-Caveat Lector- <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/"> </A> -Cui Bono?- From http://www.philosophynews.com/philosopheye/PE20000204.htm {{<Begin>}} February 4, 2000 Religious right is wrong about homosexuality by EDWARD MANIER RELATED LINKS * Edward Manier's Web site http://www.nd.edu/~amanier/index.html Twenty years ago, philosopher Thomas Nagel developed a complex metaphor of human intimacy implying that the only sexual perversion is the use of another person as a passive or uninvolved tool for one's self-centered purposes, whether these are procreative, hedonistic, or nothing but expressions of power. I endorse a variation of that thesis by combining it with dicta concerning "genuine intimacy" as necessary for "good sex." Genuine intimacy builds on friendship, a reciprocal relation built on mutual compassion, sharing, sympathetic criticism and love. Genuine intimacy and good sex must be generative -- i.e., they must be directed to the genuine good, the continued growth, development and maturation of the intimate other and the intimate relationship. Genuine intimacy and good sex also require shared commitments to the common good, and to the general welfare of present, previous, and future generations. Such intimacy is equally compatible with a celibate life and with monogamous sexual relationships, homosexual or heterosexual. Monogamous, fecund, sanctified heterosexual marriage may be totally perverse, while monogamous, generative, genital but childless, homosexual unions have exemplified morally heroic forms of friendship and love. Neither biology, psychology, metaphysics, ethics, jurisprudence nor politics sustain a valid argument that genuine intimacy requires genital activity of a preferred sort, or any sort. Some forms of sexuality explicitly renounce the goal of genuine intimacy. Such relationships, if consensual, are little more than the reciprocal exchange of erotic satisfaction. Inability to move beyond such (implicitly) contractual relationships to real friendship is a distinctive perversion of modern life. Mutually satisfying erotic relationships between true narcissists, whatever their sexual orientation -- e.g., the central characters in the current remake of "The Thomas Crown Affair" -- offend ethical criteria I am willing to defend. I suppose that's where Nagel and I part company. But let me be clear: I am not a movie critic. This movie simply illustrates heterosexual erotic behavior that falls short of the moral standards of genuine intimacy and good sex I defend. Sharing the thrills of free fall, in other words, is a tempting but eventually inadequate metaphor for genuine intimacy. The Religious Right The target of this essay is that segment of the religious right which seeks to uphold the conjunction of the fundamental religious imperative of love for all humanity with variations of the latinate thesis that homosexuality is an "objective disorder." This latter thesis, to American ears, has clinical overtones. It suggests that homosexuality is an illness, or even a mental disorder. It suggests that love for homosexuals should be like love for alcoholics, that upright folk should encourage homosexuals to seek help in an appropriately structured twelve-step program. The term "objective disorder," uttered by highly placed leaders of a world religion, also has a completely non-clinical and even an anti-clinical aspect, a tone strongly suggesting moral condemnation. This second tension of the therapeutic and the punishing enhances the combustibility of the first. Subtleties of translation and mistranslation aside, there is much evidence that many folk on the religious right think that while they are directed to treat homosexual persons with love, they are also directed to continue the social stigmatization of homosexuality as a threat to the family and its norms. But stigmatization is a form of discrimination. Our society makes certain social resources and opportunities available to married heterosexuals; denial of those same resources and opportunities to homosexuals is discriminatory. Discrimination, we all know, is one of those offenses which often occurs in the absence of specific intent. Stigmatization Stigmatization is perhaps the most oppressive, inhumane form of punishment any group of human beings can inflict on one of its members. For primitive, uncivilized or semi-civilized peoples, "scapegoating" was the ultimate weapon of social control. The scapegoat, like an adolescent primate at the bottom of a dominance hierarchy, is driven out of the group and into an arena where only a narrow range of behaviors in the species' repertoire succeeds, where death comes early and often violently. Scapegoating survives as an element of dysfunctional forms of the family romance. The practice enables the dysfunctional family, society or church to localize the source of all its pain in one or a small number of its members, deferring or completely avoiding accurate diagnosis of its own plight and evading meaningful reform. Such contemporary forms of stigmatization or scapegoating intensify the tragic inhumanity of its earlier forms. In forms that are painfully familiar in the domestic, ecclesiastical and political circumstances of modern life, the scapegoat is not stoned or beaten and driven into the wilderness, but "loved" and left twisting painfully in the wind; not killed, deported or excommunicated, but allowed to live, in communion, a miserable life. The stigmatization of vice is an ineffective, often counter-productive means of teaching virtue. Stigmatization is a form of social control a civilized society will use rarely, and only with the greatest care. In domestic and ecclesiastical situations it is difficult to avoid the suspicion that resort to stigmatization, as distinct from outright expulsion, is itself pathological or that, at least, it calls into grave doubt the moral authority of those who impose such pain. Western Sexuality for Dummies Most contemporary Americans who give the matter any thought are confused by apparently conflicting claims about the roles of nature, nurture and social construction in thinking about homosexuality. There are any number of biological determinants of sexual orientation (genetic, hormonal, gestational, volumetric differences in key brain areas). Psychological explanations ("exotic becomes erotic") are much more speculative. Others insist sexual orientation is a social construct, variable both diachronically and synchronically independently of comparable change in the relevant biological factors. It is likely that some combination of all three of these propositions is true. The appearance of conflict among them is quite misleading. Such worries do not afflict those segments of the religious right with which I am most familiar. The sexual morality which prevails among folk on the religious right has little, if any, informed contact with biological, psychological, anthropological, or historical analyses of sexual orientation. To the extent that morality has deeper roots than prevailing folk mores, a main stream of it can be traced to a medieval theological adaptation of Aristotelian biology and the characteristic Aristotelian move of finding ethical norms in the nature of things. This polemic is not the place to discuss Aristotle's ethics, but I will briefly address the characteristic Aristotelian biological distinction of what is natural and what is monstrous. Aristotle's philosophical biology is built on a key distinction between those organic details which are the proper object of scientific study and those which are not. The proper object of scientific inquiry into processes which take place in both living and non-living objects on this earth (his "sub-lunar" realm) is "that which happens always or for the most part," or the natural/normal. This is the realm in which the essence of a thing can be construed as both a formal and a final cause, and it is this causal understanding which undergirds Aristotle's philosophical biology. Within this philosophical biology, individual variability may be noticed, and even accounted for, but not really understood because the coincidence of material circumstances which underlies individual variability is formally identifiable (the realm of chance or luck), but not intelligible. "Monstrous" organic development is the result of "chance," the blind intersection of otherwise causally independent sequences of natural events, and is not the subject of Aristotelian science. This view of things seems quaint when juxtaposed with the statistical models underlying the "modern synthesis" of Darwinian and Mendelian thought. But it is this quaint and archaic perspective which underlies Aristotle's typological thinking and blindness to the evolutionary potentional (and scientific significance) of individual variability. Medieval philosophical biologists, always prone to hyperbole in the implementation of Aristotle's teleological themes, were misled by the philosopher himself in this case. Biological organs have many functions, or even no function, and individual variability is a source of vitality and vigor for a species. Aristotle, heir to Plato and so to Socrates, and familiar with all the details of Athenian culture, would not have recognized "homosexuality" or "sodomy" as special categories of human behavior. Obviously, he would not have labeled them "abnormal" or "monstrous." But his philosophical biology, with its foundational commitments to essentialism (what evolutionists now call "typological" thinking) and to teleology, provided all the philosophical tools a medieval theologian might need to find cosmic normative significance in the complementarity of male and female, and, to condemn any and all deviation from heterosexual norms. This way of thinking has had surprising ideological and historical sweep. William Paley thought the marvelous coadaptation of male and female genitalia, in all or most animal species, was evidence for divine design as sound as the intricacies of the human eye. Some views on this topic are said to be "personalist" in a sense that floats free of the archaic apparatus of medieval philosophical biology. Those views, however, do not address the possibility, in a culture in which "homosexuality" is an accepted social category, that homosexual unions are as likely to exhibit authentic generative intimacy as are heterosexual unions. Why bother to be a personalist if you let medieval philosophical biology determine the limits of what can be considered to have personal significance? "Reparative therapists" have swallowed a good deal more than medieval philosophical biology. They are also the heirs of a mistake made by the young Sigmund Freud, the founder of their discipline. With the young Freud, they see homosexuality as a pathological deviation from normal development, and so as an appropriate subject for "therapy," dynamic, behavioral, or what have you. Scientific and religious zeal combine here to make the cosmically ordained goal of male/female complementarity of immeasurably greater significance than any transient human suffering. What can a good therapist from the religious right do when confronted with such a monstrous combination of sin and sickness but exorcise it, root and branch? Some may find comfort in the putatively pre-established cosmic complementarity of male and female. Classicists among them should remember the Pythagorean authors of this polarity thought it strictly analogous to that of the rational and the irrational and that of the ordered and the chaotic. So Analyze This! Imagine a university, far, far away, in solidarity with the religious right on most matters of sexual morality, presided over by staunch defenders of medieval philosophical biology, and whose official "Proclamation of Magnanimity" asserts: "We value gay and lesbian members of this community as we value all members of this community. We condemn harassment of any kind, and University policies proscribe it. We consciously create an environment of mutual respect, hospitality and warmth in which none are strangers and all may flourish." Nevertheless, this fictional university, with its many fans on the religious right, refuses recognition and the ordinary resources attendant upon recognition (meeting space, posting and advertising privileges) to all local variants of a gay and lesbian caucus. The institution's president and its board of fellows (the final local authority in such matters), reject a vote of the Academic Council favoring the inclusion of sexual orientation in the university's non-discrimination statements. The official explanation amounts to this: Adopting such a statement would expose the university to increased risks of litigation, and to possible judicial interpretations of the policy that would, in practice, deprive it of the right to determine its own identity as a religious institution. In this instance, the university's identity is said to hang on the distinction between a homosexual orientation and homosexual (genital) activity. One might paraphrase this view under the familiar "hate the sin, love the sinner" rubric. This policy, however, cannot be stated consistently within any framework providing for procedural fairness in settling appeals of decisions about hiring, promotion, and retention when discrimination is alleged. Many on the religious right proscribe sexual acts that heterosexuals may commit in private as seriously as they proscribe homosexual acts, but our fictional university does not offer to inspect the private lives of its heterosexual faculty. How could it justify such intrusive fact finding in the case of homosexuals? In fact our dystopian institution hangs its "Proclamation of Magnanimity" on the practical fiction that institutional stigmatization of homosexual acts can leave the honor and integrity of a homosexual orientation unblemished. No religion which leaves issues of chastity and generative love to the conscience of individuals can or should be able to intrude upon essentially private efforts to achieve genuine intimacy and good sex. This effort can be a long and lonely twilight struggle. It is best supported by organizations of genuine friends. This is one clear instance in which it is simply impossible to hate the sin (homosexual acts) and love the sinner (those with homosexual orientation). ____________________ Ed Manier, professor of philosophy at the University of Notre Dame, does research, teaches, and publishes a little on topics having to do with philosophy and human evolution and biopsychiatry. Copyright (c) 2000 by Edward Manier. All rights reserved. Reprinted by permission. {{<End>}} A<>E<>R ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Integrity has no need of rules. -Albert Camus (1913-1960) + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + The only real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes. -Marcel Proust + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + "Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your common sense." --Buddha + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + It is preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that prevents us from living freely and nobly. -Bertrand Russell + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + "Everyone has the right...to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers." Universal Declaration of Human Rights + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + "Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will teach you to keep your mouth shut." Ernest Hemingway + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Forwarded as information only; no endorsement to be presumed + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without charge or profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this type of information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance�not soap-boxing! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'�with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright frauds�is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRL gives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector. ======================================================================== Archives Available at: http://home.ease.lsoft.com/archives/CTRL.html http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/ ======================================================================== To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Om
