THE GREAT EMOTIONAL SPASM THAT GAVE A VICTORY TO GAY MARRIAGE

AS EVERYBODY KNEW they would, the government won the debate on gay marriage, but at what may turn out to be at great cost to the Conservative Party. The party needed the support of Labour and the Liberal Democrats. As Cameron, from outside of the chamber, viewed (probably) on a flat screen over half of the Tory parliamentary Party (149) march through the No lobby.

            I watched a good part of the debate, and there were two features that stood out to me. Those speaking for the motion perpetually used the equality argument, and arrogantly believed themselves on the side of history; while those opposing were seen as sexagenarian reactionaries to whom history would turn to ashes within a decade or two leaving the field open for progress to finally triumph.

            The equality argument as a socialist concoction usually meant the dumbing down of all society so nobody should be left behind. Instead of raising people up, everybody had to be equal; so those considered above average had to be pruned back so those less gifted should not feel themselves left out or inferior (thus the ending of grammar schools). This was the traditional socialist egalitarian structure.

            Equality under the law; and equality of opportunity are the benchmark conservative values; and no doubt it was equality under the law that spurred on David Cameron to hold this debate. As far as that modern post-war liberal innovation known as secularism is concerned there should be no difference between the rights of male/female, male/male, and female/female to marriage.

            But, as was pointed out in yesterday’s debate, marriage was the creation of the Christian church in Western culture. It was a ceremony tied to religious faith; the faith in question being Christian. The ceremony was meant for the consummation between male and female, joining together in holy matrimony; and it has been so for 2,000 years. The Christian ceremony maps its frontiers in accordance with Biblical authority. This authority cannot be undermined by secular authority - in the sense that such an authority has no part to play in any religious decisions on anything, let alone the 2,000 year old wedding ceremony between men and women.

            Everybody has to take full cognisance of the law and obey it. But as far as church practice and ceremony are concerned; there is no other authority other  than that of Biblical teaching. Only the church itself, and not parliamentarians, can decide the nature of the wedding ceremony and who can and cannot be part of it when it comes to Biblical teaching.

            The trouble is, I fear, that those who support gay weddings see this 2,000 year-old legacy as nothing more than bigoted suppression of gay sexuality, and like slavery and votes for women, it must be brought to an end…such is the secular position.

            On this issue parliament has no role to play if it means desiring the marriage of same sex couples to be performed in a Christian Church. If it were to happen and various liberal Bishops and prelates saw fit to go against their own Archbishop, who has openly spoken out against such ceremonies, and allow same sex marriages to take place in their diocese, then schism will be their reward and civil unrest may follow. We may even become once more acquainted with the church of Rome as our state religion, if the Christian liberalarte become determined upon seeing the Christian marriage ceremony so undermined.

NOW WE COME TO who is on what side of history. During the debate, smugness, vanity, and  arrogance all became orchestrated into a confederacy of the enlightened progressive debunking of the “staid and reactionary” opinions of those, who through conscience, sought to oppose this motion. The progressives were determined to bury the bones of reaction. They thought themselves to have judged history well in the past; they had helped end slavery; they had given women the vote. Now they are about to give gays their entitlement to marriage; and once more it is the reactionary conservative who will be on the wrong side of history.

            Within the next two or three decades yet another sexual proclivity will demand to be heard and treated as sympathetically as that of the gays . The paedophile will exercise the attention of those who today seek equality for gays. Those who oppose it will in turn become the sexagenarian reactionaries to whom  history would  turn to ashes within a decade. The next great leap forward in progressive thinking will be the sexual relationship between adults and children; and if those advocating gay marriage are appalled by such a possibility, then let them see what happened in the 1970s.

The Paedophile Information Exchange (PIE) was formed in 1974 but was gone by 1984. However, what happened between these years, particularly in 1978 when PIE became affiliated to the National Council of Civil Liberties (NCCL). The NCCL, known today as Liberty, campaigned against the press’s treatment of the Paedophile activist groups like PIE.

            In 1974 Patricia Hewitt later to be the Labour Party’s Health Secretary in government was appointed General Secretary of NCCL. She was joined by the current Deputy Leader of the Labour Party, Harriet Harman, who served as the NCCL’s legal officer between 1978-82. Both sympathised with the remit of PIE at the time.

            So it is not so farfetched to believe that those who today seek to promote gay marriage will come to oppose future legislation regarding the sexual conduct between adult and child. For this is the next great liberal challenge for the next generation of liberal “progressives”, who will continue to believe themselves to be on the right side of history. Will those who spoke yesterday in parliament for gay marriage, themselves become what they consider to be reactionaries, if, within the next two decades or so, future liberal progressives turns their support toward, what we now call Paedophilia, but will be described as the love of a man for a child?

            For if men can have access to the love of each other on the basis of emotional attachment, then why cannot a man for a child? In the future, liberals will, I am certain, make the case, and, no doubt, a time will come when a relationship can be established between a fully mature man and a child using  the same kind of emotional rhetoric on display yesterday by those speaking in support of gay weddings…there is a lot to be said for conservative staidness after all.