France is known for being a country where people stand up for what they believe in. It’s a country of protests. It’s a country of going on strike when necessary. That makes sense to me.

Today, there’s a large anti-gay-marriage protest happening in Paris, and, to be honest, I just don’t understand.

Can someone please explain to me how being against gay marriage makes sense?
The arguments I’ve heard are that:

 
1. Marriage is traditionally between a man and a woman.

Really? The bible spoke of many forms of marriage, often with many wives, or the sale of people being involved. A more recent flavour of the week has been marriage between a man and a woman. Perceptions and beliefs evolve. Surely we should promote ‘marriage’ as a union between two individuals who want to be committed to each other and potentially raise children together in a loving and committed environment?

2. Children should be raised by both a father and a mother.

Firstly, why? Countless people have been raised in non-traditional households and been fine. Also, countless people have been raised in a ‘traditional’ household and turned out to be gay (not that there’s anything wrong with that, but arguing against gay marriage suggests that there is), or much worse.

Secondly, studies show that the best thing for children is a stable household. Single-parent-raised children have more social issues growing up, as do children of divorced parents. There is NO research suggesting that being raised in a same-sex parent household affects the quality of their upbringing. The main factors that contribute to child wellbeing are stability of  the caregivers’ relationship, and other factors such as family income and time spent with the children. It happens that most ‘stable’ families with consistent family structure tend to be of the traditional structure. But that’s because most people tend to be in heterosexual relationships. That doesn’t invalidate the quality of the potential family in a same-sex parent situation.

If you want to argue that it’s so that children are shown both aspects of gender, you’re horribly misguided. ‘Gender’ is a complex term these days. And even if there were only a ‘male’ and a ‘female’ version, does that mean the man has to be the family breadwinner and the woman the homemaker? Are you implying that families where the man is the stay-at-home-husband are no longer fit to raise children? Or single parents? Should we take these children away from their parents because these families do not conform to the stereotypical view of a ‘family’ that you are trying to perpetuate? Should we ban divorce?

And if these family examples are ok, why not same-sex parents? People who are ready for parenthood (emotionally, financially and otherwise) and who want to raise children are probably much better suited to parenthood than a traditional couple who fall pregnant by accident before they have the resources set up for a family.

3. A man and woman family is the ‘natural’ thing.

What do you mean by ‘natural’? It occurs by itself in nature? Gay people aren’t made in labs, you know. They occur naturally in society and have done for thousands of years. Not just in humanity, either.

And since when does humanity only do the conventionally ‘natural’ thing? Should we shun all medications because they don’t grow on a bush? Since when is it ‘natural’ to sit in a plane seat for 6 hours or more and move at close to the speed of sound to go visit another country?

4. A man+woman family is the truth.

I’ve seen posters for the anti-gay marriage movement which say ‘On ne ment pas aux enfants’, ‘We don’t lie to the children’. I take issue with that concept. By telling your children that families only exist as a man+woman+children = family concept, you are lying. There are other options.

Also, you’re implying that same-sex couples would lie to their children. They would have no reason to. In fact, if anything, they’re being more honest by saying that people sometimes don’t conform to convention. A child raised in a same-sex parent household would surely be told that it has a biological mother and father, but that the parents it has at the moment are the ones that love it most and look after it, no matter what happens. If anything, a heterosexual adoptive couple would have more motivation to lie about the child’s biological parents.

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A question for you anti-gay-marriage conservatives, too:

Why do you care?

Why would you go to the point of protesting this issue? It doesn’t change or invalidate heterosexual marriage. If anything, it promotes the idea of long-term commitment, which is by far a more useful and heart-warming concept than anything else on the table here.

It doesn’t improve your marriage to stop someone else getting married! Nor does it make it more worthwhile. Why would you be against people who love each other officially committing to one another under the eyes of the law and getting the same benefits as any other couple?

I just don’t understand. From all logical standpoints it just doesn’t make sense. Why do you care?

It just looks like bigotry to me.