A glossary of marital perversions

The current debate over homosexual marriage invites analogies. For purposes of comparison and contrast, let’s put these options on the table, with precise terminology.

Keep in mind that not all of these are mutually exclusive. It’s possible to combine some of these:

1. Open marriage

Where one or both spouses agree to let the other have sexual partners outside the marriage.

2. Homosexual marriage

Marriage between (at least) two lesbians or sodomites.

3. Incestuous marriage

“Incest” is an umbrella term.

Technical

“Incest” can be purely technical. For instance, you could have a blended family with two sets of kids from different marriages. Legally they are siblings, yet they are really in-laws rather than blood relatives.

Likewise, different cultures have different prohibited degrees of affinity. In some cultures, marriage between cousins is incestuous whereas that’s morally licit in other cultures. Some cultures favor endogamy.

In analogy with homosexual marriage, I think the type of incest in view would be parental incest, whether parent/underage child or parent/grown child.

Sibling

A sexual relationship between a biological brother and biological sister.

Adult

Consensual sexual relations between adult family members (e.g. father/daughter, mother/son, uncle/niece, or adult siblings).

Parental

Sexual relations between a biological parent and biological child, whether minors or adults.

Homosexual

Sexual relations between family members of the same sex.

When Christians compare homosexual marriage to incestuous marriage,  that’s probably shorthand for something more specific, like parental incest.

4. Polygamous marriage

Marriage between three or more parties.

5. Bestial marriage

Marriage between humans and animals.

6. Pederastic marriage

Marriage between an adult and a child or minor of the same sex.

7. Pedophilic marriage

Marriage between an adult and child or minor of either sex.

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Proponents of sodomite marriage typically resent these comparisons. So I’m going to say a bit more:

i) Proponents of sodomite marriage become oddly Victorian or prudish when opponents compare sodomite marriage to incest, polygamy, pedophilia, or bestiality. But when did proponents of sodomite marriage suddenly develop these sexual hang-ups? Why are they entitled to find these alternative marital arrangements morally invidious when Christians are not entitled to find sodomite marriage morally invidious?

Fact is, once you accept sodomite marriage, then there are no rules. We can define and redefine the rules at will. The rules are whatever we say they are, from one day to the next. It’s just a social convention.

ii) This isn’t just hypothetical. Muslims practice polygamy, child marriage, and–in the case of the Pashtun–pederasty. In the current political climate, it’s very easy to see how Muslims in America would demand legal accommodations on all three fronts, in the name of multiculturalism. Muslims already wield great political clout in Michigan.

In addition, the American Psychiatric and Psychological Associations have been softening their historic opposition to pedophilia.

iii) What about bestiality? Some American Indian tribes reportedly practiced bestiality. So you could imagine American Indians demanding a legal accommodation, just like they did with Peyote.

Likewise, OT prohibitions against bestiality presume its occurrence among pagans. Well, what about neopagans?

In addition, millions of Americans like their pet animals better than human beings.

So what really stands in the way of bestial marriage, once sodomite marriage punches through?