According to the American Dictionary of the English Language, the word discrimination means, “The act of distinguishing; the act of making or observing a difference.”
From a purely denotative standpoint, discrimination is nothing more than the act of comparing one person, place or thing with another. For example, when an employer has an open position, he or she will invariably discriminate during the selection of the new hire. The employer will compare the qualities of each applicant against those of the hypothetical ideal candidate. The person who best matches the qualities of the ideal candidate will be hired. Strictly speaking, such comparisons—such classifications— are forms of discrimination.
With that being said, what we generally consider to be discrimination is merely a subset of the true, dictionary definition. Connotatively, we use the word discrimination to describe classifications where the underlying set of criteria is socially unacceptable—particularly when such classifications result in disparate privileges being conferred. For example, if an employer discriminates based upon race, such discrimination is wrong because the underlying basis for such comparison is illegal. Conversely, if the employer discriminates based upon the level of the applicant’s education, then such discrimination would be perfectly acceptable. (After all, who wants a high school dropout performing brain surgery?)
In essence, discrimination occurs every time we create classifications. When the classification is based upon the wrong set of criteria, then the discrimination is wrong. However, when the set of criteria is acceptable, then the discrimination is acceptable.
Take the issue of gay marriage. When pro-homosexual activists lampoon efforts to preserve traditional marriage, they yell, “Discrimination!”
They are right.
When opponents of gay marriage voice their disproval, they are exercising discrimination. They are observing a difference, a deviation from a standard norm. Specifically, they are using a particular set of criteria (i.e., tradition, religion, or whatever else) to conclude that persons of the same gender shouldn’t join in marriage.
The question, then, is not whether discrimination against gays is occurring, for we all know that it is. Rather the real question is whether the set of criteria yielding the discrimination is proper.
Assume, arguendo, that homosexual unions are perfectly acceptable and that any such discrimination is wrong. If so, Adam would have as much right to marry Steve as he would to marry Eve—with all things being equal.
Certainly, Steve would have to consent (just as Eve would). Moreover, just to be fair, existing laws concerning heterosexual unions would have to be enforced with regard to homosexual marriages. After all, if our purpose is total equality between gays and straights, then the same rules for marriage must apply to both classifications.
This raises an interesting question. If the proscriptions in question were put in place for heterosexual couples, then should they necessarily apply to homosexual couples?
Take incestuous marriages. Obviously, society does not want to undermine the gene pool by encouraging brothers to procreate with their sisters, or parents to procreate with their children. Accordingly, it is altogether fitting for government to prohibit heterosexual family members from marrying.
However, since a brother cannot procreate with a brother, or a sister with a sister, or a father with a son, or a mother with a daughter, it would be impossible for homosexual family members to pollute the gene pool. Therefore, why should they be prohibited from marrying?
This creates a dilemma for the person who is wanting to create a fair system for marriage. On the one hand, if homosexual family members are permitted to wed, then heterosexual family members are at a disadvantage. Whereas homosexual family members would be permitted to enjoy certain legal privileges (such as the complete marital exemption from estate taxes, or the marital privilege in criminal matters), their heterosexual counterparts would not.
On the other hand, if homosexual family members are prohibited from marrying, then all non-family members (whether gay or straight) could marry each other, while all family members (whether gay or straight) would be prohibited from marrying.
Either way, one group—one social class—would enjoy a benefit that another class would not. Therefore, the only way that total marital equality could exist under the anti-discrimination paradigm would be for anyone—regardless of familial relations—to be able to marry anyone else.
In other words, if we are going to legalize homosexual marriage in the name of fairness, then logic dictates that we should legalize incest as well.
But why stop at incest? What if Adam loves Steve and Bruce? What if the feelings are mutual—or better yet, trilateral? Shouldn't Adam, Steve and Bruce have the right to marry each other simultaneously? Or what about prohibitions against children being married?
Certainly if we are going to reexamine the 6,000 year-old traditional norm of man-woman marriage simply because the institution discriminates, should we not also put everything else on the table as well?
This brings me to the ultimate point of this discourse. Proponents of gay marriage are certainly opposed to discrimination in the connotative sense—i.e., the classification of persons in socially unacceptable categories. And while homosexual activists would argue that the exclusive confirmation of marital benefits upon heterosexuals is socially unacceptable, I submit that the scope of their true agenda is much broader, to wit: They want to get rid of all discrimination by abolishing all types of social classification.
Just as Marx and Stalin and Lenin and Mao wanted to abolish the distinction between the rich and the poor, the modern gay rights establishment wants to abolish the distinction between the married and the unmarried.
These neo-Marxists, like their fellow travelers from days gone by, want to create a classless society, where the delineation—dare I say, the classification—of right and wrong is blurred in the name of fairness and equality.
I oppose gay marriage, not only for traditional and/or religious purposes, but also because I know from history that attempts to make the world fair have universally promoted totalitarianism and misery. The homosexual rights agenda and Marxist-Leninism are too close for my comfort.
