Questions or comments are welcomed.
Find videos and transcripts from MVP events and other related events here.
Visit the MVP library for pieces by Professor Chai Feldblum and other scholars.
This page is maintained by Professor Chai Feldblum. Materials from scholars and professionals in various fields provide the intellectual framework for much of the MVP’s work.
The MVP seeks to:
- develop a consensus-based set of progressive moral values regarding sexuality, sexual orientation and gender; and
- intervene in the political discourse to promote a more progressive set of public policies with regard to sexuality, sexual orientation and gender.
We believe that moral values matter in the governing of our polity. And we believe that Americans can articulate, and live up to, a more progressive set of moral values regarding sexuality, sexual orientation and gender equity. Sexuality can be a positive, important force in our lives. Heterosexuality, homosexuality and bisexuality are all morally neutral. But the love that is expressed by those who are straight, gay or bisexual is morally good – and all equally morally good.
All forms of gender are morally neutral. But lack of gender equity is morally bad. When women are required to take on more than their share of caregiving in the family; when transgender people are not assisted in living in the gender of their choice; when intersex infants are subjected to genital surgery; or when young women are denied effective contraception -- our society is not living up to its important moral values.
No one person or group has a monopoly on moral values. It is our critical job as a self-governing society to articulate and carry out our best understanding of moral values. Views from organized
religion may properly be the source of such values, but so can views stemming from secular beliefs or spiritual/energy beliefs. No one source has greater or lesser validity than another in developing
public policy based on moral values.
A Conversation With
Chai Feldblum
Georgetown Law Professor, Founder of the Moral Values Project
On November 27, 2006, Chai delivered an address describing the Moral Values Project. In it, she discussed why moral debate in politics is good and why advocates for LGBT rights and gender equality should make their case in moral terms.
Watch or listen online
FEBRUARY 17, 2009
Chicago Tribune: Letters to the Editor Debate on "Gay Rights vs. Religious Rights"
Chai responds to a letter about a proposal in Illinois to legalize same-sex marriage and its effects on on religious freedoms, and sets the record straight about her position.
Read Chai's Letter to the Editor
JANUARY-FEBRUARY 2009
Harvard Gay & Lesbian Review: "The Selling of Proposition 8"
Reflecting on the passage of Proposition 8 in California, Chai discusses and refutes the deliberate mistruths about same-sex marriage that have been strewn by some reglious groups.
JANUARY 26, 2009
Panel Discussion at Georgetown Law:
Same-Sex Marriage and Religious Liberty
Chai participated in a panel discussion among legal scholars on whether recognition of same sex couples through civil marriage or civil unions places inappropriate burdens on religious liberty and if so, how such burdens should be addressed.
Visit the News & Events page for materials and cases related to the panel.
NOVEMBER 2008
NEW BOOK: Same-Sex Marriage and Religious Liberty
Chai contributed a chapter, titled "Moral Conflict and Conflicting Liberties," to a new book recently published by The Beckett Fund for Religious Liberties.
JUNE 16, 2008
Talk of the Nation (NPR): Gay Rights Law Faces Legal, Religious Challenges
NPR's religion correspondent Barbara Bradley Hagerty talks with Chai Feldblum and Jordan Lorence, senior counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund, about the battle between equal rights and American ideals of religious freedom.
