The Slippery Slope

21 Dec 2010

A few years ago, I had taken a speech class. My final speech was on the topic of same-sex marriage and one of the points I had made was that love, by itself, is not enough to justify marriage. As part of the closing I had included news articles showing what happens when love is the only ingredient required. These stories included: a man marrying two women¹, a woman marrying a dolphin², a woman marrying a cobra³, and a woman marrying her dead fiancé⁴. In fact, that was not the first woman to marry a dead man. According to French interior ministry officials, “Around ten posthumous marriages are carried out each year in France”⁵.

I’ll never forget the look on one young woman’s face as I returned to my seat afterwards; she stared at me with what may have been the evilest eye I’ve ever seen.

Later in college, as I learned about the slippery slope fallacy, I wondered if my use of it in that speech had been a bad idea, but events in the last couple weeks have proven to me that it wasn’t a bad idea. In fact, in certain cases, I don’t think it’s fallacious at all, particularly when dealing with people. The reason being, is that people tend to push boundaries, and once one boundary is broken, they will inevitably work on the next.

I tend to think a lot about how being a Christian should impact how I look at the world. Not being omniscient, I struggle with much of what I see, after all, a lot of the answers aren’t clear and even when they are, people don’t want to hear, “It says so in the Bible.”

A while back I wrote an article where I had posited that maybe it wouldn’t be a bad idea for the church to step back and let the state perform same-sex marriages, while still remaining steadfast in its claim that homosexuality is a sin. Just because the state recognizes them, doesn’t mean the church has to. I’ve come to the conclusion, that that was wrong. It became perfectly clear when I read But They Were Consenting Adults! by Robert Stacy McCain⁶. In his article, McCain highlights the comments made by a guest regarding a situation between a father and daughter. The guest writes: “Wait, why is consensual incest a crime? It might not be appealing to everyone, but if they’re adults and they consent, who cares what they do?” This, is exactly why marriage between a man and a woman needs to be protected, and anything other than one man and one woman, needs to be illegal. But how is this related to incest? Because consenting adults is one of the same arguments used to support same-sex marriage.

Leaving aside the fact that it is a sin, a few years ago, a majority of Americans said that same-sex marriage should not be legal. Their built-in moral compass hadn’t been over-ridden, and desensitized, by the liberal media and a small, but loud, minority of Americans. Although sex outside of marriage had become “okay,” there were still plenty of actions considered wrong: incest, polygamy, pedophilia, theft, murder, and so on.

In the last few years, it has become common to charge those against same-sex marriage as discriminating. And it’s been an effective weapon to change the tide of public opinion. But here, the question is raised, why can’t two consenting incestuous adults have sex? Indeed, why not? Why can’t two consenting incestuous adults get married? If you read Tony Ortega’s article, Memo To Bruce McMahan, Daughter-Seducer (Updated), it’s not as far-fetched as it seems⁷. Would it be discrimination to object to an incestuous marriage? Sure, one could cite genetic-defects between offspring, but by setting aside God’s instructions, what argument is there against incest? What about polygamy? What about the ancient practice of pederasty? Should we “discriminate” against any of them if all participants are willing?

If same-sex marriage is legalized, I don’t think it would be long before polygamists started coming forward with the exact same arguments that have been used to forward same-sex marriage. Everyone who argues against polygamy will be haters and discriminators. They will want an explanation as to why they can’t have the same rights as those who practice homosexuality.

Objecting to same-sex marriage is not discrimination. You discriminate against people, not actions. Homosexuality is an action practiced by people, and that action should not be encouraged, just as sex outside of marriage between heterosexuals should not be encouraged. Opening the door to same-sex marriage will simply create opportunities for other people with deviant behavior to seek acceptance in the mainstream. Take for example, the story above regarding incest, the pedophilia book that was pulled from Amazon last month⁸, or the polygamy case the Supreme Court declined to hear in 2007⁹.

So, as I’ve changed my mind, it’s also time for America to change it’s mind regarding same-sex marriage, and put a stop to it before the proverbial “can of worms” is opened. We need to start listening to the moral compass in our heart. The moral compass that GOD put there.

The young woman in my speech class gave her speech later. Her topic was why homosexual couples should be allowed to adopt children. No wonder I received the evil eye. I’ll never forget the look on that young woman’s face in my speech class, nor do I want to. It reminds me that, despite the desire to make everyone happy, it isn’t possible. Still, I can’t forget that our decisions affect the feelings of others, and we must seek to minimize the pain others feel. As Christians, we need to ensure that we attack actions and ideas; not people. We need to remind them, respectfully, that even as we don’t agree with them, they are not agreeing with us either. This is not a world that we are entitled to our own ideas, only if they match someone else’s.

Tagged: homosexuality same-sex "marriage"