Hot-Button Issues—looking at more than the facts

Hot-Button Issues—looking at more than the facts

A version of this article was printed in Humanism Ireland, Vol. 141 (2013)

Conservative theorists and right-wing economists often tell us that individual human behaviour is the product of nature, and differences in ability, skills, and intelligence can be understood as those that are rooted in biology. Liberal ideologies, on the other hand, frequently say that differences between individuals are not the product of nature, but are in some way socially constructed due to unfair social and institutional infrastructures; variations on IQ scores between different ethnic groups, they argue, can be explained as a result of one ethnic group having less access to higher education or because of the inherent cultural bias situated within IQ tests. What’s more, humans are not violent by nature. Violent behaviour, they claim, is down to the fact that modern capitalist systems create societies of vast inequality, where luckless people, feeling alienated or frustrated, and through no fault of their own, resort to violence and aggression in reaction to those who are more fortunate. 

Remarkably, when the issue comes to considering sexual orientation, the explanations from both sides are reversed. I find it entertaining when conservatives claim that men who have same-sex relationships are making a “lifestyle” choice, and that one is not really born gay, whilst liberals, in opposition, say that a certain proportion of people are born gay and nature has made it impossible for them to be straight. For conservatives, psychological sex difference, aggression, and inequality can be explained as something innate, but homosexuality is a lifestyle choice. For liberals, conversely, anti-social behaviour, individual variation, and current gender roles can be understood as something fabricate by socio-cultural factors, while sexual orientation is something innate. Why do both sides treat sexual orientation as different to other issues?

Although it might be a crude generalisation to say that most people furnish this apparent inconsistent criterion when making evaluations, it wouldn’t be incorrect to say, though, that many who formulate moral arguments on this hot-button issue do so by appealing to science, biology, or nature.  When conservative religious doctrines and political ideologies are not saying that homosexuality is a “life-style choice”, they’re often saying it’s an unnatural or deviant act that disobeys our true nature as human beings. Last December, prior to his resignation, Pope Benedict XVI, for example, used his Christmas greetings to the Roman Curia to condemn a “new philosophy of sexuality” that tampers with and denies nature: “sex is no longer a given element of nature,” but a “social role we choose for ourselves.” When debating the proposed Irish Civil Partnership Act on Newstalk’s Colmean at Large a number of years ago, the Catholic Voice editor, Anthony Murphy, declared “the gay lifestyle” as something “unnatural” and “sinful”. Defenders of Proposition 8, California’s ban on gay marriage, more recently, base their case on what they call the “objective biological fact” that procreation is an exclusively heterosexual practice.

Those who support equal rights for gays and lesbians are likely to refer to scientists and psychologists who claim that sexual orientation is an inborn mixture of genetic and environmental factors that mostly determine a person's sexual attractions before they are born. They may also make reference to cases of homosexuality elsewhere in the animal kingdom. In his recent New York Times article, David George Haskell, for instance, cites evidence of same-sex bonds existing within groups of mallards, and between members of our closest living cousins, such as the bonobos and chimpanzees. This confirmation, liberals assert, suggests that sexual orientation and same-sex attraction are natural.

From this, we can see that certain moral arguments in favour of, or against, gay rights point towards facts, science, or nature to justify claims.  However, a number of problems come about if we completely pursue this approach. Even if we are to assume that the causes of homosexuality are predetermined before birth, this information, by itself, doesn’t give us any moral grounds for supporting same-sex relations. Those who claim otherwise are committing, what the philosopher G. E. Moore called, the “naturalistic fallacy.” Moore accused anyone who concludes that X is good from any propositions about X’s natural properties of having committed the naturalistic fallacy. For example: those who claim that same-sex attraction is a natural phenomenon, so therefore morally benign, are committing this fallacy; equally, someone who contends that same-sex marriages are against nature, so therefore morally bad, are also committing the fallacy. In order to avoid the fallacy, Moore argues, a moral premise must also accompany the factual or empirical claim.  Purely factual premises about the naturalistic features of things don’t automatically bring about value statements.   

To be sure, it’s reassuring to know that many scientists agree (to some degree anyway) that homosexuality is influenced by factors determined prior to birth. In the future, maybe it will be possible to say that fundamental differences will ultimately prove to be biological and not social. Any person against homophobia will certainly hope this is true, for it will make their job of fighting discrimination less difficult. But suppose, for instance, unforeseeable evidence did emerge affirming the hypothesis that sexual orientation was in no way biologically determined, and was instead the result of social factors, such as, childhood nurture. What would the implications be for those fighting against homophobia, whose argument solely rest upon sexual orientation being a biological fact? Would they have to concede that their understanding of the issue was mistaken, and admit that those who said it was a life-style choice were correct all along? 

We only have to look at other issues to realise that entirely appealing to biology or nature, in order to invoke moral arguments, seems incongruous. Suppose evidence strongly suggested that homicide is an innate feature of human nature, it would be absurd to seriously deliberate over claims made by an accused murderer that the intentional butchery of a defenceless victim is a morally justifiable act. If we had good reasons to believe humans are naturally racist, it wouldn’t give us legitimate grounds to discriminate against racial minorities. Despite all this, it didn’t stop outrage, demonstrations, and disruptions of lecturers from occurring in 2000, after Randy Thornhill and Craig Palmer published a book titled A Natural History of Rape. Controversy arose, not surprisingly, after the authors proposed that rape should be understood through evolutionary theory—namely, that in humans, rape is an evolved adaptation, by means of sexual selection, allowing some males to replicate their genes to ensuing generations. “We fervently believe that, just as the leopard’s spots and the giraffe’s elongated neck are the results of aeons of past Darwinian selection, so is rape,” they declare, and “there is no doubt that rape has evolutionary—and hence genetic—origins.” The proposal was put forward in consideration against feminist and socio-cultural accounts of rape as something that is not sexually motivated, but an expression of male power and domination over women. Several reviewers accused Thornhill and Palmer of pardoning rape, misogyny, and violent against women, and dismissed the book as sexist and reactionary; this was in spite of the fact the authors stated that rapists are criminals and should be punished.  

Even an issue as seemingly innocent as left-handedness can turn out to be an emotive one. A scientific paper in 1991 suggested that left-handed people are victims of more misfortune, and die younger than right-handed people. Consequently, the scientists involved in the study were flurried with abuse from incensed left-handers and their supporters.   

Knowing the mere conclusions, and not actually seeking to discover how they came about, is hardly the spirit of credible or reasoned debate. Someone who feverishly opposes the view that homosexuality is unnatural, for instance, may feel threatened by the idea, and think the best way to defend their values is to claim that the study’s findings are non-credible or ulterior in force. They fail to realise, in this way, that impartial statements or empirical observations (whether they are true or not) about certain things, do not, by default, imply moral evaluation. Reaching the conclusion that same-sex attraction is not rooted in biology, does not necessarily give one a reason to alter the way one views the topic from an ethical point of view.

According to Janet Radcliffe-Richards, the author of The Sceptical Feminist and Human Nature After Darwin, the roots of this endless confusion can be traced back to Aristotle -- and were subsequently adopted by Islam and Christianity. Western thought, from this time on, has been of a world that is naturally organised and harmonious. This outlook leads to an understanding of morality in which our obligation is to comprehend our nature, and to act in accordance with it. Put another way, God, or nature, has engineered a cosmological rational order that will offer us the direction or guidance we need to act in a particular set of circumstances as we should. Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species, however, undermined the Greco-Christian worldview in the 19th century by showing that the appearance of order in the living world stems not from design, but from natural selection.  In contrast to the traditional worldview, though, Darwinian natural selection has no underpinning moral order build into it. Knowing the nature of things from an evolutionary perspective, in consequence, doesn’t give us any guidance on how things ought to be.

This fundamental misapprehension was made by the Social Darwinists in the late 19th and early 20th century, who appealed to Darwinian natural selection to justify “survival of the fittest” social policies that deliberately showed prejudice against individuals and social groups deemed “undesirable” and “unfit”. Concluding that their policies where in harmony with natural selection, the Social Darwinists considered their programmes morally acceptable. Correspondingly, some right-wing and libertarian economists nowadays might defend laisser-faire capitalism as fair and desirable because humans, as they believe, are innately selfish and that inequality is part of the natural order of social life.

As Radcliffe-Richards reminds us, when one makes a claim about the world, or state facts about what’s true or natural, the main thing to bear in mind is that until he is clear about the moral principles he wants to comply with, he can’t tell whether the evidence put forward is even relevant to his political and moral enquiries. Somebody, for instance, who adjudges rape to be wrong because it invasively attacks the victim against her will, and adversely influences her present and future well-being, should not be disturbed with the idea that rape is natural. Regardless of whether the idea is true or not, the person’s reason for morally opposing rape remains the same. The reasons she believes rape to be wrong are based on how it harms the victim, not for reasons why one might commit such an act. The facts of the case should only affect someone’s moral evaluation if they believe rape is wrong solely because it’s unnatural. 

Additionally, if someone fights against homophobia because he believes it wrongly discriminates against a proportion of people within society, and thinks intolerance can be damaging towards the mental health of many gays and lesbians that would be unfairly treated, his position should also not be affected if evidence suggested same-sex attraction is a wholly socio-cultural phenomenon. Whether same-sex attraction is learned behaviour or not, the facts of the case alone should not affect the reasons why he’s against unequal rights. These facts, if they were ever to exist, would only influence someone’s moral estimation if he believes same-sex relations are morally benign, solely because he, up until that time, considered homosexuality not to be a “life-style” choice.

Perhaps in any debate about what we ought to do, we could, from our analysis, focus more on working out and clarifying our values and what we want to achieve, in advance of getting into discussions about the facts and evidence on hand. Radcliffe-Richards argues this approach is exactly the opposite of the way much public discourse tends to work, where people regularly think they need to begin by finding out as many facts as possible; inevitably, she says, they “never get beyond the wrangles about the facts to the value issues that are at the root of all questions about what we should do.”

It’s all well and good to know that politicians and policy makers are influenced by verifiable facts and relevant empirical evidence, but if we don’t have any understanding of their values, we will not have any idea where science will lead them. For more lucidity in our public discourse, and where improvement can be reached, maybe politicians, public representatives, bankers, economists, and so forth, could focus more time on working out their value systems before indulging on facts and scientific evidence.