Gays, God and the Law: difference is not inequality, and tolerance doesn’t always trump faith

By John Buckingham

This week’s California gay marriage row is very much a storm in a teacup. The fact is that California has long allowed gays to access domestic partnerships (like our Civil Partnerships) with almost identical rights to marriage: this is uncontroversial in the state. Where conflict remains it is essentially over who gets to use the word ‘marriage’: to my mind, this is a trivial point which does not merit the outcry which has ensued. It would appear that some gays are keen to achieve not equality, but sameness. But the fact is that gay and straight people, and gay and straight couples, are not the same – and why should they be? Do people need to be identical to have the same rights? And if they’re not the same, why not be content with two different but essentially equal legal provisions, as we have in the UK?

There seems no reason to provoke hostility and angst by trying to mimic straight people in every regard; people should be proud to be different. Far better to focus efforts (and the m spent fighting Proposition 8) on getting civil unions recognised in the many states where gay couples presently have no such rights, and no means of expressing their enduring affection. This is the real battle, not some pointless posturing against a faux-injustice.

This logic can be extrapolated to problems in our own country. Thus, recent legislation which prevents Mosques, Churches and other faith organisations from discriminating against gays in job applications is totally misplaced. Clearly, it is unacceptable for either private or public sector employers to discriminate, because democratic processes have legislated against such practices; there should be no opt-outs for Christian or Muslim employees dealing with gay clients (although reasonable provisions should of course be made if they don’t reduce the efficiency of work).

But faith groups – unlike private and public bodies – can legitimately govern their internal mechanisms according to their own morality. People enter faith groups because they share the beliefs of that group: it is a choice that is entirely different to the choice made to work for Tesco’s rather than Sainsbury’s, or for a particular hospital or school. Therefore if you choose to enter the employ of such a group, you surrender yourself to be treated according to its values – to which you yourself have subscribed – however intolerant of you they may be. All religious activity is voluntary, therefore any discrimination incurred within this activity is also self-inflicted.

The headlong rush towards sameness and legal homogeneity is misguided and illiberal: faith groups are a special case in both freedom of speech and with regard to their internal practices. Clearly, since faith is a choice position, religious people deserve only the merest level of legal protection from criticism and ‘offence’; they certainly have no right to complain that national level legislation on issues such as gay adoption infringes their rights. But, equally, to use the law to compel Catholic adoption agencies to accept gay couples is merely officious nonsense.

Both ‘equality’ activists and religious groups continually get it wrong on these issues: gay rights campaigners are determined that everyone must agree with then, whilst religious leaders claim to be offended by laws determined by Parliament simply because they don’t tally with ancient scripture. Both miss the point. We can accommodate religious practice with gay rights precisely because one is a choice and the other is not: people who choose to engage in religion forfeit their right to be treated equally on the basis of their sexuality within that sphere – and if they make that choice, the law has no place overruling sincerely held belief, ancient tradition and moral conscience.

John Buckingham is a student at the University of Cambridge and a contributor to cambridgeunilabour.blogspot.com.