Evangelism and Trump

[Barrister]

What is the maximalist pro-life position, and who holds it?

No abortion from conception onwards, no exception for rape and incest.

Hard to say who holds such a view, but several states seem to be passing such laws, or at least proposing such laws.

[garbon]

Yeah, gay marriage wasn't a concession. The concession was "registered partnerships, separate but equal - so religious folks can feel 'marriage' is still their own special thing unsullied by the gay."

TBH this was my favoured solution for a long time.
Ideal world gay marriage of course, but in terms of practicality did it really matter what you called it? If the word marriage was what was causing all the trouble then just do the same thing but by a different name and let gay people have all the rights they want already.
Thankfully this is one issue where I have been pleasantly surprised by humanity as attitudes on this came on a lot quicker than I thought they would.

Given how many Republican states took steps to ban unions, the issue was clearly not just the term.

[crazy canuck]

Yeah, gay marriage wasn't a concession. The concession was "registered partnerships, separate but equal - so religious folks can feel 'marriage' is still their own special thing unsullied by the gay."

I mean - I'm not going to defend an article I didn't write, I don't agree with, and that I'm 99% sure the author would not write the same way today.

What gives you that degree of confidence?

Familiarity with the man's work?  As a fairly regular reader of The Dispatch (founded by him, Jonah Goldberg and a couple of others)?

And I did fudge it by saying "the same way".  Maybe he'd still write that he still opposes same-sex marriage.  But I'm quite confident he wouldn't do so because of how poorly Christians are being treated.  Because that kind of "whataboutism" argument has really been badly exposed as being intellectually hollow during the Trump years.

But I think that is the basic inconsistency Garbon identified.  Why do you think this man has a deep commitment to equality when he is opposed to same-sex marriage?  Isn't the answer that he has a deep commitment to his interpretation of Christian beliefs and where those beliefs intersect with issues of equality, his religious beliefs will always prevail?

And to follow the logic further, isn't that the point Berkut is making?

[crazy canuck]

What is the maximalist pro-life position, and who holds it?

No abortion from conception onwards, no exception for rape and incest.

Hard to say who holds such a view, but several states seem to be passing such laws, or at least proposing such laws.

The reason I asked is you mentioned that the GOP is beginning to see how unpopular it is.  I was wondering if we had a different understand of the term, but you and I agree on what it means.  And so where I think we differ is how the GOP analyzes the popularity of that stance.  From the reports I am seeing out of the GOP controlled states, it looks like it is very popular within the GOP because (and this is the important port that brings us back to Berkut's original post) the GOP has become deeply committed to evangelical Christian theology.

[Barrister]

But I think that is the basic inconsistency Garbon identified.  Why do you think this man has a deep commitment to equality when he is opposed to same-sex marriage?  Isn't the answer that he has a deep commitment to his interpretation of Christian beliefs and where those beliefs intersect with issues of equality, his religious beliefs will always prevail?

And to follow the logic further, isn't that the point Berkut is making?

I don't see this conversation going anywhere useful for either of us.  Have a great day CC.

[crazy canuck]

But I think that is the basic inconsistency Garbon identified.  Why do you think this man has a deep commitment to equality when he is opposed to same-sex marriage?  Isn't the answer that he has a deep commitment to his interpretation of Christian beliefs and where those beliefs intersect with issues of equality, his religious beliefs will always prevail?

And to follow the logic further, isn't that the point Berkut is making?

I don't see this conversation going anywhere useful for either of us.  Have a great day CC.

I don't know why?  If you find it difficult to answer a civil question, you might want to think about why that is.

[Barrister]

But I think that is the basic inconsistency Garbon identified.  Why do you think this man has a deep commitment to equality when he is opposed to same-sex marriage?  Isn't the answer that he has a deep commitment to his interpretation of Christian beliefs and where those beliefs intersect with issues of equality, his religious beliefs will always prevail?

And to follow the logic further, isn't that the point Berkut is making?

I don't see this conversation going anywhere useful for either of us.  Have a great day CC.

I don't know why?  If you find it difficult to answer a civil question, you might want to think about why that is.

Because clearly my views are immoral and lack any intellectual rigor and I don't want your brilliant cross-examination of me to expose that fact.

Really I'm just a coward.  That's why I prefer to not engage with you.

Why do you force me into such painful self-flagellation CC?

[crazy canuck]

But I think that is the basic inconsistency Garbon identified.  Why do you think this man has a deep commitment to equality when he is opposed to same-sex marriage?  Isn't the answer that he has a deep commitment to his interpretation of Christian beliefs and where those beliefs intersect with issues of equality, his religious beliefs will always prevail?

And to follow the logic further, isn't that the point Berkut is making?

I don't see this conversation going anywhere useful for either of us.  Have a great day CC.

I don't know why?  If you find it difficult to answer a civil question, you might want to think about why that is.

Because clearly my views are immoral and lack any intellectual rigor and I don't want your brilliant cross-examination of me to expose that fact.

Really I'm just a coward.  That's why I prefer to not engage with you.

Why do you force me into such painful self-flagellation CC?

There are considerable logical leaps there.

Do you believe the same as the author you have attempted to defend?  I would not have thought so.

The purpose of the discussion is to delve into the validity of your claim that the people you have chosen to throw out as examples are in fact contrary to Berkut's assertion. 

[Eddie Teach]

What gives you that degree of confidence?

David French is actually BB's pseudonym. The give-away is the last name "French" which is a reference to BB's well known Francophilia.

Sometimes I forget that BB and Valmy are the same person.

[Barrister]

There are considerable logical leaps there.

That's just the shitty kind of person I am.  Why must you keep pointing it out?

[crazy canuck]

You are right BB, best we just go back to ignoring eachother.

[Barrister]

You are right BB, best we just go back to ignoring eachother.

It's for the best.

[Valmy]

You should check out a writer named David French.  Deeply conservative, deeply evangelical.  Also deeply committed to racial justice and equality, and absolutely #NeverTrump.  Volunteered to serve in Iraq, former National Review writer.  And just basically proof that there is such a thing as a thoughtful evangelical conservative.

Ah like this thoughtful piece where he outlines how Christians are under attack and has evolved to thinking gay marriage should not be legal. That kind of equality?

https://www.nationalreview.com/2015/04/why-i-changed-my-mind-about-gay-marriage-david-french/

Unfortunately, the conservative argument against gay marriage often reeks of hypocrisy. Our society stopped viewing marriage as a sacred (God-ordained) institution long ago. Since the invention of no-fault divorce laws, divorce rates have skyrocketed. Now, almost half of all marriages end in divorce.

So...60 years ago no-fault divorce was introduced and divorce rates increased but that was something that happened once 60 years ago and remained pretty steady. Somewhere between 40% and 50% of marriages won't make it to death-do-us part but as far as I know it ever actually reached 50% at any point, in 2019 it was 44%. But for some reason it is some kind of talking point that "half of all marriages end in divorce" despite it not being half and despite the fact we are talking about a lifetime commitment undertaken by young people in an era where people can expect to live well past the age of 70, as if that is comparable to previous centuries when people would barely make it to 50. I feel like he is being just a little dishonest here and misrepresenting the issue and also coming to one conclusion that clearly this means that society doesn't value something. They stick to it 56% of the time, that's pretty damn good. Would people one hundred years ago have stayed married as much as they did if they lived as long as people do today?

I also hate this line of thinking. That marriage is this sacred thing more important than petty things like your safety and health and all that? So your partner is a liar? Abusive? Fuck you, fix it for God. I think the accusation and conceit is that we are all taking this thing lightly and not taking it seriously. I disagree, I think the overwhelming number of people who get divorced do not take it lightly and consider it a terrible thing.

And I guess I should add that the number of divorces is much higher in the more religious areas of the country, but granted there are also a lot more marriages there and particularly young marriages. So that's logical. More marriages mean more divorces. But the issue is that if this was a "sacred" versus "secular" thing where the problem is people not taking it seriously because of a lack of religious faith well one would expect the less religious areas to just take it less seriously and divorce more readily and that doesn't seem to be the case.

So that right there makes it hard for me to take him as a shining example. I am not seeing the evidence that religion produces stronger marriages. Nor that it produces weaker marriages.

Or maybe his claim is the government needs to undo no-fault divorce and use the coercive power of the state to force people to stay married for God. And that is how we would signify we think marriage is sacred? That seems psychopathic.

Of course he is also using it as the reason his past self for supporting gay marriage. Because our society sucks on marriage already why worry? Weak.

My thesis was rather simple: Since the advent of no-fault divorce, the secular definition of "marriage" had become nothing more than a voluntary arrangement less binding than a refrigerator warranty. Adding same-sex couples to that already thoroughly secular institution would be, at most, an incremental, largely irrelevant cultural and legal change.

The progressive version of this guy sucks. He really has nothing but contempt for everybody who isn't part his group.

But now he opposes it! Because it makes Christians be oppressed:

Christians must lose their jobs, lose their businesses, and close their schools, unless they bend the knee to the sexual revolution.

But now he reverses course because accepting gay marriage might hurt Christians and Christianity. Well if something hurts me than FUCK GAY PEOPLE, clearly he and his group are more important than them. Also I think it is already illegal to discriminate based on religion. I think there already a zillion special privileges and benefits religious organizations get. But apparently we have to have gay marriage illegal or Christians will be persecuted for their beliefs. But if:

Bonds of friendship and loyalty are meaningless if the cultural conservative holds the wrong view on same-sex marriage, and Christian clubs are vile discriminators if they simply want to be led by Christian leaders.

And this would end and gay marriage supporters would suddenly embrace his values and nobody would ever be mad at Christians again or think they are vile discriminators? The culture war would immediately cease and we would all embrace David French and his pals and their views. All we have to do is sacrifice the Gays. A small price to pay to save the people who really matter.

And of course people with views I disagree with shouldn't have to worry about their jobs, businesses, and schools. I think that's wrong. I just don't see how ending gay marriage will solve that.

In the "blue" sectors of America, particularly the academy, some Christians feel that they have to live under deep cover to protect their careers.

Just because some Christians feel that way doesn't mean it is true. But granted in at-will employment states I guess you can just fire anybody for any reason you like. It is still wrong and I agree that nobody should have to do that. Can you imagine the horror of having to hide who you are to escape persecution? If only we could outlaw gay marriage then nobody would ever have to do that again.

I agree with the notion that gay couples should be able to make health-care decisions for each other, write each other into wills, solemnize their relationships if they wish, and otherwise enjoy many of the same bundle of rights enjoyed by heterosexual couples, but it is easy and simple enough to write those protections into law without changing the very definition and nature of marriage.

So it is just semantics. We just can't call it a marriage, but it should be identical in every way. Because if we don't have strong semantics then:

Cultures that have sought to alter marriage from its fundamental norms do not have a happy history. Polygamy has hardly proven conducive to enduring cultural strength, and when segments of the young American nation changed thousands of years of marriage traditions by injecting white supremacy into what was once a color-blind institution, it commandeered marriage into the unsustainable and ultimately ruinous practice of race-based chattel slavery and race-based economic, cultural, and legal discrimination.

Where is the proof that Polygamy has not been conducive to enduring cultural strength? I don't like polygamy but is he saying that Islamic cultures do not have enduring cultural strength? What is his measurement of enduring cultural strength? Besides Moses had multiple wives. The Law given by God in the Old Testament allowed for Polygamy. King David, who God seemed to think was pretty cool, had multiple wives. Isn't the very culture he is participating in have its roots in Polygamy? Seems like it has been pretty enduring culturally. What a weird and bizarre thing to say. I could think of many reasons I don't like polygamy but the idea it produces weak and non-enduring cultures is a really weird one.

And what made the history of Jim Crow and slavery unhappy was that they fucked with the "thousand year old" color-blind institution of marriage? I mean yes they did shitty things with marriage. Yes the history is unhappy. But if they had done everything the same way but didn't screw with the color-blind sacredness of marriage everything would have been fine? Besides, it is not like once inter-racial marriage was legalized all the unhappy things about racism disappeared. Another very weird example.

But now we're racing off on our own cultural experiment, one that began two generations ago when Baby Boomers decided they needed to shed their spouses at will, and continues now with the equally radical step of redefining who a "spouse" can be and re-ordering marriage to center completely and totally on adult emotional contentment.

Ok look it is not that everybody thinks they should end their marriage on a whim, it was just that maybe the government shouldn't get to decide what a good reason was. And why are you calling it radical when you have already stated you want the exact same thing just call it a different name. It sounds like you are 99% in approval but going 1% farther suddenly makes it radical.

And we're racing on despite the clear record that families who maintain the traditional bonds do far better — in aggregate — emotionally, socially, and economically than families who shun tradition to carve out their own definitions of "ideal."

I am confused because of the euphemisms used here, "families who maintain the traditional bonds." What exactly is he talking about? I mean it sounds like he is cool with gay couples but is he saying that gay people do far better in heterosexual couples? If a gay man marries a woman he is just going to do so much better emotionally, socially, and economically? And we have clear evidence for this? I am highly skeptical we have a clear record showing this result. If he is talking about something else then I am not sure what. Is he saying don't get divorced? Be nice to your dad?  Don't cut off your cousins? I mean fair enough but what does that have to do with gay marriage?

As I said once before when discussing my own intellectual journey, the tides of history and opinion are not irreversible. It's not inevitable that everyone will follow the Obama/Clinton path to transform the very nature of this "foundational institution." People can, in fact, move back towards time-tested tradition. I'm living proof.

But why though? Nothing you said here makes any sense at all. He wants to move back towards the time-tested tradition of accepting and wanting rights for gay couples but just to not use the word marriage. I don't know how much of a time-tested tradition this one particular stance is. It seems very 1990s or 2000s. And the reasons why it is bad are barely coherently articulated. And frankly the reasons he once supported gay marriage seem really ridiculous as well. I don't have to agree with you for you to make sense.

I mean if he had just said, "look I love gay people but I think the Bible said marriage is for one man and one woman, so I am sticking to it no matter what. Sucks for the gays but that is just what God wants." I don't agree with that but I understand it, it is logically coherent. Instead he goes on about Christians being persecuted, polygamy being bad for cultures, and Jim Crow having shitty marriage laws. Huh? What?

I don't know about David French BB. I am sure I would agree with him on other things but man it would be nice if he made sense. Granted this article is from seven years ago.

[Barrister]

I don't know about David French BB. I am sure I would agree with him on other things but man it would be nice if he made sense. Granted this article is from seven years ago.

I mean... you just spent a lot of energy attacking a 7 year old article that no one here is defending.  He's also gone through an evolution in some of his thinking due to the Former Guy.  As mentioned I'm 99% sure he would not write the same article today.

I mean if somehow I interested you in the guy here's a bunch of his more recent writing:

https://thedispatch.com/people/5849328-david-french

I searched and can't see that he's said anything about his personal views on same-sex marriage since this 2015 NR article.  He's still though a guy hated by most on the right for his willingness to attack right-wing shibboleths, and hated on the left for being a right-winger.

[garbon]

I don't know about David French BB. I am sure I would agree with him on other things but man it would be nice if he made sense. Granted this article is from seven years ago.

I mean... you just spent a lot of energy attacking a 7 year old article that no one here is defending.  He's also gone through an evolution in some of his thinking due to the Former Guy.  As mentioned I'm 99% sure he would not write the same article today.

I mean if somehow I interested you in the guy here's a bunch of his more recent writing:

https://thedispatch.com/people/5849328-david-french

I searched and can't see that he's said anything about his personal views on same-sex marriage since this 2015 NR article.  He's still though a guy hated by most on the right for his willingness to attack right-wing shibboleths, and hated on the left for being a right-winger.

But you said he was thoughtful and deeply committed to equality. At least in the last year pre-Trump, he didn't show many signs of either unless going with idea that thoughtful just means one has many thoughts.