OPINION:The continued ban on same-sex marriage demeans gay and lesbian people, writes ELOISE McINERNEY
HUMAN RIGHTS theorist Ronald Dworkin said certain liberties are valuable when having them constrained demeans us in a way that goes beyond the limitation on our freedom. We have a right to the values, interests or standing that the particular constraint defeats. Consequently, rights to distinct liberties should be recognised when the fundamental right to be treated as an equal can be shown to require them.
For example, constraining the liberty of people to drive on the right hand side of the road in Ireland cannot be said to affect justice or morality. It does not demean us in any way. However, the continued ban on same-sex marriage does demean gay and lesbian people in a very deep way. It demeans their capacity to love, it demeans their relationships, and it demeans the families they raise.
When gay people ask for the ban on same-sex marriage to be lifted, they are not doing it out of adherence to some sort of abstract theory of human rights.
They are asking because its existence has deeply negative effects on their lives and because it would remove much of the stigma that still attaches to being gay. They are asking because it would give them and their families access to the full set of rights and protections enjoyed by heterosexual married couples, which the current offer of civil partnership will not do.
On the other hand, those who oppose lifting the ban frequently seem to do so for solely ideological reasons, if not out of pure prejudice. They complain when they are called bigoted, but their arguments often have so little basis in logic or fact, and are so disparaging to gay people, that it’s hard to conclude otherwise.
John Waters is a classic example. In an article in The Irish Timeson Friday, July 31st, he said: "The gay lobby has made its case by mangling the meaning of terms such as 'marriage' and 'discrimination', and by bullying with accusations of 'homophobia' and 'bigotry' anyone who refuses to acquiesce in the new definitions." He went on to give us the traditional definition of marriage according to him: "Marriage, a contract between a man and a woman, is an institution maintained by society for reasons having little or nothing to do with 'love'."
Marriage may have been a contract between a man and a woman in the past, but marriage between two men and two women can take place in a number of countries, including Spain, Belgium, Canada, the Netherlands and most recently, Albania. Marriage has been ever-changing – it is defined as we wish to define it according to the spirit of our times.
And the spirit of our times is showing a clear shift in favour of defining marriage as a legal contract between two people who love and are committed to each other, irrespective of gender.
The next argument used by Waters is laughable. “All men and all women have a right to marry, provided they wish to marry members of the opposite sex to whom they are not closely related by blood. Heterosexuals, like homosexuals, are prohibited from marrying people of their own sex. It is no more valid to allege wrongful discrimination in this context against gays than to argue that cycle lanes ‘discriminate’ wrongfully against wheelbarrows.” Leave aside that neither cycle lanes nor wheelbarrows are people, is Waters advocating sham marriages?
But Waters doesn’t even think that “there is (a) ‘human right’ to be married or to adopt children”. He should do his research. Article 16 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights does indeed enshrine the right to marry. “Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family. They are entitled to equal rights as to marriage, during marriage and at its dissolution.”
It goes further downhill from here. “Many people never get married and do not regard themselves as discriminated against.” This is clearly not the point: adult heterosexuals can marry and gay people can’t. You can’t choose your sexual orientation any more than you can choose the colour of your skin, and discriminating on this basis is the same as race-based discriminating. This is inequality and it is a violation of human rights, which is why Amnesty has rightly taken up the cause.
Waters is a campaigner for the rights of unmarried fathers to their children. This is an admirable cause and the State should legislate to protect their rights. However, he seems to think that gay people are going to steal babies away from their rightful parents. What is evident is a prejudice against non-traditional family forms
Numerous scientific studies carried out by organisations such as the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Psychological Association and the Royal College of Psychiatrists in the UK, have concluded that children raised in households headed by same-sex parents do just as well as those raised by heterosexual parents.
The current ban on same-sex marriage and joint adoption does severely infringe upon the rights of gay people and their children, and should be lifted immediately in the name of justice and equality.
Eloise McInerney is communications officer with Nosie, a gay rights advocacy group. John Waters is on leave