David Boonin's Response To Jeff Jordan

David Boonin’s response to Jeff Jordan made great points. Boonin mentions that “marriage involves a public recognition of a personal relationship between two people and people who are married become eligible for various sorts of public benefits that are unavailable to unmarried couples” and that to take this away from homosexual couples makes it into a “public dilemma” (Boonin 247). I strongly agree with this claim, as it is basic to understand that regardless of your gender, race, or sexual orientation, you are entitled as a human to certain rights. It is a discrimination to try and retract this right from anyone because of their sexual orientation. Just as it would be to try and prevent marriages of different races or religious backgrounds.

She states that “society upholds the marriage option, formalizes its definition, and surrounds it with norms and reinforcements, so we can raise boys and girls who aspire to become the kind of men and women who can make successful marriages” (263). I agree with this but pose a question. How can we expect boys and girls to make successful marriages if they cannot marry the person they desire and why would a homosexual couple be incompetent in raising these children in that way? I was raised in a broken home and I can promise that having two parents, regardless of their gender, would have been a lot less confusing than the alternative. Having a dad, then not, then having two dads in two house with two moms and deciding which house I wanted to live in and what to call each parent. I strongly believe that Gallagher’s views on marriages and their foundations is incorrect. She claims that “denying marriage to same-sex couples does not amount to discrimination...because they can always marry members of the opposite sex” (Gallagher 261). It is that exact kind of thinking that leads confused adults into marriages that are unfaithful or unsuccessful. If a man is married to a woman that he does not truly love, but loves the other man down the road who is also married to a woman that he does not love, then they

To make a marriage, what you need is a husband and a wife. Redefining marriage so that it suits gays and lesbians would require fundamentally changing [concepts] of what marriage is in ways that threaten its core public purposes”