Public Discourse

Marriage and religious freedom will stand or fall together.

To demand that we recognize same-sex romantic relationships as marriages, and teach our children so, is to prevent them from discovering reality.

Redefining marriage will make it harder for our children to develop their self-understanding and will sanction procreative methods that treat children like commodities.

The sexual permissiveness of men will emerge a winner in the contest of ideas as same-sex marital norms begin to shape the larger institution of marriage.

After the French protests against same-sex marriage, we can no longer speak of redefined marriage as inevitable or enlightened.

The just way to settle the marriage debate is to delink from marriage any benefits that apply to any group of people who cohabit and comingle assets, while preserving marriage as a permanent and exclusive union of a man and a woman to provide the optimal setting for raising children.

No-fault divorce hurts women, men, and children. So why is it still legal?

During oral arguments on Prop 8, Justice Kennedy alluded to the views of children of same-sex couples as if their desires and concerns are identical to and uncritical of their parents’ decisions. But the reality is far more complicated.

Proposition 8 does not, contrary to Judge Vaughan Walker’s claims, treat equals unequally.

Media voices and progressive activists for same-sex marriage are appealing to judicial fiat because they know they won’t always have public opinion on their side.

It remains unclear whether sexual orientation is genetically determined. Even if it is, that doesn’t justify advocacy for same-sex marriage.

Young adults desire stable marriage and family life even while they engage in unmarried sex and parenting. We should encourage and help young adults achieve these goals instead of trying to make birth control “sexy.”

The oral arguments on Proposition 8 at the Supreme Court suggest that there is very good reason to believe that the declaration of a “right” to same-sex marriage will set us on the path to polygamy.

When we define our terms based on the results we want, rather than on the reality of the thing being defined, all hell breaks loose.

It’s a myth that marriage law “bans” same-sex relationships because it treats marriage as the union of a man and a woman.

Debates about marriage will only be cluttered up, and decisions confounded, if the issue is framed in the question-begging terms of “marriage equality.”

Just as chess requires players to seriously consider every possible consequence of their moves, we need to seriously consider every possible consequence of the push for same-sex marriage, especially for children.

We cannot embrace same-sex marriage and live in continuity with our past as a civilization. To embrace it is to deny that tradition, revelation, reason, and nature have any authority over us.

While there is something noble in economists’ assumption that social life is based on mutually beneficial exchange, rather than coercion and plunder, this fails to account for what philosophy, theology, and literature reveal to us about the true substance of marriage.

Good public policy can meet the needs of all Americans without redefining marriage.

The Supreme Court first put marriage on its track of decline forty-one years ago, when it ruled that states could not limit the sale of contraceptives to unmarried couples.

While religion and tradition have led many to their positions on same-sex marriage, it’s also possible to oppose same-sex marriage based on reason and experience.

Since redefining marriage requires us to deny sexual differences, even school children now have to conform to that principle at the risk of punishment.

Marriage as a human good, not marriage law, has an objective core whose norms the state has an interest in tracking and supporting—in a way that respects everyone’s freedom.

With money as the biggest incentive for sperm donation, donors are set up to be absent fathers. Politicians, charitable organizations, academics, and donors themselves should counter the ills of sperm donation through law, journalism, and funding for anti-sperm donation advocacy. The second of a two-part series.

Commercialized sperm “donation” degrades and objectifies men, promotes a culture of irresponsible parenting, and hurts children conceived through donation. The first of a two-part series.

Whatever same-sex marriage is, that’s not what gays are after. They are after a symbolic vehicle that can make them equal to people who can do something they cannot—procreate.

Family, church, and school are the three basic people-forming institutions, and it is no wonder that they produce the best results—including economic and political ones—when they cooperate.

Unlikely characters, including gay men, are leading the French people in protest against redefining marriage. A repeating refrain is “the rights of children trump the right to children.” Americans should follow their example of mobilizing across party lines.

Michael Klarman’s history of the push for same-sex marriage shows just how recently it’s developed and how its leaders lack substantive arguments for the nature and purpose of marriage itself.

Any honest analysis of the Newtown tragedy must address the social problems caused by divorce, absent fathers, and the burdens of single motherhood.

Young adult men’s support for redefining marriage may not be entirely the product of ideals about expansive freedoms, rights, liberties, and fairness. It may be, in part, a byproduct of regular exposure to diverse and graphic sex acts.

How successful can a “new conversation on marriage” be when its leaders can’t even say what marriage is?

A recent ruling in the United States District Court in Hawaii reveals a rational basis for the Supreme Court to rule on a morally neutral basis that marriage can be enshrined in law.

One of the great achievements of the 20th century is the development of the universal human rights regime. But that regime teeters under the weight of new ideologies, and as it teeters it endangers not just gays and lesbians but everyone.

In their book What Is Marriage? Man and Woman: A Defense, Sherif Girgis, Ryan T. Anderson, and Robert P. George draw our attention to the question that matters most in the marriage debate—what marriage is—and make a reasonable and compassionate argument for marriage as a one-man one-woman union.

Public opinion, the methods and messaging of LGBT activists, and social reality all converge on a simple fact: marriage is worth fighting for and we can win.

By discarding its support for life, marriage, and religious freedom, the GOP, contrary to what some party members think, will doom itself to minority status.

Preserving marriage as a union of man and woman is bound to fail unless we address the true point of contention in the marriage debate, one completely ignored by even the best legal advocates for redefining marriage: the question “what is marriage?"

The effects of same-sex civil marriage in Canada—restrictions on free speech rights, parental rights in education, and autonomy rights of religious institutions, along with a weakening of the marriage culture—provide lessons for the United States.

Mark Regnerus’s response to his critics shows more clearly that instability is characteristic of same-sex relationships and that stable same-sex parented households are virtually non-existent. Second of a two-part series.

Attacks on sociologist Mark Regnerus after he challenged the “no differences” thesis haven’t obscured the high quality of the New Family Structures Study or its troubling findings. The first of a two-part series.

Promoting “genderless parenting” contradicts what the facts show us both about the harms of single parenthood and the benefits of having a mom and a dad.

A new argument that reduces marriage to any consensual caring relationship is grounded by a cynical view of human nature that we ought not accept.

Governments don’t legally recognize a certain type of relationship because they are suckers for romance; they do so because they are understandably afraid of the potentially destructive consequences of such romance.

A California bill allowing children to have three legal parents will not help children, but instead will unnecessarily complicate their lives. The supposed need for California’s SB 1476 flowed directly from the drive to normalize same sex parenting and recognize same sex unions.

The children of same-sex couples have a tough road ahead of them—I know, because I have been there. The last thing we should do is make them feel guilty if the strain gets to them and they feel strange.

The case for same-sex marriage, as articulated in a new book that debates the issue, still refuses to recognize that civil society needs real marriage, as it has always existed, to preserve itself.

In the name of “marriage equality” and “non-discrimination,” liberty—especially religious liberty and the liberty of conscience—and genuine equality are undermined.

The truth about something as important as marriage cannot be the price we pay to live with each other. The challenge of our time is to find new ways to combine truth and love. Giving up marriage is too high a price to pay. And it is not the last good we will be asked to surrender, unless we find the courage to stand.