The Law of Unintended Consequence

I realise that my last blog post was about 'the gays', and touched on gay marriage. Unfortunately, the wretched denizens of this dismal, blighted world have failed to recognise me as their living god and thus the last post did not immediately set the world to rights. So this one is for you, Craig.

When I got home from wasting my life at university one day*, I enjoyed the surreal experience of my housemate staring at a Mars bar with the intensity of a cobra.

"A less strict vegetarian may still enjoy our products," he mumbled, reading an online press release from Mars with absolutely no conviction. The confusion didn't leave his face.

"A less strict vegetarian. Isn't that someone who is not a vegetarian? I mean, it's either got animals in it or it hasn't."

And there you go. It was hardly the most profound thing to say, but I feel for him, since it's an unusual case. Not many people are called to bring down judgement on a Mars bar, but it was probably the most concise, accurate and damning critique I've ever heard that didn't involve spades of foul language. You wouldn't say, "A less strict egalitarian can still enjoy heaps of tasty discrimination," would you? Sometimes, things just are that black and white.

Equality.. You either have it, or you don't. I know for a fact we don't, but it's always comforting to at least pretend like everyone's interested in it.

Calderdale's Arch-Parasite and Lord Overfiend, Craig Whittaker MP, has published an interesting blog recently. In between defending his expenses spending and writing articles on missing children, he managed to get a quick dig in at this week's popular controversy - gay marriage.

"The unintended consequences of same-sex marriage and why I will not vote for it"

Craig's post starts out with a bit of a curveball, just to prepare you for the thigh-deep pools of pointless bile you'll have to wade through later. Anyone who assumed this could be a well rationalised argument immediately finds themselves on the back foot. Clever move, sir.


"It is wrong to say that Gay marriage is the next Civil Rights battle. To do so would make marriage adult centred instead of Child centred as it currently is.

It is important to say that I want to be as objective as I can with what I think is an incredibly important issue and I am basing my decision not on information or beliefs from faith groups, whether my own or others, but on what the unintended consequences of re-defining marriage may bring."

I mean, surplus capital letters aside, it is a readable if not strange way to open an argument.  I don't know how many weddings Craig has been to, but marriage is adult centered. Conducted by adults, for adults, in the presence of other adults and perhaps some children. Unless he means that it is for the purposes of procreation, which displays a terrifying ignorance of biology.

I'm sure he'll clarify, just like he clarified he was being objective. He's already said that he doesn't consider the struggle for gay marriage as a rights issue. Objectivity in motion. It's a deceptively important sentence where a man can claim to be objectively examining something based on a set of made up criteria and hypotetical scenarios that have filled his small mind with stark terror.


"My overriding concern is that if we do indeed as a Parliament change legislation to allow same sex marriage now, then what will our successors be discussing and have to legislate for in the future?; Polygamy?; Three-way relationships?; Who knows what else?"

WHO KNOWS!

Portals to Hell triggering daemonic incursion. One side-effect of same-sex marriage?

I mean, god forbid that you could love more than one person at once. I mean, my feelings on marriage as an institution force me to play Devil's Advocate here, but really?


What follows is a bizarre list of ways the law in other countries has been changed. At this point, Craig's blog could probably do with some sinister music to underline the seriousness of it all. It's all innocuous stuff designed to satisfy a legal framework that only a backward minded yokel would get upset about. But Craig is obviously upset, on the brink of collapsing to the ground and spasming like a panicking fish.


"Marriage has a unique place in our society. It is a bedrock institution and the most stable environment for raising children. Redefining marriage would make marriage adult-centred rather than child-centred."

Reasserting, but disappointingly not clarifying something he said earlier just about wraps up the rest of the blog, bar a few emotive platitudes and a rendition of Jerusalem playing in the background. So it's a bedrock institution, right? For a guy who is on his second marriage, that's quite a bold statement. Not as bold as defining it as 'child-centered'. I mean, he was arrested for assaulting his own son. There's nothing great about hypocrisy from normal people, but from someone in a position of power making moral judgements about the ability of a same-sex couple to raise children. He's either made the worlds worst joke using himself as the punchline, or it's just a staggering amount of arrogance.

People in glass houses, and all that.

At least you can see him coming. Face and all.

It's even stranger that the MP for Calder Valley, containing the unofficial 'Lesbian capital' of the UK, should want to deliberately piss off his constituents. Actually, it's not that strange. He probably doesn't recognise those hippies as legitimate human beings anyway. At least you can take solace in the fact that Representative Democracy allows your representative to turn their back on both the party line and their constituents. That liberating ability to fuck people off without consequence, and absolute freedom just to be a prick.


* Instead of wasting it someplace else.