4) On the Issue of Homosexuality: Man and Woman

It would seem not only that the rules of relating are generated by difference between people, but that these rules are, for lack of a better term, derivative from those differences. A younger person relating to someone who is greater than himself in age considers him greater than himself in many other respects. The older person considers his student less than himself, certainly not in terms of value, but in the sense that he values his student enough to bend down to his level and lift him up higher. Relationships between friends of equal age ought to, and usually do, involve a lot of give-and-take, since they see each other as equals. Sons want to be like their fathers because, in a very real sense, they already are very much like their fathers biologically (and therefore, by extension, psychologically) speaking.

Therefore, the first thing to consider when attempting to define rules of relating between genders is to look at what their differences are. Well, to state the obvious, opposite genders are, biologically speaking, sexually cooperative, whereas same genders are not. As a derivative of the differences, then, the rules of relating dictate that a relationship between two men or two women ought not be sexual, whereas a sexual relationship between a man and a woman is permissible. The idea that homosexuality is emotionally and psychologically "fit" for certain people as a relational rule cannot possibly be derived from the fact that sexual relations between same genders is physically "unfit", and sometimes even detrimental.

A critic of this conclusion might point out that, under this logic, we would have to justify sexual relations between any given man and woman, such as a son and his mother and a daughter and her father. But what such a critic fails to realize is that the rules of relating, with their derivative nature, have this supposed problem covered as well. Sex, among its many attributes, is profoundly mutual and treats (or ought to treat, anyway) each participant as an equal. If the participants are not actually equal, in the sense that both are in the same stages of life, then that creates problems. Someone who is in their adolescent years should not have sexual relations with someone in their young adult years (indeed, I would say that not even two adolescents should have a sexual relationship with each other or anyone else; but I do not insist on this, for it is outside the scope of this essay). That is why children shouldn't have sex with their parents and spouses should not have sex with strangers; there are already "rules of relating" set in place precluding the rule that sex is permissible between opposite genders.

It is as the psychologists and biologists tell us: the physical is profoundly connected to the psychical. Why then, if sex is not physically fit for two people of the same gender should we suppose that a sexual relationship between two people of the same gender is psychologically fit? If psychology is greatly affected by physiology, than that which is physically unfit must be psychologically unfit as well.