Advancing the Gay Rights Debate

Singer Juan Cruz, a 17-year-old New Jersey youth, was savagely beaten by two older men on Aug. 5. Juan was found shortly after the attack and was taken to a nearby hospital. He died four days later. Sadly, there are many stories just like Juan's; but very few of these tragedies are told as loudly or purposefully as Matthew Shepard's was. National and local media have not amplified Shepard's death because it was exceptionally grisly, but because it offered the opportunity to proclaim him a casualty of America's moral backwardness and intolerance.

Publications from The Crimson--"We have reason to fear, growing homophobia from coast to coast"--to The New York Times, which wrote of the "menace and hatred that homosexuals still face in being honest in the United State," have followed this tack. While it is certainly just to condemn Shepard's attackers, along with any other brutes who would so grossly violate the basic respect due all people (whatever their sexual orientation), it is disingenuous to decry Americans in general as "bigots" or "homophobes," suggesting a senseless hatred of homosexuals. To do so is to assert that there are no reasonable grounds for opposing homosexuality worthy of discussion.

The widespread willingness to frame the debate in this manner belies a dangerous trend in America's deliberation regarding the moral status of homosexuality. This fissure, if allowed to widen, will make it utterly impossible for each side of the debate to reach common ground. There are several arguments against the moral acceptability of homosexuality which, whether convincing or not, deserve attention.

The most common condemnation of homosexuality stems from religious faith. This argument holds that the Bible is the sole moral authority; the Bible says that homosexuality is a sin, so homosexuality is immoral--to posit anything to the contrary would smack of blasphemy.

A prominent rejoinder to this stance is that religious beliefs have no place in public life--or, at least, they ought not to be imposed on others through legislation. It is difficult to disregard, however, the fact that many Americans consider the Bible an infallible moral guide. For these people, religion informs all decisions--even those relating to politics. To require a public life devoid of religious belief, then, is to effect a dangerously bifurcated citizenry, wanting but unable to communicate what is most dear and fundamental to them in their deliberations regarding the public good.

The most prudent opposition to religious condemnation of homosexuality, then, is not to impugn religion's place in public discourse, but to debate the legitimacy of interpreting the Bible to this end. Religious reasoning against homosexuality should not be cast aside as easily as has become common practice--rather, it must be examined and energetically engaged. Homosexuality might also be opposed cogently by traditionalists. To the suggestion that homosexuality ought to be approved and embraced, the starchy traditionalist might reasonably reply: "Thanks, but heterosexuality as the sole acceptable form of sexual expression has been working out tolerably well over the past couple of millennia--I think that we ought to stick with what we know." The best way to address this argument is to prove beyond a doubt that homosexual union is a viable, albeit heretofore unexplored, version of virtuous living. Even the crustiest nostalgist will be forced to relent in the face of a thoroughly convincing argument.

The most overlooked argument against homosexuality considers its social utility. One might focus on the corrosive effects on the institution of marriage. Or one might conclude that unions which do not produce virtuous citizens should not be accepted.

Much has been made of poll results indicating that 60 percent of Americans find homosexuality morally unacceptable. In response, the media and intellectual elite stake out the supposed moral high ground, proclaiming the other side unworthy of attention. The effect is not unlike a version of King-of-the-Mountain, only instead of conquering challengers, those at the peak shame competitors with ugly epithets. Thus, the intelligentsia use words such as "bigot" and "homosexuality morally repugnant. It is not surprising, then, that so few opponents of homosexuality are eager to step into public debate.

A better response abandons name-calling in favor of reasoned discussion. This is the best way to reach some sort of consensus, and it is the only way that we will be able to determine collectively whether homosexuality deserves moral approbation. A shift toward a form of argument cleansed of hate language would make for a more civil and, ultimately more fruitful discourse.

Hugh P. Liebert '01 is a social studies concentrator in Eliot House.