Same Sex Marriage Thread - Part III

[Irvine511]

Originally Posted by INDY500

I'm sure your analysis is mostly correct but it doesn't hurt that Northern Virginia has several of the nation's wealthiest counties largely immune from the recession because of the explosion in federal spending. Kinda makes for a natural breeding ground for Democrats doesn't it?



But we can't talk about the income inequality between counties that surround Washington D.C and the rest of the country can we?

The explosion in federal spending happened under Bush, not Obama.

Many of these counties are so wealthy not because of the federal goveremt but because of Mark Warner and Tim Kaine and the diversification of the economy. Also, places like Loudon County are wealthy not because they're home to millionaires-via-fed bit because they were once farmland and a bunch of shitty quick housing was thrown up to accommodate the exploding population. There are no poor people in these places, just a lot of people making between $80-150k. The lack of income diversity skews them high.

[INDY500]

Originally Posted by Irvine511

The explosion in federal spending happened under Bush, not Obama.

Both actually.

Super Bowl weekend starts right now, talk amongst yourselves.

[martha]

Originally Posted by Pearl

I believe I answered too

Sorry.

[Galeongirl]

Originally Posted by INDY500

Well what? I might be in agreement with Camille Paglia. Obviously individuals are born with traits but sexuality like any action is always a choice. One chooses to be celibate or promiscuous for example. In addition, there are environmental, family and sexual abuse issues. Homosexuality is part of the human condition but no, I don't feel one is born gay which is not to say that there are not men who find, for example, the thought of sex with women repulsive

What makes you come to this conclusion? Honestly curious there.

I think you're mixing up two things though. There's a difference between sexuality and acting upon it. As you say, someone chooses to be celibate, does that mean they are not gay or straight? No, they still have a sexual preference, they just choose not to act upon it.
Sexuality isn't a choice. Acting upon your sexuality is.

[LJT]

Originally Posted by INDY500

The current activist dogma states that sexual orientation is innate while one's sex is subjective and malleable.
Do you believe that?
How many, to use the current accepted language, genders are there Diemen?

Well first we don't think sex is subjective. Sex is you are biologically male, female, or intersex. Gender is the cultural expectations or role you are assigned, usually male or female. But since that is all cultural stuff that is malleable. To be honest there can probably be as many genders as there are people if everyone wanted to. But don't worry your cotton socks we aren't all going to become genderqueer femmes.

[Irvine511]

Originally Posted by INDY500

Well what? I might be in agreement with Camille Paglia. Obviously individuals are born with traits but sexuality like any action is always a choice. One chooses to be celibate or promiscuous for example. In addition, there are environmental, family and sexual abuse issues. Homosexuality is part of the human condition but no, I don't feel one is born gay which is not to say that there are not men who find, for example, the thought of sex with women repulsive.
Many lesbians have long insisted that their homosexuality was an expression of feminist empowerment. Which explains the many examples of ex-lesbians.

what about love?

it seems it's only about fucking with the anti-SSM folks.

does it ever cross the anti-gay mind that not only are gay people sexually attracted to the same gender when you are gay but, more importantly, you are emotionally attracted to the same gender? that these are the people you can only honestly fall in love with? that it's not so much about finding women repulsive but about finding men physically and emotionally fulfilling in a way that no woman could ever be?

[Pearl]

Originally Posted by INDY500

Well what? I might be in agreement with Camille Paglia. Obviously individuals are born with traits but sexuality like any action is always a choice. One chooses to be celibate or promiscuous for example. In addition, there are environmental, family and sexual abuse issues. Homosexuality is part of the human condition but no, I don't feel one is born gay which is not to say that there are not men who find, for example, the thought of sex with women repulsive.
Many lesbians have long insisted that their homosexuality was an expression of feminist empowerment. Which explains the many examples of ex-lesbians.

It's also not to say that it's not a very complicated issue as simple as "praying away the gay" or however I imagine some of you will twist my social heresy.

By the way, Ms Paglia (an atheist and certainly no conservative) also called out the fascist nature of gay activists ie. Duck Dynasty and as Irvine will surely tell us she is hated by them for straying from the accepted orthodoxy.

Firstly, even though Camille Paglia speaks out against homosexuality, she's been a lesbian for decades, so she's largely contradicting herself.

As for homosexuals who are that way because of abuse, who can blame them for not wanting to be with the opposite sex after all the hell they've been through? If my father, uncle, stepbrother, whoever sexually abused me for years as a child, I sure as hell would want nothing to do with men.

Does that still mean I would deserve fewer human rights than you? And not be able to marry who I loved?

Anyone who isn't born gay and acts on it is a minority in the LGBT community. Plus, there have been plenty of studies to show being gay is innate from birth.

[Irvine511]

there's ample evidence that sexuality seems to be more fluid in females then in males, and simply because a woman is with a woman and then a man doesn't mean that she's an "ex-lesbian," it means that she's bisexual.

[martha]

I still can't believe there has to be all this discussion of sexuality just to let two guys who love each other get hitched. No one asked me whether my heterosexuality was a choice when I married my sweetheart. No one ever asked about our sex life. Did anyone ask straight couples whether being a Jew or a Catholic was a choice, because what about the children? Who gives a rat's ass what Camile Paglia thinks about gay activists? What does that have to do with two lesbians who've been together for 10 years getting married? It's a done deal; it's happening. No one's getting hurt. If the guy doesn't want to bake a goddamn cake for a couple, then get out of the business of cake-baking. No "Christian" organization would touch that clown if he'd declined to bake a cake for a Jew marrying a Catholic. Jesus, it's not that hard. There's actually no slippery slope; there have been no dire consequences. Gay people get married, the world turns.


/rant

[Galeongirl]

I just thought of something...


Being gay is not a choice. But a religion is. So while we are born this way, others choose to hate us for who we are... while they gain absolutely nothing with all their hate. Damn, that's pretty messed up.

[martha]

It is.

And they hate in the name of the One who Loves.

[Irvine511]

i don't think marriage inequality is apartheid, nor do i think it's Jim Crow. these are different things.

but i do think the violence LGBT people have suffered historically, and today, is absolutely on par with any group's collective suffering.

take Russia:

Ever since virulently homophobic Russian President Vladimir Putin pushed through a law effectively outlawing openly gay people, the country’s LGBTQ community has, predictably, been plagued by violence. Now a study published in Harvard University’s Health and Human Rights journal confirms what myriad horrific anecdotes suggest: Gay people in Russia are being beaten, raped, and murdered at record rates—and the government is doing little to stop it.

The issue of violence against gays in Russia is, of course, nothing new. Before the passage of the new federal measure, several regional governments passed identical laws, stripping gay citizens of legal rights and human dignity. More than one-half of Russian gays reported psychological abuse, while 16 percent experienced physical assault, and 7 percent were raped. Yet 77 percent also reported complete distrust of the police, leaving most anti-gay crimes unreported.

Putin’s law has only darkened this already bleak picture. By putting the government’s stamp of approval on rampant Russian homophobia, Putin effectively declared open season on gay people. As the Harvard study notes, violence against gays in Russia isn’t considered violence at all; rather, it’s thought of as a way for young males to prove their own heterosexuality—while simultaneously cleansing society of an aberrant, pedophilic community.

That’s the motivation behind groups like Occupy Pedophilia, which lure in gay teens through social media in order to publicly humiliate them by beating them with sex toys or forcing them to drink urine. The guerrilla group claims that its ultimate goal is to “cure” gay people of their orientation—echoing the Russian health minister’s statement that homosexuality is often a mental illness. Concerned by the violence, one Russian citizen sent 70 appeals to law enforcement agencies, asking them to investigate the attacks. Every request was refused.

Maxim Martsinkevich, the leader of Occupy Pedophilia, was recently arrested in Cuba and will soon face trial in Russia, though none of the charges against him stem from his gay-bashing. (Given that Martsinkevich was a proud neo-Nazi, his rap sheet is predictably extensive.) But his arrest will likely do little to stop the vicious zeal with which Occupy Pedophilia and likeminded groups are shaming, beating, and sexually assaulting gay Russians. In fact, much anti-gay violence comes from law enforcement officers themselves, who have brutally suppressed any public showing of gay tolerance. (That’s the law, after all.)

Putin didn’t introduce homophobia to Russia. But his crusade against the gay community has direly exacerbated the country’s already suffocating haze of anti-gay bigotry and ignorance. A strong and confident leader could have helped the country move beyond its antediluvian conceptions of sexuality and gender. Instead, the paranoid Putin has used gays as a common enemy and a scapegoat. He might have scored political points with this stunt, both in his own country and in the West. But the toll of his intolerance is currently being paid in human lives.

[LuckyNumber7]

The case of Russia blows my mind. Not that Russia is by any means "Western," but I can think of a handful of non-Western countries that outlaw homosexuality and are far less advanced in time, if you will, that hold a much higher standard for human rights.

[cobl04]

Scotland has joined the list of countries to burn in hell for all eternity.

[Galeongirl]

Heard that on the radio this morning, and by an overwhelming majority too! 100 something vs 18 against.

[Irvine511]

that's the sound of the world spinning forward ...

i am very, very curious as to what the Putin Olympics will have in store.

[PennyLanePHINS]

Originally Posted by Irvine511

that's the sound of the world spinning forward ...

i am very, very curious as to what the Putin Olympics will have in store.

Besides discolored water and unfinished buildings?

[martha]

It's Russia, fer chrissakes. People didn't expect that?

[INDY500]

Originally Posted by Galeongirl

What makes you come to this conclusion? Honestly curious there.

I think you're mixing up two things though. There's a difference between sexuality and acting upon it. As you say, someone chooses to be celibate, does that mean they are not gay or straight? No, they still have a sexual preference, they just choose not to act upon it.
Sexuality isn't a choice. Acting upon your sexuality is.

I've recently changed my mind on the topic having believed orientation was largely determined at birth for the last 10 years. And I don't rule it out either, but I need some real scientific, empirical proof. None currently exists. But frankly I don't see how it matters. Whether or not one is "born gay" has no significance either way on the SSM argument for me.
The hysterical and violent reaction to the Mark Regnerus study showed just how politicized the social science on homosexuality and same-sex parenting has become. It's one-sided. Like global-warming. It's largely agenda-driven science with an outcome looking for verification.
I would never argue with someone about it however. If Irvine says he has been attracted to males his entire life and feels he was born homosexual I have no reason to doubt him.

You doubt that science can be bastardized by politics?

http://atlanta.cbslocal.com/2014/02/...king/parenents

Study: Third-Hand Smoke Exposure As Deadly As Smoking

Riverside, Calif. (CBS ATLANTA) – Exposure to surfaces and objects that have been saturated in cigarette smoke, labeled as “third-hand smoke,” may be as deadly as smoking the cigarette itself.

Idiotic but it will be used by zealots.

[PhilsFan]

Haha, you think people object to Regnerus because of politics?