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The Spectacle Blog
Maggie Gallagher has a thoughtful response to David Blankenhorn’s piece in The New York Times revising his past views on same-sex marriage. Blankenhorn is founder and president of the excellent Institute for American Values, a group that offers some of the most valuable research around on the breakdown of the traditional American family and strategies for reversing the trend.
I have long been an admirer of IAV generally and Mr. Blakenhorn in particular. That’s why I was so saddened to see his reversal.
As Jim Antle has already noted, Blankenhorn now supports same-sex marriage. Maggie gently takes issue with that in her rebuttal, pointing out that her former colleague never took a viewpoint shared by most cultural conservatives — that male-female relationships are God’s standard for a healthy society, and homosexual relationships are not on par with them.
In essence, Blankenhorn views traditional marriage and homosexual relationships as two competing goods. “In David’s mind, gay marriage represents not a case of good versus evil, but a conflict of goods,” Maggie writes. “He has not stopped believing that marriage is the union of male and female, he has simply lost hope he can help strengthen marriage as a social institution by opposing gay marriage.”
Blankenhorn’s view is a common line of reasoning, but a faulty one in my estimation. The drive to grant homosexual relationships the same status as traditional marriages is not the only threat faced by the institution of marriage, but it is certainly a threat. When conservatives say that we should focus on reducing unwed motherhood, cohabitation, and divorce as social ills, they are absolutely correct. But why must we focus on these facets to the exclusion of the same-sex marriage agenda, which seeks to fundamentally alter what marriage means from a civic standpoint?
All of the factors I list above — including same-sex marriage — are contributors to the disastrous decline of the traditional family in the United States. As a cultural conservative, I’m concerned about all of these factors. Declaring certain parts of the battle “off limits,” though, doesn’t help anything, particularly when it’s done under the duress of political bullying.
Later in Maggie’s piece, she writes that the chief lesson for the Left from Blankenhorn’s conversion is that “stigma and hatred directed at people who disagree with them work.” Blankenhorn testified during the court proceedings for California’s marriage amendment, Proposition 8. He was roundly villified for doing so.
Maggie goes on to quote from Mark Oppenheimer, the NYT Belief columnist, who wrote a transcript of a documentary on Blankenhorn’s conversion, released the same day as Blankenhorn’s op-ed:
“After the [Proposition 8] trial, something changed in Blankenhorn,” according to Oppenheimer, “He does not entirely know how to describe what happened. Maybe it was some cocktail of the fame, the public abuse, or just getting older. Maybe it’s that he began to fear for his legacy, for how the world would remember him. He definitely saw that gay marriage was happening, and it was likely to spread and wasn’t going away. There was no turning back the clock. Is it too cynical to say that nobody wants to be on the wrong side of history? Maybe that’s not a fair way to put it.”
But David switched sides. Above all, Oppenheimer says, “David Blankenhorn has decided to stop fighting. He is fifty-seven years old, and he says he still ‘has a little gas left in the tank.’ In the years he has left, he wants to forge alliances with all people interested in building stronger families, whether those people are gay or straight.”
In the realm of public policy, compromises have to be made in order to forge alliances and achieve the greater good. Defending the true identity of marriage does not fall into the “compromise” category.
Maggie concludes her piece this way:
Here’s what I want to say to David and to you: a comity that is bought by surrendering principle is submission, not comity at all. The truth about something as important as marriage cannot be the price we pay to live with each other.
The challenge of our time—and it is a deep challenge, not an easy one—is to find new ways to combine truth and love. Giving up marriage is too high a price to pay. And it is not the last good we will be asked to surrender, unless we find the courage to stand.
View all comments (20) | Leave a comment
More Blog Posts by David N. Bass
http://spectator.org/blog/2012/06/26/maggie-gallagher-on-blankenhor
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C. Vernon Crisler | 6.26.12 @ 4:50PM
So, now that Blankenharm has repudiated traditional marriage, is he ready to allow for child marriages, as was the case with Mohammed or Richard II?
John2| 6.26.12 @ 6:18PM
Expect an announcement any day. The story as told is inconsistent and cannot be complete.
Perhaps an introduction to Mr. Blankenship's new paramour, ... who knows? But he sure blew everything with this "conversion."
Occam's Tool| 6.26.12 @ 5:56PM
Civil Unions protect Civil Rights for Gays. It is even possible that a Gay Parent can be a good one, as well, this I do not deny.
But Marriage is a Traditional Aspect in a Society losing its Moorings. It needs to be protected. Men neeed to have a mechanism to sublimate aggressive urges into constructive ones, and Marriage is the best institution Society has found for this. Where men are NOT encouraged to be married and become fathers in the context of wedlock, VERY bad things happen---Re: the Black Family over the last 40 years, and Black educational outcomes, crime outcomes, etc. All due to poorly thought out societal interventions.
"All men are alike: he is best who trained in the Severest School." Thucydides.
Kingofthenet| 6.26.12 @ 5:58PM
Apparently this guy is ALL about GOOD marriages and families, as long as Marriages and families are STRONG this guy is happy, seems fine to me. Maggie on the other-hand is a religious cultural crusader, using the words 'Good Vs Evil and Truth', she REALLY doesn't care about health families or Marriages IF they aren't Traditional.
kingsmill| 6.26.12 @ 6:32PM
Mr. Blankenhorn lacks the central trait of a principled human being, Sidney Hook declared it indispensable, moral courage.
Bob K| 6.26.12 @ 6:53PM
"Maybe it's that he began to fear for his legacy, for how the world would remember him."
It's a sad commentary if that is what drives him. If that, in fact, is what drives all the "ink stained wretches" in our country. It says more about the Journalistic profession than Mr. Oppenheimer imagined and probably is one of the reasons that brought about it's tarnished reputation for truth, honor and principle. It is nothing more than hubris.
Most people never heard of him; never read anything he wrote or, if they did, they forgot it. It is better to stay with First Principles. No one is perfect but a man should be able to look himself in the eye while he is shaving.
Truth to Power| 6.26.12 @ 7:20PM
Two men or two women can't provide what a man and woman can provide. Gay couples sexually abuse their wards at a much higher rate and are not even close to being as stable. On top of this women and men supply something different and desirable to a child's upbringing. Blankenhorn just ignores this and treats the sexes as interchangeable parts. He also listens to authority figures that base their opinion on what is fashionable not on data. Our society is simultaneously undermining the raising of children and damning their future through unsustainable debt.
Fiscal| 6.27.12 @ 1:13AM
So you want data? Interracial marriages have a much higher divorce rate than white/white marriages. Perhaps we should outlaw them as well. It seems that the real question should be whether two same sex people could provide a more stable environment than a single mom or dad. Having someone home when the child gets home from school is extremely important for stability.
Face it, most objections to same sex marriage is based on personal religious beliefs, not on the data. In other words, you are forcing the rest of us to accept your religious beliefs.
C. Vernon Crisler | 6.27.12 @ 2:29AM
Homosexuality is a grave crime against the natural order, hence a violation of natural law. The law of God against homosexuality transcends local laws or political whims.
Chris (the second one)| 6.27.12 @ 8:52AM
Apples and oranges. A home with a mother and father is the best environment for a child. We've already seen the disaster that are single parent households. Does any honest person think that homosexual households will improve things?
Before someone brings up anecdotal evidence, let it be pointed out that people have been know to survive falls from thousands of feet in the air without parachutes. That doesn't mean the rule of jumping out of a plane with a parachute is required is wrong.
Yeah, most objections to homosexual "marriage" are based on such flimsy beliefs as pretty much every major religion in the world . I mean it's not like societies that have had rampant homosexual behavior haven't soon collapsed or anything.
Mick Lee| 6.27.12 @ 8:53AM
Does anybody seriously think gay marriage advocates actually give a wit about the relative health and stability between these two family constellations? To the champions of same-sex marriage, when it comes to “rights” stability and instability, health and unhealth are irrelevant. In our present controversy, these studies are interesting in and of themselves; but if it eventually turns out homosexual households are inherently unstable and/or the children in these families will have long term problems—perhaps some even into adulthood-- gay marriage advocates will pronounce these studies extraneous and unconnected to the issue.
Dai Alanye | 6.27.12 @ 11:08AM
Correct.
Mick Lee| 6.27.12 @ 8:55AM
Let’s entertain a check on reality. The current campaign for same-sex marriage isn’t about marriage at all. The question isn’t the question. The real issue is the public approval of homosexual behavior—and the removal of any social implication that there is something wrong with it. Period. Marriage is merely the battleground in play at the moment in the scope of a much larger war. Any mutilation to the institution of marriage is regarded as collateral damage. Unfortunate…maybe…or maybe all institutions should be recast in a “unisex” image anyway….Yeah, that’s the ticket! Well, collateral damage, anyway.
The larger “cultural war” is over just how and by whom meaning is assigned. “Fiscal” self-servingly asserts that his position is the “default” one when in fact it is he who must provide a persuasive and compelling case why the coercive power of the state should be used to change an institution which existed long before the state came to be. “Fiscal’s” lack of caution is most un-conservative in this case.
Dai Alanye | 6.27.12 @ 11:08AM
Absolutely correct.
Mick Lee| 6.27.12 @ 8:55AM
When has it happened and how often does it work out that making a major concession to "progressives" has established a mutual intension to strengthen societal institutions? Progressives know no principled boundaries in their project to remake society. They have no “this far and no farther”. (Free speech today. Censorship to promote tolerance tomorrow.) Let us remember that it was not that long ago Progressives raised high indignation at the suggestion that "gay rights" would lead to same-sex marriage. The counter-attack made by progressives was that "gay marriage" was phony scare tactic invented by the religious right to use as a weapon to dissuade otherwise open minded folk from supporting essential civil rights for gays. No one, they protested, was even considering anything like same-sex marriage.
So, here we are.
Once same-sex marriage is established, progressives will use it as a platform to pursue some other newly discovered "justice". Former partners in compromise be damned.
JP| 6.27.12 @ 9:24AM
The end game simple. Gays were never interested in "equal rights". Nope. They have their sights on the churches themselves. And they will settle for nothing other than total victory. And what does total victory look like? It will come in the form of a federal court order that directs all churches to begin marrying gays immiediately.
And future historians will wonder how such a small group of people (gays constitute less than 2% general population) could make the majority dance like puppets. Of course, Muslims will be exempted. Not even the most radical gay activst wishes to pick a fight with the Imans.
Sawgunner| 6.27.12 @ 3:49PM
The final two paragraphs speak volumes. Blankenhorn was unique in that he like so many these days felt impelled to rely more on anecdotal evidence and aggregate statistics. Do those carry more legitimacy than appeals to Scripture? They certainly do not but Scripture-quoters seldom get the respect Blankenhorn gained. Yes, he will be tssk'd tssk'd as a casualty in the culture war but we can now expect to see him along side Dick Cheney and Ted Olsen, there among the "respectable right" who champion and wish to normalize same sex marriage.
I'm sad for him.
Sawgunner| 6.27.12 @ 3:52PM
The Spanish anarchist Buenaventura Durruti probably speaks for many in the same sex movement. You know, those wonderful enraged gents who knocked the little old lady's cross down and stomped on it as she stood there defending Prop 8. Durruti quipped that the only church he ever found illuminating was a burning church.
Is that smoke I smell??
J| 6.27.12 @ 4:47PM
Hi all
I understand some of the concerns of Mr. Blankenhorns change in views. I am unclear of his reasons, however this is not uncommon when a person meets people, is offered reasoning that is not based on their religious belifes. I have yet to find a person who has reasonalbe arugment that is not based in ones preson religious view that truely explainse why marriage equlity is not valid.
Please consider this a man willing to listen , meet people and re-evaluate demonstrate maturity in thought. I think openly reversing his views is a risk of public humilation not fame.
Those who wish to personally apply faith I respect. please allow others to do the same. As a lesbian I don't have some seacret agenda to change you, I just want my civil rights to love who I love jut like you too. I wnat the legal rights... please give me the respect I wnat ot offer you.
thanks you
J| 6.28.12 @ 2:57AM
Please note: I was rushed in writting and could not proof read.. but wanted to share some thoughts... I am sorry for the typo's and missed words.. wow
I look forward to some thoughts