n the 1990s, things began to change. Crime declined, welfare was radically scaled back, and affirmative action receded from the political stage, in part because of the deep support it enjoyed from such conservative bastions as corporate America and the military. But the culture war didn't end: It simply morphed from a struggle primarily about race to a struggle primarily about religion. In the 1990s, as the affirmative action, crime, and welfare debates subsided, the void was partly filled by gay marriage, an issue that pits not black against white, but secular against religiously orthodox. The impeachment of Bill Clinton was not a racial battle, but a battle over what standard of public morality would govern political behavior. Bill Clinton's legacy, noted political scientists William Galston and Elaine Kamarck, was to relieve some of the racial anxiety that white working-class voters felt about the Democratic Party but substitute for it a new moral anxiety, felt most acutely by whites who regularly attended church.For Barack Obama, this shift has been useful. A black politician running in the midst of a racial culture war is virtually doomed. But amidst a religious culture war, being black is less of a handicap since blacks are the least secular element of the Democratic coalition. Barack Obama was more successful than John Kerry in reaching out to moderate white evangelicals in part because he struck them as more authentically Christian.
Ross notes that Obama is more repositioning his forces than ending the war. It's not like Obama isn't making moves on abortion, and I expect that Don't Ask Don't Tell will rise again, and it isn't like conservatives aren't seeing it. Plus, we're living in a time when economic concerns trump all. That isn't exactly the best environment to make a case for a constitutional ammendment banning gay marriage.
The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood 
In my mind there is a major problem with that argument. The religious culture war last year WAS a racial culture war also. There are very few wingnuts in this country who realize there are white people that are also Muslims. In their mind muslims are all dark skinned people which is what made it so easy for them to believe President Obama was one. The day a white man gets accused of being a muslim is the day I will change my mind. But I don't see it happening any time soon.
John Walker Lindh. According to the wingnuts, he was a liberal, pampered, San Francisco child who turned into a Muslim traitor. He was tortured for his efforts, we now know.
Not all that difficult to elide whiteness with being Muslim. Just can't be Southern, truck-driving white.
Meh... The whole meme of 'culture war' belongs to, and is beholden to, Conservative goosesteppers like William F. Buckley RIP ('standing athwart history, yelling "STOP"') It, likely, won't 'end' until liberals find enough backbone to, collectively say 'meh'.
Or, put another way, "do not try and bend the spoon, for that is impossible. Only think, there is no spoon."
Gramsci
Do you see Lindh's name associated with Islam or with terrorism? Imma do a google search and see how many times they list him as a muslim in articles talking about his case.
What Obama said to the evangelicals was meant for them and them only.
Sgwhiteinfla,
I concur with you! The wingnuts knew it was not in their interest politically to say publicly in a chorus voice that they will not vote for a black man. In this era, muslims are the new anti-blacks.
"Do you see Lindh's name associated with Islam or with terrorism? "
O'Reilly flogged it till it fell apart, sgwhitefla. Drop this one; this is one of the rare times when you are mistaken.
The culture war has been going on for more than a century in various forms, and it usually eventually takes on a religious cast. The Abolition movement was certainly part of this struggle, and it prompted the South to invent Fundamentalism to cover its wounded religious vanity. The Temperance Movement and Prohibition were essentially a struggle between Protestant small towns against immigrant-filled, boozing cities. Look at the demographics of who is on which side of this campaign in the culture wars. Where is the religious right centered?
In each one of these phases everyone can think of lots of counter-examples - the were were Irish women at the forefront of the Temperance Movement, there are black chuches who are basically on the Religious Right. Lenin had a name for people like this - "useful idiots."
Ross says "when the stem-cell debate comes around, or the next Supreme Court vacancy, or any flashpoint you can think of: Liberals will praise Obama for taking steps to defuse the culture war, but what they'll mean is that he's taking steps to win it."
Several polls show support for stem-cell research 3-to-1 so, culturally speaking, this isn't a wedge issue between the left and right, it's an issue with the far right. This is also an example that undermines Ross's assertion that Beinart's argument is "characteristic [of] liberal conceit that the culture wars are a one-sided affair." Well, issues like that *are* a one-sided affair, and Ross completely misses this very important point.
There are issues, like stem cell research, that majority of people view as having swung too far to the right over the past eight years, and they logically expect Obama to bring back to the center.
What Obama is able to do in terms of building bridges in the "culture war" is tap into the mood of the country, if you will. For example, Obama was able to see that the majority of people were tiring of the "I'm a patriot, you're not" and the "Real America vs Fake America" bullshit. That was an easy bridge for Obama to build. I don't know if I'd even say it was building a bridge because I think people we're ready for it. He was simply smart enough to see it and point it out.
I would argue it's precisely this ability to tap into the mood of the country, if you will, that gives Obama the ability to make progress on issues that the majority agree on. In other areas---like abortion, supreme court appointments---well, Obama's no different than any other left-of-center politician. Except maybe that Obama is smart enough to know that issues like abortion are not areas where you can really build bridges, but he also knows you can't be like Bush and vilify the other side's position. So he softens his rhetoric. That won't work with people who are passionately pro-life, but it will satisfy the people in the middle who are tired of the nasty rhetoric from both the extreme ends. So Obama doesn't put an end to the culture war, but he makes it more bearable for the people in the center. That's why people in the center like him, and what people like Ross don't or can't understand.
With the wingnuts regarding him as muslim because he is black, I remember a survey with a significant amount of Hillary supporters who thought he was a Muslim as well.
The belief is based upon his middle name and the religious background of his father's family rather than his skin color. The right didn't go around accusing Sharpton of being Muslim.
Socially, Obama is offering a place at the table for everyone on all sides of the cultural perspective; that is, he has a point of view that most often coincides with liberals and progressives, though not always, and is willing to see American culture pluralistically.
The right, who protest that Obama is just coopting them culturally, see culture as a war (many on the left do as well, no doubt). The big difference it seems to me, is that the right under Bush wanted to institutionally impose their perspectives on others, and want to continue to exclude wide swaths of our populace from being a legitimately American part of culture.
Look, part of the reason Obama was elected is because the majority of the electorate at this point in time perceived Obama's perspective as touching a wider swath of Americana than folks like Ross Douthat wish to include.
Choice means that it is up to conservatives to exercise without government intervention their right to bring a child to term. Conservatives should welcome restraint when it comes to the most intimate part of a person's life--the issue of marriage, and take the responsibility for strengthening marriages, especially among the poor, by becoming aware of how tax dollars can improve the conditions by which heterosexual couples can keep their marriages together.
With Obama we get culture politics and culture diplomacy; with the values of the right we get the imposition of one, minority, perspective. Rule of the majority, rights of the minority--the American way, is it not? We've tried it the other way; if the last election cycles are any evidence at this point in history in our nation, demogoguery appears hung right. It was Pat Buchanan who termed it culture wars, and the right has followed that meme since.
The right finds it fine to throw our treasury away for revenge of a few thousand American lives, but grudges the money it would cost to support universal health care to protect many more thousands of Americans from death, misery, and ruin because they disapprove of their "cultural leanings."
Get out of the way if you can't lend a hand. America is what it is. I was born here and served my fellow citizens and the world all my adult life. I'm not Christian; I'm not caucasion (though as a Jew, I pass for white, and my people are from European Russia); I'm not conservative. My perspective has an ear in the White House; live with it.
Please see Kevin Drum for a little perspective on Obama's alleged success with white evangelicals.
http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2008/11/religion_watch.html
Proper diagnosis of what actually happened is important, before we pile on all this noise and analysis.
Maybe having some segment of the country believe Obama really made significant inroads is a useful illusion. Maybe no need to knock the illusion down in general, but those actually playing the game and calling the shots need to know the real score.
Yes, I have seen sgwhiteinfla's previous argument that Obama's basically running even should be viewed as a gain, because he started with some unknowable handicap based on race. Given that white racist have caught on at least since the 80's that ALL Dem presidential candidates are their enemy, I think the incremental opposition specifically to an actual black Dem candidate is hard to quantify, but smaller than one might think at first glance.
Also I agree with Tessa - right on.
Beinart's larger point might be accurate--I'm not sold, but I could be convinced--but this part is just silly.
That's utter crap. The impeachment of Bill Clinton was an attempted power grab by Republicans led by people like Ted Olsen, Newt Gingrich, Richard Mellon Scaife, and all the rest of them. Public morality, my ass. The people who led the charge were dirtier that Clinton when it came to sexual infidelity, and there was a significant backlash against the Republicans in large part because of their hypocrisy on the matter.
Sgwhitefla, would it have been different if Lindh were black? Absolutely. He would have been seen not just as a Muslim traitor, but as a particularly militant and menacing one. In Lindh's case, he was tagged with being Muslim and terrorist as an example of cultural surrender-- in other words, here's what happens to perfectly good white boys when they aren't brought up to hate the Muslims and love Jesus. He was seen, in a sense, as a hippie Muslim traitor. But Muslim and terrorist he most certainly was called, by O'Reilly, Malkin, and many others.
They did not accused Al Sharpton of being Muslim because he was never a real threat to their hallowed position meant for "white Only." He was considered as a trouble maker that can be contained as anytime.
Bear in mind, racism is surely in both blue and red states. So, the Hillary supporter from the bluest state of New York who called Barack, an illegible black man is what? I hope I get the quote right--but she was purely against barack because of his blackness. Rothchild who campaigned passionately for McCain because Barack is "elitist" was from the great Blue of state of New Jersey. Most of them came back when they saw their 401k varnishing like the speed of light. It like a joke that says, if you want white people to run away from their secluded neighborhood, tell them that cancer is about to invade the neighborhood.
Gramsci,
You're right, but when was the last time Lindh was a major story? It's been a while. Meanwhile, we've had plenty of stories about people being hassled on planes for "flying while Muslim," and they're always dark-skinned. You don't hear too many stories of Indonesian Muslims being tossed off of planes because some tight-assed white person had a snit fit about them. But you do hear stories like those of some of my students who are dark-skinned, have vaguely Arabic sounding names, and are always subjected to extra searches at airports, even when they're fundamentalist Christians.
Ross and Peter misunderstand what obama is trying to end in the culture war. Ross and Peter put their emphasis on "culture", obama's emphasis is on "war". Obama's is an argument on procedure and process rather than specific issues.
I expect that Don't Ask Don't Tell will rise again
Here's to hoping it does, and soon. That's a political winner for Obama. Big time.
What the Ross Douhats don't realize is they have already lost the Culture War. On issue after issue the majority opinion is against his views. The only issue that is still roughly 50/50 is Gay Marriage and demographics are going to end that one in the next 10-15 years if not sooner.
Even Deep-Red South Dakota has failsed to pass harsh anti-abortion laws, twice.
Look at what happened with Schiavo and the polls on Stem Cell research.
I'm not so confident. Sure, the majority of Americans now think lesbians and gay men should be able to serve in the military. Watch Fox and the nutjobs go craaaaaaaaazy, though. And, they'll have plenty of support in Congress from folks like Heath Shuler.
Maybe I've been around too long and am too stuck in the past, but I just don't trust polls of American attitudes toward gay folks. Even though polls tell us that Americans support some kind of protection for gay couples, they giddily run to the polls to ensure that gay couples get no protections. We get our butts kicked in every state every time something goes on the ballot. And it pretty much always gets ugly. All I know is this: when it gets more controversial and heats up, gay folks are gonna get bashed on the streets in greater numbers. Always do.
On top of this, I'm pretty confident that of gay-positive policy will have even less support in the halls of Congress than public opinion polls would indicate.
The culture wars aren't over when it comes to the lives of gay folks, no matter how much the "new way" might want to make nice or how much Americans lie to pollsters (Yeah, last summer 60-some percent said they'd consider voting for a gay person for President--there were a hell of a lot of folks lying that day.)
I don't trust my fellow citizens, and I trust politicians even less.
Agreed, Brian. There's no question there's a racial, ethnic component to this that fortifies an association of Muslim with dark skin. And the Lindh story by no means measures up to or negates that. I just think religion has some wrinkles that race does not (just as the reverse is the case), in terms of how the "enemy" is being cast.
What Incertus said!
And there was definitely a racial element in the impeachment. I don't have time right now to support my arguments with actual data, but the Clinton Hunters from Arkansas were originally incensed by his progressive racial policies.
Mr. Beinart is an ignorant apologist for so many ugly things, particularly the Iraq War. That's why he is such a perfect fit for the moribund New Republic Magazine which has been Concern Troll Central for decades.
On the subject of white American Muslim "terrorists," Army reservist and attorney Brandon Mayfield's casegot parts of the Patriot Act overturned. (He was accused of being involved in the Madrid bombings.)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandon_Mayfield
"Even Deep-Red South Dakota has failsed to pass harsh anti-abortion laws, twice." EK
TR: A potential factor is that they knew, certainly the first time and likely both times, that the law would've been challenged and rendered unconstitutional. If states had a real, rather than purely symbolic, ability to restrict first and second trimester abortion it might be different. (Or not, hard to know)
I really don't like the term "culture war", but if we're going to use that term I'd say it's either always had a strongly religious aspect or has since the late 1960s. Perhaps both Nixon and Reagan won Wisconsin and Iowa twice because those two states were so racist or segregationist, but it seems at least plausible religion/anti-counterculture voters also played a role.
Also it takes two to tango in any "war." In 1966 abortion was illegal and a movement for same-sex marriage may not have yet existed at all. Granted from the liberal perspective such social progress is "inevitable", but for many traditional types it's understandable they/we would feel like the ones being attacked. The Baptists were traditionally apolitical, an important early document concerning the separation of church and state was intended to soothe the fears of Baptists about established churches, until the Sexual Revolution.
And yeah I know this will sound ridiculous or offensive to most here, but needs to be said.
"ranted from the liberal perspective such social progress is "inevitable", but for many traditional types it's understandable they/we would feel like the ones being attacked."
I understand your point here, Thomas, but that's just thing. A person asking for the right to be able to marry someone isn't an attack on you. So why do you feel attacked? Why do you and others react as if you are being attacked? Because I just don't think that way.
Maybe I've been around too long and am too stuck in the past, but I just don't trust polls of American attitudes toward gay folks. Even though polls tell us that Americans support some kind of protection for gay couples, they giddily run to the polls to ensure that gay couples get no protections. We get our butts kicked in every state every time something goes on the ballot. And it pretty much always gets ugly. All I know is this: when it gets more controversial and heats up, gay folks are gonna get bashed on the streets in greater numbers. Always do.
I think it'll depend on-- as so many things do-- how the issue is presented. You can make a strong and pretty convincing case that firing those gay translators hurt the war on terror, and if that angle is hit hard, along with current and former military personnel advocating the repeal, I think 'national security' will win the day. It's an argument from practicality, rather than ideology, and I suspect as a nation we're in a pretty practical mood.
"A potential factor is that they knew, certainly the first time and likely both times, that the law would've been challenged and rendered unconstitutional."
This doesn't make any sense whatsoever. Fundamentalist Republicans in South Dakota voted against abortion restrictions because there was a likelihood a few years down the road it would get overturned in a courtroom? How's that work exactly? And aren't pro-life advocates raging to get another case before the Supreme Court?
The correct assupmtion seems to me that even in a very conservative state only a minority wants abortion limited to such incredibly narrow circumstances. People generally vote the way they mean to vote.
Thomas R, the Baptists were always political, going back to their beginnings in Germany. Read H. Richard Niebuhr's "Social Sources of Denominationalism" for more info. And in America, well, the whole formation of the Southern Baptists came about because of the need to defend slavery theologically. This is why it is tricky to talk about "religion" and "race" separately to begin with (but hey, Beinart been a lot more wrong about a lot more things than that). For the Southern Baptists, there was no difference between defending one's religion and defending white supremacy-- same belief system in their mind.
The culture war has been going on for more than a century in various forms, and it usually eventually takes on a religious cast. The Abolition movement was certainly part of this struggle, and it prompted the South to invent Fundamentalism to cover its wounded religious vanity. The Temperance Movement and Prohibition were essentially a struggle between Protestant small towns against immigrant-filled, boozing cities. Look at the demographics of who is on which side of this campaign in the culture wars. Where is the religious right centered?
In each one of these phases everyone can think of lots of counter-examples - the were were Irish women at the forefront of the Temperance Movement, there are black chuches who are basically on the Religious Right. Lenin had a name for people like this - "useful idiots."
Jim,
I'd say this is a somewhat inaccurate, and somewhat harsh, characterization. There was a strong social gospel movement among both 19th century evangelicals and Catholics, and a lot of the folks within that movement were invovled in abolition, women's suffrage, and temperance, as well as a number of endeavors to help newly freed slaves and the urban poor and immigrants. A lot of the organizations established by these group exist today (e.g., YMCA, Salvation Army).
Now there are definitely things to criticize about these movements--they could be patronizing, for one. And it did lead to the fundamentalist backlash you already mentioned. But they also did a lot of good, creating such things as hospitals and many of the HBCU's that we still have today.
I'd say Peter Beinart has his history all wrong. The "culture wars" didn't morph from race to morality; after all, it's well documented by now that Republicans are no more moral than Democrats. No, when crime receded as an issue for conservatives to blame on liberals, the "culture wars" morphed from race to Bill Clinton. The impeachment of Bill Clinton was the culmination of years of effort on Republicans part to bring down the politician they hated the most because, well . . . who knows. They hate Clinton and that's that. Regardless, they needed something else to hate so it became moo-slim fondo-mentalist terrorists. Just give conservatives some time. They'll have a new boogey man out soon.
Nathan,
An excellent political cartoon during the conflict in the Balkans illustrated the Right's irrational hatred of Clinton well. In it, an elephant finds a magic lamp and rubs it. The genie who appears tells him he can grant him one specific wish: he can either rid the world of Slobodan Milosevic, or rid the world of Bill Clinton. (This was after the former's plan of ethnic cleansing had become well-known). Two more panels pass while the elephant just stands there. In the final panel, an impatient genie asks, "Well?" And the elephant responds, "I'm thinking, I'm thinking!"
I just think religion has some wrinkles that race does not (just as the reverse is the case), in terms of how the "enemy" is being cast.
Perhaps, but the thing I've noticed, whether online or in real life with my students--I teach at a very multi-cultural public university--is that lots of people, especially conservative, use Muslim as a synonym for what they perceive as Arab.
Here's an example--I had a student whose last name was Hosein, and he was dark-skinned. He was also a fundamentalist Christian from Tobago, but that didn't stop him from getting hassled every time he tried to get on a plane, or from having people assume he was a Muslim because of his name and skin color. I've got a dozen stories like that, and I'm sure there are hundreds, if not thousands more available online.
I think Aaron Magruder captured the attitude perfectly when, in the first season of The Boondocks, he had a character refer to some guys working in a convenience store as being "of terrorist descent." That's really the attitude we're seeing here. Whether they're actually Muslim or not is irrelevant--they fit the physical profile, and for those idiots, that's enough.
I think your last point is very important. The debate rises or falls to the level of the problems we face. In times of prosperity middle class whites can afford to fret about gay marriage, abortion, and smut on tv. When they are faced with losing their jobs however, economic issues overwhelm every other concern. Trust me, when the economy is back on track they will all once again be lamenting the moral collapse of our society.
I'll add a "worth saying" and "worth more than a passing thought" to Thomas R's comments. On the balance I'd say the changes to society ushered in by the sexual revolution were positive, but there were/are excesses.
At it's worst, the ethos of the sexual revolution idealizes consequence-free sex; which (to my mind at least) ignores or renders moot some of the most important and nourishing aspects of sexuality. I am libertarian in my beliefs about the role of the state in our private lives, but fairly conservative in my personal beliefs. I end up feeling as if may aspects of "socially conservative" sexual values are right(ish) but for terribly misguided reasons; and that their prescription is (probably) worse than the disease.
The bully pullpit of presidency is long recognized as chief among the soft-power the office weilds. My the hope is that Obama will set a tone that moves beyond demogogery and the rewarding of the loudest, most inflamatory voice to a place that recognizes that people can, in good faith, dissagree; about abortion and many other things, and that this is a strength not a weakness. During the John McCain said more than a few things that spoke to this in a way that reasonated with me. He had a chance at my vote before he cast his lot with Sarah Palin. But simply the fact that this sentiment was shared by both candidates gives me hope that we're at the dawning of a new day.
OTOH, I celebrated President Obama's historic inaugeration by cleaning my rifle. That's another part of this nation's strength.
"A person asking for the right to be able to marry someone isn't an attack on you. So why do you feel attacked?" Tessa
TR: I should've put the "we" part in quotes, like that, as that's an area that's not as pressing to me.
Still SSM does have the potential to be an attack, or at least used as an attack, on small-o orthodox Christianity. Right now churches, even in totally anti-SSM states, can perform same-sex marriages if they want or not recognize them if they want. SSM will mean that the state is officially sanctioning homosexuality and that non-recognition is no longer an option for any religion. Private businesses will have to accept same-sex couples the same way they have to accept interracial couples.
People like Sullivan are more libertarianish so would oppose various restrictions on speech or association, but it playing the way he'd like I think is a bad bet. I don't think it's played that way in most places I'm aware of that have it. Nor do I think it's clear, yet, if it's as beneficial as claimed even for gays.
In addition to that whether I think SSM is right or wrong it's clearly not what people want. It's not even what the gay community necessarily wanted until very recent times. It also has no basis in American tradition. And that just can not be said about, for example, interracial marriage. When the US Constitution was adopted five of the thirteen states had no rules against interracial marriage.
"This doesn't make any sense whatsoever. Fundamentalist Republicans in South Dakota voted against abortion restrictions because there was a likelihood a few years down the road it would get overturned in a courtroom?"
They knew voting for it was pointless. So they may have either stayed home or even voted against it because it would be a pointless act that could hurt tourism.
I don't think it would've been struck down in "a few years" either. I think it would've been struck down as fast as the lawyers could strike it down.
On an issue like abortion, it seems like the right to one is more secure today, but as a practical matter, it is less acceptable. In the early 80's, fictional characters in Fast Times At Ridgemont High and Last America Virgin, got abortions. It seems like it does't happen as much in popular culture of late. Even by the late 80's Madonna talked about keeping her baby.
Maybe it is more a function of political correctness than attitudes, but even as of late, Democrats started stressing the rare,in safe legal and rare.
I would think as far as gays go, society will become more tolerant, but even this is not a guarantee. I am sure in the late sixties and early seventies, some saw a future where America would be as secular as France and reefer would be legal.
The culture war has never ended and never will. The economic situtation will just move the battlefield. Religion has been part of it since day one w/ the Pilgrims. It has been expressed politically and religiously as pointed out here w/ the Southern Baptists or perhaps you remember nailing America upon a cross of gold William; Jenning Byrant, the Temperance movement.
On an issue like abortion, it seems like the right to one is more secure today, but as a practical matter, it is less acceptable.
This really is a function of where you live. If you live in a metropolitan area of a blue state, you can probably still get one without a tremendous amount of hassle. Live in the country, or in most deep red states, and it becomes difficult to nigh impossible depending on your economic class. Many of those states have mandatory 24 hour waiting periods, or overly-onerous licensing standards for the places that perform them. In Mississippi, last I heard, there was one abortion clinic, and it was only open a handful of days a month, so if you don't live in or near Jackson, you're probably SOL if you need one. One of the Dakotas doesn't have a doctor in the state who will perform one, so a team comes in once a month from a neighboring state to perform them, but if you can't get there on the days they're there, again, you're SOL.
The anti-choice people have been busy, and they've been effective in limiting legal abortions all over the country.
It has been argued that the culture war goes back not one but two Civil Wars, to Cavaliers and Roundheads. It is a particularly interesting argument partially because of the sharp theological contrast between Obama and Bush (salvation by works vs. salvation by faith) -- a theological contrast that would be quite familiar to 17th and 18th century settlers.
That said, we can't talk about our modern culture war without talking about Vietnam. It's a historical commonplace that lost wars have a divisive social effect -- ask the Russians, the Germans, or the French. The fact that we've even been divided over whether we 'lost' is only indicative of war's impact. I'd venture that much of the hurt, guilt, and hatred surrounding Vietnam has been sublimated and re-directed into our kulturkampf over drugs, guns, race, sex, and marriage.
Part of Obama's opportunity, of course, is that the Vietnam generation is McCain's age, while the nation is being reshaped by the wave of immigration post 1965. The other opportunity, sadly, comes from the fact that our current war was -- for the most part -- a Republican SNAFU.
bzzzzt! There's that lie about churches being forced to perform weddings again. And before you get all fussy about the New Jersey case, it was a public site they were placing no restrictions on until a lesbian couple applied. When they stopped allowing any weddings on the land for which they received tax abatements in exchange for allowing public use, and then rejected a lesbian couple, a court ruled they were on solid ground. No church will be required to perform a wedding against their doctrines; a Catholic church can't be forced to marry two jews today.
As to your other point, a church like the Unitarians can perform a "wedding" for a same-sex couple in states where marriage is banned, but it will be worthless in the eyes of the law--no health insurance, no inheritance rights, no next of kin. How about we stop conflating the civil and religious sides of marriage.
And boo-hoo, the state will condone homosexuality. I keep forgetting that conservative folks' religious beliefs are more important than my life. How silly of me.
"bzzzzt! There's that lie about churches being forced to perform weddings again." MAJeff
TR: No, that's not what I meant. Although I had concerns it was unclear.
Churches will have to recognize same-sex marriages as marriages for legal reasons, etc. Granted Catholic Churches have to do that for remarriages after divorce now, but I imagine that was tough at first too. Plus this, unlike divorce/remarriage, would effect virtually all religions. (No religion I know of, exempting certain American Indian ones, had anything like SSM until the 1960s. Even now few denominations do)
"And boo-hoo, the state will condone homosexuality. I keep forgetting that conservative folks' religious beliefs are more important than my life." MAJeff
TR: Yes because you'll literally die if you just get "domestic partnership" or "Adelphopoiesis" instead. And your life is of course determined by who you want to marry or if you marry at all.
Marrying anyone is a matter of choice and in a sense belief. Conservative folks' religious beliefs are equally important to the definition you give to your life. Granted they could be more important in that there are more conservative religious folks than there are people who consider being gay "their life." (Needs of the many, etc) Still I mostly think in terms of balance and compromise on issues like this. Granted, as I recall, this puts me akin to Fred Phelps or Jerry Falwell for many here but I don't consider that my problem.
Also on some of this I'm just speaking for what I think their concerns are. The state "sanctioning homosexuality" does not necessarily bother me as such. Although the state indicating homosexuality is the same as heterosexuality, which is what having the same system for both says, does strike me as slightly unreal.
And before you start, making an analogy with race is very much not going to fly with me. This is really more like gender/sex. The differences are far more real and meaningful.
Thomas R,
Why don't you repeat what you said in a Douthat post a while back?
"I agree with the notion homosexuality is a disorder within Catholic understanding of sin and the mind."
At least then everyone would know your real position.
------
You know on consideration that kind of ticks me off. I'm not liberal. For that matter I'm not even gay. I agree with the notion homosexuality is a disorder within Catholic understanding of sin and the mind.
I never mentioned anything about my sexuality online until this year. I figured I was 30, had stayed celibate, and had alread mentioned periods of mental illness elsewhere. I was thinking admitting some attraction to men was not much worse than admitting I once had a manic episode. As long as I keep any mental abnormality under control it's not that big a deal. In hindsight that was probably frightfully naive. Anything sexual gets you labeled even if you're not into being labeled. Hopefully I won't ever make that mistake again.
Still even if I were into bearded men, or liked dogs or had HIV, that wouldn't mean I'd have to think well of Sullivan.
Posted by Thomas R | June 27, 2008 6:32 AM
Thomas R, do you really mean to be so dismissive of the importance of people's families to their lives? My husband and child play a central role in my life, and I'd fight like hell to keep my right to *have* a husband and child from being taken away from me. Would you mock that by talking about "people who consider being straight 'their life'"?
"A disorder", and I was speaking purely in terms of a religious perspective, clearly does not mean I have to view people badly or anything. I have two disorders, and I admitted as such, going by the opinion of secular medical or psychiatric science. (An anxiety disorder that, twice, led to insomnia-induced mania. Also osteogenesis imperfecta)
Jen I see what you're saying. Still I do think getting married and having a family is, on some level, a choice we make. It may be noble and wonderful choice, but there's still an element of choice in it.
That said I don't want gays to be denied any constitutional rights as I know them. I do think the union of same-sex is different than opposite sex and their should be some recognition of that. Even if it's just reserving the word "matrimony" for opposite-sex couples. I also believe in being gradualist on this matter and doing better to balance the rights of conservative religion vs gay livelihood. I feel that, unfortunately, neither side is very interested in that.
"I also believe in being gradualist on this matter and doing better to balance the rights of conservative religion vs gay livelihood. I feel that, unfortunately, neither side is very interested in that.
Posted by Thomas R | January 30, 2009 9:09 PM"
Because there is no need for gay people to care. When people are denied rights, they should be given those rights. The people who deny others their rights have no room to complain because they are the ones doing legal harm to their fellow citizens. If a one half of a gay couple falls ill and is hospitalized and their partner cannot visit them in the hospital before they die because conservatives feel queasy and want things to go slowly, the state is inflicting genuine emotional harm on that couple as one of them lays dying just to protect conservatives' delicate sensibilities. It doesn't matter if the majority doesn't want a subsection of Americans to not have the same rights - equal rights are for everybody.
Yeah. That right there, that's why I started kind-of turning against the whole idea of same-sex marriage.
(Especially as it's full of nonsense. Non-relatives had no problem visiting me at the ICU. Contrawise one of Aunts was not allowed to see her husband when she was dying of cancer because her relatives deemed him sinful and were able to keep him away.)
Not everyone is going to be in the same position or have the same access to everything. All situations and ways of being are not the same. Unlike some disabled I don't demand society turn entirely on its head so I can play baseball or ride roller coasters.
Equality, when it means uniformity, is an unrealistic pipe dream. Hence I'm conservative.
"(Especially as it's full of nonsense. Non-relatives had no problem visiting me at the ICU. Contrawise one of Aunts was not allowed to see her husband when she was dying of cancer because her relatives deemed him sinful and were able to keep him away.)"
Gay couples have encountered this as a result of not being married. This is part of their reality of not being able to legally marry. If you want to have change only be gradual, then you have to accept that you are prolonging such suffering.
"Gay couples have encountered this as a result of not being married." RM
TR: This would only be because certain relatives of one person in the couple keep them apart. And this can, does because I know it, happen when the family disapproves of a spouse.
Still I'd concede marriage gives you a greater ability to override the family. (Although I'm wondering how often this situation occurs in reality.)
"If you want to have change only be gradual, then you have to accept that you are prolonging such suffering." RM
TR: Well if the family adamantly opposes their lover being there, which would pretty much have to be the situation for this to occur, then there is going to be some suffering anyway.
Still at times the suffering of some has to be prolonged to avoid greater suffering of others, societal disturbance, etc. Even civil rights didn't happen instantly. Loving v Virginia happened when most states already allowed interracial marriage and twenty years after the California case that struck down anti-miscegenation laws in that state. In cases where you do get instant purely non-democratic change making it effective can take decades or produce a long-lasting reaction.
To make it more real I'd say if same-sex marriage happens fast, and is required of all states, it would be the biggest boost the Republican Party could get. Because outside the Northeast SSM is still fairly strongly unpopular. There are states that never banned interracial marriage, but have amendments against SSM. And I think, from your perspective, boosting the Republican Party is not what you'd want.