NOM speaker explains his homosexuality/incest parallels: “Too much sameness”

Robert Gagnon, professor of theology and speaker for the National Organization for Marriage’s Ruth Institute, recently explained one of his anti-gay arguments on Facebook:

When I compare homosexual practice to incest it is primarily to make the point that if we are opposed to the latter we should also be opposed to the former, since both involve a union of persons who are too much alike on a structural (formal, embodied) level: too much sameness as regards kinship (incest) or gender (homosexual practice), not enough complementary otherness.

Next up on the chopping block: marriages of white people, Christians, and partners who both prefer salty snacks over sweet. Not enough complementary otherness!

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NOM speaker explains his homosexuality/incest parallels: “Too much sameness”
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32 thoughts on “NOM speaker explains his homosexuality/incest parallels: “Too much sameness”

  1. 1

    What degree of difference is required, then? Surely he is in favor of setting up a Department of Matrimonial Anthropometry, which will quantify the degree of structural similarity, allowing us once and for all to prevent men from marrying women who are too similar.

    Also, it’s news to me that two unrelated men are as alike as brother and sister.

  2. 2

    The real criterion for an acceptable relationship is banana preference. One person must like green (or at the very least, yellow, though it’s wrong to play for both teams!), one must like brown.

    Otherwise bananas are wasted!

    1. Rob
      2.1

      In my experience that never works. The person who likes brown bananas never gets any because the person who like green bananas finishes them before they have a chance to get brown.

      1. A good friend of mine has discovered the solution to this, it is a permanent marker. When people buy bananas she writes her name on her appropriate share (depends on number of people in the house who like bananas). The not very ripe banana people are only allowed to eat un-named pieces of fruit. This works well providing you live with generally polite people.

  3. 4

    Yeah, by this logic political conservative white Christians should not be permitted to marry. All said, it’s nice that the anti-GLBTQ crowd is grasping as straws, they’ve only got the most ludicrous arguments left. I’ve heard it before but phrased in more pretentious language of ‘homogeneous’ versus ‘heterogeneous.’

    I think this fits into the conservative marriage agenda though, where marriage ‘works’ because of the ‘men are from mars, women are from venus’ gender stereotypes (the man can’t cook or clean but the wife can do that, but she can’t handle the big decisions and needs a paycheck) and where bridging the gap between men and women makes marriage obsolete. I mean, it makes traditional marriage obsolete, but that’s kind of a good thing.

  4. Rob
    7

    I wonder if these people would allow a male(born without genitals) marry a female(born without genitals)? It happens, it is rare but it does happen. So because they are so alike would they not allow them to be married? Or what if a male had an illness that required total removal of his genitals, would they allow him to marry a female even though their “private” areas are so similar? How can they boast about a “free” country yet want to prohibit peoples freedom to do what they want with other consenting adults?

    1. 7.1

      Or what if a male had an illness that required total removal of his genitals, would they allow him to marry a female even though their “private” areas are so similar?

      This is a pervasive notion that is very degrading to women. A vagina is not simply a lack of a penis and testicles, it is a complex organ in its own right.

      Also, males and females are not defined by their genitals.

      1. And I just applied something that is bad for people with vaginas as bad for women right before I said women aren’t defined by their genitals. I sincerely apologize for that.

    2. Rob
      7.2

      Hi Rob

      Seeing as we’ve both chosen to use an incredibly common name to comment under, how can we differentiate? Is it possible to set custom avatars?

  5. 9

    Well, that certainly is a contrived and groundless bit of rationalization for their position.

    both involve a union of persons who are too much alike on a structural (formal, embodied) level

    That sounds downright postmodern.

  6. 14

    Does this mean Mr. Gagnon supports relations between homosapiens and other species? I mean, if the basis of “sameness” and “difference” is that shallow, the species of the participants certainly must be a factor!

    Gay marriage really does lead to people advocating for beastiality… on the against gay marriage side.

  7. 17

    When I compare theology to stupidity it is primarily to make the point that if we are opposed to the latter we should also be opposed to the former, since both involve a union of very foolish ideas that are too much alike on a comical (formal, embodied) level: too much sameness as regards to a complete lack of reason (stupidity) or babling incoherently (theology), way too much complementary foolishness.

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