Sexual Orientation and Human Rights

Thomas argues that gay people should not be treated differently from any other group of people if the different treatment is simply because they are gay. He thinks the government should recognize lover-unions between gay people as much as it should recognize them between straight people. However, he argues that this should not be confused with marriage, which he says should be regulated by religious organizations not under the jurisdiction of the government, where married couples are formed explicitly (though not exclusively) for the purpose of raising a family. This is quite a conservative view, one that accords with the recent interest in covenant marriages.

Thomas is concerned to show that Biblical texts, even if they clearly condemn homosexual behavior, do not give any grounds for the hateful venom directed by religious people against the homosexual community. In this he agrees with many highly conservative religious-right-type people, though many of the public ones seem to disagree at least in their behavior, at least the ones vocal on this issue. I think he goes a bit too far when he suggests that someone who finds homosexual behavior appalling should nevertheless be happy about the union. That seems unrealistic to expect.

Levin, on the other hand, refuses to rely on religious arguments for the view that what is often called "hate speech" or "hate behavior" should be tolerated (excluding physical harm, of course). He argues that those who are made uncomfortable by homosexuals should be able to avoid them, even in public circumstances and in roles of hiring and renting. I find his arguments to be fairly bad in most cases, something unusual for such a well-trained philosopher, whose work in the philosophy of mind is quite respected. These are the sort of arguments I teach my undergraduate students not to use. He makes a few nice points, but his arguments on the whole seem just unmotivated, and his criticisms of Thomas seem to miss the point in many cases. It's unfortunate that someone else couldn't have been selected for the "conservative" view, but Thomas seems to have done a good enough job satisifying this conservative.


A new look at homosexuality and totalitarianism.   April 5, 2000
Matt Nuenke (Pleasant Hill, CA USA)
10 out of 19 found this review helpful

This short book pits a gay activist, Laurence Thomas against the iconoclastic Michael Levin. Thomas argues mainly from anecdotal data from the bible, that homosexuals were never that singled out by Christianity or Judaism for condemnation. In fact very little is even said about homosexuality. He then goes on to make some arguments in favor of civil rights for gays, and to me the arguments were weak but sincere.

But Levin as always, one of the most articulate political philosophers, argues some very good points against the liberationists, that is the radical left that wants to force society to accept gays. I am probably fairly unbiased, I am married, I have been around lesbians and gays a lot when I lived in San Francisco, and they just do not bother me one way or the other. Upbringing or genes--I don't know. But I fall in that small majority that doesn't want special rights for anyone, but at the same time cannot sympathize emotionally with homophobes. Christians and Communists alike offend me far more.

Having said that, Levin makes some brilliant observations against the liberationists. First, he points out that these new totalitarians are out to "force" society to accept all gays openly, and if they must they are willing, like the Bolsheviks, to kill those who cannot accept gays. That is, they are hell bent on brainwashing society to think the way they think. Levin brilliantly points out that, just like the liberationists arguments that gays are genetically born gay, likewise homophobia may also be as equally genetic. So how can it be any worse to be a homophobe than a gay? Levin states "Societies respecting the diversity of individual tastes, as ours professes to, let people shun what they find repulsive. Tolerance includes tolerating fences. Forcing people to put up with what they loathe is tyranny." He also comments that as genetic testing progresses, couples may choose to abort children that test for homosexual tendencies. And he also notes that where as the left denies that genes have any impact on the differences between blacks and whites with regards to intelligence, they then turn around and insist that genes cause homosexuality. All and all, this is a very readable book looks at more than just homosexual human rights.