E. J. Dionne: Family Values and Glass Houses

[babylonsister]

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/family_values_and_glass_houses_20100523/

Family Values and Glass Houses

Posted on May 24, 2010

By E.J. Dionne

snip//

It’s not the self-righteousness of religious conservatives that bothers me most. We liberals can be pretty self-righteous, too. It’s the refusal to acknowledge that the pressures endangering the family do not come from some dark secular leftist conspiracy but from cultural and economic forces that affect us all. People are encouraged to put all sorts of things (career advancement, wealth, fame, the accumulation of things, various forms of self-indulgence) ahead of being good parents and spouses. Our workplaces are not as family-friendly as they could be.

Why does it even have to be said that a devotion to family has nothing to do with ideology? In my very liberal Maryland neighborhood—my precinct voted 80 percent for Barack Obama—parents crowd school meetings, flock to their kids’ sporting events, help them with homework and teach them right from wrong on the basis of values that I doubt differ all that much from those prevailing in more conservative environs. And while a lot of my neighbors are active in their religious congregations, the secular parents take their family responsibilities as seriously as the believers do.

And those of us who are liberal would insist that our support for the rights of gays and lesbians grows from our sense of what family values demand. How can being pro-family possibly mean holding in contempt our homosexual relatives, neighbors and friends? How much sense does it make to preach fidelity and commitment and then deny marriage to those whose sexual orientation is different from our own? Rights for gays and lesbians don’t wreck heterosexual families. Heterosexuals are doing a fine job of this on their own.

“Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.” It’s a Scriptural passage that no doubt appeals to Mark Souder. But it would be lovely if conservative Christians remembered Jesus’ words not only when needing a lifeline but also when they are tempted to give speeches or send out mailers excoriating their political foes as permissive anti-family libertines. How many more scandals will it take for people who call themselves Christian to rediscover the virtues of humility and solidarity?

[ellenfl]

1. i think they have the solidarity part down. i love e.j. eom

[Still Sensible]

2. To the far right, scandals don't matter

very much and never have. All they care about is that their candidates have completely consumed the kool-aid dogma and that they can regurgitate said dogma on cue!

They have built in excuses and spins on every eventuality (I gave into temptation, I have sinned, I have let down my family, it's the work of the devil)... and they have stock plans of action (getting 'spiritual' treatment for sexual addiction, going into seclusion to 'cure' homosexual urges, etc.)...

And in the end, none of it matters when their folks do it because they still regugitate the bullshit... but if someone on our side does it, it is proof of our side's moral bankruptcy... well fuck 'em.