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The future of marriage is a contentious topic, even around the Hooksexup offices. Some of us are getting hitched before the year is out. Others are avoiding it like a family reunion. It's at once an incredibly personal matter and a major issue on the national stage. Is the institution obsolete? Should same-sex marriage be legal? Are children raised by single parents more likely to go postal? Is this generation waiting too long to get married? In search of insight, if not answers, we assembled an e-roundtable that included the resolutely single writer Jonathan Ames, comedy queen Margaret Cho, the conservative commentator Maggie Gallagher, a gay historian and the editor-in-chief of Maxim. — Tobin Levy





The participants: (For full biographies, click here).

Margaret Cho is an award-winning comedian, blogger, Off-Broadway performer and activist. You can visit her official website at www.margaretcho.com . She also has started her own website on marriage equality: www.loveisloveislove.com .
Jonathan Ames is an NPR contributor, Letterman regular and author of the books What is Not to Love?, My Less Than Secret Life and Wake Up, Sir! He is single. You can visit his website at www.jonathanames.com.
Susan Shapiro Barash is a professor of critical thinking and gender studies at Marymount Manhattan College. She is the author of A Passion for More: Wives Reveal the Affairs that Make or Break Their Marriages and Second Wives: The Pitfalls and Rewards of Marrying Widowers and Divorced Men. She has been happily married (the second time) for the past six years.
Darcy Cosper's first novel, Wedding
Season
— about a young couple who is anti-marriage but has
to
attend seventeen weddings in six months — was published last March.
Keith Blanchard is the editor-in-chief of Maxim magazine. He is "very happily" married and has three young children.
Blaise K is a writer and graphic designer living in Brooklyn. Her website,
bazima.com, has been featured in The New York Press, The Times
and The Daily News.
Jim de Sève is a Brooklyn filmmaker. His documentary Tying the Knot makes the case for gay marriage.
Maggie Gallagher is president of the Institute for Marriage and Public Policy and a co-author of The Case for Marriage: Why Married People are Happier, Healthier, and Better off Financially.
Dr. Scott Haltzman is a psychiatrist experienced in the relationship patterns of husbands and wives.
Molly Jong-Fast is the twenty-five-year-old author of the novel Normal Girl. For the last year she has documented her wedding in a column for Modern Bride.
David Moats is the author of Civil Wars: Gay Marriage in America.
Ethan Watters is a writer living happily in San Francisco. He is the author of Urban Tribes: A Generation Redefines Friendship, Family and Commitment.





Question 1:

WHAT IS THE FUTURE OF MARRIAGE?

Question 2:

The FERTILITY GAME: WILL PEOPLE START MARRYING YOUNGER?

Question 3:

GROUNDS FOR DIVORCE?

Question 4:

UNMARRIED... WITH CHILDREN?

Question 5:

SAME-SEX MARRIAGE?

Participants:

BIOGRAPHIES

 

Join the discussion! Tell us what you think about...

   
Same-sex marriage
Open marriage
The future of marriage

 



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Comments ( 9 )

I guess I shouldn't be surprised by the politically correct responses by many of your (younger) panel members on the "Future of Marriage". The indoctrination centers of today's government schools have done their job. To draw a parallel between marriage and gay unions defers to the politically correct notion of gay rights. I don't think marriage is a matter of rights but a matter of biology. Marriage is after all, the molecular unit of society. It is the preferred and traditional way to replenish society with future citizens. Have we evolved so far that the very idea of regeneration of society is obsolete? If one believes that a couple of men who insert their penises up the rectums of other men is the moral/biological equivalent to a heterosexual couple who produce and nurture children then I have some ocean front land in Arizona I would like to sell you. I have no objection to civil unions for gay couples with all the legal benefits of a marital union, but to co-opt the marriage concept for political correctness is truly perverse and does not serve society. It is another step toward the ACLU ideal of a morally neutral culture, which will surely lead us down a path where far more difficult moral principles will be in jeopardy. Can we get some common sense about this?
SAI commented on May 24 04 at 9:06 am
SAI - I have to say that I agree with you 110%, this whole idea of extending the dinifintion of marriage to include homosexuals is just plain crazy. I also have no problem with them having civil unions, but the idea that they have of marriage being a "right" is just plain wrong. Marriage is no more a "right" than is getting a driver's license. It is a privledge to those that meet the requirements, ie: age, not being related, male/female couple. As much as a blind person may want to drive and get his/her driver's license, they simply do not meed the requirements of the privledge. That is not to say they are not alowed in a car, just someone else needs to be driving! Homosexual couples should be extended the financial benefits as married couples, just don't call it marriage, it is not.
ApB commented on May 24 04 at 9:59 am
why the concern about the procreation of the species ? i don't see any evidence that it is slowing down. what is it, exactly, that is threatening about the idea of gay marriage? i am a breeder (hetero) and i don't see what gets everyone's panties up in a wad. on the other hand, its also not clear to me why gay people, or at least a subset of gay people, *want* their unions to be called marriage. it does seem to me that the real battle should be for full legal rights to all the tax benefits, etc. the consternation on both sides of this issue doesn't make full sense to me.
sta commented on May 24 04 at 10:06 am
Hi... Margaret Cho's entry is cut off. Please fix! I'm very interested. :)
DF commented on May 24 04 at 10:57 am
Why must Ames stereotype the midwest? I have lived here all my life, and all my friends got married when they were about 27 to 30, or are single. I wouln't be supprised if the average age of marriage is the same out here as it is in NYC. Did Ames bother to do any research? Doubt it. Worthless.
afd commented on May 24 04 at 11:29 am
To SAI; I am a married woman who is unable to have children. I will not be "regenerating society", nor was that a concern for my husband and myself when we chose to marry. We did not form a civil union; but as hetereo's who married for love, not procreation, are we to be denied our right to marriage too?
CLS commented on May 24 04 at 6:20 pm
Common sense, SAI? That
JGH commented on May 24 04 at 10:42 pm
DF - Is Margaret Cho's thing fixed now? Let me know: , I'll try and fix it.
WB commented on May 25 04 at 12:00 pm
3 june 2004. Is the legalization of same -sex marriages a nullification of the unnatural sex crime laws such as may not take place in 49 states of 50, lawful sodomy? lawful Fellatio? lawful Cunnilingus? in Same sex marriages? Mildly curious. Jnokgray @yahoo.com
jkg commented on Jun 04 04 at 5:32 pm

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