Tricky
Briefly immortal
Only makes sense. After all, the state was named for a Queen.
What you call "natural" in the animal kingdom is probably just a bunch of dumb animals using trial and error before finding the proper entry.
Using computers isn't part of the natural order. Neither is wearing clothes. That doesn't make them wrong.
Suppose we accept this proposition.
Should we not use our intellect and conscience to establish boundaries of behavior based on logic? If so then why, logically, is gay marriage bad? It hasn't been established that it harms anyone.
Do you want to disallow things that harm no one?
Do you want to disallow something that harms no one because of an old book?
Do you want to disallow something that harms no one because you think it isn't natural?
If you answered "yes" to any of that then please ask how, using that logic, you should not be banned you from watching a television.
Homosexuality harms a whole lot of people, especially homosexuals.
I absolutely love this thread. Now nature is unnatural. What's next?What you call "natural" in the animal kingdom is probably just a bunch of dumb animals using trial and error before finding the proper entry.
How does homosexuality, specifically, harm people? Note, again, that I'm being specific about homosexuality. Not your beloved anal sex, I made a separate thread where you can discuss that to your heart's content.Homosexuality harms a whole lot of people, especially homosexuals.
So... why is homosexuality wrong again? If you're going to say "because it's harmful", how is it harmful?Using computers isn't part of the natural order. Neither is wearing clothes. That doesn't make them wrong.
What you call "natural" in the animal kingdom is probably just a bunch of dumb animals using trial and error before finding the proper entry.
Homosexuality harms a whole lot of people, especially homosexuals.
Are you going to provide any evidence for that claim - or are you going to continue blowing hot air?
Please detail.
On second thought, don't. Who knows what foolishness your mind will invent?
Heterosexuality harms a whole lot of people. Especially heterosexuals. That's a fact. Prior to modern medicine when religion was running the show mortality rates resulting from pregnancy were very high. What does that make heterosexuality?Homosexuality harms a whole lot of people, especially homosexuals.
Apparently that too is all the fault of homosexuals...Heterosexuality harms a whole lot of people. Especially heterosexuals. That's a fact. Prior to modern medicine when religion was running the show mortality rates resulting from pregnancy were very high. What does that make heterosexuality?
An anonymous Free Republic poster citing a Chatholic apologetics group with broken or no links? Looks legit!
Seems like a reasonable counter-point to the argument that homosexuality is unnatural therefore wrong.I understand those who claim homosexuality has a natural basis means it isn't a matter of "sin" or just "choosing to be a pervert" or similar insults. But merely because it's natural doesn't mean it is praiseworthy or morally neutral, or that society should treat it equally to heterosexuality. That MIGHT be the case, but it doesn't logically follow.
Numerous human inclinations and desires are natural in the sense of being innate, or partially innate, but this is usually simply irrelevant to whether or not human society should accept them. After all, the whole point of human society is often to curb or change what is natural. If we acted completely "naturally", we would all still be hunter-gatherers.
Bears repeating. In short, if people like Robert Prey would not appeal to nature then the LGBT community would have no need to discuss homosexuality in nature. They don't need to justify anything. Period.I understand those who claim homosexuality has a natural basis means it isn't a matter of "sin" or just "choosing to be a pervert" or similar insults. But merely because it's natural doesn't mean it is praiseworthy or morally neutral, or that society should treat it equally to heterosexuality. That MIGHT be the case, but it doesn't logically follow.
Numerous human inclinations and desires are natural in the sense of being innate, or partially innate, but this is usually simply irrelevant to whether or not human society should accept them. After all, the whole point of human society is often to curb or change what is natural. If we acted completely "naturally", we would all still be hunter-gatherers.
Seems like a reasonable counter-point to the argument that homosexuality is unnatural therefore wrong.
Most or all of us in the LGBT community feel there is no coherent moral distinction between straight and gay relationships, so there can't possibly be a rational moral basis for stigmatizing gay people. Anti-gay sentiment is based on an irrational prejudice against gay people.
Seems that, whatever your political leanings, there's no way to get behind anti-gay prejudice for any rational reason whatsoever, and seems pretty damn stupid stupid to get behind anything for irrational reasons.
That's what we're trying to tell them. None of us "gay apologists" ever bring up the whole natural vs. unnatural thing. It's always the people who get their panties in a twist over the thought of certain "sinful" romantic relationships who insist on claiming it's "unnatural" for two boys or girls to love each others.I understand those who claim homosexuality has a natural basis means it isn't a matter of "sin" or just "choosing to be a pervert" or similar insults. But merely because it's natural doesn't mean it is praiseworthy or morally neutral, or that society should treat it equally to heterosexuality. That MIGHT be the case, but it doesn't logically follow.
Everyone got popcorn?An anonymous Free Republic poster citing a Chatholic apologetics group with broken or no links?
Originally Posted by Robert Prey
Homosexuality harms a whole lot of people, especially homosexuals.
An anonymous Free Republic poster citing a Chatholic apologetics group with broken or no links? Looks legit!
MYTH # 1
Gay people molest children at far higher rates than heterosexuals.
THE ARGUMENT
Depicting gay men as a threat to children may be the single most potent weapon for stoking public fears about homosexuality — and for winning elections and referenda, as Anita Bryant found out during her successful 1977 campaign to overturn a Dade County, Fla., ordinance barring discrimination against gay people. Discredited psychologist Paul Cameron, the most ubiquitous purveyor of anti-gay junk science, has been a major promoter of this myth. Despite having been debunked repeatedly and very publicly, Cameron's work is still widely relied upon by anti-gay organizations, although many no longer quote him by name. Others have cited a group called the American College of Pediatricians to claim, as Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council did in November 2010, that "the research is overwhelming that homosexuality poses a [molestation] danger to children."
THE FACTS
According to the American Psychological Association, "homosexual men are not more likely to sexually abuse children than heterosexual men are." Gregory Herek, a professor at the University of California, Davis, who is one of the nation's leading researchers on prejudice against sexual minorities, reviewed a series of studies and found no evidence that gay men molest children at higher rates than heterosexual men.
Anti-gay activists who make that claim allege that all men who molest male children should be seen as homosexual. But research by A. Nicholas Groth, a pioneer in the field of sexual abuse of children, shows that is not so. Groth found that there are two types of child molesters: fixated and regressive. The fixated child molester — the stereotypical pedophile — cannot be considered homosexual or heterosexual because "he often finds adults of either sex repulsive" and often molests children of both sexes. Regressive child molesters are generally attracted to other adults, but may "regress" to focusing on children when confronted with stressful situations. Groth found that the majority of regressed offenders were heterosexual in their adult relationships.
The Child Molestation Research and Prevention Institute notes that 90% of child molesters target children in their network of family and friends. Most child molesters, therefore, are not gay people lingering outside schools waiting to snatch children from the playground, as much religious-right rhetoric suggests.
Some anti-gay ideologues cite the American College of Pediatricians' opposition to same-sex parenting as if the organization were a legitimate professional body. In fact, the so-called college is a tiny breakaway faction of the similarly named, 60,000-member American Academy of Pediatrics that requires, as a condition of membership, that joiners "hold true to the group's core beliefs ... [including] that the traditional family unit, headed by an opposite-sex couple, poses far fewer risk factors in the adoption and raising of children." The group's 2010 publication Facts About Youth was described by the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Psychological Association as non-factual. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, was one of several legitimate researchers who said Facts misrepresented their findings. "It is disturbing to me to see special interest groups distort my scientific observations to make a point against homosexuality," he wrote. "The information they present is misleading and incorrect."
...
MYTH # 4
Gay people don't live nearly as long as heterosexuals.
THE ARGUMENT
Anti-gay organizations want to promote heterosexuality as the healthier "choice." Furthermore, the purportedly shorter life spans and poorer physical and mental health of gays and lesbians are often offered as reasons why they shouldn't be allowed to adopt or foster children.
THE FACTS
This falsehood can be traced directly to the discredited research of Paul Cameron and his Family Research Institute, specifically a 1994 paper he co-wrote entitled, "The Lifespan of Homosexuals." Using obituaries collected from gay newspapers, he and his two co-authors concluded that gay men died, on average, at 43, compared to an average life expectancy at the time of around 73 for all U.S. men. On the basis of the same obituaries, Cameron also claimed that gay men are 18 times more likely to die in car accidents than heterosexuals, 22 times more likely to die of heart attacks than whites, and 11 times more likely than blacks to die of the same cause. He also concluded that lesbians are 487 times more likely to die of murder, suicide, or accidents than straight women.
Remarkably, these claims have become staples of the anti-gay right and have frequently made their way into far more mainstream venues. For example, William Bennett, education secretary under President Reagan, used Cameron's statistics in a 1997 interview he gave to ABC News' "This Week."
However, like virtually all of his "research," Cameron's methodology is egregiously flawed — most obviously because the sample he selected (the data from the obits) was not remotely statistically representative of the gay population as a whole. Even Nicholas Eberstadt, a demographer at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, has called Cameron's methods "just ridiculous."
It looks like at least some of these myths can be attributed to discredited psychologist Paul Cameron, "the most ubiquitous purveyor of anti-gay junk science":
10 Anti-Gay Myths Debunked
It looks like at least some of these myths can be attributed to discredited psychologist Paul Cameron, "the most ubiquitous purveyor of anti-gay junk science":
10 Anti-Gay Myths Debunked
I suspect that if one were to look into the other claims made, they would be similarly supported by the evidence (that is to say, not at all supported by the evidence).
-Bri
This is the same World Net Daily that helped promote the Birther conspiracy theory so much? Another completely legitimate source!