Sex Columnist Dan Savage talked to Stephen Colbert on “The Colbert Report” about his premise that monogamy shouldn’t be requirement for marriage. It’s a great interview, but what’s worth noting is Savage’s distinction between modern marriage, how marriage used to be, and who changed it.

It’s that gay people are forcing straight people to admit that they redefined marriage decades ago. Marriage used to be a gendered institution. It used to be a property transaction where a man took possession of another man’s property – daughter and it became wife – and that’s not what marriage is anymore.

Marriage, when straight people do it, is the legal union of two autonomous equals. And they get to then define their marriage. A marriage can be monogamous or not. There can be children or not. It can be for life or not. There can be – It can be religious – the ceremony – or not. It’s up to that couple. That institution as straight people practice it, as straight people redefined it – there’s no logical case to be made to exclude gay couples from it, monogamous or not, from an institution that doesn’t exclude straight couples, monogamous or not.

That’s a great reminder for those who signed the Marriage Vow.

See the full interview here:

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