Homosexuals and Bisexuals

[b&wpac4]

If I understand Shane correctly, he doesn't mind the concept of homosexual marriage in the US as long as it is gained by support of the population, or by legislation (our elected representatives) instead of gained through judicial means, correct?

 

[Shane Roach]

Sometimes men and women get together and can't have babies, but they still love each other want to commit themselves to each other in marriage.

And the law lets them do that.

Because the nature of marriage is that it happens before sex. The fact that you have broken that does not mean that this is not the function of marriage, it merely means you have undermined it.

And it has different rules for married folks filing income taxes than it does for single folks, whether or not the married couple has procreated or will ever procreate. And if one spouse dies his/her property can be willed to his/her spouse tax free, whether or not the couple ever procreated. And if a spouse ever finds herself in the unfortunate situation of being asked to testify against her spouse in court, she can claim the marital communications privilege which will prevent her from having to divulge any confidential communications between her and her spouse during her marriage. These are three examples of "regulations" which apply irrespective of a couple's procreative potential or history.

All granted on the basis of a thousands of years old understanding about the uniqueness of the relationship between a man and wife. Under your new and invented form of "marriage", the very terms "husband" and "wife" become ambiguous, and close to meaningless.

The modern institution of civil marriage is about two people commiting themselves to one another to form a central family unit. And if they decide to expand their family by having children which they adopt, or conceive through artificial insemination, surrogacy, or sex, they may do so -- and their rights and responsibilites as parents to those children are identical irrespective of how those children came to be.

There is no "modern" institution of marriage. Much of the reason why some of what you say is reflected in reality at all is because people just like yourself in the past have made arguments just like these.

The results have been increased divorce, increased single motherhood, decreased surety that we can know who the father of a given child is, decreased stability for kids, increased problems for our young, and dozens of other documented negative results of the deterioration of the understanding of the family as exactly what it is, always has been, and always will be -- the union of men and women to have their own kids and raise them.

Gays cannot engage in this institution, and do not uniquely therefore deserve all the benefits you describe, nor the responsibilities.

 

[David Brider]

More semantic games. A person who exhibits punctuality is a person who is punctual. Same concept. Punctuality is a behavior -- the behavior of being habitually on time.

What is the point of all of this? I have many times over ceded that homosexuality might be a behavior people have little or not control over in terms of the urge to participate. If that's your issue, you have the point ceded by me from ages back.

Here is a study that both refers to homosexual behavior and undermines the claim that it is some sort of preset orientation.

Potential for homosexual response is prevalent and genetic.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1...ubmed_RVDocSum

Do you ever intend to tell us what behaviour you think homosexuality consists of, or are you just going to keep copy & pasting that non-answer?

David.

 

[beechy]

Because the nature of marriage is that it happens before sex. The fact that you have broken that does not mean that this is not the function of marriage, it merely means you have undermined it.

Despite your vehement assertions to the contrary, there is absolutely no evidence that modern civil marriage laws presume or require that a couple will have children at all, let alone through procreation as opposed to any other means.

All granted on the basis of a thousands of years old understanding about the uniqueness of the relationship between a man and wife. Under your new and invented form of "marriage", the very terms "husband" and "wife" become ambiguous, and close to meaningless.

What is the legal signifiance of the terms "husband" and "wife" which make it important that they not be collapsed into a single term, "spouse"?

There is no "modern" institution of marriage. Much of the reason why some of what you say is reflected in reality at all is because people just like yourself in the past have made arguments just like these.

At what point in history should marriage laws have stopped evolving? Shall we revert back to ancient Greece? They seem to be on board with the procreation thing. They also required the bride to marry whomever her father or guardian chose, whether she liked it or not. ("Girls in Athens were normally married soon after puberty to men who were typically in their late twenties or early thirties. Her father or other guardian provided the dowry and arranged the match.") See also: ("The bride's father, as her legal guardian, had the power to make [the betrothal pledge] without consulting his daughter, and she did not need to be present for the engye. Under ideal circumstances she could have no preferences in the choice of a groom, since the segregation of the sexes in ancient Greece would have provided her with little opportunity to come into contact with men.)

The results have been increased divorce, increased single motherhood, decreased surety that we can know who the father of a given child is, decreased stability for kids, increased problems for our young, and dozens of other documented negative results of the deterioration of the understanding of the family as exactly what it is, always has been, and always will be -- the union of men and women to have their own kids and raise them.

Gays cannot engage in this institution, and do not uniquely therefore deserve all the benefits you describe, nor the responsibilities.

I agree that couples should be encouraged to create and maintain strong, lasting family units. I disagree that this provides a legitimate reason to exclude homosexual couples from marriage and the benefits and responsibilities they would concomitantly receive for themselves and their children.

 

[Philothei]

Do you ever intend to tell us what behaviour you think homosexuality consists of, or are you just going to keep copy & pasting that non-answer?

David.

And just curious as to what can be wrong with that

 

[FlamingFemme]

Look folks, this is getting to be a waste of my time for now. You're all just tossing random questions without taking any responsibility on yourselves to explain your assertions, and most of what you are asking is exceedingly simple to respond to, but would leave me sitting here all day repeating myself for hours.

I have been watching you all make these same assertions for months, and you have nothing to back your assertions about confusion with except more questions. We all know where families come from. The state needs to be allowed the space to regulate accordingly. That's the simple answer.

I've been reading the last dozen pages or so, and (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong) you seem to be saying that a gay couple with children is not a family, but a straight couple with children is.
Why? What, exactly, is so fundamentally different between my family - which consists of me, my wife, and our daughter - and a man/woman couple with a child?
And, if there isn't a fundamental difference, please stop saying that my family (and, in turn, any other family headed by a gay couple) is not a family.

 

[Wyzaard]

Can you prove that God does not exist?

I need not demonstrate the nonexistence of anything that has not been shown to exist.

Can you prove how the earth was created?

Cosmological models are fairly well confirmed...

Can you prove evolution?

... as are biological ones. Look them up on your own.

The facts are, No you cannot... Everything you present will be ideas, not proven fact, and there is no proven facts, just circumstantial evidence.

Well-confirmed empirical models are not assemblages of 'circumstantial evidence'.

There are far too many species of insects, mamals, fowl, fish, plant life, etc., to ever evolve from the same one cell life. Even scientist believe there was an instant explosion of life...

Study up, and then get back to us.

TalkOrigins Archive: Exploring the Creation/Evolution Controversy

 

[Wyzaard]

An idea does not gain literal existence based on only the ability of someone to think it up.

"Oh yeah??? I'll show you... (squeezes eyes shut and imagines an anvil over your head)"

---Anselm

 

[Wyzaard]

Socialists simply do not want us to be able to self govern in this matter any more...

If you were really interested in self-governance, you would be a libertarian; what you ACTUALLY espouse is a flavor of totalitarianism... the state exacting invasive control over the bodies of the citizenry.

Good thing the Supreme Court has recognized the horrors that come from governments dictating to people when and how they may procreate.

 

[Skaloop]

More semantic games. A person who exhibits punctuality is a person who is punctual. Same concept. Punctuality is a behavior -- the behavior of being habitually on time.

A person who exhibits homosexuality is a person who is homosexual. Homosexuality is a behavior -- the behavior of _________________.

Could you fill in that blank for me, please?

 

[CraigBaugher]

Oh, the ignorance. Science isn't about proving absolute facts. It's about testing an idea to the best of our ability, and finding out if it works. When the idea tests wrong, we change the idea. I don't think anyone but the religious or ignorant ask for absolute proof. If you have any evidence worth sharing, that would be sufficient.


Now, see, if you could show this to be true in a scientific setting, do you have any idea how famous and rich you could be? It's something I've always wondered about people who attack evolution, despite it being incredibly popular, fantastically supported, and the foundation of modern biology.

If, for example, scientists are godless heathens conspiring to make evolution seem true, then why are they doing it? If a scientist today revealed evidence of evolution being flat out wrong, that scientist would be instantly famous. Indeed, many creationists make careers out of spreading anti-evolution propaganda. So if there was real evidence to be shown that evolution was wrong, not only would the scientist who discovered this evidence be famous around the world, but rich from book deals and the like.

AND YET, evolution is accepted everywhere, by everyone, except fringe extremists willing to be ignorant and delusional.

So once we put aside your name calling, and your side step dance, your answer is no... You acknowledge there is no proof, just accepted ideas...

 

[SiderealExalt]

So once we put aside your name calling, and your side step dance, your answer is no... You acknowledge there is no proof, just accepted ideas...

In much the same way a person falling from the top of a three story building acknowledges there is no proof of the theory of gravity, just the accepted idea of the theory of gravity as supported by accurate information , experimentation and corroborated evidence.

If on the other hand you seem to want to push the notion and dive straight into relativism. Then I suppose if you and I are looking at a red car. And you say, "Hey look, a blue car!" and I say, " No you dope, it's a red car." Then both our statements are true, as what constitutes red is simply an accepted idea of language.

The irony of people who believe in "One true religion." engaging in these levels of relativism to dismiss scientific realities that contradict their world view boggles me.

 

[Philothei]

The irony of people who believe in "One true religion." engaging in these levels of relativism to dismiss scientific realities that contradict their world view boggles me.

How are the "religious" people engage in relativism? I think it is the other way around. Those who are relativists engage in 'theories' not yet "proven" and drow conclusions without even a trace...of available data ...

example what you call "homosexual family" that the findings are so rare and recent that no one truly can affirm that children are going to come out okay...The relativism is all with those who aspouse that new "idea of family" since in the recorded history no such data exists!! Talkig about experimentation...hmmmm

 

[CraigBaugher]

Tea kettle on Pluto. An idea does not gain literal existence based on only the ability of someone to think it up. You might as well ask to prove that the hallucinations of a schizophrenic does not exist and other asinine questions. More interestingly. Where as Christians do not believe in any gods but their own. The question is just as easily put as Can you prove Shiva does not exist? Or Zeus, or Re, or Osiris, or Mithras, or Legba, or...you get the idea. The question is self defeating.


Wrong question. It's, can you prove that life sustaining planets are created. Current information points very VERY strongly to no, no and......no.

Can you prove evolution?

A biologist can. The Scientific Theory of Evolution is the detail explanation OF evolution. Not that evolution happens. We know it happens. Yeesh...bloody high school science.


This is relativism. Yet another self defeating position.

Really dude... like, the biologist dudes, have like, ideas, but they can't prove anything dude... really...

 

[SiderealExalt]

How are the "religious" people engage in relativism? I think it is the other way around. Those who are relativists engage in 'theories' not yet "proven" and drow conclusions without even a trace...of available data ...

Craig is, as in, he specifically is and others do as well.

Point A. Do you actually know what a SCIENTIFIC theory is. The term you are describing with, "engage in theories not yet proven." shows you are thinking of the term, "hypothesis." Which in layman's terms is often referred to as a theory. But is your misuse or lack of understanding over scientific terminology science's fault? I seriously doubt it. And what you are describing barely qualifies as a scientific hypothesis because that involves making an EDUCATED guess using already established information in order to form that hypothesis. Which is then tested. Come on now, this is basic high school science, and I'm not that old so apparently the public education system still apparently works now and then.

example what you call "homosexual family" that the findings are so rare and recent that no one truly can affirm that children are going to come out okay...The relativism is all with those who aspouse that new "idea of family" since in the recorded history no such data exists!! Talkig about experimentation...hmmmm

This mass of sentences does not make sense. Seriously, it's like you read my post, didn't actually understand any of it(are you even familiar with the concept of relativism?). Said, "Argh he's saying bad stuff bout religious people...I think." And just posted anything to sound snarky.

Really dude... like, the biologist dudes, have like, ideas, but they can't prove anything dude... really...

So basically you're unwilling to go through the actual trouble of studying?

 

[Philothei]

I even confuse myself....

I should have read that first

 

[Philothei]

And just posted anything to sound snarky.

And where excatly is the snarky part ? so I can edit ....that is...
Thank you

 

[SiderealExalt]

I should have read that first

So I take it you realized I was correct about your mistakes in terminology and intentions then?

 

[Shane Roach]

A person who exhibits homosexuality is a person who is homosexual. Homosexuality is a behavior -- the behavior of _________________.

Could you fill in that blank for me, please?

Having sex with someone of the same gender.

As to this science related stuff, moral relativism is not related to science. Also, there's a fairly simple end around for Christians to be moral relativists.

A. All moral values are opinions.
b. God has moral values.
c. God communicates His values to people.
d. God's values do not change.
e. Even though moral values are relative, God will preserve His own. The others will pass away.

The point is largely irrelevant.

In any event, you'll note there is still silence on the issue of the nature of consciousness. Show me your consciousness, and I will then accept that there is something unusual or uniquely unobserved about God. Otherwise, I am convinced that after acknowledging that I myself have this quality, that it is illogical to assume that others do not have it, or that there may not be truth to portions great or small of many religions or even the entirety of one.

Further study and thought has led me where I am today. It's not even mildly illogical. It's a more complete view of the world and the nature of mankind that any that pretends to explain things that are not explained, and it does not require me to hold too tightly to the probability of things that frankly are currently beyond our ability to thoroughly research, i.e. claims to know the source of the universe, all of life's diversity, and so forth.

 

[Skaloop]

Having sex with someone of the same gender.

Not all homosexuals do that.