Oh, and this is why all those other societies that were neither Jewish nor Christian never had a neutered definition of marriage either! What’s their excuse, Mark?

I don’t doubt for a moment that traditional marriage had an awful lot to do with paternity. It’s the idea that it’s ever been consistently about anything much _other_ than paternity that you’ll need to convince me of if it comes up. And more specifically, paternity from the point of view of the male, as opposed to any of the other stakeholders (women, children, society in general).

So, once paternity is taken out of the equation, Mark, what biological incentive is there then for sexual exclusivity? Really, I can only think of one….spread of disease. Which we’d all prefer to eradicate as a threat. So what’s left, then? But, of course, you don’t care. You are essentially arguing, are you not, that the desire for sexual exclusivity in marriage is outmoded and should be thought of that way as well? Was there ever a real purpose for it, in your opinion?

Oh, I thought I had addressed that ages back: Judaism incorporated arbitrary hatred of gay sex into its scriptures 3000 or so years ago (Jews were considered odd in the Roman empire for their homophobia), and Christianity actively chose to keep it even when it was cleaning out a lot of other cruft from Judaism. And I’m afraid I don’t believe, and I invite the readers to disbelieve, that the current anti-SSM marriage is anything but a lame retrospective rationalization of that deeper hatred.

DB: “Non-exclusive marriages between men and women are a bad idea (and yes I’ve thought of it) because of confusion over paternity, [...]”

I don’t doubt for a moment that traditional marriage had an awful lot to do with paternity. It’s the idea that it’s ever been consistently about anything much _other_ than paternity that you’ll need to convince me of if it comes up. And more specifically, paternity from the point of view of the male, as opposed to any of the other stakeholders (women, children, society in general).

DB: “[...]because sex can be the glue that holds relationships together, and society (for the sake of children) has an interest in holding relationships together without the jealousies and confusions that can come with sexual non-exclusivity.

Sure, (i) sex can be the glue that holds relationships together, (ii) society (for the sake of children) has an interest in holding relationships together, and (iii) jealousies and confusions can come with sexual non-exclusivity. And these are perfectly good reasons for a default understanding of sexual exclusivity unless specifically negotiated away.

On the other hand, (i) sex can be stale or just plain bad and not hold relationships together, (ii) society, for the sake of people, also has an interest in not trapping people in unhappy relationships unnecessarily, and (iii) non-exclusivity can also defuse jealousies and confusions and make livable relationships that are satisfactory in areas other than sex.

Moreover, paternity is much more easily confirmed or denied than traditionally, contraception is much more reliable than traditionally, and women have many more options than traditionally, and these facts undermine some of the secondary arguments that might have been advanced.

Non-exclusive marriages between men and women are a bad idea (and yes I’ve thought of it) because of confusion over paternity, because sex can be the glue that holds relationships together, and society (for the sake of children) has an interest in holding relationships together without the jealousies and confusions that can come with sexual non-exclusivity. That’s just two for now.

Moshe:

You’re simply wrong about the cheeseburger restriction. It applies to anyone with a Jewish mother or who converts to Judaism according to Jewish law. It doesn’t matter if you “choose” Judaism or not.

I appreciate the humility in wanting to turn the idea of the chosen people on its head, but my understanding is that it’s not a particularly mainstream or scripturally supported idea. I can see that there’s reasonable doubt about what it entails to be chosen, but Deuteronomy says flatly, “For you are a holy people to YHWH your God, and God has chosen you to be his treasured people from all the nations that are on the face of the earth.”

MG: “If gay dating sites are allowed to not cater to heterosexuals, religious sites should be allowed to do the opposite. It’s only fair.”

Note that it’s not symmetrical: gay sites aren’t trying to express disapproval of or punish people seeking the opposite sex, just specialize in a particular niche. Some straight dating sites are probably just specializing in a niche as well, and I have no particular problem with that, but at the same time, I don’t see why I should put up with religious sites actively trying to inconvenience me. Since that would be a tricky line to draw I have a better idea: I’m perfectly OK with dating sites (and bars and other commercial enterprises) that aspire to cater to the gay market being prevented from doing so by banning people seeking the opposite sex if the same is true in reverse. If enterprises want to specialize they’ll have to do it by advertising their competences and/or providing services of particular interest to straight or gay people. By way of example, the L.A. Gay Men’s Chorus freely accepts straight men, it just sings repertoire of particular interest to gay men.

MG: “As far as your examples, a caterer and his staff would be stopped from wearing those shirts at a wedding. Freedom of speech only extends so far, and the owner of a private property has the legal right to not allow things like that.”

Sure, but I can’t always depend on the kindness of strange private property owners. That said, if some conservatively religious caterers want to be jerks at my wedding, I’m inclined to accept it as free speech and leave the power of government out of it (even though I could make an argument that it had gone beyond free speech into harassment), but work to build a consensus that they were jerks and deserved to be treated socially like jerks. Honi soit qui mal y pense.

Second of all, while I am pro gay marriage, I do not think that dating sites should be forced to cater to relationship types they do not believe in. If gay dating sites are allowed to not cater to heterosexuals, religious sites should be allowed to do the opposite. It’s only fair.

As far as your examples, a caterer and his staff would be stopped from wearing those shirts at a wedding. Freedom of speech only extends so far, and the owner of a private property has the legal right to not allow things like that. Your other two examples are fine legally, but who really gives a crap? I see things like that, and I just pity the ignorance of the people who put that crap on their cars.

So you say, but is there a substantive reason that it’s bad for straight couples? I can think of substantive reasons that it might be bad, at least on certain assumptions, but I’m curious as to whether you can. I’m betting you’ve never actually thought about it.

DB: “[...] and I really don’t have an opinion if it’s good for gay couples, that’s like saying should a Jew make a blessing on a cheeseburger. He shouldn’t be eating the cheeseburger in the first place.”

In particular, if you’re going to compare gay relationships to cheeseburgers, it seems to me you’ve tacitly conceded that there is no substantive reason. After all, the prohibition on cheeseburgers is the ultimate non-substantive reason - it’s an arbitrary hoop that God supposedly requires Jews (but only Jews) to jump through as their side of a covenant that God has entered into with them (and only them). If it were intrinsically immoral or universally bad it would be universally required. But conversely if it were universally bad, you ought to be able to give a substantive reason why.

In any case, since you obviously haven’t thought about it, you can hardly say with any credibility that including gay couples will change traditional opposite-sex marriage for the worse. After all, if there really is a substantive reason why it’s bad for opposite-sex couples, then why not just point it out? Maybe it’s the same for same-sex couples, in which case you can point it out to them as well. Or maybe it’s good for same-sex couples, in which case you can point out why two different approaches should coexist. But I put it to the readers that you don’t care enough about the substance to be bothered, you only care about pursuing a mindless religious vendetta against gay people and collecting martyr points if you can’t.

Thanks. Got here OK.

RK [3/31 19:52]: “And it’s still fallacious.”

“Fallacious”? You seem confused. You speak as if it were a deductive argument and we were assessing whether there was any logical possibility at all of the conclusion not following. But that would be a stupid exercise because it’s not a deductive argument, it’s an inductive argument. In fact one of the changes I made to your straw man version was to add the word “probably”, to make quite clear that it was inductive.

With an inductive argument, it’s always _possible_ that the conclusion does not follow. Inductive arguments are _always_ deductively fallacious. The future could _always_ be different from the past. It’s just that, (i) with a good inductive argument, it’s not very _likely_, and, (ii) whether you like it or not, as a finite and fallible human being, _every_ argument you can make about the real world is inductive. You have two choices: be clear-eyed about the fact that you’re doing induction and use what we know of best practice for doing induction, or go into denial and blunder through.

There are stronger inductive arguments than my improved version, but my point was that it’s rather better than your straw man version because it’s clear-eyed about the fact that we’re doing induction and because it invokes more and better information. It’s not perfect, and indeed explicitly disclaims perfection (”probably”) but if your only rebuttal to it is that it’s not perfect, you’re the one committing the fallacy: of spurious absolutism, of confusing (potentially) 99% with 0%. In particular, in holding out for an impossible certainty, you’re implicitly discounting any risk associated with leaving realizable gains on the table and with not reacting appropriately to external change.

RK: ” And, Mark, I am sure others feel the same way, so if your game here is to see who wears out sooner so you can assume they have no response to give, or to give them that message, don’t make such an assumption (From your response to David 3/29/09 18:07 I believe that is your game here).”

Indeed I _was_ going to wait a few days and then point out that if the subject is how Jews are being persecuted if they’re not allowed to persecute gay people, you can get a post and four follow-ups out of David in two days, but you make one criticism about his vanishingly rare attempts to make an argument on the merits of SSM itself and there’s radio silence. David half-surprised me by responding at all, but sure enough, it was still light on the substance (see forthcoming reply) and heavy on the martyrdom.

RK: “Many of your arguments are getting repetitive [...]”

Oh, I’ve got lots more material, but I can’t get you or David to engage on substance at all.

RK: “[...]and we’re really down to a basic difference regarding burden of proof.”

Yes and no. We do differ on where the burden of proof lies, and your position does seem to be an irreducible axiom not susceptible to further analysis for you. My position is not a basic tenet for me, rather it follows from various other principles that I’ve tried to explain. But hey, if “Something might go wrong!!!” is where your philosophy starts and ends there’s only so much I can do. Hopefully any lurkers who may be reading have profited.

RK: “What’s more, both you and Rusty fail to appreciate the complexities of cause and effect and how this effects culture (indeed, any complex system) with time.”

Yes and no. I’m a professional scientist - I analyze complex systems for a living. I appreciate the complexities in the sense that I acknowledge they’re there, and they’re, well, complex. I don’t appreciate them in the sense of being so awestruck that I want to sit down in the middle of the road and despair of ever understanding or exploiting them, which is the impression I get of how conservatives regard them. That’s why I refer rather derisively to cargo-cult conservatism. The cargo-cultists are the canonical example of people who wanted to restore prosperity by bringing back elements of the past but who had no idea of which elements of the past were important, or why.

RK: “(Did anyone back in, say, the 1920s, predict that the divorce rate would get as high as it has recently, and if so, who were they?)”

I don’t know. I certainly don’t trust you or David to tell me. And in any case, who cares? What would it prove either way? The core of the argument for making divorce more available was that some marriages were very unhappy. If more couples took advantage of the new flexibility than anyone had anticipated, all that tells you is that more couples were unhappy than anyone had anticipated. Thus all you have a preaching-to-the-converted argument for moralistic conservatives who never regarded marital unhappiness as a cost to be weighed in the balance with other factors in the first place. Everyone else sees that the benefits scale roughly with the costs, and that the exact take-up rate is not any sort of paradigm altering surprise.

http://www.firstthings.com/article.php3?id_article=6262