Where do homosexual politics lead us?

Posted by Guest Blogger on Monday, 24 January 2005 02:16.

I’d like to throw into the ring a theory about homosexual politics I’ve been musing on.

One approach to homosexual politics is to assert that homosexuality is genetic, meaning that it’s inborn. The response of a liberal modernist to this will be to insist that it therefore be made not to count, so that an individual is not limited in his will in any way by his homosexuality.

This means invoking the principle of non-discrimination. However, even if everyday forms of discrimination are outlawed (employment, club memberships etc) there is still the limitation that homosexuals cannot choose to be heterosexual. Therefore, a more radical version of non-discrimination is applied, in which it is insisted that homosexuals not be excluded from important forms of heterosexual life, such as marriage and the bearing and raising of children.

The emphasis of this approach, therefore, is on bringing homosexuals within heterosexual norms. This is the way that the “unimpeded individual will” is created.

However, there is a second approach to homosexual politics. This begins with the idea that homosexuality is not fixed from birth, but is chosen by the individual. This then becomes proof that sexuality itself is something which is fluid, diverse and uniquely individual. This means that the heterosexual norm, in which there is a simple, fixed binary relationship between men and women, is not a biologically grounded reality, but is a false social construct.

The task therefore becomes to break down the artificial heterosexual norm, so that everyone can shape their own unique gender identity and sexual orientation for themselves, just like homosexuals do. So, in this second approach, the emphasis is on bringing heterosexuals closer to a homosexual norm, rather than allowing homosexuals to participate in heterosexual norms.

No wonder that so many gay activists prefer the second approach I have outlined! It makes them pioneers in the struggle to sexually liberate humanity.

No wonder too that some on the right prefer the first approach. The first approach retains heterosexuality as an important norm. This might help to explain why some influential right-wingers have come out in support of gay marriage. They possibly prefer this whole approach of bringing homosexuals within heterosexual norms, rather than the more radical alternative of rejecting heterosexuality as a social construct.

Such right-wingers are mistaken, though. First, traditional marriage is an expression of heterosexuality, so you wouldn’t expect too many homosexuals to be interested in participating in it. And this appears, in fact, to be the case. So opening up marriage to homosexuals is not really an effective way of bringing them within the norms of heterosexuality.

Second, because marriage is an expression of heterosexuality, our understanding of what it means has to change if it is to incorporate homosexuals. So, again, the effect is not to bring homosexuals within heterosexual norms, but to transform a formerly heterosexual institution.

So what should conservatives opt for? I think we have to step outside of the two options set up by liberal modernism. Neither really works from the conservative viewpoint. We need, in other words, to reject the underyling assumption that what matters is the unimpeded, self-authoring will.

Once we do this, we can offer tolerance to homosexuals but without the ideological drivers which make it necessary to offer forms of heterosexual life to homosexuals. It becomes possible to ask that homosexuals accept the limitations flowing from the nature of homosexuality itself.

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Comments:

Posted by Geoff Beck on Mon, 24 Jan 2005 05:16 | #

No stranger to controversy, I’ll take a stab at your essay.

Mark, if we are to “step outside of the two options set up by liberal modernism” which marks not only the gay debate but so many others it seems we come to the question of authority.

Perhaps we can agree that liberal modernism is a challenge to all norms, and standards - except the norm of no norms, and the standard of no standards.

So, we’ve left behind the moral sewer of liberal modernism! Good! Now what?

Where do we find the authority to oppose homosexualism: Christianity? Eugenics? Darwinism? Scientism? History? Evolution?

I think we both know that homosexual marriage is a proposterous absurdity. But by what authority do we oppose it, and all the other liberal schemes?

Posted by Guessedworker on Mon, 24 Jan 2005 11:56 | #

The authority you need is not very authoritarian, I am afraid. Quite the opposite. For four hundred years after Henry VII tamed the English barons in the fifteenth century a stable social order was seen as the pre-requisite for individual freedom. Henry tolled the bell for the end of serfdom. Freedom flowed out of stability.

In our time we know that childhood psychological wellbeing is maximised within a stable two-parent family, by far the best guarantor of which is marriage. It is Conservative to seek to advance individual freedom from such a foundation. It is liberal to seek to particularise for freedom at the expense of it - and, of course, freedom is not obtained that way.

Conservatism, Geoff, is your answer - if you can find any out there!

Posted by Geoff Beck on Mon, 24 Jan 2005 15:09 | #

Guessedworker:

Ok, sure I accept your argument. Now that Gay marriage is established in Scandanavia is defending that custom in that place now a conservative statement? (This is a much reduced Burkean approach).

If not, then you’re back at the authority issue.

You may not be aware that former Vice President Al Gore was on a book tour, a few years ago, for his lost epic: <u>Joined at the Heart</u>

“In this wise and clear-eyed book, Al and Tipper Gore see all families — single-parent, blended, gay and lesbian, dual-earner, and breadwinner-homemaker — as works in progress. Warmly appreciative of the diversity of ways we are joined at the heart, this book is a call to restore the social ecology on which the American family depends.” Arlie Russell Hochschild, author of The Time Bind

Posted by Geoff Beck on Mon, 24 Jan 2005 18:11 | #

Guessedworker, I know this line of reasoning can be tedious but I think it important…

Mark said that we need to “step outside liberal modernism” when approaching the issue before us. Now, if we accept that liberalism is a form of self-referential authority then we might not want to make that same mistake, because over time we will become liberals.

So, how are conservatives to justify themselves?

Where did Henry VII’s authority derive? He was a Christian monarch, a defender of the faith - his authority was Christ. ( Not a bad choice ). I recall reading a story about one old English King that was told one of his retinue was a gay . He asked the messenger if that subject had committed suicide upon his discovery - an indication of the King’s disapproval.

When we as “conservatives” come to the issue of authority we must source our justification, or we are self-referential.

Reading your justification for discrimination it seems to rely on the discipline of sociology, psychological and the like. Is this a basis for conservative rule? It seems - in totality - sociology and psychology are wont to endorse this peculiar affection, not disapprove.

As I recall Roger Scruton based the “Meaning of Conservatism” on the Kantian Categorical Imperative. It seems we have at least two choices: Christ or Kant.

Posted by Geoff Beck on Mon, 24 Jan 2005 18:35 | #

This sums it up… O’Sullivan’s First Law:

“All organizations that are not actually right-wing will over time become left-wing.”

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/johnleo/jl20040405.shtml

Posted by Guessedworker on Mon, 24 Jan 2005 19:47 | #

Geoff,

Of Kant I shall remain silent. He had a utilitarian view of human value, whereas in my extremely humble opinion human value lies in potential for trancendency (the prerequisite for which is psychological normalcy - already a high condition).

On those grounds alone you could say I side with the Saviour. But equally I think that social tradition is, in the West, a wise guide. I trust to and rely upon this, the accreted wisdom of my people. Who am I to overturn the cultural fruits of my forefather’s lives? Not a liberal, for sure. The freedom which grips my imagination is not some tacky and insubstantial Judeo-German form of self-invention.

In any case, standing behind my forefathers’ wisdom is a greater giver of lessons, which is Nature. Liberal or sane, like it or not, we heed her sociobiological expressions in our minds and in our daily lives. Women, even feminists, cannot cease wishing to be beautiful, nor men substantial. This may seem a base reference beside the sunlit glories of being - as opposed to not-being - with which I started this comment. But at least I am covering both bases!

Posted by Geoff Beck on Mon, 24 Jan 2005 19:59 | #

I, too, share your position.

Posted by John Ray on Tue, 25 Jan 2005 08:47 | #

Dear me! Our history is shaky:

“Where did Henry VII’s authority derive? He was a Christian monarch, a defender of the faith - his authority was Christ”

Henry VII’s authority derived from overturning the last of the Plantagenets and he was NEVER “fidei defensor”. That was an honour for his son.

Posted by Guessedworker on Tue, 25 Jan 2005 11:20 | #

That is true, John. In fact, Henry had a weak claim to the English throne, but he settled the matter through marriage to Elizabeth of York and with a remarkably light subsequent toll in judicial murders. So, for example, the 10-year old Yorkist imposter, Lambert Simnel, was forgiven and sent to work in Henry’s kitchens - where he glorified his leige with the invention of the Simnel Cake! Henry was a ruler of some magnanimity in an age when absolutism made no requirement of that.

He was also mindful to manage his exchequer wisely and to engage in few expensive foreign wars.

The general peace and quiet and the stable order in society which so benefitted the gentry of England were largely a product of Henry’s early imposition of law and order on the barony. Thus the beginnings of individual freedom which flowed from that accorded with Henry’s self-interest in establishing his tenure.

Henry’s son - as you say - had the luxury of reclaiming a divine reference. But he understood or respected none of the subtleties that his father did, and wrought contrary results.

Posted by Pericles on Tue, 25 Jan 2005 12:39 | #

William II (Rufus) killed by an arrow offshot by Walter Tirel. Bit of a lad with the lads. Edward II had his favourites at court as did James I. Wasn’t Richard II punished where he sinned? Henry IV had an on-again, off-again relationship with his cousin, Richard II . He was one of the Lords Appellant who, in 1388, persecuted many of Richard’s advisor-favorites, but his excellence as a soldier gained the king’s favor - Henry was created Duke of Hereford in 1397. In 1398, however, the increasingly suspicious Richard banished him for ten years. John of Gaunt’s death in 1399 prompted Richard to confiscate the vast Lancastrian estates; Henry invaded England while Richard was on campaign in Ireland, usurping the throne from the king.

In the UK, marriage contracts have inheritance and tax ramifications, which may be driving the demand for homosexual marriages.

Pericles

Posted by Geoff Beck on Tue, 25 Jan 2005 15:22 | #

Mr. Ray:

Henry of Tudor was monarch 1457 - 1509. He was Catholic and part of the Western Christendom medieval system, which legitimized all monarchs. Though there was considerable stress with Rome by this time he was not excommunicated and like all monarchs,of this period, I would guess he was coronated in a explicitly Christian ceremony.

I never intentionally suggested he was a protestant - as has been written.

Posted by Effra on Tue, 25 Jan 2005 18:45 | #

Glad to see some encomia for Henry VII, one of the greatest and the most underrated of all English sovereigns.

Quiet, pious, cunning, thrifty: he embodied every virtue that radical or flamboyantly pseudo-conservative hostiorians *don’t* appreciate, and which ordinary subjects welcome. Henry won a civil war, knocked the factions’ heads together, put the country back on its feet, filled the royal exchequer and avoided stupid foreign entanglements. The Francisco Franco of his day and country—and there is no higher praise in my book.

Posted by Geoff Beck on Tue, 25 Jan 2005 19:19 | #

Francisco Franco, I’ve been thinking about him quite often recently. Can you recommend a biography or history of this man, perhaps one with a sympathetic bent?

I read that the birth rate in Franco’s Spain was 4.5. Not bad. Seems like fathers knew where their beds were, and what hole it belongs in, unlike today.

Posted by Guessedworker on Tue, 25 Jan 2005 19:37 | #

Quite so, Effra. The question then arises how, in our times, does an advocate of quietism and stability compete in the political market with the megaphone-wielding hype merchants of liberty? To what extent is the long declension of true Conservatism a simple product of the devil having all the best songs?

Posted by Marc on Tue, 25 Jan 2005 21:20 | #

I’ve always believed that a strong defense against gay marriage is the fact that it is not good for gays themselves to be apeing heterosexual unions. I don’t know how “Jung-friendly” this site is, but I invite everyone to read my online essay, “The Misappropriation of Marriage: A Jungian Look at Efforts to Redefine our Most Sacred Institution.” It can be found at

http://www.santificarnos.com/zappala.html

Posted by Guessedworker on Wed, 26 Jan 2005 16:06 | #

Marc,

Read that chapter. Thank you. Found it informative, obviously, but also insightful and rather courageous. Your argument for the exclusivity of marriage as an heterosexual institution is novel and interesting but I wonder how many homosexuals will really think it so. Being so close to liberty, hedonism is a natural ally of the politics of pleasure. Being responsible in one’s own interest lies a good distance off, and mindfulness of another’s interests even further. Still, you are to be commended.

As for Jung, it is interesting to see the utility of his ideas. It was also a bit of a journey back in time for me. I looked at Jung long ago, in my early twenties - Adler, too. Rejected them both for the lack of a critique of consciousness and will. I can see that in that respect, at last, I haven’t changed very much in thirty years.

Posted by Marc on Thu, 27 Jan 2005 06:17 | #

Thank you Guessedworker for your kind words! Unfortunately I haven’t swayed many gays to my way of thinking. The legalization of gay marriage is to many a symbol of full acceptance. I understand and share in that need for acceptance, as does every human to some degree, but the road to real acceptance is not through dressing homosexuality up as something it is not. Of course, here I am merely repeating myself as well as preaching to the choir, so on that note…

Posted by jwberrie on Tue, 14 Feb 2006 08:05 | #

“...thereof of which one can not speak thereof one must remain silent”........Wittgenstein