But as Saint Paul rather delicately said, and people in the eighteenth century rather more plainly said, enforced abstinence is not going to fly.
So, if “rape” in marriage is a concept, marriage is not a concept. If marriage is not a concept, massive drop in female fertility and male investment in offspring, decrease in total children, increase in fatherless children.
Which is not moral progress.
Insert abortion debate: Right to choose is morally coherent, and right to life is morally coherent. It is debatable which of these would constitute moral progress.
However, what is not morally coherent, is that women have sole power over reproductive decisions, but men have an obligation to support those choices whatever they may be, that husbands don’t have a say, that unmarried men can be forced to support babies, but women cannot.
This is not moral progress, but anti white male democratic coalition.
One could coherently argue that right to choose, but no right to child support is moral progress
One could coherently argue that right to life, plus right to child support is moral progress.
One cannot argue that right to choose plus right to child support is moral progress. It is morally right that he who pays the piper, calls the tune, and that she who calls the tune, gets stuck with the piper’s bill.