Redefining Normal

There was once a time when having sex outside of marriage was considered immoral. Now it is not only the norm but is even encouraged.  Homosexual relationships once had a stigma attached to them. Now same-sex couples are seen as sexual pioneers and champions of social justice. It is hard not to be desensitized in a culture that is constantly redefining its moral and social values. But once you’ve come to the point where you think you’ve heard and seen it all, there is always that “you-ain’t-seen-nothing-yet” moment that can catch you off-guard.

Last Saturday, Yale University held a workshop entitled “Sex: Am I Normal,” in which students were assured that incest, bestiality, and accepting money for sex are legitimate and healthy sexual practices. It was all part of Yale’s Sex Week, a celebration of sexual deviance that masquerades as sex education.  And to answer the question that you probably just asked yourself, yes, the depravity knows no bounds.

“It’s sensitivity training,” Dr. Jill McDevitt, a sexologist who hosted the forum, said in Campus Reform interview. “Don’t judge other people, because we all have something we are embarrassed about.”

Sure, as a Christian I am taught not to judge others. Love the sinner, hate the sin. Yet Yale is twisting the virtue of human compassion to not only include sympathy for the person committing the horrendous act, but also acceptance of the act itself. This establishes a foundation for moral relativism. Right and wrong are no longer inherent human principles but become qualities defined by society that need to be constantly re-evaluated.

Nathan Harden both recognized and addressed the danger that such a mindsight imposes. Harden is the author of Sex and God at Yale, a continuation of sorts to William F. Buckley’s God and Man at Yale. In the book, Harden, himself a Yale graduate, gives the reader an insider’s look into Sex Week, where he describes a porn star look-alike contest held in one classroom and a sadomasochism lesson taught in another. He recounts one instance when a student was allowed to make an art project out of the blood and tissue from her self-induced abortions.

These are moral atrocities that Buckley probably couldn’t even have fathomed when he was writing his Yale exposé 50 years earlier. In this sense, Harden goes a step beyond Buckley by chronicling just how faded our moral identity has become.

There need to be more people like Harden who can expose organizations such as Yale that are trying to remove any lasting idea of what is sacred and who can understand that phrases like “sensitivity training” are just code for value indoctrination. Until there is a strong and consolidated push towards moral solidity, the slippery slope will just keep getting more slippery.