Gay-Hatin' Gospel (pt. 1)

How did gay-hatin' come to be the "most-common perception" of Christianity?

Theory No. 1: The Safe Target

"No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to us all," St. Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 10:13.

If you're a preacher, and if you possess the slightest bit of self-awareness, that's problematic. It means that preaching against any temptation or sin implicates your entire congregation and yourself as well. That can be really uncomfortable for all involved. Pick any of the seven deadlies or the 10 commandments and you risk alienating everyone in the pews and exposing yourself as less than perfect. Awwwk--waaard.

But lately, many American evangelical preachers think they have found a loophole: Homosexuality. Here is a temptation that does not seem to be common to us all. It seems to be the perfect "sin"* -- the perfect safe target. Straight preachers can rail against it without worrying about exposing themselves as hypocrites or, even worse, as fallible humans just like everyone else. And statistically speaking, most of the congregation will be able to say "Amen" without squirming or feeling the least discomfort. It's all win.

No other sin provides this kind of free shot. Point an accusing finger at gluttony, pride or envy and the proverbial four fingers pointing back at yourself underscore Paul's point about temptation being "common to us all." That's way too Pogo -- too "we have met the enemy and he is us." But here, instead, is the allure of an "enemy" who is not us. This is a unique opportunity, and kind of a rush. It's the chance to rail against sinners who seem completely other -- people whose sin doesn't tempt us in the least. (And since these others are clearly in the minority, we don't even have to worry much about a serious impact on the offering plate. Contrast that with gluttony, pride and envy -- the foundations on which some of the church's biggest donors have built their fortunes.)

I don't think this safe-target dynamic fully explains the motive or the cause of American evangelicalism's anti-gay obsession, but I do believe it accounts for part of its appeal. That appeal is all the more appealing in the American church, where we're deeply anxious about the fact that we don't seem significantly different from everybody else in our culture. Since we expend our lives chasing after the exact same things as everyone else, and since we can't say with any confidence that "They'll know we are Christians by our love," we have to latch onto whatever insignificant signifiers we can. We don't drink (in public), and we don't dance (well). Still not convinced we're the elect, the chosen few? Well then, um, we're heterosexual. Dazzled yet?

As that Barna survey demonstrated, the increasing popularity of railing against the supposed safe target of homosexuality has come at a cost. Evangelical Christians have become famous, or rather infamous, for being anti-gay. It is the "most-common perception" of who we are. The public face of Christianity is not the face of Christ, or even of Billy Graham or Martin Luther King Jr. or Dorothy Day. The public face of Christianity has become that of Fred Phelps and of his slightly more tactful, smiling surrogates like Pat Robertson, James Dobson and Tony Perkins. That is the "most-common perception" of American Christianity, both inside and outside the church.

But there's another theologically perilous cost to this safe-target preaching. The idea that there are "super-sins" worthy of particular opprobrium and the idea that there are "others" subject to temptations not "common to us all" are spiritually dangerous notions. I don't have the time or the wisdom to unpack all the ways that these ideas have altered our preaching and teaching, but consider just one example: Fidelity is the virtue at the core of nearly all Christian sexual ethics. Yet our safe-target condemnation of homosexuals treats fidelity and infidelity as indistinguishable. That suggests to me that something has come off the rails.

The passage quoted at the beginning of this post is the central insight of G.K. Chesterton's delightful Father Brown stories. The priest-sleuth is able to solve these mysteries not because of his keen powers of observation or because he is a Holmesian deductive genius, but rather because he is an expert on human nature, having studied the subject for decades by hearing confessions. The wisdom of Father Brown is that we're all pretty much alike, that there is no temptation that is not "common to us all." This was true for the Corinthians, the most screwed-up collection of misfits in the first-century church, and it is true for the Americans, the most screwed-up collection of misfits in the 21st-century church.

Chesterton, like Paul, could be a scold. But also like Paul he was never so foolish as to think that he could exempt himself when he preached against sin and temptation. Seeking such an exemption by taking aim at safe targets leads to self-delusion, smugness and complacency, and it goes against everything the Bible (and experience) teaches us about human nature. That point is worth repeating: The anti-gay preaching that has become the pre-eminent characteristic of American Christianity contradicts what the Bible says about human nature. It is unbiblical.

Anyway, so much for Theory No. 1. (As you've probably already guessed, I'm following the hackneyed convention here of dismissing the unsatisfactory theories first, gradually working toward what I think the actual explanation is. Next up: Theory No. 2, Inner Demons.)

- - - - - - - - - - - -

* I want to make a distinction here between two things, both of which I disagree with. The first is the contention that homosexuality is, by definition, a sin. The second is the belief, implicit and explicit, that homosexuality is the worst and most odious of sins. This post is primarily concerned with the latter belief and in order to challenge that here I have accepted here for the sake of argument the language, if not the logic, of the former belief. The larger point is that the belief taught by most Christians -- that any sex outside of holy matrimony, narrowly defined, is a sin -- does not, and ought not, entail the idea that homosexuality is thus some kind of super-sin or that homosexuals should be singled out for condemnation from which other humans are exempt by the supposed virtue of their heterosexuality.

Comments

[Doctor Science]

I wish Erick would come back and explain how

As for marriage, they have the same rights to marry as anybody else: all they need to do is find someone of the opposite sex

isn't meant as satire. I've never been able to get someone who says this to tell me whether they actually mean it.

As for "endlessly upping the ante", we call that moving the Overton Window.

[Bugmaster]

I don't understand why homosexuality is even considered a sin in the first place.

Actually, that part probably made sense at the time. In a nomadic society with a Tech Level of approximately zero, your only chance to survive is to outbreed the mortality rate. Thus, anything that reduces reproduction rates without an acceptable tradeoff -- masturbation, homosexuality, abstinence even -- is taboo.

The problem is, we live in a different world now...

[Spalanzani]

Jos: "Shouldn't this be either "It's all good." or "It's win-win"? "It's all win." isn't an expression I'm familiar with."

"It's all win" is internet-speak. A related expression is "made of win".

As for the topic: Hey, I don't see what the problem is. You can buy any color car you want. Provided the color you want is black.

[Brandi]

Yeah, I don't have much fondness for Erick, but I figured he was just doing a heavy-handed and far-less-witty-than-he-thinks take on Anatole France's "The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread."

[Mad Latinist]

The "Gays are free to marry" argument, when used seriously, is presumably relying on the semantic argument certain people want to make law: "Marriage == 1 man, 1 woman." I mean, men can't get their fallopian tubes tied, but if they want they can get their vas deferens tied. What's the point of a man protesting that he can't get his fallopian tubes tied, no matter how much he wants it?

...

OK, leaving aside questions of how valid that argument is, my analogy is such a stretch that I think I've sprained something. Sorry.

[Salamanda]

Spalanzani: You can buy any color car you want. Provided the color you want is black.

Or the renter's lament: You can paint your walls any color you want, so long as it's white.

[Tonio]

Bugmaster, you're right that the logic might have made sense back then. The flaw, however, is that gays wouldn't procreate even with the taboo, unless they marry straights and procreate under force or threat of force.

The recent Maryland court decision on gay marriage claimed that government has a compelling interest in procreation. I was embarrassed for the state. The court did not show how legalized gay marriage would hinder procreation.

From my reading, the fundamentalist opponents to gay marriage really believe that individuals have a duty to society to procreate. Some of them say that a full-scale halt to procreation is not only possible but probable.

[Ursula L]

...is that gays wouldn't procreate even with the taboo, unless they marry straights and procreate under force or threat of force.

"Procreate under force" is pretty much the Old Testiment situation. Parents arrange marriages, and you're expected to go along.

[hf]

"Your Honor, I just couldn't help it - I saw those guys kissing and hugging and it squicked me and I just had to give them 'a memorable beating up'." Depending on where you live (and when you live) and which judge you get, of course, that defense even works.

Indeed, I hear that gay pride parade 'squicking' exists partly to stop any jury from believing that such a sight would automatically make someone kill.

I'd also like to point out that Massachusetts has same-sex marriage and apparently will continue to do so. Arguments for inequality will therefore come to seem more ridiculous every year, as the state fails to collapse in bloody anarchy.

[nationElectric]

Erick may have just been being satirical, but I've heard gay marriage opponents use that argument quite unironically. For example, at a moderately popular fundamentalist catholic blog I saw the blogger put that forward several times, usually in moments of frustration, and it was met with little argument from his readership. Along with other classy observations, such as cursing Andrew Sullivan because he put his "love of sodomy" before the safety of the United States from the "bronze-age fanatics."

At its core, I think, a lot of these people are just unwilling to recognize that gays are just, well, gay. They insist on casting it as an affectation or a phase, because it's much easier to condemn someone for a voluntary act than for an innate quality.

[damnedyankee]

Service in the military is not a right; many straights are turned away for flaws as minor as color-blindness.

Color-blindness could actually impact on operations, and is a legitimate reason to deny somebody the opportunity to serve. After all, if you think the chemical marker is green when it's actually red, that's a problem.

The rationale for denying homosexuality, however, does not lie in any perceived operational difficulties, but rather in a piece of circular logic.

(I was in the Army during the startup of the "don't ask, don't tell" thing, so Stars and Stripes explained it in excruciating detail.)

The rationale: Allowing homosexuals is against regulations. Why? If they're in the Army then they might be subject to blackmail and might spill vital information. And what would they have over them that might be blackmail material? The fact that they're homosexuals and aren't allowed in the Army. James Heller would be proud.

After pointing out that - duh - removing the regulation that barred them from service would also remove any reason for blackmail, the unofficial argument became "I wouldn't want to be in a foxhole with one!"

Speaking as someone who's done more than his share of field time in the Infantry, this strikes me as being the argument of someone who, after weeks without ready access to a shower, just as much time's worth of camouflage paint caked onto his face, and laundry that may soon constitute an environmental hazard, gravely overestimates his attractiveness to any member of the human race, let alone the guy next to him.

[nationElectric]

Alison: The point here is that denying gays the right to marry according to their natural inclinations creates an atmosphere that breeds this kind of tragic situation.

Yeah, good point. My original post was poorly articulated. I've known gay people who've struggled in straight marriages, and the problem isn't a lack of love.

[nationElectric]

I don't know about the "public space" debate, but here's some photos of the Folsom Street Fair:

http://www.zombietime.com/folsom_sf_2007_part_1/

There's pretty unambiguously a whole lotta dicks out there.

NSFW. Just not, not SFW.

[Pseudowolf]

nationElectric
At its core, I think, a lot of these people are just unwilling to recognize that gays are just, well, gay. They insist on casting it as an affectation or a phase, because it's much easier to condemn someone for a voluntary act than for an innate quality.

Well, yeah. If it's a choice and voluntary, then you can denounce them for choosing to do it. If it's a psychological choice, then they can be "cured" with "therapy".

However, if it's *not* a choice, if they are, in fact, born "that way", then you can't condemn them for it. Also, and here's the sticking point, if they are born that way, then God must have a hand in it since there's a verse about Him knowing you when you were still in the womb. And if that's the case, God must have made them gay. And if He did that, then maybe it's not a sin to be gay. And then....well right about here I think most fundie's heads would explode, but you get the drift.

[Pseudowolf]

nationElectric
At its core, I think, a lot of these people are just unwilling to recognize that gays are just, well, gay. They insist on casting it as an affectation or a phase, because it's much easier to condemn someone for a voluntary act than for an innate quality.

Well, yeah. If it's a choice and voluntary, then you can denounce them for choosing to do it. If it's a psychological choice, then they can be "cured" with "therapy".

However, if it's *not* a choice, if they are, in fact, born "that way", then you can't condemn them for it. Also, and here's the sticking point, if they are born that way, then God must have a hand in it since there's a verse about Him knowing you when you were still in the womb. And if that's the case, God must have made them gay. And if He did that, then maybe it's not a sin to be gay. And then....well right about here I think most fundie's heads would explode, but you get the drift.

[Pseudowolf]

I don't know why my posts get posted twice. I swear I'm hitting the "Post" button only once.

[ako]

Well, yeah. If it's a choice and voluntary, then you can denounce them for choosing to do it. If it's a psychological choice, then they can be "cured" with "therapy".

However, if it's *not* a choice, if they are, in fact, born "that way", then you can't condemn them for it.

You can't condemn people for an inclination which is beyond control. But you can offer 'sympathy' for the desires, while demanding they not be acted on. If you insist the acts are wrongful, then you can demand people not engage in them, no matter how much they want to.

So, while I have definite opinions on the whole choice thing, I think it's ultimately a distraction. Choices aren't always good grounds for discrimination (take religion, for example), and inherent inclinations don't justify behavior.

So I don't think people realizing that sexual orientation isn't a choice is going to solve everything. The Catholic church concedes it isn't a choice, and their stance isn't one I'd want to have enforce on me. A better argument is that there's nothing wrong with being gay.

[Tonio]

"The Catholic church concedes it isn't a choice..."

Even with that concession, does the Church still teach that people are under orders from God not to have gay sex? If so, what is the justification for that teaching?

I'd also like to point out that Folsom is a BDSM event! As an active member of the BDSM community, I can attest that, while we're very accepting of homosexuality, it is not by nature a homosexual community-- it is a *pansexual* community.

[hapax]

It is considered to be on par with paedophilia, necrophilia, other "sexual deviancies." They aren't the person's "choice," but it is a sin to act on them, so the "afflicted" individual is required to refrain.

Nor is saying "they're born that way" considered the equivalent of saying "God meant them to be that way." After all, babies are born blind, handicapped, otherwise damaged everyday, and that's not God's intent, is it? It's considered to be a tragic consequence of living in a fallen world.

(Note: None of the above reflects my personal opinion. I am just reinforcing the argument that "Teaching people that homosexuality isn't a choice won't solve the problem."

I prefer to make the point that the Biblical passages in which God shows any interest in where we put our genitals, compared to God's quite detailed and emphatic demands about where we put our money, are so scarce as to be nonexistent. It doesn't make much headway with the determined a**hole, but it does give the less dogmatic something to think about.)

[LMM]

From my reading, the fundamentalist opponents to gay marriage really believe that individuals have a duty to society to procreate. Some of them say that a full-scale halt to procreation is not only possible but probable.

And this is a *bad* thing how?

Are they living on the same planet as I am?

Oh, that's right: we've got to outbreed the Islamo-fascists, or else they will take over our country.

[Retrogrouch]

Ako: inherent inclinations don't justify behavior
Tonio: what is the justification for that teaching

Clearly, the Church is trying to cheer everyone up by increasing the total level of laughter through increases in the total level of sex driven situational comedy. We all know there are extensive psychological and physical benefits to laughter. Simply put the more of it we have, the better off we are. The church recognizes this and is committed to increasing laughter as a form of mission.

The church also recognizes that everyone the sex-farce movie genre is particularly good at inducing laughter. Everyone loves classic sex-farce comedies from Wierd Science to American Pie to Superbad - or even the Wedding Banquet. Of course the main element required to bring about such a sex farce is convincing small subsets of the east african plains ape that it is wrong for them to engage in sex, but that their "normalcy" depends on having it. This contradiction invariably leads to comic hijinx.

The key incite of the church is that these comic situations need not be soleley displayed on celluloid. It works in writing - as demonstrated by authors dating back to Chaucer and long long before. It also works in drama and, as it turns out, in real life. Creating the same conditions in actual subsets of east african plains apes can result in just as much hilarity as the movies, literature, music and drama.

So please don't jump to conclusions about the church's motives. After all, everyone benfits when the total level of laughter is increased. And that Benedict is a funny guy (most Septugenarian germans are).

[MikeJ]

Front slash I, not backslash.

[Retrogrouch]

True, Mike, now can you tell me how to edit it?

[MikeJ]

As with many things, let its continued existence be a reminder to do the right thing the next time, but don't obsess over a stupid mistake everybody eventually makes.

[Ryan Ferneau]

Seriously, isn't there some way to equip blogs like this with defenses against things like double posts, anonymous posts, and open HTML tags?

[MikeJ]

Now for something completely off topic: I was reading Charles Funk's book on word origins Thereby Hangs a Tale, and came across the entry for Rapture:

In its earliest use, rapture meant "an abduction," especially the forceable kidnapping of a woman. It was formed, in analogy with "capture," from rapt, at a time when rapt meant "abducted." The Latin source was rapio, to snatch, seize, which became rape in English, and the Latin participle raptus, seized, was shortened to rapt. The latter word, however, acquired a theological usage; it was applied to such personages as Elijah, Elisha, Enoch, and others who were said to have been rapt — that is, snatched — into heaven. From this theological use it acquired further extension into the senses now current, "carried into the realms of emotion or deep thought." The course of rapture was similar, from "abduction" to "transportation into heaven," hence "mental or emotional transport."

So I was wondering: should we say that PMDs are waiting to be raped, from the Latin rapio?

[Jesurgislac]

Ryan: Seriously, isn't there some way to equip blogs like this with defenses against things like double posts, anonymous posts, and open HTML tags?

Yes, there is. You use Wordpress. Six Apart's Typepad is much inferior. (Sorry, Fred. Not your fault. It's a fallen world.)

Tonio: From my reading, the fundamentalist opponents to gay marriage really believe that individuals have a duty to society to procreate. Some of them say that a full-scale halt to procreation is not only possible but probable.

And when you point out that the main barrier to lesbians having babies if they wanted to used to be the legal discrimination against people who had been born outside wedlock, and given (a) the ability to form legal partnerships and (b) the removal of all legal discrimination from people whose parents weren't married to each other - why, then lesbians have babies. I won't say "as often as straight women", because obviously lesbians only procreate by choice, not circumstance. If every woman in the world became a lesbian, the main difference it would make would be that women would only have wanted babies.

At this point, the fundamentalist starts explaining angrily that when they said they wanted more babies they meant they only wanted proper babies, and babies born outside one-on-one mixed-sex marriage are not proper babies and don't count.

[hapax]

when they said they wanted more babies they meant they only wanted proper babies,

Nobody could say this who had ever seen a real baby. There is nothing less proper than a real baby. Real babies make bonobos (simultaneously masturbating, defecating, and picking off fleas and eating them) look like Emily Post in comparison.

Just sayin'.

[ako]

I won't say "as often as straight women", because obviously lesbians only procreate by choice, not circumstance. If every woman in the world became a lesbian, the main difference it would make would be that women would only have wanted babies.

I'm wondering if that doesn't make things worse in some people's eyes. There are people with intense objection to planned procreation, whose think women should be passively 'open' to reproduction, and any attempt she makes to decide either to get pregnant, or not to get pregnant will completely wreck family life (which sounds like an incredibly narrow and depressing definition of 'family life' to me). Women controlling their own involvement in reproduction freaks a lot of people out, and the same people tend to be anti-gay. I'm wondering if they've realized how homosexuality cuts down on pregnancy-as-a-consequence-of-sex.

[Jesurgislac]

Hapax: Nobody could say this who had ever seen a real baby.

They do not, in fact, say "proper babies". They are much more longwinded and tedious about explaining why the babies who are not born to mixed-sex couples are not the kind of babies they meant. But to avoid boring you all (and also because I cannot be bothered to go back and find an example and copy it here) I will summarise it as "proper babies".

Besides, Miss Manners considers most normal baby behavior to be proper behavior, and I'll go with her rather than Emily Post any day.

[hapax]

I'll go with her rather than Emily Post any day.

You're just saying that because Miss Manners doesn't make you eat your ice cream with a fork.

[Jesurgislac]

ako: I'm wondering if that doesn't make things worse in some people's eyes.

I think that any success at making procreation choice, not uncontrollable circumstance, makes things worse in some people's eyes. People who oppose same-sex marriage solidly overlap with people who oppose abortion on demand, free access to contraception, and informative and sensible sex education. (A gay man once noted that when he doesn't know if a politician will support gay marriage, he checks to find out if they're pro- or anti-choice, because a pro-choice politician will usually not be an active opponent of gay marriage, while an anti-choice politician often will be.) Misogyny and homophobia do tend to run together. (As does racism with both: the "we must procreate" people almost invariably mean that they want more white babies.)

[Jesurgislac]

Hapax: You're just saying that because Miss Manners doesn't make you eat your ice cream with a fork.

Actually, I'm just saying that because I've had a crush on her ever since she said, in response to a question about how a person should react on being introduced to "a homosexual couple" (and this was somewhere about 1985, I think...)

"How do you do?" - "How do you do?"

[Jesurgislac]

I don't mind eating ice cream with a fork so long as it's got nice thick tines... Besides, God must love sporks, he made so many of them.

[wintermute]

I cannot stand the word "spork". What's wrong with "runcible spoon"?

[Jesurgislac]

I'm neither an owl nor a pussycat.

[Michele]

Shouldn't it be a "foon" since the tines are first?

I got jumped on, which would ordinarily make my day but in a web forum it just means it's hopeless to continue, so I won't.

Don't worry, Harold. It's just that wacky Jesurgilac. She'll do it every time ;)

[hapax]

Shouldn't it be a "foon" since the tines are first?

Only if you're about to stick it into your eye.

I've seen sporks with a saw-toothed edge on one side, like a knife. What would call that? A knorkoon? Spifork?

[85% Duane]

Grapefruit spork.

[Michele]

Silly hapax! That would be the runcible spoon!

The Wikipedia article says:

modern dictionaries have generally defined a runcible spoon to be a fork with three prongs, such as a pickle fork, which is curved like a spoon, and also has a cutting edge

[Boze]

"How do you know this?" he cried. "Are you a devil?"
"No," said Father Brown gravely, "I am a man, and therefore have all devils in my heart."
- Chesterton, "The Hammer of God" (my favorite Father Brown story)

[Jeff]

Seriously, isn't there some way to equip blogs like this with defenses against things like ... anonymous posts, and open HTML tags?

PREVIEW. Use it, love it, have its children. (It will not prevent double posts, but as Mr Loaf said "Two out of three ain't bad."

As for marriage, they have the same rights to marry as anybody else: all they need to do is find someone of the [same color] who's free to marry (IOW, not already married) and not off-limits (too young or too closely related) and it's off to the Chapel of...well, can't call it love, now can I?

I believe Mrs Loving would disagree.

[Abelardus]

So I was wondering: should we say that PMDs are waiting to be raped, from the Latin rapio?

That makes sense in a perverted way; Fred has called the LB novels "Pre-Trib Porno". But that's only one example, so . . .

[Tehanu]

I, too, am an arachnophobe. I recognize that it's my problem -- the spiders aren't doing anything wrong. Sure, I try to keep them out of my house and off my person. But I don't think that part is really analogous -- I mean, what, Mr. Oppeen, are gay men scuttling under your door and building webs in the corner of your shower? You can't go down to the basement without taking a stick to knock down all the gay men clinging to the ceiling before you go in? When you're outdoors in the fall gay men drop from the trees and get caught in your hair? When you go out to the wood pile, gay men run out and scurry up your pants leg?
Posted by: McJulie

McJulie, as a fellow arachnophobe, I love you!

[L]

@nationElectric: "You can marry anyone you want, so long as you can't love them."

This is wrong, very wrong. I know what I'm talking about firsthand.

[Mad Latinist]

Honestly I don't know how anyone can have the audacity to use the "If everyone were gay, the human race would die!" argument. I mean, obviously everyone will not ever be gay, duh, but furthermore the human race is not exactly being threatened by underpopulation at the moment, now is it?

(On the other hand, fundies reproduce faster than non-fundies, so we could have a problem if we don't turn from our underpopulatin ways)

[L]

@wintermute: 'I cannot stand the word "spork". What's wrong with "runcible spoon"?'

A spork is made of plastic. A runcible spoon is made of silver.

Miss Manners avers that the runcible spoon was invented after it was used as a nonsense word in Edward Lear's poetry, as it was too good a name for a piece of silverware for it to not actually exist. And hey: if you're a wealthy British upper-class snob, you can never have too many obscure silver utensils.

[Dean Booth]

Nice observations, as usual, Fred.

Glenn Greenwald has some interesting things to say on this the political aspects of this issue (in particualr, the differing treatment of the Craig and Vitter scandals):
"The only kind of 'morality' that [the political Christian Right] knows or embraces is politically exploitative, cost-free morality. That is why the national Republican Party rails endlessly against homosexuality and is virtually mute about divorce and adultery: because anti-gay moralism costs virtually all of its supporters nothing (since that is a moral prohibition that does not constrain them), while heterosexual moral deviations -- from divorce to adultery to sex outside of marriage -- are rampant among the Values Voters faithful and thus removed from the realm of condemnation."

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2007/08/30/craig_vitter/