Text of Justice Scalia's Dissenting Opinion [to paraphrase, "epitaph for Christian civilization"]

SCOTUS ^ | Justice Scalia

[Thorondir]

It offended liberals, libertines and libertarians who wanted sodomy legalized.

And it is still offending them and getting them foaming at the mouth, as we see here on this thread where they have gathered to defend their sAcREd right to depravity.

[Thorondir]

BTW, I am none of the above, and the law offended me.

Yeah. OK.

[B-Chan]

Eh, let 'em rant. I'll take six thousand years of Judeo-Christian moral tradition over four decades of do-as-thou-wilt libertarianism any day.

The one good thing about our society's newfound tolerance of sexual perversity is that such perversity is by its very nature disordered and contrary to nature -- which means that it will destroy itself in time. A society based upon the maxim "anything goes" can only be destructive to human life and happiness over the long term. No society based on the ideals of Reason and Liberty can last long -- since such societies elevate relativism, hedonism, and greed at the expense of tradition, the family, and private property. Like the French Revolution, our current revoution will continue until chaos makes day-to-day life impossible, at which time we'll probably beg the new Bonaparte to restore some semblance of order -- but until then, it's unrestrained sex, disease, and decadence all around!

[spunkets]

"'freedom is the liberty to do what is RIGHT,' not to do what is 'wrong.'

There is no "freedom" in doing evil. No spiritual freedom, no corporeal freedom.

Freedom permits folks to make their own choices. Fundamentally the only valid limits regard the rights of others. Law is a real limit, but the fact that it is law means nothing other than the state will sanction contrary behavior, it does not neccessarily carry the weight of right.

Freedom allows for no arbitrary, subjective limits. When those are imposed, there is only authoritarian tyranny. Those that support the limits are no more free than those who don't support them.

[ninenot]

To be brutally frank, your understanding of the issues is juvenile. But 30 years ago, so was mine. Best get to reading. Start with Schall's Another Sort of Learning (Ignatius) and run through Chesterton's Orthodoxy as a followup. We'll talk then. Oh yes: submit a 5,000 word (WORD format) book report on each volume with footnotes, single-spaced, 12-point Arial.

[B-Chan]

Who says that "freedom" (i.e. individual liberty) is the ultimate Good, to be preserved at all costs?

[Thorondir]

The one good thing about our society's newfound tolerance of sexual perversity is that such perversity is by its very nature disordered and contrary to nature -- which means that it will destroy itself in time.

Yes, except that the sodomites are hellbent on recruiting your children. Remember their motto: "Eight is too late." They will not rest, because their master does not sleep.

[Thorondir]

Freedom permits folks to make their own choices. Fundamentally the only valid limits regard the rights of others.

The Founders knew that freedom could not exist in a decadent society. They were as concerned about an internal moral collapse as they were about a foreign invader. Samuel Adams wrote: "A general dissolution of principles and manners will more surely overthrow the liberties of America than the whole force of the common enemy. While the people are virtuous they cannot be subdued; but when once they lose their virtue then they will be ready to surrender their liberties to the first external or internal invader." Samuel Adams was not alone in such a belief. James Madison said: "To suppose that any form of government will secure liberty or happiness without any virtue in the people, is a chimerical idea." Richard Henry Lee wrote: "A popular government cannot flourish without virtue in the people." One only has to turn on television or read the popular press to realize that the Founders’ worst fears are coming to pass (or just look at recent SCOTUS decisions and the twisted arguments of those who support them). The virtue quotient in our culture and in our political system is approaching zero.

--http://www.bushcountry.org/news/columnists/jdaloia/c_111802_jdaloia_freedom-decadent-society.htm

[Pahuanui]

Eh, let 'em rant. I'll take six thousand years of Judeo-Christian moral tradition over four decades of do-as-thou-wilt libertarianism any day.

Please detail exactly how the past four decades have been 'libertarian'.

[Thorondir]

The legacy of the Catholic Church (which includes all of Christianity and protestantism) built the safest, fairest, healthiest, most prosperous, just, advanced and free society ever seen on the face of this earth. The degenerates who cry here for the protection and promotion of their sacred sodomy could only do so under the protective shadow of the very Christian-generated society they decry--the very society they will destroy if they fully get their way.

You know it.
I know it.
And they know it.
But they are twisted enough to hate the very ship that saves them from drowning--for the time being.

[B-Chan]

Liberalism will destroy itself in practice as well as theory. Tyrants must be prudent, but liberalism cannot be prudent forever. It makes human desire [i.e. "freedom -- B-chan] the measure and so has no place for unpleasant facts. The consequences are everywhere; liberalism depends on competent elites, for example, but is reluctant to recognize human differences and so institutes affirmative action programs that make it impossible to deal with issues of relative competence. It cannot justify nonconsensual authority -- parental authority or even ordinary moral standards for example -- and so feels bound to undermine it as oppressive whatever the consequences. The resulting disorders permeate social life, and as the generations succeed each other make orderly government progressively harder to maintain.

Further, a philosophy based on independent individuals pursuing their own interests cannot deal with issues that go beyond one's life as a self-interested individual -- reproduction and child-rearing, loyalty and sacrifice, life and death. Such issues are fundamental to social survival, but liberalism can only treat them as matters of individual preference. The consequences are suicidally low birthrates, children growing up without parental care, and an army that cannot take casualties. If such things endure, and it is hard to see what within liberalism can stop them, they will mean the end of liberal society.

-- James Kalb, "The Tyranny of Liberalism", Modern Age, Summer, 2000

Most "conservatives" -- on FR and elsewhere -- are nothing of the kind. They may be classical Liberals, free-market libertarians, or out-and-out Max Stirner anarchists, but they are not Conservatives, because they hold Liberty and Reason rather than Duty and Faith to be the highest goods.

[E Rocc]

"It is clear from this that the Court has taken sides in the culture war"

Actually, the Court has said that government should stay out of the so-called "culture war", not letting either side using legal compulsion as a weapon. A suprisingly sloppy opinion from the future Chief Justice.

-Eric

[B-Chan]

The rise of the idea of personal liberty as the ultimate value -- as expressed through the various "liberation" movements, the destruction of institutions, the relaxation of social morés, and the rise of ecstatic, emotive and inclusive religious movements within the Christian faith -- is the prime example of the libertarianization of society since the 1960s.

[spunkets]

" Laws are a reflection of what a society views as important. "

That's true. However that doesn't imply that the law is rightful, or wise.

" As of the 1960s, there was a tectonic shift in people's personal morality thanks to, among other things, a steady drumbeat of big-lie propaganda telling them that they could now have sex without worrying about those nasty traditional consequences--STDs and pregnancy."

No, there was no techtonic shift, because of some word of marvelous med tech. It was, because the purveyors of morality failed to make a persuasive rational, consistent case for what they were preaching. Their mistake was to resort to the power of the state to enforce their worldview. That they saw as a way to maximize their effect. Effects gained by the power of force over reason and example. Fire, brimstone and the heavy hand of the law doesn't make a powerful persuasive force.

What they did was to make a pact with the socialists first, in the belief that the redistribution of goods and services was a good thing. Once the socialists gained their new tool to bribe the electorate, they dumped them. They weren't interested in the moral ideas of their old enabling allies. Letting the serfs have their fun is a powerful tool for them to wield. It keeps 'em happy, ignorant and preoccupied.

Rather than allowing the natural consequences of behavior to occur, they insisted on imposing their own consequences and accompanied them with irrational claims, reasons and tales. That, along with the tyranny imposed by having this unnatural order imposed by the force of law alienated those folks they were trying to reach. They were and remain in the hands of the socialists. They not only feed them now, they give them whatever they want to keep them dumb and happy.

" Tell me, do you think AIDS would have become the scourge that it is had we not given up any attempt at enforcing sodomy laws?

Scourge? Africa's morality allows for open sex. Homos everywhere are unbridled. The proper response is to simply let the consequences of their actions be the light. Your attempt to control it with jailings and redistributed resources, draging everyone else down with them is ridiculous. " I posit that it would have been better for those with homosexual tendencies if we had enforced such laws. More of them might actually be alive and healthy today."

You evidently don't understand them. They are homos, they aren't going to stop, because you threaten jail. The real ones will never marry. They'll not give up the party 'till they see fit to. They'll just hate your guts. Other folks will see you picking the fight and come to a similar conclusion.

"The fact is that the true enemies of people afflicted with homosexual attraction are those who tell them that their identity as a human being is completely dependent upon what they do with their sex organs--who tell them that if they don't act on their impulses, they are doing harm to themselves. This is another example of the big lie.

Sure it is.

"Contrary to your hysterical rant above, those of us who fight against the gay-deathstyle pushers and their lazy "straight" enablers actually do a much greater service to those with same sex attraction. And we do it out of true love--charitas. What is the motivation of the other side? Nothing but pure selfish eros.

Your efforts contain irrational claims, like your claim that med tech leads to something. It doesn't. Med tech is tech, not cause. You also insist on changing homos by force. You can't. They ARE homos. Let them be.

"And we do it out of true love--charitas. What is the motivation of the other side? Nothing but pure selfish eros.

If you love them, set them free. If they don't return, they were never yours. All else is a selfish act to impose ones will on the world (with other people's money).

[spunkets]

"Who says that "freedom" (i.e. individual liberty) is the ultimate Good, to be preserved at all costs?"

God...

and spunkets...

there are others too.

[Technogeeb]

You can be as abtuse as you would like, but there were no laws addressing specifically and exclusively same-sex sodomy in America until the 1970's

Irrelevant the the falseness of your original statement. Your original statement was "There was not a single law outlawing same-sex sodomy in this country 100 years ago", and that statement is a lie. Just admit it was a lie (or poor wording and not what you meant to say).

One of the most important things about understanding the world around you is not lying to yourself,

Then stop lying to yourself.

so, if you don't want to see what's as plain as the nose on your face, that's fine, but don't go accusing me of making false statements.

If you don't want to be accused of making false statements then either stop making false statements or correct the ones you have made.

By the way, according to your line of reason then, should the government of the State of Texas decide to outlaw Jewish religious ceremonies, there would be no discrimination against Jews because gentiles would be forbidden from participating in Jewish religious ceremonies as well

Now you are inventing strawman arguments. The only posts I have made on this subject is to point out that your post (#204) was a lie; nothing else.

Or better yet, we could criminalize performing or participating in Jewish religious ceremonies, and it would not mean that we are discriminating against Jews because gentiles could not participate in, or perform Jewish religious rites either.

Now you are simply setting up strawmen to attempt to distract others from the facts surrounding your lies. For the sake of honesty, why can you not simply admit that you misstated the truth in post #204. Or were you deliberately lying in the hopes that no one knew that Texas law 100 years ago punished homosexual sodomy?

[Pahuanui]

The rise of the idea of personal liberty as the ultimate value

Libertarianism doesn't have or express an 'ultimate value'. Fundamentally, it involves two co-equal principles, personal liberty and personal responsibility. One without the other is not libertarianism.

-- as expressed through the various "liberation" movements, the destruction of institutions, the relaxation of social morés, and the rise of ecstatic, emotive and inclusive religious movements within the Christian faith -- is the prime example of the libertarianization of society since the 1960s.

Without specific examples your contention remains unsupportable. How, precisely, did the relaxation of social mores involve 'libertarianism'? How about the destruction of institutions, and which institutions were they?

[spunkets]

"Schall's Another Sort of Learning (Ignatius) and run through Chesterton's Orthodoxy as a followup."

I don't believe those guys. Too many contradictions and mystery. God is perfectly clear in the Bible. There are no contradictions, or big mysteries to be found there.

[B-Chan]

"Who says that "freedom" (i.e. individual liberty) is the ultimate Good, to be preserved at all costs?"

God...

Really? And where did the Almighty express this opinion?

and spunkets...

You will forgive me for not agreeing.

there are others too.

Yes, indeed there are. One particular individual comes to mind. Hint: Have you ever read Paradise Lost?

[Luis Gonzalez]

There were no laws exclusively banning same-sex sodomy in America until the 1970's.

Go get your jollies off, about the fact that you figured out that I did not state the idea in a manner that suited you.

Call me a liar if it jingles your chains, I knew what I meant to say, as did others in the forum.

Now you can go claim your award for pointing out inproper verbiage.

Now, having said all that, and wasted all this valuable time, I'll stand by my original statemt that there were no laws banning same-sex sodomy until the 1970's, sodomy laws before that pertained to all people.

Now, prove me wrong and find one single same-sex sodomy law before 1970...don't come back with your word game now, just find one sodomy law, prior ro 1970, against same-sex sodomy, not just against sodomy in general.