I want to thank readers for their outpouring of kind words and encouragement after my post of Friday night. I know this is a very controversial issue and that a number of readers disagree with my view, so I am immensely grateful for the hundreds of readers who chimed in and said, “Good going, Mike.” I think I’ve responded to everyone who wrote in personally on e-mail; thanks also to all the hundreds on Facebook, whoever you are. (I don’t know if there’s a way I can find out who all those folks are individually; anyway, thanks to all of you.)
I’m even thankful, to some extent, to those who wrote in disagreement, most of whom avoided cheap vilification. Many gave me food for thought, and some, I admit, for tongue-in-cheek mockery. One of my favorites deplored gay marriage as sending us down the road to “the full ‘gay’ morally relativistic agenda” which will result, if we permit it, in “materialism at high-tide.” Now, this is an objection I take very seriously indeed, because I think materialism is a great danger to the soul, especially in a wealthy country such as ours. So I hope we never reach those vilest depths of moral decay, the ones my reader is so worried about; and never become a country so overtaken by materialist excess that a respected conservative presidential candidate will have a million-dollar account at Tiffany’s to buy gifts for his wife. The gays will sure have a lot to answer for, if that ever happens. (Note: Yes, I recognize that it’s not for me to judge what people spend their money on. They have a right to spend their own money on whatever they want, as far as I’m concerned. I’m just saying that blaming the triumph of materialism in America on the — what? 2 percent? 5 percent? — of Americans who are gay, or on the 2 percent within that 2 percent who want to be married, is completely ludicrous.)
Also: Thank you, Jason, for that spirited defense! I am generally a fan of Archbishop Dolan — I have written about my appreciation for him here — but I thought his North Korea comparison was unfortunate. I know that he was trying to make a very specific point, about the relation between government power and the use of language; but I also know that if some liberal ever compared America to North Korea, even in the most “nuanced” possible way, conservatives would be jumping up and down accusing him of “anti-Americanism.” I’m fond of Dolan, indeed that’s why I didn’t put his name in my post; I wanted to attack the rhetoric, which I disagree with, not the man, whom I admire. (This led to the unfortunate consequence that some comboxers thought I had invented the “North Korea” thing myself and was thus guilty of creating a straw man! Oh well; sometimes decency must be its own reward.) But more important to me now is to rebuke Archbishop Dolan’s critics, in the comboxes and elsewhere — those who are faulting his efforts and blaming the gay-marriage passage on his ineffectiveness. Hogwash! In the fantasy world of these critics, there is some Ideal Archbishop — a Forceful, Manly Man — who will tell the state legislature “Do this!” and the state senate will meekly obey; and the fact that Dolan’s efforts weren’t successful proves that he’s simply not up to the job. When the fact is, Archbishop Dolan is a good man, politically skilled (despite my cavils at some particulars of his language), and deeply committed to religious truth as he sees it; he deserves better than this sort of sniping from people who should instead be immensely grateful to have somebody of his stature taking their part in this argument.
Let me close with a moment of serendipity from tonight’s Choral Evensong at St. John the Divine Episcopal Cathedral. The closing hymn was written by none other than the Blessed John Henry Newman:
Lead, kindly Light, amid th’encircling gloom,
Lead Thou me on!
The night is dark, and I am far from home;
Lead Thou me on!
Keep Thou my feet; I do not ask to see
The distant scene; one step enough for me.
It is indeed dark, and we are all of us far from home. We all walk by faith, and not by sight; we are all often wrong, and sometimes right; let’s try to look on one another’s follies with God’s merciful light.
Thanks again, to everyone.
Hmmm, I didn't count, but I had the impression that the negative comments on the thread outnumbered the positives by quite a large margin. And most of the positives came from unregistered commenters (again, my impression), as is usually the case when this subject arises and they seem to arrive en masse. It's too bad all the people who wrote to encourage Mr. Potemra didn't see fit to argue their cases here.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI hate to be a wet blanket, but given that most of the positive comments to the piece came from unregistered users denouncing bigoted fundamentalist Christians (at least that was my impression), I have to question how many of them truly are devoted NRO fans. I go back reading National Review twenty-five years this year and I have to say I found Potemra's piece somewhat cloying.
To be sure, many in the cultural elite who are (or call themselves) conservatives have moved far away from the party line on moral issues. And there's the libertarian strain as well. I myself frequently have been turned off by some of the attitudes toward gays expressed on conservative sites (over at Big Hollywood, for example, many people defended Tracy Morgan's anti-gay rant--if you questioned this, you were massively disliked).
So I'm all for civility. But the contempt spewed on anyone questioning the wisdom of SSM as social policy gets rather tiresome too.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWe have subscribed to National Review for a good while, but I have never before responded to an online posting. I was frightened and dismayed by the favorable treatment of gay marriage in Potemra's post and several others recently--and, of course, in the nasty, hate-filled, anti-Christian responses from those who share his vision. I let Time, Newsweek, and the NYTimes go a long time ago because I found their agenda destructive to the common good. I hate seeing this publication and its website moving in the same direction.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe conservative candidate you mention is hardly "respected" anymore and will find it difficult to locate a primary where he can win 5 percentbof the vote -- and a major reason for that is his serial public immorality
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseRE: "sending us down the road to “the full ‘gay’ morally relativistic agenda”"
You mean we're not being sent?
Slippery slopes do exist.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseHonestly, as a reader here, I don't need any goofball nonsense like that. Get some serious people in here.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe thing that gets me about cons like Poterma is that he's apparently unconcerned about playing with the fundamentals of society in order to promote something so thoroughly unnecessary as SSM. The only reason people want it is to bash religious people. Think about it: have any of the people supporting SSM done anything else to strengthen marriage or the family? No. 20 years ago, they mocked the whole institution.
It's a trick, Mike, and you fell for it.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMike Potemra's Rainbow 'Thank You' Tour, everyone. They like him! They really like him!
He is 'Exhibit A' of the peculiar and destructive RINO desire to cater to the opposition and the cocktail crowd.
To paraphrase Justice Thomas, "Something has gone seriously awry at NRO."
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseNR writers thanking liberal (and liberaltarian trolls) for coming to their defense at the expense of the very mission of National Review. Wow. It's said that great nations die from within. Maybe great organizations do as well.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseYou said it. An NRO writer thanking some liberals and libertarian trolls for their approbation is downright perverse. The company in which Potemra finds himself on this issue is a chilling indictment itself of his position.
And that's a great and especially salient quote you reference:
"A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself from within."
-Will Durant
We're seeing the wisdom and prophecy of Mr. Durant's words firsthand.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseDouglas, are you aware of the benefits to an organization of differing thoughts? That a combination of good ideas from 10 people are better than the thoughts of just one?
Are 'conservatives' in your view, not allowed to believe in gay marriage? Are National Review readers all supposed to be on the same page---hook, line and sinker?
Barry Goldwater, the 'father' of the conservative movement would mock you ---he stated, rather forcefully, on gays in the military, that "I don't care whether one is gay or straight, as long as they can shoot straight".
Do you think that WFB wanted everyone to think and write the same-ol, same-ol, for NR??? No, that is why he supported Lieberman over Weicker, and more like that.
No one, NO ONE holds views that everyone supports --- that is why when you write a critical letter, or an essay, or whatnot---you sleep on it --to make sure it is what you truly believe, and want others to accept as your best effort.
You, Douglas, do not fall into that category. You are not appreciative of divergent viewpoints, no matter how well intentioned.
Ben Franklin wisely admonished that we will all hang together, if not seperately....that is, let us make the strongest statement from all of the thirteen colonies to the one Crown, rather than up to thirteen (or more, with dissents) opinions to said Crown.
As President Reagan, amongst more clear thinkers admonished "It's best to be in charge, than be 120% correct and not in charge.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseReagan also said that moderates in the REpublican party sought to blur the lines b/t the GOP and the Democrats. It's become hip for moderates to use Reagan against conservatives but it never ends well for those tryig to do that.
Goldwater was giving a beatdown in an election. He wasn't the father of a conservativism. Conservativism has been around a long time prior to the founding of thise country, and I donn't think there is any one man that gave birth to it.
I don't have a problem with Republicans who support gay marriage. It's the ones that want to beat their chest about awesome and tolerant they are and sneer at those that don't support it I have a problem with. I'm agnostic on the issue, but I am curious how a straight person can lose sleep over gays not being able to marry. It seems like a trivial issue to me yet it dominates politics, even in a economic depression. This is why Mitch Daniels was silly to assert we need a truce on social issues. That's a fantasy of all moderates...it's not based on reality.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"I am curious how a straight person can lose sleep over gays not being able to marry."
It's easy if you have gay friends who love each other and want to legally wed but cannot (for about another 30 days, anyway.)
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMyKu:
I am all for a
bigger tent as long as it
has much smaller doors.
-------------
We tried squish. It was not the answer.
Conservatism - social, fiscal - has to be *conservative* and defined as such. Well explained, the reasonable person will get it and come aboard.
One does not have to hold exclusively conservative views, but one cannot just arbitrarily change the definition of conservatism to taste. Right now, the NY GOP is attempting to do just that.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse>"Do you think that WFB wanted everyone to think and write the same-ol, same-ol, for NR???"
On certain topics, yes, he did. Anyone with a passing familiarity with NR knows which topics those are. Besides, if we took you seriously we'd have to wonder why there are no Obamacare supporters writing at NRO. Doesn't NRO appreciate diversity of views? Maybe they can bring back David Frum and Kathleen Parker. And hire Erza Klein while they're at it.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"Douglas, are you aware of the benefits to an organization of differing thoughts? "
National Review was created for one reason: because there were no serious conservative voices in the media. He created NR so that he'd have a platform to "stand athwart history yelling 'Stop!'", not to give liberals a platform for "differing thoughts".
In a world dominated by liberal media, you want NR to spot the other side points. Conservatives come to NR because it's... stand by... conservative. Buckley didn't create it to give "the other side" a "fair chance" in debate. There are other platforms for that. NR is a place for the best in conservative thought. You'll never find The Nation touting conservative themes, and for a good reason... it's a magazine to promote liberalism.
"Do you think that WFB wanted everyone to think and write the same-ol, same-ol, for NR??? "
At the very least, he wanted conservative writing.
"Are 'conservatives' in your view, not allowed to believe in gay marriage? "
If you do, you are by definition not conservative, as American conservatism, defined by Buckley and Burke, is rooted in social conservatism. Social conservatism is why we're conservative on other issues as well. It's not a coincidence, it's a reason. If you support destroying good social structures to remake them in a leftist image, then no, you're not a conservative.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseGoldwater at that time was a near senile old man completely dominated by a young, liberal wife. Not too persuasive for me.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"Are 'conservatives' in your view, not allowed to believe in gay marriage?"
Well, of course not; don't be ridiculous.
I'm not wedded to the term "conservative" or deeply interested in arguing its meaning, but I can see no way to reconcile any coherent definition of the term "conservative" with "SSM supporter." Are you some kind of Andrew Sullivan follower, or what?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMy understanding is that in the creation of NR, Mr. Buckley assembeled a host of conservative writers who disagreed on many important issues, but all agreed on the need to stop, and turn back totalitarian communism.
Front Page Magazine: WFB proceeded to create an intellectually respectable conservatism" and " Assembling this masthead proved easier than holding together thinkers with such widely divergent views, a task Buckley accomplished by focusing all parties on the overriding objective of defeating Communism – and leavening disputes with his abundant personal charm. This tactic would be writ large as Cold War conservatism united libertarians, neo-conservatives, traditionalists, and social conservatives."
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So, Douglas, who really is the troll?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMike and all of your haters, this article was written nearly 20 years ago by NR hero John O'Sullivan. In my very FIRST foray into blogging 10 years ago, it was about this post. Look, we've all known it was coming and John gave us hope and I still have it. Reasonable options leading to a desired solution - is that so bad?
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