Unlike, say, heterosexuals, who have the audacity to actually put photographs of their sexual partners on their desks, talk about what they did with their sexual partners and their offpsring outside of work, and bring their sexual partners to social events. Yeah, that’s practically invisible compared to homosexuals. :rolleyes:
How about morons or bigots?
Um… Freedom2, you might shoulda made some reference to the Stoidela post you were paraphrasing. Good technique, in that you showed the weakness of her argument by showing the results of its application to a different group, but I suspect you’ve confused people about your attitude toward gays.
Freedom2, I have to admire you for being so blatant in your opinions, vile as they may be. It’s a refeshing change to have an enemy declare himself so openly, rather than hiding behind “some of my best friends…”
If it weren’t for people like you who would treat me as a second-class citizen based on the gender of those I love, the rainbow stickers and activists would be unnecessary. I see bumper stickers and Jesus fish that annoy me, but you don’t hear me whine about it. I respect the rights of heterosexual couples, I absolutely support the religious liberties that America affords Fundamentalist Christians. Is it asking too much to be accorded human dignity in turn?
Why should you, as part of a heterosexual couple, be allowed to have property rights, inheritance rights, and medical visitation rights, and I should not? Why is my love inferior to yours? If you cite the Bible, I can’t argue with you, but I will say that this is still a secular country, and we don’t yet have a Christian version of Q’uaranic Shari’a in the US.
To quote Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar, a leader of India’s Untouchables or Dalit, another group subject to religion-based discrimination,
Oh, and nobody wants to have homosexual sensitivity classes in school. It would be nice to teach kids, however, that “faggot” is a bad word.
That was my intent. I knew I was putting a line in the water, but I didn’t think I would actually catch any fish.
I had a discalimer on the original post, but took it off to see the reaction I would get.
Somehow I didn’t see anyone rush to criticize Stoidela’s post.
Man, I love not being the one who goes off half-cocked.
Read the entire thread like Xeno did, and then re-evaluate my post.
I picked homosexaulity not because that is how I feel, but because it is a hot-button issue around here that I knew would hit the spot.
Somewhere else I would have picked whatever other group I thought would get the best response.
That’s called “trolling,” and it will get you a spanking from the mods.
Nothing to do with trolling. He made an excellent point, in the context of this thread. Did you even pause to consider it? Brilliant post, freedom.
Ah. I see. Part of the problem is that I rarely read Stoidela’s posts. That being the case, I think her reasoning is equally contemptible. I don’t subscribe for a moment to the modern reactionary “straight white Christian males can’t get an even break” school of thought, but neither do I go out of my way to mock or bash Christians. If they get in my face, or I feel some Christian group is endangering or basic freedoms, I won’t be shy about stating my opinion. Otherwise, they’re pretty much off my radar as a group.
Did you read the whole thread?
Here’s a hint, go read Stoidela’s post.
Then come back and talk to me.
By your reasoning, should I take the way you thought about me and apply it to Stoidela since I’m a Christian?
Oops, my apologies, Freedom2. I don’t pay a lot of attention to Stoidela’s posts. I have to agree with PLDennison, that her reasoning is flawed and reeks of anti-Christian bigotry. It shows a lack of breeding and class to mock the religion of other people.
So I hit the quote button on Randy’s statement in your followup, not his original posting (it says “Originally posted by Randy” above the quote).
Beat me…flagellate me…cast me among the Gadarene swine…
Sorry for the confusion.
All I got to say is Randy excellent post. What blows my mind on this board is the line they use on me alot about this board is dedicated to fighting ignorance but they don’t find bashing a religious group that they don’t agree with as ignorant. Oh well as some say to me alot, “ignorance is bliss I guess”.
That’s a load of hooey, Bill. Did you not read what Phil and I wrote? Nobody here supports bashing Christians qua Christians. Christian posters like Polycarp and Triskadekamus get respect because they make intelligent arguments. However, we do demand better proof for the execution of homosexuals and teaching Creation Science than “the Bible sez so.” That’s not bashing, that’s demanding evidence.
Goboy,
I never said I was talking about you. Ease up a little. I know you don’t support bashing Christians. I was just saying that on a board that is dedicated to fighting ignorance nobody should bash anybody. We can have differences of opinion but we can still show respect to each other as humans going through this journey we call life. (man, that was profound if I say so myself. 
)
Goodness, Bill, I think I love you!
I think we generally agree that bashing a group qua group isn’t right. But it started me thinking, "Why do Fundamentalist Evangelical Pentacostal Christians (if Bill is going to pout if I don’t spell out the whole bleedin’ words) annoy me so much more than the other groups mentioned?
After all, I’m a straight white male over 21 - I should hate everybody, right? So why do I like gay people, black people…but let one SUV with a Jesusfish on the back cut me off in traffic and I want to follow them home, pick them up by the lapels and make them understand. Why is that?
I think it comes down to the fact that gay people don’t think I’m a less-than-worthy person than they because I’m an unrepentant liker-of-women.
Black people have never smugly assured me that I could avoid a well-deserved eternal damnation if I would just convert to Blackness.
If gays, blacks, and other groups treated me the way that the supposed followers of Jesus do, I might feel the same way toward them.
Screwtape, still faulty logic. People who are racist use logic like yours to defend their points. They are like “blacks rob you” or whatever. Same thing you are doing. No less worse than racism.
Maybe it’s just a question of a group that has a notoriously intolerant stance toward the belifs of others crying because they feel people are not being tolerant back. No dogma requires me to turn the other cheek.
If the most vocal members of a particular group are contstantly condemning me and my beliefs, am I wrong in assuming that the self-avowed followers of these people feel the same? Mind you, we are talking about a small but very noisy sub-set here, the ones who feel free to tell me that I am going to hell for what they imagine my sins to be, and are trying to pass laws too make sure my time on Earth is hell as well. Fundamental evangelical bible-literalist Christians have openly taken the position that they are the only chosen, and the rest of us are hell-bound sinners. Their political leaders would love to make it legal to persecute me (and a few others on this board). Statements by certain posters lead me to believe they feel the same. If they are going to stand so firmly next to intolerant leaders, nodding parroting them, they should whine about getting tarred with the same brush from time to time.
Come on guys, if a guy wears a sheet and attends Klan meetings, do you assume he doesn’t agree with the goals? Or, for those who find that analogy uncomfortable, if someone pays $5000 a plate to attend a Democratic politcal fundraiser, can I be blamed for assuming they belief in the Democratic party platform?
Basically, don’t look for tolerance of your ideals if your ideals are not tolerant in return.
Asmo’, I’ve read that post three times and I still don’t know WTF it means. No less worse? “Worse” and “Less” are both absolutes - they admit no comparatives.
Tell you what - let’s drop you into the tiger cage. But don’t worry! Just because they have stripes, and teeth, and claws, and do a great impression of a tiger, doesn’t mean that they’ll act the average tiger - they may be fluffy kitties! To assume otherwise is **racism. **
I’m sorry that I didn’t have time to explain my position further. I’ve got a few minutes now.
Here goes:
I like in-your-face Christians less than I like other persecuted (puhleeeze!) groups. Why? Because they feel they are better. Intrinsically better, and they are not shy about letting me know about it. Furthermore, they will use their membership among the supposed “elect” to take advantage of the rest of us, and feel no guilt about it. It’s okay, because God likes them better. When we screw up, we pay for it. When they screw up they’re “Not Perfect - Just Forgiven.”
And the attidude toward learning! C’Mon! Don’t you want to retch when you see some smug yuppie with that TRUTHfish-eating-the-DARWINfish on his soccermommobile? Such a smug, self-assured ignorance of Darwin, and TRUTH, and good manners, coupled with such a pride in this ignorance!
I also know a little history. One of the things that is vewwy, vewwy, scawwy about religion is that it can have the function of dissociating a person from otherwise humanitarian sensibilities, enabling the person to perform acts of horrific atrocity. Examples? The Crusades. The Inquisition.
So, as lucie said, when someone displays a membership logo of a group that considers me as a lesser being, don’t be surprised if I don’t like it.
A Thank-you is in order to Screwtape, for reinforcing my original observation, that led me to post this thread. I was afraid no one would believe me, but along came Screwtape.
“In-your-face Christians”? Have you ever seen a Gay Pride parade? Have you ever seen a Klan Rally? Have you ever seen a Pro-Abortion group lined up outside a clinic to support it, or the Million Man March? Talk about “in your face”.
I never said Christians were “persecuted”, I said that society as a whole feels okay with openly bashing Christians, and pointed out that with most groups, this is not accepted. Words are not my idea of persecution, but I do sense a growing intolerence of Christians as time goes by.
Like I said in the OP, Everyone is Preaching Something. Screwtape is here preaching his version of the Truth, with the same vigor, attitude and intolerence he accuses Christians of having, and his justification is, he feels Christians did it first, and that his Truth is more truth than Christianity? Oh boy.