Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Conservatives Speak on Gay Marriage (updated)

Conservative Author Cal Thomas may be getting an inkling.
To those on the political and religious right who are intent on continuing the battle to preserve “traditional marriage” in a nation that is rapidly discarding its traditions, I would ask this question: What poses a greater threat to our remaining moral underpinnings? Is it two homosexuals living together, or is it the number of heterosexuals who are divorcing and the increasing number of children born to unmarried women, now at nearly 40 percent, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention?

Most of those who are disturbed about same-sex marriage are not as exercised about preserving heterosexual marriage. That’s because it doesn’t raise money and won’t get them on TV. Some preachers would rather demonize gays than oppose heterosexuals who violate their vows by divorcing, often causing harm to their children. That’s because so many in their congregations have been divorced and preaching against divorce might cause some to leave and take their contributions with them.
Ya think? Yes, I know it is said that a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, but the hypocrisy of opposing gay marriage and fidelity while overlooking straight divorce and infidelity--teh stupid, it burns.

Meanwhile, Catholic-now-Orthodox gay-phobe Rod Dreher (he really is phobic in a rather hysterical way; he imagined in the wake of Prop8 someone would attack HIM in deepest darkest Texas!!) admits it too as hebemoans,
It is increasingly obvious that the US Supreme Court is going to have to rule on this matter soon. It is an untenable situation for a same-sex couple to be married in Vermont and Massachusetts and Iowa, but not in Texas, Nevada and Montana. I believe SCOTUS will constitutionalize gay marriage, and that being the case, it might be better for my side if it gets done sooner rather than later. If done sooner, there might still be enough backlash left in the American people to get a constitutional amendment passed erecting a high barrier or protection around religious institutions.
But the most ridiculous reaction I read today was someone complaining that Christians would all be fired from their jobs for disagreeing with gay marriage (I'm sorry I can't find the link). Aside from the fact that lots of Christians are proSSM, I had to laugh. Because, you know, all those Catholics who disapprove of divorce can't get jobs and are being prosecuted for preaching against contraception. Yeah, right. SPARE ME.

So, this meme continues that gay marriage is actually an assault on the poor beleaguered Christians, conveniently avoiding the fact that (for example) the anti-divorce, anti-contraception distinctly mediaeval Roman Catholic church is prominent and active and in no way marginalized and provides evidence that there is already a bright line between the civil square and the religious sanctuary. Not to worry Mr Dreher. You keep your church out of my life and I'll keep my life out of your church.

Still, this claim that their civil rights are under attack by MY marriage, continues and do not for a moment think this is done. Quoted in the LA TImes, Brian S. Brown, executive director of the National Organization for Marriage, says a new ad campaign
which he said would eventually include more than $1.5 million in airtime, would "highlight how same-sex marriage undermines the core civil rights of those who believe in the simple truth that marriage is the union of one man and one woman."
And what about my core civil rights? Keep their faith in the church, and everyone is fine. But depriving me of marriage is no different than, say, a Jewish demand that we all cease to eat pork, or a Mormon demand that we all abandon caffeine, or a Catholic demand that we outlaw cotraception, because to do otherwise affects their "core civil rights".

It's long past time to address this foolish, lying argument forcibly. This is how they won Prop8, this and the argument that those Awful Homos would teach their children that being gay is ok! We know what to expect, and we have to immediately take them up.

(updated again)
(Crossposted at DailyKos and Streetprophets)

8 comments:

JCF said...

The hysterical rants of Wingnuts are getting more and more deadly: you heard that the cop-killer in Pittsburgh went on his rampage, out of paranoia that "Obama would take his guns away"? Just as Fixed Noise channel bloviators like Glenn Beck have been ranting Obama would do?

Lord have mercy...

John I. said...

Rod Dreher left the Roman Catholic Church several years ago for the much smaller Orthodox Church in America, - one of a dozen Eastern Orthodox jurisdictions in N. America. He did tough reporting on the clergy sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic Church, and apparently was so appalled by what he found that he left the church for Orthodoxy.

Having been Orthodox for a number of years myself, I can tell you that they have become a refuge for scared Evanglicals and ex-Episcopalians fleeing what they perceive as the "gay menace". In a word, GLBT's and friends, if you are looking for "bells and smells" in your worship, trust me, don't waste your time there!

back in TEC - j

IT said...

Thanks, John
Updated

Plenty of smells-and-bells in our local TEC Cathedral, that's for sure

David said...

That second to last paragraph says it all. Until the wingnuts can make a rational case concerning how same-sex civil marriage really takes away one of their "core civil rights," then they should just shut their pie holes.

And while I've appreciated some things Dreher has written lately about how the desire for political power has adversely affected religious conservatives, he really is just (forgive me) an hysterical drama queen when it comes to this issue.

IT said...

Tony Blair, another recent RC convert, Tells the pope he's wrong. Speaking to the gay magazine Attitude, the former Prime Minister, himself now a Roman Catholic, said that he wanted to urge religious figures everywhere to reinterpret their religious texts to see them as metaphorical, not literal, and suggested that in time this would make all religious groups accept gay people as equals Can excommunication be far behind?

Andrew Sullivan, appalled, comments on the National Review:Flip this around and you see what the theocon right actually believes: that society has no interest in the welfare of its gay citizens, and an abiding interest in ensuring that they remain unequal, feel unequal and suffer the consequences of a culture where family and commitment and fidelity are non-existent. And they write this within living memory of an appalling and devastating plague. This is how the social right is responding to our times, and to put it personally, my life and the lives and deaths of countless others. One day, they will understand the callousness and bitterness and willful ignorance they currently represent. As civilized society leaves them increasingly behind.

Some non-conservatives are speaking up too:

PeterSagal:
here are three arguments against same-sex marriage, summarized thusly:

1) God hates it.

2) It’s against thousands of years of tradition.

3) It’ll ruin marriage for everyone else.

To which the effective ripostes are:

1) Actually, He told me in a dream that He’s all for it.

2) So was abolishing slavery, outlawing polygamy, and making women citizens, and those have worked out pretty well.

3) No, it won’t.

IT said...

This is also a great article by Alex Massie

James said...

Great post! And, I agree with all the comments, too. Will wonders never cease?

It's nice that Cal Thomas recognizes that the whole issue is about money, money, money, and the power that targeting GLBT people creates for the fundamentalists.

June Butler said...

Cal Thomas, with whom I almost never agree, has written on the subject before. I think he gets who is destroying hetero marriage.