Gay Marriage In the article “The Worst Thing About Gay Marriage- It isn’t going to work”, the author provided four aspects of marriage that explained why he believed that gay marriage is wrong (SCHULMAN, 2009). The first is the most important: It is that marriage is concerned above all with female sexuality

Second, kinship modifies marriage by imposing a set of rules that determines not only whom one may marry (someone from the right clan or family, of the right age, with proper abilities, wealth, or an adjoining vineyard), but, more important, whom one may not marry

Third, marriage changes the nature of sexual relations between a man and a woman.

Fourth, marriage defines the end of childhood, sets a boundary between generations within the same family and between families, and establishes the rules in any given society for crossing those boundaries.

The arguments this author made did not have any logical reasoning behind it. Most of the reasons that he stated were old and antiquated based on how life was lived during times that we are no longer in. Even then I am sure only a handful of people thought this way. Specifically, he mentions that gay marriage is wrong because how it affects female sexuality. It states that females are not protected unless they are involved in a kinship that only family or heterosexual couples can enter into according to the author. According to the definition of kinship, it states “relationship by blood or marriage to another or others” (Kinship, 2011). This definition does not state that the marriage must be of the opposite sex. The author bases the reasoning for his entire article on the concept of kinship. According to the author, a female is protected only from “rape, degradation, and concubinage” (SCHULMAN, 2009) if she is in a hetrosexual relationship. This logic means as a single woman who do not have a brother or father or husband that I am not to be protected from these horrible acts. I find this completely obsurb and offensive. Further the fact that he uses kinship as his reasoning shows how narrow-minded he is with this opinions on different issues. He apparently has a some made up definition of kinship in his mind, where it states that a man and a woman must be part of kinship for it to exist. Within the article, he further states that relationships that hetrosexual couples have with their significant other’s family and friends are non-existent in a homosexual relationship. It goes on to state (SCHULMAN, 2009): There is no particular reason to ban sexual intercourse between brothers, a father and a son of consenting age, or mother and daughter. There are no questions of ritual pollution: Will a hip Rabbi refuse to marry a Jewish man--even a Cohen--to a Gentile man? Do Irish women avoid Italian women? A same-sex marriage fails utterly to create forbidden relationships. If Tommy marries Bill, and they divorce, and Bill later marries a woman and has a daughter, no incest prohibition prevents Bill's daughter from marrying Tommy. The relationship between Bill and Tommy is a romantic fact, but it can't be fitted into the kinship system.

To assume that homesexual partners do not have the same boundaries than hetrosexual partners is a falicie in itself. This is to assume that homosexual individuals have different values than hetrosexual individuals and that cannot be proven to be correct. A straight man will cheat on this wife with his wife’s sister just as a gay woman would cheat on her wife’s sister. Based on the author’s reasoning, we should assume that hetrosexual couples also have no “forbidden relationship.” In conclusion, although every individual is entitled to their own opinion, I was very much surprised by the most illogical and absurd reasoning that this author used to back up his opinion. It was antiquated and not at all applicable in this day and age. I am not entirely sure it was ever applicable but I definitely will give him the benefit of the doubt on that and only that.
References
Kinship. (2011). Encarta Dictionary. Redmond, WA: Microsoft Corporation.
SCHULMAN, S. (2009, June 01). The Worst Thing About Gay Marriage -It isn't going to work. The Weekly Standard, 14(35), p. http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/016/533narty.asp?page=3.