Brain Fertilizer

In this article by Joshua K. Baker & Maggie Gallagher, they ask the questions:

Will young adults who currently favor gay marriage continue to do so, even as opposition to gay marriage continues to be voiced and as they move through the lifecycle, marrying and becoming parents themselves? Will teenagers’ current high levels of opposition survive the college experience? The answer to both questions is: We don’t know.

I disagree. I think we do know the answer. I can all but guarantee that support for homosexual marriage decreases within a population as that population ages.

Churchill supposedly said, “If you are young and not liberal, you have no heart; if you are old and not conservative, you have no brain.” I think I’d prefer to re-state that as, “If you are young and not idealistic, you have no passion; if you are old and are not pragmatic, you have no sense.”

The young are always going to be more excitable, more willing to fight for “unjust” causes…but also more self- and ego-centric. Make no mistake, having children changes your perspective. Most parents are incapable of remaining so narcissistic, so unaware of the prerequisites for a stable society, so blissfully unconcerned for future generations. Having a child (not just adopting) makes you aware of grandchildren, and even the possibility of seeing and helping raise great-grandchildren. That often has a profound impact on attitudes toward social tinkering.

And while you can make the argument that heterosexual support for homosexual marriage is “caring about the needs of others, it is based on the twin self-centered attitudes of “it doesn’t affect me, so why should I stop it?”, and “I can’t imagine being legally barred from marrying someone I love, so how can I support legally barring someone else?” When you have children, if you are a good parent, your priorities switch to “What needs to be done to ensure a happy, successful life for my children and their children and their children?”

That is a significant difference. Not everyone adopts that attitude, no, and there are other arguments for homosexual marriage that can be made that are equally valid. But many will see it the way I described, and that will reduce support for homosexual marriage among the currently-young as they age.