The love which dared not speak its name until now
View(s):Once upon a time, there was a love that was hidden: darkly seen in the glass of human fallenness: closeted in secrecy. Well… no longer. Not for some time, anyway. It has grown bolder with the attacks on, and battering of, many bastions of putatively established institutions. Male dominance over women who were long seen and treated as mere chattel; Slavery seemingly endorsed by scripture (a mistaken idea, if there ever was one, as some holy writ has been the most subversive of texts against this practice); Divine rights of kings; Etc.
A long time lobbying for its agenda in the corridors of power and social control in sundry nation-states, that love is out in the open. It has been outed for a while since at least Wilde in the western world, and possibly Shakespeare. It is outré in the east. It is out there in the most obscure but also most outrageous corners of the World Wide Web. Tomorrow, it may be over here… Already advance bells (“Repeal 365!”) are tolling the knell of that day impending, and have been doing so for the dubious pleasure of those who have ears to hear it. Today, that crusade is being hash-tagged with the emotionally appealing but rationally effete “Love Wins” slogan.
Today, the world’s dominant empire has spoken out in favour of that love. It has arrogated a federal right, and relativized the voice of the states. In doing so, privileging the will of the powerful and influential over the personal and independent individualism it has overturned. There will be ramifications of that legal system’s ruling all over the world, as echoes of the new sexual liberalism reverberate in the dark corners of the world system. Which takes a cue from the world system’s leading superpower! Which may have an impact on the thought world of our own judicial system as a result?
The new wave of euphoria sweeping over the northern hemisphere is in danger of setting off another Indian Ocean tsunami that could swamp the mores and morality of island-nations that shall be nameless for the nonce. The rainbow-hued flag become something of a second – if not sacred at least subversive – national icon for a small minority with loud and insistent voices. But the loudness of a lobby is no guarantee that it makes good sense or indeed that it is good for anything. And while one empathises with a broad spectrum of affinities and aspirations and orientations, one might do well to heed caution and the conventional wisdom on matters of marriage, sexuality, and love. Not to put too fine a point on it, the all too ‘natural’ tendency to pride does not legitimize my propensity to boast. Nor my ‘inclination’ to sin with eye and mind permit or endorse the ‘sins of the flesh’ (call me Onan; call it adultery or fornication).
Tomorrow, the love that once did not dare to speak its name might be legit – and legalised – and legitimized – in our land. Already, at least in social-media circles, the ‘like’ buttons seem ready to melt the minds of those who are neutral on the issue. The bleeding hearts in the liberal establishment and LGBTIC neoculture are shouting themselves hoarse and shouting down the naysayers among conservative elements of society, government mandarins, scripture thumpers, trumpeters of conventional wisdom, et al. Really dears, don’t overdo it, would you.
There are more important things in our life than the free expression of our loves and our likes and our lusts. Hard as it is for yours truly to be counted not among the mockers and scoffers, one must say that there is a great deal more to be said about the traditional view of marriage than there is to be said for redefining what culture and civilization have rightly defined for centuries if not millennia. Even if not everyone is agreed on all the parameters or all the details: That marriage is between a man and a woman; That it is for a lifetime, “till death do us part”; That it is sexually exclusive; That it is relational, recreational, procreational; That it is the basis of human stewardship of the planet we seem to be entrusted with…
Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediments is a flawed argument for those appealing for the love that dared not speak its name once upon a time. Get real, dears. Bet you the strongest outcry against the opinion expressed here will be from the so-called liberals who champion free speech and free love. Test me not. I stand here, on the wrong side: majoritarian culture over popular sentiment, civilizing movements over contemporary trends, and church over state. Quote me if you must.
If we go on like this, the love that dares not speak its name will be that between a man and a woman, “to have and to hold, for better or for worse”. If we don’t all – all genders and orientations – take stock of what’s good, what’s right, what’s legal, what’s permissible, the love that dares not speak its name will be the love that is “patient and kind”; that “does not envy or boast”; is “not arrogant or rude” or “insist on its own way”; being neither “irritable” nor “resentful” – the love that “does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth” – the love that “bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things”. Believe it or not, that was written about not romantic love (ēros) nor friendship (storgē) or even family love (philia), but charity (agapē). 
That kind of love – unlike likes or lusts – never ends … The sooner we all remember that, the less lawyering, and lobbying, and legitimizing, will stop dividing us.