The Simpsons

My husband and I are big Simpsons fans. The quality of the show has been going downhill for several years now, but we still watch every Sunday night anyway, hoping for a bit of the brilliance we used to enjoy. Last night there wasn't anything much on offer, and there was one point of the show that seriously disappointed me.

Homer has managed to put the entire fire department out of commission, and on the news Kent Brockman interviews a man hanging out of the second story window of a burning house and asks him how he feels considering the fact that no one is coming to save him. The man in the burning house responds to this effect,

"It's not as bad as the fact that somewhere gays are being allowed to marry. That's the real emergency."

Kent Brockman sarcastically replies,

"Once again, tragedy has brought out the best in us."

The point the Simpsons writers are apparently trying to make is that with so much tragedy in our world, paying attention to the issue of gay marriage is petty and stupid. However, it is only those opposed to gay marriage who are being petty and stupid. One is left to assume that those who are fighting for gay marriage while hanging out the window of a burning house are doing just fine. But if it's so petty to defend traditional marriage despite all the other tragedies we face, then it must be just as silly for gay marriage supporters to be focusing on this issue.

It is only through a major paradigm shift in my own understanding of what marriage is and what purpose it serves at both a personal and public level that I have managed to have a successful marriage myself. Marriage is a fundamental social institution, and I personally love my marriage, so I understand why some gays want to be able to get married while still maintaining their gay identity. But if they care so much about marriage that they feel they should have a right to it even against the will of the majority of Americans, then they need to understand and respect the opinions of those who also care so much about marriage that they don't want to fundamentally change it. Those who defend marriage are not simply being petty. They are on one side of the conflict of goods that David Blankenhorn details in The Future of Marriage. And to me, they are much more persuasive.