Author: Pete Vere

Writing in the Weekly Standard, Stanley Kurtz has an excellent piece entitled “Beyond Gay Marriage – The Road to Polygamy“. Definitely a good read, as Stanley does not so much prophecy the future as present evidence of what is currently being done by polygamists and polyamorists to mainstream their movement on the backs of the gay marriage movement. I particularly enjoyed the following response to Andrew Sullivan, who has more or less insinuated that social-conservatives are playing Chicken Little with the slippery slope argument between gay marriage and polygamous/polyamorous marriage:

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DURING THE 1996 congressional debate on the Defense of Marriage Act, which affirmed the ability of the states and the federal government to withhold recognition from same-sex marriages, gay marriage advocates were put on the defensive by the polygamy question. If gays had a right to marry, why not polygamists? Andrew Sullivan, one of gay marriage’s most intelligent defenders, labeled the question fear-mongering–akin to the discredited belief that interracial marriage would lead to birth defects. “To the best of my knowledge,” said Sullivan, “there is no polygamists’ rights organization poised to exploit same-sex marriage and return the republic to polygamous abandon.” Actually, there are now many such organizations. And their strategy–even their existence–owes much to the movement for gay marriage.

Scoffing at the polygamy prospect as ludicrous has been the strategy of choice for gay marriage advocates. In 2000, following Vermont’s enactment of civil unions, Matt Coles, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s Lesbian and Gay Rights Project, said, “I think the idea that there is some kind of slippery slope [to polygamy or group marriage] is silly.” As proof, Coles said that America had legalized interracial marriage, while also forcing Utah to ban polygamy before admission to the union. That dichotomy, said Coles, shows that Americans are capable of distinguishing between better and worse proposals for reforming marriage.

Are we? When Tom Green was put on trial in Utah for polygamy in 2001, it played like a dress rehearsal for the coming movement to legalize polygamy. True, Green was convicted for violating what he called Utah’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy on polygamy. Pointedly refusing to “hide in the closet,” he touted polygamy on the Sally Jessy Raphael, Queen Latifah, Geraldo Rivera, and Jerry Springer shows, and on “Dateline NBC” and “48 Hours.” But the Green trial was not just a cable spectacle. It brought out a surprising number of mainstream defenses of polygamy. And most of the defenders went to bat for polygamy by drawing direct comparisons to gay marriage.

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On another note, my prediction is that the next attack against marriage and the family in the culture wars will likely come from the legalization of prostitution. Especially in light of the growing pornography industry, and the striking down of anti-sodomy laws, how can the government now hope to regulate a business transaction between two consenting adults? Sooner or later someone is going to point out the discrepancy between legality of pornography and the illegality of prostitution, which are essentially the same thing except that the former is somehow made available for public viewing.

The only president to have joined the Ku Klux Klan was a Democrat, Harry Truman.

A lot of St. Blog parishoners — not just my blogmates on Catholic Light — have asked me to comment on the document Careful Selection And Training Of Candidates For The States Of Perfection And Sacred Orders. This is the 1961 document that prohibits homosexuals from being admitted to religious orders and ordination.

Okay, I will be upfront; I’ve deliberately avoided commenting on this on-going controversy up until now. Basically, in reading it over, there are a number of variables I am uncertain about — variables that would admittedly affect the proper interpretation of this document, how much weight it should be given, etc… Without being able to clarify these issues, as a canonist the best answer I can give fellow St. Blog parishoners is that I cannot give a good answer.

Anyway, allow me to share some of these questions: 1) What is a homosexual in the context of this instruction? Is it someone who has same-sex attraction or someone who has same-sex attraction and acts upon it? The context for this instruction would seem the latter, or someone in great danger of the latter. However, the chaste individual who occasionally finds himself tempted toward same-sex attraction, but who has never acted upon it because he recognizes that such acts are sinful, does not appear to be the target of this instruction. Yet this is where a canonist who is also a psychologist would come in handy — I’m not one of these. 2) What type of approval did the Holy Father give this instruction. If it was general, then the instruction would clearly be an act of executive power and not law in the sense of legislation. In short, there are two Latin words for law — one lex and the other ius. While this was definitely ius to some degree, I’m not certain to what degree, nor am I certain that it was ever lex — meaning that it would have legislative force. Of course, if it was approved in forma specifica, it would likely have legislative force. Does anyone have access to the Latin original?

That being said, I really cannot give a good answer.

Now that I’m back and rested, I had the opportunity to pick up and read the July 28th issue of The American Conservative. This is a great paleo-conservative magazine edited by Pat Buchanan. In this particular issue, there’s a wonderful article written by Peter Wood under the heading “Sex & Consequences — An anthropologist vindicates the traditional family.” In it, Professor Wood discusses various societies that are built around either polygamy or male homosexuality. Ultimately, according to Professor Wood, they end up male dominant societies.

Here’s an interesting observation on homosexual societies: “When such relations are subject to cultural elaboration they almost always fit into a pattern of initiation into secrets, male exclusivity, and a low status for women. Why this should be so is a complex question, involving both biology and the underlying nature of human society. A short answer is that heterosexual marriage is shaped by the complicated interplay of marital sex, pregnancy, childcare, and the sustained dependence and interdependence of husband, wife, and children. Male homosexual relations, because they are sterile and because they channel relations of male dominance, are built on a narrower base of sex, subordination, and control.”

Another interesting observation: “The link between homosexual desire and erotic interest in children is especially contentious. Gay activists and their supporters frequently point out that most child molestation is perpetrated by heterosexual males. And they emphasize that homosexuality had no necessary link to pedophilia: a great many gay men are primarily interested in other adult gay men. I grant both points, but we are also left with the stubborn empirical fact that societies that have indeed institutionalized something akin to ‘gay marriage’ have done so in the form of older men taking adolescent boys as their partners. To imagine that we could have gay marriage in the united States without also giving strong encouragement to this form of eroticism is, in light of the ethnographic evidence, wishful thinking.”

Well I’m finally back from the Order of Alhambra convention in Las Vegas, where I was elected Supreme Vizier to our international executive. Besides a whole lot of extra work, I now get to wear a gold tassle on my new gold trimmed fez. This is indeed an honour, as I’m the youngest member to hold the title of Supreme Vizier in recent years. I also got to meet and hang around with Cardinal Maida and Msgr. Bob McClory from the Archdiocese of Detroit, as well as William Cubbage, our new Grand Commander for Fatima College Caravan #265 at the Catholic University of America.

While I was in Vegas, the whole media scandal about Bambi hunting in Las Vegas was just breaking. Although it now appears to be somewhat of a hoax, bambi hunting is when a prostitute or so-called adult entertainer is paid to run around the Nevada desert in the buff while rich men shoot at her with paint ball markers. I will be honest. I find this so-called sport extremely distasteful.

What I cannot understand, however, is the relief many of socially liberal elite now feel in discovering that this whole sport was just a hoax to sell a line of pornographic videos in which men dressed as hunters shoot naked women prancing about the Nevada desert in the buff. So let me get this strait, if rich businessmen pay to shoot naked prostitutes or adult entertainers with paint guns, this is morally reprehensible and a social outrage. On the other hand, if the average Joe buys a video of men carrying out the same action, this is a First Ammendment issue and social conservatives like myself have no right to try and censor it.