Revisionism

Revision of history (hindsight) is the enemy of progress based on scientific experience and the enemy of true compassion. I rallied from restless sleep this morning to the pablum of a show on local public radio. It is called On Being. This episode, The Future of Marriage, was centered on the recent teaming-up of a religious opponent to LGBT equal rights and a gay-marriage advocate (Uncle Mary?). These two are a tag team act on the university speaking circuit apparently. This is a new business model for the intellectuals who sit on their dubious laurels.

 

I am a fan of reconciliation, but not normalization or revisionism. Reconciliation, as I have experienced it many times in my life, often entails agreeing to disagree in peaceful coexistence. These two are selling gay marriage as a way to keep homosexuals in line and to shame heterosexuals into remaining nuclear in the family way. They obviously have a low opinion of a single life with or without children.

 

The recasting of the LGBT rights movement into an intentional quest for an ivy-covered cottage filled with children, adopted or genetically engineered, is ludicrous and insidious. The LGBT movement for rights was and is, for many, a sexual movement, a movement of liberation of the individual mind and body from the shackles of heterosexual conformity and convention. Conformity and convention are the enemies of individual enlightenment. They are the enemies of scientific advancement. They are the enemies of fine art. They are the enemies of humanism's highest values, because they are based in satisfaction with the status quo and the lowest common denominator.

 

My humanism is offended by the compulsion of intellectuals in the mainstream to normalize and neutralize in these times. They preach that Islam is a religion of peace, for example. They preach that capitalism is freedom. They preach that being gay is no different from being heterosexual. They preach that religious faith is a progressive human experience. This is all nonsense for consumption by the fearful and the intellectually lazy.