Dangerous as the Plague

Samuel Huneke

The Baffler

Originally posted 23 JUN 22

Here is an excerpt:

There is not enough space here to enumerate all of the similarities and differences between National Socialism and today’s right, but the place of Christianity in each movement is instructive. The churches were always on tenuous terms at best with Hitler’s state. Many Nazi leaders were openly hostile to Christianity and to the “traditional” family. Homosexuality posed a threat to Nazism not in moral terms, but rather in social and political terms, threatening to undermine its homosocial order. In stark contrast, the American right today remains in thrall to white Christian nationalism, which openly seeks to impose its own version of morality on the nation. The threat queerness poses to this version of patriarchal Christianity, coupled with broader anxieties about loss of social status, is what appears to motivate the new right’s transphobia and homophobia.

The endurance of these tropes also highlights the limits of the professionalized LGBTQ political movement in this country, which has prioritized visibility and assimilation—eschewing more revolutionary strategies that would encompass the needs of the most marginalized. Groups like the Human Rights Campaign have been successful up to a point, but their strategies were always predicated on the notion that if queer people were visible and showed that they weren’t actually that different, prejudice would seep away. Because its aim was assimilation, this tactic fundamentally upheld the division between normal and abnormal on which animus rests. Instead of contesting that very division, it sought to put certain queer people on the “right” side of it. In this way, it also misunderstood hatred as a product of ignorance rather than a political strategy or an expression of sublimated anxieties.

Now animus against queer people—especially trans people—is back with a vengeance. From the conspiracy-addled world of QAnon, in which a shadowy cabal of pedophiles, juiced on the blood of children, runs the world, to the mendacity of trans-exclusionary radical feminists (or TERFs), a growing segment of the population seems willing to entertain the notion that lesbians, gay men, and trans people are “recruiting” children. The bestseller Irreversible Damage, published in 2020 and reaching audiences well beyond the fringe right, insisted that girls were being seduced by a “transgender craze” that it termed a “contagion.” Just before Pride month, U.S. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, who has embraced the rhetoric of “grooming,” predicted that in “four or five generations, no one will be straight anymore.”

The info is here.

West Virginia Poll examines moral and social issues

Brad McElhinny
wvmetronews.com
Originally posted September 30, 2018

Here is an excerpt:

Role of God in morality

There was a 50-50 split in a question asking respondents to select the statement that best reflects their view of the role of God in morality.

Half responded, “It is not necessary to believe in God in order to be moral and have good values.”

The other half of respondents chose the option “It is necessary to believe in God in order to be moral and have good values.”

“The two big, significant differences are younger people and self-identified conservatives who have opposite points of view on this question,” said professional pollster Rex Repass, the author of the West Virginia Poll.

Of younger people — those between ages 18 and 34 — 60 percent said it’s not necessary to believe in God to have good moral and ethical values.

That compared to 35 percent of those ages 55-64 who answered with that statement.

“So generally, if you’re under 35, you’re more likely to say it’s not necessary to say have a higher being in your life to have good values,” Repass said.

“If you’re older that percentage increases. You’re more likely to believe you have to have God in your life to be moral and have good values.”

Of respondents who labeled themselves as conservative, 73 percent said it is necessary to believe in God to have moral values.

The info is here.

Bill to Bar LGBTQ Discrimination Stokes New Nebraska Debate

Tess Williams
US News and World Report
Originally published February 22, 2018

A bill that would prevent psychologists from discriminating against patients based on their sexual orientation or gender identity is reviving a nearly decade-old dispute in Nebraska state government.

Sen. Patty Pansing Brooks of Lincoln said Thursday that her bill would adopt the code of conduct from the American Psychiatric Association, which prevents discrimination of protected classes of people, but does not require professionals to treat patients if they lack expertise or it conflicts with their personal beliefs. The professional would have to provide an adequate referral instead.

Pansing Brooks said the bill will likely not become law, but she hopes it will bring attention to the ongoing problem. She said she hopes it will be resolved internally, but if a conclusion is not reached, she plans to call for a hearing later this year and will "not let this issue die."

The state Board of Psychology proposed new regulations in 2008, and the following year, the Department of Health and Human Services sent the changes to the Nebraska Catholic Conference for review. Pansing Brooks said she is unsure why the religious organization was given special review.

The article is here.

Trump Administration Rolls Back Birth Control Mandate

Robert Pear, Rebecca R. Ruiz, and Laurie Godstein
The New York Times
Originally published October 6, 2017

The Trump administration on Friday moved to expand the rights of employers to deny women insurance coverage for contraception and issued sweeping guidance on religious freedom that critics said could also erode civil rights protections for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.

The twin actions, by the Department of Health and Human Services and the Justice Department, were meant to carry out a promise issued by President Trump five months ago, when he declared in the Rose Garden that “we will not allow people of faith to be targeted, bullied or silenced anymore.”

Attorney General Jeff Sessions quoted those words in issuing guidance to federal agencies and prosecutors, instructing them to take the position in court that workers, employers and organizations may claim broad exemptions from nondiscrimination laws on the basis of religious objections.

At the same time, the Department of Health and Human Services issued two rules rolling back a federal requirement that employers must include birth control coverage in their health insurance plans. The rules offer an exemption to any employer that objects to covering contraception services on the basis of sincerely held religious beliefs or moral convictions.

More than 55 million women have access to birth control without co-payments because of the contraceptive coverage mandate, according to a study commissioned by the Obama administration. Under the new regulations, hundreds of thousands of women could lose those benefits.

The article is here.

Italics added.  And, just when the abortion rate was at pre-1973 levels.

Richard Swinburne’s Toxic Lecture on Christian Morality

By J. Edward Hackett
Philosophical Percolations
Originally published September 24, 2016

Here is an excerpt:

While Swinburne did not think homosexuality was intrinsically wrong in the same way that adultery was wrong, he argued (if that’s the right verb under some principle of charity) that homosexuality was extrinsically wrong. Homosexuality was a disability in the lacking of the ability to have children, and God’s commands of abstaining from homosexuality might prevent others from fostering this incurable condition in others.

Yeah. I know.

My response was mixture of abhorrence and overwhelming anger, and I tried as I might to encounter this idea calmly. I told him he medicalized being gay in the same way that phrenology medicalized racism. It was obnoxious to listen to Christians lay claim to sacrificial love at this conference, but at the same time not see the virtue of that same love as a possible quality underlying other configurations, yet I told others this is the reason why Christians should read Foucault. When you do, you start to notice how power manifests in local contexts in which those discourses occur.

There was a way power was working in this discourse. Specifically, Foucault exposes how medicalizing discourse divorces the condition apart from the body of the patient. Swinburne advocated “sympathy and not censure” for homosexuals, those with the “incurable condition” and “disability.” In this medical context, medicine acts as a way to dehumanize the person without appearing as if that’s what you’re doing.

The blog post his here.

Unraveling the Church Ban on Gay Sex

By Gary Gutting
The New York Times
Originally published March 12, 2015

Here is an excerpt:

The primary arguments derive from what is known as the “natural-law tradition” of ethical thought, which begins with Plato and Aristotle, continues through Thomas Aquinas and other medieval and modern philosophers, and still flourishes today in the work of thinkers like John Finnis and Robert George. This tradition sees morality as a matter of the moral laws that follow from what fundamentally makes us human: our human nature. This is what the archbishop was referring to when he said that homosexual acts are contrary to natural law. This has long been a major basis for the church’s claim that homosexual acts are immoral — indeed “gravely sinful.”

The problem is that, rightly developed, natural-law thinking seems to support rather than reject the morality of homosexual behavior. 

The entire article is here.

Undercover Doctor: Cure Me, I'm Gay

By Christian Jessen
Channel 4
Originally published March 20, 2013

In this one-off documentary Dr Christian Jessen goes undercover to both investigate and undertake controversial gay 'cures' in the UK and the USA.

Christian is shocked to find that not only are there people who believe that homosexuality is a disorder which should be cured, but that there is a growing number of therapists and self-styled healers who believe that they have the 'cure' for the 'illness'.

He sets out to prove or disprove their claims by offering himself up as a suitable case for treatment.

Suicide risk reduced for all students by gay-straight alliances in schools

By Medical News Today
Originally published January 23, 2014

Canadian schools with explicit anti-homophobia interventions such as gay-straight alliances (GSAs) may reduce the odds of suicidal thoughts and attempts among both sexual minority and straight students, according to a new study by University of British Columbia researchers.

Gay-straight alliances are student-led clubs that aim to make the school community a safer place for all students regardless of their sexual orientation. Their members include lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer or questioning (LGBTQ) youth and their straight allies.

The entire story is here.

Oklahoma ban on same-sex marriage unconstitutional

By Greg Botelho, CNN
January 14, 2014

A federal judge ruled Tuesday that an Oklahoma law limiting marriage to heterosexual couples violates the U.S. Constitution, giving yet another victory to same-sex marriage supporters.

U.S. District Court Judge Terence Kern said the court would not immediately enforce this ruling -- therefore not opening the doors right away to marriages of gay and lesbian couples in Oklahoma -- pending appeals. Still, he delivered a clear opinion on how the voter-approved Oklahoma state constitutional amendment relates to the U.S. Constitution.

The entire article is here.

City Seeking to Diversify Foster System

By Mara Gay
The Wall Street Journal
Originally posted on June 2, 2013

New York City is launching a campaign to recruit gay and lesbian foster parents, part of a major push to expand the kinds of families who consider fostering and to find more welcoming homes for children who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or queer.

The public ad campaign, set to roll out this week, features images of an interracial gay couple spending time with a young child. "Be the reason she has hope," one of the ads reads. In another, a black woman is pictured alone with a white teenage boy. "Be the reason it gets better," the message says.

How many of the nearly 13,000 children in New York City's foster-care system identify as LGBTQ is unclear because the city does not keep such data. But, citing anecdotal evidence, researchers, child advocates and city officials insist that the children are disproportionately represented in the foster care system and say the need to find them supportive homes is great.

"When we decided to do this campaign we knew that LGBTQ young people are disproportionately represented in our foster care population, especially among our teens," said Ronald Richter, commissioner of the Administration for Children's Services, the city's child welfare agency.

Mr. Richter, citing a study the city commissioned last year, said the data show that adults who identify as LGBTQ are more likely to want to foster a child who may also identify that way.

The entire story is here.