First!!! Slow Monday for everyone else, I guess.

Is this going to be a regular feature on the blog, Michael? Unfortunately, I don't think you'll ever run out of material.

Well, France was right !!

I don't get what the Saudi prince is going for. Is this what passes for sarcasm in Riyadh? Hrm, having read the link, I think I now understand why I've never heard of this particular prince. It's a good thing the Saudis don't actually want a competent military, if this constitutes the state of the art in Saudi military discourse.

On the other hand, maybe this is whistling past the graveyard, now that the US military is leaving the royal family to their own devices.

People are stupid

George,

It might become a regular feature of the blog, I'm not sure yet. The New Republic ran an Idiocy Watch two years ago, and I miss it. And since I miss it, I figure I could just run with it myself. :)

Nice mix -- proof that no political persuasion has yet cornered the market for inanity, an equal opportunity affliction. You'll have no trouble finding enough material to make this a regular feature.

It would be nice to be reminded that no particular political or social group has a market cornered on stupid comments.

Those comments by that Saudi prince are reminiscent of those by the Taliban, We are not Iraq, and Iraq, we are not Afghanistan.

I don't wish to defend Santorum, but he actually has a point without knowing why.

Marriage for love is very recent development in human societies and is still unknown in much (maybe most) of the world today.

The hope is those cultures is not that you will marry the one you love, but that you will eventuaklly fall in love with the one you marry. But if not, oh well, you're still married and have important work to do.

Courtship, falling in love and then marrying is the development of wealthy societies that can afford the social costs of permitting it. Most societies can't.

Remember when Sanctorum made those first initial comments that supposedly fired up controversy?

I was taking a class on Constitutional Law then. The exact thoughts of Sanctorum (on the Lawrence case) were the same as my liberal professor. I couldn't understand why people were so angry or 'fired up' as such legal possibilities and analysis seemed common in the constitutional cases I saw.

I'm against a Constitutional Amendment defining marriage because I don't see marriage in a legal context, it is more social and natural. The State has no business defining marriage (of homosexuality or against) as this is the role of society, not judges or intellectuals trying to remake another Plato's Republic.

Whatever you think of Sanctorum's earlier comments, it must be admitted he was prophetic in the Lawrence fall-out. What if he is being prophetic again?

I understand what Sanctorum is saying PERFECTLY (explained in the comments in the post below) because I'm Catholic as well. There are certain laws of sexuality. As a young man, I couldn't understand why young women didn't like me (or why they went for the jerks). The reason why is because I wasn't a sexualized being. (I didn't even look like a guy. I looked like a dork.) Sexuality includes not just male-female unions but everything from births, to families, to the process of generations. If the knowledge and practice of sexuality is broken up, the results would be disintegrated families, population decline, guys not resembling anything like men, girls not resembling anything like women, etc.

Sanctorum is viewing everything through this lens of life cycle, of this wheel of sexuality. It'd be more fruitful to understand his perspective then write him off as an 'idiot'.

Watching Andrew Sullivan go beserk this week was interesting too. He posted several excerpts on Catholicism Dogma. Sullivan, propping himself on whatever intellectual 'ideas' of the present, failed to see the distinctions Catholicism provided (which is odd, since he is/was Catholic).

Why is Catholicism not against fertility but against impotence? Because of sexuality. Let us say a man got chopped off from the waist down. Yes, he can LOVE people all he wants. But that is not the reason for marriage. Marriage is all about sexuality. If he lacks these characteristics, then marriage will be impossible for him.

As for fertility, I knew a deacon who, when he married, was told was infertile. He ended up having six kids. Nature finds a way. But if a guy is impotent, where no sexuality can take place (like if he was chopped off from the waist down), then marriage is not considered for him no matter how much 'love' he has.

'Love' is for clergy, the total giving of self to God. Catholicism holds that marriage is the giving of Man and Wife to each other. Both man and woman are not seen to be 'potent' forever (we all age) but they must be potent to marry at first (to have children, etc.). It all comes down to sexuality, not love.

Consider: the criticisms of Catholicism vary with the century. In this century, the criticism is almost entirely based on sexuality, from the Church's stand on Homosexuality to ordination of women and so on. No one is demanding the Church change its position on gluttony or sloth. And we must admit that the Church doesn't modify its teachings over time. They are the same at the begining as they are now.

So what if WE are off in our knowledge of sexuality? Advocacy of gay marriage keeps pointing to words like 'love', 'tolerance', and such, but they fail to mention 'sexuality' as the reason for the union. What if we are entering a Dark Age concerning the knowledge of sexuality, where we start defining marriages from a POLITICAL angle rather than a SEXUALITY angle?

How about we let married people define their own marriages? I am so tired of the religious element to this debate; as an atheist, I don't give a rat's ass what the Bible or the damn Pope say about marriage. Our secular society should not take religious motivations into account, period. It's absurd, childish, and offensive.

Good quotes, btw. Santorum is out of his gourd.

Nice idiocy watch. Donald's note very relevant; also by historic norms marriages today last much longer (really! much less early death). I think sexuality in marriage is less underdiscussed than commitment. But if the atheists don't want religions to define marriage, tough -- call the union something else.

I just saw/heard that some 6 French women are killed each week in domestic violence (sorry, no link); in ref to the French actress murdered by her lover.

I wonder when being a French wife will be statistically more dangerous than being an American Marine in Iraq?

I'm with Brett on this one.

I am a married atheist without children. No one can tell me that my wife and I are not really married or that our marriage doesn't count. This goes way beyond the gay issue.

Santorum thinks I am not really married, or that I should not be married, or that I should have children even though my wife and I don't want them.

He is trying to negate my own experience and existence.

Why is it such a difficult concept for so many to grasp that a) we are not all Catholic, that in fact Catholics are a minority in America, and that b) America is a secular state with a diversity of religious traditions? Really, what is so hard? I'd genuinely like to know.

Jonathan,

Interesting post. Not sure I agree with everything, but interesting.

Not sure what you look like now, but you sound like a man.

Santorum sounds like a dork.

Sorry Johnathan, I don't buy your arguements.

"As a young man, I couldn't understand why young women didn't like me (or why they went for the jerks). The reason why is because I wasn't a sexualized being. (I didn't even look like a guy. I looked like a dork.)"

I doubt it was for that reason. Generalizations usually fall short of truth, and when it involves the feelings of teenage girls, it really falls short. There are many reasons why teens look for certain men. Not necessarily for sexual (in your terms) reasons. I doubt many of them are looking to breed at this point in their lives.

"Marriage is all about sexuality."

I'd say no. Politcs played a big role too in the past(uniting families for land/money/titles). Today you add love into that mix. That is the only serious new wrinkle in the institution of marriage.

"But if a guy is impotent, where no sexuality can take place (like if he was chopped off from the waist down), then marriage is not considered for him no matter how much 'love' he has."

Now consider this situation. If said legless/torsoless man and his equally legless/torsoless wife adopted a gaggle of third world babies and saved them from disease/war/whatever, isn't that just as 'sexual' (and perhaps even more moral) than a 'regular' married couple? They're both rearing young.

"And we must admit that the Church doesn't modify its teachings over time. They are the same at the begining as they are now."

Then why is Mel Gibson's father so pissed at the Vatican? Come on, ever hear a mass in Latin these days?

Weak arguments.

-x

Brett and Michael,

Consider this quote from Benjamin Franklin at the constitutional convention

"I therefore beg leave to move-that henceforth prayers imploring the assistance of heaven, and its blessings on our deliberations, be held in this assembly every morning before we proceed to business…."

Why did Franklin say this? He was a Deist. The reason was because (as we can imagine) the constitutional convention was full of INTELLECTUALS who all thought they were the smartest person in the room. Franklin is not getting religious here, he is getting the delegates to acknoledge a higher power then themselves, that they do not have the answers to everything. This might lead them to cooperate more.

I think the mark of 'enlightenment' is when someone realizes that their little ideas cannot explain everything and that humility, indeed, is necessary for true knowledge. The Oracle said Socrates was smart because he thought he 'didn't know anything'. Shakespeare said, "There are more wonders in Nature then ever dreamed of in your philosophy." My brother is atheist but as he's gotten older, he certainly wisened up that he wasn't the 'genius of the world' as he thought years ago.

My references to Catholicism was to point out (since it is the oldest Western Institution and the most consistant), that it is our echo to the ancient world and its wisdom. Even though we travel in cars where our ancestors traveled on horses, we wear jeans while they wore hoop skirts, human nature is still exactly the same. The Ancient World had to deal with serious threats to human nature from strains of paganism, to bizzarre tribes, and so on. Our fresh modern world is built on the collected wisdom of the ancients. Before we go changing things that have been constant for centuries, we ought to re-examine the reasons why they began in the first place.

It has very little to anything to do with 'religion'. The weakness in our modern philosophies is how they spit on wisdom and anything older then a century (or even totally ignorant of). Has our modern politicians read even an SHRED of the knowledge that John Adams or Thomas Jefferson did? Of course not. Yet, they consider themselves infinitely smarter. They might be on technological matters or other modern matters, but in others, no. The arrogance strikes me as obscene.

Rather then already defining the arguments, the pros and cons, I don't believe we have enough information TO debate. We are a sexually confused century, institutions do not even dare admit there are differences between men and women. (For myself, I consider the ignorance of sexuality the chief fault in everything that is going on. The failure of people to even ADMIT a possibility of ignorance of sexuality strikes me as stupid pride. But if the demigraphics continue as they do, this might change. Time makes more converts then facts.)

verplant colvin

"I doubt it was for that reason. Generalizations usually fall short of truth, and when it involves the feelings of teenage girls, it really falls short. There are many reasons why teens look for certain men. Not necessarily for sexual (in your terms) reasons. I doubt many of them are looking to breed at this point in their lives."

I came from a webstie and forums that dealt strictly with 'men obtaining women' and a producer from Bold View Productions liked where I was going and snatched me up. Generally, what I found was the ignorance of sexuality being the chief cause of the problems. The 'nice guys' are not seen as sexual beings (why? Because the nice guy follows his stupid philosphies rather then be flesh and blood). I don't want to go into detail on this subject, but I was able to re-transform myself and other people as well.

One thing I also learned was how much ancient literature had to say. Shakespeare blasted the 'thinking' or 'scared' person when it came to love. He had everyone marry in his comedies except ONE and that was the one he condemned. In the bible's Proverbs, we find advice to young men dealing with women (and to avoid the 'loose' women as they'll suck away your ambition and life). In Great Expectations, we find Pip tormented by his desire for Estella and re-evolving his life to 'please' her. This sounds like a tormented echo from Dickens's own life.

With Greek Mythology, I don't see how anyone can read it without sensing the sexuality throughout it. Poetry, also, is filled to the brim with it.

The point is that the ancient works speak more on sexuality then all of our philosophies do. There is more knowledge in human nature in one play of Shakespeare then an entire library of psychology.

"I'd say no. Politcs played a big role too in the past(uniting families for land/money/titles). Today you add love into that mix. That is the only serious new wrinkle in the institution of marriage."

Go to Andrew Sullivan's page and click on the link on Culture. Then click on the essay about 'Romanticism'.

One thing I do agree with Sullivan is how much the culture is oriented towards 'Romanticism'. Why Sullivan later contradicts himself by romanticizing gay marriage, I have no idea.

Romanticism is a very new concept. This is why marriages are not based on 'love' and do not survive on 'romance'.

"Now consider this situation. If said legless/torsoless man and his equally legless/torsoless wife adopted a gaggle of third world babies and saved them from disease/war/whatever, isn't that just as 'sexual' (and perhaps even more moral) than a 'regular' married couple? They're both rearing young."

No. Rearing young is not to tend to children as one tends to cattle. The parents are also the model. The marriage of the parents is also the model for the children.

Marriage (especially the Christian type that our current system is descendent from) is considered an actual fall. In Leviticus, we read, "It is better to marry then to burn." It was seen that everyone ought to give his life to Christ first. Marriage, then, was an outlet only for sexuality.

Now I know people will read that above paragraph and go, "These are religious reasons!" No they aren't, they are historical. If you want to find out WHY marriage became what it was, you have to look at these works.

"Then why is Mel Gibson's father so pissed at the Vatican? Come on, ever hear a mass in Latin these days?"

There are masses still in Latin. If you actually read up, you would find that after Vatican II not ALL the masses would be in Latin.

A priest can still give latin masses. However, he will get in trouble if he tries to give all his masses in latin (as Mel Gibson prefers).

The changes with Vatican II are stylistic. Masses are not all said in latin. How is this a change in the teachings of the church? After Vatican II, churches could be constructed differently. If you consider this to be a change in the teachings, THAT is the weak argument. How Mass is performed is a stylistic change, not a core change. Gay marriages certainly would be a core change.

Even if the Church does alter itself (it is a human institution after all), it usually corrects itself within the next pope or so. I remind people who think the Church will alter itself (question: if america is so secular then why are so many intellectuals incensed that the Church stays true to itself?. Others think that if it continues along its way that it will be seen as 'unpopular'. Don't forget the Church let England schism then to alter Christ's teachings on marriage.

The Church isn't going to budge.

You Sir, are a homo.