legal battle over 'what marriage really means' feels like a desperate attempt by conservatives to preserve the traditional Norman Rockwell Family. When you're politically conservative, you hold on to tradition, it's what you do, but even conservatives eventually change. Maybe they haven't noticed, but the 2.3 kids, ranch house in the suburbs, meatloaf in the oven family is an endangered species. With rates of divorce, domestic violence, infidelity, co-habitation, single-parent households, and adoption all going up, the 'normal family' is in the minority. No wonder the conservatives are scared. Let's take a look at marriage for a second. Marriage exists for stability's sake. People who get married do it so they can raise their babies in a stable environment, have their money hang out in a stable bank account, so they can have stable sex in a stable bed, and get old with someone they don't mind being stable with. This used to mean a man and a woman, but things are starting to change.
As of June 14th, the political fisticuffs over gay marriage in Massachusetts is over. Legislators voted 151 to 45 against a proposed amendment that would exclude gay and lesbian couples from the definition of marriage. A good number of legislators who were originally in favor of this bill switched their votes at the eleventh hour, many as a result of talking to their gay constituency.
In Colombia, congress passed a bill that will give full legal rights to gay couples. This includes health insurance, inheritance rights and social security. Colombia's conservative president Alvaro Uribe backs this bill, making Colombia the first Latin American (and overwhelmingly Roman Catholic) country to give gay couples all the legal rights as straight ones.
I'm not saying that it would be best to give up on traditional family all together. It still exists in some places, but it's undeniable that it's in trouble. So why not open up the pool, play the odds in our favor? The ideals of marriage--stability, love, and family--can still exist even if the face of it is different. Gay couples can embody these ideals just as much as straight couples, and allowing gays to marry legally will create more healthy marriages. In order to survive, marriage needs to evolve. Allowing gay marriage gives the ideals and family that are so important to conservatives and liberals alike a fighting chance. Massachusetts and Colombia have set an example that will hopefully be followed by the rest of the world. Charles Darwin would be proud.
