Δαφνη Ευτυχια Αρθουρος

"Actually, there are TWO ends to marriage: 1) Unitive and 2) Procreative. The unitive end of marriage is simply a union of love and life. The Procreative end is, of course, to create new life. It is important to understand that the unitive end of marriage is sufficient for a valid marriage. The Church sanctions, and considers a sacrament, the marriage of elderly heterosexual couples who are biologically incapable of reproduction. So, if two people of different genders who are incapable of reproduction can enter into a valid marriage, then why is that two people of the same gender, who are incapable of reproduction, cannot enter into a valid marriage.

"The objections which are raised at this point are taken from Sacred Scripture. Scripture scholars reveal the problematic nature of attempting to use passages from the Hebrew Scriptures as an argument against same gender relationships. Essentially, these scriptures are addressing the cultic practices in which sex with temple prostitutes was part of an act of worshiping Pagan gods. With regard to the Pauline epistles, John J. McNeill, in his book: 'The Church and the Homosexual,' makes the following point: 'The persons referred to in Romans 1:26 are probably not homosexuals that is, those who are psychologically inclined toward their own sex--since they are portrayed as 'abandoning their natural customs.'' The Pauline epistles do not explicitly treat the question of homosexual activity between two persons who share a homosexual orientation, and as such cannot be read as explicitly condemning such behavior. Therefore, same gender sex by two individuals with same sex orientation is not 'abandoning their natural custom.'"

-- Roman Catholic priest Geoffrey Farrow (of Fresno, CA, US) 2008-10-05 (thanks to dmk for pointing it out)

Yesterday I was in a couple of conversations that I found frustrating and bewildering, and I eventually put my finger on at least part of the reason they seemed so strange. From my point of view, they went very much like this (though about a different topic, and X wasn't a single person):

X: Factoring is bullshit. You can't factor 31, factoring is pointless, all numbers are prime.

Me: While a minority of numbers are prime, most can be factored. Some are even squares or cubes.

X: Yeah, but 31, man. Numbers are evil. All of them. Also prime. Not like words. Words are nice. You can always split them up into smaller pieces.

Me: No, not all numbers are prime, not even most. Only some numbers are prime. You're ignoring the differences. Besides, not all words are splittable. Look at 'a' or 'I'. Just like numbers, some are and some aren't.

X: Oh hey, I never said that factorable numbers were evil, only primes. And I have nothing against words, so whether words are splittable or not is irrelevant. Just numbers that you can't factor.

Me: So we agree then, that most numbers can be factored and primes are a minority?

X: No, because they're all prime. Didn't you notice 31? Sheesh, liberals. You can talk all mathy, but that doesn't change 31.

Me: Yes, I noticed 31. And 17, too. But 12 can be factored -- it's 2x2x3; and 30 can be factored -- it's 2x3x5. Some numbers are prime. But no, not all numbers are prime. Just some of them.

X: Well, if you're going to deny that prime numbers exist, go factor 31, smartypants.

Me: I already admitted that 31 is prime. But what about 12 and 18 and 25 and 300?

X: Numbers are allowed to change how they look, like 12 can claim to be 10+2, so they're just deceiving you into thinking they can be factored. Any number that looks factorable has to be faking it.

Me: Wut?

It's a curious pattern. And it's a frustrating pattern. There's a bizarre cognitive shift in there, where one statement fails to connect up to another, and anything that challenges the initial premise is misunderstood, not-heard, or forgotten from one breath to the next.

It's a rigidity of thought, where anyone who challenges the assumptions using reason is first deemed mistaken, then deemed dangerous. New information is not allowed in. Reasoning is "just being fancy" and doesn't count. Arguments in favour of the initial premise don't have to make sense -- can even be contradictory -- and as long as they're dogmatically-correct the sound perfectly sensible to the speaker and his allies. "Have you thought of ____ as a sign that you might be mistaken?" never applies to the dogma, only to challengers of it. Positions cannot evolve, and nuance is seen as evidence of confusion, not evidence that the world is more complex than what is modelled in the dogma.

It's an odd pattern. And it's (*cough*) fundamentally broken.