Dakota Beacon

This is the title of a reasonable essay published in 1978 by Michael Novak wrestling with the appraisal of homosexuality in society. I came across the essay in a volume of quaint and forgotten lore.

Novak passed away 02/17/2017. He led an active life serving as a diplomat, American Catholic philosopher, journalist, and novelist. His book The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism offered a reasoned defense of capitalism as an ideal.

Novak wrote with a gentle heart the considerate essay “Men Without Women: Meditations on the Half-Life of the Homosexual.” His essay is straight forward and says nothing about the LGBT activism which would come later with the politicizing of the homosexual life style.

“A peculiar paradox emerges from recent debates about homosexuality. On the one hand, proponents of homosexuality speak of ‘sexual preference’ and ‘alternative choices.’ On the other hand, they speak of being ‘trapped,’ of ‘having been given a different nature.’ So there are really two different possibilities involved. First, if homosexuality is a matter of choice or preference, it lies in the realm of freedom. The argument then concerns whether such choices ought to be encouraged or discouraged; whether, in a word, homosexuality is a good choice. Second, if homosexuality is a matter of nature, it lies in the realm of necessity. The argument then does not reach so high a moral level. Those involved are not really free to choose an alternative. They suffer from a diminished range of freedom.”

So, either homosexuality is a choice, or it is predetermined by nature.

“Is it true that the number of homosexuals is multiplying in our day? Who could marvel if it were? Men find it perplexing to be male. Seeking the male principle, some women are trying to supply it themselves. It is not just that ‘sex-role stereotypes’ are breaking down. Rather, basic systems of identity have been profoundly altered by the technology and organization of modern life. Personal confusion abounds. The problem is deeper than that of homosexuality alone.”

Indeed it is. Read on.

“Society has a special stake in the development of married family life. Without strong, enlightened, spiritually nourishing families, the future of society looks bleak indeed. The family is the original…most effective department of health, education, and welfare. If it fails…it is exceedingly difficult for any other agency to make up for its failures. Who would trust politicians to do the job?”

“More than that, society has an important stake in nourishing that special wisdom and powerful realism learned in marriage in the battle between the sexes. For thousands of years, masculine culture and feminine culture have been quite different. It is not easy for men and women to understand each other….”

Novak is not referring to same sex unions, but to traditional one man one woman marriage.

“There is no doubt that women can truly love women, and that men can have profound love for other men. (Aristotle, indeed, argued that men could only be true friends with men, not with women, because friendship depends on equality, and men and women did not have equality.) In some ways, friendships are indeed easier between persons of the same sex. Sexual relations between men and women are enormously complex, so that one short lifetime is normally insufficient to plumb even one such relationship. Heterosexual relations are full of terror. They are not as rosy and cheerful as Playboy and Penthouse would puff for our infantile fantasies.”

And we are to trust politicians to “fix” an equally complicated homosexual union? Ha!

“The politicizing of almost everything…is a symptom of civil corruption. Politics is a clumsy instrument for the teaching of tolerance or the spreading of moral enlightenment…[P]olitics [is] a blunt and destructive instrument, supplanting precise reason with slogans, stereotypes, name-calling, and other campaign necessities…If one is seeking tolerance…politics defeats one’s efforts by stimulating and crystalizing opposition.”

“That there are, and always will be, homosexuals among us…is certain…Heterosexuality is the full and complete human ideal. Homosexuality is not a preference of equal moral weight. Still, it would be good for laws specifically aimed against homosexuality to be stricken from the books, so that coercions of the state do not enter into private life. Similarly, no one should be coerced by the state into giving approval for a way of life of which he does not approve.”

Novak makes a lot of sense in the old fashion way – reasoned discourse. This is a far cry from today’s LGBT activists who do not hesitate to ruin small businesses like bakeries, pizza parlors, and florists who will not bend to homosexual demands.

“Society has a strong interest…in encouraging heterosexuality and in discouraging homosexuality. To do so without injuring those homosexuals who are without choice…is an important social task. I am in favor of an open and tolerant system. I am not in favor of one that treats heterosexuality and homosexuality as equals…Individuals (and societies) can make their own moral vision clear without undue coercion upon those who do not, or who cannot, share it. For the good of all of us, homosexuals included, it is well that society should prefer heterosexuality and specially nourish it…But it is also good for all of us to lighten the burdens of homosexuals, as we would have them lightened for ourselves.”

So go the thoughtful musings of one from a bygone era.

Dennis M. Patrick can be contacted at (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).