Hello everybody

[MikeH]

And "not changing things because we have a general world view that changing things is bad" is a crap argument. Take each issue on it's merits and decide whether to change it or not. A blanket disapproval of any change is illogical.

[Jon Miller]

It depends on what you start from.

The conservative mind starts from 'things should not change unless there is a good reason to do so'.

The liberal mind start starts from 'things should change unless there is a good reason not to do so'.

Which 'mind' you have is due to sociology and genetics, and I think there is good reason to have conservatives in society.

JM
(I am not certain what I am, but I might have some inclination for conservatism due to my views and having a PhD (which sociologically pushes me towards change). I definitely favor conservatism in my religion.)

[Asher]

What happened to Boissoin was persecution.

Boissoin was not in trouble for his religious beliefs. He got in trouble for hate speech. The motives behind his hate speech were not important. It doesn't matter if he was racist, Christian, or a Nazi. You are making the case it's because he was Christian. This is not the case. The problem was his speech served as a rallying cry against homosexuals. This is against the law in most civilized countries, regardless of if the Bible says you should assault gays.

He didn't say "being gay is sinful in the eyes of Christ". What he said was what amounted to was a call to arms against the "homosexual machine" and how they are a "plague" just like "pedophiles, pimps, and drug dealers". Days later a gay teenager in his community was assaulted by members of his church which had no possible motive other than gaybashing.

And even then, for whatever reason, HE WAS EXONERATED.

You have no claim here worth anything.

[Jon Miller]

you might want one word for married partner and one for unmarried partner. But yeah, no reason to make the distinction really.

I think all these word differences you are talking about are irrelevant when talking about whether a person doing the job of a preacher/priest/reverend should be allowed the job title of preacher/priest/reverend which is what I was addressing.

I would consider it a sign of progress even if you moved to saying they can be called a Priestette or a Preachess or something, then we can normalise the names later.

Normalising the names is happening, we now have police officers and firefighters rather than policemen and firemen, and that feels better. More representative of how things really are.

But this depends on whether you are a conservative or not.

I would bet that conservatives would in general favor policeman/policewoman over peaceperson (for example).

I think it is entirely appropriate to have a name for female spiritual leader. The female spiritual leaders in SDA churches that I have attended that are against women pastors call themselves elders/etc.

JM
(Personally, despite the fact that I consider myself religiously conservative, I am in favor of female pastors.)

[Zevico]

You're arguing that its ok to discriminate until such a time as those doing the discriminating are persuaded differently. We've been through the same tired old arguments when poor people demanded the right to vote, when women demanded the right to vote, when blacks demanded the same rights as whites, and every time it was achieved not by sitting waiting for the bigots to realize they were being bigots, but instead by a movement that refused to sit down and be quiet.

If you're acting like a bigot then you're going to get called on it, and no we don't give a **** about your hurt feelings. They don't matter when compared to people being treated like second class citizens because they were born different.

Here's a question for you: what part of the marriage law is a fundamental human right to you? Leave aside the ceremony and the part where you get a nice little stamp and a document with your name and the name of your partner on it.

What part of it do you think ought to apply to gays? If the answer is "everything", you might as well say "nothing", because you haven't given a specific answer addressing the specific policy issues concerning gay marriage. If you can define marriage policy for me and tell me how each aspect of that policy ought to be changed to recognise gays because it would improve society you would convince me. Until you can give a comprehensive explanation of what marriage laws are and what they do to me and tell me why they ought to be changed I can hardly support that change. I can only note that love and self-validation are not reasons to make or change laws.

If and when you do, I'm quite open to the argument. In fact at an earlier time I was supportive of gay marriage on this board. The reason I changed my mind was that I simply wasn't convinced that the words "marriage is about love" proved much at all about anything, for reasons already explained. I'll grant you this, it made me feel very tolerant and open-minded to support gay-marriage. But it is clear-sighted, dispassionate analysis, not lazy assumptions, self-satisfaction and self-righteousness, which ought to guide how we think about politics.

[MikeH]

It depends on what you start from.

The conservative mind starts from 'things should not change unless there is a good reason to do so'.

The liberal mind start starts from 'things should change unless there is a good reason not to do so'.

Which 'mind' you have is due to sociology and genetics, and I think there is good reason to have conservatives in society.

JM
(I am not certain what I am, but I might have some inclination for conservatism due to my views and having a PhD (which sociologically pushes me towards change). I definitely favor conservatism in my religion.)

"genetics" really?

My mind starts from "we should look at an individual thing and see if it needs changing or not".

I think conservatives and liberals both want some things to stay the same, and both want some things to change. Depending on whether the current standard matches their political preference or not.

liberals only tend to want change in social policy because they believe in equality and freedom and current social policies are still very unfair. If we already had free and equal societies, liberals would want things to stay the same.

You get massive protests from liberals when governments want to introduce restrictions on civil liberties and in that case they are resisting change.

note in these case I am using liberal and conservative in their non-political meanings, in the same way JM is. the words have been horribly abused, especially in US politics.

[Zevico]

And "not changing things because we have a general world view that changing things is bad" is a crap argument. Take each issue on it's merits and decide whether to change it or not. A blanket disapproval of any change is illogical.

Quite so, much as is the blanket approval of all things. No one is making an argument to the contrary. What I've argued is that the debate on gay marriage is too abstract and high-level and therefore may not produce useful results. We need to get down to the specifics of marriage and agree on what we're doing and why.

[Asher]

Every faith that preaches that homosexuality is wrong is discriminated in Canada - it's not just Catholics, and Boissoin, and others have been targetted by the Human Rights Commission for expressing biblical teachings.

Here is what Ben honestly believes constitutes Christian Preaching. The letter that Boissoin wrote and was published in a newspaper that was charged as hate speech.

The following is not intended for those who are suffering from an unwanted sexual identity crisis. For you, I have understanding, care, compassion and tolerance. I sympathize with you and offer you my love and fellowship. I prayerfully beseech you to seek help, and I assure you that your present enslavement to homosexuality can be remedied. Many outspoken, former homosexuals are free today.

Instead, this is aimed precisely at every individual that in any way supports the homosexual machine that has been mercilessly gaining ground in our society since the 1960s. I cannot pity you any longer and remain inactive. You have caused far too much damage.

My banner has now been raised and war has been declared so as to defend the precious sanctity of our innocent children and youth, that you so eagerly toil, day and night, to consume. With me stand the greatest weapons that you have encountered to date - God and the "Moral Majority." Know this, we will defeat you, then heal the damage that you have caused. Modern society has become dispassionate to the cause of righteousness. Many people are so apathetic and desensitized today that they cannot even accurately define the term "morality."

The masses have dug in and continue to excuse their failure to stand against horrendous atrocities such as the aggressive propagation of homo- and bisexuality. Inexcusable justifications such as, "I'm just not sure where the truth lies," or "If they don't affect me then I don't care what they do," abound from the lips of the quantifiable majority.

Face the facts, it is affecting you. Like it or not, every professing heterosexual is have their future aggressively chopped at the roots.

Edmund Burke's observation that, "All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing," has been confirmed time and time again. From kindergarten class on, our children, your grandchildren are being strategically targeted, psychologically abused and brainwashed by homosexual and pro-homosexual educators.

Our children are being victimized by repugnant and premeditated strategies, aimed at desensitizing and eventually recruiting our young into their camps. Think about it, children as young as five and six years of age are being subjected to psychologically and physiologically damaging pro-homosexual literature and guidance in the public school system; all under the fraudulent guise of equal rights.

Your children are being warped into believing that same-sex families are acceptable; that men kissing men is appropriate.

Your teenagers are being instructed on how to perform so-called safe same gender oral and anal sex and at the same time being told that it is normal, natural and even productive. Will your child be the next victim that tests homosexuality positive?

Come on people, wake up! It's time to stand together and take whatever steps are necessary to reverse the wickedness that our lethargy has authorized to spawn. Where homosexuality flourishes, all manner of wickedness abounds.

Regardless of what you hear, the militant homosexual agenda isn't rooted in protecting homosexuals from "gay bashing." The agenda is clearly about homosexual activists that include, teachers, politicians, lawyers, Supreme Court judges, and God forbid, even so-called ministers, who are all determined to gain complete equality in our nation and even worse, our world.

Don't allow yourself to be deceived any longer. These activists are not morally upright citizens, concerned about the best interests of our society. They are perverse, self-centered and morally deprived individuals who are spreading their psychological disease into every area of our lives. Homosexual rights activists and those that defend them, are just as immoral as the pedophiles, drug dealers and pimps that plague our communities.

The homosexual agenda is not gaining ground because it is morally backed. It is gaining ground simply because you, Mr. and Mrs. Heterosexual, do nothing to stop it. It is only a matter of time before some of these morally bankrupt individuals such as those involved with NAMBLA, the North American Man/Boy Lovers Association, will achieve their goal to have sexual relations with children and assert that it is a matter of free choice and claim that we are intolerant bigots not to accept it.

If you are reading this and think that this is alarmist, then I simply ask you this: how bad do things have to become before you will get involved? It's time to start taking back what the enemy has taken from you. The safety and future of our children is at stake.

Rev Stephen Boissoin

War was declared, even. Christianity at its finest, amiright?

[MikeH]

But this depends on whether you are a conservative or not.

I would bet that conservatives would in general favor policeman/policewoman over peaceperson (for example).

I think it is entirely appropriate to have a name for female spiritual leader. The female spiritual leaders in SDA churches that I have attended that are against women pastors call themselves elders/etc.

JM
(Personally, despite the fact that I consider myself religiously conservative, I am in favor of female pastors.)

police officer. peaceperson is a name that everyone would agree is horrible.

[MikeH]

Every faith that preaches that homosexuality is wrong is discriminated in Canada - it's not just Catholics, and Boissoin, and others have been targetted by the Human Rights Commission for expressing biblical teachings.

Good. We should not allow people to use religion as an excuse to preach bigotry or to encourage any other criminal acts.

Canada

[MikeH]

Quite so, much as is the blanket approval of all things. No one is making an argument to the contrary. What I've argued is that the debate on gay marriage is too abstract and high-level and therefore may not produce useful results. We need to get down to the specifics of marriage and agree on what we're doing and why.

Jon was saying that is what conservatives do (I disagree as in my later post).

I favour 'marriage' being a legal bond between two people to be carried out in a legally designated building. Any religious ceremony should have no legal basis.

[kentonio]

Is Kentino saying that conservatives shouldn't be allowed to marry.

Don't think so.

It depends on what you start from.

The conservative mind starts from 'things should not change unless there is a good reason to do so'.

Many conservatives see that discrimination is a good reason to change something. Why should we pander to those who don't? If this was some new social change then sure, its going to take time, but how many decades has it been now?

I've actually advised gay people in the past to just hold on a little longer, that change was coming, that the gentle approach to progress would be more productive, and now years later I realize how patronizing it was to ask someone to tolerate discrimination just so that others don't have to feel uncomfortable.

Zevico talks about specifying what parts of marriage is supposed to be important, but for me this misses the whole point. If you're trying to deny certain sections of society the rights that others have, then the burden of why falls on you. What is the reason for not allowing gays the same right to marry as hetro couples? Is there any reason whatsoever other than religious people don't like it and some other people find the idea of gays to be icky?

[Jon Miller]

I find your line of argument nonsensical. Just to make sure I'm completely clear and not misunderstanding you, are you really suggesting that conservatives being offended by gay marriage is more important than gays actually being denied the right to marry?

I am saying that yelling 'bigot bigot bigot' at conservatives is more important (more impact/etc, a more important example of prejudice) than maintaining that the social institution where a man and man establish their decision to live as co-partners by legal (and religious/etc) commitments is not marriage.

I am not saying that you shouldn't support marriage being changed to include homosexual relationships.

I am saying that you should understand (some) of those that oppose you as being conservatives and not bigots.

JM

[MikeH]

I will acknowledge that some of them don't realise they are being bigots by opposing equal rights to marry for everyone and explain to them why opposing this change amounts to bigotry.

[MikeH]

Caveat: It is possible to oppose gay marriage and not be a bigot, if you oppose all marriage.