Peter Singer has written a rather meandering article explaining why he thinks homosexuality should be legal and thereby demonstrates how leftists are doubly wrong. After rather a lot of pointless rhetoric:
If a form of sexual activity brings satisfaction to those who take part in it, and harms no one, what can be immoral about it?The underlying problem with prohibiting homosexual acts, then, is not that the state is using the law to enforce private morality. It is that the law is based on the mistaken view that homosexuality is immoral.
The only interesting bit of this essay is that Singer is forced to be intellectually honest and admit that leftism requires the state to enforce private morality. He clumsily sidesteps the interesting question of what that morality should be, but by conceding that the battle to be fought is a moral one he undermines just about every leftist politician in America.
I wasn't aware that homosexuality wasn't legal to begin with.
It's funny how liberals think about harm. If it's a question of environmental harm, then they're certain that tiny amounts of pollutants in the air or water are grievously injuring society, even though few people complain about them. But harm from the destruction of sexual mores is undetectable no matter how many people complain about it.
Someone should ask Peter Singer whether Jim McGreevy's wife and children agree that homosexuality is a sexual activity that harms no one.
Well, what really causes the harm in "love triangles" and the like? Is it the sex itself or the lies, deception, and betrayal of trust that is almost always involved? More often than not, it's the latter.. and it is those lies, that deception and betrayal of trust that leaves the biggest scars. Would the McGreevy situation really be all that much different for his wife and children if he was cheating on them with a woman instead? I don't think it would be.
Beyond that, though, some people are just jerks.. whether they're homo- or heterosexual.
Michael, just so we know where you're coming from: do you think homosexual conduct between consenting adults, if it takes place on private property and behind closed doors, should be illegal?
McGreevy's problem wsn't that he was gay, his problem was he was corrupt and then played the gay card when he saw the writing on the wall.
How does the CDC showing that homosexuals have a disproportionate number of AIDs cases affect the harm aspect of the love triangles, after all it can be more damaging thant the lies aspect.
As far as the question from Francis...my two cents: As long as its not hurting anyone and I don't have to pay them for doing it (or for anything that results from it), I don't care.
tP asked: "How does the CDC showing that homosexuals have a disproportionate number of AIDs cases affect the harm aspect of the love triangles, after all it can be more damaging thant the lies aspect."
If you're going to make sweeping generalizations, then that statistic is relevant. Given the relative infrequency of this type of situation, though, I think an evaluation on a case-by-case basis is best.
FWP: There are all sorts of reasons why I don't think gay sex itself should be illegal.
For the record, I think that gay sex, like hard drugs and prostitution, are horribly immoral and should be completely legal, and regulated only to the extent of requiring descriptive labeling and adherence to contract law.