Brilliant !
I don’t know about all 125 million, but yeah, racism is pretty rampant here. Still love 'em, though (most of them, anyway).
And this is relevant to the argument at hand… how?
And it’s a long drive into left field, folks.
or
WTF?
I’m inclined to say this regarding Liz Taylor:
If you’ve been married and divorced 8 times, then it’s you - not the other person.
Read the text I originally quoted:
Japanese businesses can freely discriminate based on race, national origin, the tattoos you have…etc. What exactly did you guys miss?
Just my provincial Americanism - I thought we were speaking of things American. Are you in Japan? I’m not.
The fact that this discussion isn’t about Japan?
And if my privately owned business operates in the public sector of the West Pixie District in Outer Bongrovia, everyone has to hop on the left foot in a counter-clockwise circle as they pass my front door, but only if they didn’t purchase a green freeblesnit on the previous Floobday.
And that settles that discussion.
The reason I asked is because, while she said it was illegal in the US, she implied that it was wrong. Wrong should be wrong everywhere, not just in America.
And I wasn’t necessarily disagreeing with her. I was (and am) genuinely curious about her feelings with regards to Japan’s treatment of this issue, and I didn’t think it was a big enough question to start a new thread over, especially considering that it is relevant to this discussion.
(sigh…) [breaks out trusty old shovel]
First off let me start off by saying that I’'m just going to make myself a wider target because my writing skills are piss poor at best so please forgive me if my post seems to jump around about.
The main issue I’d like to discuss first is my stance that hetero love is not equal (IMO) to gay love.
The first and foremost reason I say this is because I’ve got two hundred thousand (give or take) years of evolution on my side that say I’m right. So if the PHYSICAL love between a man and a woman are so great like this; it’s not to far a leap of faith to say that the mental attributes between a man and a woman are of equal perfection too.
Also, I feel compelled to tell you a personal story about myself that leads me to believe this as well.
When I married my ex-wife she had a 2yo son. A son who’s father wanted NOTHING to do with him. So I took this boy on as my own. Raised and loved him as my own. During the course of our marriage me and my (at the time) wife had a child of our own. Four years later we get divorced. But even after we got divorced I continue (we’ve been divorced four years now) to see my (step) son every weekend along with my bio-son because well, just because I couldn’t reconcile with my wife doesn’t mean that I had to stop loving my (step) son. (I think it’s safe to say that not a whole lot of fathers will do this. Not that I deserve an award or anything). Now as much as I love my (step) son; If I were left with like a “Sophie’s Choice” situation to where I had to choose one son over the other; you can bet your ass that I would pick my bio-son. I sure as hell wouldn’t flip a quarter to see who lives or who dies. Why? I don’t know really, I guess it’s that bond you share with your son. A bond that is too complex to put into words.
So for anybody that would tell me that they would choose the adopted son over their bio son is either BS’ing themselves or BS’ing you. I just don’t buy that they would.
Now see if a child were to have two daddies or two mommies; they wouldn’t HAVE that kind of bond. Oh, sure, he might have that kind of bond with ONE of his dads or moms but not both.
So yeah, with that capacity, I say that hetero love IS indeed unequaled.
as per the whole call it marriage or civil union
You know in reality this is such a non issue with me. I mean if they decide to call it marriage; OK fine I’m not going to loose any sleep over it or anything. It’s just that on a personal level, when I think marriage, I think about the beautifull life my grandparents had, I think about the beautifull life my parents had and also admitably to put it into more cheesey terms I think, A house in the suburbs with the white picket fence and 2.5 children playing in the yard. So throwing around the word marriage to have such a broad meaning kind of takes away from the sentimental value that I hold for marriage.
But, I’ve already said this before and I’ll say it again. If I could go to the poles tomorrow and vote FOR gay marriages I’d absolutely do it. Not necessarily because I agree with it 100% but I do agree with it enough in the fact that I don’t think it’s right to repress people for any reason.
Now, before anybody jumps all over me about “Hey SHAKES remember what you said about the gay doctors and sharing locker rooms with gay people?” Yes I remember, and to my own defence I conceded, I was wrong, ignorance was fought and the SD won. This is a good thing folks. I mean this IS the primary function OF the SD. Right?
Also, if your wondering “If we call it marriage or civil union is such a non issue to you; why did you bother posting in the first place?”
Because well, I felt I did have some agruements as per the opposition. Which BTW I saw no opposition when I entered the thread. So I figured WTF? I’ll throw my two cents in. I went in thinking I could debate this with out it turning into a shit-storm. I’ll admit this is mainly my fault, I had NO idea what a sore wound gay issues are to (some) of the gay community. However, I bare clay-feet in the fact that I’m going to say what I think even if I know it might offend some people. I can’t help it; it’s just the way that I am. I’ve been labeled an asshole for this very reason more times than I can count.
as per the bigotry calling
You know, carefull folks, this sword cuts both ways.
When you get people saying things to me like (I wont name names) “Your father should have taken a grenade to the crotch” or “Your mother should have aborted your unborn fetus.” It just strikes me as rather ironic that here this person is that wants me to embrace the whole gay agenda; and when I don’t do it 100% he too readily is ready to hate me based on just a few of my views on this matter. This to me is a defining attribute of bigotry.(snap judements) If not bigotry, something just as malovent. Somebody once told me (I can’t remember who)“Carefull what you hate, because that which you hate can came back to bite you in your ass.” True, how true.
Also if you keep throwing around the word bigotry to every tom, dick and harry that doesn’t back you 100%; it kind of loosed its meaning. Isn’t it enough that we accept homosexuality and not EMBRACE it? Or at least, isn’t that a step in the right direction?
Furthermore along those same lines; IF you want to hate me fine, but before you can legitimately hate me; you have to get to KNOW me, you have to get to know whats inside my heart, you have to know the love I feel towards my friends and family, you have to get to know ALL the things about me before you can REALLY hate me. Because anything else wouldn’t be hate, it would be just blind ignorance and prejudice.
Which I’m not too proud to admit that maybe I DO have a few blind spots on gay issues; but not bigotry.
Peace.
[/sets aside trusty old shove…"China? is that you?]
**B-I-G-O-T
B-I-G-O-T
B-I-G-O-T
and BIGOT is his name o**.
Are you kidding me? You’re a goddamned asshole.
You people who plug your ears and scream ‘BIGOT/RACIST/HOMOPHOBE…etc’ at the top of your lungs need to come down off your crosses and either do something productive or shut the holy fuck up.
IMO, it’s only “being on a cross” if nobody is out to get you. And I don’t think anybody can look at politics today and say that’s true.
Dude, don’t get worked up about it. They are like a 3 year old that learned a new word and insists on shouting it out at every possible opportunity, even if they don’t know what it means.
Ok.
Although it’s common in Japan, it has in fact been ruled as ‘wrong’, just not very illegal. There have been at least two court cases (one in Hokkaido regarding public baths and one in Shizuoka regarding a jewelry store) where judges have ruled that business cannot discriminate based on race, on the grounds that Japan’s signing of international human rights treaties outweighs the lack of any local legislation on the matter.
You could argue that this is still a legal/illegal matter rather than a right/wrong one. My response would be the same as in my first post. It doesn’t matter if 125 million Japanese do it (and actually, the vast majority don’t, there’s just not much legal recourse when dealing with the 1-2% who do), it’s wrong.
I was curious about that. Thanks.
Jesus H. That’s just lame. Why don’t you take your fingers out of your ears and stop with the name-calling and at least recognize when somebody’s at least trying to meet you halfway? Sheesh.
Well, SHAKES, if you’re honestly opening yourself to the possiblity of other viewpoints, then I say ‘Bravo!’ and sorry for letting loose with both barrels up there.
I still think you’re wrong on many points, but I regret the harshness in my post above - it really happened to push some buttons.
In fairness, a bigot isn’t somebody who has the viewpoint that you’re less than a human being or who has a viewpoint that belittles you or marginalizes you in some way.
It’s somebody who obstinately won’t change thier view in favor of compelling reason.
SHAKES sounds more to me like an uninformed person walking into a larger worldview. It would be great if personal philosophy was like math and we could plug in some numbers and see the equation work, but it isn’t. I think a little trial and error is in order, along with perhaps some experiences.
You are a pitiably stupid little critter, ain’t you, Shakes? Evolution supports your claim that a man and a woman can love each other more and better than two men or two women? Clearly, you have no real understanding of what evolution is or how it works. I’d explain to you just how stupid this assertion is, but I’m tired and you probably wouldn’t listen anyway, so there’s no point.
Being able to have a bio-parent bond with offspring makes love superior? Are you really sure you want to run with that particular football? You’re not likely to score any points with it, you know. I mean, arguments about whether or not it’s an idiotic assertion aside, you are pretty much saying that the emotional bonds of the infertile and childfree-by-choice are inferior to those of people who’ve bred. Is that really what you think, or is this bio-bond stuff just a convenient rationalization?
As for the whole marriage v. civil union issue, I’m not quite sure I understand what your argument is, here. Are you saying that the millions of hetero marriages that aren’t a white picket fence in the suburbs with 2.3 kids in the yard also sully your sentimental views of marriage? Are you saying that them thar hommosexshuls ain’t capable of having the white picket fence and 2.5 kids? I’d beg to differ with either of those viewpoints, frankly.
And yes, honey, you’re a bigot. It’s not that you have a few blind spots about gay people, it’s that you think they’re less than equal human beings because of an inborn characteristic. You’re like those people on Jerry Springer who get all pissed off because the audience dares boo them for sleeping with their pregnant sister’s husband and forging her name on cold checks, yelling “You don’t know me! You don’t know nothin’ bout me!”
Precisely what homosexual agenda is this? :rolleyes:
Don’t forget, accepting the the homosexual agenda gets you a shiny toaster. :smack:
Why do you think homosexuality is some kind of sickness?