Connecticut creates same-sex marriage

Of course I will comment on the Kerrigan decision, handed down in Connecticut today, when time permits. I am swamped at the moment, grading mid-terms and trying to meet a publication deadline for a scholarly article. In the meantime, enjoy the much-deserved ridicule that the scholars at Bench Memos are heaping on the decision.

More dishonesty from the homosexuality lobby

This ad is currently running in California. The ad shows an attractive young woman trying to get to the alter, where her handsome, chivalrous husband-to-be waits to marry her. Various obstacles have been placed in her way, and after squeezing between cars in the parking lot, losing a heel and her veil, and being tripped up by a clumsy, elderly guest, she gives up and sits in the aisle just a few feet short of her destination. The minister then restrains her fiance from coming to her aid. The following words then apear on the screen: "What if you couldn't marry the person you love."

The ad is disingenuous on so many levels. To name just a few:

(1) The couple trying to get married consists of one man and one woman. No same-sex couples, polygamous couples, or any other groups of people trying to marry the people they love appear anywhere in the ad. The imagery is intentional, of course, and extremely dishonest. A single image of a same-sex couple approaching the alter would belie the myth underlying the ad.

(2) The message is predicated upon a lie. Nothing prevents any person -- heterosexual or homosexual -- from getting married. Everyone has equal access to marriage under traditional laws. But homosexuality lobbyists don't want equal access. They want the law's special and particlar endorsement of homosexual intimacy.

(3) An unmistakable, if veiled, implication of the ad is that various people have thrown up (legal) obstacles to prevent homosexuals from reaching the alter. Of course this also is untrue. But the implication betrays a more subtle presupposition: anti-gay traditionalists are obsessed with keeping harmless homosexuals from attaining marital bliss.

The traditionalists-are-obsessed-with-same-sex-marriage slander, commonly recited by sexual liberationists, is particularly galling because it is a classic example of psychological projection. Before the homosexuality lobby shoved this issue into the national consciousness by litigating it before the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court and every other judicial forum they thought might be receptive, I and most people like me though about same-same marriage as often as we thought of platinum ice cream (that is to say, not at all) and for exactly the same reasons.

Bullies for same-sex marriage

I never cease to be amazed by the willingness of homosexuality advocates to bully social conservatives into accepting their premises. Our arguments are so bad, we must be motivated by anti-gay animus. The analogy between same-sex marriage and polygamy is disingenuous and therefore no reasonable person takes it seriously. Et cetera.

Trouble is, it's not just cowardly libs who use these tactics. Libertarians willingly use the same ploy. Today on Volokh, both Eugene Volokh and Ilya Somin, in consecutive posts, play the any-reasonable-person-must-accept-my-presuppositions-about-same-sex-marriage game.

Why do most (all?) opponents of conjugal marriage refuse to engage supporters of conjugal marriage on the merits of our arguments? Is it intellectual cowardice, disrespect?

And why do those who consider themselves liberal and broad-minded so often resort to illiberal debate tactics? Is it delusion, malevolence?

For once, let's have a debate on the merits of a conservative idea without all the hocus-pocus. Is that too much to ask?

Fathers need not apply

In their same-sex marriage decisions, the high courts of California, Massachusetts, and Canada proclaimed the moral lesson that gender doesn't matter. A man may choose to marry a woman or a man. A woman may choose to marry a man or a woman. It doesn't matter. Whatever the individual's gender preference, the law must endorse the morality of the individual's choice.

The UK Parliament has learned the lesson well. Last night the House of Commons voted to do away with the requirement that fertility clinics consider a child's need for a male role model before providing fertility treatment to women. A child has neither an interest nor a right to have a father because men are obsolete. That is the claim.

The war against fathers and their children is real. Studies show time and again that fatherlessness is a root cause of a host of social ills, including career criminality, poverty, psychological disorders, and drug use. Yet enlightened social engineers continue to chip away at the legal supports for fatherhood. First no-fault divorce, then same-sex marriage, now this. Must we Westerners pretend that we have no enemies without, all the while destroying ourselves from within?

CA follows MA off the deep end

By a 4-3 decision, the California Supreme Court has overruled the carefully-considered laws of the State of California, which recognized conjugal marriage and same-sex domestic partnerships, and has imposed its own moral views on the people of that State. This act of judicial tyranny makes California the second state, after Massachusetts, to enshrine in law the morally-partisan claim that same-sex intimacy is morally valuable conduct, which deserves equal approbation in law to conjugal monogamy (the committed union of one man and one woman).

The court left no doubt about its moral partisanship. From the introduction to the majority opinion:

One of the core elements of the right to establish an officially recognized family that is embodied in the California constitutional right to marry is a couple’s right to have their family relationship accorded dignity and respect equal to that accorded other officially recognized families, and assigning a different designation for the family relationship of same-sex couples while reserving the historic designation of “marriage” exclusively for opposite-sex couples poses at least a serious risk of denying the family relationship of same-sex couples such equal dignity and respect.

Of course, California's conjugal marriage law never denied to any of its citizens, homosexual or hetereosexual, equal respect and dignity. What it did was to endorse the proposition that conjugal marital sex is intrinsically valuable while other sexual acts are not. The California Supreme Court thinks it knows better.

The court has done a grievous disservice to the people of California, especially those citizens tempted toward homosexual acts and those who reside at the margins of society, who need the encouragement of the law to take responsibility for their actions and to choose to marry.

UPDATE: It strikes me that advocates for same-sex marriage have committed a strategic blunder, in light of the popular referendum that will appear on the November ballot in California. That referendum would amend the state constitution to anneal the traditional definition in the state constitution. It is now almost certain to pass, and to motivate conservative Californians to get out and vote. Defense of (the special status accorded to) conjugal marriage always gets people to the polls. Defense of marriage from judicial overreach really gets 'em goin'.

So, unless (heaven forbid) the United States Supreme Court creates same-sex marriage nationwide, this California decision looks an awful lot like the high water mark for the same-sex marriage project. Even if Connecticut follows suit later this year, other states are unlikely to do so. The high courts of New York and New Jersey have already declined to create same-sex marriage in those states.

Along similar lines, Election Law Blog wonders whether the California Supreme Court just did John McCain a favor.

This helps John McCain because those conservative voters may not have come out in great numbers for him, but they will come out now to vote for this amendment, and they are more likely to vote for McCain than for the Democrat once they are already voting. That's not to say that California will go red, but it is to say that the Democratic nominee will have to devote more resources to this very expensive to campaign in state.

The slope is, in fact, slippery

We defenders of conjugal monogamy are frequently pilloried for pointing out that nothing in principle distinguishes same-sex marriage from polygamous marriage or incestuous marriage. If there is no rational basis for the conjugality predicate to marriage then there is no rational basis for the numerosity (2) or filial (not) predicates. We are excoriated as homophobic chicken littles for even mentioning the analogy. No one is seriously arguing for polygamous or incestuous marriage, the argument goes. That's a scare tactic.

In fact, plenty of people are arguing for legal recognition of polygamy. And, as predicted, the incest threshhold is in danger of being breached, as well. Martin Knight over at RedState calls our attention to the Deaves, father and daughter who have brought into this world a child of their own.

We join Mr. Knight in standing athwart this progression of history yelling, "Stop!" But we are not confident that anyone is paying attention.

Why the social conservative platform benefits homosexuals

Titus' post below calls to mind a canard commonly traded among homosexuality advocates, academics, and the mainstream media, that those of us who defend conjugal (monogamous, opposite-sex) marriage and oppose special rights for homosexuals are motivated by some anti-gay animus. We here in the Cloakroom have recently expressed our opposition to same-sex marriage (here, here, and here) and to Ted Kennedy's so-called "Employment Non-discrimination Act." It behooves us, I think, to explain why our positions are borne not out of antipathy toward homosexuals but rather out of principles of universally-accessible practical reason.

The case for conjugal marriage and the case against distinguishing homosexuals as a suspect class under the Equal Protection clause and federal employment discrimination laws both begin with the observation that not all sexual acts are equally good. That is to say, not all sexual acts fulfill a basic human good. In fact, only monogamous, conjugal, marital sex draws a person into the two-in-one-flesh communion that integrates the human person. Unless one adopts the view that sex is something less than what it self-evidently is, one cannot argue that all sex acts are equally constitutive of, and fulfilling of, the instrinsic good of marriage.

Sexual acts performed outside the intrinsically-valuable relationship of conjugal monogamy disintegrate the human person by objectifying the human body. This is true of fornication, adultery, pornography, and homosexual acts. The institution of conjugal marriage promotes the integration of human persons by directing sexuality into the channel in which it instantiates a basic, human good. And it disincentivizes disintegrating, non-marital sex acts.

Homosexuality advocates respond that, while conjugal marriage may be well and good for heterosexuals, homosexuals want no part in it. Homosexuals, they argue, are fulfilled by pursuing their preference for same-sex intimacy. The autonomous choice of same-sex intimacy enables homosexuals to express their true identities.

The fundamental problem with this response is its failure to distinguish between proclivity and choice. As the Vatican has affirmed in recent years, homosexuality is a tendency and not an identity. That a person struggles with homosexual temptation does not entail that he should succumb to that temptation. I have known men (perhaps I have also known women in this category, though they have not so identified themselves to me) overcome the temptation to homosexual acts and lead healthy, fulfilling lives in their victory.

When Gene Robinson, the Episcopal priest who abandoned his wife for a homosexual lover and whom the Episcopal Church in New Hampshire nevertheless elected as Bishop in 2003, called alcoholism a "disease," he was on to something. However, he failed to see the implications of that fitting appellation. The parallels between alcoholism and homosexuality are many. Both disorders stem from a compulsive proclivity. Both take something that is essentially good -- the fruit of the vine in one case, human sexuality in the other -- and pervert the goodness beyond recognition. Both destroy. Though neither proclivity is a sin, both drive people to indulge in unhealthy, disintegrating acts.

Laws creating a special class for homosexuals encourage homosexuals to identify themselves as homosexuals. We would never create a special class in employment discrimination law for alcoholics, because such a classification would encourage people who tend to drink too much to identify themselves as alcoholics. Such a law would cause moral, and perhaps physical and psychological, harm to those persons.

Homosexuality activists claim, dishonestly, that they want equality with heterosexuals. When subjected to the same rules as everyone else -- uniform pre-requisites for marriage, anti-discrimination laws that permit discrimination based upon tendencies -- they demand special treatment. Special treatment means legal approbation for choices that harm. That is why we here in the Cloakroom oppose creation of special classes for homosexuals.

The Christian perspective takes this one step further. If, as Christians like myself believe, all sexual activity outside of monogamous, conjugal marriage disintegrates human persons and relationships, then we are doing homosexuals no favor by giving the approbation of the state to choices that harm them. In fact, we are discriminating against them by denying the same grace -- truth about the sinfulness of their actions and the sufficiency of Christ's atonement, and forgiveness and restoration to the way God made them -- that we Christians are to extend to all sinners, whether homosexual or heterosexual.

On a personal note, I invite anyone who considers me antipathetic to homosexuals or a homophobe to consider these facts. I shared an apartment with a homosexual in college. I have two openly gay cousins. I have other close friends who have struggled with, and overcome, homosexual temptation. I want the best for these friends. That is why I am so firm on these issues.

Of all hair-brained follies

this ranks among the most regrettable. Kmiec stops beating around the bush and endorses Obama.

Someday Professor Kmiec will wake up with a post-Obama hangover, either because the Candidate of the Past has lost the election or because he has won the election and violated Kmiec's misplaced confidence. For reasons that should be obvious (but apparently are not to Kmiec), no thoughtful person who endorses the self-evident good of conjugal marriage and the intrinsic value of human life in all stages of development can in good conscience vote for Obama.

I have much more to say on Kmiec's twisted logic, and might share more later today, time permitting. But what is most troubling about Kmiec's endorsement is the timing. He posted this endorsement on Easter Sunday. Even as his fellow Christians were celebrating the resurrection of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, who conquered death to give us life, Kmiec was playing against type and celebrating a man who consistently exercises his power and influence to ensure the destruction of innocent human lives.

More disingenuous Wallis

I will refrain from commenting on most of the misguided op-ed Jim Wallis wrote in the Boston Globe yesterday. But I feel compelled to dispel one (deliberate) misstatement of his.

Speaking of a crowd he addressed at Boston's Park Street Church, Wallis wrote, "They suspect that Jesus would likely care more about the 30,000 children who die globally each day due to unnecessary poverty and preventable disease than he might worry about gay marriage amendments in Ohio." (How he discerned the thoughts of hundreds of silent audience members is a mystery.) This is yet another of Wallis' incendiary assertions predicated upon a slander.

The presuppositional slander is that those who disagree with Wallis (conservatives) care more about "gay marriage" than they do about children dying of diseases and poverty. I can only speak for me and my family, but I resent Wallis' slander. I believe very much in conjugal marriage and defend it at every turn. Meanwhile, my wife and I are heavily involved with a non-profit religious organization that performs development work and provides disease-prevention services in the developing world. We have given thousands of dollars to it. We have each provided dozens of hours of pro bono consulting services to it. (My wife's services are much more valuable than my own.) And we support numerous other organizations that do very good work for children and adults in other parts of the world and here in the United States.

To suggest that defending conjugal marriage and saving dying children is an either-or proposition is offensive. This is merely the latest of Wallis' detestable remarks. It is consistent with his modus operendi. But to use children? This man has no scruples.

An aside: Those of us who defend conjugal marriage do not oppose gay marriage. Indeed, we support homosexuals who get married. We oppose the creation of a same-sex marriage institution, or any civil union institution that discriminates against non-homosexual, same-sex couples. Add this to the growing list of Wallis' misstatements.

Is California next?

Obama's comments are timely. The California Supreme Court today heard oral arguments in a legal challenge to that State's conjugal marriage statute. Keep one eye trained on San Francisco.

Blessed are the liberals, for they shall defy public reason

The Sermon on the Mount includes a mandate for legal approbation of same-sex unions. So saeth the junior Messiah from Illinois. Reverend Obama did not choose to enlighten us by instructing where precisely the mandate may be located. Perhaps it ought to be inferred from the passage on interior decoration, a well-known strong suit among gay men: "Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house."

Obama's is a curious interpretation of a passage that includes express prohibitions against both lust and divorce and makes no mention of same-sex relationships, much less homosexual intimacy. (His description of St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans, which expressly condemns homosexual conduct, as "obscure" betrays a manifest ignorance of biblical literature, Christian theology, and Western philosophy.) But leaving aside Obama's embarrasingly bad hermeneutics, his assertion raises two additional questions.

First, is there any conceivably rational interpretation of his statement? CNSNews speculates that Obama might have been referring either to the Golden Rule or to the prohibition against judging. However, neither has any bearing on the question whether the State ought to lend legal approbation to monogamous, same-sex intimacy. Indeed, nothing in the Sermon on the Mount has any obvious relevance to the issue. Just as nothing in the Sermon addresses same-sex unions, nothing about conjugal marriage offends against any of Christ's admonitions. So what was Obama thinking?

Second, why does Obama think that this theonomous rhetoric is persuasive? Some conservative evangelicals are often excoriated for engaging in the same practice. A public figure who argues against same-sex marriage on the ground that the Bible condemns homosexual conduct short-shrifts the conclusive argument from public reason in favor of conjugal marriage for two reasons: (1) which choices are right or wrong for individuals does not directly determine which choices the State ought to approve in law and (2) arguments from authority are only persuasive if the audience submits to the authority invoked. Most of our interlocutors in the public square do not recognize the authority of Scripture. We are well-advised to offer the very compelling public reasons in favor of legal approbation of conjugal marriage and to avoid turning Holy Scripture into a law and policy manual.

Legal approbation of conjugal marriage -- the two-in-one-flesh communion possible only in a monogamous commitment between persons of opposite sexes -- is eminently reasonable. It promotes a self-evidently valuable relationship and, additionally, secures the practical benefits that flow out of marriages and familes. As a strategic matter, Obama is wise to call attention away from the reasoned arguments in favor of conjugal marriage; those arguments are not merely persuasive but conclusive. His attempt to distract is as transparent as the emptiness of his message of hope.

Gore, oblivious (are you surprised?)

So did you hear the one about same-sex marriage and equal rights for homosexuals? You know that one already? Can you believe Al Gore fell for it? Yeah, I can too.

The creation of same sex marriage entails removal of the conjugality requirement from the definition of marriage. It necessarily involves the rejection of the opposite-sex predicate to the institution of marriage. So, endorsement of same-sex marriage is not morally neutral. It does not follow from any principle of equality, autonomy, or any other morally-neutral principle. (Homosexuals have access to conjugal marriage on terms equal to heterosexuals. Just like heterosexuals, they can marry one person, who is not a close relative and is a member of the opposite sex, who does not carry a loathesome disease, and is not currently married to someone else.)

The only rational argument to be made for same-sex marriage is that homosexual conduct adds something of value to same-sex friendships -- in the same way that conjugal sexual conduct adds something of value to committed, opposite-sex friendships in the context of marriage -- and thus deserves approbation in law, just like conjugal marriage. Those of us who defend conjugal marriage and oppose same-sex marriage are not arguing that same-sex friendships have no value, or that homosexuals are not entitled to the same rights as heterosexuals, or that homosexuals are less deserving of dignity or autonomy. We simply disagree on the moral value of homosexual conduct. We think it is beneath the dignity of all human persons, whether or not they are attracted to members of the opposite sex.

Gore, like most Liberals, refuses to engage us social conservatives on the merits of our argument, instead fighting the straw man of putative inequality. This would be insulting were it coming from someone other than Al Gore. Ever since he started performing his Chicken Little schtick on global warming, I have had a hard time taking him seriously. It's sad, in a way, to watch a former Vice President be so unintentionally comical.