Orson Scott Card is pretty worked up about gay marriage. "Because when government is the enemy of marriage, then the people who are actually creating successful marriages have no choice but to change governments, by whatever means is made possible or necessary."

More:

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.

Biological imperatives trump laws. American government cannot fight against marriage and hope to endure. If the Constitution is defined in such a way as to destroy the privileged position of marriage, it is that insane Constitution, not marriage, that will die.

I like to think that Lisa and I are "actually creating a successful marriage," but it happens that we're not so worked up about gay marriage. Do we have to pick up our torches and pitchforks, too?

Interesting that Card focuses only on states where judges have ruled in favor of gay marriage, but ignores Connecticut, where the legislature okayed civil unions (Vermont and NJ approved civil unions after court decisions). What happens if more states vote to approve civil unions, or gay marriage? Do we need to overthrow those governments?

Card is shaky on the facts when he says that monogamy has been the rule "in most societies through history," with violations of marital vows punished severely. Polygamy has a long history and is still practiced in some places, including pockets of the United States, and a lot of monogamous cultures make at least tacit accommodations for some action on the side. Marriage has meant a lot of things over the centuries.

He complains that accusations of homophobia have been "extended to apply to anyone who opposed the homosexual activist agenda in any way," but as noted previously, he's far too modest about his own work in that field.

Comments

[drfranklives]

My Gosh,

Whatever will he do when he finds out the government lets people divorce?

[Ian McDowell]

I'm loathe to claim that the majority of homophobes are closet cases, as that's always struck me as facile psychology. Still, I have to wonder if there's something in it here.

Much of OSC's fiction is rife with not-so-thinly-veiled adolescent homoeroticism; SONGMASTER is a particularly striking example of this, with its surprisingly sensual paens to young male beauty, even if it ultimately takes a "look longingly, but don't touch!" approach.

I remember hearing him speak about how he and his best friend were apparently the only straight males in Brigham Young University's Drama Dept., and how he later felt "bitterly betrayed" when that friend came out of the closet. And at a science fiction convention at UNCG in the early 90s, he dismissed Clive Barker's horror fiction (which was rife with clues to Barker's sexuality over a decade before he came out of the closet) with a quip that suggested he found it immoral and clumsily written but also arousing.

All of which makes me wonder if he feels that public acceptance of homosexuality is a threat to marriage because it might be a threat to HIS marriage.

[Fec]

There's a burgeoning market for bigots flexing their muscles. Maybe Card will take his brood to Salt Lake City and leave us be. We've enough probs with the natives. Thanks for the heads up.

[Joe Killian]

Ian - having read and enjoyed Card's fiction years ago I was sort of disappointed to find, upon moving to Greensboro, that in a lot of ways he's a huge prick.

But after I read a few of his diatribes about the "homosexual agenda" I did indeed think back to a number of things in his fiction that I thought were pretty homoerotic.

People say the same thing about the self consciously masculine Hemingway and Mailer, I guess. I wonder if I'd have given it a second thought with Card if he hadn't so railed against homosexuality.

[Joe KIllian]

Also: take up arms against the government?

Over gay marriage?

I say go ahead -- I'll watch on TV.

I'm always entertained by watching people who love America so much they have to destroy it realize painfully that their right to oppose the government doesn't mean that the government -- or its agents and armies -- have to let them win.

When they throw you in prison cell with a giant, amorous neo-Nazi who had the same idea you can rest assured he's not interested in marrying you. Just aggressively "co-habitating."

[Ian McDowell]

Joe, I've dated several women in the science fiction community who were seriously creeped out by Card's work. Not the homoeroticism (although they felt it was there), but the procession of raped and tortured children and the highly sadistic nature of many of his short stories (not to mention his notorious fantasy novel HART'S HOPE). Check out his ULTIMATE IRON MAN mini-series for Marvel Comics, in which he makes the young Tony Stark into yet another of his Saintly Tortured Children, whose foot is casually cut off by the bad guys in one scene (there's also some heavy-handed commentary on the evils of adultery and divorce).

Card's penchant for literary sadism and rape wouldn't bother me, particularly (some of my own fiction is pretty gruesome and perverse) if he weren't such a crusader for family values who considers not just Tarantino's violent pulp fiction but even Tim Burton's candy-coated gothicism to be vile and repulsive.

[Beelzebubba]

Card is starting to scare me and I'm seeing a little too much hitch in his giddyup.

[Graham Shevlin]

Is it too late to observe that this reads like another tedious, repetitive set of rantings from a bigoted, paranoid intolerant little shit?
I love how these people always find time to produce the "secret homosexual agenda" card from their pocket and wave it around like a soccer referee waves a yellow card...if that isn't a classic example of projection...

[Patrick]

The lady doth protest too much, methinks.

[Ed Cone]

Insults and dimestore psychoanalysis are good fun, but at some point yelling "you are" to Card changes the subject and lets him off the hook too easily.

[Patrick]

He appears to give about as good as he gets in terms of insults and dimestore psychoanalysis. He just directs his at whole groups of people instead of individuals.

[Ian McDowell]

Ed, point taken, but I'm a tad uncomfortable with the "letting him off the hook" phrasing, as this suggests Bubba's self-important mantra about holding people "accountable." Ultimately, anything we say here about Card, or anyone else, is fairly trivial, as none of us is in a position to put Card on a metaphorical hook or take him off one. But yes, you have a point if you're implying that Card's actual statement is more interesting than his motives, and would be worth discussing regardless of his own sexuality.

Still, I can't resist another cheap shot. Take a look at the wiki entry for Card's SONGMASTER:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Songmaster

[Lex]

Yet another example of why government ought to be in the nondiscriminatory-civil-unions business and out of the marriage business. Let faith communities marry, or refuse to marry, whomever they want. Keep government out of it. That approach satisfies both the establishment clause and the free-expression clause of the First Amendment.

I'd like to think that's an approach OSC could live with. But I suspect I'm wrong.

[Eric]

Card is shaky on the facts when he says that monogamy has been the rule "in most societies through history," with violations of marital vows punished severely. Polygamy has a long history and is still practiced in some places, including pockets of the United States

Yeah, you'd kind of expect a Mormon to have some inkling of this fact.

[Ian McDowell]

OSC also thinks the Jedi were the Bad Guys.

Mind you, I think his arguments in this piece are more lucid than in his hysterical gay marriage screed, but also a bit ironic, considering his own faith.