Missed quote
CommentsThe anti-gay-marriage folks in Washington state are using the most unfortunate phrase I’ve written in 10 months of op-ed writing. In my second op-ed during that time, which appeared in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, I wrote:
Openly gay Washington state Sen. Ed Murray, D-Seattle, and a representative of the largest Michigan gay-rights group, the Triangle Foundation, have both told me that people who continue to act as if marriage is a union between a man and a woman should face being fined, fired and even jailed until they relent.
While Murray and the Triangle Foundation rep did say that people continuing to behave as if marriage is between a man and a woman should face being fined, fired, and even jailed, they did not say “until they relent.” Murray did refer to Martin Luther King and Gandhi, who were jailed until they relented, but that’s no excuse for the sloppy paraphrase. (Note: it’s not a misquote because I didn’t quote them. It’s a poor paraphrase.)
As soon as this was called to my attention I apologized.
Anyway, the phrase has now made it into a campaign commercial against a gay-marriage bill in Washington state.
I of course like being quoted, but not in this case.
I wouldn’t sweat it. The whole point of even making such an outrageous threat is to get us to relent. It’s understood, if unsaid, and uncontroversial.
Isn’t it amazing how radical these people are? Jailed for thinking that both mothers AND fathers have equal standing in the family? Fired for opposing sexism, and promoting gender diversity? Fined for not going along with one of the most radical social agendas since 1930’s Germany?
Tolerance is grand aint it?
here’s some wonderful tolerance:
Court rules homosexual couple can adopt foster son
Jerusalem Post - 21 hours ago
and some more:
Flo Wish npr dot org
Flo Wish, one of 10 elderly women in Beachwood, Ohio, says she is excited to be going through the Jewish coming-of-age ceremony on March 22. In the 1930s, when the women were ages 12 and 13, girls weren’t even allowed to read from the Torah.
and then:
Poll: 48 percent of voters would repeal Prop. 8 Mercury News
on the other side of tolerance we have Richard Williamson and his heart felt acknowledgement of the Holocaust.
Williamson’s comments and the pope’s decision to lift the excommunication caused a deep rift in Catholic-Jewish relations. The decision was condemned by Holocaust survivors, some Catholics, Israel’s Chief Rabbinate, world Jewish leaders and German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Rueters
But you go Marty . . . two snaps for you
Rusty - Your use of the phrase “here’s some wonderful tolerance” is positively Orwellian.
You use an important concept “tolerance” to describe the placement of adoptive children by the state, a religious tradition being usurped, and a poll????
We may need the concept of tolerance one day only to find it watered down and mangled beyond all comprehension.
Are you referring to this: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/364362_ltrs26.html ?
Then I note that you don’t apologize for what I would have thought was the primary and more serious misrepresentation.
Mark- Any careful reading of the letter you quote would suggest that the primary and serious misrepresentation is the one I apologized for - “until they relent,” which the letter calls “absurd” and “borderline libel.”
The rest is true. Sen. Murray joins several gay activists in believing, for example, that if a teacher teaches that marriage is between a man and a woman, he should face discipline or dismissal, that a small business owner that absolutely refused to give a marriage discount to same-sex couples, she should be fined or jailed, and that if a newspaper described a “married” gay man as a bachelor, it should face libel suits.
Murray’s attempt to say “but that’s the law” only underscores my point. People who don’t want repression against those who believe that marriage is between a man and a woman need to vote against gay-marriage bills and propositions.
So with the exception of “until they relent” which was sloppy and irresponsible, but not deliberately misrepresentative, I stand by my point that same-sex marriage will involve restrictions on the rights of traditionalist Americans to run their companies, perform their jobs, and raise their children using their own definition of marriage instead of the gay community’s cum the state’s definition of marriage.
Even people sympathetic to same-sex couples should be alarmed by this aspect of the proposed change.
Before I say anything more, I should check one thing: Murray quotes (not paraphrases) you as saying “any person who continues to conduct himself as if what he thinks is God’s definition of marriage is correct, instead of the gay community’s definition, should be fined, fired and even jailed until he relents.” However this text does not appear in the on-line version of your op-ed. Has he misquoted you, or has the op-ed been revised?
It’s a good question. The MIlwaukee Journal-Sentinel version says “any person who continues to conduct himself as if what he thinks is God’s definition of marriage is correct should be fined, fired and even jailed until they relent.” The LA Daily News version omits that paragraph altogether. The Philadelphia Inquirer version is no longer on line, and I do not recall what my original version was (nor do I still have the computer on which I wrote the version I turned in). I should say, though, that Murray’s version sounds like me. It is strange, though, that he didn’t quote directly from the P-I and either quoted the Philadelphia Inquirer or some version he got from me somehow or made parts of the quote up. I guess it’s also possible, but unlikely, that the P-I edited the op-ed after receiving Murray’s letter, but that seems unlikely given that they left in “until they relent.” Thanks for catching this, Mark.
Ah Fitz,
describe the placement of adoptive children by the state: ‘ In 1995, Yosi was kicked out of his biological family’s home after they discovered that he was homosexual. The Even-Kamas took the teenager into their house and got the authorities to recognize them as Yosi’s foster family.’ JPOST
‘As a result of Family Court Judge Alissa Miller’s decision to recognize Professor Uzi Even and Dr. Amit Kama as Yosi’s parents, they will now have the same rights as biological parents of any child. In order for the adoption to be official, Yosi’s biological father had to agree to renounce his paternal rights to his son. ‘
Fitz again: a religious tradition being usurped
Such that the tradition of the bat mitzvah is celebrated in the dear state of Isreal, I am wondering why such an objection by you. . .have a problem with women being recognized.
Bat Mitzvah literally translates to “daughter of commandment” and implies “responsible female.”
or by ignoring the last topic of the dear Williamson, are you a Vatican I supporter or a Vatican II supporter or just another supporter of Holocaust revisionism.
but with the last item of the poll on folk supporting the reversal of Prop 8. . .well I guess CHANGE is HARD to accept.
and to David: from your comment on earlier 12. March 2009, 0:16 :
The rest is true.
from the op letter you wrote:
There are real and injurious issues the gay community could be focusing on. . .heartless prohibition of gay and lesbian adoptive parents.
Fitz, thank David for his support on gay adoption.
DB: “Thanks for catching this, Mark.”
Just doing my job. But to the extent you said what he quoted you as saying, then, well, what he said. His point is basically buried under your spin, and not just in respect of the “till they relent”.
Ed Murray in the letter Mark linked to above: “The issue is not between the “gay community’s definition” of marriage and “God’s definition,” as Benkof would have it. Rather, as I told him, it’s about the state’s definition of marriage…..The law should be enforced, just as it was when either King or Gandhi engaged in civil disobedience. Both ended up in jail despite the righteousness of their cause….We are a people of laws, and respect for the rule of law is paramount.”
So, I take it thus that Mark, and Ed Murray, would see no problem if, in those states that have defined marriage as only between a man and a woman, teachers who teach that marraiage is (or should be) between any two persons should lose their jobs because of it, small business owners who give the same marriage discounts to same-sex and opposite-sex couples should be fined, or a newspaper that describes a gay couple as “married” should also be fined. After all, the argument is now that “it’s about the state’s definition” and “respect for the laws is paramount” and those who deliberately misstate the laws are obviously not respecting them. Still, in what states that do not have SSM is this being done? In what states was this being done even long before SSM was on the political burner?
Have SSMers been engaged in mass civil disobedience to laws that fine and jail them for disagreeing with the man-woman criterion of marriage law?
Even during Newsome’s stunt there were no fines and no one was rounded-up and fined for disobeying the marriage laws. Or did I miss the water cannons, police dogs, and paddy wagons?
RK: “So, I take it thus that Mark, and Ed Murray, would see no problem if, in those states that have defined marriage as only between a man and a woman, teachers who teach that marraiage is (or should be) between any two persons should lose their jobs because of it, small business owners who give the same marriage discounts to same-sex and opposite-sex couples should be fined, or a newspaper that describes a gay couple as “married” should also be fined.”
I’d go one and a half out of three, and for rather different reasons in each case. A teacher can say that marriage has traditionally been opposite-sex, they can say that according to most religions it’s opposite-sex, they can even say that in their personal opinion (explicitly distinguished from that of the government) it should be opposite-sex. But they can’t say that “marriage”, unqualified, is opposite-sex because it won’t be true - in the most common sense, i.e., civil marriage, marriage won’t by hypothesis be opposite-sex, and not to add appropriate qualification will be to deliberately mislead the students. I think that sanctions starting with reprimands and working up to dismissal are totally appropriate for a teacher willfully misleading their students.
For wedding-related activities, I would unapologetically draw public accommodations very broadly and religious expression very narrowly. Saying sectarian words over a marriage is definitely religious expression. Advocating for opposite-sex-only marriage in nearly all contexts is. As far as I’m concerned, not a whole lot else is. If you offer business services in connection to one lot of marriages that happen to be civil, I would want to see you held to offering the same service in connection with all civil marriages, even if some of them aren’t religiously valid according to your tradition. If your beef is that you don’t want to be seen to be endorsing the idea that same-sex marriages are religiously valid, I’ll happily let you off the hook by acknowledging loudly and often that as far as I’m concerned, the law is about civil marriages and nothing but. But if, as is pretty much always going to be the case if you’re conservatively religious, you’re also trying to express moral disapproval of same-sex relationships and/or punish them, too bad. As far as I’m concerned, you don’t get to punish people, and you don’t get to express moral disapproval on this issue by inconveniencing people, no matter how trivially.
As for newspapers etc, describing a civilly married same-sex couple as not married would be willfully misleading and bloody rude, but I don’t see how it would rise to the level of libel except in artificial circumstances.
RK: “Still, in what states that do not have SSM is this being done? In what states was this being done even long before SSM was on the political burner?”
Is/was what being done?
BTW, I still owe you a comment on your link in the “Talk amongst yourselves” thread. I’ll try to get to it this weekend.
CO: “Have SSMers been engaged in mass civil disobedience to laws that fine and jail them for disagreeing with the man-woman criterion of marriage law?”
Yes and no. Off the top of my head I’m not aware of civil disobedience with respect to SSM per se, but there’s been civil disobedience with respect to sodomy laws, and I’ve always argued that they should be considered part of traditional marriage. After all, sodomy did the lion’s share of the work on your pet project of integrating the sexes -straight people don’t need encouragement and gay people aren’t going to pair up male-female merely because you withhold the right to marry - you’re going to need something approaching criminal sanctions to get our attention.
RK: “Still, in what states that do not have SSM is this being done? In what states was this being done even long before SSM was on the political burner?”
MB: “Is/was what being done?”
Mark, read the part of my post which you quoted again.
MB: “BTW, I still owe you a comment on your link in the “Talk amongst yourselves” thread. I’ll try to get to it this weekend.”
I was going to wait until you posted that, but either way, I will respond to you as well in that thread this weekend.
Mark on teachers: “they can even say that in their personal opinion (explicitly distinguished from that of the government) it should be opposite-sex.”
Let us see if that is really tolerated long under SSM.
RK: “Mark, read the part of my post which you quoted again.”
I have, and I still don’t know what you’re referring to. You refer to a bunch of different actions, but none of the them seem to make sense in the context of your question. If it’s important, you might want to start from scratch.
Mark, the marriage laws were not designed to “to get our attention”, if you mean the attention of people who prefer nonmarital arrangements, such as that promoted by SSMers.
Mark, this is what I posted, and what you quoted: “So, I take it thus that Mark, and Ed Murray, would see no problem if, in those states that have defined marriage as only between a man and a woman, teachers who teach that marriage is (or should be) between any two persons should lose their jobs because of it, small business owners who give the same marriage discounts to same-sex and opposite-sex couples should be fined, or a newspaper that describes a gay couple as “married” should also be fined.”
And my question was: “… in what states that do not have SSM is this being done? In what states was this being done even long before SSM was on the political burner?” (And a further question: should this be done in states without SSM?)
You answered as if I had asked this:
“So, I take it thus that Mark, and Ed Murray, would see no problem if, in those states that have defined marriage as between any two persons, teachers who teach that marriage is (or should be) only between a man and a woman should lose their jobs because of it, small business owners who don’t give the same marriage discounts to same-sex couples should be fined, or a newspaper that describes a gay couple as “unmarried” should also be fined.”
That is not what I asked.
RK: “You answered as if I had asked this: [...]”
Ah, I see. Sorry, I misread you totally - let’s start over. Then, no, I wouldn’t take the symmetrically opposite position because I didn’t get to my position via a process argument, I got to it via a substantive argument. I’m not proposing to steamroll anti-SSMers if I can build a coalition to do so because I believe something like that as a matter of process in a democracy it’s legitimate to steamroll minorities in a winner-take-all fashion. Rather, I’m proposing to steamroll anti-SSMers if I get the chance because I think that, at least on this issue, they’re bad people and they deserve it, and the fact that it’s their sincere religious belief isn’t any sort of excuse. Indeed a process argument in terms of freedom of speech is all that’s stopping me from being even more ruthless.
CO: “Mark, the marriage laws were not designed to “to get our attention”, if you mean the attention of people who prefer nonmarital arrangements, such as that promoted by SSMers.”
If you accept my point that sodomy laws were a de facto part of marriage as traditionally understood in Western culture, then nonsense. You don’t attach criminal penalties to something unless you want to send a _very_ forceful message to people who might be tempted to do it, or to make the point with a bit of rhetorical flourish, unless you want to get their attention. If your goal is to to have _all_ people, gay people included, “integrated” in an opposite-sex fashion, then you need that level of duress, because the incentive for gay people to pair up in same-sex couples is very powerful. And, although you’ve always carefully avoided saying one way or the other, if you don’t care about that, then you’ve completely gutted your case for keeping marriage opposite-sex only, because everybody else will be pairing up that way anyhow.
Mark: I’m not proposing to steamroll anti-SSMers if I can build a coalition to do so because I believe something like that as a matter of process in a democracy it’s legitimate to steamroll minorities in a winner-take-all fashion.
Please rephrase that if you can. I can’t tell what you are saying in that statement.
Rather, I’m proposing to steamroll anti-SSMers if I get the chance because I think that, at least on this issue, they’re bad people and they deserve it, and the fact that it’s their sincere religious belief isn’t any sort of excuse. Indeed a process argument in terms of freedom of speech is all that’s stopping me from being even more ruthless.
Thank you for being honest, Mark. Please continue to be honest, and if attitudes such as yours are quoted by those who oppose SSM when it comes up for votes, don’t go screaming “lies”.
What, by the way, do you think is the root reason for having freedom of speech and religion?
Mark Barton’s comment @ 15. March 2009, 4:13 serves to demonstrate the totalitarian impulse of the SSM campaign (in its various shapes and forms in and out of courtrooms) and serves to illustrate that the core meaning of SSM is identity politics and that’s belies an obsession not in justice but “in just us”.
CO: “Mark Barton’s comment [...] serves to demonstrate the totalitarian impulse of the SSM campaign (in its various shapes and forms in and out of courtrooms) [...]”
Err, what exactly is totalitarian about it? After all, the religious conservatives are shrieking as if they’re being persecuted, but all that’s actually being proposed is that they would be prevented from going totalitarian on gay people.
Mark in the ‘Talk Amongst Yourselves’ thread: I hope that you would agree that the dignity of gay people would be significantly increased if that attitude were authoritatively slapped down, and that whatever else it might do, allowing SSM would have that effect.
So, Mark, if SSM does not significantly increase the dignity of gay people to the degree you had hoped, what more would you then do to “authoritatively slap down” the attitudes you think still prevent that? If SSM is not enough then what?
Rather, I’m proposing to steamroll anti-SSMers if I get the chance because I think that, at least on this issue, they’re bad people and they deserve it, and the fact that it’s their sincere religious belief isn’t any sort of excuse. Indeed a process argument in terms of freedom of speech is all that’s stopping me from being even more ruthless.
So why should freedom of speech stop you? What’s the root reason for having it? Once people no longer understand that, it won’t be there to stand in your way.
Oh my G-D. . .First Israeli gay man gets ‘maternity’ leave Haaretz dot com
RK: “So, Mark, if SSM does not significantly increase the dignity of gay people to the degree you had hoped, what more would you then do to “authoritatively slap down” the attitudes you think still prevent that? If SSM is not enough then what?”
Why wouldn’t it be enough? Assuming that it comes at the end of the typical sequence of repealing sodomy laws, enacting anti-discrimination and hate-crime laws, and creating some more light-weight relationship framework, it would close off pretty much the last way in which religious conservatives have used the authority of the state or otherwise acted punitively against gay people. (The only other loose end of any significance is repealing DADT.) Sticks and stones…
RK: “So why should freedom of speech stop you?”
Because fairness is important, and thus I’m serious about not taking away any freedoms from religious conservatives that I’m not prepared to give up myself. I already have little freedom to retaliate against religious conservatives because freedom of religion is in the constitution and restrains me from getting at them via the state, and there are anti-discrimination laws which include religion and constrain me from many private actions. And I’m not even particularly unhappy about that, I’m just asking for analogous constraints on them. But conversely, freedom of speech is very important to me, so I couldn’t in good conscience restrict it for others even if the constitution let me, and nor could I in good conscience attempt to get the constitution changed to do so.
I’m ideologically opposed to unions. I think, with a few exceptions, they hurt workers more than they help them. They are anti-meritocratic and unfair, and hold back the progress of American business. So I can foresee no situation in which I would join an American union, even if that meant I couldn’t be a part of a specific field, like acting.
You may disagree. Fine. But if I had been around when Congress was debating the closed shop, I would have fought like Hell to stop the closed shop, because it would mean that I’d be excluded from certain professions. And you couldn’t blame me.
Similarly, I may want to own a catering business someday that caters weddings (real weddings, not fake same-sex weddings) or I might want to teach in a public school that marriage is between a man and a woman, and anything else might be a “union” but its’ not a marriage, and as a journalist, I certainly want to protect my right to write in newspapers that same-sex “marriage” is a fake, poor joke or a relationship that mocks the true institution of marriage, and should be stomped out whenever possible (or whatever).
So If I want the right to do those things, my only choice is to fight same-sex “marriage” tooth-and-nail, because when it passes it will restrict my freedom.
During the Prop. 8 campaign the “No” side ridiculed the idea that SSM restricts anyone’s freedom. And, like many other things, the “Yes” side was hard-pressed to articulate exactly what they meant.
But this is what it means: Same-sex marriage means using the government to force people like me to pretend like a man can marry a man and a woman can marry a woman. It’s not just about more freedom for gays, it’s about less freedom for traditionalist conservatives. And that’s not fair.
So, David, what about the JLC. after a little google fun I can up with
jewishlabor dot org JLC_Basic_History.pdf ( Love the photo of Bayard Rustin, famous gay man addressing the JLC)
and with your hands on your hips: ‘AND THAT’S NOT FAIR.’ You can put a sign up in any business ‘ we refuse the right to serve’ and there you be. and you can teach anything you want. . . and just like Bishop Williamson you can announce anything you believe.
Bishop WIlliamson is a true traditionalist conservative. Have a nice day.
Mark: Why wouldn’t it be enough?
Because attitudes don’t change just because the law does. And this still affects the group that thought that “equalizing” the laws alone was going to make society treat them exactly the same. Name one group for which all prejudice or social hostility disappeared quickly because of a law. You know this full well, so I think your refusal to admit otherwise is your way of getting around the question I asked.
RK: “Because attitudes don’t change just because the law does. And this still affects the group that thought that “equalizing” the laws alone was going to make society treat them exactly the same. Name one group for which all prejudice or social hostility disappeared quickly because of a law. You know this full well, so I think your refusal to admit otherwise is your way of getting around the question I asked.”
But I understand all this. I’ve seen the sorry example of race relations in the US. I’ve seen how racism gets pushed underground and bubbles up again as paranoia that whites are being persecuted. But while it’s not my business, seeing as how I’m pasty white and from another country, I totally sympathize with the prevailing sentiment in the African-American community to reject the advice to appease such complaints as concern trolling. Not only are the complaints of persecution ludicrous - whites have it _really_ good in the US even after allowing for affirmative action - but appeasement would buy you nothing. If you dismantled the various protections against racist actions, most of the paranoia would just morph back into the overt racism from which it came and start persecuting black people with renewed freedom.
Certainly I take the same attitude to gay issues, which are very much my business. I reject with contempt David’s complaints that he would be being oppressed if he was prevented from making life difficult for me. I’m slightly more optimistic because of one important difference between blacks and gays: black kids are normally born to black parents, whereas gay kids are normally born to straight parents. That means that once a critical mass of out gay people is established, it’s difficult to sustain a gay ghetto. Out gay people are going to be very uniformly mixed throughout the population and people are going to be forced to deal with them as people rather than as a shadowy other. But there’s still going to be a large minority, maybe 30%, who are going to dig in for religious and other reasons, and who will rail at gay people and fume about persecution. I don’t kid myself that I can change everybody’s mind, but I do think I can convince a healthy majority that the dead-enders are being pathetic and should not be allowed to take out their hatred for gay people in practical ways.
DB: “I’m ideologically opposed to unions. I think, with a few exceptions, they hurt workers more than they help them. They are anti-meritocratic and unfair, and hold back the progress of American business. So I can foresee no situation in which I would join an American union, even if that meant I couldn’t be a part of a specific field, like acting.”
Sure. Unions are cheerfully anti-competitive. They exist to bid up the price of labour by being able to credibly threaten an artificial shortage at any moment. And they work best if they are able to coerce unanimity among the workers (as by kicking heads or with a closed shop agreement). Otherwise the employer will always create a Prisoner’s Dilemma situation in which it is to the short-term advantage (but long-term disadvantage) of every worker to defect from the union (by sacking union members or paying non-union members more).
And hey, it works. Since serious union-busting started under Reagan, the median wage stopped increasing and remained flat, as it was always intended to. Of course you might want to consider that not only was supply-side economics a deliberate fraud on the part of the people who promoted it, it’s actually dangerously backwards. When the median wage remains flat but productivity increases, you fairly quickly reach a situation where the super-rich have nothing but asset bubbles to invest their money in. There’s no point in them investing factories to make cool stuff for the masses because the masses don’t have any money to buy it. Call it demand-side economics. And eventually the asset bubbles reach such size that they take down the entire economy when they pop. And here we were in 1929 and here we are again.
But at the end of the day, if such hardball tactics strike you as unseemly, or you want to take the short-term gain and run, or you’re a morally stunted Randian who actually thinks that it’s right and proper for an ever increasing share of the productive capacity of the economy to go to the super-rich, then feel free to not join a union, or work to tear them down. We’ll just have to do without your support.
DB: “So If I want the right to do those things, my only choice is to fight same-sex “marriage” tooth-and-nail, because when it passes it will restrict my freedom.”
Same deal. Even if we held our noses and accepted support from someone whose contempt is so obvious, what you’ve promised us is weak as dishwater (Salt Lake City-style domestic partnerships - ha bloody ha) and we’d be signing off on the principle that religious conservatives get to discriminate. No way.
what exactly is totalitarian about it?
Each of your “ifs” is a disconnect from reality and is a product of your imagination.
These glimpses you offer of that imagination betray an impulse to make Government the owner of civil society.
It is an impulse that prioritizes not an interest in justice, but “in just us”, as per your overt reliance on gay identity politics.
Identity politics, when pressed into the government to assert a group’s supremacy, is one of the most reliable sources of injustice, political corruption, and despotism.
It begins, as always, with appropriation of the foundational social institutions of civil society. It proceeds, apace, with the innoculation of the favored group identity. There is no “live and let live”, only ends that justify all means.
Be careful what you wish for, Mark, because even the most adamant true believer of gay identity politics will be subject to the suppression you imagine would be reserved just for those outside your identity group.
US society went throught that with racist identity politics. Your imagined “ifs” present the promise of more of the same with gay identity politics.
I’ll step off now and leave you the last word in our exchange here, if you’d want it and would not abuse it.
CO: “Each of your “ifs” is a disconnect from reality and is a product of your imagination.”
No, there’s nothing imaginary about the fact that there used to be sodomy laws with criminal penalties and that they did most of the heavy lifting in ensuring that people paired up male-female. That is, as far as being opposite-sex only was concerned, marriage was all stick and no carrot. There’s nothing imaginary about the fact that plenty of people, mainly Christians, would like to bring back the stick. I had the chastening experience of having to drive up California’s Central Valley the day after the decision in Lawrence v. Texas was handed down, with nothing but gospel radio stations to listen to. They were as mad as cut snakes. Therefore I don’t apologize for assuming that any conservative who speaks of marriage as if it were a precious carrot not to be wasted on same-sex relationships is either clueless about the past or has a stick behind their back.
CO: “These glimpses you offer of that imagination betray an impulse to make Government the owner of civil society.”
Yes and no. I don’t particularly want to put the government in charge of everything, but if it’s a choice between that and making organized religion the owner of civil society I’ll take it every time. RK asked me why I think freedom of speech and freedom of religion are important and I realized I only gave half an answer. I said that freedom of speech is valuable to me and therefore it’s something I have to make sure everyone is allowed to have. More generally, I think freedom of speech is important because I think speech is a good thing, and I actively want to encourage it, even from people I currently disagree with. What I didn’t say, but should have added, is that I take close to the opposite attitude to religion: freedom of religion is mostly about freedom from other people’s religion. Freedom of religion didn’t get into the US constitution because some malevolent abstraction called government kept picking on some warm fuzzy abstraction called religion, it got there because religious people kept imposing their religion via the government on other religious people. And although the constitution only constrains the government, I interpret freedom of religion in the same spirit elsewhere. To parody a famous slogan: your freedom of religion stops at my nose.
CO: “It is an impulse that prioritizes not an interest in justice, but “in just us”, as per your overt reliance on gay identity politics. [//] Identity politics, when pressed into the government to assert a group’s supremacy, is one of the most reliable sources of injustice, political corruption, and despotism.”
I really am at a loss as to where you get this idea that anyone is asserting the supremacy of anyone. I don’t argue that religious conservatives should be prevented from acting against gay people because gay people are superior. I argue that religious conservatives should be prevented from acting against gay people because gay people are people and are being harmed or inconvenienced, and religious freedom does not extend to harming or inconveniencing people.
CO: “It begins, as always, with appropriation of the foundational social institutions of civil society. It proceeds, apace, with the innoculation of the favored group identity. There is no “live and let live”, only ends that justify all means. [//] Be careful what you wish for, Mark, because even the most adamant true believer of gay identity politics will be subject to the suppression you imagine would be reserved just for those outside your identity group.”
I’m afraid this appears to be word salad.
CO: “US society went throught that with racist identity politics. Your imagined “ifs” present the promise of more of the same with gay identity politics.”
Well, yes, as I was saying to RK, I fully expect US gay politics to follow roughly in the footsteps of US race politics, and while that’s not exactly great, it’s better than the alternatives.
But there’s still going to be a large minority, maybe 30%, who are going to dig in for religious and other reasons, and who will rail at gay people and fume about persecution. I don’t kid myself that I can change everybody’s mind, but I do think I can convince a healthy majority that the dead-enders are being pathetic and should not be allowed to take out their hatred for gay people in practical ways.
And sorry, but even if I (for argument’s sake) believed that you personally would not feel that more than just the law was necessary to deal with that 30 % that was still a problem, I do not, based on history, believe that other pro-SSM leaders will feel that way. And as far as believing that there is no significant difference between gay and straight I don’t think the number will be as low as 30 %, especially as the definition of what attitudes are regarded as being a problem will also be expanded. After all, 35 years ago, I did not hear gay leaders saying that public non-acceptance of same-sex marriage was a problem, either.
RK: “And sorry, but even if I (for argument’s sake) believed that you personally would not feel that more than just the law was necessary to deal with that 30 % that was still a problem, I do not, based on history, believe that other pro-SSM leaders will feel that way.”
You seem to have misread me. I did not say I thought that nothing more than the law was required to deal with the 30%. On the contrary, I said I thought that after SSM and DADT there was no more legal change worth asking for. I think the battle is not over by a long shot, but it will require something rather more than the law to win, or at least get a better class of stalemate. I look forward to the day when, as with racists, the only friends that homophobes have in polite society are the constitution and the ACLU, not even the churches.
RK: “And as far as believing that there is no significant difference between gay and straight I don’t think the number will be as low as 30 %, especially as the definition of what attitudes are regarded as being a problem will also be expanded.”
No difference significant with respect to what? The fact that opposite-sex couples are normally fertile, whereas currently same-sex ones never are is a highly significant difference for _some_ purposes. The fact that gay people are 5% of the population and straight people are 90% is highly significant for _some_ purposes. Gay people couldn’t be more keenly aware of some of these differences, and we have no desire to have people pretend that they’re not real. We just don’t accept that the various arguments that are made that they’re significant for the purposes of who should be allowed to get married are anything but malicious and/or braindead.
RK: “After all, 35 years ago, I did not hear gay leaders saying that public non-acceptance of same-sex marriage was a problem, either.”
Sure. I don’t know what the full range of opinion was like, but certainly people like Harvey Milk tended to treat marriage as a prison to be fought off rather than a prize to be taken. It’s no longer the prevailing opinion among gay people, but you still encounter it. And it was understandable, because intrinsic to the traditional conception of marriage still largely prevailing at the time was that marriage was the only acceptable outlet for sex. Marriage and only marriage had the magic property of washing away to some extent the intrinsic shamefulness of sex. But in the interim, marriage itself changed radically, and not because people were being unaccustomedly tolerant of gay people, but because of a bunch of other factors that mostly affected straight people, including but not limited to (i) more reliable contraception, (ii) technology that freed up women’s time at home and expanded opportunities for them in the workplace, (iii) improved medicine which meant that people didn’t have to breed like rabbits to have a chance of a few children surviving, (iv) increasing educational expectations which made children more expensive, early marriage more inconvenient and late marriage more onerous, and (v) decreased importance of children as social security in old age. It’s now something that people graduate to after a period of dating a spectrum of people, when they find someone they’re serious about, and that’s something that gay people can sensibly aspire to as well. Conservative religion begs to differ and a fair few people pay lip service, but hardly anyone takes notice in practice except for the anti-gay bit, and that’s quickly changing.
So indeed, in another 35 years something radical might have happened, and gay people might have moved to take advantage of it, but I can’t image what that might be, I’m sure you can’t, and I don’t see why I should take responsibility for it in advance any more than gay people of 35 years ago were responsible for the last 35 years of developments in opposite-sex marriage.
You seem to have misread me. I did not say I thought that nothing more than the law was required to deal with the 30%. On the contrary, I said I thought that after SSM and DADT there was no more legal change worth asking for.
Then you haven’t used your imagination enough, but regardless, when I said SSM would not be enough for your side, I was not just talking about laws. When you replied “why would it not be enough?”, I thought you weren’t just talking about the laws either. Now you tell me you were, and admit that extra-legally you’re not going to be satisfied at all.
So, tell us all, after SSM, just what do you think will still have to be done to achieve your end that “the only friends that homophobes (by which you mean everybody who thinks marriage is between a man and a woman, or who thinks homosexuals should be left alone but that homosexuality is not equal to heterosexuality) have in polite society are the constitution and the ACLU, not even the churches”.
No difference significant with respect to what? The fact that opposite-sex couples are normally fertile, whereas currently same-sex ones never are is a highly significant difference for _some_ purposes. The fact that gay people are 5% of the population and straight people are 90% is highly significant for _some_ purposes. Gay people couldn’t be more keenly aware of some of these differences, and we have no desire to have people pretend that they’re not real.
But how are you going to really overcome the tendency for people to feel that the first fact by necessity makes heterosexual sex more important to society than gay sex? Whether you or I agree is besides the point, many people, and not just religious people, will see it that way. How are you really going to overcome the tendency for people to think (less defensibly in my opinion, but inevitably nonetheless) that the second fact makes homosexuals the “odd ones” in society and treat them as people throughout history (particularly a large subset of the young and particularly males) have tended to treat the “odd ones”? You don’t seem to really grasp what you’re up against, and why if you really want to achieve the near-utopia you think you can reach you have a lot more to overcome. And if you’re serious you’re not going to be able to achieve this utopia without coercion any more than John Lennon’s “Imagine” utopia could be achieved without coercion.
But in the interim, marriage itself changed radically, and not because people were being unaccustomedly tolerant of gay people, but because of a bunch of other factors that mostly affected straight people, including but not limited to (i) more reliable contraception, (ii) technology that freed up women’s time at home and expanded opportunities for them in the workplace, (iii) improved medicine which meant that people didn’t have to breed like rabbits to have a chance of a few children surviving, (iv) increasing educational expectations which made children more expensive, early marriage more inconvenient and late marriage more onerous, and (v) decreased importance of children as social security in old age.
In the interim? These changes had already been occurring long before Harvey Milk. They could not have been the reason for the change in the consensus gay attitude toward marriage. No, the real reason was more likely political expediency. They knew they couldn’t sell the public on gay marriage in the 1970s. But it was in the plans:
http://www.article8.org/docs/general/platform.htm
So indeed, in another 35 years something radical might have happened, and gay people might have moved to take advantage of it, but I can’t image what that might be, I’m sure you can’t….
Oh, I can. Some of it’s in the above link.
Be thankful for my laziness, Mark, but I’ll get back to you with more.
(Note what else was in the plans here. Note “State”, #s 7 & 8.)
My second to last comment in my 4/30 1:56 post was merely about why I don’t post more often, that’s all, lest anyone think it may have meant more.
RK: ‘So, tell us all, after SSM, just what do you think will still have to be done to achieve your end that “the only friends that homophobes (by which you mean everybody who thinks marriage is between a man and a woman, or who thinks homosexuals should be left alone but that homosexuality is not equal to heterosexuality) have in polite society are the constitution and the ACLU, not even the churches”.’
MB: First note that of course, by homophobes I don’t mean _only_ the two classes that you mention. Second, I concede in principle that someone could believe in opposite-sex-only marriage for non-homophobic reasons, it’s just that all the superficially non-homophobic reasons that have been suggested strike me as so lame/tortured/stupid that I don’t believe they’re actually convincing more than a handful of people. Rather I think three different things are going on: (i) zealous religious conservatives whose only real argument for punishing gay people is because God supposedly says so but know that that won’t fly with moderates are putting out third and fourth string arguments because that’s all they have that’s publicly acceptable, (ii) not-quite-so-zealous religious conservatives who want there to be a substantive reason are making bad rationalizations, (iii) mushy moderates take the rationalizations more seriously than they deserve due to the Overton Window effect. I don’t think I do anything about (i) but I can do more about (ii), and quite a lot about (iii), and by the time I’m done everybody who still thinks marriage is opposite-sex only will be an unambiguous homophobe.
And what will this look like? Well, if someone told racist jokes in your house, what would you do? I like to think that you’d make it clear to them that such behaviour was unacceptable, and if they persisted they would be asked to leave. That’s what it would look like.
RK: “But how are you going to really overcome the tendency for people to feel that the first fact by necessity makes heterosexual sex more important to society than gay sex.”
Err, attempt to clarify their thinking. After all, nothing follows from the fact that opposite-sex sex is more important without some auxiliary assumptions. Clearly it’s important in the sense of being necessary, and something would follow from that if for example there were a shortage of opposite-sex sex, but that’s ludicrous. (And yes, it _is_ ludicrous and there are backup arguments if someone doesn’t immediately get it.) I’ve been unable to think of an auxiliary assumption that completes the argument and isn’t ludicrous, and despite intense goading nobody on the anti-SSM side has been able to suggest one. (In fact, I haven’t yet found an anti-SSM advocate who doesn’t just evade the question, which leads me to suspect that half of them know they have a weak case and the rest aren’t capable of thinking in anything but slogans and can’t make sense of the question.)
RK: “These changes had already been occurring long before Harvey Milk. They could not have been the reason for the change in the consensus gay attitude toward marriage. No, the real reason was more likely political expediency. They knew they couldn’t sell the public on gay marriage in the 1970s.”
What’s your point? SSM didn’t receive much emphasis early on partly for the reason I’ve suggested (many gay people used to think it was more a weapon against gay people than a prize) and partly for the reason you’ve suggested (there’s a natural progression to wish lists and things like repeal of sodomy laws have to come first). So? _Some_ gay rights activists have wanted marriage rights for a long time and have been perfectly upfront about it since at least 1970, when the first (unsuccessful) court challenge was mounted in New York. I’m not aware of anyone speaking for the gay community ever totally disclaiming interest or purporting to take SSM off the table in in perpetuity in exchange for some concession. I’ve seen anti-SSM advocates _claim_ that’s happened but I don’t believe it, especially since the time David made such a claim in connection with letters to the editors in Hawaiian newspapers and then turned out to be misrepresenting them.
RK: “Oh, I can. Some of it’s in the above link.”
What exactly? I would have said the platform was pretty prescient. The most striking differences relative to the gay agenda of today are things that have disappeared: item repealing age of consent laws (#7 under State) has been pretty comprehensively renounced, and #8 has been offloaded on the polyamorists to make of what they will. As far as I can see, the only innovation in 35 years is hate crimes laws, and I don’t apologize for those.