“Swallowing half an hour before closing time that second dose of soma had raised
a quite impenetrable wall between the actual universe and their minds”
(Aldous Huxley, Brave New World).

I’ll give it a go once more for the intellectually lazy and socially insulated “progressives” out there who, when discussing issues related to homosexuality, refuse to address questions regarding basic presuppositions and logical consequences. For example, Chicago Tribune columnist Rex Huppke just wrote a silly and condescending column in the Chicago Tribune about the serious issue of religious liberty in which he revealed his own ignorance of the topic.

“Progressives” like Huppke replace serious intellectual thought and rigor with ridicule and condescension in their quest to impose their homosexuality-affirming dogma on the entire country. Unfortunately in a country hypnotized by the digital soma that spews from Hollywood, this retreat from intellect works.

Huppke’s “argument” includes the following:

1.)  First, he trivializes the real concerns of conservative people of faith that they will be required to contribute to a same-sex “wedding” celebration. He trivializes this concern through exaggeration, saying that conservatives fear that homosexuals will “flock to bakeries run by people whose faith denounces gay marriage.” 

Well, he’s surely correct in saying that homosexuals won’t “always” seek the services of orthodox Christian, Jewish or Muslim business owners, but that’s hardly reassuring to those who have been, are currently, and will in the future be sued by those homosexuals who do intentionally seek those businesses out.

2.)  He trivializes the religious liberty component central to the debate by saying that though “Americans have many serious issues to worry about—unemployment, education…one issue rises above all others…gay wedding cake.” He further describes efforts to protect religious liberty as efforts to oppose the “menace of gay wedding cakes.” 

Perhaps Huppke and his ideological compeers aren’t aware that cultural change—including radical cultural change—rarely happens through a single cataclysmic event, but rather through the slow accretion of small events or seemingly trivial ideas that society ignores, accommodates, or embraces. Using the force of government to compel property owners to violate their faith in even seemingly small matters constitutes a significant erosion of religious liberty. 

3.)  Huppke mocks Christian beliefs about the nature of homosexuality through his neologism “gaynosity.” He explains that a number of states are considering “religious liberty laws that would allow bakers—or photographers, or florists, or, I suppose, plumbers—to deny service to gay couples if the business owner’s faith is compromised by the gay couple’s gaynosity.”He might be surprised to learn that many Christians do not believe that homosexuals choose their feelings. What they actually believe is that those who affirm a “gay identity” choose to place their unchosen feelings at the center of their identity and choose to act on them. So, while their feelings are not chosen, their (to use Huppke’s insulting term) “gaynosity” is. Where orthodox Christians most disagree with “progressives” is on the Left’s assumption that homosexual acts are morally neutral or morally good—which, of course, is not a fact.

4.) Huppke and virtually every other “progressive” trot out that bedraggled, old false analogy which holds that homosexuality is analogous to African American descent, comparing the efforts of Blacks to gain access to government schools and restaurants to homosexuals forcing businesses to provide their goods and services for an event that violates their religious convictions.

Homosexuality per se has no points of correspondence to skin color, but Huppke never addresses that pesky little fact. And Christian business owners are not refusing to serve homosexuals. They’re refusing to use their labors in the service of a ceremony that the God they serve abhors. But Huppke doesn’t address that pesky fact either.  

5.)  Then Huppke goes off the humor rails in a juvenile faux-interview with well-known Illinois  homosexual activist Rick Garcia, asking him inane questions that mock what the socially insulated, intellectually lazy “progressives” assume orthodox Christians believe: 

• “Rick…are you still gay?
• “Did you find that [eating a gay wedding] cake made you more gay?”
• “Do you believe gay wedding cakes can turn people gay?”
• “What is it about wedding cakes baked by gay marriage opponents that makes (sic) them so irresistible to gay people? Does the sinfulness of the occasion enhance the taste of the cake?”

6.)  Huppke thinks he has discovered a heretofore hidden conservative inconsistency. He argues that the claim of Christian bakers that using their labors in the service of a homosexual “wedding” means they’re “complicit in a gay marriage” is at odds with the claim of gun manufacturers who argue that their sale of a gun to someone who later commits a crime does not make them complicit in the crime. But selling a legal product to someone who without the gun manufacturer’s (or seller’s) knowledge intends to use it for an immoral act is patently not analogous to creating and selling a product with the certain knowledge that it will be used exclusively for an immoral act. There is no other purpose for the wedding cake other than the non-marital, faux-wedding, which is the immoral act. 

What else should business owners be compelled by the government to do in violation of their consciences—and remember, Christian bakers, florists, and photographers are not refusing to sell their products to homosexuals. They’re refusing to sell their products for a particular event:

• Should a male Muslim photographer who would be willing to photograph the pre-wedding preparations of groomsmen be compelled also to photograph the pre-wedding preparations of the bridal party, which would entail violating his religious beliefs about interactions with women?
• Should a Catholic photographer be compelled to photograph the annual Easter “Hunky Jesus” contest  (WARNING: SOME EXPLICIT PHOTOS) in San Francisco, which is hosted by the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, a group of “cross-dressing nuns,” and starts with an Easter egg hunt for children?
• Should an Evangelical Christian be compelled to photograph a commitment ceremony for five polyamorists, two males, two females and one genderless (aka “neutrois”)?
• If Kermit Gosnell had sought to hire a cleaning service owned by a pro-life Christian to clean aborted baby parts out of his refrigerator, should she be prohibited from refusing?

Some may raise objections to these questions, arguing that they don’t illustrate discrimination based on “sexual orientation.” First, I would once again remind them that Christian business owners are not refusing to serve homosexuals. Christian business owners are refusing to use their services for particular kinds of events. They’re perfectly willing to sell cakes and flowers to homosexuals—whose orientation they have no way of knowing anyway. Second, just wait a few years; polyamorists are going to be clamoring for their right to have their sexual desires and volitional sexual acts identified as a “sexual orientation.”

This type of objection should raise the more important question: Is “sexual orientation” a valid protected category?  No, it’s not. Historically protected categories were constituted by objective, morally neutral conditions like biological sex, race and ethnicity, and nationality. Homosexuality, in contrast, is constituted solely by subjective feelings and volitional acts on which there is no moral consensus. If “progressives” had any real interest in consistency, they would insist on protecting all members of groups that are constituted by subjective feelings and morally dubious volitional acts. This would mean adding all paraphilias to our anti-discrimination policies and laws. Logical consistency would demand that sadists, masochists, minor-attracted persons (MAPS), frotteurists, and zoophiliacs be protected for they are members of groups constituted by subjective feelings and often volitional sexual acts that are virtually always unchosen, powerful, and persistent.

But if we “protect” all groups constituted by subjective feelings and volitional acts, what happens not only to our religious liberty but also to our liberty to freely associate and assemble? What else do we base our diverse associations on other than feelings, beliefs, and volitional acts?

Though Huppke intended his Garcia interview to mock conservatives, what it really accomplishes is to reveal his own ignorance of what thoughtful Christians actually believe. It’s curious that “progressive” media pundits like Huppke rarely seem to find time to interview serious conservative theologians and legal scholars from academia who are writing on this topic. Many “progressives” have no idea who the conservative scholars are who are writing on topics related to homosexuality. Nor do they engage the serious ideas that inhere this discussion. The reasons for those intellectual failures are either ignorance or fear that their “arguments” don’t pass rational muster.

When “progressive” pundit Kirsten Powers recently outed herself as a born-again believer (whose theology needs some work), she made yet another astonishing revelation: Before her religious conversion at age 38, she did not know any Christians. As disciples of diversity and militants of multiculturalism, the social and intellectual insularity of so many “progressives” is both astonishing and ironic.

“Progressives” don’t really want to engage in a reasoned argument on this or any other topic related to sexual deviance. They don’t really want to debate in a serious way the ideas proposed by smart, well-educated dissenters. This in part explains why public high school teachers censor virtually all resources that espouse conservative views on the nature and morality of homosexuality (the other reason is arrogant self-righteousness). And so “progressives” leap nimbly over arguments with unctuous sophistic non-arguments and mockery. If they’re not simply mocking, they’re reaching into their cornucopia of fallacies. In Huppke’s short piece, we can find these fallacies: false analogy, straw man, and ad hominem (the fav of “progressives”).

The only funny part of Huppke’s lamentable article was his very last sentence in which he described his interview with Garcia as a “reasoned argument.”

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Yesterday I wrote about the question Chicago Tribune columnist Eric Zorn posed to me regarding the potential effects of legally recognizing same-sex unions as marriages. He asked for specific research on which to base “gloomy” predictions and asked what “animated” groups like ours to oppose same-sex “marriage.” It’s important to note that his question was premised on the implicit assumption that predictions about the effects of changing the legal definition of marriage should only be justified by sociological or objectively-measured research. But such an assumption must itself be justified. There are other warrants or justifications for predictions, including both those that derive from logic or history.

It’s not only arbitrary to say predictions should be justified only by sociological research or data, but it’s also an idea not widely or consistently held by the Left. For example, lesbian attorney and former Georgetown University law professor, Chai Feldblum has predicted that once same-sex “marriage” is legalized, conservative people of faith will lose religious rights. And she did not base her prediction on sociological research. She based her prediction on her knowledge of the law and how the establishments of legal precedents under one set of facts are later used to expand into other areas of the law. I included that in my email to Mr. Zorn, but that wasn’t a quote he chose to include in his column.

The Left has made fervid claims about the salubrious (i.e., favorable to health or well-being) cultural effects of the legalization of same-sex “marriage” with very little evidence. In fact, they made those claims long before there was any evidence.

Zorn seems concerned solely about marriage and divorce rates, whereas conservatives are “animated” by a whole host of cultural effects. He spends some time exploring marriage/divorce statistics from Massachusetts which has had legalized same-sex marriage for a mere nine years. He also mentioned Europe. Zorn might want to look at the sobering marriage and divorce rates  in the European Union, in which a number of countries legalized same-sex “marriage” or civil unions prior to Massachusetts. I’m certainly not suggesting that the legalization of same-sex marriage is the cause of these dispiriting rates, but it may be a contributing factor.

One of my reasons for writing this follow-up to yesterday’s article is that an attorney wrote me, disagreeing with my assertion that “the legalization of same-sex marriage will not affect my marriage.”  He felt that I left out something important. Here’s an excerpt from his email:

Every citizen in the country is harmed by the erosion of personal rights such as the freedom of religion, which includes the freedom to choose—based on religious beliefs—not to partake in celebrating gay marriages by choosing not to do business related to them. It is much the same way that all Americans are harmed when a person of color is discriminated against. Our country is less free and less what it was intended to be when such things happen. 

It’s surprising that “progressives” claim they can’t see any potential negative cultural effects from the legalization of same-sex “marriage.” In the corporate world, it’s easy to express the view that marriage has no inherent connection to sexual complementarity. If an employee expresses a dissenting view, professional repercussions are possible if not likely. Human resources and the ironically named “diversity officer” assert that such views make homosexuals feel “unsafe”—(another proposition inconsistently applied). So already, we’re seeing the loss of religious freedom and speech rights.

It’s one thing to say, “Yes, those liberties will be diminished, but they’re justifiable losses,”—a claim with which I would disagree. It’s entirely different to say there will be no ill effects, which seems to be the view of Zorn and his ideological compeers.

I’ve not yet heard “progressives” offer reasons why their newfangled definition of marriage that says marriage is just about love would allow for the retention of the requirement that marriage be composed of only two people. Already polygamists of the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints variety and polyamorists are using the very same definition to fight for their “equal marriage rights.”

Finally, I think it would be helpful to public discourse and, therefore, the common good, if the Left would refrain from asserting that the only reason to oppose the legal recognition of same-sex unions as marriage is animus toward homosexuals. It’s simply a false claim. It’s no more true than claiming that the only reason for opposition to the legalization of plural unions is animus toward Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints or animus toward polyamorists.

Those on both sides of the same-sex “marriage” debate believe marriage has a nature that the government merely recognizes but does not create out of whole cloth. Conservatives assert that central to marriage is sexual complementarity (which accounts for the “twoness” of marriage), without which it’s not marriage.

Most “progressives,” on the other hand, claim that marriage is centrally constituted by the presence of erotic/romantic love between two people of any sex (of course, they can’t account for the “twoness” that they claim is essential to marriage and should not be jettisoned).

We would do much better at discussing this issue, which (like abortion) will never go away, when the Left ceases to impute false and ugly motives to their opponents—motives that they don’t impute to themselves as they seek to maintain marriage as a binary institution. Continuing to spew poison for political gain is the sole cause of the new form of bullying that is emerging and is described by a father in this email I received yesterday:

My family, specifically my daughter, has been verbally attacked by friends and classmates accusing her and our family as being Christian bigots because of our position that marriage is between one man and one women and should not be redefined by politicians, many of whom have been elected in a corrupt political environment.

 Some liberal and “progressive” friends state that we are anti-gay and bigoted because we choose to exercise our 1^st Amendment rights to express these beliefs in the public square.

My older children who attend a public school are being labeled as “narrow-minded” freaks. Would these “enlightened” public officials allow my family to file an anti-bulling claim and seek damages against the school district?

Unfortunately, these are the signs of the times that we face today and the more reason that we must pray for those who ‘hate’ Christians for our beliefs. They will come to know the truth only by our love and how we live our faith.

The Left mistakenly believes this issue will eventually go away because they mistakenly believe homosexuality is analogous to race. And it is this foolish and indefensible analogy that they use to justify intolerance, censorship in schools, the usurpation of parental rights, and the diminution of First Amendment speech and religious protections.

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In a stunning public admission during a debate on the future of marriage in Illinois, the chief sponsor of SB 10, the proposed bill to legalize same-sex “marriage,” homosexual State Representative Greg Harris (D-Chicago) acknowledged that the bill does not provide religious liberty or conscience protections for individual Christian business owners. Further, it was clear that both he and homosexual Chicago Alderman Deb Mell (a former state representative and co-sponsor of of SB 10) oppose any such protections.

In the unfortunately titled “Marriage Equality” debate, sponsored by the Chicago Tribune, moderator Bruce Dold asked Harris about the absence of conscience protections in the bill:

Dold: The bill specifically protects churches, but it does not have any language about individual conscience…. Would the bill not have a better chance if it had an individual conscience protection in it?

Harris: [D]ecades ago when the Human Rights Act was passed, it said, we the people of Illinois have decided not to allow discrimination based on race, religion, sexual orientation, disability, veteran’s status in housing, employment, or public accommodations. The question of should we treat all of our citizens equally in all of those three areas has been answered. But also there are exemptions for religious institutions in the Human Rights Act. There’s also the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, and specific language in this bill…that explicitly protects freedom of religion for those churches and denominations which do not want to consecrate same-sex marriages.”

Harris publicly admitted that this bill protects the religious liberty of only religious institutions, churches, and denominations—not individuals. It was clear that Harris has no desire or intent to include such protections.

That said, the inclusion of such protections would not make this a good bill. It would simply make it a less terrible bill.

Harris tried to claim that SB 10 poses no threat to religious liberty, but was challenged by both Robert Gilligan, Executive Director of the Catholic Conference of Illinois, and Peter Breen, Vice President and Senior Counsel with the Thomas More Society, who talked about the Illinois bed and breakfast owner who is being sued for his refusal to rent out his facility for a same-sex civil union ceremony  (read more HERE).

Mell, who earlier had claimed that warnings about future religious persecution were dishonest “scare tactics,” responded “But [the bed and breakfast] is a business that does business in the state of Illinois, and in Illinois, we don’t allow discrimination.” While claiming that warnings about loss of religious liberty were deceptive and false “scare tactics,” she vigorously defended this religious discrimination. She apparently didn’t notice her own contradiction.

Neither she nor Harris seemed to notice that while they obsess about Illinois’ prohibition of discrimination based on “sexual orientation,” they pay no attention to its prohibition of religious discrimination. They don’t care if the bed and breakfast owner is discriminated against because of his religious beliefs.

Former Georgetown University law professor and current EEOC Commissioner, lesbian activist Chai Feldblum has written that when same-sex marriage is legalized, conservative people of faith will lose religious rights. She argues that it’s a zero-sum game in which a gain in sexual rights for homosexuals will mean a loss of religious rights for conservative people of faith, which she finds justifiable. She, Mell, and Harris share the view that the sexual “rights” of homosexuals trump religious rights.

Harris cited the Illinois Human Rights Act as his justification for not protecting the rights of people of faith to refuse to use their labor and goods in the service of an event that violates their deeply held religious beliefs. Well, the Illinois Human Rights Act also prohibits discrimination based on religion; hence the conflict of which Chai Feldblum spoke. Harris finds discriminating based on religion tolerable and justifiable but not discrimination based on sexual predilection.

By the way, choosing not to participate in a same-sex “wedding” does not reflect discrimination against persons. It reflects discriminating among types of events. The elderly florist who is being sued by the state of Washington for her refusal to provide flowers for a same-sex “wedding” did not discriminate against a person. She made a judgment about an event. She had previously sold flowers to one of the homosexual partners. She served all people regardless of their sexual predilections, beliefs, sexual activities, or relationships. She just wouldn’t participate in an event that she (rightly) believes the God she serves abhors. She takes seriously Jesus’ command to “Render unto Caeser what is Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s.”

Prior to the debate, I had a conversation with one of the event planners in which I predicted Harris would refuse to answer the critical question regarding why marriage should remain a union of just two people. Dold twice asked, if marriage is a right, why should it be limited to two people? Twice Harris obstinately refused to answer.

It was an embarrassingly obvious and intellectually dishonest dodge. Harris tried to use the language of the current bill to deflect the question saying in essence that the bill’s language says nothing about plural unions. This is the same embarrassing dodge ACLU spokesman Ed Yohnka used in a program on which both he and I were guests. Three times I asked him why marriage should be limited to two people, as he claimed it should be. Three times he awkwardly refused to answer.

It doesn’t take much intellectual wattage to understand that once the ideas that marriage is just about love and has nothing to do with sexual complementarity or reproductive potential are embedded in law, there remains no reason to restrict marriage to two people. The legalization of plural unions becomes not merely possible but inevitable.

Harris also said, “All families should be created equal,” to which I would have asked, “Even polyamorous families?”

And he said marriage law should “expand to reflect the reality of society,” to which I would have said, “But there exist polyamorous families in society.”

A few additional thoughts on the debate:

1. “Progressive” language police: At one point Mell attempted to compel Breen to use the term she wanted him to use for her partner (whom she “married” in Iowa). She attempted to compel him to use the term “wife.” She correctly insisted that “terminology is important.” But the law is not the ultimate arbiter of truth and reality. Compelling Breen to use the term “wife” would rob him of the right to use the term he wanted to use and believes reflects truth and reality. Conservatives have the ethical right and obligation to use the language they believe reflects truth and reality. Conceding terminology to the Left, as conservatives too often do, is not smart, not truthful, not helpful, and not compassionate.
   
   In reality, a wife is the spouse of a man (and each partner must actually be the sex they claim to be). No one is ethically obligated to participate rhetorically in any fiction the government has foolishly decided to join.

2. Media bias and the “equality” chimera: The importance of terminology is the reason I described the title of the debate, “Marriage Equality” as unfortunate. “Marriage Equality” embodies and reflects assent to “progressive” assumptions. Conservatives recognize that the notion of “equality” in this context is strategically effective non-sense.  Treating different things differently does not reflect unjust, unequal treatment. Equality demands we treat like things alike. When homosexual men and women say they are attracted only to persons of their same sex, they are acknowledging that men and women are fundamentally and significantly different. As such, a union composed of two people of the same sex is fundamentally and significantly different from a union of two people of opposite sexes. Society has no reason to treat them as if they are the same.
   
   
3. The connection between marriage and children: Both Mell and Harris talked about children deserving, in Mell’s words, “the label” of marriage. Inconsistencies abound. While homosexuals claim that marriage has no inherent connection to reproductive potential, they use arguments about children as justifications for the legal recognition of same-sex unions as marriage. This points to the fact that homosexuals are pursuing the acquisition of children, which necessarily means that in their view, children have no inherent, unalienable right to be raised by their biological parents. Homosexual couples are creating children who will be wholly unconnected to either their biological mother or father or both. In addition, they are creating intentionally motherless or fatherless children, which means homosexuals believe children have neither a right to be raised by both their mother and father, nor a right to be raised by a mother and father.
   
   The issue of children naturally and inevitably arises because marriage is centrally about the next generation. If marriage weren’t centrally about the procreation of children, if children weren’t procreated via sexual unions, there would be no such thing as marriage. The government has no more vested interest in recognizing inherentlysterile homosexual relationships as marriages than it does in recognizing platonic friendships as marriages. The government simply has no vested public interest in recognizing or affirming loving, inherently non-reproductive relationships. If it does, Harris and Mell need to explain what it is. And remember, they cannot include children in their answer, because the Left says marriage has no inherent connection to children (and by extension, their rights).
   
   If the government is compelled to recognize as marriage any loving relationship that involves the raising of children, then, for example, a grandmother and aunt who are raising the children of their deceased daughter/sister, should be permitted to marry.

4. Appeals to emotion and redefining marriage: Mell’s “arguments” amounted to little more than appeals to emotion: She really loves her partner. She and her partner have been together for nine years. Her partner has stuck with her through difficult times. Therefore, the government should legally recognize their relationship as a marriage.
   
   Say what? If marriage has an inherent nature, it doesn’t change simply because she and her partner wish it were different. Harris and Mell have concluded that because they are not attracted to people of the opposite sex, marriage has nothing inherently to do with sexual complementarity or reproductive potential.
   
   What’s interesting is that they don’t deny marriage has a nature that is inherent and immutable. They believe marriage is inherently and immutably constituted solely by the presence of love between two people. But then they can’t provide a single reason for their stubborn insistence that marriage is an inherently binary institution. Harris and Mell need to provide reasons for jettisoning sexual complementarity from the legal definition of marriage while retaining the less essential requirement regarding number of partners in a marriage. Simply asserting that marriage is a union of two people is not an argument.

5. Catholic Charities and religious discrimination: During the debate, a brief discussion arose about Catholic Charities being forced to drop out of the adoption business following the passage of Illinois’ civil union law—a change that Harris views as serving the “best interests” of children. Neither Harris nor Mell expressed concern about the clear presence of religious discrimination—something which deeply concerned Princeton University law professor Robert George. In a 2011 CNN debate among candidates running in the Republican primary, George asked the following question and in so doing, told congressmen and women what they should do:
   
   

   In Illinois, after passing a civil union bill, the state government decided to exclude certain religiously affiliated foster care and adoption agencies, including Catholic and Protestant agencies, because the agencies, in line with the teachings of their faith, cannot in conscience place children with same-sex partners.

   Now, at least half of Illinois’ foster and adoption funds come from the federal government. Should the federal government be subsidizing states that discriminate against Catholic and other religious adoption agencies? If a state legislature refuses to make funding available on equal terms to those providers who as a matter of conscience will not place children in same-sex homes, should federal legislation come in to protect the freedom of conscience of those religious providers?

There is no more critical legislation pending than SB 10. Despite what some lawmakers and pundits fecklessly claim, this issue is more important than even pension reform. The rights of children, parents, and people of faith are at risk.

Demonstrate that you care more about preserving marriage than the Left does in destroying it. Demonstrate your willingness to endure hardship and even persecution in the service of truth.

Please call your lawmaker, and please try to attend the Defend Marriage Rally in Springfield on Oct. 23. The Left will be marching on Oct. 22. 

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Yesterday in the Chicago Tribune, Bob Secter writing ostensibly in support of Common Core Standards (CCS) engaged in the very kind of hyperbolic mischaracterization of critics of CCS for which he condescendingly mocks them. He spends the first quarter of his opinion piece comparing CCS critics to Joseph McCarthy, and then he spends the rest of his time mocking CCS critics based on one flawed story on FOX News. He wraps up his piece of demagoguery—as opposed to reasoned analysis—by returning to his dishonest and paranoid McCarthy analogy. This was not a sound analysis of CCS. It was a hit piece on FOX News masquerading as an analysis of CCS. Not once did Secter respond to the substantive criticisms proffered by reasonable experts on the left and right, some of which are outlined here. 

As I wrote in Part 1, opposition to the effort to nationalize public education known as Common Core Standards (CCS) is growing. And we’re witnessing a rare political event: opposition is coming from both the political right and left.  Part 2 outlines some of the problems that are likely to accompany the adoption of  CCS.

Problems with Common Core Standards:

• No prior research or testing of CCS to determine their efficacy. Early on, Common Core proponents claimed the standards were “internationally benchmarked.” Since that claim was proven false, the Common Core website has removed it.
  
  Further, education historian and professor, Dr. Diane Ravitch says, “The Common Core standards have been adopted…without any field test. They are being imposed on the children of this nation despite the fact that no one has any idea how they will affect students, teachers, or schools. We are a nation of guinea pigs, almost all trying an unknown new program at the same time.” 

• Academic quality will diminish in many schools. Literary reading and study will decrease to make room for the study of “informational,” non-fiction texts. Many educational experts believe this will further exacerbate the decline in college-readiness that began in the 1960s with the replacement of more challenging literature by “easier, shorter and contemporary texts.”

  According to Sandra Stotsky, one of the Common Core co-creators, Dr. Jason Zimba, offered this bit of critical information about which the public remains ignorant: “Common Core defines ‘college-­readiness’ as ready for a nonselective community college, not a four-­year university.”
  
  The Common Core math standards too are challenged for their weaknesses relative to other “high-achieving” countries. In a series of articles critical of CCS, Michelle Malkin exposes some of these weaknesses: 

Stanford University professor James Milgram, the only mathematician on the (CCS) validation panel, concluded that the Common Core math scheme would place students two years behind their peers in other high-achieving countries. In protest, Milgram refused to sign off on the standards. He’s not alone. 

Professor Jonathan Goodman of New York University found that the Common Core math standards imposed “significantly lower expectations with respect to algebra and geometry than the published standards of other countries.” 

• CCS will shape both curricula and assessments (i.e., tests). Proponents claim that CCS are just that, standards. Proponents of CCS are crossing their fingers hoping no one will realize that uniform testing will follow uniform standards and that uniform curricula will inevitably follow uniform standards and assessments. They conceal the close connection between CCS and the curricula and assessments (i.e., tests) that have already been developed to align with CCS and which are currently being marketed to schools.
  
  Lindsay Burke of the Heritage Foundation suggests that this newest effort to expand the expansive reach of the federal government into curricula via CCS is unconstitutional:

The constitutional authority for education rests with states and localities, and ultimately with parents—not the federal government. The federal government has crossed this line in the past, but dictating curriculum content is a major new breach that represents a critical level of centralization and a major setback for parental rights.

• Testing/Assessments are flawed. In a letter excerpted here, fifty New York State school principals complained to the state education commissioner about the CCS-aligned assessments developed by Pearson Education (see Part 1):

Unfortunately, we feel that not only did this year’s New York State Exams take an extreme toll on our teachers, families and most importantly, our students, they also fell short of the aspirations of these Standards.

…As it stands, we are concerned about the limiting and unbalanced structure of the test, the timing, format and length of the daily test sessions, and the efficacy of Pearson in this work.

…

[T]he testing sessions….were unnecessarily long, requiring more stamina for a 10-year-old special education student than of a high school student taking an SAT exam. Yet, for some sections of the exams, the time was insufficient for the length of the test. When groups of parents, teachers and principals recently shared students’ experiences in their schools, especially during the ELA exams with misjudged timing expectations, we learned that frustration, despondency, and even crying were common reactions among students.

There were more multiple-choice questions than ever before….for several multiple choice questions the distinction between the right answer and the next best right answer was paltry at best. The fact that teachers report disagreeing about which multiple-choice answer is correct in several places on the ELA exams indicates that this format is unfair to students….The math tests contained 68 multiple-choice problems….The language of these math questions was often unnecessarily confusing….

Finally, we are concerned about putting the fate of so many in the education community in the hands of Pearson – a company with a history of mistakes. (…Pearson has a 3-year DOE contract for this test alone, worth $5.5 million.) There are many other examples of Pearson’s questionable reliability in the area of test design….Parents and taxpayers have anecdotal information, but are unable to debate the efficacy of these exams when they are held highly secured and not released for more general analysis. These exams determine student promotion. They determine which schools individual students can apply to for middle and high school. They are a basis on which the state and city will publicly and privately evaluate teachers. The exams determine whether a school might fall under closer scrutiny after a poor grade on the test-linked state and city progress reports or even risk being shut down.

• Loss of local control. The left is obsessed with choice when it comes to killing babies in utero but not when it comes to educating those lucky enough to survive their treacherous gestational journey. In an interview with Hugh Hewitt, American Principles Project Emmett McGroarty warns that when states choose to adopt CCS, local communities lose control over educational standards: 

[I]n agreeing to entering the Common Core System, they’ve pledged to implement the Common Core 100%. They can’t change the standards at all. They can add 15% but they can’t change any of it….[T]hen tied to the Common Core are federally funded and really federally managed or overseen high stakes standardized tests. So, in entering the system the states have given up large swaths of education policy decision making. 

• Centralization eliminates mechanisms of improvement: local accountability, choice, competition, and flexibility. 

• Costly. Cash-strapped states will have to spend money they don’t have to cover the costs of new textbooks, teacher-training, substitute teachers during teacher-training, assessments, and technological updates to accommodate online testing. Even supporters of CCS acknowledge costs will exceed current expenditures. 

• Invasion of privacy/student tracking: Jane Robbins, attorney and senior fellow at the American Principles Project, explains the creepy invasion of student privacy that will result from the adoption of CCS—an invasion aided and abetted by the Obama administration’s redefinition of terms in a federal student-privacy law: 

Both the 2009 Stimulus bill and the Race to the Top program required states to build massive student databases. It is recommended that these databases ultimately track over 400 data points, including health-care history, disciplinary history, etc. Any of this data that will be given to the Smarter Balanced consortium as part of the national test will be sent to the U.S. Department of Education. USED can then share the data with literally any entity it wants to—public or private—because of regulations it has issued gutting federal student-privacy law. 

Diane Ravitch explains the surreptitious way Obama’s Department of Education gutted this privacy law (Family Education Rights and Privacy Act):

In the past few years, the privacy protections built into federal law have been weakened by the U.S. Department of Education to allow third-parties to access confidential information about students.

…

In December 2011, the U.S. Department of Education changed the regulations governing the release of student data to the private sector, without Congressional authorization to do so. At that time, “the ED issued final regulations implementing its proposed amendments, despite the agency’s admission that “numerous commenters…stated that they believe the Department lacks the statutory authority to promulgate the proposed regulations contained in the NPRM.”…

[T]he proposed FERPA regulations reinterpreted FERPA statutory terms “authorized representative,” “education program,” and “directory information.” This reinterpretation gives non-governmental actors increased access to student personal data.”

…

This is the background for inBloom, the massive database of confidential student information funded by the Gates Foundation with $100 million, assembled by a subsidiary of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation, stored on a “cloud” by amazon.com.

Previously, “authorized representative” meant the parents or student once he or she turned 18. The spanking new “interpretation” includes school administrators as “authorized representatives” who have the right to release private student information to third parties. 

A Reuters report exposes who benefits from this indefensible violation of parental rights and student privacy:

[T]he most influential new product [at an educational technology conference] may be…a $100 million database built to chart the academic paths of public school students from kindergarten through high school….

[T]he database already holds files on millions of children identified by name, address and sometimes social security number. Learning disabilities are documented, test scores recorded, attendance noted. In some cases, the database tracks student hobbies, career goals, attitudes toward school—even homework completion.

Local education officials retain legal control over their students’ information. But federal law allows them to share files in their portion of the database with private companies selling educational products and services.

…

The database is a joint project of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which provided most of the funding, the Carnegie Corporation of New York and school officials from several states. Amplify Education, a division of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp built the infrastructure over the past 18 months. When it was ready, the Gates Foundation turned the database over to a newly created nonprofit, inBloom Inc, which will run it.

States and school districts can choose whether they want to input their student records into the system; the service is free for now, though inBloom officials say they will likely start to charge fees in 2015. So far, seven states – Colorado, Delaware, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, North Carolina, and Massachusetts – have committed to enter data from select school districts. Louisiana and New York will be entering nearly all student records statewide.

Federal officials say the database project complies with privacy laws. Schools do not need parental consent to share student records with any “school official” who has a “legitimate educational interest,” according to the Department of Education. The department defines “school official” to include private companies hired by the school, so long as they use the data only for the purposes spelled out in their contracts.

The database also gives school administrators full control over student files.

No matter what the good intentions of the Gates’ or other cultural movers and shakers are, this is tantamount to an end run around the limits placed on the federal government’s ravenous appetite for power and the people’s money. The critical ends of improving low-performing schools do not justify the means of nationalizing public education and robbing high-performing schools of their freedom to control their standards and corresponding curricula and assessments. Moreover, there is no research-based evidence proving that the expensive implementation of Common Core Standards will even achieve the goal of improving low-performing schools.

The left exploits the human tendency to focus on the immediate. It takes time and effort to think through the logical outworking of ideas and the likely  systemic changes that will follow the implementation of ideas like the adoption of CCS.  Dazzle Americans with shiny gewgaws dangled right in front of them, blinding them to the cliff a mile ahead. And just for good measure, slap a dollop of ridicule on critics to keep anyone from listening to them.

The truth is that the United States cannot afford yet another huge expansion of the parasitic, bloated federal behemoth that feeds on Americans. 

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The Left, energized by feckless Republicans wheedling conservatives to set aside those pesky social issues, is poised to make a run at marriage again this week in Springfield. It’s time to retrieve our creaky spines from storage and return them to their proper places, holding our gelatinous bodies upright. We must exceed the fervor and tenacity of those who seek to pervert marriage and rob children of their birthrights. Don’t allow homosexual demagogues and bullies cow you into submission through lies and name-calling. Stand for truth and children’s rights even if doing so is costly.

Republican State Representative Ed Sullivan from Mundelein just announced his support for same-sex “marriage,” presumptuously explaining   that “because my mother-in-law is gay, I have more of an understanding and familiarity with same-sex couples.” Clearly, however, he has virtually no understanding of what marriage by nature is or why the government is involved.

Sunday morning on Fox 32 Sunday, House Minority Leader Tom Cross said “I think you’re going to see 3 or 4 Republicans…probably be supporting [same-sex ‘marriage’].

Chicago Tribune columnist Eric Zorn fulminating against conservatives again reveals the Left’s profound ignorance of marriage and the reason for the government’s involvement in marriage. He exposes his ignorance through his baseless comparison of homosexuality to race and his equally foolish assertion that “opponents [of legalized same-sex ‘marriage’]…rage incoherently about tradition, biology and scriptural condemnation of sodomy.” (It’s curious that Zorn dismisses biology without even an attempt at defending his dismissal. Why are reasons emerging from biology, that is to say, hard science, less legitimate than reasons emerging from the ever-fluid world of social science that the Left relies on even when it’s bad social science?)

Zorn, and other “progressives” would be well-served by studying the important book What is Marriage? Man and Woman: A Defense by Ryan T. Anderson, Sherif Girgis, and Princeton Law Professor Robert George. It may surprise the self-righteous Zorn to learn that they don’t rage, their arguments are non-religious, and they’re coherent.

If Zorn wants to talk about incoherence, he needs to look no further than President Obama who every year issues Mother’s Day and Father’s Day proclamations that affirm the essential roles that mothers and fathers play in the lives of their children, and then endorses a form of “marriage” which says, in effect, that mothers or fathers are expendable. Now that’s incoherent—and pernicious.

Zorn prophesies that “40 years from now, opposition to gay marriage will be an embarrassing relic of our Puritan past” and that those who yet believe marriage is inherently sexually complementary will be a “hateful and fundamentally irrelevant minority.”

Is homosexual marriage analogous to interracial marriage?

The basis for his ugly prophecy is his comparison of homosexual “marriage” to interracial marriage, which is based on the baseless comparison of homosexuality to race. Race is, of course, a lousy analogue for homosexuality. Race is 100% heritable, in all cases immutable, and has no inherent connection to subjective feelings, desires, or volitional acts. Homosexuality, in contrast, is not 100% heritable, is in some cases fluid, and is constituted centrally by subjective feelings, sexual desire, and volitional sexual acts.

Here are some differences that the Left refuses to acknowledge:

• Bans on interracial marriage were wrong because they introduced a criterion wholly irrelevant to the nature and purpose of marriage, which is a sexually complementary relationship naturally ordered to reproduction and childrearing.
• Bans on interracial marriage were wrong because they were based on a flawed understanding of human nature. The erroneous assumption was that white men and black men were by nature different. Bans on homosexual marriage are based on the true belief that men and women are fundamentally different—a fact that homosexual men and women openly acknowledge.
• Bans on interracial marriage were wrong because they discriminated based solely on who someone was, whereas bans on homosexual “marriage” make distinctions among behaviors—which all laws do. A black man who wants to marry a white woman is seeking to do the same action that a white man who wants to marry a white woman seeks to do. A law that prohibits an interracial marriage is wrong because it is based on who the person is, not on what he seeks to do. But, if a man wants to marry a man, he is seeking to do an entirely different action from that which a man who wants to marry a woman seeks to do. A law that prohibits homosexual marriage is legitimate because it is based not on who the person is but rather on what he seeks to do.

What is marriage and why is the government involved? Some non-religious reasons

Zorn, like his fellow dogmatists, simply declaims that marriage constitutes “legally formalizing the love and commitment of same-sex couples.” That’s a contention—not an argument. And it’s a revolutionary idea. The government has no vested interest in “formalizing” love. The government couldn’t care less if those seeking to marry love each other.

The Left argues that marriage has no inherent connection to sexual complementarity or reproductive potential and that it’s just about who loves whom. If that’s the case, then why the magic number two?

What our presumptuous “progressives” don’t discuss is the inconvenient truth that children have an inherent, inalienable right to know and be raised whenever possible by their biological mother and father—a right of which they are illegitimately denied when society formally severs marriage from sexual complementarity and reproductive potential.

Marriage is the union of one man and one woman, which is the type of relationship that naturally results in children. The government doesn’t compel reproduction or ascertain fertility. It merely recognizes and regulates the type of relationship from which children naturally ensue.

And what are the essential elements for the procreation of children? You need one man and one woman in a sexual union. This is the only reason the binary criterion of legal marriage makes sense. There are two sexes. When two people, one from each sex, come together in a sexual union, children may and often do result. Sever marriage from any inherent connection to reproductive potential and the binary requirement becomes irrational.

Eliminate sexual complementarity from the legal definition of marriage and eliminate reproductive potential from our understanding of marriage, substituting love as the central constituent feature, and not only does the prohibition of plural marriage become irrational but so too does the prohibition of incestuous marriage.

The government is involved in marriage to protect the developmental needs and inherent rights of children—which ultimately also serve the future health of any civilization. The Left in transmogrifying marriage into a virtually unrecognizable shape is changing the central focus of marriage from the needs and rights of children to the desires of adults. As the French who oppose the legalization of same-sex “marriage” (and that includes atheists and homosexuals) say, the rights of children trump the rights to children, who are being objectified and commodified as they’re bought and sold to homosexual couples that are by design sterile.

Please don’t allow battle fatigue to get the better of you. Religious liberty, speech rights, parental rights, and, most important, the rights and needs of children are at stake.

Take ACTION: Please take a few minutes to email or a fax to your state representative — it is time to speak up now!  Click HERE to contact your Illinois Representative and tell him/her to oppose the effort to redefine marriage!  Even if you have previously contacted your representative, please do so again. Tell your representative in no uncertain terms that you want him or her to oppose same-sex “marriage.” 

Please take a few minutes to also call him/her through the Capitol switchboard at (217) 782-2000.

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I had other plans for today until I read the Chicago Tribune editorial that ebulliently celebrates the rejection in four states of the central defining feature of marriage—sexual complementarity.

In a display of astonishing hubris, the Trib editorial board has prognosticated—without evidence, I might add—that “letting same-sex couples marry does no harm to the civil institution of marriage, but promotes family stability, rewards loving commitment, and safeguards the interest of children” (Apparently in the Trib’s view, the interests of children don’t include having a mother and a father).

Further, the Trib asserts that the “public understands” all this. The Tribune editorial board arrogantly and paternalistically claims to know that the entire American public believes what the editorial board believes about “same-sex marriage.”

And how do they know what the “public understands”? They claim to know that the entire American public agrees with them on the nature and impact of “same-sex marriage” based on the narrow passage of “same-sex marriage” initiatives in four solidly Democratic states.

A larger lens may provide a corrective to the Trib’s perspective. Maine passed the same-sex marriage initiative by 53 percent and Maryland and Washington by 52  percent. In Minnesota, 51  percent of the voters opposed a constitutional amendment defining marriage as one man and one woman. What is interesting is that more voters voted against same-sex marriage than voted for Mitt Romney.

While 41  percent of Maine voters voted for Romney, 48  percent voted against same-sex marriage. In Maryland only 37  percent of voters voted for Romney, while 48  percent voted against same-sex marriage. In Washington 43  percent voted for Romney, while 48  percent voted against same-sex marriage. And in Minnesota, 45  percent voted for Romney, while 48  percent voted against same-sex marriage.

Two recent articles detail the strategies and stratagems used successfully by homosexual activists in Maine  and Minnesota:

• They secured much more funding than opponents of “same-sex marriage” did.
• They had a passionate and tenacious army of foot soldiers.
• They had significantly more support from young people.
• They have switched from intellectual arguments about “equality” and “discrimination” to demagogic appeals to emotion. They focus on feelings and “narrative,” which work in an increasingly non-rational culture (read Neil Postman’s influential book, Amusing Ourselves to Death).

In these four deep blue states, “same-sex marriage” won by slim margins, but the greater support for real marriage than for Romney raises two questions: Is the decision by many Republicans to avoid the social issues a winning strategy? And are there Republicans who simply didn’t vote because they rightly perceived that Romney is not a reliable and committed supporter of the entire Republican platform? During post-election coverage, Stephen Hayes, senior writer for the Weekly Standard, suggested that perhaps Romney’s loss indicates that he didn’t offer a sufficiently different choice to Republican voters.

This is the larger election context, but there’s a larger cultural context still, and that bodes ill for real marriage.

“Progressives” like to promote the deceit that the increasing support for “same-sex marriage” represents the natural, organic evolutionary progress of society from a state of ignorant bias to a state of enlightenment. In so doing, they fail to discuss the fact that academia, the entertainment industry, and the mainstream media have been held fast in the iron ideological grip of intolerant “progressives” for almost half a century. Combine that with the deafening silence of most conservative churches on the issue of homosexuality and surprise, surprise, Americans, particularly young Americans, are adopting “progressive” views on all things homosexual. I would argue that even many conservative adults don’t know how to respond to the specious secular arguments used to normalize homosexuality. And they’re evidently not sufficiently motivated to become informed or involved.

The truth is that the Left cares far more deeply about the destruction of marriage than the Right does about preserving it. We tolerate the intolerable with unjustifiable equanimity. We tolerate censorship in public schools. We tolerate the presentation of false and evil ideas as objective truths to little children in the schools we subsidize. And we tolerate the destruction of marriage.

Democrats and “moderate” Republicans are eager to say that social conservatives are to blame for the election losses. They may be right that conservatives are the proximate cause, in that conservatives didn’t vote in sufficient numbers to elect Republicans (or preserve marriage in four blue states). But perhaps the ultimate reasons for Republican losses were either that the candidates didn’t espouse conservative values (like Robert Dold), or that those candidates who espoused conservative values were flawed in other ways (like Joe Walsh, who is intemperate and often uncivil).

Conservatives cannot be naïve about political strategy, but we must not sacrifice truth on essential issues like marriage and life to the protean theories of political expediency pronounced with certainty by the strategist ‘o’ the day. We must “major in the majors.” Marriage and life are among the non-negotiables that must be defended with confidence, conviction, and intelligence.

There’s much talk about the soul-searching that the Republican Party will be doing in the upcoming months. If it’s going to search for its soul, I would suggest looking for it where they lost it: on the road paved with capitulation leading to the altar of political victory at any cost. 

Last Wednesday, also known as Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day, was a very encouraging day for anyone who values the First Amendment and who believes that government doesn’t create marriage and ought not try to deconstruct it.

Americans turned out in droves to demonstrate their support for free speech, religious liberty, and true marriage. They showed their support by patronizing Chick-fil-A, waiting patiently for hours to demonstrate with their time and their money that First Amendment rights and marriage matter.

For those who have been vacationing in some Internet-free wilderness, Chick-fil-A’s president and COO Dan Cathy has been vilified for stating in an interview with a Christian organization that he believes marriage is the union of one man and one woman and for donating money to organizations that are trying to maintain the legal definition as such.

Pandering Politicians and “Diversity”

The mayors of Chicago, Boston, and Washington D.C. as well as Chicago Alderman Proco “Joe” Moreno and New York City Council speaker, lesbian Christine Quinn, in effect, told the entire nation that conservatives are unwelcome in their cities. In so doing, they revealed a willingness to abuse power and an embarrassing degree of constitutional ignorance.

Quinn wrote this in a letter to the president of New York University:

NYC is a place where we celebrate diversity….We revel in the diversity of all our citizens and their families….Let me be clear—I do not want establishments in my city that hold such discriminatory views. We are a city that believes our diversity is our greatest strength and we will fight anyone and anything that runs counter to that….As such I urge you to sever your relationship with the Chick-fil-A establishment that exists on your campus. (emphasis added; irony Quinn’s)

How do progressives demonstrate tolerance and revel in diversity? They ostracize anyone who does not think exactly as they do. Here are some of the men and women who, according to these elected leaders, would be unwelcome in their cities: Jesus Christ; every Old and New Testament writer; virtually every biblical scholar in the history of Christendom until the late 20^th Century; the pagan writers Juvenal and Horace; all faithful Catholics and Southern Baptists; all faithful members of the Eastern Orthodox Church; all faithful members of the Anglican Church of North America; all faithful members of the Presbyterian Church of America, Orthodox Presbyterian and Reformed Presbyterian churches; all Orthodox Jews; all Muslims; the 3,700-member Coalition of African-American Pastors; and, of course, Barack Obama (between the years 2004 and mid-2012 when he opposed “same-sex marriage”).

The good news is that outside the irrational, hypocritical, bullying world of homosexual activism, these five received widespread condemnation even by progressive pundits and the ACLU.

The Strange Theology of Alderman Moreno

Cardinal Francis George responded  to Rahm Emanuel’s claim that support for true marriage is inconsistent with Chicago values (which may be true, if Emanuel is using “Chicago” as a presumptuous synecdoche for himself).  Christians, both Catholic and Protestants, have been encouraged by his unequivocal words, a portion of which are quoted here:

Recent comments by those who administer our city seem to assume that the city government can decide for everyone what are the “values” that must be held by citizens of Chicago. I was born and raised here, and my understanding of being a Chicagoan never included submitting my value system to the government for approval…. The State’s attempting to redefine marriage has become a defining moment not for marriage, which is what it is, but for our increasingly fragile “civil union” as citizens.

The Chicago Tribune reports that Alderman Moreno had this to say about Cardinal George and the Bible: 

“It’s unfortunate that the cardinal, as often happens, picks parts of the Bible and not other parts,’ said Moreno, who added that he was raised Catholic in western Illinois, attended a Catholic grade school and was an altar boy. Moreno said he now occasionally attends church.

“The Bible says many things,” Moreno said. “For the cardinal to say that Jesus believes in this, and therefore we all must believe in this, I think is just disingenuous and irresponsible. The God I believe in is one about equal rights, and to not give equal rights to those that want to marry, is in my opinion un-Christian.”

Four thoughts: 

• I’m not Catholic, but I assume that cardinals have read and studied the Bible more thoroughly than have altar boys and occasional church attendees. 
• Generally speaking, it is not cardinals and other theologically orthodox religious leaders who pick and choose those parts of Scripture that suit their fancy. It’s theological heterodox religious leaders, atheists, and homosexual activists who cherry-pick and decontextualize Scripture. 
• Clearly, a man who thinks it’s “irresponsible” to suggest that Christians must believe what Christ believes understands virtually nothing about Christ’s Lordship or the nature of God. 
• I wonder if Moreno will catch any flak from progressives for violating the separation of church and state by using his Christian beliefs about “equal rights” to shape public policy? 

The Look of Love

Pandering politicians like mayors Rahm Emanuel, Tom Menino, and Vincent Gray have a greater commitment to currying favor with homosexual activists, who have become increasingly brazen in part because of conservative cowardice, than they do to protecting constitutional rights.

The behemoth of homosexual activism has grown by gorging on political and judicial power, academia, the mainstream press, the entertainment industry, and the arts. Now it stands slavering over the church and marriage. It licks its chops while waiting for these last delectable morsels of civilized life to be handed to them on a silver platter by an obsequious public afraid of confrontation and persecution. Yum, yum, eat ‘em up. 

And they’re no fools. They gussy themselves up in Sunday-go-to-meetin’ finery, deceiving America—especially America’s gullible youth—with the language of love and “social justice,” keeping their gimlet eyes affixed on images that appeal and beguile. Homosexual activists keep Americans from the hard intellectual work of critically analyzing their flawed presuppositions, propositions, and analogies:

• They want to keep Americans from thinking deeply about whether marriage is a private institution concerned only with the romantic and sexual feelings of adults.
• They want to keep them from thinking about whether marriage is really an infinitely malleable social construct or whether it has an intrinsic nature.
• They want to keep them from wondering why, if marriage has no intrinsic connection to sexual complementarity or procreative potential, we limit it to two people.
• They want to keep them from asking whether prohibiting polyamorists from marrying the persons they love constitutes hatred, discrimination, and intolerance.
• They want to keep Americans from demanding evidence for the claim that homosexuality is by nature like race.
• And they definitely want to keep them from asking whether children have any inherent rights to be raised whenever possible by their biological parents. Homosexual activists don’t want Americans to ask whether the desires of couples who are sterile by design supersede the rights of children.

Public Controversies and Good Business Practices

Throughout the Chick-fil-A imbroglio, a number of commentators have said that although Dan Cathy has a right to express his views and donate his money to whatever cause he wants, getting involved in controversial social issues is just bad business practice. It’s curious that I have never heard those same pundits fret about the “bad business practices” of Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon who just donated $2.5 million to defend same-sex marriage in Washington State; Disney; General Mills; Home Depot; JC Penney; Marriott; Microsoft; Nabisco; Office Depot; Starbucks; or Target, all of which have very publicly taken sides on the controversial issue of homosexuality.

The Firing of CFO Adam Smith

Adam Smith, the CFO and treasurer of a medical device manufacturing company in Tucson, Arizona, and a lecturer at the University of Arizona, visited a Chick-fil-A on Wednesday, recorded his conversation with the young woman who waited on him, and then posted his recording on YouTube. He is now the former CFO and treasurer of the medical supply company, Vante.

Some are arguing that he shouldn’t have been fired and that conservatives are hypocritical for not supporting his right to express his views. That line of thinking seems flawed. Adam Smith’s problematic behavior was not the expression of his political or religious views. The problems were, first, he publicly impugned the character of a young woman whom he did not know, saying to her, “I don’t know how you live with yourself and continue to work here.”

Second, he continued to record her even after she told him that she was uncomfortable with him recording her.

And finally, he posted this recording, presumably without her permission, online. If this remarkably poised and respectful young woman is under 18, Smith’s actions may not have been merely rude and inconsiderate, they may have been illegal.

The lack of respect for the feelings of this young woman and his lack of judgment in posting his video are more than sufficient justification for his firing.

Final words

Some claim that this incident was “really just about the First Amendment.” It wasn’t. It was equally about the truth of marriage. It was equally about whether marriage has an objective status and whether our government should recognize, promote, and regulate it—or whether it should be deconstructed to accommodate the desires of a small group of people with specious arguments, abusive voices, political power, and deep pockets.

Let’s hope Americans will not slip back into inertia, acquiescence, and cowardice. As Michael Medved said, Wednesday was inspiring.

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I’m reluctant to beat a dead horse, but in light of a comment made by the pastor of Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church and an editorial in the liberal National Catholic Reporter (NCR), a bit more needs to be said about the “gay pride” parade brouhaha.

1.   In addition to the cowardice of conservatives, it is the failures of religious leaders that have helped create the cultural mess we’re in right now. NCR recently wrote favorably about this portion of a statement issued by Our Lady of Mount Carmel’s pastor, Fr. Thomas Srenn:

The annual Pride Parade is one of the hallmarks that make Lakeview unique and we in no way wish to diminish its place in the community.

This should be a deeply troubling comment coming from any Christian leader, whether Catholic or Protestant. The word “hallmark” means either “a mark indicating quality or excellence” or “a conspicuous feature.” Perhaps Fr. Srenn is a skillful rhetorician and was deliberately playing on that ambiguity. Perhaps he thinks the parade is a conspicuous and obnoxious Lakeview feature but hopes that others will assume he finds it an excellent Lakeview feature.

But, viewed in light of the second half of his statement, that is to say, his wish that the parade’s “place in the community” not be diminished, it seems more likely that he looks on the parade positively.

Such a view would be at minimum an odd notion coming from a Catholic priest, presumably well-schooled in theology. How can a Catholic priest view positively a parade that celebrates that which the Catholic Church views as profoundly sinful? I wonder too if he would be willing to invite children to attend this hallmark of the unique Lakeview community.

2.   NCR opines that Cardinal George’s analogy is a “nonsensical historical comparison.” I’ve already argued ad nauseum that there are valid and obvious points of correspondence between the KKK and the “gay liberation” movement (i.e., hatred of the Catholic Church, vitriolic rhetoric directed at the Catholic Church, and offensive parades). But now NCR raises another issue. If NCR editorial board is so incensed by nonsensical historical analogies, perhaps they could write an indignant editorial about the nonsensical comparison of race to homosexuality, or the nonsensical comparison of the civil rights movement to the “gay liberation” movement, or the nonsensical comparison of anti-miscegenation laws to laws that prohibit same-sex marriage.

Come to think of it, why hasn’t there been an editorial in the Chicago Tribune arguing that the comparison of race to homosexuality is bizarre?

3.   I can’t conceive of a group in America today that holds the Catholic Church in as much contempt as the movement to normalize homosexuality (i.e., the “gay liberation” movement). Fifty years ago, who could have imagined that homosexual activists would become the oppressors of religious freedom? Not some, but many homosexuals detest the Catholic Church because of its theological position on volitional homosexual acts — a theological position that survived the Reformation and is, therefore, the same theological position of many Protestant churches. In fact, there was no theologian prior to the late 20th Century who affirmed volitional homosexual acts as moral acts.

4.   NCR also drew attention to one of the central stratagems of homosexual activists: ad hominem attacks. NCR described Cardinal Francis George’s analogy as “embarrassingly imprudent.”

Conservatives, like all other humans, are ridicule-averse. Ridicule conservatives. Call them homophobes, bullies, haters, and bigots. Call them old-fashioned and out-of-step with the times. Suggest that Lady Gaga would find them totally uncool, and you win the debate through the cowardly forfeit of conservatives.

5.   I would not have used the analogy Cardinal George used, but not because it lacks soundness. I wouldn’t have used it because the emotion it generates within the perpetually petulant world of homosexual activists creates such a gaseous environment, it clouds even what passes for discourse today.

The reality is any comparison of homosexuality to any behavior of which society still has permission to disapprove will generate bilious howls of outrage and nastiness from homosexual activists. The closest analogue to homosexuality is not race or skin color. The closest analogue is polyamory or adult consensual incest. Try using those, especially the latter, and witness the torrent of non-rational, ad hominem-infused, fire-breathing that ensues from homosexual activists.

Today, Monday, December 19, 2011, the Chicago Tribune included not one, but three articles (click HERE,HERE, and HERE) on “transgenderism” by Rex Huppke, their designated proselyte for “progressive” views of homosexuality and Gender Identity Disorder (GID). (In the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the American Psychiatric Association uses the term Gender Identity Disorder to designate the phenomenon that Huppke refers to as “transgender issues.”)

In response to these articles, I sent this brief letter to Mr. Huppke and to the Tribune editorial board:

Dear Mr. Huppke,

Once again, you’ve written an editorial masquerading as a news story. Your lengthy article (or three articles) on “transgender” issues includes one mention of American Family Association’s dissenting views on Gender Identity Disorder and one quote from Focus on the Family’s position statement on Gender Identity Disorder.

Apparently, you didn’t solicit any comments from either public policy organizations or mental health professionals who hold different views on the nature of Gender Identity Disorder, the morality of cross-dressing, or the ethics of “sex reassignment” surgery. The absence of any substantive exposition of dissenting views is particularly notable in light of two articles written by psychiatrist Dr. Keith Ablow that lit up the blogosphere, particularly among those who identify as homosexual and transgender. (Read Dr. Ablow’s articles HERE and HERE.)

It would have been illuminating to interview some theologians and philosophers on the nature of reality. For example, is “reality” merely a construct of our minds or our subjective feelings, or does an objective reality exist?

Another interesting question concerns allowing people to change their birth certificates: Does such an act make the state complicit in fraud?

Or, what evidence do you have for your clear implication that “discrimination” is the cause of the the increased risk of suicidal ideation among those who experience Gender Identity Disorder. And what do you mean when you use the word “discrimination”? Do all expressions of moral disapproval of behavior constitute illegitimate “discrimination” or just those with which you disagree?

But alas, it’s abundantly clear that your mission is not to report or discuss, but to exploit your position as a journalist to write an extended apologetic for your personal moral, philosophical, and political views, painted over with a rhetorical patina of neutrality.

What is equally troubling is that your bosses find this acceptable.

Sincerely,

Laurie Higgins
IFI Cultural Analyst

Take ACTION: Chicago Tribune reporter Rex Huppke continues to write pro-homosexual opinion pieces, presenting them as “new” articles.

Send email complaints to the Tribune editorial board about Mr. Huppke’s lack of balance and failure to present views from mental health professionals who hold different views on the nature of Gender Identity Disorder, the morality of cross-dressing, or the ethics of “sex reassignment” surgery.

Illinois Family Institute
P.O. Box 88848
Carol Stream, Illinois 60188

Phone: (708) 781-9328
Fax: (708) 781-9376

Evil men don’t understand the importance of justice,
but those who follow the Lord are much concerned about it.
~Proverbs 28:5

On Tuesday, John Keilman wrote a lighthearted editorial on last week’s annual dishonest campaign by the American Library Association (ALA) laughably named “Banned Books Week.”

His personal story was revelatory. Keilman shared that when he was young, pulp novels with “absolutely no redeeming value” beckoned with an irresistible force. He describes what so powerfully attracted him: their “lurid” titles and the cover art which depicted the hero with “his arm around a busty woman, blasting a hole through some underworld stooge.”

But then after explicitly stating the sexual and violent language and imagery that served as “catnip to a preteen” boy, he almost-deftly switches his argument.

After describing the features that actually appealed to him, he then spends the rest of the article suggesting that what motivated him to sneakily read these novels was parental disapproval. From that strained but common argument he posits, perhaps disingenuously, that since kids are attracted to books that parents prohibit, if we just prohibit good books, kids will be attracted to them. Yes, Keilman believes that all parents need do is furrow their censorious brows at Moby Dick and before they know it, little Betty will be hidden under her covers with a flashlight reading about Ahab’s battle with the great fish.

Here are some of the issues surrounding “Banned Books Week” that Keilman ignored:

• Most parents are not requesting that a book be banned. Most parents are requesting one of three things: 1. that a book be moved to an adult section of the library, 2. that a library not use its limited resources to purchase a particular book, or 3. that a publicly funded school not select a particular book to be taught.Parents are not requesting that publishing companies be prohibited from publishing particular book titles, that parents be prohibited from purchasing them, or that Amazon stop selling them.
• Books that are never purchased can’t be “banned.” So, for example, when school and community libraries refuse to purchase or request books that espouse conservative assumptions about the nature and morality of homosexuality, there’s no opportunity for “progressives” to “ban” books. Their censorship is achieved prior to the purchase of books; it’s far more comprehensive; and it’s much more cunning in that librarians have created the de facto censorship protocol, euphemistically named “Collection Development Policies” (CDPs), that effectively bans books they don’t like (i.e., conservative books) with nary a controversial word messily spilling out into the public square. If CDPs resulted in no books being purchased that espouse liberal assumptions about homosexuality, you can bet your bottom dollar that ALA members and diversity devotees everywhere would throw a wobbly even Rumpelstiltskin would admire.

Here’s an interesting exercise for Mr. Keilman and anyone who cares about both intellectual diversity and how their taxes are spent: Search your local high school’s or community’s library catalogue from the comfort of your home using the search terms “sexual orientation,” “lesbian,” “gay,” and “homosexuality.” Count up how many resources espouse liberal assumptions about the nature and morality of homosexuality (scores and scores) versus how many affirm conservative assumptions (close to nil).

Then try to get your library to fill the gaping hole in its book collection by ordering some of these:

• A Queer Thing Happened to America by Michael L. Brown
• Divorcing Marriage edited by Daniel Cere and Douglas Farrow
• The Gay Gospel by Joe Dallas
• The Bible and Homosexual Practice by Robert A.J. Gagnon
• The Meaning of Marriage: Family, State, Market, & Morals ed. by Robert P. George and Jean Bethke Elshtain
• Light in the Closet by Arthur Goldberg
• Ex-Gays?: A Longitudinal Study of Religiously Mediated Change in Sexual Orientation by Stanton L. Jones and Mark A. Yarhouse
• The Marketing of Evil by David Kupelian
• Homosexuality and the Politics of Truth by Jeffrey Satinover, M.D.
• Outrage: How Gay Activists and Liberal Judges are Trashing Democracy to Redefine Marriage by Peter Sprigg
• Marriage on Trial: The Case Against Same-Sex Marriage and Parenting by Glenn T. Stanton and Dr. Bill Maier
• The Homosexual Agenda: Exposing the Principal Threat to Religious Freedom Today by Alan Sears and Craig Osten
• Same-Sex Marriage: Putting Every Household at Risk by Matthew D. Staver
• Out from Under by Dawn Stefanowicz
• Correct, Not Politically Correct: How Same-Sex Marriage Hurts Everyone by Frank Turek
• Homosexuality and American Public Life edited by Christopher Wolfe
• Same-Sex Matters: The Challenge of Homosexuality edited by Christopher Wolfe
• Out of a Far Country by Christopher Yuan

If your library refuses to order any of these books citing Collection Development Policies as their reason, remind them of these words from the former head of the ALA’s Office of Intellectual Freedom, Judith Krug:

We have to serve the information needs of all the community and for so long “the community” that we served was the visible community…. And so, if we didn’t see those people, then we didn’t have to include them in our service arena. The truth is, we do have to.

…

We never served the gay community. Now, we didn’t serve the gay community because there weren’t materials to serve them. You can’t buy materials if they’re not there. But part of our responsibility is to identify what we need and then to begin to ask for it. Another thing we have to be real careful about is that even though the materials that come out initially aren’t wonderful, it’s still incumbent upon us to have that voice represented in the collection. This was exactly what happened in the early days of the women’s movement, and as the black community became more visible and began to demand more materials that fulfilled their particular information needs. We can’t sit back and say, “Well, they’re not the high-quality materials I’m used to buying.” They’re probably not, but if they are the only thing available, then I believe we have to get them into the library. [emphasis added]

According to Krug, intellectual diversity is of such paramount importance that it trumps even quality of material. And if resources are scarce, Krug believes it is the obligation of librarians to ask for them.

In remembering the books that so tantalized him as a boy, Keilman offered one other illuminating reflection: “If they never make the most-challenged list, it’s probably because no respectable school library would stock them in the first place.”

To read more on IFI’s response to “Banned Books Week” (and the Tribune), click HERE.

Rep. Lou Lang is drafting an amendment to a (shell) bill passed in the Senate, according to the Chicago Tribune. If the bill passes in the House, the bill would go back to the Senate for a vote, but no amendments will be added according to Rep. Lang.

The Chicago Sun-Times recently published an editorial supporting a casino in Chicago and slots at six racetracks. The new Mayor of Chicago, Rahm Emanuel, has expressed interest in a city-owned casino, and Governor Quinn is “open to discussing proposals” that raise revenue, create jobs and lead to greater investment in schools, as noted in the editorial.

Gambling interests promise more than they can deliver. The 10th casino license is scheduled to open in July, and promised to bring in about $9 million in revenue each year for the city of Des Plaines. The Daily Herald reported that based on the latest projections by a bipartisan state commission and the city’s own independent research, the city will only receive $2 million to $4 million — the cost of one fire truck!

The legislative session is scheduled to end on May 31. Legislators still have many issues to address. Gambling is an unstable source of revenue. Ramming a massive gambling expansion bill through in the final days of the session will not solve the revenue problems for Chicago or the State, and the cost, harm, and impact on communities are not even being considered.

Take ACTION: Click HERE to send your lawmakers an email or a fax to encourage them to oppose any bill to yet again expand gambling in the Land of Lincoln.

More Action:

1. Call your State Representative and Senator at             (217) 782-2000       and ask them to Vote NO on ALL gambling bills.

2. Call Governor Quinn at             (800) 642-3112       to ask him to OPPOSE a Chicago casino, slots at race tracks, and ALL gambling expansion.

3. Write a Letter to the Editor

4. Share this Alert with your faith community and PRAY.

5. Forward to 10 others.

In early November 2010, suburban St. Charles North High School became embroiled in a controversy during yet another public school event designed to affirm homosexuality.

In response to “Ally Week,” a pro-homosexual week sponsored by the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN), three students wore t-shirts that said “Straight Pride” on the front and had a verse from Leviticus on the back that read, “If a man lay with a male as those who lay with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination and shall surely be put to death.”

Administrators asked the students to cross out parts of the verse, but the next day when two students wore shirts that simply read “Straight Pride” with no Bible verse, administrators asked them to cover their shirts with sweatshirts because they deemed the phrase disruptive. Space does not permit a discussion of First Amendment speech rights, diversity, tolerance, fairness, or disruptiveness, all of which deserve a full discussion.

Instead, I want to respond to an editorial by homosexuality-affirming demagogue, Chicago Tribune columnist Eric Zorn, who wrote the following:

“Gay Pride” is an antidote to gay shame – the sense of alienation and otherness in adolescence that prompted writer Dan Savage to start the It Gets Better project to reduce the incidence of suicide among gay teens; kids who kill themselves in part because they’re treated unmercifully by the sorts of peers who would wear shirts to school consigning them to being murdered at the command of an angry God.

…the expression “Straight Pride” can only be read as a gratuitous and contemptuous response to the suggestion that gay people not be marginalized.

…Most of us long ago got our minds around the idea that “Black Power,” a slogan calling for dignity and opportunity for historically oppressed African Americans, is not the bland mirror image of “White Power,” a slogan employed by bigots clinging fearfully and often violently to the vestiges of Caucasian prerogative.

School administrators have not just the right but also the obligation to quell such hate speech within their walls.

Before responding to Zorn’s comments, I want to say that the verse from Leviticus was unnecessarily provocative. For a proper understanding, this verse requires context and theological exposition–two things in which liberal journalists seem little interested even as they pontificate on things theological.

Also, I hope readers will research the man to whom Zorn refers: Dan Savage is a homosexual writer and speaker who uses sophomoric, hateful, and obscene rhetoric to promote sexual perversion and denigrate Christians.

Zorn is wrong in asserting that “Straight Pride” can “only be read as a gratuitous and contemptuous response to the suggestion that gay people not be marginalized.”

Although “gay pride” may signify a proclamation against shame, it also implies that conservative views are wrong, hateful, and must be silenced. Zorn implicitly affirms this when he compares those who hold conservative moral beliefs about homosexuality to hateful, fearful, violent, bigoted oppressors. That’s a lot to impute to teens who wear “Straight Pride” t-shirts. And it’s a message they don’t need to hear from Mr. Zorn, because they likely hear it repeatedly at school.

“Straight pride” is not contemptuous of the message that homosexuals should not be marginalized. “Straight pride” rebels against the idea that only pro-homosexual messages have a right to be spoken in public schools. “Straight pride” conveys the idea that conservative moral beliefs are right, true, and entitled to a place in public discourse, including schools.

Adolescents don’t take kindly to authoritarianism or censorship, which is what many conservative teens rightly perceive in the endless implicit and explicit criticism of traditional moral beliefs in public schools. Again and again, conservative kids hear that their moral beliefs about behavior constitute hatred of persons and must be silenced. The phrase “Straight pride” is not a contemptuous message of hatred for persons who identify as homosexual; nor is it a threat. It is an act of non-conformity that conveys the message that conservative students have as much a right to express their moral beliefs as liberal students and teachers have to express theirs.

Teens can see what many taxpayers don’t want to see: activist ideologues inside and outside public schools are imposing their unproven political, moral, and philosophical beliefs on students.

And some teens have had enough.

If taxpayers would oppose this sustained and systemic propaganda, teens wouldn’t feel the need to.

Those who truly love children–parents, grandparents, public school teachers and administrators, church leaders, and legislators–should no longer tolerate government employees preaching homosexuality-affirming dogma in schools that their taxes subsidize.

In schools that purport to care about diversity, the free exchange of ideas, and critical thinking, students are entitled to study competing ideas about, for example, whether homosexuality is analogous to race; whether disapproval of homosexual acts constitutes hatred of persons; whether homosexuality is biologically determined; whether homosexuality is fixed; whether interracial marriage is analogous to homosexual marriage; and whether children have an intrinsic right to a mother and a father.

Don’t avoid discussions about homosexuality. Talk to your neighbors, friends, teachers, and church leaders. Write letters to your local press and elected legislators. Ask your pastors and priests to speak up in the communities in which they live. Ask them to teach adults and teens in your church how to think through the secular arguments used to normalize homosexuality. Don’t flee from persecution. Persevere for the sake of our children, our schools, our freedom, and truth.

Support IFI’s Division of School Advocacy!

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I can’t say I was surprised by Rex Huppke’s Dec. 1, 2010 front-page Chicago Tribune story on the passage of the “civil union” bill, but I was certainly disappointed by its lack of objectivity. His sources were exclusively pro-homosexual, and there was nary a word about opposition to this bill. He evidently didn’t solicit so much as a comment from anyone who finds this bill troubling.

Not only was there no discussion of the controversial nature of the bill or its potentially harmful implications, but there was also no mention of any strong arm tactics that may have been responsible for conservative lawmakers reversing their commitments to oppose the bill.

Huppke more than once introduced the hospital visit red herring, without once mentioning President Obama’sApril 15 executive order mandating that any hospital that receives Medicaid or Medicare funds allow hospital visits for same-sex partners.

And there was a curious discussion at the end of this article regarding the economic impact of this bill. Huppke quotes Brad Sears who claims that any increase in health care costs will be negligible “because the LGBT population is small and the same-sex couple population is even smaller.” And yet, this very small population of same sex couples will potentially save “tens of millions” of state dollars because once same-sex partners are joined in a civil union, their combined income may make them ineligible for social services.

Doesn’t it seem odd that due to its teeny tiny size this segment of the population will not noticeably increase health care costs, but this same teeny tiny group may potentially save social services tens of millions of dollars? I guess if the entirety of this teeny tiny group of same sex couples is on Medicaid, it could account for this huge savings.

On Dec. 3, Huppke’s next advertisement for civil unions appeared in the Trib.

Advocate Huppke gave one paragraph to homosexual activist Rick Garcia, three paragraphs to attorneyCamilla Taylor who works for the homosexual advocacy law firm Lambda Legal, three paragraphs to pro-homosexual law professor Andrew Koppelman, and only one to Catholic Conference director Robert Gilligan.

It was especially troubling that Huppke chose to showcase these ignorant and smug words from Koppelman in the concluding paragraph:

The big picture is that the people that think homosexual conduct is intrinsically immoral have been spectacularly unsuccessful at passing on their views to their children….I got news for you. You’re already on the slippery slope.

It would have been both fair and illuminating to solicit a response from a conservative scholar on the issue of the apparent increasing support among the nation’s youth for all things homosexual. Koppelman (and perhaps Huppke) is either deceitful or spectacularly ignorant of the reasons for such apparent increasing support.

Might the exploitation of public education have something to do with the transmogrification of children’s moral and political views? There is absolute censorship of all writing by conservative scholars in public schools even as students are exposed to essays, articles, plays, novels, films, speakers, and “enumerated” anti-bullying resources that espouse unproven, non-factual “progressive” beliefs about the nature and morality of homosexuality. Public school libraries carry anywhere from 50-150 resources that affirm “progressive” assumptions about homosexuality and 0 that affirm conservative views. Why doesn’t Huppke do a story on that astonishing manifestation of censorship–censorship that should trouble all educators, civil libertarians, and defenders of diversity?

I am on occasion interviewed by high school and college students. I have learned that many are spectacularly ignorant:

• They believe without evidence that homosexuality is ontologically equivalent to race. They and anyone else who employs arguments based on the flawed analogy between homosexuality and race should be asked to provide justifications for this analogy. For example, all public educators who use such an analogy should be required to explain the ways they believe homosexuality is like race and that they explain to students the weaknesses of and challenges to this analogy.
• They believe that laws prohibiting same-sex “marriage” are analogous to laws prohibiting interracial marriage. This reveals that they don’t understand the difference between homosexuality and race/skin color. They don’t understand that anti-miscegenation laws were based on the erroneous belief that black men and white men are ontologically different, whereas laws prohibiting same-sex marriage are based on the true belief that men and women are ontologically different. These young people also don’t understand that when a black man seeks to marry a white woman, he is seeking to do the same thing that a white man is doing, so the discrimination inherent in anti-miscegenation laws is discrimination based on race or skin color. In the case of same sex “marriage,” however, the discrimination is based on behavior, which is legitimate. In the case of same sex “marriage,” a man is seeking to marry a man, which is an utterly different act that a man marrying a woman. Laws prohibiting same-sex marriage are not discriminating between people based on immutable, morally neutral conditions; these laws make rational distinctions between behaviors or acts.
• They believe that marriage is solely a private relationship.
• They have no understanding of the reasons why the government is involved with marriage.
• They believe that disapproval of homosexual acts constitutes hatred of persons, and yet curiously they don’t apply that principle consistently. They don’t assert that their moral disapproval of particular beliefs or volitional acts constitutes hatred of persons.
• They believe that to demonstrate love, one has to affirm all beliefs and all behavioral choices of others, and yet they don’t apply that principle consistently. They believe that it’s possible for them to love those whose moral beliefs and behavioral choices they do not affirm.
• They have no idea that until the late 20th Century, there were no Catholic or Protestant theologians who embraced “gay” theology.
• They believe that homosexuals constitute 10% of the population (a long-discredited figure).
• They believe that science has proved that homosexuality is 100% heritable even though they can’t produce even one study to support that claim.
• They have no idea that “Queer Theory” argues that homosexuality is mutable and fluid.
• They have no understanding of church-state relations. They would be stunned to read what Martin Luther King Jr. said about law in “Letter From Birmingham Jail.” I’m often asked if my opposition to legalized same-sex marriage violates the Constitution. Because students have such a lousy understanding of the First Amendment, they have trouble answering this question: If someone attends a church that affirms homosexuality, should they be prohibited from imposing their religious beliefs in law through support for legalized same-sex marriage?

Perhaps their ignorance is facilitated by the failure of public schools to have students study the work of the best scholars on both sides of the debates surrounding homosexuality. Perhaps their ignorance is facilitated by biased reporting like that of Huppke. And perhaps their ignorance contributes to their adoption of myopic, specious Leftist assumptions.

Now factor in the entertainment and advertising industries that promote through language and images the same unproven Leftist assumptions. Finally, throw into this toxic mix the use of invective to scorn and humiliate anyone who dares to publicly assert the belief that homosexual acts are immoral, and even Koppelman might be able to understand why the younger generation appears to be embracing the ontological and moral views of the Left.

I have been called “c**t,” “b**ch,” and “a****le”–multiple times. I have been told that I’m a “f***ing idiot” who should die–multiple times. I was recently threatened with “schoolyard” violence. And the Southern Poverty Law Center has added IFI to their “hate groups” list. Might this kind of vitriolic bullying contribute to the transformation of the moral views of young people or at least to their silence?

Neither I nor anyone affiliated with IFI has ever advocated hatred or violence. In fact, we have advocated against both. We neither express hatred nor feel hatred, but that’s irrelevant to the contemporary promoters of diversity and tolerance. If anyone dares to express his conservative moral claims with as much boldness and conviction as “progressives” do theirs, he will be on the receiving end of shocking hostility, lies, and invective.

It might have served both the cause of journalistic integrity and enlightened discourse if Huppke had bothered to explore the propagandistic tools that are shaping the public debate on homosexuality.

I have a question for the powers-that-be at the Chicago Tribune: Do you believe that Rex Huppke is covering the homosexual issue in general and the civil unions issue in particular fairly and objectively?

Perhaps Mr. Huppke could be reassigned to the editorial page and leave reporting to someone with the professional integrity to write objectively.

On Sunday, June 27th, one of the largest “Gay” Pride Parades in the country took place in the city of Chicago. According to the Chicago Sun-Times, supposedly 450,000 people lined the streets in the city’s Lakeview neighborhood for the 41st annual parade. The Chicago Tribune in its hard news section wrote, “While maintaining its reputation as a lively, often flashy event, the parade has also come to reflect broader acceptance of gays and lesbians. Marching politicians were followed by dancers from gay nightclubs and floats filled with employees of major corporations.” See complete article HERE.

The Tribune comments were more appropriate as commentary because the failing newspaper suggests the homosexual lifestyle is receiving “broader acceptance” from the general public. In reality, homosexuality and the alternative lifestyle represented by those who participated in and supported the parade is not a demonstration of wider support by the American people.

The truth of the matter is, if the establishment media, including the Chicago Tribune, related all the facts concerning homosexuality’s impact on our culture, the public would look at this behavior from a perspective other than something seen through rose-colored glasses.

For example, one of the major issues facing Illinois in 2010 concerns the $13 billion budget shortfall. Homosexuality is a very unhealthy lifestyle which costs taxpayers literally hundreds of millions of dollars in added health care costs. Yet you would be hard-pressed to find a story in the mainstream media in any major metropolitan area and especially Chicago which provides information on how homosexuality is taxing our economic system in a time of deep recession.

Would such a story be appropriate in a discussion of the unhealthy alternative lifestyles represented in the “Gay” Pride Parades held across the nation? In contrast, the establishment press goes out of its way to give the impression those who practice homosexuality live a carefree life, filled with boundless joy and “gaiety”.

To illustrate my point, the homosexual characters in nearly every television series are portrayed as happy, well-adjusted individuals who have a true grasp of the meaning of life. In reality, the homosexual lifestyle is very painful for those who are caught up in it. Studies conducted by the Center for Disease Control say male same-sex partners often die early. Rampant infidelity among those who practice this type of decadence leads to a hollow existence, compounded by the moral judgments this group applies to themselves.

Both the Chicago Tribune and Chicago Sun-Times say the police estimate 450,000 people lined the parade route in support of gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transsexuals. However, many of those who looked upon the parade were there for prurient interest. Often the event features what a majority of Illinois residents would refer to as obscene behavior which is in clear violation of the city of Chicago’s obscenity and decency laws. The Chicago Police look the other way while parade participants and on-lookers perform simulated and actual sex acts in public and flaunt their nudity, all in the attempt to either titillate those along the parade route or draw the ire of innocent members of the public who are subjected to an x-rated display of the most vile and perverse behavior. And it is behavior. If every human being on the planet Earth suddenly became a homosexual, the human race would die out within a generation. In addition, there is evidence, as with any addictive behavior, individuals can and do overcome the curse of homosexuality, contrary to claims by gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transsexuals who assert they are “born that way”.

Holy Scripture tells us we are to love the sinner, but hate the sin and we are all sinners in God’s eyes. But if not for the precious gift of Christ’s salvation because of the blood He shed on the cross for the remission of sins, all of us, homosexual or not, would be without hope.

Many homosexuals claim their existence and purpose for living is more than simply a choice concerning how they have sex. Yet the image presented to the public by the establishment media and those who supported and participated in “Gay” Pride Parades–not only in Chicago, but across the country–sent a very different message. So, if it is not about the sex, what was the purpose for the parades? The clear message is that homosexuality is all about the sex. And it has to be. After all, it’s the “Gay” Pride Parade.

A blogger, called Red Blooded American, put it most succinctly when replying to a Chicago Sun-Times article by writing:

They certainly hurt themselves every time they dress up in @$$less chaps and a Speedo and scream to the top of their lungs “I’m no different from you”. If you want your lifestyle to be accepted as normal, then act normal. Until then, you will struggle with acceptance.

An excellent column was written by David Smith, Executive Director, Illinois Family Institute, prior to the parade. For complete article, click HERE.

Smith lists which politicians, corporations and media organizations supported the “Gay” Pride Parade by either marching or having a float in the parade or simply financially supporting the day’s activities. Those who support the pro-family agenda should take special note of this list. Are these politicians and groups representing all of us? Or do they have a politically correct agenda which is in stark contrast to the Judeo-Christian ethic which a vast majority of Americans still embrace?

The media is supposed to be a neutral observer, reporting on the facts. However, in recent decades, commentary has blended its way into the hard news sections of news entities which cross the lines of journalistic integrity. The media’s coverage of Chicago’s “Gay” Pride Parade, by some members of the press, was a perfect illustration of tainted journalism. Sadly, when this occurs, we are all losers.

Rex Huppke, who purports to be a reporter for the Chicago Tribune, but is, in reality, a mouthpiece for homosexual activism, has written yet another propaganda piece about homosexuality. Huppke wrote an article — not an opinion piece — but an article that doesn’t even attempt a pretense of objectivity.

In language dripping with bias, Huppke wrote about the plight of Americans who define their identity by their homosexual desires and behavior and who have non-American sexual partners. Huppke wrote a thinly disguised endorsement of U.S. Rep. Luis Gutierrez‘ disastrous immigration reform proposal which would allow “foreign-born partners of gay and lesbian Americans the same path to citizenship as heterosexual spouses.” It was an endorsement so thinly disguised it could be mistaken for a bare-naked, Hollywood-produced public service announcement.

Congressman Gutierrez — and evidently his PR accomplice Huppke — seeks to write into law the unproven, a-historical assumption that relationships defined by unnatural homosexual desire and immoral homosexual acts are morally equivalent to heterosexual relationships.

In a 747-word article, Huppke allotted a whopping 21 words to an acknowledgment that opposing views exist. This is the entirety of his commitment to presenting both sides:

Invariably the addition of language to benefit same-sex couples will rile some who oppose extending marriage rights to gays and lesbians.

Here are some additional telling stats from the impartial, unbiased reporter Rex Huppke:

• Number of quotes from Gutierrez: 4
• Number of quotes from supervising attorney for the National Asylum Partnership on Sexual Minorities at the National Immigrant Justice Center in Chicago (yes, apparently, such a center exists): 2
• Number of quotes from homosexuals who have foreign-born partners: 3
• Number of quotes from opponents of Gutierrez’ proposal: 0

It’s not merely the inclusion of quotes from only supporters of the proposal that is problematic; it’s also the soap opera-esque content that is troubling.

Huppke quoted Gutierrez who said that “The underlying part of any comprehensive immigration bill is family unity.” This language manipulates Americans’ deep respect for family and family unity while ignoring the disturbing embedded assumption that two homosexual men constitute a “family” that per se deserves respect.

Huppke then quoted a homosexual Episcopal priest who frets about the possibility of his homosexual paramour being deported:

You can’t imagine the stress we live under daily…To wake up every morning and think this could be the day that we no longer have the resources or support to be together.

And then Huppke delivered his coup de grace in a concluding tear-jerking anecdote. Have your hankies at the ready:

For Josh Lampinen, a 30-year-old Chicago Web designer, a change in the law couldn’t come soon enough. His fiance, Jerome Lienard, lives in France, and the couple are struggling to find a way to be together.

…

Lampinen said the distance between them is always a strain, particularly in times of crisis. A year and a half ago, Lampinen’s grandmother died, and Lienard couldn’t be by his side.

“That’s when you want your partner there,” Lampinen said. “And he wasn’t. It just wasn’t possible. It’s instances like that that just make it evident how unfair this situation is.”

Unfortunately, in an increasingly non-rational, non-thinking culture, appeals to such tales of woe carry persuasive power. It is these kinds of “narratives” that are shaping the views of even conservative Christians, particularly younger Christians who are not being taught to think critically. As Thomas Sowell, African American Senior Fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institution, writes:

The problem isn’t that Johnny can’t read. The problem isn’t even that Johnny can’t think. The problem is that Johnny doesn’t know what thinking is; he confuses it with feeling.

Huppke reported that Gutierrez met with “LGBT community leaders at noon on Monday at the [homosexual] Center on Halsted” where he was joined in his confab by U.S. Rep. Mike Quigley (D-IL) and openly homosexual Rep. Jared Polis (D-CO).

Some concluding and random thoughts:

• Appeals to emotion are not reasons.
• The presence of sad feelings tells us precisely nothing about the morality of homosexuality — or any other moral issue.
• The presence of emotional and sexual feelings and sexual interactions between two (or more) people does not render their relationship a family structure worthy of affirmation or legal status.
• Rex Huppke is not reporting; he is cheerleading and proselytizing.