OPINION:
Dear Dr. E, I have noticed recently that many people who say they stand for “love” seem very angry. They say that “Love is Love” and “Love Trumps Hate,” but when someone disagrees with them, particularly on matters of sexual identity and sexual behavior, it seems as if the gloves come off. Doesn’t this seem somewhat contradictory to you? I am curious what your thoughts on this are. — CULTURE WATCHER FROM CHICAGO.
Dear Watcher: A few years ago, I wrote a column titled “Conversations About Sex.” In this article, I asked this basic question: If our culture has decided there is no such thing as an objective moral standard pertaining to sexual behavior, then on what basis can we make any moral judgments about any behavior?
To make my point, I used a rhetorical tool called “the argument in the extreme” (something that is not always a logical fallacy, as some may claim). It went like this. If there is no “measuring rod outside of those things being measured” regarding LGBTQ sex, then on what basis is there any objective moral standard regarding any other sexual act?
In other words, if it’s all about “acceptance” and “tolerance,” on what basis can we declare that things such as adultery, incest, pedophilia, or bestiality are right or wrong? After all, if love is love, who are you to judge?
Well, as you can imagine, some of my social media “friends” came absolutely unglued because I dared ask this logical question. Here are some of their comments.
One said, “You’re disgusting.”
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Another chimed in, “You are a piece of excrement.”
Still others offered, “If Jesus did exist, he’d tell you to take a flying f—- at a rolling donut.” “You’re a bigoted piece of s—-.” “You’re a clown.” “Christians are the Taliban.” “You’re a homophobic so-called educator attacking others for Jesus,” and “What a sick, disgusting, small-minded man and an ugly blemish on our beautiful city.”
And perhaps the best example of “love” from these affirming champions of tolerance and inclusion was this: “You are blaspheming hate-filled slime mold purveyor of lies and false religion. Your death will make the world a better place.”
So much for inclusion, acceptance, pluralism, and tolerance. So much for respecting those from different cultures with different views and values. So much for all that, and so much for any modicum of self-awareness that would recognize the obvious duplicity in all of this and the fact that you are sawing off the very rhetorical branch upon which you sit when you say that you hate hateful people and that you can’t tolerate intolerance.
This vitriol is the only logical end of the moral relativism of today’s identity politics. This is the blatant hypocrisy of those who preach acceptance while condemning all those they simply cannot and will not accept.
This is the inevitable consequence of our “name it, claim it” game of pretending human desires define the human being, and that human identity is equal to the sum total of human inclinations. This is what happens when you claim that “who we are” is no more than what your libido temps you to do. This is the outcome of placing personal feelings over biological facts and sexual license over sexual restraint. This is what happens when “gnosis” supplants God and man presumes to be the final authority of what is right and wrong, what is good and evil, and what is even male and female.
M. Scott Peck warned of what he called “the people of the lie” – those who deceive themselves so frequently and persistently that they start to believe their own fantasies.
Graham Walker talked of the “pathology of the intellect,” where the smarter we think we are, the more prone we become to our own deception and moral compromise.
St. Paul admonished that every time we worship ourselves as God, we are given over to a reprobate mind.
Augustine confessed to the temptation to deem his intellect worthy of worship.
The Greeks told of the death of Narcissus, not his triumph. His story is not one that celebrates the inflation of personal identity but rather one that predicts its ultimate demise.
If history teaches anything, it is this: When we decide there is no standard of morality other than ourselves, exchange God’s truth for a lie, and begin to worship the created rather than the Creator - when “everyone does what is right in their own eyes” - culture collapses of its immoral weight and judgment is at hand.
If you are seeking guidance in today’s changing world, Higher Ground is there for you. Everett Piper, a Ph.D. and a former university president and radio host, takes your questions in his weekly ‘Ask Dr. E’ column. If you have moral or ethical questions for which you’d like an answer, please email askeverett@washingtontimes.com and he may include it in a future column.
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