The Future of Marriage (Easyread Large Edition)With precision and passion, David Blankenhorn offers a bold new argument in the debate over same-sex marriage: that it would essentially deny all children, not just the children of same-sex couples, their birthright to their own mother and father. If we change marriage, we change parenthood - for all families. Altering marriage to accommodate same-sex couples would mean weakening in culture and eliminating in law the idea that children need both their mother and their father. The Future of Marriage analyzes recent survey data from 35 countries, offering the first scientific evidence that support for marriage is weakest in those nations where support for gay marriage is strongest. Blankenhorn explains how same-sex marriage would transform our most pro-child social institution into a purely private relationship (''an expression of love'') between adults, defined by each couple as they wish. Changing marriage laws to include same-sex couples, he argues, would require us to ''deinstitutionalize'' marriage, ''amputating from the institution one after another of its core ideas, until the institution itself is like a room with all the furniture removed and everything stripped from the walls.'' For Blankenhorn, the main question concerning the future of marriage in the United States is not whether we will adopt gay marriage. The main question is whether the social institution of marriage will become stronger or weaker. If we wish to strengthen marriage on behalf of children, there is no shortage of ideas for doing so. What matters is whether we as a society regard this as a worthy and urgent goal. |
Contents
What | 1 |
Introduction | 101 |
Goods | 263 |
Determining Marriages | 335 |
Topics in the Anthropology of Kinship | 391 |
Front Cover | 509 |
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Adopting gay marriage Adopting same-sex marriage adults American Values Andrew Sullivan anthropologist argues argument Azande baby basic believe biological parents birth called child civil unions Claude Lévi-Strauss cohabitation commitment Court culture debate defined definition of marriage deinstitutionalization divorce E.E. Evans-Pritchard Evan Wolfson fatherhood female fundamental future of marriage gay and lesbian gay marriage gender gift Gilgamesh heterosexual homosexual human rights human societies husband Ibid idea important Institute for American institution of marriage issue Jonathan Rauch Kinship lesbian living male Malinowski marriage’s matrilineal ment Mesopotamia moral natural parents Navajo Nayars norm Nuer parenthood percent person Polyamory Polyandry procreation public meaning recognized riage right to marry role same-sex couples same-sex marriage scholars sexual intercourse social institution society’s specific spouses Stacey thing tion today’s Trobriand Islands unions United University Press unwed childbearing wife woman women York