IGF CultureWatch

John Phillips informs us of an amusing column he wrote for the conservative site Men's News Daily, arguing why conservatives should support gay marriage. As he puts it:

I've always believed that when it comes to protecting liberty the following rules apply: (1) individuals know better than politicians, (2) the states know better than the feds and (3) those who think that the Constitution should grow like Topsy are always wrong. Unfortunately, when it comes to gay marriage many conservatives suddenly develop amnesia. It's the only issue that I know of that can make committed Republicans get down on their hands and knees and beg for government regulation.

If conservatives are willing to give Big Brother the power to tell you who you can or can't marry, why get upset when liberals want to dictate what your salary should be, what you should pay for rent or whether or not you really need your sports utility vehicle? You're either for big, intrusive government or you aren't.

The column sparked quite a bit of debate on another conservative site, freerepublic.com. Remarks Phillips in his note to us, "For the first time in my life I was accused of being an anarchist, socialist and atheist! Anyway, I just thought that you guys would be amused by this." You may be, too.

From the Log Cabin Republicans:

President Reagan's inspirational vision for America relied on optimism, hope and an enduring faith in individual freedom.... He succeeded by bringing America together -- not trying to divide it for political gain.

From the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force:

The Reagan administration's policies on AIDS and anything gay-related resulted -- and continue to result -- in despair and death.

More Recent Postings

5/30/04 - 6/06/04

From a survey of evangelical Christians reported on the website Christianity Today:

52% of evangelical Christians would rather prohibit gay marriage through state laws than through a constitutional amendment.

48% of evangelicals say a candidate's support for gay marriage would disqualify him from getting their votes.

That is, a majority of evangelicals are opposed to the anti-gay Federal Marriage Amendment, and less than a majority would make gay marriage a litmus test issue. The prospects for the FMA look weaker all the time.

Mail Call

There are some new letters in our mailbag, including comments on anti-Americanism and a defense of Mississippi. Check 'em out.

In this L.A. Times op-ed. "Marriage Can Be Expanded," the mathematician father of a lesbian daughter writes:

Each time the right to vote was extended, those who already had that right were indeed threatened. They could still vote, but their vote had less impact. But permitting two people of the same sex to form a union graced by the word "marriage" does not jeopardize those already married. It does not dilute the strength of an existing marriage...

If we were able to accept the ever-broadening meaning of the vote, which at each stage did threaten the existing order, we can surely absorb the extension of marriage, which will only strengthen the bonds that hold our society together.

An interesting analogy, which reflects how in free societies the nature of rights is to expand.

A conservative group has filed suit in federal court on behalf of a California high school student suspended for wearing an anti-gay T-shirt and allegedly told to leave his faith "in the car."

The lawsuit against the Poway Unified School District claims that Tyler Chase Harper, 16, was suspended for refusing to change out of a homemade T-shirt that on the front read, "Be Ashamed" and "Our School Embraced What God Has Condemned," and on the back read, "Homosexuality is Shameful" and "Romans 1:27."

According to his lawyer, reports the Christian Examiner, the school's action violated Harper's constitutionally protected freedom of religion because Harper has a "religious viewpoint that...homosexuality is not acceptable." Harper wore the T-shirt in protest of the "Day of Silence," an event sponsored by the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network. His lawyer says he "believes the event was school-sponsored in conjunction with a student Gay-Straight Alliance."

I'm all for freedom of expression, but public schools restrict speech and behavior in all sorts of ways in order to maintain civility. Children are minors and public schools are government outposts; the rights of adults in civil society don't pertain here. I don't think there would be an issue about the suspension if Harper was expressing his Christian beliefs by wearing a T-shirt that said "Jews will burn in hell" during an event focusing on religious diversity.

Still, as NBC online reports, even some gay groups grudgingly agree with Harper:

"Those were hurtful comments and they are painful to see, but it's also necessary to recognize the importance of the constitutional protection," said Richard Valdez, a Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgendered Association Center spokesman.

The actual nature of the "Day of Silence" event and its sponsorship may be relevant here. Public schools (that is, the government) can't force students to embrace ideas that violate their religious beliefs (unless their religion is far out of the mainstream and advocates criminal behavior). On the other hand, schools rightly should teach the need for those who differ to respect each other's rights and disagree civilly, and justly limit hurtful expressions that denigrate other students (again, "Jews will burn in hell" would not be allowed at most public schools).

So the Pope criticized Bush for the Abu Ghraib abuses. A wag tells me he'd like to have seen a quick-witted Bush(!) respond, "You get the priests in line, I'll see what I can do about the prison guards."

Many will never forgive his apparent lack of concern as so many perished from AIDS (though Deroy Murdock makes the case that much was actually being done), or that his administration helped legitimize the religious right as a political force. Still, his refusal to play the appeasement game brought down the Soviet Union and freed millions from totalitarianism, and his policies slowed the expansion of welfare-state paternalism and reversed economic stagnation here at home. A mixed legacy, as is so often the case.

Worth noting: the first openly gay couple spent a night together in the White House during Reagan's term. From a Washington Post story on March 18, 1984:

The Reagans are also tolerant about homosexual men. Their interior decorator, Ted Graber, who oversaw the redecoration of the White House, spent a night in the Reagans' private White House quarters with his male lover, Archie Case, when they came to Washington for Nancy Reagan's 60th birthday party -- a fact confirmed for the press by Mrs. Reagan's press secretary. Indeed, all the available evidence suggests that Ronald Reagan is a closet tolerant.

Deroy Murdock's column helps puts to rest the charge that Reagan harbored anti-gay animosity. He notes a Time magazine story in which Patti Reagan recalls "the clear, smooth, non-judgmental way" her father discussed homosexuality. Speaking of Rock Hudson, she says:

My father gently explained that Mr. Hudson didn't really have a lot of experience kissing women; in fact, he would much prefer to be kissing a man. This was said in the same tone that would be used if he had been telling me about people with different colored eyes, and I accepted without question that this whole kissing thing wasn't reserved just for men and women.

Deroy also reminds us that Reagan publicly opposed Proposition 6, a 1978 ballot measure that called for the dismissal of California teachers who "advocated" homosexuality, even outside of schools. His opposition was considered instrumental to the measure's defeat.

And Deroy quotes Kenneth T. Walsh, former White House correspondent and author of the biography Ronald Reagan, who wrote: "Despite the urging of some of his conservative supporters, he never made fighting homosexuality a cause. In the final analysis, Reagan felt that what people do in private is their own business, not the government's."

The anti-gay group Focus on the Family is up in arms over the fact that, in Montana, an evangelical church's tax-exempt status is being challenged after the church showed congregants a video simulcast called the "Battle for Marriage" and then circulated a petition at the event calling for a state constitutional amendment to outlaw same-sex marriages. Similarly, an e-mail release from the anti-gay Family Research Council declared:

pro-homosexual advocates want to silence all churches and pro-family groups like FRC who are critical of the homosexual lifestyle. It has already happened in other countries where same-sex "marriage" has been legalized, and tomorrow it may happen to the Church in this country if it does not stand firm today. The intolerance of these left-wing extremists will roll right over our First Amendment rights unless we
respond vigorously. We will respond!

An even more hysterical account, from an evangelical news service, ran under the headline "LIBERAL HOMOSEXUAL RADICAL AGENDA, MAKING ITSELF KNOWN TO BE ANTI-GOD IN MONTANA."

Of course, to be fair, liberals never object to "peace" or civil rights political activism in churches, or when Jesse Jackson and others African-American politicians pass the hat for their political campaigns at Sunday services in black churches. Whether on the left or the right, if religious organizations want to behave like political action committees, they should not retain their tax-exempt status.

Bush's Beliefs: A Response

Commenting on President Bush's remarks cited in yesterday's item, "What Bush Believes," IGF contributing author Rick Rosendall reminded me of what he wrote in a Salon.com article last March:

After calling for a constitutional amendment against same-sex marriage without once mentioning the dreaded words "gay" or "lesbian," President George W. Bush ended on a conciliatory note: "We should also conduct this difficult debate in a manner worthy of our country, without bitterness or anger. In all that lies ahead, let us match strong convictions with kindness and goodwill and decency." This reminds me of Dame Edna Everage, who, after saying something horribly cruel about her bridesmaid Madge Allsop, habitually adds, "I mean that in a nurturing and caring way."

This piece from Christianity Today about President Bush's recent get-together with religious editors and writers shows that he truly is committed to the anti-gay Federal Marriage Amendment (FMA), and not just as a political ploy. His conservative religious convictions are deep and guiding. He also seems to realize that the FMA, for now, lacks sufficient grassroots support:

I will tell you the prairie fire necessary to get an amendment passed is simmering at best. I think it's an accurate way of describing it. ... I'm not sure people quite understand the issue yet.

Then he adds:

It's essential that those who articulate the position that defends traditional marriage as the only definition of marriage do so in a compassionate way. I like to quote [from the Bible's book of] Matthew, that you know, I'm not going to try to take a speck out of your eye when I've got a log in my own. You know what I'm saying. And therefore, this dialogue needs to be a dialogue worthy of a nation and worthy of a debate over a constitutional amendment. And it's a very important discussion. And it's one that should not be politicized.

But of course, if you're pushing for a constitutional amendment, it can't help but be "politicized," can it? Bush's position is at best muddled -- not the hate and animus of the hard-core religious right, but still a severely misguided sense of the federal government as defender of traditional morality. (Thanks to IGF's Mike Airhart for the heads up)

In a posting on his Overlawyered.com site, Walter Olson (who is also IGF's webmaster and a contributing author) takes aim at the new Virginia statute that declares null and void not only civil unions but also any "partnership contract or other arrangement between persons of the same sex purporting to bestow the privileges or obligations of marriage"

Taking issue with National Review's Ramesh Ponnuru and other conservative pundits who defend this indefensible statute, Olson writes that couples who have a Vermont civil union "might be in for a very rude surprise after their I-95 accident when Virginia treated them as legal strangers for purposes of hospital visitation and the like." Moreover, since at least one of the measure's sponsors has said he hopes the law will invalidate guardianship arrangements:

children who had lived uneventfully for years with the surviving female partner of their deceased mother in New Jersey or California might be subject to being seized and handed over to the Virginia social service/foster care bureaucracy because the family was so ill advised as to attempt a vacation trip to Williamsburg or Mount Vernon.

Olson also reminds us that "Virginia is the only state where companies not large enough to underwrite their own insurance policies are prohibited from offering domestic partner benefits," and that "it is perhaps needless to add that Virginia's powerful religious-right lobby has vocally supported that prohibition." Yet supposedly mainstream conservatives still refuse to condemn these dangerous and damaging statutes that erode fundamental contractual rights.

They Can Have Mississippi.

This isn't new, but it's a hoot. A reader points out a website, www.christianexodus.com, is from a group of fundamentalists preaching secession from the United Sates to oppose the nation's embrace of gay marriage and abortion, banning school prayer, and other abominations. They note on their "Plan" page
that the three states under consideration, due to their relatively small populations, coastal access and Christian-conservative citizenry, are Mississippi, Alabama and South Carolina. Guess they never heard that the civil war kind of settled the issue of whether states can secede. And how in the world did they overlook Virginia?