Category Archives: Relativism

The dark side of the rainbow

Whatever happened to sin?


-by Dr Matthew Petrusek

“The month of June is Pride Month. You may have noticed. For thirty days, corporations, universities, local businesses, community organizations, and government institutions take a break from their perennial praise of the LGBTQ+ movement to demonstrate (especially to those surveilling online) that they are really, really—really—committed to the cause. Although the symbol of Pride has struggled to keep up with the exponential growth of qualifying identities, celebrants communicate their fidelity in the form of rainbow-saturated company logos, sidewalk displays, oversize billboards, and even Pride-themed onesiespick-up trucks, and ice-cream.

But what, precisely, is being celebrated? There are numerous bumper-sticker responses: “love is love,” “acceptance,” “being who you are,” and even, incongruously given the corresponding statistics, “joy.” But how does any of this relate to pride—pride in what exactly? Examining the assumptions and implications of the Pride movement leads to some unsettling conclusions.

Before digging deeper, it’s important to separate Pride ideology—a system of thought that seeks to advance specific cultural and political goals—from individuals who do not fit traditional sexual and gender categories. It’s likely you know someone, are related to someone, or maybe even a parent to someone who’s in this group. You likely love them very much and they may, indeed, be exceptionally lovable. You certainly don’t want to hurt them, and, in fact, that may be the reason you’ve hesitated to say anything about their professed identity. Setting aside the scurrilous knee-jerk accusations of “hatred” and “phobia” that inevitably accompany any skepticism, or even, ironically, curiosity about the meaning of the Pride movement, the search for clarity should recognize that addressing the topic honestly may cause real, even if unintended, pain to good people. And so it goes without saying, to draw on Pope Benedict XVI’s encyclical, that truth must never be separated from charity.

But who I am to say anything about the “truth” of Pride? Though this question is usually taken as a blow in defense of the movement (Who are you to judge?), it, in fact, opens the first line of critique: What separates Pride from traditional hetero-centric morality? In other words, what makes Pride ideology true, or at least truer, than competing worldviews in such a way that its advocates are not merely imposing their values on society because they have the power to do so?

It’s important to keep in mind that there are only two possible responses to the question of moral truth: either (a) it doesn’t exist (thus all truth is relative), or (b) it does exist, meaning that there are moral principles that are universally, objectively true. Pride ideology often finds itself in the first category, moral relativism, under the declarations, “This is my truth” or “This is our truth.” Those may sound like objective truth claims on the surface; however, if there is no “the truth” lying beneath “my/our truth,” then there is no way to distinguish it from an expression of emotive preference. If this is the case, then the whole Pride movement would be based on an irrational (or at least a-rational) imposition of will on those who disagree with it—which, in turn, would render it analogous, in both method and substance, to how tyrants and bullies operate (“Obey and celebrate me because I say so”).

To escape this assessment, the Pride movement must make the case that they are advocating for something that everyone ought to believe not because they are saying it but because it is, in fact, true. In this case, those who disagree with Pride ideology would be wrong to do so because they would be holding false beliefs. What might those truth claims look like and what implications would they have? Let’s return to some of the bumper-stickers.

“Love is Love”

It’s not clear what this statement means, but it seems to imply at least two things: (1) All individuals’ internal sexual attractions should be considered equally morally valid (if not praiseworthy), no matter who or what the object of desire is (if the movement were only advocating for non-sexual relationships then it would not find opposition, certainly not from traditional morality); (2) All individuals ought to be able to act on those internal attractions whenever and however they desire, provided there is mutual consent and no subjectively defined “harm” occurs—indeed, such sexual expression is to be encouraged and feted.

Are these two statements about love true? That’s a complex question, but let’s assume that Pride ideology affirms them as such. If that’s the case, however, then, given the variety of human beings’ empirically observed (which is not to say natural) sexual proclivities and behaviors, these conclusions necessarily follow: (1) Pride ideology believes that we should celebrate individuals’ freedom to engage in hetero- and homosexual relationships with immediate biological family members; (2) Pride ideology believes that we should celebrate individuals’ freedom to express their desires to have sexual relationships with children (now rebranded as “Minor Attracted Persons”), even if they are not currently free to act on those desires legally; and (3) Pride ideology believes that we should celebrate individuals’ freedom to have sexual relationships with non-human animals, provided they don’t violate anti-cruelty laws. These are the implications of believing “love is love” is true, even if we don’t see them represented on parade floats yet.

“Be who you are”

Drawing on the meaning of “love is love,” this claim implies that individuals’ subjective feelings morally authorize them to (attempt to) appear on “the outside” what they experience themselves to be on “the inside.” This tenet of Pride lies at the heart of transgenderism and, in general, being “queer,” which includes a justification (and celebration) of surgically slicing off healthy breast and genital tissue and forcing women to compete against men in sporting events. However, if it’s true that individuals should be celebrated for making their outside look like their inside—and everyone else must accommodate their wishes—then Pride must also affirm that we praise trans-abled individuals for snipping their healthy spinal cords, trans-species individuals (also known as “Furries”) for demanding societal respect for non-ironically donning animal costumes in public, and even trans-age individuals for dictating that they be cared for like infants, including while in prison. (It is crucial to note that once age, like biological sex, becomes subjective, the moral prohibition against practicing pedophilia dissolves). All this, too, follows from the ideology’s internal logic.

“Acceptance”

Though this word sounds especially innocuous, Pride ideology transforms its meaning into “Shut up and don’t ask questions, bigot.” To “accept” is not to tolerate; it is to recognize as normal. “Acceptance” thus mainstreams the movement’s definitions of the nature of the human body, the purpose of human sexuality, and the rights of individuals to do as they please according to the dictates of Pride’s principles. At the same time, and consequently, it both stigmatizes what was once considered normal as “abnormal” and marks anyone who critically questions the new normal as a bigot (for only a bigot would be against “acceptance”). In other words, “acceptance” is both the shield and weapon of Pride: it protects the movement from scrutiny by tarring all objections, a priori, as prejudiced.

Holding tight to the distinction between ideologies and individuals, it’s important to highlight that there are some people who, though they fall outside traditional gender and sexual typologies for various reasons (though most likely not genetic ones), are resisting elements of the Pride movement. (One such group is called “Gays against Groomers.”) Yet Pride ideology still remains dominant in the US and most of the West, despite the fact that, according to its own assertions, it is either (a) a subjective, relativistic morality that imposes itself on the Pride-nonconforming by the brute force of its cultural and political power, or (b) a putatively universal morality that, based on the logic of its own principles, permits and encourages incest, bodily mutilation (including of children), pedophiliac attraction (if not practice), bestiality, and the silencing of dissent.

In short, a candid assessment of Pride reveals it to be either dictatorially arbitrary or fiendishly depraved. There is no amount of kaleidoscopic fanfare, corporate-sponsored enthusiasm, or coercively moralizing legislation that can wish this conclusion away. To embrace the Rainbow!™ necessarily entails embracing its shadow. Pretending otherwise, fantasizing that we can dethrone heterosexuality and reality-based biology as natural and normative without letting the full panoply of Pandora’s Box of perversion out into the world, is, itself, to be bigoted—against reason and the evidence of our own eyes. ”

For the love of God and willing the good of others,
Matthew

Refuting relativism & the argument from disagreement


-please click on the image for greater detail

Relativists will deny there is objective truth simply because people do not agree. There are three ways to refute this.


-by Karlo Broussard

“First, consider how the argument reasons from the fact of disagreement to the conclusion that there is no absolute truth. Such an inference can be made only if the following premise is true: if there were such a thing as absolute truth, then there would be no disagreement. Here’s how the reasoning looks in the form of a syllogism:

Premise One: If there were such a thing as absolute truth, then there would be universal agreement (the hidden premise in the argument stated above).

Premise Two: There is no universal agreement (the fact of experience appealed to).

Conclusion: Therefore, there is no such thing as absolute truth (the relativistic claim).

The problem here is that the relativist must assume the truth of premise one if he wishes the argument to go through. But, of course, assuming that premise one is true falsifies the relativism that is being argued for, since the relativist would be affirming at least one absolute truth—namely, universal agreement is a criterion for absolute truth. Therefore, the argument is self-defeating.

There’s a second way in which the argument is self-defeating. Notice that disagreement is that which the relativist thinks grounds the claim that there’s no absolute truth. Well, if disagreement entails no absolute truth, then our disagreement with the claim of relativism necessarily makes relativism a belief that’s not absolutely true.

Now, perhaps the relativist doesn’t care that his relativism is not absolutely true. Maybe he’s okay with saying that it’s true only for him. But if that’s the case, then his claim becomes trivial. There are three ways to see this.

One: He’d only be expressing a mere preference or taste, something we don’t need to be concerned about.

Two: For the relativist to say that the statement “there is no absolute truth” is relatively true for him means that it happens to be a member of his personal set of beliefs and opinions. By saying his belief that relativism is true is among his personal beliefs and opinions, the relativist is implying such a belief is not among the personal beliefs and opinions of non-relativists. It amounts to saying, “I don’t myself believe in absolute truth, but other people do.” But this doesn’t tell us anything we don’t already know. Thus, it’s trivial.

Three: His appeal to disagreement as an argument for relativism would be futile. Why argue for something if you don’t think it describes the way the world really is? Why try to convince the non-relativist that there’s no absolute truth when the idea that there’s no absolute truth is true only for the relativist?

There’s one more thing to say in response to someone who says he doesn’t care that relativism is not absolutely true since it’s true only for him. Recall what we said above: To say relativism is true only for me amounts to saying, “I don’t myself believe in absolute truth, but other people do.” Well, this means relativism is essentially recognition of the fact that people disagree.

But disagreement is what the relativist appeals to in the argument from disagreement. Remember, the argument states, “There’s no absolute truth because people disagree.” If relativism is essentially an affirmation of the fact that people disagree, and the argument from disagreement appeals to disagreement among people to justify relativism, then the argument from disagreement is tantamount to saying, “People have different beliefs because people have different beliefs.” That’s called circular reasoning, which is not kosher logic.

A third way in which the argument from disagreement is self-defeating is that some disagreements necessarily presuppose an absolute truth. Consider, for example, the belief that God exists and the belief that God doesn’t exist. Given that these are two contradictory beliefs (A and not A), we know at least one truth: that one is true and the other is false. God either does or doesn’t exist. We might not know which is true or false. But we know that one is true and the other is false—unless someone wants to say it’s both true and false, at the same time and in the same respect, that God exists.

For most, however, denying the principle of non-contradiction (something can’t be both true and false at the same time and in the same respect) is too high a price to pay. Moreover, the principle can’t be denied in thought (even if people can voice words denying it), since to say it’s false necessarily presupposes that something can’t be true and false at the same time and in the same respect.

So the next time someone tries to convince you that disagreement about absolute truth means there can be no absolute truth, you can offer a simple syllogism of your own:

Premise One: Any argument that’s self-defeating is a bad argument.

Premise Two: The argument from disagreement is a self-defeating argument.

Conclusion: Therefore, the argument from disagreement is a bad argument.

There’s nothing relative about that!”

Love,
Matthew