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Dennis Prager

Why change your position on marriage just because someone you love is gay?

Progressives do not seem to recognize that in life there is always tension between standards and compassion. Standards, by definition, cannot allow for compassion for every individual. If society were to show compassion to every individual, it would have no standards. Speeding laws are not waived for the unfortunate soul who has to catch an important flight. Orchestral standards are not waived for the musician who has devoted his or her life to studying an instrument, is a wonderful person and needs the job to support a family.

It is either right to maintain the man-woman definition of our most important social institution, or is it not. We cannot base our decision on compassion for gays, whether the gay is our child, our sibling, our friend or anyone else.

Yes, societies have changed qualifications for marriage regarding age and number, but no society before the 21st century ever considered redefining the fundamental nature of marriage by changing the sexes. That is why it is not honest to argue that same-sex marriage is just another redefinition. It is the most radical change to the definition of marriage in the history of civilization.

How then should people of compassion deal with this, or any other, issue? By asking whether we maintain standards or whether we change them because of compassion. Do we change universities’ academic standards out of compassion for blacks and their history of persecution, or do we maintain college admission standards? Do we change military standards in order to enable women to enter fighting units or do we ask only what is the best policy to maintain military excellence?

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Forgot. One last link to an article published yesterday:

Same-Sex Marriage and the Abyss of Nihilism.

It’s worth reading.

Now, if normative principles and guiding purposes can be gleaned from our reflections on nature, there would seem to be no truth more obvious than that human sexuality is oriented by its nature toward uniting man and woman, with a view to procreation and family life. If nature cannot tell us that, then it cannot tell us anything. It is completely mute, and human beings are utterly left adrift to invent themselves according to whatever standards they like. This is nihilism, and this unfettered autonomy is in fact what the most consistent proponents of same-sex marriage admit they are after.

The rights doctrine of the Declaration—and the Lockean teaching from which it is derived—depend on reason’s ability to discern and draw valid conclusions from the data of nature. That all human beings have certain fundamental rights, says Locke, is evident from the fact that we are all the same kind of being, endowed with the same natural faculties. Among such beings, one cannot be made by nature to rule over another in the same way that we might rule a dog or a horse.

Yet it is surely no less evident that human beings are distinguished as male or female, that their sexual desires commonly lead these different kinds of human beings to unite, and that the common natural consequence of those unions is the procreation and nurturing of new human beings. It is incoherent to be guided by nature when it comes to individual rights but then to censor the data of nature when it comes to sexual ethics and the definition of marriage. To try it is to embrace a willfulness that is in principle indistinguishable from nihilism and that therefore cannot help but terminate in full-blown nihilism. There is, after all, no important difference between saying, “we only have to listen to nature when we want to” and saying, “we don’t have to listen to nature at all.”

INC on March 19, 2013 at 10:57 PM

I was explicit with my mother that it was duty as my mother to support me in every way as a gay man or else. She complied after a week. Just because there has been hateful bigotry against gay people doesn’t we, your gay children, have to accept it from you.

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 10:53 PM

You sir are a model of tolerance.

Greek Fire on March 19, 2013 at 10:57 PM

MikeA on March 19, 2013 at 10:33 PM

Sounds like a well thought-out position. I wish those who oppose you could disagree without calling you a homophobic bigot; tolerance for thee but not for me.

Jackalope on March 19, 2013 at 10:58 PM

Daniel,

His concluding statement is for those who think as you say you do:

I do not expect that these reflections will mean much to many contemporary liberals. They seem exhilarated at the prospect of total liberation from the past. They think such liberation is itself a form of progress, and they are not ready to consider that it might in fact be a form of decay. Perhaps these arguments will, however, prompt second thoughts in those conservatives who regard the fight over same-sex marriage as a pointless distraction, who think conservatism should drop its opposition to the redefinition of marriage and get about the important business of defending free-market capitalism. Such conservatives should understand that the kind of audacity that can insist on redefining marriage is not likely to bow down with reverence before such concepts as property, contracts, and economic liberty.

INC on March 19, 2013 at 10:59 PM

INC

Read the pamphlet. I’m not going to argue with it’s contents, it’s very well written. I’m in Los Angeles. I work in film. My girlfriend is an artist’s agent.

We used to own a home just outside of West Hollywood. I’ve met enough gay people throughout my life to know that they have made this issue their life mission.

They explain it as a fairness issue, but I don’t think that’s the truth. I believe they see it as an acceptance issue. They cannot be Americans without all of the rights, and marriage and family are included in the package.

danielreyes on March 19, 2013 at 11:00 PM

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 10:53 PM</blockquote

"Or else." "She complied."

Is she your mother or your slave?

Poor lady. To likely have sacrificed so much yet all the thanks she gets from disobedient, dysfunctional junior is an ultimatum!

viking01 on March 19, 2013 at 11:00 PM

Pedophilia will be mainstreamed. You will not even be shocked. In 20 years, after scientists have ‘proven’ that it’s a natural, normal sexual orientation.

Don’t worry. Hollywood will help it along.

Lanceman on March 19, 2013 at 11:04 PM

They explain it as a fairness issue, but I don’t think that’s the truth. I believe they see it as an acceptance issue

You do realize the absurdity and the failure of trying to legislate acceptance, correct?

They cannot be Americans without all of the rights, and marriage and family are included in the package.

danielreyes on March 19, 2013 at 11:00 PM

State licensed marriage is not a right. Licensing by its nature is exclusive or you wouldn’t need a license. And no one is keeping them from making a commitment in the church or committment ceremony their choice, making a contract at an attorney’s office and having a family(well excpet may biological reality).

melle1228 on March 19, 2013 at 11:06 PM

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 10:53 PM
“Or else.” “She complied.”

Is she your mother or your slave?

Poor lady. To likely have sacrificed so much yet all the thanks she gets from disobedient, dysfunctional junior is an ultimatum!

And today she is more fanatically pro-gay than I am. It’s just that she had to get her head cleared from the lies she heard as a child.

And really does a parent really love their child if they are willing to tolerate intellectually incoherent anti-gay bigotry of the sort Prager advocates?

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:08 PM

I was explicit with my mother that it was duty as my mother to support me in every way as a gay man or else. She complied after a week. Just because there has been hateful bigotry against gay people doesn’t we, your gay children, have to accept it from you.

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 10:53 PM

Wow her duty as your mother.. LOL Maybe it was your duty as her son to give her a little time to come to grips with the fact that her son would never have a family or a life like she envisioned. Maybe compassioned and understanding would be given if it is offered in return. I truly feel sorry for your mother.

melle1228 on March 19, 2013 at 11:09 PM

And really does a parent really love their child if they are willing to tolerate intellectually incoherent anti-gay bigotry of the sort Prager advocates?

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:08 PM

/rolling my eyes..

melle1228 on March 19, 2013 at 11:10 PM

The definition of marriage is a man and a woman.

The definition of lesbian is a woman and a woman.

The definition of gay is a man and a man.

If the latter two want to change the first definition, then I want to change the latter two definitions. I think that would be a fair trade. I’ve always wanted to be a male heterosexual lesbian.

The Rogue Tomato on March 19, 2013 at 11:11 PM

And today she is more fanatically pro-gay than I am. It’s just that she had to get her head cleared from the lies she heard as a child

Or maybe she just didn’t want to be browbeat with the bigot label and lose her son if she said the wrong thing. Did you ever stop to think about how you treated your mother. Or did you only think about YOU?

melle1228 on March 19, 2013 at 11:11 PM

Now, in the realm where we have been given dominion, we live in a Nation of laws. American laws. If you don’t like them, leave.

danielreyes on March 19, 2013 at 10:24 PM

Great. Thanks for the admission. Now what do you suppose Amendment I will say about Congress redefining an institution whose etymology is clearly religious?

anuts on March 19, 2013 at 11:12 PM

Perhaps these arguments will, however, prompt second thoughts in those conservatives who regard the fight over same-sex marriage as a pointless distraction, who think conservatism should drop its opposition to the redefinition of marriage and get about the important business of defending free-market capitalism. Such conservatives should understand that the kind of audacity that can insist on redefining marriage is not likely to bow down with reverence before such concepts as property, contracts, and economic liberty.

INC on March 19, 2013 at 10:59 PM

There is something to be said here, but I think it’s a choice to be made. Marriage rates are way down, and more children then ever are born out of wedlock. This speaks to an issue that younger voters are not finding important, and concepts of property and economics will not have any meaning to them until they can experience it. That day seems further away all of the time.

danielreyes on March 19, 2013 at 11:14 PM

Let’s take Reyes’ logic to it’s conclusion:

“The government is eventually gonna take your savings, portfolios, 401Ks, etc. Why fight against the inevitable. Because the parasites already outnumber us and they will remember who helped them.”

Lanceman on March 19, 2013 at 11:15 PM

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:08 PM

Fanatical indeed. Brainwashed more likely.

That and Ivory Tower Syndrome. Those intolerable intolerant must not be tolerated! the fanatic yelled tyranically….

viking01 on March 19, 2013 at 11:16 PM

Or maybe she just didn’t want to be browbeat with the bigot label and lose her son if she said the wrong thing. Did you ever stop to think about how you treated your mother. Or did you only think about YOU?

melle1228 on March 19, 2013 at 11:11 PM

But to what advantage is it to the mother of gay child to accept the barbaric hateful superstitions of old? Do you ever think about anything but your own hatreds? How exactly does your hatred of gays help you?

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:17 PM

melle1228

People want what they want. It doesn’t always make sense.

danielreyes on March 19, 2013 at 11:18 PM

I still don’t understand why a compromise can’t be had on civil unions. Which tells me all I need to know about the agenda of the activists.

John the Libertarian on March 19, 2013 at 11:19 PM

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:17 PM

Must you always reek of inflated self-importance?

viking01 on March 19, 2013 at 11:20 PM

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:17 PM

Must you always reek of inflated self-importance?

viking01 on March 19, 2013 at 11:20 PM

Are you suggesting that I am unique in Hotair commenters in that regard?

In honesty, I attempt to have a libertarian sense of equality in commenting. I may fail, but I hope I’m a open person.

I do wonder why you make character attacks rather than being substantive to the topic.

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:26 PM

Let’s take Reyes’ logic to it’s conclusion:

“The government is eventually gonna take your savings, portfolios, 401Ks, etc. Why fight against the inevitable. Because the parasites already outnumber us and they will remember who helped them.”

Lanceman on March 19, 2013 at 11:15 PM

I keep everything in corporate shells.

danielreyes on March 19, 2013 at 11:26 PM

But to what advantage is it to the mother of gay child to accept the barbaric hateful superstitions of old? Do you ever think about anything but your own hatreds? How exactly does your hatred of gays help you?

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:17 PM

I can’t explain it to you, because you assume that someone who has a political position of being against gay marriage is automatically a bigot and hates gay marriage therefore explaining it would be like talking to a wall, but I will try:

As a parent, we have a certain idea of what we want for our children- an ideal. Sooner or later that ideal dies. Whether it dies a big death or a little death depends on our children’s life choices. Most parents envision their children’s life similiar to theirs: spouse with children etc. For example, if my son decided to become a Catholic Priest I would be disappointed because he would not have the family he envisioned. I don’t expect you to understand as I doubt you are a parent.

Futhermore, I don’t have any hatred for gays and never have. My very wonderfully gay cousin would find it extremely funny to think that anyone thought that I hated gay people in general. Just because I difer in political positions from someone does not mean I hate them.. I even have a Democrat brother… gasp..

melle1228 on March 19, 2013 at 11:27 PM

I still don’t understand why a compromise can’t be had on civil unions. Which tells me all I need to know about the agenda of the activists.

John the Libertarian on March 19, 2013 at 11:19 PM

Yep, you are right. Gays don’t want to be second class citizens.

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:27 PM

I still don’t understand why a compromise can’t be had on civil unions. Which tells me all I need to know about the agenda of the activists.

John the Libertarian on March 19, 2013 at 11:19 PM

Yup. I used to be apathetic on this issue. Its not the end of the world if gay people want to get “married”. The problem is, they don’t want equality, they want special rights for being gay (or any minority). If its all about equality, why the constant push for hate crime laws and hate speech laws? If we’re all equal why does it matter than the reason for a beating was because the victim was gay?

oryguncon on March 19, 2013 at 11:30 PM

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:26 PM

Help,help… I’m being repressed. Get off it silly.

To quote:
“barbaric hateful superstitions of old?”

Substantive? You poor thing!

viking01 on March 19, 2013 at 11:30 PM

But to what advantage is it to the mother of gay child to accept the barbaric hateful superstitions of old? Do you ever think about anything but your own hatreds? How exactly does your hatred of gays help you?

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:17 PM

Do you think your hatred of religion came before or after your hatred for religious people?

anuts on March 19, 2013 at 11:31 PM

Yep, you are right. Gays don’t want to be second class citizens.

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:27 PM

You aren’t. We just don’t want a deviant sexuality shoved down our throats. I don’t care how many ‘scientists’ have ‘proven’ otherwise.

Logic dictates otherwise.

Lanceman on March 19, 2013 at 11:31 PM

Yup. I used to be apathetic on this issue. Its not the end of the world if gay people want to get “married”. The problem is, they don’t want equality, they want special rights for being gay (or any minority). If its all about equality, why the constant push for hate crime laws and hate speech laws? If we’re all equal why does it matter than the reason for a beating was because the victim was gay?

oryguncon on March 19, 2013 at 11:30 PM

Bing, Bing, Bing…

melle1228 on March 19, 2013 at 11:32 PM

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:17 PM

You think that everybody who disagrees with gay marriage is a bigot stuck in the hatreds of yesteryear. Gee, I would say that makes YOU intolerant.

Jackalope on March 19, 2013 at 11:33 PM

You think that everybody who disagrees with gay marriage is a bigot stuck in the hatreds of yesteryear. Gee, I would say that makes YOU intolerant.

Jackalope on March 19, 2013 at 11:33 PM

I was just listening to the Point Park University College Republicans

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wtlURxCw_Z8&feature=youtu.be

Oh well. I am sleepy. Good night.

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:51 PM

I was just listening to the Point Park University College Republicans

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wtlURxCw_Z8&feature=youtu.be

Oh well. I am sleepy. Good night.

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:51 PM

They anything like the establishment Republicans?

Lanceman on March 19, 2013 at 11:55 PM

Just keep tilting at that windmill, social cons.

The article leaves out the obvious: that finding he had a gay son made him realize his “standard” was arbitrary to begin with, and that what he thought he knew about The Gays(tm) simply wasn’t true.

Lehosh on March 20, 2013 at 12:17 AM

The article leaves out the obvious: that finding he had a gay son made him realize his “standard” was arbitrary to begin with, and that what he thought he knew about The Gays(tm) simply wasn’t true.

Lehosh on March 20, 2013 at 12:17 AM

The “standard” in question is about marriage. Not gay people.

anuts on March 20, 2013 at 12:32 AM

Why change your position on marriage just because someone you love is gay?

I have lots of gay friends. I know, I know, standard startup. I played college basketball and my coach was a lesbian and fully half or more of the team was. Pretty uncomfortable for a hick small town girl after away games in the lockerroom, I tell you that.

But, they are my friends. Still in contact with quite a few of them, 15 years later.

I still don’t believe they can be married, though. One of them is “engaged”. I didn’t de-friend her on Facebook, I didn’t stop talking to her, I encourage her work and her accomplishments. I don’t comment on her life choices and I won’t go to her “wedding”, as they live in D.C., and apparently it is legal there now.

My old coach and her partner have a daughter now, through IVF. I don’t comment on that either. I think IVF is wrong, let alone for a lesbian couple, so I just don’t comment.

But…they also don’t try to shame me. They don’t try to make me accept parts of their lives I don’t want to confront. They allow me to have my heartfelt beliefs as they have their own, and we are able to stay friends.

But those 15 year old friendships don’t change my core convictions. And if one of them required that I changed my core convictions to be friends with them, I just wouldn’t.

cptacek on March 20, 2013 at 12:52 AM

Prager is correct.

Of course parents of gay children want their children to be happy (in most cases, for sure). This doesn’t require them to suddenly do a 180 on the most basic element of the definition of marriage… that’s silly.

My parents surely don’t think gay marriage is right – they still love me just as much and want me to be happy, and they love my cousin who is married to her partner of many years… doesn’t mean they think marriage suddenly means something it never has.

dpduq on March 20, 2013 at 1:11 AM

wrong

lexhamfox on March 19, 2013 at 9:17 PM

Not really. There are a bunch of foxes here. Fortunately, your moniker, lexham, is easy to associate with Mass.

Lanceman on March 19, 2013 at 9:28 PM

wrong again. nothing whatsoever to do with Mass.

lexhamfox on March 20, 2013 at 1:30 AM

Maybe, without standards, we just make everyone who shacks up married? Oh, I see British Columbia just did that. Shacked up with someone for two years? Have a child with them? You’re married! Oh, and the state can split up your assets 50/50 like in a real divorce. I’m sure this will encourage long lasting marriages or serious relationships in the long run and promote good parenting. I’m sure any sane person would absoulutely shack up with a single mother/father now.

http://news.nationalpost.com/2013/03/17/at-midnight-on-sunday-b-c-s-common-law-couples-transform-into-married-couples/

oryguncon on March 20, 2013 at 2:29 AM

Looking at the new BC province law, they created the term “unmarried spouse”.

“Under the new FLA, spouses may share property and debts. A spouse is someone who is married to another person, or who has lived with another person in a marriage-like relationship for at least two years. A spouse also includes former spouses (married spouses who have divorced and unmarried spouses who have separated). Under the new act, unmarried spouses will have the same property rights as married spouses. Under the current Family Relations Act, unmarried spouses don’t have property rights.”

How can one be an unmarried spouse? What is a spouse then? What does marriage mean? NOTHING. Its just the state sticking its nose in your life. This will come to the USA, just watch.

oryguncon on March 20, 2013 at 2:45 AM

Yep, you are right. Gays don’t want to be second class citizens.

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:27 PM

No. They won’t settle for equal protection. They want to go after churches.

John the Libertarian on March 20, 2013 at 4:59 AM

Portman is a fool. He took an obviously unprincipled stance and did so in such an obvious way that he managed to offend even gay marriage supporters.

In the end, though, Christians need to focus on restoring the marriage culture. Gay marriage only “makes sense” because the left managed to secularize the institution in the 60s and created welfare programs to facilitate single parents. So now marriage is reduced to a declaration that two people reallly love each other (at least until they get divorced) and want to share a health insurance plan. Under that very empty definition, it’s hard to argue why gay marriage doesn’t make sense.

Restoring the marriage culture helps to cure many social ills, including generational government dependence and poverty (we know single parents are much more likely to experience both than married parents). It will also place the inherently self indulged, nihilistic truth about “gay marriage” into sharp relief, and maybe convince some homosexuals to rethink what they’re doing and strive for something better.

Outlander on March 20, 2013 at 7:46 AM

And really does a parent really love their child if they are willing to tolerate intellectually incoherent anti-gay bigotry of the sort Prager advocates don’t give them whatever they want whenever they ask?

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:08 PM

FIFY

But to what advantage is it to the mother of gay child to accept the barbaric hateful superstitions of old?

thuja on March 19, 2013 at 11:17 PM

So you don’t recognize that homosexual activity is abnormal even according to evolution? I think that makes Prager’s point.

GWB on March 20, 2013 at 9:23 AM

How can one be an unmarried spouse? What is a spouse then? What does marriage mean? NOTHING. Its just the state sticking its nose in your life. This will come to the USA, just watch.

oryguncon on March 20, 2013 at 2:45 AM

Reading that definition, they are using what used to be called “common law marriage” but using the ludicrous term “unmarried”. Better be careful with expanding that common law marriage definition, though. You could end up paying alimony to your college roommate.

GWB on March 20, 2013 at 9:26 AM

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