There exists an argument against the state allowing same-sex marriages; this argument is known as the "slippery slope" argument. It goes something like this: once you start expanding the definition of marriage from being a union of a man and a woman to allowing two men or two women to get married, what's to stop it from expanding even further to allow a man to marry a goat, or a table?
This argument can be found, for example, in a brochure, The Slippery Slope of Same-Sex 'Marriage', by Timothy J. Dailey:
But once marriage is no longer confined to a man and a woman, it is impossible to exclude virtually any relationship between two or more partners of either sex--even non-human "partners."
Mr. Dailey describes the possibility of a man marrying a horse. This is supposed to be an argument against same-sex marriage. However, this way of thinking is complete nonsense. Why?
To be able to think about this issue properly, we have to consider what is at stake. A marriage is a legal designation that involve issues such as inheritance, hospital visitation, tax benefits, insurance, and immigration. But horses can't own property. Horses don't pay taxes. Horses don't have citizenship. To talk about a man marrying a goat is a category error -- a horse doesn't have the legal standing necessary for it to make sense to talk about it being married. There may be problems with the idea of same-sex marriage, but this is not one of them. To argue that same-sex marriage will lead to man-horse marriage is fallacious scare-mongering which does nothing to further intelligent debate on the subject.
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