Tuesday, September 12, 2006

Bryan Fischer, Executive Director

MASSACHUSETTS: WHY MARRIAGE AMENDMENT IS NECESSARY IN IDAHO

If concerned Idahoans need more reasons to vote "Yes" on the marriage amendment on Nov. 7, they need to look no further than Massachusetts. Massachusetts, due to a stunning display of judicial arrogance and tyranny, is the only state in the union which recognizes homosexual marriage.

Despite the fact that gay marriage has only been legal in Massachusetts since 2004, careful observers can already see the tidal wave of social impacts that this unprecedented legal novelty has caused.

Scott FitzGibbon, a law professor at Boston College, summarized these impacts in testimony before the United States Senate's Judiciary Committee. His testimony is a powerful argument in favor of the proposition that the homosexual agenda must be stopped in Idaho, and that the place to begin is by elevating protection for natural marriage to the state constitution.

FitzGibbon has observed significant and rapid social and moral effects of gay marriage legalization, radical changes that took less than two years to take hold.

Public education

First, it has produced a chilling and oppressive influence in public education. In the wake of the legalization of gay marriage, the Superintendent of Boston Public Schools issued a "zero-tolerance" policy regarding any action or speech that could result in "harassment, discrimination, bias or intimidation" toward "any member of our community" for "any reason" including "sexual orientation or perceived sexual orientation."

Further, he ordered all school staff to rat out anyone who would do or say anything that "may create a climate of intolerance" in the school setting. Discipline includes termination of employment for a teacher and expulsion for a student.

Thus, teachers, even in health classes, would be forbidden to discuss any of the health risks of homosexual behavior, and can get fired if they fail to report a student who raises similar concerns.

Parental authority

Second, it has demolished parental authority. I've written you before about a parent who spent a night in jail and was banished from school property for a year simply for insisting that school officials obey a state law requiring them to give parents advance notice of discussion of sexual matters.

In fact, the superintendent there issued a policy statement flatly declaring that"[S]taff has no obligation to notify parents of discussions, activities, or materials that simply reference same-gender parents or that otherwise recognize the existence of differences in sexual orientation." And this was for kindergartners!

An eighth-grade Boston teacher, in an interview with National Public Radio, gave an example of how a classroom discussion - with eighth-graders! - ought to go.

"[Teacher]: All right. So can a woman and a woman kiss and hug? Yes. Can a woman and a woman have vaginal intercourse, and they will say no. And I'll say, 'Hold it. Of course, they can." [they then go on to graphically teach how it is done - ed]

Legalization of gay marriage will require indoctrination of public school students in the merits of the homosexual lifestyle. Said one Massachusetts homosexual activist, "[The issues of same-sex marriage and gay rights] are going to come into the classrooms, whether people like it or not."

A human rights complaint has already been filed in Canada, alleging that the mere absence of pro-homosexual instruction in public schools is a denial of equal treatment.

Confusion and increased cohabitation

Fourth, as FitzGibbon points what is obvious, radically redefining marriage in this way will produce inevitable confusion about the very meaning of marriage and family, and blur the distinction between marriage and co-habitation, with disastrous results for children. In Ontario, Canada, for instance, the term "spouse" has been redefined to include people who are not even married.

And of course, once the one-man, one-woman standard for marriage is abandoned, there is no place to stop. Leading authorities are already urging legal recognition of polygamy, which is an official part of the ACLU's agenda.

Lastly, all of this inevitably results in the degradation and destabilization of both marriage and the family. Legalization of gay unions in places like Denmark have made cohabitation the normatively accepted option, leading to the current reality that over 60% of children in some parts of Scandinavia are now born to parents who are not married.

And children are the victims. FitzGibbon reminds us that 75% of children born to cohabiting couples are likely to see their parents split up before they are 16 years old, whereas only a third of children born to married parents face a similar fate.

Additionally, children in cohabiting households grow up in less nurturing and more dangerous environments. Couples who live together without being married report lower relationship quality than married couples, with more conflict and violence and lower levels of satisfaction and commitment.

When cohabiting couples break up, their children are often raised by reconstituted couples, which place children at additional risk. Study after study has shown that the most dangerous place, for both physical and sexual abuse, for children is in a home where they are cared for by adults unrelated to them. The risk is especially high when children are left home with their mothers' boyfriends.

In sum, a "Yes" vote for natural marriage on Nov. 7 is a vote for normative sexuality, for children, for parental authority, for sanity in public education, and for social stability.

Testimony in support of Federal Marriage Amendment - Scott FitzGibbon