Same-sex marriage in Netherlands: parsing the stats

[AveSantaMaria]

The Netherlands was the first country to legalize same-sex marriage in 2001 so may be the best country to statistically and rigrously study the effects of same-sex marriage on traditional marriage and gay marriage.

Same-sex marriage in Netherlands: parsing the stats
(By a same-sex marriage supporter)
URL: cathyyoung.blogspot.com/2005/11/same-sex-marriage-in-netherlands.html

On Friday, Andrew Sullivan posted this brief item on his blog:
There’s a big jump in the number of same-sex married couples in Holland, as the reform begins to change gay culture and societal expectations
Here’s what the the linked article, at the Dutch English-language website Expatica, actually says:
The number of gay couples in the Netherlands has risen sharply in recent years.

There were 53,000 gay and lesbian couples living together in the Netherlands at the beginning of 2005, according to Statistics Netherlands (CBS). Ten years ago there were less than 39,000 gay or lesbian cohabiting couples.

Almost a quarter of the gay or lesbian couples are married or in a registered partnership. Of these, 12 percent are married and 10 percent are in a registered partnership.

The CBS said there are 29,000 all-male couples and 24,000 lesbian couples. Despite the significant increase in the number of gay and lesbian couples, the group is equal to just over 1 percent of the total number of cohabiting couples in the Netherlands.

Clearly the article talks about all same-sex couples living together, not just married ones.

It’s hard to tell what the rise in same-sex couples in the Dutch census really represents. It could be, in part, due to the fact that more same-sex couples are identifying themselves as such to the census-takers. A change in gay culture – a shift toward “settling down” – has undoubtedly taken place as well, just as it has in the United States. But it’s hard to make the case that legalized same-sex marriage has a lot to do with this, considring that only 12% of same-sex couples living together in the Netherlands are married.

As this CBS statistical table shows, same-sex marriages peaked in 2001 when they were first legalized; that year, there were 1,339 male-male marriage and 1,035 female-female ones. (Male-female marriages that year numbered 79,677.) The figures have dropped in every subsequent year, to 579 male-male marriages and 631 female-female marriages in 2004. In the same year, there were 261 civil partnerships registered between two men, and 322 between two women; these figures have held relatively steady over the past four years. (Registered partnerships first became available in 1998.)

In 1996, Jonathan Rauch wrote that if same-sex marriage is to succeed, it must become the general norm in the gay community, not just another lifestyle option. At least so far, that does not seem to be happening in Holland.

Also in the past 10 years, the overall marriage rate has dropped, from 5.4 per 1,000 inhabitans in 1994 to 4.5 per 1,000 in 2004. More heterosexual men and women are entering into civil partnerships – which are much more easily dissolved – instead of marriage; in 2004, about 7% of new male-female legal unions were civil partnerships. This does not prove, as Stanley Kurtz has argued, that same-sex marriage undermines heterosexual marriage; the drop in marriage rates is undoubtedly due to many complex factors. However, one can plausibly argue that the changing attitudes toward marriage that make same-sex marriage possible may also be related to overall lower marriage rates. (Whether that’s a bad thing is another matter.) And the Dutch experience does seem to refute Rauch’s argument that legalizing same-sex marriage will improve the status of marriage in the larger society.

Why am I pointing this out? Because, while I fully support legal rights for same-sex partners, I think both sides in the marriage debate have been prone to unwarranted and exaggerated claims about the social impact of same-sex marriage. The legalization of same-sex marriage has not, as some have claimed, led to polygamy in the Netherlands. But at least so far, it has not created a “marriage culture” among gays and has not boosted marriage among heterosexuals. As we continue our own discussion of same-sex marriage, we need to have all the facts on the table.

(By the way, my best wishes to Andrew in his recovery from the flu.)

Other peoples comments included in the URL link

 

[Dale_M]

So AveSantaMaria, what is your point?

 

[dkdempsey]

Good for the Dutch. Hopefully other countries will come to their senses and allow gay and lesbian couples to marry.

 

[Teen4Christ]

I’m a little confused as well, what’s the point of this thread friend?

dkdempsey:

Good for the Dutch. Hopefully other countries will come to their senses and allow gay and lesbian couples to marry.

]

 

[AveSantaMaria]

I think that Netherlands is an interesting case for analysis and we should be analyzing it more rigorously and scientifically. I am hoping that we will start doing so soon and I am posting the very few people that I have seen starting to do this and the results that they have found.

This article is especially interesting to me because it is written by a same-sex marriage supporter who finds that legalization of same-sex marriage, even over time, does not seem to changing the fragile nature of relationships in the homosexual community as same-sex marriage proponents say that it does. One can also see that STD and suicide rates among gay people in the Netherlands are very high despite the greater level of tolerance. Maybe a lot of the problems in the gay community that they are blaming on homophobia actually have deeper roots, homosexual activity and not pursuing Christ and accepting only part of Christ, but not all of Christ and not trusting 100% in Christ that he truly loves them and cares for them and knows better for them than they know for themselves.

By their fruits, you will know them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes or grapes from thistles." Matthew 7:16

"Therefore, God handed them over to degrading passions. Their females exchanged natural relations for unnatural, and the males likewise gave up natural relations with females and burned with lust for one another. Males did shameful things with males and thus received in their own persons the due penalty for their perversity. And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God handed them over to their undiscerning mind to do what is improper. They are filled with every form of wickedness, evil, greed, and malice; full of envy, murder, rivalry, treachery, and spite. They are gossips and scandalmongers and they hate God. They are insolent, haughty, boastful, ingenious in their wickeness and rebellious toward their parents. They are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless.

Although they know the just decree of God that all who practice such things deserve death, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.** Romans 1:26-32**

Cathechism of the Catholic Church

2357 Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms throughout centuries and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity, tradition has always declared that “homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.” They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.

2358 The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligble. This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfill God’s will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord’s Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.

2359 Homosexual persons are called to chastity. By the virtues of self-mastery that teach them inner freedom, at times by the support of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection.

Michaelangelo, painter of the Statue of David, Sistine Chapel, St. Peter’s Basilica, and sculptor of Pieta, may have struggled with same-sex orientation, given his biography. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelangelo#Sexuality Yet, he maintained throughout life a monk like chastity. He is pleasing to Christ. :dancing: :clapping: :crying:

 

[eichenb2]

brusselsjournal.com/node/301

brusselsjournal.com/node/421

nisnews.nl/public/120808_1.htm

 

[eichenb2]

catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=13538

 

[gam197]

originally posted by eichenb2eichenb2 catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=13538

Rotterdam, The Netherlands, Aug 15, 2008 / 05:19 pm (CNA).- Dutch authorities have recognized the marriages of Muslims who have several wives even though polygamy is banned in the Netherlands.

While bigamous or polygamous marriages are prohibited in the Netherlands, registrars accept marriages contracted in countries where more than one wife is permitted, a Netherlands Information Services news bulletin says.

Local authorities register all the marriages of immigrants possessing several wives who settle in the Netherlands.

It is not known how common polygamy is in the Netherlands because the Central Bureau for Statistics removes bigamous or polygamous marriages from its files on the assumption the records were created through administrative errors.

Spokesman T. Verhoeven of Rotterdam’s city council said polygamous marriages are registered almost every week. “They are simply acknowledged. It is important for us to check that the documents are authentic and that the husband does not have Dutch nationality,” he explained, saying the registration of such marriages in Rotterdam is “practically never” refused.

In Amsterdam local government employees must inform the authorities if they suspect marriages of convenience or exploitation of women are factors, b

I’ve heard that gay marriage affects heterosexual marriages in that fewer heterosexual couples marry but this article is scary.