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 Saturday, May 06, 2006
SSM vs. Religious Freedom / Jon Rauch
Kudos to Maggie on her fair-minded and, to me, ominous article in The Standard ("The Coming Conflict Between SSM and Religious Liberty"). If the predicted collision happens, the tragedy will be that this is an eminently avoidable conflict. Sensible religious exemptions to antidiscrimination law would do the trick, in combination with a reasonable willingness to be reasonable. In the case of Catholic Charities and same-sex adoption in Massachusetts , I think Dale Carpenter gets it exactly right in this article ("Let Catholics Discriminate"). Unfortunately, culture warriors on both sides are teeing up this conflict on purpose: Catholic Charities decides that even a small handful of placements with same-sex couples, out of thousands, are too many, and Massachusetts decides that even a handful of exemptions to anti-discrimination law are too many. Culture wars aren't born, they're made, and this is how. Maggie and I do differ on an important matter of emphasis. Same-sex marriage may sharpen the church-state conflict over religious discrimination (however defined), but that's only because same-sex marriage is so controversial. The problem itself is neither new nor unique to SSM. As Dale says: These conflicts are already being produced by existing antidiscrimination law. Gay marriage adds something to the mix, but not much. Any jurisdiction that adopts gay marriage will already have banned much anti-gay discrimination in employment, housing, accommodations, etc. The examples that Maggie refers to were produced by existing laws, not by gay marriage. Catholic Charities is a great example of this, since the adoption agency was held to account under a two decade old antidiscrimination requirement, not gay marriage. Bob Jones University had nothing to do with marriage discrimination. It was a general federal racial antidiscrimination case.In fact, if the whole idea of SSM vanished tomorrow, we'd still be seeing growing conflicts between broadening social acceptance of homosexuality and deepening determination from some religious quarters to resist that trend. For example, here's a recent case from Overlawyered.com:
It would be nice if the country could have a frank discussion about the proper limits of antidiscrimination law, instead of turning this into (yet another) hot-button gay-marriage debate. posted by Jon at 7:56 PM | link 
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Oddly enough one never finds a critic of anti-discrimination laws covering gay people who is willing to put on the table for consideration the anti-discrimination laws protecting religion.
The proper limits of anti-discrimination law are as they always have been ... behavior is not a protected class and therefore not afforded special anti-discrimation protection. The problem is that homosexual behavior is just that ... behavior ... as distinguished from skin color, gender or ethnicity. Once the courts get it right by separating the gay agenda misinformation and propaganda from the truth then we can get back to protecting religious liberty.
Mr. Rauch,
You said something fascinating:
"In fact, if the whole idea of SSM vanished tomorrow, we'd still be seeing growing conflicts between broadening social acceptance of homosexuality and deepening determination from some religious quarters to resist that trend."
May I respectfully add that there's a parallel debate going on here: What truly IS "homosexuality" and is it a genetic and/or inborn condition or not?
For the last eight years, I have listened constantly to Focus on the family, Family Life Today, For Faith and Family (with Dr. Richard Land) and a host of other programs hosted by what could be described as evangelical Christians. From what I've heard, I can assure you that to a man, none of these hosts believe that same-sex attraction, at least the type that manifests itself as any form of homosexuality, is a condition that one is born with.
In fact, most of these programs have had some very eloquent guests who have left their homosexuality. Said guests all tell pretty much the same story as to why they believe they became gay, and how they left it. They will also freely state that, for many people, leaving (and in many cases, changing) their sexuality is rarely an easy process. However, to a man they agree that the path they chose has been, in the long run, better for them than had they stayed homosexual.*
Now, the mainstream media (or at least key figures in it, such as Barbara Walters) say there's a "growing body" of evidence that one is born gay. However, no one seems to have any piece of said evidence that: A) definitely says same-sex attraction is genetic/inborn in origin and; B) has pass the process of scientific replication. In fact, the last time I checked the P-FLAG (an organization to help gay youth, their families and friends) "what is sexual orientation" page they candidly state that no one knows what causes this type of attraction.
More troubling to me, though, is how in so many circles of gay and lesbian people the discussion of what genuinely causes same-sex attraction has been shut down. In 2001, Columbia University researcher Dr. Robert Spitzer (by his own admission and actions very much a friend of gay and lesbian people, and not much at all in agreement with evangelical Christians) published results of a survey that said an apparent minority of people had been able to change their sexual orientation from quite homosexual to quite heterosexual.
His character immediately was put under attack, with lobbying organizations putting out press releases asserting the Dr. Spitzer was linked with groups that are anti gay-marriage, gay-adoption and gay-military service. I know people who are quite the gay/lesbian activists who also know Dr. Spitzer and believed the charges completely baseless, as they were eventually proven to be.
And since then we've not heard a thing on this subject from the mainstream press.
Mr. Rauch, it bothers me, and from what I can gather the evangelical radio hosts I've heard, when discussions on what many from Sigmund Freud on have believed are the genuine origins of same-sex attraction are being shut down apparently at the behest of gay-friendly organizations.
But that's not going to shut down people of the "not born that way" viewpoint from speaking what they see (and frequently have lived) as the truth. Consequently, it also won't shut down the evangelical Christians who support them, mainly because they've all seen the power of God, and what He can deliver people from.
And that "parallel argument" alone is going to keep energizing, IMO, the conflicts you described in your very thoughtful response.
(*In addition, these "ex-gay" arguments get some strange help from not-infrequent reports in the secular media of people who seem to identify as some of the gayest people on planet earth yet who also fall in love with people of the opposite sex, without benefit of prayer, counseling or any other contact with Christianity.)
I disagree. Gay marriage is an integral part of the issue. It's entirely possible to object to gay marriage because of a view of marriage, not because of any animus against gays. Marriage is so intimately connected with family and parenting that it is disingenuous to treat marriage as a completely separate institution. Anything one says about marriage directly affects what can be said about family.
What does gay marriage say, then, about our understanding of the family? Society has traditionally held that the responsibility to raise a child belongs to the two (that is, one man and one woman) who biologically produced it. To support gay marriage, however, you must abandon that connection. Is that something we expect the law to enforce? I doubt it.
Further, if you believe that opposing gay parenting is discrimination, you must view parenting as a privilege that cannot be denied to any citizen. However, traditonally, parenting is not a privilege; it's a responsibility. You acquire this responsibility because of a specific act that biologically demands one man and one woman, and not because you're a citizen and entitled to equal treatment.
It would be disastrous for society to uphold gay marriage because it requires us to hold that those who biologically produce children are not fundamentally responsible for raising them.
A very good way to make (at least partial) peace in the culture wars is to REDUCE THE SIZE OF GOVERNMENT. Take schools, for example. Are there arguments about curriculum at private schools, sex ed, evolution and creation, homosexual rights, phonics vs look-see, etc.? No, of course not. The whole idea of a culture war in private schools is silly. If the customer (in this case, the student's parents) don't like one product, they just go to another (school.) So let's keep government out of pre-schools, to take just one very obvious example of what I'm talking about.
These arguments are absurd.
1)"Behavior" is often protected, including in the context of employment discrimination, housing and the allocation of credit. The "behavior" protected has been religion. The government, moreover, is prohibited from discriminating on the basis of all sorts of individual behavior. If you are searching for an analog, you have one: religious affiliation is equivalent to sexual orientation, and religious practice is equivalent to romantic expressions. The rules that apply in the workplace, allocation of credit and housing would be appropriately applied in discrimination laws in a parallel fashion. That is not very difficult at all; what the religious right seeks to create is a "gay exemption" to antidiscrimination laws, which is clearly probative of their animus towards gays.
2) The inborn debate is not really that important. I have worked with Mormons, Muslims, atheists , Christians and pagans. I do not really feel that I need them to justify their affiliations and practices. I find many of their practices and beliefs extraordinarily bizarre, disturbed and unhealthy. In the context of Mormons and conservative Christians and Muslims, for example, I question their ability to raise healthy children and, with respect to evangelicals, their ability to fulfill their marriage "vows" given their egregious divorce rates. But of course, I believe that they have individual rights that must be respected, so I do, on a personal, professional and political level. Most Americans are uncomfortable with evangelicals, perhaps not as uncomfortable as they are with gays, but nevertheless evangelicals are ridiculed in popular culture for a reason. The relative social acceptance of evangelical Christianity, its impact on national and social health, is only a question to the extent that they attempt to use their political influence within the GOP to force their agenda on others.
3) Ex-gays...well, I for one am a full-fledged ex-Christian, much healthier since leaving that "faith" and I encourage all who are entrapped in it to leave it as well. Again, what does behavioral change, if that is really what it is, have do to with civil rights protections? The rules with respect to sexuality have been pretty simple: most men are stuck with whatever sexuality they have had since early adolescence, women as a whole appear more flexible and true bisexuality is exceedingly rare. The Spitzer study was so unrepresentative as to be laughable, and his "conclusions" were restricted to this: a self-reporting (always a bad sign) minority of highly motivated individuals report a change in sexual attraction. There have been numerous studies suggesting that these programs are harmful. Personally, I think the ex-gay ministries are fine...as ministries. But please, successful? You would have to be a fool to date one a man who had gone through such a program and claimed to be "cured" of his sexuality. I can only imagine how readily those ex-gay candidates are introduced to unmarried Christian women in their own social circles.
4) The "secular media" ex-gays...yeah, it happens. But romantic love is not necessarily sexual love, as most would understand it, and those arrangements often involve open sexual relationships. The wisdom of entering into such arrangements is something I will leave to the psychiatrists, but I would note that, anecdotally, many if not most of my heterosexual friends have had sexual encounters with members of their own sex, in adolescence or during university. They are still heterosexual. Behavior and orientation are different beasts.
5) Marriage. The marriage debate is so patently absurd from all sides that it is quickly becoming a mockery of civilized debate. So we have 1) people who hate gays so much they are attempting to use the marriage amendments to destroy all legal recognitions of same-sex couples, 2) their misguided electoral support, that votes for the amendments despite their breadth, 3) gay marriage activists who have acted prematurely and 4) those who are willing to comrpomise, state by state, with domestic partnerships and civil unions. All of the legal benefits of marriage can of course be separated from the institution, and certainly from traditional notions of family and procreation. The gays were not the first to do that, heterosexuals were.
I am not certain I agree that you can be a supporter of these current amendments without having animus directed against gays, because they go so far and do so much damage it is difficult to believe that could be the case. But even granting that, marriage is just not what it was described above as. Its origins are frankly brutal, legalalistic and rooted in property principles that are horribly inegalitarian and sexist. You do not have to be a raging feminist to see that either, but a single semester in property law will probably disabuse you of the notion that marriage is the sacred union the right portrays it to be.
"Oddly enough one never finds a critic of anti-discrimination laws covering gay people who is willing to put on the table for consideration the anti-discrimination laws protecting religion."
Did you mean to question why civil law does not seek to protect religion itself, or did you instead mean to ask why anti-discrimination does not protect religious PEOPLE. The difference lies in the point of civil anti-discrimination law, that no other person, persons or institutions may restrict or deny any other PERSON (not the belief structure they subscribe to) any rights they themselves posses. The blissfully ignorant idea of Western marriage as a holy institution may survive in the minds of as many individuals as wish to keep it there, but the state should not be able to restrict equal rights to those capable of performing equal duty.
If marriage was a privilege, then wedding chapels would not exist. Any straight couple can get married, despite their ability or inability to act responsibly as such. Everytime a dysfunctional heterosexual couple raises equally dysfunctional children, its a slap in the face to any otherwise functional same-sex couple who wanted to adopt a child to raise but was legal prevented from doing so.
but the state should not be able to restrict equal rights to those capable of performing equal duty.
As well it does not! All men and women are equally allowed to marry, without regard to race, religion, or -- yes -- even sexual orientation.
"As well it does not! All men and women are equally allowed to marry, without regard to race, religion, or -- yes -- even sexual orientation."
Just as heterosexuals are not legally forced to select from a limited group of marriage partners, neither should homosexuals be forced to marry those of the opposite sex if they wish to partake in the same CIVIL rights and responsibilities as straight people - IF that was what you were so slyly implying.
I'm sorry for not understanding you Anonymous. Heterosexuals are not legally forced to selected from a limited group of marriage partners -- and neither are homosexuals. Men and women marry with almost unlimited variety, such is the essence of Marriage, of Parenthood, of Family. Their individual sexual orientations are no more relevant than the colors of their skin.
Slyly? No, just a simple basic truth that you seem eager to avoid addressing. I'll say it again, as clearly as i know how: the problem for advocates of gay marriage is not that marriage treates gay people differently because they are gay, it's that it treats them the same despite that fact.
Mother nature doesn't concern herself with the sexual orientations of your Mother and your Father, and neither does the State. And neither will your own children -- unless you force them to, by depriving them of either a mother or a father, according to your own bias.
Sorry it took me so long to get back to you Marty...
Your essential argument as I see it is disengenuous. Your might as well say that is permissible to prevent racially-mixed couples from marrying WHOM THEY CHOOSE, for the social benefits implicit in creating a family unit WHOM, on the basis that all races are equally prevented from marrying outside of their own.
I'm afraid your truths, as convenient as they are, aren't as simple as you think.
Sorry it took me so long to get back to you Marty...
Your essential argument as I see it is disengenuous. Your might as well say that is permissible to prevent racially-mixed couples from marrying WHOM THEY CHOOSE, for the social benefits implicit in creating a family unit WHOM, on the basis that all races are equally prevented from marrying outside of their own.
I'm afraid your truths, as convenient as they are, aren't as simple as you think.
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