It's amusing that people who harbor contempt for conservative ideas are often quick to lecture right-minded individuals on what is and isn't legitimate conservatism. Hardball reporter David Schuster is the latest liberal instructing conservatives to be faithful to conservative principles by acting like liberals. He tells conservatives that gay marriage's overwhelming defeats at the polls one week ago represent "A loss for true conservatism."

Usually when liberals say something is a loss for "true" conservatism, they really mean it's a loss for liberalism.

Schuster laments "an endless supply of hatred and fear" and confesses that he is "baffled as to why we would keep such an institution [marriage] away from anybody." Anybody? Really? How about a brother and a sister, or marriages with time limits, or group marriages? A 29-year-old woman in Connecticut, readers of the Drudge Report learned today, claims she wants to marry an eight-year-old boy.

Perhaps proponents of gay marriage would say that it's a no-brainer that the aforementioned people--bigamists, pedophiles, incestuous couples, and other assorted pervs--should be excluded from the marital rite. In doing this, one admits that there should be some discriminatory standard. If one agrees on this, the question becomes what should the standard be?

Mired in relativism, liberals don't have an answer. Conservatives do. Marriage is a union between one man and one woman till death do they part. What's the conservative rationale for retaining the standard definition of marriage?

First, so-called gay marriage exalts theory over experience. It discards thousands of years of tradition in favor of the present-day whims of a small number of people. Second, it flaunts the moral teachings of Christianity, Judaism, Islam, and all of the world's great faiths. Third, its imposition, by way of judicial dictates in Vermont and Massachusetts, violates the will of the people of those states. It literally transforms Vermont and Massachusetts from democracies into oligarchies. Finally, it undermines the cornerstone of our civilization, the family, by devaluing the institution, its alreadly slipping permanence, and its role in raising children.

Consider Schuster's self-righteous lament about last week's ballot initiatives that rejected gay marriage in eleven of eleven states where the issue appeared before voters. He writes: "Maybe some Americans want to return to the days of slavery, devout observance to the Sabbath, long hair, all cotton clothes, and stoning people... I would prefer that our society move forward."

Me too, but believing that the destruction of traditional marriage is progress requires an incredible amount of hubris. Everyone that came before me, the homosexual marriage proponents argue, was wrong.

"We all want progress," C.S. Lewis argued more than a half-century ago. "If you're on the wrong road, progress means doing an about-turn and walking back to the right road; and in that case the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive man." Amen.

There is a great scene from "Life of Brian" in which the Judean People's Front led by Reg (John Cleese) discusses which rights they will fight for:

REG: Furthermore, it is the birthright of every man -
STAN (Eric Idle): Or woman.
REG: Why don't you shut up about women, Stan. You're putting us off.
STAN: Women have a perfect right to play a part in our movement, Reg.
FRANCIS: Why are you always on about women, Stan?
STAN: I want to be one.
REG: What?
STAN: I want to be a woman. From now on, I want you all to call me 'Loretta'.
REG: What?!
'LORETTA': It's my right as a man.
JUDITH: Well, why do you want to be Loretta, Stan?
'LORETTA': I want to have babies.
REG: You want to have babies?!
'LORETTA': It's every man's right to have babies if he wants them.
REG: But... you can't have babies.
'LORETTA': Don't you oppress me.
REG: I'm not oppressing you, Stan. You haven't got a womb! Where's the foetus going to gestate?! You going to keep it in a box?!

To me, this illustrates perfectly the kind of confusion associated with "gay marriage." Marriage IS the joining in matrimony between a man and a women. Two men can no more get married, than Reg can have a baby.

Actually, Brad, I would go even further. The impossibility of two men getting married is more strict than the mere biological impossibility of a man having a baby. Marriage, as a matter of essence, is between people of the opposite sex; men not having babies is a mere empirical law of our species.

(Note: Even in traditional polygamous unions, the married is between a man and a woman: the several wives are not married to each other, but married to a man who happens also to be married to more women. You might as well say my dishwasher is married to my refrigerator: this is just a matter of making sense.)

Short: what you refer to as "a mere empirical law of our species" may (and I believe is) an expression of the human essence or form. That a man (or woman; see above scene) has certain biological features is surely due to his (her) essence. Demarcating essence and nonessential biological features is a tall order, but the principle involved is relatively simple.

At any rate, we are on the same side of the fence here with respect to the confusion involved in "gay marriage."

Brad: is the human essence sex-specific, is there one essence that is the same? Then what do we say about mixes? And besides, isn't it consistent with the essence of a male to implant a "womb" of some sort with child, a la that terrible Arnold movie?

Surely, with a country full of lawyers, we can devise a legal phraseology that takes care of the problem of the word, "marriage."

Great scene Brad, I see a trend of pulling from film dialogue on this site! Thanks for reminding me of it.

And, Guido, we could also devise a legal definition that would take care of the word "life" -- to get Scott Peterson off the hook for "killing" his "wife."

But even if we do, Scott Peterson is still in fact a murder and two dudes are still not married. Changing the definition doesn't change the fact.

Love,

Short, Scott Peterson is innocent until proven guilty!

Orenthal

I just actually read what Schuster wrote and it is rather unpersuasive. I must say that I really find it humorous when liberals quote Scripture and pretend to understand, let alone care, what the Bible says about something. He pulls a number of quotes from Leviticus in an attempt to suggest that biblically sanctioned moral principles are either incoherent and contradictory, or are in fact immoral and hateful. For some odd reason though he doesn't seem to note the passages from St. Paul's writings which deals with the moral issues at stake here. It is as if Schuster doesn't realize that he mostly isn't dealing with Jews but with Christians . . . you know . . . like we have this thing called the New Testament and all.

I know I am late in commenting, but I've a question I haven't seen discussed anywhere. Must other states recognize gay marriages from states where it is legal?

Thanks for any replies.