Lately there has been a lot of discussion about the so-called religious freedom laws in many states. Depending on the states and what groups of people are covered in the protected classes, these laws have been interrupted by some as a way of giving those who provide services within that state the legal right to refuse to provide services to the GLBT (gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community.) This again raises the legal and ethical question of whether it is permissible for someone such as a shop owner to refuse to serve those who they know or perceived to be in the GLBT community. Some have compared this sort of discriminatory service is similar to the past legal right to refuse services to “people of color”. In the past, many so called religious people cited scripture which they said alluded to God’s law keeping the people of different races separate, by either refusing service or providing separate but equal accommodations. We will leave aside the discussion of the fact that services were often not even close to being equal.
If one researches articles by those of whatever religious faith who posit that sexual behavior which deviates from that between a married male and female and which is primarily for the purposes of procreation one gets a number of argument based on their translation of words originally written in an ancient language which can often be widely interrupted or a list of “sins” or behaviors which some religious person decided at one point in history were displeasing to God. For example, often in the lists are “drunks”. This term reflects a level of understanding about the excessive use of alcohol for many, many centuries. For the most part, it is only in the past century that there has been any understanding and acceptance of the concept of the disease of addiction. One might also find thieve in the list. The purpose is usually to convince people that God is going to be displeased if one engages in certain behaviors, so displeased that punishment might be for all of eternity. God, Allah, or Elohim was often a very pissed off old man who demanded to be obeyed and certainly did not tolerate any deviations from His strict codes of conduct. This god was often a far cry from the often very playful and erotic Gods of Greece or other cultures. This God is also very different that that modeled or discussed by my understand of Jesus or The Buddha.
Some of the prohibition against certain behavior was certainly designed to create an orderly community of people who could work together for the common good. People stealing from one another is not conducive to people working together. There also needs to be some system for procreation, the safe birth and the care of children. One of the early beliefs was that male sperm/seed was very limited. One did not want to waste seeds if the goal was to get the female pregnant often enough to make sure some children were born alive and lived to help keep the community operating. In many early communities and even today in certain intentional communities the care of the children is the responsibility of the entire community. Thus the concerns were not in the context of a nuclear family, which creates its own set of issues. Along the way in many cultures survival chores got divided up based not only on skills but also practical issues relating to pregnancy, physical strength and other factors.
The point I am attempting to make is that many rules and laws began as a sincerer attempt to build a community, which could survive and even prosper. Often these rules and laws were based on the very limited knowledge available, which might be supplanted by superstitions, or beliefs about what the God or Gods would find pleasing or displeasing.
There was and is also the matter of the shaky sense of self worth of most of we humans and the frequent corresponding attempt to prove one’s worth by being better than or less sinful or worth more than or …
Once a community of people adopts a set of beliefs, which they attribute to the wishes of a God or Gods, the power base and structure is often directly tied to these beliefs. If one questions the beliefs than all beliefs including the power hierarchy becomes open to question. One of the ways to prevent this from happening is to convince ourselves and others that God may be eternally displeased if we question or change the rules.
Since many may believe that there is a “chance” that what the elders are telling them is true they are not going to question these beliefs and will spend their life journey keeping any possible new “truths” from disturbing this precarious balance.
How else to explain the often obsessive preoccupation with what one is doing or not doing with one’s genitals sexually with self or another person. Leaving aside the question of using sex as a power tool (this has nothing to do with procreation or a consenting fun relationship between two adults or even between two teenagers), the issue is not even very interesting except to those who might be interested in the making of or the use of pornographic material for stimulating or enhancing sexual play (again assuming adults who are truly in a position to consent).
Certainly we do not need to keep increasing the population of the world. We do need to do a better job of teaching people about sexually transmitted diseases and how to more effectively prevent unwanted pregnancies. It would be wonderful if the only time the issues of abortion came up was a conception engendered by or during a violent rape.
In all of our behavior we need, I believe, to consider the needs of others and strive never to take advantage of anyone or to use anyone as an object rather than a person of equal worth. I personally do not care what one does sexually or with whom one does it as long as both people are at an age and have the current mental capacity to make an informed decision. Obviously if someone is drunk or impaired in other ways they cannot consent or make an informed decision about anything.
It takes great courage to question the “truths” of a particular culture or community. Whether the truth is one which new seems blatantly silly such as ‘the earth is flat.” or more open to varying opinions, it is only the brave, which are going to let go of the illusion of certainly and open themselves to new possibilities. When those possibilities concern human relationships we need to be very careful, but we also need to realize that our refusal to take this courageous step hurts many people.
Lastly this courage presumes that we know that if we quit judging others we may have to look at our own fears of who we are and what gives our life meaning. We may have to stretch our faith to include a God which, I as mentioned in a previous blog, is more expansive and accepting of our humanness.
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