Anti-Gay Wolves in Sheep's Clothing (Updated)

OK -- I've calmed down slightly. I was depressed all day at work, couldn't write a word, and just came home and read BL manga and drank root beer. (I did, however, avoid a junk-food binge.)

This morning, Via Andrew Sullivan, I ran across this attempt at analysis by Rod Dreher. Dreher needs to learn to question his own assumptions. Just a few of the more objectionable highlights:

Don't gloat over this. While I would have supported Prop 8 had I been a Californian, because I do not think there exists a right to same-sex marriage and I fear for the religious liberty implications of constitutionalizing same-sex marriage, I recognize that this is a tremendous blow to good men and women who disagree. It seems to me to be unseemly, even cruel, to rub salt in their wounds.

The sentiment is nice, but the backstory is sadly lacking. First, the "right to same-sex marriage." It's really very simple: the court found, as has the United States Supreme Court, that marriage is a fundamental right. Get that? It's a right that belongs to everyone, and the government is not allowed to interfere without a damned good reason. Trying to break out a "right to same-sex marriage" is a naked attempt to load the dice. Dreher loses points on that one. (Update: Thinking about this further, this is a common straw-man argument in this debate, subscribed to by no less that Antonin Scalia, and an article of faith on the anti-gay right: to state it clearly once again so that even James Dobson gets it, there is a fundamental right to marriage that is being withheld from a particular group for no compelling state reason. That is the only valid way to state this, and I find it more than a little ironic that those who are the first to decry the creation of "new rights" by the bench are also the first to do so when it suits their purposes.) Dreher loses more points on the "religious liberty implications" red herring. There are none. That's a naked lie pushed by the anti-gay right. It was never anything more. (And congratulations to Dreher on incorporating a straw man and a red herring in the same paragraph.)

Barack Obama's candidacy made this win by the Prop 8 folks possible. Black voters went for Prop 8 by a margin of 9 to 1. Hispanics split, and whites voted against it. Without such a huge black turnout, it probably wouldn't have passed.

This is very true, and the fact of it makes me furious. One thing that I thank my parents for is that I was raised without racial bias. I don't understand it. I don't really understand bias at all. My question for the black community is simply this: who gave you ownership of civil rights, and why do you feel that you can take mine away? Because you're the ones who did it. Do the math.

I also want to say to the PC left, particularly in the gay community: how long do we have to work for the benefit of people who are going to turn around and spit in our faces? I think I'm sort of over that whole syndrome.

In regard to that datum, this comment from a reader at AmericaBlog strikes home:

I'm glad Obama won, but how come it's expected of me to rise above the anti-black bigotry I was raised with, and go vote for a black man, but then black people can go vote to enshrine bigotry into law and no one challenges that?

I've heard, from Sullivan and others, that we need to reach out to the black community. I think we need to challenge them. That community, of all in this country, should be the most supportive, and they are the least. It's a result of the bigotry of their churches, from everything I've seen. I'm going to revisit my comments on "caritas" -- the fundamental tenet of Christianity -- and put the question: can you really call yourselves "Christians"?

Most importantly, this result shows the strategic risk of trying to carry out a social revolution via the courts, without consulting the people. I don't doubt that barring some unforeseen cataclysm, same-sex marriage is going to be the law of the land in my lifetime. If you look at the actuarial tables and the demographic charts, it's clear that younger voters accept it. Had gay activists in California pursued a gradualist strategy building democratic support for same-sex marriage measures incrementally, they would be well on their way to getting what they want. Even though I'm against gay marriage, I could live with compromise legislation that erected a zone of protection around religious liberty. I suspect you could built a workable majority of voters who'd support something like that.

This is the "activist courts" bogey-man in a false moustache -- and not a very good one. (Gods, I am so tired of this little costume: it's a naked attempt to trade on the fact that most people don't know how the damned system works.) Dreher's language is biased, but we'll take that as a given in this kind of screed. What "social revolution" -- by which I assume he means the extension of basic civil liberties to groups that have previously been excluded -- has happened in this country without the courts? Name one in which the courts had no role. Dreher's obviously another one, like Jonathan Rauch, who thinks we should wait patiently for Daddy to come up with a reward for our being good boys and girls. Doesn't happen that way. Never did. I can't see that it ever will. Squeaky wheels, and all that.

There's also the fact that there is widespread support for same-sex marriage in California -- don't forget that the elected legislature has twice passed bills specifying that it's legal. This argument is drivel, and it's insulting.

But by appealing to the courts to impose something as radical as same-sex marriage, something that has never in the history of human society existed, they invited this backlash. Now, traditional marriage has been constitutionalized, and same-sex couples are worse off than before, because they only way they can get marriage now is by amending the state constitution. It was a foolish strategy, and if the US Supreme Court should in the next decade or so discover a same-sex marriage right in the US Constitution, there will swiftly arise a movement to pass a constitutional amendment defining marriage as one man and one woman. Yes, the Federal Marriage Amendment failed in the Senate in 2005, but I think that's because the idea of court-imposed gay marriage was an abstract threat. In California, it was a reality, and that appears to have galvanized voters.

More garbage. (Sorry -- the further along I read in this, the more angry I get. Be warned: there will probably be some intemperate language in this post.) First, "never in the history of human society" -- spare me. And convince me that you know all about the history of human societies -- all of them, from every time and place. Because, you see, that's just not true, any more than the "universal definition of marriage" so beloved of the religious freaks on the right. (Check out the work of Stephen O. Murray, and comments by Patrick Chapman at Box Turtle Bulletin. And say what you will about John Bosworth, he does present some evidence about the status of same-sex unions in early Europe.) It's really stupid to base an argument on sweeping generalizations like that, because they're so easily shot down.

As for "inviting a backlash" -- let's get this straight: this vote was purely and simply the result of a deliberate campaign of lies, distortion, and scare-mongering by the Mormon Church, the Knights of Columbus, the Catholic hierarchy, and the fundamentalist, evangelical groups against gays. They've been using us as the scary monster under the bed for decades. It's the Dobson Gang again, with Fred Phelps as their spiritual guide. (The subtext in this sort of thing is always "God hates fags!") No one "invited" a backlash: it was planned from the get-go: those petitions were in place and on the streets before the court ever handed down its decision and would have gone forward no matter what the court decided. Don't try to shift the blame onto us: it was your side of the fight that did it, and we didn't need to do anything to start it rolling.

I expect that the anger among the gay community and their supporters over this result will make rational discussion of the matter impossible, at least for a time. But what I would like to see is an honest reckoning over why Prop 8 won, something that goes beyond, "They hate us! They hate us!" If you blame it all on bigotry, that doesn't require you to think about other reasons why people voted for Prop 8 -- like, for example, resentment over something as radical as same-sex marriage being imposed by a judicial elite.

See my previous paragraph as to why Prop 8 won. See also my comments about inflammatory and biased language. There's also the fact that rational discussion has never been possible, but that's not a function of our side -- that's simply the "moral" religious fanatics who got mired in Leviticus and never read a word that Jesus said, and who pick and choose which commandments they want to pay attention to. It's hard to have a rational discussion with someone who admits of no compromise and doesn't listen to a word you say. Dreher is simply taking "rational discussion" as meaning "accept what I say at face value."

Nor does it invite self-criticism over your own side's tactics -- like, for example, the role played by that preening jackass Gavin Newsom. . . .

Even one of Andrew Sullivan's readers, a woman who supports gay marriage, wrote to him to talk about how Newsom's public arrogance was hurting the cause. People don't like being told by slicks like Newsom that they don't have any say in what's going to become of a fundamental institution of society.

Speaking of preening jackasses. . . .

Once you're finished laughing at the line about "self-criticism of your own side's tactics," (see comments about the Dobson Gang above). . . .

Dreher's playing the spin for all it's worth. His take is the approved right-wing take on Newsom's comments, and it's pure spin. Here's the video he embedded -- watch it without preconceptions and see what interpretation you come up with:



I don't see Newsom saying anything like what Dreher and the right-wing hacks pushed as the substance. What he's saying is that history is marching forward, and same-sex marriage is going to happen. There's a certain inevitability to history -- it happens, whether we like it or not. It must be kind of bitter to be faced with spending eternity in the dust bin.

Until gay activists contend with the risk in pursuing their idea of equality through the courts without having first won a social consensus, they're going to set themselves up for the prospect of a crushing failure like this.

Another "wait until I tell you it's OK" line. Bullshit. What Dreher is saying is "I think you should all sit back and let old white straight guys decide for you."

I've commented on this whole conservative mantra of "pushing social agendas through the courts is a bad thing." Y'know what? It works. Look where we have come in fifteen years, since the first same-sex marriage case popped up in Hawai'i: same-sex marriage is recognized in two states, not to mention a half-dozen foreign countries, it will soon be legal, barring some bizarre event, in two more, more civil unions bills will be passed, and those will shortly be converted to recognition of full marriage rights, as happened in Connecticut and will soon happen in New Jersey. Fifteen years. That's no time at all. And then the repeals of the constitutional amendments will happen, or we'll manage to get rid of some of the dead weight on SCOTUS (Antonin Scalia, in particular, is a specialist in asking the wrong questions) and get the definitive answer. (Of course, it will be time to haul out that worn, scratchy old "activist judges" record again.)

Hmm -- I was going to examine the most objectionable parts of Dreher's essay, and it turned out to be nearly the whole thing. Reading it over again, this whole essay is the purest self-serving, slanted, condescending trash. I know Sullivan links to Dreher regularly, but then I'm known as considering Sullivan fairly shallow. If this is an example of Dreher's commentary, I'm afraid I have no respect for his honesty or his reasoning ability. (Take it as a given that, based on the evidence I've seen, actually knowing what you're talking about is not a requirement on the right.) He sure as hell doesn't understand how social change works.