Advocates of “consensual incest” are supporting the lawsuit of a New York parent who is seeking to marry their own adult child.

According to The New York Post, “Australian Richard Morris, who is pushing to change incest laws in about 60 countries, said he supports the legal push in Manhattan Federal Court and that such behavior between consenting adults ‘should not be criminalized.’”

In an interview with The Post, Morris said that fighting for true marriage equality is “the right thing to do, isn’t it?”

“It seems to be as unjust as the law that used to imprison gay people, and the law that used to stop people of different races marrying,” he added.

Another advocate for decriminalizing incest is Keith Pullman. He told The Post, “It is absurd to say that an adult can’t consent to marry their parent.”

“That same adult can be sent to war, take on six or seven figures of debt, operate heavy machinery, be sentenced to death by a federal court, and consent to sex with five strangers (and marriage with one of them) but can’t consent to marry someone they love?” he added.

The New York lawsuit, filed on April 1, 2021, is from a parent who wants to marry their own child, citing “individual autonomy.”

The lawsuit, seeking to overturn New York’s laws against incest, states, “Through the enduring bond of marriage, two persons, whatever relationship they might otherwise have with one another, can find a greater level of expression, intimacy and spirituality.”

The Post reports that incest is a third-degree felony under New York law, and is “punishable by up to four years behind bars, and incestuous marriages are considered void, with the spouses facing a fine and up to six months in jail.”

The case seems to once again prove the point of those who believe in and advocate for traditional marriage. If marriage can be redefined to include the union of two persons of the same sex, what is to stop it from being redefined to include incestuous relationships?

Prior to the Supreme Court’s decision in Obergefell v. Hodges, traditional marriage advocates often used this slippery slope argument, but their concerns were dismissed and derided as fanciful.

But just six years following the high court’s decision, doesn’t this lawsuit once again prove the veracity of it?

Before the Supreme Court’s dictate in Obergefell, Ryan T. Anderson, one of the nation’s premier conservative philosophers, gave a lecture on the nature of marriage.

Following his speech, one gay-identified questioner asked Anderson why he did not have the right to jointly file his taxes like heterosexual couples do.

In response, Anderson said, “What if we were to say why should I be able to file a joint tax return just because I’m in a throuple? Or a quartet?”

“You think we should have same-sex marriage for same-sex couples. But would you also extend marriage equality rights to the throuple?” Anderson asked.

Here, Anderson takes the questioner’s point to its logical conclusion. If marriage could be redefined to include couples of the same sex, why couldn’t it be redefined to include three, or four people?

In his well-reasoned dissent in Obergefell, Chief Justice John Roberts asked this same question.

“One immediate question invited by the majority’s position is whether states may retain the definition of marriage as a union of two people. Although the majority randomly inserts the adjective ‘two’ in various places, it offers no reason at all why the two-person element of the core definition of marriage may be preserved while the man-woman element may not,” the chief justice pointed out.

“Indeed, from the standpoint of history and tradition, a leap from opposite-sex marriage to same-sex marriage is much greater than one from a two-person union to plural unions, which have deep roots in some cultures around the world. If the majority is willing to take the big leap, it is hard to see how it can say no to the shorter one.”

That is why we should again ask, if marriage can be redefined to include same-sex couples, couldn’t it also include romantic relationships between one parent and one child?

Will the lawsuit filed in New York become the next Obergefell?

It is too soon to know. But Christians can be confident that no matter what the legal definition of marriage may be, the ontological definition will never change.

Marriage is a union of one man and one woman, ordered to the procreation of children.

You can follow this author on Parler @ZacharyMettler

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