I recently saw this attitude on a forum, and I’ve seen it numerous times on others. It’s not a direct quote from any of those sources, but a summary of the same idea I keep coming across:
“Just make people who don’t agree with gay marriage come up with another name for their relationships.”
Huh?
Now some want to kick married people out of marriage altogether? Marriage has been a protected institution for centuries. It is not just a religious issue either, despite terms like matrimony. While religion does play a role for many, the secular terms for marriage have also described life long commitments between one man and one woman. Yet it is now those who practice marriage -as it was designed- who should come up with something else?
I don’t think so.
I’m sorry, but that doesn’t even make sense. That basically amounts to saying that adoption should now be called childbirth, even though that would be an obvious perversion of the word, then if birth parents don’t like it they should be the ones to change.
Adoptive parents may step into the role of parenting, and in some cases do it better than biological parents do. That certainly doesn’t make their valuable efforts suddenly turn into childbirth, and you don’t see them demanding that it be defined as such in order to garner wider acceptance or appreciation.
Redefining a word, a concept, or an institution, to fit a particular lifestyle or agenda does not and will not ever make that definition accurate. It will also never make it acceptable to those who disagree with it, but actually trying to oust the people who practice the custom as intended is unbelievable.
This tactic speaks volumes to me. Not only does it show zero respect for the institution of marriage -despite outcries to the contrary- it also shows that gay marriage and other alternatives, at least for those making such shocking demands, are not as much about committed relationships or marital benefits as they are about agendas and forced acceptance.
Marriage is a lifelong commitment between one man and one woman. Anything else is an alternative. Whether you believe such choices are right or wrong, good or bad, isn’t really the point. They are alternatives to marriage –not marriages- and it’s really that simple.