The so-called National Organization for Marriage (but you can call it the National Organization for Straight Folks Getting Hitched but No One Else, No Way) has put out talking points for its supporters.
These show they have already lost. What do I mean?
First, something about the group. These are the people who generated the "coming storm" ad that appears to show "real" (straight) people who are suffering because gay folks can marry. You may have also seen the outtakes and practice sessions of the actors. The group is headed by Maggie Gallagher. She claims to be a "marriage expert," but her highest level of education is a B.A. in religious studies.
Gallagher got into a pickle back in the Bush years.
On January 26, 2005, Howard Kurtz of the Washington Post uncovered records of Gallagher receiving payments of tens of thousands of dollars from the Department of Health and Human Services from 2002-2003 for helping the George W. Bush administration promote the President's "healthy marriage" initiative. During this time, Gallagher testified before Congress repeatedly in favor of "healthy marriage" programs, but never disclosed the payments.
source
Now, onto the talking points.
First, they stress what not to say.
Language to avoid at all costs: "Ban same-sex marriage."
Why can't they be upfront and refer to a gay marriage ban? Well, it turns out that this undermines their cause.
Our base loves this wording. So do supporters of SSM. They know it causes us to lose about ten percentage points in polls. Don’t use it. Say we’re against "redefining marriage" or in favor or "marriage as the union of husband and wife" NEVER "banning same-sex marriage."
Now, this is interesting. Preventing gay folks from marrying is not something they want to admit to. They get a 10 point drop in support when they admit that's what they're doing. And, think about it, this is not even that positive a set of words. Personally, I like to talk about supporting equal marriage. I would think that phrasing would poll pretty well since it puts the emphasis on equality. But even without talking about equality and instead talking about "same sex marriage," their side gets 10 percentage points less support.
Do you think this would have been the result ten years ago, even five years ago? I don't think so.
So, what do they counsel? Basically, don't talk about gay people and try to sound tolerant. Also, talk about the kids. You know, what about the children????
Children are confused enough right now with sexual messages. Let’s not confuse them further.
Marriage is about bringing two sexes together, so that children get the love of their own mom and a dad, and women don’t get stuck with the enormous disadvantages of parenting alone.
Two men might each be a good father, but neither can be a mom. The ideal for children is the love of their own mom and dad. No same-sex couple can provide that.
The talking points also counsel people to say that a constitutional amendment against equal marriage would be good because then we just don't have to fight about it anymore - let's get this settled and behind us! (As if.)
We need a marriage amendment to settle the gay marriage issue once and for all, so we don’t have it in our face every day for the next ten years.
And of course there's a litany about how the rest of us shouldn't have to be bothered by a new definition of marriage which might somehow be hurt by this.
Who gets harmed? The people of this state who lose our right to define marriage as the union of husband and wife, that’s who. That is just not right.
This set of points shows how much backtracking these folks have had to do. They can't be upfront and show their real views about gay men and lesbians. In this day and age, that would sound intolerant. But they can't face the reality that real children grow up in families with loving gay parents, nor that there are many kids being raised by straight single parents. So they fall back on their idealized nuclear family, the vague threat to "marriage" and "people of faith," and the hassle of having to deal with this so-we-might-as-well just pass a constitutional amendment to limit marriage.
These folks have lost already. No, not through the whole country and no, not this year. But these are very defensive talking points and not particularly persuasive. I can't see how these move the demographic tidal wave of pro-equality young people.