Race, Marriage and a False Analogy

Chuck Donovan / November 30, 2009

Brushing aside criticism that it is savaging religious liberty and some of the most reliable social services in the District of Columbia, the D.C. City Council today is set to approve a bill to end the protected status of traditional marriage. The collision between the redefinition of marriage and religious liberty is being closely followed – and now more attention is being devoted to the collision between that redefinition and the traditional understanding of civil rights.

A new column over the weekend by Johns Hopkins graduate student Taylor Harris makes the point in a compelling way. Harris, who is African American, takes NAACP leader Julian Bond to task for equating opposition to same-sex marriage with racial prejudice. Harris faults Bond for trying “to peg African Americans’ morals and opinions to our socio-historical identities.” Harris underscores that two-thirds of African-American Protestants support traditional marriage, and that, at 12.8 percent of the population, they are not the difference makers in all of the 31 states that have voted to date to uphold the traditional understanding. (more…)