Townhall.com | Matt Barber | August 2, 2007
Jesus said, “But from the beginning of the creation, God ‘made them male and female. For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’; so then they are no longer two, but one flesh.” (Mark 10: 6-8, NKJV)
Virginia resident Lisa Miller – now a born-again Christian – and her beautiful five-year-old daughter Isabella find themselves immersed in a nightmarish custody battle. But this battle is unlike most others. The person trying to take Isabella away from her mother is entirely unrelated to the little girl and is essentially a total stranger. She’s lesbian Janet Jenkins, a woman with whom Lisa had at one time been homosexually involved.
By her own account, emotional problems brought on by a series of events — including abandonment by her father, abuse by her mentally ill mother and a decade long struggle with alcoholism now overcome — eventually led Lisa Miller into the lesbian lifestyle. In 1999, Lisa began a homosexual relationship with Jenkins after coming out of a legitimate marriage that ended in divorce.
In 2000, soon after Vermont became the first state to legalize homosexual “civil unions,” Miller and Jenkins made a weekend trek from Virginia to Vermont to enter into such a “union.” They then headed back to Virginia where they lived together.
In 2001, Lisa was artificially inseminated after the two decided to raise a child in an unnatural, deliberately fatherless home environment as self-deluded “wife” and “wife” — mother and “mother.”
In August of 2002, Miller and little Isabella, now just a few months old, moved to Vermont with Jenkins. However, things were unstable, and according to Lisa Miller, Jenkins was physically and emotionally abusive. “It was a troubled relationship from the beginning,” Lisa told World Magazine in a recent interview. “The relationship did not improve, as Jenkins — working as a nightshift security guard — grew increasingly bitter and controlling,” reported World.
About a year later, when Isabella was less than a year and a half old, Lisa ended her lesbian relationship, took her daughter back home to Virginia and filed for dissolution of her homosexual “civil union” back in Vermont.
And that’s when the nightmare really began.
Although Jenkins had no parental connection to Isabella (she was neither an adoptive parent, nor biologically related) she filed papers in Vermont in 2003 to try to take Isabella from her mother. Even though the child was conceived, born and living in Virginia, the Vermont court nonetheless held that it had jurisdiction. The legal battle has continued since that time, and incredibly, the court recently ruled that Jenkins possessed parental rights over Lisa’s daughter. It granted Jenkins regular and very liberal visitation. Isabella is now required to make the several hundred mile roundtrip journey from Virginia to Vermont every other week to visit a total stranger (Jenkins) who, according to reports, outrageously forces the confused and traumatized little girl to call her “momma.”
Rena M. Lindevaldsen, who is an attorney with Liberty Counsel and is representing Lisa and Isabella Miller, explains, “After Lisa ended her relationship with Janet, when Isabella was only 17 months old, Lisa became a born-again Christian. For the past three years, she has attempted to raise her child according to Biblical principles. According to recent filings by Janet, however, Janet believes that Lisa’s religious beliefs render Lisa incapable of properly parenting Isabella. As the fit, biological parent of Isabella, it is Lisa, not Janet, who has the fundamental right to decide how to raise her child and with whom she visits. Shockingly, when the Vermont courts declared Janet, a woman who is still actively involved in the homosexual lifestyle, to be Isabella’s parent and set a liberal schedule for visitation between Janet and five-year-old Isabella, the court did not even address Lisa’s fundamental parental rights.”
. . . more
Fr. Hans writes: “How can you make this assertion absent long term data? All we have are assumptions, much of it grounded in experience and common sense.”
We have research data going back at least as far as the 80s, in addition to the many more recent studies.
Question: if the “long term data” — however you define that — were to show that children reared by same-sex couples did just as well as children reared by heterosexual couples, would you then not be opposed to same-sex parenting? This is a simple question that should be easy to answer.
Fr. Hans: “Your assumption is that I will ignore the data.”
If the data support the other side of the issue, will you? I don’t know if you will. That’s why Phil and I keep asking. Again, this should be a simple question.
Fr. Hans: “My assumption is that the data will conform to long term experience, i.e.: redefining family will have seriously negative effects on children.”
Why haven’t we seen that yet? There are adults walking around today who were reared by same-sex couples. Studies show that their mental health, their likelihood of being homosexual or heterosexual, their educational attainments, their emotional health, etc., is no different from people who grew up with heterosexual parents.
This Is for christopher on #43
Christopher you busted yourself out with the term “supervised”
You are making an assumption that those gay men would try and push their beliefs on to those two boys. Even if gay people are being altruistic in adopting, then so what we as humans are naturally altruistic nobody does anything without something in return and thats fine, but the fact that you say they should be supervised shows that you want to control the situation. What if the government told you they wanted to supervise your family, because they feel that your means of parenting are incorrect wouldnt that just totally feel awful.
I think those two gay men are being very thoughtful, and honestly if i was them and being treated like most gay people are i would say “Piss on this world it has done nothing but hurt me and cast me aside”, but you know what despite all the hate that has been passed towards them they still try to be good faithful people in this world, and help others, and you want to superivse them i think that is awful that you would even consider that.
I do support idealism about love, but at least that idealism includes everyone and doesnt take away from anyone, except those who wish to destroy and hurt people you know: Rapist, Murderers, Warlords, people who torture others for personal gain, etc.
People express that gay people cannot possibly love, but if you make that comment then at some point you would had to have been or are still A homosexual, otherwise you lack the knowledge to say they do not love. Don’t answer peoples hearts for them you should answer your own, and let others do the same.
I admit that everyone on this blog has good points and everyone on here has a good amount of intelligence, however their is a lacking of compassion and understanding that some scenarios are going to differ than the normal ones, and in the end things will come out alright as it is willed by the all powerful god (this means that you are not god so quit acting you are god)
This whole blog is almost 50/50 opposition and that is how this country tends to be, and i doubt it will ever change. Half of us think that homosexuals should be given adoption rights provided they pass the normal adoption screening (can provide a home, No Drugs, obviously if the person has a record of Rape then no way, etc.), and then the others want to keep adoption only if its a male and female residence, regardless if their is a lack of adoption and kids are being tossed around like dirty gym shorts in foster homes.
Can’t we all agree that these poor adopted kids are already partially screwed up, and as long as they get a chance to have home to eat and a school to go to, and become who they are to become not what some Homosexuals or Heterosexuals want them to be.
This whole blog was to focus on the childs sake with these two lesbians, but we are so wrapped in other stuff, that the child doesnt even exist anymore (this is typical in most religious arguments they always float away from the real issue).
this who thing has been a big False Dilemma
an adopted kids has few choices:
A. Stay In Foster Care
B. If lucky be adopted by a traditional family that wants one because they cannot produce one of their own.
C. Be adopted by a homosexual couple who cannot have kids and wants the same opportunity as traditional families to provide and give a poor abandoned child hope.
D. Argue about what the child should have and meanwhile the child rots in a foster care scenario
Can’t every agree that both B & C are better than A & D, so this where compromising comes into play their are not enough traditional families to adopt the kids, so now that the government has given gay people some rights to adopt they are eager to mimic traditional families and provide pretty much the same setup as a traditional (except with more freedom to become ones own).
Lets all argue til hell freezes over meanwhile the kids suffer for own inability to work together as humans not social and culture standardization of whats right and wrong, because in the end their is no right and wrong with this type of stuff, otherwise it would have been solved by now.
Note 52:
You are making an assumption that those gay men would try and push their beliefs on to those two boys.
Of course they would. They, by the very act of asking for an “adoption”, are “pushing their beliefs” about what it means to be a family, what it means to raise children, etc. They are “homosexualists”, or “homosexual activists”.
In other words, taking something we talked about on the other thread, they are not hypocrites. They are principled homosexualists, in that they believe not only is their nothing wrong with homosexual acts, lifestyle, behavior, but that the rest of society ought to implicitly recognize this – that we ought to call them a “family” and that they should be allowed the normal fruits of a family (in this case through adoption because they of course can not produce a child on their own).
but the fact that you say they should be supervised shows that you want to control the situation.
Of course – I don’t want their philosophy recognized, as I believe it to be a moral degradation (i.e. not “loving”). I don’t want their philosophy taught to children.
What if the government told you they wanted to supervise your family, because they feel that your means of parenting are incorrect wouldnt that just totally feel awful.
Implicit in your question is the idea that two homosexualist together constitute a “family”. They do not. The government, society, does recognize my family already (a union between a man and a women). It also “supervises” it at a minimal level, as I have to treat my children a certain way (provide for their health and education, not leave them in the car on a summer day, etc.).
Can’t every agree that both B & C are better than A & D
No. In my parish, there are two families who are foster families. These families are great families – better than a two homosexualist activists “adopting”. I know the foster system needs work, but two wrongs don’t make a right…
Note 51. Jim asks:
Of course, just as I hope you would. But let’s be clear here. Data is manipulatable and thus has to be examined and verified closely. For example, you are already appealing to data to justify homosexual marriage (and by extension the redefinition of family and parenthood) in exactly the same way that single motherhood was defended. Remember Murphy Brown? That wasn’t that long ago and Dan Quayle was excoriated from the comments. Turns out he was right.
Further, let’s also be clear that the reason the question is posed is not in service to science, but polemics. Both you and Phil have an aversion to discussion the moral and cultural dimensions of this debate preferring instead anecdotes and recourse to dubious notions of legal rights. You don’t seem to have any answers for the social destructiveness of other cultural experimentation.
Well Jacobse social destructiveness is occuring with or without Homosexuals. The biggest issue with the downward slope of everything is the fact that their are more than 16 religions and they are all competing with each other its like businesses, but only these businesses play on faith (Most humans weakness).
I think the whole homosexual thing is a diversion away from the real problem at hand. I am 22 year old Male and in my short years i see this world falling apart quicker than lindsay Lohan, and i can tell you from experience and wherever the truth lies is that Homosexuality is but a small cause of the whole crumbling apple cobbler.
We all want to correct this world, but in order to do so we all must look at the big picture.
The muslims are a perfect example of what will happen with organized religion if people don’t open their eyes. Say a christian girl slept and wanted to marry a Catholic male do you know what would happen to her if it was a muslim setup?? She would be stoned to death, so im sorry if i have trouble believing that people of the same sex wanted to love each other & do their private business behind closed doors, and at least be acknowledged equal rights would be the cause of all the worlds problems (Shrugs).
Maybe i am not looking at the big picture, but i really think alot of us have our priorities mixed up here.
Morality is different with each person, so i struggle to bring morality into certains things, because i don’t think its immorale for gay people to have rights, but others do, and some people think that killing someone is okay, whereas others don’t, which leads me to believe that morality is a individual thing and it differs with everybody, so its hard to make a collective decision based on morality. I look at the intention of the person, and most gay peoples intention from what i have gathered is to not be outcasted by the world by means of trying to fit in with everyone else in fact try to be like everyone else, but if they cannot do that they are going to continue to be the way they are (Promiscious, discrete sex, drug use, depression, the whole sorts) these are signs of someone who struggles with things, so they resort to pleasures that are dangerous.
I don’t expect any of you to agree with me, but i hope that you see that i am not defending any particular person, but rather making this “chessboard” fair without any missing pieces, so that we can all collectively make an assumption what is the right step.
“You don’t seem to have any answers for the social destructiveness of other cultural experimentation.”
I take issue with the level of overgeneralizations about large movements within the culture. Take for instance the issue of women in the workforce which was, to some degree, a “cultural experiment” in the sense that at one point, it was not the norm. In some cases, it works well. In other cases it doesn’t. Factors such as the age of the children, the amount of work and the type of work involved all come into play. Perhaps you can argue that society would be better off had women just consented to never work at all (or perhaps never been permitted?), but I’m uncertain that is the case and there’s not much that can be done about it now, anyhow. The change is here to stay.
However, what this has not signified is a continuing downward spiral that many probably suggested would occur once women became more visible in the workforce. Families have adjusted to allow for both parents to share the amount and kind of responsibilities, companies have expanded their maternity policies (sometimes even extending it to the husband), etc. Additionally, while women keeping jobs may have reduced the necessity of women finding a spouse earlier in life, it has not radically reduced the incidence of marriage altogether. There are many women who marry now for reasons having nothing to do with financial dependence. This is not a bad thing.
Certainly, we need to be attentive to the negative effects that may arise from subtle shifts within the culture and do what we can to alleviate them, but it seems we’re saying that nothing should ever change.
Jacobse,
It seems prudent to clarify a few things. You write:
…when I asked what social experiments I had championed. So, when you wrote
What you really meant was “we’ve tried homosexual marriage before with dismal results?” That seems an odd statement for you to make; perhaps you misspoke?
When you write
…I think I’ve been very explicit in providing a rationale for same-sex marriage that does not include polygamists, adult/child relationships, etc. It’s in previous threads on Orthodoxy Today, and I can give you a link if you need it. But what I really expect you’re doing here is what I’ve accused you of in my most recent post–ignoring what I have actually said and instead focusing on broad cultural themes that have nothing to do with the specific argument being made.
You’re parroting right-wing talking points here, and while you may feel that other same-sex marriage proponents provide a rationale for SSM that may lead to pedophile marriages, it’s categorically untrue that I have.
Again, my reason for wanting to avoid debating SSM is not that I don’t think it’s valuable; there’s just something else I think is valuable to discuss right now. If you don’t want to talk about it, say so, but don’t create straw men so that you can pretend you’re responding to me.
I will restate my thesis:
Whether same-sex parenting has any validity or not, the style of argument that you have employed earlier in this thread is deceitful.
As you can see, I’m not conflating the argument to one or two points; I’m arguing about something else entirely.
Perhaps this explains why we’re experiencing confusion in this discussion. I’m not attacking you, I’m attacking your methodology. I don’t assume that you will ignore the data; I assume that you have already determined that the data will be irrelevant if it doesn’t support the position that you already believe. It’s not quite the same thing.
For analogy, if I made some weak Scripture-based argument along the lines of “Christ said to love your neighbor as yourself, and therefore you should not do XXXX,” you might respond with a carefully-chosen quotation from Christ. And that would be an exercise in futility, because I never really believed that Christ’s words provided evidence for my belief. I’d just be playing with you, pretending that I believed the Scriptural evidence that I was presenting.
I’m honest and up-front about this: as a non-Christian, there isn’t a quotation from Christ that will change my mind about a social issue. Here’s what I propose about your argument style: As a devout, non-materialist Orthodox Christian, there isn’t a shred of evidence that will change your mind about this particular social issue.
If that were not the case, then you would be able to present a hypothetical example of evidence that might change your mind. Remember, I’m not talking about same-sex marriage here, I’m talking about argumentation and methodology. If you think of a hypothetical example, it wouldn’t disprove all of your points about SSM, it would be hypothetical. I submit that the reason that you refuse to do this is because you perceive that it would be tacit acknowledgment that you’ve been deceitful all along.
I can conceive hypothetical data/evidence that would cause me to rethink my views on same-sex marriage. (Sure, I think it unlikely that the examples I come up with would ever happen, but if they did, I’d be forced to rethink my views.) I cannot conceive hypothetical Scriptural quotations that would cause me to rethink my views on same-sex marriage. I have already determined that they have zero relevance to my understanding of this issue, just as I’m suggesting you’ve already determined that all empirical data has zero relevance to the issue. I’m being upfront about it; you’re just insisting on arguing about something else instead of admitting point-blank whether my suggestion is true or not.
You also write
I didn’t challenge it because challenging your assertion would lead you to, yet again, discussing something other than the point I’ve been trying to make. My point is that if homosexual relationships were not unstable, that would be irrelevant to you. As such, it’s a red herring in this debate. If my point is wrong, then say so, and provide some examples (even if they’re hypothetical.)
this is for christopher on #53,
Im sorry to say but by the words you use i don’t think you get out much and see this world as it is. You say their loving is moral degradation not loving, but how can you make such an assumption are you a mind reader, because if you are you really ought to get award for that.
I could care less about your love for your wife, and i dont question wether or not you have cheated on your wife, because you dont really love her, so therefore you do not have the power to assumes peoples feelings for one another i mean if they both sane parties both love each other then it must be real enough. Are people who suffer from dementia or alzheimers disease do they not love? since they cannot remember that they loved someone doesn’t mean they are incapable.
You have very imperialistic views Christopher by that i mean you think you know what people ought to want or feel, however since you are no god by any means i think you are talking out of muddy water.
Its too bad you don’t wake up one day and realize that you are in love with another male, and then stuck in that morale perdicament as to wether or not what you feel is real or not, and then have someone tell you what you should feel (Manipulation).
If someone were to tell me that they love someone of the same sex i may not agree with that, but at doesnt mean i know whether they are sincere in their feelings.
I hope nobody is buying christophers way of handling things, because handling things well would be to help someone out i mean maybe its a phase maybe, but your not going fix that by trying to force them.
Remember when i mentioned Hitlers name …. Yes Adolf Hitler he was imperialistic by means that he convinced the germans that they hated the Jews, and as a result more than 6 million deaths, and his ultimate goal was to control the whole world with the perfect race of people.
these are extremes yes i agree, however extremes gotta start somewhere…
Oh for those who don’t know what imperialism means it is derived from the latin term Imperio totalus it means to control/Manipulate totally. Imerpialism today means something a bit different but ultimately it means to control.
Michael, you write
I’m aware that in debate, most people present evidence that they believe supports their views.
What I’m criticizing in this thread is the act of presenting evidence as if it supports your views when in fact it was entirely irrelevant to your views. It’s not quite the same thing.
I agree that lots of people do it. For example, lots of atheists will happily debate about small biblical details when the truth is, not a word of the bible makes any difference to them. They pretend that there is “evidence” in the bible that contradicts the creation story, or the Resurrection, when in fact, they’ve already ruled out biblical evidence entirely as a valid category of data. They’re posturing so they can get a rise out of the faithful.
There’s a difference between ignoring evidence and discounting evidence that one believes is invalid.
Here’s a hypothetical example:
Let’s say I am a college admissions officer, and I interview two students, one of whom (Student A) I find charming and one of whom (Student B) is a social misfit. If I say on Tuesday that I’m going to accept Student A because of her high SAT scores, and reject Student B because hers are low, then I’m presenting empirical evidence as if it mattered.
If, the next day, one of my colleagues shows me the two students’ SAT scores, and Student A’s are abysmal while Student B’s are stellar, then I must either change my decision about who to accept into the college, or admit that I was lying when I said the SAT scores were the reason for my decision. The point at which I was lying was on Tuesday, before the new data even presented itself, and if it turned out that the test scores were indeed as I had predicted, it doesn’t change the fact that my statement was a lie: I was pretending that I believed the decision should be based on a factor that I, in truth, believed was wholly irrelevant.
Here’s a non-hypothetical example:
Jacobse says that homosexual couples are especially prone to breaking up and more prone to domestic abuse than straight couples. He cites this as evidence that children should not be placed in gay homes. I suggest that if, tomorrow, ten thousand studies conclude that gay couples are not more unstable than straight couples, and another ten thousand studies show that gay couples have identical domestic abuse rates to heterosexuals, Jacobse will not say “meal culpa” and change his mind based on the new evidence.
Thus, even if no new studies come out, even if the evidence doesn’t change, Jacobse is still being deceitful by pretending that the evidence matters today, when he (and probably everyone who has ever debated an important social issue with him) knows that no contradictory evidence would matter tomorrow.
Here’s a non-hypothetical example:
I believe that kids raised by committed gay couples probably have pretty decent childhoods and grow up to be stable members of society at a rate similar to kids raised by committed heterosexual couples. If valid studies came out tomorrow that indicated that kids raised by gay couples had astronomically higher suicide rates than other kids, I’d genuinely question my position.
Sure, I’d question the methodology of the study, I’d want to find out what research biases there were, I’d look to experts I trust to help me analyze the data. All of that is normal human behavior. But empirical evidence has an influence on me, which is why I occasionally use it to support my arguments. I don’t use it to lie or pretend.
Note 58:
You say their loving is moral degradation not loving, but how can you make such an assumption are you a mind reader, because if you are you really ought to get award for that.
Because love, or charity, is more than a subjective feeling. Love is objective, while it has subjective components.
When I was a teenager, I “loved” a girl – or so I thought. Turns out I simply had a strong emotional and sexual attraction. It was not love at all. Today, I love my wife. The strong emotional and sexual attraction is a part of this, but this love is many other things besides that.
These homosexualists, they might really believe they “love” these children, and in certain subjective, and even material senses they do. However, the real harm caused by their objective ordering of the moral/sexual lives points in the opposite direction.
I do not believe it is in anyone’s interest to redefine family in this way.
Its too bad you don’t wake up one day and realize that you are in love with another male, and then stuck in that morale perdicament as to wether or not what you feel is real or not, and then have someone tell you what you should feel (Manipulation).
Today, someone cut me off in traffic. I was angry, quite angry. I “felt” very strongly about it, that I should ram this person off the road, and if that did not kill them, pull them out of the car and choke the life out of them (I am a competitive Jiu-Jitsu player and really could carry this out if I allowed myself ;).
Clearly, morality, living in a society, is something more than a “feeling”. These homosexulists, they are capable of real love (as anyone is, as we are all made in His Image and Likeness). This love however will have an objective component. One of the fruits of this love however, will NOT be redefining the family, or “adopting” (thus implicitly redefining the family) because that is not love – that is acting on strong emotions. An emotion, and feeling, Eros, it is not it’s own justification.
Imerpialism today means something a bit different but ultimately it means to control.
All societies “control”, in that they encourage some types of behavior, and discourage others. Lawless societies are the last place anyone wants to be. All societies have a “transcendent source” or inspiration for which they label some things “bad”, and thus set up controls.
Our society has a long history of recognizing family as one thing, and not another. Christianity, from the very beginning, did NOT recognize the homosexual behavior that was rampant, and even encouraged, in the ancient world. This is not a new debate.
Christianly speaking, two homosexualists is not a “family”. Indeed, most cultures throughout time have come to this conclusion, even while some indulged in it. I see no reason to redefine “love”, and “family”, to include strong homosexual feelings.
Finally, have you ever read Scott Peck’s “The Road Less Traveled”?? Let me suggest it to you – he takes on the question of “love”, and what it means directly…
Note 57. Phil writes:
No. I meant what I said. Single parenthood was touted with the same arguments you use to defend homosexual marriage. The results are dismal. Frankly, the assertion that homosexuals can replicate a healthy marriage shared between a man and a woman can only come from someone who 1) is not married, and 2) has no children. Does that describe you?
No you haven’t. The only reason you provide to justify two person homosexual marriage is that since marriage is defined as only two people, we will keep it to two homosexuals. The problem is that you are appealing to a moral tradition that at the same time disallows the moral legitimacy of homosexual relations. Your appeal, IOW, is not valid.
Further, your rationale for the moral sanction of homosexual marriage is based on a legal argument. Again, the problem here is that your rational can just as easily justify polgamy, adult-child marriage, brother-sister marrage, the whole nine yards. You have never resolved this in an satisfactory way.
Let me make it crystal clear. You cannot invoke the authority of the same moral tradition you otherwise dismiss. You don’t get to pick and choose.
Phil, please. Marriage and family are related. This is self-evident. It is also true of the activist homosexual cultural agenda. We should not close our eyes to the obvious.
Drop the pretense Phil. You believe homosexual relationships are moral. I don’t. I don’t believe you will ever marshall the data to prove homosexual relationships are stable because homosexuality is essentially an internal instability.
You sense this which is why you are trying to cast the argument into personal terms. In fact, you already know that my point about the inherent instability of homosexual relationships is correct. You also know that homosexual promiscuity is a huge problem. It’s the sting that is driving the personal attack.
Be that as it may, I am not willing (as are most Americans) to let homosexual activists such as yourself launch social experiments in order to try and normalize homosexual behavior. Sorry to put it so bluntly, but it is clear you are committed to the agenda and won’t be detered. So be it.
“I don’t believe you will ever marshall the data” may be a true statement, but it’s misleading. You refuse to even acknowledge that hypothetical data could come into existence that would prove homosexual relationships are stable. So “marshalling the data” is irrelevant to your actual point.
I’m not asking you to say it’s likely. I’m just asking you to acknowledge that either A) hypothetical future data, that you don’t actually believe will ever happen, COULD provide support for homosexual marriage or B) Your beliefs about homosexual marriage cannot change due to statistics, data, studies, etc., because they were never dependent on them in the first place.
Which is it? A or B?
I’m not attacking you, I’m attacking your position. Why are you trying to draw me into a debate about culture and same-sex marriage and parenting when you’re not really debating–you’re pretending that evidence is important in shaping views on the subject.
“I don’t believe you will ever marshall the data” may be a true statement, but it’s misleading. You’ve been refusing to even acknowledge that hypothetical data could come into existence that would prove homosexual relationships are stable. So “marshalling the data” is irrelevant to your actual point.
I’m not asking you to say it’s likely. I’m just asking you to acknowledge that either A) hypothetical future data, that you don’t actually believe will ever happen, COULD provide support for homosexual marriage or B) Your beliefs about homosexual marriage cannot change due to statistics, data, studies, etc., because they were never dependent on them in the first place.
Which is it? A or B?
I’m not attacking you, I’m attacking your position. Why are you trying to draw me into a debate about culture and same-sex marriage and parenting when you’re not really debating–you’re only pretending that evidence is important in shaping views on the subject.
Phil, to expand a little on Fr. Han’s thought. IMO to really support the homosexual agenda of normality requires one to believe that human beings are defined by their sexual desires. These desires are obviously polymorphous. Unless you take the ridiculous position that ONLY homosexual conduct between to consenting adults is moral, there is no ground for disallowing any type of sexual behavior.
I made the comment in another thead several weeks ago that it was obvious that you had no understanding of what moral are. Let me expand on that a little: morals are not a simply a list of actions or principals that allow folks to interact with less harm to each other, adjustable as required by whim and fancy. Morals are statements of anthropological and cosmological principal that describe the best way to behave within a certain cosmology and anthropology. When Christianity declares homosexuality is a sin, it does so on a the foundation of a particular understanding of our nature as human beings that links us to God and to a specific place in the spiritual/phenomenal creation. Homosexuality violates the Christian understanding of how we are created to be and what we are called to do. Every sin has the same general effect and each sin damages our communion with God (some more than others). It is not just that hetrosexuality is “good” and homosexuality is “bad”. The Orthodox understanding of human sexuality in general is far deeper than that and presents us with a challenging vision that is at odds with the way our culture looks at sex period even within marriage.
As Fr. Hans points out folks like you want to have your cake and eat it too by riding on the coat-tails of Christian anthropology in legalistic fashion where it is amenable to your own desires while rejecting the entire substance of Christian morality.
One of the primary reasons I frequent this place is in the hope that I can gain some understanding of how best to address our culture and the diverse people in it from a traditional Christian perspective. Frequently those who do not share that perspective have their hackles go up immediately and come charging in with defensive guns blazing. In part because I simply don’t do a very good job.
One last thought: IMO it is impossible to be non-Christian because you are a human being and Christ took on human nature when He Incarnated. Whether you like it or not, recognize it or not, His call to the very heart of your being is there because of His Incarnaton. Because we have free will, we can act in un-Christian ways and think un-Christian thoughts, even ignore His call altogether if we work really hard, but there is no human being who is outside of Christ (non-Christian).
Note 63. Phil writes:
Did you miss note 54?
Fr. Hans: “Your assumption is that I will ignore the data.”
Jim Homan: “If the data support the other side of the issue, will you?”
Fr. Hans: “Of course, just as I hope you would.”
…I guess I’m scratching my head here.
But if your “Of course” really meant, “No, I would not ignore the data,” can you provide a hypothetical example of data that would cause you to change your mind? I’d gladly do the same (and have, see previous posts.)
What’s unclear? Of course means yes.
Michael writes: “One of the primary reasons I frequent this place is in the hope that I can gain some understanding of how best to address our culture and the diverse people in it from a traditional Christian perspective.”
As an “outsider” let me give you my take on things. The Orthodox view of sex and relationships and the morality thereof makes perfect sense to me within the context of Orthodoxy. In other words, if an Orthodox Christian refrains from certain practices because he believes them to be immoral, more power to him. If a potential convert to Orthodoxy, homosexual or heterosexual, wishes to take upon himself the various moral and other disciplines of the church, I have no issue with that.
The problem is when you try to take that understanding out into the larger world, that simply does not have the “deeper understanding and vision” that exists within the Orthodox church. That doesn’t mean that Orthodox believers can’t “preach” their moral vision to others. It just means that the preaching happens by example, and the focus is on the vision, not the sin.
This is an example of what I meant earlier by Christians being perceived as negative rather than positive. It’s one thing to say “I oppose homosexuality, homosexual relations are immoral, homosexual relationships are unstable,” and so on. It’s quite another thing to say “we have a profound vision of morality rooted in a two thousand year old tradition, in which sex, love, and humanity are understood in the total context of creation and the mystery of divine love. Let us explore this tradition together, and perhaps you also will come to understand the beauty and power of a life in Christ.”
The book of Proverbs says that “where there is no vision, the people perish.” The vision is primary. If people grasp the vision, you won’t have to preach against homosexuality. If they don’t have the vision, preaching against homosexuality, however well-intentioned, just comes across as mean-spirited. It just depends on what battle you want to fight: the battle against homosexuality, or the battle for the soul.
I’m not Orthodox, but I’ve read books on Orthodoxy, and I have to tell you that there are things within Orthodoxy that are very beautiful and compelling. That’s your citadel, the base of your power. But when Orthodox folks try to make philosophical and social arguments against this or that immoral thing, in effect they leave the citadel and end up throwing rocks at people. The goal should be to bring people into the citadel, not to yell at them for how they live their lives outside of the citadel. In my humble opinion.
Note 67–
I think I see the problem.
I interpreted that exchange as, you saying Jim thinks you’d ignore the data, and then Jim asking, if the data support the other side of the issue, will you? As in, will you ignore the data?
So I read your of course as “Of course. Yes, I will ignore the data.”
…from your response, it seems like you meant to say, “Of course I will support the other side of the issue.”
But that’s great! I’m impressed. You’re saying if data support gay parenting, then so will you. If real data showed me that gay parenting was inherently harmful to kids, my views might change too.
Now, we might differ on how to analyze data. For example, can we both admit that studies that show the ill effects of single motherhood and single fatherhood on children are not really valid in predicting the effects of gay parenting? For gosh sakes, we’re talking about double motherhood. So, while I might suggest that double motherhood might be comparable to heterosexual parenting (perhaps with a few unexpected benefits), you are free to argue that there isn’t enough data about double motherhood, or that the data is incomplete, or that you find the existing data unpersuasive. All of those might be reasonable positions to take. But suggesting that statistics about single motherhood can simply be applied to double motherhood is unreasonable.
Lots of studies have shown that obese parents are more likely to have obese children. Additionally, obesity is a leading cause of health problems in this country, up to and including early death. If we’re talking about “social experiments,” that is a social experiment that failed. The data is overwhelming: obese people are hugely more likely (no pun intended) to have obese children, and obesity has terrible health effects. So, given the conclusive data in this area of family populations, would I be justified in attempting to render obese-marriages illegal?
I’d be making exactly the same argument that you do when you say that gay marriage is bad for children. The only difference is that my point would be supported by reams of unquestioned research, while the research to support your point is still a little shady. My proposal need not be as extreme as yours: I could just propose that state governments require obese persons to lose weight before marrying.
Now, since I’m making exactly the same argument that you do, would you agree with such a proposal? Why or why not?
Wow i must say that this whole blog is being drawn out, and thank god that todays youths do not have the patience to go the distance like this.
This is a silly debate that will never end, and i think we all should pull away from the computers and go outside and enjoy Nature, and not worry about this whole thing its ridicoulous.
We can all argue about who is right and wrong til we are blue in the face, and in the end it still won’t solve anything except how much time one can waste of their precious life sitting around arguing about things that are going to happen regardless.
Their was something on tv last night about the human rights campaign, and you know what its growing stronger and stronger despite what heavily religious people have to say, because todays youths are caring less and caring less about religion, because religion itself has became so obscured from its original intent that most youth find it unappealing.
Yes i may sound a like a hippie, but at least hippies know how to forgive and learn, and not want to snap someones neck, because they were cut off by some jujitsu christan warrior that snaps infidels necks.
Im laughing right now because people my age and below think this whole thing is hilarious, and a crock of crap “look at those poor old people trying too desperately to cling on to old ways” that is what most of youngs ones are saying, and guess what we will eventually take over once all the older people pass away.
This is like the movie village of the damned, minus the fact that us youngins aren’t possessed by Satan, but possessed by a refresh view on religion, not this baudy old stuff that reeks of mustiness.
I’ve Shown this blog to some people and we all have some good laughs at how old fashion alot of you guys on here are.
So you all know we will be taking over soon, and paying your social security, so you oughta be a little more understanding of how the younger are going to run things :0)
Phil writes:
Phil, you try so hard to portray homosexuality as merely a personality quirk, no different than left-handedness, or in this case obesity.
I’ve told you before that you tend to reduce questions that have all sorts of cultural ramifications to one or two points as if all the ramifications should be reduced to those one or two points. Here you argue about the responsible use of data to argue -what? — since no long term data about homosexual “families” exist, we should launch the experiment until data comes in?
Well, sorry, but again an absence of data is not a sufficient reason to overhaul marriage and family. The reason there is no data is because society (most human societies, BTW) has always deemed homosexual coupling as disordered thereby precluding the establishment of a homosexual “family”. These decisions are made by looking at broader questions about the nature of homosexuality, the nature of family, what is best for raising children, — in short the larger cultural questions that you want reduced to points about absence of data, left-handedness, obesity, or others that continuously skirt the larger questions.
Frankly, I don’t believe many homosexuals want to set up house anyway. I don’t think many want to get “married”. This notion of the domestication of the homosexual has never been part of homosexual theory until the last twenty years or so. I think it’s primarilly polemical. I think the nature of the lifestyle largely precludes it.
But what’s the problem? Homosexuality is biologically closed to new life, so just live that way. No one is stopping you. But don’t ask for an overhaul of cultural mores just because it is.
Brent, my 20 year old son would agree with you on one point: the endless debate on unsolvable issues. He has no patience with that either. Some of it is just plain arrogance and stubborness but not all. A lot of it is practice and a desire to communicate what we find valuable.
My son would emphatically disagree with you about faith however for the simple reason that he has experienced too much of its reality. He knows Jesus Christ is real. He has an experiential understanding of a lot of the theology of the Church that I still stuggle with. For him the Church is the foundation for what he wants to do and how he wants to grow as a man. Believe me, if he had not had the experience, he certainly would not take my word for it. He challenges me all the time and I am better for it.
Just some points to think about:
1. Ideas have consequences because people act on ideas, we don’t just think about them.
2. Many people come to the Church only after experiencing pain and suffering in their lives. In recent years there have been a significant number of young punkers and street youths who have come to the Church because they see and experience the hardness of worldly life which you, apparently have not yet(thank God). They want something better, they want to be healed.
3. Life in the Orthodox Church is about union with Christ, that is it. In the 2000 year tradition of the Church much has been discovered about the actions and attitudes necessary to grow in that union, to be healed of the pain and scars which we carry because of our lack of unity.
4. If you are like most people at age 20 you are largely oriented outward, there is so much to do, to discover, to experience “out there”. That’s great, but there is likely to be a question that comes up frequently unanswerable by what is “out there”. Who am I really? My Christian journey began when I was 20 because I was asking that question.
5. Morality, if it has not degenerated into legalistic moralism, is founded upon a realization of what is best in human beings. Morals are a standard by which we and others may judge the quality of our life. Since human nature does not change, real morals should not either. Just because something is old, does not make it “old fashioned”. The morality taught be the Church (and hopefully demonstrated by those in the Church) if founded upon the way God fashions us.
6. Often our personal desires are not in accord with the way God fashioned us. Following those desires is therefore self-destructive (sinful).
So I wish you well on your journey through life; may it be fruitful and fulfilling for you.
Oh, BTW, homosexuality is a painful burden. I have known a number of homosexuals over the years and seen the pain. Most of the pain is not the result of societal rejection. Societal acceptance will not lessen that pain and for some it may even deepen it. We are more than our genitals and our desires.
Morals are a standard by which we and others may judge the quality of OUR life.
Brent, I would add to what Michael has said in his post, that Orthodox Christians look to the measuring rod of Christian morals to gauge how “real” they are as human creatures. It is believed and taught in the Church that humanity “fell” into a condition that is lower than the beasts. Christian moral standards are reflective of OC belief that human creatures are made in “the image and likeness of God”. Respecting OC morality means realizing that giving in to bodily desires (“passions”) is to live like beasts that relate to the world “sensually”. When humans act like sensual beasts, they are worse off than beasts, because as humans they have forsaken their calling, their inheritance, traded it for say … a car, clothing, fame, fortune, etc. OCs believe humanity is capable of more than sensual existence and are not truly happy unless such is being achieved.
Failing to value and work at becoming dispassionate, choosing instead to live sensually by the dictates of one’s own passions, might be said to be a case of “mistaken identity”, that is why it is referred to as forsaking Truth for a lie. Identity for Orthodox Christians is with the Divine Image & Likeness that is illustrated by the God-man Jesus the Messiah, in whom humanity is rejoined with Divinity.
Recently, I taught in public ed for 2.5 years and it was quite the experience. American teens are driven by passions. I used a wooden Pinocchio figure to try to communicate to them about asceticism, something which I doubt few if any have every heard growing up in this culture. I’m not sure they have even heard the real story of Pinnochio, only the Disney version. Pinnochio doesn’t tell the whole story of Orthodox Christianity, but you can see it below the surface. Pinnochio desperately wants to become a “real” human (boy), but he is constantly being tempted and falling in with the undisciplined crowd that lives sensually, only for fun, always running after pleasure (hedonism) and away from pain (the discipline of school studies, obeying parents, becoming dispassionate, etc.)
Carlos Collodi wrote Pinnochio before Italy became a nation at a time when it was ruled by a foreign power, the Hapsburgs. He knew that if Italy was to stand any chance for sovereignty, the younger generations would have to develop discipline or they would always be ruled by something foreign to themselves, in the form of their passions or another nation. The only real form of government is self-government. The fact that we are not all capable of it internally is the reason that we must subject ourselves to it externally.
I capitalized OUR in quoting Michael, to stress that this is the belief of the Church. To belong to the ecclesia (literally “assembly; Church) is to join oneself to humanity that is being empowered by God through Christ to “real”-ize the potential for which humanity was created. The Church does not view humanity as individuals but as one “body”, the understanding of which may be as simple as realizing that none of us got here except through the body of someone else who came here the same way before us. We are much more connected than our culture gives credit, or that we may “sensually” be able to experience because to one degree or another we each have some of the “lie” still living in us (often seen as the way we pontificate, or forcefully “declare” our views to one another).
The meaning and purpose of temporal life for Orthodox Christians may best be explained as the “time” given each of us human creatures by our Creator that we need for the pilgrimage back to our Real home where we live in the presence of God. The focus of which is repentance, one’s own more so than anyone else’s. It is said that no one can save another until they first save themselves. Morality is not a “thing” that is applied externally but something that is the manifestation of each human creatures “being” (ontology). Morality is the product (the cart). The horse is one’s relationship with their Creator.
Trust that the motives here are “good”. That said, I will agree with you that the approach and form of the medium may not be the best, especially for conveying the message in a clear and nonconfrontational way. There are many things you’ve said with which I concur, particularly wasting time in blogs which tend to be more of a “sport” than conducive to helping anyone “see” the others point of view. As if language alone is not abstract enough, now we can further abstract our interactions with others by way of the computer screen. I hope that no one will come away from here thinking Orthodoxy to be some abstract, mechanistic, quantitive “thing”, for nothing could be further from the Truth. Orthodox Christianity, which encompasses but is not defined by “morality” is qualitative and experiential, not quantitative and abstract.
Note 70:
Yes i may sound a like a hippie, but at least hippies know how to forgive and learn, and not want to snap someones neck, because they were cut off by some jujitsu christan warrior that snaps infidels necks.
LOL! Funny rhetoric, but you know what I was talking about. You have all sorts of “feelings” everyday, even anger. Hippies were angry about many, many things, because they are human. If you can’t admit your feelings, even “ugly” ones like anger, jealousy, lust – then you are not being honest.
As far as the “old vs. young” think, Plato complained about the same thing! It’s an aspect of society, so sorry, young people turn into old people who have children, get real jobs and real responsibility for others, and find out that these “debates” are quite relevant. You will to…;)
Not exactly. I’m glad that you appear to concede that it’s ridiculous to apply data from studies about single mothers to gay couples, though.
But here are a few true statements from which I’ll draw some conclusions:
1. You, like many SSM opponents, purport to care about “the children” and what potential effect their parents’ relationship will have on them.
2. As a protection to these children, your view is that SSM should be completely illegal.
3. When presented with evidence about other children, such as the children of obese parents, who we already know face serious risks, you don’t propose the same protections.
4. All of the children in these examples are hypothetical; we haven’t been talking about your kids or my kids or a particular child down the block.
5. Since we’ve been talking about hypothetical kids (or future kids), they’re all equal. It’s not like there’s some special child who deserves more protection than others.
So, when presented with exactly the type of data that you say we don’t have about gay parenting, you make a completely different choice in terms of how to solve it. I suggest that the reason for this is because your views are illogical and irrational. You are singling out gay people for second-class status, but you’re only claiming that the needs of children are your reason. You might believe that they are, but then you propose different solutions for the at-risk children of obese people, or for the at-risk children of minorities.
It’s interesting that you criticize me when I compare homosexuality to a changeable personality trait, because you whine just as loud when I compare it to race.
Here’s the truth:
Every couple is an “experiment.” Every single person who raises a child is entering uncertain territory, even if it’s their eighteenth baby. The number of factors that affect that raising of a child are countless.
Children raised in the country experience better air quality than children raised in the city.
Children raised in Vermont will get better public education than kids raised in Mississippi.
Children raised in Muslim families will be exposed to different ideas about God than kids raised Orthodox Christian.
…and so on. Every child has a unique upbringing. You select “gay parents” as a factor that deserves special treatment from the state. I suggest that this selection is, from a social, scientific, and political perspective, arbitrary.
I illustrated that your selection is arbitrary by presenting other categories of couples who present a known risk to their children, and you confirmed my belief by failing to advocate the same government “protections” for their children.
This debate is not about you personally, Jacobse. What matters in the greater scheme of things is that your arguments don’t hold water outside of the Orthodox Christian context.
Phil says:
“I’m glad that you appear to concede that it’s ridiculous to apply data from studies about single mothers to gay couples, though.”
Why would it be “ridiculous”? If “changing” the family one way leads to poor results, if follows that changing it another way would do the same thing. People, children, are not “datum points”. The family as traditionally defined is the organic result of nature, nature’s God, and societies long and hard fought experience. The norm is the norm for good reasons. I know this fly’s in the face of liberalism, which is always trying to deconstruct the norm, but it is true. The family as traditionally constituted is such for many reasons, but one is that is simply works the best. Study after study (and common experience) has shown the benefits of intact, mother and father families. It is a truism that two homosexuality are not true “fathers” or “mothers” – even by their own definitions. This “experiment” is not worth
it…
children of obese parents, who we already know face serious risks, you don’t propose the same protections.
Of course not – fat people are not moral threats to their children, at least not because they are fat.
You are singling out gay people for second-class status, but you’re only claiming that the needs of children are your reason.
Only in your worldview. Family is not a “right”, it is not “free”. It is something that is a responsibility, has rules, and expectations of following these rules. A homosexualist is, by definition, not following those rules. Two men, two women, can not be a family. This does not cause “second class status” any more than my lack talent causes me to not be able to compete with Tiger Woods. I am not “second-class” because I am not in the PGA. This follows even IF homosexuals are such by “fate”, “genes”, whatever.
Every couple is an “experiment.”
Not true. Society knows, by long hard organic knowledge, that family is one thing and not another, that a man and a women is a family, not an “experiment”.
You select “gay parents” as a factor that deserves special treatment from the state. I suggest that this selection is, from a social, scientific, and political perspective, arbitrary.
Not true. Society has come to the knowledge of “family” through the centuries. Your definition of “social” is very very truncated. Your definition of “scientific” is arbitrary, because people are not datum points – they are moral beings, thus the moral HAS to be brought into the equation. Politics flows from the culture, which flows from humanity, and humanity is a religious, moral “phenomenon” first.
What matters in the greater scheme of things is that your arguments don’t hold water outside of the Orthodox Christian context.
Modern amoral, materialistic, nihilistic thought does not hold water outside it’s own context. It posits man as amoral, relative, material pain vs. pleasure machine. Your arguments don’t measure up to what man is, as most any philosophy known to man understands (vast majority of them recognize the moral element in mankind). This is why Fr. Jacobse arguments make sense to most folks, even if they are not Orthodox, or even Christian…
Note 75. Phil writes:
Phil, I must admit you try valiantly to posit homosexuality on the same moral plane as heterosexuality. And by moral here I don’t mean moralistic, I mean the foundational values that shape and direct culture.
Look, your grand design to normalize homosexuality by redefining and reshaping such long-term and enduring structures like a two-parent heterosexual family requires more thought and deliberation than debates about the application of data, the relegation of a defense of the traditional structures to a religious bias, whatever.
The fact is that the traditional family holds water in many places outside of Orthodox Christianity as well. Even some secularists resist the homosexual acculturation, although I agree with your implied premise that secularists abandon the tradition much more readily (they are driven more by utopian dreams than an understanding of history). But it isn’t even limited to Christians. What about Jews? What about Muslims? What about most cultures of the world?
And if you don’t like religion, look at nature. Homosexual relations preclude the creation of family. Why pretend otherwise? Men were not made for men, women were not made for women. Now if you want to have sexual relations with another man, well, that is your decision. But don’t bring children into it in order to pretend it’s really a family. It isn’t and everyone knows it except for yourself and a few others. That’s why initiatives to legalize homosexual marriage fail whenever the issue is given to voters.
You are confused. You argue morality to limit marriage to two people, but then trash it when you reach the barrier against homosexuality. Then you switch into a discourse about civil rights while ignoring the point that your reasoning could apply to any new social arrangement and not just homosexuals. You don’t really want homosexual marriage as much as you want the abolishment of the traditional marriage structure.
Two thoughts:
Obese parents present a physical threat to their children. This is illustrated statistically: the children of obese parents are significantly more likely to be obese, and to die young.
I understand that you don’t view moral and physical threats in the same way, but the discussion about was about “data” and “evidence,” and physical harms are easy to quantify.
The first and most important guardians of a child’s morals are her parents, as Jacobse has argued in other threads. The government shouldn’t be interfering with the moral upbringing of children.
(Incidentally, why is it that only when it comes to gay parents do conservatives pretend that adoptive parents aren’t real parents?)
This is a right-wing talking point. (Of course, that doesn’t automatically make it false.) But it’s misleading. No one is suggesting reshaping two-parent families. In fact, I wholeheartedly support two-parent, heterosexual families. Some of my best friends… (Insert grin here.)
But seriously– what do you actually believe is going to happen to two-parent families when SSM is legal? What has happened to two-parent families in Massachusetts? Did the heterosexual marriage rate go down? Did cannibalism go up? What are you talking about?
You’re right, of course, Jacobse. Gay people are a small minority, and we’re only just beginning to understand them. All kinds of cultural institutions have ignored the rights of minorities throughout history.
Actually, I think some men were made for men, just as some women were made for women. Answer honestly: do you really want your daughter to marry a gay man?
When did I argue morality to limit marriage to two people? You’ve always criticized me for being legalistic, not moralistic. I argue that the practical benefits of marriage are largely nullified in a multiple-person marriage, and that since it’s not a right that is granted to any person in the land, there’s no discrimination issue.
That’s another right-wing talking point. Allowing gays to marry won’t abolish traditional marriage structure any more than allowing blacks to use white folks’ bathrooms “abolished traditional restroom structure.”
Note 79. Phil writes:
Phil, this gets tiresome. Your model of a two person homosexual “marriage” is drawn from a two person heterosexual marriage. Where else can it possibly come from? But the two person heterosexual model draws from a moral vision of the human being. Absent a sophisticated and developed moral vision, the natural path would be polygamy.
So, regardless of what you argue, the fact is that you ride on the coattails of that moral understanding. You get off the boat when that same tradition prohibits homosexuality and switch into a discourse on rights (homosexuals are the new minority — you know the drill) using talking points that every other group that wants to sanction different sexual arrangements always employ.
For example:
There is the civil rights appeal. (Blacks cringe at your usurpation of the terms and concepts, BTW.) And note the conflation (you use this a lot) between between blacks using bathrooms and homosexuals replicating traditional marriage, as if a real relationship exists between the two.
I could substitute all your arguments with the term “polygamist” and it would read exactly the same way. You say that you don’t support polygamy, but your personal views here are largely irrelevant. Didn’t you argue upstream that a benefit of gay marriage is that a child gets two mothers? Well, why not three of four? Why not nine or ten?
What about nature? Does it make any impact on you that homosexuality is biological closed to any natural creation of family?
Sure, it makes exactly the same impact on me as the fact that infertile couples are closed to any natural creation of family. If I was picking folks to put on a spaceship to populate Mars, I’d probably pick the heterosexuals over the gay couples or the infertile couples. Beyond that, I honestly don’t think other people’s gender is my business unless they choose to share it with me.
If you’re going to marry someone, Jacobse, I sense that it would be very important to you whether that person has a penis. If they refuse to tell you, take my advice: don’t marry that person! You shouldn’t marry someone who isn’t comfortable confiding in you.
Now, if we lived on the same street–imagine how awesome trick-or-treating would be on that street!–and a couple moved into the house between us, it would not matter one whit to me if neither member of that couple had a penis. And why should it matter to you?
You claim that your reasons have something to do with natural creation of a family. But that’s not true. You apply a different standard to infertile couples than you do to gay couples.
You claim that your reasons have something to do with an increased statistical likelihood that children will be harmed. But that’s not true. You apply a different standard to obese couples than you do to gay couples.
You claim that your reasons have something to do with the inevitability of polygamy. But that’s not true, either. You don’t oppose just polygamy, you oppose both gay marriage and polygamy.
Actually, I think the urge to pair off is pretty natural. It’s not that human beings don’t crave sex–we do–but we also seem to be very jealous creatures. So finding a person you want to spend your life with is pretty human. Sure, some people might find more than one person, and that group might decide that they want to spend their lives together. I think they should be allowed to.
Maybe you find it odd that I don’t make an argument against polygamy on moral grounds? I don’t really care about polygamy. I happen to think that the reasons to avoid creating a new institution for multiple-partner marriage are practical, not moral. (This is not the same as saying that I think it’s moral. But [whether or not it is moral] is not something I consider a valid reason not to do it. [The fact that it is wholly impractical] does seem to me to be a valid reason.) But if people choose to live in the same house and make love in interesting combinations, that’s not something I concern myself with, unless they ask for my opinion.
But your argument here is ridiculous, Jacobse. We live in the 21st century, in the United States of America. You’re arguing that anyone who wants to change a law, ever, must start from scratch. If I want to lower the speed limit, I must envision a time before cars. It’s silly.
I think I missed your response to my question “But seriously– what do you actually believe is going to happen to two-parent families when SSM is legal?” If you answer with specific examples, I’ll be impressed.
Phil writes:
Man this gets tiresome. I keep having to draw the most elementary distinctions for you.
Look, an infertile couple is an biological anomaly. Yes, some people cannot have children. But this is due to a problem with the body, not the fact that the body is not designed for children. The natural male-female complementarity still exists.
This is not true when you put two men or two women together. Even nature rules out the possibility of family with same sex marriages. Of course people get around this natural limitation, but the end run is unnatural nevertheless. There is no natural complementarity between a couple of the same sex.
Yes, of course. Isn’t this self-evident? My argument is that your reasoning leads not only to the sanctioning of homosexual marriage, but all sorts of new arrangements. The logic is all the same. That’s why I contend you are not arguing for gay marriage as much as you are the abolition of traditional heterosexual marriage. Remember, your intentions are irrelevant here. Intentions can’t hold back the consequences that your ideas might unleash.
If you want to have relations with men, well, that’s up to you. I won’t stop you. The problem is that you want society to sanction it. You want moral parity with heterosexuality to the point that you press for homosexual marriage. Well, the polygamists want parity too. In fact, even some pedophiles want sanction. And all of them make same appeal to civil rights that you do. (You can see why Blacks are fed up with the usurpation of the language.)
If same-sex marriage becomes the law of the land, homosexual activists will demand access to every classroom in America to teach third graders about “anal safe sex” and other homosexual practices. Activists will attempt to inculcate homosexuality into all corners of the culture, especially youth culture.
Don’t think this will happen? Read: Gay Activism in the Schools
Meanwhile, The health risks of gay sex will be suppressed.
Organizations like the Boy Scouts will undergo even greater assault by gay activists. U.S. Supreme Court Ruling that Boy Scouts Can Discriminate is ‘Damaging but Limited,’ ACLU Says
The list goes on.
Homosexual marriage Phil, is not really about marriage but about advancing the gay cultural agenda. Like I said upstream, I doubt that many gays will marry. Even fewer would adopt children if allowed. It’s about normalizing a behavior.
Phil, here is an article you need to read.
Camille Pegalia I’ll take religion over gay culture
Wow, from a self-described atheist lesbian I found this part particularly striking:
(emphasis mine).
Pegalia exemplifies something increasingly difficult (almost impossible actually) to find: an honest liberal, one who does not yield to the pressure to walk lockstep with the activists. You don’t hear that monotone drone, that demand for blind conformity that runs through so much leftist thought like background static on the car radio.
Compare her thinking to Phil’s inability to incorporate any distinctions that challenge his homosexual parity agenda. Phil unfortunately represents the leftist mainstream, as witnessed by the Democrat candidates dutiful obeisance to homosexual activism this week. No one on the left dares challenge it. Its become a litmus test of personal virtue.
This drone of the same specious arguments repeated over and over again, aided and abetted by pygmy politicians and others, is starting to wear thin. I think you are going to see the culture pushing back.
note 85:
I think you are going to see the culture pushing back.
It already has. The MSM has not really realized it yet (though I think their executives are beginning to get it) but people are starting to crave sources in the culture that do not follow the party line on these issues. The “alternative” media is successful in part due to this.
On my way home from work, I sometimes switch back and forth between the local AM talk station (solidly libertarian, with a bit conservativism mixed in) and NPR. NPR is the old action line, AM the new alternative media. I here about all the standard liberal “news” on NPR. They even droned on and on about some Catholic priest in Italy who said something not very nice about Jews. I thought to myself “Now this is LIBERAL news”. The AM station however was talking about things that mattered to almost everyone: Local schools, immigration, local anti-smoking efforts, even health care. It was in a solidly libertarian way (for example, I support the anti-smoking efforts), but at least it was real issues that effect real people, in a way the liberals have lost.
The culture saw through the efforts of the senate to label people “bigots” who don’t support open immigration. They have solidly rejected “gay marriage” despite efforts to label them.
I am still not convinced our culture is truly reversing it’s “death spiral”. I think the long term trend is still downward. However, it’s nice to see these signs of pushback.
Note 83: I appreciate Camille’s insights, and they are often accurate. I think she neglects to acknowledge that what she defines as a “gay male” problem is in reality a male problem. Were women to acquiesce to men’s propositions more frequently, I think we’d see statistics that are a bit closer between the two worlds.
Jacobse,
I think Paglia hits the nail on the head when she writes
If you’ll wholeheartedly endorse that statement, I’ll happily concede that many gay men lead hedonistic lives, filled with ramptant drug use and anonymous sex, and that they–and their communities–would be better off if they remained clear-thinking and committed to a single partner. In fact, I’ll concede that regardless of your reaction, because both statements are true.
However, I’ll say, and perhaps you’ll agree, that Paglia’s ridicule of the physical appearances of both Gary Bauer and Barney Frank is repugnant. It’s evidence of a peculiar brand of pseudo-intellectual immaturity.
Well, there you go. You continue, basically explaining that “boys have a penis, and girls have a vagina.” We’ve established that the deciding factor in determining which couples you view as valid vs. invalid is not semen, nor is it the fertility of the couple. If I pressed you, and I said, “So, it’s really about the penis? There’s something magical about the penis so that there can’t be two in a relationship?” You’d probably reply that it’s not about the penis, don’t be silly. If I said, “So, the testicles? The testosterone? Etc.” You’d deny that any of those things was the magical factor. Instead, you refer to something indefinable: the mystical complementarity of man and woman. But the maleness and femaleness that you refer to is not defined by any attribute, or by any combination of attributes. It just is. And yet you essentially sigh and act as if I’m being difficult when I suggest that the “bright line” you draw between straight couples and gay couples is entirely arbitrary.
It’s clear that you envision policy decisions taking place in a grand cultural narrative. It’s not dissimilar from the way some pundits viewed the Duke rape case as a “story,” and a story with grand, mythic elements, at that. They viewed the LaCrosse players as spoiled, rich, amoral white boys, and the accuser as a “symbol” of oppressed black femininity. As facts came in, however, it became clear that stories and myths don’t always correspond to reality in the ways that we expect them to.
You view large social issues as a story, too–one with heroes and villains. You exhibit this with a tendency to paint large, diverse groups of people with the same brush. For example, earlier this thread, you implied that black people think the same, and that parents think the same.
Both of those statements imply homogeneity of belief, but they’re evidence of the thinking that went into your “Cultural Narrative: Gay Marriage Story.” Certainly, many blacks do not resent civil rights analogies that are made by gay supporters. Many of the African-Americans I’ve spoken to see a reflection of the civil rights movement in the struggle of a group that is seeking equality (and yes, respect), denied them not because of the color of their skin, but because of who they love. Notice I didn’t say “all blacks believe…”? That would be a falsehood. What’s true is that not all black people think the same way.
Your second statement there is even stranger. You’re suggesting that a married person with kids could not agree with me–when I say that, on average, committed gay couples probably make fine parents. I don’t think you’re intentionally lying, I just think that exaggeration is the result when you view all married heterosexuals with children as the heroes in a simple story of good and evil. Clearly, many married parents wholeheartedly support gay marriage and gay parenting.
Finally, your argument falls apart when you’re asked to list specific examples of what you think will happen to two-parent families when SSM is legal. None of your examples is specific to two-parent families (that’s the structure you’re claiming is being dismantled.) Further, your examples are what a debater might call non-unique. None of them require SSM to be legalized for them to happen anyway. Further, none of them is actually a direct effect of SSM. Each is a part of your “cultural narrative.”
The first example you list deals with curriculum. I agree that in the future, ways to protect yourself during anal sex will probably be taught in sex education classes. I think that as young as “third grade” is a stretch, and I’m not sure whether you’re exaggerating or not. I went to a public school in a small Midwestern town in the 1980s. We learned about safe anal sex (as well as oral and vaginal) in the eighth grade. To my knowledge, there wasn’t a single homosexual activist among the school board or the administrators.
Your second example is scary. I think everyone should know all the risks associated with all sex. Who will do this suppressing? Certainly, I agree that fisting (one of the topics of the link you posted) is probably a dangerous thing to do. I’ve never met someone who was into fisting. I’m all for gay rights, and I’m absolutely against suppressing information about the dangers of fisting, if it makes a difference.
On the other hand, I think a lot of right-wing propaganda exaggerates both the prevalence and the general “acceptedness” of extreme sex acts. Would you agree?
Finally, I’m not really sure what “assault” means in the context of the Boy Scouts. I’m sure they’ll continue to be criticized (as any massive organization is– do we say that Congress is being “assaulted” by every newspaper in the country, almost every day?) But the Boy Scouts went to the Supreme Court to argue that they are a private religious organization. That they are now being treated exactly like a private religious organization is hardly assault. And again, that has no direct connection to SSM.
What DO the studies show?
There seems to be an unquestioned assumption that “the studies show” that children do well in same-sex marriages. I beg to differ.
For just a part of the literature on this topic see Patricia Morgan:
http://www.amazon.com/Children-as-Trophies-Patricia-Morgan/dp/1901086186/ref=sr_1_20/105-3353067-6375639?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1186902545&sr=1-20 Morgan addresses the studies done in the United States
Stanely Kurtz has addressed studies done in the United States.
First, there is exists a strong challenge to the very notion of a longitudinal study using real life human children. In other words, it will be a generation before we have extensive longitudinal studies (although shorter term studies do not support same-sex parents in the manner asserted here). Negative results will have virtually ruined the lives of millions of children before we have the answer. This would not be considered acceptable if a medicine were being tested, the FDA would not approve such a form of testing.
I have to agree with several commenters here that both JamesK and Jim Holman have a very detached and therefore truly uncaring attitude about children’s welfare. As much as they deny it, children’s interests don’t mean much to them if those interests restrict the freedom of adults to engage in any type of activity that they choose at will.
I think that an effective, purely secular argument can be made against same-sex parenting.
It is possible that more children would be adopted if we allowed active prostitues to adopt, but, even so we should not accept that. If society cannot find good adoptive homes for children, then it should provide good group homes for children. It has been done with great success in the past. Ever hear of Boy’s Town?
Europes pro-homosexual sociologists admit that same-sex marriage undercuts
traditional marriage–Instability as the new normal
For a good discussion of what is really going on see Stanely Kurtz here
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MTU4NDEzNTY5ODNmOWU4M2Y1MGIwMTcyODdjZGQxOTk=
It is clear the destabilizing marriage, destabilizes the lives of children and nobody thinks that is important.
Missourian writes: “As much as they deny it, children’s interests don’t mean much to them if those interests restrict the freedom of adults to engage in any type of activity that they choose at will”
Why is everything all-or-nothing? You act as if I’ve suggested that we should hand out children to serial rapists and psychopaths. I’m simply asserting that in some situations, children could fare better with two same-gendered parents than in the alternative (whatever that may be). You seem to forget that most child abuse occurs in home of the biological parents, and most children currently up for adoption were abandoned by their biological parents.
I doubt it will be of much interest to you, but the APA has done a number of studies and found that:
” In all studies, the great majority of offspring of both lesbian mothers and gay fathers described themselves as heterosexual.”
“Fears about children of lesbians and gay men being sexually abused by adults, ostracized by peers, or isolated in single-sex lesbian or gay communities have received no support from the results of existing research.”
Now, if you can provide studies that reflect the contrary, I’d be more than willing to read them.
Missourian writes: “First, there is exists a strong challenge to the very notion of a longitudinal study using real life human children. In other words, it will be a generation before we have extensive longitudinal studies (although shorter term studies do not support same-sex parents in the manner asserted here).”
The studies that do exist are sufficient to the extent that the American Academy of Pediatrics, the National Association of Social Workers, and the American Psychological Association all agree that there are no significant differences between children reared by same-sex and heterosexual parents. Rather than relying on a single study, they have looked at the total body of research going back from the late 70s to today. What they have found is that the vast majority of research all converges on the same conclusion. Relying on many studies is one way of controlling for the effect of different samples, sample sizes, and methodologies.
Missourian: “Negative results will have virtually ruined the lives of millions of children before we have the answer. This would not be considered acceptable if a medicine were being tested, the FDA would not approve such a form of testing.”
Well, these tragic results haven’t shown up yet in 30 years of studies.
Missourian: “I have to agree with several commenters here that both JamesK and Jim Holman have a very detached and therefore truly uncaring attitude about children’s welfare. As much as they deny it, children’s interests don’t mean much to them if those interests restrict the freedom of adults to engage in any type of activity that they choose at will.”
Oh really? How many stepchildren have you brought up? I have one under my belt, a college graduate by the way, currently working as an editor for Yahoo. How many of other’s people’s children have you taken care of for months after their families had financial difficulties or lost their apartments? I have three. How many children were you in loco parentis for after their parents abandoned them? I have one. (Currently a Captain in the U.S. Army.) How many young people from other countries have you hosted while they were here studying in the U.S.? I have seven. How many Spanish-speaking young people have you tutored in English? I have around 30. That makes around 42 children or young people in whose lives I have been actively involved. Gives a whole new meaning to “detached and uncaring.” Care to revise your statement at this point? And feel free to share your experiences in this regard.
I think Missourian may have misspoke. The two people mentioned who show little or no understanding of children were Phil and James, not Jim and James.
Thanks, I stand corrected
Note 93, two of the organizations named have been politicized
The American Psychological Association, the National Association of Social Workers have strong political agendas. They are in fact leaders of the social revolution. No so long ago the APA considered homosexual conduct to be a psychological disease or defect. Psychology as a whole has questionable scientific bona fides outside of Skinnerian behaviorial studies. Many of the ideas of the original founders of psychology are now only considered to be of historical value. I remember when many of the APA leaders, such as Albert Maslow, endorsed recreational drug usage as a route to psychological growth. No one has inventoried the damage done by them to millions of young people from my generation. All of that has gone down the memory hole along with the Vietnamese slaughter after the collapse of South Vietnam.
The National Association of Social Workers is one of the largest concentrations of culturally leftist social engineers in the country.
If you cared about children you wouldn’t be so ready to normalize the idea that either a mother or a father is dispensable. Any good done to individual children has to be offset by the massive damage being done to generations of people right now.
Note 96: So you’re going to discredit the entire APA because of some loopy ideas held by Maslow? If that’s the case, then we need to write off all Christian Baptists because of this.
Why don’t you approach the studies that were done along with their methods and conclusions instead of making random assertions that have no relevance to anything?
Further, as to my own experience with children (which you’re making many assumptions about, by the way), how does that have any relevance to my referencing conclusions made by professionals? After all, your lack of experience in the military hasn’t kept you from making statements about proper military strategies in other threads has it?
Note 92, JamesK, you don’t understand what it means to make policy and you posit a false choice
JamesK, I have been around the block with you on this point many, many times and I don’t see any signs of progress. You basically don’t understand what it means to make policy for an entire country and an entire culture.
You think that if you can find one situation in which the activity prohibited by a policy produces better results than one endorsed by the policy that the policy is therefore shown to be defective, not so, that is now how law or policy works.
Let’s take one example. The law prohibits running a red light. However, it isn’t hard to find an example in which it would be beneficial to run a red light, for example, a driver could be rushing to a hospital with a critically ill patient. The mere fact that one can imagine a case in which violating the law is better than not violating the law does not decide the virtue of the policy.
Policies or laws are intended to cover everyone in a particular situation. It is called “equal rights under the law.” This means that the same rule apply for everybody. A law is a statement of a moral and cultural consensus. If properly developed a law has the moral standing of a joint decision made in a democratic manner.
The proper analysis is whether, given all possible circumstances, the good produced by the law strongly outweighs any bad.
Going back to your example, you claim that there may be circumstances in which a child is better off with a same-sex couple than with an abusive married couple. There are three fallacies with this approach. First, you compare a “worst-case” heterosexual example with a “best-case” homosexual example. In doing so, you ignore the fact that no child should be placed with any couple which is abusive to him and that the child should be removed and placed in foster care or a group home. Second, you posit that living with a same-sex couple is harmless unless that same-sex couple is actively abusing the child. The harm of placement with the same-sex couple is that the child is exposed to psychological sickness and he is deprived of either the love of a mother or a father. This always occurs in same-sex couples without fail.
Lastly, you ignore the fact that society can, if it is motivated, provide a safe and healthful group home for children Such group homes have existed for centuries and have produced happy and productive people. As I asked earlier, have you ever heard of Boy’s Town?
No, sorry JamesK, the mere fact that you shrug off the vital role that a father plays and the vital role that a mother plays and that you are willing to lightly abandon the principle that a child needs a mother and a father is proof of a lack of concern for children.
How casually you dispense with 8,000 years of recorded human culture from every part of the globe for the sake of a trendy social fad. There are fundamental reasons that virtually every successful culture on the face of the planet has outlawed homosexual conduct or relegated it to a secondary status.
If sterility and narcissism are endorsed and “celebrated” by society that society has embraced death. Spain and Germany have birthrates among native Europeans that, if left unchanged, will result in the virtual dissappearance of indigenous Spaniards and Germans within a century.
Actions have consequences and the consequence of embracing and normalizing homosexual conduct if the death of the culture. Homosexual rights activists are simply opening the door to dominance by cultures that promote fertility and child birth. You can’t prevail if your culture is dying.
Note 96, Yup, Maslow, Jung and Freud for starters
Maslow was a lion of the APA. He has much to account for.
A society gets what it rewards- the “War on Children”
For centuries, Anglo-American law rewarded those who married and committed themselves to a life-long partnership and raised the next generation of children to become good citizens.
Now, we have undercut that reward system. It could be called a “war on children.”
Marriage can be ended for trivial reasons regardless of the effect on children.
Adults can bring children into the world without the care of a second parent
with little or no negative consequences for the adult.
Homosexual conduct seeks normalization and legitimization and is doing
a good job of winning that battle, trivializing the sacred roles of father
and mother
American Law Institute legal scholars are now developing the underpinnings of an assault on monogamy and campaing to legitimize polyamory which would in practice means polygamy. Besides its devastating effects on women, polygamy tends to distort the father-child relationship into one of competition between the children of various mothers in the polygamous family.
A society gets what it rewards. Muslim birth rates are high, indigenous European birthrates are low. As they say, do the math.