August 22, 2023
Can We Fight a Culture of Whoredoms?
By: David George
Growing up as a millennial, I often heard parts of the controversy over same-sex marriage and homosexuality. I vaguely remember “Prop 8” although I wasn’t involved in it – but mostly I remember struggling to make sense of the arguments from both sides.
I didn’t really have a dog in the fight, as I saw it.
I’ve also been thinking more about the LGBTQ political movement in recent times. I find it alarming to see sexual celebrations strike so close to home, with “Drag Queen Story Time” events being held in local public parks even in small town America. In my mind such events are beyond the pale, partly because the target of many “Pride” events is admittedly children and youth (see: “A History of Drag”).
Back in 2008 I was still in high school. We heard a lot about gay marriage then but if I remember correctly, I never heard a truly compelling argument against it – one that grabbed my attention and settled the issue in a definitive way.
On the other hand, I also never heard a compelling argument in favor of gay marriage – probably because I wasn’t looking at either side of the issue in a serious way in both cases. I was young and like I said, I didn’t think I had a dog in that fight, one way or the other.
Today, the fundamental controversies over human sexuality loom large in a threatening way, especially for the rising generation and my own children.
What will I say to them about this issue?
What has been said by many about same-sex marriage strikes me as lack-luster, for what its worth. I am under the impression that Republicans and conservatives were pushed into a corner between 2008 and 2015 and lacked truly compelling arguments for a few specific reasons. (In mentioning “arguments” I mean social and cultural arguments, rather than the specifics of the legal battles.)
For instance, many conservatives had spent decades previous championing “personal freedoms” and “rights,” including pornographic production and consumption. Arguments against homosexuality and other deviant relationships might have seemed hollow coming from people with a track record of defending sodomy and a culture of whoredoms.
Conservatives simply couldn’t muster a crushing defense against the “Why should you get to decide what I do in my own bedroom?” argument, and we lost a major part of the culture war on that issue as well as the legal ground.
Notably, the Netherlands legalized same-sex marriages in 2001, becoming the first nation to do so.
Canada legalized same-sex marriages in 2005.
And it was only in 2015 that the United States fully legalized same-sex marriages on a national level, as a matter of federal law.
In the scheme of time and precedent, 22 years is not very long; and 9 years isn’t either. I would propose that we do not fully comprehend the consequences and results of shifting such fundamentally moral compasses within our powerful legal systems.
Now, nearly a decade later, these same breaches in the wall of our own common sense and morality have led us to the great and terrible confusion of our modern times, with the explosion of gender theory, surgical transgenderism, and the official “Pride” of the LGBTQ community flaunted almost everywhere we look.
On the whole, it seems as if the strongest conservative arguments against same-gender marriage law appealed to religion and the Biblical teachings of Christianity. I still hear these arguments frequently today, and while I agree with them for the most part due to my own personal perspectives, a purely Christian approach probably limits conservatives in the realm of secular credibility. (THIS argument makes sense to me: In Favor of Family)
Either way, and for whatever reason, we (the conservatives) lost the battle over homosexuality and continued ceding good and moral ground in our nation.
However, there are some positive developments in our nation which seem to look upstream and calculate the source of our problems from their point of origin.
Take the repeal of Roe v. Wade as an example of constitutional conservatives setting the house of our nation in order. Decisive action against abortion bodes well for equally decisive action against Obergefell v. Hodges (the ruling which enforced same-sex marriage across the nation).
A strong coalition of constitutional conservatives are looking up-stream, reexamining our tolerance of a series of moral transgressions in order to make sense of our predicament.
A CULTURE OF WHOREDOMS: LOOKING UPSTREAM
While I absolutely view transgender surgery and hormone therapy as one of the principle evils of our modern day, along with Drag Queen Story Time and “queer theory” in general, as it is taught to children – I also view our consumption of “pornography” as a cultural pollutant from whence all other moral horrors of our day and age have emerged.
“Pornography” – as a term – is simply a new name for a really old thing: “whoredoms.”
This is important to know because “whoredoms” are mentioned explicitly throughout our common history as being a course of conduct which sank entire nations, crippling them from the inside out.
And the essence of “whoredom” is simply transacting sex for money or favor.
Notably, “pornography” is produced by a system of financial transaction which not only purchases sexual acts, but also records, publishes, and broadcasts them.
So, in many ways, “pornographic” consumption simply means that the vast majority of society is enchanted by the “whoredoms” of a select group of people which we magnify and disseminate without any real discrimination.
But rather than splitting hairs and specifying that only pornographic studios are culpable in transacting sex for money, any casual observer will admit that pornographic material is also bought and sold by society at large, with intent equal to the actual act of production.
I believe that possessing the understanding of “pornography” that I have mentioned here – namely that “pornography” IS “whoredoms,” a very old problem masquerading under a very new name – is extremely important.
Would America have lost the battle against homosexuality if we had held the sacred ground of purity, virtue, and morality against pornography?
Is it possible that a culture of whoredoms weakened our ability to contend against the serious legal challenges of the LGBTQ political movement?
I am always puzzled when I hear people step forward to defend pornographic production or consumption, as if the industry or practice needed defending.
My perspective of liberty – which has born out to be true in my own life as well as the stage of history – is that when people use their liberty to commit degrading or destructive acts, it brings destruction in and of itself, inevitably.
There might be an argument to be made, that government does not have a role to play in regulating or forbidding the “sex trade.”
But apart from that, within the sphere of our own liberty and conscience, we can easily make the decision to discourage people (especially our own children) from participating in the sex trade. We can EASILY and REASONABLY make the argument that such activities are absolutely destructive, debasing, vile, degenerate, predatory, perverted, and even evil.
Moreover, it is worth pointing out that America was founded on “moral legislation,” meaning state laws that condemned adultery, lasciviousness, fornication, sodomy, prostitution, and a slew of other behaviors. Those laws were the chosen laws of the founding generation, which were formulated and consented to by “the People.” In the centuries since, we have steadily walked that type of legislation back – and I would make the argument that we have NOTHING to show for it but misery and sorrow. Divorce rates, skyrocketing abortion statistics, hook-up culture, feminism, the LGBTQ movement, ect. ect.
In my mind, any person defending pornography might as well be making the argument that we CAN choose to drive ourselves off the edge of a cliff, if we so choose. We CAN participate in the sex trade, as things stand – but we might as well shoot ourselves in the foot.
Surely the idea that “we have enough rope to hang ourselves” applies to what we do within the scope of liberty.
And liberty brings the potential for absolute self-destruction, by definition.
I would prefer to hear more voices argue us away from the edge of a cliff rather than push us towards it.
NEW LEGISLATION
Thankfully, those voices are rising in volume and strength.
A legislator in Louisiana recently made significant headway by passing a law that requires users to provide their ID before logging into a porn sites. Louisiana’s legislation became the model for six other states: Arkansas, Montana, Mississippi, Utah, Virginia and Texas, and 16 more have introduced similar or nearly identical bills (Politico.com).
By all accounts, the legislation is curbing access to the sites by minors and children.
And it is encouraging to see serious legislative efforts being taken against a culture of whoredoms.
I DO have a “dog in this fight,” as it were. All of us do. And thankfully the fight isn’t over.
David George is an independent journalist from East Idaho who specializes in investigative journalism about Idaho politics. His work is available on Substack, here.
