Like on a lot of other issues the country is divided on allowing same-sex couples to marry. To me the idea of two men or two women marrying one another is comical. But I’m not queer so what do I know.

I’ve read that there is evidence that homosexuals like the idea of being able to marry more than actually getting married. Whatever their motives it seems to me that we could all benefit from putting this issue behind us. So I’m offering a solution. Let’s allow them to narry instead of marry. (At first I was going to recommend the terms quarry, quarried and quarriage but decided it probably wouldn’t sell.) This should satisfy the same-sex couples without corrupting the institution of marriage.

Narriage would be legally equivalent to marriage except for one thing. I would incorporate into narriage an element not included in marriage. It’s difficult for same-sex couples to produce offspring (in fact, I don’t think it has ever been done) so I would provide a legal route for them to build a family. I would allow them to legally team up with another narried couple of the opposite sex. This team of two men and two women could then set about producing children for both narried couples. The details of how they do this would be left to them, except that the couple to have legal custody of a child would be declared before conception.

Ideally the two couples would function as an extended family. After all, the kids are all siblings, half-siblings or pseudo-cousins. If they stay close and visit often all the kids will have both women and men as role models. The kids could call their biological parents mom or dad even if they don’t live with them, and they could call the others aunt or uncle even if they do live with them.

Narriage then is marriage plus. It carries all the benefits of marriage and then some. So it’s put up or shut up time for same-sex couples. Do you really want the benfits of marriage or do you just want to make a political point?