You’re Kidding me Right?

Just when I thought the Right Wing couldn’t get any more ridiculous it manages to leave me with my mouth hanging open again.

Maggie Gallagher is a former editor of the National Review and currently the president of the National Organization for Marriage (NOM). Clearly neither Maggie nor NOM is happy with the recent California Supreme Court ruling on gay marriage but Maggie outdoes herself in a Yahoo op-ed by trying to metamorphise the question from one of individual rights and equal protection into one of religious freedom!

While she’s at it she manages to engage in the time honored fascist tactic of fear mongering. At best she throws out slippery slope arguments, at worst she flips in assertions that are either untrue or irrelevant. Let’s go to the quotes.

“Ideas have consequences. And the California court endorsed two big, brand-new, very bad ideas.”
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Well, let’s go see what these “two big, brand-new, very bad ideas” are shall we?

“The first idea is that the internationally recognized human right to marry includes same-sex marriage.”

But this is the very point of the debate isn’t it? One side says that same sex marriage should be recognized on an equal footing with heterosexual marriage and the other side says it shouldn’t.

This is far from a new idea and the idea has been making progress for a long time. Conservatives have been fighting a delaying action here with an occasional counter-attack but the fact is that the zeitgeist is slowly but surely accepting the idea of gay sex and gay couples.

Over the last 30 years the idea of “domestic partnerships” and “civil unions” have slowly gained acceptability until, at the moment, in many places it’s simply a question of semantics. The best example of this is New Jersey where “civil unions” must be the legal equivalent of marriages.

But semantics are important. Some words carry with them strong emotional attachment and strong cultural meaning. “Marriage” is one of those words.

“In U.S. constitutional law, fundamental human rights are those deeply rooted in our traditions.”

No, fundamental human rights are fundamental human rights. They are not driven by tradition or law but exist in and of themselves independent of the law. Fundamental human rights are not created but discovered.

Following Maggie’s line of reasoning the concepts in the Declaration of Independence are nonsense because they were not rooted in traditional. Allow me to quote that document.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

These rights were not firmly rooted in tradition. Note also that the rights are “unalienable.” In other words they cannot be surrendered. They can never cease to exist; they can only be unrecognized or suppressed by tyranny.

“So in rooting around for precedents, the California court had liberal recourse to our neighbor to the north, Canada. Like Canadian courts, the California court grounded same-sex marriage in a larger human right to form families of choice and to have the government sanction all family forms as having equal dignity. Polygamy anyone?”

Ah yes, the old slippery slope argument. If one takes the argument to its logical extreme, then yes one could argue that polygamy and group marriage fall under the same protection. Practically speaking however this is highly unlikely to happen simply because the number of people who would support such an extension is vanishingly small.

Another point to keep in mind is that while it is probable that homosexuality is not a choice but driven by genetic and hormonal factors, things like polygamy are clearly a choice. That being the case, I for one see no inconsistency in allowing gay marriage while outlawing polygamy.

“Just last week the Orwellian ‘Human Rights’ Tribunal of Ontario ruled that Christian Horizons, a charity that runs homes for developmentally disabled adults, engaged in illegal discrimination when it tried to ensure that its employees were practicing Christians who accepted Christian sexual teaching on adultery, fornication and homosexual sex.”

This is a scare tactic pure and simple. First of all this has absolutely nothing to do with gay marriage. It’s related to discrimination based upon sexual orientation. In the United States, the Federal Government, and a growing number of states, already prohibit discrimination based upon sexual orientation but specifically exempt religious organizations. Therefore, this scenario could never happen in the home of the free. In the United States, religion is allowed to discriminate.

Does it bother you that in a country which prides itself on freedom and equality we allow religions to discrimnate?

But if such practices are illegal, what is it that exempts a Christian organization from following the law if it has no exemption from that law? Simply the fact that it’s Christian? The last time I looked religious organizations, unless specifically exempted, were obligated to adhere to the law just like everyone else. I also thought it was cute that Maggie put Human Rights in quotes and threw in “Orwellian.” Both of these moves allow Maggie to imply things that she doesn’t have to justify.

“…the second big idea endorsed by the California court is even less promising: Sexual orientation should be treated just like race under the California equal protection amendment, subject to ‘strict scrutiny.’ This is another historic first for a U.S. court.”

An Historic First? As I already pointed out, the Federal Government and many states already prohibit discrimination based upon sexual orientation but exempt religious organizations so it isn’t much of a first now is it?

“This is a ruling which, if left undisturbed, means that Protestants, Catholics, Jews and Muslims who see marriage as the union of husband and wife, and view sexual activity as best confined to marriage so defined, are in the exact position as racists under California law.”

And the problem with this is? If you honestly believe in equality under the law, and homosexuality is non-voluntary, then this is precisely where they should be. It isn’t equality under the law except for homosexuals.

“The First Amendment will not protect us if our own governments (through the courts) decide that, for example, my Catholic faith is in itself a form of bigotry.”

Again this is a scare tactic by implying that all of Catholicism, and therefore by extension Christianity itself, would be declared a form of bigotry. What you would really have, and in fact already have, is a situation declaring that within the secular sphere discrimination based upon sexual preference is equivalent to discrimination based upon race but, in order to protect freedom of religion, religions which declare homosexuality immoral are exempt.

The United States allows religions to discriminate.

As far as I can see this is exactly where things should be. There is no valid reason in the secular sphere for treating homosexuals different from anyone else. To try and overlay a religious rationale onto the secular sphere, which is what the religious appear to be trying to do, is a violation of the principle of the separation of church and state.

“In Great Britain, a similar idea recently led a court to fine an Anglican bishop $100,000 for refusing to hire an openly gay man -- as a youth minister in one of his parishes.”

More scare tactic. Again this has nothing to do with gay marriage but with discrimination based upon sexual orientation and, again, in the U.S. religious organizations are exempted. They’re allowed to discriminate against gays. I'll also point out the emphesis on "youth minister" here. A reference designed to inflame the old nonsense that somehow homosexuality equates to pedophilia. The fact is that homosexuals are no more likely to be pedophiles than heterosexuals.

“I'd love to get beyond the culture wars in this country. But so far, there are few signs that the courts, or the people who disagree with me, are content to let me.”

But only if everyone accepts you dictating your religious beliefs unto everyone else. The only reason a culture war exists in this country is that the Christian right wants to enforce its moral opinion on the rest of us. We’ll get beyond the culture war when Christians stop trying to do that.
To my mind this column is an example of the dishonest tactics continuously engaged in by Religious Conservatives. I’m willing to accept that a legitimate debate about the appropriateness of gay marriage exists, but throwing in issues not even related to the gay marriage question, and scenarios that can’t even happen, in order to imply that somehow gay marriage will lead to them isn’t legitimate debate.

If you’re opposed to gay marriage because your religion says that homosexuality is an immoral choice and therefore you don’t believe secular society should allow it, make that your argument instead of wrapping it around glittering generalities like tradition and family.

In other words, TRY TO BE HONEST FOR A CHANGE. If you did that 90% of the Liberals in the country, including all the agnostics and atheists, might drop dead from shock. Now isn’t that something you’d like to try and bring about? So go ahead, try honesty.

You’ll excuse me if I don’t hold my breath. Maggie and NOM will be fighting tooth and nail to get Californians to approve a constitutional amendment to overturn the courts ruling. Here’s hoping that the good people of California tell them to stick it.