Don Roach: Marriage Equality Advocates Don’t Love All Minorities

Wednesday, July 03, 2013

Don Roach, GoLocalProv MINDSETTER™

 

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Fathers.

Babies.

Those were the minorities I was thinking about last week. Seems odd given the context of the major victories for gay marriage, right? In case you’ve been vacationing in Cancun for the past week, the Supreme Court stated that the federal Defense of Marriage Act’s refusal to recognize state approve gay marriage contracts was unconstitutional and they also declined to make a decision on Prop 8 (which defines marriage as an act between a man and a woman) thus allowing a lower court’s ruling to stand (the lower court overturned Prop 8).

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The comments stemming from these rulings were pretty polarizing. It was either the best thing to happen since American Idol entered our lexicon or the worst think since Coke Zero. I’ve discussed at length my position on the matter and that’s not what I’d like to discuss today. Instead, I’d like to discuss and daresay challenge a few opinions on issues. At the heart of today’s discussion is intellectual consistency.

It’s all about rights

What is a right in the context of government? Who defines it? Who defends it? When can we demand it? Proponents of gay marriage call the issue a ‘rights’ issue, meaning that barring them from marrying discriminates against them and their life choice. But, if we go back 200 years did I have a right to vote as a black man? I didn’t. 100 years ago did women have the right to vote? Not yet.

So when does a right truly become a right? I believe the answer is, a right becomes a right when we decide it is. By ‘we’, I mean citizens of the country. Let’s leave the polarizing issues I’m talking about for a moment and pretend we lived in a country where you were not allowed to eat as much candy as you wanted. One day a group of people fought hard to change the law so all people could consume as much candy as they desired. Others fought against them for a myriad of reason. In the end the Candy Consumers win and a few hundred years later the community laughs about a time when people could not eat as much candy. By then the thought of life where people couldn’t eat as much candy as they wanted, is completely foreign and the struggle long gone. Candy eating has become an inalienable right.

I use this analogy to make one point – rights are a by-product of our culture and are not ‘rights’ in a vacuum but only in the generally accepted principles of the populace. I have no more a right to vote than I do to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness unless the rest of us in America (or at least a majority) agree that I have a right to such things. One of the reasons I’ve struggled with accepting the gay marriage debate as a ‘rights’  issue is that framing the question in such terms opens the doors to so many other items to be framed in like manner. Do I have a right to marry a goat? Can I marry my children? Can I walk the streets naked?

Many of the proponents of this rights theory talk about well, gay marriage doesn’t hurt anyone. But I ask how does marrying an animal, your children, or walking the streets naked ‘hurt’ anyone? Regardless of your answer to any of those questions the fact remains that justifying a social change because it ‘doesn’t hurt anyone’ seems flimsy logic. I’m not suggesting that’s the only argument, but it was an argument I reflected upon last week and it made me think of dads and babies.

Fathers, it’s a rights issue!

In many states, fathers of babies (before they are born) do not have equal rights to the child as do mothers who are carrying the future rights requestors of America. I’m going to come at this from both angles. Many men can’t terminate pregnancies they don’t want and in many cases can’t force their partners to have babies they don’t want. Yet, should the woman choose to have the child, the father is on the hook to support the child regardless if he wants to or not.

In my opinion that’s simply not fair. On the one hand, women say “my body, my choice” and in the next the state requires men to be there (at least financially) for their children or suffer legal and in some cases criminal headaches.

In my opinion, the birth or termination of a child should be the joint…and equal…decision of both parties who took part in the union of sperm and egg (assuming sex between consenting adults). And while homosexuals are asking the majority of Americans to recognize that we should recognize their unions will proponents of gay marriage recognize my rights as a dad?

Will they champion me if I go to the steps of the Supreme Court asking the court to treat me equally before the state and throw out the antiquated “my body, my choice” rhetoric? Will they help me with “her body, our equally protected under the 14th Amendment choice” T-shirts?

I doubt it.

Because at the end of the day I don’t believe gay marriage proponents and abortion activists are about the rights of all and ensuring that everyone is protected. Instead, I believe they are about classifying things as ‘rights’ that help their constituency. In a democracy, I’m fine with that but to be consistent I’d like to see support for those of us in the minority – we dads (women outnumber men from a population standpoint) and rights to be treated equally under the law.

What about my rights? – 6 month old fetus, Bob

And I haven’t even talked about the burgeoning human being growing inside of the woman. When does that person have a ‘right’  to live? Is it at 20 weeks as the Texas legislature is trying (unsuccessfully) to enforce? 24 weeks? 30? 35?

Last week there was a lot of applause for a woman who spent a good 11 hours filibustering a bill that would outlaw abortions past 20 weeks in Texas. All over twitter and Facebook people were applauding her courage, her fortitude, and her relentlessness to stand up for what’s right.

Right for who? I’m certain if the person who in the woman’s body could speak, they’d probably seek representation from the ACLU about their right to live.

And I just can’t reconcile those on the left who applaud the recent Supreme Court rulings and applaud when men’s rights are curtailed and the rights of unborn children are ignored. Not trampled upon, but ignored. Can one of you who was excited about the gay marriage rulings explain it to me? Government tells me I’m a sperm donor up until the point a baby takes its first breath and then don’t let me assume that it’s still “her body, her choice” cuz it ain’t!

Don Roach is a proud dad of three and longs for the day his rights are equal to that of women. Don can be reached at [email protected].

 

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