‘NOW . . . ANYTHING GOES’

A Website headline says a lot about the current culture in the United States: “Whatever Happened to Private Sex?” Perhaps that could be also be stated as, whatever happened to secretive or secluded behavior?

Homosexuals wish for their passion to become recognized as normal behavior. But they also seek more. They wish to be labeled openly as a legitimate group, something akin to a nationality or race rather than an organization or class. Well, on second thought, none of those classifications seem to fit. Nonetheless, they wish recognition by society.

Heterosexuals need no such recognition because they are part and parcel of societal order.

Something is out of order for individuals to group together mainly because of a propensity to certain behavior practiced only in privacy because it is so personal. Heterosexuals generally are loath to speak of their distinguishing behavior because it is by nature a private act. Thus members of the latter category do not organize solely because of that shared characteristic. Why then should homosexuals coalesce because of private behavior?

Homosexuals go even further. They seek, by government action if necessary, to force heterosexuals to endorse their private behavior as a type or variation of normal behavior. Down through the ages, until recently, such behavior was considered abnormal and even illegal in many jurisdictions.

So, what has changed?

Much of human behavior and misbehavior has come out of the closet since people have stopped blushing about such things involved in what came to be known as the sexual revolution. Public attitudes seemed to begin evolving about a half century ago with Masters and Johnson reporting on their research, the Pill¸ and Playboy. Whispers became open talk. Also appearing about the same time were the Hippies, “Make love, not war,” Haight-Ashbury and bathhouses and AIDS and HIV, open use of marijuana and psychedelic drugs. Now, Cialis sponsors the golf Tour. Viagra is hardly a punch line. Cohabitation among the rich and famous is an accepted norm, in contrast with the time Ingrid Bergman had to leave the United States because of her romantic scandal. Same-sex marriage has become law in a number of states, although it is the subject of a U.S. Supreme Court case.

Wide acceptance of open sexuality seems to have reached the tipping point. Perhaps polling would show more Americans ­– nay, humanity – than not do accept it. Does that make it right? (More and more, polls are citied to back up arguments over right and wrong.) It is to be hoped that morality is not a question of tallied opinion. Better, such an argument should be over what is logical and truthful rather than what squares with public opinion.

Current arguments about same-sex marriage could very well turn out to be the key to the whole sexual revolution outcome. The nature of marriage – its very definition, its purpose – is at the very center of the matter.

Marriage is the recognized union of one man and one woman, often with written contract, to produce offspring that will maintain the species in a civilized manner.

If marriage is only meant to make people feel good, which seems to be the boiled-down reason given through the mass media by some gay, lesbian, bisexual, and trans­gendered advocates, then the traditional definition is worth nothing. The twain can never meet. If same-sex marriage were true, then a mutual understanding of marriage in various cultures maintained over the centuries comes to naught. “Anything goes,” as Cole Porter wrote. [In olden days a glimpse of stocking was looked on as something shocking. Now, heaven knows, anything goes.]

If anything does go, lascivious life styles will lead, many of us old-timers believe, to further decay of civilization.

IS PUBLIC BROADCASTING BELIEVABLE?

Conservatives believe that public broadcasting is biased.

Progressives (that is, liberals) believe public broadcasting speaks the truth in the face of heresy.

Listening to public broadcasting with an open mind is the way to assay the worth of those news media. In this piece, public broadcasting will be referred to as PB, with no distinction made between NPR, PBS and other broadcast outlets.

First, staff questions to guests and news sources should not be judged as automatically prejudicial. In the early, radio days of “Meet the Press” listeners were advised that the questions did not necessarily reflect the views of the questioner. They were only meant to illicit information. Would that such an attitude were understood and practiced today by both broadcast and print journalism and opinion purveyors. When listening to and viewing PB outlets one cannot always be sure that fundamental to good news gathering is being practiced. Fairness demands that the questioners being given the benefit of the doubt, unless over the length of the program evidence shows otherwise.

Second, call-in listeners are more prone to be up-front with their feelings. If preponderance appears to be on one side of an issue, it can be assumed that the call screener has been instructed to put only certain callers on the air, or to make sure most display the desired stance. Of course, PB listeners and viewers tend to be of a type, although generalities can be misleading.

Third, the guest is not necessarily wisdom incarnate. He or she might have been chosen because of current notoriety of because of a certain reputation. Certainly, the more controversial the more likely the questioning will be focused tightly. Also, the more controversial, the more likely any pre-judging will surface.

A neutral assessor must strive to fairly apply those three provisos. Because PB as a whole is the subject here, individual programs can be only antidotal. Examples thus are called for, but those who choose examples are almost always intent upon making a point. That is true for all forms of discussion, debate, and argument. Reasoning wants particulars to be knitted into generally acceptable arguments. Preliminary premises must be true to reach truthful conclusions. The art of logic has taken on the correctness of mathematics to reach for conviction. The precision of the syllogism is marvelous to behold and to enfold. But can criticism – in the best sense of that word – of PB be expressed in a syllogism? And, how does the assessor of content leave his own prejudices behind?

Newspaper editors have recognized these problems of good reporting for a long time. And, indeed, early editors made no attempt to be even handed, preferring to adopt a cause and publish whatever seemed to advance their positions on politics and on civics and on society.

An early conclusion might very well be that fairly judging the political leanings of PB is like judging those of a particular newspaper or news organization. Newspapers have clearly labeled opinion pieces, whether on the editorial page, the op-ed page or in columns. So the outside judge has to confine assessments to the news pages. The divisions are not so clear in PB, for opinion is not so clearly delineated.

Neutrality on the part of the assessor is paramount.

Even a truly neutral assessor upon expressing his conclusion would have a hard time convincing his audience of the truth outlined. His would be an opinion to be accepted, rejected or given a mixed grade. No single assessor of any public institution is going to be awarded the title of unassailable truth-giver. (Even a pope fails to get the respect of every Catholic.) Voters cannot be expected to collect all facts and select the officeholders best for country and local jurisdiction. Voters can ­– not always – be the target for public broadcasters that would like to influence the outcome of elections. Same for newspapers.

Let’s face it, not many of us are neutral. We need opinions. One cannot act without opinion.

Even if PB could be pinned as liberal or conservative what difference would it make? As long as audience members use its programming to form their own opinions . . . that is what counts.

A person who tries to keep informed by reading and listening and watching a spectrum of news and opinion sources might very well fail to find a single source that meets his ideal purveyor of facts. What he will find is that there usually is one -- maybe two -- source for every major story. After that, come the variations and emendations and interpretations that jam the various news and opinion media. The persnickety news user will masticate his grazing and arrive at a conclusion. It is to be hoped that sincere grazing and thoughtful mastication produces something to slake the public’s thirst for useful knowledge of public events.

In short, public broadcasting is just another source of news and opinion to be judged by the thoughtful listener and viewer.