Post by: Winston Smith on May 24, 2006, 08:08:02 PM
Post by: K Frame on May 24, 2006, 08:13:14 PM
Post by: Winston Smith on May 24, 2006, 08:17:29 PM
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 24, 2006, 08:32:56 PM
I will not explain my point of view on this issue a second time, but I will try to answer your question about why this issue is a "big deal." The big deal is that twenty years ago, homosexuality was almost universally perceived as disgusting, immoral, wierd, ridiculous, etc. This has generally been the view of most cultures in most times. Very suddenly, the leftist elite declared from on high that anyone holding the former set of views was disgusting, immoral, wierd, ridiculous, etc. While the majority have "come around" on the immoral and wierd part, most Americans still regard it as disgusting and ridiculous. This is similar to the way that racism is still widespread in America, although very few will conciously defend it. The cognitive dissonance is not as pronounced, of course. Nevertheless, the accepted view now is that homosexuality is normal and good and wonderful.
This has all been very shocking, insulting and frustrating for some people. The whole world changed their minds for no particular reason, and now the hold-outs are vilified for holding what must be considered a very normal point of view. Just ten years ago, I myself would have been considered quite tolerant for believing that sodomy should not be illegal. Today, I am considered a bigot for not supporting homosexual marriage. It is as if someone changed the rules in the middle of the game without telling half the players and now we are being yelled at for playing the wrong way. Yet we're playing the right way, as far as we can see.
That's why it's a big deal.
Post by: zahc on May 24, 2006, 08:57:55 PM
The government should not be in the business of marrying ANYONE. Right now the government and various christian churches are so entangled in the 'marriage' process that it makes me sick. BOTH institutions are corrupted in the process. Of course, rather than realize this and call for--if I may use the word--separation of the two, the churches, being the power hungry mini-governments they are, are enjoying the seeming monopoly they have over government sactioned legal unions, and would never pass up the chance to use the government as a tool to force their views on the population.
If, from the beginning, the government only wrote contracts between consenting parties, this would pretty much be a non-issue. Any religious organizations would be expected to denounce homosexuality or not (as per their interpretation of the bible/torah/solar flares/emergent patterns of ant lines), and the government would be expected to ensure equality and fairness amidst consenting parties. It would all be so simple, but alas, entrenched power gives up ground reluctantly.
Post by: Twycross on May 24, 2006, 09:23:56 PM
Quote from: zahc
The big deal ultimately stems from government involvment in religious affairs.
That about sums up my position. As a conservative christian, I believe that homosexuality is a sin. But it is none of the government's business. Marriage is a religious institution, not a civil one, and the state should keep out of it in it's entirety. It doesn't matter if a man is marrying a woman, or another man, or his dog, or several of each. Regardless of morality, what you do in the bedroom is nobody else's concern (as far as the law goes).
Post by: zahc on May 24, 2006, 09:54:34 PM
Post by: Stand_watie on May 24, 2006, 10:50:47 PM
Quote
...it is none of the government's business. Marriage is a religious institution, not a civil one, and the state should keep out of it...
Quote from: zahc
Thank you, it's amazing to see a someone who both professes christianity and understands that.
I profess Christianity and I believe that, so you've got at least two right here on this board.
Post by: Winston Smith on May 24, 2006, 10:53:52 PM
Post by: TarpleyG on May 25, 2006, 01:44:41 AM
As far as Christian marriage goes, is is truly hypocritical for same-sex couples to be married--says si right in the bible. But, like someone stated earlier, what goes on behind closed doors with two consenting adults is their business--not mine and certainly not the government's or the church's.
I believe they should be allowed to be "married" (from a governmental standpoint) for the sake of benefits, etc. that are protected in a marriage.
Greg
Greg
Post by: Ron on May 25, 2006, 03:03:45 AM
Quote
Absolutely, and here it is: that I believe that nobody should decide who people should marry except the people themselves.
Then why keep insisting the rest of the country acknowledge their marriages?I'm in the get government out of the marriage business camp myself.
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 25, 2006, 03:49:29 AM
Post by: Jamisjockey on May 25, 2006, 04:35:45 AM
Quote from: Winston Smith
I just don't see what the big deal is. Why not?
I want to take it one step further:The state (ie, .gov) shold not regulate Marriage, recocnize marriage, or regulate the relationships between consenting adults.
Post by: richyoung on May 25, 2006, 05:07:29 AM
Post by: Stand_watie on May 25, 2006, 05:20:24 AM
Quote from: JamisJockey
Quote from: Winston Smith
I just don't see what the big deal is. Why not?
I want to take it one step further:The state (ie, .gov) shold not regulate Marriage, recocnize marriage, or regulate the relationships between consenting adults.
For example, I think it would be perfectly correct and legitimate for a state to say "we only accept legal contracts between persons who are at least 18 years of age", or, "we only accept legal contracts if they were witnessed by a licensed notary public".
Post by: Winston Smith on May 25, 2006, 05:21:45 AM
Post by: The Rabbi on May 25, 2006, 05:37:11 AM
Gee. This can be fun. Let's try another one.
This has all been very shocking, insulting and frustrating for some people. The whole world changed their minds for no particular reason, and now the hold-outs are vilified for holding what must be considered a very normal point of view. Just two thousand years ago, I myself would have been considered quite tolerant for believing that Christians should be stoned, rather than crucified Today, I am not considered a bigot for believing that Christians should be stoned. It is as if someone changed the rules in the middle of the game without telling half the players and now we are being yelled at for playing the wrong way. Yet we're playing the right way, as far as we can see.
Post by: richyoung on May 25, 2006, 05:38:36 AM
Quote from: Winston Smith
I'm guessing you don't know too many gay people richyoung.
Just who are YOU to be "guessing" (or anything else) about me? I happen to work one desk away from a gay person, and my favorite double cousin also happens to be gay. How many gay people I know has NOTHING to do with the truth or lack thereof of what I assert. You just MIGHT want to get a little more life experience than 17 years before you go "guessing" (in a condescending manner, btw) about peoplewho've been around more than twice as long as you've lived. It seems from your posts that you are possibly the victim of a public shool INDOCTRINATION passed of as "education" - and you don't yet realize it. Let me ask you the following:While in school, did you EVER:
1. Hear anything BAD about the United Nations?
2. Hear anything GOOD about the pre-WWII isolationist movement in the US?
3. Hear anything BAD about Franklin Delano Roosevelt?
4. Hear anything GOOD about Richard Nixon?
5. Hear anything GOOD about private gun ownership?
6. Hear anything BAD about the anti-war movement in the 1960's US?
7. Hear anything GOOD about the Confederacy?
8. Hear anything BAD about Abraham Lincoln and the Union?
I could go on, but the point is - if you only hear ONE SIDE of an issue, you haven't been EDUCATED, you've been INDOCTRINATED. You can't help what's been done to you, but you MUST be aware that the problem exists - and from the "whats wrong with.." tone of your posts, I'm not sure you are yet.
Don't feel bad - I can still recall my feelings of disillusionment when I realized what my 12 years of "education" really amounted to...
Post by: Gewehr98 on May 25, 2006, 06:26:16 AM
Winston is a product of his environment, whether he realizes it or not.
I cringed when I saw his faction become popular when I was an off-duty assistant teacher in the PRK in the 1990's. The revisionist history even then made me want to have a one-on-one with the principal, let alone the fact they wanted me to learn Spanish as a teacher, vs. teaching the kids proper English. That's not even counting the liberal crap they were filling the kids' minds with, it sickened me. In hindsight, I'd have loved to stay there and fight the system, but they were going to ban my AR-15 and Kalashnikov rifles - so I took an assignment to Florida. It was really too bad, for a while I was helping a really cute teacher, she felt the same way I did about what the school system was creating in the way of students, but she needed the money. I should've rescued her from that location, vs. my now ex-wife.
Post by: BrokenPaw on May 25, 2006, 06:30:16 AM
Age brings experience, and experience viewed though the lens of intellect leads to wisdom. But that does not mean that one who is merely 17 cannot have wisdom; it merely means that he has less experience from which to draw. But a man with years of experience and a clouded intellect may nave no wisdom at all.
Consider that a man with 17+1 rounds in his Glock, and who shoots it sideways, may hit the mark occasionally, but will probably score less than a guy with a six-shooter and the patience to have studied. Years are like cartridges. Having more of them doesn't mean you'll be on target more; it just means you've got more chances to get it right.
So let's leave the ad-hominem "you're too young to have an opinion, kid" rhetoric out of it, and consider what Winston says on its merits rather than in the light of your august years and his relatively brief life experience.
Now. To the question at hand:
Quote
the push for homosexual marriage is DRIVEN by the desire to get medical benefits (heretofor primarily reserved for married couples and their dependent children...) for AIDS stricken gay men by "marrying" (either legitmately, or as a sham a la "Desperate Housewives") to pay for those expensive "drug cocktails" that keep them alive.
Cite, please.Quote
the push for less gun control is DRIVEN by the desire to get cheap automatic weapons (heretofor primarily reserved for police and military personnel...) for criminals by "buying" (either legitmately, or as a sham a la "Straw Purchases") to steal property to pay for those expensive "drug cocktails" that keep them high.
Yes, I can pontificate baselessly as well.Quote
I happen to work one desk away from a gay person, and my favorite double cousin also happens to be gay.
Knowing these two people gives you the authority on what gay people want, then? Gosh. I know an awful lot more black people than two. I suppose that qualifies me to speak at the next NAACP meeting.Quote
While in school, did you EVER:
Yes? So? While in school, did you EVER have a 4-gigahertz computer sitting on your desk? And so what if you did or did not?People learn from things besides school. In fact, the clever of wit use school to learn the mechanics of thought (reading, writing, mathematics) and learn what to think from other sources.
The reasons that gay people wish to get married are, by and large, exactly the same reasons that straight people want to get married: They want to have their union legally recognised, they want the survivorship benefits, they want next-of-kin rights in situations where one partner is (for instance) in a hospital. All of this makes perfect sense. Currently it's possible for the family of a gay man to deny hospital access by the man's partner, because only "family" is allowed to decide who may and may not visit a patient. That's wrong right there, because it denies gay couples equal protection under law.
The primary objections to gay marriage come from one of three premises: religious/moral objections, "purpose of marriage" objections, and legal/financial objections.
The first come from the religious belief that homosexuality is wrong. And that's ok, up to a point. People have a right to believe that homosexuality is wrong. And if they believe that, they ought not to engage in it, and then everyone would be happy. Unfortunately many groups aren't happy just following their own rules; they have a psychological need to make sure everyone else is following their rules as well.
This brings me to the concept of "wrong". In legal terms, there are two sorts of crimes one can commit. One is called malum in se ("bad in fact"). This sort of crime is one that is wrong because it demonstrably infringes upon the rights or property of others (murder, for instance). The other kind of crime is called malum prohibitum ("bad because it's prohibited"). Most traffic-related violations are of this type: If you make an illegal U-turn, but don't cause an accident, you've commited a (minor) crime, but only because the law says you have.
The people who object to gay marriage on moral grounds are confusing the issue of malum in se and malum prohibitum. They believe that homosexuality is, by its very nature, wrong, and they fail to understand that when two consenting adults choose to do something, it's not possible for malum in se to apply. Because they're consenting.
The second sort of objection is the "purpose of marriage" objection. It says that the purpose of marriage is to create children. This one falls apart if you consider four people: Jane, John, Mary, and Gary. All of them are gay. They've no interest in any kind of physical contact with anyone of the opposite sex. Under current law, it's legal for Jane and John to marry, and also for Mary and Gary. These would be legal unions, but there would be no children as a result. The outcome would be identical if Mary and Jane were to get married, and Gary and John were to get married, yet this situation is not currently legal.
The "purpose" of marriage argument falls apart further when you consider that straight couples that are (for whatever reason) sterile (or even just choose not to have kids) are allowed to marry under current law. And the final logical progression of the "purpose of marriage" argument is that once a woman reaches menopause, there's no further purpose to her being married, so her legal status as a spouse should be revoked. There are examples and examples of why this argument is wrong, and these are just a few.
The last sort of objection to gay marriage is the legal/financial one, and these objections actually have a grain of merit behind them, until you look closer at them and realize that they're based on a false premise.
The argument goes like this: If we allow gays to marry, then companies will have to extend insurance benefits to gay partners as they currently do to the spouses of straight employees. Gay relationships are statistically more likely to be brief and casual, so this puts an undue burden on the insurance companies, since gay couples will likely get married just so one partner can share the other one's medical coverage. This will drive costs up for everyone else, and is therefore not fair to them.
The people who use this argument will point at companies who offer "domestic partner" coverage on their insurance, and will show how those companies have a higher cost of insurance than companies that do not offer these benefits.
The tricky part of this argument is that the premise is true: Statistically, a gay relationship is more likely to be brief and temporary than a straight marriage is. Fact. The deceiving part is that this is a comparison of apples and fishies. They're comparing all gay relationships with married straight relationships. Of course the numbers are going to show a difference. If the comparison was between all gay couples and all straight couples (married or not), the numbers would come out more evenly, because there are straight couples getting together and breaking up all the time, just as there are gay couples doing the same.
And the part about insurance costs for "domestic partner" benefits is 100% accurate, too. Since domestic partnership does not carry any legal force, couples do "shack up" so that one can share the benefits of the other. And since these benefits generally only apply to gay couples (straight couples can't get coverage unless they're married) there's a lower standard for who can get coverage, and straight couples end up having to pay more for insurance, which makes them upset, and rightly so.
The argument falls apart when you look at the fact that if gay marriage were legal, it would come with all of the legal hassles to get out of that straight marriage does; if gays could legally marry, and "domestic partner" benefits were removed (because now the gay partner would be covered under spousal coverage), the ability to "shack up" for bennies would no longer work; couples would not get together casually just so that one can share the coverage of the other, because they'd have to show a marriage certificate, and when one moved out, there'd have to be a legal divorce.
There's also the "slippery-slope" argument: if we allow this form of "non-traditional" marriage, that opens the door to all manner of other sorts of "non-traditional" marriage: polygamy, polyamoury, and so on. If (for instance) a man can marry more than one other person, then all of those other people would legally be spouses, so they'd all have to be covered under insurance. This would allow people to build "insurance communes", where one person has insurance, and he or she marries a whole bunch of people, and all of them get coverage, and this unfairly burdens that one person's company and co-workers.
This argument is correct, as far as it goes; just by sheer numbers, if poly marriages are allowed and given coverage benefits as monogamous spouses are, it would wreck the insurance industry. But there's a simple solution to that as well: Re-write the insurance laws so that only one person may be covered under spousal benefits. Done.
Churches get very, very upset when the government tries to tell them what they can and cannot do. They cry, "The church and the state must be separated!". But the moment anyone appears to be doing something that goes against their own doctrine (but which is not malum in se), they want the government to pass laws based upon the definitions of right and wrong put forward in their own holy traditions.
The only possible solution that makes any sense is this: Remove the word "marriage" from the legal lexicon. The government shall no longer recognize "marriage" of any kind. Instead, the government shall recognise a legal "civil union", which is basically a corporation set up between consenting adults. The laws governing these unions, as far as next-of-kin and hospital visitation and so on, will be essentially the same as they are for legal marriage now. But the government shall make no determination of who may or may not for such a union, except that the people entering it must be consenting, and of legal age. The dissolution of such a union shall be just as legally rigorous as a divorce is under current law. This will prevent "casual" civil unions from becoming an undue burden on the insurance industry.
Once this is accomplished, churches may perform a religious sacrament of marriage for whomever they choose. If a church does not wish to allow gay couples to marry, it may refuse to marry them. If a church does not wish to allow straight couples to marry, it may refuse to marry them. Either way, such a religious union shall have no legal force whatsoever, and may be dissolved at any time by whatever means the particular church deems appropriate.
Couples wishing to join one another both spiritually and legally must do two things: They must get married in whatever way their spiritual path indicates, and they must form a legal civil union.
Under this system, as now, a member of clergy shall be allowed to act as an officer of the court to ratify a legal civil union (as this is a matter more of licensing than of faith) just as a justice of the peace may. In this way, a couple wishing to marry and form a legal union many do so all in one ceremony, just as now. And just as now, a couple with no spiritual leanings may stand before a justice of the peace and become legally united. And just as now, a couple may make vows before their gods (and before their clergy if they so choose) committing to one another in a spiritual sense, but making no legal connection.
Nothing changes under the new system that I suggest, except that the government no longer as a religiously-based moral code for saying which consenting adults may join together for a lifetime.
Done. Next question?
-BP
Post by: DrAmazon on May 25, 2006, 06:32:15 AM
This could have a lot of odd consequences and uses. For example, my best friend has 4 kids. If her husband died, she and I could civil partner so I could help her with her kids. We're not lesbians, and wouldn't sleep together, but we could own a home together, I could adopt her kids, her gang could be on my insurance etc..
Could this be abused, sure it could. But right now a lot of my gay friends that have been in long long term partnerships are really struggling with all of the issues that married people take for granted-for example buying a home, or dividing assets in the event of an ugly breakup.
Post by: K Frame on May 25, 2006, 06:39:17 AM
1. Hear anything BAD about the United Nations?
2. Hear anything GOOD about the pre-WWII isolationist movement in the US?
3. Hear anything BAD about Franklin Delano Roosevelt?
4. Hear anything GOOD about Richard Nixon?
5. Hear anything GOOD about private gun ownership?
6. Hear anything BAD about the anti-war movement in the 1960's US?
7. Hear anything GOOD about the Confederacy?
8. Hear anything BAD about Abraham Lincoln and the Union?"
I went to high school from 1979 to 1983.
To answer your questions...
1. Yes.
2. Yes.
3. No.
4. HELL yes. Detent with China.
5. Yes. Certainly helped along by the fact that during hunting season there were probably a dozen or more hunting rifles in the school lock up, which had be brought to school by students.
6. Hum... Good question, I honestly don't remember.
7. Yes.
8. Yes.
Post by: Jamisjockey on May 25, 2006, 06:40:44 AM
Quote from: richyoung
All this talk and no one will acknowledge the 800 lb gorilla in the debate: the push for homosexual marriage is DRIVEN by the desire to get medical benefits (heretofor primarily reserved for married couples and their dependent children...) for AIDS stricken gay men by "marrying" (either legitmately, or as a sham a la "Desperate Housewives") to pay for those expensive "drug cocktails" that keep them alive. Apart from strong genuine moral reprehnsion at thte idea on the part of the majority (democracy's a real tough act when you can't convince a majority, huh nellies...) the bulk of the people realize their health insurance costs, which are already skyrocketing, will dramiatically increase even more.
Proof?
Post by: The Rabbi on May 25, 2006, 06:47:15 AM
Quote from: richyoung
Let me ask you the following:
While in school, did you EVER:
1. Hear anything BAD about the United Nations?
2. Hear anything GOOD about the pre-WWII isolationist movement in the US?
3. Hear anything BAD about Franklin Delano Roosevelt?
4. Hear anything GOOD about Richard Nixon?
5. Hear anything GOOD about private gun ownership?
6. Hear anything BAD about the anti-war movement in the 1960's US?
7. Hear anything GOOD about the Confederacy?
8. Hear anything BAD about Abraham Lincoln and the Union?
I was in school (NYC) from about 1974 to 1980. The answer to all of them is a resounding NO.
While in school, did you EVER:
1. Hear anything BAD about the United Nations?
2. Hear anything GOOD about the pre-WWII isolationist movement in the US?
3. Hear anything BAD about Franklin Delano Roosevelt?
4. Hear anything GOOD about Richard Nixon?
5. Hear anything GOOD about private gun ownership?
6. Hear anything BAD about the anti-war movement in the 1960's US?
7. Hear anything GOOD about the Confederacy?
8. Hear anything BAD about Abraham Lincoln and the Union?
Post by: zahc on May 25, 2006, 07:04:41 AM
Post by: richyoung on May 25, 2006, 07:09:48 AM
Quote from: Mike Irwin
"While in school, did you EVER:
1. Hear anything BAD about the United Nations?
2. Hear anything GOOD about the pre-WWII isolationist movement in the US?
3. Hear anything BAD about Franklin Delano Roosevelt?
4. Hear anything GOOD about Richard Nixon?
5. Hear anything GOOD about private gun ownership?
6. Hear anything BAD about the anti-war movement in the 1960's US?
7. Hear anything GOOD about the Confederacy?
8. Hear anything BAD about Abraham Lincoln and the Union?"
I went to high school from 1979 to 1983.
To answer your questions...
1. Yes.
2. Yes.
3. No.
4. HELL yes. Detent with China.
5. Yes. Certainly helped along by the fact that during hunting season there were probably a dozen or more hunting rifles in the school lock up, which had be brought to school by students.
6. Hum... Good question, I honestly don't remember.
7. Yes.
8. Yes.
How much of the "yes" material came out of the texts, or was otherwise "official" doctrine on the matter?
1. Hear anything BAD about the United Nations?
2. Hear anything GOOD about the pre-WWII isolationist movement in the US?
3. Hear anything BAD about Franklin Delano Roosevelt?
4. Hear anything GOOD about Richard Nixon?
5. Hear anything GOOD about private gun ownership?
6. Hear anything BAD about the anti-war movement in the 1960's US?
7. Hear anything GOOD about the Confederacy?
8. Hear anything BAD about Abraham Lincoln and the Union?"
I went to high school from 1979 to 1983.
To answer your questions...
1. Yes.
2. Yes.
3. No.
4. HELL yes. Detent with China.
5. Yes. Certainly helped along by the fact that during hunting season there were probably a dozen or more hunting rifles in the school lock up, which had be brought to school by students.
6. Hum... Good question, I honestly don't remember.
7. Yes.
8. Yes.
Post by: Firethorn on May 25, 2006, 07:20:48 AM
BrokenPaw said it better than I could. Marriage gives people rights and privilages far beyond taxes and insurance. It generally gives inheritance rights, guardianship privilages in case one becomes disabled, etc... Still, look at the Terry Schiavo case. The husband eventually won out. There have been cases where the courts and hospitals ignored contracts and letters of intent and gave guardianship to the parents of gays, who then proceeded to deny the long term lover/partner all access because they disaprove of gays.
I say get the states out of the 'marriage' business and go to straight civil unions. At the same time we should take the oppertunity to clean up divorce law.
Post by: Headless Thompson Gunner on May 25, 2006, 07:32:25 AM
Sorry, the world doesn't work that way. They don't get to make these decisions for everyone else.
Words have meaning. "Marriage" means "man and woman, forever". Marriage has held that definition for as long as it has existed as a word. Marriage does not mean "man and man" or "woman and woman" or "man and woman, but only for a few years" or "man and woman and man" or "man and dog" or whatever else you might come up with.
I don't have a problem with people involving themselves in any way they see fit. If it makes you happy to live with your gay lover for the rest of your life, then I'm happy for you. But those arrangements are NOT a marriage. That's not a moral judgement or condemnation, it's a simple statement of fact. "Red" is not the word that describes the color of grass, "hot" is not the word that describes the temperature of ice, and "marriage" is not the word that describes a lifelong homosexual relationship. "Gay marriage" is an oxymoron, a contradiction in terms.
The big gripe levelled by the gay community is that they aren't being treated fairly by their insurance companies, employee benefit plans, inheritance, taxes, and so forth. Well, if that's the case, the appropriate solution to negotiate a more equitable arrangement with the insurance companies and employers and so forth, or to acquire a power of attorney for the partner. It is NOT appropriate to try to re-engineer the national culture to serve your own selfish needs.
Post by: richyoung on May 25, 2006, 07:52:09 AM
Quote from: BrokenPaw
Rich, you're doing it again.
Age brings experience, and experience viewed though the lens of intellect leads to wisdom. But that does not mean that one who is merely 17 cannot have wisdom; it merely means that he has less experience from which to draw. But a man with years of experience and a clouded intellect may nave no wisdom at all.
Consider that a man with 17+1 rounds in his Glock, and who shoots it sideways, may hit the mark occasionally, but will probably score less than a guy with a six-shooter and the patience to have studied. Years are like cartridges. Having more of them doesn't mean you'll be on target more; it just means you've got more chances to get it right.
So let's leave the ad-hominem "you're too young to have an opinion, kid" rhetoric out of it, and consider what Winston says on its merits rather than in the light of your august years and his relatively brief life experience.
It wasn't intended as an attack - rather, and observation of fact, and a response to his "I guess"" crack. If it was percieved by him or anyone else as an attack, I appologize - that was not my intention. When attacks start, the exchange of ideas ends, as everyone defends themself, and their ideas as analogues of themself, rather than seeking enlightenment.Age brings experience, and experience viewed though the lens of intellect leads to wisdom. But that does not mean that one who is merely 17 cannot have wisdom; it merely means that he has less experience from which to draw. But a man with years of experience and a clouded intellect may nave no wisdom at all.
Consider that a man with 17+1 rounds in his Glock, and who shoots it sideways, may hit the mark occasionally, but will probably score less than a guy with a six-shooter and the patience to have studied. Years are like cartridges. Having more of them doesn't mean you'll be on target more; it just means you've got more chances to get it right.
So let's leave the ad-hominem "you're too young to have an opinion, kid" rhetoric out of it, and consider what Winston says on its merits rather than in the light of your august years and his relatively brief life experience.
Quote
Quote
the push for homosexual marriage is DRIVEN by the desire to get medical benefits (heretofor primarily reserved for married couples and their dependent children...) for AIDS stricken gay men by "marrying" (either legitmately, or as a sham a la "Desperate Housewives") to pay for those expensive "drug cocktails" that keep them alive.
Cite, please.To promote marriage, however, is to accept a privatized framework for meeting basic needs such as health care. As Lisa Duggan wrote recently in The Nation, "Marriage thus becomes a privatization scheme: Individual married-couple-led households & privately provide many services once offered through social welfare agencies. More specifically, the unpaid labor of married women fills the gap created by government service cuts. & So there is an economic agenda, as well as surface moralism, attached to calls for the preservation of traditional marriage. The campaign to save gendered marriage has some rational basis, for neoliberals in both parties, as a politics of privatization."
from http://www.dollarsandsense.org/archives/2004/0504gluckman.html
"Marriage & Medical Benefits:
Marriage was meant to provide for children, not matrimonial hop-scotch to procure medical benefits for the reckless lust of homosexuals who care more about their partner-of-the-month than their own medical safety. As described in Part 1, there are approximately 120,000 in California with HIV/AIDS, an extremely expensive illness to treat which will have a huge impact on medical insurance costs. Dr. Ron Valdeserri of the CDC confirmed the fear of mutant viruses and states HIV infections are on the rise, "This could be an indication that the drugs that have revolutionized HIV care in the United States are losing their efficacy due to mutant viruses." (9)
Activists contacted me and claimed "California state law already provides medical benefits to same-sex partners." This simply isn't true. California law, AB 25, requires the POSSIBILITY of medical benefits is offered to employers by the insurance companies as a package for domestic partnerships IF EMPLOYERS so choose. Activists then claimed that many employers are already providing benefits to domestic partnerships, in fact, "everyone they know" which causes me to wonder if that is why medical insurance has been skyrocketing in California recently, with more employees paying co-payments while receiving less coverage. Less employers are offering medical benefits at all! This bill (thanks to Davis) recently passed in 2001.
from:http://www.renewamerica.us/columns/shroder/040229
Quote
Yes, I can pontificate baselessly as well.
You are the one who just mentioned ad hominem attacks, yet you commit them yourself...Quote
Knowing these two people gives you the authority on what gay people want, then? Gosh. I know an awful lot more black people than two. I suppose that qualifies me to speak at the next NAACP meeting.
...adding attempted reducto ad absurdio to your ad hominem repertoire? Needs work...Quote
Yes? So? While in school, did you EVER have a 4-gigahertz computer sitting on your desk? And so what if you did or did not?
Rrelevance to discussion?Quote
People learn from things besides school.
SOME do - others never learn anywhere.Quote
In fact, the clever of wit use school to learn the mechanics of thought (reading, writing, mathematics) and learn what to think from other sources.
The reasons that gay people wish to get married are, by and large, exactly the same reasons that straight people want to get married: They want to have their union legally recognised, they want the survivorship benefits, they want next-of-kin rights in situations where one partner is (for instance) in a hospital. All of this makes perfect sense. Currently it's possible for the family of a gay man to deny hospital access by the man's partner, because only "family" is allowed to decide who may and may not visit a patient. That's wrong right there, because it denies gay couples equal protection under law.
WRONG - a gay man has JUST as much "right" to marry as a stright man - he just has to marry a woman, just like a straight man. The rest of your objections could be easily addressed with a thing called a "power of attorney" - except that most gay men are too busy hopping from partner to partner to fill out such paperwork.The reasons that gay people wish to get married are, by and large, exactly the same reasons that straight people want to get married: They want to have their union legally recognised, they want the survivorship benefits, they want next-of-kin rights in situations where one partner is (for instance) in a hospital. All of this makes perfect sense. Currently it's possible for the family of a gay man to deny hospital access by the man's partner, because only "family" is allowed to decide who may and may not visit a patient. That's wrong right there, because it denies gay couples equal protection under law.
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The primary objections to gay marriage come from one of three premises: religious/moral objections, "purpose of marriage" objections, and legal/financial objections.
The first come from the religious belief that homosexuality is wrong. And that's ok, up to a point. People have a right to believe that homosexuality is wrong. And if they believe that, they ought not to engage in it, and then everyone would be happy. Unfortunately many groups aren't happy just following their own rules; they have a psychological need to make sure everyone else is following their rules as well.
Religious people have JUST as much right to political power and to exert pressure, collectively or otherwise, as any other balkanized special interest group. Again, if your position for change can't win a majority in a democracy, its going to be a long hard road - unless you can convince 5 of 9 supremes to violate their oaths of office and "magic" your position into law, in violation of the Constitution, but not, unfortunately, precedent.The first come from the religious belief that homosexuality is wrong. And that's ok, up to a point. People have a right to believe that homosexuality is wrong. And if they believe that, they ought not to engage in it, and then everyone would be happy. Unfortunately many groups aren't happy just following their own rules; they have a psychological need to make sure everyone else is following their rules as well.
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The people who object to gay marriage on moral grounds are confusing the issue of malum in se and malum prohibitum. They believe that homosexuality is, by its very nature, wrong, and they fail to understand that when two consenting adults choose to do something, it's not possible for malum in se to apply. Because they're consenting.
If I can be forced to wear seatbelts and motorcycle helmets, and my drinking and smoking be heavily taxed and regulated, on the argument that my "dangerous behavior" causes health care costs to rise for everyone, then the sodomistic activities that have spead AIDS, the new "black death", as well as skyrocketing rates of other diseases, can be regulated for the very same reason. When I don't have to "click it or ticket" anymore, then let the anonymous AIDS parties ensue...Quote
The second sort of objection is the "purpose of marriage" objection. It says that the purpose of marriage is to create children.
Wrong - its to create a stabile environment in relationships that are very likely to produce children, without invading the privacy of everyone to determine actual proclivity and fertility. The absence of children is exactly why neither gay adoption or marriage is needed.Quote
... there are straight couples getting together and breaking up all the time, just as there are gay couples doing the same.
NOT "just as" - NOTHING approaches the level of promiscuity that gay men demonstrate. Quote
Churches get very, very upset when the government tries to tell them what they can and cannot do. They cry, "The church and the state must be separated!". But the moment anyone appears to be doing something that goes against their own doctrine (but which is not malum in se), they want the government to pass laws based upon the definitions of right and wrong put forward in their own holy traditions.
Its called a "judeo-christian" heritage. Get over it. Like it or not, this nation was, and is, a Christian nation, with attendant principles. Want different principles? Either convince 50.1% or move.
Post by: Trisha on May 25, 2006, 08:07:17 AM
At best, one might manage a "Reader's Digest" of sorts on a dozen or two specifics during any given month - so, for sanity's interests I suppose, one generalizes by best-intentioned extrapolations. Topic-specific scholars become more sourced as information overload swamps consciousness; and there are real pitfalls in far-reaching dependence on any single source for any opinion/perspective, yes?
Polarization of social groups/demographics would seem to be in the best interests of any over-reaching governance structure as the masses would be more readily monitored that way (if demonstrable and repetitive cause/effect facile control wasn't dependable enough for policy goals). What to do?
If one senses an uncharacteristic feeling of uncertainty on challenge of their opinion of an issue, slow down! Take the time to invest in yourself and do some research. Think, and work on actual discussion (the old discourse process of thesis vs antithesis yielding an incremental synthesis remains as valid today as it ever did) - like I see here. . .
There's hope that the collective 'we' may find our way to continue grow and adapt to the pressures, demands, and overload today presents and tomorrow soberly promises.
"Animal Farm" meets "The Zero-Sum Society" meets "1984" meets "The Dancing Wu-Li Masters" meets "Godel, Escher, Bach" meets etc. . .
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 25, 2006, 08:50:43 AM
Quote from: Headless Thompson Gunner
Words have meaning. "Marriage" means "man and woman, forever". Marriage has held that definition for as long as it has existed as a word. Marriage does not mean "man and man" or "woman and woman" or "man and woman, but only for a few years" or "man and woman and man" or "man and dog" or whatever else you might come up with.
....But [the above] arrangements are NOT a marriage. That's not a moral judgement or condemnation, it's a simple statement of fact. "Red" is not the word that describes the color of grass, "hot" is not the word that describes the temperature of ice, and "marriage" is not the word that describes a lifelong homosexual relationship. "Gay marriage" is an oxymoron, a contradiction in terms.
This is simple fact. Notice that HTG does NOT say that woman and woman and woman and man is not a marriage. This type of polygamy has usually been considered actual marriage, even if it was not acceptable in many communities. If you really want to know what "the big deal" is, consider that a minority (though a quickly growing one) has pronounced that a basic societal institution must be changed to accomodate a type of relationship that has heretofore not been considered marriage. One cannot say the same for interracial marriage - those have been honored in many cultures throughout history.....But [the above] arrangements are NOT a marriage. That's not a moral judgement or condemnation, it's a simple statement of fact. "Red" is not the word that describes the color of grass, "hot" is not the word that describes the temperature of ice, and "marriage" is not the word that describes a lifelong homosexual relationship. "Gay marriage" is an oxymoron, a contradiction in terms.
While I agree that it should be easier for pairs or groups of people to arrange their affairs as they wish, there is no reason why homosexuals should expect to receive the benefits of monogamous heterosexuality. If homosexuals truly wanted marriage, they would simply marry someone of the opposite sex. But marriage is not what they want.
Post by: BrokenPaw on May 25, 2006, 09:45:35 AM
Quote from: richyoung
from http://www.dollarsandsense.org/archives/2004/0504gluckman.html
from:http://www.renewamerica.us/columns/shroder/040229
When I asked for cites, I didn't mean "cites from polititically-motivated publications that agree with you". I meant "cites from neutral sources." I would like to see a survey, perhaps, of gay people asking them why it is that they want to be able to marry. from:http://www.renewamerica.us/columns/shroder/040229
Oh, and quotes from "activists" do not represent the main base of gays and lesbians any more than quotes from abortion-clinic bombers represent the main base of pro-life people.
Quote from: richyoung
Quote
Yes, I can pontificate baselessly as well.
You are the one who just mentioned ad hominem attacks, yet you commit them yourself...Quote from: richyoung
...adding attempted reducto ad absurdio to your ad hominem repertoire? Needs work...
Let's recap. You stated that you knew two whole gay people, in response to someone asking how it was that you knew so much about their agenda. I responded in kind, saying that I know even more black people, so I must have a handle on their agenda. Oh. I see. Your logic obviously carries water, whereas my use of the same logic to demonstrate the flaw in yours is somehow lacking? Gosh.
Quote from: richyoung
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Yes? So? While in school, did you EVER have a 4-gigahertz computer sitting on your desk? And so what if you did or did not?
Rrelevance to discussion?You cannot lay the intellectual corruption of today's your entirely at the feet of the public schools, and you cannot assume that anyone who has a viewpoint different that yours must have gotten it from the public schools and is otherwise devoid of independent thought.
Quote from: richyoung
Quote
People learn from things besides school.
SOME do - others never learn anywhere.Quote from: richyoung
WRONG - a gay man has JUST as much "right" to marry as a stright man - he just has to marry a woman, just like a straight man.
Straw man. It's just as wrong as if you lived in a country that had an official and legally-enforced religion. Say, "Islam". If you said, "I want the right to practice my own religion," and I said, "You have the same rights as everyone else...you have the right to be muslim".It's not about people having the right to do what you want them to do, Rich. It's about them having the right to be free to do what they want, absent causing harm to others. If I want to marry a cat, unless you can demonstrate in some concrete way how that harms you, you've no legitimate cause to object.
You have the right to object, of course, but forcing a law to prevent it is thuggist statism just as much as passing a law to keep the law-abiding from having guns just because you fear them.
Quote from: richyoung
The rest of your objections could be easily addressed with a thing called a "power of attorney" - except that most gay men are too busy hopping from partner to partner to fill out such paperwork.
Ad hominem. Try again.Quote from: richyoung
Religious people have JUST as much right to political power and to exert pressure, collectively or otherwise, as any other balkanized special interest group.
Well, yes, of course they do. That part's not in debate. They have the right to say anything they wish. That doesn't mean that what they say is right. Quote from: richyoung
Again, if your position for change can't win a majority in a democracy, its going to be a long hard road - unless you can convince 5 of 9 supremes to violate their oaths of office and "magic" your position into law, in violation of the Constitution, but not, unfortunately, precedent.
If my position can't win a majority, then chances are it won't change the law of the land. Oh, but wait! We weren't talking whether a majority agrees or not. We were talking about the reasons behind why the majority feels the way they do.I'm going to guess, Rich, and (seriously) please forgive me if I'm wrong. I'm going to guess that you're opposed to abortion, because you believe it to be morally wrong. Yet it's legal in many places in the country. Does the existence of that legal status change in your mind the rightness or wrongness of the base issue? I'm going to further guess that it does not.
Whether or not gay marriage is legal isn't the point of this debate. Whether it should be, and what the reasons for and against it, are the points of this debate. Saying, "More people agree with me than with you" doesn't change the underlying truths.
500 years ago, everybody knew the Earth was flat. Did them all agreeing on that point make it so?
Quote from: richyoung
If I can be forced to wear seatbelts and motorcycle helmets, and my drinking and smoking be heavily taxed and regulated, on the argument that my "dangerous behavior" causes health care costs to rise for everyone, then the sodomistic activities that have spead AIDS, the new "black death", as well as skyrocketing rates of other diseases, can be regulated for the very same reason.
Somewhere, way back in the hinterlands of my youth....I recall a saying my father used...what was it? What could it have been? Oh yes: "Two wrongs don't make a right."Sorry, defending an injustice by pointing out a different injustice is worth zero Debate Points.
Quote from: richyoung
When I don't have to "click it or ticket" anymore, then let the anonymous AIDS parties ensue...
Ad hominem. The people who want to have "AIDS parties", as you put it, are not waiting for legislation. The people who are hurt by the lack of legal gay marriage are the men and women who are in secure, long-term committed relationships, and who want the same legal recognition as straight folks who are in secure, long-term committed relationships.Quote from: richyoung
Wrong - its to create a stabile environment in relationships that are very likely to produce children, without invading the privacy of everyone to determine actual proclivity and fertility. The absence of children is exactly why neither gay adoption or marriage is needed.
If that's the case, then why allow a sterile man or woman to marry at all? The absence of children is exactly why neither adoption or marriage is needed.Quote from: richyoung
NOT "just as" - NOTHING approaches the level of promiscuity that gay men demonstrate.
Very well. I will grant you that point. I don't know it for a fact, but I can't refute it with facts either. So a bunch of gay men are promiscuous. So what? What does that have to do with the non-promiscuous ones getting married? A bunch of college kids are promiscuous, too. Should we ban straight marriage as a result?There are an awful lot of gang-bangers in the inner city gangs who kill each others with guns. What does that have to do with law-abiding people buying guns for legal purposes?
Answer: Nothing. Just like the promiscuity of a vocal few has nothing to do with the rights of others.
Quote from: richyoung
Its called a "judeo-christian" heritage. Get over it. Like it or not, this nation was, and is, a Christian nation, with attendant principles. Want different principles? Either convince 50.1% or move.
Ah! The ever-popular like-it-or-get-out debating tool! Hmm. There are all sorts of things that are part of the "Judeo-Christian" heritage that we would not stand for today: Public stonings for minor crimes. Crucifixion for thievery. Drawing and quartering. Burning or drowning for mere suspicion of being a witch. More or less the entire Spanish Inquisition. A Crusade or two. Minor stuff like that.This is not a Christian nation. It is a nation that was formed by many people who were Christian, and some who were not. The principles of the nation are evidenced in its laws. The nation's laws supported slavery for more than half a century. If this country were guided by the Judeo-Christian heritage, how can slavery have ever existed at all? Either the heritage itself is flawed, or its implementation in law was flawed. And if the latter is true, how can we be certain that it's not still flawed and in need of correction?
-BP
Post by: BrokenPaw on May 25, 2006, 09:49:34 AM
Quote
If homosexuals truly wanted marriage, they would simply marry someone of the opposite sex. But marriage is not what they want.
Um...what?You're saying that if they truly wanted to have a committed, long-term, legally-protected relationship with the person they love, with next-of-kin rights, inheritance rights, and so on...they'd marry a person they don't love, because...that...makes some sort of sense?
I'm honestly completely baffled.
-BP
Post by: Headless Thompson Gunner on May 25, 2006, 10:07:31 AM
Marriage means a lifelong, committed, home/family-building relationship between a man and a women. Nobody is preventing any gay or lesbian individual from entering into a marriage.
Gays don't want marriage, they want want a man/man or woman/woman relationship. Neither of those arrangements constitute a marriage. Gays want something that isn't a marriage, but they wanna mis-label it as a marriage.
Nobody is telling them they can't have a marriage. Nobody is telling them that they can't have a lifelong, loving, happy relationship with someone of their same sex. But simple reality is that it's impossible to have both at the same time. The two are mutually exclusive. They're self-contradictory.
Post by: BrokenPaw on May 25, 2006, 10:13:25 AM
Quote
Marriage means a lifelong, committed, home/family-building relationship between a man and a women. Nobody is preventing any gay or lesbian individual from entering into a marriage. The thing is, gays don't want marriage, they want something different.
Oh. Yes. You're correct. What they want is the legal recognition of their stable, long-term male-male or female-female relationship. The same legal recognition that the government already gives to the union of "marriage" that the church has defined (and is free to define) as "one man, one woman". If we're going to pick nits about the term, then the rest of the debate is meaningless.
But the point still stands that the government has no business saying "these two consenting adults are legally recognised as kin, whereas these two are not and cannot be, because it's wrong in the religious canon of someone else."
-BP
Post by: Headless Thompson Gunner on May 25, 2006, 10:24:18 AM
Just don't call that a marriage. It isn't. Calling it a marriage is offensive to those of us who practice any of several religions, to those of us who hold traditional American/western values, and to those of us who respect the critical importance of families and marriages. Social re-engineering is not something the State should be empowered to do.
If gays want a marriage, they can have one. If they want a State-recognized partnership with their same-sex partner, then they can have that instead. But they can't have both at the same time.
Post by: AJ Dual on May 25, 2006, 10:24:54 AM
My wife and I do know several gay people, (community theater, go figure) and on the issue, they are all over the map. It seems to me that there are three distinct camps in the "gay community" over the gay marriage issue.
1. The large group of gays that wants gay marriage as a "civil rights victory", whether they're personally interested in being married, or not.
2. The smaller group of gays that is in a long-term committed relationship, and perhaps has a legitimate feeling of being discriminated against that the cannot codify their relationship in the same way as hetero couples.
3. The other large (and silent) group of gays, that thinks gays who want to be married are "crazy" and feel it's forsaking what they view as one of the few (to them) advantages of being gay, namely avoiding the financial burdens of marriage/family, and the loss of social and personal freedom they enjoy.
Where that leaves us, I don't know. I can say that I do agree with those that homosexuality has always been with us, and always will be with us. (A tired example, but Ancient Greece, Rome, etc. come to mind&) Despite the massive increase in social acceptance, being openly gay still carries a huge personal stigma, and I can't fathom anyone "choosing" to be gay, any more than I "chose" to be hetero. The thought of being either physically or romantically attracted to another man is so alien to me, I can only personally conclude there's a biological mechanism behind most homosexuality, although I recognize that proof has not yet truly been found.
However, I also think that those who are pointing out that they believe the gay marriage movement is in part a cynical ploy to exploit the Insurance/AIDS/Marriage connection are onto something. To those who demand "proof" of it, it's brought up by proponents themselves in every state that's having a gay marriage battle right now. And the Libertarian contract solution would solve it, because under a Libertarian system that allowed same-sex marriage contracts, insurers would not be forced to insure anyone they didn't want to. If gay marriage were suddenly legal, and all insurance carriers refused to cover same-sex spouses. Too bad.
The gay community, and it's supporters would, of course, be free to form their own insurance company. Good luck.
Although in the meantime, I think that the inheritance and medical custody issues are overblown. They're easily addressed through wills, trusts, and durable powers of attorney. The maudlin example of a partner being refused the right to see or consult in medical decisions for his or her partner dying of AIDS by unnactepting family is trotted out constantly. I'm sure it's happened, but I'm also sure it's rare. And now that the gay community is aware of the problem, they should have powers of attorney drawn up if they are in a comitted relationship. I haven't looked, but I'd be very surprised if there weren't gay-rights or community groups that offer this service pro-bono...
That's what I like about Libertarian solutions to problems. Everywhere a Libertarian policy creates a new freedom, it also takes away the "free lunch" that would allow people to avoid the consequences of such freedom as well.
In the meantime, I intend to vote against gay marriage referendums or proposals, and for politicians that oppose it, not on any particular grounds against gay marriage per-se, but because I believe the state does not have an interest in it. I am against the state's current interest in "conventional marriage" as well, and I see no benefit to extending that improper interest to other classes of people. To do so is like saying my neighbor was mugged, so it's only fair I should be too.
Post by: zahc on May 25, 2006, 10:30:46 AM
Quote
It is NOT appropriate to try to re-engineer the national culture to serve your own selfish needs.
No it IS appropriate to try to re-engineer a bigoted national culture to promote freedom and equality.What is NOT appropriate is attempting to uphold the status quo to serve your own selfish, religious needs.
Post by: BrokenPaw on May 25, 2006, 10:47:20 AM
Quote
If the question is one of legal recongition, then grant the appropriate legal recognition to gays who've entered into a lifelong relationship. Work out the details with the insurance companies, use a power of attorney or change the law to accomodate for next-of-kin issues, and so forth.
This is more or less what I was talking about. Get the government out of the "marriage" business, let the churches "marry" as they see fit.I'm sorry that the use of the term "marriage" as applied to gay couples offends you. But objection over the term used should not invalidate the underlying principle. Some people will refer to it as "marriage", no matter what its official term is, just as many people will refer to a facial tissue of any brand as a "Kleenex". Doesn't mean it's accurate, but it is part of common usage.
And while the Christians may think that the fact that the term "marriage" is theirs alone to use, it's not; a Justice of the Peace can perform a "marriage". That makes it a non-religious term; if it's non-religious, it can apply to anyone the state says it can apply to.
Even those of us legally joined in a wild-and-crazy hedonistic Pagan ceremony in the woods refer to ourselves as "married".
It's just a word, folks.
-BP
Post by: roo_ster on May 25, 2006, 11:21:44 AM
Where I (and the vast majority) get irate and lose sympathy is when the norm breakers want to make the rules for everyone and glom onto a term and institution that already has meaning.
So sorry, but bents don't get to make the rules for straights.
Oh, gov't does have an interest in marriage. It is awfully hard to have a country without the births of new citizens. Also, a gov't that is looking out for the security of its citizens understands that male/female marriage is the best way to ensure that men are less destructive and children more likely to be successful...thus costing citizens fewer dollars in support and fewer crimes to clean up afterwards.
Post by: Gewehr98 on May 25, 2006, 11:54:39 AM
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I'm sorry that the use of the term "marriage" as applied to gay couples offends you.
Crocodile tears, from what I've read of the previous dialogue on the thread.Religiously, I find homosexuality an abomination in the eyes of the Lord. Morally, I find it repulsive.
However, it does seem quite fashionable to be gay in today's society, and more than once I've considered that aspect of being upwardly mobile as an incentive to espouse such a lifestyle. However, my religious and moral objections still take precedent.
Regardless, I will not persecute or go out of my way to make life miserable for those who choose that path. I'm relatively open-minded, but not so open-minded my brain fell out. I was fortunate enough as part of my military career to monitor, inventory and exhume graves in Bosnia/Serbia, and have seen the worst of mankind when they don't particularly like another group. (Put that into your 17 year-old pipe of San Francisco wisdom, Winston, and then ask us why we think your opinion needs a little more time to mature)
However, those institutions I find sacred, to include marriage, I will most definitely defend from that which I find abominable and repugnant. I'll do that by what appears to be the only means legally available in this day and age - by lobbying and voting. Hopefully, I can contribute another 40 years or more of grief to those who would have Christianity labeled "a passing fad".
Mike, that reminded me of when I carried my rifle to school on the school bus prior to 1980, and nobody so much as batted an eye. We had Junior Rifle Club on Thursday afternoons in the grade school locker room, where there was a rimfire backstop set up at 50 feet, and we had 3 separate relays of shooters, the program was so popular. Could you imagine that type of program trying to exist today?
Post by: Headless Thompson Gunner on May 25, 2006, 12:13:09 PM
Quote from: zahc
Quote
It is NOT appropriate to try to re-engineer the national culture to serve your own selfish needs.
No it IS appropriate to try to re-engineer a bigoted national culture to promote freedom and equality.What is NOT appropriate is attempting to uphold the status quo to serve your own selfish, religious needs.
There is nothing unfair or discriminatory or uequal about the status quo. Gays are as free to marry as straights. The rules apply equally to everyone: any man is free to marry his wife, and any woman is free to marry her husband.
If there are benefits or legal standigs afforded to straight couples but denied to gay couples, then let's change that. But we don't need to coerce everyone else into accepting a new definition of marriage in order to accomplish that.
Quote from: BrokenPaw
And while the Christians may think that the fact that the term "marriage" is theirs alone to use, it's not; a Justice of the Peace can perform a "marriage". That makes it a non-religious term; if it's non-religious, it can apply to anyone the state says it can apply to.
Therein lies the crux of the matter. Marriage transcends religion and Christianity. You're right, marriage is non-religious. But marriage also transends government and the leftists. They didn't create marriage, history did. Yet they act like it is theirs to do with as they please. And the rest of us have to go along with their whims, or else be called bigotted or backwards or discriminatory or whatever.I have a problem with that. I don't try to make my own rules whenever it suits me. I consider it to be arrogant and self-centered when other people do.
Post by: Trisha on May 25, 2006, 01:02:25 PM
Fascinating, insightful thread as a whole; please, continue!
Post by: richyoung on May 25, 2006, 01:41:38 PM
Quote from: BrokenPaw
When I asked for cites, I didn't mean "cites from polititically-motivated publications that agree with you". I meant "cites from neutral sources."
Neutrality, or lack thereof, has no bearing on VERACITY. Do your "line drawing" somewhere else please.Quote
I would like to see a survey, perhaps, of gay people asking them why it is that they want to be able to marry.
A survey of pedophiles and rapists would reveal that "the victim wanted it", a survey of Nazis would reveal that their concentration camp/cremetorium victims were "subhuman" - doesn't make it true.... what was that about NEUTRAL sources again???Quote
Oh, and quotes from "activists" do not represent the main base of gays and lesbians any more than quotes from abortion-clinic bombers represent the main base of pro-life people.
As one who remembers the great "Heterosexual AIDS epidemic" that was used to politically coerce research funding all out of proportion to the actual need for a disease that is 100% preventable, I am a little sceptical and search for hidden agendas - and the extremist always drive the agenda, esp. with incrimentalism.Quote
Quote from: richyoung
Quote
Yes, I can pontificate baselessly as well.
You are the one who just mentioned ad hominem attacks, yet you commit them yourself...Quote
Quote from: richyoung
...adding attempted reducto ad absurdio to your ad hominem repertoire? Needs work...
Let's recap. You stated that you knew two whole gay people,...Quote
You cannot lay the intellectual corruption of today's your entirely at the feet of the public schools,...
Yes I can. In fact I did so - and I think you will find the majority agrees with me, seeing as how the public school system has a largely captive audience whom they then proceeed to brain wash under the GUISE of "educating" them - many never realize the difference.Quote
It's not about people having the right to do what you want them to do, Rich. It's about them having the right to be free to do what they want, absent causing harm to others. If I want to marry a cat, unless you can demonstrate in some concrete way how that harms you, you've no legitimate cause to object.
in a democracy, some things ARE left to the wil lof the majority. Since our currrent Constitution has NEVER been "interpreted" to allow gay marriage, get an ammendment passed... IF you can. Otherwise, shut up and deal with it.Quote
Quote from: richyoung
The rest of your objections could be easily addressed with a thing called a "power of attorney" - except that most gay men are too busy hopping from partner to partner to fill out such paperwork.
Ad hominem. Try again.Quote
500 years ago, everybody knew the Earth was flat. Did them all agreeing on that point make it so?
You are having a real problem with facts. All educated people knew otherwise - else how did Columbus get the idea to try to sail to India?Quote
Quote from: richyoung
If I can be forced to wear seatbelts and motorcycle helmets, and my drinking and smoking be heavily taxed and regulated, on the argument that my "dangerous behavior" causes health care costs to rise for everyone, then the sodomistic activities that have spead AIDS, the new "black death", as well as skyrocketing rates of other diseases, can be regulated for the very same reason.
Somewhere, way back in the hinterlands of my youth....I recall a saying my father used...what was it? What could it have been? Oh yes: "Two wrongs don't make a right."Quote
The people who are hurt by the lack of legal gay marriage are the men and women who are in secure, long-term committed relationships, and who want the same legal recognition as straight folks who are in secure, long-term committed relationships.
Who gets to decide what "marriage" means? Society. Want to change what it means? COnvinve society. That hasn't happened yet.Quote
If that's the case, then why allow a sterile man or woman to marry at all?
Because some "sterile" men aren't, because there are such things as sperm banks, andin the last analysis, its none of the state's business who is, and isn't fertile.Quote
Quote from: richyoung
Its called a "judeo-christian" heritage. Get over it. Like it or not, this nation was, and is, a Christian nation, with attendant principles. Want different principles? Either convince 50.1% or move.
Ah! The ever-popular like-it-or-get-out debating tool! Hmm. There are all sorts of things that are part of the "Judeo-Christian" heritage that we would not stand for today: Public stonings for minor crimes.Quote
Crucifixion for thievery. Drawing and quartering. Burning or drowning for mere suspicion of being a witch. More or less the entire Spanish Inquisition. A Crusade or two. Minor stuff like that.
Got anything thats happened in, like the last 200 or so years? Youknow, since there WAS a "United States"?Quote
This is not a Christian nation. It is a nation that was formed by many people who were Christian, and some who were not.
Wrong again. The "In God We Trust" on the money is a reference to a Judeo-Christian god. Both houses of the legislature open with a Judeo-Christian prayer. The judicial branch swears in witnesses on a Christian bible, and many Christian holidays are official government holidays. Chaplains are provided to our armed forces, the vast majority of them Judeo-Christian. Many of the original Thirteen Colonies were founded by ...various Christian sects. Hows that foot taste?Quote
The principles of the nation are evidenced in its laws. The nation's laws supported slavery for more than half a century. If this country were guided by the Judeo-Christian heritage, how can slavery have ever existed at all?
There is nothing in the Judeo-Christian heritage that specifically prohibits slavery, although slaves arre admonished to be "faithful servants" as part of their obligation to God. For that matter, how can slavery be prohibited, but young men, (and ONLY men....) forced into the armed forces against their will, possibly to die?Quote
Either the heritage itself is flawed, or its implementation in law was flawed. And if the latter is true, how can we be certain that it's not still flawed and in need of correction?
-BP
Fine - convince a majority that it needs to be. Thats how it works. That hasn't happened yet.
-BP
Post by: Ron on May 25, 2006, 01:57:22 PM
Quote
While in school, did you EVER:
1. Hear anything BAD about the United Nations?
2. Hear anything GOOD about the pre-WWII isolationist movement in the US?
3. Hear anything BAD about Franklin Delano Roosevelt?
4. Hear anything GOOD about Richard Nixon?
5. Hear anything GOOD about private gun ownership?
6. Hear anything BAD about the anti-war movement in the 1960's US?
7. Hear anything GOOD about the Confederacy?
8. Hear anything BAD about Abraham Lincoln and the Union?
High School Class of 82. No to all above.1. Hear anything BAD about the United Nations?
2. Hear anything GOOD about the pre-WWII isolationist movement in the US?
3. Hear anything BAD about Franklin Delano Roosevelt?
4. Hear anything GOOD about Richard Nixon?
5. Hear anything GOOD about private gun ownership?
6. Hear anything BAD about the anti-war movement in the 1960's US?
7. Hear anything GOOD about the Confederacy?
8. Hear anything BAD about Abraham Lincoln and the Union?
Big government cannot be all things to all people.
The answer is not using government coercion to force Christian ethics on Gay folk or vice versa.
The answer is truly limited government. Get em out of the social engineering business.
Post by: BrokenPaw on May 25, 2006, 06:13:13 PM
I will respond to your post. Unfortunately I will be away from my computer from now through the weekend, so I won't be able to take the time to properly respond until probably Tuesday.
-BP
Post by: cosine on May 25, 2006, 07:02:26 PM
Quote from: Gewehr98
Religiously, I find homosexuality an abomination in the eyes of the Lord. Morally, I find it repulsive.
However, it does seem quite fashionable to be gay in today's society, and more than once I've considered that aspect of being upwardly mobile as an incentive to espouse such a lifestyle. However, my religious and moral objections still take precedent.
Regardless, I will not persecute or go out of my way to make life miserable for those who choose that path. I'm relatively open-minded, but not so open-minded my brain fell out. I was fortunate enough as part of my military career to monitor, inventory and exhume graves in Bosnia/Serbia, and have seen the worst of mankind when they don't particularly like another group. (Put that into your 17 year-old pipe of San Francisco wisdom, Winston, and then ask us why we think your opinion needs a little more time to mature)
However, those institutions I find sacred, to include marriage, I will most definitely defend from that which I find abominable and repugnant. I'll do that by what appears to be the only means legally available in this day and age - by lobbying and voting. Hopefully, I can contribute another 40 years or more of grief to those who would have Christianity labeled "a passing fad".
My views exactly. Thank you, you saved me the trouble of having to type it all out. However, it does seem quite fashionable to be gay in today's society, and more than once I've considered that aspect of being upwardly mobile as an incentive to espouse such a lifestyle. However, my religious and moral objections still take precedent.
Regardless, I will not persecute or go out of my way to make life miserable for those who choose that path. I'm relatively open-minded, but not so open-minded my brain fell out. I was fortunate enough as part of my military career to monitor, inventory and exhume graves in Bosnia/Serbia, and have seen the worst of mankind when they don't particularly like another group. (Put that into your 17 year-old pipe of San Francisco wisdom, Winston, and then ask us why we think your opinion needs a little more time to mature)
However, those institutions I find sacred, to include marriage, I will most definitely defend from that which I find abominable and repugnant. I'll do that by what appears to be the only means legally available in this day and age - by lobbying and voting. Hopefully, I can contribute another 40 years or more of grief to those who would have Christianity labeled "a passing fad".
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 25, 2006, 07:03:59 PM
Quote from: BrokenPaw
Quote
If homosexuals truly wanted marriage, they would simply marry someone of the opposite sex. But marriage is not what they want.
Um...what?You're saying that if they truly wanted to have a committed, long-term, legally-protected relationship with the person they love, with next-of-kin rights, inheritance rights, and so on...they'd marry a person they don't love, because...that...makes some sort of sense?
I'm honestly completely baffled.
-BP
Post by: zahc on May 25, 2006, 08:59:20 PM
My lit teacher used to tell me that language truly is power. He was very right. I give up. Honestly, I can't understand why people can love a word so much as to refuse to give any ground or be realistic about how it's being used in the real world. As an areligous person, it's amazingly silly. Marriage...I think it means heterosexual marriage, and I use it as such. But lots of people don't, because to them marriage is not necessarily a covenant made before God, it something you can do in a courthouse and have reversed whenever you feel like it. That's what you get for involving government in your precious instutution. It's too late to take your word back now. There is no point in lobbying to protect the usage of a word! How is that more important than the real ramifications of the issue?
As I stated in the first post, the government should never intefered in marriage to start with. If that was the case than they wouldn't be corrupting the Christian's institution. Why can't the Christians see that and realize that the solution is not to attempt to get the government to enforce thier admittedly and necessarily intolerant viewpoints on a population that it has to treat equally under the law, but rather to wash their hands of the whole mess and separate their religous ceremonies from legal paperwork?
Again, the only answer that makes sense to me is that they enjoy using the government to shape society toward their religious goals, as people in this thread have admitted to explicitly or otherwise.
I'm a religiously tolerant person, but when you stray from the non-aggression priciple and attempt to evangelicize not through example and teaching, but through coercion, you cross the line into being everything BAD that there is about religion, my hackles stand up, you end up grouped right with any other freedom-limiting tyrannical institution in my book.
Post by: Winston Smith on May 25, 2006, 09:55:20 PM
Quote
Just don't call that a marriage. It isn't. Calling it a marriage is offensive to those of us who practice any of several religions,
The New PCAnd by new I mean extremely old. At least they can't burn me at the stake for thinking different anymore, just ridicule me.
Quote
I was fortunate enough as part of my military career to monitor, inventory and exhume graves in Bosnia/Serbia, and have seen the worst of mankind when they don't particularly like another group. (Put that into your 17 year-old pipe of San Francisco wisdom, Winston, and then ask us why we think your opinion needs a little more time to mature)
I've seen a little bit of what mankind can do to itself too, and part of it is in the form of not acknowledging that others may be different from you yet still deserve the same opportunities.You know, based on skin color, social status, gender, sexual orientation... or even age.
Quote
Sigh. I'm a bigot, just because I hold a diferent viewpoint than you. (And they say ther we are the intolerant ones...)
Don't try and make that out to be an ad hominem. Your opinion on this matter is bigoted because it's intolerant. And saying you can't be intolerant of intolerance is like saying you can't kill someone for trying to kill you.Quote
So sorry, but bents don't get to make the rules for straights.
Obviously, and visa versa. That's called freedom.Quote
There is nothing unfair or discriminatory or uequal about the status quo. Gays are as free to marry as straights. The rules apply equally to everyone: any man is free to marry his wife, and any woman is free to marry her husband.
And all jews are free to go to the gas chamber.That aint freedom my friend.
Quote
And the rest of us have to go along with their whims, or else be called bigotted or backwards or discriminatory or whatever.
How does this directly affect you? And don't talk about medical care costs, or insurance, because your argument right now is centered around the sanctity of marriage.Quote
the public school system has a largely captive audience whom they then proceeed to brain wash under the GUISE of "educating" them - many never realize the difference.
the religious system has a largely captive audience whom they then proceeed to brain wash under the GUISE of "saving" them - many never realize the difference.Quote
I am becoming used to a lack of intellectual rigourousness in your posts,
Strong and bitter words indicate a weak cause.And seriously, the meanings of words change. It's okay. Society changes. And if you feel the need to not change with it, well, that's your right, but at least let it change around you. Seeing as it's none of your buisness.
And PS the promiscuity of gay men is due to the fact that they are men, not gay. It's a human thing, not a gay thing.
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 26, 2006, 03:05:20 AM
Quote from: zahc
Man, there are a lot of people that have totall hijacked the debate into arguing over the meaning of a simple word.
No, it is far more than semantics.
Post by: Ron on May 26, 2006, 03:19:49 AM
Quote
Again, the only answer that makes sense to me is that they enjoy using the government to shape society toward their religious goals, as people in this thread have admitted to explicitly or otherwise.
On both sides my friend.The more progressive types are trying to force a majority of Americans accept something they find morally wrong, and they are using the coercive power of government to do this.
The laws of the land will reflect someones ethical code, they do not exist in a vacuum
To infer that the progressives and secularists are NOT using government to reach their goals of what society should look is contrary to what is obvious to any one paying attention. The leftists use the court system to engineer away the will of the people on a regular basis.
Post by: richyoung on May 26, 2006, 04:47:27 AM
Quote from: Winston Smith
Quote
the public school system has a largely captive audience whom they then proceeed to brain wash under the GUISE of "educating" them - many never realize the difference.
the religious system has a largely captive audience whom they then proceeed to brain wash under the GUISE of "saving" them - many never realize the difference.Quote
Quote
I am becoming used to a lack of intellectual rigourousness in your posts,
Strong and bitter words indicate a weak cause.Post by: Guest on May 26, 2006, 07:32:20 AM
Cripes. I find lots of things morally repulsive but don't figure its my government's job to mandate people stop doing them.
Post by: Guest on May 26, 2006, 07:33:20 AM
Post by: zahc on May 26, 2006, 07:41:06 AM
Quote
The more progressive types are trying to force a majority of Americans accept something they find morally wrong, and they are using the coercive power of government to do this.
Perhaps it's not obvious that allowing equality with respect to the legal union of couples (I'll stop using the term marriage to keep everyone happy) is PRO-FREEDOM, whereas selectively granting certain privileges to a certain group is DISCRIMINATORY.Coercive power? How can you coerce by giving people something they want? The government is not taking away civil-unions-between-heterosexual-couples-regardless-of-their-religious-beliefs-or-belief-as-to-the-sanctity-of-marriage-which-you-insist-is-the-only-proper-way-to-use-the-term-'marriage' (CUBHCROTRBOBATTSOMWHIITOPWTUTTM). They are only granting it to more people who have no respect for your definition of marriage. This affects you only because it offends your religious beliefs, and to that, I say tough cookie. I respect your religious beliefs as long as they are not tyrannical.
Post by: SteveS on May 26, 2006, 08:13:41 AM
Quote from: Barbara
It doesn't do anything to the sanctity of marriage to let people marry whoever they want. Why aren't the same people griping about letting people decide for themselves who they're going to love trying to ban divorce in our country? The Bible says its immoral and it does destroy marriage. How can you yell about one without being equally strident about the other? Or adultry. How about we start introducing prison sentences for adultry? The Bible recommends execution and it certainly destroys the sanctity of marriage.
Cripes. I find lots of things morally repulsive but don't figure its my government's job to mandate people stop doing them.
Apples and oranges.Cripes. I find lots of things morally repulsive but don't figure its my government's job to mandate people stop doing them.
I don't see Christians going around saying that adultry is ok. They seem to be equally against that. I agree that the sanctity of my marriage is not affected by what others do in theirs.
IIRC, Any biblical death sentence for adultry appears in the OT and is only applicable if you are an Isrealite.
FWIW, adultry is still illegal in MI, but I don't think anyone has been charged since the 1940's.
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 26, 2006, 08:25:16 AM
Quote from: zahc
Perhaps it's not obvious that allowing equality with respect to the legal union of couples (I'll stop using the term marriage to keep everyone happy) is PRO-FREEDOM, whereas selectively granting certain privileges to a certain group is DISCRIMINATORY.
True, but it is equally obvious that homosexuals will receive legal recognition for any actual marriage they enter into, barrying polygamy, incest, age limitations, etc.
Post by: Guest on May 26, 2006, 10:45:27 AM
Post by: richyoung on May 26, 2006, 11:01:44 AM
Quote from: Barbara
Its not apples and oranges. Both are banned in the Bible and only one is the subject of a proposed Constitutional amendment. Why is that, exactly, other than people's discomfort?
One is discouraged, and the other is described as "an abomination". In fact, in the O.T., there was an admonishment that "its better for your seed to go into the belly of a (lady of easy virtue) than to fall on the ground...", implying that adultery/fornication can be the lesser of two evils. No such loophole for homosexual.bestial/pedophilic acts.
Post by: Stand_watie on May 26, 2006, 11:25:28 AM
Quote from: richyoung
Quote from: Barbara
Its not apples and oranges. Both are banned in the Bible and only one is the subject of a proposed Constitutional amendment. Why is that, exactly, other than people's discomfort?
One is discouraged, and the other is described as "an abomination". In fact, in the O.T., there was an admonishment that "its better for your seed to go into the belly of a (lady of easy virtue) than to fall on the ground...", implying that adultery/fornication can be the lesser of two evils. No such loophole for homosexual.bestial/pedophilic acts.Do you have a reference for the "better to sow your seed in the belly of a whore" quotation? I'd like to read it in context as I've never seen it before - I'd just assumed it was either urban legend or one of the Catholic books.
Post by: cordex on May 26, 2006, 12:15:45 PM
Quote from: richyoung
One is discouraged, and the other is described as "an abomination".
In the OT, the punishment for adultery was death for both the adulteror and the adulteress.I'd say that's more than just discouraged.
Quote
In fact, in the O.T., there was an admonishment that "its better for your seed to go into the belly of a (lady of easy virtue) than to fall on the ground..."
Where?
Post by: The Rabbi on May 26, 2006, 01:26:37 PM
Quote from: richyoung
Quote from: Barbara
Its not apples and oranges. Both are banned in the Bible and only one is the subject of a proposed Constitutional amendment. Why is that, exactly, other than people's discomfort?
One is discouraged, and the other is described as "an abomination". In fact, in the O.T., there was an admonishment that "its better for your seed to go into the belly of a (lady of easy virtue) than to fall on the ground...", implying that adultery/fornication can be the lesser of two evils. No such loophole for homosexual.bestial/pedophilic acts.Wearing garments of wool and linen is forbidden but it is not called an abomination.
Post by: Ron on May 26, 2006, 01:51:14 PM
Quote
This affects you only because it offends your religious beliefs, and to that, I say tough cookie. I respect your religious beliefs as long as they are not tyrannical.
The tyranny is having government in the marriage business to begin with. Maybe it wasn't an issue when the country was more homogeneous but that doesn't make it right. There should be contract law for all the privileges that marriage provides and no more Justice of the peace marriages.
How many times do I have to say this? Get government out of the marriage business.
The government should not be placed in a position of perverting a religious institution and offending a large part of their constituency.
Post by: Ron on May 26, 2006, 01:59:01 PM
Hence the need for Christs redemptive work. I never understood the venom toward gay folks. You can be a deacon who lies, fornicates or commits adultery and not get half the grief some poor sexually confused kid gets.
I can't change what the Bible says about homosexuality but I can tell you this, it isn't mentioned in the New Testament hardly at all as compared to many other human failings.
I'll try to love everyone and let God sort it all out.
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 26, 2006, 02:04:38 PM
Quote from: Barbara
It doesn't do anything to the sanctity of marriage to let people marry whoever they want.
It does. The debate over this issue has reduced marriage to a business arrangement. Barbara, I think I could line up a lot more Christians to restrict divorce than I could to outlaw homosexuality. And actually banning homosexuality and refusing to recognize homosexual marriage is a comparison of oranges and orangutans. Homosexuals are free, right now, to "marry" the same sex in any church or other private or public venue that will have them, just not with legal endorsement. But to return to divorce, more Christians would oppose divorce if they didn't have a horse in that race themselves. Sad but true. In any case, Christians shouldn't and usually don't make our political decisions based on the jurisprudence of the Mosaic Law; we believe that phase of God's plan was fulfilled and finished two thousand years ago.
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 26, 2006, 02:06:56 PM
Quote from: GoRon
I can't change what the Bible says about homosexuality but I can tell you this, it isn't mentioned in the New Testament hardly at all as compared to many other human failings.
The Bible seems more concerned with more common sins, but the Old and New Testaments leave no doubt that God disapproves of homosexuality.
Post by: Iain on May 26, 2006, 02:10:38 PM
Are you some kind of level-headed sensible person?
Post by: Guest on May 26, 2006, 02:18:23 PM
People have the right to decide who they will love, who will be their next of kin, who they will legally bind themselves to. We deny that right to those who want to do that with someone of the same gender, which makes no sense from a governmental point of view. If your church doesn't want to marry gays, that's their business and they shouldn't be forced to. But the government should treat all citizens equally, and that means that if you legally sanction marriage, you have to do equally. Gays aren't asking for special rights. They're asking for the same rights you take for granted.
You want to know a secret? Being around gay people sometimes makes me uncomfortable. Especially being around gay men. So what? That's not a basis for a governmental decision.
Post by: Stand_watie on May 26, 2006, 02:51:39 PM
Quote from: GoRon
...I can't change what the Bible says about homosexuality but I can tell you this, it isn't mentioned in the New Testament hardly at all as compared to many other human failings.
I'll try to love everyone and let God sort it all out.
I got interested enough to go do a little researchI'll try to love everyone and let God sort it all out.
New Testament references I could find (multiple accounts of the same prohibition/ situation excluded - eg Mathew, Mark, Luke and John all quoting Christ's Sermon on the mount)
Adultery and fornication forbidden or referred to as wrong (excluding multiple accounts of the same story)
1. Mathew 14: John castigated Herod's wife
2. John 4: The Samaritan woman
3. John 8: The woman brought to the temple to Jesus
4. 1 Corinthians 5: Adultery and Fornication ('you're even worse than the gentiles')
5. Mathew 5: Christ's prohibition
6. Hebrews 13: 'whoremongers and adulterers God will Judge'
7. Mark 10; Christ's prohibition
8. Acts 15: 'abstain from'
9. Romans 1: Describing wicked people
10. 1 Corinthians 6: 'body not for fornication'
11. 1 Cor. 6: "flee fornication"
12. 1 Cor. 7: "avoid fornication"
13. 1 Cor. 10: 'Neither let us commit fornication"
14. 2 Cor. 12: "..bewail fornication"
15. Galatians 5; " works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication...
16. Ephesians 5: "But fornication, and all uncleanness, or covetousness, let it not be once named among you.."
17. Colossians 3: "Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication.."
18. 1 Timothy 1: "Whoremongers"
19. 1 Thessalonians 4: "abstain from fornication"
20. Jude 1: Sins of Sodom and Gomorrah - fornication
21. Romans 13: Repetition of Levitical commandment against adultery
22. James 2: Quotation of commandment
23. 2 Peter 2: shall receive the reward of unrighteousness... Having eyes full of adultery.. cannot cease from sin;
Plus six references in Revelation that I haven't researched the context enough to say.
******
Homosexual activity (including vague and debatable references)
1. Jude 1: referenced Sodom and Gomorrah, mentioned in same context as fornication (#20 above)
2. 1 Corinthians 6: With number 11 above
3. Romans 1: 'Natural use..against nature'
4. 1 Timothy 1: mentioned with fornicators, reference 18 above 'them that defile themselves with mankind'
****
The application for me, from the Christian perspective can be encapsulated in this passage.
1 Cor 6:9 Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.
Everybody I sit in the pews with on Sunday sometimes meets one or another of those definitions. The following verse is the essence of Christianity as I see it.
1 Cor 6:10...And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 27, 2006, 06:09:39 AM
Quote from: Barbara
Not all Christians believe that, Fistful.
I said a number of things about Christians and I don't know which of it you're talking about.Quote
People have the right to decide who they will love, who will be their next of kin, who they will legally bind themselves to. We deny that right to those who want to do that with someone of the same gender, which makes no sense from a governmental point of view.
I can't believe you are going on like this. You know good and well that homosexuals can love whom they wish and that has nothing to do with same-sex marriage. Concerning next of kin and legal contracts, there is only one situation I can think of in which it might be said one has a right to decide who their family will be. That is marriage, into which homosexuals are free to legally enter with anyone who meets the requirements the rest of us must meet. You don't get to marry everyone that you love. Some people love close relations. Some men think they love 8-year-old girls. Some love people who are married to someone else. Some would like to add a second wife to their harem. Some love people of the same sex. There is no reason why we should endorse, via government, any or all of these relationships.Quote
But the government should treat all citizens equally, and that means that if you legally sanction marriage, you have to do equally. Gays aren't asking for special rights. They're asking for the same rights you take for granted.
Wrong. They should have the same rights I do, but no one has the right to make marriage into something that it has never been. Those who would engage in homosexual marriage are asking for the social and legal recognition of marriage when they refuse to be married. If they want to be married, they should get married to someone of the opposite sex. That is what marriage is. Only in the "enlightened" modern Western world can we be so muddled as to be confused about that. Quote
You want to know a secret? Being around gay people sometimes makes me uncomfortable. Especially being around gay men. So what? That's not a basis for a governmental decision.
Uncomfortable? You think morality is about what you're "comfortable" with? I thought that kind of fuzzy thinking was for leftist twits, and I don't think you're one of those.
Post by: zahc on May 27, 2006, 06:28:05 AM
Quote
Wrong. I don't have a right to make marriage into something that it has never been. Those who would engage in homosexual marriage are asking for the social and legal recognition of marriage when they refuse to be married. If they want to be married, they should get married to someone of the opposite sex. That is what marriage is.
(it's a good thing I have short hair)It appears this poster is entirely concerned with his word. So if the government would just not use the term marriage (perhaps marriageII), then he wouldn't care what happened as far as the realistic ramifications of the law. As long as the word marriage is used only according to his definition, than that's what he's concerned with here.
It still amazes me that people care so much about a word. A word that has equavalent meanings in 24 different languages, was probably borrowed from another language to start with, and given the nature of english, will semantically drift into an entirely diffrent meaning in a few decades, and indeed already is. And especially so because the government, who call airguns firearms and hunting rifles assault weapons, have their claws on it. If you didn't want that to happen, you should have kept it separate from government and sued them the instant they tried to endorse a religous institution.
No matter, what this poster is really concerned about is the usage of his word. So as long as we call it 'marriageII', we can 'marriageII' gays, animals, porcelain statues, and sea slugs, nevermind any real world or societal effects it has, just as long as we don't call it 'marriage'. Because you know, his definition is the only correct one, and that's what really matters here....
It's a language cop out. A 'get out of argument free' card. There's a similar phenomenon regarding cities allowing (or not allowing) bikes in public skateparks. Whenever the skaters, who are enjoying their exclusive access, cannot come up with a logical reason why bikes must be excluded, they default to 'it's called a skatepark, not a bikepark'. There is no logical response, because it is not even an arument. Textbook language cop out.
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 27, 2006, 06:51:18 AM
The scorned one does feel that homosexuals have every right to pretend to be married and so amuse themselves freely. He does not, however, feel they have any argument for these sham marriages to deserve legal recognition.
Love and commitment do not a marriage make, otherwise we should consider parents to be married to their children.
Post by: zahc on May 27, 2006, 07:32:10 AM
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 27, 2006, 08:01:07 AM
Article has been removed for further tinkering.
Post by: Guest on May 27, 2006, 08:47:52 AM
Can you name one reason, other than a religious belief, that people should not be able to marry someone of their own gender?
Procreation? Is that required for heterosexuals? Is there a requirement that one be married to have children?
Obviously, no.
I mentioned my discomfort because I cannot fathom any other reason in the world that someone would feel free to deny a portion of our citizenry the right to have a legally recognized relationship with someone they love.
You can say the word means whatever you want. So can I. To me, the word means that you are united as a family, and that you have legal responsibilities and obligatons and legal benefits, as one entity. You say it means something else, but have not been clear on what that is, except it doesn't involve girls marrying girls and boys marrying boys.
If I am married, my spouse cannot be denied access to me if I'm seriously injured. If I'm married, my spouse inherits my property without having to go through legal battles. If I'm married and I die, my spouse automatically gains custody of children we have as a couple. If I'm married and I die, my spouse has pension and social security benefits. If I'm married and my spouse becomes ill, I am entitled to certain leave to care for them. If I'm married and asked to testify against my spouse, I can refuse in most cases. If I'm married and I die, my spouse can determine where my final resting place will be. If I'm married, and my spouse leaves me, I'm entitled to certain property of the marriage and to joint custody of my children.
Etc.
But these only apply because I'm heterosexual. If I were not and the person I wanted to spend the rest of my life with was another woman, I have no guarantees on any of these things.
What exactly does allowing people to marry those of their own gender hurt? It doesn't take away from your marriage at all..yours is what it is. More than 50% of marriages end in divorce. Does that make your marriage less? I've read that 70% of people cheat on their spouses. Does that make your marriage different than what it is? If marriage for gays is made legal, will you feel obligated to marry a man?
The same arguements were made 50 years ago against interracial marriage and they made no sense either.
The only reason to ban marriage of gays is religious and we're not a theocracy. Our government should strive to be objective and apply the law equally to all citizens. If your church wants to refuse to marry gays, I'm fine with that. If you never want to allow a gay person into your house, you should absolutely have that right. But there is no sensible reason on earth for our government to ban the marriage of two individuals of the age of consent.
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 27, 2006, 09:35:20 AM
Post by: Guest on May 27, 2006, 10:55:53 AM
Post by: Guest on May 27, 2006, 11:00:56 AM
Post by: Phantom Warrior on May 27, 2006, 01:09:37 PM
Quote from: Barbara
We do always wonder about the Lutherans, of course.
ELCA, I'm assuming? Missouri Synod is definitely NOT supporting homosexual marriage. And good for them.
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 27, 2006, 03:03:09 PM
Quote
The same arguements were made 50 years ago against interracial marriage and they made no sense either.
Not very familiar with that issue. Which arguments do you think were similar?Quote from: Barbara
Can you name one reason, other than a religious belief, that people should not be able to marry someone of their own gender?
The burden of proof is on those who want to change the law; they must supply reasons.Concerning the semantics of the debate, saying that marriage is just a word leaves some question as to why this mere word is so important to homosexuals. I have no problem with saying that two homosexuals and their children are a family, but my infantry company at Fort Hood was also a family to me. It's a much wider meaning, and I submit that it has always been so used - marriage has never been so widely defined. Just to answer the obvious jab, no there was nothing homosexual going on in Bravo company, so far as I know.
Quote
More than 50% of marriages end in divorce. Does that make your marriage less?
Our current divorce rate is the result of a culture in which divorce is far too easy and far too acceptable. Imagine if business contracts could be severed at any time by either party, and both parties could walk away with little societal disapproval. Of course, legal difficulties increase when children are involved, but so does the negative effect of divorce. The rate itself doesn't hurt my marriage, but the culture makes it very tempting to give up at the first sign of trouble. Then consider that children of divorce have a poor model to follow for thier own relationships, and we can see that it builds upon itself.
Post by: Gewehr98 on May 27, 2006, 06:26:04 PM
Quote
We do always wonder about the Lutherans, of course.
This Wisconsin Synod Lutheran [WELS] is doing just fine, thank you. Although, I'm sure somewhere someone would consider our after-service fellowship of coffee and cookies offensive.
Post by: Gewehr98 on May 27, 2006, 06:32:13 PM
My parents stayed together for the sake of the kids. Once we had left the nest they didn't divorce, and are soon to celebrate their 41st anniversary. They made it work, obviously.
Myself, I'm on Wife #2, but I'm trying hard not to repeat the mistakes of Marriage #1. Maybe some day I'll quit asking myself if I just didn't try hard enough to make things work the first time...
Post by: 280plus on May 28, 2006, 01:33:55 AM
Quote
I'm sure somewhere someone would consider our after-service fellowship of coffee and cookies offensive.
Absolutely. Cake and donuts go with coffee. MILK goes with cookies. What's wrong with you people?
Post by: Guest on May 28, 2006, 04:07:42 AM
Outside of religious belief, what are the reasons for denying the right to marry to a portion of our citizens?
If it makes sense not to allow gays to marry, it will make sense outside of a religious context.
Post by: thebaldguy on May 28, 2006, 09:38:28 AM
Having said that, I don't think I should be considered a law breaker by living with my girlfriend. Many states consider unmarried people living together felony sodomy. Many state don't enforce it, but they never removed it from the books. We've lived together for three decades now. Three decades of breaking the law.
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 28, 2006, 06:46:42 PM
Quote from: Barbara
Ok, let's try this.
Outside of religious belief, what are the reasons for denying the right to marry to a portion of our citizens?
If it makes sense not to allow gays to marry, it will make sense outside of a religious context.
Barbara, you keep asking the same question without acknowledging what I have said. If you do not accept my reasoning, please at least let me know. Perhaps I have merited you ignore list. Outside of religious belief, what are the reasons for denying the right to marry to a portion of our citizens?
If it makes sense not to allow gays to marry, it will make sense outside of a religious context.
This is not a question of "not allowing gays to marry." They are free to marry anyone or anything. The question is why government must expand its understanding of marriage to include a different kind of relationship that doesn't have to do with government's supposed interest in marriage.
Post by: Headless Thompson Gunner on May 28, 2006, 08:17:02 PM
Quote from: Barbara
Ok, let's try this.
Outside of religious belief, what are the reasons for denying the right to marry to a portion of our citizens?
If it makes sense not to allow gays to marry, it will make sense outside of a religious context.
First, nobody is denied the right to marry. If anything, gays already enjoy special protections under the law that are denied to straight individuals. Homosexuals have MORE rights, not less.Outside of religious belief, what are the reasons for denying the right to marry to a portion of our citizens?
If it makes sense not to allow gays to marry, it will make sense outside of a religious context.
Second, rather than asking why we shouldn't change anything, why not tell me why we should be forced to change things? Most Americans find homosexual marriage to be objectionable (and this is not necessarily a religious objection). If you wanna make a change, and in the process force most of your contrymen and women to accept something they strongly disagree with, then the burden is on you to give compelling reasons why. You have to explain BOTH the reasons why the change needs to be made, AND exactly which delegated authority grants government power to force those changes upon all of us.
Third, once marriage is expanded to allow two men or two women to marry, we won't be able to stop there. Some men love more than one women, so let's also expand marriage to accomodate folks who want three-way marriages. Some men love little girls, and in the interests of not discriminating against them we'll have to expand marriage to allow old guys to marry 8 year olds. The single women living next door really loves her cats. She's a nice person, and we can't discriminate against her, so we'll have to expand marriage to allow unions with one's pets (it wouldn't be fair to deny Mischieff and Fluffy and Figaro access to their "domestic partner's" health coverage). Of course, many couples love each other dearly, but only for a few weeks or months at a time. Let's stop insisting that marriage be a life-long affair, and thus allow all American couples the right to marry regardless of their level of commitment. If the un-insured kid next door breaks his arm, perhaps you should be allowed to marry him for the afternoon, so that his injury is covered by your own employee benefits (nevermind that your employer never intended to pay for converage that extends to the entire neighborhood).
"Marrying" you cat is absurd. But really, it's no more absurd than "marrying" someone of the same sex, or "marrying" your 5 best friends, or "marrying" God-only-knows who or what else...
Blech. I have half a dozen non-religious reasons why gay "marriage" is a bad thing, but it's late and I'm tired. I'm going to bed. Goodnight, y'all.
Post by: Oleg Volk on May 28, 2006, 09:21:01 PM
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 28, 2006, 09:34:51 PM
polygamy - marriage with more than one husband or more than one wife.
polygyny - having more than one wife, concubine, etc.
polyandry - having more than one husband, consort, etc.
complex marriage - multiple husbands, multiple wives
Post by: Guest on May 28, 2006, 11:42:19 PM
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 29, 2006, 07:18:32 AM
Quote from: c_yeager
I would also like to see how it has any impact on anyone else whatsoever if two men or two women wish to marry.
Precisely why it doesn't merit government's support, approval or endorsement.
Post by: Iain on May 29, 2006, 07:44:12 AM
We're talking about two consensual adults engaging in some form of contract with each other. Expanding the definition of marriage to include this situation would in no way also expand the definition to include relationships where one party is not a consenting adult. Or would it include cats.
There have been a couple of half-hearted attempts to equate homosexual relationships and paedophilic relationships in this thread. Call it what you like but those attempts have been made, and it says far more about a moral judgement that the poster is making than it does about whether or not homosexual marriage should be legal. You of course have the right to that moral judgement, but for all intents and purposes there is no legal similarity between a relationship between two men above the age of consent and a relationship between an old man and an eight year old girl.
And as for the idea that marriage is a serious concept and that it shouldn't include 'bizarre' relationships like that between a woman and her cat and or a marriage between myself and my best friends - I entirely agree. Sham marriages are ridiculous, but are we really saying that it is not ok for me to marry my cat, or a homosexual to marry his boyfriend and that these are somehow equatable? Again that you would equate the two only highlights a moral judgement about homosexuality on your part.
You've not given one reason so far why two men above the age of consent who are involved in a serious relationship should not be able to 'marry' each other under the eyes of the law.
A change in the law to recognise gay unions would not force any change on you either. I doubt it would make the slightest bit of difference to me, you or anyone who is not homosexual and the marrying type. If you can tell me why and how it would impact you then I'll be interested.
Fistful - I agree that a part of marriage is to raise children (as that is what I interpret your last post to mean). That sits uncomfortably with me in a way because my having children relies on IVF, but anyway, in this country there are certain tax benefits attached to being married aside from having children, and there are certain legal powers and responsibilities too.
Now how about a situation where homosexuals could draw up a contract to enable each to take on those responsibilities (next of kin etc) and that they take out health insurance and the like where the company involved agrees to recognise their relationship as they would recognise marriage. Government would equalise the tax situation by abandoning any tax breaks for being married and would only provide tax breaks and the like for those actually having children, thus the point of marriage (as far as you are concerned) is recognised by government. Homosexuals have some of the attached legal rights that marriage presently entails. It wouldn't be called marriage (legally anyway), it would be a contract, and governments interest in marriage (children) is still recognised. Thoughts?
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 29, 2006, 08:50:24 AM
If I wished to psychologize my opponents as cheaply as you do, I could say that the attempt to equate my position with that of anti-miscegenationists "says far more about a moral judgement (about my point of view) that the poster is making than it does about whether or not homosexual marriage should be legal."
Post by: Stand_watie on May 29, 2006, 09:54:01 AM
Quote from: fistful
Does the state suppress Mormon polygamy in terms of breaking up weddings and/or homes, or do you mean that the state simply does not recognize the additional wives?..
The state actually puts people in prison for polygamy.
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 29, 2006, 10:00:58 AM
Post by: Guest on May 29, 2006, 11:25:07 AM
Quote from: fistful
Quote from: c_yeager
I would also like to see how it has any impact on anyone else whatsoever if two men or two women wish to marry.
Precisely why it doesn't merit government's support, approval or endorsement.By your grossly flawed logic the government *is* supporting, approving, or endorsing heterosexual marriage. WHy dont you justify why that is OK?
Post by: Iain on May 29, 2006, 01:44:37 PM
Quote from: fistful
Iain, if the general, historical taboo against homosexuality has been so swiftly and easily swept away, why not the general, historical taboos against incest and pedophilia? Has homosexuality historically been regarded as less abhorent or less harmful than these other two? I doubt it.
The fundamental difference, historical condemnations aside, is that one is behaviour between two consenting adults and the other is having sex with kids.
Post by: Firethorn on May 29, 2006, 02:07:16 PM
Quote from: fistful
So they are charged with polygamy or bigamy, then, not with statutory rape or some other crime?
Note: This actually plays multiple ways, but I'm defaulting to the usual 'man marries multiple women' thing.I believe that they usually only go after morman polygamists when they fail to pay child support. The laws place such people in very fragile circumstances, the man is basically at the women's mercy if they choose to take him to court.
Bigamy charges come up when one wife doesn't know about the other.
The true problem that comes up is that he's not legally married to any extras, causing issues with inheritance, medical powers, taxes, co-mingled finances, etc... Basically the same issues that the gays are currently having.
For example, let's say that one of the 'undocumented' wives, sadly, ends up in the same situation as Terry Schiavo. The parents would become the legal guardian of her, and they could deny all access to the husband. Now, in Morman America, you know that the parents generally at least tacitly approved of the situation and would probably go along with his wishes, but you can't be sure. Also, if the will isn't perfectly set up, the parents might end up with it all, maybe with or without guardianship of the kids, with the money held in a trust for same.
The tax situation may actually favor the polygamist, since 'single parent' qualifies for all sorts of tax breaks and aid, and legally speaking, the man can't claim the undocumented wives as dependents. Even claiming his kids would be complicated.
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 29, 2006, 02:20:16 PM
Post by: Firethorn on May 29, 2006, 02:24:59 PM
Quote from: fistful
Iain, if the general, historical taboo against homosexuality has been so swiftly and easily swept away, why not the general, historical taboos against incest and pedophilia? Has homosexuality historically been regarded as less abhorent or less harmful than these other two? I doubt it. Could not the physical dangers of the other two be as easily dismissed as the physical danger of homosexuality has been? Or who are you to say that a marriage between a woman and a cat is less valid than a homo or hetero marriage? This is also a personal, moral judgement.
Incest has genetic consequences with any offspring. This gets complicated with many unions today not actually being for reproduction. I mean, you could have a couple people, who, in a completely asexual relationship, decide to enter a civil union for various reasons.As Ian said, pedophilia(acted upon), statutory rape, molestation are all against children, which are not considered competent, thus needing extra protection. Now, there are arguments as to where this occurs, if you survey people, you'll get values ranging from 15-18, with some outliers.
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 29, 2006, 02:27:24 PM
Quote from: Iain
Quote from: fistful
Iain, if the general, historical taboo against homosexuality has been so swiftly and easily swept away, why not the general, historical taboos against incest and pedophilia? Has homosexuality historically been regarded as less abhorent or less harmful than these other two? I doubt it.
The fundamental difference, historical condemnations aside, is that one is behaviour between two consenting adults and the other is having sex with kids.You are primarily wrong, though, in assuming that because I say two things are wrong that I equate them in all particulars.
Post by: Stand_watie on May 29, 2006, 05:07:12 PM
Quote from: fistful
So they are charged with polygamy or bigamy, then, not with statutory rape or some other crime?
Yup.http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a3b0723802d39.htm
Post by: Stand_watie on May 29, 2006, 06:06:27 PM
Quote from: fistful
Quote from: Iain
Quote from: fistful
Iain, if the general, historical taboo against homosexuality has been so swiftly and easily swept away, why not the general, historical taboos against incest and pedophilia? Has homosexuality historically been regarded as less abhorent or less harmful than these other two? I doubt it.
The fundamental difference, historical condemnations aside, is that one is behaviour between two consenting adults and the other is having sex with kids.You are primarily wrong, though, in assuming that because I say two things are wrong that I equate them in all particulars.
One is a case of legality and religious mores, the other is a case of adults abusing children.
Even statutory prohibitions against 'incest' do not neccessarily follow the letter of judeo-christian morality. Don't believe me? Read the bible. 2/3r'ds of states prohibit marriage of 1st cousins, but the Levitical and Deuteronomical prohibitions only include parent or grandparent and child or grand-child, and aunt/uncle and niece and nephew.
You can get it or not regarding consensual sexual activity between adults, but pretty much Kyle and Stan had it right in South Park's Nambla episode...
Quote
NAMBLA LEADER
Rights? Does anybody know their rights?
You see, I've learned something today.
Our forefathers came to this country
because... they believed in an idea. An
idea called "freedom." They wanted to
live in a place where a group couldn't
be prosecuted for their beliefs. Where
a person can live the way he chooses
to live. You see us as being perverted
because we're different from you. People
are afraid of us, because they don't
understand. And sometimes it's easier
to persecute than to understand.
KYLE
Dude. You have sex with children.
NAMBLA LEADER
We are human. Most of us didn't even
choose to be attracted to young boys.
We were born that way. We can't help
the way we are, and if you all can't
understand that, well, then, I guess
you'll just have to put us away.
KYLE
Dude. You have sex with children.
STAN
Yeah. You know, we believe in equality
for everybody, and tolerance, and all
that gay stuff, but dude, *expletive deleted*ck you.
KYLE
Seriously.
Rights? Does anybody know their rights?
You see, I've learned something today.
Our forefathers came to this country
because... they believed in an idea. An
idea called "freedom." They wanted to
live in a place where a group couldn't
be prosecuted for their beliefs. Where
a person can live the way he chooses
to live. You see us as being perverted
because we're different from you. People
are afraid of us, because they don't
understand. And sometimes it's easier
to persecute than to understand.
KYLE
Dude. You have sex with children.
NAMBLA LEADER
We are human. Most of us didn't even
choose to be attracted to young boys.
We were born that way. We can't help
the way we are, and if you all can't
understand that, well, then, I guess
you'll just have to put us away.
KYLE
Dude. You have sex with children.
STAN
Yeah. You know, we believe in equality
for everybody, and tolerance, and all
that gay stuff, but dude, *expletive deleted*ck you.
KYLE
Seriously.
Post by: Headless Thompson Gunner on May 29, 2006, 06:47:01 PM
Quote from: Iain
HTG - you realise that a lot of that post was way off-beam right?
Yeah, I probably wasn't as coherent as I should have been. It was late and I was tired. Sorry.Quote from: Iain
We're talking about two consensual adults engaging in some form of contract with each other. Expanding the definition of marriage to include this situation would in no way also expand the definition to include relationships where one party is not a consenting adult. Or would it include cats.
My point, which was probably lost in the midst of my drowsy ramblings, was that once it's permissible to change marriage to allow homosexual marriages, then there'll be no stopping things. You can't expand marriage to accomodate one particular class of unconventional unions (gay marriages) without also expanding it to accomodate all of the myriad other unconventional unions that our society will come up with. It's a slippery slope of the worst sort. If the concept of marriage is reformed now, then it will be re-reformed again and again, by anyone who can muster enough political clout. "Marriage" will become a meaningless and obsolete idea. Marrying your cat may be out of the question, but a polyandrous marriage between you and your 5 best friends will be no problem. Count on it.
Quote from: Iain
There have been a couple of half-hearted attempts to equate homosexual relationships and paedophilic relationships in this thread. Call it what you like but those attempts have been made, and it says far more about a moral judgement that the poster is making than it does about whether or not homosexual marriage should be legal. You of course have the right to that moral judgement, but for all intents and purposes there is no legal similarity between a relationship between two men above the age of consent and a relationship between an old man and an eight year old girl.
If that is directed at me, then you've completely missed my point. Once we start altering marriage to suit everybody's whim, a concenting union between an older person and a younger person is entirely probable. Discriminating on the basis of age is as wrong as discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation (both logically and legally).I fail to see the difference between two consenting gay men wanting to marry, or two consenting women wanting to marry, or a consenting adult wanting to marrry a consenting youngster. All three situations fall outside the bounds of the proper and traditional idea of marriage, but it seems we're going to throw all the rules out the window. If we're going to coerce society into accepting the first two, why shouldn't we also coerce society into accepting the latter? Afterall, it's just one more of the many uncommon unions that people will want to engage in.
Quote from: Iain
And as for the idea that marriage is a serious concept and that it shouldn't include 'bizarre' relationships like that between a woman and her cat and or a marriage between myself and my best friends - I entirely agree. Sham marriages are ridiculous, but are we really saying that it is not ok for me to marry my cat, or a homosexual to marry his boyfriend and that these are somehow equatable? Again that you would equate the two only highlights a moral judgement about homosexuality on your part.
I agree, sham marriages are rediculous. Bt whose definition shall we adhere to when deciding which marriages are shams? The Christians and/or conservatives and/or originalists have one definition, which considers gay marriage to be a sham. The gays have different idea on which marriages constitute a sham. Paedophiles undoubtedly have their own opinions on the matter. I bet my neighbor who loves her cates genuinely feels that marrying them would NOT be a sham. And on and on... If we're going to change the standards for what a propper marriage is, we'll have to allow somebody to define the new standard. Who shall we grant that boon to? And what recourse shall everyone else have when they disagree with the new standard?
Quote from: Iain
You've not given one reason so far why two men above the age of consent who are involved in a serious relationship should not be able to 'marry' each other under the eyes of the law.
Sigh. I've given several, but perhaps you aren't interested in hearing them. Oh well.I try to learn from my previous errors, so tonight I'll sign off before it gets too late and I degenerate into senseless ramblings. Goodnight y'all.
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 29, 2006, 08:53:22 PM
Quote from: Stand_watie
Why do you equate incest with pedophilia?
I don't know who this question is for, but I do not. In any case, the slippery slope is an interesting and frightening thing to consider, but not the surest argument against homosexual marriage. I am curious, though, why you bring up the difference between Biblical teachings on incest with current American law.
I recognize a difference between adult homosexuality and pedophilia. I also recognize a difference between interracial marriage and homosexual marriage. When someone insists the two latter issues are equivalent, I wonder how long it will be before the two former are held to be the same issue as well. If that time comes, the notion that five-year-olds are not old enough to consent will be mocked as an article of faith. I can hear the refrain now: "Yes means yes. Why should the government tell us who we can love?"
Post by: Iain on May 29, 2006, 11:45:16 PM
Actually I agree that it is an interesting dilemma as to who gets to define marriage, and in a way (although this would never be accepted by the most strident of the homosexual lobby) the best solution is not to call it marriage. That's not a semantic point, the best solution is to create a situation where two men can have next of kin and inheritance rights and the like and not be called Mr and Mr X. It might cheapen the situation for them, but I can imagine certain circumstances where I might engage in such a contract with a long term friend.
if we are going to redefine the concept of marriage though it would simply be a case of saying that it is a civil union between two people who love each other (romantically) and wish to make their love official. That would not apply to cases where the 'love' is just wrong. As the Southpark quote illustrates (for me at least) you can argue the rights of a thing and claim freedoms but some things just are wrong, and having sex with children is one of them, because adult informed consent is not possible where a child is involved, never will be. The reason that I say that to argue that setting aside the homosexual taboo easily means that one day the paedophile taboo may be set aside too is wrong is because there is no similarity legally or, for the vast vast majority, morally. I do understand your point.
Incest between adults: It's very messed up, but I believe social services and the state only get involved where children are concerned (either as abused or born as a result of), is there a specific criminal offence involved? Again though, there is a big difference between my thinking it is ok for Mr Smith and Mr Jones to get it on and thinking that it's just wrong for Mr and Ms Davis (nee Davis) to get it on. Don't think adult incest should be illegal as it involves consenting adults, but certainly if I argue that gay 'marriage' should be legal, I still can't find the slightest grounds for accepting brother/sister marriage, nor see the slightest similarity.
Slippery Slope
Any lawyers out there? Can I decide to delegate next of kin rights and so subsequent rights of visitation and powers of medical attorney and the liike to whomsoever that I wish? And inheritance rights? It's not a solution that will satisfy everyone, but then again we called my dog Theo because nobody expressed much dislike for the name (I wanted to call him Byron or Rabbit).
http://www.stonewall.org.uk/documents/Pre_White_Paper_briefing_June_2003.doc - contains some interesting little notes on intestacy and next of kin powers -
Quote
Inheritance tax
"My partner died in 1995 after 51 years together. In his will I was the sole beneficiary and had to pay £30,688.40 in inheritance tax. Had he married a woman for even one day no tax would have to be paid."
Hospital visits
"My partner was knocked over by a car and rushed to hospital. When I went to be by his side, I found the hospital was under no obligation to let me see or talk to my partner. They didn’t ask my view on his treatment and said that if anything happened, they would only want to talk to his ‘legal’ next of kin, a sister who lived on the other side of the world and who he has not seen in over 15 years."
That paper argues for legal recognition only in four basic areas:"My partner died in 1995 after 51 years together. In his will I was the sole beneficiary and had to pay £30,688.40 in inheritance tax. Had he married a woman for even one day no tax would have to be paid."
Hospital visits
"My partner was knocked over by a car and rushed to hospital. When I went to be by his side, I found the hospital was under no obligation to let me see or talk to my partner. They didn’t ask my view on his treatment and said that if anything happened, they would only want to talk to his ‘legal’ next of kin, a sister who lived on the other side of the world and who he has not seen in over 15 years."
- when one partner becomes ill or incapacitated
- financial and property arrangements
- rights for consultation on medical treatment
- provisions in the event of the death of a partner
I can't see how continuing to deny those basic recognitions achieves anything. Sure that may only be the first step for some, but two men who live together and love each other should not be subject to the whims of recognised next of kin, nor be in any different situation with regards to inheritance tax that a man and a woman should be. In fact I'd argue that it should be entirely possible to have a 'civil union' as a man and a woman if you choose not to be married but wish to have recognition in those four basic areas. Doing any of this is not going to stop the world turning.
Post by: K Frame on May 30, 2006, 02:40:25 AM
5 pages of arguments, of which I've read probably 2 lines.
But, I suspect that I can summarize....
Some people are on one side, some people are on the other.
Moral, ethical, psychological, nature vs. nurture, basic fairness, constitutional, religious, et al arguments have been raised.
Anyone have their mind changed one way or t'other?
Didn't think so.
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 30, 2006, 03:17:30 AM
This is the umpteenth time I've had this debate online, and I do learn more about the issue as I talk to more people about it. I have changed my mind substantially in earlier threads, and continue to refine my point of view where shortcomings are identified.
Post by: K Frame on May 30, 2006, 03:28:53 AM
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 30, 2006, 03:41:30 AM
Quote from: Iain
the best solution is not to call it marriage. That's not a semantic point, the best solution is to create a situation where two men can have next of kin and inheritance rights and the like and not be called Mr and Mr X. It might cheapen the situation for them, but I can imagine certain circumstances where I might engage in such a contract with a long term friend.
Well said. If two or more people desire such legal arrangements, I hope they can get them without a terrible amount of trouble. I don't know if civil unions are required for this, so much as just reducing general red tape. In any case, to make sex or romance a prerequisite for all of this would be a little intrusive. As I may have said earlier, marriage is not so intrusive, as it only deals with already publicly-known facts like gender and family relationships, without asking whether anyone is in love or plans to have sex. Quote from: Iain
if we are going to redefine the concept of marriage though it would simply be a case of saying that it is a civil union between two people who love each other (romantically) and wish to make their love official.
Boy, imagine how the libertarian segment would come down on you if you said that about any other issue.Quote from: Iain
That would not apply to cases where the 'love' is just wrong.
Yeah, that too. Projecting your personal moral beliefs into your politics? Oh my!I was first told of the fallacy of the slippery slope in my college logic class about twelve years ago. I had problems with it from the beginning, and I think I know why, having had more time to think about it. So far as I know, it is not a logical fallacy to illustrate the implications of an opponents argument. But this can easily be labelled a slippery slope. The connection between gun registration and gun confiscation would be an example.
Post by: Iain on May 30, 2006, 04:36:00 AM
Fistful, I've appreciated the conversation. Slippery slope as a fallacy applies where you don't demonstrate a particular causal relationship. You may be able to highlight multiple instances of registration-confiscation and a mechanism, but to say that to allow A means that B will happen without demonstrating any actual link between the two is a fallacy. In this case I can see no link between allowing civil union between two men and that leading in any way to legal recognition of abuse of a minor.
I didn't phrase my love being wrong bit very well. I mean to say that many many people who have no objection to homosexuality will define a distinct difference between it and paedophilia because consent can not be given by a child. Interestingly though when someone raised the subject of Mohammed and his nine year old bride in another thread some time ago I did some research on age of consent laws in the Western world. Age of consent in English common law was 10, and in California it remained so until the 1890's. So yeah I am injecting my moral beliefs about when a child can consent into argument and I accept that criticism. Age of consent is a tough one, some countries have interesting laws about the age gaps that can exist in a sexual relationship until full majority is attained. Anyway enough drift.
We can agree on a basic civil contract set-up (next of kin and the like). That's good. A civil union as a compromise for both heterosexual and homosexual couples doesn't seem a terrible idea. Persuading government that inheritance tax levied on long term cohabitors is going to have to be given up might be a different matter.
Like I said before, I've appreciated the conversation, it's clarified some stuff for me.
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 30, 2006, 06:24:08 AM
Quote from: Iain
So yeah I am injecting my moral beliefs about when a child can consent into argument and I accept that criticism.
Don't take it as a criticism; there's nothing wrong with "imposing your morality" in such a case.
Post by: K Frame on May 30, 2006, 07:21:14 AM
I consider myself to be a Christian, and a conservative Republican.
But, that said, I find it REALLY hard to care enough about other people to the point where I'm interested in their choices of lifestyle, sleeping partner, sexual orientation, or true or perceived legal status.
That really falls under the heading of "not my goddamned business, I don't want to hear about it from you OR anyone else."
Post by: Iain on May 30, 2006, 11:14:44 PM
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/5032196.stm
Post by: m1911owner on May 31, 2006, 09:02:11 AM
Because it is wrong. Because homosexuality is wrong. The Lord stated in Leviticus and Deuteronomy that homosexuality is an abomination worthy of death. He destroyed the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah because of wickedness, and homosexuality was a prominent feature of that wickedness.
Our consciences tell us that homosexuality is wrong; most people feel a great aversion to homosexuality. Those who promote homosexuality have attempted to vilify those warnings of the conscience by pinning the term homophobia on them. Those feelings are not intolerance ; they are the Light of Christ telling you that homosexuality is deeply wrong.
At this point, I expect that some are already screaming, Thats what your bigoted religion says; I dont believe in your god, and will not have your god dictating what I do in my life. I imagine the denizens of Sodom and Gomorrah said exactly the same thing right up until the sky started raining fire.
The Lord did not condemn sexual immorality as an arbitrary and capricious restriction to make life difficult for those who want something different from a lifelong marriage to a person of the opposite sex. Rather history shows us that the nature of mankind is that civilizations that deviate from traditional marriage collapse.
In the early 1930s, British anthropologist J. D. Unwin postulated that civilizations that get rid of smothering sexual taboos would become move vibrant and successful. He studied 86 different cultures throughout recorded historyall the cultures for which records were extant.
He found exactly the opposite of what hed expected: No nation that rejected monogamy in marriage and pre-marital sexual chastity lasted longer than a generation after it embraced sexual hedonism. In Unwins own words: "In human records there is no instance of a society retaining its energy after a complete new generation has inherited a tradition which does not insist on prenuptial and postnuptial continence."
That is Why not Homosexual Marriage. Because we dont want to commit suicide as a society.
Post by: cordex on May 31, 2006, 09:27:38 AM
I mean no disrespect, but have you read Leviticus and Deuteronomy through and through?
Assuming you have, do you support the US government enforcing all of those laws and regulations, or just the ones you like?
Post by: m1911owner on May 31, 2006, 09:46:08 AM
Post by: cordex on May 31, 2006, 10:11:17 AM
Quote
The fact of it being an abomination stands, even if we don't use the Law of Moses as our legal system.
Sure, I agree. As are unclean meats and violation of the Sabbath.But since you're using Leviticus and Deuteronomy as the basis for what you beleive law should allow with regards to homosexual marriage, I thought it would be appropriate to mention that there are other things that OT laws condemn that are legal today and that I hadn't noticed people raising a fuss about.
I believe homosexuality is a sin and wrong. I don't believe it is necessary that the government punish it, nor prohibit it.
Post by: m1911owner on May 31, 2006, 11:33:31 AM
More recently, Pope John Paul II and Pope Bendict XVI have condemned homosexuality and homosexual marriage. And just this last Sunday, the First Presidency of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints sent a letter to all the U.S. congregations reiterating the doctrine that "marriage between a man and a woman [is] the only acceptable marriage relationship," and urging members to contact their U.S. sentators to support the Protection of Marriage Amendment that is due to be presented in the U.S. Senate the week of June 5th.
I once also thought that prohibiting and punishing homosexuality, adultry, and the like were probably not the proper province of government. Having read of the work of Unwin and others, and having seen firsthand the damage that sexual license has caused and is causing to our own civilization, I'm coming around to the idea that it is, in fact, essential that government enforce moral standards in order to prevent the destruction of our civilization.
Post by: Guest on May 31, 2006, 01:36:34 PM
Post by: m1911owner on May 31, 2006, 02:05:51 PM
I have no idea what the Taliban argued. Your comment appears to be "guilt by association"--"The Taliban opposed homosexuality, therefore opposing homosexuality is evil." Obviously, the Taliban took positions on some things that we would consider evil (like flying airplanes into buildings), and some that we consider good (like not robbing the local 7-11).
My argument, in summary, is that 1) The Lord has condemned homosexuality as an abomination, and 2) History shows that civilizations that deviate from chastity outside of marriage and fidelity inside marriage universally collapse. And that these are two reasons not to have homosexual "marriage."
Post by: Guest on May 31, 2006, 02:30:47 PM
1.) My God also condemns the use of pork as food. Would you be comfortable with that as law?
2.) Every civilization collapses eventually. Can't blame them all on gays.
Post by: BillBlank on May 31, 2006, 04:15:20 PM
Firstly my position is that two consenting adults should be able to formalise their relationship, if that option is open to the heterosexual community then why not the rest of the adult population? See Iain's posts for my interpretation of the definition of two consenting adults.
I await solid statistical evidence that there is any significant variation, in the negative direction, between the personal achievement and success of homosexual individuals or societies where it is accepted vs. heterosexuals. Show me some solid numbers.
In my experience the majority of what some of you would call deviants that I have known have been of above average levels of intelligence and attainment. I'd be happy to have them as neighbours. I'm not talking about peadophiles here just BDSM, swinging, group marraiges, transvestites, transexuals etc. etc.
J.D.Unwin eh? Not come across him yet. Off to the library I go. But, seeing as the ancient greeks, the romans, the egyptians, the english navy and upper classes were merrily buggering each other and assorted livestock for hundreds of years and at the same time were running very succesful civilisations I would consider his findings flawed. I mean c'mon, half (no I don't have exact figures, yes that is a guess, but try reading some and you'll see what I mean) of the poetry and epic tales from greece featured homosexuality, god's as animals seducing people or waxed lyrical about young men's firm, rounded buttocks.
The right's or wrongs of homosexuality are not relavant to this question because they are merely opinions of what goes on in someone else's bedroom. I would say that homosexuality is neither right or wrong, merely a state of being and in no way a choice if the existence of a genetic marker for homosexuality should be proven to exist. If that is the case then it's hardwired so wouldn't that make it part of the "PLAN"? The fact of law is that it is considered legal for two adults above a certain age proscribed by law, of whatever sex, to have a sexual relationship. How does it make sense to determine that because they happen to be of the same sex they cannot enjoy the benefits of marriage that are open to heterosexual couples?
Furthermore, to state that you base your opinions on the belief that the bible is the literal word of god requires some clarification on your part. If you have a catholic church nearby go and chat with the father there about this, I did and have the pleasure of counting him as a friend. Educated fellow too, he got me thinking anyway.
First off, which particular bible are you talking about? It's one of the most translated and edited works in the history of humanity. I'm not sure there's even evidence that a hard copy existed of the majority of the scriptures before 300ad. The majority existed as verbal history passed from generation to generation before that point. It's been revised, retranslated, mucked about with and had whole sections dumped in the trash by various king's and popes through the ages, what their motives were when they were guiding that process I wouldn't like to say.
Doesn't the difference between O.T God, all mighty and smitey and N.T God, bit more chilled out, intrigue you? I'm not disputing the possibility of god but I can't see how you can believe that the bible is the word of god. Don't these inconsistencies and all the others I'm to knackered to list point to the possibility that we are dealing with a document that's had a chequered editorial history?
This one facet of one of my favourite debates and something I'm genuinely curious about. There are enough intelligent and pleasant devout person's with faith here, that I also respect, for me to be able to say that if you want, PM me and we'll continue this without boring other people.
Post by: Guest on May 31, 2006, 04:31:55 PM
Maybe it should be a different thread, though.
Post by: Firethorn on May 31, 2006, 05:08:54 PM
Quote from: m1911owner
2) History shows that civilizations that deviate from chastity outside of marriage and fidelity inside marriage universally collapse. And that these are two reasons not to have homosexual "marriage."
History has shown that over time the collapse of civilizations approaches unity, no matter what their views on chastity and fidelity. Besides, I believe that our current divorce and single mother rate is far more a threat to our nation than gay marriage or civil unions could be. Single mothers outnumber gays, and have far more effect on their children.To back it up, the national unmarried mother rate is 32%. Finding what percentage of the population is gay is more difficult(IE the whole 'Bi' thing), but varies between 1-6%
To put it blunty, I believe that having children raised by a loving, dedicated gay couple to be better than for them to be raised by a single, drug addicted, new boyfriend every month mother.
Gays are born to hetero couples every day, yet they're still gay. I think that most gay couples would be far more understanding of a hetero child than many of their hetero parents. Matter of fact, it happens today, especially with lesbian couples. All one has to do is find a 'donor' male and some non-marital sex. Not difficult at all around most college campuses. The genetic father doesn't have to know a thing.
edit - I found BillBlank's line quite insightful.
Quote
J.D.Unwin eh? Not come across him yet. Off to the library I go. But, seeing as the ancient greeks, the romans, the egyptians, the english navy and upper classes were merrily buggering each other and assorted livestock for hundreds of years and at the same time were running very succesful civilisations I would consider his findings flawed. I mean c'mon, half (no I don't have exact figures, yes that is a guess, but try reading some and you'll see what I mean) of the poetry and epic tales from greece featured homosexuality, god's as animals seducing people or waxed lyrical about young men's firm, rounded buttocks.
Indeed, the Egyptions, Greeks, Romans, etc made it far longer than a single generation, thus making your guy's findings suspect.
Post by: Perd Hapley on May 31, 2006, 06:39:58 PM
Quote from: Firethorn
Gays are born
The myth of the gay gene rides again.
Post by: Oleg Volk on May 31, 2006, 07:39:18 PM
Post by: cordex on June 01, 2006, 02:51:09 AM
Quote
If you consider being gay a conscious choice, then why would anyone choose to be a persecuted minority?
I'm not certain whether or not homosexuality is a choice, but people have been known to convert to Judaism, a group which has been known to be a persecuted minority for most of recorded history. I chose to own firearms as a hobby despite an ever-increasing public dislike of shooters.Moreover, in today's society it has become fashionable to be persecuted. Persecution, or perceived persecution is often used as a substitute for validity in political arguments.
Post by: Perd Hapley on June 01, 2006, 03:43:04 AM
Quote from: Oleg Volk
If you consider being gay a conscious choice, then why would anyone choose to be a persecuted minority?
On the surface, your objection seems reasonable. However, in the absence of evidence that it is inherited, it is reasonable to believe that it is learned/chosen behavior. Also, we find that people frequently choose things that make their lives more difficult. First of all, before we compare homosexuality to other unpopular activities, let me make clear that I am making a comparison in one aspect; I am not saying that homosexuality is as bad as these activities, or damaging to others in the same way. There are parts of the world where converting to Christianity is almost suicidal. Yet there are still converts. In China, joining the Falun Gong or a church not approved by the government makes one liable to imprisonment, torture, or worse. Criminals are a persecuted minority. People become addicted to gambling, even though it ought to be obvious they are flushing their money down the drain. Alcoholics choose to continue drinking, even when their lives and families are falling apart. Alcohol is an interesting comparison. We have identified genetic factors that contribute to alcoholism, but no one argues that genetic determination makes alcoholism normal or acceptable. And no one denies that alcoholics choose to begin drinking.
To answer your question more directly, though, many who have looked into this matter believe that homosexuality is a disorder brought about when children do not learn to have normal relationships with members of the same sex. If I recall correctly, the main mechanism here is the situation of sons who don't receive normal affection from their fathers or from male substitutes (step-fathers, friends of the family, teachers). I am not a psychologist or specialist in this area; I am only suggesting a theory that I have found plausible.
Post by: m1911owner on June 01, 2006, 07:40:32 AM
Quote from: Oleg Volk
If you consider being gay a conscious choice, then why would anyone choose to be a persecuted minority?
I was chatting with a psychologist whose main office is in San Francisco, and the subject of gays came up. He said that when he counsels gays and lesbians, it nearly always eventually comes out that they were sexually abused.That's one person's perspective on the question. Though, given where his office is located, I suspect he's had a lot of experience counseling gays and lesbians.
Post by: Firethorn on June 01, 2006, 07:47:18 AM
Quote from: fistful
The myth of the gay gene rides again.
I'm not saying that it's genetic. I haven't heard of any studies showing a tendency for homosexuality to run in families, thus it's unlikely to be purely genetic(though genes play a role in everything). Consider that there are many enviromental factors while even in the womb. Then there's a good amount of time until sexual maturity is reached. Maybe I should have said 'matured' instead?Still, my personal theory is that whether it's enviromental or genetic, it's not 'chosen' by them, just like I didn't exactly choose to be attracted to the opposite sex. At some point I just started finding girls fascinating, etc...
There's plenty of room in biology for it to be a combination of genetics, enviromental factors, and just plain random chance. Of course, we have no clue about this, and think about what it does to people to have their views treated like a disease? How did you feel when you found about the study linking gun handling to testosterone production?
Finally, it wasn't long ago that a study found brain differences between hetero and homosexual women.
Post by: Perd Hapley on June 01, 2006, 09:06:01 AM
Quote from: Firethorn
Quote from: fistful
The myth of the gay gene rides again.
I'm not saying that it's genetic.Quote
Still, my personal theory is that whether it's enviromental or genetic, it's not 'chosen' by them, just like I didn't exactly choose to be attracted to the opposite sex. At some point I just started finding girls fascinating, etc...
Well, all species are hardwired to reproduce, so that's to be expected. Doesn't mean that homosexuality is not chosen; if anything, it demonstrates that there must be some intentionality involved. Naturally, that doesn't mean there aren't strong urges involved.Quote
Of course, we have no clue about this, and think about what it does to people to have their views treated like a disease? How did you feel when you found about the study linking gun handling to testosterone production?
I didn't hear about that study. I don't want to go out of my way to hurt people's feelings, but feelings are often hurt in debates, no matter how polite. The truth isn't changed by emotions.Quote
Finally, it wasn't long ago that a study found brain differences between hetero and homosexual women.
I heard about that kind of research in men many years ago. As I remember it, we don't know whether the brain changes the sexuality or if the sexuality affects the brain.
Post by: cordex on June 01, 2006, 09:29:45 AM
Quote
How did you feel when you found about the study linking gun handling to testosterone production?
I shrugged.And laughed when I read Tam's blog entry on the subject.
Post by: Firethorn on June 01, 2006, 11:56:39 AM
Quote from: fistful
Well, all species are hardwired to reproduce, so that's to be expected. Doesn't mean that homosexuality is not chosen; if anything, it demonstrates that there must be some intentionality involved. Naturally, that doesn't mean there aren't strong urges involved.
This I disagree with. While I think that sexual attraction is more a range(strongly biased to hetero usually) than a polarity, I don't think that it's a true choice for many people.Quote
I didn't hear about that study. I don't want to go out of my way to hurt people's feelings, but feelings are often hurt in debates, no matter how polite. The truth isn't changed by emotions.
Simple enough, they found that lesbian's scent centers respond differently to male pheromes than straight women's.Now, there is some arguement about the whole 'sexual trauma' thing flipping them into homosexual, but again, we don't really know if the abuse is a cause or consequence.
Post by: Perd Hapley on June 01, 2006, 08:22:31 PM
Post by: Perd Hapley on June 01, 2006, 08:35:06 PM
Quote from: Firethorn
This I disagree with. While I think that sexual attraction is more a range(strongly biased to hetero usually) than a polarity, I don't think that it's a true choice for many people.
I'm not sure what you mean, but I'm not saying that ten-year-olds sit in their lonely bedrooms and think, "Hmmm, I think I'll get it on with other dudes." All I'm really saying is that we all have thoughts or urges and can choose to dwell on them and/or act them out. We don't actually have to. I should think there are a lot of choices that must be conscious, though, the more one acts out one's homosexuality.
Post by: Firethorn on June 02, 2006, 02:19:04 AM
Quote from: fistful
All I'm really saying is that we all have thoughts or urges and can choose to dwell on them and/or act them out. We don't actually have to.
I should think there are a lot of choices that must be conscious, though, the more one acts out one's homosexuality.
Ok, you just want a policy like our military. 'You can join if you're gay, you just can't act upon it'.I should think there are a lot of choices that must be conscious, though, the more one acts out one's homosexuality.
It appears that we both agree that a person doesn't get to choose his or her sexuality, but does get to choose which sex they go out with. Simple enough.
I'm saying that humans are sexual beings, and as long as they can find someone they can have a good relationship with, good for them. A truly gay person will NOT be able to have a healthy sexual relationship with somebody of the opposite sex. The feelings just won't be there. So why even make them try? Any 'harm' to society would logically come from them already taking themselves out of the genepool, wouldn't it?
Post by: Perd Hapley on June 02, 2006, 03:15:46 AM
Quote from: Firethorn
It appears that we both agree that a person doesn't get to choose his or her sexuality, but does get to choose which sex they go out with. Simple enough.
I'm saying that humans are sexual beings, and as long as they can find someone they can have a good relationship with, good for them. A truly gay person will NOT be able to have a healthy sexual relationship with somebody of the opposite sex. The feelings just won't be there. So why even make them try? Any 'harm' to society would logically come from them already taking themselves out of the genepool, wouldn't it?
No Firethorn. If you want my view, I will explain, but not because I am expecting to persuade anyone.I'm saying that humans are sexual beings, and as long as they can find someone they can have a good relationship with, good for them. A truly gay person will NOT be able to have a healthy sexual relationship with somebody of the opposite sex. The feelings just won't be there. So why even make them try? Any 'harm' to society would logically come from them already taking themselves out of the genepool, wouldn't it?
A "truly gay person" is such only because they give in to unnatural desires that have come about due to unusual conditions that have harmed them psychologically. In other words, no one is "truly gay" in the sense that homosexuality is an inherent part of them; we begin as heterosexuals and must be turned in the other direction by external pressures. The answer to this condition is not to try to find happiness with a same-sex partner, but to cure the problem of homosexuality. A homosexual "will NOT be able to have a healthy sexual relationship" with anyone until they deal with and do away with their homosexuality. In the same way, it would be difficult for someone with an addiction to pornography to have a healthy relationship, or someone with a serious alcohol problem. But from what I have heard from Christian "Exodus" types (who work with and often were themselves homosexuals) it isn't the goal to "make them try" to have a romantic/sexual relationship with the opposite sex but rather to help them have healthy, non-homosexual relationships with the same sex so they can be normal again, sexually speaking.
Quote from: Firethorn
Any 'harm' to society would logically come from them already taking themselves out of the genepool, wouldn't it?
I don't know what you're trying to say here.
Post by: Guest on June 02, 2006, 08:07:32 AM
Post by: m1911owner on June 02, 2006, 08:37:26 AM
Post by: m1911owner on June 02, 2006, 09:58:11 AM
Quote from: Barbara
No, my argument is that the Taliban thought it was government's job to enforce religious standards.
1.) My God also condemns the use of pork as food. Would you be comfortable with that as law?
The law in most places in the U.S. already outlaws dog and cat as food, so I don't see that pork would be much of a change from current legal practice. So, while I occasionally like a nice Hawiian pizza, I suppose I could live with that. (Take away my steaks, though, and there'd be a problem...)1.) My God also condemns the use of pork as food. Would you be comfortable with that as law?
Quote
2.) Every civilization collapses eventually. Can't blame them all on gays.
What Unwin observed is not that the civilizations eventually collapsed; he observed that they were well into collapse in the generation following embracing sexual hedonism. And this was universal among the cililizations he studied--100% that embraced sexual hedonism quickly collapsed after that change in mores. And the civilization he studied were all of them for which he had access to information--89 different civilizations.
Post by: m1911owner on June 02, 2006, 10:45:54 AM
Quote from: BillBlank
I await solid statistical evidence that there is any significant variation, in the negative direction, between the personal achievement and success of homosexual individuals or societies where it is accepted vs. heterosexuals. Show me some solid numbers.
As I understand Unwin's researches, 100% of the civilizations that embraced sexual hedonism were well into collapse in the generation following that change. Unwin studied all the civilizations for which records were extant, 89 current and historical civilizations. I'd call that a pretty solid statistical trend. Quote
But, seeing as the ancient greeks, the romans, the egyptians, the english navy and upper classes were merrily buggering each other and assorted livestock for hundreds of years and at the same time were running very succesful civilisations I would consider his findings flawed. I mean c'mon, half (no I don't have exact figures, yes that is a guess, but try reading some and you'll see what I mean) of the poetry and epic tales from greece featured homosexuality, god's as animals seducing people or waxed lyrical about young men's firm, rounded buttocks.
I don't have Unwin's book in front of me at the moment, so I'm going to suppose that while that sort of thing may have been present to some degree among the theatrical literati, it wasn't the norm in the general population. Your point, though, is well-taken, and I will at some point dig into this and see what, if anything, Unwin had to say about it.Quote
I would say that homosexuality is neither right or wrong, merely a state of being and in no way a choice if the existence of a genetic marker for homosexuality should be proven to exist. If that is the case then it's hardwired so wouldn't that make it part of the "PLAN"?
One could make the same argument about pedophilia--that it might be "hardwired"; it has certainly proven to be very persistent in those involved. Yet few would argue that we should embrace pedophilia as a norm in our society. I know that the counterargument to my point is that "it's between two consenting adults, and no one else gets hurt." But that's not true. It takes two to tango, and homosexuals seek out those that they can seduce into homosexuality.For example, in my extended family there are two lesbians. One of them was seduced by her college roommate (assigned at random by the university); the other was seduced by a counseler at Girl Scout camp. These are two people who are close to me who have been greatly hurt by the actions of homosexuals. (And don't even get me started with the Catholic priest situation.)
Quote
Furthermore, to state that you base your opinions on the belief that the bible is the literal word of god requires some clarification on your part. ... First off, which particular bible are you talking about? It's one of the most translated and edited works in the history of humanity. I'm not sure there's even evidence that a hard copy existed of the majority of the scriptures before 300ad. The majority existed as verbal history passed from generation to generation before that point. It's been revised, retranslated, mucked about with and had whole sections dumped in the trash by various king's and popes through the ages, what their motives were when they were guiding that process I wouldn't like to say.
I don't recall saying that the Bible is the literal word of God, because I don't believe that. Some parts of it yes, and some parts no. And exactly as you say, the text of the Bible as undergone considerable corruption over the millenia. However, I don't believe that it has been corrupted to the point of unrecognizabilty.If I have time, I'll address this further in a separate thread; this might take a day or two to get around to. Fundamentally, I believe the Bible to be largely true because I believe the Book of Mormon to be true, and it quotes many parts of Jewish scriptures as they existed in about 600 B.C. While there is some variation from the current biblical text, the variations are minor, except for those things that are now missing entirely.
Oh, and there are existing copies of parts of all the books of the Old Testament save one in the Dead Sea Scrolls. These documents date from the first and second centuries B.C.
Post by: Stand_watie on June 02, 2006, 04:26:39 PM
Quote from: Barbara
No, my argument is that the Taliban thought it was government's job to enforce religious standards. 1.) My God also condemns the use of pork as food. Would you be comfortable with that as law?
Quote
The law in most places in the U.S. already outlaws dog and cat as food, so I don't see that pork would be much of a change from current legal practice. So, while I occasionally like a nice Hawiian pizza, I suppose I could live with that. (Take away my steaks, though, and there'd be a problem...)
I'm not sure I understand this response. Are you saying that you wouldn't mind the banning of pork, but that you would mind the banning of beef, and using a faulty law (banning eating cats and dogs) as a logical springboard? If so what is your problem with banning beef? Just because you like to eat it more than you like to eat pork? I can't say others dietary preferences (religiously inspired or not) make a very persuasive argument to me, regarding establishment of law.Or were you just joking off Barbara's question?
Post by: cosine on June 02, 2006, 05:24:07 PM
"Bush promoting ban on gay marriage"
"WASHINGTON (Reuters) -
President George W. Bush will promote a constitutional ban on gay marriage on the eve of a Senate vote next week, weighing in on an issue that could rally his wavering conservative base in an election year."
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060602/ts_nm/rights_gay_bush_dc
Post by: m1911owner on June 02, 2006, 08:11:48 PM
Quote from: Stand_watie
I'm not sure I understand this response.
I'm saying that I can take pork or leave it, so I wouldn't mind terribly if it were banned. (I'm not saying that it should be banned, just responding to her question of whether I wound mind if it were banned by saying that it would affect me some, but not a lot, so I wouldn't mind too much.) I like beef, so I would mind if beef were banned--i.e., I do have limits in this area. To answer what I took as the subtext to Barbara's question, which was get me to balk at the idea of government banning pork because her religion doesn't allow it, my response was that the government already bans certain foods, so banning pork wouldn't exactly be breaking new ground.Edited to add: The deeper question here is what part religious codes should or shouldn't play in the law of the land. To go back the the Declaration of Independence, the founding principal of our country is this: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, among with are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among men."
The basic principal of our government, then, is inextricably tied to religion, that there is a Creator who has endowed us with rights that are to be protected by government.
Religious codes have some elements that need to be part of the law of the land. For example: Thou shalt not commit murder; thou shalt not steal. There are other elements that pertain only to the observance of a particular religion, and are not properly part of the law of the land as elucidated in the Declaration of Independence; not eating pork is an example of that.
My position is that homosexuality is part of the first group. It is a cancer that affects and in rather short order destroys entire societies, and it is therefore within the purview of governments to regulate and ban homosexual behaviors.
Post by: Stand_watie on June 02, 2006, 09:08:09 PM
Quote from: m1911owner
Quote from: Stand_watie
I'm not sure I understand this response.
I'm saying that I can take pork or leave it, so I wouldn't mind terribly if it were banned. (I'm not saying that it should be banned, just responding to her question of whether I wound mind if it were banned by saying that it would affect me some, but not a lot, so I wouldn't mind too much.) I like beef, so I would mind if beef were banned--i.e., I do have limits in this area. To answer what I took as the subtext to Barbara's question, which was get me to balk at the idea of government banning pork because her religion doesn't allow it, my response was that the government already bans certain foods, so banning pork wouldn't exactly be breaking new ground.Quote
...Religious codes have some elements that need to be part of the law of the land. For example: Thou shalt not commit murder; thou shalt not steal. There are other elements that pertain only to the observance of a particular religion, and are not properly part of the law of the land as elucidated in the Declaration of Independence; not eating pork is an example of that. My position is that homosexuality is part of the first group. It is a cancer that affects and in rather short order destroys entire societies, and it is therefore within the purview of governments to regulate and ban homosexual behaviors.
Thanks for your candor. Do you have criminal sanctions in mind that you think would be appropriate for homosexual behavior? If so would you apply these to sodomy between man/wife? Sex during menses?
Post by: m1911owner on June 03, 2006, 06:04:58 AM
Quote from: Stand_watie
Do you have criminal sanctions in mind that you think would be appropriate for homosexual behavior?
There have been criminal sanctions in place for most of the history of this country that appear to have worked reasonably well. I assume they consist of some combination of fines and/or prison time.Quote
If so would you apply these to sodomy between man/wife? Sex during menses?
To reiterate what I've already stated several times, what I support is: Chastity outside of marriage, and fidelity within marriage. That's been the standard for centuries, until the most recent two or three decades. Within a marriage, it's up to the couple themselves to determine what is appropriate for them.There have long been legal sanctions in place for adultry, premarital sex, and cohabitation.
In post 129 Firethorn discussed the facts that divorce and unwed mothers are a huge problem. I'm not singling out homosexuality as "the root of all evil"; it is indeed only a part of the much larger problem.
Post by: Stand_watie on June 03, 2006, 06:17:56 AM
Quote from: m1911owner
Quote from: Stand_watie
Do you have criminal sanctions in mind that you think would be appropriate for homosexual behavior?
There have been criminal sanctions in place for most of the history of this country that appear to have worked reasonably well. I assume they consist of some combination of fines and/or prison time.Quote
If so would you apply these to sodomy between man/wife? Sex during menses?
To reiterate what I've already stated several times, what I support is: Chastity outside of marriage, and fidelity within marriage. That's been the standard for centuries, until the most recent two or three decades. Within a marriage, it's up to the couple themselves to determine what is appropriate for them.There have long been legal sanctions in place for adultry, premarital sex, and cohabitation.
Post by: Stand_watie on June 03, 2006, 06:22:08 AM
Quote from: m1911owner
In post 129 Firethorn discussed the facts that divorce and unwed mothers are a huge problem. I'm not singling out homosexuality as "the root of all evil"; it is indeed only a part of the much larger problem.
Indeed. I myself have been a much greater victim of adultery than of homosexuality, and I'd venture to say it is a much larger sin both in the eyes of God, as written, both in frequency and in context, in the Bible, and in the ill-consequence to society than is homosexual behavior. Would you think that we should penalize adulterers with a felony or a misdemeanor charge?
Post by: Perd Hapley on June 03, 2006, 06:24:18 AM
Quote from: Barbara
So homosexuality in animals other than humans is also pyschological?
Would that matter?Barbara, I understand where you were going with the Taliban comment. I thought you were going too far with comparing 1911owner with a group like the Taliban, and probably you are. However, I didn't read this bit, which makes your comment much more understandable.
Quote from: m1911owner
I once also thought that prohibiting and punishing homosexuality, adultry, and the like were probably not the proper province of government.
Punishing homosexuality I wouldn't agree with - let them be, and don't waste my time and money on such legalities.
Post by: Perd Hapley on June 03, 2006, 06:38:08 AM
Quote from: m1911owner
My position is that homosexuality is part of the first group. It is a cancer that affects and in rather short order destroys entire societies, and it is therefore within the purview of governments to regulate and ban homosexual behaviors.
I disagree. I suggest it is only a symptom of a social order already failing for other reasons. This comports with the first chapter of Romans, 1911owner.
Post by: Perd Hapley on June 03, 2006, 07:21:55 AM
Quote from: BillBlank
Furthermore, to state that you base your opinions on the belief that the bible is the literal word of god requires some clarification on your part. ... First off, which particular bible are you talking about? It's one of the most translated and edited works in the history of humanity. I'm not sure there's even evidence that a hard copy existed of the majority of the scriptures before 300ad. The majority existed as verbal history passed from generation to generation before that point. It's been revised, retranslated, mucked about with and had whole sections dumped in the trash by various king's and popes through the ages, what their motives were when they were guiding that process I wouldn't like to say.
The bible is surely "one of the most translated...works in the history of humanity," but to say it is edited requires clarification. What do you mean by edited, and where is your evidence for this? If you mean that books were removed from the Bible, then you are mistaken. The Jewish Apocrypha were never considered inspired and the Gnostic gospels simply came too late to meet the requirements of apostolicity.We HAVE hard copies of scripture from before AD 300. For the New Testament, we have codices like the Chester Beatty papyri http://www.cbl.ie/imagegallery/gallery.asp?sec=3 Much of the New Testament comes from letters circulated among the church, so these were obviously written. For the Old Testament, the Dead Sea Scrolls most certainly prove that the scriptures were in written form before Christ and I believe the Septuagint was made before AD 300.
Quote from: m1911owner
Fundamentally, I believe the Bible to be largely true because I believe the Book of Mormon to be true,
I wonder why you find the BoM more trustworthy than the Christian scriptures.
Post by: cosine on June 03, 2006, 08:26:49 AM
Quote from: fistful
Punishing homosexuality I wouldn't agree with - let them be, and don't waste my time and money on such legalities.
Exactly.
Post by: Perd Hapley on June 03, 2006, 08:57:43 AM
Post by: m1911owner on June 03, 2006, 09:21:54 AM
Quote
I wonder why you find the BoM more trustworthy than the Christian scriptures.
I promise that I'll start another thread on that subject. It might be a day or two, because I'm pretty busy today.Quote
Punishing homosexuality I wouldn't agree with - let them be, and don't waste my time and money on such legalities.
Addressing the broader question of not just homosexual activities, but also the various varieties of extramarital heterosexual relations: If there is evidence that something in causing great harm to your civilization, possibly such great harm that it will lead to the desstruction of your civilization, then the government at the very least ought not be encouraging the damaging activity (say, by preventing landlords from discrimination against cohabitating unmarried couples, or preventing employers from discriminating against those who formerly would be considered as being of "poor moral character," or by sanctioning homosexuality by creating "homosexual marriage.") Further, I would posit that a government has an affirmative responsibility to actively discourage activities that are causing great damage to the society; the normal way that governments do this is through laws proscribing those activities, and prescribing punishments for those who transgress those laws.At this point, I would find an argument from those who have already posted about the destructive nature of extramarital heterosexual relationships, that said activities are not harmful, to be extremely disingenuous.
Quote
My question for you is if you support active criminal sanctions against adultery, premarital sex, co-habitation, and "deviant" husband-wife relations such as oral sex and anal sex as proscribed by American and English common law precedent?
I support "criminal sanctions against adultery, premarital sex, [and] co-habitation." I don't support sanctions against "'deviant' husband-wife relations." My view on the latter is that those prohibitions were the result of "seeing beyond the mark" by an overzealous, celebate Catholic clergy; I don't see any other basis for them, biblical or otherwise.
Post by: Perd Hapley on June 03, 2006, 12:18:29 PM
Morality is necessary for a free society to remain free and sovereign, but government is powerless to instill it, and freedom is ruined when it does. When morality no longer prevails, the moral concept of human rights and freedom perishes with it. Hence, an immoral people demand further chains. They declare a "right" to publish pornography and revoke the right to preach from the pulpit against homosexuality (as in Canada). This explains modern America.
Post by: Stand_watie on June 03, 2006, 05:03:57 PM
Quote from: m1911owner
Quote
My question for you is if you support active criminal sanctions against adultery, premarital sex, co-habitation, and "deviant" husband-wife relations such as oral sex and anal sex as proscribed by American and English common law precedent?
I support "criminal sanctions against adultery, premarital sex, [and] co-habitation." I don't support sanctions against "'deviant' husband-wife relations." My view on the latter is that those prohibitions were the result of "seeing beyond the mark" by an overzealous, celebate Catholic clergy; I don't see any other basis for them, biblical or otherwise.edit: fistful summarized my thinking quite well on the last post I thought.
Post by: roo_ster on June 04, 2006, 10:15:04 AM
Quote from: Oleg Volk
If you consider being gay a conscious choice, then why would anyone choose to be a persecuted minority?
Adam Smith, F Hayek, & Co. do a pretty good job of explaining human behavior, economics, choice, and networked intelligence/information on the macro level. However, their ideas are less predictive of what an individual human at a specific point in time will decide to do.Individuals make many choices that may not make sense to you or I. For instance, many libertarians would consider enlisting in the armed forces of the USA to be an illogical choice. Poor pay, riisk of life and limb, and loss of liberty are reasons given. Yet many folks still enlist and our country would not exist but for these irrational (to a libertarian mindset) choices.
To focus in a bit more on topic, "Why would any man choose ot go to a bathhouse and engage in acts that are almost certain to expose him to a fatal disease in the manner most likely to transmit that disease?" It still happens, despite knowledge of the risks.
Quote from: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0190590/quotes
Pete: You miserable little snake! You stole from my kin!
Ulysses Everett McGill: Who was fixin' to betray us.
Pete: You didn't know that at the time.
Ulysses Everett McGill: So I borrowed it until I did know.
Pete: That don't make no sense!
Ulysses Everett McGill: Pete, it's a fool that looks for logic in the chambers of the human heart.
Ulysses Everett McGill: Who was fixin' to betray us.
Pete: You didn't know that at the time.
Ulysses Everett McGill: So I borrowed it until I did know.
Pete: That don't make no sense!
Ulysses Everett McGill: Pete, it's a fool that looks for logic in the chambers of the human heart.
Post by: Lonnie Wilson on July 14, 2006, 05:24:18 PM
Quote
First, nobody is denied the right to marry. If anything, gays already enjoy special protections under the law that are denied to straight individuals. Homosexuals have MORE rights, not less.
With all due respect, Gunner, you really don't understand the point of anti-discrimination laws as stated. Give you an example, here in Washington State, we recently had GLBT anti-discrimination laws enacted, for housing, credit and insurance, employment. You can find more information on it here:WSHRC Website, look at the bottom
As a result of the law passing here, if I were the owner of a home (not residing there, that's exempted and rightfully so), and I wanted it to be a "gays only" house in terms of renting out, that would be discriminatory against heterosexuals, I could be sued, and I would lose. Before the new law took effect, Washington State did not exempt owner occupied homes at all (like federal law did). However, with the new law, more freedom was gained for those in owner occupied buildings in line with the federal laws on such issues. Gunner, if you can cite for me any case law on the issue where somehow the discrimination law is turned on it's head and where discrimination against the "majority" was ruled to be somehow acceptable, then please cite it. The law goes both ways on issues such as this, and if any court rule to rule against that idea, then the case is flawed.
That being said, it is still legal to fire or otherwise discriminate against people based on their sexual orientation in 33 states. (CA, CT, HI, IL, ME, MD, MA, MN, NV, NH, NJ, NM, NY, RI, VT, WA, WI all have laws against sexual orientation discrimination plus DC). Canards have been used against such laws here in Washington that "we shouldn't protect things based on choices". I then asked the people opposing that law to propose a bill to repeal religion, creed, marital status, and such as protected classes under Washington State laws, because those things are supposedly choices too. They change the subject or they pontificate about some other issue with gays, "they're all diseased", like richyoung was saying.
Speaking of richyoung, I seem to recall that this forum is called "Armed POLITE Society", and his posts have been anything but polite for the reasons BrokenPaw stated.
Despite the fact that people like me are going to be the best hope for reaching out to liberals about our right to keep and bear arms and personal protection, there are some people who just hate gays so much that they let it blind them to the opportunity that we present. It's easy to dismiss hetero WASP person, it's not easy for liberals to do the same thing to a left leaning gay man. I have converted quite a few liberals on RKBA due merely to the fact that I was not your typical "gun owner" in their mind. I realize APS is not a "Gun Forum", but this site spawned out of The High Road, and has it's pedigree accordingly.
We are some of the most hated minorities in the world. We get attacked politically all of the time, we are the nation's whipping boys for all that is wrong with the country because we are uppity enough to call bullshit on idea of heterosexual privilege.
My opinion on same gender marriage as stated:
It should be an absolute non-issue. Civil Unions for EVERYONE, not just same gender partners. Leave marriage to the churches, synagogues and other religious institutions. This has been suggested, and rejected multiple times by the people who oppose the same gender marriage. We wanted equality in the sense of being able to do everything opposite gendered couples can do in a LEGAL sense, including in name. Olive branches were sent out to the people who opposed same gender marriage, in the sense of "you guys can get married all you want, this takes the word marriage out of the equation in civil discourse". Of course, it was rejected because:
1. Pure out and out hate
2. Money
In regards to 1, they simply hate gay people, or want to "cure them" of their homosexuality, using methods like this to cure them of it, or want to turn the legal clock to 1960, where every state had an anti-gay sodomy law (Illinois was the first in 1961 to modernize it's criminal code). The thinking on this runs the gamut to just being being able to fire someone for being what they are, to "put them in cattle cars and gas them in camps" types. Then you have people like Freddie Phelps who are protesting at military funerals because we as a nation have the gall to not execute gay people. If it's not money attracting these leaches in the religious right, it's because they believe in what Fred Phelps says. Despite all of their PR statements saying that "Fred Phelps is a loon and we don't believe in what they believe in", it's still shades of the same color: They hate gay people. Whether or not they only support just people people in jail versus summary executions of gay people if found like what Fred Phelps supports, it still does not change the one fact: They either hate gay people, or they are just in it for the love of money, and with certain people, probably a bit of both.
That leads to the second part, which is just simple greed on the part of the anti-gay leadership. Without gay marriage as a fear, they simply cannot get as much donations and cash from their faithful followers. Peace and tranquility doesn't bring in the cash, new boogeyman who will "destroy America with their filth" will bring in money. They need more money so they can build expensive mansions out in the middle of nowhere and buy new luxury cars. Anti-gunners in a similar sense do that kind of crap too, fearmongering just to get more money. Gee, we wouldn't as those who are pro-gun know anything about being outfoxed by superior planning and outspent many times over right?
Follow the money, and everything will make sense from then on out as to why Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, Robert Dotson and company do what they do.
Post by: Lonnie Wilson on July 14, 2006, 05:35:00 PM
Quote
For instance, many libertarians would consider enlisting in the armed forces of the USA to be an illogical choice. Poor pay, riisk of life and limb, and loss of liberty are reasons given. Yet many folks still enlist and our country would not exist but for these irrational (to a libertarian mindset) choices.
Because being a member of the military also gives some interesting benefits not available elsewhere, and on top of that, joining your armed forces is considered patriotic by a very large segment of the population on both ends of the political spectrum. I can't say the same thing about just being what you are.
Post by: Lonnie Wilson on July 14, 2006, 09:14:01 PM
My apoligies all, I just did a forum search and saw the issue being mentioned.
Post by: Perd Hapley on July 15, 2006, 04:04:15 AM
But I do think it's very sad that you've bought into the all-too-common stereotype about those of us who live a conservative Christian lifestyle.
I also wonder what it would take to convince you that Fred Phelps is very much dissimilar to even the far-right-wing of "the Religious Right." His assertion that "God hates America"? His glee over the deaths of soldiers? His absolute scorn for every church besides his own little congregation? His protesting of James Dobson? His opinion that "converting" or "healing" homosexuals is useless as they are beyond God's forgiveness? He doesn't sound like your typical Bible-thumper to me. I don't have much use for Robertson or Falwell, either, but who is Robert Dotson?
Post by: brimic on July 15, 2006, 04:55:11 AM
Post by: johnsonrlp on July 15, 2006, 08:04:05 AM
Marriage should be between two people and their religion if they have one.
Post by: m1911owner on July 15, 2006, 08:41:33 AM
and a woman, and a woman, and a woman.
Post by: Lonnie Wilson on July 15, 2006, 11:27:22 AM
Quote
So according to Mr Wilson, if a person doesn't wholeheartedly support the gay agenda its only because they are bigoted, hateful, money-whoring, nazi-sympathizing Christians, and have other character flaws.
Has nothing to do with "support". It has to do with opposition to such.Why would anyone not support the idea of civil unions for everyone? It completely depoliticizes the issue, because marriage would be within the realm of churches and other places of worship. Want to get married? Find a church that will accept it, and there's plenty of churches to do so.
If you want the legal recognition? Civil union.
I want equality with heterosexuals in terms of the benefits and the name. If members of the opposition continue to insist on calling their government-blessed unions marriage, and won't support the idea of making it civil unions for everyone, or keep saying "We can have marriages, you can have civil unions", then the idea of it is repugnant under the idea of "seperate but equal", where we have two different institutions that are "almost" the same, but even if it was the same, the name "civil union" is a "lower class" in the eyes of the government.
Again, follow the money. Greed has a lot to do with it. Instead of attacking the argument with "he's saying that if you don't support the gay agenda" crap, why don't you actually address the arguments made?
Post by: Perd Hapley on July 15, 2006, 12:34:25 PM
Quote from: Lonnie Wilson
Again, follow the money. Greed has a lot to do with it. Instead of attacking the argument with "he's saying that if you don't support the gay agenda" crap, why don't you actually address the arguments made?
Not a lot of room to talk there, Lonnie, if you're going to make unverifiable charges about hatred and greed. By the way, hate is a verb, hatred is a noun.
Post by: richyoung on July 17, 2006, 08:14:47 AM
Quote from: Lonnie Wilson
...they pontificate about some other issue with gays, "they're all diseased", like richyoung was saying.
Did not say that - I DID, however, point out deliberate risky behavior despite knowledge of the consequences. Such bevaior is well documented. I also pointed out the link between "gay marriage" and health benefits for those thousand buck a month coctails to keep alive an AIDS victim.Quote
Speaking of richyoung, I seem to recall that this forum is called "Armed POLITE Society", and his posts have been anything but polite for the reasons BrokenPaw stated.
...moderator is just an e-mail away - why don't you see if he agrees with you? Its not my fault if the truth hurts.Quote
We are some of the most hated minorities in the world. We get attacked politically all of the time, we are the nation's whipping boys for all that is wrong with the country because we are uppity enough to call bullshit on idea of heterosexual privilege.
Yup. That's it. The "uppitiness". Spreading the modern Black Plague had nothing to do with it, marching down the street in assless leather chaps had nothing to do with it, NAMBLA had nothing to do with it, pedophile priests had nothing to do with it, attempting, in cahoots with other leftists to judicially activate the proto-communist leftist egneda from the bench thereby circumventing the legislative and democrAtic processes had nothing to do with it....Quote
Of course, it was rejected because:
1. Pure out and out hate
Your mind-reading beam is faulty. Suggest adjusting aluminum foil beanie and rabbit ears for better reception.1. Pure out and out hate
Quote
2. Money
Unless you are conceeding the health care issue, my check must have got lost in the mail...
Post by: Guest on July 17, 2006, 12:46:31 PM
Quote
Spreading the modern Black Plague had nothing to do with it, marching down the street in assless leather chaps had nothing to do with it, NAMBLA had nothing to do with it, pedophile priests had nothing to do with it, attempting, in cahoots with other leftists to judicially activate the proto-communist leftist egneda from the bench thereby circumventing the legislative and democrAtic processes had nothing to do with it....
Homosexuality causes Communism? I thought it was Jews.
Must update my book of silly assumptions.
Post by: wingnutx on August 10, 2006, 09:03:23 PM
"I am a little to the right of Rush Limbaugh. I'm so conservative that I approve of San Francisco City Hall marriages, adoption by same-sex couples, and New Hampshire's recently ordained Episcopal bishop. Gays want to get married, have children and go to church. Next they'll be advocating school vouchers, boycotting HBO and voting Republican." - P.J. O'Rourke
Post by: Perd Hapley on August 10, 2006, 09:09:02 PM
Quote from: wingnutx
I'd rather a bunch of gay capitalists going to the polls than straight commies. This is one issue that keeps otherwise right-of-center people firmly in the Dem camp, therefore supporting gun control.
Like who? I'd bet dollars to donuts the people you describe, and a small number they are to begin with, are Libertarians anyway.
Post by: wingnutx on August 10, 2006, 09:16:05 PM
A lot of us vote R a lot of the time, too.
Post by: Perd Hapley on August 10, 2006, 09:25:37 PM
Post by: wingnutx on August 10, 2006, 09:32:23 PM
Post by: Perd Hapley on August 10, 2006, 09:57:41 PM
Post by: wingnutx on August 10, 2006, 10:09:36 PM
Post by: Lonnie Wilson on August 12, 2006, 08:40:08 AM
You wanna get married? Go into a church that will accept you (who, btw, can discriminate against you for any reason) and get married.
You want legal recognition of your relationship for the purposes of being next of kin, and so on? Get a civil union, and that applies to everyone.
Post by: Winston Smith on August 12, 2006, 12:45:05 PM
Private entities should be able to discriminate for whatever reasons they want to. Public entities should not.
Post by: Perd Hapley on August 12, 2006, 05:05:06 PM
Discriminate between the sexes? Of course government should do that in some cases - marriage is one of those cases.
Post by: Winston Smith on August 12, 2006, 05:22:14 PM
Post by: Art Eatman on August 13, 2006, 04:33:51 AM
What chaps me about this whole issue is that it's a dictionary thing: "Marriage" is the union between a man and a woman, with a primary purpose being a sanctified procreation--the avoidance of bastardy, nine months later. (For those who can connect events as far apart as nine months.)
I'm hostile in part because during my teen years I was a walking target for every Chickenhawk running loose. Pretty-boy and baby-face, I couldn't go to a movie or wait for a bus without some sumbitch hitting on me. "Consenting adults" is a hypocritical joke. "No thanks." was a waste of breath. I got tired of running and/or hiding or looking for a cop. I finally got big enough and learned enough self-defense fighting to deal with the sorry MFs. It was many a year before I got past wanting to give twelve-gauge enemas.
I'm not much on churches. Howsomever, I pretty much subscribe to the religious idea of anathema.
Y'know, I've gotten pretty good at ignoring gay behavior, politicians' utterances, conspiracy theorists and liberal views of economics, but it's certainly regrettable that such is necessary in order to maintain sanity.
Art
Post by: Guest on August 13, 2006, 04:58:51 AM
Sounds exactly like my experience except it was men hitting on me, too, not lesbians.
So, does that make it gays that are the problem, or men?
Post by: Art Eatman on August 13, 2006, 05:16:59 AM
I had a serious altercation with a gay WAC sergeant in an NCO club, at Ft. Sill, Oklahoma, decades ago. I was doing well with a cute WAC private--I thought--until the sergeant threatened to kick my manly ass. Her mistake. I was just back from Korea, and my tolerance level for idiots was between Slim and None--and Slim had just left town. Hey, men can be problems. So can women. Overall, it's a wash, with the problems being different in kind but not necessarily in degree.
, Art
Post by: Guest on August 13, 2006, 06:00:51 AM
Post by: Guest on August 13, 2006, 09:26:51 AM
Allowing homosexuals to "marry", adopt children, etc will accelerate the demise of America. It is that simple. But the main reason it should not be allowed is that it is WRONG. I may or may not be able to express "why" well enough to satisfy anyone, but it is WRONG just the same.
(Is it too much to ask that you avoid needless pejoratives in your posts? OV)
Post by: Headless Thompson Gunner on August 13, 2006, 09:44:28 AM
Quote from: steve
Allowing fags to "marry", adopt children, etc will accelerate the demise of America. It is that simple. But the main reason it should not be allowed is that it is WRONG. I may or may not be able to express "why" well enough to satisfy anyone, but it is WRONG just the same.
I don't necessarily disagree with you, but around here you can't just assert something and expect to be taken seriously. You gotta back it up. Even if you think you can't express why well enough to satisfy any of us, you ought to at least give it a try.
Post by: Guest on August 13, 2006, 10:07:29 AM
Post by: Sindawe on August 13, 2006, 10:08:19 AM
Quote
Regardless, I think some people in here don't like the idea of the government being in the marriage business in the first place.
You wanna get married? Go into a church that will accept you (who, btw, can discriminate against you for any reason) and get married.
You want legal recognition of your relationship for the purposes of being next of kin, and so on? Get a civil union, and that applies to everyone.
Same viewpoint here. Governments only job with regards to formalized relationships is as a disinterested record keeper.
You wanna get married? Go into a church that will accept you (who, btw, can discriminate against you for any reason) and get married.
You want legal recognition of your relationship for the purposes of being next of kin, and so on? Get a civil union, and that applies to everyone.
Post by: Art Eatman on August 13, 2006, 06:03:26 PM
My problem is that a college roommate and his father and uncle used to buy rundown bars in Manhattan, renovate, and restart the business. Mostly gay bars. My roommate would MC for bands or comedians. I learned a bunch of gay jokes from him.
Same for my Jewish roommates; bunches of Jewish jokes. Then, working in Detroit for a year at the Chevy Test Lab, I learned a bunch of Polack jokes. Back to Austin, and it's Aggie jokes. Living on the Tex-Mex border, it's Pepito jokes. As a Certified Old Fart, I know lots of OF jokes. Growing up in the south, there's lots of jokes about blacks.
And a ton of jokes about women.
A pox on political correctness!
IOW, anybody who goes to mouthing off with jokes against white guys oughta make sure I ain't around.
BUT: The key to it all is that the jokes be based on obvious known characteristics, and not hostile in nature. Poking fun at group foibles can be fun and need not be taken as insulting.
Art
Post by: Winston Smith on August 13, 2006, 07:29:23 PM
But I won't explain why.
But you're wrong.
Post by: Perd Hapley on August 14, 2006, 04:52:20 AM
Post by: Perd Hapley on August 14, 2006, 05:01:08 AM
Quote from: Sindawe
Governments only job with regards to formalized relationships is as a disinterested record keeper.
That doesn't say much - somebody's got to decide what a marriage or civil union is, before any records can be kept.
Post by: Art Eatman on August 15, 2006, 04:37:00 AM
It also gets around my gripe about misuse of the word "marriage", as to the historical usage. And, I note, the gripes of church folks.
Art
Post by: Bemidjiblade on September 06, 2006, 11:03:48 PM
My dollar after taxes (2 cents for those of you in Cass Lake):
Tolerance is not equal to approval.
I believe that people have the moral right to decide what they're going to do with their sexual orientation, providing they are not actively harming themselves or others. A homosexual should have every right to engage in homosexual activity if that's what they want to do, assuming the following:
Right time (partner not unconscious or passed out etc)
Right person (Of age, consenting adult who is not being threatened or coerced)
Right Place (No PDA, which is not an anti-homosexual thing, straights who act like animals in heat gross me out just as much) and this is my biggest peeve w/ "pride" parades
Right circumstances
But I absolutely refuse to give my approval to the same actions, and that is equally my own right.
If I have a say in a society, like, say, a representative republic (civics anyone?) then I have the same right to express myself and have my voice heard as anyone else.
Even IF my beliefs are born of religious belief, that makes them no less valid than an athiests, and no more so, as far as a representative government should be concerned.
So I will support people's right to choose how they act on their desires, but I will not condone it. As such, I will not extend the implicit approval in legalizing gay marriage.