The polls have closed and news outlets now report that North Carolina will pass Amendment 1 to prohibit same-sex marriage. The Tar Heel State now joins the rest of its southern counterparts in prohibiting gay marriage, and will become the 31st state to amend its constitution with a ban.
Gay rights activists and libertarians will lament this as a regressive move that further sets back the movement for equality, but fear not, I say. To quote Bob Dylan: “The loser now will be later to win, for the times they are a-changin’.”
In other words: Social conservatives, you will eventually lose this supposed “culture war.” The long-term trends show more and more Americans supporting legal gay marriage. I cannot imagine an America in 15 years that doesn’t have a majority of states accepting gay marriage.
Social conservatives seem blissfully unaware that government hasn’t always been involved in the business of defining and “protecting” marriage. Following the Civil War, states began defining marriage in order to protect “the sanctity of marriage” from the scourge of…interracial couples.
Of course, Americas are now over the idea of miscegenation; and eventually America will get over the thought of homosexual marriage.
As a libertarian, I believe government has no place in my wallet OR my bedroom. So long as no one is harmed or defrauded by anything I do, then it is none of government’s business. This applies to marriage as well.
I’ve tried but I simply don’t understand how a gay married couple ruins my eventual heterosexual marriage. And I certainly don’t buy the bunk “slippery slope” argument — we won’t be marrying ducks or turtles anytime soon because the issue comes down to consenting adults.
Since marriage is a religious concept, where exactly does the state get the right to “establish” what a marriage is and isn’t? If a church or synagogue or mosque decides to recognize the marriage between two men or two women — how is it remotely appropriate for the government to choose not to recognize it?
Supposedly “conservative” people like Sen. Jim DeMint have the gaul to say “you can’t be a fiscal conservative and not be a social conservative,” implying that my advocacy for gay marriage is inconsistent with my fiscal conservatism. But they are the ones advocating for a bigger government, one that defines marriage for us.
The only consistently small-government opinion is to get the government out of the marriage business entirely.
But since that will probably never happen, the best we can do is extend the same privileges and titles to gay couples. You can fight it, social conservatives, but eventually you will lose.
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