i) One way of responding to SSM proponents is to press them on where they draw the line. For instance, if they approve of SSM, do they approve of pederasty? What about child prostitution?
Typically, SSM proponents stipulate certain criteria which make SSM acceptable, but pederasty unacceptable. Criteria like "love" and consent.
So, in their moral opinion, the only sexual relationships which the gov't should sanction are "loving relationships" between consenting adults.
But what makes their moral opinion truer or superior to the moral opinion of those who differ? The belief that marriage should be based on love is pretty ethnocentric. In many cultures, marriage is an essentially socioeconomic arrangement. Love is optional.
Likewise, prostitution isn't based on love. Hook-ups aren't based on love.
By the same token, mutual consent is pretty ethnocentric. Clearly ancient Greeks who practiced pederasty didn't consider that to be a necessary precondition. And it's not just a thing of the past. Pederasty is common in some Muslims societies.
The same holds true for gang-rape. Historically, that's commonplace when armies invade and conquer another country. Likewise, child prostitution is common in some Third World countries.
So what makes the social conditioning of SSM proponents morally superior to the social conditioning of pederasts? For that matter, what makes the social conditioning of SSM proponents morally superior to the social conditioning of their grandparents, who opposed SSM?
Are SSM proponents appealing to timeless, transcendent moral values? Is so, how are those grounded?
ii) When pressed, they might bite the bullet. They might admit that there are no objective moral norms.
But if they retreat into moral relativism or cultural relativism, then they can't simultaneous claim that homosexuals have a moral right to marriage. They can't insist that the state has an ethical obligation to sanction homosexual marriages.
So that's their dilemma. If, on the one hand, they draw lines between acceptable and unacceptable sexual relationships, they must explain what makes their moral opinions better or truer than those who differ. What's the secular basis for that?
If, on the other hand, they admit that these are ultimately arbitrary taboos, then they can't claim that homosexuals are morally entitled to marry.
Good thoughts. The SSM advocates I've personally interacted with, which is admittedly a small and anecdotal sample, don't tend to move the discussion along lines of morality, probably because the folks I've talked with are thoroughly secular, but rather they tend towards "equal rights" under the law and argue the state is arbitrarily withholding governmental goods and benefits from homosexuals who desire to marry.
ReplyDeleteIt's difficult for me to envision a scenario where the SCOTUS doesn't sweep aside all prohibitions against SSM and make it the de facto law of the land.
But their support for "protected classes" and "hate crimes" violates equal protection under the law (14th Amendment).
DeleteThat simply impales them on the other horn of the dilemma. If they don't argue on ethical grounds, then where do they draw the line (if at all), and why?
DeleteOn ethics I think you're correct cultural or moral relativism must become the endgame given the repudiation of objective morality.
DeleteThinking a bit further about this, bringing up pederasty could backfire since the Bible doesn't doesn't really appear to teach against it, at least not in a way that you could sum up in neat little prooftexts. What do you think is the best way to show that the Bible condemns pederasty or pedophilia?
ReplyDeletePederasty is simply a more heinous variation of homosexuality AND pedophilia in that one of the males engaging in the homosexual act is a minor and the other is an adult. There's a double act of sin in that situation, and can be condemned purely from the homosexual element alone. That's easy to show how the Bible teaches against that- I'm assuming you agree.
DeleteMoving on to the issue of adults having sex with minors, whether it's pederasty or an adult having sex with a female child- obviously there's no particular verse that explicitly says a 30-year old man can't have sex with a 10-year old girl. I'm guessing that's what you mean when you talk about "neat little prooftexts". Thankfully, that's not necessary. Marriage is consistently defined as one man marrying one woman, not one man marrying a little girl. The definition is always a grown man marrying a grown woman, not simply a biological male marrying a biological female irrespective of their ages. Consider these texts,
Matthew 19:4-5 "He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’?"
I Corinthians 7:2 "But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband."
Marriage is always spoken of as a relationship between man and woman. That excludes boys and girls, boys with women, or men with girls. Jesus quoted from Genesis where the first marriage relationship occurs between a man (Adam) and a woman (Eve). He follows up by saying therefore a "MAN" shall leave his father and mother. The context is always adults marrying adults, never adults marrying children. You didn't ask about marriage per say, but the Bible is clear that sexual relationships are only to be engaged in in a marriage relationship, and anything other than that is declared sinful, explicitly or implicitly by the Bible.
I know you asked Steve Hays, but I was eager to offer my own answer as well. In all frankness, I wanted to feel like I was smart enough to give a thorough and accurate answer. lol I hope you don't mind, Steve.
Mathetes:
Delete"Thinking a bit further about this, bringing up pederasty could backfire since the Bible doesn't doesn't really appear to teach against it, at least not in a way that you could sum up in neat little prooftexts. What do you think is the best way to show that the Bible condemns pederasty or pedophilia?"
i) OT laws are not exhaustive. Rather, they sample typical sins. It's up to judges to extrapolate from case laws to analogous situations.
ii) Pederasty involves a grown man having sex, or a sexual relationship, with a boy. The boy is his sex slave.
a) That's homosexual activity, which the Bible sternly condemns.
b) That's rape, which the Bible condemns.
iii) With respect to pedophilia, certainly procreation is a primary purpose of marriage in the OT. That rules out prepubescent girls.
iv) From what I've read, a girl needs to be a few years beyond the onset of puberty to safely bear children. Otherwise, her body is too small.