The Culture War

An interesting quote from the 7:30 Report on the Australian Broadcasting Company during a round table discussion about Intelligent Design.

DR DAVID YOUNG: Well, I think mainly it (Intelligent Design) is a political ploy, which sounds harsh, but you have to understand the situation in the United States, where there is a considerable culture war, it's being called, between the religious right and the intellectual left, and intelligent design is a tool to try to get into that debate, mainly on behalf of the religious right.

It’s the term “Culture War” that draws my attention as well as Dr. Young’s names for the two sides, “the Religious Right” and “the Intellectual Left.”

I’ve seen the term “Culture War” before but usually in reference to “moral values” rather than Intelligent Design. Maybe Dr. Young has hit the nail on the head. Perhaps we have to understand Intelligent Design as just another front in what the Christian Right views as a moral crusade.

As far as Dr. Young’s names for the combatants goes, I’m ok with “Intellectual Left” but I think “Christian Right” is more accurate than “Religious Right.” Non-Christian religions in this country, while they might agree with the Christian Right on some moral issues, are far too concerned that the Christian Right will trample their religious freedom to ally with it on any political issue. It would be sort of like a mouse joining a herd of elephants.

So what’s the fight all about? Well, it’s not really related to basic morality. I think both sides would agree on basic Western Ethics and Law (although they probably would disagree upon the foundation of those ethics and law). The battle is at what I’ll call the “Moral Border,” that fuzzy boundary between what is good and what is evil that shifts with time and circumstances.

Now while there are always exceptions and a lot of folks might sit on one side of the fence on one issue and the other side on another, I think it’s safe to say that in general the two sides appear to be at odds on the following ethical questions.

Abortion
Probably the #1 area of disagreement and the one where the two sides are least likely to ever find common ground. Calling them by the labels they’ve chosen for themselves, the Christian Right is Pro-Life and the Intellectual Left is Pro-Choice. To the Christian Right Abortion is murder, end of discussion. To the Intellectual Left Abortion allows a woman control over her own body.

I’m not a fan of abortion (no one is really), but there are clearly times when it is justified. So who gets to decide when it’s justified? Does the Federal Government decide? Do the States decide? Or should we just leave it up to the woman and her doctor? I vote for #3 so that puts me into the Intellectual Left camp on this one.

Same Sex Marriage
The Christian Right says “No” and the Intellectual Left says “Why the hell not?” We hear a lot here about the “Sanctity of Marriage” and how marriage means “one man and one woman.” Most states, as well as the Federal Government, now have Defense of Marriage Acts (DOMAs) which specifically say marriage is between one man and one woman and some folks, including Dubyah, appear to be in favor of a constitutional amendment to that effect which would forever ban same sex marriage in the US as long as the majority remained opposed to it.

The Christian Right bases its position on the ban on homosexuality in the Bible and the support for what they call “traditional marriage.” Leviticus 18:22 and Leviticus 20:13 certainly appear to prohibit homosexuality. Deuteronomy 23:17 is also often quoted due to the translation choice in the King James Version of “sodomite” for the Hebrew word Qadesh. Most modern scholars and translations agree that “temple prostitute” would be more accurate. Many folks would also argue that Paul prohibits homosexuality in Romans 1:26-27, 1 Corinthians 6:9 and 1 Timothy 1:9-10. Now aside from the fact that Paul tends to condemn everything short of breathing and that he freely admits that some of what he says is strictly his own opinion and not instructions he received directly from God, exactly what he’s saying in these passages isn’t all that clear. At least it’s not that clear in some translations while others, with little or no justification, do specifically refer to homosexuality.

Now if we were arguing about outlawing homosexuality itself, then I might understand why the Christian Right thinks biblical prohibitions mean something. But since Lawrence v Texas, which struck down laws against sodomy, there are no legal barriers to homosexual sex, but you just can’t get married and get the financial and legal benefits associated with marriage. I suppose the Christian Right thinks that somehow allowing same sex marriage endorses homosexual sex.

As to one man and one woman being the “traditional” form of marriage, while that may have been true in ancient Greece, ancient Rome and recently in western culture, one man and multiple women has been a lot more common throughout most of history including among the biblical Hebrews. We all recall the story of Jacob and his WIVES Leah and Rachel.

Aside from the religious angle the State certainly has the right to encourage things which are beneficial to it and discourage, even to the point of outlawing, things which are not beneficial to it. One could take the position that heterosexual marriage, since it usually results in children, is more beneficial to the State than homosexual marriage and therefore the State is within its rights to discourage the less beneficial union. But even if the State has the right to do something, does that mean it should? Obviously the answer is NO. That being the case, I don’t see why some citizens should be denied the financial and legal benefits of marriage simply because not everyone approves of their choice of bedroom activities. Guess I’m in the Intellectual Left camp on this one too.

Stem Cell Research
Or more accurately, Embryonic Stem Cell Research which includes the “harvesting” of stem cells from “excess” embryos produced for possible in-vitro fertilization. How did these embryos become “excess?” Well, apparently, fertility clinics typically produce more embryos than needed to achieve pregnancy so the ones left over are “excess.” While stem cells can also be found in placentas and umbilical cords, the ones from human embryos seem to be the ones with the most potential for producing dramatic results.

To the Christian Right harvesting stem cells from these embryos is tantamount to murder while to the Intellectual Left this is an opportunity to benefit all of mankind and perhaps find cures or treatments for things like Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s and the victims of debilitating strokes.

It appears that there are four choices of what to do with excess embryos. The first choice is they can be donated to help other infertile couples. A choice seldom exercised for emotional and potential legal reasons. How would you like to have one of these embryos used to impregnate someone else show up on your doorstep one day either in person OR in the form of some type of legal obligation? A second choice is they can be stored at very low temperatures which is sort of a temporary solution. I mean, who really knows how long they can remain viable and eventually they would be discarded. The last two options are they can be discarded or they can be donated for research.

Now realistically, every option but the first one ends with the destruction of the embryo. The only thing that changes is when. Since the first option is probably never going to be terribly popular and there probably aren’t enough infertile couples in need of someone else’s embryo to use up the total supply, the reality of the situation is that all of these embryos are going to eventually be destroyed. In may happen today, next week, next year or 30 years from now and it may be on purpose or accidentally but it will happen. Yet the only option which may lead to some benefit is the path of research. That being the case, unless one wants to outlaw in-vitro fertilization or can come up with a way to limit the number of embryos produced to precisely what’s needed, I can’t rationally see why, since the embryos are going to be destroyed anyway, the stem cells shouldn’t be put to good use. I guess that puts me in the Intellectual Left camp again.

The Death Penalty
While the Christian Right comes down on the side of Life in the issues of Abortion and Stem Cell Research, it comes down on the side of death here. Now this is an issue upon which you will probably find the least agreement in either camp. Virtually every Christian Sect in the country has issued statements OPPOSING the death penalty and there seem to be a fair number of people that are in the Intellectual Left camp on everything else but support the death penalty for various reasons.

I have to admit that while I’m intellectually opposed to something which is applied so capriciously and so unevenly as to be nothing more than a crap shoot, emotionally, when I read about some horrific crime, I’m ready to press the plunger personally. Then I calm down and think it through and conclude, yet again, that the death penalty is long overdue for extinction.

We’re just not SMART enough to play with something so permanent! We screw up with great regularity so, if it hasn’t happened already, it’s simply a matter of time before an innocent person is executed. Besides, how can anyone defend a practice that has been exercised 348 times in Texas since 1976 and NEVER in New York, New Jersey, Kansas, New Hampshire and South Dakota? Are there that many more evil people in Texas? Obviously not, so again I’m squarely in the Intellectual Left camp (are you sensing a pattern here?).

Intelligent Design
In keeping with the original hypothesis that the Christian Right considers this a part of the whole “moral values” debate, we’ll have to consider the question of Intelligent Design.

Actually there are two separate and only slightly related issues. The first is whether or not Intelligent Design should be taught in high school biology classrooms. The Christian Right says Yes and the Intellectual Left says No. At the very least the Christian Right wants “the controversy” to be taught while the Intellectual Left takes the position that Intelligent Design is not science and doesn’t belong in a science classroom.

I don’t believe Intelligent Design belongs in a high school biology classroom either but I have a slightly different view on why it doesn’t belong there. To my mind whether Intelligent Design is science or not is a bit irrelevant. The point is that there is no recognition of the hypothesis within the scientific community as being even vaguely credible. Even many of the folks from the Discovery Institute (which is developing the Intelligent Design hypothesis) admit that the hypothesis is not yet sufficiently developed. So why should it be talked about in high school science now? Lets have its proponents develop the hypothesis and produce papers that can be reviewed and critiqued by scientific peers rather than ask high school freshmen and sophomores to decide the merits of the idea.

The second question is whether Intelligent Design has any scientific merit? Nope, as far as I can see, it has none whatsoever. I agree with the more rabid defenders of evolution that Intelligent Design is just a Creationism lamb dressed in a pseudoscientific wolf skin. I consider the whole idea of “Irreducible Complexity” to be the equivalent of saying “gee, I don’t know how that happened so it must have been God!”

With that kind of attitude we’d still be dropping onto our faces to appease the gods every time there was thunder or lightning and virgin sacrifices would still be the main spectator sport. I think Jerry Coyne from Chicago University put it best, “If the history of science shows us anything, it is that we get nowhere by labeling our ignorance ‘God.’"

So I guess that makes it a clean sweep 5-0. I’m clearly an unrepentant Pinko Liberal in the Army of the Intellectual Left for the duration of the Culture War.