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Gay marriage and the bigot card
By John Corvino, columnist, 365gay.com 05.01.2009 11:06am
Maggie Gallagher at the National Organization for Marriage—producers of the unintentionally hilarious “Gathering Storm” ad—has been mentioning “footnote 26” of the Iowa marriage decision quite a bit lately.
For example, she tells conservative blogger Rod Dreher that same-sex marriage requires “the rejection of the idea that children need a mom and dad as a cultural norm—or probably even as a respectable opinion. That’s become very clear for people who have the eyes to see it. (See e.g. footnote 26 of the Iowa decision).”
Elsewhere she describes the footnote as “the most heartbreaking sentence” of the decision.
What is this ominous, heartbreaking footnote? The offending bit is here: “The research appears to strongly support the conclusion that same-sex couples foster the same wholesome environment as opposite-sex couples and suggests that the traditional notion that children need a mother and a father to be raised into healthy, well adjusted adults is based more on stereotype than anything else.” So says the Iowa Supreme Court in a unanimous decision.
So too says the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Child Welfare League of America, the National Association of Social Workers, the American Psychological Association—in fact, every major health and welfare organization that has examined the issue. The Iowa Supreme Court has mainstream professional opinion solidly on its side.
But to say that the opposing view is based on “stereotype” attacks our opponents’ last remotely plausible-sounding secular argument. No wonder they’re getting defensive.
The use of the word “stereotype” is a large part of what irks them. Those who rely more on stereotype than evidence are being unreasonable. And in the extreme, those who cling to unreasonable views are bigots. Elsewhere in the Dreher interview Gallagher states,
“Same-sex marriage is founded on a lie about human nature: ‘there is no difference between same-sex and opposite sex unions and you are a bigot if you disagree.’”
Indeed, Gallagher uses the term “bigot” and its cognates no fewer than five times in the short interview.
But a bigot if you disagree? Neither the Iowa Supreme Court nor most marriage-equality advocates make any such sweeping statement. On the contrary, footnote 26 is attached the following:
“On the other hand, we acknowledge the existence of reasoned opinions that dual-gender parenting is the optimal environment for children. These opinions, while thoughtful and sincere, were largely unsupported by reliable scientific studies.”
“Reasoned opinions” which are “thoughtful and sincere.” That’s about as far from “you’re a bigot if you disagree” as one can get.
Marriage-equality opponents are increasingly complaining that we’re calling them bigots. This leads to a kind of double-counting of our arguments: For any argument X that we offer, opponents complain both that we’re saying X and that we’re saying that anyone who disagrees with X is a bigot.
Then, instead of responding to X—that is, debating the issue on the merits—they focus on the alleged bigotry charge and grumble about being called names.
I don’t deny that some of us do call them names (sometimes deserved, sometimes not). Yet even those who call them “bigots”—such as Frank Rich in his New York Times op-ed “The Bigots’ Last Hurrah”—often engage the substance as well. Increasingly, our opponents ignore the substance in favor of touting their alleged persecution.
Personally, I think the term “bigot” should be used sparingly. Many of those who oppose marriage equality are otherwise decent people who can and sometimes do respond to reasoned dialogue.
To call such persons bigots is not merely inaccurate; it’s a conversation-stopper. It says, “your views are beyond the pale, and I won’t dignify them with discussion.”
But let’s not pretend that any one side in this debate has a corner on conversation-stoppers. There are plenty of people on Gallagher’s side who consider us “deviants” or “perverts,” and those terms don’t exactly welcome dialogue either. Neither does Gallagher’s calling us “liars”—as in, “same-sex marriage is based on a lie about human nature.”
There’s a more general problem here, and it’s hardly unique to the gay-rights debate. Suppose you’ve reflected on some controversial issue and adopted a particular position. Presumably, you’ve decided that it’s the most reasonable position to hold. How, then, do you explain the fact that seemingly reasonable people deny it?
There are several possibilities, most of them not very flattering. Perhaps your opponents are inattentive, or not very bright, or have logical blind spots, or are swayed by superstition.
Or perhaps they’re just being bigots. It happens.
(Interestingly, some philosophers have suggested on this basis that there’s no such thing as a “reasonable disagreement,” strictly speaking. If you accept P but think that denying P is “reasonable,” then you should either switch to not-P or become agnostic about the issue.)
I don’t pretend to understand why seemingly reasonable and decent people adopt what strikes me as an obviously wrongheaded position on marriage equality. I think the reasons are various and complex, though they typically involve a distortion of rationality caused by other commitments, such as religious bias.
But I also recognize that my opponents do, or should, wonder the same thing about me—and the ever-growing number of reasonable and decent Americans who support marriage equality.
Which leaves us with a few choices.
(1) We can call each other crazy and stupid, or bigots, or deviants. This is generally not helpful.
(2) We can pretend that we’re above all that, but complain that the other side is doing it. This, I fear, is what Gallagher is doing, and it strikes me as equally unhelpful. It would be akin to my saying that Gallagher’s position is that you should oppose same-sex marriage, and if you don’t, you’re a liar (or a heathen or a pervert or whatever).
(3) We can actually engage the substance of each other’s positions.
I can understand why those with poorly supported positions would want to avoid (3). That doesn’t necessarily make them bigots, but it doesn’t reflect very well on them, either.
John Corvino, Ph.D. is an author, speaker, and philosophy professor at Wayne State University in Detroit. His column “The Gay Moralist” appears Fridays on 365gay.com.
For more about John Corvino, or to see clips from his “What’s Morally Wrong with Homosexuality?” DVD, visit http://www.johncorvino.com/
"We Make Our Life Together..."
Stephen had a beautifully framed print of this famous drawing... I hung it in our bedroom. One day in late December, in a fit of rage that I can only ascribe to self-loathing over being gay, he took it down and destroyed it breaking up the frame and glass on the kitchen floor.
I’ve been haunted in the night by visions of Stephen’s cars…perhaps it’s because of all the news about the auto industry in the last few days. Stephen has had a Chrysler Pacifica, a Jeep Cherokee and a Mercedes during the time I’ve known him… just the sight of any of these car models on the road is enough to remind me of him.
December 10th 2008 was supposed to be “The Day Without Gay,” gays everywhere were supposed to stay home from work in protest of the California Marriage proposition’s passing. Stephen would never have participated in such an event, although I was open to the idea. But, the day before, he and I had had a terrible argument about his lying and deceiving ways. We hardly slept that night. That morning, neither of us stirred until late in the morning, we just laid in bed together in wide awake silence. When I reminded him of his promises to me, the argument resumed. He got angry and got up saying he was through with life and was going to commit suicide. I told him I was tired of living this way too and would join him. We both showered and dressed. We both put on black suits. I wrote a letter to my family and when he came downstairs; we went out to the garage and got in the Mercedes. We rolled down the windows, Stephen started the car, and we sat there waiting for carbon monoxide to do its work.
Stephen put in a CD from his Bible on CD set. I had seen the CD set before, it was where he hid his CDs of his sex pictures. I discovered them innocently enough one day, and when I looked at them, I saw the proof of what he’d lied to me about, saying Charles Kelly’s accusations about sex parties and various other things were untrue. But I never told him I’d seen them, I just forgave his lies. But as we sat in the car that morning of December 10th, I remembered them and began to question him about what I’d seen.
He began to cry and then said, “I can’t do this.” He turned off the engine and got out of the car. He went in the house… But I’d had all I could stand. I closed the door, went back to the car, started it and waited again. About half an hour later, he discovered what I was doing. He came to the car in a panic… at first I thought it was because he truly cared about me (and perhaps he did), but later I realized that it was more because he didn’t want to have to explain his role in what I was doing. I’d seen that side of him before, on Sunday, June 17th, 2007 when he told me to kill myself after an argument.
I refused to turn off the car or unlock the door for him and he went back inside the house. A short time later, he came and opened the garage door and then went back inside again. I got out, closed the garage door, turned off the circuit breaker to the door openers and then started the car again. He came out once again and discovering what I’d done, pleaded with me to turn the car off and come inside. He said he loved me and was sorry for all he’d done to make us so unhappy. I listened and after a while, my attitude changed and I unlocked the door of the car. He got in, turned off the engine, and came around to the other side and took me into the house.
We never spoke of that day again, but as it happened, it was a fitting day for our mutual suicide attempt. It was on “The Day Without Gay” and he was missing from work, no call, no show. I remember as we were getting dressed, his colleagues were calling on the phone as he had an international meeting and conference call scheduled for that morning, but he refused to answer it. Later that afternoon, I heard him call the office to say he’d been sick that morning. I think we’re both still “sick” in a way… This is one of those mornings when I wish he’d been brave enough to leave me in the car, for I surely would have left this world for a happier place that day.
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I remember when this was "just" a question...
