We have spent a fair amount of time discussing the topic of gay marriage, as it has been a hot topic in the media lately. This post is the fourth and final post in that series for the moment.
Americans are lost in the rhetoric about
gay marriage and the feel-good of political correctness in granting acceptance
to all. Few ask what society would be like with the social and legal acceptance
of gay marriage.
Below are the author’s thoughtful
projections of a world two generations in future, when children enter a culture
of gender irrelevancy, tasked with establishing personhood when society has
erased the guidelines of biological gender. These ideas are not fantasy, but are
based on similar social situations from America’s past, with the expectation
that society will continue on its current path.
What society accepts, it encourages; what
the law protects, it fosters. Once condoned, a behavior expands and becomes
common. Evidence of this abounds. Divorce, that heart-ripping destruction of
the family, was once uncommon. Couples stayed married, preferring the
unhappiness of a less-than-ideal relationship to the unhappiness of single
parenthood or a solitary lifestyle. When no-fault divorce emerged, divorce blossomed.
Youth of the 60s knew only an occasional child from a divorced home. Today,
with a divorce rate of 50%, half of all children will watch their parents divide
the family by the time they are 18.
Abortion followed the same pattern. Once
an occasional practice whispered about behind classroom doors, American women
today kill well over one million babies every year, ending 22% of all
pregnancies with the death of the infant--an entire generation every decade.
Premarital sex also reinforces the pattern of prevalence through acceptance. In
the 1950s only a few couples were doing “it” and a couple living together
outside of marriage felt social censure. Today there is no shame, little
disapproval, no guilt for what was once considered immorality. The law has
embraced them all: abortion, to kill tiny babies, Biblical fornication, and
divorce, to shred homes and lives.
How does same sex marriage fit into this
picture? It would be naïve to believe that society would follow any other
pattern than the one just described in its latest departure from Christian
moral standards. The information quoted above, simple reasoning, and common
sense tell us that two generations after the acceptance of same sex coupling
the practice will become ordinary--one of two accepted types of sexual union.
Other than a few voices “crying in the wilderness” and perhaps a raft of buried
research tying society’s ills to its departure from biological reality, the
stigma of gay marriage will be gone.
A child growing up in a gay culture will
likely experience bewilderment. Gender will have become a confused issue. As
the sexes co-mingle in ways never intended by nature and her God, they will surely
dress and act out gender confusion. As laws erase the differences between the
sexes in their quest for “equality”, some men will “become” women; some women
will choose to be men, adding to a trend already in progress. A young person’s
choices will embrace not only occupation, social activity, and intellectual
goals, but the reaches of human biology, as well—what gender do I prefer; even
what gender will I be? In this values-starved environment, a young person making
choices might be inclined to gay union simply because there would be no threat
of an unintended pregnancy.
Accepting an equal gay lifestyle will
sound the death knell for religious freedom, as well. Taking direction from current
trends, the law will require us to outwardly support same gender lifestyles.
Parents, unable to teach their children Biblical lifestyle choices, will leave
them without guidance and watch them succumb to gay marriage. We would likely see
each succeeding generation fall further and further into value deficient humanist
philosophies. Christian morals would die a hard death among believers, but die they
would.
A child of the future will enter a world with
a rapidly diminishing population. Society must replace itself as its members
grow old and die. To do so, biological fact requires that each woman, on
average, produce two offspring: one to replace herself, one to replace a man. Additionally,
because of deaths, plaques and warfare, one woman in 10 must produce a third
child, to achieve a replacement birth rate of 2.1 children per woman. However galling
to modern feminists, it is nevertheless a biological necessity, for only a
female can produce a child. Without the certainty of this birthrate, the human
race marches inexorably toward extinction; the rate of decline dependent on how
far society strays from the magical number of 2.1. Inconceivable but true,
humans must meet demographic benchmarks or perish, just as any other species.
Today our American Caucasian population
reproduces at a rate of 1.7, rather than the needed 2.1; many European
countries reproduce at 1.4. Demographers expect continued decline in these
numbers. The march to racial extinction, then, is moving at a brisk pace—in a
few generations Italians, Greeks and the Japanese may have largely expired. Americans
will require another generation or two more to evacuate the globe.
Factor into this the looming acceptance
of gay marriage. What will be its effects? How many of our youth will embrace sterile,
same gender sexual relationships two generations from now? Preliminary
information is not comforting. Using divorce statistics as a measure, perhaps up
to half of our youth could embrace posterity-free gay marriage. The effect on
the population would be ugly—with half as many women in potentially
reproductive lifestyles, each heterosexual woman would have to produce four
children on average—to replace herself, a man, and a homosexual couple not
bearing children. Every fifth woman would have to bear a fifth child. Perhaps
the homosexual marriage rates will be greater or less that stated here, but
they surely will negatively impact the demographics of our culture. In a humanist
society no longer focused on the future of children, and in a culture where sex
is no longer automatically about creating them, why would the average woman
consent to produce four when today she is unwilling to produce two?
Nor does the oft-given response that gays
will avail themselves of technology to bear children soothe the situation. The
gay lifestyle is known to be only occasionally conducive to or interested in child
raising. What is the value of children in a society that places
self-gratification first? Gay marriage is the marital arm of secular humanism,
the worship of man’s wants, rather than the worship of God. Humanists reject
life after death, continuing family relationships, and eternal consequences—all
family friendly doctrines. Under humanism, children are an impediment, rather
than a benefit. Only 6% of gay couples raise children today and only 3% attempt
parenthood in alternate ways. In the humanist environment produced by gay
marriage and the rejection of traditional family values, human nature is not
likely to change. Gay contributions to population would almost surely remain
negligible.
With society in sharp decline, the
economy would convulse. Employee shortages would decimate services and prices would
soar. Desperate to bolster population and reduce cultural decline, governments
would likely intervene to attempt rescue, and freedoms—the few left—would
vanish. Perhaps the government would offer incentives for maternity and
childbirth, as the Swedes have done: a monthly stipend for each child, all
medical expenses paid, and two years paid maternity leave alternating between
the parents. Just as in Sweden, few would likely embrace self-sacrifice for the
cultural good. Most would let “someone else” accept childbearing responsibilities.
Rather than a benign social program dedicated
to making everyone equal (while ignoring biblical counsel), gay marriage has
the potential to destroy our culture, our personal identities, and ultimately
our race. No other society has been so foolish as to seriously consider
replacing traditional families with biological sterility! God’s law is an
unchanging force; biological certainties remain rigid. If we are to survive as
a society, we have little choice but to dedicate ourselves to its preservation
through adherence to historical and divine standards of marriage.
- Pamela Romney Openshaw
