Lies, damn lies, and statistics

I don't know about you, but during the Constitutional Convention I heard the argument ad nausium about how Scandinavian countries marriage rates were iron-clad proof that gay marriage delegitimizes heterosexual marriage so much that "the institution itself is practically extinct" Religious conservatives sent us flyers, booklets, even DVDs on the matter.

Now, UMASS-Amherst Professor M.V. Lee Badgett finally wrote an article for Slate that sets the record straight (no pun intended). After looking at the study Stanley Kurtz and his ilk site, Professor Badgett sums it up in this 'graph:

"No matter how you slice the demographic data, rates of nonmarital births and cohabitation do not increase as a result of the passage of laws that give same-sex partners the right to registered partnership. To put it simply: Giving gay couples rights does not inexplicably cause heterosexuals to flee marriage, as Kurtz would have us believe. Looking at the long-term statistical trends, it seems clear that the changes in heterosexuals' marriage and parenting decisions would have occurred anyway, even in the absence of gay marriage."

America, Badgett points out, "already wrestles with the social tensions that Kurtz claims have occurred as a result of gay marriage in Scandinavia: deepening divisions over gay issues in churches [see the American Episcopal Church], the increasing acceptance of lesbian and gay relationships in the media [see Queer Eye for the Straight Guy], and the occasional radical voice arguing for the abolition of marriage. Yet heterosexual couples keep getting married—more than 2 million of them every year."

Despite emails my boss has gotten that claim this week's dreary weather is a direct result of gay marriages (if so, why did God wait a week to curse the Bay State), I don't think social and religious conservatives "Chicken Little approach" to fighting gay marriage is going to work.