriage

Robin Phillips argues against Premise 1:

Gay ‘Marriage’ Hinges on a Non-Sexual View of Marriage

I begin with the point that same-sex ‘marriage’ hinges on a non-sexual view of marriage. In contrast to the traditional view of marriage, which we can call ‘the conjugal view’, same-sex ‘marriage’ depends for its coherence on another view of marriage, which we can call ‘the revisionist view.’ According to the revisionist view, the marital union is first and foremost a loving relationship, a bond of commitment and affection between two consenting adults. It is first about the communion of souls in a committed and affectionate relationship and only secondarily about the acts those people might or might not perform with their bodies. This view of marriage contrasts sharply with the traditional view which sees marriage as a sexual union publically recognized because of its potential fecundity. As Girgis, Anderson and George explain:

In short, the revisionist view sees your spouse as your ‘Number One person,’ in one advocate’s pithy phrase. Hence it cannot distinguish marriage from simple companionship. And we all know that companionship, while deeply enriching, is far more general than marriage….

Take Oscar and Alfred. They live together, support each other, share domestic responsibilities, and have no dependents. Because Oscar knows and trusts Alfred more than anyone else, he would like Alfred to be the one to visit him in the hospital if he is ill, give directives for his care if he is unconscious, and inherit his assets if he dies fist. Alfred feels the same about Oscar. Each offers the other security amid life’s hardships,. and company in its victories. They face the world together.

So far, you may be assuming that Oscar and Alfred have a sexual relationship. But does it matter? What if they are bachelor brothers? What if they are college best friends who never rooming together, or who reunited as widowers? In these cases, most agree, they would not be spouses. And yet they would be, by most revisionists’ arguments.

Assuming a general policy of recognizing committed dyads should the benefits that Oscar and Alfred receive depend on whether their relationship is or can be presumed to be sexual? Would it not be patentlyunjust if the state withheld benefits from them only because they were not having sex with each other? A Syracuse Law professor has argued that it would be: that the state should recognize social units made up of committed friends.

The revisionist cannot successfully answer by claiming that marriages are the most emotionally intense of relationships, and that sex generally fosters and expresses that intimacy. Emotional bonds are certainly important, especially in marriage. But if sex matters for marriage only for its emotional and expressive effects, as the revisionist must hold, then surely sex is perfectly replaceable, as no one really holds. Emotional intimacy is also fostered by deep conversation, cooperation under pressure or imminent tragedy, and a thousand other activities that two sisters or a father and son could choose without raising an eyebrow. There is nothing in this respect unique to sex.

In other words, why is sex more expressive of marriage than other pleasing activities that build attachment? We know that passion, pleasure, and delight in any genuine good, including marital union, are themselves also valuable; emotional union is an important part of marital union. But if spraying oxytocin at your partner increased her pleasure and attachment to you, that would not make it fungible with sex as an embodiment of your marriage. But why not, unless something about sex besides its emotional effects isalso crucial?…

Can revisionists explain any systematic difference between marriage and deep friendship?… An account of marriage must explain what makes the marital relationship different from others.

It is interesting in this regard that in the literature of the gay and lesbian community, the specifically sexual dimensions of marriage are increasingly being downplayed, and that is why I have argued elsewhere that same-sex ‘marriage’ carries with it many Gnostic assumptions about the body.

The de-emphasis of the physical dimensions of marriage has resulted in the UK government announcing that the concept of consummation and non-consummation will be inapplicable to ‘marriages’ conducted by homosexuals. When the news surfaced that the government had decided that both consummation and adultery couldn’t be committed by two people of the same sex, many people puzzled at this, even though it was the logical outworking of the sex-less descriptions of “union” propagated amongst the agitators for gay marriage. You see, once our understanding of “union” in marriage is reduced to “a loving relationship between two committed adults”, then what two people do with their bodies becomes extrinsic rather than intrinsic to that union. But in that case, it is possible, in principle, for gay marriages to occur between two people who are celibate. By contrast, for a heterosexual marriage to be “consummated” (that is, to be a fully complete marriage), there is an act the husband and wife must perform with their bodies. Hang on to that thought, because it has profound ramifications for how we understand the family’s relationship to the state. However, one more piece of the puzzle must be put in place before I can discuss this implication, and that has to do with the concept of monogamy.

The de-emphasis on the physical dimensions of marriage surfaces again and again in the literature of the gay community and comes out most prominently in their attempts to reduce monogamy to purely spiritual categories. The notion that “Fidelity is not between your legs but between your ears” (quoted in When Gay People Get Married, p. 95) is a typical position within the homosexual community. Dermot O’Callaghan reminds us of the tendency for homosexual men to downplay the importance of monogamy:

A study called The Male Couple found that “all couples with a relationship lasting more than five years have incorporated some provision for outside sexual activity …”

Another study, Beyond Monogamy, indicates “a positive correlation between longevity and non-monogamy.” It says, “… non-monogamy isn’t by nature de-stabilizing. In fact, the results of this study would suggest the opposite – many study couples said non-monogamy enabled them to stay together”.

The agony of non-monogamy amongst gay men surfaces repeatedly in the literature. Other terms include:

• Modified Monogamy
• Monogamy of the heart
• Negotiated non-monogamy etc.

The concept of “monogamy of the heart” is simply the logical step once the physical dimensions of marriage are no longer seen as being central. As Girgis, Anderson and George again explain, “If marriage is, as the revisionists must hold, essentially an emotional union, this norm [of monogamy] is hard to explain. After all, sex is just one of many pleasing activities that foster vulnerability and tenderness, and some partners might experience deeper and longer-lasting emotional union with each other if their relationship were sexually open.”

Even those within the gay community who do practice monogamy, still generally wish to define the marriage “union” in purely non-physical terms, as simply a committed and loving relationship between two adults. This is important because, as we shall see, it has widespread implications concerning the state’s relationship to the family.