This interview with Robert P. George is about marriage in response to New York legalizing same sex marriage. But it more than touches on sexuality and I find it aptly describes the culture we are currently living in. Here in Ottawa, a conservative talk radio station recently asked listeners to respond to the New York decision. When one listener called in to express a view in support of traditional marriage, the host steamrolled him with his own view in support of same sex marriage.
Now Robert P. George is no dummie and I don’t think he’s a homophobe, either. I do buy into his arguments; they make sense to me, though they didn’t always. But even as I read this piece, I realize I probably couldn’t convey the depth of what he is saying to the average person on the street. “Sexual liberation” no matter the fact that it was initially championed by the likes of Hugh Hefner, sounds like freedom to people, and freedom, we rightly think, is good. So explaining that “sexual liberation” is actually the opposite of freedom, that it binds and constrains and takes human beings further from their potential, is a tough sell.
What I’m saying here, in a convoluted way, is that I agree with Robert P. George. He’s smart and he knows what he is talking about. But I don’t think we’re going to win this particular battle over same sex marriage because we are poorly educated, it’s a sound bite culture, and arguments in favour of traditional marriage fit better into academic journals, rather than on the nightly news.
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One way the war can be won is for people to refuse to be cowed and shamed by their opponents. Long philosophical arguments are not necessary, courage of convictions is. I’d like to see more political and cultural leaders, who are living in monogamous marriages or in celibate singlehood, stand up and say they are happy, fulfilled and find the “sophisticated elites” to be libertines, not liberals, whose chaotic personal lives should be sufficient argument against the institutionalization of same. That does not mean there should be a re-criminalization of homosexual activity, only that our society is one that relies on marriage and family, as understood as one man and one woman who are open to bearing and raising children, as its bedrock. All other personal options remain open, being neither state sanctioned nor prohibited.
You are not going to win this battle, mainly because of what one pollster called the MTV effect. As people, especially young people, get to know more and more gay people, any argument in favour of discrimination against such ordinary people becomes just plain silly.
Next, read my story. There are legal — state-sanctioned — rights and privileges afforded to married people that unmarried partners, of however long-standing, do not receive. My partner and I have been together for more than 35 years, but got married five years ago so that we would have that piece of paper.
Equal marriage, like reproductive rights for women, is a human rights issue. And moral people should support any extension of human rights.
Robert George rocks. His arguments are clear and concise. Furthermore, he always takes great pains to understand his opponents’ arguments, often explaining them with greater clarity than his opponents have done.
Here is an excellent paper by George and his colleagues on the subject of marriage:
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1722155
And on the subject of embryo ethics:
http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/daed.2008.137.1.23
Also available here, for those who don’t have a subscription to Daedalus:
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3671/is_200801/ai_n24392942