Spartacus Wrote:non-religious argument opposing same-sex marriages.

Quote:Social and gender roles greatly simply things. If every man has a wife, and kids, I can base loads of policies on this. When looking at specifics, this is not a big deal, but when looking at a big picture, accommodating for non-traditional pairings becomes very difficult.
Maternity leave, healthcare laws, divorce, kids... Any laws that might apply to a husband and wife, now need special considerations for a wife and wife, a husband and husband, as well as a husband and wife (and single parents).
And laws are really nothing compared to the social expectations. Social roles can really help for a smooth running society. On one hand, a handshake is just an arbitrary act that increases the chance the risk of viral spread. On the other it's a show of trust and respect and non-verbal communication. There are entire books written on what different handshakes represent. Similarly, there are years of tradition built on men sitting in smoking rooms, while wives chit chat and cook. Its a system of behaviours that helps us all get along and function. It's completely arbitrary, but it's a system. Imagine if you went to shake someones hand, and they licked your cheek instead - sure it could work, but it's gonna throw a lot of people off.
A lot of traditional values exist partially for these reasons. Why should we drive on the right side of the road (o left as it may be). Doesn't matter which side you drive on, but everyone needs to be on the same page. You might make more complicated rules that say, sometimes, you drive on the right, sometimes on the left, but every time you add a layer of complexity, you open the door to problems.
If everyone had traditional male-female marriages (and gender roles), it's possible for things to go extremely smoothly.
(of course, if someone rejects these traditional roles, if their gay for instance, then roles are broken anyway, regardless of whether the law agrees with them or not, so I would personally argue that it makes more sense for accommodating laws and sociality, but I find I can feel where the traditionalist are coming from a lot better when I view the problem like a backward compatibility upgrade issue. Some people are just not ready to upgrade to the new version of office, because they have loads of legacy documents that willl not work.)

You can argue against this by replacing homosexuality with racism or sexism. Just because something is tradition, doesn't mean it's good. People used to think smashing people in the head with tools would cure headaches, that yawning was letting your soul escape, that the sun revolved around the earth, and that vaguely suspicious women were probably witches. It's exactly what he's saying it is, arbitrary tradition. As with the other prejudices, it will just take a bit of time & effort to change around laws, and even for the majority of society to accept it. Times, they are a changin'.