The video below has been making the rounds on social media today, thanks largely to the good folks at Upworthy. It’s definitely worth checking out: author, professor, and activist John Corvino (left) — whom you may know as the guy who debates marriage equality with Maggie Gallagher – skillfully demolishes the usual anti-gay talking points that are most often used to justify marriage discrimination.
John Corvino Artfully Demolishes Anti-Gay Talking Points
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The arguments are fantastic – the delivery? Not so great.
Communication is more than just the WORDS spoken, it’s also HOW the words are spoken. The HOW creates the subtext.
For me, the subtext in this vid says: ‘If you use the argument homosexuality is unnatural, you’re a moron’. It has a holier-than-thou air, not dissimilar from conservative fundamentalists use when dehumanising LGBT people.
Those who agree with Corvino may have a laugh, feel more justified and feel superior to those who don’t. Others – like me – may feel a pain in their stomach as we experience flashbacks to being lectured by our smug pastors when our parents forced us to go to church twice on Sunday and once on Wednesday.
Those who disagree are likely to tune out this ‘arrogant hater-hater’ (note my brilliant multi-faceted irony) and not hear what Corvino has to say.
If the end-game is to change people’s minds and hearts about arguments used by people who work to dehumanise and condemn LGBT people, is this an effective approach?
The alternative? Take as much care in HOW you speak as you do in WHAT you speak. Respect your audience… especially if they disagree with you.
Quite frankly I found his tone to be entirely appropriate; personally, if it were **me** doing the talking, there would be a lot more shouting and obscenity. Corvino is saying EXACTLY WHAT NEEDS TO BE SAID.
Any argument can largely be driven into the ground by deconstructing the words being used until they are meaningless–in this case “unnatural.” We can deconstruct “goodness,” “knowledge,” and “apple pie.” But to do so does not establish evil, ignorance and ice cream as right.
The natural argument usually revolves around the presence of male and female–around the necessity of the two to make up a whole — to form a unity– out of which there is a fuller expression and sustenance of the species — and for some out of which there is an understanding of a Creator who formed the two as an expression of the Divine.
There are counter arguments–but the substance of the apologetic is not defeated by rendering “unnatural” to be meaningless.
It is defeated by proving that the “natural” argument is a damned lie.
Melinda: where do you get this nonsense:
“…to form a unity– out of which there is a fuller expression and sustenance of the species” ????? Evidence please!
Also, if you have evidence that there is some mysterious “Creator” who formed the two as an expression of “the Divine”, please reveal it to the rest of us. I mean evidence that is verifiably demonstrable, not just some anecdotal stories or theological sophistry palmed off by your religious mentors. You frequently make enormously ungrounded assumptions when you spout that batshit (and you seem to spout it on a fairly regular basis).
Paul–just take a drive out to the edge of this universe–look back–and peek 20 feet into the beyond.
Melinda, you forgot to throw the word “quantum” in there a couple of times. That would have really helped your nonsense talk sound serious and important.
And Melinda, we never “deconstructed natural until the word is meaningless”. We accept that natural means “what is found in nature” rather than some nonsense meaning as you’ve tried to apply to it. By the real definition of natural, gayness most certainly is.
Hi melinda, where exactly do I fit in to your definition of the word “natural”? The opposite that makes me whole is male. Does this make me “unnatural”? Because I am “unnatural”, am I not deserving of marriage rights… or voting rights or free speech or whatever else “natural” people get?
This is a serious question. What do we with “unnatural” people?
Melinda, you think by spouting woo woo, theometaphysical claptrap that you are impressing people. You are not. Why not stick to the planet earth and the 6 billion people who are living here, plus all of the other lifeforms as well. Evidence-based solutions to real problems, not fairy tale nonsense to make-believe issues.
Have you ever actually been out in the natural world Melinda? Or is your “knowledge” just what your priests and bishops tell you?
“Hi melinda, where exactly do I fit in to your definition of the word “natural”? The opposite that makes me whole is male. Does this make me “unnatural”? Because I am “unnatural”, am I not deserving of marriage rights… or voting rights or free speech or whatever else “natural” people get?
This is a serious question. What do we with “unnatural” people?” Michael C
My comment was in direct response to the videos treatment of the word “unnatural”–and not intended to lay out an argument around a natural order.
A few comments as a way to express my personal view on your most fair question:
I think “natural” is a problematic word to use clearly because it has very different usages. From a Christian stance it can reference a state of perfection as God created/intended; it can also reference essentially the opposite (e.g. all of the ‘natural’ world and humanity is depraved–corrupted by sin); it can also be used to simply express ‘what is’
My Christian perspective (not trying to speak for many who would disagree) is that there is a created order which we can see remnants of everywhere. Human dignity is rooted in this.
All persons are created and endowed with certain inalienable rights.
So “no” you are not unnatural. You are human. To deny your dignity would be an assault on the dignity of every other human and on God. There are not natural persons and unnatural persons.
And “no,” the rights of every human citizen in this nation flows to every human on the basis of their citizenship.
Is their a “created order” around marriage? Yes. Male-female.
The wholeness of male-female is not the wholeness or completion of the individual. Individuals are whole and complete in their personhood and relation to God–not in their union with a spouse.
If I understand the advocacy for marriage equality–it argues that a church might well continue to hold such a view as I express of Holy Matrimony–but that a civil ordinance around marital unions ought have no discriminatory boundaries as to which consenting adults may obtain a licensed marital status. A Catholic parish might refuse to marry a parishoner to a Jewish spouse. The State would never restrict such.
I do not think same-sex marriage is right. However, I am very much against the condemnation, hatred, violence, discrimination, barriers, suicide, depression, etc that has tarnished a society; that has corrupted a Christian faith; and that has destroyed individuals. If “civil marital equality” helps eradicate some of this plague I am supportive.
Arguing for male-female marriage as a created order (or natural) does not answer questions about what to do with persons who are not married. It doesn’t seek to “do anything” with my singleness. It doesn’t put me into a category of “the unnatural.”
@ Melinda: Clearly, you don’t know as much as you purport to. For a start, one’s rights are not based purely around their citizenship. One of the major arguments for marriage equality is so that same-sex couples are allowed the same legal rights as heterosexual married couples.
Secondly, you stated that you do not think that same sex marriage is ‘right’ . However, you have no problem with civil unions if it ‘helps eradicate some of the condemnation, violence, discrimination, hatred etc’ that exists within society(READ: DISCRIMINATION). Talk about contradicting yourself. You, like so many other religious bigots today, are merely hiding behind your religion in an attempt to justify your anachronistic views.
That’s it. I’m done.
@ Smack Down
“one’s rights are not based purely around their citizenship.” SD
Agree. But citizen rights (e.g. voting) do come from being a citizen–not from being a “natural” or “unnatural” person–such as suggested by Michael C.
“…you stated that you do not think that same sex marriage is ‘right’ . However, you have no problem with civil unions if it ‘helps eradicate some of the condemnation, violence, discrimination, hatred etc’ that exists within society(READ: DISCRIMINATION).” SD
Discriminatory action occurs on many fronts. Do you have issue with my desire to eliminate it even if I don’t consider “marriage law” to be discriminatory?
Do you believe “marriage” is anachronistic?
@ Melinda Nelson
Of course I do not take issue with your desire to eliminate discrimination. I take issue with the fact that you are discriminating against same-sex couples by proposing that they only be allowed “civil unions” rather than true marriage equality. I, for one, have no desire to ask my partner if they will ‘civil union me.’
I’m sure there were many people who didn’t think the laws preventing inter-racial marriage, prior to 1967, were discriminatory either. That did not make those people right. As I’m sure you already know, those laws were deemed unconstitutional and were overturned in 1967. But I digress.
To conclude, no marriage is not an anachronism. Rather, I believe that the religious arguments against same sex marriage are.
@smack down
when I referenced civil unions (I was not clear)–I was distinguishing between rituals of holy matrimony conducted in religious setting and marriages performed/licensed by secular governmental authorities.
Churches I have worked for often refuse to marry couples for any number of reasons: Partners want a church wedding but no part of the faith; want to marry but don’t want premarital counsel; want to marry for all the wrong reasons; want to unite when religious commitments are conflicted; etc. etc. They are ritualizing (giving meaning to) an event in ways the secular authorities are not.
When we get in these debates persons like myself often fail to say: “This is what I think is right. This is what I think the church should practice. This is what I think the society ought legislate. This is what I am willing to agree to and uphold in the secular arena even though I might have competing personal views.”
If marriage is not an anachronism–but religious arguments against same-sex marriage are–then what makes the pro-marriage arguments to not be an anachronism?
The law doesn’t make the distinction you do Melinda. Marriage is a legal contract. The church only has as much involvement as the couple wants it to.
Melinda, you seem to forget one thing…other Christians (better ones, to be blunt) such as the United Church of Christ, which has been fighting for equaltiy for decades, DO want to be able to preform weddings, not civil unions, in their churches.
Why do you think you should be able to infringe upon their religious freedom, their freedom to join two persons who love each other to make a loving union (which is utterly complientary, regardless of the gender of the persons getting married), and their freedom to do what their theology rightly points out is the just and loving thing to do for the persons requesting marriage in their Church home?
Melinda, as I have said to you before, your understanding of and opposition to what is done to gay people, world wide, on daily basis and for centuries, is admirable. Thank you.
but then you wrote this: “I do not think same-sex marriage is right. However, I am very much against the condemnation, hatred, violence, discrimination, barriers, suicide, depression, etc that has tarnished a society; that has corrupted a Christian faith; and that has destroyed individuals. If “civil marital equality” helps eradicate some of this plague I am supportive.”
do you understand how very, very close you are to actually understanding the problem? homohatred has tarnished society literally for centuries. you clearly understand this. But most important of all, it has not corrupted “A” Christian faith, it has corrupted THE Christian faith, literally for centuries, for millennia.
and the Muslim faith, and the Jewish faith, and every single culture and faith that Christianity has tarred with its homohating brush. e already know that many cultures had no problem with homosexuality until Christianity came around with with this splash of ham gravy on its god-loves-everyone necktie.
It’s clear in Corinthians. It’s clear in Romans. It is startlingly clear in the sodom story, well beyond all ofthe others. BY no stretch of the imagination is Sodom about homosexuality, as it might have been understood in 600 BC, and with 100% certainty, as it is understood now. the angels were threatened with rape, not actually raped. They certainly were not invited out for a dinner and a drink prior to a romantic evening in the sack, not by “All the people in the town.” For years, Sodomy was “the crime against nature, not to be named among Christian men.” funny, you can talk aboutthe wholesale slaughter of thousands. You can talk about incest, andthere was plenty of it. You can even talk at length aboutthe gruesome torture and murder of your man god, and picture it in loving detail in paintings, sculpture, and the Sado-porn of Mel Gibson.
Deicide you can reference easily. but sexual relations between two people of the same sex, actual love between two people of the same sex, is completely off limits?
Honey, this is the very essence of corruption. even more so if you define corruption as I do: becoming that which you hate. And that is exactly what has been done here. the forces of morality are lying through their teeth, lying about god, lying about faith, and lying about gay people.
Given that this corruption is as obvious and long lived as it is, and has pervaded every single aspect of the church, and through the church’s corruption, every aspect of society, exactly how can you say that homosexuality is in any sense that we as fallible humans can understand not natural and not whatgod intended for a certain portion of mankind, that gay marriage is not in fact a fulfillment of god’s plan for gay people in particular and marriage in general?
because if you can make that claim with a straight face, you are simply saying that that obvious corruption simply doesn’t matter in the face ofthe bias that you have already decried.
I am “straight” evangelical pastor currently working with three guys who love the Lord and consider themselves gay. The video was funny and informative. But just an observation that seems very consistent on the “Gay Christian” argument pages – when pointing the finger at “haters”, there are HUGE undertones of hate emanating from people who are appealing for acceptance. I know there are centuries of frustration, but the same tactics offend both sides – being talked down to, being labeled with “everyone else”, stereotyped, being made to feel like you are the ignorant one, being made to feel like a “hater” – all the tactics promoted by both sides trigger behaviors that perpetuate the problem and cause people to give up and turn away. It doesn’t make me want to “understand” you when I feel like you hate me, label me, hate my religious beliefs and belittle me. I’d rather walk away and leave things as they are.
@ Melinda nelson
I did not say that “marriage” itself was an anachronism. I said that the religious arguments against same-sex marriage were. These ‘pro-marriage’ arguments you are referring to, I’m assuming are those governed by non/semi? progressive Christians, such as yourself. The ones that say “No, you can not change the definition of marriage” and “No, you can not get married in a Church” but (in your case) “You can engage in a secular, contractual, civil marital union.”
If that is the case, then those “pro” arguments are in fact anachronistic, in the sense that, as Gene has so rightly pointed out, there are churches who are willing to fight for and who are willing to perform same sex marriages. And that there ARE same sex couples who actually want their marriage ceremony to “have meaning” MN and who do not, in fact, want to merely sign a piece of paper throwing half of their possessions away. What right does anyone else have to infringe upon the religious freedom of the Uniting Church?
Like you, persons like myself also fail to say, “This is what I believe; This is what I think is right; This is what I believe needs to be reconciled in order to adapt to modern society”
People like you and I, with opposing views, are always going to butt heads. However, I must say I have enjoyed our little debate, and I apologise for calling you a religious bigot. Your views may be conflicting with mine, but at least you display a level of understanding and compassion that many other religious followers these days do not.
Regards,
- E.H.B
Hi melinda, Thank you for responding to my comment.
You said “Arguing for male-female marriage as a created order (or natural) does not answer questions about what to do with persons who are not married. It doesn’t seek to “do anything” with my singleness. It doesn’t put me into a category of “the unnatural.”
I’ll start here. I totally understand that we all have the same rights as individuals. Just as you have the right to marry a man (I’m assuming you’re a woman, forgive me if I’m incorrect), I have the right to marry a woman. I am not barred from marriage. Here’s the problem, the Law is based on me being heterosexual. Marriage laws are not based on “God’s design for mankind” or “nature’s design for reproduction” or even what is arbitrarily deemed “optimal for child-rearing.” Marriage laws are in place to encourage stability for families thus lessening the burden on the State. The definition of “family” is currently limited to a heterosexual construct. Because I am not heterosexual, I am on the outside of the law. I am an alien with no hope of naturalization. Because of this, the law IS “doing something” with my individual rights. The law is excluding homosexuals from their individual rights by not recognizing their existence.
You said “The wholeness of male-female is not the wholeness or completion of the individual.”
I’m guessing that this statement is a response to my comment “The opposite that makes me whole is male.” Your version of wholeness (male-female) is spiritually different than mine. That is all. For me, the definition of physical, emotional and spiritual
relational wholeness is male-male.
Now the nice stuff :)
I have respect for the reasons why you choose to live your life the way that you do. Even more, I have respect for anyone that follows a statement of their own beliefs with the word “however”. I don’t expect you to champion law changes that eliminate discrimination, but I would love it if you were to (even casually) support the distinction between secular laws and your personal morals.
When you write “This is what I am willing to agree to and uphold in the secular arena even though I might have competing personal views.” I read that as your secular support for my potential marriage to a super hot dude. If that is what you meant, I will not ask for more.
[...] the best possible environment for children.” Leaving aside the fact that homosexuality is every bit as natural as heterosexuality, I’d like to know what “statistics” NOM is referring to here. [...]
Mike said “But just an observation that seems very consistent on the “Gay Christian” argument pages – when pointing the finger at “haters”, there are HUGE undertones of hate emanating from people who are appealing for acceptance. I know there are centuries of frustration, but the same tactics offend both sides – being talked down to, being labeled with “everyone else”, stereotyped, being made to feel like you are the ignorant one, being made to feel like a “hater” – all the tactics promoted by both sides trigger behaviors that perpetuate the problem and cause people to give up and turn away. It doesn’t make me want to “understand” you when I feel like you hate me, label me, hate my religious beliefs and belittle me. I’d rather walk away and leave things as they are.”.
Mike you create a false equivalence between the hatred of the two sides. One side hates people for innocent and harmless characteristics, the other hates people who seek to harm innocent people. One side’s hatred is justified, one side’s is not. Its not surprising anti-gay people want to walk away from this issue, they rightfully sense they are in the wrong and they don’t want to face the fact that they are bad people. There are not two equally valid viewpoints on this Mike, one side is 100% right and the other is 100% wrong. If you don’t want to feel bad about yourself then its time you changed. You can’t ask me to pretend you’re not a bad person when that is the reality.
Same sex relationship, “natural”?. The big question should be why these so many words to justify it if it was same are man woman relationship. Did it take the the same amout of words, articulations, speeches, conferences to justify hetrosexual relationships as it is the case with homosexsual relationships?. The understanding of hetrosexual relationship being natural is in the context of its evolement naturally coming into exsistance. It did not have to go through the so many publicity campaigns to justify it like the case of homosexuality.
hetrosexuality unlike homosexuality is purposeful unlike homosexuality.
As a result, the homosexual apologists, to justify it have tagged the practice to be a human right matter, they claim it is ‘innocent and harmless’.
The fact is no amount of talking can make this practice acceptable.
Explain how something that appears in nature is unnatural Eresu.