Dispatches from the Creation Wars

A reader named James Cameron emailed me a link to an interview with Alan Keyes that is pretty much par for the course for him (incidentally, I hope this isn’t the James Cameron who directed Titanic or I shall forever have to hate him for foisting that damn Celine Dion song upon the world – your heart may go on, but your brain shut down years ago). See part one of the interview here and part two here. Keyes trots out a new argument, at least one I’ve never heard him use before, which is to blame abortion and gay marriage on the invention and use of contraception:

Take the issue of same-sex marriage, for instance. This issue is actually rooted–it begins–in the very place the church has for the longest time taught that it begins. Do you know where it begins? It beings in contraception. You’re going to say, “What does that have to do with same-sex marriage?”

The contraceptive mentality is the mentality that suppresses the child, that basically says that the sexual relationship is not about procreation, does not exist in the context of God’s plan for procreation. Once you’ve turned your back on that plan, the next logical consequence–and sadly we’ve seen it, in great tragedy–is abortion. Because having suppressed the child conceptually and in your action from the meaning, the central meaning and significance of the sexual act, when the child appears as a consequence, it is then suppressed by this brutal means. Its life is taken.

Finally, of course, that means that when you look at sexual relations in marriage, if the child is no longer central, if procreation and the plan of God is no longer central, what is marriage? Marriage is just a relationship between two individuals for self-fulfillment, selfishness, self-interest, for what they can get out of it.

And however high-minded we make it, at the end of the day once you have removed that God-ordained purpose of the relationship between the sexes, what you get is a selfish relationship looking for selfish fulfillment. And guess what happens? Then people who are homosexuals for whom the relationship can be no more than the personal pleasure involved–it isn’t haunted by the presence of that third being, the child, who represents in fact the authority and will of God for the relationship, it’s not there–and then they step forward and say, “Well, if marriage is just about pleasure and personal fulfillment and the relationship between the parties involved, we can do that. How can you discriminate against our relationships?”

He also echoes reconstructionist rhetoric during the interview when he says that “the purpose of law in human affairs is to try to conform the rules and regulations that govern society with the will of God.” Catholics, of all people, should be careful in invoking reconstructionist themes because if that particular political movement should ever succeed, Catholics will be the first folks imprisoned for heresy. But in the meantime, Keyes is happy to join forces with the enemies of freedom. The man quotes excitedly from the Declaration of Independence, but does not believe in the ideas found in it at all. He is a theocrat, plain and simple.

Comments

#1 Reed A. Cartwright
May 17, 2005

When Keyes says stuff like this it makes me wonder if he had a really boring sex life.

I really want someone to ask him if he has/will have sex with his post-menopausal wife.
#2 Bill
May 17, 2005

“Catholics, of all people, should be careful in invoking reconstructionist themes because if that particular political movement should ever succeed, Catholics will be the first folks imprisoned for heresy.”

You are wrong about the reconstructionist movement wanting to imprison people for heresy. Most reconstructionists don’t believe in prisons. They consider prisons to be unBiblical. Punishments should either be swift or to make restitutions. In a reconstructionist utopia you’d have death penalties(preferably by stoning) corpal punishment(ie flogging) or restitution by indentured servitude (in other words you’d sold into slavery.) But no one would be left lingering for years in a penitentary or gulag.
#3 Jon Rowe
May 17, 2005

One wonders why Keyes doesn’t have more than three children if he doesn’t believe in contraception.

On another note, I know some couples try very hard and don’t reproduce that often. But some couples tend to be very fertile.

The Catholic Church’s position on contraception is lunacy. My mother had 3 children in 3.5 years (I was the youngest), then a tubal ligation.

She’s a lapsed Catholic. If she listened to her Church, she probably would have had 10 more children. And what a life that would have been.
#4 Jon Rowe
May 17, 2005

BTW: I might be reporting this on my blog, but it looks like some strange stuff may be going on with his daughter.

I’ve read much of her and her girlfriends blogs, and, although I don’t want to publicly be too hard on her, they are kinda wack jobs (and it’s understandable, given their upbringing). Maya’s girlfriend had the same dynamic going on with a fundamentalist parent telling her she was going to go to Hell.

Maya has this strange affinity for homeless people and has “lived on the streets” herself.

Her blog has been shut down, and another blog said she’s gone “missing.”
#5 James
May 17, 2005

No, I am not that James Cameron, but if I were, I would laugh every time you railed against Celine Dion singing that song and then I would go make another deposit in the bank.

As for Alan Keyes, it might be interesting to know the source of these “divinely’ inspired gems he comes up with. As for me, I have the distinct impression that he has an up close and personal relationship with the sphincter of a horse.
#6 Michelangelo
May 17, 2005

And however high-minded we make it, at the end of the day once you have removed that God-ordained purpose of the relationship between the sexes, what you get is a selfish relationship looking for selfish fulfillment.

Is this loon really saying the fulfillment of the partners in a marriage is immaterial in God’s eyes? Apparently it does not matter whether the parents are actually happy, as long as they pop out lots of little Christians.

Of course, being a strict and consistent Christian means you’re not allowed to be happy, so I guess he must be saying that.

And guess what happens? Then people who are homosexuals for whom the relationship can be no more than the personal pleasure involved–it isn’t haunted by the presence of that third being, the child, who represents in fact the authority and will of God for the relationship, it’s not there–and then they step forward and say, “Well, if marriage is just about pleasure and personal fulfillment and the relationship between the parties involved, we can do that. How can you discriminate against our relationships?”

That’s a very good question. Unfortunately Keyes is only using it to illustrate his misbegotten point rather than asking it as it should be asked.

Thank goodness very few people take this lunatic seriously. Yeesh.
#7 Chris Berez
May 17, 2005

That’s fantastic.

You know, every time I read something from Keyes, I feel like I should have “Yakety Sax” playing in the background.

Or, at the very least, have the end of his quote be followed by the obligatory “Ba-boom boom CHING”
#8 GeneralZod
May 17, 2005

Chris:
Is “Yakety Sax” the Benny Hill song/music?
#9 Dave S.
May 17, 2005

GeneralZod- Yes

http://www.discoverynet.com/~ajsnead/allsongs_1/yaktysax.html
#10 CPT_Doom
May 17, 2005

Is this loon really saying the fulfillment of the partners in a marriage is immaterial in God’s eyes? Apparently it does not matter whether the parents are actually happy, as long as they pop out lots of little Christians.

He ought to check out his own church’s theology on that because, although the church can denied marriage rites to the infertile, it does not require that married couples who are past child-bearing (e.g., the wife has gone through menopause) to refrain from sexual activity. Therefore even the church cannot fully defend its “you have to risk pregnancy” criterion for appropriate sexual relations.
#11 Michelangelo
May 17, 2005

He ought to check out his own church’s theology on that because, although the church can denied marriage rites to the infertile, it does not require that married couples who are past child-bearing (e.g., the wife has gone through menopause) to refrain from sexual activity. Therefore even the church cannot fully defend its “you have to risk pregnancy” criterion for appropriate sexual relations.

Maybe it’s OK as long as you’ve “paid the price” by producing a kid or two?
#12 raj
May 17, 2005

Let’s get something–um–straight.

Keyes is a perfect example of “diarrhea of the mouth and constipation of the brain.”

NB: I can’t claim authorship of that phrase. But I’ve used it a number of times since coming on the Web 10 years ago. And it fits Keyes perfectly.
#13 spyder
May 17, 2005

Keyes must be the point man in an effort to disguise this travesty of government spending—
The federal government will spend nearly $2 billion in the next decade on male impotence drugs under its Medicare program, according to a new cost estimate from the Congressional Budget Office that is fueling some lawmakers’ efforts to end that spending.
Rep. Steve King, Iowa Republican, is sponsoring a bill to prohibit most erectile dysfunction drug sales under Medicare, the government’s insurance program for the elderly and disabled, and released the cost figures yesterday as part of his effort.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20050517-122422-2678r.htm

US big pharma has a vested interest in selling sex, safe and otherwise. I don’t see Keyes attacking these corporations as the responsible agents.
#14 Chris Krolczyk
May 17, 2005

You’ve got to admit that the Freak from Maryland is working overtime on his screed these days. First, he states that contraception is wrong even though you can’t abort what hasn’t been allowed to fertilize. Then, he states that abortion is wrong because contraception is the moral equivalent of abortion because both (and I consider this a real howler of a quote, here) “having suppressed the child conceptually and in your action from the meaning, the central meaning and significance of the sexual act, when the child appears as a consequence, it is then suppressed by this brutal means. Its life is taken.”

That last quoted part would be worthy of being puzzled over in the worst postmodernist philosophy class in history; he’s effectively taken two entirely separate issues, tied them together in a bizarre knot of moral smugness and written something which makes even Heidegger seem coherent and straightforward in comparison.

I shouldn’t be surprised at the basic thrust of his linking contraception and abortion together, though; fundamentalist twits like Keyes always have been massively confused on the idea that launching your load into a condom and not some woman’s waiting vagina may not be the moral equivalent of a child’s death sentence.
#15 Sergio Méndez
May 17, 2005

Is funny, but the father of neoconservatives, Irving Kristol, had a very similar argument concerning “non procreative” sexuality.
#16 386sx
May 18, 2005

Of course, being a strict and consistent Christian means you’re not allowed to be happy, so I guess he must be saying that.

I don’t think that’s fair, really. Considering all the different sects who claim to know what the True ™ strict and consistent Christian is allowed to be, then that just amounts to throwing another definition of a “strict and consistent” Christian, namely your “not allowed to be happy” True ™ strict and consistent Christian, into the True ™ pot. They are free to ignore or even to reinterpret the “bad parts” of their Bible just as marriage is (hopefully) free to ignore Alan Keyes. So yes, it really can be happy puppy dogs and flowers and stuff! (Mostly because there are so many contradictions that it’s just not possible to be “consistent”, though.)
#17 Ginger Yellow
May 18, 2005

Three points:

1: Moral relativism!

2: It’s kind of funny to hear someone who kicked his daughter out of their home and disowned her to talk about “supressing the child”.

3: What on earth is strange about someone who was kicked out of her home having an “affinity” with homeless people.
#18 Bill Ware
May 18, 2005

Here’s a question for followers of Keyes’ indominable morals:

If his daughter became pregnant, would he let her back in the house?

Yes, children are important, he’d want to see that his grandchild was well cared for.

No, it’s yet another sin that his daughter needs to be punished for by having to deal with it on her own.
#19 Chris Krolczyk
May 18, 2005

Sergio:

Is funny, but the father of neoconservatives, Irving Kristol, had a very similar argument concerning “non procreative” sexuality.

From what I remember, both Kristol and the Freak from Maryland are creationists as well (albeit from different religions), so it’s no surprise that they share more than one stupid belief.