MovieChat Forums > Jeremy Irons Discussion > Not a homophobe - his point misunderstoo...

Not a homophobe - his point misunderstood


Watch this interview. Irons supports equal rights to all couples and says so clearly.

His point was that he feels lawyers will have a field day with gay marriage due to issues such as incestuous relationships.

The reason why gay incestuous relationships differ from straight ones is that they are not accompanied by the potential of procreation. Irons believes that the only correct argument against incest is that applied to matters of procreation, and appears to doubt the validity of other moral arguments against incest.

With gay marriage, incestuous relationships between two men will be more difficult to disallow because without the procreation factor all that is left are other moral arguments, most of which are bound to be rooted in religion rather than empirical science.

Irons believes that this will lead to some very complicated arguments, but I couldn't even tell from his words whether he is against all forms of incest or not. It appears that he sees an issue with incestuous marriage due to the inevitable legacy tax avoidance, a valid point that most people probably did not understand. He did not equate incest to homosexuality either and generally sounded very supportive of gay relationships.

In general, like Jeremy, I see laws against incest as inherently problematic and subject to inevitable debate and change. Incest carries a powerful yuck factor, but outside of the procreation matter (genetic implications) it is difficult to muster effective secular arguments against the union of two consenting adults involved in an incestuous relationship.

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It is a shame that you are incapable of grasping the severity of his comments and now opt to support him based on your own misunderstanding.

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I have gone over his argument though and restated it such that it can be understood.

Irons's point specifically pertains to the legal matter of taxes and people taking advantage of a system (a redefined institution of marriage) to benefit monetarily.

Why does this offend you?

At worst, Irons is guilty of making his comments quickly, without anticipating a media frenzy. But if people actually made the effort to understand his argument and address it on its merits this wouldn't happen.

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I haven't had the chance to watch the actual interview, could you please link me to it?

Anyway, from his comments I've read, I'm inclined to agree with you, this is what I've been getting too. Nowhere does he ever say he's against gay marriage in itself. I think he meant that possible incestuous unions that same sex marriage would allow would "debase" marriage, not actual same sex marriage itself. I definitely don't agree with him, but I can definitely see that he isn't homophobe or a bigot.

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http://www.advocate.com/arts-entertainment/people/2013/04/06/jeremy-ir ons-says-hes-not-antigay-made-valid-case

Here you go. If you scroll down, you can find a video link to the interview itself.

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It was a STUPID thing to say. He has made NO interesting point there. Father and son is incest. End of story. The only way he would think it wasn't is because he is placing homosexual sexual relations in a different category to heterosexual sexual relations, which to me means he was coming from a homophobic angle.

Sex between relatives is incest. It doesn't matter if they are the same sex, and there is no procreation possible. A father having sex with his barren daughter, is STILL incest, even if they both know no child can come from it.

Trying to bring in "tax avoidance" as a "concerning consequence" to gay marriage is absurd anyway. In case he hasn't noticed, rich people have been trying to avoid tax LONG before marriage equality was on the cards....

Jeremy Irons is a great actor, coz he sure fooled me all these years. I thought he was intelligent. Clearly I was wrong.

Now I read he is saying that the young girls that liked to hang around for autographs in the 70s were looking for "it". Coz they should've got the memo that a sexual revolution was on. Doesn't matter that they were 10. They should've known better apparently. Jesus what's wrong with this guy?? The Borgias has scrambled his brains....

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True, sex between close relatives is incest. But if you remove the procreation argument & the religious argument, then what's wrong with incest between consenting relatives? Nothing. Furthermore, what's "wrong" with bestiality? If you believe hunting (aka killing) is okay, then holding Bambi as a sex-slave is far less harmful than extermination. They may not like it but chickens don't like being served for supper either.

What Irons was saying is that the whole gender-bending of traditional unions - whether marital or coital - is a slippery slope. Both socially and legally. If you can't see the problems on the horizon, you're either purposefully ignorant or too young to be on mommy's computer.

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You win today's Today's Best Idiot. Congrats! Beware, you're on a slippery slope though.

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