Culture Watch

by Stephen H. Miller Writing in the Washington Post, Michael Gerson observes: Just 20 years ago, opposition to abortion and opposition to homosexual rights seemed to overlap entirely. They appeared to be expressions of the same traditionalist moral framework, destined to succeed or fail together as twin pillars of the culture war. But in the years since, the fortunes of these two social stands have dramatically diverged. A May 2009 Gallup poll found that more Americans, for the first time, describe themselves as "pro-life" than "pro-choice." A February CNN-Time poll found that half of ...

by David Link Bill O’Reilly is quite right.  “Something doesn’t sit right here.”  There’s a big chasm between the reasons offered by Sacred Heart of Jesus School for expelling the children of lesbian parents and the consistent application of those reasons to anyone other than homosexuals. The Catholic school did not remove these children because they were homosexual, but because their parents were.  The eager but nonpersuasive priest O’Reilly interviewed gave this wooly but absolute reason for the decision: “a religious institution [must be] able to preserve its identity on fundamental ...

by David Link On Monday, March 1, John A. Perez was sworn in as California’s first openly gay Speaker of the Assembly.  Two days later, state Senator Roy Ashburn was arrested for driving drunk in Sacramento’s gay neighborhood, accompanied in the car by a young man. There you have the culture war over homosexuality in a nutshell, the two iconic ways of being gay: pride or shame. It might not be entirely fair to call Sen. Ashburn gay; he certainly doesn’t.  But he’s about the only one.  His sexual orientation is usually referred to as an “open secret” in Sacramento, where his appearance at ...

by Stephen H. Miller California Young Americans for Freedom (YAF) leader Ryan Sorba was booed at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) when he said CPAC shouldn't have allowed the gay group GOProud [a coalition of gay Republicans] to be there. Here's the YouTube: Alexander McCobin of Students for Liberty provoked Sorba's comments by saying in his own short speech: "In the name of freedom, I would like to thank the American Conservative Union for welcoming GOProud as a co-sponsor of this event, not for any political reason but for the message it sends….Students today recognize ...

by Stephen H. Miller The libertarian Cato Institute today hosted a forum on the topic "Is There a Place for Gay People in Conservatism and Conservative Politics?," featuring Nick Herbert, MP, the British Conservative Party's openly gay Shadow Secretary of State for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs. Responses to Herbert's remarks (an affirmative reply to the above question) were provided by Andrew Sullivan, a supporter of President Obama who detests the Republican party, and anti-gay activist Maggie Gallagher, who opposes any conservatism that might grant gay people the freedom to ...

by David Link If the goal of those opposing same-sex marriage is to keep us from getting married, or having our relationships legally recognized, or “destroying” marriage, you might think they’d be happy enough to see our relationships formally dissolved. But that’s clearly not the case.  The most recent example of an eager politician deploying gay equality as a strategy rather than an issue is Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott, who wants to prevent a lesbian couple legally married in Massachusetts from getting a divorce in his state. It’s easy to simply scoff at this story, but it’s ...

by Jonathan Rauch On CNN's "State of the Union," National Security Adviser (and retired four-star general) James L. Jones argues puts a powerful frame around repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell: I have served my country in uniform since 1967, and in that period, we covered racial questions, racial integration. We've covered the integration of women in the armed forces. People suggested that that would be a national security problem if we did both of those things. It turned out to be, as a matter of fact, a force multiplier by doing those things. People — and I grew up in a generation where ...

by David Link It’s easy to find fault with “The Homosexuals,” a 1967 documentary from CBS, the first ever aired on a major network about “the problem” of homosexuality.  Dave White at The Advocate, rediscovered the relic, and provides a litany of its sins.  For example, it focuses exclusively on gay men, and has not a word to say about how lesbians (who, one assumes, are also homosexual) might be different.  Amazing how that focus on gay men to the exclusion of lesbians plagues our discussion even now. That may be because lesbians don't fit so comforably into the stereotype of relentless, ...

by David Link Just a quick (and what I think is obvious) word on the fact that the judge presiding over the Prop. 8 trial is gay:  It was inevitable that he would have some sexual orientation, and there really aren't that many options. The fact that he has a sexual orientation -- a homosexual one, as it turns out -- doesn’t make Judge Vaughan Walker any more biased toward what some might view as his team’s side than an opposite sexual orientation would in favor of the majority.  Unless, of course, you go in for the notion that nobody is ever not biased by their sexual orientation -- which ...

by David Link I come not to praise the distinction between status and conduct, but to bury it. Differentiating between conduct – doing homosexual things – and status – being homosexual – has been with us for most of the modern gay rights debate.  That’s in part because of a fundamental tenet of the law that says you can’t convict someone of a crime based on their status, only their bad conduct.  The government can’t criminalize alcoholism, but it can convict an alcoholic of doing otherwise criminal things. Sodomy has historically been the bad thing that homosexuals did.  Theoretically, ...