Get Over It

I was wandering around the "right-wing blogosphere" this morning, and stumbled across this bit of nonsense talking about the marriage issue. (Which you can expect to resurface in Canada this fall)

Since I'm feeling a little tired of ranting about the childish stupidity going on in the Middle East lately, I thought I'd dismantle the argument with a bit of a critique.

It's an attempt - albeit flawed - to discredit the notion of same gender marriage without resorting to religious argument.

There's two basic points about this guy's argument that summarize it - it's fundamentally a bunch of standard religious talking points that attempt to not refer to scripture; second it's actually much broader than SGM, and basically says that sexuality is evil.

Consider the following premise:

1. The legalization of homosexual “marriages” would enshrine the sexual revolution in law.

Ah - so, all of the changes that have happened in the last 40-50 years should be undone is the underlying assertion here. Not only should sexuality be kept firmly in the closet, but women should be kept barefoot and pregnant as much as possible. Reading a little further, we find the author more or less making that claim, by citing just about every criticism that conservatives have ever made about any change to society's regulation of sexuality:

Experimentation abounded: the so-called “open marriages,” public intercourse,...the magazines that women buy at grocery store checkout lines are as salacious as anything put out by Hugh Hefner in the 1950’s.

Omigod - the women's magazines today are as "salacious" as Hefner's 1950's works? Oh dear, what ever shall we do? (Let's start by being honest, and recognizing that women are sexual creatures too - not just men...)

The author then continues with his button pushing exercise by claiming that child abuse has increased since abortion was legalized:

We were told that the legalization of abortion would lead, paradoxically, to fewer abortions, and fewer instances of child abuse. Instead it led to far more abortions than even the opponents ever imagined, and it so cheapened infant life that child abuse spiked sharply upward. It has remained so high that no one is surprised to hear, on local television, an account a child chained to his bed and allowed to starve in his own filth, or a baby bludgeoned to death by a boyfriend, with the mother as accomplice.

What this has to do with SGM is beyond me - but I don't rattle around in the minds of the truly unhinged.

However, let's address the topic itself - first of all, I can't see how abortion would affect the child abuse rate significantly. It might reduce the child NEGLECT somewhat, but even there I have my doubts. Second, the author completely overlooks the fact that healthier, more honest sexuality has resulted in more open reporting of child sexual abuse in particular. Abuses that would have - in the past - been quietly hushed up and kept in the closet are now being reported and prosecuted. It's not a pretty picture, but I don't think that the consequences of keeping it hidden are good news either.

We were told that the legalization of contraceptive drugs would lead to fewer unwanted children -- certainly to fewer children born out of wedlock. Anyone with a passing familiarity with the human race should have known otherwise. Whatever one may believe about contraception, one must admit the historical fact: by reducing the perceived risk of pregnancy almost to zero, contraception removed from the young woman the most powerful natural weapon in her arsenal against male sexual aggression. She no longer had any pressing reason not to concede to the boyfriend’s wishes. So she agreed; and we now have one of three children born out of wedlock.

This one's a doozy, and quite an attack on women if you think about it for a moment.

First, I'll take issue with the notion of children born out of wedlock. Again, this is a matter of statistical and social honesty. At one time, such children were called "bastards", and quietly shuffled out of sight, living under names that would not associate them with their male parentage; in the early part of the 20th century, those children either became orphans, or the proverbial "shotgun wedding" was held, and a baby was miraculously born less than 9 months later. Anybody who believes that people weren't having sex outside of wedlock at that time is either blind or stupid, possibly both.

Second, it makes the whole issue of fertility the woman's problem. She either keeps her legs firmly crossed until she's married, or _she_ has a problem. Contraception didn't lead to a social problem, it simply allowed women the freedom to do what had been happening anyways for millenia - just removed the social artifices involved.

Again, this is utterly unrelated to the SGM issue. I think the author is trying to draw a line of "failed" experiments to justify his anti-SGM stance, but instead is merely revealing his ignorance of human behaviour and history.

As near as I can tell, his first point is a basic anti-feminist, anti-sexual revolution screed written in a button-pushing style that would make Jason Kenney proud. The only thing you can derive from the reasoning is the author idealizes the pseudo-Victorian society of the early 20th century.

2. It would, in particular, enshrine in law the principle that sexual intercourse is a matter of personal fulfillment, with which the society has nothing to do.

This one is the classic "it's all about sex" argument. I can't even begin to enumerate the ways that this reasoning is just plain wrong.

First, and foremost, I can think of few relationships - heterosexual or not - that are predicated entirely on sex. Certainly not the long standing ones. Sure, sexuality is part of the picture, but it is far from being the focal point. The focal points tend to be common interests, shared values and a combination of love and friendship that is hard to quantify.

At the true wedding, the elders know that the future belongs to the couple, who in their love that night, or on a night soon to come, will in turn raise up yet another generation. Sexual intercourse is, as a brute biological fact, the act by which we renew mankind. We celebrate the wedding because it betokens our survival, our hope for those to come after us.

Ah yes, the "it's also about procreation" argument. Okay, a homosexual couple isn't likely to produce children per se. However, this is still false reasoning. How many marriages don't have children - either by choice or biology? Plenty - just in my office I can think of half a dozen couples who don't have children, are their marriages invalid because they haven't had children? No. Are their marriages any less loving? No.

Having pushed this button repeatedly, the author moves onto his next point:

And unless man and woman unite -- and, given their differences, it always amazes me that they can -- the culture cannot survive. The women will split away to protect their persons and their relatively few children; the unattached males will pass the dull hours in destruction.

The "omigod, society will crumble" argument. This is a complete crock. First of all, human society has existed with - and without - marriage for millenia. Before the concept of theistic religion emerged, families formed and grew, and they did so without some deity "blessing" the union.

The second point that the author misses here is the fact that if you take the most generous estimates of the size of the G/L population, and a generous percentage of those _wanting_ to get married, you still only have a tiny fraction of the overall population that is actually affected. Those people are already paired off, and changing their legal status to "married" really only affects what's ticked off on their tax returns. Your property values aren't going to change because John and Jim moved in down the block and are legally married.

Lastly, I'd point out the obvious reality that our understanding of human behaviour has changed a great deal in the last 60 years. Psychology has slowly exposed a wealth of human behaviours that are all perfectly normal. Increased awareness of what truly causes harm to people (child abuse, rape, discrimination) has led to more honest reporting of these issues. Personally, I'd much rather have these issues out in the open where we can deal with them constructively, instead of burying them in the closet and hoping they will "go away". We've seen in the last 20 years plenty of evidence of the kind of hurt and suffering that sex abuse survivors experience, we would be remiss to believe that suppression is an improvement.

This isn't about "liberalism" or "freedoms" - it's ultimately about personal honesty. Honesty that has to start with people living genuine, authentic lives that are true to themselves first. The rights and sexual revolutions did not damage society, they in fact made it more honest by stripping away huge numbers of false fronts and exposing humanity to itself.