Some Guys Are Normal

The Immorality of Homosexuality

Homosexuality, or for those that are more precise, homosexual acts, are immoral. Yes, I know. I've heard this or been told this thousands of times. I don't agree with it, but I understand the message loud and clear.

The problem is that lots of stuff in this world is immoral. And, in a society like ours, the alleged or believed immorality of something simply isn't reason enough to form public policy, laws, or rules. I'm sure there are people out there that think that morality alone should be the deciding factor when we make laws and form our government's policies, but if you think about it, it just doesn't make sense.

I got to thinking about this when the military's top General said he supported "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" because he believed homosexual acts were immoral and we should not support or condone immorality.

Let's set aside my disagreement with what I view as his fairly narrow-minded understanding of homosexuality and extend the argument to it's logical conclusion--that if homosexuality should be banned in the military because it is immoral, then all things immoral should be banned in the military.

Some simple acts of immorality come to mind for me, but I'd like to start with the one immoral thing that is the reason we don't mix our government with religion. For Christians, simply not being a Christian is immoral and will lead to an eternity without God faster than anything else. It's really that simple--if you are not Christian--if you are worshipping another God or no God at all, you are committing an immoral act.

I'm not saying we should ban all Christians from the military, but being a good person isn't enough to get a person in to heaven--believing in Jesus Christ is. I just feel that when so many people are up in arms about the terrible immorality of being gay, they should really try to be more reasonable and "big picture" about their issues. Depending on who you ask 3-10% of the population is gay and are supposedly immoral. Trust me that way more than that number are non-Christians. Yes, I realize Christians worry about that side of the coin too, but if they weren't so worried about the boogieman of gays, I bet they'd be able to do a lot more to help the faith spread.

Back to the General's comments about supporting DADT because homosexuality is immoral. For some more immoral actions, try bigotry, lying, premarital sex, extra-marital sex, coveting, greed, pride, not helping the poor or disabled, not tithing to the Church (this is debatable, I'm sure, but that's kind of the point). Anyway, the list can go on. We don't keep the people committing these immoral acts from being the in military. If the people doing these things are qualified to be in the military, they get in. The same should go for gays.

I've heard arguments in favor of DADT citing unit cohesion and other ideas related to how straight soldiers would feel. I think the reasons are misguided, but at least they are trying to make an independent point rather than singling out one act of immorality as if to pretend the others don't exist. Being against being gay is one thing, but letting skewed and narrow views of what constitutes morality shape a national policy is quite another. If we are going to judge things based on immorality, we should at least be consistent.

posted by Brady @ 1:29 PM