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Love the Sin: Sexual Regulation and the Limits of Religious Tolerance
In this powerful and timely book, Janet R. Jakobsen and Ann Pellegrini make a solid case for loving the sinner and the sin. Rejecting both religious conservatives' arguments for sexual regulation and liberal views that advocate tolerance, the authors argue for and realistically envision true sexual and religious freedom in this country. With a new preface addressing recent events, Love the Sin provides activists and others with a strong tool to use in their fight for freedom.
174 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2003
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September 26, 2007
This book tackles the issue of sexual freedom from the interesting perspective of comparing the freedom of sexual expression to that of religious freedom. While the book's main focus is on the rights of gays and lesbians, the viewpoints presented in this book apply just as well to all sexual minorities.
The authors point out that the basis for all state and federal laws regulating consensual adult activity are religious in origin. Civil laws regulating American marriage are a place where religious ideas about the "proper" form of intimate relationships have been enforced as "secular" law.
Marriage was a religious institution until the evolution of civil law. The authors address the question of whether it would be best to offer everyone the right to marry, or does our constitutional commitment to religious freedom actually require that the government get out of the marriage business altogether?
The First Amendment requires both the disestablishment of religion and protection for the free exercise of religion, which includes all religions and the right not to practice religion as well. If marriage is based on religion, it too, should be disestablished, thus protecting the free exercise of sexuality.
The authors also question why religion is considered to be an appropriate basis for public policies concerning sex, but wonder why this religious base isn't extended to other moral issues such as poverty, the death penalty, environmental issues, etc. What makes sex different?
They note that on one hand, sex is seen as a private matter by many people but that it's also seen as having amazing powers that can either make or break the entire nations's well being.
To those who take the second view, it seems logical that sex must be regulated, controlled -- domesticated. Seeing sex as a potentially destructive power justifies to them extensive regulations concerning sex that otherwise go against the high value in which freedom is placed in this country,
The authors point out that by regulating sex, the state also attempts to regulate family life. This is because such regulations actually define what legally counts as family.
Advocates of gay and lesbian rights often appeal to nature, saying that homosexuals are "born that way", in much the same way that people cannot choose their race. The authors assert that it shouldn't matter why someone is homosexual, that to say one is gay because they can't help it is tantamount to saying it's like they don't know any better, as if there's something inherently wrong with being gay.
They believe it is better to link sexual freedom not to race, but rather to relgious freedom. That is, we aren't born any particular religion that we cannot change -- we choose what, if any, religion we will practice and the right to do so is protected by the Constitution. Likewise, people shouldn't have to justify why they're gay in order to enjoy the same freedom in regards to sexual practices.
The authors also discuss the pitfalls of the idea of "tolerance". They point out that "tolerance" is extended to homosexuals on the conditions they become "just like everyone else", such as entering into a monogamous marriage. However, tolerance doesn't include sexual minorities, gay and straight, who don't want to be "like everybody else" and who value and want something else.
These ideas and more are explored in depth in this well written and timely book. It will make many people think differently that will give a new perspective on the gay marriage issue and that of sexual freedom in general.
I cannot recommend this book highly enough.
The authors point out that the basis for all state and federal laws regulating consensual adult activity are religious in origin. Civil laws regulating American marriage are a place where religious ideas about the "proper" form of intimate relationships have been enforced as "secular" law.
Marriage was a religious institution until the evolution of civil law. The authors address the question of whether it would be best to offer everyone the right to marry, or does our constitutional commitment to religious freedom actually require that the government get out of the marriage business altogether?
The First Amendment requires both the disestablishment of religion and protection for the free exercise of religion, which includes all religions and the right not to practice religion as well. If marriage is based on religion, it too, should be disestablished, thus protecting the free exercise of sexuality.
The authors also question why religion is considered to be an appropriate basis for public policies concerning sex, but wonder why this religious base isn't extended to other moral issues such as poverty, the death penalty, environmental issues, etc. What makes sex different?
They note that on one hand, sex is seen as a private matter by many people but that it's also seen as having amazing powers that can either make or break the entire nations's well being.
To those who take the second view, it seems logical that sex must be regulated, controlled -- domesticated. Seeing sex as a potentially destructive power justifies to them extensive regulations concerning sex that otherwise go against the high value in which freedom is placed in this country,
The authors point out that by regulating sex, the state also attempts to regulate family life. This is because such regulations actually define what legally counts as family.
Advocates of gay and lesbian rights often appeal to nature, saying that homosexuals are "born that way", in much the same way that people cannot choose their race. The authors assert that it shouldn't matter why someone is homosexual, that to say one is gay because they can't help it is tantamount to saying it's like they don't know any better, as if there's something inherently wrong with being gay.
They believe it is better to link sexual freedom not to race, but rather to relgious freedom. That is, we aren't born any particular religion that we cannot change -- we choose what, if any, religion we will practice and the right to do so is protected by the Constitution. Likewise, people shouldn't have to justify why they're gay in order to enjoy the same freedom in regards to sexual practices.
The authors also discuss the pitfalls of the idea of "tolerance". They point out that "tolerance" is extended to homosexuals on the conditions they become "just like everyone else", such as entering into a monogamous marriage. However, tolerance doesn't include sexual minorities, gay and straight, who don't want to be "like everybody else" and who value and want something else.
These ideas and more are explored in depth in this well written and timely book. It will make many people think differently that will give a new perspective on the gay marriage issue and that of sexual freedom in general.
I cannot recommend this book highly enough.
Read
November 30, 2019This is the most boring book I have ever attempted to read. I was really interested in the contents but unfortunately it is so incredibly boring that I cannot read it. The best I could manage was a weary skim and I think it gave me a hemorrhoid (I was reading it in the bathroom). Interesting premise. There must be some good info in there. But again, it was boring. It was so boring. This book was boring. If anyone wants to read it and tell me what it says, I will listen to you. But the book itself was, as I mentioned, really boring.
June 30, 2023
i liked a lot of parts of this book, especially the beginning court case analyses and the chapter on tolerance. i feel like the writers didn’t delve deeply enough into what radical queerness/sexuality can mean for the nation state (aka how queer liberation necessitates destruction of the nation state) and the dynamic of race and class that come with religion. “love the sin” has some really important topics and theories that help us understand the paradox of religion in the u.s., but i wish it went a little deeper and more radical in its conclusion and analysis. good read and great cover!! haha
July 7, 2015
"Not only does tolerance reinforce structural inequality, but it also sets up a political culture in which extremism, rather than injustice, is the major problem to be addressed in public life. In a public organized around tolerance, the question is not whether we as a society have created unjust (and violent) social hierarchies, but whether we as individuals hate anyone. This disabling structure of tolerance has important implications for participatory democracy because it puts those who take up political activism in any form at risk for charges of extremism" (p. 58).
I don't really remember what I thought when I first read this book in 2007, but it's important and I just re-read it as part of preparing my statement of purpose/writing sample for reli studies grad programs.
"This, then, is the 'afterlife' of religion in modernity: secularization has not so much meant the retreat of religion from the public sphere as its reinvention...under cover of an official secularism, particular religious claims about 'the good life,' the way things are or should be, remain operative" (p. 21).
Social theorists Lauren Berlant & Michael Warner - heternormativity (p. 28)
"But we are even more concerned with another moment that erases the complexities of history, namely, Burger's invocation of 'Judaeo-Christian moral and ethical standards.' The hyphen suggests and equality and event an identity between the two positions, as if any areas of difference between Judaism and Christianity are of nothing next to their shared 'moral and ethical standards' around sex. In fact, whether or not 'Judaism' and 'Christianity' agree on questions of sexual ethics depends entirely on which Judaism and which Christianity are being considered...Consequently, we caution against mistaking Burger's hyphenated 'Judaeo-Christian' as a marker of religious pluralism in America. It seems to us, rather, that the hyphen actually passes off a wished-for assimilation of Jewish difference into Christian tradition as an instance of religious pluralism" (p. 31).
"[Scalia] is speaking out of a shared --and largely unconscious--cultural logic. This cultural logic depends upon the establishment of an exclusionary notion of Americanness. Within its terms, antigay discrimination is reasonable precisely because homosexuals can be constructed out of the meaning of America--as Jews once were and perhaps still are (invocations of 'Judaeo-Christian' values notwithstanding" (p. 41).
"Toleration, then, falls well short of democratic equality...The American principles of religious freedom were supposed to overcome these limits of toleration. In principle, religious freedom provides for the equal treatment of different faiths---there is no established church, and all religions are free to practice as they please. But this ideal of religious freedom has never really been enacted in the United States. On matters of religion, the United States has two conflicting self-understandings: that this is a nation of religious freedom and equality, and that this is a basically Christian nation...Thus, in America as well as in Britain, the initial boundaries of tolerance were narrow and offered only to differences within Christianity. Those who were Christian in a nondominant way (who were, for example, Catholic) might be tolerated, if marginalized...But there were others who were not Christian and, hence, remained outside the bounds of tolerance. These 'others' could be eradicated, as was so often the case in Christian interactions with American Indians, or enslaved, as was the case with Africans...In fact, as a number of historians have noted, the original distinction that determined who could be enslaved in the colonies and who could not was not a racial distinction, but a distinction between 'Christians and strangers'....In all this, the category of 'Christian' anticipates future categories of race and national identity...To put the point more strongly, the category 'white' was not yet fully operative" (p. 47-48).
"This history teaches us that in the United States religious understandings of difference have served as the basis upon which secular social differences (for example, race and ethnicity) have been constructed. It is not that religious distinctions have disappeared or are inoperative in American life, but that they have sometimes been absorbed into other social differences, such as those that define racial, national, and ethnic identity. Contemporary conflations of Arabs with Muslims, for example, show how confusion between religious and ethnic or national identities persists. Similarly, 'tolerance' emerges out of a specifically religious history that may not be directly named, but that remains powerful. Thus, as we argued in the first chapter, Protestantism is expressed in American secular sexual regulation, and so too have Protestant understandings of religious tolerance influenced areas of our social life that now seem fully secular" (p. 49).
"The rhetorical practices through which a narrow segment of the American public is represented as 'all' of it are repeated, often unthinkingly, across a wide range of contexts. For example, when the mainstream media reported on AIDS in the early years of the pandemic, they would ask questions like, 'Is AIDS a threat to the general public?' Now, if the 'general public' includes everyone, this question would be meaningless...However, the reason this could be a meaningful question was because the 'general public' did not really include everybody; it did not include those persons who had been identified as members of 'at-risk' groups, such as homosexuals, hemophiliacs, and intravenous drug users" (p. 51).
"Framing our public discussions in terms of tolerance versus hate makes it seem as though the major problem we confront as a nation is one of misplaced feelings rather than problematic social relations. Tolerance is supposed to remedy a specific feeling (hate) or disposition (bias). This form of response personalizes and decontextualizes a larger issue, disconnecting feelings or biases from both structures of power and the everyday enactments of those power relations" (p. 60).
"Has lesbian and gay politics really come down to this? To counter antigay laws, pronouncements, and even violence, advocates for gay rights must play not just the biology game (for example, "born that way"), but also the Bible game, arguing about what the Bible really does or does not say about homosexuality? This form of argumentation does not make more room for difference. In fact, it reinforces a Christian public sphere" (p. 80).
"In the previous chapter, we examined how the emergence and legitimacy of 'the middle' and its fantasized 'tolerance' depend on the construction of two opposed sides. Not only are these two sides opposed to each other, but more importantly, they are also opposed to precisely the values of reason, tolerance, and civility the middle comes to represent. This analysis helps us to understand how the progay ad works, but it is not an understanding that provides any comfort. The progay ad does not simply speak to the middle; it actively participates in its ongoing construction...As an initial political response, the gay-affirmative ad was absolutely necessary. Its short-term effectiveness, however, does not mitigate its higher-term costs. The progay ad reasserts a conservative approach to both homosexuality and religion...[it] does not challenge the cultural centrality of Reform Protestantism, then, but even reasserts it in the name of tolerance" (p. 87-88).
"We need to develop persuasive arguments for the value, rather than mere toleration, of difference" (p. 96).
"So often antigay rhetoric focuses on the malleability and 'correctability' of homosexual identity...But we need not restrict our responses to this rhetoric to assertions of immutability. Instead, lesbian and gay advocates could turn charges of malleability to their own advantage by taking the vulnerability of sexual identity to a logical, if unorthodox, conclusion. To require that homosexuals change or 'convert' to heterosexuality in order to receive the full rights of citizenship is to compel sexual orthodoxy. And it is not simply that this sexual orthodoxy (heteronormativity) is akin to religious orthodoxy; it is an express of a particular religious orthodoxy" (p. 100).
"By moving the ground of debate away from a constricted focus on "rights" to freedom, we hope to change a movement that, as it currently stands, is really only against something (discrimination) into one that is actively and unembarrassedly for something (freedom)...The shift from being against discrimination to being for freedom also entails a shift in focus from identity to practice. We do not want to stop at an analogy between religious and sexual identity. Rather, we want to use this analogy to jump-start more expansive considerations of not just want it means to be different , but also what it means to enact our identities differently" (p. 101).
"One of the reasons that we argue for public space rather than simply a zone of privacy for sexual freedom is to interrupt this Christianizing map of the social. The recognition of sexual freedom as a public right is also a recognition of the right not to be Christian in the terms laid out by the dominant understanding of Christianity" (p. 115).
"Thus, constant conflict is maintained, rather than ended, by a system that officially values neutrality but actually enforces hierarchy" (p. 119).
"We need to disaggregate, or unbundle, the set of social goods currently brought together under the rubric of sex and marriage (or even domestic partnership). This insight has important ramifications for our discussion of the interplay between disestablishment and free exercise. Under current social arrangements we cannot freely practice sex, because we have established it as central to social relations that have no necessary connection to sex: emotional ties, raising and caring for children, living arrangements, financial responsibility...Marriage effectively creates a two-tier system that allows the state to regulate relationships...Why should some consensual ways of doing intimacy and family get the stamp of state approval and others not?" (p. 142).
"If lesbian or gay 'does' good, then the good it performs is not for homosexuals alone. Rather, the alternative values developed in lesbian and gay sexual communities offer all of us a deeply ethical vision of the work sex can do to open up new horizons of possibility between people. What is at stake here is nothing less than what kind of social world, what kind of America, we wish to create and inhabit. Sexual relations are part of this reimagination of the possible" (p. 147).
[Originally read March 2007; re-read July 2015.]
I don't really remember what I thought when I first read this book in 2007, but it's important and I just re-read it as part of preparing my statement of purpose/writing sample for reli studies grad programs.
"This, then, is the 'afterlife' of religion in modernity: secularization has not so much meant the retreat of religion from the public sphere as its reinvention...under cover of an official secularism, particular religious claims about 'the good life,' the way things are or should be, remain operative" (p. 21).
Social theorists Lauren Berlant & Michael Warner - heternormativity (p. 28)
"But we are even more concerned with another moment that erases the complexities of history, namely, Burger's invocation of 'Judaeo-Christian moral and ethical standards.' The hyphen suggests and equality and event an identity between the two positions, as if any areas of difference between Judaism and Christianity are of nothing next to their shared 'moral and ethical standards' around sex. In fact, whether or not 'Judaism' and 'Christianity' agree on questions of sexual ethics depends entirely on which Judaism and which Christianity are being considered...Consequently, we caution against mistaking Burger's hyphenated 'Judaeo-Christian' as a marker of religious pluralism in America. It seems to us, rather, that the hyphen actually passes off a wished-for assimilation of Jewish difference into Christian tradition as an instance of religious pluralism" (p. 31).
"[Scalia] is speaking out of a shared --and largely unconscious--cultural logic. This cultural logic depends upon the establishment of an exclusionary notion of Americanness. Within its terms, antigay discrimination is reasonable precisely because homosexuals can be constructed out of the meaning of America--as Jews once were and perhaps still are (invocations of 'Judaeo-Christian' values notwithstanding" (p. 41).
"Toleration, then, falls well short of democratic equality...The American principles of religious freedom were supposed to overcome these limits of toleration. In principle, religious freedom provides for the equal treatment of different faiths---there is no established church, and all religions are free to practice as they please. But this ideal of religious freedom has never really been enacted in the United States. On matters of religion, the United States has two conflicting self-understandings: that this is a nation of religious freedom and equality, and that this is a basically Christian nation...Thus, in America as well as in Britain, the initial boundaries of tolerance were narrow and offered only to differences within Christianity. Those who were Christian in a nondominant way (who were, for example, Catholic) might be tolerated, if marginalized...But there were others who were not Christian and, hence, remained outside the bounds of tolerance. These 'others' could be eradicated, as was so often the case in Christian interactions with American Indians, or enslaved, as was the case with Africans...In fact, as a number of historians have noted, the original distinction that determined who could be enslaved in the colonies and who could not was not a racial distinction, but a distinction between 'Christians and strangers'....In all this, the category of 'Christian' anticipates future categories of race and national identity...To put the point more strongly, the category 'white' was not yet fully operative" (p. 47-48).
"This history teaches us that in the United States religious understandings of difference have served as the basis upon which secular social differences (for example, race and ethnicity) have been constructed. It is not that religious distinctions have disappeared or are inoperative in American life, but that they have sometimes been absorbed into other social differences, such as those that define racial, national, and ethnic identity. Contemporary conflations of Arabs with Muslims, for example, show how confusion between religious and ethnic or national identities persists. Similarly, 'tolerance' emerges out of a specifically religious history that may not be directly named, but that remains powerful. Thus, as we argued in the first chapter, Protestantism is expressed in American secular sexual regulation, and so too have Protestant understandings of religious tolerance influenced areas of our social life that now seem fully secular" (p. 49).
"The rhetorical practices through which a narrow segment of the American public is represented as 'all' of it are repeated, often unthinkingly, across a wide range of contexts. For example, when the mainstream media reported on AIDS in the early years of the pandemic, they would ask questions like, 'Is AIDS a threat to the general public?' Now, if the 'general public' includes everyone, this question would be meaningless...However, the reason this could be a meaningful question was because the 'general public' did not really include everybody; it did not include those persons who had been identified as members of 'at-risk' groups, such as homosexuals, hemophiliacs, and intravenous drug users" (p. 51).
"Framing our public discussions in terms of tolerance versus hate makes it seem as though the major problem we confront as a nation is one of misplaced feelings rather than problematic social relations. Tolerance is supposed to remedy a specific feeling (hate) or disposition (bias). This form of response personalizes and decontextualizes a larger issue, disconnecting feelings or biases from both structures of power and the everyday enactments of those power relations" (p. 60).
"Has lesbian and gay politics really come down to this? To counter antigay laws, pronouncements, and even violence, advocates for gay rights must play not just the biology game (for example, "born that way"), but also the Bible game, arguing about what the Bible really does or does not say about homosexuality? This form of argumentation does not make more room for difference. In fact, it reinforces a Christian public sphere" (p. 80).
"In the previous chapter, we examined how the emergence and legitimacy of 'the middle' and its fantasized 'tolerance' depend on the construction of two opposed sides. Not only are these two sides opposed to each other, but more importantly, they are also opposed to precisely the values of reason, tolerance, and civility the middle comes to represent. This analysis helps us to understand how the progay ad works, but it is not an understanding that provides any comfort. The progay ad does not simply speak to the middle; it actively participates in its ongoing construction...As an initial political response, the gay-affirmative ad was absolutely necessary. Its short-term effectiveness, however, does not mitigate its higher-term costs. The progay ad reasserts a conservative approach to both homosexuality and religion...[it] does not challenge the cultural centrality of Reform Protestantism, then, but even reasserts it in the name of tolerance" (p. 87-88).
"We need to develop persuasive arguments for the value, rather than mere toleration, of difference" (p. 96).
"So often antigay rhetoric focuses on the malleability and 'correctability' of homosexual identity...But we need not restrict our responses to this rhetoric to assertions of immutability. Instead, lesbian and gay advocates could turn charges of malleability to their own advantage by taking the vulnerability of sexual identity to a logical, if unorthodox, conclusion. To require that homosexuals change or 'convert' to heterosexuality in order to receive the full rights of citizenship is to compel sexual orthodoxy. And it is not simply that this sexual orthodoxy (heteronormativity) is akin to religious orthodoxy; it is an express of a particular religious orthodoxy" (p. 100).
"By moving the ground of debate away from a constricted focus on "rights" to freedom, we hope to change a movement that, as it currently stands, is really only against something (discrimination) into one that is actively and unembarrassedly for something (freedom)...The shift from being against discrimination to being for freedom also entails a shift in focus from identity to practice. We do not want to stop at an analogy between religious and sexual identity. Rather, we want to use this analogy to jump-start more expansive considerations of not just want it means to be different , but also what it means to enact our identities differently" (p. 101).
"One of the reasons that we argue for public space rather than simply a zone of privacy for sexual freedom is to interrupt this Christianizing map of the social. The recognition of sexual freedom as a public right is also a recognition of the right not to be Christian in the terms laid out by the dominant understanding of Christianity" (p. 115).
"Thus, constant conflict is maintained, rather than ended, by a system that officially values neutrality but actually enforces hierarchy" (p. 119).
"We need to disaggregate, or unbundle, the set of social goods currently brought together under the rubric of sex and marriage (or even domestic partnership). This insight has important ramifications for our discussion of the interplay between disestablishment and free exercise. Under current social arrangements we cannot freely practice sex, because we have established it as central to social relations that have no necessary connection to sex: emotional ties, raising and caring for children, living arrangements, financial responsibility...Marriage effectively creates a two-tier system that allows the state to regulate relationships...Why should some consensual ways of doing intimacy and family get the stamp of state approval and others not?" (p. 142).
"If lesbian or gay 'does' good, then the good it performs is not for homosexuals alone. Rather, the alternative values developed in lesbian and gay sexual communities offer all of us a deeply ethical vision of the work sex can do to open up new horizons of possibility between people. What is at stake here is nothing less than what kind of social world, what kind of America, we wish to create and inhabit. Sexual relations are part of this reimagination of the possible" (p. 147).
[Originally read March 2007; re-read July 2015.]
January 25, 2018
Despite the heavy focus on and enumeration of legal cases and important social movements/changes, the authors make a clear and compelling argument for sexual freedom (a term which gains a new, theoretical basis). The problem addressed in Love the Sin is universally discussable, but the specific case is only relevant for the United States, and thus, the book will appeal mostly to citizens of the U.S. and/or those who have a deep interest in the country's social background.
March 21, 2022
Recognizes real problems in the way that the USA as a whole has responded to the sexual revolution particularly in terms of LGBT rights. Points out the USA has always been a Protestant country and religious freedom for anyone else has been tolerance at best harassment at worse. As the book highlights tolerance is something we do to them, not us. This is not about them and us, it's just about us.
January 28, 2017
While I found Jakobsen and Pellegrini’s (J&P) case against sexual conservatism compelling, the lack of definition for a number of key terms weakened their critique and left many openings for objection. All the worse is that defining these terms could’ve been a simple matter of an extra sentence or footnote. Democracy and toleration are two salient examples.
Throughout the book, J&P appeal to democracy as a vital means for securing sexual freedom. However, if democracy simply means rule by the people, then it becomes difficult to understand why J&P appeal to democracy as the vehicle for sexual freedom (144). If a majority of people decide that they don’t want to allow certain sexual acts and orientations, what can the democratic theorist appeal to in order to prevent the people from enacting their preferences? Without properly defining democracy or giving any theoretical or historical background for democracy, J&P’s appeal to democracy falls flat. In fact, we have been using a democratic system for hundreds of years to repress sexuality. Without a massive change in public opinion (which is also left unaddressed by J&P), it’s unclear how democracy will secure sexual freedom for anyone.
Chapter 2 attacks tolerance, but surprisingly enough J&P fail to give a clear definition of tolerance. Instead, they give a historical account of how tolerance has been appealed to and enacted by liberal states. While tracing the political usage of toleration can help us understand how toleration operates in US public policy today, it does not give us a full picture of what toleration is. There is a vast literature on this very subject. Toleration scholars would likely argue that these historical instances are misinterpretations or misuses of the concept “tolerance.” Perhaps the *appeal* to tolerance is more important than the actual theorized concept, but at the very least, J&P need to clarify that they are making only this more limited critique of tolerance.
Throughout the book, J&P appeal to democracy as a vital means for securing sexual freedom. However, if democracy simply means rule by the people, then it becomes difficult to understand why J&P appeal to democracy as the vehicle for sexual freedom (144). If a majority of people decide that they don’t want to allow certain sexual acts and orientations, what can the democratic theorist appeal to in order to prevent the people from enacting their preferences? Without properly defining democracy or giving any theoretical or historical background for democracy, J&P’s appeal to democracy falls flat. In fact, we have been using a democratic system for hundreds of years to repress sexuality. Without a massive change in public opinion (which is also left unaddressed by J&P), it’s unclear how democracy will secure sexual freedom for anyone.
Chapter 2 attacks tolerance, but surprisingly enough J&P fail to give a clear definition of tolerance. Instead, they give a historical account of how tolerance has been appealed to and enacted by liberal states. While tracing the political usage of toleration can help us understand how toleration operates in US public policy today, it does not give us a full picture of what toleration is. There is a vast literature on this very subject. Toleration scholars would likely argue that these historical instances are misinterpretations or misuses of the concept “tolerance.” Perhaps the *appeal* to tolerance is more important than the actual theorized concept, but at the very least, J&P need to clarify that they are making only this more limited critique of tolerance.
June 30, 2014
This book presents some original ideas that might be easily classified as "counterintuitive." One such example would be the authors' desire for there to be an expanding amount of religious freedom along with an expanded amount of sexual freedom in the United States. The authors link religious freedoms and sexual freedoms by noting that freedom from the establishment of religion should mean more religious and sexual freedom. The writers demonstrate how this is not the case in the present-day US while also including an instructive chapter on the value derived from sex and sexual freedoms.
Altogether, this is an excellent read of interest to those who are looking to understand the role religion plays in regulating sex and also in establishing publics which exclude. The verbiage is at points overwrought and in need of simplification, so I am giving it four stars instead of five. It requires patience, but the ideas included are worth it.
Altogether, this is an excellent read of interest to those who are looking to understand the role religion plays in regulating sex and also in establishing publics which exclude. The verbiage is at points overwrought and in need of simplification, so I am giving it four stars instead of five. It requires patience, but the ideas included are worth it.
September 27, 2011
Jakobsen and Pellegrini do not go far enough in their analysis. I was left wondering "so what?" after each and every chapter.
April 18, 2024
This book dives deeply into the idea of tolerance in American politics by looking through a religious lens of sex and sexuality. This was a very interesting and informative way of discussing the topic but I also found it difficult at times to grasp. Still, I’m glad I read it because it opened a window for me to look out into the world and see new possibilities and understandings of the ways things operate. I think that is a valuable resource to garner from reading a book even if there is disagreement of opinions on the topic (This is a very liberal leaning book if that is not your cup of tea. It is mine tho lol ;))
December 31, 2020
A very dense read on an important topic. Can be hard to parse at times but makes some fantastic points.
One of my favorite being that the emphasis on accepting homosexuality because it isn’t a choice implies that if it was, it would be the wrong choice.
One of my favorite being that the emphasis on accepting homosexuality because it isn’t a choice implies that if it was, it would be the wrong choice.
October 17, 2024
Jakobsen and Pellegrini ignite the reader with a sense of fiery urgency throughout the pages of this book. With sharp and concise analysis spanning throughout American history, they paint a picture not just of what sexual freedom means, but of everything that it could someday be.
May 22, 2017
Some interesting claims. Only, they we're followed by boring, unneeded writing.
June 22, 2024
Read for religion, gender, and sexuality w/ Ramachandran. A little boring sometimes but broke things down nicely
July 23, 2025
A great perspective on ‘tolerance’ - although I don’t think the presentation was quite there. Messy at times but still a good read!
January 13, 2015
What we have here is a case of mistaken marketing. The title, Love the Sin, and the cover (which contains mild, painted nudity and is not shown) give the impression of an in-your-face anti-religious political book. I was interested in the arguments but prepared to ignore the style in which they were delivered. Instead, this is a surprisingly academic book about the structure of social arguments in the United States. I assume it was a publisher’s effort to get people to buy the book, but still. The other downside is that it’s from 2003, so the authors aren’t able to speak about all the LGBT+ developments we’ve seen in the past few years.
However! It’s still a good book! Since it is essentially about argumentative structure, the specific examples aren’t so important. The essential thesis is that sex (and morality in general) are too linked with Protestant Christianity in the US. It’s so deeply embedded that even many Christians don’t realize they’re operating on that basis, they think they’re being secular. Jakobsen and Pellegrini argue for more sexual freedom and more religious freedom, making “freedom” a positive right. The current structure, which Jakobsen and Pellegrini term “tolerance,” has the dominant culture being exhorted to “tolerate” difference, which still sets up an unequal hierarchy. Instead, all people should be free to practice whatever religion they choose, and all people should be free to pursue the sexual practices they choose, (excepting harm to others of course). The authors explain that “freedom” does not mean the absence of ethics, but it allows for a truly democratic discussion of those ethics, and allows people to be legitimately equal. They go much, much deeper into this and various related issues, and it’s all fascinating.
There’s a lot of interesting stuff here, especially if you’ve been involved in any kind of social activism in the US. It’s a way of defending sexual freedom that you may agree with and be able to use if you’re an LGBT advocate, and the argument easily extends to other social issues. I’ve heard some of their arguments before, like how the government shouldn’t be regulating marriages at all, but I think their full-fledged position deserves more attention. Despite my repeated use of the word “academic,” it’s quite a short book. Finally, I should mention that despite the title, they’re not anti-Christian at all. Here’s a paragraph from page 61 that I think best describes what it’s all about:
"If we were to move outside the framework of tolerance to a framework of freedom, we would be able to stand up for the victims of homophobic violence whether or not we thought homosexuality was a sin. It would be possible for those who believed that homosexuality is a sin to embrace the religious freedom of those who thought otherwise. This stance is not the tolerance of loving the sinner and hating the sin. It is the democracy of religious freedom in which one group’s idea of sin does not limit the freedom of those who believe and practice differently, in which laws are based on democratic processes, not on particular religious beliefs."
I don’t know about you, but I think that sounds nice.
https://hannahgivens.wordpress.com/20...
However! It’s still a good book! Since it is essentially about argumentative structure, the specific examples aren’t so important. The essential thesis is that sex (and morality in general) are too linked with Protestant Christianity in the US. It’s so deeply embedded that even many Christians don’t realize they’re operating on that basis, they think they’re being secular. Jakobsen and Pellegrini argue for more sexual freedom and more religious freedom, making “freedom” a positive right. The current structure, which Jakobsen and Pellegrini term “tolerance,” has the dominant culture being exhorted to “tolerate” difference, which still sets up an unequal hierarchy. Instead, all people should be free to practice whatever religion they choose, and all people should be free to pursue the sexual practices they choose, (excepting harm to others of course). The authors explain that “freedom” does not mean the absence of ethics, but it allows for a truly democratic discussion of those ethics, and allows people to be legitimately equal. They go much, much deeper into this and various related issues, and it’s all fascinating.
There’s a lot of interesting stuff here, especially if you’ve been involved in any kind of social activism in the US. It’s a way of defending sexual freedom that you may agree with and be able to use if you’re an LGBT advocate, and the argument easily extends to other social issues. I’ve heard some of their arguments before, like how the government shouldn’t be regulating marriages at all, but I think their full-fledged position deserves more attention. Despite my repeated use of the word “academic,” it’s quite a short book. Finally, I should mention that despite the title, they’re not anti-Christian at all. Here’s a paragraph from page 61 that I think best describes what it’s all about:
"If we were to move outside the framework of tolerance to a framework of freedom, we would be able to stand up for the victims of homophobic violence whether or not we thought homosexuality was a sin. It would be possible for those who believed that homosexuality is a sin to embrace the religious freedom of those who thought otherwise. This stance is not the tolerance of loving the sinner and hating the sin. It is the democracy of religious freedom in which one group’s idea of sin does not limit the freedom of those who believe and practice differently, in which laws are based on democratic processes, not on particular religious beliefs."
I don’t know about you, but I think that sounds nice.
https://hannahgivens.wordpress.com/20...
May 25, 2007
I actually took a course at NYU with Professor Ann Pellegrini, the co-author of this book. She'd developed the class around this text, and somehow, it worked. Love the Sin is really eye-opening, and takes a nice, critical look at American society.
February 26, 2016
Really enjoyed the first part and learned a lot about the German Revolution. Found the descriptions of the post-Armistice celebrations a bit boring and endless
November 20, 2013
Very interesting thesis, but the argument was solid & I'm sold.
April 22, 2015
Would be four stars, but things have changed so much in the American political landscape since it was written that quite a bit of it is dated.
January 25, 2017
Conservatives should try reading this book. Very open and explanatory
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September 22, 2021Don't usually add what I read for academic purposes on here but I really liked this one. It's very US-centric but it's still applicable to other (Western, at least) countries.
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