Same Sex Sexual Relations

1
Same Sex Sexual Relations

• Philosophy of Love and Sex

2
The Old and New Testaments

• If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both
  of them have committed an abomination they shall
  be put to death, their blood is upon them. (Lev.
  2013)
• Do you not know that the unrighteous will not
  inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived
  neither the immoral, nor idolaters, nor
  adulterers, nor the soft, nor those males who lie
  with men, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor
  drunkards, nor revilers, nor robbers will inherit
  the kingdom of God. (1 Cor. 69-10)

3
Corvinos argument in defense of homosexual
activity

• The goods available to same-sex couples are the
  same as those available to infertile heterosexual
  couples, plus one.
• Pleasure
• Objection But is pleasure always good, or only
  when one takes pleasure in an independent good?
• Interpersonal communication
• Emotional growth
• Stability
• Undercutting of stereotypes
• Objection Chastity does that even more
  effectively.

4
Patrick Lee

• Procreation is a purpose of a marital community.
  But just as a firefighter might never actually
  fight a fire or a soldier might never be in a
  war, so too a couple might never reproduce. (p.
  428)
• The only thing a couple can do is to act in ways
  that dispose them to conceiving. (p. 429)
• When a couple make a commitment to each other to
  share their lives, in the type of community that
  would be fulfilled by bearing and raising
  children together, then the biological unity
  realized in sexual intercourse actualizes or
  concretizes that community. In sexual intercourse
  they unite (become one) precisely in that respect
  in which their community is defined and naturally
  fulfilled. Their procreative-type acts embody
  their community. (p. 423)
• If a couple conceives through IVF or adopts,
  there is no intrinsic connection between their
  sexual acts and the raising of the child. (p.
  430)
• The state should recognize this natural community
  for two reasons
• The community is good for children.
• It channels sexual energies to a good.

5
Adèle Mercier

• Mercier worries that because Lee and Somerville
  reject the permissibility of same-sex sexual
  activity and of non-marital sexual activity,
  there is not enough common ground for a
  discussion.
• According to Mercier, for Lee, another
  condition is also necessary besides openness to
  children, that the couple engage in sexual acts
  in which sperm meet oocyte at least sometimes
  (p. 439). Where does Lee say that?
• It is disingenuous to think that octogenerians
  who marry enter into a procreative-type union.
  (p. 439)
• It is ideal for children to be raised by their
  own biological parents, when these are loving
  and responsible. But ideals should not
  replace a robust sense of reality (p. 441)

6
Rajczis argument for same-sex marriage

• The opponents of same sex marriage (SSM) think
  SSM can be prohibited because
• 1. homosexual activity is immoral
• 2. allowing SSM spreads false ideas
• 3. SSM results in further harms
• But
• 1. Even if homosexual activity is immoral, we do
  not think it is OK for the state to deny
  opportunities to people because the people engage
  in immoral activity. But Surely we wouldnt
  want to have a kindergarten teacher who
  continually lied to the students or broke
  promises. And you might lose your drivers
  license for buying cigarettes under-age.
• 2. The state cannot deny anybody an opportunity
  simply because allowing that opportunity results
  in the spread of false ideas. But we would fire
  a math teacher in a public school who thinks
  2x25, precisely because it would spread ideas.
  Im denied the opportunity to receive letters
  from the government addressed Barack Obama,
  precisely because thats not in fact my name. We
  dont want a kindergarten teacher who teaches
  that promises may be freely broken. We have all
  sorts of slander, fraud and misrepresentation
  laws including laws against faking money,
  falsely representing oneself as blind,
  representing oneself as a police officer, etc.
  We would fire a holocaust denying head of
  Department of Transportation.
• 3. The harms are unclear. Rajczi doesnt
  consider the intrinsic harm of SSM to the persons
  getting marriedthat by publicly committing
  themselves to a relationship that is understood
  to be sexual in nature, they commit themselves to
  something that is intrinsically harmful to one.
  If one agrees with Socrates that the worst thing
  that can happen to one is that one becomes
  immoral, this outbalances the benefits of SSM to
  the couple.

7
A hypothesis Rajczi doesnt consider

• Rajczi dismisses the argument that marriage by
  definition is between a man and a woman. He also
  argues that it is wrong to deny the use of the
  word marriage to persons of the same sex. But
  consider this hypothesis which Rajczi has not
  argued against There is a natural kind of
  relationship which is only between a man and a
  woman, which relationship is different in kind
  from any relationships between persons of the
  same sex. In that case, it makes sense for the
  government to mark the distinction between this
  relationship and other relationships by having a
  term reserved for it. We should not think the
  equality of men and women is violated by the fact
  that masculine pronouns are used for men and
  feminine pronouns for women. I have no right to
  have government functionaries talk about me as
  she if I am in fact a man (leaving aside the
  question of a sex-change operation), or to say
  that I am a wife. Likewise, a Vietnam war
  veteran has no right to be called by a Korean war
  veteran, nor is there any obligation for the
  government to adopt a neutral term for both, even
  if both deserve equal treatment. Where there is
  a genuine difference, we allow the use of
  different terms.