Is that the kinds of words you use in your letters? Three guesses why you’re not making progress.
Need I point out that such sentiments have not appeared anywhere in this thread?
Why no…no they’re not, but the local press is NOT the pit, now it it? <Eyke hands Lizard a 5 spot to by a clue>:wally
Not explicitily, no, but I think in intent they were when you insinuated that we gays are clogging up this board with our problems!
And, by the way…actually I DO find homosexuality, transsexualism, and an assortment of other sexuality-related topics to be endlessly fascinating. The reason? I have no first-hand knowledge and want to know more. Why? Because knowledge reinforces empathy, compassion, and helps me to combat people who would wish these people physical or emotional harm. Why is that so hard to understand?
I feel the same way about a lot of topics. This just happens to be where I “know” the most people who can fill me in on stuff.
It’s on the board a lot lately because it’s in the news a lot lately, and common topic of conversation. And if anything inspires a thread on political or social issues, it’s a news story or a conversation.
Expect more threads. We ain’t going away, and we’re not going to condense a variety of rather different issues under one heading for your convenience. Job discrimination is different from marriage discrimination is different from gaybashing, etc.
So why are people talking about it so much, on and off the boards? Simple. For the last five centuries, organized Christianity has been waning as a political force. Every generation or so, religious conservatives draw a line in the sand – against freedom of religion, against the theories of Galileo or Darwin – the examples are legion. Sometimes they win some small victory, but they always lose support in the long run. They drive their increasingly-embarrassed congregations to less-organized versions of the religion, to other religions, or to agnosticism. That’s what’s happening here.
When it’s over, you won’t see many more threads about homosexuality. Instead, it’ll be threads about whoever has become the most recent scapegoat for those who like to mix politics and religion.
Is this that “irony” thing I keep hearing about?
Well, if you are, then why don’t you understand that certain topics fascinate certain people, and that issues involving homosexuality and gay rights constitute just a small proportion of the infinite number of possible topics that might interest people.
As for the issue of lack of originality, surely your own threads suggest that originailty is not exactly your strong suit, either. More threads abouts sex and relationships, anyone? Just go see Lizard, he’s got just the thread for you.
Why bother taxing the hamsters more than necessary. You’ve provided a perfect opportunity to kill two birds with one stone. By posting in this thread, i can demonstrate that not only do you have a stupidly narrow conception of what constitutes reasonable and interesting thread topics for a wide variety of people, but that you are also something of a hypocrite, decrying in others the sort of behavior you display yourself.
You can keep trumpeting that tired line, but i’m not buying it. Enough people interpreted your OP as a slam against discussing homosexuality that you must surely at least be asking yourself why so few people understood your “real” intention.
And it’ll take a lot more than sophomoric OPs whining about the alleged excess of homosexuality-related threads to make them go away. You still fail to understand, apparently, that implicit in your whole rant is idea that gay issues are somehow less worthy of discussion. You also seem to assume that gay-related issues are somehow irrelevant to us heterosexuals, when it should be clear to anyone without a pipe through his head that the issues being discussed in some of those threads are relevant to society as a whole.
You fail to understand the difference. I am responding to a specific set of “arguments” put forward by you, whereas all you are doing is ranting against a general phenomenon that need not have concerned you at all, had you chosen just to ignore the threads you don’t like.
And, contrary to your assertion, i do like this thread. There have been some interesting and relevant points made in it. Just not by you.
Hoo, geez. Quite the trainwreck we have going here. And again, there’s a whole lotta misinterpretation goin’ on.
Now, as is my custom, I shall make a post in which I attempt to clarify things as I see them, and as is also customary, I shall be largely ignored. That’s okay though; I’m used to it. It seems to me that all the OP is saying is that he doesn’t care whether or not anybody is or isn’t gay, and he wishes nobody else did either. Frankly, that is a sentiment with which I quite agree. If people could just mind their own fucking business and ignore other people’s sex lives if they found them displeasing, there’d be a hell of a lot less to argue about. So, his message itself was fairly innocuous. It’s just that, for reasons I cannot begin to fathom, he chose to state this point in the most inflammatory tone he could muster. It seems almost as though he was trying to deceive people into thinking he was saying something else entirely, throwing choice slurs about in an attempt to needlessly rile the more vocal defenders of gay rights. And boy, did he ever succeed at that.
Lizard, if you’re saying what I think you’re saying, I agree with you. But you said it in a manner deliberately engineered to piss people off, and now you’re pretending to be surprised when you’re “mistakenly labeled” as a bigoted homophobe.
I strongly suspect that you were attempting something else with this: a high-handed “test” of the average Doper’s rationality; that is, their ability to read beyond the surface wording of a statement and get to the true meaning of the statement itself. If this is true (and I use the word if purposefully), that not only makes you an egomaniacal self-righteous asshole, but is also valid grounds for an accusation of trolling.
Now, I acknowledge that I may be misinterpreting something here…but I doubt it. Regardless, I don’t think anything about the issue bears further debate. Either Lizard is trying to stir up a conflict, or else he just really sucks at trying to properly word a valid point. Whatever the case, arguing with him won’t get anyone anywhere. As such, let’s not.
You may all now ignore me at will…
Hmm, I might have paid $50 but not for the collectibility but for the opportunity to browse through the Good ole Days[sup]tm[/sup].
Sorry. No more hijacking, I promise.
Actually, I thought you made a great point. I still think our OP needs to be bitch-slapped for his choice of words and attitude. It came off as both cruel and obnoxious. He may not be an asshole, but I think he wants us all to THINK he is. Sometimes I just don’t understand people.
Ya know what’s odd?
Not one mention of Bush in that whole list (I’m not gonna count the sole Q about Rummie).
Maybe there is something to this whole saturation theory.
Oh how cute. So you’re actually contending (or you’re just joking) that I, who hadn’t yet made an appearance in this thread, was going to first-post Godwin here?
Honey, you don’t need any help digging yourself into a hole as big as the Ritz. I just thought I’d gently remind you what happened last time you pulled stupid shit like you hinted at in that post.
And by the way, it’s an election year. And by the way, this is a hot-button topic. And by the way, you’re not a mod and thus not required to read the threads you don’t think you’ll enjoy (see, that’ll be more of the “If you don’t like this thread, or my opinions, why don’t you quit reading them, moron?” FROM YOUR OWN POST").
Holding a minority opinion doesn’t make one wrong. Of course not. What you have isn’t just a minority opinion, it’s a frighteningly mindless, undeveloped opinion. Even that doesn’t necessarily make you wrong, it just makes you simple-minded. Par for the course, it seems, esp. wrt the threads linked to by mhendo. But hey, reducing sexuality to “who you want to sleep with” smacks of simplemindedness, so at least you’ve realized your true calling.
Boy do I wish this was true. It would mean we’d would not have needless clogging of this board with gay issues. It would mean I wouldn’t have to buy newspapers just to see who is putting anti-gay diatribes in the reader’s forum and spend time researching the answers. (I know that would make HWMBO very happy as I’d have more time to dote on him :p.) Since this isn’t the “perfect world” people are going to be asking questions, ranting and raving, and just generally discussing gay stuff.
<Gump>That’s all I have to say about that.</Gump>
Have a great day!
Well, they do. But only because of the scorn and prejudice of many of the so-called “normal” people they must interact with, not because of any inherent flaw or difficulty.
(Yeah, yeah, the whole “it’s society’s fault” thing is overdone, but in this case, I think it’s true.)
As you demonstrate, repeating it back shows what an ungodly stupid argument it was to begin with.
I find nothing here to disagree with.
I see what you mean. It’s kind of like the effect describing some people as “backwards, clueless, bigoted, racist, homophobic, “Christian” hillbillies”, might have, huh? Assuming you consider those “slurs.”
“Deliberately engineered” is a bit much.
Nah, none of the above. I know what trolling is, and I don’t do it. You’re analyzing a bit much, although unlike all the self-appointed social seers on here, at least you’re being rational. It’s simply this: I had a rant, and I made it. Of course, the obvious rejoinder is that all the threads I complained about are people getting out their rants too. But I think what Eyke said is more indicative. It’s more about expressing hatred of people not like them, which is the very thing they claim to oppose. I’m very, very weary of preaching from both sides, but you know what? I hear a lot more of it from the left side of the aisle. I’ve known a lot of Christians, and I’ve known a lot of gays. truth be told, I agreed with the views of the gays far more often. But when you got right down to it, they were a lot more unbearable to be around than the Christians were.
Anecdotal? Sure. I never claimed to know anything more.
Or neither, like I said above.
OK Lizard, do us all a favor then. Since we’ve proven ourselves incapable of rational behavior, why don’t you give us a translation of the OP? Show us how the words in the OP can be rationally interpreted to lead to anything besides the conclusion so many of us have drawn. Restate your “point” and show where in your original rant that “point” can be found.
Go read my last post again.
Oh, man, mhendo, there I was, innocently reading this thread and nodding my head at the sagacity of your posts, when I got to this:
Best. Phrase. Of. The. Thread! Oh, the mental image… 
I read it. Very nice. You managed not to call anyone a queen.
It didn’t answer my question. Where is that sentiment in the OP?
What are you looking for? Do you think all OPs should meet your standards?