Just a Gwai Lo fun within prescribed limits [?]

Charles, referring to Jonathan Rauch's article on religious conservatives: “I think perhaps he was even trying to be a little witty in his choice of words and phrases. Assuming that were we as his readers taking in the whole of his argument, we would have surmised that his whole point was to poke fun at the over-the-top rhetoric about our "divided nation" in an effort to get us all to lighten up a bit and realize who much more we have in common than we have to be divided over.”

One of my favourite writers is Jonathan Rauch. He wrote "Caring For Your Introvert", which I encourage all my friends, extrovert and introvert, to read and pass along. (The Atlantic Monthly removed the article from their website, as it is available to subscribers only.) Rauch also wrote Gay Marriage: Why It Is Good for Gays, Good for Straights, and Good for America, an excellent defense of marriage between both couples of men and women and couples made up of members of the same sex.

Yesterday, as it was happening, I began tracking responses to Rauch's recent article about religious conservatives by self-described religious conservatives as part of an experiment with PubSub and my editorial discretion. Now I learn that Rauch has not only read the responses, and not only has he clarified his position and admitted to carelessness on his part, but made his article available for those who wish to read his full argument. I've saved a copy locally in case that link no longer points to the article or the response.

(I do not intend disrespect to Hugh Hewitt, whom I only heard about yesterday, nor do I mean to accuse him of intending to remove the article in the future. It's just that the way the weblog seems to be set up, with no apparent archives, means to me that the link is temporary.)

See also Hugh's article in The Weekly Standard, which, although a little on the self-congratulatory side of things, offers commentary on the subject of Rauch's article (religious conservatives and the mythical Red-state/Blue-state divide), blogging and using individual weblogs as letters to the editor that mainstream media may not publish for months if at all, and the reaction to Rauch's article as well as Rauch's mea culpa: “On Tuesday I had Rauch on my [radio] program. He pleads hasty writing and objects that the focus I put on these sentences is unfair to the intent of his piece. I offered to post the entire article and any response he wants to make. He agreed that I was at least allowing him the chance to reply. I did not note to him that this is a courtesy the Atlantic did not extend to a religious conservative in its package of essays on the divide in America.”

I was initially concerned that it had the looks of a blogger pile-on, i.e. that many people saw something that they took out of proportion and felt the need to write something (anything) right away. Also, it looked like the responses fit a pattern: first the double-take, then focus on the word "insurgent", then reference to how "secular liberals" don't understand those who self-identify as religious conservatives. (With respect to the latter, they have a point.) Also, the reaction was one-sided. I saw no-one come to Rauch's defense, regardless of defense was warranted. This looks like a case where Rauch himself feels there was no defending what he wrote, or at least not a point worth worth expending partisan energy on. My disconcern, then, is not that Rauch had no defenders but that "secular liberals" seem not to read religious conservative thinkers in order to at the very least understand where they come from and not automatically assume that mocking them is the appropriate course of action.

Marvin: “It isn't that we are likely to take to the streets and its even less likely that we'll harm anyone, yet it is that picture that [Jonathan] Rauch chooses to paint. He ensures that we recognize his agenda, his malice and his complete disregard for the implications, to us, of his words. Rauch has no idea who or what the center-right or conservative American looks like. He doesn't know what we believe, or how and why Christian culture is so vastly different from the religious extremes of the Islamist. By comparing pro-life conservative to the murderous thugs, if only in the choice of language, Mr. Rauch has shown his true disdain for the Christian, the Conservative (religious or otherwise) and for the civility of Christian culture in America. This perhaps more than anything shows him to be a part of the left rather than a moderate as he describes himself. He has joined the fringe he describes, such as the leftist protesters who clamor about calling the President a fascist or Nazi, and thusly removing themselves from any serious discussion. Rauch is not in the mainstream, and neither is the Atlantic [Monthly].”

Alex: “What strikes me as interesting is that Rauch still seems to think that evangelical Christians are a bunch or radical idiots. We continue to be caricatured as resemblances of Eric Rudolph (the Olympic and abortion bomber) and the "God Hates Fags" morons than by anyone else. It is easy to write off people whom you don't agree with as backwoods cavemen, rather than give them an honest hearing and evaluating their arguments. Having associated them with images and ideas related to a radical fringe, you can then dismiss "religious conservatives" by definitional fiat. I suppose it is far better to label than to engage, to caricature than to understand, to scorn than to listen. Now let's be fair - conservatives often are guilty of the same kinds of arguments.”

John: “I cannot believe that he lumps religious conservatives together with abortion clinic bombers. It's as if we did not have a voice in the party we would instantly resort to bombing. What this says is that in the mind of the left, the ends justifies the means. They ignore the fact that the very essence of our ends (our religious convictions) of necessity limits our means.”

Mark: “religious conservatives are or have ever operated as "insurgents" or "provocateurs". In today's political climate, "insurgent" as we know is Reuters code word for "terrorist", which makes the comparison to American religious conservatives more than a little insulting. It has been popular of late, for the left elite media types to spend a little expense account money and venture timidly out into the frozen tundra of the "red states" in flyoverland. Mr Rauch apparently didn't want to put too much pain on the expense account and decided to mail it in. Mr Rauch, allow me to explain, all but a vanishingly small number of religious conservatives exhibit anything resembling "terrorist" activities. The average religious conservative does not only never bomb abortion clinics, he doesn't even know anyone who knows anyone who has. Painting religious conservatives with that brush is either rhetorical smoke or dumb ignorance. Acting from the "political inside" is how we normally operate.”

David: “the notions of civility and centrism are being used to crowd out the idea of truth. The abortion issue was mentioned by Rauch and that is an example of how this plays out. Sure, let's be civil in our discourse about this, but let's not assume that there is no right and wrong on this matter. If the fetus is a human being, as we pro-lifers claim, then no amount of civility in discourse can sway us from our commitment to protecting human life.”

Carol: “As a Republican and someone who is pro-life (except in cases of rape, incest & life of the mother), I do not believe there is any room in my party for someone who is willing to bomb abortion clinics. It would, in fact, be wrong and injurious -- not only to the party but to American society in general -- for Republicans to lend credence to such extremism by accepting its proponents into their ranks. A similar case can be made for the Democrats -- would it really be morally right to lend mainstream respectability to, for example, environmental terrorists (a more suitable anology for Rauch to have employed)?”

Kathy: “The message I get is that he is uncomfortable thinking beyond the extreme stereotypes of religious conservatives. Entertaining the possibility that religious people may have it right is inconceivable to him. Mired in his personal liberal agenda, Rauch finds menacing the fact that people of faith are an influential demographic in America. Thus threatened, he attacks. By using the examples of Vietnam and civil rights issues of the '60s to make his case, Rauch denies the differences inherent in the increasing impact of today's religious conservatives. Despite the controversies it ignited, the Vietnam War did not threaten the moral fiber of our country. The civil rights movement succeeded in large part due to people of faith, including Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., not in spite of them. Today's call by religious conservatives to be heard and respected, openly and equally as the secular left has been for decades, is their birthright. Freedom isn't restricted to the left.”

Charles: “If you're a "religious conservative," you are someone Rauch fears. You are someone Rauch believes to hold the capacity for violence against those with whom you disagree. In Rauch's world, you are dangerous, full of anger, and perhaps even homicidal. The only way to keep people like you under control, says Rauch, is to pull you into the "political system," where your psychotic tendencies can be channeled and tamed.”

Greg: “religious conservatives, who make up a sizable portion of the Republican party, oppose bombing abortion clinics and agree that those who do so should be convicted in a court of law and punished appropriately. No matter how strong their feelings on abortion, they are more likely to try to get you to understand and share their opinions with reasoned debate, and propose small restrictions (such as on the dilation and extraction procedure, and abortions for minors without parental or judicial consent). They hope one day everyone will agree that abortion is wrong. But they're not going to attempt to convince you with a glass jar of gasoline and a lit cloth.”

Best Book of 2004: The Wisdom of Crowds by James Surowiecki. Along with Moneyball by Michael Lewis, and The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell, The Wisdom of Crowds is the latest to attack conventional wisdom in an accessible way. Surowiecki argued very compellingly that groups of relatively independent and diverse individuals with well-aggregated information can make better decisions and are more accurate about matters of fact than the "experts". In fact, Surowiecki almost advocates distrusting experts entirely, a remarkably unconvential piece of advice.

Honorable Mentions: Free Culture by Lawrence Lessig. The book was read by people I admire for a collaborative audiobook project. Lessig writes with passion and humility about copyright law and digital rights management and other threats to our culture from government and business. He's a believer in copyright and the protections it affords, but he argues that the music and motion picture industries fundamentally misunderstand the nature of creativity and are acting extremely inconsistently with the tradition of using the past to create the future. Also: Gay Marriage by Jonathan Rauch, which had an interesting effect on my views of heterosexual marriage; The Corporation by Joel Bakan. I covered the book for One Book One Vancouver 2004 and interviewed the author.

I didn't read a lot of books published in 2004, but the ones I read were excellent.

KFX: “As far as I am concerned all the gay couples around the world campaign to be allowed to perform a legal ceremony of marriage, the ones who have a sense of love and committment between them......they're already married. For all intents an purposes they fulfill the most important part of a marriage. What they are campaigning for is legal recognition of the fact, and as such I fully support them.”

The following is the text of a comment I wrote to that article, though the links have been added.

I'm with Jonathan Rauch, who wrote an excellent book on marriage (and not just gay marriage, but marriage in general), and he argued that marriage has more to do with creating a home and family as well as making a commitment to the community than it does with two people making a commitment to each other. People (not just a man and a woman, but adults of all sexual orientations) who get married are saying to the community "I promise to be the first person at this other person's side when they are in a crisis and I also promise that I will be faithful to them at all times". Sometimes people break promises, and the second promise is especially easy to break. There are social punishments for people who break them. How many people do you know that have slept with someone other than their spouse who have a good reputation in the community because of it?

Rauch in his book argues that marriage has been history's most successful tamer of wild young men, so he argues that social conservatives should really see gay marriage (especially marriage of two gay males) as a social positive: here are two men who have decided that they want to once and for all not fit the stereotype of the male who cruises for sex. Hello! Conservatives! What better institution than marriage is there for people (straight and not straight) who fit that stereotype? Basically he's arguing that to save the institution of marriage, you have to let gay people do it.

James Moore, Canadian Member of Parliament for Port Moody — Westwood — Port Coquitlam, in a remarkable—for an MP, not for him, evidently—email to his constituents: “believe in equality under the law for all Canadians for civil marriages, which in a perfect world would be termed civil unions. And I also believe strongly in the separation of church and state in order to protect the rights of religious institutions and people of faith from having to embrace or perform same-sex marriages if they choose not to.”

Port Moody and Port Coquitlam are suburbs of Vancouver, British Columbia, which may help understand why he focuses on B.C. in his email. Moore opposes use of the term marriage for the legal union between two homosexual adults, but argues that civil unions cannot discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation. It's not a compromise I'm fully comfortable with, but Moore is proof that the Conservative Party at least has some room for diversity of opinion on the subject of gays and lesbians. There is a strong-enough conservative argument (as I outlined above) for gay marriage and a strong enough argument that civil unions (a "marriage-lite" solution) is not good enough. Increasing the amount of types of marriage only serves to weaken the institution, as does the exclusion of gays.