Mike Huckabee is a smug little hypocrite who tries to defend his opposition to gay marriage by arguing that a) it’s traditional (never mind that marriage has changed greatly since biblical times), b) it’s natural and necessary for procreation (ignoring the fact that a childless marriage is still regarded as a marriage), and c) that you can’t redefine the magic word “marriage” (yeah, like language never evolves). Jon Stewart makes him squirm over his position.
This wretched ignoramus will be running for president again in 2012, you know it. I know I’ll be struggling to suppress nausea when he does.
Wow PZ,
Youre pushin all my buttons tonight.
Santa, the Hamster, and now Pastor Huck.
Whats next?
PZ, do you ever sleep?
Yeah, the future of the GOP is Romney, Huckabee and Palin. I’ve never been a registered Republican. I first voted in 1976, and I’ve never voted Republican.
I’m in no danger of changing.
Yeah, I saw this. The most cringeworthy part was when the Huck-meister suggested that if we let gay people get married, we’d have to allow people to get married to their domestic animals, cars and all manner of other stuff.
Important to remember this guy’s position is not based upon rational dissection of the issues at hand.
Over on the Americans United blog, there’s a mor(m)on asshat named Aaron arguing the “you can’t redefine the word” position. Hilarious to watch the idiot leap through “intellectual” hoops to do it.
But if you’ll buy into mormon ‘theology’, you’ll buy absolutely anything.
http://blog.au.org/2008/12/04/uncivil-union-catholic-prelate-says-he-wooed-mormons-for-california-marriage-battle/comments
You know what’s funny? Huckabee talking about chromosomes. He did it on NPR, too.
Yeah, I saw that last night. It was pretty woeful from Huckabee, Stewart did well to press him though.
I am not sure the Republicans have much of a future with people like Palin around. Well, what do I know, huh.
What about this wretched ignoramus:
I think PZ is like my father-in-law. He doesn’t need all that much sleep. And he can have the computer delay some of his posts so that the Anzacs and Europeans can get first crack at posting.
I don’t think there would be much danger of me thinking about voting GOP next time around.
Off-topic (but worth mentioning).
It looks like Obama may be recruiting from the NCSE Steve list.
There will most likely be at least one NCSE Steve in Obama’s cabinet: Stephen Chu
Details here: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/washingtondc/la-na-obama-epa11-2008dec11,0,3390641.story
Coincidentally, I was catching up on this episode of the Daily Show while you were busy posting this blog entry. I enjoyed the way Jon Stewart held Hucksterbee’s feet to the fire, and the timely applause from the audience drowning out Huck’s regurgitated responses.
Sadly, the same majority of fools who crush us in pointless magic vs reality polls will be voting in record numbers in 2012. If we don’t find a way to return the US to a secular republic before then, we can look forward to even more extreme sectarian mob rule in four years.
It’s precisely this sort of impending doom that makes me think twice about the 2012 doomsday crackpots. Maybe they’re on to something.
And on the same night, I’m excited about Dr. Steven Chu.
Yes, he doesn’t have the political experience. But that’s a smart dude.
Imagine, a real physicist running the energy department. Um, what? But how does he feel about ID?
Heh.
I get excited about the goophiest things. This is one of them.
Randy @8, I just checked:
Context.
This wretched ignoramus will be running for president again in 2012, you know it.
I hope so. Imagine the most intelligent president in history, President Obama, running against a man so stupid a dog would be better qualified to run the country. The election would be a landslide.
People who claim ‘traditional marriage’ consists of one man and one woman should be forced to study ethnologies and kinship monographs until they become the liberal feminist homosexuals they’re afraid are lurking in front of every university chalkboard. It would only be a ‘cruel and unusual’ punishment if it weren’t so gosh dang easy for people to choose their sexual orientation.
Whatever happened to religious people showing their devotion to God by taking vows of silence?
HUCKABEE / PALIN ’12!!!!!!!
“Whatever happened to religious people showing their devotion to God by taking vows of silence?”- Brownian OM
Ha ha, good one. I’ll be sure to bring it up the next time a troll makes an appearance ;)
Oh yes Randy, we all know McCain/Palin ftw is your vote this last election, but don’t be so quick to assume that you have a valid opinion just because of that.
#14
Careful, BobC. Remember the anecdote about Adlai Stevenson:
During his 1956 presidential campaign, a woman called out to Adlai Stevenson: “Senator, you have the vote of every thinking person!”
Stevenson called back, “That’s not enough, madam, we need a majority!”
Off-topic, but you must post this, PZed: http://www.ectomo.com/index.php/2008/12/10/all-hail-the-cephalopope/
Randy, you’re sleaziest, most dishonest little fucking prick I’ve ever encountered, and an incredibly stupid man.
Why not find yourself a healthier hobby than trolling here, especially since your brain seems to be shrinking in response to the growth of your obsession and desperation to ‘prove’ PZ wrong about any little thing? I had stalkers in high school with more dignity than you, you petty little freak.
It takes a very special kind of stupid to be considered wrong by the majority of scientific community and the majority of the religious community based on your lack of knowledge of either subject, and to consider it all a sign of your outside-the-box intelligence.
You are the very model of that special kind of stupid, Stimpy. Do all of us (and yourself) a favour and stop posting here.
Hey RickrOll,
Actually I vote for Obama. It was an easy choice. However, I was for McCain in 2000. I figured Gore would get us into a war so I ended up voting Rebublican (opps).
If you hear me say something out of character — like calling someone a wretched ignoramus — it just means I am practicing for a Molly award. I don’t really mean it. I am just trying to sound smart for you guys.
But seriously, why hold Huckabee’s feet to the fire on this issue and ignore Obama’s position?
You heard it here first-
Not only is Mike Huckabee the real father of Trig Palin-
He is also the father of Bristol’s unborn child.
It was his secret confession of these scandals to James Dobson that prevented him from getting the endorsement of the religeous blight, thus denying him the nomination.
You report, we deride!
It’s a ridiculously easy thing to do, lackwit: LEARN SOMETHING!
What a pathetic, whiny pissant you are.
Fundies never struck me as “religious,” just bat-shit insane. Crazy people love rambling on about nonsense, right?
Plus the level-headed Catholics I’ve met prefer to keep quiet about this since it’s not their concern.
A Molly Award winner said:
Huckabee’s theory that “23 male and 23 female chromosomes come together” during sexual reproduction deserves further study. It’s not at all clear, for example, how the “female” ones can be identified so that they can be forced to meet their Biblical requirement to submit to the “male” ones.
Brownian, OM – The same stupidity that makes christians reject jezus’s idea that they should pray in private in their closets to gawd.
@BobC
“Imagine the most intelligent president in history, President Obama……”
Not to be a pedant or anything but Jefferson was no slouch. Or either Adams. Or Lincoln. Or either Roosevelt. Taft went on to be Chief Justice. Hoover was a pretty smart guy. Nixon may have been a crook but he wasn’t lacking in the gray matter department. Let’s wait until January 21 before we proclaim Obama the smartest man ever to occupy the White House.
Randy,
There are OMs who’ve written worse, and probably about you as well. IIRC you’ve got first-hand experience with the vicious invective of Truth Machine.
Someone FINALLY called out as bullshit the ridiculous assertion that marriage has been one man and one woman “for five thousand years”. WTF?!?
It’s not bad enough they don’t know real history, but they don’t even know their fake Bible history!!
Oh I’ve also seen them argue that marriage has been one man and one woman since “the beginning of time”!!!
That’s right, heterosexual-only marriage predates the earth. It appeared at the moment of the Big Bang. Didn’t you know?
co-
How many pair of red shoes does that thing take?
If that was the case it would have been called ‘The Big Hetero-Only Bang’.
Stewart was right on the money when he told Fuckabee that religion was the real lifestyle choice.
Is that what the little loner is crying about? Swearing? Being ‘mean’? If so, perhaps the fucking brain-donor shouldn’t have linked to a post in which he wrote this:
Yeah well, fuck you too, you stupid twit. And read a fucking book on biology, you miserable lackwit. (And nice ball-less weasel words, chickenshit. Do you fuck with that empty scrotum too?)
Swearing doesn’t make you look stupid, assface. Being stupid makes you look stupid.
During his 1956 presidential campaign, a woman called out to Adlai Stevenson: “Senator, you have the vote of every thinking person!”
Stevenson called back, “That’s not enough, madam, we need a majority!”
-funding a political campaign- $44,444,000
-nice,presidential clothes- $130,000
-bribery for a blind-eye media- $50,000
-good speech writers- $1,200
-getting destroyed for simply saying a couple very true words: priceless
just jokes people, just jokes
but on to more serious business.
“Randy, you’re sleaziest, most dishonest little fucking prick I’ve ever encountered, and an incredibly stupid man.”
“Why not find yourself a healthier hobby than trolling here, especially since your brain seems to be shrinking in response to the growth of your obsession and desperation to ‘prove’ PZ wrong about any little thing? I had stalkers in high school with more dignity than you, you petty little freak.”
“It takes a very special kind of stupid to be considered wrong by the majority of scientific community and the majority of the religious community based on your lack of knowledge of either subject, and to consider it all a sign of your outside-the-box intelligence.”
“You are the very model of that special kind of stupid, Stimpy. Do all of us (and yourself) a favour and stop posting here.”-Ditto
I thought maybe i should post it since Randy seems to respond to me the most besides Kel. At the very least, it will make him think twice before doing that again. Although, Brownian, i doubt you have spent an extended time trolling Nance’s Blog, trying to slap some sense into Her. The parallels are striking.
Randy – A second Molly Award winner agrees with Brownian, OM. You are a stupid little prick.
Fuck off.
If that was the case it would have been called ‘The Big Hetero-Only Bang’.
Or, if you want to piss of Mormons, just say it’s what happened when Yehweh was fucking his celestial wife.
Since marriage is so sacred, maybe gay folks should only be allowed to wed..
I don’t get it. They’re basically using the same arguments against homosexual marriage, as one might employ against interracial marriage 50 years ago. Why aren’t more people comparing them to Nazis?
In fact, now that you mention it, “The Big Bang” does sound rather homoerotic, and decidedly polygamous. I guess that why the sexually repressed have such a tough time accepting it.
None, I confess. Although I’m guilty of a few drive-bys on anti-atheist blogs, I do my best to avoid trolling blogs. I get enough attention in my personal life, I guess.
@13: All the context in the world doesn’t change the fact that he gave his reason for not supporting same-sex marriage in religious terms. I voted for Obama, because, hell, look at the alternative. But the fact that even someone who has been pro-gay rights all the way down the line can still turn around and cite Jesus as a reason not to support gay marriage just shows us how far we have yet to go.
k Brownian OM, just one stop at her place for me. Granted, whatever you say stands little to no chance at being accepted on her site, i just want to shake the cage…really hard.
http://womenintheword.wordpress.com/
Haaaaave fun! *chuckles maniacally*
Gah! I hate having blown up at Stimpy like that. Man, he’s infuriating, but I feel like a bullying asshole now.
I’m sending myself to bed without dessert and to think about what I’ve done.
G’night.
@FlameDuck
Godwin’s law.
You’ll find a lot of homoeroticism in religions, especially the more rigid (hee hee) sects. Lot’s of repression there.
I did like it when Stewart asked the huckster when he chose to be straight, getting no answer (of course).
Speaking of “traditional” marriage, why do they skim over the many different varieties of marriage in traditions around the world (the one native american – I forget the tribe – that had a man marry another (who acted as the woman) would be a good one – if they changed it to Judeo-Christian tradition, we can say the NA are jewish, just ask a moron, I mean mormon). Whew – like that run-on sentence?
Speaking of traditional marriage, I found a Kos link, through Americablog (http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Americablog/~3/Lp86cD51I9U/traditional-marriage-bible-style.html) that gives a good rendition of traditional biblical marriage. Cute read.
What does OM mean?
Well, well, well Randy. I flounced over to have a look at your blog. Got a case of the ass against Kel huh.
You are the 3rd worst kind of blog whore. You can’t even tempt PZ’s horde 2nd hand. Sorry about your luck. Toad.
It’ll have to be tomorrow then RickrOll, but I’ll check it out.
And guys, the OM is a title, but not necessarily the name. Saying Brownian, OM would be like referring to someone with a medical degree or a PhD ‘Doctor.’
So Brownian’s what you call me. You know, that or, uh, His Brownianness, or uh, Brownie, or El Brownerino if you’re not into the whole brevity thing.
OK Jeeves (#28), I’ll call Obama the most intelligent president in my lifetime (instead of “in history”). I didn’t mean to criticize Jefferson and some other great presidents we had.
If the choice was between Huckabee and a dog, I’d vote for the dog.
DangerAardvark- you realize there ARE no ulterior reasons to deprive someone of their rights. and that’s what this is about -deprivation, not some sort of “equalizing” agent that would make Gay marriage any better than hetero-marriage. They don’t need to be given some sort of special exemption for being a “non-traditional” marriage. In this case, not criminalizing is the same as supporting, i think.
The fact that he cites Jesus as the reason behind the hate is actually going to work to the detriment of the many churches in the nation. It is a wake up call to people to live in a secular, pluralistic society. Not a statement about how his convictions will interfere with the “liberty and pursuit..” of others.
I really hope that Huckabee or Palin isn’t elected in 2012.
The economy continues to steadily deteriorate. It’s the 800-lb. gorilla in the Oval Office.
I am afraid that people will quit caring about social issues if no one can get a job. Also, I agree that it’s better to reserve judgment on Obama’s intelligence until after he takes office. Jefferson, Taft, Nixon — yes, all of them were highly intelligent.
Also, I know Randy may have infuriated all of you greatly in the past, but why condemn him so vociferously for this particular remark? It seems to me like you’re just needlessly taking out your latent anger on him from his other transgressions.
Seriously, all he said is that Obama doesn’t have a perfect record on gay rights. Is that some kind of blasphemous statement around here? Is it heresy to criticize Obama?
I voted for Obama, but I’m willing to have a polite discourse on his political stances without resorting to so much insult.
I’d recommend for you guys to tone down your rhetoric a bit. Give Randy hell when he deserves it, not when he’s making what appears to be a valid criticism.
@BobC,
“If the choice was between Huckabee and a dog, I’d vote for the dog.”
Haha. I don’t know if you’re familiar with the comic strip This Modern World by Tom Tomorrow but he did a running gag throughout Bush’s tenure in office by comparing him to a “small, cute dog” that was running America in a different dimension and had many of the President’s attributes. Huckabee is charming and funny. I’ll give him that but I don’t want to live in a theocracy.
Brownian – I am a sage judge of assholes, as Ken Cope is of shapely asses…
Your remarks to Randy do not make you an asshole. You’ll have to try harder to win the Golden Crupper award.
That video of Huckabee on tds was just painful to watch.
Also, I agree that it’s better to reserve judgment on Obama’s intelligence until after he takes office.
Why? It’s obvious he’s very intelligent. I don’t have to wait 2 months to figure that out.
Why is it that the only insightful critique of political bigots comes from a comedy show?
How about “Lord of the Browns”? HAhahaha
“If the choice was between Huckabee and a dog, I’d vote for the dog.”
We did vote for “the Dog”, to be technical And use slang lol (asking for a pedant lynching isn’t it?). No, Obama is waaay to removed from his roots to make that pun work Ha ha. And he is like…melato. Doesn’t work.
It feels nice, not having a rich old white man running the show for a change. This sure as hell makes racist jokes a lot less embarrassing..Or am i just a terrible person?
Can’t it be both?
As is the case with all fundie bullshit, it’s arguing semantics. I suggest we remove all doubt and controversy in a very simple way: remove the word marriage from the law books. Civil unions for everybody! It really is that simple. If you take away the basis for the argument what do they have left?
@ BobC
I meant that we should wait to evaluate Obama’s intelligence in relation to other Presidents until he takes office. Hoover was obviously an intelligent man, but we can safely say he wasn’t the best of American Presidents. Yes, it would be wise to withhold some judgment when evaluating Obama until he can actually be in charge of the country.
When Henry Kissinger was appointed Secretary of State, at his first press conference, a reporter asked “How should we address you, as Doctor Kissinger, or Mr Secretary?”
Kissinger replied “You may call me Excellency”
@rickroll
My statement wasn’t saying anything in particular about Obama. He’s a politician and he does what he needs to do to get elected. My point actually mirrors your own, namely that this comment from “the most liberal Senator in Congress” in addition to the passage of Prop 8 in arguably the most liberal state in the union should act as a wake-up call to people to recognize the common thread behind opposition to gay marriage: religion.
I just hope Obama makes a little change on his stance on Nuclear power: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/nov/09/miniature-nuclear-reactors-los-alamos
As far as this topic is concerned, PCB ftw
Teleprompter – You are blog whoring as well. Tick.
James F (#18) wrote: During his 1956 presidential campaign, a woman called out to Adlai Stevenson: “Senator, you have the vote of every thinking person!” Stevenson called back, “That’s not enough, madam, we need a majority!”
OK, that’s a good reason to hope Huckabee isn’t the Republican candidate in 2012. I was just reading this news article about the hopeless stupidity of Americans.
More Americans Believe in the Devil, Hell and Angels than in Darwin’s Theory of Evolution. Nearly 25% of Americans Believe They Were Once another Person.
Please note that I didn’t read a single comment before posting.
Or maybe for someone elses transgressions.
I tend to inspire that in people. Even moreso in people who think they know better than the entire scientific establishment.
I agree it would be logical to wait until Obama has a chance to prove he is competent. But I can’t wait that long. I’m just too excited about having a president who isn’t an idiot like Bush. I think America is incredibly lucky have somebody like Obama, especially with the mess we’re in right now. What a total disaster Bush was. Imagine having McCain instead of Obama taking over. I would have given up all hope if that happened.
Patricia:
I am blog whoring? Fine.
I don’t see anything wrong with it.
I believe it’s a positive practice — you gain exposure to other people’s thoughts. If you agree with what someone says, you have a link to more of their thoughts. If you disagree with someone, you potentially have a place to go comment further on the matter.
Blog whoring is an important medium for the exchange of ideas. I don’t care whether it’s “socially acceptable” or not.
Besides, it’s not an especial inconvienence. No one is forced to click on my name. Everyone knows that. I don’t know why you have such a problem with my promotion. I post here a few times when I have something relevant to say, and when I do I include a link to my blog. Is that such a terrible thing for you? I’m so sorry.
Your concern is noted.
DangerAardvark @#61: HOW Dare you you presumptuous little…..OH. Well ok then :)
Hmmm, blog whoring..?
I guess it’s back to being a silent observer for me. I guess I wasn’t shrill enough in my comments to evoke a response from either side of this ridiculous debate.
PCB,
You don’t have to be a silent observer. I agree with you. It’s just, it takes awhile to sort through everything on these threads.
I do believe that civil unions for everyone would be the best solution. Keep “marriage” as a religious concept. Let the government define the current concept of marriage as a civil union, and let it apply to both heterosexual and homosexual couples. However, I doubt this is practicable.
I wonder if its something in the air that people are so aggressive at the moment,the blog has been really a group therapy session recently,more insults are flung than ever before,my patients call me fucking shithead and have their folks try to beat me up…Must be something in the air,or the water?
As to thread topic,
I didnt realize how i enjoyed the 4 weeks break after the election to not having to hear from the likes of the Huckster again,but here we go again….
I guess that just shows these guys are still out there and nothing is achieved or changed yet…..
“Please note that I didn’t read a single comment before posting.”-PCB
Oh, it’s a breakaway! He charges down the field, three defenders attacking him, he shoots, he scores!
In hockey that’s an unassisted goal, aye.
Part of the problem with civil unions is that it doesnt have the same rights allowed it as marriage. There are 1186 federal laws discriminating against LBGT individuals in this country. Thats why a change must be made.
You’re absolutely right teleprompter. Even though the solution is obvious, its implementation is nearly impossible. It would be political suicide for anybody who supports it considering today’s political climate.
Oh well. One can hope that this modern day Jim Crow law will fade into the obscurity of semi-forgotten embarrassments that clog our nation’s closet.
I’m out, past my bedtime. Have fun, all of you, and I apologize if I got a bit whiny. Keep up the good fight.
The problem with that is like removing the word Christmas. What it’s come to mean in our society is an expression of love between two people, like Stewart said in the interview, it’s changed definition over time. To take it away would not reflect the role the word plays, and in effect it would harm marriage far more than allowing two gay people who use it.
Before I go…Rickroll, I only posted that as a disclaimer. I was afraid it may have been posted earlier. But, whatever. Cheers!
I love Jon Stewart. I have to say, though, its a sad commentary on american news shows that you have to flip over to Comedy Central in order to see an interview like this. Stewart called Huckabee out on his craziness, particularly in pointing out that marriage in the Bible was not always “one man, one woman”, and that religion is more a choice than sexuality. The thing I really love, though, is that Stewart let Huckabee state his case, then countered. The two clearly disagree vehemently on the topic, and yet there was no yelling, and very little talking over each other. I wish that actual news programs had such civilized discourse.
No Kel, it isn’t. Marriage, as it is being discussed here, is a legal term granting specific privileges by law, i.e. tax cuts. Love has no place in this discussion other than it being a reason for two people to enter into the aforementioned contract (which is what legal marriage is, a contract).
Brownian, OM
I haven’t visited this blog in a while and was baffled by your obscenity-laden attack on Randy’s post about Obama. Even taken in context, Obama’s statement is no different than Huck’s and, at best, is simply another instance in which, given a choice between politics and principle, he opts for the politically safe choice.
(Please, don’t mention Iraq. One sentence in a speech barely covered by the press in a safe district, that he half repudiated – “had I been in the Senate, I might have voted differently”- until it became politically useful, and safe, to tout it.)
No, I didn’t vote for Obama, or McCain. I’m tired of Democrats electing Rockefeller Republicans.
DangerAardvark – yet Obama voted against DOMA and opposed Proposition 8. The problem isn’t “religion,” it’s specific homophobes who are using their religious beliefs as an excuse for their homophobia. There are plenty of secular homophobes, sadly.
Actually it does have a place here, because the way the word is used in society is why this debate is being fought out.
Patricia (OM) and Randy
The difference between the two is this; Patricia gets cranky, Randy is a crank.
Huckabee is a hardcore christofascist Dominionist. He screwed up Arkansas big time, not that anyone in Arkansas cared or anyone outside noticed or gave a damn.
He also doesn’t come across as too bright although fundies never do anyway. He has very little post secondary education.
One of his presidential candidate proposals was to base the US constitution on the ten commandments. Which he probably hasn’t ever read. As some have pointed out, the ten commandments don’t have a lot to do with civil law. And we already have a constitution which has worked well for 200 years.
“Thou shalt have no other gods before you.” What about the nonxian religions, native american, moslem, hindu etc.. I suppose they can be made illegal and deported or gassed or something.
“Thou shalt not take the lords name in vain.” This is what he and all the fundie morons do whenever they purport to speak for god. Huckabee is one and I’m sure he will report to the nearest reeducation center for proper programming.
Really all he and Palin can do is god babble. Which any moron can do, it isn’t hard. But don’t count him out, we just had 8 years of a god babbling moron and people elected Bush.
There is no reason why homosexuals can’t just have civil unions.
There is no reason to be married accept to try to look like they are normal and accepted in soceity.
Schools will then teach children what a “Normal” family is and include gay and lesbian couples as a normal family and that is wrong. It is already happening in the State of Maryland.
If we do that, then people who are into Pedophilia will want to get maried and I could go on, but I think you get the picture.
It has nothing to do with hate, that is just stupid people talking. It has to do with protecting our children and moral values.
The liberals here just want to open everything up and just do whatever that feels good.
Feel like you want to murder someone, no problem. Legalize drugs and prostitution. No problem.
These are the people that think they are guided by morals. Right.
There are laws for a reason.
Horses and people want to marry. No problem, we just need to change the marriage laws.
I really wish these liberals would have stayed back in the 1960’s, because they are killing our society.
The whole anti gay thing is just primate tribal and fascist politics. Groups often build cohesion by defining in groups and out groups. The out groups are demonized and sometimes killed.
The fundies have a bit of a problem. Their usual out groups don’t work any more. They can’t hate the commies because there aren’t very many. The Soviets collapsed and the Red Chinese keep us afloat with a trillion plus in US treasury bonds they bought by making stuff for us. Blacks and Jews don’t work any more either.
So that leaves gays, moslems, and atheists. Got to wonder about a so called religion that defines itself by the number and type of groups it hates. But not to wonder too much. No doubt about it, fundies are just plain old evil.
8 years of a god babbling moron and people elected Bush.
I hope you seriously don’t believe that garbage. Bush is not a Christian at all. He just claims it so that he can get Christians to vote for him.
See, this is the problem with you morons. You just assume that anyone who says anything with their mouth happens to be the truth. He is trying to get votes. That is his entire purpose. It’s politics! This is all about trying to get elected.
Bush is about as much as a Christian as Tom Cruise is an atheist.
I feel like I am on a kindergarden messageboard.
The fundies have a bit of a problem. Their usual out groups don’t work any more. They can’t hate the commies because there aren’t very many. The Soviets collapsed and the Red Chinese keep us afloat with a trillion plus in US treasury bonds they bought by making stuff for us. Blacks and Jews don’t work any more either.
oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
Is this a joke post?
Fundies have nothing to do with any of that. Try the KKK. I just hope some of you people are really not this ignorant. Please, Tell me that you are not this bad.
I just really have doubts about the educational system in this country.
Kel @77:
Except that with the exception of being a day off for some (not yours truly) Christmas has no legal meaning. Marriage does.
So I think his point would have been better stated: get rid of all of the legal standing associated with marriage. Then allow anyone to, with a person of their choice, enter a civil union with all the rights and privileges we now associate with marriage.
Marriage is the ceremony and the cultural context. Civil union is all of the legal benefits. Of course gay people already have the ceremony and cultural context. Its the legal benefits and governmental recognition that the fundie whacknuts are trying to prevent LGBTIQetc people from enjoying.
Prop H8 in California wasn’t to make it illegal for myself and my partner to go to the local Unitarian Universalist Church, drop $10k and get married from the cultural perspective. It certainly doesn’t stop us from loving each other as husband and husband. Nor does it prevent me from saying that Dan is my husband. It also doesn’t prevent me from wearing a wedding ring and celebrating our wedding anniversary.
What it does do is make me pay more in taxes. It means that if we’d gotten in an accident while in TX recently they can try to stop me from visiting him in the hospital because I’m not family. It means that if I die earlier he doesn’t get my social security survivor benefits. It means there are only certain states in which we can live and/or certain employers I can work for because otherwise he would go uninsured.
Sorry, but even entertaining that concept is complete and utter horse shit. This is in no way about love or cultural meaning. It is pure and ignorant bigotry that legally makes us second class citizens.
Charles the moron – so much stupid, so little time.
You wrote
Funny, all the gay people I know are both normal and accepted in society. Homophobic morons like yourself, on the other hand, are neither.
How is it wrong? Any number of studies into comparisons of same-sex parents vs. mixed-sex parents shows the former are far more successful.
It’s everything to do with hate. And the only stupid person talking right now is you.
How does gay marriage lead to pedophilia? It’s the act of two consenting adults, just like conventional marriage is. Has conventional marriage led to male/female pedophilia?
How many horses have you met that can sign the applicable forms?
Any society that spawned a wretch like you deserves to die and be replaced by a better one.
Huck will run, but I think Mitt is the clear frontrunner for 2012. Palin will run too but till fizzle out early. I’m sure 2 or 3 other random people will throw their hats in the ring, but if I had to bet on who would be the GOP nominee, I’d bet on Romney.
In re: Charles @ #88 and 89 – It looks like we’ve got a live one here!
Nick @ #92
He’s not nearly Evangelical enough, I don’t think he’s got any pull with the conservative base.
Charles @86
You certainly write as if you are.
More inanity from Charles, pig excrement in human form:
We can’t join the KKK, genius – it’s a proud christian organisation. Pharyngulites are, for the most part, atheists. Epic fail.
Since it produced you, I have doubts, too. Maybe with all the marriage-law-changing going on you can come to some arrangement with a human brain so you can fill the space where yours isn’t.
Assclown.
I hadn’t seen this fellow before. My first thought was “Oh, Colbert forgot his glasses.”
Why is Jon Stewart so apologetic on abortion? It seems to be an alarming shift in America, that even formerly pro-abortion people are being bullied into an anti-abortion, pro-choice stance.
Funny, all the gay people I know are both normal and accepted in society. Homophobic morons like yourself, on the other hand, are neither.
It does not matter if they are nice people or not. That really has nothing to do with anything really.
I am not homophobic at all. I am not scared of gay people and I am not scared of my sexuality. I have met
some nice gay people. However, I have also met some nice people who cheat on their wives/husbands.
How is it wrong? Any number of studies into comparisons of same-sex parents vs. mixed-sex parents shows the former are far more successful.
It is wrong in many ways. It is not natural. It is a sin. It is wrong just as anyone cheating on their wife or husband and then taking that
and making it into a lifestyle. If a child and a man or woman want to marry, what is wrong with that? (yes it is wrong), but I mean you can excuse
any bad behavior. If someone murdered someone, you could just say their brain made them do it or they were insane, or insert excuse here.
There is no right or wrong, because everything can be excused.
How does gay marriage lead to pedophilia? It’s the act of two consenting adults, just like conventional marriage is. Has conventional marriage led to male/female pedophilia?
What if the child wants to get married? The entire idea is that you are excusing bad behavior. Can anyone explain to me how anyone can tell right and wrong?
This is my entire point. You liberals don’t want morals. I am not even talking religion here. I am talking about basic morality. You blur the lines between right
and wrong, until wrong does not matter anymore.
How many horses have you met that can sign the applicable forms?
If the liberals keep it up, you won’t have to have forms. Just say you are married and you are.
Nothing is of any value, nothing is sacred. Just do whatever you want to do. No worries.
Any society that spawned a wretch like you deserves to die and be replaced by a better one.
Maybe you might want to study history again kid and find out what happened with other nations that went down this path.
Charles @ #88:
So our problem is that we aren’t a bunch of wingnut conspiracy theorists then? Guess I’ll know who to blame when I turn on CSPAN only to find representatives from the tinfoil hat industry lobbying congress for a bailout.
Seeing as how you’re privy to inside information that us “kindergarteners” don’t have, how about you tell us what Bush’s covert religious affiliation is?
Charles are you really that psychotic? I sort of woke up to the fundies when the MD assassins started murdering my colleagues. I really woke up when I and people I knew well started getting death threats and I ended up spending time with the FBI. Who actually managed to catch two of them and charged them with felonies. Because xianity is a religion of peace, love, tolerance, and the occasional murder. And death threats are a felony.
So who is on your list to kill? All fundies have such a list. The record holder is Rushdooney. He wanted to kill 297 million of the 300 million US citizens alive today. It is easy to dismiss Rushdooney as a mass murder wannabe psychopath. He is one. OTOH, he is also the Father of Xian Dominionism and Pat Roberson’s mentor.
In the likely event that you are too stupid to make up your own list, just borrow one. Everyone in the world, 6.7 billion people, is perfectly acceptable and what Sarah Palin is wishing for. Or you can be more moderate and just wander around stoning disobedient children to death like it says in Deuteronomy.
I make about $250,000 annually. My partner makes about $0 annually (he works, just not at things that make money.) Paying federal and state income taxes on $250,000 as an individual is a substantially larger bill than paying as a couple filing jointly.
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Well good for you. Nobody cares about what you make. You assume that means something. I honestly am not impressed about what you make. I used to make 100k myself.
The root of the problem has nothing to do with your income, I mean there are married people making it on a lot less and you should be happy you have income at all right now.
The root of the problem is that you want to be accepted like real married people and not just have a civil union. It has nothing to do with you, but your life style is not normal and should not be taught anymore than we tech children how cheat on their future partners or that it is okay to steal or murder people.
Some people want you just to keep it in your house so we don’t have to see you in a parade all the time and expressing yourself all over my TV, the Village in Manhattan, Hollywood, or all over San Fran.
It should be like the 70’s where you kept it in private the way strait couples do. The only difference is that there should be no promotion of violence against homosexuals. That is the only thing that should have never started.
Because while conservatives are all about black and white thinking while progressives are able to think in shades of gray.
Take a healthy woman who became pregnant during consensual sex with her partner who is 40 weeks pregnant with a viable healthy fetus and who will deliver the next day. Should she be able to have an elective abortion on demand? Should she be able to the next day once its delivered commit infanticide?
That kind of question about human development is hard and there is no simple answer… its not unlike the concept of children entering adulthood and consenting for medical treatment. While we all would agree a child of 5 can’t and someone 18 can, what about a 15 year old? Its not like you are incompetent when you are 17 years 364 days and suddenly you become a mature adult the next day.
With abortion the fundies select the bright line of conception. Which is stupid because there is no bright line. But its just as stupid to select 39 weeks and 6 days as the bright line. And while I am willing to say I don’t know the answer to the question I posed above, fundies don’t. Progressives can see that and so we’re willing to waffle and sometimes come up with ‘well it is regrettable and we’d like to have it be safe, legal, and rare.’
What pissed me off with Stewart though was he didn’t say rare, he said ‘none’. That’s just stupid because there is no perfectly foolproof means of contraception. Even in my dream world where kids get (age appropriate) sex-ed starting in kindergarden and by the time a girl menstruates she has the option of getting birth control in a confidential non-judgmental fashion we’re still going to have unplanned and unwanted pregnancies. Jon…. dude…. what were you thinking?
@ Twin-Skies
So since Godwin’s Law states that as debates are ongoing, the probability of being compared to Nazis approaches 1, and since this debate has been raging forever, and nobody is comparing them to Nazis yet, despite Godwin’s Law stating that the probability is asymptote to 1, that must mean that Godwin’s Law is now positively falsified?
@Charles #98
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robyn-blumner/gay-adoption-in-florida_b_149302.html
have, how about you tell us what Bush’s covert religious affiliation is?
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I don’t know what his religion is and I am not sure he knows either. However, the language he was speaking was just to get Christians on his side. I would be sure that Rove would be behind all of this.
You would know this if you stop to think a little bit and use a little rationality.
Politics is all about trying to get votes in any way possible. Bush would say he is an atheist if that could get him the votes. However, atheism is a minority in this country. He would have to be from Europe where it matters.
Most of the people in here are supposed to be intelligent, then why are they missing the obvious and not getting it.
Unless you were overlooking the fact in the first place so you can blame everything else on religion.
“Children in Public schools are failing! It must be religions fault! oh wait! Public schools are secular. We have to blame it on church vs state and sunday school!”
All of this is why people fail to take atheists seriously.
Charles, you halfwitted moron:
If you think gay people should have fewer rights than other people, you’re a homophobe. You’re a bigot. Being anti-gay because of what your god says is still homophobia. Bigotry is bigotry, regardless of the reason behind it. If you don’t like being called a bigot, don’t be one. You’re trying to have your cake and eat it: making homophobic comments and then whining when you’re referred to as a homophobe.
Pathetic slippery slope argument there regarding paedophilia and bestiality. Gay human adults can give consent, just like straight human adults. Children can’t give consent, and neither can horses. As far as I’m aware, adult-child marriages and adult human-farm animal marriages and adult human-chair marriages haven’t become rampant in countries that have legalised gay marriage. You’re using a lot of specious bullshit (il)logic here. You’re also a homophobe. If that’s what makes you happy, then you’re an asshole, but ok. But stop whining when you’re called out as one.
Bloody conservatives. You people are destroying the world.
@FlameDuck
It’s not that Godwin’s Law has been invalidated – their side just invoked it first. Frequently. For example, these religious wingnuts likened pushing Prop 8 to “defeating Hitler.”
http://crooksandliars.com/julia-rosen/prop-8-spokesman-says-defeating-gays-d
Hey Charles, would it make you even more pissed if you knew that just this past weekend I did a lecture at a public university (subsidized by your tax dollars) about LGBTQetc people?
I did. :D And I even got free travel and a nifty tee shirt and tote bag.
Ummmm…. I bet you’d just have steam coming out of your ears if I told you I was providing free clinical breast exams at one of those every year for the past three and have marched in them numerous times? I’ve even gone to Disney Gay Days twice (super fab, btw – especially if you stay on property… love the animal kingdom lodge). And when traveling to my talk this weekend, my husband and I held hands almost all the way there on the plane and through the DFW airport where we connected. I only wish you could have been in the window seat to lose your fucking shit worrying that you’d catch teh gay. That would have been waaaay better than the tote bag.
Oops. So you lost your job then? Sorry, honey. If you want, we need someone to rake the leaves in our house and haul some stuff to the dump for us that’s left over from the remodel we did earlier this year. If you’re in northern California, give me a ring, K? $20 an hour and if you do a good job, we’ll throw in dinner at McDonalds.
If you think gay people should have fewer rights than other people, you’re a homophobe. You’re a bigot. Being anti-gay because of what your god says is still homophobia. Bigotry is bigotry, regardless of the reason behind it. If you don’t like being called a bigot, don’t be one. You’re trying to have your cake and eat it: making homophobic comments and then whining when you’re referred to as a homophobe.
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Homosexuals can have civil unions. What is wrong with that instead of marriage. I am not homophobic. Just because I don’t agree that gay people should have civil unions instead of getting married and now I am homophobic?
I don’t agree that an 11 year old girl who wants to get married to a 50 year old man should get married if they both consent. Is that pedophobic?
I don’t agree with Rape, does that make me rapeophobic?
will you read what you type? It’s just purely stupid.
You are supposed to be intelligent here and you are doing an epic fail here.
@Charles
Not agreeing with gay marriages is not being homophobic. Acting upon this personal opinion to intentionally deny gay couples the right to marriage, now THAT’s being a homophobe.
Hey Charles, would it make you even more pissed if you knew that just this past weekend I did a lecture at a public university (subsidized by your tax dollars) about LGBTQetc people?
I am not angry at all. My entire family and myself voted YES for Prop 8.
Ummmm…. I bet you’d just have steam coming out of your ears if I told you I was providing free clinical breast exams at one of those every year for the past three and have marched in them numerous times? I’ve even gone to Disney Gay Days twice (super fab, btw – especially if you stay on property… love the animal kingdom lodge). And when traveling to my talk this weekend, my husband and I held hands almost all the way there on the plane and through the DFW airport where we connected. I only wish you could have been in the window seat to lose your fucking shit worrying that you’d catch teh gay. That would have been waaaay better than the tote bag.
I am not worried about catching teh gay at all. I worry about our morals falling apart because of your kind (your kind being liberal not just gay).
Oops. So you lost your job then? Sorry, honey. If you want, we need someone to rake the leaves in our house and haul some stuff to the dump for us that’s left over from the remodel we did earlier this year. If you’re in northern California, give me a ring, K? $20 an hour and if you do a good job, we’ll throw in dinner at McDonalds.
I am not worried about money. Sooner or later you will find out that its not all that its cracked up to be. I enjoyed the money, but the pressure was a lot. I am not making 100k anymore, but I don’t have the stress anymore either. Well, not that kind of stress. I am doing my own thing now and I am much better with stress.
Yes. And if you thought ‘seperate but equal’ schools and facilities were appropriate in the early-to-mid 20th century, you were a racist.
The term consenting adults escapes you, doesn’t it? Can minors legally enter into any other contract?
Hey, he really is nuts. He’s talking to himself now.
“You are supposed to be intelligent here and you are doing an epic fail here.”- the current idiot.
Grammar epic fail; funny it wouldn’t be so epic if you hadn’t used the word
What makes gay marriage sinful then smart-ass? What? Tell us, we would be interested to know exactly what evil is precluded by homophobia, as opposed to say… Intellectual inbreeding (a.k.a. indoctrination of children into your death cult) and xenophobia (Got Mit uns)?
Not agreeing with gay marriages is not being homophobic. Acting upon this personal opinion to intentionally deny gay couples the right to marriage, now THAT’s being a homophobe.
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So, they can’t have civil unions instead of getting married?
I voted “Yes” on Prop 8, not because I hate anyone.
They can have Civil Unions.
Even OBAMA isn’t for marriage for gays.
Because he knows that should not happen.
Is Obama homophobic too?
African Americans were a big part of Prop 8 passing, are they homophobic too?
What about Latinos, they also voted “Yes” for prop 8.
Are they homophobic?
Think about what you are saying. Just because you think something should be legal and right doesn’t mean everyone else should.
Marriage was ment for a MAN AND A WOWMAN ONLY. Homosexuals are not a part of that union and they can have a civil union.
It’s so funny on how everyone on here overlooks Obama being for traditional marriage and allowing civil unions for homosexuals and you all just gloss right over it.
Oh wait, Obama is a homophobic racist! yeah!
You guys are as stupid as the redneck Klu Klux Klan.
Charles the bigot and possible poe- “It should be like the 70’s where you kept it in private the way strait couples do.”
Um, Charles? The 70’s?? Are you kidding me?
Thelma Houston and Donna Summer wanna have a little talk with you.
The term consenting adults escapes you, doesn’t it? Can minors legally enter into any other contract?
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Well if you can change the laws on marriage then you can change anything. It’s a slippery slope.
When you are liberal, nothing is bad, evil, wrong (everything except morals, religion, and helping others).
Charles @ #105 babbled:
That’s rich.
Because most of the people here don’t hold with the tortured logic you seem to use to arrive at the “obvious”. Like: Bush claims to be Christian. This nation is largely Christian. Ergo, Bush is a Secret Atheist lying about being Christian to get more votes. That’s the logical equivalent of saying that 2 + 2 equals a large grapefruit.
If Bush were secretly an atheist than what purpose does he have in very publicly supporting the teaching of Intelligent Design? There aren’t any non-religious reasons to support the teaching of Intelligent Design.
What, your imagined atheistic stance on public schooling? I very much doubt that your fantasy scenarios affect other peoples’ perception of atheism one way or the other.
First, there are several things that your bible says about marriage….
A. Marriage in the United States shall consist of a union between one man and one or more women. (Gen 29:17-28; II Sam 3:2-5)
B. Marriage shall not impede a man’s right to take concubines in addition to his wife or wives. (II Sam 5:13; I Kings 11:3; II Chron 11:21)
C. A marriage shall be considered valid only if the wife is a virgin. If the wife is not a virgin, she shall be executed. (Deut 22:13-21)
D. Marriage of a believer and a non-believer shall be forbidden. (Gen 24:3; Num 25:1-9; Ezra 9:12; Neh 10:30)
E. Since marriage is for life, neither this Constitution nor the constitution of any State, nor any state or federal law, shall be construed to permit divorce. (Deut 22:19; Mark 10:9)
F. If a married man dies without children, his brother shall marry the widow. If he refuses to marry his brother’s widow or deliberately does not give her children, he shall pay a fine of one shoe and be otherwise punished in a manner to be determined by law. (Gen 38:6-10; Deut 25:5-10)
G. In lieu of marriage, if there are no acceptable men in your town, it is required that you get your dad drunk and have sex with him (even if he had previously offered you up as a sex toy to men young and old), tag-teaming with any sisters you may have. Of course, this rule applies only if you are female. (Gen 19:31-36)
Which of these Bronze Age precepts do you follow?
Second Obama has a much more nuanced position that you said he has. Go read post # 13.
You know what’s funny about this assclown……NOTHING.
Fuck yourself Charles- IN THE ASS! If i wasn’t so sure that you were trying to spread the homophobia around to mask your obvious infatuation with the business of other people’s genitalia- by which i mean, throbbing cocks you are very tempted to suck but guilt yourself into merely projected self loathing.
Dismissed.
If Bush were secretly an atheist than what purpose does he have in very publicly supporting the teaching of Intelligent Design? There aren’t any non-religious reasons to support the teaching of Intelligent Design.
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You are dumb. I never said Bush was secretly an atheist.
I said it was LIP SERVICE! He did a few things to keep the flock. He is not a Christian. He does a few things to please the crowd because they would have turned on him if he didn’t do anything.
Do you honestly think that most people in the USA are really Christians? NO IT’S LIP SERVICE. A lot of them are probably agnostics but don’t want to look bad so they say Christian or some of them are really nothing but just put that on there.
Politics are all about LIP SERVICE. Maybe you should just consider sticking to science because you know nothing about humanity and politics.
Hmmm. This troll’s got a lot to say about LIP SERVICE.
Rickr0ll may be on to something.
His arguments mostly make no sense and he fails to respond in a satisfactory way to Stewart’s objections. I would never vote for the man since I disagree with pretty much everything he stands for. Yet, I find the guy fairly likeable. Clearly he is neck deep in dogma yet I think he is a very different kind of character from Palin or Bush. I think that if he were in the Whitehouse he would be pretty much just as toxic but I would be happy to have a drink with the man whereas I’d not wish to be in the same room as either of the other two religious nutters I mentioned.
Considering that, as it is, civil unions don’t give all the same legal benefits? No, no they can’t.
He’s Christian, unfortunately. But he’s also said he KEEPS HIS PERSONAL FUCKING BELIEFS PERSONAL.
Um, yes. Homophobia doesn’t bother with racial divisions.
Or do you think we ‘liberals’ give minorities a pass on everything just because they’re minorities?
And just because your retarded drivel of a ‘Bible’ thinks it’s wrong doesn’t mean it IS wrong.
Marriage was ment for a MAN AND A WOWMAN ONLY. Homosexuals are not a part of that union and they can have a civil union.
In Biblical times, marriage was a man buying property (his wives). It was slavery (which, by the way, the Bible also condones, along with genocide, rape, and child-murdering, as long as it’s ‘for teh Lord’). So yes, what marriage was ‘ment’ for in Biblical times means jack.
His stance on marriage is one of the things I dislike about Obama, but, as he’s said he won’t let his personal beliefs affect his governing, I’m willing to give him a pass.
Again, he is, indeed, a Christian.
Really? I thought you’d LIKE the KKK, being a moronic Christian bigot who voted to take rights AWAY from a minority.
And ‘slippery slope’ is a logical fallacy, and anyone with three functioning brain cells realizes that it’s bullshit.
Right. There are NO religious ‘liberals’, and the conservatives are ALL about helping others (Y’know, in fucking BIZZARRO WORLD). And ask the people at that Unitarian church from a while back, for example, or all those Catholic choir boys how they feel about conservative and/or Christian ‘morals’.
First, there are several things that your bible says about marriage….
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You might want to start by trying to understand it first.
A lot of what is in the Bible is not what God wants you to do, it is how some of them lived back then, they lived in Sin back then as well.
That is my point. What you posted is in there on what NOT TO DO. Just because lot had sex with his daughters and sinned does not mean that God wants you to do that. That was a Sin and was shown to be as much.
There is lots of Sin in the Bible, but that is ment to show you something. For example what was the outcome of that sin and how it effected other people.
Like the lot example that I gave. It created two different groups of people and later on it will show how that haunted Israel.
If I give you a drivers manual and give an example of someone who got into an accident, that is there for your benefit. It does not mean that you should get into an accident.
Use your head.
#122- “Clearly he is neck deep in dogma yet I think he is a very different kind of character from Palin or Bush.”
You seem to think he would be a disaster in the White House. So, in what meaningful way is he different?
sad when a half-asleep, mostly incoherent babbleoff can peg someone down like that huh? Soooooooooooooooooo transparent.
Charles recent shit-spew: Yeah it’s IN DUETERONOMY! God condones it. Commands genocide, Commands polygamous marriage systems…
What’s the point. You live in denial, you’re like a fucking forth-grader who’s response it “No it’s not.”
“Use your head.”
*irony meter go BOOM*
“Use your head.”
OH, i bet you USE YOURS!! WAH HAHAHAH HAH AH HA HA XD
….it’s a double entendre, charlie-boy
Although i’m afraid the last comment only makes sense if it is: “Use your head?”
To which the answer is, of course, a resounding “YES!”
Right, because getting rid of the word “marriage” would really take the steam out of the “they’re trying to destroy marriage” argument.
Considering that, as it is, civil unions don’t give all the same legal benefits? No, no they can’t.
It’s not about benefits and its never been about that. Its about being accepted as normal.
He’s Christian, unfortunately. But he’s also said he KEEPS HIS PERSONAL FUCKING BELIEFS PERSONAL.
So, you are a bigot against Christians. Typical. He has said it many times that he does not
agree with gay marriage and if a republican says that you grill them or if a Christian says that you
grill them too. Letting someone off the hook I see. yeah, nice. Really nice.
Um, yes. Homophobia doesn’t bother with racial divisions.
Or do you think we ‘liberals’ give minorities a pass on everything just because they’re minorities?
They are voting Yes for many of the same reasons that I did. Stop hiding behind the homophobic word so much.
It makes you look stupid. Gays should not have the right to marry anymore than I have the right to marry 12 wifes.
And just because your retarded drivel of a ‘Bible’ thinks it’s wrong doesn’t mean it IS wrong. Marriage was ment f
or a MAN AND A WOWMAN ONLY. Homosexuals are not a part of that union and they can have a civil union.
Its not just about the Bible either, its called MORALS and NATURE. Its against morals, nature, and the Bible.
It is against marriage and not for it. Mariage should be sacred and trampled on by a bunch of people who feel like
doing whatever they want in life.
In Biblical times, marriage was a man buying property (his wives). It was slavery (which, by the way, the Bible also
condones, along with genocide, rape, and child-murdering, as long as it’s ‘for teh Lord’). So yes, what marriage was ‘ment’ for in Biblical times means jack.
Exagerating and misunderstanding the Bible really does not help your case. As I posted before there is a lot of things in the Bible
that is provided as a sin, but people still do it. Kind of like right not.
Again, he is, indeed, a Christian.
So, again you don’t say anthing about him being a homophobe and going off on him.
Different standards there. I like Obama and I also voted for him, but you let him off the hook really easy and that bothers me to be honest.
Really? I thought you’d LIKE the KKK, being a moronic Christian bigot who voted to take rights AWAY from a minority.
Taking rights away from a minority that should have never had marriage to begin with.
The fault here lies with California as their court system is horrible. The people don’t have any rights.
There is no point in voting if its going to be overturned.
And ‘slippery slope’ is a logical fallacy, and anyone with three functioning brain cells realizes that it’s bullshit.
I read a lot of BS, but I don’t see any proof that I am wrong. Prove it.
So Charles then how do we decide what we are supposed to follow and what are we supposed to ignore?
“It is wrong just as anyone cheating on their wife or husband and then taking that and making it into a lifestyle.”
Why? How does a consensual romantic relationship between two adults compare to a relationship based on lies and subterfuge?
“Has conventional marriage led to male/female pedophilia?”
I’m guessing that you want to pretend that no married heterosexuals have ever engaged in sexual intercourse with a child. You would be dead wrong.
“Homosexuals can have civil unions. What is wrong with that instead of marriage. I am not homophobic.”
If it walks like a homophobe and talks like a homophobe…
“Just because I don’t agree that gay people should have civil unions instead of getting married and now I am homophobic?”
What’s so special about “marriage” that gays can’t have it? Civil unions are just another case of “separate but equal” being anything but. The rights of married couples are encoded in laws everywhere with the word “married” or variants thereof. Rather than rewrite every law to reflect that gay partners in “civil unions” can have such rights, why not just call them “married”?
“Some people want you just to keep it in your house so we don’t have to see you in a parade all the time and expressing yourself all over my TV, the Village in Manhattan, Hollywood, or all over San Fran.”
What a sad and pathetic man you are.
Well then Charles, why is it that even in nature all animals exhibit homosexual behaviors in the same percentage as humans? Its because they were all born that way. You need to go read the Kinsey report.
“So Charles then how do we decide what we are supposed to follow and what are we supposed to ignore?”
Oh just ask Charles, who not only is the arbiter of the word of God, but of Nature as well. Just ask him to give Gaia a call and see what she thinks about homo sex.
What’s the point. You live in denial, you’re like a fucking forth-grader who’s response it “No it’s not.”
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Well, when you can’t understand humanity, how are you going to begin to understand the Bible.
That is the problem, you can’t grasp at what it means. You don’t understand the relationship between both halves of the Bible and you don’t understand the relationship between them.
If I sat down an explained it all to you, you still would not get it. You can’t put something in a closed mind and someeone who is not willing to learn.
Like the muslims in the middle east. You would think that they would like democracy, but they can’t begin to understand it and they can’t grasp it. Therefore they are not willing to learn and do what it takes to get it.
I am out. But I hope that I was able to get my point across to the morons here.
Perhaps you’d be so kind as to step through this more clearly, to help educate me:
1) Why do you feel qualified to judge who is a Christian and who isn’t?
2) Can you list the reasons why you think Bush isn’t Christian? The more reasons the merrier but, for the purpose of clarity, please keep each item itself reasonably short.
Peoples’ religious beliefs are personal, as much so as their private thoughts. Sometimes they won’t even tell their own family what they actually believe, let alone some anonymous pollster. In many cases I’ll have no idea, even after extended interaction with a person, what she believes — it simply doesn’t come up all that often.
Given how extremely subjective the nature of a person’s religious belief is, my policy is to take their word for it, at least until they’ve given me ample reason to think they were lying. I believe it in exactly the same way I believe someone who tells me he’s tired, or happy, or in pain, or doesn’t like spinach.
As I’ve said elsewhere, we could stop having this whole argument if we simply took marriage out of the control of the state. In the end, the problem is that, in our present society, the word “marriage” refers to two completely different processes: a legal contract conferring certain mutual rights and obligations, and a religious sacrament.
I would simply separate the two. Remove the word “marriage” from the law, and have civil unions for any couple, regardless of gender, conferring all the present legal rights of marriage. This will be the civil legal part of the process. Then, if a couple want to get married in a church according to the precepts of their religion, they have every right to do so, just as they do at the moment (and, of course, churches would not be obliged to recognise same-sex partnerships where this would violate their beliefs).
“I am out. But I hope that I was able to get my point across to the morons here.”
Oh you did, Charles. You did.
Though probably not the point you wanted to get across.
it’s against morals and nature, ironic, because homosexuality is Rampant in the animal world. Dolphins, Giraffes, badgers, dogs, ect. over 1500 species, in fact. http://translate.google.com/translate?sourceid=navclient&hl=en&u=http%3a%2f%2fwww%2enrm%2ese%2fsv%2fmeny%2fbesokmuseet%2futstallningar%2frainbowanimals%2e6876%2ehtml
(long ass address, it needed to be translated a couple of times.)
And our morals are empathy based, and kinship groups were the first “in group” we had, where share and share alike allowed fro survival. Know some shit before you show us you ignorance so proudly.
How are they not normal? Homosexuality has been found throughout history, and is found all over the NATURAL world. The only reason you think it isn’t normal is because of your precious book.
I personally don’t give a fig if a Republican or Democrat disagrees with gay marriage. I believe it’s stupid and bigoted for them to DO so, but it’s when they start trying to pass laws against it, that’s when I get pissed. If Obama starts trying to ban gay marriage, hell yeah I’ll be pissed off at him.
That they are bigots.
If the shoe fits…It makes you look stupid. It’s accurate. Accuracy is stupid now?
By Biblical standards, you should have that right. http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/says_about/polygamy.html
I’ve already said, I dislike the beliefs he claims to hold, and if he attempts to ban gay marriage, there’s no way in your imaginary hell that I’d let him ‘off the hook’ for that.
Like interracial couples? Seriously, same damn arguements.
It’s wrong that the majority even GOT to vote on this issue. Ever hear the phrase ‘tyranny of the majority’? If the majority had it’s way, blacks would still be unable to vote or marry whites, and women would still be property.
You wouldn’t see the ‘proof’ if it bit you on the ass, slapped you upside the head, and gave you a swift kick in the shin.
Bonus:
Observe what I command you this day. Behold, I am driving out from before you the Amorite and the Canaanite and the Hittite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite. Take heed to yourself, lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land where you are going, lest it be a snare in your midst. But you shall destroy their altars, break their sacred pillars, and cut down their wooden images (For you shall worship no other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God.)
Exodus, Chapter 34, verses 11-14
You will chase your enemies, and they shall fall by the sword before you. Five of you shall chase a hundred, and a hundred of you shall put ten thousand to flight; your enemies shall fall by the sword before you. For I will look on you favorably and make you fruitful, multiply you and confirm My covenant with you. You shall eat the old harvest, and clear out the old because of the new.
Leviticus, Chapter 26, verses 7-9
Your God is PERSONALLY promoting, and ASSISTING IN, genocide. Spin that.
I agree. Jon Stewart seems to have a thing for Huckabee, though and I think I know why. When I first heard about Huckabee I almost liked him. He seemed like the kind of Christian you only hear about in stories, you know, the kind that’s actually concerned about the poor and downtrodden. Then, however, I read more about him and realized that his compassion only extended so far and he was really more of a populist with couched (and some blatant) theocratic views and my thoughts immediately jumped to Sinclair Lewis’ It Can’t Happen Here (even more so than with Bush).
I think Jon Stewart, however, sees a ray of light in the creepy charm that Huckabee exhibits and is trying to get through to him somehow. I would love to see a long discussion between the two of them (I was initially upset that Stewart gave Huckabee a full two segments, but I appreciated it much more after the exchange). I think they respect each other and I wonder what would happen…
“both halves of the Bible”- except that one half is alot bigger than the other. And also full of differing, contradictory ideas of what God IS, at the most basic level.
You’re the tool who’s knows jack-shit about Scripture.
Leave then. We’ll be sure to miss you and pray for you and all that *pppffsh*
“If it walks like a homophobe and talks like a homophobe…”
It usually molests alter boys. ZZZZIIIINNG!
Pimentita,
Youre onto something there I think.
To me,the creep is just a creep tho,and the charming ones are probably the most dangerous ones…..Huck or Romney,each of those is going to fuck your country and the world up,not even talking about the moose-killer….
#142- “When I first heard about Huckabee I almost liked him. He seemed like the kind of Christian you only hear about in stories, you know, the kind that’s actually concerned about the poor and downtrodden.”
My first impression of pastor Huck was that infamous “I think we should change the Constitution to bring it in line with the bible” comment in the months before the primaries. So, right off the bat, I saw he was just another theocrat warrior for jesus.
His pseudocharm just creeps me out.
Walton @138, that sounds like an eminently sensible idea. I like it, though I doubt you could eradicate the use of the term “marriage”.
Charles, it is surprising how few of your posts were necessary to apply a very accurate label to you. That Label? A bigoted homophobe who is ignorant about both nature and your holy babble.
#147- “Walton @138, that sounds like an eminently sensible idea. I like it, though I doubt you could eradicate the use of the term “marriage”.
It’s sensible indeed. But imagine the uproar- such a law would essentially “eliminate the right of opposite sex couples to marry”. Or so the spinmeisters would play it.
There would be a revolution.
JM @ #147:
…though I doubt you could eradicate the use of the term “marriage”.
To clarify, I don’t want to eradicate the use of the term “marriage”; I just want to remove it from the scope of the civil law. People could still choose to refer to themselves as “married”, and could still get married according to the precepts of their religion if they so chose; but the concept of “marriage” would no longer carry secular legal consequences distinct from those of a civil partnership.
Walton,
aren’t the two already separated in the USA ? Can’t you do a purely civil marriage contract (heterosexual today) without any sort of religious ceremony ? The state shouldn’t be in the business of requiring any sort of religious confrmation, that would seem unconstitutional. What happens if two atheists today want to get married in the USA ?
Just asking.
In any case, if it were separated that way, what would be the problem of calling it a “civil marriage contract” (heterosexual or homosexual) and if they feel like having a “religious marriage ceremony” up to them.
What would you call a couple that has signed such a contract and hasn’t done a religious ceremony (heterosexual or homosexual) ?
This all becomes a purely semantic debate, not one on homosexuality, as the question is raised exactly in the same way for a heterosexual couple and a homosexual couple who refuse to have a religious ceremony. Why should anyone be forced to accept as a given that the word “marriage” is a religious term. This is ridiculous.
Ugh…I don’t know why I am responding to this, but I also don’t know why I woke up at 5am while I am on vacation either so here goes.
No, there’s no reason why they can’t, but so many of your brethren have stopped even that from happening in several states.
How is this argument any different than the ones used against interracial couples 50 years ago? Please, do tell.
Why is it wrong? Because your invisible god says so?
No, I don’t get the picture. Why don’t you spell out for the rest of the class how two consenting adults compares to an adult fucking a child?
It has everything to do with hate. Hate of anyone who is not exactly like you.
Exactly…because you hate and fear everyone who is not exactly like you, you feel like you have to “protect” your children from them.
Nice strawman.
Yes, laws created by humans. If you disagree, please describe for us your theocratic paradise and all of its laws. Just for our own edification…
Again…consent. Are you really comparing consenting adult humans to children and animals?
Huh?
To Charles.
A few years ago I was like you; I believed homosexuality to be a sinful practice (on religious grounds), and I was strongly opposed to same-sex marriage. So I do know where you’re coming from.
But my opinion changed, for a number of reasons.
Firstly, contrary to popular belief, I don’t think Scripture obliges Christians to oppose homosexuality. Yes, the Mosaic law describes homosexuality as an “abomination”; but it applies the same denunciation to, inter alia, eating shellfish and wearing clothes of mixed fabrics. Peter’s vision in Acts 10, and many of the writings of Paul, make clear that Christians are not bound to follow all the precepts of the Jewish law.
Indeed, I think that, rather than quoting Leviticus, it’s much better in this context to think about how Jesus would have behaved. Jesus associated with many people who were seen as outcasts in conservative Jewish religious society: tax collectors, prostitutes, Samaritans. He condemned the self-righteousness and hypocrisy of the Pharisees and other religious leaders. If He were physically among us today, I suspect Jesus would be much more favourable towards the homosexual community, and other marginalised people, than towards TV evangelists who rant and rave and collect donations.
Secondly – and just as importantly – my conscience tells me that there is nothing inherently evil about two people who are in a committed, loving, monogamous same-gender relationship, nor do I have any right to condemn them. I believe that our consciences, and our powers of reason, are a gift from God, and He presumably intended us to use them.
So I believe it’s possible to have faith and yet be tolerant towards the homosexual community, and I think you should re-think some of your ideas. Did Jesus condemn? Remember: “Let him who is without sin cast the first stone… Neither do I condemn ye. Go, and sin no more.”
*snicker*
You obviously didn’t live during the 70’s.
(Or the 60’s.
Or any other decade since history began…)
Jeebus…..
It must be Christmas !
BobC making civil comments,and now Walton making sense,well,to a degree anyway…
Still a bit annoying how he tries to integrate common sense with his former dogmas,but at least he is trying.Hasnt dropped the dogmas yet,but at least considering differing opinions…Good on you Walton !
Charles,
Have a good day.
And Yes, anyone reading your droppings would conclude that you are a homophobe of the worst kind and you probably managed to convince quite a few “undecided” on how inconsistent, inhumane and untenable opposing gay marriage can be.
From a homosexual, thanks for the good job.
Neg,
there you are you mad person LOL
How could you hahaha…..
I woke up this morning and was like,oh shit….
Good riddance to the Charles thing…
But when we call that consecration marriage in our society regardless of beliefs, why make such a big deal over the semantic inference? That’s the issue, that the word is common place in our society for just that legal and cultural reason. It would be a lot harder to change the meme of marriage than the laws behind it.
As weird as it was for Charles to reference the ’70’s as a time when things seemed “ideal”, it’s not the first time I’ve heard a christard say just that.
Since the conservatives who wrapped the ’50’s in the golden glow of idealistic american perfection are all dying off, is the new meme to paint the ’70’s as it’s replacement?
Are the ’70’s the new ’50’s? Is “The Brady Bunch” replacing “Father Knows Best” in republitard-fundieland?
Actually, Walton, there is much good evidence that our consciences and powers of reason are the products of evolution. There is, in contrast, no good evidence for God or for her having given us any “gifts.” Your beliefs are unsupported.
Charles has gone, but I wrote this so I might as well post it anyway, since it captures how I feel about his using the bible to justify his homophobia.
Just because a bunch bronze-age middle eastern goatherders cooked up a bunch of rules they felt people should live by doesn’t mean squat today. Humanity has moved on – well, most of it; backwards-thinking retards like Charles are the exception – and no longer feels that it should be bound by archaic superstitious nonsense and the supposed whims of a nonexistent sky-fairy whose own actions demonstrate that he would be, if he existed, exactly the opposite of what any right-thinking person would want as a moral compass.
There was this one girl at Uni,you know……
O RLY.
Or could it be because of this?:
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/12/new_thread_for_ken_hams_old_wh.php#comment-1255654
Ah, yes, those typical 10th-month abortions.
(By the way, NickG, while Charles is beneath contempt, I find your argumentum ad income fairly disgusting.)
That was probably the stupidest argument of the night,I agree.
@clinteas
Absolutely! Once I realized Huckabee’s true motives, his “charm” ceased to be and he became simply dangerous. I think Jon Stewart wanted to like him, but I think he might have lost a little more heart after this last exchange. Not all of it, but that much more.
@ Pimientita,
I havent actually seen it yet,got it on disk tho,so will watch it tomorrow.
Dont all these kooks have a lot of charm tho,Huck,Romney,they all sound so jovial and amicable when they have a camera in front of them…
Like the televangelists in a way,I guess….
Civil partnership law can function as a transitional stage to proper marriage equality; once they’re established, because the terminology is clunky (nobody says “we’re getting civil-partnered next summer), people get used to saying marriage/married, and society takes another step towards full acceptance. The UK now has a civil partnership law (http://www.civilpartnershipinfo.co.uk/) which everyone informally refers to as marriage. That being said, if in the US you can leverage state or federal or constitutional law to require full marriage equality in one go, more power to you.
The truth is, the huckabeast or the Churches don’t care shit about whatever the issue might or might not be. They don’t even know themselves what the issue is, semantics, you gotta be kidding me ! What they want is to pick up a fight, because they can make money from it. So they think, hmmm, what fight ? Let’s look at opinion polls, that word “marriage”, hmmm, a majority of Americans still seem to think we should own it, that looks like an easy fight, let’s go for that one. And they fight. To make money.
In the mean time, those who suffer from the huckabeast or the Churches’ monetary appetite are real human beings.
In the end, when they’ll have lost it, because they will eventually, they’ll look for another fight and forget entirely about the whole homosexual marriage thing. They’ll also have lost the dimes of a big chunk of the younger generation forever.
@clinteas
And serial killers…
This wretched ignoramus will be running for president again in 2012, you know it.
I think that depends on Obama’s popularity at the end of his first term. Huckabee’s clever enough to avoid being another Alf Landon.
-jcr
jcr,
the huckabeast knows damn well he’ll never be PotUS. He’ll not run for President to be elected President, but to make money on his books, TV shows, conferences, etc… Where else can you get such a wonderful tax free sponsorship for your own persona ?
I’ve lived in Arkansas my whole life. I’ve been exposed to about 10 years of Huckabee as governor. Yeah, he’s a creationist, a religious idealogue, a hypocrite, and a liar. However, the main reason to disqualify him as a potential president is that he’s a crook. Here’s an article in Salon by one of our state’s best journalists that scratches the surface on some of Huckabee’s nasty political and personal dealings: Huckabee the Crook.
Is there any marriages in the bible that can be hled up as a good example? If marriage is so sacred why did everyone get ther magic underwear in a knot when Dan Brown suggested Jesus was married?
Just send him to Minneapolis. We’ll catch him in the bathroom at the airport. Then it will be all over.
Priests and Pastors have always been experts at the intellectual peep show business. That’s what they do for a living. The huckabeast has just moved to a bigger scale, from congregaton to the whole territory. Need a free nationwide advertising campaign for the intellectual peep show ? No problem, run for President every 4 years.
Huck may run in 2012 but I don’t think he will be in it to win it. Would he just be hoping to upgrade his talk show? Call it what it is, just more noise and self promotion.
We had a lot of candidates this past election who were just taking up space, just protest candidates.
Ron Paul knew he could never win. He wanted to say his libertarian protest bit and drop out. His supporters didn’t understand this, gave him all their money and kept him around -far- longer than he wanted to be. In the end he retired back to his congressional race with all that money in his war chest.
Alan Keys didn’t run but did you get a load of Fred Thompson not even sure if he wanted to go through the motions.
Who cares about republicans. We elected the dems and Obama to accomplish something. If they can save the average American from “the best health care system on earth”, that savage, callous, ruinous and bankrupting thing. If they can implement a clean functional single payer system no republican stands a chance of getting elected for a long time.
As despicable as Huck’s position is… there’s something to be said for having good a spokesperson. I mean… has anyone seen the cable news debates over the washington christmas massacre? The ffrf spokespeople are absolutely, without a doubt the worst public speakers I’ve ever seen. They make a wonderfully defendable position look just like the sniveling ethnocentrism that the placard was designed to combat.
No, do you know if this is available online ?
What? God wants us to be atheists? Walton, you owe me a needle for an irony meter.
atheistmedia.blogspot.com has kept up with the carnage rather nicely. It’s mostly just short segments on cable news shows. I mean, I applaud the fact the like… the higher ups in the ffrf are willing to go on the air and defend their position… but there’s a reason that big organizations have pr guys. The job of a president is logistics, politic-istics, and bureaucracic navigation. By having a pr guy you can narrow the skill set down a little and find someone who specializes in sounding right…
Emmet…
I have to say… your comment a few blogs back on non-literal Christianity was priceless. I have happily spread the meme.
@Charles
Indeed, Obama has said that he is personally against gay marriage. As per his interview with ABC News’ a while back:
“I believe marriage is between a man and a woman. I am not in favor of gay marriage. ”
However, Obama continued on to say that he is also very much against any sort of legislation that would clamp down on gay couples’ rights.
“But when you start playing around with constitutions, just to prohibit somebody who cares about another person, it just seems to me that’s not what America’s about…Usually, our constitutions expand liberties, they don’t contract them,”
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/2008/11/obama-on-mtv-i.html
Is Obama a homophobe? Having a personal bias is one thing. Trying to force it down the throats of other people is an entirely different story. No, I doubt Obama is homophobic.
Do you believe? Or do you want to believe?
No, a conservative. Being for gay marriage except the _*WORD*_ “marriage” is a standard conservative position in Europe and was shared by Kerry.
Huckabee is an off-the-map reactionary, it goes without saying…
#181 Cap’n Timothy Beerbong:
Thanks. It was quite unexpected, not to mention gratifying, that so many people found that comment amusing. Really, all I was trying to do is point out the incongruity of trying to reconcile 21st century knowledge with a 1st century myth, which is what “sophisticated” Christians try to do. The result is utterly preposterous nonsense, but it really wasn’t me who made it that way, I just underlined it.
@David Marjanović
I assume you mean a conservative of the William Buckley tradition, before the religious right mutated the whole movement into the discombobulated, puss-filled mess that reeks today.
Thankfully conservatism in Europe has avoided the worst of what has happened to their American colleagues.
Here in the UK there are some religious right looney types in the Tory party, but the leadership does it best to disown them
.
Is it safe to say at this point that Charles is trolling?
I had an epiphany the other day:
If they redefine “marriage” as between a man and a woman, all we have to do is redefine “man” and “woman”. Say any person person gets the choice to decide whether they’re officially a man or a woman, and not only have you re-legalized homosexual marriage, but you’ve also made a big step forward for the various transgendered folks.
The forces of ignorance aren’t smart enough to use something so sciency as “a man is any human with one or more Y chromosomes, and a woman is any human with zero Y chromosomes”, and any definition less strict than that must necessarily contain loopholes and vagaries (ie, for transgendereds, homosexuals, eunuchs, hermaphrodites, et cetera).
Yes, this is at least partially satire.
@David Marjanovic
I think you can only call Obama a conservative if you equate conservative with pragmatist. Sometimes this pragmatism can make one twitch–he is not a corrupt man but allied himself to the Daley machine and other corrupt IL pols, at least to the extent of working for their candidates. At the same time he worked for campaign reform laws. He could have taken a more steadfast position, and he would have been a universally admired pinnacle of virtue to the middle class constituency of his city council seat, who would be the only people who ever heard of him. (We had a guy like that on the DC council in the Barry years.)
I watched the Stewart interview but unlike many here I think Huck’s a decent man. He was desperately squirming in an effort to make his anti-gay marriage position sound reasonable, despite that somewhere on the rational bit of his brain he must know it is not. But his aversion to gay marriage is too deep seated to give up. It is more deeply seated than his decency. This is true of a very large proportion of Americans, and they will keep gay marriage from being legal in almost any state. Maybe the next generation will do better. In the meantime, I think the “substantially marriage but called something else” approach is the right one. A lot of people who do not want gay marriage also are not opposed to gay people having the same rights as married people. It is indeed the word “marriage” and the cultural baggage attached to it. Yes, this baggage varies over time, but I don’t see why we should have to wait a generation or two before addressing the substantive issues. I believe the basic problem in the States is that there is no form of civil union recognized across all 50. Such a union would not only be of benefit to homosexuals, but to spinster sisters and other people whose lives would be made much easier by having the legal rights of the married.
By the way, Huck’s worry that gay marriage would open the door for unreconstructed Mormon polygamous marriage is I suspect one of the main drivers for the mainstream Mormon church’s opposition. But what do you think of allowing polygamous marriage (or civil union)? The civil libertarian in me wants to say “why not,” and I am not sure my distaste is any more fair than the distaste of gay marriage.
Right, and generally we refer to people whose decency can’t overcome their biases as “hypocrites”. Indeed, what good is a sense of decency if it isn’t strong enough to make one do the right thing? If one doesn’t act on one’s decency, in what sense is one actually decent?
My thoughts exactly.
@Tori
Whoa… paragraphs man… paragraphs.
@Tulse
This seems kindof pedantic… but aren’t we objectifying “decency” a tad too much?
This is the Internet — there is no such thing as “too pedantic”.
Yeah, I think so, and that was kind of my point (if I am understanding your objection). AntiquatedTory seems to believe that Huckabee possesses some quality called “decency”, but doesn’t actually use it in any obvious sense, at least on the issue of gay marriage (and, I might add, various other hot-button right-wing issues). I don’t see how one can say that he’s “decent” if he doesn’t actually act, ya know, “decently”. “Decency” isn’t some kind of possession, it is a description of a tendency to act in a certain way — if one doesn’t tend to act in that fashion, then that description is inappropriate.
Huckabee can be charming and warm and charismatic, there is no doubt about that, but that is not the same thing as being “decent”.
I can’t believe that nobody’s posted the Virgin of Guadalupe.
She’s a lady alright.
well… my point though was that decency is going to be defined by your particular value set (excluding a long but limited list of human universals).
so… what im saying is that decency is subjective to the point that A)He is correct in calling him decent. and B) you’re correct in calling him indecent.
Well its not an argument to income, but rather a calculated attempt to make him feel angry and frustrated and powerless. I want him not only to understand we think he’s a piece of shit, but for him to actually feel that way. Contempt is passive, this is active. Metaphorically its bashing back.
And while there is an argument for pacifism and non-violence, I’m fed the fuck up with people like him causing concrete injury to myself, my partner, and my community (e.g passing CA prop H8.) Unfortunately I can’t actually beat the living snot out of the next pair of Mormon missionaries I see (without risking jail). So instead I do two things: 1) I work to help my own community because the larger society won’t (e.g. working pro bono two days a week as a physician at an LGBT clinic) and 2) making a concerted effort to make sacks of shit like him feel miserable. And I do really hope he does feel miserable. I hope he feels powerless to change his own situation. I hope he becomes depressed because I have taken a small part away from his ability to feel better about himself because he’s straight, white, male, xian, and American. I hope his whole holiday is fucked up because he’s fallen into a severe depression. In short I hope he hurts more than mere physical violence can engender.
The income thing was merely a convenience after he rose to that specific button pushing. If it was a recent divorce he’d had, his discomfort about his educational level, being obese, being an ex-con, or whatever I would have used that too.
That is actually a straw man since you’re trying to point out logical fallacies. I did not in any way say that late third trimester abortions were in any way typical, but used that to point out that birth is as fallible of a bright line as conception. The process of becoming a person with the full rights and privileges associated with it isn’t something that you can define as happening last Tuesday at 7:38pm any more than adulthood can be accurately defined as something that occurs at the moment when one has existed ex-utero for enough time for the Earth to circle the sun 18 times exactly.
Bright lines don’t happen in human development which is a gradual process of becoming. We just can’t deal well in our society with that idea of gradually assuming a role, and in fact in many of those ways conservatives are less able to deal with those shades of gray than progressives. This is not just the case with abortion but also with the age of consent. Ask the question ‘should a 16 year old girl be able to seek and consent to reproductive health care services without parental consent?’ and most progressives will say yes, while most conservatives will say no. Ask them why they feel that way and the conservative will point to a bright line before which a child is essentially the property of her parents while progressives will talk about gradual assumption of adult rights and privileges.
So similarly, you can’t equate a term fetus with a zygote with regards to their humanity. Unfortunately I don’t know for certain where the white begins to blend into gray and then becomes black. Though I do feel that there is a solution to the competing rights issue. I don’t think a woman in even her late third trimester should be forced to carry a fetus for a moment more than she desires any more than she should have to carry an early 1st trimester pregnancy. However if its a healthy pregnancy and she’s purely doing it electively, after a certain point of viability ex-utero, I think the solution should be delivering the fetus and mom relinquishes her rights to it.
And extending that, calling someone decent as a measure of worth is then inherently useless in a dialog like this.
Hard to say whether charles was trolling, lying, or crazy. Fundie xians are just as warm and fuzzy as fundie moslems, just not quite as well armed or ambitious.
Here is an argumentum ad nauseum and argument from popularity. The majority of the US population is sick and tired of fundies, poll below. Most of those are…other xians. When fundie becomes synonymous with liar, kook, killer, moron etc., people react accordingly. And they controlled the government for 8 years and left a monumental mess and piles of bodies behind.
Looks like there is a backlash against the Death Cults. These are nihilists who have only brought death and destruction during their time in power. Their latest victim is the US economy, the largest in the world at one time. Palin is one, a hardcore religious kook. And Huckabee.
lol. argumentum ad income.
my latin isn’t great… but I believe that would be
argumentum ad reditus (income/return)
or perhaps argumentum ad argentum (silver/money)
… it sounds better.
Heterosexuality is the default, but not the exclusive sexuality. I say we make heterosexual marriage “depraved” for a while, and maybe even make hetero’s hold straight pride marches, just to keep things fair…
And I do really hope he does feel miserable. I hope he feels powerless to change his own situation. I hope he becomes depressed because I have taken a small part away from his ability to feel better about himself because he’s straight, white, male, xian, and American. I hope his whole holiday is fucked up because he’s fallen into a severe depression. In short I hope he hurts more than mere physical violence can engender.
That’s really vicious.
I have several friends who suffer from depression, low self-esteem and other mental health problems. I’ve seen the way this can ruin people’s lives. And I wouldn’t wish it on anyone, no matter how much I disliked them, or what they’d done to me.
I agree that Charles has talked nonsense in much of what he’s said on this thread. And I hope, after reading it, he thinks about some of the things I and others have said, and reconsiders his stance on this issue (just as I did). But I don’t wish any harm on him, nor on anyone else here – especially not mental illness.
Revenge will do you no good. While wanting to inflict harm for harm is a human instinct, it isn’t a constructive one. Rather, what will do good for you, and the rest of the LGBT community, is to work to change people’s attitudes. Social attitudes can change. Mine has changed; I was, in the past, opposed to same-sex marriage (on religious grounds), but over time my view has changed.
LC, there’s nothing wrong with someone bringing up Obama’s position on gay marriage–indeed, the fact that a nominally reasonable man like Obama feels the need to make tacit reference to the grand farce that is Abrahamic religion in defense of some such policy or another is one of the prime reasons for this blog and the community that reads it.
Stimpy is a fool of a man who deludes himself by thinking he is not; a graver sin to me than any possible sexual contact between consenting adults, and his creepy little snipes at PZ in attempt to score his little ‘Gotchas!’ are petulant and whiny. Since he has the brain power (maybe) to understand evolution but instead chooses to deride it from a position of ignorance (out of fear, laziness, or whatever), he’s a personal affront to thinking people everywhere.
As for obscenities, what the fuck are you talking about, man?
It wasn’t bashing back at him specifically or his ideas. It was bashing people of a particular social class, which was bizarre in this case since you had no idea of his income or class background when you made those comments, so you were just being an obnoxious jerk. (“But then I suspect you are a trailer-living, uneducated fucknut who works at a dead end job paying barely above minimum wage. That tax issue wouldn’t have occurred to you because you’ve never filed taxes on anything other than a 1040EZ.”)
So you would’ve assumed he was obese and then proceeded to bash all obese people because you wanted to hurt him? How very Vox Day of you.
You used that as your example, when the fact is that the case you describe is not only not typical of abortions in the US but is illegal and not done in the US. Therefore, it couldn’t be what Stewart was referring to when he talked about making abortion more rare. It’s the kind of bogus scenario used by rightwing ideologues to portray all abortion as a mere blurry line away from infanticide. (You even asked: “Should she be able to the next day once its delivered commit infanticide?” as though being a freely existing human being not using the body of another to live is not a clear dividing line. Bullfuckingshit.)
Your bringing it up was a total red herring, and not much different than if every discussion about gay couples adopting focused on scenarios in which gay people wanted to adopt and raise their children in a situation in which they would force them cross-dress and regularly attend gay bareback orgies. Moreover, Stewart was suggesting that he could “see” Huckabee’s “pro-life” point, which is clearly that life begins at conception, so your whole discussion about progressives appreciating grey areas doesn’t work.
Finally, there’s no grey area in the definition of my personhood and my human rights. I do not cease to be a person or lose any portion of my rights if I become pregnant.
On the issue of whether Bush is or is not a Christian…
It looks like we all missed a Bush interview on Monday…
This is from this Raw Story entry.
By the way, I’m not sure how PZ’s blog entry here, which was really aimed at Some Huckster, turned into such a pissing match. I even caught this yesterday, when “Virginie” made “her” comments. I didn’t comment, but caught it as a Poe anyway… It was obvious enough to where several posters caught it immediately, and noted it. I was going to, then I realized, eh, redundant, why bother? But it was off to the races anyway, with people attacking, people apologizing, and so on.
You know, Rooke et al deserved to be attacked when they’re obviously sincere, but it sure would be nice if we could either not comment or maybe give one FUNNY comment when the Poe is as clear as Virginie’s was. Can we??
I hope people check out this Bush comment on religion. What a loser. How’d we elect him anyway?
And, Dr. Steven Chu! We have reason to celebrate today! Imagine, a real scientist in charge of energy. What?? Really??
Nice contrast to Bush, here, folks!
The more I think about this the more infuriating it is.
No, the real reason is that anti-abortion forces have been so successful at promoting this false abortion-infanticide link that progressives (or so-called progressives) have not only dangerously failed to question it but have bought into it hook, line, and sinker, such that people like you can talk about blurred lines between a full-term fetus and a baby and propose “solutions” to nonexistent problems that have zero to do with the reality of abortion. All the while, you promote the anti-abortion agenda of people like Huckabee, and keep the discussion away from real reproductive rights issues and their relation to social and economic issues.
Yeah, I was lazy, but I knew someone out there wouldn’t be:). I think I’ll use that.
[Oh, delete the “sic” from the quotation in my last post. I read Tony Sidaway’s too quickly at first.]
New idea: whenever the word “marriage” is used, say the words “penis” and “vagina”, since that’s what it’s really all about to the exclusivists. I’m really tempted to excise that word from my vocabulary completely, but having this exception is even better since it makes the word impossible to use in polite company.
Yes on the surface it is a good sign. And it’s definitely a much better sign then appointing some know nothing to the position. But that position isn’t just about science, it’s about knowing how to play the politics game.
He’s hasn’t really been in much of a position to deal with the things he’s going to have to deal with when helping to set energy policy.
Such as dealing with the Energy companies and their lobbyists.
But hopefully he will be able.
Yes, he will be running for president again. This is why we should save all these little tidbits so we’ll be able to remind voters exactly who he is after he tries to adopt some new image.
How the hell is that an “alarming shift”?
No one has ever been “pro-abortion” other than for its availability, not in the procedure itself. Abortion has always been considered the last resort when other methods fail. Abortion has never been promoted as the best form of contraception, nor even the first choice for an unwanted pregnancy. That’s why it has always been “pro-choice”, that it is ultimately the woman’s choice and hers alone whether or not to have it done.
Just because there is a medical procedure to rescue you after getting something stuck someplace in your body, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t avoid getting it stuck there in the first place. And just because I may be disgusted by you getting it stuck there doesn’t mean I can prevent you from getting it removed.
PZ had a recent post about a preacher that seems relevant to this point…
SteveM wrote:
Clarity request. You’re disgusted by pregnancy? Sex? Abortion?
what we need is a mass of godless couples going and getting domestic parnerships and then suing the federal government when they’re denied rights in their home states.
Well, duh. I’m not any more pro-abortion than I am pro- any other surgery. To be pro-abortion means that you don’t recognize it as anything disgusting or morally wrong and actively support access to it. As I said on the earlier thread, I am only anti-abortion in the sense that I recognize that it’s a surgical procedure and as such carries some minor risks as well as inconveniences to women, particularly when compared to, say, emergency contraception.
It’s not to “rescue” anyone outside of medical emergencies. It’s a choice a person makes about her own body.
This is a big part of what I meant above. Make moral judgments about women and whether they “deserve” an abortion or should have to “pay” for some perceived mistake. No attention to access to education about sexuality and contraception, making contraception (including emergency contraception) readily available, providing pre- and postnatal care and counseling, etc.
And more broadly, the total depoliticization of the issue. I’ve quoted Wendy Brown (2000) here before, but I’ll do it again:
***
Why would you be “disgusted” by a woman becoming pregnant?
Actually, it sounds quite a bit like you’d like to. With friends like that…
Here’s a thought.
If ‘marriage’ is a religious word (as the ‘religious’ would have you believe), what the hell is the government doing recognizing it?
Instead of pushing for gay marriage, why don’t we push to stop the government from granting marriages in the first place? You want to get government-recognized benefits? You need to get a civil union – and any 2 consenting adults could get one from a recognized member of the legal system (JP/judge/etc). You want to get married? Go to a church. But having your priest/rabbi/imam/minister/etc. ‘bless’ you doesn’t give you anything from the government…
You want to get married and get recognition in society (i.e. visitation, social security benefits, ability to file taxes jointly, etc.)? Guess you’d have to make 2 stops…
I was thinking of that, too!
…means that you don’t recognize it as anything disgusting or morally wrong…
I changed the wording there mid-course without fixing it. Should read: “…means that you recognize it as nothing disgusting or morally wrong…”
This is a small slice of the world we live in:
http://abcnews.go.com/WN/story?id=3311859
Fuck you and your sham morality.
You think that wouldn’t also send the fundies into an apoplectic fit?
It was a legal contract before it was a Christian sacrament, so why act as if the Christians have exclusive rights to the concept?
so I fail at analogies. do I need to spell it out? I’m not actually disgusted. The analogy of getting pregnant to getting something stuck up your ass is not perfect, okay? In the pregnancy case, one may be disgusted or horrified by the procedure of removing the fetus, the equivalent in the butt analogy seemed to me the getting it in there in the first place. And the point was that since you (or I) are not the one with the preganancy (or the stuck object) gives you (or me) no say at all about whether that person should choose to have the appropriate procedure.
When I said “and just because I may be …” I intended the “may” to indicate it was hypothetical, not an expression of my actual opinion. The opinion I was trying to express is that nobody has any say in a medical procedure other than the patient.
Marriage is no longer a religious word, it’s a secular word. It’s long past that point where it had some religious exclusivity and the word is common place in society. Taking the word away now would be a far bigger change in society than granting the right of homosexuals to the word. The civil union thing is quite bullshit, a way to weasel around those religious conservatives who make oh so much fuss.
For better or worse, marriage is that word in our society that couples do to express their love and commitment. Why shouldn’t gays have that too?
Well, yeah…see, that would have made it an actual “analogy.” For example, “Pregnancy is kind of like getting something stuck up your ass…” Instead you used an unadvertised metaphor that nobody else had any way of knowing was a metaphor.
Possibly. (On the other hand, your analogy may have revealed more about your thinking than you intended it to.)
Apparently, since at least two people read it the same way. (While we’re pointing things out, I’ll point out that women do not impregnate themselves. Shouldn’t have to be spelled out, but you seem to have a problem in this department.)
I just read your comment again, and I’m not sure I believe you, but I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt.
Yes, I thought about that and was afraid it would be offensive to say it like that. And so I tried to make more of a parallel situation that one could then see the same argument applied to the abortion issue. But clearly I do not have the writing skills to pull it off successfully.
Marriage is a social invention, and as such could be considered secular before it was ever religious. Now, I wouldn’t claim neolithic cultures were secular per se, but they sure as hell weren’t Judeo-Christian and yet they managed to get hitched without some celibate ass telling ’em how.
So let’s keep the word secular. If the religios want some kind of relationship sanctified by God and sodomised by the Holy Spirit that gays aren’t allowed to participate in, fine. They can call it ‘marriage’ as well, ‘Jesus Unions’, or ‘The Pope’s Own Furry Pink Handcuffs That Require Exactly One Penis and One Vagina and God Fucking Help You If We Check and Find You’ve Had Some Sort of Urogenital Accident’ if they want. Hell, they can call it something in Latin to give the impression that theologians are scholars, if they want.
But ‘marriage’ doesn’t belong to them any more than ‘eating bread’ and ‘drinking wine’ do (also sacraments, but somehow even the priesthood knows better than to claim they invented that shit.)
So, are we clear on this? We keep ‘marriage’, and let anybody who wants to have it have it (assuming consent of course), and let the religios change the word for what they do if they want to remain pricks about it.
SteveM, analogy or not, it seemed pretty clear to me from the context what you were trying to say.
Or perhaps I just remember enough of your comments to know that you’re neither anti-abortion, nor (apparently) anti-sticking-things-up-one’s-bum.
Instead of pushing for gay marriage, why don’t we push to stop the government from granting marriages in the first place? – Dr Plutonium
Well for one thing, because this is much more legislatively complex. To extend marriage to same-sex couples is quite straightforward. To remove “marriage” from all the relevant laws and replace it with “civil partnership” is not – even without all the arguments that would ensue about what rights under federal law would be included in civil partnerships – as you will undoubtedly know, federal law currently does not recognise the civil partnerships some states have legislated for, and these state laws differ among themselves.
You do realise that makes you an asshole though?
I’ll defer to Brownian as I trust his judgment.
It may be a language problem. It sounds silly to say you’re pro-abortion, as it can easily be misinterpreted. But expressions of this weak pro-choice position (and I dont believe Stewart even mentions that he’s pro-choice in that segment, while in contrast he’s explicit about his strong support for gay marriage), emphasizing the fervent wish that abortions be rare and carrying the implicit presumption that there’s something shameful or wrong about them, are worrying. This is especially so in a context in which the right is making every effort to limit women’s reproductive freedom and will seize upon any weakness.
The GAO lists over a thousand statuatory provisions in which marital status is a factor in determining benefits, rights, and privileges in the US. To say that marriage is a ‘privilege’ rather than a ‘right’ is a lie. I repeat – it’s a lie. This issue isn’t just about tax status. The law is clear – felons have a right to marry. Deadbeat parents have a right to marry. Interfaith couples have a right to marry. Interracial couples have a right to marry. So, why is it sneeringly labeled a privilege that same-sex couples have to do some complicated dance to earn?
The construct of marriage predates the Abrahamic religions. And, in the course of its existence the definition has gone through countless revisions. To say there is one form of “traditional marriage” and that equals the one man plus one woman bullshit just boggles my mind. Repeating it over and over does not make it magically more true. But the people who tend to spew this nonsense are the same folk that fuzzy logic is the only sort that winds its way through their grey matter.
I’ll say one more thing: Grammar RWA has linked to several studies showing that making abortion illegal doesn’t reduce the number of abortions – it only makes them more dangerous, leading to injuries and deaths among women. These people aren’t interested in reducing the number of abortions. They’re interested in controlling women. It’s very dangerous, then, even to imply that there might be some common ground with their position in the sense that you don’t think abortions are anything to celebrate (“We all want fewer abortions”). It’s the people fighting for women’s reproductive and economic rights who will both protect women’s health and lives and at the same time reduce the need for abortions.
OK, I think I’m done.
I’ll add to that with some anecdotes that show that personally being anti-abortion doesn’t seem to stop people from having them (and remaining anti-abortion douchebags throughout the procedure. Bonus hypocrisy!)
I suspect that’s too strongly stated in general. Many of them do want to reduce/eliminate abortions as their primary goal, a goal grounded in sincere (if misguided) moral certitude and therefore important enough to them that controlling women is seen as a reasonable means to achieve that end. I think that’s dangerously wrong.
Conversely there are many who are resolutely pro-choice and opposed to the legislation of morality, but who nevertheless do not share your own conviction that there is nothing wrong with abortion. The hardline stance that it’s just another surgical procedure just doesn’t ring true, at a deep and nonrational level, to such folks. I think it’s important to keep them on our side.
shit…I’m an appeaser.
I don’t think so. If their primary goal were to reduce or eliminate abortions, they would make a genuine effort to understand the results and effects of policies that have been tried. If they don’t do so actively, then I can’t believe that this is their main end.
I don’t think I really disagree with this, but, first, if someone angrily responds to a post of mine about “disgust” at abortion I will (OK, often angrily) challenge them to defend their view and try to change it. Also, it’s contextual. I was very unhappy with Stewart’s statements* in the context of a discussion with someone like Huckabee, and think that someone in his position, if he sincerely supports women’s reproductive rights, should be a lot more responsible. The contrast with his vocal defense of gay marriage was jarring.
*It’s not the first time. I stopped watching for a while after he interviewed John Ashcroft and laughed at a joke Ashcroft made about torture.
SC,
Since I, as per your express request, wrote a few of my thoughts on the Allen Wood article over on this thread,
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/12/lets_hope_the_nightmare_ends_s.php
are you going to respond in full? (Your response so far was simply “Sigh. I see this is going to take some time.”)
Yes, I’m planning to, Walton. I was waiting to get into paper-reading mode, which won’t start till tomorrow.
By the way, are you still planning to read the articles and answer my questions about US/British policy in Iraq and Iran? Just curious.
On abortion, in response to others’ comments above:
Abortion is one of the few areas where I break decisively with the mainstream of libertarianism.
It is not at all comparable to same-sex marriage. Same-sex marriages have no discernible effect on anyone except the participants; they do not involve inflicting anything on anyone who is not a consenting adult; and, therefore, there is no good secular reason to oppose them. I therefore share Jon Stewart’s stance, and that of most people here, in supporting same-sex civil marriage.
Abortion, in contrast, is probably the most difficult and nuanced of all moral issues. It is not “just another surgical procedure”, as someone asserted above, and to believe so is entirely morally incoherent. It is, at minimum, the killing of a living creature for the benefit of another; the question, of course, is whether it constitutes the killing of a human being, and whether the mother’s interests outweigh those of the foetus. To that end I can understand the validity of pro-choice arguments; but I find it disgusting that anyone would treat it lightly, or would assert blithely that “there is nothing wrong with abortion”. It is, at best, a necessary evil.
A viable late-term foetus is, in every meaningful sense of the word, a human being; to argue otherwise, one must argue that a premature/underdeveloped newborn baby is not a human being, since there are no differences of consequence between the two. I am therefore implacably opposed to late-term abortions, for any reason other than to save the life of the mother. I do, however, understand that the vast majority of abortions take place well before the point of viability, and that this is, therefore, essentially tangential to the main issue.
The question, then, is whether a non-viable foetus is a human being, and, if so, whether the mother’s interests outweigh its interests. There is, of course, a lot to be discussed here; and it is perfectly legitimate to point out, as Grammar RWA has done, that banning abortion does not necessarily lead to a drop in the number of abortions, but does lead to higher fatality rates. So I can see the validity of a pro-choice viewpoint, and there’s nothing to be gained from having that argument yet again. But I find it abhorrent that some of you treat it as merely an issue of “women’s reproductive rights”, as if the foetus were no different from, say, a cancerous tumour, and its life were of no consequence compared to that of the woman.
SC: By the way, are you still planning to read the articles and answer my questions about US/British policy in Iraq and Iran? Just curious.
I will if you repost them, since I can’t remember where they were originally posted.
I apologise for the fact that I never got around to it – to be honest I completely forgot, and was busy all term. My term has now finished, so I’m perfectly willing to read them if that’s what you want. But I hope that my prompt response to the Wood article has shown that I am not wilfully ignoring everything you post.
I’ve just got to say on the issue of abortion that it’s going to happen regardless of whether the process is legal or not. By making it illegal, you are putting people into harms way who would not necessarily be so by making those people who are in a desperate state undergo an unsafe procedure. Whether the action is moral or not is quite beside the point, being pro choice is an issue of harm minimisation – giving safeguards to people who for a variety of reasons cannot carry a foetus to term.
Though really the best way to limit abortion is a comprehensive sex education program. Look at the Dutch, low teen pregnancy rates and low abortion statistics, and have one of the best sex education systems in the world. Abortion really is a necessary “evil” in our society, though I’m all for it because the world is grossly overpopulated as is. ;)
Alright, how do I contribute to ‘Operation Get Walton a Hooker’?
If abortion were outlawed, it wouldn’t stop them. The rich and upper middle class would just fly to Europe and do some shopping. The middle class would go to Mexico or Canada and do some shopping.
The poor would either have dangerous illegal abortions or a bunch more kids. The taxpayers would pay for them until age 18 at least. This would also accelerate the trend towards a minority whites society. No big deal to me, California is already close. But the Palinesque wingnuts aren’t going to like it.
Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it!!!
I must admit that it doesn’t ring true to me either. If my girlfriend told me that she was pregnant and was going to have an abortion, my reaction would be different to what it would be if she told me that she was going to have another surgical procedure. Depending on my attitude to the prospect of fatherhood, I may be either relieved or disappointed by her decision, neither of which would be appropriate responses to her telling me that she was going to have a tonsillectomy.
I tend to think that abortions should be, as Clinton put it, “safe, legal, and rare” and it seems that the best way of doing that is with comprehensive sex education and destigamatising pregnancy and motherhood outside of marriage. Having never seen anti-abortion demonstrators carrying placards with “Comprehensive Sex-Ed Now!” and “Support Pregnant Teens”, I’m forced to conclude that anti-abortion activists either don’t really give a shit about reducing the number of abortions, or care so little about it that they’ve never bothered investigating how it might be achieved.
Says you. Is this true historically or cross-culturally, or is it only a major question in certain places and times because of religion?
Prove it.
What’s the scientific definition of a “living creature,” Walton? Please note that a bacterium is a living creature by most definitions I know of.
Yes, 99%, and the other 1% are performed for medical reasons only.
So of course you felt you had to contribute your thoughts on that entirely tangential point, ignoring many other points raised above.
Indeed, especially as you have nothing to add to it.
I couldn’t care less. Defend that position on rational, non-religious grounds.
That’s true. Most of them are more interested in babbling and being obnoxious than making abortion “safe, legal, and rare”.
Just part of in group out group tribal identity. “We all hate the same groups of people so we must belong to the same tribe.”
Kel and raven,
See my comment @ #232.
Can’t two atheists already get “married” in the USA, without the need for any religious crap added to it ?
Isn’t the notion that the state would defend that “marriage” is defined as religious term and not a secular one or that a religious ceremony is required clearly unconstitutional ?
I mean this whole thing is ridiculous of letting religions define terms is ridiculous.
So if you have a group that says, my religion says that “marriage” is the union of only a woman with blue eyes with a man with green eyes, another group says that their relgion says that “marriage” is the union of only a man with a man, another group says that their relgion is the union of a man and a woman, and another group says their religion says that “marriage” is the union of any two human beings, what does the state do ?
It’s obvious to anybody with a thinking brain that the only possible definition that the state can defend is the common denominator between all Americans, ie that marriage is the union between two human beings.
The rights that come with the marriage contract are confered by the state. Religions have NOTHING to do in this business. If some people wish to have a religious ceremony because they like the decorum in the church, the aweful music and the very boring and nutty words that go with it from some crazy guy who thinks he’s got a special power to sanctify this union in front of the eyes of some hypothetical God, that’s their choice, but what on earth does the state have to do with this ?
Just asking.
#241 Feynmaniac
I’m keeping track. We currently have $40: my initial $20 and Patricia’s $20. Given some of his comments along the same lines, I think we can probably hit clinteas up for $20 pretty easy. Can I put you down for $20 too?
We’ve been teasing Walton about which gender he wants. I think he’s concerned that we might really manage to organise a rent-boy to come around to wherever he lives in Oxford :o)
I saw, and I fully agree. It’s never about saving lives, it’s always about control. If anti-abortionists really wanted to limit abortion, they would look at the countries that have the lowest rates and try to adopt a similar tactic. Problem is that the countries with the lowest rates are the ones with the most liberal sex education programs, and having people know about sex would break the control they desire.
There is nothing fucking “mere” about women’s reproductive rights.
First, I don’t believe I ever said it was “just” another surgical procedure in a way that would imply that I think it’s indistinguishable from a tonsillectomy. Those weren’t my words. I argued that my desire to see it made more rare was based in the fact that it’s, though very safe, still surgery, with attendant risks and issues, when other safer means of preventing pregnancy exist and could be made available. And I certainly never said or implied that I didn’t believe it was an extremely emotionally-charged decision and procedure. My point was that it doesn’t differ from other surgeries in terms of its morality.
The question, then, is whether a non-viable foetus is a human being, and, if so, whether the mother’s interests outweigh its interests.
A non-viable foetus is not a human being, only a part of an independent, living human being. Any pregnancy is an expensive investment of material, mental and spiritual resources that are frequently scarce. By far the largest numbers of abortions are spontaneous and beyond the control of the mother. As dramatically compelling as the notion of a potential human life may be, it’s only an abstraction than cannot eclipse the needs of a living human being. Given the chance to rescue only one or the other, even Walton will rescue a living child rather than a refrigerator full of snowflake babies from a burning building. Walton would be better off asking why a mother’s interests outweigh those of even a viable foetus, unless he wants to be a lonely guy for a long long time.
By the way, working my way slowly through Isaacson’s Einstein biography, I came across this about his first wife (65):
I hadn’t known that. (She decided to have the baby.)
I miswrote in 247 :
I mean this whole thing of letting religions define terms is beyond ridiculous.
I’d like to add, rather than the state getting out of the “marriage business”, as Walton has suggested, wouldn’t it be time that the state declares that if the churches want to exercise some sort of parasitic sanctifying peep-show business around the rights confered by the state, it’s their prerogative but it will have nothing to do with this.
Isn’t homosexuality a evolutionary dead end? Where would evolution be without procreation?
Oh – that was in 1901.
Isn’t homosexuality a evolutionary dead end? Where would evolution be without procreation?
Despite the homosexual menace, breeders manage to spawn. Homosexual behavior is common and useful in all animal species.
Who says that homosexuality has to be passed down by homosexuals? Who says it’s a black or white issue when expressed genetically in our code? What about bisexuals?
Though interestingly enough, they found apes (can’t remember which species) that had a gay uncle were better off than apes without. Homosexuality could be a survival strategy as it helps with the burden of parenting.
I loved how Huckabee kept talking about the importance of forming “the next generation.” Because gay marriage will lower straight people’s fertility, and underpopulation is such a huge global problem right now.
underpopulation is such a huge global problem right now
Won’t somebody please think of the [white] children?[/SMS sound drop]
The only things missing from Huckabee’s rant were the ‘but I’m not a bigot,’ and ‘I have a lot of gay friends’ canards.
What I don’t get is why gay marriage is assumed to be at the top of that slope? The same BS argument could easily be made that we already allow straight marriage, so why not allow animal marriage.
For that individual yes. But in the last year I saw a news article where the aunts of gay men had more babies than normal. That could be the drive that could keep “gayness” in the gene pool.
Homosexual behavior is common and useful in all animal species.
But much, much less common among humans. It seems as evolution continues homosexuality decreases.
Useful to humans? Given the extremely small percentage of homosexuals among the population, how useful can it be?
There’s procreation. As a matter of fact, too much of it on this planet earth right now. If it continued at the current rate of 1.2% per annum, the world population would double every 58 years, that’s 13.4 billions in 2066 and 26.8 billions of us in 2024. Needless to say, that’s not even a scenario that is evisaged, as population growth HAS to reduce if we want to survive as a species on this planet.
That takes care of your second sentence.
As far as the first one, I’d just say that a heterosexual couple without chikdren doesn’t produce more children than a homosexual couple. It’s obvious, but maybe you don’t get the obvious.
It seems as evolution continues homosexuality decreases.
Useful to humans? Given the extremely small percentage of homosexuals among the population, how useful can it be?
It seems as evolution continues atheism decreases.
Useful to humans? Given the extremely small percentage of atheists among the population, how useful can it be?
Rearing a child is a huge burden on the individual and to society as a whole, having people without that responsibility is a benefit to society.
In America, the largest single indicator pointing to impending bankruptcy for a double income family, is the birth of a child.
As long as we’re simultaneously discussing homosexual marriage and abortion rights, I’d just like to go for the Apoplectic Christian Trifecta and bring up the issue of assisted suicide. Discuss.
Emmet #246,
Sure. The boy needs to get laid. However, if all he’s going to do is give her/him a verbose, overly formal political monologue than I want no part in it.
Just a precision, if it wasn’t clear in #264, 1.2% is the current world population growth rate (births minus deaths), not procreation rate.
So if we’d want this 1.2% to decrease gradually to zero, in order to have constant world population, we’d want the number of births to decrease to the number of deaths, which is itself decreasing because life expectancy is increasing.
Right now, the growth rate is forecast to decrease gradually from 1.2% to less than 0.5% within 50 years.
Today, the birth rate is 2% per annum, death rate 0.8%.
In 50 years, forecast is birth rate 1.2%, death rate 0.7%.
That means on average we hope women will be producing 40% less children. And that’s still an 0.5% world population growth, with already close to 10 billion of us by 2050.
I’d chip in, but only if actually having sex would cause Walton to start spending his time looking for further sex, and along his blog use up all his time, so he would stop infesting us here.
Sven #268, what is there to discuss? I somebody wants to die, let them die. That is their choice. Who am I to tell them otherwise?
I love the old attempted suicide laws in various states. They executed you if you tried suicide and failed as a punishment.
I’ve got better things to do with twenty bucks, even if it only goes to a WoW sub. Besides, I predict such an encounter can only result in the slaughter of millions of innocent potential lives.
a conservative of the William Buckley tradition,
Buckley was instrumental in shifting conservatism in the USA away from a small-government, free market ideology into a movement directed towards building a British-style mercantilist empire.
-jcr
I’m not sure. It’s easy to think of cases where abortion is morally equivalent to other surgeries. It’s even easy to think up cases (e.g. child incest victim with an anencephalic foetus) where all but the worst right-wing loony would agree that abortion is a moral imperative: doing it is the right thing to do, and not doing it is wrong.
On the other hand, my girlfriend’s decision whether or not to have an abortion has definite long-term consequences with a moral dimension for both of us. If we know that we can’t (for whatever reason) bring up a child, we oughtn’t have it; I have a moral responsibility to our child if she decides not to have the abortion (we both do). We may discuss it, but it is her decision and her decision alone. I can’t think of another surgery where her decision to have it would alleviate me of a moral obligation. Of course, I could be wrong, there may well other surgeries that I haven’t thought of: as I say, I’m not sure.
Given the evolutionary dead end homosexuality is for the homosexual, the fact that homosexuals represent a very, very small percentage of humanity (the most intelligent product of evolution), and the AIDs epidemic that seems to target homosexual behavior among humans, it appears that homosexuality is being chosen for extinction, at least among human beings.
homosexuality is being chosen for extinction
How teleological. Apparently, the goal of evolution is the expansion of willful ignorance and stupidity.
Absolutely and unequivocally in favour of it subject to certain obvious safeguards (person is not mentally ill, etc.).
I think what happened to Diane Pretty was tantamount to torture — she ultimately died by suffocation: the way she most feared.
HG,
That’s got to be the lamest troll I’ve seen in quite a while. Did you cut and paste that all by yourself?
-jcr
@HG
There is always adoption – there are a lot of orphans and abused kids out there that more than deserve a good home, IMHO. You’re still passing on your legacy to a younger generation by this means.
HG, check my post 262. While it may not favor the homosexual, it may have an evolutionary advantage to his aunts. I think we can conclude in the hominid line women are more important than men in keeping the species going.
Homosexuality is not a dead end, a small part of the population is still a substantial amount in a large group, and AIDS is quite irrelevant to the survival of non-reproducing organisms, your argument is full of crap.
Maybe we should get HG a hooker, but one with AIDS. Then he will see how AIDS “target homosexual behavior”. Also we wouldn’t have to hear from him/her.
@ 268
If heaven is all so great, you’d think the cristers would be jumping off cliffs like lemmings. Even though lemmings don’t do that.
Really, it galls me to think that government intrudes in such a personal decision. In awful pain, a month to live…gimme the damn pills!
#51 Teleprompter:
I’d recommend for you guys to tone down your rhetoric a bit.
Not likely to happen on this blog. It’s rare for PZ to admonish anyone to be civil, and that “Order of Molly” business encourages vitriol.
-jcr
“HIV is a gay disease,” reads the ad placed in four gay magazines and posters in gay bars and venues (left). The ads are part of the “Own It. End It.” campaign from the L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center, executed by Better World Advertising, a shop that works exclusively with nonprofits.
The intent is to persuade gays to accept the disease and their responsibility to help eradicate it through responsible sex. Gays have long bristled at the very suggestion that AIDS was a gay disease, arguing that it was a disease affecting both hetero and gays.
The campaign also includes two billboards (below). Though they don’t carry the politically charged message, reading simply: “HIV–www.OwnItEndIt.org,” a visit to the site finds “HIV is a gay disease” displayed prominently.
Les Pappas, president of Better World, says that the site is attracting around 1,000 visits a day, and L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center chief of staff Darrel Cummings says the campaign is serving its purpose. Says he: “Even those people that have been hyper-negative about the campaign are ultimately talking about the epidemic.”
http://www.medialifemagazine.com/cgi-bin/artman/exec/view.cgi?archive=444&num=7806
Thus spake Feynmaniac:
OK, I’ll be sure to find a hooker who gives money-back guarantees ;o)
HG is attempting the “I’m posing as an evilutionist atheist in the hope of turning my strawman version of your own arguments against you hoping for a Gotcha! moment” troll tactic.
Such tactics always end up revealing more about the loathsome moral bankruptcy of the troll than anything else. Disgusting.
Maybe we should get HG a hooker, but one with AIDS.
Wishing death on another person? What a charming suggestion. Did you consult the Jerry Falwell handbook for that one?
-jcr
I’ll be nore specific. My argument is that the decision to abort a pregnancy is no more inherently immoral than any other medical-health decision a person makes. There may be other layers of morality at play, but these are not inherent in the surgery itself. Of course there are other surgeries that also have associated moral questions.
***
I just returned from a quick trip out to the store (in the rain – yuck), during which I was starting to fume. You know what I find a major moral issue? That a third of the planet lives on less than a dollar a day; people (including children) are dying right now of completely preventable diseases and malnutrition; pregnant women are being abused and murdered by their husbands, boyfriends, and family members; women are oppressed and denied basic rights around the world; Iraq continues to be demolished by the government of my country; we are destroying the planet for future generations and putting our own and numerous other species at risk of extinction; gay kids are being beaten up and tormented and driven to run away, often ending up on the streets; tens of thousands of people are losing their jobs, throwing families into dire financial straits in which they won’t have even basic health cre, while corporate fatcats make out… And given this and much more there are people who actually consider the nonfucking issue of late-term abortion the quintessential question of our time which will decide our morality. It’s obscene.
HG
Yah, AIDS is a gay disease and stupid is a homophobe disease
HG wrote:
Can you elaborate on this? I find it a little puzzling.
HG, Homophobe Giantroll
What’s a “very very small %”, How do you know, what’s your source ? What is the % of humans that are on the Kinsey Scale between 6 and 1 (from exlusively homosexual to Predomnantely heterosexual and only incidentally homosexual) ? And what about in a post-religious world ?
I probably haven’t heard someone say something that stupid and hateful since 1990.
Let’s hear it for HG and the naturalist fallacy.
Evidence?
I would tend to think that some kind of peer-recognition system encourages people to write comments that they think are likely to appeal to other readers, but I see no evidence that there are higher levels of “vitriol” here than on sites without such an award.
Man, was that transparent. And extremely silly.
If that were the case then BobC and Holbach would have them, and Cuttlefish, Mrs Tilton and Scott Hatfield wouldn’t.
…and that “Order of Molly” business encourages vitriol.
More like bitterness among the betas, apparently.
jcr,
When someone tells a homophobe ‘to fuck off and die’ they’re not being literal. Just like when I tell you to get whatever the fuck is stuck up your ass out already.
I know I’m often afraid windy’s on the verge of violence.
Quit making up facts. In most of the world, AIDS is a heterosexual epidemic with equal numbers of men and women afflicted. It also hits children hard both by vertical transmission and because they lose their parents in societies without safety nets.
The US gay epidemic was due to historical chance. Nowadays, the US epidemic is shifting towards the world norm, it is about 1/3 female, 2/3 male. Not all the males are gay, so it is probably around 50:50.
No one knows why gayness is ubiquitous in animals and humans. The current theory is group selection. Why it doesn’t directly lead to their reproductive numbers, the group benefits from it. And members of groups are quite often closely related. BTW, many gays do have children. Karl Rove’s father was gay and Ted Haggard has a few kids floating around.
Yeah, but what about Sastra? She’d knife you in the face as soon as look at you, I tell ya’
#295 Emmet:
“truth machine” would be one of the clearest examples.
-jcr
Quit making up facts.
Did you miss the link to the Los Angeles Gay & Lesbian center?
Hmm, with that in mind, maybe I should start being more offensive in my posts. Perhaps I’ve become too lenient in recent weeks – though I can’t imagine anyone reading my responses to homophobe pissant Charles earlier in this thread would agree.
Maybe somebody should let Pete Rooke know we want to hear his analogies again. They always set me off.
get whatever the fuck is stuck up your ass out already
Touchy, aren’t you? Got a bit of guilt over borrowing a tactic from the bad guys?
-jcr
:D Did you know Henry Gee called Pharyngula something like a “rough bar frequented by people who’ve been damaged by religion” after Ichthyic and others made him try to defend his arguments (he failed) a few months ago? I still laugh when I think of it.
Of what? Are you suggesting that his desire to get a Molly was responsible for his personality? That it encouraged others to emulate him in some way other than making logical arguments, because they believed it was his tone that was responsible for the award? Who are the many other examples?
He is, indeed, often vitriolic, but it’s still not evidence, it’s just an anecdote, it merely establishes that one vitriolic person has a Molly, not that “that ‘Order of Molly’ business encourages vitriol”, and,as has been pointed out, the majority of OMs are the very opposite of vitriolic. Vitriol tends to polarise. Some people like snark, some people don’t. Being polite and measured tends to have broad appeal.
To render your claim plausible, you’d have to show that on a similar blog with similar levels of moderation and similar readership, but no similar monthly peer-recognition award, there is markedly less vitriol.
Based on the other forums I know, I think you’d have your work cut out for you.
HG, not that you truly give a damn about reality, or gay people, or humanity, you sick fuck. But HIV infection rates among gay men have been rising (after being on the decline following the community efforts at AIDS education in the 80’s and 90’s) mainly due to the use of drugs like meth (that significantly lower inhibitions and overall judgment), the huge increase in the effectiveness of HIV meds that have changed the impression of the disease from “death sentence” to “long term manageable condition”, and the overall tendency toward rash stupidity and recklessness in the young. You know, kind of the way you felt like you would live forever when you were 20. It’s a complex issue, something that would sail right over the head of an asshole like you.
What, so we’re now a virtual biker gang armed to the teeth with cyber-pistols? Cool!
I hadn’t heard that he wrote/said that – it’s quite funny, really. That was one of the first ‘heavy’ threads I posted on, and it was an amazing learning experience.
But I have to admit I did get a bit riled up when he started calling us antisemites.
‘Did you know Henry Gee called Pharyngula something like a “rough bar frequented by people who’ve been damaged by religion”‘
That sounds like boatloads of awesome! How’s the parking? Is there a cover charge?
jcr,
Nah, just sick of reading your “concerns” every singe thread. Judging from the responses you get I’m not alone.
As for telling someone who says AIDS is a “gay disease” to put his theory to the test, I have no guilt over that.
Here’s windy’s link to his comment (the original thread was “Dr. Who? Dr. Dawkins”):
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/10/ruse_vs_fuller.php#comment-1156699
That’s amazing! See my comment just below @ #100 of the link. :)
I like the “rough bar” analogy.
So why do these people walk in wearing their jesus fancy-pants?
Like HG, you must know stupid homophobe fancy-pants aren’t tolerated here.
Looks like I missed the abortion discussion, but one really good post about it that got me thinking about it differently was this one at BitchPh.D. To highlight the best parts for the link-averse:
The bottom line about abortion is this. Do you trust women to make their own moral judgments? If you are anti-abortion, then no. You do not. You have an absolute moral position that you don’t trust anyone to question, and therefore you think that abortion should be illegal. But the second you start making exceptions for rape or incest, you are indicating that your moral position is not absolute. That moral judgment is involved. And that right there is where I start to get angry and frustrated, because unless you have an absolute position that all human life (arguably, all life period, but that isn’t the argument I’m engaging with right now) are equally valuable (in which case, no exceptions for the death penalty, and I expect you to agonize over women who die trying to abort, and I also expect you to work your ass off making this a more just world in which women don’t have to choose abortions, but this is also not the argument I’m engaging right now), then there is no ground whatsoever for saying that there should be laws or limitations on abortion other than that you do not trust women.
[…]
When pro-choice feminists like Wolf, or liberal men, or a lot of women, even, say things like, “I’m pro-choice, but I am uncomfortable with… [third-trimester abortion / sex-selection / women who have multiple abortions / women who have abortions for “convenience” / etc.]” then what you are saying is that your discomfort matters more than an individual woman’s ability to assess her own circumstances. That you don’t think that women who have abortions think through the very questions that you, sitting there in your easy chair, can come up with. That a woman who is contemplating an invasive, expensive, and uncomfortable medical procedure doesn’t think it through first. In short, that your judgment is better than hers.
Think about the hubris of that. Your judgment of some hypothetical scenario is more reliable than some woman’s judgment about her own, very real, life situation?
Yes, Truth Machine was (and, no doubt, still is) vitriolic. But from what I saw – excepting the last few weeks of his presence here where he became enmeshed in something more personal than intellectual and ‘went off the deep end’, for want of a better expression – he never presented an argument that he couldn’t back up. Extensively. And with well-expressed and well-thought out reasoning.
Vitriol on top – but rationale beneath.
It’s too bad HG devolved into a malignant intracranial neoplasm so soon; I wanted to bring up eusocial insects at isn’t homosexuality an evolutionary dead end? They’re examples where large numbers of individuals sacrifice their individual fitness for the reproductive success of their relatives.
Saviours are even less common. How useful can they be?
kamaka, I thought you all were supposed to be the tolerant ones?
I feel like the odd one out, I haven’t been damaged by religion at all.
So far, you haven’t demonstrated any success at all when it comes to thinking, so why do you cling to the idea that anyone else should care about the results when you do it?
“rough bar frequented by people who’ve been damaged by religion”
What, like the private club of the Satan’s Helpers?
Willful ignorance and profound intellectual dishonesty aren’t covered by our tolerance policy. Better luck next time.
If we tolerated the intolerant, the entire system would break down. Just think about it in game theory, if we had tolerant people and intolerant people then eventually the intolerant people would win out because they wouldn’t tolerate the tolerant while the tolerant would tolerate the intolerant. So there needs to be a strategy that’s successful in the fact of intolerance, and in that case a game of tit-for-tat is on.
SC,OM,
Priceless! I’m psychic!
Carlie,
Just so I’m not misunderstood, I don’t dissent from that view to the smallest degree. I absolutely, unequivocally, and unreservedly support the principle that the only person who has any right to make the decision whether or not a mentally competent adult woman has an abortion is her, and I deplore any attempt to restrict or limit that right in any way. My discussion with SC was in relation to an interesting academic fine point of moral categorisation, which has no bearing whatsoever on that principle.
Emmet and I are teasing Walton. Although I’m sure we could find him a hooker somewhere if he ever shows up at an atheist convention or book signing. Sneaking a hooker into Oxford might be a bit more difficult? Anyone? He really needs to get rid of that poker.
As for the Order of Molly making folks more blood thirsty…nah. It’s not fair to judge anyone else here by Truth Machine, OM – he’s a whole other species.
“I thought you all were supposed to be the tolerant ones?”
HG, what church do you go to?
It is not like they are the only source of information on medicine or social problems. Didn’t you read my post?
The US CDC is the central clearing house for US infectious disease stats. The world data is WHO. 48% of the world’s AIDS cases are women. So much for your lie.
HG, you are a typical fundie troll. I’ve yet to see a fundie who wasn’t stupid, lied a lot, and was very good at hating. Don’t you have something better to do than lie on message boards. Maybe you could find some disobedient kids to stone to death (Deuteronomy) or burn some witches or something.
Only TM, OM could have been threatened by PZ with being banished to the dungeon, while being nominated for a Molly, and then spend most of the thread trying to talk everybody out of giving him one–in his own particular idiom. He’s called me an idiot, but I got better.
HG
Why, is stupidity to be tolerated?
“AIDS is a gay disease” is such a stupid thing to say, your head must be on fire.
Oh, yeah, that virus chose gay men, with a purpose. What a great population to target. Gays are vilified, society will be slow to rise up and find a way to eradicate the virus. This was the virus’s master plan!
Of course, the virus’s greater plan is to eradicate those horrible homos from the gene pool. The virus is humanities friend, yes? The world would be better off without the contributions gay men make to society?
The rest of the destruction the virus causes, that’s just collateral damage. A few million orphaned kids and their dead parents, that’s a small price to pay for the extinction of homosexuality, right?
Thus spake Patricia,OM:
Are you kidding? We’ve got $80 already. At this rate, we’ll be able to fly you in to perform the poker removal personally!
We just need a small miracle to pay the excess baggage charge on the leather, whips, and rubber gear.
I’ll throw in $20 on the proviso that Walton goes ass to mouth.
Hee. Darn. I’ve spent the last several minutes on YouTube trying to find the bar scene from MST3K Werewolf (one of my favorites). Can’r remember where it was. Darn.
***
In case anyone’s wondering, I have no idea what happened to truth machine. There’s been no attempt at reconciliation from either one of us, and the whole episode is still fairly painful for me to think about. Ay, live and learn. But I apologize again to everyone for having some of that take place here – if I had it to do over, I wouldn’t.
There are places in Asia and Africa where more than 50% of female prostitutes are HIV infected.
And they did not get it from their lesbian lover.
I havent heard anything so stupid about HIV said since 1983.
Is that surprising, clinteas? Pot odds says HG starts spouting stupid shit dating back to the writing of the Pentateuch.
Brownian,
yeah,probably not really surprising to hear stuff like that from the likes of this HG…..
Ken Cope,
nice to have you around again,miss your lucid comments and great links….:-)
Emmet, Nope, I have the Lady Chablis in mind for Walton.
Although I would find it amusing to take his arm and allow him to escort me to my seat for one of PZ’s lectures. I’m sure the lad has exquisite posture.
Aren’t those the places we’re writing off anyway, clinteas?
Dude! I did not need to entertain that thought.
Let’s see – could someone smuggle a prostitute into a residential college at an institution created to educate the sons of wealthy gentlemen and embody them with the scrupulous moral standards of the British aristocracy?
Yeah, I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say that it’s been done maybe once or twice before…
If you can find it, read Portherhouse Blue by Tom Sharpe – it’s an hilarious story about the goings-on at a (fictitious) Cambridge college. It’s rather rude (published in 1974) and not especially PC by today’s standards, but funny nonetheless.
Jebus, run off to eat dinner with the Redhead and an AIDS idiot shows up. AIDS stopped being a gay disease years ago. Where does HG get his information from?
Anyway HG, having gay males within a tribe can give hominids two survival/reproduction advantages. First, their related females appear to like sex a little better than women without gay relatives, so they have more children. Secondly, the gay males can take point position for guarding the community. If they are killed, the reproduction of the community goes on as the female relationships are not disturbed. You have to look at bigger pictures than you are presently doing. Having gays in the community is not an evolution dead end for hominids.
Come pick a fight with me SC !!!
It might make you feel less grumpy…:-)Im sorry youre not in a good mood !
And yes,lots of people in the first world are writing those places off,unfortunately,or do not do nearly enough to help them to be able to help themselves,but you know that….
Emmet #326
Does this mean that you do not support the Roe v. Wade decision that the state can regulate the abortion procedure during the second trimester “in ways that are reasonably related to maternal health”, and that the state can choose to restrict or proscribe abortion as it sees fit during the third trimester when the fetus is viable (“except where it is necessary, in appropriate medical judgment, for the preservation of the life or health of the mother”) ?
*chuckle*
I’m sure he does. Not so sure it’ll be the same after the support is removed, though.
I think HG is no longer with us, another seagull-troll.
Fear does not exist in this dojo.
Sorry.
Nah, but thanks for the offer. :)
Aw.
OK, so it was an observation – you weren’t agreeing with that view. That does make me less grumpy.
Dammnit! Missed Charles @124. Although Holbach & I are trying to dial our christian slaying down a notch, I wish I could have gotten my 24 inch skewers into that one.
A lot of what is in the bible is not what gawd wants you to do… Damn crap and run trolls.
Holbach’s been a bit more, um, enthusiastic of late, and it hasn’t been very well received, mostly because he seems to be turning on the people who don’t share his ‘destroy all religion and everyone who doesn’t want to destroy all religion’ POV and giving them both barrels.
“I think HG is no longer with us, another seagull-troll.”
He had to go stick his head in the toilet to put the fire out.
Patricia, you would have needed 36″ skewers even to get his attention. That was one stupid dude. After reading his posts I had to wash my hands and use mental floss.
I’m perplexed as to how someone can think that a non-breeding population is going to be any worse off when put under an evolutionary pressure. Homosexuality remains despite homosexuals not having offspring, them contracting AIDS is not going to harm their reproductive success. HG couldn’t even get his story consistent.
Kel, the old reproduction of many versus the reproduction of the one. Godbots have trouble with that concept.
un petit condensé de la betise Charles :
There is no reason to be married accept to try to look like they are normal and accepted in soceity.
If we `[allow gay marriage], then people who are into Pedophilia will want to get maried and I could go on, but I think you get the picture.
I am not homophobic.
I don’t agree with Rape, does that make me rapeophobic?
I am out. But I hope that I was able to get my point across to the morons here.
negentropyeater,
Yes it does. I don’t think I could possibly have been clearer. The hint was in the use of words like “unequivocally” and “unreservedly”. I think a strong case can be made for regulation to save the foetus if it is viable, but not to proscribe ending the pregnancy. In any individual case, the best person to make the decision is the woman herself, duly informed by medical professionals. I don’t see how involving the blunt and slow machinery of the law in extreme cases is practical, desirable, or might plausibly lead to a better outcome.
Pardon:
un petit condensé de la betise de Charles :
Indeed
And he is correct — so what’s wrong?
Wowbagger, It’s tough to tone down christian slaying, especially for me. My aunties and grannies got hanged in witch trials. I like Holbach, and his comments, which I find much more palatable than say Truth Machine, OM.
Nerd – 36 inchers! Holy shit, that means I’d have to harness up a Clydesdale to turn the spit. He was one nasty huge troll.
Patricia,
I’m all for christian slaying, and I love nothing more than seeing him give some woo-soaked assclown the what-for, but he’s been dishing it out to confirmed atheists. He seems to believe that anyone who doesn’t agree with him on everything must be a secret godbot in denial – an example from the Bill O’Reilly thread a couple of days back:
That’s more than a little unreasonable, and profoundly inaccurate.
Stimpy is a fool of a man who deludes himself by thinking he is not; a graver sin to me than any possible sexual contact between consenting adults- Lord Brown
So….have you taken a look at that blog? Randy has, though what he thought he was accoplishing i have not the foggiest idea. IT’s Pretty bad stuff.
But it looks like i can’t be allowed to say anything that makes sense there anymore. So the only way it will be a balanced playing feild is if some pharyngulites go over there and say something.
Soooo many comments, so little time!
I find it odd that he’s linked to one of my blog posts on his. Especially odd as he “challenged” me to make a post on one topic, I did so, and he responded by commenting on another that had nothing to do with it.
Wow, I had completely missed that whole Henry Gee thing. Amazing.
“Alright, how do I contribute to ‘Operation Get Walton a Hooker’?”
Send money to reyfox@rey.fox
I miss contributing to the threads I only lurk on, Patricia, SC, Clinteas, and all the usual suspects. I might not contribute so much, were it not for procrastinating during the last few days of the semester. I’m lurking as fast as I can! Now, back to that essay on Brion Gysin, the real originator of Alice B. Toklas Brownies!
Charles, you idiot:
Marriage used to be a property contract between a woman’s father and her husband, in which ownership of a woman was transferred from father to husband. For the most part, this is no longer the case. Language is dynamic. Meanings of words evolve. You don’t agree? How’s your Shakespearean English?
I’m really not sure to put this any more simply: children and horses cannot give consent. Even if a child wishes to get married, we don’t allow them to do so. Allowing adult gay persons to enter marriage contracts does not mean that children will be allowed to enter marriage contracts, because children are not adults and are thus afforded certain protections and subject to certain limits, such as not being allowed to vote or serve in the military.
Paedophilia and homosexuality are not comparable. There is always going to be a power imbalance in a relationship between an adult and a child, which is why such relationships are generally considered to be exploitative and a Bad Thing. By your logic, allowing heterosexuals to marry will lead to opposite sex adult-child marriages, but that remains illegal, because children cannot give consent.
Regarding civil unions: a civil union is not the same thing as marriage. Allowing heterosexuals to marry while restricting gay persons to civil unions is denying a right (marriage) to a particular group. It’s not that complicated if you think about it for more than a second or two. Either you truly are a moron or you’re being deliberately obtuse. Either way, you’re a raging bigot and I wish to [deity of choice] that you’d STFU.
The fact that this has to be pointed out….
Good concise sum-up,Ariana.
Re: abortion –
The problem with the argument that abortion should be restricted is that it implies women cannot be trusted to make our own reproductive decisions. It suggests that we’re all either homicidal psychopaths who think murdering foetuses is fun, or that we’re unstable morons who’ll be stampeding reproductive health clinics to have abortions at 39 weeks because we don’t don’t understand what we’re doing, we don’t care, or because we think it’s fun (or some combination thereof) if we’re not legally restrained from doing so. It implies that the nice benevolent (and predominantly male) government is better placed to make decisions about women’s reproductive health than women are.
Re: Obama and conservatism –
I think he is a conservative in some areas, such as in his belief in US imperialism, that the US has right to wage war on any country it wishes, and that any country that doesn’t put American corporate interests ahead of its own people is an evil dictatorship – even if its government is democratically elected. All the pro-‘free’ market, ‘free’ trade and capitalism stuff is also pretty damned conservative. I do think he’s far preferable to any Republican, but he’s no progressive.
Of course, one possible solution here would be to ban marriage entirely, guaranteeing equality for all… and the conservatives could stop pretending that they’re not triple divorcees.
Interesting- I just checked Wikipedia to see if Huckabee himself was divorced; the answer is no; but there is this gem of a quote in the “Early life” section:
`His father was a strict disciplinarian, and left a lasting impression. Speaking to Charles Gibson of ABC News, he explained with a grin: “My father was the ultimate patriot. You know, he’d lay on the stripes, and I’d see stars.”[9]’
Chalk up yet another case of bad parenting leading to authoritarianism.
“Chalk up yet another case of bad parenting leading to authoritarianism.”
Did Hitler’s dad beat him? I wonder… What about Nero, Cortez, and all those crazy blokes.
Scratch that, Cortez was greedy, not a megalomaniac.
Yes. Hitler seems to have had little love during his childhood. The first volume of Ian Kershaw’s biography covers Hitler’s relationship with his father in detail. Throughout his life Hitler had trouble forming normal relationships, and Kershaw suggests his relationship with his parents was in part to blame for that.
Jon Stewart was so close to getting Huckabee to say it plain. Huckabee said something about “types of relationships”, and Jon missed the opportunity to challenge him on that and get him to admit that he regards gay people and their relationships as having less value than straight people and their relationships. That’s what the “let’s not change the meaning of marriage” crap is all about.
I’m so glad I live in Canada; we recognize that marriage is a civil arrangement and a civil right: a consenting adult can marry another consenting adult regardless of their respective sexes.
HYEa pz ur so not a hypocrite.Ahem mr people with religous shouldnt be respected.In that case u shouldntg be allowed to have ur views as well.Squirrel man Pz
Did Hitler’s dad beat him? I wonder. – RickrOll
Certainly did. An illuminating book on the results of parental violence against children is Alice Miller’s “For Your Own Good: Hidden Cruelty in Child-Rearing and the Roots of Violence”. She deals with Hitler’s childhood, and also that of a notorious (in Germany) child-murderer.