Blood & Rhetoric

Orson Scott Card’s anti-gay rant

Writing by Jana on Tuesday, 29 of July , 2008 at 8:48 am

Last week in the Mormon Times, prolific science fiction and fantasy writer Orson Scott Card published a venomously anti-gay essay in response to California and Massachusetts recognizing same-sex marriage.

In this essay, Card takes it upon himself to define marriage for everyone:

“Here’s the irony: There is no branch of government with the authority to redefine marriage. Marriage is older than government. Its meaning is universal: It is the permanent or semipermanent bond between a man and a woman, establishing responsibilities between the couple and any children that ensue.”

And sounds out the Mormon trumpet to bring the government down:

“How long before married people answer the dictators thus: Regardless of law, marriage has only one definition, and any government that attempts to change it is my mortal enemy. I will act to destroy that government and bring it down, so it can be replaced with a government that will respect and support marriage, and help me raise my children in a society where they will expect to marry in their turn.”

I was very disappointed when I read this, and also very upset.

When a public figure goes on a racial or sexist tirade, as in the case of Mel Gibson or Micheal Richards or Don Imus, the media outrage is massive and so are the repercussions.

The men in question became equivalents of social pariahs’, and why should it be any different for Orson Scott Card?

Many things have evolved and changed over the centuries, so why shouldn’t marriage and how we define it? The fact is, marriage is not a static institution, nor is society and civilization. It was once illegal for a black person and white person to get married. Or white and Chinese. Divorce was once a tabboo or outright illegal. Should we go back to those days?

Gay people can’t have children the old fashioned way, but many choose to adopt or go through artificial insemination. Is that somehow less of a family then what you and your wife have with your “natural” god-fearing Mormon off-spring? I seriously hope one of them is homosexual.

Why does it matter so much? In Canada, same-sex marriage has been legal for a while, and yet somehow our society has not delved into anarchy and chaos yet. Basically, life went on as usual. It’ll be the same in America eventually, when you catch up. Our conservative Bush-loving premier even wanted to hold a referendum on the issue after he was elected, and the public just didn’t care enough.

Orson Scott Card goes on further, criticizing the current state of heterosexual marriage in general:

“Divorce is “no-fault,” easily obtained on any pretext.”

So is a marriage! Maybe it should be harder to get married, easier to get divorced.

“A vast number of unmarried men and women have such contempt for marriage that they share bed and home without asking for any formal recognition by society.”

Yeah, and? Contempt is a strong word choice there, buddy. My boyfriend and I share a bed and home together because we’re not ready to get married, can’t afford it even if we were, and enjoy fucking too much to live apart.

In an era when birth control and abortion make childbearing completely optional, the number of out-of-wedlock births shows the contempt that many women have for marriage.

Wow, way to over-simplify a matter. Abortions are not easy to get in every state, and are illegal in backwaters like South Dakota which is why illegal and unsafe abortions are still being performed each year, even in North America. And birth control is not readily available everywhere either. Several states have made it very difficult to obtain and enacted ridiculous legislation that allows pharmacists to choose not to dispense birth control because of their religious beliefs. And I suppose Orson Scott Card is of that fringe group of religious nut jobs who naively believe restricting access actually makes statistics go down — it doesn’t. And I love that he places women the sole bearer of responsibility here!

“Yet most of these single mothers still demand that the man they chose not to marry before having sex with him provide financial support for them and their children — while denying the man any of the rights and protections of marriage.”

Well heaven forbid these poor men actually take responsibility for the children they created! Yes, make the children, the by-product of all this sin, suffer by not making the men accountable! Oh dear god, your Mormon roots are showing here.

As for Orson Scott Card — you’re not getting another cent from me. I respect your right to have an opinion, but I do not respect you or the opinion in question. My society does not include bigoted asshats like yourself hiding behind the curtain of your religion to somehow excuse your intolerance. Just as I would not want to purchase from, and thereby support, product from a racist or child-molester (priest) I will no longer support the work you do.

Category: stupid writers

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