Theses On The Door: Addendum 2 - "Not (Homosexual) Conversion?!"

[As you may know, blogs often present themselves in reverse. This is the last part of a lengthy series which starts here. I hope you find all this useful. Peace. BG]

In Part VIII of my latest series, "Theses On The Door", Contratimes visitor (and my friend) Luke Buckham posted this comment:

I'm curious--these essays are very articulate about your position on homosexuality inside the church, and they also seem to show quite clearly that you're in opposition to homosexuality itself.

Right now, though, I'm not here to argue about that, and I know better than to always jump to the obvious conclusion when it comes to your views. So I just wanted to ask: what's your position on homosexuality OUTSIDE the church; in other words, homosexuality in general? Do you think the sexual orientation of gays can be significantly altered? If you believe that homosexuality is just plain wrong and irrational, do you have any idea of what might constitute a remedy?

It might seem very easy to assemble an answer to that question from previous posts of yours, but I'd rather hear it from you in direct response to the preceding question.

As I stated yesterday in Addendum 1, Mr. Buckham has a penchant for asking tough questions. And these are no exception. Where, and how, to begin?

I might begin with homosexual activists themselves. There seems to be ample evidence that activists believe homosexuals can change, or that at least some people can "change" their orientation. I knew a man who had a lovely wife of 22 years, and three gorgeous children they raised together. He rather suddenly left his wife and family for -- surprise! -- a man. Did the father change? Was he really an intrinsically gay man who was behaving in a way extrinsic to his nature? Was he finally "genuine" sexually when he was with his male lover? Had he finally found himself in such liberation?

Some of us who have paid attention to those modern novelists and psychologists who address the "self" and its elusive nature, notice that the theme of many of these writers and thinkers is singular, even determined: what -- and who -- are you, really? How do you know you are you; how do you know you are genuinely "yourself"? Are you really a "banker", a "writer", an "artist", a "mother", a "loser", a "heterosexual"? What I am getting at is that there is a rather modern fascination with identity. And there is also a fascination with doubting whether identity is even possible: can the self ever know itself, and can it ever be happy? Can it ever be found? Who can tell?

So, in a sense, it is right to ask whether the once straight man I knew remains truly and intrinsically gay. Are any of us any of the things we think we are? Perhaps. But perhaps not. It would not be surprising to hear of a man who leaves his wife for a gay lover only to come to some later epiphany that he is not really gay at all.

But Luke has not really asked me about my rather random ruminations on identity. He wants to know whether I am opposed to homosexuality in general. The answer is simple: I am. But what my series has been about is restricting homosexuality in the Church. It is about seeing it as it is: irrational, aberrant. What I have not done is insisted that homosexuality be restricted in the culture, the secular culture outside the Church. I have not insisted that gays and lesbians not be allowed to do whatever they wish "out there", which is everywhere else but inside the Church's Holy Offices. I am even willing to give them everything -- Hollywood and the arts, the marketplace of fashion, the peaks of political aspirations, the great chairs of academia; but I am not willing to give them the imago dei, the image of God, nor am I willing to call loving and committed sex between members of the same sex "sacred marriage". I will give them the world as long I can have Jerusalem; they can have the whole house as long as I can keep the conservatory or the study.

But there is more to say about "changeability", about conversion from homosexuality to heterosexuality, or at least to sexual abstinence. Indeed, Luke is right -- he could have discovered my opinions in other things I've written. For I have written that the political marriage between gays and lesbians, on the one hand, and the transgendered folks on the other, is utterly confounding. It is one of the most irrational, contradictory alliances on the planet. For the gay and lesbian conviction, particularly theologically, is that God and nature do not make mistakes; that being gay or lesbian is not a matter of choice, but one of essence. There is no changing this; there is no mistake or aberration. Gender is fixed, sexual attraction is innate, hardwired from conception. Or so it goes. But for some strange reason these advocates of a static sexual genesis suddenly become elastic; God and nature do indeed make mistakes, and trans-gendered folks are those mistakes. Suddenly we learn that sexual identity can change; we learn that the repressed female self can be liberated through surgery and hormone therapy into an XY-chromosome male, one cosmetically altered to look like an XX-chromosome female (though in reality the altered person still looks like an XY-chromosome male, only with lipstick and skirt). Suddenly we learn that sexual behaviors can be influenced by reinforcement (medical, psychological, social) and nurture; we learn that sexual identity is fluid and personal, even a choice (for a man trapped in a woman's body must choose transformation). It is all rather confusing.

Gamesmanship

There are certain identity games (or so I call them) for which I have little patience. I can recall a woman at college who often dressed like a clown (she was in a clowning ministry). Somedays she'd stop fellow students on the quad, or in the hallway. She'd do her clown thing, and would always take issue -- quite defensively -- with those who insisted on calling her by her real name. No, no. You had to call her "Happy the Clown" or "Sunshine the Clown". She was not Sandy or Heather. And Happy the Clown was not above making her audience rather miserable, embarrassing folks in front of their peers as they would inadvertently (though genuinely) blurt out her REAL name; Sunshine often became quite stormy.

This sort of thing is remarkably similar to men who dress in drag. It stymies me, thoroughly, why such men demand that I refer to them in female terms -- she, her, etc. There is nothing -- at all -- female about them. They are mere imitators, mere fakes. They are male on the surface and they are male at the core. Their very chromosomes declare this to be the case. But why, why, am I expected to affirm an illusion, even a lie? Why am I expected to call Jim Smith in drag Julianna Plumbersbut? He is no Julianna, and he "ain't no woman". Why the charade? Why the lack of the genuine, the real? Why is sexual artifice preferred to what is plainly natural; why prefer Sweet and Low when one can have honey?

Alas, it is because there is nothing genuine or real. Even gays and lesbians must accept this, if they accept draq queens and sundry queer celebrations where genders are blurred, destroyed, transformed; where gender and sex are whacked out in drag bustiers or butch tags of denim, leather and chain. And since there is no "real", then it follows that sexuality and gender is not real either; nor are self and happiness and a fixed sexual nature. Sexuality is malleable, and is therefore changeable. I don't need science or scripture to tell me this, I need only look at a Gay Pride parade. People can't be proud of what they can't help but be. I am not proud I have hands, white skin, XY chromosomes, whiskers, grey hair. I am proud of the choices I have made and will make; I am proud of many of the choices I have not made. Pride, including gay pride, is all about choice. And I don't need revelation to tell me what my eyes plainly see: the secular and progressive mind is committed to changing reality, where existence precedes essence and essence is determined on a whim. You decide who and what you are. That is modern psychology to the core. And if you are comfortable doing this, if you are able to live a "meaningful and fulfilling" life -- to your own standards -- then that is modern psychological bliss.

Long Hair Is A Woman's Glory?

Several days ago I watched "The Sky Did Not Fall", an indie film-short produced by Andrew Rossi and aired on Current TV. The film documented the legalization of gay marriage by the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts. It is an amazing piece of cinematography and documentary.

In the final minutes of the film, two lesbian lovers, engaged to be wed, finally pick up and complete their long-awaited marriage license. One of them notices something curious on the license: there are respective lines requesting the names of the "husband" and "wife". The spouse-to-be comments about this, sparking the following exchange:

A: One of us has to be a bride and someone has to be a groom. Who’s gonna be a bride and who’s gonna be the groom? [Pause] I get to be the bride!

B: Alright. My hair's shorter.

***

My hair's shorter. Even here, in the midst of their holiest moments as a "couple", both women tacitly imply that there is a need for maleness and femaleness to make a marriage a marriage. It is a stunning moment in the film, as they speak so casually and softly to each other, breathlessly perusing the license. I'll be male -- a husband -- because I have shorter hair.

The film ends at the couple's wedding. Let me put this climax plainly: there is NOTHING ROMANTIC about the vows they exchange. In fact, their vows are thoroughly political: I will be your safe harbor from those outside who declare that what we have is not real. It is a shocking moment of emptiness.

But the whole thing is telling: gender ain't what you is, it's what you claim you is. You decide.

Hence, change must be possible.

Luke asked, finally, whether I have any idea how one might "change" or convert from homosexuality to either heterosexuality or abstention. I have no answer. But I have often wondered why it is the case that, if a marriage between two men is not about sex but loving another person, then how is it that they each can't love a woman? Surely a woman is another person. And if it is about sex AND love, gay men are limited to anal intercourse and fellatio -- really. But why is this a gender thing, then? Women have anuses and mouths; how are they excluded from being loveable and wonderful?

It is often asked how a marriage between two men (or two women), deeply in love and committed with all due fidelity, is a threat to my marriage to my wife. That's a fair challenge, for sure. But so is this: if true human relationships are all about love and commitment, how does my saying that marriage can only be between a man and a woman threaten the loving commitment between two men? Surely "marriage" is only a formal and public declaration of a couples' private love and vows. How then does not making such public declarations of gay couples' private vows threaten those vows? How does marriage as traditionally defined limit gay and lesbian love and fidelity?

But this whole thing really DOES threaten my marriage, because it threatens language, and therefore it threatens thought. Anyone who asserts that my marriage to a woman, utterly distinct from me in nearly every way, is equal to a marriage between two men -- who are not that distinct -- or two women (also not distinct), well, such an assertion is tantamount to intellectual death. A man who declares two saucers atop each other is equal to a cup atop a saucer; a woman who believes that a gun and gun is equal to a gun and a bullet; a psychologist who believes a seed on a seed is the same as a seed in the soil; a preacher who asserts that a sword inside a sword is equal to a sword in a scabbard; any one of these proponents of new identities ultimately destroys our liberal ability to think and reason. That painter who uses paint to apply paint; that sculptor who attempts to sculpt the tool in his hand with that very tool; the carpenter who hammers hammers into boards; the seamstress who threads needles with needles; the chef who roasts lamb on a lamb -- none of these are Zen koans freeing us from illusion. They are delusions freeing us from reality. This is not about being wise or enlightened. It is about dulling the mind entirely. It is devolution. It is surely not evolution.

On Homophobia

One closing note. When I was doing research for a book (finished, unpublished) I read Heterosexism: A Weapon of Homophobia, by Suzanne Pharr. She writes:

The elimination of homophobia requires that homosexual identity be viewed as viable and legitimate and as normal as heterosexual identity. It does not require tolerance; it requires an equal footing. Given the elimination of homophobia, sexual identity–whether homosexual, bi-sexual, or heterosexual–will not be seen as good or bad but simply what it is. [emphasis added]

Ms. Pharr lays down quite a hand. Clearly she sets for us the political goal: hetero-, bi- and homosexuality are "normal", and are on an equal footing. But that is not the most interesting card in her hand. For she throws down elsewhere a card with a rather bold face: in her opinion, the best way to combat opposition to homosexuality is to "keep the problem focused on the homophobic person". You see, it is not about truth, science, genes, psychology. It is about winning a fight. It is about declaring someone homophobic, and to keep hammering that point home until the opposition skulks off in embarrassment, fear, or shame. Of course, she let's us know what homophobia means:

Homophobia -- the irrational fear and hatred of those who love and sexually desire those of the same sex.

But as this essay and series have shown, opposition to homosexuality need not be rooted in fear or hatred. Rather, such opposition can be born of a love of reason. There is nothing irrational or even remotely fearful here. Hence, it can't be deemed homophobia, can it? Undoubtably, that is a problem.

Peace.

©Bill Gnade 2006/Contratimes - All Rights Reserved.

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