The Australian and The Age both ran opinion pieces yesterday favouring gay marriage, but the two articles were contrasts in tone and argument.

In The Age, Tim Wright preached to the converted. None of the concerns people might have about gay marriage were addressed. Rather, gays should be allowed to marry because it is a ‘basic human right’. Opposition to it comes from personal flaws: it is senseless, inhumane, mean-spirited, the product of fear, a cave-in to conservative lobbies.

In The Australian, Tim Wilson took a more conciliatory path. Picking up on Tony Abbott’s covenant marriage argument, he argued for pluralism in marriage contracts – letting gays marry and also letting religious people have stricter forms of marriage.

The Wilson approach seems much the better one. Opposition to gay marriage cannot be put down to the left’s standard cast of villains. While I personally think the case for gay marriage is strong, even from a secular conservative perspective, the arguments are counter-intuitive. People need to to be taken through them, not insulted.

Tim Wilson’s argument also highlights that gays and conservative Christians have more in common politically than either probably realise. They are both cultural minorities with the same threats from an homogenising state.

Wright’s article is an example of how an emphasis on rights damages democratic discourse. It encourages people just to assert entitlements, rather than to engage with other people’s views and perhaps reach a compromise on some evolutionary position. Winner-take all politics brings unnecessary rancour and division to civic life.