In case anyone's still curious, "nature's law" is an ancient concept based on the idea that, just as things like stars and tides move in an orderly way reflecting some kind of divine logic behind the world, so must there be some sort of an intrinsic divine law for human behaviour. For people who are not religious, this translates as just some built-in kind of universal order that will make people behave optimally.
The concept was first applied to homosexuality by St. Paul in the Christian book called Letter to the Romans, when he referred to 'men turning to men instead of women' as "para physin," that is, against nature. He also referred to other things, such as men wearing their hair long, as para physin. You can recognized that Greek word physin as being connected to the English word physics, which shows you that the concept of nature used then had nothing in particular to do with greenery, national parks and cute wild animals. It's often said that Paul was influenced by Plato's thought, since Paul was an educated fellow in a Greek-speaking area of the Roman Empire, and Plato had been very big on the idea of an ideal sphere of worldly existence, including an ideal nature of everything. This is possible, but in the case of Paul's speech on same-sex acts, he may also have been trying to render the Hebrew word "to'evah," "an abomination" (King James Bible) into some sort of an understandable Greek expression. This word is used to characterize "men lying with each other in the same way as with a woman" in the Jewish Torah (Christian old testament book of Leviticus). It is notoriously difficult to translate adequately.
Here are my views on all this (or at least some of "this"). If I can restrict my comments to men, I think there are two different situations in which men get together for sex. One of them is the situation in which both of the men involved are gay, that is, predominantly sexually attracted and also likely romantically attracted to men. This is an intrinsic sexual orientation, not some sort of adopted habit, fashion statement or philosophical position (I know because I've been there), so in this case the men are surely following the nature that "nature" or God gave them. The other situation is when two men get together for sex and one or both of them is heterosexual. This sounds like it shouldn't happen, but there are a couple of situations where it is common enough. The most famous is in prison, where lots of tough straight men deprived of women for a long time start thinking that some of the other guys will do as substitutes, especially if they're a bit on the young and cute side. I call this substitute use of men "surrogacy." The other situation for surrogacy is when similar things happen to randy and deprived guys anywhere else, as happens mainly in places and societies where premarital or casual sex with women is hard to come by (no pun intended). The old joke, "a place where men are men and sheep are nervous" could be rewritten to say "a place where men are men and sheep AND other men are nervous." Most men will only take the active role in this game but there are always some who, for one reason or another (maybe they're gay, maybe they just got talked or frightened into it) will take the "passive role," if you know what I mean. This is no longer so common in the English-speaking society I grew up in, but in the days when it was more common, the English word for such a fellow was a catamite. Most societies have such a word. In Morocco, for example, the word "zamel" is used. In St. Paul, the word was "malakos" ("weak one"). It's very clear that St. Paul was familiar with such behaviour.
Surrogacy was very common in various societies in ancient times, and in fact also had a third forum of activity, ritual temple prostitution in the ancient polytheistic religions. The apparent biblical/torah/quranic condemnations of homosexual acts, and the idea that homosexuality is against nature, really relate to surrogacy -- this is why the concept of turning away from women, or doing it with a man as if with a woman, are mentioned in the scriptural passages on this topic. (The islamic equivalent is committing an act of 'zina,' or extra-marital sex.) Here we are talking about people who easily could and ideally should be heterosexual, and yet they are "doing it" with each other, just as pure cold usage or "getting off." You can see any saint worth his salt would have found this pretty crazy -- normal, woman-loving guys turning off their self-control and just doing it with each other as an alternative to bothering the farm animals. Very unnatural. Of course, if this kind of sexual activity is also mixed with violence and the man being used is really a rape victim, as in American prison movies (or in the quranic and possibly also the biblical story of Sodom), then so much the more unnatural. Even I would call that unnatural, and (as people always say in this situation) I'm no saint.
Leaving the violent people aside and returning to the ordinary, non-violent ones, you could easily say that what those guys should really do, especially in the kinds of traditional societies where surrogacy becomes an active option, is to toughen up for a couple of years, restrain themselves, and then get married and put all that energy in the right place. And of course, stay out of prison. That's well and good and "kata physin" (in harmony with nature).
On the other hand, if gay men get married to women, that's against their nature. AND -- the important thing that conservative people never recognize on this topic -- it's also deeply against the nature of heterosexual marriage if one of the partners lacks sexual interest in members of the opposite sex. Every year even now, all over the world, many women get stuck with marrying guys who, however genuinely friendly they may be, are faking heterosexual interest just because, in their society or family, it's difficult or impossible to deal with the reality of being gay. The whole system of beliefs that bamboozles people into these fake marriages is one of the most unnatural mind-viruses that humans ever inflicted upon themselves.
The dread that letting gay men be gay will cause humanity to give up heterosexuality completely and stop making babies is the fundamental "sneeze" that an infection by this virus causes in the sufferer. This scary statement propagates the belief to new sufferers, who then also nervously want to get EVERYONE making babies, whether or not they have any natural inclination to do this. Meanwhile the planet practically implodes from the weight of all the 'babies' living on it.
Gay marriages as a social phenomenon are pretty benign. They are really a development reflecting the value placed on relationships as opposed to "just sex." As such, they are a sort of counter-revolution against the Western "sexual revolution" dogma of the sixties and seventies, in which everyone was supposed to be a swinger and not limit themselves to one life-long partner. One could be gay and just do one-night stands or brief affairs, but if you value relationships or, at least, your own relationship, then you might wish to get married, especially when this confers suitable and necessary partner privileges like hospital visiting rights in times of emergency. Relationships are very conspicuous no matter what you do and so, unlike sex (for most people), are part of the public domain. People are relentlessly asked about their relationship status ("are you married?"), so they might as well be able to give a good and true answer.
No one knows just why there are sexual orientations such that some people are gay, a few bi, and most heterosexual. It's some sort of an interaction between our animal sexual imprinting system (that also leads to eccentric imprints like the lifelong "shoe fetish" etc. that some people have) and our rapidly evolved (a few million years) capacity for higher intelligence. Whether there has been any Darwinian natural selection for it, as sociobiologists have claimed, is very hard to say. Given that it's real, though, for gay men to act in keeping with their natures and not get involved in tragic marital mistakes with innocent heterosexual women is very much "kata physin," in harmony with nature.
My fundamental principle is this: "every woman willingly getting involved in a heterosexual marriage deserves to have a truly heterosexual man as her spouse." (I am absolutely on her side.) The corollary is "any marriage a gay man gets involved in should not be to a woman," and then by extension, "if a gay man is to get married at all, it should be to another gay man."
Deepa, if you find this reasoning to be against nature's law, let us know.
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