Ponder Away

Third Way, a progressive think tank in the moderate movement, published a valuable report titled “Commitment: The Answer to the Middle’s Questions on Marriage for Gay Couples” in late 2011. I fully support marriage equality, and have had difficulty understanding why others are offended by the notion. This report gave me some much needed perspective, and reaffirmed my belief that in order to address inequality we need to restructure our arguments using a human rights framework. While the privileges marriage bestows in the eyes of our government are important, we must not lose focus on what is truly important: love. My intent is not to debase the importance of civil rights - they have their place - but when we found our calls for equality on benefits, it seems to me that we lose support because the most powerful message we have is love. Third Way found that the majority of people define marriage as “a public promise of love and commitment.” I believe that ultimately that is an equality we could all stand for.