Walter Williams On Customs, Traditions And Moral Values

Well said and say it often.

My favorite line was What’s worse is that instead of a return to what worked, many of us fail to make the connection and insist “there ought to be a law.”

That sheds a new light on the knee-jerk Democratic mentality to fix things with legislation, when there are more and better tools available, vis-à-vis your faith, family, community and a little moral restraint.

I think that you and Mr. Williams are absolutely correct in that there are limits and that as a whole society, we live beyond them… and that it is going to kill us as a society if something is not done…

I have a great deal of hope, however; it seems to me that it is even obvious to our nation’s youth. I think the growing generation has a strong conservative streak in many places.

With respect to marriage (and for the record I am an extremely happily married heterosexual) I am still struggling. I agree with your observation about the slippery slope, but I also believe that for some at least, homosexuality is something they were born with. We see it even in animals. Am I wrong in thinking that it is also part of God’s plan?

If not God, then what happened?

I live across the street from a gay couple. They are both nurses, and loving people. I run a small computer company. When all has been said and done, weighed and measured, did their lives offer more to humanity than mine did? If so, how can I judge them so harshly?

It is a difficult topic for me, indeed. I look forward to your reader’s comments.

By the way, you don’t have to believe in God to have a civilized society, or even understand it. Many Asian cultures have had overwhelming civil order while essentially being godless. I saw this very well in Japan when I was there – it’s not a very religious country. And yet, they have far more social strictures and traditions than most Christian societies.

And what’s interesting – Miss Manners (aka Judith Martin) has been making this very point for decades. I’ve got books of hers that date back to the early 80s, at least, where she talks about what the basis for American etiquette is, and why it’s important for a civil society. Why a breakdown in civil society led to anti-smoking laws… if people had stuck to the idea of particular times/places for smoking (like smoking lounges in hotels and whatnot) and didn’t throw their butts everywhere, people may not have been pushed to the limit to pass laws against smoking in public places.

“Customs, traditions, moral values and rules of etiquette, not laws and government regulations, are what make for a civilized society.”

This is certainly well said.

In my view, law represents the enforcement of the outer limits of conduct regulated by customs, traditions, moral values and rules of etiquette. Law represents society’s decision that some conduct is so destructive of society that the power of the state, including physical force is necessary to control the conduct. The line drawn by law does not represent what is good for society, rather it represents the line where society is virtually certain to be destroyed if the conduct is allowed.

Those who see law as the limit of their behavior are opting to live in a society on the edge of collapse.

Often it is difficult to address an issue that has a lot of emotion attached to it. What I find helpful some times is to consider another closely related topic that does not have the emotion attached.

Sexual preference is one of those topics. Try evaluating all of the arguments that are attached to sexual preference to this somewhat related situation.

Most researchers believe the alcoholism has a powerful, if not determinative genetic component to it. Not only does it appear more often in some populations, but it an alcoholic is more likely to have an alcoholic offspring. There are also brain scan indications that true alcoholics react differently to alcohol than the general population.

If you consider sexual preference a trait that is genetic, consider all of the arguments about it in the context of alcholoics rather than gays.

Oh, yeah…and I should say that I was quite a hardcore commie liberal pinko tree-hugging social activist hippy sort when I started in this line of work. It’s amazing how a few reality smack-downs have made me more conservative…
and how 15 years in the trenches of government has illustrated for me, all too clearly, the limitations of government in social welfare policies.

Oops! Sorry. Continued “IF she used protection WHEN she had sex,” by the office nurse. The daughter reported this to her parents who took it up with the people in charge of the clinic and they apologized. I wonder what the practice is today. The expectations of our society have changed a great deal since I was in college. Yet getting pregnant out of wedlock can be devasting to a young girl and “protection” is not 100% foolproof.

Thanks, Evon. One of the problems with moral relativity and the freedom do what you want with your body is that OTHER PEOPLE end up paying the cost for someone’s carelessness in the form of taxes for health care, welfare or prison – or wherever the person ends up. We simply CAN’T do whatever we want, and when someone’s lifestyle is costing me money, it IS my business.

One thing moral relativists don’t seem to understand is that it’s not rules that are confining… it’s sin.

All sins have some short term reward that make them desirable… else no one would do them. Drugs feel good, smoking makes you acceptable to ceratin peers, sex feels good, stealing things gets you stuff without having really work for it. But all these things have long-term consequences that are far worse than denying yourself an immediate pleasure.

Drugs addict, and sometimes kill.

Smoking prematurely ages you, makes you sick, and can eventually kill you.

Pre- and extra-marital sex can lead to getting STDs, and can result in pregnanacy.

All these consequences are far more confining than the rules not to commit the acts in the first place.

And those are just the consequences to the individual. All of these things also have societal consequences that are being completely overlooked by moral relativists.

Removing the individual consequences doesn’t fix the societal consequences, but rather exacerbates them, and usually creates other individual consequences, as well.

For instance:

By legalizing abortion, the individual consequence of going through an entire pregnancy and having a child to take care of or give up for adoption was removed. The result was that more people choose to have pre- and extra-marital sex. But, the result wasn’t just that women didn’t have to have babies if they didn’t want to, though. In additon to so very many abortions, there are more women outside of wedlock who get pregnant that don’t have the means to care WELL for their children, but not only don’t choose abortion, but also choose not to give the child up for adoption. They usually have to have welfare to get by, and often don’t get the opportunity to learn and accomplish as much as they should be able to. And, the children brought up in single-parent homes have such a harder time… they are more likely to have trouble with the law, and more likely to make the same mistake as their parents and perpetuate the problem.

And that’s just one example. Sins may lead to immediate pleasure, but they never lead to long-term happiness.

Heavenly Father gave us commandments to help us, not to hold us back. He has promised us so many wonderful blessings for obedience (over and above the avoidance of the earthly consequences of our sins), and he wants to be able to bless us with those things. But he can’t do so if we don’t do what He has set up as a pre-requisite for those blessings.

But even for those who don’t believe in God, it amazes me that they refuse to see the consequences of allowing and encouraging these behaviors.

Marriage between one man and one woman (who are not brother and sister and a host of other rules) is what marriage is El. It is not whoever are consenting adults. That is not the definition.

Every man and every woman has the right to marry someone. Nobody is denying them that right. Where people go wrong is when they say that marriage doesn’t fit them because they love another human being of the same sex. So then they want to change the definition of marriage to the dismay of many people.

Between 60%-70% of people in every state do not want the definition of marriage changed. Yet, liberals want to call that set of people all kinds of names and also compare it to the civil rights struggle. It is not the civil rights struggle and there is no comparison. Every man and woman has the right to marry. Nobody is being denied that right. But because the definition of marriage isn’t how some want it they want to change the definition of marriage (again the deep dismay of many).

Another indicator of moral decline in our society is the normalization of porn.

Adrian

That was a GREAT post. Well reasoned and well put. What the gay community does not want us to focus on is the difference between accepting a behavior in the world and condoning that behavior. In the church, we can reject no one because we all are sinners. But we cannot overlook and condone the adulterer or ongoing alcoholic and the damage they do to themselves and their families, than we can to overlook and condone homosexual practice.

So gay organizations must paint this debate in terms of either/or: either you accept AND condone our behavior, or you are a bigoted homophobe. They cannot allow a more moderate and reasonable stance of the behavior being morally wrong but still accepting their struggle with it and loving them as Christ directs us. In the church, we must be careful that our rejection of the sinful behavior does not lead to rejection of the person. That is where self righteousness comes in, and we must work hard to avoid it. At the same time, however, we must be careful that in loving and accepting our brother/sister, we do not fall into morel relativism that condones sin. Its a hard line to walk, and we do not walk it well many times.

‘Customs, traditions, moral values and rules of etiquette, not laws and government regulations, are what make for a civilized society. These behavioral norms, mostly transmitted by example, word of mouth, and religious teachings, represent a body of wisdom distilled through ages of experience, trial and error, and looking at what works and what doesn’t.’

How does he account for progress, of the sort that the enlightenment was?

I don’t understand why the gay left is pushing for homosexual marriage. It’s a waste of their time, effort, and money, because it’s not going to happen. The majority of America does not want it. Whatever happened to civil unions and domestic partnerships for gay people?

Having said that, I fail to see the parallel between homosexuality and either alcoholism or adultery. Chronic alcoholism destroys lives and destroys families. Adultery is an infidelity that again destroys lives and destroys families. Would someone please explain (without using metaphysics) to this conservative agnostic what harm a stable, monogamous homosexual relationship does to individuals or to society?

Both! I’m 5′4′ and Williams must be….6′5′?

Idle,

I’ll try to answer your question, tho I may not be very good at it.

One of the arguments that the gay community advances concerning homosexuality is that it is genetic, ie it is who they are. This argument is used to advance the proposition that because they were created this way, it was God’s intent and they cannot help themselves, therefore homosexual activity cannot be a sin. Studies have shown that alcoholism also has a genetic component, yet we know that alcoholics can overcome their inclination and do not have to succumb to their genetic makeup. The comparison is between 2 genetically induced behaviors.

The comparison to aldultery is based on the biblical concept of it as sin, and it is viewed as sinful in almost all other religions as well. The bible also teaches that acts of homosexual nature are sin, and almost all religions teach it as sin also.

Do the comparisons hold across all levels of each behavior? No, but they are useful in illuminating the similarities between them in certain areas. I don’t know if that answers your question or not.

Michael,

Thanks, man. I would add this: LOVE is the most “intolerant” thing in the world.

A.

90% believe shacking up is okay? OH I SO hope you’re wrong…that number seems WAY high…

One thought comes to mind Idle Hour…
In 20 years or so, who are you going to ask that question to? A bunch of test tube babies (I mean, it’s no secret homosexuals can not pro-create) and a lawless civilization? Wait, maybe they don’t want kids…

So we just have the beginnings of man breeding himself out of existance. (Wait, we already have that)

Hmmm, that gives me warm fuzzies

Dear Idle Hour,

There’s a prior question that needs to be sorted out here. Setting aside for a moment the question of “harm,” we need to ask first whether consensual homosexual sex is right or wrong. If it’s right, or, at least, not wrong, then there’s no reason, as far as I can see, not to let gays marry.

Of course, some people, maybe a lot of people, find the bizarre and laughable the claim that any consensual sex can be considered right or wrong, moral or immoral. It’s become part of the common sense of the culture to assume that consent makes all questions of right and wrong moot when it comes to sex.

Still, there are some consensual sexual practises that many people regard with disapproval: polygamy, sex between teenagers and older “partners,” bestiality, and so forth. If gay rights groups weren’t exerting such pressure to normalize homosexuality, I suspect that a lot of people would feel the same instinctive disapproval—or, at least, would be bolder in expressing it—that they do in relation to the other behaviors mentioned just now.

My point, of course, is not that the existence of moral disapprobation is a proof that the acts disapproved of are morally wrong. My point is rather that the existence of moral disapprobation vis-a-vis certain consensual behaviors shows that it’s not abnormal or absurd, but rather natural, for people to make moral judgments even about consensual sex.

And why not?

Now, in order to show that homosexual sex is wrong, you have to do a lot of things. I won’t attempt them here. I won’t even name all of them. I’ll limit myself to pointing out one of them, to wit: showing that homosexual sex is wrong requires (among other things) thinking about what sex is and what it is for.

If, as many in the culture assume, sex is just for the expression of emotional intimacy, then there is no reason to stigmatize gay sex, indeed, it would be unfair to do so. If, on the other hand, sex finds its inner fulfillment as sex in openness to new life, then an argument can be made (I won’t try to make it just now) that there is something wrong with gay sex. (This isn’t the only basis for argument, but it is an important one.)

Conducting this argument would not require, at least not right away, any invocation of the divine will. It would require, instead, (1) attending to nature of human sexuality, as it manifests itself “always or for the most part” (as Aristotle would say); (2) within that attention, trying to disengage a normal form of that sexuality; in order then (3) to point out the ways in which homosexual sex deviates from that norm.

Of course, whether natural givens are just amoral contingencies, or whether they are meaningful to the point of being able to provide norms, is itself a big question. It’s a worldview question. And, sooner or later, a worldview question brings us to issues concerning the nature and value of the whole of reality. And to God.

Now, this doesn’t mean that someone who is against the normalization of homosexuality is secretly “imposing his religion,” whereas the proponent—or the undecided person of good will—is just dealing in an unbiased fashion with the facts. No: both sides make their judgments about the morality of homosexual sex within the context of often implicit worldviews that bear on ultimate matters.

Assuming, then, that one had shown that homosexual sex did deviate from the natural norm, and just so far as wrong, then there could be an initial answer to your question about how stable, monogamous homosexual partnerships “hurt” others.

If, as the gay rights advocates want, such partnerships were given public recognition by the state as being, for legal purposes, just as good as “traditional” marriages, then, for all intents and purposes, the state would be declaring that the latter, that is, “traditional” marriages to be no longer the publicly recognized norm. But, if such marriages are in fact the natural norm, then the state would just so far be declaring public warfare on the natural norm.

The whole of society, then, would be “hurt” because the state would be imposing a lie on all its citizens. It would be forcing them to participate in an injustice, the injustice, that is, of having to treat as equally normal, of having to give equal rights to, what in fact is not equally normal and does not deserve those rights.

What we’re talking about, then, is a proposal for the reorganization of society around a new conception of sexuality that undercuts the conception of sexuality underlying “traditional” marriage. How this could not demoralize “traditional” marriage is beyond me. Note, too, that the ethic underlying “traditional marriage” underlies prohibitions against bestiality, polygamy, adultery, you name it. If we accept the principle that the consensual is beyond moral evaluation, then, quite literally, anythying goes in the sexual sphere.

You may say, no, not anything goes, because we can and will urge people to be loving, committed, stable, monogamous, etc. But, if consent makes immune to moral evaluation, then there is no intrinsic reason for love, commitment, stability, and monogamy. In fact, those are just holdovers from the “traditional” sexual ethic underlying “traditional” marriage. To claim, as the gay rights people do, that those holdovers are transportable, tels quels, from the old ethic to the new, without acknowledging that the new ethic undermines the basis of the old, is, at best, whistling and the dark and, at worst, disingenuous manipulation of the truth for political purposes.

Cordially,

Adrian

Hi Idle Hour.

Context is that I was raised in the Christain tradition and believe in a higher power (God!), but my views are primarilly developed from a secular perpective.

1) I’m not at all sure that monogamous homosexual relationships cause harm to society. I am sure that judicial fiat and/or outright breaking of the law by officials duty bound to enforce it (when there is not a clear moral reason for breaking the law) is bad for society. Its the pairing of the political cause of homosexual marriage with the tactics to advance it that has been of primary concern to me.

2) Even if monogamous homosexual relationships are not bad for society, it does not necessarily follow that homosexual marriage is good for society.

3) On the broader question of genetic homosexuality:
This will be boring or blasphemous to those that don’t subscribe to macro evolution. Additionally, some here may see signs of eugenic thinking and be scared off. If so, your reading too far into it.

My personal opinion, backed slightly by a BA in biology, is that human sexuality is a gradient. Studies with rats have shown that male rats exposed in the womb to abnormally high estrogen levels display sexually submissive behavior with other male rats. There are likely two primary “sexual” circuits involved, both present in both sexes, with variable dominance between the circuits.

In evolutionary theory, homosexuality is strongly selected against. A homosexual rat does not reproduce! Under social evolution theory (this is a biology theory, not a political theory, and happened in the past.), things get more interesting. Because social animals have culture/traditions, a member may have marginal homosexual tendencies and still be “bent” slightly by the culture, enabling reproduction and passing on of genes. This is not just a homosexual issue. Social animals can have a greater genetic diversity because the individual’s behavior does not have to be “hard wired”, but can instead be passed on through tradition.

What I don’t want to loose in our society is my “traditional” right to prefer that my children are heterosexual. I truly believe that if one of my children falls into the gray area of the gradient, they will be happier in life living the way it has been done for at least 2000 years; in a heterosexual nuclear family. If, on the other hand, they are absolutley homosexual, I’m still going to love them.

Would love replies. Not many people like to talk about this stuff.

Dear Josh,

Thanks for your post.

Could you clarify your position about the relation between the biological and moral aspects of homosexuality?

Let me tell you what I am hearing: you think that there’s some level of genetic predisposition to homosexual desire in EVERYONE, only that in most people it’s rendered negligible by other factors, but that, all things being equal, it’s still better for a person to be sexual within heterosexual marriage.

Is this what you’re saying?

If it is, I’m wondering on what grounds you think that, all things being equal, it’s better to be sexual within heterosexual marriage.

I ask this question in part because, if everyone, so to speak, is at least a little bit gay-oriented biologically speaking, then it seems to me that, biologically speaking, there’s no compelling reason to say that homosexual desire is abnormal in any moral sense, but only in a statistical sense.

But if that’s the case, then on what would you base your preference for happy heterosexual marriages for your kids?

I should add that the example you cite bears another interpretation than the one you give it. That is, the male mice get sexually submissive to other males because of unusually high estrogen levels. But how does it follow from that that there are “two circuits” in each gender? Or are there other, more relevant examples, which you might mention to bolster your claim?

My take on all this is that the human body, as given in ordinary experience, is not just a gene machine, but carries in its very structure a standard for judgments about what’s normal and abnormal, not just in a statistical, but in a moral sense. It seems to me that, given the testimony of ordinary experience—the testimony that, is, that says that male-female difference is real, goes all the way down, and is morally and humanly significant, the burden of proof rests squarely on the shoulders of those who would reduce the body to a gene machine.

Because of this, I’m a bit suspicious of claims to find a biological basis for homosexuality that would somehow be on the same plane of normality as the biological basis for what is in fact the norm, namely, desire for the opposite sex.

Cordially,

Adrian

Hi Adrian. Thank you for a thoughtful reply.

Clarify relation between biological and moral aspects of homosexuality?

a) Homosexual desire in everyone?
My original post was not clear: when I stated “human sexuality is a gradient”
I should have said any given individual falls on a relatively static point on the gradient. Additionally, I’m not arguing that it is a linear distribution. The distribution is heavily weighted toward the heterosexual end. But you are correct that I was implying that both circuits are present in most people.

“homosexual desire” is not the correct way of viewing the alternate circuit, and I don’t mean that in a semantic sense. First, access into the circuit (ways in which the circuit is stimulated), is limited. For instance, hardwired patterns of what is attractive are very different between men and women.
Second, even if the circuit is stimulated, its expression is different between men and women (and individuals, which should always be assumed in this reply).
An example of access to the alternate circuit would be the very well documented attractiveness of “symmetry”. Both men and women can recognize the attractive qualities of symmetry in both sexes. Both circuits are stimulated to some extend by pictures of highly symmetrical people (multiple studies, including CAT/PET scans). But in most individuals, the signal to one circuit is not reinforced by other factors. Their is no “desire”, just a tickling of an isolated circuit. I am simply stating that the isolation of the circuit varies between individuals.

b)So take away the “desire” part of your response. Also, take away the “all things being equal” phrase. For most people, all things are not equal.

c) The hardest question: “there’s no compelling reason to say that homosexual desire is abnormal in any moral sense, but only in a statistical sense.”

I believe the moral relativists have been making a fundamental error in logic. I’ve been thinking about this for a long time, but have never written a crystalized response. This is a weak attempt. It has to do with logical mistakes about self referential systems.

1) To say that there is no God is an equivalent act of faith as stating that there is a God.
2) When studying other cultures, it is scientifically reasonable to attempt to not judge them from the perspective of your own culture. It does not follow that the other culture is as good as your own, or that all cultures are equally good. In order to reach that conclusion one has to necessarily throw away
parts of ones own cultural system.

So: I am reluctant to throw away a morality system that I believe is an integral part of the success of the United States of America. I’m willing to debate any given part of our morality, but I do not understand why the left wants to throw everything away to be more like Europe when we are beating Europe, and the rest of mankind, in virtually all metrics.

Homosexual desire is immoral because it is part of the morality system that has delivered the “Last Best Hope of Mankind”.

Lastly, I am not saying that all my morality is shaped by the type of reasoning above. In fact, its a minor part. I don’t get many chances to bring my biology backgroud into discussions. Thank you for indulging me.
I do find that a great many arguments brought by the scientific left have logical and factual errors, and because of my background those errors bother me. This is the type of response that works with them.

Dear Josh,

Thanks for your reply.

One thing it suggests to me is that the “alternate circuit,” if it exists, is not, in fact, anything like a “gay gene.” At most, it’s an ability or predisposition to recognize that someone of the same sex is handsome or beautiful. But, as you yourself say, that’s a far cry from homosexual desire. I recognize that Brad Pitt is handsome, for example, but I don’t want to have sex with him. Thus, if someone wants to have sex with a person of the same gender, the “other factors” you mention are going to be the decisive ones. Is there any compelling evidence that those other factors have anything to do with what’s called genetic or biological “hardwiring”? I have my doubts. Certainly nothing that you’ve said in either of your posts would necessarily suggest such a conclusion.

Most people on both sides of this debate think that human biology is just the sub-moral mechanics of human existence. I think that that’s a terribly impoverished understanding of human biology. What I think is that the human body, as given in ordinary human experience, itself contains a standard of normality and abnormality that can serve as a basis—at least as a partial basis—of moral judgments. Because morality doesn’t mean someone’s rules, but doing justice to what’s appropriate to the kind of being that ordinary human experience manifests us to be.

In other words, if we want to support our moral judgments about homosexuality, we’ve got to wrest the body away from the reductionists and restore ordinary experience to its rights. Because it’s ordinary experience that tells us that there’s a fundamental difference between man and woman and that that difference is key to the meaning of sex.

Cordially,

Adrian

Renee, so true indeed.

I nominate LaShawn Barber as new head of the NAACP. I’m not holding my breath.

Ok, how about Walter Williams? I guess not. But these people give me hope. That’s why I’m “annoyed” and not “angry” anymore.

Josh,

Maybe I’m not following you, but now you seem to be saying almost the opposite of what I took you to be saying before. Now you’re maintaining, I think, that humans sexual behavior is somehow free-floating with respect to biology. But, if that’s the case, then I don’t see how it follows, even as a possibility, that homosexuality can be “hardwired.” More importantly, I don’t see how it would any longer be possible to deny that anything goes sexually.

The position I’m staking out neither ignores biology nor lets reductionism have the final say in determining what biology is and means. In other words: the body, as we ordinarily experience it, remains the basic reference-point, the basic unity, and, on that level, the very structure of the body itself contains norms of normal and abnormal.

Someone told me this last night: a talk-show host, arguing against homosexuality, draws an analogy to the effect that, even though it’s physically possible to drink by sticking a straw up one’s nose and inhaling, doing so goes contrary to what the nose—and the mouth—are for. My point all along has been that there is a “what it’s for” built into the body, and that this “what it’s for” is a bodily, natural phenomenon, but that it’s so basic that it can’t be explained exhaustively in terms of genes, etc.

Cordially,

A.

Josh – Threads usually remain open unless the discussion gets out of hand. I maintain enough control so that doesn’t happen often. See you later!

Dear Catz,

The issue, it seems to me, is not whether a non-Christian/non-theist can see that there are what are called “exceptionless moral norms” (e.g. no possible circumstance could justify killing an innocent person in cold blood).

The real question is whether we are capable of not violating those norms on their own.

I submit that, in answering that question honestly for ourselves, we have to imagine ourselves, not as the nice people we think we are, and probably are, in our ordinary lives when everything is going OK. We have to imagine ourselves under duress in situations where it’s very tempting to do the wrong thing to get oursleves out of a tight spot.

Speaking for myself, I won’t venture to claim that I wouldn’t give into the temptation. The fact that I cannot claim that I won’t suggests, I think, that our goodness isn’t automatic and that much of what we take to be our goodness now is due to finding ourselves in easy circumstances where we’re not being put to the test.

Cordially,

Adrian

Dear Andy,

Yes. I’m not sure I would put it in terms of goodness versus morality, but, say, in terms of niceness versus morality, but I agree with your point.

The standard “I can be a good person without God” line is just what you say it is: an unrealistic extrapolation from the habitual niceness that comes easily to us in our comfortable, peaceful lives (although not all of us are even as nice as we think)—an unreasonable extrapolation from that to the ability of be truly good/moral when it’s really necessary to rise to the occasion.

In other words, we can’t claim to be reliably, infallibly good. Only God is reliably, infallibly good—trustworthy, as Scripture says. It’s for that reason that we say that we need God to be good. Non-believers can do good things. But to do the complete good and to do it consistently is something that we can’t do without the help of the One who does consistently, reliably, always do the complete good because he IS the GOOD.

It’s good “talking” with you.

Adrian

Hey La Shawn, did I miss something in your archives about your meeting with WW? If not, when ya gonna share?

Oh yeah thanks.