Useful, thank you!…

>> “The fact that they also want to form relationships is understandable, and the fact that some will want to formalise the relationship is fine for an increasing number of people.”

1. The choice to form a nonmarital relationship, such as the one-sexed arrangement — homosexual or not, is a liberty exercised, not a right denied.

2. It may be understandable that some would formalize such a relationship but that can be done without touching marriage law. See designated beneficiaries. It is not unjust to discriminate on the basis of marital status.

3. That you point to an increasing number of peoplemight think that this or that thing is fine, let alone favor the proposed merger of nonmarriage with marriage, points to a reliance on convention as the primary source of truth.

Do you support convention — i.e. the argument from tradition?

My views are based on the perception that while most people feel comfortable with a sexuality based on being either a man or a woman, there are some people who are different. And that’s fine. That’s natural. The fact that they also want to form relationships is understandable, and the fact that some will want to formalise the relationship is fine for an increasing number of people.

The implication of your views – that their sexuality is “at odds with the nature of humankind” is, I think, harmful and dangerous.

I asked a handful of basic questions about your objections.

If your schema is superior, then it should be no problem to answer the questions which are begged by your own stated objections.

Take the emotion out of your objections and let’s focus on the thought process, the reasoning, the structure of the schema.

My understanding is that this is speculation informed by looking at how different primates, including bonobos, now live. Another aspect to this is what is called “sperm wars” – the size of the testicles of the male may be related to how promiscuous females are – the theory is that if females are promiscuous, the testicles are larger (larger testes produce more sperm).

Richard Dawkins writes that people are speculating that, by looking at current primate behaviour and thinking about what sinilar behaviour might have meant for early humans, it is possible that humans may well have lived in harem-like social structures due to human adult males being, generally, larger than females, and also by looking at human testicle size. Human testicles are tiny, nor enormous (compared to chimpanzees (?)) so early human females may have been a bit promiscuous, but not enormously so.

This is all speculation of course!

You could extend your simplistic view of biology = destiny to women and work. Women are biologically the childbearers and thus traditionally ‘integrated’ with men by running the home, while the men went out to work. (Didn’t work too well for women who didn’t follow that path but too bad for them). Should we go back to those ‘natural’ roles? Should women resign from their jobs when they marry, should we get rid of equal pay?

And, as I have said, I did not refer solely to biology. You did, mistakenly, in replying to my comment.

>> “Biology seems very straightforward, whereas sexuality isn’t – I think you need to expand your awareness of the variety of human experience.”

What is the nature of human sexuality, Russell? Is it at odds with the nature of humankind?