I’ll try this again.
Jack Batty asked me if I thought it was recent. I clairfied, and stated it has only been talked about openly recently.
It doesn’t “bug” me that its open.
lissener, before you prepare that Newbie of the Year acceptance speech …
Let me see if I got this right: How I feel about the practice of homosexuality is not my business? Sorry, I’m not sure I can get that schizophrenic.
OK, lissener, this is going to get confusing here, because actually, I agree with you. However, who are you to say how someone such as Saint Zero processes life’s information for himself?
Is abortion a woman making decisions about her body and her life, or is it infanticide? Depends on what’s in the head of the person you ask. You show me someone who knows one way or the other as an absolute truth, and I’ll show you someone who has an over-inflated sense of the importance of their viewpoint.
** For you**, this isn’t about behaviors; it’s about who you are as a person. This other human being over here, with his own brain and soul, however, views the matter differently. He has no quarrel with you viewing it how you view it, at least none that he’s expressed here.
My view is similar to the one expressed by someone in the thread linked at the OP: Fucking is fucking, and I don’t particularly care who is fucking who, as long as it’s all consensual and among adults and in good fun.
My view and three dollars can get you a cup of latte at Starbucks.
I disagree with some of what Saint Zero said. You disagree with all of what he said. But where, in the words he has written here and in the linked thread, is the “thinly veiled bigotry,” as my respected fellow SDMB poster Esprix put it?
Where did he condemn gays? Where was he mean and violent and hateful? Those who have gone on the attack are seeing things that aren’t there.
There’s quite a few people doing some bashing in this thread and spreading unwarranted vitriol. Ironically, the guy you’ve got tied to the stake as you’re getting the kindling smoldering isn’t one of them.
I find it amazing that people who claim to be tolerant, unbigoted human beings can still use words like “unnatural” and “lifestyle choice” when refering to homosexuality. I’m so angry right now, that my attempt to type a rational post is about to disintegrate. I am always saddened and surprised at how much intolerance there is of other human beings, especially when it is disguised as benevolent disagreement.
You do not have a right to an opinion of my self.
You have a right to discuss your own misunderstanding of the way things are, but the subject of that misunderstanding has nothing to do with “rights.”
This has no parallels whatsoever with the debate over abortion rights. That debate centers around a situation that involves the ending of a life and philosophies of choice.
Flowing from this thread, slightly, I have posted a debate in GD on a recent court ruling on gay rights.
It can be found here
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I don’t think Saint Zero is an idiot. I think he’s a person with an opinion. Some people happen to disagree with his opinion. So what else is new?
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Esprix, I don’t think it’s fair to single out Saint Zero for a Pit thread when Lizard said the same thing, and he said it first, too:
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Just generally sorry to see people bashing somebody who IMO didn’t say anything worth getting bashed over. Like Milossarian says, “Where was he mean or violent or hateful?” If he said, “I’m opposed to homosexuality on moral grounds” in a GD “gay rights” thread, nobody would call him an idiot over there.
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Glad to see you back, Esprix! Sure has been quiet around here lately!
And there lies the problem. The jury is still out on whether or not being gay is a choice. Personally, I think gay people are born that way, but it’s still open to debate. In fact, I think everything is open to debate. Including weather (<–sorry, really should’ve passed it up) rain falls, asphalt is hard, and which way is up. Granted, it’s pretty ridiculous to argue that rain doesn’t fall. Just like it’s ridiculous to say that being gay is a choice (yeah, like there’s a line of people going all the way around the corner, just waiting for their turn to be gay).
Remember, nothing is ever proven beyond a doubt. Perhaps beyond a reasonable doubt (but hey, what’s reasonable?). But that still leaves room for debate.
Of course, JMNSHO.
Yes, lissener, I have a right to hold any opinions I want, be they profound or lackwitted, on any subjects I can conceive of. I have the right to have opinions about you, about Saint Zero, about pldennison, about Lauralee or about any other Straight Doper. Life sucks, doesn’t it?
In my opinion, you are absurd. And stupidly dogmatic. And as intolerant as any fundamentalist.
Have a nice day.
OK, here’s my view on the issue…
If you’re attracted to members of the same sex, It’s not you’re fault that whatever celestial being God put in charge of assembling you wasn’t paying attention to what he was doing and plugged something in backwards. I can’t condemn someone for having feelings.
Now…
Sex outside of marriage is a sin. Homosexual behavior is a sin for the same reason it would have been a sin for me to grab a certain male former co-worker for whom I had a lot of, um, romantic feelings. It’s on the same level as fornication or adultry. I am bound by the moral teachings of my religion to keep my legs crossed until I meet and marry the Right Person (oh, God, where is he?)
I think you know where this is leading as far as homosexuality is concerned.
Saint Zero, you’ve made many posts in this thread, but you’ve yet to tell us exactly why homosexuality is wrong. And here’s my guess why: You don’t know. You just have a whiff of an idea of a sense that something ain’t quite right with it, and you live by that. Maybe the pastor of your church as a child made some reference to it being wrong; maybe your parents were once watching TV with you and made disapproving glances toward some gay person on TV, or maybe they told you more directly. Whatever the case, you feel “morally opposed” to it, and you can’t say why. Because there isn’t any reason to be opposed to it. You can’t say, “homosexuality causes something bad” because it doesn’t. When two men or two women have sex, if it’s consensual, no one gets hurt by the act (not counting potential emotional issues that could arise in any relationship, straight or gay). But homosexuality in and of itself hurts no one, just like heterosexuality. So please let me know how I’m mistaken, and how homosexuality itself causes pain or some ill - because otherwise I have no idea how it could be immoral to be a homosexual.
Are you questioning his right to be wrong?
Nah, I’m not taking any of these attacks personally.
SanibelMan: Ah, good question, and calmly worded. 
I’m still wondering this one myself. It’s okay to question what we believe. so this is one I’m working on. I believe it’s morally wrong, so I don’t do it. I’m still questing for the reasons behind it theologically. They don’t make sense to me. But just because something doesn’t make complete sense to me doesn’t mean the rule/commandment/law behind it is bad.
I will now repeat for your convenience something I first said at about age fourteen or so.
takes deep breath
WHY?!
Do you enjoy being sexually frustrated or what?
Don’t most people? Makes the payoff much more fun.
I have to disagree with this. A moral (read: religious) code usually presupposes that IT is the final authority (on everything.) Therefore, the code must be propagated and spread to the whole world/ as many as possible. If members are engaged in homosexual behavior (yes I see that snarl on your faces as you read that phrase), they aren’t having kiddies to spread the code. If the damnation of homosexuality can intimidate some homosexuals into a child bearing marriage, wahoo! More code believers.
Of course, I guess they’re still idiots. But calling them idiots is just a reflection of my own moral code. The same reasons that you call them idiots are the same reasons that they condemn homosexuality.
I’m not sure I’m understanding you here. Do you mean I don’t have a right to tell you how you should feel about yourself? Or do you mean I don’t have a right to make a moral judgement about you?
Either way, you’re dead fucking wrong. I have a right to make any moral judgement I want, and have an opinion on anything I damn well please. And you are free to ignore those judgements and opinions.
Now, to clarify, I’m speaking of personal judgements and opinions. Bodies of (legal, economic, governmental) authority should NOT make moral judgements. As Saint Zero said, MY morals guide MY life. Not yours.
[/semi-coherent diatribe]
No… I believe it’s wrong, so I choose not to do it. Obviously, Esprix doesn’t believe it’s wrong, and that’s fine with me. Nobody said I had to agree with him or he had to agree with me.
For instance, (and please correct my pldennison, if I’m thinking of the wrong person) I think any moral code that says I shouldn’t eat meat is idiotic. But that has no bearing on whether or not you eat meat, now does it?
You seem to have clarified that you don’t really think homosexuality is a “modern invention”. I retract the implication of your ignorance on the matter.
As near as I can tell, he did try to address that.
Saint Zero, as well as I understand your response, it is that the doctrine of your religious affiliation dictates that homosexuality is a sin. You state that, while at the same time acknowledging that you’re not sure exactly how religious authorities come to that conclusion (Jesus had nothing to say about it etc).
But you don’t seem to be trying to supply an argument from your own experience. Let alone trusting that experience more than what others tell you to believe.
If you have had experiences that speak to your personal conclusions about the morality of it (other than that other people are telling you that it’s wrong) I think there are a lot of people here who’d want to hear it.
I also have some questions for you:
You mentioned before that you’re not sure if homosexuality is genetic, therefore it may just be a “lifestyle choice”.
So, why would it make a difference to you if it was conclusively proven to be genetic? Doesn’t this imply that morality is dependent on the scientific basis for a behavior and not the behavior itself? I mean, if we found a genetic marker than makes someone a serial killer, would killing be OK for those people?
I don’t think dragging the science of it into the picture is meaningful, when we’re arguing about morality.
Actually, matt, I’m more concerned with this:
So, agisofia, if the recent ruling in VT gets extrapolated to cover marriage for homosexuals, will it suddenly become peachy keen? You’re travelling a path that will, hopefully in my lifetime, come to a dead end that will force you to make that decision. I’ve no doubt whatsoever that you will continue to refer to it as a sin.
Waste
Flick Lives!
OK. I’ve blatantly opened myself up to be misunderstood.
What I mean to say is far simpler, and therefore far more complicated to try to explain, than my oversimplified declaration above.
Of course everyone has a right to have an opinion about anything, in the vaguest sense of the word. But “right” is such a politically loaded word, and “opinion” is such a diaphanous excuse for a lack of knowledge and commitment, that together in a sentence they render it almost meaningless. So yes, in the abstract, you have a right to an opinion on any subject. But in the concrete: do you have a right to an opinion on my innermost, most vital and basic, most tied-in-with-my-essence-as-a-human, self?
When I say no, I mean you have no place in a debate about this subject. An interior decorator has no place in a debate about genetics (I am monstrously oversimplifying and generalizing to make a point); a slug has no place in a debate about flying. Any “opinion” of this subject expressed by you is no more significant than an opinion about blue from someone who’s been blind from birth.
(As to the further reduction of this “debate” to the sophomoric absurdity [and I mean that in the nicest way :D] as expressed by FreakFreely, that’s a meta-debate at the back of every single human exchange, and serves only obfuscation at the expense of any kind of clarity; let’s please avoid that path, shall we?)
In other words, what you have expressed is not an opinion about me, or about homosexuality, but about your understanding of the universe. Your ignorance on the subject prevents it from reaching any further than the confines of your own skull.
And to try to extend the argument into an area where it’s possible to obtain experience (history, biology), you begin to cross over into a realm where the value of opinion diminishes and fact comes into play. As you make the transition, you must come out from behind the defense of “opinion” and be damn sure of your facts. To wit: not only is homosexuality not a recent invention, it’s not even a human invention. According to the numbingly exhaustive research catalogued in Biological Exuberance: animal homosexuality and natural diversity by Bruce Bagemihl (St. Martin’s Press, NY 1999), homosexuality exists in practically every single animal species ever observed by science.
It’s a universal part of creation, Lauralee and St. Zero. Do penguins sin? Do giraffes?
An “opinion” that does not take this into account is–wait for it–irrelevant to the debate.
No, it’s just ice cream.
:: ducks and runs ::