Gay Marriage will force fewer people would remain monogamous and sexually faithful
Image via WikipediaOne value that remains remarkably strong, even among people who have multiple sexual partners before marriage, is the belief that marriage itself is a sexually exclusive relationship. Among married heterosexuals, having sexual relations with anyone other than one’s spouse is still considered a grave breach of trust and a violation of the marriage covenant by the vast majority of people.
Yet the same cannot be said of homosexuals—particularly of homosexual men. Numerous studies of homosexual relationships, including “partnered” relationships, covering a span of decades, have shown that sex with multiple partners is tolerated and often expected, even when one has a “long-term” partner. Perhaps the most startling of these studies was published in the journal AIDS. In the context of studying HIV risk behavior among young homosexual men in the Netherlands (coincidentally, the first country in the world to legalize homosexual civil “marriage”), the researchers found that homosexual men who were in partnered relationships had an average of eight sexual partners per year outside of the primary relationship.29 (It must be conceded that having such a
Again, the “conservative” argument for homosexual “marriage” suggests that granting the rights of civil “marriage” to homosexuals would “tame” such promiscuous behavior. (To be fair, it must be pointed out that the data in the Dutch study mentioned above were collected before the legalization of homosexual “marriage” in that country, albeit after most of the rights of marriage had been granted through civil unions). However, the implausibility of this claim is illustrated not only by the experience of the Netherlands and other northern European countries that recognize homosexual partnerships, but also by the open declarations of many homosexuals themselves.31
Rather than marriage changing the behavior of homosexuals to match the relative sexual fidelity of heterosexuals, it seems likely that the opposite would occur. If homosexual relationships, promiscuity and all, are held up to society as being a fully equal part of the social ideal that is called “marriage,” then the value of sexual fidelity as an expected standard of behavior for married people will further erode—even among heterosexuals.
