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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: I call all homophobes to Hell - especially Russ
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Why would that matter to IngoB? His entire argument is based on his church's position. All the rest is attempting to reconcile that with reality, even though it has no direct link.
No, it's based on what he fancies his church's position to be. My cousin's take on such matters is rather different, but she's a lifelong Roman Catholic. My late aunts would probably take a different view too, but all of them would be considering real people, not intellectual abstractions.
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
That's a good point. IngoB's position strikes me as very cut off, in a human sense, and cold, I suppose. Plenty of Catholics are probably friendly with gays, and don't construct these ludicrous castles in the sky.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
In this, I will have to agree with his interpretation. The RCC, even with the current pope, teaches that homosexuality is not cool. That some RCC members do not agree is beside the point.
The farthest the official position gets is let's not condemn. But it isn't as far as everything is copacetic.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
When you take maternal mortality figures into account I don't think you can really say that heterosexual sex is all that risk free. It's not as if pregnancy isn't a consequence of heterosexual sex.
Oral sex and mutual masturbation may be the least risky, though throat cancers are on the rise in my jurisdiction as oral sex has become ubiquitous. Maybe with more standard vaccination against human papilloma virus (HPV) this will drop.
If we want to talk about normality re sexual behaviour in general, masturbation is the most frequent. It is also probably necessary, meet and right so to do, both because having experience of sexual pleasure prior to being with another person is likely to contribute to knowing what is pleasurable and not, and because God gave us hands to reach that far. I wonder what this thread would read like if we debated the morality of masturbation.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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Russ
Old salt
# 120
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
You might, I suppose, have a terminological difficulty in calling a committed and exclusive personal and sexual relationship sealed by formal covenant a "marriage" if the people are of the same sex
Indeed. In Ireland, homosexuals had the legal right to have their relationship recognised by the state in very much the same way as marriages are, before the referendum.
quote:
I may have mistaken your question.
Apologies if I phrased it badly.
We seem to be discussing both the substantive question "is there any moral/value difference between homosexuality and heterosexuality ?" and also the meta-question "is answering "Yes" to the first question necessarily a mark of cruelty, hated and bigotry ?"
And so I'm asking you to think how you might behave towards someone whose unchosen orientation is towards doing something that you consider to be morally sub-optimal. As a starting point, some common ground to work from.
quote:
It's an important point that "approval" or "disapproval" in this context is not a binary thing.
That's what I'm arguing. Against those (not you) who appear to be maintaining that the binary view "OK iff consensual" is the last word in ethics.
quote:
There are better and worse ways of being promiscuous. Someone who regularly has sex with strangers AND takes steps to ensure that he is being honest about his intentions, not taking advantage of damaged or desperate people, not poking at the cracks in other people's committed relationships, taking precautions against disease and pregnancy, and doing his best to ensure that his partners have as enjoyable a transient experience as possible, just is behaving more morally than someone with far fewer notches on the bed post who takes none of those steps.
Agreed.
quote:
I am (on this issue) a relatively conservative and orthodox Christian, I consider promiscuity to be morally wrong, but I live in a society where it happens, and I'm in no hurry to start ostracising bed-hoppers. Couldn't you have guessed that already?
Let's say that I've been a little surprised at some of the reactions on this thread, am uncertain how far your agreement with the "pro-homo" side's conclusion implies agreement with all of the various views that different people have put forward in support of that conclusion, and am trying not to take anything for granted.
Does your reply mean that your position is perhaps not too far from what I've called "tolerance" ?
quote:
No one thinks that sex with a stranger, whose name you might not know and whom you expect never to see again, is "just a different type of marriage", much less proposes to legislate to that effect. You aren't talking about anything remotely realistic here.
Agreed that it's unrealistic. But the parallel is obvious...
quote:
Of course, some people are both married and promiscuous. Sometimes as a deliberate ethical choice (open marriages, polyamory* and the like). We already recognise these people's marriages in law.
When their contract might more accurately be called a "civil partnership", yes. Should we change the law to call it that ?
Not something I'd agitate for - better to let lying dogs sleep. And I'd want to hear the arguments of both sides before voting on such a proposition. But I wouldn't rule out a vote in favour...
quote:
Last point - yes, I certainly do want my children to be taught about promiscuity. Why: firstly because they are very likely going to grow up to have sexual interest in people and to have others sexually interested in them, and some of those people might be intending promiscuity. I want my children to know about that so that they are forewarned when they negotiate mutual expectations. I hope that they, like me, aspire to a process of friendship-attraction-love-marriage-sex but I'm not fooling myself, and don't want to fool them, that everyone they meet will have the same aspiration. Some people just want to fuck. I think it's as well that children knew that. Secondly, if, contrary to my hopes, my children choose lives of promiscuity, I want them to know about, and avoid, the inherent risks associated with that choice. I am in favour of education.
Another word with multiple shades of meaning. I'm in favour of the classical ideal of education, of both informing children of facts at an appropriate age and of teaching them how to deal with facts and opinions and ideas, how to think for themselves.
I'm not in favour of the idea of "educating" others that some people have, that involves using their own political views as a syllabus for instruction.
I'm not in favour of the idea some progressive-minded people have of attacking prejudice by catching the children young (before they've had a chance to form prejudices).
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Wish everyone well; the enemy is not people, the enemy is wrong ideas
Posts: 3169 | From: rural Ireland | Registered: May 2001
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Russ
Old salt
# 120
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB
OED (Mac): "bigoted - having or revealing an obstinate belief in the superiority of one's own opinions and a prejudiced intolerance of the opinions of others."
Reminds me of
quote:
Originally posted by Boogie
I don't tolerate.. ..racism, sexism or homophobia
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Wish everyone well; the enemy is not people, the enemy is wrong ideas
Posts: 3169 | From: rural Ireland | Registered: May 2001
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Russ
Old salt
# 120
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
This is in effect saying two things:
Firstly children are there to give their parents grandchildren...
Secondly, anyone who isn't a parent is a second class citizen, heterosexual or homosexual.
No and no.
Do you really not get the difference between thinking people should do something and thinking it a good thing if they get the chance to choose to do something ?
Do you have no tolerance gap at all ?
I met a woman recently who can't have children. She's the sort of Catholic who believes in large families in principle. At the social event where we met, she was doting on all the young ones present, interested in them, saying how sweet they were, caring about them. It was obviously just watching her that she was carrying a big wound in her life.
And no, thinking that fate has dealt her a severe blow doesn't mean thinking any the less of her as a person.
Other people think they're not cut out to be parents, or that they contribute more by devoting themselves to their work. Their choice.
Time to outgrow the binary logic. Parents good does not mean non-parents bad.
I mean, mothers are great. Everyone should have one...
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Wish everyone well; the enemy is not people, the enemy is wrong ideas
Posts: 3169 | From: rural Ireland | Registered: May 2001
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Eliab
Shipmate
# 9153
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
We seem to be discussing both the substantive question "is there any moral/value difference between homosexuality and heterosexuality ?" and also the meta-question "is answering "Yes" to the first question necessarily a mark of cruelty, hated and bigotry ?"
No, not really. We're discussing more why you think there's a moral difference, and whether your stated reasons are principled and rational ones, or whether they are so spurious and untenable that hatred and bigotry appears to be the best explanation for why you would hold such views.
I don't think (I may be wrong) that you're very likely to get a Hell call on the Ship for saying something like:
"I accept the Bible as a moral authority, and there are passages in the Bible which certainly seem to me to unequivocally condemn homosexuality. The tradition of the Church appears to endorse that interpretation. I'm unconvinced by more liberal attempts to re-intrepret those problem passages. I accept that those who do not share my view of scripture can't be expected to agree with my reasons for thinking homosexuality is wrong, but I can't honestly take any other view."
It's the comparison of homosexuality to paedophilia and necrophilia, the conflation of homosexual orientation with wantonly promiscuous homosexual practice, the support for denying gay people equal rights, the refusal to use ordinary relationship words like "marriage" to describe ordinary gay relationships, and the insistence on using words like "deviant" and "pervert", that give the appearance of hatred and bigotry. Because ... well, because they are hallmarks of hatred and bigotry.
If you don't want to be thought hateful and bigoted, then knock that shit off. You can still say that homosexuality happens to be against a code of religious ethics that you believe to be binding. No one's going to get very angry with you just for saying that.
quote:
And so I'm asking you to think how you might behave towards someone whose unchosen orientation is towards doing something that you consider to be morally sub-optimal. As a starting point, some common ground to work from.
Well I think you've got your answer to that. For what it's worth.
quote:
Let's say that I've been a little surprised at some of the reactions on this thread, am uncertain how far your agreement with the "pro-homo" side's conclusion implies agreement with all of the various views that different people have put forward in support of that conclusion, and am trying not to take anything for granted.
The point at which I differ from the "pro" side is that I'm not (yet) quite ready to say that I'm convinced that the traditional interpretation of the Bible which condemns homosexuality is definitely wrong. I don't know that. I think that the job of working out exactly what those problem passages mean is one that God has primarily given to gay Christians, and I'll welcome, and assume good faith in, a gay Christian who behaves ethically in his or her relationships and in one who decides to be celibate.
As for the rest of the "pro" side - that homosexuality isn't damaging or disordered, and legally and socially should be treated with full and absolute equality, and that conservative Christians (and others) have no business in imposing rules based on religious authority on everyone else - you can assume full agreement from me.
quote:
Does your reply mean that your position is perhaps not too far from what I've called "tolerance" ?
It certainly includes what you call tolerance. It also includes the granting of full legal equality to gay people, which is something that I call tolerance, and you call "ramming it down other people's throats".
quote:
quote:
Eliab:No one thinks that sex with a stranger, whose name you might not know and whom you expect never to see again, is "just a different type of marriage", much less proposes to legislate to that effect. You aren't talking about anything remotely realistic here.
Agreed that it's unrealistic. But the parallel is obvious...
I don't think it's a parallel and I don't think the relevance is at all obvious. I think it's another stupid and offensive comparison of homosexuality with something most people find morally objectionable.
Look, if you really want a coherent example of an "immoral" act to compare homosexuality to, try "working on the Sabbath", or "eating pork", or "not fasting in Lent", or "praying to false gods". Things which are not obviously damaging in secular worldly terms, but are forbidden by some interpretation of a religious scripture. Don't pick things which are clearly (or even arguably) wrong for some reason that anyone can see, pick sometime that people disapprove of on authority. That would be valid comparator.
Here's a clue, if you are less tolerant of homosexuality in the secular sphere than you expect other people to be of acts which violate their different religious taboos, then you're a bigot. You aren't (necessarily) a bigot for having a religious taboo. You are when you use it as a reason for taking away other people's rights.
quote:
I'm not in favour of the idea some progressive-minded people have of attacking prejudice by catching the children young (before they've had a chance to form prejudices).
So what are you in favour of teaching children? That homosexuality is wrong? That homosexuality exists, with no comment either way about right and wrong? The impression you've given on this thread is that you want gay people to treat their orientation as some sort of shameful secret, that we must keep from the impressionable ears of children. That is not a neutral position. Nor is it a pro-education one.
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"Perhaps there is poetic beauty in the abstract ideas of justice or fairness, but I doubt if many lawyers are moved by it"
Richard Dawkins
Posts: 4619 | From: Hampton, Middlesex, UK | Registered: Mar 2005
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
Well then, what about the HIV epidemic? There can be no reasonable doubt that without "males having sex with males" (MSM) there never would have been one, and would not be one now.
This is one of the stupidest things I've ever read, and also one of the most white, Western-centred as well.
Because HIV arrived in the Western world through a man who had sex with men. Statistically, there was a small chance that that would happen. That small chance affected the way in which the disease spread in Western populations.
Meanwhile, in Africa, HIV spread quite happily through the heterosexual population. Infecting millions of people.
But no, the "epidemic" is in the part of the world you know about. Not the part of the world you couldn't give a shit about.
Your claim is about as stupid as claiming that ebola is a disease of health workers and missionaries.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB
OED (Mac): "bigoted - having or revealing an obstinate belief in the superiority of one's own opinions and a prejudiced intolerance of the opinions of others."
Reminds me of
quote:
Originally posted by Boogie
I don't tolerate.. ..racism, sexism or homophobia
Only if you don't understand what the word "prejudiced" means.
Warnings against jumping to conclusions are not supposed to prevent ever arriving at conclusions.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
I don't think (I may be wrong) that you're very likely to get a Hell call on the Ship for saying something like:
"I accept the Bible as a moral authority, and there are passages in the Bible which certainly seem to me to unequivocally condemn homosexuality. The tradition of the Church appears to endorse that interpretation. I'm unconvinced by more liberal attempts to re-intrepret those problem passages. I accept that those who do not share my view of scripture can't be expected to agree with my reasons for thinking homosexuality is wrong, but I can't honestly take any other view."
Let me pipe up on this and say that I don't think this would get a Hell call either.
Because this was the position of Tony Campolo for quite some time. He would speak on the subject with his wife (who did support homosexual relationships, and differed with her husband on the interpretation of the Bible).
When I heard a recording of them speaking, I was in fact full of respect and admiration for the man. He was very open that this was about his personal interpretation (and that he wouldn't, despite calls from conservatives, force his wife to comply with his own views), he would set out the passages that he could get past and the passages he couldn't.
It was exactly the kind of open, honest, wrestling with the issue and with Biblical interpretation that I wanted to hear from Christian leaders, and which I hardly ever did.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
Do you really not get
God kills a kitten every time someone who argues like you starts a sentence with these five words.
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468
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Posted
Re kittens:
Then expect a rumble between God and Death (from Disc World). Death is rather fond of cats.
If God really did behave that way, I know who I'd want to win.
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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")
Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001
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Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468
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Posted
Russ--
Please explain what your story about the woman without kids has to do with tolerance.
Thx.
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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")
Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001
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Gee D
Shipmate
# 13815
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
He's making the point that sexual behaviour can have serious social consequences, and that (in particular times and places - though he didn't say that explicitly) homosexuality can be of particular concern. He's making that point to answer the opposing view that homosexuality, even if "immoral" by some people's standards, should be invisible to law and to politics because it does no harm. Within limits (specific sexual behaviours can indeed be disproportionately associated with specific social harms) it's a sort-of valid point. I think it needs the causation point to be unpicked first (to do the work that I think IngoB wants it to do, homosexuality would need to be inherently causative of disease rather than merely associated with it in some instance, and the African example tells against that). That's a substance/accidents distinction that I'm surprised to see a Catholic thinker miss, and I think it's fatal to his point.
I doubt that there are very many Catholic thinkers these days still grasping the old scholastic arguments based on accidents/substance, save for the explanation of transubstantiation. That method, and the aridity of doctrine and teaching based upon it, started to vanish in the Counter-Reformation and has by now all but disappeared completely.
[ 05. September 2015, 07:51: Message edited by: Gee D ]
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Not every Anglican in Sydney is Sydney Anglican
Posts: 7028 | From: Warrawee NSW Australia | Registered: Jun 2008
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Curiosity killed ...
Ship's Mug
# 11770
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
No and no.
Do you really not get the difference between thinking people should do something and thinking it a good thing if they get the chance to choose to do something ?
I totally get the implications of expectations of parenthood on people. My mid twenties daughter is reading along with this (she's a Shipmate and has forgotten her log in, otherwise she'd be engaging too). She is the only person on her research team who is not under parental pressure to settle down and produce grandchildren. Personally I'd rather she did the research she's doing rather than satisfy any societal need for me to have grandchildren.
quote:
Do you have no tolerance gap at all ?
I have no idea what you mean by a tolerance gap. It seems to be something you're inventing to justify prejudice and judgementalism. If that's the case, no, I really don't want to be prejudiced and judgemental so I don't have what you call a tolerance gap.
quote:
I met a woman recently who can't have children. She's the sort of Catholic who believes in large families in principle. At the social event where we met, she was doting on all the young ones present, interested in them, saying how sweet they were, caring about them. It was obviously just watching her that she was carrying a big wound in her life.
Really, truly? I would suggest that you are projecting there. That can only be your interpretation. I spend time with the children at events because I like children. I work with children. I suspect you would see me at an event and your interpretation would be that I am suffering because I have no grandchildren. No. Just no.
quote:
And no, thinking that fate has dealt her a severe blow doesn't mean thinking any the less of her as a person.
That's really big of you. I am sure she appreciates all your interpretations of her motivations and your pity.
quote:
Other people think they're not cut out to be parents, or that they contribute more by devoting themselves to their work. Their choice.
Yep, my point entirely.
quote:
Time to outgrow the binary logic. Parents good does not mean non-parents bad.
I mean, mothers are great. Everyone should have one...
Russ, I am arguing back at you with binary logic because it's all you are using. It seems to be all you understand.
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Mugs - Keep the Ship afloat
Posts: 13794 | From: outiside the outer ring road | Registered: Aug 2006
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anne
Shipmate
# 73
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Golden Key:
Russ--
Please explain what your story about the woman without kids has to do with tolerance.
Thx.
I am starting to think that it might simply mean that she, as a childless (perhaps 'barren' would be more biblical) woman is fortunate enough to be tolerated by Russ. Her childlessness is deserving of pity and compassion and tolerance because a) it is the right sort of childlessness and b) she clearly (clearly to Russ at least) regrets it. And patronising compassion is what he means by tolerance.
I have hesitated to respond to this thread and have deleted a number of angry posts (preview post really is my friend.) It is a little close to home in several ways and I have not wanted to smear my emotional response across the coherent and sensible arguments being patiently made by other posters. But Russ seems to have found my limit now.
I am currently working with a devoted Christian couple to find a way in which we as a church can licitly and publicly honour and pray for them when they marry. Our conversations remind me every time of God's grace. It is entirely down to Him that they are still regular members of a congregation, because church leaders seem to have done everything possible to crush their faith and to make them feel unwelcome at every turn over many years. I am frustrated and angry and helpless that I cannot offer them what I would offer to a straight couple in their circumstances. Neither the couple nor I wants to make a stand, no-one is interested in scoring points, this is not about making headlines, it's not even about 'tolerance'; it's about justice. In conversations with church hierarchs I have been told that I can offer prayers in their home, and that I should pray extemporaneously so that there's nothing on paper that could be objected to later. I've been told that I should be preaching the joys of celibacy (by a married man.) This, apparently, in the name of tolerance. But when the outcome of tolerance is this treatment of devoted Christians, how is it practically different from homophobia?
Personally, during this thread, Russ has told me that anyone finding me sexually desirable is disordered (he may have said deviant, but I'm not hunting back six pages to check), and that marriage is not for the likes of me. I am straight, celibate and post-menopause - and really offended by this nonsense - but I am really collateral damage, I know he wasn't aiming at me. I am horrified to think how hurtful it must be for LGBQT readers of this thread to see these insults.
How dare he - or anyone - tolerate our brothers and sisters in this hateful way? We are not told to tolerate our neighbour, we are not told to tolerate our enemy. We are given another word altogether.
Anne
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‘I would have given the Church my head, my hand, my heart. She would not have them. She did not know what to do with them. She told me to go back and do crochet' Florence Nightingale
Posts: 338 | From: Devon | Registered: May 2001
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Ariston
Insane Unicorn
# 10894
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gee D:
I doubt that there are very many Catholic thinkers these days still grasping the old scholastic arguments based on accidents/substance, save for the explanation of transubstantiation. That method, and the aridity of doctrine and teaching based upon it, started to vanish in the Counter-Reformation and has by now all but disappeared completely.
Uh...
Um...
Don't underestimate the influence of the River Forest school of Thomism—one very, very devoted to the ideals of Aristotelian philosophy of nature and metaphysics—on contemporary Catholicism. Back when I was in school (about four years ago now), it was all Scholasticism, with distinctions between necessary/contingent, substance/accident, and essential/accidental (none of which are precisely the same distinctions, mind you) being de rigeur. Aristotelian-influenced scholasticism is not dead at all.
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“Therefore, let it be explained that nowhere are the proprieties quite so strictly enforced as in men’s colleges that invite young women guests, especially over-night visitors in the fraternity houses.” Emily Post, 1937.
Posts: 6849 | From: The People's Republic of Balcones | Registered: Jan 2006
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Carex
Shipmate
# 9643
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
And so I'm asking you to think how you might behave towards someone whose unchosen orientation is towards doing something that you consider to be morally sub-optimal...
I regularly deal with those who choose to do things I consider morally "sub-optimal". That's enough to deal with. Those who "possibly might have an inclination at some point in the future" get the benefit of the doubt - who am I to judge them for what I imagine they possibly might think about doing? I don't treat someone differently because they remind be of the type of person who might abuse their wife - that's all in my head rather than being based on their actual actions. But when they are sitting beside me on the phone being verbally abusive, at least then I have evidence of their actual actions, and can choose to respond accordingly.
Posts: 1425 | Registered: Jun 2005
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
What difference does it make if they have an orientation to doing something I think sub-optimal, or they just, outside any considerations of orientation, are choosing to sin?
What should I do if all around me people are living WBOC, or having one-night stands, or cheating on their spouses, or masturbating to porn, or (god forbid!) driving faster than the posted limit? What should I do, what should I do? Should I refuse to serve them? Should I refuse to teach math to their kids? Should I refuse to talk to them in public?
Or maybe I should just mind my own business unless what they're doing is actually hurting another human being. Because their sins, if sins they be, are between them and God.
Nah. I should wring my hands and cluck my tongue and worry more about other people's sins than my own.
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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Russ
Old salt
# 120
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
What should I do if all around me people are living WBOC, or having one-night stands, or cheating on their spouses, or masturbating to porn, or (god forbid!) driving faster than the posted limit? What should I do, what should I do? Should I refuse to serve them? Should I refuse to teach math to their kids? Should I refuse to talk to them in public?
Or maybe I should just mind my own business unless what they're doing is actually hurting another human being. Because their sins, if sins they be, are between them and God.
So you're saying that you tolerate their behaviour ?
That in your heart you don't think such behaviour good, don't want it held up as an ideal, don't want your children to grow up to think "this is what you do" ?
But you think it's really not your business as long it's not harming others ? That you have to get along somehow with people who don't think as you do, and part of that is that you respect their private space and don't intrude on their private lives and you expect the same from them in return ?
Tolerance.
That's what I've been trying to argue here. That for each of us there's a gap between what we actively seek to prevent (whether by the sort of private action you mention or by voting for the State to Do Something) and what we approve.
I'm delighted that you seem to have come around to my way of thinking, but a bit baffled as to why you seem to think what you're saying here is an argument against my position.
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Wish everyone well; the enemy is not people, the enemy is wrong ideas
Posts: 3169 | From: rural Ireland | Registered: May 2001
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Russ
Old salt
# 120
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by anne:
Russ has told me that anyone finding me sexually desirable is disordered (he may have said deviant, but I'm not hunting back six pages to check), and that marriage is not for the likes of me.
Hi Anne.
There's a long line of people twisting what I say and choosing to misunderstand. If you want to join in, you're welcome - the back of the queue is over there.
I would never say to a lady the words you've put into my mouth.
I am quite aware that desire does not necessarily depart when fertility does, and that people are increasingly carrying something of their youthfulness with them into later life.
I'm not going to look back through all those pages either, to find the bit where I said something unoriginal about people doing the best they can starting from where they are now.
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Wish everyone well; the enemy is not people, the enemy is wrong ideas
Posts: 3169 | From: rural Ireland | Registered: May 2001
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anne
Shipmate
# 73
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
quote:
Originally posted by anne:
Russ has told me that anyone finding me sexually desirable is disordered (he may have said deviant, but I'm not hunting back six pages to check), and that marriage is not for the likes of me.
Hi Anne.
There's a long line of people twisting what I say and choosing to misunderstand. If you want to join in, you're welcome - the back of the queue is over there.
I would never say to a lady the words you've put into my mouth.
It may not have been what you meant Russ - I can easily believe that you intended to insult gay people, rather than infertile straight ones. It is, however what you said when you described "a disorder involving the transfer of sexual desire from its functional object - a female of child-bearing age - to another object, in negation of its evolutionary purpose." I looked it up.
For those who've been following along at home, this gem comes somewhere between parents should be unhappy if their children are gay and "I'm not going to talk about the issue of homosexuality any more" That last one is also a direct quote. From page 9.
Anne
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‘I would have given the Church my head, my hand, my heart. She would not have them. She did not know what to do with them. She told me to go back and do crochet' Florence Nightingale
Posts: 338 | From: Devon | Registered: May 2001
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Russ
Old salt
# 120
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
We seem to be discussing both the substantive question "is there any moral/value difference between homosexuality and heterosexuality ?" and also the meta-question "is answering "Yes" to the first question necessarily a mark of cruelty, hated and bigotry ?"
No, not really. We're discussing more why you think there's a moral difference, and whether your stated reasons are principled and rational ones.
Why restrict it to just my reasons ? Your reasons for thinking the other way are of just as much interest.
If you say "it's self-evident" of your views and I say "it's self-evident" of mine, then not only do we not get anywhere, but there's a certain symmetry to the situation.
If there's asymmetry - if you say "it's self-evident" of your views and I make an effort to give a principled and rational argument for mine, which of us is the bigot ?
quote:
You can still say that homosexuality happens to be against a code of religious ethics that you believe to be binding. No one's going to get very angry with you just for saying that.
I find this line quite extraordinary. If I say that although I disagree with you it's because I'm only obeying orders, that makes it better ?
quote:
It's the comparison of homosexuality to paedophilia and necrophilia...
The argument that's been made to me is that homosexuality is OK because it's like left-handedness. Now that's a brilliant analogy. It says exactly what the pro-gay side want it to say. The symmetry of it - homo and hetero like left-handed and right-handed twins, equal and opposite - the reference to the stupid superstition of the past. Wish I'd thought of it. The problem is that it's not true.
Homosexuality is a form of sexual preference. If it's good or harmless then it's good or harmless in the way that other sexual preferences are good or harmless. If it's wrong then it's wrong in the same way that other sexual preferences are wrong. If I said that homosexuality s wrong in a unique way that doesn't apply to any other form of sexual preference (so they're all irrelevant) then you may well suspect that I'm only rationalising a prejudice.
quote:
..the conflation of homosexual orientation with wantonly promiscuous homosexual practice..
Have I said anything about homosexual promiscuity ?
quote:
the support for denying gay people equal rights
I've said they had equal rights
quote:
the refusal to use ordinary relationship words like "marriage" to describe ordinary gay relationships
Do you really think marriage has nothing whatsoever to do with children ?
quote:
the insistence on using words like "deviant" and "pervert"
If part of my belief is that homosexuality is a
"distortion or corruption of the original course, meaning, or state of something" (Google definition of perversion) then of course I'm going to use the words that convey that idea.
You were kind enough to suggest some alternative terms, but I'm not sure they fully convey the concept...
quote:
And so I'm asking you to think how you might behave towards someone whose unchosen orientation is towards doing something that you consider to be morally sub-optimal.
Well I think you've got your answer to that. For what it's worth.
No, I think you half-answered the point.
You said that your response to the hypothetical person hard-wired to be promiscuous would include what I call tolerance. And then immediately switched into talking about gay people, whose actions don't contradict your values in the same way.
What about the other half ? Would you approve of the hypothetical person's promiscuous behaviour just because it corresponds to their innate orientation ? Would you count it of equal value with marriage ? Would you celebrate their promiscuity as part of the wonderful diversity of the human species ? If the answer is "of course not" you can just say that.
Not because I'm trying to smear gay people by association with promiscuity. I'm using promiscuity just because that seemed the opposite of the example you gave of one of your values.
Just trying to get you to the point where you admit that tolerance of the activity but opposing societal approval of it is a reasonable position to take regarding behaviour that goes against your values. Regardless of how innate the desire may be.
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Wish everyone well; the enemy is not people, the enemy is wrong ideas
Posts: 3169 | From: rural Ireland | Registered: May 2001
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
quote:
It's the comparison of homosexuality to paedophilia and necrophilia...
The argument that's been made to me is that homosexuality is OK because it's like left-handedness. Now that's a brilliant analogy. It says exactly what the pro-gay side want it to say. The symmetry of it - homo and hetero like left-handed and right-handed twins, equal and opposite - the reference to the stupid superstition of the past. Wish I'd thought of it. The problem is that it's not true.
Homosexuality is a form of sexual preference. If it's good or harmless then it's good or harmless in the way that other sexual preferences are good or harmless. If it's wrong then it's wrong in the same way that other sexual preferences are wrong.
And you keep comparing it to other 'sexual preferences' that you know people will regard as wrong because they are harmful.
Even as you're setting up this dichotomy, you're skewing it. You're taking it as a given that homosexuality is 'wrong' somehow, not actually demonstrating that this is the case.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
Tolerance.
That's what I've been trying to argue here.
Then you've been doing a piss-poor job of it.
quote:
That for each of us there's a gap between what we actively seek to prevent (whether by the sort of private action you mention or by voting for the State to Do Something) and what we approve.
There is a huge range of things here which I'm not sure are all even on the same axis.
seek to prevent
tolerate
approve
promote
wish for all
I'm not sure you mean by "approve" what the rest of us do. You seem to think it equates to "promote" or "wish for all." I think the rest of us are more likely to put it closer to "tolerate," but collapse the scale somewhat.
But you're talking about more than these verbs. You're talking about having to have some kind of ready response for people you don't approve of. Not whose ACTIONS you don't approve of, heavens no. Whose innate potentialities you don't approve of. And we're trying to get you to see that there is a little bit of a problem with this as regards things you CLAIM to tolerate. (Although as many have pointed out, your claim here seems to be at odds with many of the other things you say.)
quote:
I'm delighted that you seem to have come around to my way of thinking
![[Killing me]](graemlins/killingme.gif)
That's a good one.
quote:
but a bit baffled as to why you seem to think what you're saying here is an argument against my position.
I'm beginning to think you don't even realize what your position looks like to the rest of us. Even when we keep holding it up to you as in a mirror.
quote:
Just trying to get you to the point where you admit that tolerance of the activity but opposing societal approval of it is a reasonable position to take regarding behaviour that goes against your values. Regardless of how innate the desire may be.
Russ, your idea of "approve of" seems to be different from mine. You seem to think it means "would wish it for everybody." I approve of people doing a lot of things that I wouldn't want to make a universal rule. Kant was wrong. I can approve of my son becoming a lawyer without wanting everybody to be a lawyer. Given this, the argument that "if everyone were gay the human race would cease to exist" is shown to be the stupidity it is. If everyone were a lawyer the human race would cease to exist because nobody would be growing food. But that doesn't make being a laywer immoral. Kant was wrong.
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
If there's asymmetry - if you say "it's self-evident" of your views and I make an effort to give a principled and rational argument for mine, which of us is the bigot ?
That would be awesome! When do you think you'll start?
quote:
You were kind enough to suggest some alternative terms, but I'm not sure they fully convey the concept...
Well they don't fully convey your bigotry. They convey the concept just fine. Alternately, if they don't convey the concept, what are they not conveying? What is being left out?
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
He has no interest in presenting a case. All his language appears designed to insult. If this is an amazingly consistent accident, it does nothing to promote any confidence in his abilities to process a reasonable discussion.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
The argument that's been made to me is that homosexuality is OK because it's like left-handedness. Now that's a brilliant analogy. It says exactly what the pro-gay side want it to say. The symmetry of it - homo and hetero like left-handed and right-handed twins, equal and opposite - the reference to the stupid superstition of the past. Wish I'd thought of it.
Correct
quote:
Homosexuality is a form of sexual preference.
Wrong.
Homosexuality is a sexual orientation. You need to learn the difference.
Heterosexuals have many and varied sexual preferences. Homosexuals have many and varied sexual preferences. Some of these are harmful - you keep naming some of the most harmful examples of sexual preference and, for some reason, lumping them with homosexuality. Do you think the same of bisexual people or asexual people?
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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Penny S
Shipmate
# 14768
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
quote:
Originally posted by anne:
Russ has told me that anyone finding me sexually desirable is disordered (he may have said deviant, but I'm not hunting back six pages to check), and that marriage is not for the likes of me.
Hi Anne.
There's a long line of people twisting what I say and choosing to misunderstand. If you want to join in, you're welcome - the back of the queue is over there.
I would never say to a lady the words you've put into my mouth.
I am quite aware that desire does not necessarily depart when fertility does, and that people are increasingly carrying something of their youthfulness with them into later life.
I'm not going to look back through all those pages either, to find the bit where I said something unoriginal about people doing the best they can starting from where they are now.
Do you have any idea how that paragraph, the one telling us what you are quite aware of, sounds to those of us in Anne's position? Do you read things out before posting? Do you imagine yourself in the place of the reader? You have implied the normal state is to lose desire with fertility, and to lose youthfulness in later life.
I remember reading that people once believed that in the resurrection we would all be 33 because it was Christ's age at his death, and I suspect that idea was developed by people who knew from experience that our head age is far far younger than our body age. Personally, I would put 33 a bit high. I think I've been 28 since I was 24.
[ 06. September 2015, 09:24: Message edited by: Penny S ]
Posts: 5833 | Registered: May 2009
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Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468
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Posted
Russ--
Is it that you think that pro-creation is fundamentally all there is to life???
Serious question. That would make sense of what you've said about childless women, homosexuals, etc.
Ingo has written similarly, here and on other threads. But I think he believes there's more to life than pro-creation.
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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")
Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001
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Russ
Old salt
# 120
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Golden Key:
Russ--
Is it that you think that pro-creation is fundamentally all there is to life???
Serious question. That would make sense of what you've said about childless women, homosexuals, etc.
Not all there is to life. But one of the things that makes all the rest possible.
Your question seems to me to exemplify once more the excluded middle, as if there's nothing in between thinking procreation unimportant and thinking it's all there is.
What I've said about childless women is that for some of them this is a deep personal tragedy, and for some of them it's a rational and moral choice which is rightfully theirs to make. I've met people in both categories.
Posts: 3169 | From: rural Ireland | Registered: May 2001
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Russ
Old salt
# 120
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Penny S:
You have implied the normal state is to lose desire with fertility...,
People are having so much fun taking umbrage at what they think I've implied, it seems almost a shame to contradict.
But if I make a cautious statement "X isn't necessarily so" and you read this as "we can take it for the purposes of the argument that X is true" then we're really getting to the point where communication isn't happening.
quote:
...and to lose youthfulness in later life.
You're seriously objecting to this ? What do you think "youthful" means if it's not a reference to characteristics that distinguish earlier life from later life ?
In face-to-face conversation, much meaning can be conveyed by tone of voice. Which is of course absent here. So this medium demands a greater attention to the actual words used.
If you choose to read what I write in a negative tone of voice then you can probably generate all sorts of implications that are in your head and not in mine.
I've been there. Walked the dog composing passionate arguments in my head against something particularly stupid or spectacularly wrong that someone's posted. And then come back to the Ship to find that they didn't exactly say whatever it was...
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Wish everyone well; the enemy is not people, the enemy is wrong ideas
Posts: 3169 | From: rural Ireland | Registered: May 2001
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Curiosity killed ...
Ship's Mug
# 11770
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
There's a long line of people twisting what I say and choosing to misunderstand.
Russ, when there's "a long line of people twisting" your words "and choosing to misunderstand", that might suggest that the way you are expressing yourself is not conveying the message you want it to say.
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Mugs - Keep the Ship afloat
Posts: 13794 | From: outiside the outer ring road | Registered: Aug 2006
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Dafyd
Shipmate
# 5549
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
Homosexuality is a form of sexual preference. If it's good or harmless then it's good or harmless in the way that other sexual preferences are good or harmless. If it's wrong then it's wrong in the same way that other sexual preferences are wrong.
What's wrong with paedophilia is that it's sexual desire for people who cannot meaningfully consent. For that matter, so are necrophilia and bestiality, to name two other desires that homosexuality is often likened to by homophobes.
Since homosexuality isn't wrong in that way, on the above argument it must be good or harmless.
But nice as it would be to agree, I think the logical principle you're invoking is misapplied here. Merely because something is a form of medical practice, doesn't mean that if it's malpractice it's wrong in the same way as other forms of malpractice. It merely means it's wrong to apply the standards that apply to, say, war tactics.
quote:
quote:
the refusal to use ordinary relationship words like "marriage" to describe ordinary gay relationships
Do you really think marriage has nothing whatsoever to do with children ?
It doesn't always have anything to do with children, though, does it? Couples generally continue to be married once the children have grown up and left home. Not to mention couples who are infertile for one reason or another.
In any case, I trust you have no objection to marriage between people of the same sex who do have children.
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we remain, thanks to original sin, much in love with talking about, rather than with, one another. Rowan Williams
Posts: 10567 | From: Edinburgh | Registered: Feb 2004
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Curiosity killed ...
Ship's Mug
# 11770
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
Do you really think marriage has nothing whatsoever to do with children ?
Actually, the ONS* figures for 2014 (pdf), the latest I can find, give:
quote:
Live births within marriage/civil partnership
In 2014, nearly half of all babies were born outside marriage/civil partnership (47.5%), compared with 47.4% in 2013 and 42.2% in 2004. This continues the long-term rise in the percentage of births outside marriage/civil partnership, which is consistent with increases in the number of couples cohabiting rather than entering into marriage or civil partnership
and show that there is an increasingly tenuous link between marriage and children. Projections from the 2013 figures had headlines suggesting that more than half of all children would be born out of wedlock by 2016.
The increase is slowing down slightly, possibly due to the increased incidence of homosexual couples registering children within a civil partnership/same sex marriage. Note 5 from the above document states:
quote:
The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 2008 contained provisions enabling 2 females in a same sex couple to register a birth from 1 September 2009 onwards. Due to the small numbers of births registered to same sex couples, births registered within a civil partnership are included with births registered within marriage. Births registered by a same sex couple outside of a civil partnership have been included with births registered outside marriage. The impact on 2014 birth statistics is negligible since only 0.1% of live births were registered to same sex couples. In 2014 there were 713 live births registered to same sex couples in a marriage or civil partnership and 277 live births registered to same sex couples outside a marriage or civil partnership.
* UK Office for National Statistics
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Mugs - Keep the Ship afloat
Posts: 13794 | From: outiside the outer ring road | Registered: Aug 2006
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Soror Magna
Shipmate
# 9881
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Posted
Thank you - I was wondering when someone would point out to Russ the obvious fact that people manage to have children without being married. It appears he knows even less about heterosexuality than he does about homosexuality.
quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
quote:
In 2014 there were 713 live births registered to same sex couples in a marriage or civil partnership and 277 live births registered to same sex couples outside a marriage or civil partnership.
* UK Office for National Statistics
And lo and behold, same-sex couples do have children, married or not. Which brings us to one of the smack-down arguments from SCOTUS - denying same-sex couples marriage HARMS CHILDREN.
So, Russ-add-ty-and-get-the-farm-implement: do you really want society to punish these kids for the entire duration of their lives because you and Bingo and all the other Pharisees think they have the wrong parents? Tell us. Or would you take their children away and give them to straight couples? Sterilize lesbians and gays so they don't have any more? Oh, crap, it looks like you've got Godwin on your shoes again.
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"You come with me to room 1013 over at the hospital, I'll show you America. Terminal, crazy and mean." -- Tony Kushner, "Angels in America"
Posts: 5430 | From: Caprica City | Registered: Jul 2005
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
There's a long line of people twisting what I say and choosing to misunderstand.
Russ, when there's "a long line of people twisting" your words "and choosing to misunderstand", that might suggest that the way you are expressing yourself is not conveying the message you want it to say.
Russ, if everyone thinks the same thing, even if wrongly, they are not the problem.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Soror Magna:
So, Russ-add-ty-and-get-the-farm-implement: do you really want society to punish these kids for the entire duration of their lives because you and Bingo and all the other Pharisees think they have the wrong parents? Tell us. Or would you take their children away and give them to straight couples? Sterilize lesbians and gays so they don't have any more? Oh, crap, it looks like you've got Godwin on your shoes again.
But Russ doesn't want to make it illegal for same-sex couples to marry. He's perfectly willing to "tolerate" them, as long as he can make it crystal clear to us and them and the world at large that he doesn't "approve of" them, and would genetically modify his own sperm (or his wife's eggs, or both) to prevent his future children from being gay, if it were possible.
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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RooK
1 of 6
# 1852
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Posted
Is that actually so? I had the impression that Russ' version of "tolerance" mostly involved us quietly tolerating his support of legislation that denies equivalent marriage rights for same-sex couples. Which he is advocating as a principled stand based on natural order, justified by "tradition". All the while trying to help us see why we should tolerate his view of homosexuals as disordered, which he insists is perfectly reasonable despite FOURTEEN FUCKING PAGES of emphatic exposition about why it is, in fact, horrible.
Posts: 15274 | From: Portland, Oregon, USA, Earth | Registered: Nov 2001
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Leaf
Shipmate
# 14169
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
Tolerance.
That's what I've been trying to argue here. That for each of us there's a gap between what we actively seek to prevent (whether by the sort of private action you mention or by voting for the State to Do Something) and what we approve.
Your position: patting yourself on the back for holding your nose.
It makes you look exactly as dignified as described.
Posts: 2786 | From: the electrical field | Registered: Oct 2008
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Leaf:
Your position: patting yourself on the back for holding your nose.
This would be sad if it weren't so funny if it weren't so sad.
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
If I said that homosexuality s wrong in a unique way that doesn't apply to any other form of sexual preference (so they're all irrelevant) then you may well suspect that I'm only rationalising a prejudice.
Well, I for one would call that being honest. If you could actually express reasons why you consider homosexuality to be wrong without introducing irrelevant forms of sexual preference then we would have something to discuss. We might even manage that discussion outside Hell. You probably won't convince anyone here of your position, but you may not come across as a bigoted twat.
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
Posts: 32413 | From: East Kilbride (Scotland) or 福島 | Registered: May 2001
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
If I said that homosexuality s wrong in a unique way that doesn't apply to any other form of sexual preference (so they're all irrelevant) then you may well suspect that I'm only rationalising a prejudice.
Merely stating it like that wouldn't be rationalizing it, because rationalizing it implies you're giving spurious reasons for it, which implies you're giving reasons. You haven't given any reasons yet that I have seen, spurious or otherwise. Only spurious analogies.
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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Eliab
Shipmate
# 9153
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
Why restrict it to just my reasons ? Your reasons for thinking the other way are of just as much interest.
Because it's your fucking Hell call. Although I doubt that there is anyone on this thread but you who thinks that I haven't explained my position and my reasons for holding it better than you have yours.
quote:
If you say "it's self-evident" of your views and I say "it's self-evident" of mine, then not only do we not get anywhere, but there's a certain symmetry to the situation.
No there isn't. Because if the question is "is there a difference between X and Y?", the answer "not that I can see" is a sufficient response. It can be challenged, of course, by someone pointing out a difference that has been missed, but they do actually need to refer to a specific difference to do that. Whereas the answer "yes, there is" immediately invites the further question "so what is it, then?".
You think there's a moral difference between gay and straight relationships? So what is it, then?.
quote:
If there's asymmetry - if you say "it's self-evident" of your views and I make an effort to give a principled and rational argument for mine, which of us is the bigot ?
Not only have I put the pro-gay case in a more principled and rational way than you have yours (so much is obvious), I have even put the anti-gay case in a more principled and rational way than you, too.
quote:
I find this line quite extraordinary. If I say that although I disagree with you it's because I'm only obeying orders, that makes it better ?
Better than what? At the moment, I would remind you that you've yet to offer any cogent reasons whatsoever for being anti-gay (feel free to link to one, if I missed it). An argument from authority would undoubtedly be an improvement on your position.
There are obvious problems with an argument that God "just says" that same sex relationships are wrong - most notably that little or nothing else in Christian ethics is taught on a "God just says" basis, but can be reasoned about and argued for on the merits. But I can't and don't deny that the Bible and the tradition of the Church are sources of authority that a Christian ought to be concerned about, and are sufficient at least to start a discussion.
quote:
If it's good or harmless then it's good or harmless in the way that other sexual preferences are good or harmless. If it's wrong then it's wrong in the same way that other sexual preferences are wrong.
What nonsense. Different sexual desires can be right or wrong for a variety of reasons. Your "biological purpose" reason, for example, has nothing to say against my desire to cheat on my wife, which is wrong for a wholly different reason (because it's a breach of trust).
quote:
Have I said anything about homosexual promiscuity ?
Yes. You said that changing the law to make sex with strangers just another form of marriage was an obvious parallel with the equal treatment of gay people. You have used promiscuity repeatedly as a comparator with homosexuality. If you didn't mean to imply a link, what the fuck was that all about?
quote:
Do you really think marriage has nothing whatsoever to do with children ?
Sure. If an opposite sex couple who intend to raise children think to ask my advice, I might well suggest that they get married. I think there are other reasons for getting married, so I might also give similar advice to a couple not intending children, but the fact that stable, committed, socially-supported and legally-recognised relationships are good for child-rearing is a biggie.
And now that I've written that, I've noticed that I could remove the words "opposite sex" and the reasoning still makes sense. Or don't you think so?
quote:
If part of my belief is that homosexuality is a
"distortion or corruption of the original course, meaning, or state of something" (Google definition of perversion) then of course I'm going to use the words that convey that idea.
The primary use of "perversion" is to express disapproval and contempt. It really is. That's how the word is used in English. You can use it in a technical sense, but if you do, you take the risk that your audience will infer disapproval and contempt into what you are saying.
Now that you know this, if you want to persist in calling homosexuality a perversion, then I can't stop you. But I'll know what to think of you.
quote:
You said that your response to the hypothetical person hard-wired to be promiscuous would include what I call tolerance.
Actually no, because the person wasn't "hard-wired to be promiscuous" in any sense that most human beings are not. He/she has exactly the same motivation for promiscuity as the rest of us (being attracted to people with whom a relationship is not necessarily desireable), and the reasons why that might be a bad idea are also the same. The person differs from most other humans only by being incapable of sexual attraction to people other than strangers. He or she is incapacitated from normal marriage, not hard-wired for promiscuity.
So the question is really, does my sympathy for someone denied, through no fault of their own, a source of sexual satisfaction that I consider moral, cause me to excuse them from seeking satisfaction in ways that I consider immoral. The answer is "not much - a bit, I suppose". The extent to which I would "tolerate" their promiscuity is pretty much the same as the toleration someone of more normal desires who simply chooses to be promiscuous would get.
quote:
Just trying to get you to the point where you admit that tolerance of the activity but opposing societal approval of it is a reasonable position to take regarding behaviour that goes against your values. Regardless of how innate the desire may be.
And you likely aren't going to get me to that point, because "tolerance", "opposing societal approval" and "behaviour that goes against your values" are all categories that needs unpacking. I would want to be sure I was using those words in a similar sense to the way in which you would hear them before concurring.
I like to have reasons why something goes against my values. Those reasons matter. Whether something falls into what you are calling the "tolerance gap" or not depends on those reasons, not on the fact of it being against my values. Your analogies are all with behaviours that I would disapprove of for reasons which I could articulate and which don't apply to homosexuality. Further, what you refer to as "opposing societal approval" probably includes behaviour which I think is blatantly unjust and harmful. I think that I might use the word "persecution" to describe some elements of what you mean by "tolerance", if you are indeed serious about forcing gay people to obey some sort of enforced silence about who they are. But I say that mindful of the fact that you have expressed your position somewhat incoherently and your real views could be either much more, or much less, odious than I fear they might be.
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"Perhaps there is poetic beauty in the abstract ideas of justice or fairness, but I doubt if many lawyers are moved by it"
Richard Dawkins
Posts: 4619 | From: Hampton, Middlesex, UK | Registered: Mar 2005
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
Not only have I put the pro-gay case in a more principled and rational way than you have yours (so much is obvious), I have even put the anti-gay case in a more principled and rational way than you, too.
Eliab taking both sides of an argument is a wonder to behold.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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Russ
Old salt
# 120
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
[QUOTE]There is a huge range of things here which I'm not sure are all even on the same axis.
seek to prevent
tolerate
approve
promote
wish for all
I'm not sure you mean by "approve" what the rest of us do. You seem to think it equates to "promote" or "wish for all." I think the rest of us are more likely to put it closer to "tolerate," but collapse the scale somewhat.
Yes, I think "approve" is pretty close to "think good", and if you think something good you'd recommend it to others.
A point beyond "approve" might be "think so overwhelmingly good that I'd impose it on others".
But if you can come up with a better scale, whether with more or fewer points, whether on a single or multiple axes, I'm all ears...
quote:
Kant was wrong. I can approve of my son becoming a lawyer without wanting everybody to be a lawyer. Given this, the argument that "if everyone were gay the human race would cease to exist" is shown to be the stupidity it is. If everyone were a lawyer the human race would cease to exist because nobody would be growing food. But that doesn't make being a laywer immoral. Kant was wrong
I agree. (Without wanting to rule out the possibility that he had some right ideas that just can't be applied in that straightforward way).
But do you think Kant was a cruel and hate-filled bigot for thinking it ?
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Wish everyone well; the enemy is not people, the enemy is wrong ideas
Posts: 3169 | From: rural Ireland | Registered: May 2001
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
I agree. (Without wanting to rule out the possibility that he had some right ideas that just can't be applied in that straightforward way).
But do you think Kant was a cruel and hate-filled bigot for thinking it ?
If you agree the categorical imperative is wrong, then why do you apply it to homosexuality?
Kant, as far as I know, never tried to use his moral philosophy to denigrate and delegitimatize an entire class of people. So the question is absurd.
quote:
Yes, I think "approve" is pretty close to "think good", and if you think something good you'd recommend it to others.
See, here we see you being all Kantian. I can approve of someone being (say) a long-distance trucker without having to recommend it to others. Because it may not be right for others. Perhaps this is part of the problem -- you think that there is no such thing as "good for this or that person" -- only "good for everybody." Which is pretty darned Kantian as these things go.
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
Yes, I think "approve" is pretty close to "think good", and if you think something good you'd recommend it to others.
As in "Good sir, have you tried penis? I truly think you'd enjoy it. All my gay male and straight female friends think it is ever so lovely".
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
A point beyond "approve" might be "think so overwhelmingly good that I'd impose it on others".
This may not quite be as far as to make Hitler your BFF, but he would like you at least a little bit.
Nobody here is attempting to force anything on anyone, nor even seeking approval.
Think whatever you wish, just get the hell out of the way.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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Russ
Old salt
# 120
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Russ, if everyone thinks the same thing, even if wrongly, they are not the problem.
Insanity is a minority of one, huh ?
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Wish everyone well; the enemy is not people, the enemy is wrong ideas
Posts: 3169 | From: rural Ireland | Registered: May 2001
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Russ, if everyone thinks the same thing, even if wrongly, they are not the problem.
Insanity is a minority of one, huh ?
You know, you are as funny as you are rational.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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