Rob Portman, Gay Matrimony, and Selfishness

Photo: Drew Angerer/Getty Images

Rob Portman's dual revelations that his son is gay and that he has decided to support gay spousal relationship are both a touching story of familial love and another signpost in the astonishingly rapid success of the gay-rights revolution. Just over eight years agone, when Republicans gleefully seized on the gay-marriage event to mobilize their base in Portman's own country, it was inconceivable that a statewide Democrat would endorse gay matrimony, permit alone a Republican. The triumph of the issue relies upon the changing of minds — some thanks to force of argument, others to personal contact with gay friends, colleagues, and neighbors. From that standpoint, Portman's conversion is a Very GoodThing.

And yet every bit a window into the working of Portman'south mind, his conversion is a confession of moral failure, one of which he appearsunaware.

Here is the story Portman tells, in a Columbus Dispatch op-ed, of how he came to alter hislisten:

At the fourth dimension, my position on marriage for same-sex activity couples was rooted in my religion tradition that union is a sacred bond between a human being and a woman. Knowing that my son is gay prompted me to consider the issue from some other perspective: that of a dad who wants all 3 of his kids to lead happy, meaningful lives with the people they love, a approval Jane and I have shared for 26 years.

Past Portman's own business relationship, in other words, he opposed gay marriage until he realized that opposition to gay marriage stands in the way of his ain son'shappiness.

Wanting your children to be happy is the most natural human being impulse. Merely our responsibility every bit political beings — and the special responsibility of those who agree political power — is to consider problems from a societalperspective.

It is possible to argue that the societal cost of granting the right to gay marriage — or, say, access to wellness insurance — outweighs the do good. The betoken failure of conservative thought is an inability to give any weight to the perspective of the disadvantaged. It's one thing to argue that club can't beget to provide all its citizens with access to wellness insurance. It's quite another to dismiss the needs of the uninsured because the bulk has insurance. In his acceptance oral communication at the Republican National Convention, Paul Ryan dismissed universal health insurance as "a new entitlement we didn't even ask for." The structure was so telling — "we" meant the bulk who have access to regular medical care and would rather not subsidize those whodon't.

It is also possible to change your listen on whatever of these questions. I support the estate tax. If I discovered my children were due to inherit a fortune from a long lost relative, information technology'south possible that the experience would prompt me to alter my mind. I'd like to think information technology wouldn't. And if I did modify my heed, I'd take some obligation to explicate how I had learned something new in the procedure of all of a sudden becoming the father of wealthy heirs — estate planning is way more onerous than I thought! — rather than just construct a new rationale to conform my newly discovered self-interest. If I simply declared that my children'southward newfound wealth had given me a previously absent-minded sympathy for the economic rights of the very rich, yous would rightly question the value of my thinking onanything.

In President Obama's interview explaining his reversal on gay matrimony, he cited contact with gay friends, but besides wrestled with the competing demands of gay happiness against the prerogative of those wedded to traditional practices. ("When I hear from them the hurting they feel that somehow they are still considered — less than full citizens when it comes to — their legal rights — so — for me, I think information technology — it simply has tipped the scales in thatdirection.")

Portman ought to be able to recognize that, even if he inverse his mind on gay marriage owing to personal experience, the logic stands irrespective of it: Back up for gay wedlock would be right fifty-fifty if he didn't have a gay son. There's little sign that any such reasoning has crossed hismind.

In a CNN interview, Dana Bash repeatedly prodded Portman to reconcile his previous opposition to gay rights (which extended non only to matrimony but too to not getting fired for existence gay). He repeatedly confessed that it all came down to his ainfamily:

But you know, what happened to me is really personal. I mean, I hadn't idea a lot about this issue. Again, my focus has been on other issues over my public policy career…

What would Portman say to gay constituents who may be glad he's changing his position on gay marriage, but also wondering why it took having a gay son to come up around to supporting theirrights?

" Well, I would say that, you know, I've had a change of heart based on a personal experience. That's certainly true," he responded with a shouldershrug.

Merely he also repeated a reality. His policy focus has been almost exclusively on economicissues.

"Now it's different, you know. I hadn't expected to be in this position. But I do think, you know, having spent a lot of time thinking about it and working through this issue personally that, you know, this is where I am, for reasons that are consistent with my political philosophy, including family values, including beingness a conservative who believes the family is a building block of society, so I'grand comfortable therenow."

Information technology'southward pretty unproblematic. Portman went along with his political party's opposition to gay marriage considering it didn't affect him. He idea about gay rights the style Paul Ryan thinks about health care. And he however obviously thinks nearly most bug the style Paul Ryan thinks near healthcare.

That Portman turns out to have a gay son is user-friendly for the gay-rights cause. But why should any of usa come up away from his conversion trusting that Portman is thinking on whatever issue near what's good for all of u.s., rather than what's good for himself and the people heknows?

Rob Portman, Gay Union, and Selfishness