It all sounds very official, because you were using terms like “proponents” and “fiduciary” earlier, but that’s what it boils down to. That’s adulthood for you: You get to tell the entire Supreme Court about how “very few men outlive their own fertility” — and it’s not weird, as it usually is when you work the fact in during second dates, or readings of the biblical story of Isaac and Sarah. Years of law school, studying precedents, becoming head of the Law Review, getting your name on a law firm — all so you can stand before the court and make note that, Hey, America, Older Men Are Pretty Fertile, As You Can Tell From All Those Commercials With Them In Bathtubs Holding Hands. “Marriage HAS to be between a man and a woman because 55 YEAR-OLD MEN ARE SO FERTILE, GUYS! SO FERTILE! Did I mention how FERTILE? Unlike women! And if they weren’t married TO LADIES, they’d go and sow SO many wild oats!”
Also, “the fertile party”? (“Hello, I’m Lucille Smith, and this is my husband, Dave, or as we like to call him, the Fertile Party.”) There’s a certain undeniable awkwardness in the way these arguments slowly creep back to sex, every time. If you want to defend traditional marriage, it keeps coming down to your having to stand in front of the Supreme Court pointing out that Virile 55 Year-Olds Need To Be Kept In Check Or Else They Would Strew Children Liberally Over The Earth.
I also like how Scalia pointed out, I think, that Strom Thurmond was so Virile While Elderly that Rules Didn’t Even Apply To Him, or something.
Yes, Strom Thurmond, a great example of marital fidelity and everything we aspire to.
There’s always that point in the argument that comes down to yelling about who is the most fertile, and this was that point.
The deeper you wade into this argument, the closer you get to the unnerving idea that marriage as an institution is simply necessary for keeping Roving Hordes of Barbarous, Fertile Men in check. As Alyssa Rosenberg points out, this is a deeper problem with the whole argument that doesn’t simply revolve around middle-age sex. This is Middle Age sexual mores, and they’re much more problematic.
*I hate this term, but I lack a better one.