THG and...Gay Marriage

[Lexingtonian]

This is a part of the Malcolm Gladwell column in this week's New Yorker magazine's "Talk of the Town" section.

This is unfortunately the best URL for it so far-
http://216.239.57.104/search?q=cache:cy8xu3MJ7_kJ:www.drugpolicycentral.com/bot/article/newyorker5731.htm

<....>
Despite the N.F.L.'s claims that it is concerned about the health of the players, it is more concerned about the health of the N.F.L. Football's governors make a distinction between natural violence and artificially aided violence, and it's their contention that the former has a good deal more market appeal than the latter, in the same way that consumers are believed to be willing to pay more for pure orange juice than they are for the adulterated version. What the N.F.L. really cares about is the institution of football. That is the reason players, when they are not smashing into each other on the field, have to behave like Rotarians, and dress up nicely in suits, and visit sick children in the hospital, and not smoke marijuana. The idea is that there is some abstract thing out there called "football" that is bigger than them and will long outlive them all, and that it needs to be nourished and protected with socially appropriate behavior.

If this argument sounds familiar, it is because the idea that institutions—and not the constituents of institutions—need our support is very much in vogue right now. The case against affirmative action, for instance, has become an argument in defense of the institution of higher learning—which is, apparently, so fragile that it will crumble in the face of a few sub-par test scores. The same logic was at work last week in President Bush's response to the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court's ruling that gay couples have the right to marry. "Marriage is a sacred institution between a man and a woman," he said. There's that word again, and notice how the sentence doesn't quite make sense. It should read: "a sacred bond between a man and a woman." But the President had to say "institution," because nobody imagines that the court's decision will actually jeopardize the personal bond between any particular man and any particular woman. Notice, as well, that neither the President nor the N.F.L. bothered much with the principles involved in these causes. That is why the N.F.L., in its statements about the health of its players, had to obscure the fact that there isn't any appreciable ethical distinction between the profound physical harm caused to football players by playing football and the harm caused to football players by taking drugs. Massachusetts officials, for their part, in criticizing the court's decision, maintained that the purpose of marriage was procreation, that children were better off in male-female unions, and that gay unions would pose a burden to the state. None of those arguments are derived from principle; they are arguments of expediency. They are appeals to the institution of marriage, and institutions—on and off the football field—are where we hide when we can't find our principles.— Malcolm Gladwell

(It seemed necessary to give adequate amounts of the run up paragraph, but the stuff of real interest around here is the second one. That closing sentence is just great.)

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. I've said this before

the greatest threat to the institution of marriage isn't the sex of the marriage partners. It's the fact that so many people divorce and that so many people have children out of wedlock. Divorce used to be looked upon as something disgraceful (my mother was divorced in the late 50s, and she was treated as a social outcast), and one simply didn't have children without being married. These attitudes have changed since I was a kid. If you want marriage back as the strong institution it was, then you have to restrict divorces to extreme cases and you have to ostracize innocent children and call them 'love child' or worse.

And what's this about marriage and procreation? Nothing on my license that said my husband and I had to have kids to make the paper valid. Since we have chosen not to contribute to the world's overpopulation, does this make our marriage null and void? I guess in some people's minds it would. But in our minds, our marriage was a bond, the most sacred trust given us by God. And, personally, I don't think He/She cares so much about the sex of the couple as He/She cares about how much they care about each other.

[arwalden]

3. Okay... I Love You!

Great post.

-- Allen

[xchrom]

2. brilliant

this just gives me huge hope when i read well written and thought out articles like this.
and it's the very thing that get's to the heart of ''wedge issues'' and liberals. there will always be issues the repukes THINK they can bash the liberal community with -- and when we don't present our arguments in a forceful, unequivocable manner, i.e. the great way this article makes the case, then liberals help repukes beat them up.
liberals really do have the high ground when it comes to most issues -- the trick is getting ahead of the message and staying ahead. and for god's sake -- don't actually help the other side beat us up.