Bennett’s Take on Marriage

William J. Bennett’s gambling losses must have included one too many brain cells because his “GOP Must Wed Values to Politics” (Opinion, Jan. 18) was rife with contradictions and nonsense. If benefits and rights “should be allocated as needed, without discrimination and without privileging homosexual relations,” then why do heterosexuals “need” tax breaks, visitation rights, insurance/pension entitlements, inheritance rights, etc., any more than homosexuals “need” them? Is it, as he implies, so that women can be protected, men domesticated and children raised? I’d like to see how both the National Organization for Women and Bennett’s spouse (a female, I presume) would respond to that assertion.

Why does government-sanctioned exclusion of homosexuals from equal rights and benefits via marriage not qualify as discrimination? Why is it permissible for an equal-opportunity government and society to “privilege” heterosexuals to the detriment of homosexuals?

If rights and benefits “should not be based on sex and should not force people to engage in sex as a condition of receiving them,” why is heterosexual marriage permissible but homosexual marriage not? Didn’t he say that marriage should be between a man and a woman for procreation (sex)? No sex, no marriage.

Todd Cloaninger

San Diego

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Marriage has protected women and domesticated men? Specious hogwash! Until 100 years ago, marriage was -- for millenniums -- the exchange of property between men. And men could whip their property with a stick, so long as it wasn’t any thicker than their thumbs. It was not your GOP that righted this wrong, Mr. Bennett, nor was it your born-again Christian friends; it was the feminist movement. Today, everyone understands the difference between civil and religious marriage, including the Supreme Court. But Bennett has the gall to respin world, moral and GOP history? Put away your tin sword, Mr. Bennett.

Art McDermott

Los Angeles

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Bennett writes that marriage is primarily for three purposes: “protecting women, domesticating men and raising children.” No matter how narrow his definition, how gay marriage throws a wrench into his matrimonial rationale is beyond me.

I’m not one to bring up the glass-house failings of those who choose to throw rocks at others, but if I were, I might speculate that excessive gambling would more destroy a marriage and manifest a disturbing message for children than having a same-sex couple enter into a lifetime bond of trust and love. With Bennett’s evangelical mores reeking of his divisive “Republicans are virtuous and Democrats are behind the disintegration of America’s values” mantra once again, his so-called moral intentions continue to be paper thin, heaped in hate toward anyone who doesn’t see it the way he sees it and about as virtuous as a political commercial.

Steve Young

Chatsworth

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How would any “same-sex” marriage affect any “different-sex” marriage? I’ve been married for almost 30 years -- my husband and I are different-sex partners. We have absolutely no fear of my niece’s civil union (in Vermont). All it has brought to her and to our family is joy and another precious person to love, not to mention a new level of happiness to both young women. I would appreciate a short, simple description of why this fear exists for Bennett or anyone else. Why fear more love in our world?

Barbara Clark-Elliott

Renton, Wash.

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After reading Bennett’s piece, we were initially confused. How would allowing gays to marry weaken the institution of marriage for heterosexuals? Why should we care what two consenting, committed adults choose to do on a Sunday in June? And then we realized the havoc it would wreak. The demand and prices for caterers would skyrocket. Banquet rooms would be booked even further in advance. There would be a shortage of fabulous cake and not enough tuxedos to go around.

We see the light. Count us against this dangerous assault on the institution of marriage.

Bruce Kaplan

Claudia Russell (aka Mrs. Bruce Kaplan)

Culver City

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Thank you, Bill Bennett. At long last I know why I remain single. I don’t know any women who need my protection, I have always been thoroughly domesticated and I raised my children rather nicely without Republican guidance. And I haven’t thrown away millions of dollars at the tables in Las Vegas. But then, maybe I’m an anomaly.

Donald Ferguson

Whittier