This is a very ordinary, traditional Christian view with pretty strong Biblical support. It's also a view that has a lot of philosophical support, and not just from Christian or religious philosophers: Kant takes exactly the same view in the Metaphysics of Morals, 6:277-8, all the way down to asserting that the issue is one of a violation of logic (or basic rationality).
Sexual union (commercium sexuale) is the reciprocal use that one human being makes of the sexual organs and capacities of another.... This is either a natural use (by which procreation of the same kind is possible) or an unnatural use, and unnatural use takes place with a person of the same sex or with an animal of a nonhuman species. Since such transgression of laws, called unnatural (crimina carnis contra naturam) or also unmentionable vices, do wrong to humanity in our own person, there are no limitations or exceptions whatsoever that can save them from being repudiated completely.In the next paragraph, Kant goes on to define marriage as "the union of two persons of different sexes."
You're not obligated to be a Kantian, and I'm not one; you're not obligated to be a Christian either. But it's extraordinary to treat this as if it were a mere expression of hate. Kant, for example, has an argument for what it means to 'respect the humanity in one's own person' that applies here as elsewhere.
Kant is too important to the Left for him to be disappeared. I won't be surprised, though, if it becomes increasingly hard to find copies of his book that don't redact those paragraphs.
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The Hollywood Reporter readers may be a little shocked to see this:
Do you support Phil Robertson's opinion?
Yes↑ No↓
23611 110
and the yes votes were counting up quickly as I watched.
Do I support his opinion? What does that even mean? Do I agree that he ought to have a right to speak his mind? Do I agree with his position? Or something else?
I'm sure I don't agree that he should be shamed out of public life, recognizing that A&E has every right to free association with only those who are 100% on board with the gay agenda.
As many of the commenters at Hollywood Reporter pointed out, A&E probably needs the Robertsons a lot more than they need A&E. There are other channels who might be happy to pick up a show that averages 14 million viewers per episode.
A&E has never been particularly comfortable with patriarch Phil, who ends each show with the prayer that starts the family dinner, and has the audacity to include the phrase "It's in Jesus' name we pray." A&E asked him if he'd mind deleting the reference to Jesus, which made them nervous. He declined.
I understand their discomfort. I invoke that name myself at the end of some prayers, and it scares the hell out of me.
I remember talking to someone at church who remarked that it was always worthwhile in any Christian religious discussion to measure how long it took for participants to actually mention Jesus by name. It's much easier to talk in generalities than to come face to face with the one you take to be the author of the universe.
It's worth doing just because it is hard. Like most things.
The Robertson family has now issued a statement confirming that they can't imagine carrying on with the show without their patriarch.
What a lot of silly nonsense it is. Everything not prohibited is mandatory. All this over a show that's about as provocative in its tone as Andy Griffith.
I don't have cable, so this is pretty easy to ignore.
Nor have I cable, which is why I didn't know him before. A&E can do what it wants, including going out of business for all I care; but for what it's worth, the position is a stronger one than may be obvious. People scorn it coming from this guy, whom they call a redneck of some ancient and pointless generation of damn Southerners; but Kant said the same thing, and he's not so easy to dismiss. To say nothing of still wiser men than Kant, who might be dismissed for being unfairly religious: but Kant at least they can't readily show the door. What's the answer to him?
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