We Can Fight Back, Too

More and more often, we find these sorts of stories in the news:

Two women named Melinda and Dani Phoenix and the man they both consider their husband, Jonathan Stein, are in a polyamorous relationship and parenting two babies together under the same roof.

Melinda and Dani began their relationship as a lesbian couple and became domestic partners in 2010. A year later, Jonathan joined them as the third partner and the three married last summer in a ceremony that is not legally recognized.

Or this:

Three gay men from Thailand have tied the knot in what is thought to be the world’s first three-way same-sex marriage.

Happy newlyweds Joke, 29, Bell, 21 and Art, 26, took the plunge on Valentine’s Day after exchanging their vows in a fairy-tale ceremony at their home in Uthai Thani Province, Thailand.

The three blushing grooms are thought to be the world’s only wedded male threesome and have since become internet sensations after photos from their big day went viral.

Or this:

[Actor Neil Patrick] Harris has two children with his “husband,” actor/chef David Burtka — 4-year-old twins, Gideon and Harper, who were conceived via a surrogate mother.

If we consider how cleverly the progressive left has “normalized” what once was not considered normal (and actually which is not normal), then we come to understand that we can peacefully fight back, using their tactics.

We do not have to accept their reworking of the English language. Men do not have husbands. Women do not have wives. Marriage is between two people of opposite sex: one male and one female, as ordained by God.

Someone in a traditional marriage should refer to the marriage this way:

I am traditionally married.

Why must anyone who is in a state of holy matrimony, in a traditional marriage, cede to others the privilege of warping the definition of that sacramental state? We should not.

To refer to a man as the “husband” of another man, or to a woman as the “wife” of another woman, is an insult to anyone who is in a traditional marriage, in the holy state of matrimony.

Why is it that certain small groups of the population are allowed to change the very semantics of marriage? Definitions have already subtly changed; consider these examples from various online reference sites:

A husband is a male in a marital relationship.

 Husband: a married man, especially when considered in relation to his partner in marriage.
 
Husband: A man joined to another person in marriage; a male spouse.

Husband: a married man: the man someone is married to.

How carefully they parse. How carefully they avoid using the words woman, female, wife, when describing a man in relation to his “partner”, “spouse”, “another person”, or (my special favorite) that “someone” that he’s married to.

How soon will they have to change those definitions to take into account the “someones” (plural) that any man is married to? How soon will they have to change the definition to include female “husbands”? Surely it’s only a matter of time until males demand to be called “wives”.

Already Facebook gives users 58 different options for defining their own “gender”. What’s to keep traditionally married people from demanding the same courtesy by being allowed to define their own marital status, for example, by demanding a new category: traditionally married?

Or, as Dolce and Gabbana suggested, “classically” married? Read this story to see how those two gay fashion designers ran into the buzzsaw of the “Gaystapo”, when they advocated for the right of all children to have a mother and father in a “classical family.” That was their personal opinion, but politically incorrect opinions (as defined by progressives) apparently no longer are worthy of First Amendment protection.

But we can fight back against censorship and the distortion of the English language.

We can refuse to use the words husband or wife when speaking of homosexual partners in a homosexual “marriage”.

We can refuse to use the word marriage at all in the context of any homosexual legal relationship without using a suitable qualifier, such as, gay marriage, same-sex marriage, homosexual marriage, non-traditional or non-classical marriage.

Better yet, use gay-coupled; don’t use the word marriage at all, no matter what the government calls it. It’s a mockery and a sacrilege.

We all have the right to free speech. We should exercise our First Amendment rights. Do not allow a vocal minority to get away with hijacking the semantics of traditional (classical) marriage.

Consider this story:

[F]our adult children of gay parents — acting as a “quartet of truth,” according to their lawyer David Boyle in Long Beach, Calif. — have submitted briefs to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals opposing same-sex marriages, with several saying that growing up under the rainbow was neither normal nor pleasant.  …

“I was exposed to overt sexual activities like sodomy, nudity, pornography, group sex, sadomasochism and the ilk,” wrote Ms. Stefanowicz, adding that her father sometimes took her on his “cruising” visits to gay art galleries, nude beaches and public parks.

Like other daughters of gay men she has talked with, Ms. Stefanowicz said she felt she — and her femininity — were not valued or affirmed.

“Ultimately, I was seeking his love and acceptance. [But] I was not allowed to freely question him, bring up moral arguments or hurt his feelings, or I would face long-term repercussions,” Ms. Stefanowicz wrote. …

Ms. Klein said she was expected to pay “constant homage and attention” to her mothers’ gayness and believe that gays were “much more creative and artistic” because they weren’t sexually repressed.

The heterosexual culture of marriage and children was held in “utter contempt” by the gay adults in her world, Ms. Klein wrote. [What?! Teaching innocent children cisism? I thought I invented that word, cisism, until I searched for it.] 

In fact, the isolation from the “inferior” heterosexual world was so complete, she wrote, that “I had no idea how two heterosexuals behaved toward their children as mother and father” until she was placed in foster care over a medical issue when she was a teenager.

Mr. Lopez said he and other children of gays feel “pain” — but it’s because there’s a “missing biological parent,” not because people lack legal marriage.

He said his childhood exposure to radical Catholic liberation theology and talk about “the beauty of homosexual relationships” led him into years of sexual experimentation, including taking money for sex with men.

A reunion with his long-estranged father led to his escape from the “toxic” gay family life, said Mr. Lopez, who is now married to his girlfriend and a father. …

Despite what the gay lobby and progressives want society to believe, children raised by gays are not “happier and healthier than their peers,” as those brave fellows Dolce and Gabbana understand.  Indeed,

In a historic study of children raised by homosexual parents, sociologist Mark Regnerus of the University of Texas at Austin has overturned the conventional academic wisdom that such children suffer no disadvantages when compared to children raised by their married mother and father. Just published in the journal Social Science Research, … the most careful, rigorous, and methodologically sound study ever conducted on this issue found numerous and significant differences between these groups–with the outcomes for children of homosexuals rated “suboptimal” (Regnerus’ word) in almost every category.

Other comprehensive studies have shown the damage that can be inflicted when one is raised by a gay couple:

[T]he majority of the studies finding no disadvantages are of dubious quality: They rely on small numbers of survey participants, often recruited through gay advocacy events, websites, sperm banks, parent forums, word of mouth, or other nonrandom methods. Such “convenience samples” can produce useful data but are prone to bias—where the families most likely to respond are those already faring well.

A new study, published in February in the British Journal of Education, Society & Behavioural Science, avoids that problem. It examined a survey database from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, involving random interviews with tens of thousands of U.S. households.

In analyzing data from 512 same-sex couples with a child under 18 living in the home, study author D. Paul Sullins—a sociology professor at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C.—found that children raised by same-sex parents were twice as likely to suffer emotional and behavioral problems as children with heterosexual parents. When compared only with children raised jointly by their own biological parents, the difference was even more stark: Children from same-sex households were four times as likely to suffer problems such as depression, anxiety, defiance, or inattention.

Mr. Lopez and Ms. Stefanowicz, mentioned above, have decided to “fight back:”

Instead of cowering, Lopez has decided to fight back. Last year he co-launched an advocacy group, the International Children’s Rights Institute, whose mission involves defending the right of children to have a mother and father—their biological ones, whenever possible. Stefanowicz is on the organization’s testimonial council, along with other children’s rights advocates and children of gay parents.

Nor should we who believe in traditional marriage cower. We also should fight back, if only by insisting upon reserving for traditional marriage the language that has traditionally defined traditional marriage. A marriage is the union of one man and one woman.

Marriage is

the state of being united to a person of the opposite sex as husband or wife in a consensual and contractual relationship recognized by law.

Marriage is

a state instituted and ordained by God for the lifelong relationship between one man as husband and one woman as wife. … [It is] the most intimate of human relationships, a gift from God, and a sacred institution.

Anything else is not marriage and we should never be heard saying that it is.

Laws are already being misapplied to punish people for words they speak, when someone arbitrarily decides that those words constitute “hate speech.”

We’ve not yet reached the point where the government has tried to punish people for not speaking words that they never intend to speak, or for having “hate thoughts” (such as, that gay “marriage” is a sacrilege, a mockery, and a travesty). If we ever do reach such a point, then our Republic is lost.

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