So What's Wrong With Homosexuality?

In the tradition of STR, I wrote a brief response to an pro-gay article in Malaysiakini called So What? Its Their Sexual Preference.

Dear Francis

First, let me say that I hold no grudges against homosexuals. Not only that, I fully support your timely call to treat our fellow Malaysians who are homosexuals with respect, understanding and compassion.

The authorities must be vigilant to bring swift justice upon those immoral individuals who verbally or physically abused them.

Now, I accept my homosexual friends as valuable, dignified human beings. And they understand that I do so without condoning their behavior. In my humble view, homosexuality is immoral just as heterosexual adultery is immoral.

However, if you say that publicly nowadays, you are immediately called derogatory names like homophobic,
heterosexist, bigot or hate-monger.

I don’t use emotive labels to publicly stigmatize people who I disagree with. But name-calling is often used to condemn people who disagree with the 'morality' of homosexual behavior.

This is a convenient but unhelpful way of muddying the waters. Of course, I may be wrong but at least my views are based on principles, not prejudice.

So what’s the big deal about homosexual behavior?

You seem to argue that homosexuality is ‘normal’ or morally benign because “being gay is their choice, they have the right to choose their preferences”. That’s a “freedom of choice” argument.

But let’s think about this: Can people choose whatever sexual preferences they fancy?

Apparently not. We are not morally entitled to choose preferences like pedophilia, necrophilia or extramarital affairs, for that matter.

Why not? Because it’s wrong, even if it’s done in private.

Now, it may be objected that unlike pedophilia, homosexual behavior may be consensual among adults. What’s wrong with gay lifestyle as long as “the couple truly love and accept each other”?

But again, this argument does not hold water after a moment’s reflection.

Are people allowed to commit adultery or incest “as long as they love and accept each other”?

Even a heterosexual man who falls in love with his own sister or daughter (yucks!) can’t simply marry anyone he wants. So mutual consent simply does not justify immoral behaviors.

Now, I do agree with your description of homosexual practice becoming more “normal” or publicly visible as seen in examples of gay clerics, Ang Lee movies and celebrity tabloids.

But what is “normal” (as- is) may not be “normative” (ought-to-be).

Yes, homosexuals are among us. But it doesn't follow that their behavior is a moral norm just as having Mat Rempits all around us does not mean that we ought to encourage illegal races.

There is also another sense of the word “normal”, meaning “things are functioning in the way it was meant to be”. When things work “normally”, they are fulfilling what they are designed to do.

In this sense, homosexual practice is simply “abnormal”. Sexual organs were obviously not meant to fit in bodies the way homosexuals use them, resulting in a host of adverse medical consequences.

So we should not confuse the call to accept the existence of homosexuals in a spirit of tolerance with advocacy for homosexual behavior as morally acceptable.

Now don’t get me wrong. There is a lot of confusion when it comes to making such distinctions.

Our moral objection against homosexuality per se no more fosters violence against homosexuals than our disagreement against adultery fosters violence against people who are unfaithful to their spouses.

I am not asking people to be bigoted gay-bashers, spread hate or boycott Elton John’s music just because there are moral objections against their lifestyles. This kind of thinking would make PEMADAM responsible every time a drug addict gets beat up behind Chow Kit Road.

Lastly, I share your hope for a period of social reform in our nation that makes for a more equitable, just and caring society for all citizens regardless of creed, skin color or economic status.

Ethnicity has nothing to do with morality. With homosexuality we're talking about something different – it is a particular behavior that most Malaysians find odd, unnatural, harmful and deeply unethical.

As yet, there is no confirmed biological cause for homosexuality. Even if a biological factor may contribute to homosexual tendency, it does not determine our choices. Human beings are not programmed robots whose destiny is fixed by nature.

Surely, we don’t approve of hot-blooded heterosexuals who ‘naturally’ feel biological urges to grope female pedestrians to carry out their hormone-induced inclinations just because they are supposedly ‘born that way”. Even they are not entitled with such ‘equal rights’ in society.

Why not? Perhaps not because of blind prejudice, prudery or lack of scientific understanding.

But simply because it’s unethical.

They should still have the freedom to vote, find security and equal employment opportunity as any other citizen in our country.

But no one – heterosexual or homosexual – is entitled to unethical behavior.

Chang Wei Hao, a heterosexual sinner in the process of being rescued by Grace, is also an avid blogger at The Agora.