Utterly Meaningless

Interesting – but in typical NYT fashion, he does not accurately represent the conservative position when he says:

“You would think that faced with this marriage crisis, we conservatives would do everything in our power to move as many people as possible from the path of contingency to the path of fidelity. But instead, many argue that gays must be banished from matrimony because gay marriage would weaken all marriage. A marriage is between a man and a woman, they say. It is women who domesticate men and make marriage work.”

To make his point, Brooks establishes a mis-leading straw argument (above) and then attacks that to demonstrate why the conservative position is flawed.

Which one is the straw man? Gay marriage would weaken “real” marriages? How ’bout this example.

Marriage is between a man and a woman? FEDERAL MARRIAGE AMENDMENT (H.J.Res. 56)
Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman…

Admittedly, I couldn’t google a quick example of the third but that hardly discredits the whole argument.

Ball’s in your court.

The individualist libertarian position is that marriage is not properly a matter of public policy.

On Gay Marriage

With all the discussion, debate, argument, enraged spewing, and general hoo-hah going on these days about gay marriage, it is interesting to see that a self-professed conservative come out in favor of it. David Brooks, does it in the New