by Wayne Besen • June 3, 2023 • Opinion, Politics • Comments (0) • 206

Wayne Besen Debunks Ben Shapiro’s Shallow and Homophobic ‘Defense’ of Traditional Families

Right wing commentator Ben Shapiro fancies himself the great defender of families. In a crazy Tweet he said:

Any society that isn’t normatively based on heterosexual family formation is definitionally doomed to collapse. Pretending that society ought to be apathetic about such matters – or even worse, condemnatory of the presence of traditional norms – is civilizationally suicidal.

What a bizarre opinion. Heterosexuals are the overwhelming majority of people. Thus, all societies are based, by default, on heterosexual families. They don’t need fascist right wing social engineers to stop an imaginary collapse. Homophobia never helped a single family thrive – it only causes pain and misery for LGBTQ people.

Conservatives like Shapiro talk about the “natural family”. Well, if it’s so natural, why does Shapiro portray heterosexuality as fragile. But for the intervention of right-wing conservatives everyone would turn out gay or trans. Isn’t that what he’s implicitly saying?

Heterosexuality is the predominant orientation. The Republican Party has no need to promote, nor protect the sexual longings and romantic desires of straight people. This is no more than cheap demagoguery for political gain.

Almost all LGBTQ people are raised by heterosexual families. So, being gay or trans has nothing to do with what you teach. You find sexual minorities in virulently anti-LGBTQ societies like Iran, Uganda, Russia and Mississippi. These kids grow up where they hear nothing, but negative messages – and yet they still turn out LGBTQ.

If being gay or trans is “taught”, as Shapiro ignorantly implies, why are there are so many so many LGBTQ evangelicals, Muslims and Orthodox Jews? Obviously, negative messages have zero influence over sexual orientation or gender identity.

Shapiro acts as though cities across America are turning gay. But only 15% of San Francisco’s population is gay. Just 4.5% of New York’s population is gay. So, it appears that heterosexuality is alive and well everywhere except in the paranoid and conspiracy-addled minds of conservatives.

What directly and indisputably undermines families is divorce. It’s literally the disillusion of the family unit. Yet conservatives are experts at divorce. In just the past few months, “pro-family” icons Margorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert announced divorces. Why isn’t Ben Shapiro condemning them? His outrage is quite selective.

No society in human history has collapsed because of LGBTQ people or the demise of the heterosexual family. Show me the anthropological evidence – and cherry-picking Bible verses doesn’t count.

What Shapiro is preaching is dangerous. He’s advocating for Big Government to enforce a cult of conformity. Have you ever noticed how every despot—like Russia’s Putin or Turkey’s Erdogan — poses as the great defender of family values?

Shapiro isn’t defending traditional families. Instead, he’s calling for the oppression of LGBTQ people. He’s pressuring gay people to marry the opposite sex – even though their orientation hasn’t changed. Such arranged “families” are a façade. They lead to pain, suffering and misery – not that a rigid ideologue Shapiro cares if real people are harmed.

The best thing that Ben Shapiro can do to support the traditional family is stop talking about it. Nobody needs his help to form families. It’s a mark of extreme narcissism for one to present themselves as the protector of the American family and the savior of civilization.