Heh - what a fascinating analysis. I particularly like Glorfindel's succinct and subjective rejection of Passy's economic reductionism.

While I can't imagine what it would be like to be a gay Christian and all the necessary rationalisation that would entail, it seems to me that there's a bit more to homophobia than Passy's historical materialist analysis allows.

Sorry Glorfindel, I am John Passant.

Fou say:

"I don't believe that homophobia can be attributed to any particular economic system. (I also have difficulty with Passant's characterization of the economic system in fourth century Roman Empire as 'capitalist'. The term seems rather pointless before the rise of forces which were capable of generating significant 'surplus value'.)"

First, I haven't re-read my article, but where do I say Roman society is capitalist? I would not say that.

Second, most seem to have misconstrued my point that the drive against homosexuality in Victorian England may have harnessed homophobia in its religious guise for another purpose - to strenghten the family unit as a cheap means of producing the next generation of workers.

So, allow me a question. Was there a drive against homosexuality in Victorian England?

It may be my speculative ramblings could have been better expressed but they are definitely not post-modernist, or reductionist for that matter.

Crapulent by the way means over indulging or resulting from alcohol. I can assure you I was sober. It reads sort of soberly.

A joke. What do you get if you cross a post-modernist with the mafia. An offer you can't understand. Boom boom.

Hi Passy, thanks for the clarification. And the joke :-) To add to my unfinished posts:

Within Zoroastrianism, a non-Abrahamic monotheistic faith, a majority discourage homosexuality.

While Hinduism has no scriptural strictures against homosexuality, there is plenty of anti-homosexual tradition within it.

Theravada Buddhism tends to see homosexuality and other alternative forms of sexuality as karmic punishments for heterosexual misconduct in a past life. It doesn't much support gay rights. Tibetan Buddhism is ambivalent but the Dalai Lama has said the purpose of sex in general is for procreation, so homosexual acts do seem a bit unnatural.

Confucianism disapproves of homosexuality as not conducive to reproduction which would discharge responsibility to ancestors and country.

Taoism sees heterosexuality as according with harmony between yin and yang.

Japanese Shintoism does not appear to be homophobic.

I don't see any of these as related to capitalism, or requiring Marxist analysis!

I know 'crapulent' means 'intemperant'. But what a waste of the juicy sound of this word! Let me recall to you:
'When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said, in a rather scornful tone,' it means just what I choose it to mean, neither more nor less.'
'The question is,' said Alice, 'whether you can make words mean so many different things.'
'The question is,' said Humpty Dumpty, 'which is to be master - that's all.'

Now, to get back to Marxist analysis of 'capitalism and gays'. John, I find your fixation on Marxism - a rigidly materialistic world view - one-dimensional, a shortchanging of the richness of life and the complexities of human behaviour. It gives no moral compass to one's life (except the frightening 'whatever serves the revolution'), and reflects a depressing poverty of the human spirit.

Dostoyevsky and Solzhenitsyn (warts and all) pointed to the vital importance of non-materialist, transcendental values in giving meaning to life. Solzhenitsyn in his Harvard address in 1978 spoke of "the calamity of an autonomous, irreligious humanistic consciousness" which “has made man the measure of all things on earth—imperfect man, who is never free of pride, self-interest, envy, vanity, and dozens of other defects.

We are now paying for the mistakes which were not properly appraised at the beginning of the journey. On the way from the Renaissance to our days we have enriched our experience, but we have lost the concept of a Supreme Complete Entity which used to restrain our passions and our irresponsibility.” [end of Solzhenitsyn quote]

Marxism and other ideological -isms can appeal to the (non-materialist) idealism in well-meaning people. But the depressing reality has so regularly been that human nature's tendency to selfishness, callousness and desensitization fouls the nest.

John, that's why I react to your sustained crusade for socialism with irritation. Let me say, I lived for a year in the Soviet Union in the late sixties, and despise today’s Socialist Alliance as Totalitarian Left scum.

I DO believe in social justice and community, and I hate economic rationalism's identification of 'efficiency' as the fundamental objective of public policy, rather than 'the well-being of people in our community'. Of course I voted for Rudd.

But I believe that personal transformation of individuals, the internalization into our personal selves of moral principles, is an essential element of our quest for a better society. Jesus was absolutely on-message when he said "The kingdom of God is WITHIN YOU.

Glorfindel

You say:

""Marxism and other ideological -isms can appeal to the (non-materialist) idealism in well-meaning people. But the depressing reality has so regularly been that human nature's tendency to selfishness, callousness and desensitization fouls the nest.

John, that's why I react to your sustained crusade for socialism with irritation. Let me say, I lived for a year in the Soviet Union in the late sixties, and despise today’s Socialist Alliance as Totalitarian Left scum."

Stalin murdered those in my poltical current. Stalinism was the defeat of the revolution becuase it failed, narrowly, to win in Germany.
I am not a member of Socailist Alliance but don't see how you can describe them as totalitarian left scum, since you appear to know little about them (or Socialist Alternative, the group I am a member of.) Those of us who opposed and oppose stalinism in all its forms and value demcoratic rule and production for meeting human need aren't totalitarian. Others can judge whether we are leftists and/or scum.

To give a current example. I oppose the Russian invasion of Georgia (just as I opposed the USSR's invasion of Afghanistan). Short of a world in which competing imperialisms are no more (ie socialism, not stalinism) I want the Ossetians and Georgians to be free of both brands of imperialism. Only struggle against both oppressors can achieve that.

The fact that various religions (perhaps left overs from an age of superstition, ignorance and mass poverty except for the ruling class) display homophobic tendencies can be explained in materialist terms relating to those times. Those tendencies are then adapted for the purposes of the propogation of the family in capitalist times. (I think there's a joke in there somewhere.)

The idea that human nature is immutable is just wrong. What is natural to one society is not to another. The present economic system brings out and emphasises greed and this is as true of western capitalism as it was of state capitlaism. Even then the humanity of people breaks through despite the seemingly overwhelming pall of despair and self interest cast over us.

"But I believe that personal transformation of individuals, the internalization into our personal selves of moral principles, is an essential element of our quest for a better society" says Glorfindel.

Unfortunately, this is not possible if human nature is fixed. If it is fixed, nobody can be transformed in terms of their thinking. Homophobia, for instance, will always be with us if you believe that. Fortunately, I know that to be untrue. For starters, sexual orientation (let alone homosexuality) was a concept unknown prior to the 19th Century. Something had to change within human thinking in order to understand such concepts. Some societies, such as Spain used to be virulently homophobic. Now Spain recognises same-sex marriage. Something significant changed when that society went from accepting a Catholic dictator to voting in a government which regarded same-sex marriage as a human right.

Actually, I do believe there are things that make up human nature - reason and emotion. And what we regard as reasonable and what we get emotional about changes from time to time.