The culture-war crusaders at the American Decency Association are now joining a slew of other anti-gay activists in arguing that conservatives have been too lenient towards the gay community and need to fight against LGBT equality even more fervently.
“[W]hile we’re wielding a knife in the gunfight, we’re leaving our gun in the holster,” the ADA’s Chris Johnson lamented in an blog post last week.
Johnson insisted that the Religious Right must maintain its opposition to gay adoption, arguing that a “needy child” seeking adoption will “be better off waiting to be adopted by a heterosexual family which can give them the benefit of both a mother and father.”
When the same-sex marriage proponent says “these two people love each other; why shouldn’t they be allowed to stand in front of their friends and family and make it official?” our response is that marriage has always been defined as between as a man and a woman and the state’s interest in marriage is to regulate the individual units of society in the way that’s most productive to society.
When they say, “why can’t this loving couple adopt a needy child who just wants a family?” we answer that, statistically speaking, the child will be better off waiting to be adopted by a heterosexual family which can give them the benefit of both a mother and father.
And these arguments are solid, but the problem is that if you tell two people who really do love each other, that making the state recognize their love will fray the fabric of society, you will always look like a spiteful villain.
That is not to say that we shouldn’t make those arguments. If the only result was that we would be more resolute in our own support of God-defined marriage, that would be valuable enough to focus on those aspects – and that’s beside the fact that some people’s emotions may still be swayed by an intellectual argument.
The issue, in my opinion is that while we’re wielding a knife in the gunfight, we’re leaving our gun in the holster.
