Whenever the word “equality’ crops up in public policy
discussion, you know that a political solution is about to be imposed. And when political solutions are imposed,
someone takes a haircut while someone else reaps ill gotten gains.
Consider for a moment, the recent dust up over gender wage
inequality. Economists such as Thomas Sowell and Walter
Williams debunk this canard through rigorous analysis. The do this by adjusting for the facts that
many women opt for less time consuming professions such as teaching or nursing
that afford them the flexibility to spend time raising their families. They also adjust for the fact that many
women voluntarily step off of the corporate ladder for extended stretches in
order have children and raise families.
They go on to note that when these variables are accounted for, there is
negligible difference in the earnings of men and women of comparable
qualifications.
Government attempts to impose “equality” would simply
interfere with the lifestyle and career choices that women voluntarily elected
while burdening employers with endless paperwork to justify their pay
structure.
Sowell performs the same analysis for reported race based
differences in earnings. When all
other factors are solved for, Blacks and Whites with comparable qualifications
earn comparable money. The factors that
drive the overall shortfall in African American incomes include the dangerous
zip code monopoly schools that they are forced to attend, the war on drugs
which disproportionately jails young Black men, minimum wage laws that prevent
them from taking their first step on their career path and a welfare system that
rewards single parent families.
Government attempts to impose to impose wage equality
ignores the true reasons the income disparity which is State created.
Thus it totally baffles me that many who profess to be
libertarian support marriage equality. Libertarians from Rand to Rothbard and from
Bergland to Boaz agree that the State has no business in regulating relations
between consenting adults. That is the philosophically
consistent libertarian stance.
Marriage equality,
however, is a political imposition, a statist contrivance. Ayn Rand tell us that the statist is a person
“who believes that some men have the right to
force, coerce, enslave, rob, and murder others.”
In this instance the people
who will suffer are those of various religious convictions who elect not to
endorse same sex marriage. By using the full
force of the courts and the endless array of anti-discrimination statutes these
dissenters are forced into acquiescence with practices that they find
objectionable.
It is true that a great many
libertarians are secularists who may have little sympathy for those who they
might dismiss as religious bigots. To
this there are two responses. The first
is Martin Niemoller’s chilling epitaph:
First
they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out--
Because I was not a Socialist.
Because I was not a Socialist.
Then
they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out--
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then
they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out--
Because I was not a Jew.
Because I was not a Jew.
Then
they came for me--and there was no one left to speak for me.
The
point being is that for each of us, the day may come when the State will force
us to kowtow to that which we find odious.
That is why we stand in unison with others with whom we disagree.
The
other reason is that is essential that libertarians stand on principle. Principle is what sets us apart from and
above the political riff-raff. Republicans,
Democrats, neo-cons and liberals worship at the altar of expediency. They think nothing of using any means to
attain the ends that they desire. Think
of George W. Bush saying that he "abandoned free-market principles to
save the free-market system".
WTF?
So, would
we stand in the way of same sex couples pursuing happiness as they see fit? Not at all.
Marriage
needs to be depoliticized by removing it from State oversight. Whenever anything of value is brought into
the political realm it becomes the object of strife and acrimony.
Civil
marriage is rightly the subject of contract law between two (or more)
consenting parties. Religious marriage
is a matter of personal choice for the participants. There is no place for State involvement in
church services.
Classical
liberal doctrine separated church and state, protecting religious expression
from State interference. The evolved libertarian
also separates:
Commerce from State
Education from State
Banking from State
Money from State
Healthcare from State
Energy from State
Agriculture from State
Technology from State
Transportation from State
Art from State
The Environment from State
Charity from State
Telecommunications from State
Internet from State
Infrastructure from State
Personal defense from State
Likewise,
now is the time to divorce marriage from state.
Ultimately, all of the above can summed up in just two lines:
Separation Me and State
Separation of You and State
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"Half the people are stoned and the other half are waiting for the next election.
Half the people are drowned and the other half are swimming in the wrong direction."
- Paul Simon
Half the people are drowned and the other half are swimming in the wrong direction."
- Paul Simon
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