Limpeh's response to Pastor Khong's speech

Much has been said on social media over anti-gay Pastor Khong's speech in the last few days: the response has been split into two camps (it is naturally a divisive issue). There are those who are pro-gay and anti-gay - those who are pro-gay condemn Pastor's Khong's speech as it lacked substance and evidence and it was one presumptuous remark after another. Take for example, he said,

"Examples from around the world have shown that the repeal of similar laws have led to negative social changes, especially the breakdown of the family as a basic building block and foundation of the society"

Excuse me? Oh Pastor, you were saying? Examples from around the world? What country please? Would you care to elaborate and give us the facts please? I could make an equally slanderous statement such as "examples from around the world have shown that Christian churches are guilty of the following crimes against humanity..." but any Christian who reads or hears such a statement would immediately challenge me: show me the evidence then, what example are you talking about? It is easy to see what is going on here: it is evident that his congregation is already homophobic to begin with. They don't need any case studies or examples to persuade them to take an anti-gay stance: they are already homophobic. This is why Pastor Khong's congregation would nod (and even clap) in approval when they hear that statement for they are being told something they already agree with.

However, once you take that statement out of the context of a Pastor's sermon in a (rather homophobic) church, then it is so easy to criticize just how flimsy his argument actually is, when he clearly hasn't bothered to look around the world and actually find any concrete evidence to support his statement. The fact is, what he said is simply untrue - I am going to use the UK as an example as our legal systems are similar and section 377A is in fact a relic leftover from the colonial days. Oh and we have plenty of religious bigots in the UK too.

377A is a very, very divisive topic indeed. 

Consensual homosexual sex was decriminalized in the UK in 1967 - making it one of the less liberal European countries. Countries like France, Holland, Belgium, Italy, Luxembourg were way ahead of the UK - with France being the first in 1791. Nonetheless, regardless of the fact that the UK is a relatively late starter compared to her more liberal counterparts on continental Europe, it has caught up in many aspects making gay rights in the UK pretty much on par with countries like France, the Netherlands and Belgium today. Let's focus on that  decriminalization of consensual homosexual sex  in the UK in 1967 - did it come easily? No, in fact it was a long process that took over 10 years of campaigning with religious groups declaring that the moment consensual homosexual sex was decriminalized, all hell would break lose. There would be random, rampant gays flaunting their sexuality in the streets, infecting other people with their gayness and as Pastor Khong puts it, it would lead to negative social consequences and lead to the breakdown of the family as a basic building block and foundation of the society.

Indeed, Pastor Khong is merely reusing and recycling the same kind of arguments that have been used time and again by the religious groups in places like the UK in their anti-gay campaigns. Now just because someone says something doesn't make it true - if some religious bigot in the UK makes such a statement, the fact that he may hold some respectable position within the church doesn't automatically validate his opinion. We still need to look at the evidence to see if his argument is indeed valid. 

When you present an argument, you need to supply appropriate evidence. 

Did society as we knew it rip apart at the seams the moment consensual homosexual sex was decriminalized in 1967? No, hardly. The UK was undergoing a period of intense social change anyway - it was the swinging sixties. The economy was booming and young adults found themselves happily in employment, earning enough money to spend on themselves: nice clothes, fashionable shoes, accessories, going out dancing, drinking, making new friends, finding love, mopeds, holidays abroad - these were luxuries that weren't available to their parents and probably not even to their older siblings. If you haven't already watched it, I truly recommend the film Quadraphenia which truly captures that new found freedom of that generation mixed with the anger and frustration that comes with this kind of rebellion. 

It was convenient for the angry religious groups to look at all these changes happening to their society in the late 60s and claim, "You know why all this is happening? They decriminalized gay sex in 1967, that's why all the young people are going wild - taking drugs, boozing, having sex with many partners... If they didn't decriminalize gay sex, none of this would have happened. Yeah, blame it on the gays." 

Is this true? Of course not. In the Republic of Ireland, consensual gay sex wasn't decriminalized until 1993. Yet Irish young adults were doing exactly what their English counterparts were doing in the 1960s and 1970s even if Irish law continued to criminalize gay sex. It wasn't like Irish youths were not given to any of the excesses of the swinging sixties or the disco generation of the 1970s - hardly. These changes were brought about by other social factors such as young people becoming much more educated than their parents, having greater earning power than their parents. There was also a change in attitude towards divorce in the meantime - all of these have got to be understood in the wider context of social changes in those decades, rather than simply saying, "blame it on the gays". Really? How does decriminalizing gay sex have any bearing whatsoever  with all these social changes? 

Modern relationships are evolving because our very societies are evolving. 

One of the main reasons why there have been such big changes to the nature of the family in the last few decades is the growth of women's rights - and that is a good thing. With women being much better educated, they are able to gain much better paid employment as adults - this leads to a major change in the dynamics within the married couple. The wife is no longer the housewife and mother at home, financially dependent on the husband and father who is the sole breadwinner of the family - having a successful career often means delaying having children and having less children as a result. All this came about because of an improvement in the provision of education services for girls at school, better funding for education and eradicating discrimination against women in the workplace. If a marriage broke down (eg. if a husband is caught having an affair), the wife would have the confidence to divorce him as she would have the confidence to walk out on him and support herself - this wouldn't have happened a hundred years ago when women had far fewer rights and less confidence. This fallacy of strong families staying together in the past was a result of the oppression of women by men. We have witnessed this in Singapore, of course - and it has nothing to do with section 377A or homosexuality. Men have a lot to answer for in terms of what they have done in oppressing women in the past and still do so, in many countries around the world. Should an unhappy, abused and betrayed wife be forced to stay trapped in her marriage with her abusive husband? Of course not you would say - but this would lead to more divorces if we accept that, it's two sides of the same coin, so by that token, divorce isn't a bad thing if it means liberating women and we have to adjust our perception of families with women's rights at the very top of that agenda. 

Would anyone dare to argue that empowering women, this rise in women's rights is a bad thing? Of course not, it would make them come across as incredibly misogynistic - that is why they decide to pick on the gays and blame the gays instead. Essentially, they are using gays as a scapegoat because it would be very unpopular to "blame" this transition we're witnessing of the modern family unit on women. I put the word blame in italics because I think it's ridiculous to try to blame anyone for this change - you don't need a phD in sociology to realize that you can't change these many variables in a society (education, employment opportunities, wealth, urbanization etc) without having some kind of impact on the basic family unit. It's basic cause and effect - that is why it is ridiculous to try to blame the gays for this transition. Pastor Khong is not only being downright homophobic - his argument doesn't stand up to any kind of academic scrutiny, in short, he's making himself look rather stupid to the rest of us who do not blindly believe anything a Christian minister would say. 

What are you views on the role of women in modern society? 

Does the lack of academic substance prevent these Christians from employing the same homophobic defence time and time again? Hell no, they don't believe the normal rules of academic scrutiny apply to them. They use the same ridiculous bullshit argument every single time anything to do with gay rights is being debated in parliament - from an equal age of consent, to scrapping section 28, to gay civil partnerships and now gay marriage (which we should be getting in the UK sometime in 2013). Oh these Christians are like a broken record, it's the same ridiculous argument, "if you give the gays this concession, our society as we know it will fall apart!" Look if it didn't happen in 1967, it didn't happen when gays achieved an equal age of consent, it didn't happen when we got rid of section 28 and it didn't happen when gays had civil partnerships, you were wrong, wrong, wrong and wrong time and time again.

Oh and you know what the most ridiculous part is? These Christian bigots would claim that falling church attendance is because the government is introducing all these liberal laws, making young people turn away from god towards sin. Good grief. Yeah blame the gays. Church attendance has fallen to an all time low in the UK that's true - but that's simply because the people here feel that the church has become totally out of step with the real world, it is an old fashioned, dated, sexist, misogynistic and homophobic institution who are so keen on playing the victim rather than making any real effort to try to reach out to non-Christians. Take the recent vote by the Church of England to refuse to ordain female bishops - that's a slap in the face to all their female believers, what kind of signal does that send about the place of women within the Church of England? How would a woman feel going to such a church?

Don't even get me started on the Catholic church - they have had countless scandals over the years about Catholic priests sexually abusing children in their care. Yet the pope is so homophobic and doesn't stop blaming gays for anything and everything around the world. Excuse me, please get your church in order first and stop this sexual abuse of children in your care. Did it occur to you that it is because of this sexual abuse scandals that people are turning away from the Catholic church in disgust, anger and disillusionment - rather than anything to do with the issue of sexuality? Is the Catholic church really that blind to its own flaws and how it is perceived?

Good grief, these Christians don't seem to realize that they keep using a very ridiculous argument that has failed them time and time again - yet they seem to insist on using that same argument again on the issue of gay marriage in 2013. Are they blind to the fact that the rest of the world is not vehemently homophobic like them? Newsflash: we're not waiting for 100% consensus before we make gay marriage legal in the UK - as long as the majority of British people want it, then we'll have it. As for the minority (such as the religious bigots) who oppose it, I say, "tough shit, too bad for you, you're in the minority. You don't get to tell the majority what to do, so stuff it." Another ridiculous assumption made by these Christians is that it's only gays who are interested in gay rights - that's bullshit. I don't need to be a woman to care about equality for women, nor do I need to be in a wheelchair to care about the how the handicapped are treated - this is about what defines us as a civilized society, whether we can respect those who are different from ourselves or if our dominant value is that of ignorance and intolerance. 

Good grief, so that was just me responding to one tiny part of Pastor Khong's speech. Let's try to do another little bit: 

(Section 377A) takes away the rights of parents over what their children are taught in schools, especially sex education. It attacks religious freedom and eventually denies free speech to those who, because of their moral convictions, uphold a different view from that championed by increasingly aggressive homosexual activists.

Do parents get to dictate the curriculum their children are taught in schools?

Where do I even begin?! Parents have no rights anyway over what children are taught in schools, even when it comes to sex education. That's what the Ministry of Education is for - the MOE has experts who decide what the curriculum is, this is not parents. Let's take the example of a Christian parent who believes in creationism, this parent goes to the school and demands, "I don't want my child to be taught about anything that doesn't adhere to my creationism beliefs, so I object to a lot of the content in the geography, physics, chemistry and biology syllabus. It is my right to demand what my child is taught in this school because I am the parent of the child, right?"

Wrong, it doesn't work like that! The school operates within the framework of a clearly defined system - parents never get to dictate what the curriculum should be.  If you really have a serious issue with what the school is teaching your child, then the onus is on you to find an alternative school for your child. In any case, let's get real here - in this day and age, your child is not going to learn about sex from the woefully inadequate sex education programme at school. Most teenagers learn about sex from the internet these days whether you like it or not. There's just so much adult material easily available online to anyone who cares to type the word 'porn' into google. 

City Harvest Church's "Music Pastor" Sun Ho 

As for religious freedom, since when has religious been about discriminating against gays? This is really going down a slippery slope here Pastor Khong, especially in a place like Singapore. Christians may claim, "homosexuality is against my religion Christianity, so condoning homosexuality in Singapore is a breach of my right to religious freedom!" Okay, but take this into consideration, isn't worshipping Allah and the practice is Islam against the religion of Christianity as well? Whoops. Slippery slope ahead Pastor Khong. It's called intolerance - you should stay well away from it. So why Pastor Khong, do you tolerate Islam being practised in Singapore when in principle, it is against your religion as well? The fact is, you cannot demand to ban anything simply on the basis that it is not permitted by your religion. You don't wanna have gay sex? Fine, then don't. Heck, I can't stand Justin Bieber but I would never demand that radio stations ban his music just because I find him incredibly irritating. I am happy to accept that there are some people who do like Justin Bieber and it is their right to listen to his music. The world doesn't revolve around me, nor does it around Pastor Khong - so nobody should have the right to impose their opinions on others on any basis, especially that of religion. 

The fact is, there's nothing to stop Pastor Khong from taking a stance on homosexuality within the context of his church. Indeed, in the UK, there are plenty of churches here which do regularly spew hateful homophobic rhetoric. They do enjoy the freedom of religion and the freedom of speech here in the UK, where they can tell their congregations what they think about gays - but most importantly, a clear balance is struck between the right of church leaders to preach what they want to their congregations and the rights of the rest of the British population who are not Christians at all. What about our rights to be free of Christian oppression, what about our rights to tell the Christians, "please do not impose your values and judgements on us non-Christians, kindly respect our rights to live our lives without your interference, thank you." Us non-Christians have rights too you know.

I believe in science, not religion. 

Can Pastor Khong accept the fact that there are people who do not agree with him and value our right to disagree with his point of view? Or does he have this holier than thou attitude, as a church minister - he thinks his morals and values are superior to us non-Christians and thus he doesn't feel that our values and opinions are as valid as his? This is a slippery slope which we must not go down. Singapore is a secular state - individuals have the right to pursue religion if they wish to, but individuals also deserve to be protected from aggressive Christian preachers like Pastor Khong who are hell bent on imposing his Christian opinionson those of us who have made it clear that we are NOT Christians.

I am really disappointed that people like Pastor Khong are not held to account by his own congregation - but then again, being an ex-Christian myself, I have seen the group dynamics in a church. I remember as a teenager being shot down for asking too many questions during bible study class and being accused to not trusting the word of god and lacking faith. Perhaps there were people in his congregation who did question his sermon but feared the wrath of those around them. I do know of some Christians who are not brainwashed by homophobic pastors and do not blindly believe everything they're told in the church.

So there you go, that's how I feel about Pastor Khong's ridiculous speech. How do you feel about the issue? You know the drill, leave a comment below, cheers.