Gay marriage should never be recognize by the state because...

[rah]

Not to be a wise ass or anything but if you wrote out all of your beliefs down and then went back and substituted the word "ALIEN" for "GOD", the plausibility hasn't really changed so why should the question of intellect be any different.

[Lorizael]

What does it matter what some gobby morons on the internet think about your character or intellect though?

It's true. Mindlessly arguing with the gobby morons is one thing; respecting their opinions is quite another.

[Elok]

Not to be a wise ass or anything but if you wrote out all of your beliefs down and then went back and substituted the word "ALIEN" for "GOD", the plausibility hasn't really changed so why should the question of intellect be any different.

I don't know that there aren't aliens either. As their existence has no bearing on how I live my life (unlike my religious beliefs), I generally don't think about them. If somebody on here believed in aliens, I certainly hope I wouldn't be an ******* about it. I don't believe in Caligastia's Urantia book, but I didn't rag on him about it. Largely because it's none of my business.

[MikeH]

If you talk about it on-line in a forum like this you are putting it out there for people to discuss, agree with, argue with or ridicule.

[Elok]

What does it matter what some gobby morons on the internet think about your character or intellect though?

It's true. Mindlessly arguing with the gobby morons is one thing; respecting their opinions is quite another.

I view respect as a given. And if I thought everything everyone on here thought was worthless, I wouldn't come.

[Elok]

If you talk about it on-line in a forum like this you are putting it out there for people to discuss, agree with, argue with or ridicule.

That's the thing, I don't "put it out there." I don't try to proselytize on here, unless somebody asks a question about Orthodoxy or Christian doctrine. And just because people do act like cretins online, that doesn't give me license to be a cretin myself.

[Lorizael]

...that doesn't give me license to be a cretin myself.

You're one of the few people on here (perhaps the entire internet, or maybe even the planet) who apologizes readily when you do something wrong. It's pretty rad.

[MOBIUS]

Not to be a wise ass or anything but if you wrote out all of your beliefs down and then went back and substituted the word "ALIEN" for "GOD", the plausibility hasn't really changed so why should the question of intellect be any different.

Or L. Ron Hubbard for that matter...

[MikeH]

Why should one respect the views of someone if you think their views are stupid or wrong?

It's the old moral relativism thing, whilst in principle it sounds a nice theory to accord equal value to everyone's views, it's not realistic.

[rah]

That's just my line when believers shake their heads and tell me they can't understand why I don't believe since it's so evident to them. Different strokes for different folks.

[Elok]

Hey, I'm fine if you disagree with me. But if you could not call me a "silly cultist," "******," etc., about it, that would be just swell.

[MikeH]

To be fair, I think you have mainly been collateral damage on that front from me, I don't really know who you are well enough to aim that kind of comment directly at you.

[Elok]

I know, but at the risk of sounding like an even bigger pansy than I probably already do, collateral damage is still damage.

[Lorizael]

Why should one respect the views of someone if you think their views are stupid or wrong?

It's the old moral relativism thing, whilst in principle it sounds a nice theory to accord equal value to everyone's views, it's not realistic.

Moral relativism is perfectly realistic. It just depends on what that equal value you assign to everyone's views turns out to be. For awhile I valued all philosophical arguments at 5, but that ran into some problems. People complained that this meant The Golden Rule wasn't valued enough, or somesuch. So then I changed it so that all philosophical arguments were valued at 100. But then people were like, dude, you think Nazism is worth 100? You're a Nazi! So that didn't work out. Then I found the answer. Moral relativism works if all viewpoints are valued at 0. Then, if someone complains that they don't like how you've evaluated a particular viewpoint, you don't have to change a thing because their opinion that your evaluation is wrong is worth 0!

[Ming]

Hey, I'm fine if you disagree with me. But if you could not call me a "silly cultist," "******," etc., about it, that would be just swell.

If you want to claim that religious marriages are better than non relgiious marriages because some hypothetical deity blesses it, then I will call you a silly cultist. People can love each other and make a commitment to each other without the need of some relgion. To think that one is more important or better than the other is just plain silly. To argue that the term marriage should only apply to a religious couple is discriminatory and supports the "we are better than you" attitude simply because you believe in some god.

I never used the turm retarded.