Top6News
Courtesy of iMAPP
1-NEWS: Senate tackles marriage amendment today
2-NEWS: Danish study: Divorce is a killer for many
3-NEWS: Boys in 1-Parent Homes Have Sex Earlier, CDC Says
4-OP-ED: M. Romney: Letter to Senators urging a vote for m amendment
5-OP-ED: R. Brownstein: Gay Marriage Vote Serves Only to Divide Nation
6-OP-ED: S. Kurtz: Why so few?
Book review by E. Marquardt, sex ed is about adult’s views of marriage: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/01/AR2006060101589.html
Eskridge has a new book on Stanley Kurtz’s material: http://islandia.law.yale.edu/GayMarriageBook/
On Friday, IA lawmakers tried to intervene in ssm case: http://desmoinesregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060602/NEWS01/60602005/1001
Singles are deciding to be single: http://www.boston.com/news/globe/magazine/articles/2006/06/04/single_minded/
It has been 25 years since AIDS became a big deal. There are several stories in many papers about it.
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1-NEWS: Senate tackles marriage amendment today
Transcript of Bush's radio address: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,198062,00.html
Senate to Tackle Gay Marriage Ban
By Laurie Kellman, Associated Press Writer
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,198154,00.html
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Congress-Gay-Marriage.html
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2006/06/05/senate_tackles_gay_marriage_ban/
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/05/AR2006060500085.html
WASHINGTON — President Bush and congressional Republicans are aiming the political spotlight this week on efforts to ban gay marriage, with events at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue — all for a constitutional amendment with scant chance of passage but wide appeal among social conservatives.
"Ages of experience have taught us that the commitment of a husband and wife to love and to serve one another promotes the welfare of children and the stability of society," Bush said in his Saturday radio address. "Government, by recognizing and protecting marriage, serves the interests of all."
The president was to make further remarks Monday in favor of the amendment as the Senate opened three days of debate.
All but one of the Senate Democrats — the exception is Ben Nelson of Nebraska — oppose the measure and, with moderate Republicans, are expected to block an up-or-down vote, killing the measure for the year.
Democrats say the amendment is a divisive bow to religious conservatives, and point out that it conflicts with the GOP's opposition to big government interference.
"A vote for this amendment is a vote for bigotry pure and simple," said Democratic Sen. Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts, where the state Supreme Court legalized gay marriages in 2003.
The House also is expected to take up the measure this year.
Fueled by election-year politics, the gay marriage issue is the most volatile Congress will consider as it returns from a weeklong Memorial Day recess.
Other legislation has better chances for success, particularly a record-size emergency spending bill to continue U.S. military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and provide hurricane relief along the Gulf Coast.
The Pentagon says it needs its money — about $66 billion — right away or delays could begin to affect the conduct of the war in Iraq. The Senate added new relief for farmers and other aid to the package, swelling its cost to more than $100 billion. Bush is demanding that the price tag stick within his $92.2 billion request, plus $2.3 billion to combat avian flu.
An agreement could be passed this week.
The House is expected to consider a $32 billion spending bill would give the Homeland Security Department $1.8 billion more in 2007 than this year. It also is likely to send Bush a Senate-approved bill to raise indecency fines tenfold, to $325,000 per violation, for television and radio broadcasters.
Meanwhile, the Senate Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing Tuesday on government surveillance of journalists who publish classified information, the result of probes into published reports on secret prisons overseas and the Bush administration's domestic wiretapping program.
An election-year debate on the constitutional amendment to define marriage as a union between a man and a woman was never in doubt, however doomed the legislation. As Republicans geared up to defend their majorities in the House and Senate, conservative groups earlier this year let them know that they were dissatisfied with the GOP's efforts on several social issues, including gay marriage.
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, a possible presidential candidate in 2008, promptly placed the amendment on the floor schedule, with Bush's promotion central to the plan.
In his Saturday radio address, Bush cast the amendment as a defense of the stability of society and a strike back at judges who have overturned state laws similar in intent to the proposed legislation.
"In our free society, people have the right to choose how they live their lives," Bush said. "And in a free society, decisions about such a fundamental social institution as marriage should be made by the people, not by the courts."
Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., said Sunday that the amendment is unnecessary. "We already have a law, the Defense of Marriage Act. ... Nobody has violated that law. There's been no challenge to that law. Why do we need a constitutional amendment?" Biden said on NBC's "Meet the Press."
Parliamentary maneuvers were likely to sink the amendment for the year. Senate procedure requires two days of debate before the 100-member Senate decides — 60 votes are required — whether to consider the amendment on an up-or-down vote.
Even the amendment's proponents don't expect it to survive this first step, let alone Senate passage by the two-thirds majority needed in both houses to send it to states for ratification.
"This is important throughout the country," Sen. George Allen (news, bio, voting record), R-Va., said Sunday on CNN's "Late Edition." "The fact that we'll have a majority vote but not a two-thirds vote doesn't mean that you don't try."
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2-NEWS: Danish study: Divorce is a killer for many
Article at: http://ije.oxfordjournals.org/misc/terms.dtl
IJE vol.33 no.2 © International Epidemiological Association 2004; all rights reserved.
Divorce is a killer for many
http://www.denmark.dk/portal/page?_pageid=374,610572&_dad=portal&_schema=PORTAL&ic_itemid=924679
New research finds that single or divorced men are twice as likely to die early
A study by scientists at the University of Copenhagen concludes that divorce is closely linked to poor health. Among other trends, the research indicates that the death rate for single or divorced males aged 40-50 is twice as high as for other groups.
Some 2500 males, all born in 1953, participated in the study. Coming from a nuclear family is generally believed to have a tremendous effect on identity, so therefore assessment of the participants' family backgrounds formed part of the research - family patterns were analysed through looking at parents and grandparents.
Senior lecturer Rikke Lund, who was in charge of the research, said that the nuclear family seems to be an all important factor for the participants in the study.
'In the 1950s the nuclear family was of paramount importance, and growing up without a whole family might have led to stigmatisation and a lack of relations to other people.'
The research has taken into account whether there are other factors that could lead to an early death - such as a mental illness and having grown up under poor social conditions.
According to Lund, some of the males in the study committed suicide and others died of alcohol related illnesses, but a quarter of the men died of coronary heart disease. Lund hopes that the research will be used constructively.
'Considering the high amount of children growing up in broken homes we do believe that the study is very relevant. It proves that divorce can have a serious consequence.'
Lund thinks there is need for a prevention strategy. John Aasted Halse, psychologist and author of numerous books about divorce, agrees.
'It would be an idea to do the same as in Norway. When somebody files for a divorce there, they are obliged to seek counselling. This has resulted in 25-30 percent of people changing their minds and choosing to stay together.'
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3-NEWS: Boys in 1-Parent Homes Have Sex Earlier, CDC Says
Report: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/series/sr_23/sr23_026.pdf
"Boys in 1-Parent Homes Have Sex Earlier, CDC Says"
Atlanta Journal-Constitution (06.01.06):: Helena Oliviero
http://www.ajc.com/search/content/auto/epaper/editions/thursday/news_44e70827d18990b400fb.html
Boys living with one parent are far more likely to have sex by age 15 than boys living with both parents, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report released Wednesday.
One in four males who lived in a single-parent household reported they had sex by age 15, compared with about one in seven of those who lived in a two-parent home, according to the study which examined sexual attitudes and behaviors of males between 15 and 44.
Gladys Martinez, the study's lead author, said the findings --- based on face-to-face surveys of 4,900 males --- speak to larger social issues.
"It's not as simple as saying teens living with two parents are less likely to have sex," she said. "It's really a measure of resources."
Martinez said two-parent households typically have higher education and income levels, and are more likely to afford after-school care and other activities.
Bill Albert, spokesman for the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy, however, sees a simple correlation between early sexual activity and supervision.
"I think almost any parent will tell you from a common sense point of view that having two, careful, watchful parents is better than one," Albert said. And that means, he said, that "heroic" single parents --- already stretched --- have to find ways to counterbalance the odds.
The study's surveys, conducted in 2002, also found that about one-third of men said they either had mixed feelings about having sex, or simply didn't want to have sex at all, when asked their first experience with sexual intercourse.
Among white males, 28 percent reported they had mixed feelings or did not want to have sex the first time they had intercourse. Among African-American males, 41 percent; and among Hispanic males, 34 percent.
"The sexual playing field between boys and girls has leveled out," said Albert. "It's not just girls who regret having sex at an early age. It's a significant minority of boys who do as well."
Albert also said the findings underscore the importance of parents' talking to their sons --- not just daughters --- about saying no to sex.
Albert said a study slated to be released Friday by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy found that less than half of parents talk to their sons about how to turn down sex, compared to the majority of parents who discuss the subject with their daughters.
CDC FINDINGS ABOUT MALE SEXUALITY
> 25 percent of boys surveyed who lived with one parent said they had sex by 15. That compares with 14 percent of those living with both parents.
> About half of men without a high school diploma have had a child outside of marriage, compared to 6 percent among college graduates.
> One-third of men marry by age 25; almost two-thirds marry by age 30. Among women, half are married by the time they are 25 and three quarters by age 30.
> Half of men who married as teenagers were divorced or separated within 10 years, compared with 17 percent of men who married at 26 years or older.
> Among African-American fathers, 25 percent fathered their first child before they were 20 years old; 19 percent of Hispanic fathers became parents as teenagers and 11 percent of white men became fathers while teens.
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4-OP-ED: M. Romney: Letter to Senators urging a vote for m amendment
The Importance of Protecting Marriage
Romney encourages the Senate on FMA.
By An NRO Primary Document
EDITOR'S NOTE: Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney has sent the following letter to United States senators on Friday in anticipation of this week’s vote in the Senate on a Federal Marriage Amendment.
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZmViZGQ2NjVhMGUxNTgwZGYxNjBhMDkxNDBkMjVkOWY=
Next week, you will vote on a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution protecting the institution of marriage. As Governor of the state most directly affected by this amendment, I hope my perspectives will encourage you to vote “yes.”
Americans are tolerant, generous, and kind people. We all oppose bigotry and disparagement, and we all wish to avoid hurtful disregard of the feelings of others. But the debate over same-sex marriage is not a debate over tolerance. It is a debate about the purpose of the institution of marriage.
Attaching the word marriage to the association of same-sex individuals mistakenly presumes that marriage is principally a matter of adult benefits and adult rights. In fact, marriage is principally about the nurturing and development of children. And the successful development of children is critical to the preservation and success of our nation.
Our society, like all known civilizations in recorded history, has favored the union of a man and a woman with the special designation and benefits of marriage. In this respect, it has elevated the relationship of a legally bound man and woman over other relationships. This recognizes that the ideal setting for nurturing and developing children is a home where there is a mother and a father.
In order to protect the institution of marriage, we must prevent it from being redefined by judges like those here in Massachusetts who think that marriage is an “evolving paradigm,” and that the traditional definition is “rooted in persistent prejudices” and amounts to “invidious discrimination.”
Although the full impact of same-sex marriage may not be measured for decades or generations, we are beginning to see the effects of the new legal logic in Massachusetts just two years into our state’s social experiment. For instance, our birth certificate is being challenged: same-sex couples want the terms “Mother” and “Father” replaced with “Parent A” and “Parent B.”
In our schools, children are being instructed that there is no difference between same-sex marriage and traditional marriage. Recently, parents of a second grader in one public school complained when they were not notified that their son’s teacher would read a fairy tale about same-sex marriage to the class. In the story, a prince chooses to marry another prince, instead of a princess. The parents asked for the opportunity to opt their child out of hearing such stories. In response, the school superintendent insisted on “teaching children about the world they live in, and in Massachusetts same sex marriage is legal.” Once a society establishes that it is legally indifferent between traditional marriage and same-sex marriage, how can one preserve any practice which favors the union of a man and a woman?
Some argue that our principles of federalism and local control require us to leave the issue of same sex marriage to the states—which means, as a practical matter, to state courts. Such an argument denies the realities of modern life and would create a chaotic patchwork of inconsistent laws throughout the country. Marriage is not just an activity or practice which is confined to the border of any one state. It is a status that is carried from state to state. Because of this, and because Americans conduct their financial and legal lives in a united country bound by interstate institutions, a national definition of marriage is necessary.
Your vote on this amendment should not be guided by a concern for adult rights. This matter goes to the development and well-being of children. I hope that you will make your vote heard on their behalf.
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5-OP-ED: R. Brownstein: Gay Marriage Vote Serves Only to Divide Nation
Gay Marriage Vote Serves Only to Divide Nation
http://www.latimes.com/news/columnists/la-na-outlook4jun04,1,6281414.column?coll=la-news-columns
'That's vanity ... not politics," President John F. Kennedy once snapped at an aide who wanted him to provoke a confrontation with Congress on an issue Kennedy knew he didn't have the votes to pass.
Times change, don't they?
Now many in Washington believe the essence of politics is provoking confrontations over issues that have little chance of becoming law but a high probability of dividing the country.
Exhibit A is this week's planned Senate vote on a proposed constitutional amendment to prohibit gay marriage. No one doubts the outcome. Proposed constitutional amendments require a two-thirds majority — 67 votes — to clear the Senate. When the Senate last considered the gay marriage ban, in July 2004, supporters mustered only 48 votes on a procedural test. The backers might do better this time, but they are unlikely to get close to the votes they need.
One big reason is that supporters haven't built a clear majority for the momentous step of amending the Constitution. In surveys, most Americans say they oppose legal recognition for gay marriages. But many appear comfortable allowing the states, which have traditionally regulated marriage, to handle the issue.
In the latest Gallup Poll, 50% said they supported a constitutional ban on gay marriage; 47% opposed it. Nine other Gallup surveys since 2003 have produced similar results. There's no evidence supporters have established the overwhelming social consensus that should accompany any effort to amend the Constitution on this issue.
But like so much else in contemporary politics, the Senate vote isn't designed to produce a law; it's intended to pick a fight. The White House and Senate GOP leadership are betting that a noisy confrontation over gay marriage will encourage turnout this November from conservative voters — many of whom, polls show, are discouraged over President Bush's second term.
That strategy may help Republicans in some red states this year. But it could also deepen the image of intolerance hurting the GOP in many white-collar suburbs outside the South. Either way, these near-term, tactical calculations don't represent the most important political consequence: Both parties may pay a long-term price if manufactured cultural clashes such as the gay marriage amendment continue to control the spotlight.
Whatever else Americans may think about gay marriage, few consider it one of the country's most serious moral challenges. By elevating it so prominently, this week's debate is likely to deepen the sense that Washington is fixated on the preoccupations of ideological minorities while slighting most Americans' day-to-day concerns.
That danger is captured in a national survey due to be released Monday by the liberal Center for American Progress. The survey, conducted in late February, underscores the importance of religion and morality in Americans' lives. Nearly three-quarters of those polled said they prayed at least once a day, and just over half said they attended religious services at least once a week. Concern that the country had lost its moral compass was widespread.
But the survey demonstrated again that the moral issues people worried about most in their daily lives were very different from the ones dominating political debate. The survey asked Americans to name the most serious moral crisis in America today. Atop the list, 28% cited "kids not raised with the right values." Next came corruption in government and business, followed by greed and materialism, people too focused on themselves, and too much sex and violence in the media. Only 3% named abortion and homosexuality as the nation's top moral challenge. Even among those who attend religious services most often, just 6% picked abortion and homosexuality.
These findings challenge the values agenda of both parties. They do point to priorities different from the conservative focus on gay rights and abortion. But they also suggest liberals don't hit the mark either when they try to signal their values simply by describing causes, such as reducing poverty, as moral imperatives.
"There is a deep hunger to get away from religion being associated solely with the antiabortion and anti-gay marriage agenda — there is a deep public yearning for an alternative moral vision," said John Halpin, a senior fellow and opinion analyst at the Center for American Progress. "But it's not just talking about the left's issues and tagging the word 'moral' on it. You have to talk to people at a personal and family level about what faith and values mean."
Public policy can't easily reach all of these anxieties. But it can address some of them. Government can do more to support parents who believe they are competing with a rapacious marketplace to shape their children's values.
One example: The day after the Senate rejected the gay marriage amendment in 2004, it gave broad bipartisan approval to legislation that would have empowered the Food and Drug Administration to regulate tobacco — including the marketing of cigarettes to young people. That idea died when the House said no. Senators from both parties are pushing the tobacco issue again. Surely a Senate leadership that has time for a symbolic statement about gay marriage could find a moment to help parents fight the tangible problem of teen smoking.
Washington might support parents in many other ways. (President Clinton pioneered this path, although often with modest steps, with the "tools for parents" initiatives he launched in his first term.) But, as Halpin suggests, Americans probably aren't looking to Washington for programs so much as evidence it understands the cultural forces pressing upon communities and families.
It's difficult to see how the Senate sends that signal by squandering its time on a choreographed argument over gay marriage staged for no higher purpose than dividing the country.
Ronald Brownstein's column appears every Sunday. Read current and past Brownstein columns on The Times' website at latimes.com/brownstein.
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6-OP-ED: S. Kurtz: Why so few?
Article from Kurtz on Friday “The Netherlands shows the effect of same-sex marriage”: http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MDFhMjk0YjI4NzgyZGM4NjMxZmY4NTQwZWNjYzkzYjg=
Looking at what we know about same-sex marriage.
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=OWVmMDgyYWRmOTNjOTM2M2JlNGZhZTI5YTlmYjY4ZWY=
Why have so few gays chosen to marry? A new study by Maggie Gallagher’s Institute for Marriage and Public Policy (iMAPP) estimates that, in countries that legally recognize same-sex unions, typically between 1 percent and 5 percent of gays and lesbians have entered into a same-sex marriage. Obviously, that is a very low number. Much of the argument for gay marriage turns on the claim that same-sex couples need the cultural, legal, and economic benefits of marriage. Yet if only a small number of gays actually marry, the practical impact of the change on gays themselves would be minimal.
The fundamental purpose of marriage is to encourage mothers and fathers to maintain stable families for the children they create. It would be a mistake to undercut that purpose by redefining marriage, whatever the take-up rate for same-sex unions. Yet, for those receptive to arguments for same-sex marriage, the case for this reform would be greatly weakened if it turned out that only a few gays actually marry.
And there’s more at stake than numbers. Since the “conservative case” for same-sex marriage holds that marriage will import a more conservative ethos to the gay community, we need to know something besides how many same-sex couples actually marry. If substantial numbers of gay couples take advantage of the legal benefits of marriage, while simultaneously rejecting traditional martial norms (like monogamy), that would greatly weaken the “conservative case” for same-sex marriage.
Despite the few short years formal same-sex marriage has been available, we can now offer some preliminary answers to questions about why so few gays marry, and how those gays who have married understand their unions. The iMAPP study covered only countries that have formal same-sex marriage, with data going back, at most, five years (for the Netherlands). Yet a turn to Scandinavia provides a fuller story. A series of recent empirical studies on Scandinavian registered partnerships have made available a fascinating body of data about a same-sex partnership system that has been in existence for 17 years in Denmark, 13 years in Norway, and 12 years in Sweden (19 years if we go back to the same-sex unions Sweden created in 1987).
The new studies show that after nearly two decades of Scandinavian registered partnerships, only a very small number of gays have actually entered legal unions. And there are clear indications are that even many couples who have registered may be doing so more for legal benefits than because they aspire to traditional marital norms. In short, there are now clear signs that same-sex marriage is not working the way its defenders claim it should, even for gays.
Before turning to the new Scandinavian studies, we need to consider an obvious objection. Scandinavian same-sex unions are “registered partnerships,” not “marriage.” Presumably, the iMAPP study excluded data on take-up rates for Scandinavian same-sex unions because they were not formal “marriage.” Yet there is good reason to believe that take-up rates for Scandinavian registered partnerships are not substantially different than they would be for formal marriage.
The title of an important new study by prominent Scandinavian demographers, Gunnar Andersson, Turid Noack (and associates) tells the tale: “The Demographics of Same-Sex Marriages in Norway and Sweden.”
Andersson and Noack use the terms “registered partnership” and “same-sex marriage” interchangeably, explaining that Scandinavians generally see registered partnerships as a de facto form of marriage. To be sure, in addition to their unions being called something other than “marriage,” Scandinavian registered partners were initially not permitted to adopt children, to receive state funded artificial insemination, or to be married in the state church. (Many of those differences have now fallen away, especially in Sweden and Denmark.) Yet few Scandinavian gays and lesbians consider these exclusions barriers to registration.
Along with the work of Andersson and Noack, a recent book by William Eskridge and Darren Spedale, Gay Marriage: For Better or for Worse? sheds light on Scandinavian registered partnerships. Eskridge and Spedale criticize me in their book, and I’ve responded to them in “No Nordic Bliss,” “Zombie Killers,” and “Smoking Gun.” Certainly, I find the rosy picture of Scandinavian registered partnerships painted by Eskridge and Spedale unconvincing and incomplete. Notwithstanding my objections to their broader approach, however, Eskridge and Spedale provide us with some fascinating material. And one point they make convincingly is that the differences between registered partnerships and formal same-sex marriage do not account for the low take-up rate.
In their conversations with registered partners, and in an online survey of 812 Danish gays and lesbians, Eskridge and Spedale found that most gay Danes consider registered partnerships and marriage to be “about the same thing.” Words like “marriage” and “spouse” are frequently used to describe the relationship of registered partners. And very few respondents said they would be any more likely to enter a union if “partnerships” were converted to formal “marriage.” Eskridge and Spedale note that the lifting of adoption restrictions in Sweden and Denmark has had no discernable effect on partnership registration rates.
The experience of the Netherlands with a system of registered partnerships also suggests that take-up rates for such an institution do not substantially differ from rates of same-sex marriage. After an initial surge of 3,010 Dutch same-sex partnership registrations during the first year of availability in 1998, registrations leveled off to 1,757 in 1999 and 1,600 in 2000. When Dutch same-sex marriage came into effect in 2001, there was an initial surge of 2,414 marriages (many converted from prior registered partnerships), followed by a leveling off to 1,838 in 2002, 1,499 in 2003, 1,210 in 2004, and 1,166 in 2005. So in both the initial surge pattern, and in absolute amounts, the take-up rates, first for Dutch registered partnerships and then for Dutch same-sex marriage, have been about the same. If anything, the Dutch same-sex marriage rate is down somewhat from the earlier rates of registered partnerships.
In short (and following Andersson, Noack, Eskridge, and Spedale), it seems perfectly fair to take the nearly two-decade-long experience of Scandinavia with same-sex registered partnerships as a rough approximation of what take-up rates would have been had full and formal gay marriage been in effect during the same period.
According to Andersson and Noack, the incidence of same-sex marriage in Norway and Sweden is “not particularly impressive.” As Eskridge and Spedale put it, the number of same-sex couples in legal unions is “at best, modest.” Given the numbers, even these characterizations border on understatement. Andersson and Noack’s data on Norway run from 1993 through 2001. In that time, a mere1,293 same-sex partnerships were contracted. During the same period, 196,000 heterosexual marriages were entered into in Norway. That indicates a ratio of about 7 new same-sex marriages for every 1,000 new opposite-sex marriages. The Swedish numbers are starker still. Andersson and Noack show a mere 1,526 same-sex partnerships registered in Sweden between 1995 and 2002. Given the 280,000 heterosexual marriages recorded during the same period, we are talking about 5 same-sex partnerships per thousand heterosexual marriages. These ratios of same-sex partnerships to opposite-sex marriages are considerably lower than various estimates of the proportion of gays in the population.
These comparisons are important, because one of the key objections to the iMAPP study was that it did not offer a clear juxtaposition of the yearly marriage rates of heterosexuals and homosexuals. Drawing on comments by UCLA demographer, Gary Gates, same-sex marriage advocate Jonathan Rauch argued that it was unfair to compare the small percentage of gays who had married in just a few years (in, say, the Netherlands) with the massive accumulated number of heterosexual marriages contracted over decades. Yet the Andersson-Noack study does give us a comparison of yearly marriage rates between heterosexuals and homosexuals, and the results continue to show a strikingly low rate of same-sex marriage.
In fact, the differences are larger than the numbers indicate. In a response to Rauch, Maggie Gallagher noted that comparisons of yearly marriage rates have their own drawbacks. After all, said Gallagher, since gays start out with 0 percent married, you would expect them to get married at a higher yearly rate than heterosexuals, many of whom are already “taken.” Given that, the striking discrepancies in yearly marriage rates between Scandinavian heterosexuals and homosexuals are all the more impressive.
Any way you slice it–whether as a proportion of the total gay population, or as a likelihood of getting married in any given year–Scandinavian gays are far less likely to get married than heterosexuals. In contrast to Andersson and Noack’s yearly-marriage-rate comparison, Eskridge and Spedale offer an estimate of married gays as a proportion of the total gay population. Using estimates of the gay population ranging from 1 percent to 5 percent of national populations, Eskridge and Spedale say that anywhere from less than 10 percent (they don’t give an actual figure) to less than 1 percent of Scandinavian gays have taken advantage of registered partnerships.
So the numbers of Scandinavian gays actually getting married are very low. But that’s only the beginning. What proportion of the already very small number of Scandinavian registered partners enter their unions with what we might call a reasonably “conservative” attitude? The answer is uncertain, yet there are strong indications that, despite the tendency to call these unions “marriage,” a great many registered partners have decidedly untraditional views about what their unions entail.
In that online survey of 812 Danish gays and lesbians run by Eskridge and Spedale, 49 percent of respondents claimed that their “primary” reason for entering into a registered partnerships was, or would be, to secure the legal rights of marriage. Only around 41 percent said that demonstrating their commitment to their partner or their community was, or would be, their chief motivation for registering. We don’t have results for a comparable heterosexual population, yet it’s striking that so many Danish gays see partnership as chiefly a matter of legal benefits. It seems unlikely that half of heterosexuals would say that securing legal benefits was their “primary” reason for getting married. At any rate, that sort of response from heterosexuals would indicate a significant hollowing out of marriage.
The reported focus of Danish gays on the legal benefits of marriage, rather than on the relationship, tells us something meaningful. As an explanation for low European take-up rates, University of Minnesota professor of law and same-sex marriage advocate Dale Carpenter notes that many gays take an “oppositional” stance toward social convention. “Just give us the benefits of marriage and you can keep the word,” is one way Carpenter describes that oppositional attitude. In her 1999 study, From This Day Forward, sociologist Gretchen Stiers found that even many of those American gays and lesbians who actually disdain traditional marriage (and even gay commitment ceremonies) might possibly get legally married. Why? For “the bennies”–the financial and legal benefits of marriage. So gay couples with an interest in the legal benefits of marriage can have a decidedly unconservative view of the institution itself. Returning to Denmark, the fact that fully half of those gays surveyed said benefits were their “primary” reason for marrying suggests that the number of Danish registered partners with a “conservative” attitude toward their unions may be far smaller than the already minimal partnership registration numbers would indicate.
To a degree, Eskridge and Spedale concede this. Same-sex couples approach legal union “with more pragmatism than their heterosexual counterparts,” they say. Even the couple Eskridge and Spedale select as their demographically “typical” registered partners saw no reason to register for years, until concerns about death benefits that made them change their minds. At that point, this typical registered couple, like many others, told no one about their registration, so as to avoid a wedding ceremony altogether.
The pragmatic cast of Scandinavian same-sex unions likely goes further still. While half of Scandinavian partners say they marry chiefly for the benefits, as many as one third of Scandinavian partners likely have a very specific benefit in mind. Around one third of Scandinavian registered partnerships involve a foreign-born member. The numbers are particularly striking for men. In Norway, 43 percent of male partnerships include a non-Norwegian citizen. In Sweden, the figure is 45 percent. Many of these cross-national unions are with non-Europeans.
This huge disproportion of dual-nationality unions suggests that many Scandinavian same-sex couples have married chiefly to facilitate immigration. Andersson and Noack clearly recognize this phenomenon. Eskridge and Spedale downplay it. They call immigration rights “only the tip of the iceberg” when it comes to the benefits of same-sex unions. Yet the numbers say that unions contracted primarily for immigration purposes probably represent, not merely the tip, but a huge part of the base of the iceberg. This suggests that, among the already extremely small number of Scandinavian same-sex partnerships, a far smaller number are undertaken for anything like “conservative” reasons.
So after an experiment in same-sex marriage that has lasted between one and two decades, Scandinavian marriage rates are still exceedingly low. As many as half of all partnerships may be undertaken primarily for legal benefits, and only secondarily, if at all, out of a “conservative” attitude toward union formalization. About a third of all same-sex unions involve non-citizens, often from non-European countries. Many of these partnerships would likely not have been entered at all were it not for the immigration rights.
In short, if registered partnerships were designed to bring a more stable and conservative family ethos to Scandinavia’s gays, far too few have married for this to have happened. And the actual attitudes of Scandinavian gays toward their marriages may be even less conservative than the numbers we’ve seen so far indicate. In Part II of “Why So Few?” we’ll see why.
ESKRIDGE-SPEDALE [Stanley Kurtz]
Over at the marriagedebate blog, William Eskridge and Darren Spedale respond to my piece, “Smoking Gun.” Well, although Eskridge and Spedale appear to be responding to me, they still haven’t actually discussed my points about “catching up,” remarriages among divorced, or birth order. Nor have Eskridge and Spedale responded to my more extended critique of their Scandinavia argument in “No Nordic Bliss.” They prefer to repeat their favorite points and ignore my replies, even as they claim to be issuing a response.
Eskridge and Spedale want to blame the substantial acceleration in Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrates entirely on the opening up of registered partnerships to both gay, and especially straight, couples in 1997. The implication is that any problems for marriage were caused by the symbolism of this “marriage lite” institution for straights. Supposedly, the passage of formal gay marriage in 2000 sent an opposite and more “conservative” pro-marriage message. But this whole line of thinking is mistaken.
What Eskridge and Spedale need to explain is how the same Dutch politicians who established a “conservative” institution like same-sex marriage in 2000 could have created a “marriage lite” institution like registered partnerships just three years earlier. The answer is that Dutch politicians never saw gay marriage as a conservative, pro-marriage step to begin with. Gay marriage didn’t draw Dutch politicians back to marital conservatism. On the contrary, gay marriage deepened their existing belief in a flexible “menu” approach to relationships. (For details, see “Going Dutch?”)
Gay marriage is not the conservative step Jonathan Rauch says it is. Gay marriage is just another form of marriage lite. Once you’re prepared to bring partners who cannot between them create children into either a de facto or a formal system of marriage, you are opening yourself to a “marriage lite” mentality. So it’s not surprising that the same legislators who favored gay registered partnerships should have also created straight registered partnerships. Nor is it surprising that when formal same-sex marriage was created, parliament kept the registered partnership system in tact. It was all part of the same way of thinking, rooted in the notion that the unified functions and benefits of marriage (parenthood, above all) can be disaggregated, disentangled, and reapportioned in many different ways.
Eskridge and Spedale ought to understand this, since they themselves have endorsed a marriage lite, “menu” approach to partnerships. Eskridge and Spedale even recommend that an American state should abolish marriage altogether and set up a flexible, across-the-board partnership registration system from scratch, in its place. Just as Eskridge and Spedale favor both gay marriage and various menu-like deconstructions of marriage, the Dutch parliament adopted gay marriage, not out of reverence for the institution, but as a way of deconstructing it.
Do Eskridge and Spedale favor the continuation of Dutch registered partnerships alongside of same-sex marriage? If so, they endorse a step that, by their own testimony, draws people away from marriage. Yet if Eskridge and Spedale do not endorse the continuation of a Dutch “marriage lite” alongside gay marriage, they are repudiating the menu approach they put forward in their book. It would appear that Eskridge and Spedale support a “marriage lite” policy that, by their own testimony, undermines marriage.
That energetic gay marriage supporters like Eskridge and Spedale can defend parental cohabitation, and even call for the experimental replacement of marriage by a complex partnership system, speaks volumes about the real implications of same-sex marriage. Eskridge and Spedale are trying to use Jonathan Rauch’s arguments against “marriage lite,” while actually revealing, by their own advocacy, that Rauch’s interpretation of gay marriage is incorrect. As with the Dutch parliament, Eskridge’s and Spedale’s own support for same-sex marriage flows from and reinforces their support for various forms of “marriage lite.”
Here’s another question. Since Eskridge and Spedale argue that unmarried parental cohabitation is really nothing to worry about, why do they even care whether the Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrate goes up or not? Would Eskridge and Spedale like to see the Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrate come down? If so, how can they reconcile that with their published defense of Scandinavian parental cohabitation? If not, what’s the point of this debate?
However much Eskridge and Spedale deny it, the substantial acceleration in Dutch out-of-wedlock birthrates following the passage of registered partnerships, and then gay marriage, is exactly the sort of evidence of rate accelleration they call for in their book. Comparable spikes in Eastern European out-of-wedlock birthrates are widely recognized as both significant and in need of explanation. And contrary to Eskridge and Spedale, I have discussed other factors that might have contributed to this rate increase in some detail (see “No Explanation.”) Moreover, in “Dutch Debate” I show that there are indeed those in The Netherlands who share my concerns about same-sex marriage.
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