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Secular Conservatism, Libertarians, Progressives, and Marriage
I take conservatism to be an appreciation and defense of what has been proven to work, and which benefits society and the individual in a balance.
If that seems overly-broad, let me provide an example. Morality is effective in curbing largely destructive impulses and reactions, therefore morality is worth defending in principle, with some room for debate on many fronts. Not all morality is the same, and it is not always helpful in the particulars. But to hold that morality is not a necessary part of society is anti-conservative in my view, as morality is the most tested method for a society to control its own behavior with respect for the society and the individual in balance.
Libertarianism is a radical extreme that places no value on society as a body, and progressivism is a radical extreme that places no value on the individual. Conservatism is the compromise position arrived at through experience, and stored in our cultural traditions as the wisdom of the ages. To a secular conservative, the Bible is one of many instruments to this end. Just because there is a religious proscription against adultery doesn’t mean that only religious people can defend a belief that adultery is harmful to individuals and society. Likewise with other religious proscriptions.
Religion is, of course, a large component of the conservative movement, but philosophically it is not a necessary component of a thoroughly conservative position. Not even for marriage. I view the partnership between religion and conservatism as a co-development from a common origin. Shared predicates yield shared conclusions, and therefore common interest. Where religion ascribes things to God, secular conservatism agrees to the extent that it is destructive of society and the individual for mankind to mess with certain things. Progressivism on the other hand is the confidence that a small group of people in the present know better than (on the one hand) everybody else across time, and better than (on the Other hand) God in His infinite wisdom. Secular conservatism and religion get along just fine as defenders of our culture.
I see value in describing much of libertarianism as allied with progressivism, because conservatism is where the middle is, and to pull us off that mark either this way or that is just as destructive. If a movement seeks to abolish our traditions as proven over time, it is not conservatism. Progressivism and libertarianism get along just fine as disruptors of our culture.
There is already a philosophical position consistent with conservatism which enshrines human rights and the liberty of the individual: it is called conservatism.
Now, not every tradition is valuable, and a slavish devotion to traditions which are not good is not conservatism; that’s mechanism, on the process level. Radical opposition to a flawed and failing government is not anti-conservative, but radical opposition to the institutions of our culture, most definitely is.
For example, you could argue that big spending by government is now a tradition and that it is therefore conservative to defend it and radical to oppose it, but this is wrong for a number of reasons. First, it may be a tradition, but empirically it has not been proven to be a useful one. Some spending is necessary, some spending is excessive — making judgements is important, and at any rate, even if all projects were equally worthy, the sheer sum of spending which displaces other worthy but non-government projects must be taken into account and weighed for relative merit. Big spending is anti-conservative because it is destructive.
Second, the dependencies come to play in that objects and policies are not the only subjects to be appreciated and defended. The decision to spend less is no less valuable than the process by which we arrive at that decision, and its implications. If we feel that the accumulated wisdom vouchsafed in our culture is probably more valuable as a guide for society (in the aggregate) than the intellect spawned in a few brilliant fellows, then a process which lends itself to operation gently over time by many rather than abruptly, once, by the few is an inherently conservative method of arriving at conclusions. Big spending is anti-conservative because it operates through an anti-conservative process.
As the free market is operated gently by many, and government spending is operated forcefully by few, any problem not specifically recommended for government remedy is probably better handled outside of government. So no matter how “traditional” big spending may have become, it is not conservative in itself, and it is not conservative to defend it merely because it is the status quo.
Marriage pre-dates any law. It simply is, and it is between one man and one woman. This may sound circular, or like a “no true Scot” defense, but I assert it as a foundational fact. Marriage is not produced by law any more than our rights are. Marriage is enshrined and defended by law in our culture, and if the law should fall, marriage would remain, just as our rights do. The law does not trump marriage.
This should not be too alarming; conservatism is a platform, a set of positions. Some planks rest upon others and not all must be as heavily pedigreed. I hold that marriage is a foundational plank in the conservative platform. I hold that marriage is an emergent cultural defense against various destructive impulses and reactions, including those of jealous males, engineering females, and hostile out-group sentiment. Good manners are a defense against some offenses which can become lethal, and marriage is a defense against outrage.
Humans are sexual beings (as our grade-schoolers are reminded every minute by government busybodies), and many of our impulses and reactions are not rational in the way we would like, no matter how logical they may be from a chromosome’s point of view. As manners are typically maintained by society itself, morality is often maintained by religion as a specific example of a philosophy operating in context.
As the male-female pairing is not up for debate in conservatism (I challenge you to convince me that it is not what has been proven to work), so the societal adaptation which defends it is a necessary component of conservatism. I realize that many “conservatives” disagree with this, but they are mistaken about either their conservatism or their conclusions.
Published in General
Wrong. Both the gay community and the traditional movement are both invested in the thing, not the name. “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet…” That doesn’t mean that all sweet things should be called roses.
Just for the sake of clarity. It is also my view.
I seem to recall Larry pulling out the homophobe card in this thread. I will go back and look.
A^2,
I don’t deny the possibility of negative consequences to SSM. I just don’t believe government should ban something based on the mere unproven possibility of harm to society. And I don’t believe that anyone has the faintest idea of what these negative consequences might be or how they compare to the positive. That is why we have states as the laboratory of democracy, and that is why I strongly, strongly, strongly favor leaving the decision to individual states. (So now you’ve seen it.)
But from a moral standpoint, the burden of demonstrating the harm is on those claiming the harm exists. The other side can’t prove the negative.
Look, it is a fundamental principle that government should treat like cases alike. So if you are going to ban SSM, you need to show why gay couples are not like straight couples. Don’t tell me it is because they can’t procreate – lots and lots of straight couples can’t procreate. If you cannot show me a meaningful and real difference between gay and straight couples, then you have no right to call upon the coercive power of the state to ban SSM.
So we both agree that SSM should be an issue for the states, though we differ in that I have extending marriage to include gays and you do not?
While there is undoubtedly some correlation between strong support for a thing and a willingness to call the opposition names, they’re hardly equivalent.
I’ve noticed that a willingness to call dissenters names can have more to do with an ungenerous spirit than it does with actual enthusiasm for a cause.
Sometimes I suspect that certain people call the dissenters names because otherwise they’d lose confidence in their cause.
Not if you called them “stench blossoms.”
I don’t care if someone wants to call their private relationship a marriage; I don’t care if they want to live that way. They can do so whether civil marriage is changed to accommodate them or not.
What I care about is changing civil marriage in a way that makes it meaningless in purpose or worse – progressive.
Here is Larry throwing the homophobe card. Post 296 fyi
Ed, you keep changing your argument. In any event, it is all about the name. There is no difference between civil marriage and civil union, except the name. Or do you oppose civil unions as well?
You deny that the human race has homophobia in its past? Wow, now there’s an argument I didn’t expect to see.
Well, we disagree. I believe the burden is on those proposing the change, particularly when we are talking about the most important social organization in all of human history.
A prudent society should not destroy things unless someone can prove destroying it would be harmful. A prudent society should not destroy things unless someone can prove destroying it would be salutary.
Since you keep coming back to the purpose of marriage, okay, I’ll bite. I say that the purpose of marriage is whatever purpose the partners have for getting married. I say that in most cases that purpose is to declare their commitment to each other. As in “to love and to cherish, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, ’til death do us part.” A declaration of commitment. No mention of children in those standard vows. No mention of bettering society. A declaration of love and commitment.
Now since you keep talking about the purpose of marriage, what do you say it is?
No, but I think the traditional definition of marriage has everything to do with ensuring paternal lineage of any children born of the wife and nothing to do with being intolerant of gays,which was the claim you made above.
I said it in my last post, the purpose of marriage has always and forever to ensure the paternal lineage of any child born by the wife. This is why Odysseus could tell his wife of his years long love-affair with Calypso while being outraged at the prospect of a man being in his bedroom.
Wow, that was sneaky, the way you slipped the word “destroy” in there (several times). Trust me when I tell you that my marriage is going to be just fine, with or without SSM. Everybody’s marriage is going to be just fine. And I’ll tell you, over and over and over again, my friend, I don’t believe we’re on the eve of destruction. (With apologies to Barry McGuire.)
OMG. So it’s about primogeniture or something? What the heck does “ensure” mean in that sentence?
two different things, but nice try.
I’m sorry, but I have to run. You will have to look up the definition of the word ensure on your own.
I know the definition of the word “ensure.” And if you think that being married “ensures” that your wife’s baby is also your baby, then you are either a bit naive or it is you who should look of the definition of “ensure.”
Of course that’s a meaningful difference between coupling types! Throughout history and across cultures that has been the difference that civil marriage is centered on. As I said in #479-480, just because the science of fertility is better understood now doesn’t mean that the public interest in fertility goes away, and there are only a few limited alternatives to what we do now. Since your preference for ditching civil marriage altogether is not really on the table we need to choose one of the other options. We can either get super specific in our regulation of fertility and its results or we can give civil marriage a lobotomy (or worse a frontal lobe transplant from some progressive cause).
No, I’ve been arguing consistently on this topic for some years.
Larry, that’s not what Asquared was arguing. Besides, you already stated that you don’t care about history. If you suddenly care now, though, I’d still appreciate your answer to the question about why you think that societies which were accepting of homosexuality still had a separate marriage institution that were exclusively heterosexual.
You misunderstand me. I’m not talking about why people would want to get married or how individuals might define marriage. I’m talking about civil marriage; the purpose and reason that society, through government and law, instituted the legal form; the assumptions guiding its form and function in the past and the assumptions that will guide the form and function in the future once we make the change that results in SSM.
Yes, I know: there shouldn’t be a legal form. But there is anyway. So what purpose should it serve as long as we are to have that legal form? What purpose to you think that your non-libertarian SSM allies have in mind?
That’s not quite the homophobe card and it’s certainly not directed at anyone in particular.
In context, he was suggesting that the major reason it never occurred to anyone in history that gays could be married was because of vilification, criminalization, and intolerance – that these marriages were banned rather than considered to be something other than marriage altogether. This despite at least one major counter factual of a society accepting homosexuality yet still instituting marriage as an exclusively heterosexual thing. While the charge isn’t directed at A2, it is still a charge of homophobia toward the traditionalist position generally.
Even then, Sal. Just as you’d still be a short douchey lawyer even if your name were Louis.
:P
(for people not familiar with the incident I’m referencing, that was a joke – Sal isn’t really short)
;D
Really, now, I have to move on to something productive. Farewell, everyone.
This thread is still going on?
Hey, thanks for the gross misrepresentation so you could praise the actual points I make but in other people’s mouths.
The large point I am making is that like it or not, there is a difference between conservatives and libertarians, it is irreconcilable, and I am having a lot of fun watching the libertarians here make my point for me.