You apopgized for hijacking the thread, not for insulting a whole group of people (not about their beliefs, but about how you think they look). But you started this thread because you didn’t understand how anyone could defend the “fundies”. All stereotypes are wrong, and should be disavowed in a board like this. If you want to attack Pat Robertson for his specific beliefs, or any other specific person’s belief, that’s perfectly fine. No one will object. Calling someone illiterate because they believe in the Bible is not a valid debating technique, even in CS.
I see your point, Sauron, but I wonder if there is any real difference between rights for gay people and rights for me. If gay people are granted rights, I, being a member of that group, would be included. If sacrificing my rights now would ensure that gay people in America would be fully accepted as citizens in 30 years, I could do that. However, this sounds much more like y’all are trying to hush me up because I point out inconvenient truths.
Despite my aversion to getting nailed to things, the Son of God is certainly a good model to emulate. However, a more apt comparison in this instance would be to Moses who led the Children of Israel to the Promised Land but was not allowed to cross over himself (in a parallel irony, because of his wrath in striking the rock at Meribah).
On a personal note, please convey my apologies to Aries28 for not being able to see her. in addition to the stress of recovering from surgery, I have developed a histamine reaction to the antibiotics, so now I’m covered from head to toe in painfully itchy red hives, which is not helping my temper much. Benadryl and calamine are not making them stop, either.
Really? Because I’ve yet to see the mods pounce on someone for attacking liberals on a personal level. Milum was banned when, exactly? And I’m sure we could find quite a lot of the same for Bush voters, or Reaganites, or Canadians.
Why shouldn’t fundies be attacked on a personal level? Fascists are regularly attacked on a personal level, and rightfully so. Same goes for racists. It’s one thing to attack people for birth traits, or other factors beyond their control. But when people have made a free choice to embrace an ideology of ignorance and hatred, I’d say that opens them to critiques of their intelligence and morality.
Nothing much to add other than keep the head up gobear on this point you’re fighting the good fight IMO. If you were anywhere in my vicinity I’d be offering to buy you a pint.
Nope, no hushing-up attempted, and my apologies if it came across that way. I guess I’m more about questioning tactics than proclaiming truth. Should you be allowed to marry whomever you want? Of course. My point is to keep that end goal always in the forefront of your mind. Will antagonizing “fundies” accomplish that goal? I dunno. Malcolm X achieved some success by being antagonistic. However, Martin Luther King Jr. was probably more successful in his long-term goals, and he employed a strategy that was diametrically opposed to Malcolm X.
Bummer about the hives, man. My condolences. Aries28 is struggling with some fluid on her ear and an incipient cold, so she isn’t feeling too chipper herself. If you still have her cell phone number, feel free to call her this evening … or, if you want, I’ll give you her room number. I know she’d like to talk with you.
Maybe so, but once the first assumption is true, your ire should be gone. You stated that part of the definition of “fundie” is desire to deny gay rights, so if that were not a part of it, presumably you would no longer be angry with, or desire to lash out at, “fundies”. Once they have no effect on you, would you care about their ignorance so deeply?
If the fundies kept their ignorance and malice securely chained, I’d have no problem with them. While I’d still think them gullible, I wouldn’t be angry with them or go out of my way to mock them. If they ceased their efforts to turn our republic into a theocracy and stopped trying to have their creation myths taught in schools as science, I’d be one happy Gobear indeed.
Yojimbo, Kabbes, Laigle, and Sofa King, thanks for the support.
I disagree. I think it took both. Someone has to push the extreme so the moderate appear moderate by comparison. In actuality, Dr. King was preaching a radical change in society. He only seemed moderate in comparison to Stokley Carmichael and Malcolm X. Had they not been there pushing the envelope, Dr. King would have appeared radical. If only the moderates are pushing then they become the extremists.
If there was a non-religious political movement to deny a segment of the population equality in the context of the law, it would be decried as fascist, as a fringe loony movement based on hatred and bigotry, and it would be out of the political mainstream within months.
But the fundies are playing on the goodwill this country has towards christianity. They’re taking advantage of the image that people have of ‘good churchgoing folks’ to camouflage their despicable evil, and people are buying it.
If you’re a christian, and you’re not vehemently, vocally opposed to the schism that fundies are trying to cause in the fabric of this country, if you’re sitting back and letting the fundies sculpt the public face of your religion into this image of intolerance and ignorance, then you’re an enormous part of the problem. They’re dragging your church through acres of shit, distorting the message you’ve been trying to espouse for centuries, and using your moral reputation as political capital.
And you’re letting them.
Don’t be shocked when people tar all christians with the ignorant fundamentalist brush. They’re the public face of your religion right now. There are dozens of well-funded political groups out there lobbying against gay rights, and almost all of them get their support and their agenda from churches. Where are the pro-gay religious lobbyists? Where is the Concerned Christians for Gay Rights office building, staff, think tank, and spokesperson? Why the hell are all the good christians that I’ve been told are out there so fucking afraid to say something to stop this insane persecution?
For every exception, for every Polycarp or vanilla, there are thousands of people who sit their asses in the pews and either disagree silently, or agree vocally. And the reasonable, peacable people who would stand up for the rights of their fellow humans are being drowned out by the organized, orchestrated chorus of hatred that’s spilling out of the doors of your religion, and making its way into the halls of power.
Hatred against gay people is being preached in churches every Sunday all over the country. And if you’re sitting there listening, and you don’t say anything, then you’re causing this too. Get up, tell the preacher he’s an ignorant bigot, walk out and find another church. What possible reason could you have to stay in a church that preaches bigotry? What good could that church be doing that counterbalances the persecution they’re determined to heap on homosexuals?
Fuck the fundies. Fuck them with their amazingly flexible literal interpretations of the bible that allows them to divorce but doesn’t allow them to love their neighbors. Fuck the ignorant arrogance that allows them to ignore everything except what their preachers tell them, and then feel smug about it.
But those of you who are allowing them to weild your congregations as a club to beat up gay people… fuck you too. Get some balls, for Christ’s sake. And stop being surprised when you get lumped in with the evil fucks who are using you.
First of all, you cannot compare science to faith. Faith, as they say, is evidence of things not seen. Most Christians believe God created science and its rules in the first place, as a way to create order for human beings. He himself, however, is not bound by the same rules. Therefore the events Christians ascribe to God are taken by faith, and are generally acknowledged not to be scientifically provable. It may be your opinion that they are wrong, but you insult them and their faith when you insist that no reasonable person would believe such things. If faith in the Christian God cannot be proven, neither can it be disproven. So it is a matter of personal opinion and belief.
My second point regards the way people keep throwing around the word “ignorant” here. Christians, even fundamentalists are not ignorant. Read the definition. It is a lack of knowledge, education, or comprehension. Most Christian fundamentalists I know have a thorough knowledge and understanding of the scientific facts. They simply choose to rely on faith instead, as outlined in my previous point. Most point to the fact that science has actually disproven itself time and time again. Something that has been scientifically proven will be debunked a year later. So Christians choose to rely on faith in an all-powerful God instead of human science.
As for my own opinion, I think we’d be better off as a society to remove the government from marriage altogether. There should be no special rights or benefits to married people, whether heterosexual or homosexual. That way companies can compete for talent by offering benefits for partners of either preference. Churches could decide for themselves which partnerships should be “blessed by God”. Marriages would revert back to what they should be, a spiritual union blessed by Church and God. FWIW
gobear, my eyes are glistening with tears of sympathy. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate your filling the lissener-shaped hole in the recent fundies-v-homos threads, though it’s still interesting to me that you used to take the opposite position when I was on the soapbox. I’m happy that you’ve come around to the good side, despite the overwhelming (I was overwhelmed, anyway) chorus of ostrich-headed appeasers.
Why these people imagine that tolerance is the most effective weapon against a religious cult whose central tenet is intolerance is beyond me. In fact, cynic that I am, I often suspect darker motives than whycantweallgetalong.
Bleating “Turn the other cheek” when the more appropriate saw is “All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing” is way more NevilleChamberlainy than Christlike.
And again I quote from the great Nina Simone:
You are right, and I stand corrected. Change my wording from “mods” to “many other members of this board”.
Suspect all you want. My point is, the central figure of Christianity created a religion that has lasted for 2,000 years, and He did it preaching tolerance and love.
I believe that gay people should enjoy the same benefits and rights as any other member of our society. That’s the goal. My question is, what activities do you think will be most helpful in reaching that goal? If you honestly believe that attacking fundamentalists in retaliation for their efforts is the best way to achieve the goal, then that’s your course. If you believe that attempting change through peaceful means is the best way to achieve the goal, then do that.
In noting what Jesus achieved, I’m simply stating that the peaceful method might be more successful. I don’t know, though. His Dad might’ve pulled some strings along the way.
MrVisible:
I would honestly be puzzled and confused if you attempted to claim that all Christians are equatable with “ignorant fundamentalists.” And I would hope that, as a member of this message board and therefore dedicated to fighting ignorance, you would recognize and decry such blatant stereotyping.
I wrote a whole big post there. I swear I did. Yup, just checked, it’s there. And if you’d read it, you wouldn’t have needed to make that particular comment.
No, they don’t. They misunderstand the Send Law of Thermodynamics, they don’t understand the concept of descent with modification, and they have no comprehension of the scientific methods ro the difference between a theory and a hypothesis.
Thank you for demonstrating my point.
A. Science “proves” nothing. There are no absolutes in science as there are in religion; instead, science deals with levels of certainty supported by evidence. We think that evolution is the mechanism of genetic change in organisms because it has been observed by many different experimenters over many years.
B. Science does not disprove itself; it refines itself. Science is a self-correcting discipline in that wrong or slightly errring conclusions are corrected by more detailed observation and testing.
**Lissener[/b[, I tried very hard to be conciliatory, but that gets no results. Your way is the right way.
Hmm. “Don’t be shocked when people tar all gays with the promiscuous queen brush.”
Stereotypes suck. Always.
Hey! If there’s going to be a big ol’ gay love in, I want included for my rants against the bullheaded, fig-leaf wearing strict constructionalists.
Too late. Already happened. Constitutional amendment, remember?
At the moment, christians have to do a lot of work to prove that their organization, their political fucking organization, is a charitable, forgiving, loving religion. Because at the moment, it looks a hell of a lot like they’ve been taken for a ride by a bunch of bigots hellbent of using their gullibility to achieve political power.
A whole segment of the population is being persecuted in their name. If some Christians disagree with that… where the hell are they? Why aren’t they doing something?
So do bad analogies. For one thing, gay people are not taking away thge civil liberties of fundamentalists. Gay people just want to live and let live, but the fundies won’t let them. Second, gay people of every stripe from butch to femme are open, visible and vocal. Only a self-blinkerd person would say that the only gays they see are promiscuous queens. but on the issue of gay rights, the so-called reasonable, liberal Christians are silent, ceding the entire discussion to the noisy, active fundies.
Homebrew, consider yourself loved.
So if gay people were trying to take away civil liberties, it would be OK to paint them with ridiculous stereotypes? 
Right. But “Fundies” are a small subset of “Christians.” This doesn’t really lend any credence to the whole “it’s OK to portray all Christians as ignorant because Fundamentalists are” argument, does it?
And only a self-blinkered person would say the only Christians they see are fundamentalist. You probably see liberal Christians all the time. They just don’t get in your face and scream “HI!!! I’M A LIBERAL CHRISTIAN! HAVE A HUG!”. Kinda like how there are plenty of gays who don’t walk around with limp wrists speaking in a lisp.
So that’s why the Episcopal church ordained a gay Bishop! They were being silent and inactive! :rolleyes: And all the mainstream protestant churches that are currently agonizing over how to reconcile homosexuality with their faith–they just don’t exist. Nope. And the last two churches I visited–they didn’t make specifically point out that they welcomed all. Nope. And they didn’t have Gay and Lesbian ministries. And they certainly didn’t have a long history of supporting (with money and volunteers) local HIV-related charities.
Dude. I’m sympathetic to your cause, but if you go around trying to justify outrageous stereotypes, you are the one who is gonna come across as ignorant.