Same-Sex Marriage
November 23, 2011
Dear Editor,
It's a bit swift to reduce the same-sex marriage debate to an issue of “equality”.
A genuine argument from equality would be: women are people; people have a right to vote; therefore’ women have a right to vote. But the simplistic argument that we are seeing repeatedly in the media lately is that a denial of marriage to same-sex couples is an offence against equal rights.
This is what used to be called “begging the question”. This is the fallacy of assuming the conclusion before you start your argument. It’s like saying: let’s debate whether children’s right to vote should be implemented.
I have an open mind about same-sex marriage. But we have to ask a deeper question: is marriage essentially about male-female bonding, or is it about any two persons bonding? When we’ve sorted that out, we’ll know whether same-sex marriage is a right or an illogicality.
Philip O'Carroll