In this installment of my series dealing with a local small papers regular article, I respond to the misdirection of energies to ideas surrounding religious and political extremism. A proper understanding of both history and one’s own political leaders can direct... Read More
Well, my cruise to Hawaii and back went as well as one could expect. One of my favorite parts was being “buzzed” by the USS Vinson (Carrier) on our last sea day. Not only did we see a floating military airport, F-18′s, Sea-Hawks, and E-2C Hawkeyes… but we... Read More
Just a quick note on when John says (see below) that he doubts “the origin of homosexuality will be discussed,” he does not discuss it either (if there is even an “origin” to be discussed). And while I admit to not following John’s every... Read More
Now, before I post the exact same critique of the above “meme/quote” I placed on a friends mom’s FaceBook, I wish to note a few things about the “interaction” that followed. Firstly, this action taken by D.N. (friend’s mom) proves yet again... Read More
This is a short, 6-point reason why I believe same-sex marriage should not be “normalized” by society as a whole — THAT IS, gay-unions should not be placed in importance, culturally, as equal in its benefiting society. Gender differences are important and have... Read More
In all my discussions with people about the “hot-button issue” of today, same-sex-marriage, I see a theme. And that is, bias. Not an admitted bias, or a healthy bias, one flirting with fascism. “FASCISM! How can you say that Papa Giorgio!?” Easy, a... Read More
“Properly speaking, homosexuality does not exist among animals…. For reasons of survival, the reproductive instinct among animals is always directed towards an individual of the opposite sex. Therefore, an animal can never be homosexual as such. Nevertheless, the... Read More
I have been too busy as-of-late to keep up with “Concepts,” an article in a local small paper. This recent article did, however, peak my interest and awoke me from my slumber. (As usual, you can click the graphic to enlarge to be able to read the article if so... Read More
It is funny. In this conversation (which is part two, part one can be found here) I have noticed a theme… which is, the detractors in question will bring up topics of a religious bent, even going as far as quoting Scripture; then, when corrected on the theological or... Read More
I was graciously invited to a site that is a depot for many conservatively minded homosexuals as well as supporters of these Republican leaning folk. For the record there are many independents and libertarian leaning guys and gals in the group as well. The person that invited me... Read More
In this installment of my series dealing with a local small papers regular article, I respond to the misdirection of energies to ideas surrounding religious and political extremism. A proper understanding of both history and one’s own political leaders can direct one’s energies to properly deal with the issues that animate so many.
I only have the patience and time to correct a couple of items in the above (as usual, you may click the graphic to ENLARGE it). This will again fit into the category of Mr. Huizum not knowing history well, and based on such bad historical referencing making broad claims that hurt healthy dialogue. This is a common practice in higher education, and Professor Mike S. Adams comments on what affect this has on young students:
1. They motivate some students to dedicate their professional lives to finding solutions to non¬existent problems.
2. They cause many students to become angry over things that aren’t even true.
“Life is too short to spend being angry about things that aren’t even true” (43). Similarly, one should put one’s energies towards the right area of focus. So for instance, when John states,
The Oklahoma bombing was perpetrated by a right-wing militia member, so politics was involved in that incident.
He has in his mind a picture of a religious right-winger. When in fact Timothy McVeigh was an atheist who renounced the Judeo-Christian God and said his “god” was science. So in reality, McVeigh’s motivations line up closer with John’s political (and some would say, religious… because “atheism” is a metaphysical viewpoint) views rather than the “religious-right.” And most of the violence has been committed by people who have left leaning political views.
(See bios of shooters here, and here; as well as the many Occupy stories here; as well as the violence in opposition to Bush and Palin.)
In other words, John Huizum’s focus is wrongly placed, and so his outrage in the past has not only been misplaced, but infective as well.
Another portion that I wish to point to along a similar vein is this statement:
The Crusades were motivated by Christians hating Muslims and vice versa, so a difference in religious beliefs caused those wars.
Again, some history will benefit the discussion. The following is from a recent post on Pope Francis canonizing some Christians who were killed in Muslim/Christian conflicts:
In case those here are not aware of this violent history intrinsic to Islam, here are some previous “clashes” that led to the West defending themselves:
The Third Crusade (1188-1192). This crusade was proclaimed by Pope Gregory VIII in the wake of Saladin’s capture of Jerusalem and destruction of the Crusader forces of Hattin in 1187. This venture failed to retake Jerusalem, but it did strengthen Outremer, the crusader state that stretched along the coast of the Levant.
The Politically incorrect guide to Islam (and the Crusades), by Robert Spencer, pp. 147-148.
The almost Political Correct myth is that the crusades were an unprovoked attack by Europe against the Islamic world are dealt with in part:
The conquest of Jerusalem in 638 stood as the beginning of centuries of Muslim aggression, and Christians in the Holy Land faced an escalating spiral of persecution. A few examples: Early in the eighth century, sixty Christian pilgrims from Amorium were crucified; around the same time, the Muslim governor of Caesarea seized a group of pilgrims from Iconium and had them all executed as spies – except for a small number who converted to Islam; and Muslims demanded money from pilgrims, threatening to ransack the Church of the Resurrection if they didn’t pay. Later in the eighth century, a Muslim ruler banned displays of the cross in Jerusalem. He also increased the anti-religious tax (jizya) that Christians had to pay and forbade Christians to engage in religious instruction to others, even their own children.
Brutal subordinations and violence became the rules of the day for Christians in the Holy Land. In 772, the caliph al-Mansur ordered the hands of Christians and Jews in Jerusalem to be stamped with a distinctive symbol. Conversions to Christianity were dealt with particularly harshly. In 789, Muslims beheaded a monk who had converted from Islam and plundered the Bethlehem monastery of Saint Theodosius, killing many more monks. Other monasteries in the region suffered the same fate. Early in the ninth century, the persecutions grew so severe that large numbers of Christians fled to Constantinople and other Christians cities. More persecutions in 923 saw additional churches destroyed, and in 937, Muslims went on a Palm Sunday rampage in Jerusalem, plundering and destroying the Church of Calvary and the Church of the Resurrection.
The Politically incorrect guide to Islam (and the Crusades), by Robert Spencer, pp. 122-123.
One person (my pastor at the time) said to paint a picture of the crusaders in a single year in history is like showing photo’s and video of Hitler hugging children and giving flowers to them and then showing photo’s and video of the Allies attacking the German army. It completely forgets what Hitler and Germany had done prior.
What did I mean by “intrinsic”? When I talk to a Muslim I make sure I compare Jesus to Muhammad, and the Trinitarian God to the Islamic unitarian god.
MUHAMMAD ordered his followers (and participated in) the cutting of throats of between 600-to-900 persons. Not all men, but women and children. He was a military tactician that lied and told others to use deception that ultimately led to the death of many people (taqiyya). We never see any depictions of Muhammad with children, we just know that he most likely acquired a gal at age 6 and consummated the “marriage” when she was nine. He was a pedophile in other words. While the Qu’ran states that a follower of this book should have no more than 4 wives, we know of course that he had many more. Many more.
JESUS, when Peter struck off the ear of the soldier, healed it. Christ said if his followers were of any other kingdom, they would fight to get him off the cross. Christ invited and used children as examples of how Jewish adults should view their faith… something culturally radical – inviting children into an inner-circle of a group of status oriented men as the Pharisees were and using them as examples to learn from. Jesus, and thusly us, can access true love because the Triune God has eternally loved (The Father loves the Son, etc. ~ unlike the unitarian God of Islam). Love between us then, my wife and I, the love in community/Body of Christ, has foundations in God. Even the most ardent Muslim still leaves his or her entrance into “heaven” as an arbitrary choice of “god.” The love of Christ and the relationship he offers is bar-none the center piece of our faith… something the Muslim does not have. Which is why the Church evolved because they have a point of reference in Christ to come back to. We would not want the Muslim to fall back to his point of reference but to look to Jesus as a referent.
The Quran, Haditha, and other sources make clear that Muhammad was a sinner, and had to repent FOR his sins… while the same sources say Jesus was sinless, confirming Biblical doctrine.
Which leads me to one of my favorite quotes:
The nine founders among the eleven living religions in the world had characters which attracted many devoted followers during their own lifetime, and still larger numbers during the centuries of subsequent history. They were humble in certain respects, yet they were also confident of a great religious mission. Two of the nine, Mahavira and Buddha, were men so strong-minded and self-reliant that, according to the records, they displayed no need of any divine help, though they both taught the inexorable cosmic law of Karma. They are not reported as having possessed any consciousness of a supreme personal deity. Yet they have been strangely deified by their followers. Indeed, they themselves have been worshipped, even with multitudinous idols.
All of the nine founders of religion, with the exception of Jesus Christ, are reported in their respective sacred scriptures as having passed through a preliminary period of uncertainty, or of searching for religious light. Confucius, late in life, confessed his own sense of shortcomings and his desire for further improvement in knowledge and character. All the founders of the non-Christian religions evinced inconsistencies in their personal character; some of them altered their practical policies under change of circumstances.
Jesus Christ alone is reported as having had a consistent God consciousness, a consistent character himself, and a consistent program for his religion. The most remarkable and valuable aspect of the personality of Jesus Christ is the comprehensiveness and universal availability of his character, as well as its own loftiness, consistency, and sinlessness.
Robert Hume, The World’s Living Religions (New York, NY: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1959), 285-286.
So the Crusades were motivated by Muslims hatred for civilization, and this political view entwined in Sharia is still stuck in the barbarism of the 600′s and is still at war with civilized society. I am not saying of course the Church is blameless, do not get me wrong. What I am saying is that people (fallen and infallible) responded at times wrongly in a correct situation that needed to be handled with military power… not ecumenism. Ecumenism was the root cause for Muslim’s to take over large swaths of land. Just war stopped this onslaught and many centuries later we are still reaping the net benefit of this larger good that kept a large portion of the world free enough to allow maximal liberty. Even if this liberty was slow and gradual, it sill allowed the laboratory for experiments in political and religious philosophy that led to our current situation.
Although there were some forms of democratic government in local areas in ancient and medieval history (such as ancient Athens), when the United States began as a representative democracy in 1776, it could be called the “American experiment,” because there were at that time no other functioning national democracies in the world. But after the founding of the United States, and especially in the twentieth century, the number of functioning national democracies grew remarkably. The World Forum on Democracy reports that in 1950 there were 22 democracies accounting for 31% of the world population and a further 21 states with restricted democratic practices, accounting for 11.9% of the globe’s population. Since the turn of the century, electoral democracies now represent 120 of the 192 existing countries and constitute 58.2% of the world’s population.
Therefore, when people today complain to me that they don’t want to get involved in politics because they think that politicians are too corrupt (or arrogant, greedy, power-hungry, and other forms of being “unspiritual”), I want to remind them that although democracy is messy, it still works quite well, and all the alternative forms of government are far worse. We should be thankful for those who are willing to be involved in it, often at great personal sacrifice.
Otherwise, most of the world would still practice keeping Africans in slavery, like in Muslim countries.
John, in the above and previous articles, has made clear he disdains political and religious extremism — explicitly and implicitly. Again, I will include a recent conversation from my Hawaiian vacation that speaks to John not applying his concerns to the proper areas — religious extremism:
….But every point of disagreement or complaint Walter had focused around racism. Which led me to my final point of the discussion with his. I asked him why he was so sensitive to the topic of race/racism. He responded that he had a family member who passed in a concentration camp during WWII, mentioning his Jewish roots. Awesome!
This led me to my favorite analogy, which I asked Walter to allow me time to build. He agreed, revealing ultimately his political inconsistencies:
Walter, I will use Bush in my analogy. Let us say for twenty years Bush attended a church that twice prominently displayed David Dukes likeness on the cover of their church’s magazine which reaches 20,000 homes, and a third time alongside Barry Mills (the founder of the Aryan Brotherhood). Even inviting David Duke to the pulpit to receive a “lifetime achievement award.” Even selling sermons by David Duke in the church’s book store. Authors of sermons sold in Bush’s church’s bookstore teach in accordance with Christian Identity’s view that Jews and blacks are offspring of Satan and Eve via a sexual encounter in the Garden of Eden. In the church’s bookstore, the entire time Bush attended, books like Mein Kampf, My Awakening (David Duke), and other blatantly racist books. Even members of the Aryan Brotherhood felt comfortable enough to sit in the pews at times… being that the pastor of the church was once a reverend for the group.
Now Walter, if Bush had gone to a church like that I would walk arm-n-arm with my Democratic comrades in making sure he would never be President. You would expect me to I am sure?
He confirmed my suspicion. I then shared my knowledge of Obama.
I purchased from Obama’s church’s bookstore online 3-books: A Black Theology of Liberation, Black Theology & Black Power, and Is God A White Racist?: A Preamble to Black Theology. In these books Walter, God is said to be against white people, and mirror in their hatred of whites to that of Jews in Mein Kampf, calling both devils.
“The personification of the devil as the symbol of all evil assumes the living shape of the Jew” ~ Adolf Hitler – Mein Kampf
“The goal of black theology is the destruction of everything white, so that blacks can be liberated from alien gods” ~ James Cone, A Black Theology of Liberation, p.62
“White religionists are not capable of perceiving the blackness of God, because their satanic whiteness is a denial of the very essence of divinity. That is why whites are finding and will continue to find the black experience a disturbing reality” ~ James Cone, A Black Theology of Liberation, p.64
Obama’s pastor not only was a minister in The Nation of Islam, an anti-Semitic/racist group, but the church’s book store sells sermons by Louise Farrakhan, who teaches that the white man was created on the Island of Cyprus by a mad scientist, Yakub. (Mr. Farrakhan also believes he was taken up on a UFO to meet God, and was told he was a little messiah, take note also that he was directly involved in the deaths of police officers as well.) Louise Farrakhan was featured twice on the church’s magazine which reach 20,000[plus] homes in the Chicago area. Even placing on the cover with Louise Farrakhan a third time the founder of the Nation of Islam, Elijah Muhammad. Elijah Muhammad likewise taught that the white man was created by Yakub 6,600 years ago. Walter, Louise Farrakhan teaches that the Jews in Israel do not belong there, and that the true Jews are the black people. Louise Farrakhan was invited into Obama’s church, to the pulpit and given a “lifetime achievement award.” In fact, the New Black Panthers and members of the Nation of Islam often times sat in the pews for sermons by Rev. Wright, whom Obama called a mentor.
Mouse Over To See
Another was a montage of faces – black leaders, past and present, with the title “The legacy lives on” – that included Wright, Farrakhan, Nation of Islam founder Elijah Muhammad, Rosa Parks and even O.J. Simpson attorney Johnny Cochran. (Weekly Standard; WND)
So I expect you, Walter, to join arm-and-arm with me on finding out why the media, and Democrats who are so concerned about racism let such a man into office, when, if the tables were turned, I wouldn’t want in office.
Do you know the next thing out of Walter’s mouth was?
✫ “Didn’t Bush speak in a church that forbid interracial marriage?”
I responded that no, it was a speech at Bob Jones University…
… and you are making my point Walter. If that bugs you soo much to mention it during the course of a conversation, why doesn’t Obama’s history more-so irk you? Not to mention the university overturned its silly rule, even Bob Jones said he couldn’t back up that policy with a single verse in the Bible (CNN). Obama’s CHURCH OF TWENTY YEARS has made no such concession.
At this point Walter started to get out of the hot-tub finishing with “well, that’s just your opinion” (meaning my carefully laid out facts and years of study combined with an analogy was hogwash. Walter went his way, and even avoided me when he saw me in the international caffe — even though our conversation was calm, rational, and reasoned. I even asked him permission twice to make my analogies, being polite and respecting his age. Walter is a great example of how Democrats ignore following their own concerns to their logical conclusions, when applied to their own candidate. Sad.
Well, my cruise to Hawaii and back went as well as one could expect. One of my favorite parts was being “buzzed” by the USS Vinson (Carrier) on our last sea day. Not only did we see a floating military airport, F-18′s, Sea-Hawks, and E-2C Hawkeyes… but we also saw a pod of whales and dolphins.
A great trip. But I wouldn’t post just this on my blog “Religio-Political Talk”! Who cares about Hawaii!?
I wanted to recount a conversation, really a landslide of a conversation I had with an older gentleman (Walter) in a jacuzzi on board the ship. Now, many of the people on board were vets of some sort on a twilight cruise to Pearl Harbor… so political views lined up with most on board. Conversations — when political — were for the most part neutral or in agreement. And the many Canadians and Brits on board are suffering from the same political correctness in not dealing with immigration and Islamic radicals. We are in the same boat, so-to-speak. But while talking to a police officer from SoCal on vacation with his beautiful family, an older gentleman got into the jacuzzi and proceeded to blame — in general conversation — everything on Bush and Republicans. His ability to weave politics indiscriminately into conversation was amazing! I was impressed.
At first I decided to ignore the references, I took his age into account. However, after a while I caved and proceed to challenge him on many points he made. One topic was welfare, and I pointed out that more people are on food stamps than the population of Spain, he mentioned that many single mothers needed help… to which I used an analogy to help explain how social programs assisted in making single-parenthood an option.
Lets say that the government determined that tennis was the best way to create community and health in society, so it subsidized a small portion of classes, training courses and courts to be built. As the price of tennis dropped more and more people took classes and started playing tennis. Government saw that this was a good thing and subsidized more of it dropping the price even more allowing for easier access to the sport. The opposite is don with smoking. To decrease smoking government raises the cost of cigarettes to dissuade the action of smoking.
I asked if he agreed with my analogy. He said yes. I then referenced shortly Thomas Sowell’s interaction with an official from the welfare administration and pointed out that in effect the government is doing precisely what my analogy he agreed with promotes… that is, making it very easy for men to choose to leave their families because they know the government will feed their children, pointing out — as Larry Elder points out — that 75% of black children are born into homes without a father. Mentioning that THIS is why the poverty and crime levels are so high in these neighborhoods. NOT because of racism as he had eluded to, but because of subsidizing irresponsibility and fatherlessness!
He also intimated that the banks were also racist in their ravaging the poor by loans for homes they couldn’t afford. I pointed out that Bush and McCain tried to reform Fannie and Freddie a total of 17-times and each time were shut down by Democrats. Walter, the gentleman in the hot-tub, hadn’t heard that before, and I mentioned that Bill Clinton himself blames the Democrats, while still others rewrite history.
Conversation went to education and educational costs. Here is where we had a sharp disagreement. Walter said the schools only get $5,000 or so per student to teach them. I mentioned that each student in L.A. gets about $13,000 spent on them. Actually, I was wrong, it is closer to $30,000 dollars a year. But every point of disagreement or complaint Walter had focused around racism. Which led me to my final point of the discussion with his. I asked him why he was so sensitive to the topic of race/racism. He responded that he had a family member who passed in a concentration camp during WWII, mentioning his Jewish roots. Awesome!
This led me to my favorite analogy, which I asked Walter to allow me time to build. He agreed, revealing ultimately his political inconsistencies:
Walter, I will use Bush in my analogy. Let us say for twenty years Bush attended a church that twice prominently displayed David Dukes likeness on the cover of their church’s magazine which reaches 20,000 homes, and a third time alongside Barry Mills (the founder of the Aryan Brotherhood). Even inviting David Duke to the pulpit to receive a “lifetime achievement award.” Even selling sermons by David Duke in the church’s book store. Authors of sermons sold in Bush’s church’s bookstore teach in accordance with Christian Identity’s view that Jews and blacks are offspring of Satan and Eve via a sexual encounter in the Garden of Eden. In the church’s bookstore, the entire time Bush attended, books like Mein Kampf, My Awakening (David Duke), and other blatantly racist books. Even members of the Aryan Brotherhood felt comfortable enough to sit in the pews at times… being that the pastor of the church was once a reverend for the group.
Now Walter, if Bush had gone to a church like that I would walk arm-n-arm with my Democratic comrades in making sure he would never be President. You would expect me to I am sure?
He confirmed my suspicion. I then shared my knowledge of Obama.
I purchased from Obama’s church’s bookstore online 3-books: A Black Theology of Liberation, Black Theology & Black Power, and Is God A White Racist?: A Preamble to Black Theology. In these books Walter, God is said to be against white people, and mirror in their hatred of whites to that of Jews in Mein Kampf, calling both devils.
“The personification of the devil as the symbol of all evil assumes the living shape of the Jew” ~ Adolf Hitler – Mein Kampf
“The goal of black theology is the destruction of everything white, so that blacks can be liberated from alien gods” ~ James Cone, A Black Theology of Liberation, p.62
“White religionists are not capable of perceiving the blackness of God, because their satanic whiteness is a denial of the very essence of divinity. That is why whites are finding and will continue to find the black experience a disturbing reality” ~ James Cone, A Black Theology of Liberation, p.64
Obama’s pastor not only was a minister in The Nation of Islam, an anti-Semitic/racist group, but the church’s book store sells sermons by Louise Farrakhan, who teaches that the white man was created on the Island of Cyprus by a mad scientist, Yakub. (Mr. Farrakhan also believes he was taken up on a UFO to meet God, and was told he was a little messiah, take note also that he was directly involved in the deaths of police officers as well.) Louise Farrakhan was featured twice on the church’s magazine which reach 20,000[plus] homes in the Chicago area. Even placing on the cover with Louise Farrakhan a third time the founder of the Nation of Islam, Elijah Muhammad. Elijah Muhammad likewise taught that the white man was created by Yakub 6,600 years ago. Walter, Louise Farrakhan teaches that the Jews in Israel do not belong there, and that the true Jews are the black people. Louise Farrakhan was invited into Obama’s church, to the pulpit and given a “lifetime achievement award.” In fact, the New Black Panthers and members of the Nation of Islam often times sat in the pews for sermons by Rev. Wright, whom Obama called a mentor.
Mouse Over To See
Another was a montage of faces – black leaders, past and present, with the title “The legacy lives on” – that included Wright, Farrakhan, Nation of Islam founder Elijah Muhammad, Rosa Parks and even O.J. Simpson attorney Johnny Cochran. (Weekly Standard; WND)
So I expect you, Walter, to join arm-and-arm with me on finding out why the media, and Democrats who are so concerned about racism let such a man into office, when, if the tables were turned, I wouldn’t want in office.
Do you know the next thing out of Walter’s mouth was?
✫ “Didn’t Bush speak in a church that forbid interracial marriage?”
I responded that no, it was a speech at Bob Jones University…
… and you are making my point Walter. If that bugs you soo much to mention it during the course of a conversation, why doesn’t Obama’s history more-so irk you? Not to mention the university overturned its silly rule, even Bob Jones said he couldn’t back up that policy with a single verse in the Bible (CNN). Obama’s CHURCH OF TWENTY YEARS has made no such concession.
At this point Walter started to get out of the hot-tub finishing with “well, that’s just your opinion” (meaning my carefully laid out facts and years of study combined with an analogy was hogwash. Walter went his way, and even avoided me when he saw me in the international caffe — even though our conversation was calm, rational, and reasoned. I even asked him permission twice to make my analogies, being polite and respecting his age. Walter is a great example of how Democrats ignore following their own concerns to their logical conclusions, when applied to their own candidate. Sad.
Just a quick note on when John says (see below) that he doubts “the origin of homosexuality will be discussed,” he does not discuss it either (if there is even an “origin” to be discussed). And while I admit to not following John’s every contribution to mankind, I doubt John has ever talked about it either, or, if he has, he proffered internally contradictory points. Okay, diving right in… some points I will be working on throughout the post found in the article:
1) Classification by the leading psychiatric group in America;
2) Native American “gays”;
3) Socrates;
4) Some final thoughts on the immutability of marriage and our culture.
Click to Enlarge
Okay, while trying to be understanding to John Van Huizum’s allotted space given to write within, he shows a lack of depth in his looking into the matter with anything other than his “prejudicial” view. While he tried to be non-prejudicial, he just cannot. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, we are all prejudicial in our views.
That is why knowing about worldviews is soo emphasized in Christian apologetics. A clear understanding of the prejudice in origins, for instance, can open up many avenues to learn about reality and you place in the universe. So while John may say he is trying to be more neutral, I doubt he has done the serious work to examine his own life outside of his prejudicial outlook.
Proverbs 21:2 “You may believe you are doing right [Every person’s path seems right/straight in their own eyes], but the Lord judges your reasons [weighs your heart].”
But I ingress. Moving on.
POINT #1
This is taken from a large response to the Reverend Mel White, a gay man who tries to justify homosexuality via Christianity. He uses the same tact that it is — homosexuality — is not considered a “malady” as well. Here is my response:
The APA vote to normalize homosexuality was driven by politics, not science. Even sympathizers acknowledged this. Ronald Bayer was then a Fellow at the Hastings Institute in New York. He reported how in 1970 the leadership of a homosexual faction within the APA planned a “systematic effort to disrupt the annual meetings of the American Psychiatric Association” [R. Bayer, Homosexuality and American Psychiatry: The Politics of Diagnosis (New York: Basic Books, 1981), p. 102.]They defended this method of “influence” on the grounds that the APA represented “psychiatry as a social institution” rather than a scientific body or professional guild.
At the 1970 meetings, Irving Bieber, an eminent psychoanalyst and psychiatrist, was presenting a paper on “homosexuality and transsexualism.” He was abruptly challenged:
[Bieber's] efforts to explain his position … were met with derisive laughter. . . . [One] protester to call him a . “I’ve read your book, Dr. Bieber, and if that book talked about black people the way it talks about homosexuals, you’d be drawn and quartered and you’d deserve it.” [102-103]
The tactics worked. Acceding to pressure, the organizers of the following APA conference in 1971 agreed to sponsor a special panel—not on homosexuality, but by homosexuals. If the panel was not approved, the program chairman had been warned, “They’re [the homosexual activists] not going to break up just one section” [104].
But the panel was not enough. Bayer continues:
Despite the agreement to allow homosexuals to conduct their own panel discussion at the 1971 convention, gay activists in Washington felt that they had to provide yet another jolt to the psychiatric profession. . . . Too smooth a transition . . . would have deprived the movement of its most important weapon—the threat of disorder…. [They] turned to a Gay Liberation Front collective in Washington to plan the May 1971 demonstration. Together with the collective [they] developed a detailed strategy for disruption, paying attention to the most intricate logistical details.[104-105]
On May 3, 1971, the protesting psychiatrists broke into a meeting of distinguished members of the profession. They grabbed the microphone and turned it over to an outside activist, who declared:
Psychiatry is the enemy incarnate. Psychiatry has waged a relentless war of extermination against us. You may take this as a declaration of war against you. . . . We’re rejecting you all as our owners.[105-106]
No one raised an objection. The activists then secured an appearance before the APA’s Committee on Nomenclature. Its chairman allowed that perhaps homosexual behavior was not a sign of psychiatric disorder, and that the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM) should probably therefore reflect this new understanding.
When the committee met formally to consider the issue in 1973 the outcome had already been arranged behind closed doors. No new data was introduced, and objectors were given only fifteen minutes to present a rebuttal that summarized seventy years of psychiatric and psychoanalytic opinion. When the committee voted as planned, a few voices formally appealed to the membership at large, which can overrule committee decisions even on “scientific” matters.
The activists responded swiftly and effectively. They drafted a letter and sent it to the over thirty thousand members of the APA, urging them “to vote to retain the nomenclature change” [145]. How could the activists afford such a mailing? They purchased the APA membership mailing list after the National Gay Task Force (NGTF) sent out a fund-raising appeal to their membership.
Bayer comments:
Though the NGTF played a central role in this effort, a decision was made not to indicate on the letter that it was written, at least in part, by the Gay Task Force, nor to reveal that its distribution was funded by contributions the Task Force had raised. Indeed, the letter gave every indication of having been conceived and mailed by those [psychiatrists] who [originally] signed it. . . . Though each signer publicly denied any role in the dissimulation, at least one signer had warned privately that to acknowledge the organizational role of the gay community would have been the “kiss of death.”
There is no question however about the extent to which the officers of the APA were aware of both the letter’s origins and the mechanics of its distribution. They, as well as the National Gay Task Force, understood the letter as performing a vital role in the effort to turn back the challenge.[146]
Because a majority of the APA members who responded voted to support the change in the classification of homosexuality, the decision of the Board of Trustees was allowed to stand. But in fact only one-third of the membership did respond. (Four years later the journal Medical Aspects of Human Sexuality reported on a survey it conducted. The survey showed that 69 percent of psychiatrists disagreed with the vote and still considered homosexuality a disorder.) Bayer remarks:
The result was not a conclusion based upon an approximation of the scientific truth as dictated by reason, but was instead an action demanded by the ideological temper of the times. [3-4]
Two years later the American PsychologicalAssociation—the professional psychology guild that is three times larger than the APA—voted to follow suit.
How much the 1973 APA decision was motivated by politics is only becoming clear even now While attending a conference in England in 1994, I met a man who told me an account that he had told no one else. He had been in the gay life for years but had left the lifestyle. He recounted how after the 1973 APA decision he and his lover, along with a certain very highly placed officer of the APA Board of Trustees and his lover, all sat around the officer’s apartment celebrating their victory. For among the gay activists placed high in the APA who maneuvered to ensure a victory was this man—suborning from the top what was presented to both the membership and the public as a disinterested search for truth.
So this graphic by the Reverend White means nothing. Most women I know who are lesbians who have intimated family members of mine their past have all said they were abused by a man in the family. Likewise, the two homosexual men I know well enough to ask, both had a sexual encounter with an older man when they were 14 years old and younger. Lesbian author Tammy Bruce intimates this story in her book:
… and now all manner of sexual perversion enjoys the protection and support of once what was a legitimate civil-rights effort for decent people. The real slippery slope has been the one leading into the Left’s moral vacuum. It is a singular attitude that prohibits any judgment about obvious moral decay because of the paranoid belief that judgment of any sort would destroy the gay lifestyle, whatever that is…. Here come[s] the elephant again: Almost without exception, the gay men I know (and that’s too many to count) have a story of some kind of sexual trauma or abuse in their childhood — molestation by a parent or an authority figure, or seduction as an adolescent at the hands of an adult. The gay community must face the truth and see sexual molestation of an adolescent for the abuse it is, instead of the ‘coming-of-age’ experience many [gays] regard it as being. Until then, the Gay Elite will continue to promote a culture of alcohol and drug abuse, sexual promiscuity, and suicide by AIDS.[21]
Do you think… I am asking you… do you think this is psychological in nature? I mean, raping of boys and these boys growing into men confused, hurt, traumatized (often by a close family confidant) and expressing this confusion in unhealthy lifestyle choices? These men and women are hurting and need counseling, compassion, care, and understanding. But the best way to get this to them is not to normalize the actions done to them and they do to themselves. One author mentions the timing this “reclassification came about:
…it may be just a coincidence that just about at the height of the “sexual revolution” (or devolution) the “evidence from science” changed. Keep in mind that psychiatry and psychology are soft sciences and that secular counseling and education is largely based on the societal trends de jour.[22]
Which brings me to a point I left off with in premise four. Homosexuals make up one to three percent of the population, yet, almost 70% of serial killers are homosexuals… this non-diagnosis in lieu of political correctness and the sexual revolution seems a bit quick and non-scientific, considering the abuse that leads to this lifestyle and crime stemming from this lifestyle.
I have shared in the past the story of Walt Haeyer, a man who through an operation “became a woman,” lived as such for 8-years, while getting a counseling degree dealt with his tragic childhood (as well as becoming a Christian), now lives as a man and is married with kids. Another touching story is by this young man that touched Ravi Zacharias during a Q&A portion of one of his talks:
Now, to be clear, my point is NOT TO POINT fingers at my gay friends and tell them to change. I cannot do that, nor, outside of loving advice, have the authority to do so. That is between them and their God. My point is that the “malady” may not be as immutable as some would have us think. Which then, in my minds eye, translates into harming more the gay man or woman if this reaction to trauma is accepted as completely normalized (given a rubber stamp of approval) by society. I deal with the loving ways to come at this in my official “Cumulative Case” on the topic. But the “bible” of psychiatry is defining new “illnesses” with each publication, and for homosexuality to be stricken from any analysis is harmful when the internet, grief, even thinking about anxiety are all being classified as an illness… but these often times traumatic experiences many face as children and the twisting of their sexual expression since this experience is not a malady. Something is up… and its called politics. I will let Tammy Bruce (a gay woman) take us out:
…these problems don’t remain personal and private. The drive, especially since this issue is associated with the word “gay rights,” is to make sure your worldview reflects theirs. To counter this effort, we must demand that the medical and psychiatric community take off their PC blinders and treat these people responsibly. If we don’t, the next thing you know, your child will be taking a “tolerance” class explaining how “transexuality” is just another “lifestyle choice”…. After all, it is the only way malignant narcissists will ever feel normal, healthy, and acceptable: by remaking society – children – in their image. (Tammy Bruce, The Death of Right and Wrong: Exposing the Left’s Assault on Our Culture and Values [Roseville: Prima, 2003], 92, 206.)
POINT #2
Some acquaintances I have followed for a couple of years [their work], and have a meal or two with, make a great point about the Native-American dealing with homosexuality that is quite different than many in today’s culture care to admit into the dialogue, and that is: gender differences. The fine gentlemen at Gay Patriot, the afore mentioned acquaintances, mentioned his own research into the Native-American (NA) “two-spirits” designation, and I found this very enlightening:
In my grad school paper for my Native American class, I researched the legends of the berdache, or two-spirit. Many cite the berdacge tradition as an example of cultures which accept and embrace homosexuality and same-sex relationships. And while many American Indian tribes recognized same-sex marriages, they all required one partner in such a union to live in the guise of the other sex. Thus, if one man married another man, one would wear men’s clothes and go hunting with the “braves” while the other would have to wear women’s clothes and live as a “squaw.” The one who lived as a woman could not go hunting with his same-sex peers nor could he participate in activities, rituals etc reserved for his biological sex.
California, Massachusetts, and other liberal states are not only pushing for same-sex marriage as a societal equal to hetero marriage, but in the process doing away with gender distinctions. This is a travesty, and in agreement with me are many gay men and women.
I have a larger point though, that will tie into Socrates a bit, and it is this: just because NA’s had gay persons in their society does not answer the very real possibility of abuse of young persons in that society that may be the bedrock of this behavior. In other words, we know today that many people who consider themselves gay had “coming out” experiences when they were young. In fact, one person I know posted in a gay group this question based on one of my posts (see the discussion that ensued here) and ended up proving my point. This will lead into and combine with…
POINT #3
Very bluntly and plainly, Socrates was not “gay,” per se. He was a pedophile, most pedophiles in Grecian days slept with young boys, a homosexual act. Pedophilia became common practice for the well-ta-do, and it took the Judeo-Christian worldview to shake this “habit” from the world in outlawing such actions. “Many men in Ancient Greece had relations with young teens,” however, “being outright gay and having an equal relationship with a same-sex partner was not something that was socially approved of at all.” Plato speaks to the “mean state” that creates the best “by far the safest and most moderate” a society should promote to enhance its quality of life. One should take note that even Plato’s detractor in the end agrees:
Now, what lives are they, and how many in which, having searched out and beheld the objects of will and desire and their opposites, and making of them a law, choosing, I say, the dear and the pleasant and the best and noblest, a man may live in the happiest way possible…
[….]
Speaking generally, our glory is to follow the better and improve the inferior, which is susceptible of improvement, as far as this is possible. And of all human possessions, the soul is by nature most inclined to avoid the evil, and track out and find the chief good; which when a man has found, he should take up his abode with it during the remainder of his life…. every one will perceive, comes the honour of the body in natural order. Having determined this, we have next to consider that there is a natural honour of the body, and that of honours some are true and some are counterfeit…. but the mean states of all these habits are by far the safest and most moderate;
[….]
…but they will not wholly extirpate [root out]the unnatural loves which have been the destruction of states; and against this evil what remedy can be devised?…
[….]
Either men may learn to abstain wholly from any loves, natural or unnatural, except of their wedded wives; or, at least, they may give up unnatural loves; or, if detected, they shall be punished with loss of citizenship, as aliens from the state in their morals. ‘I entirely agree with you,’ said Megillus,…
Another piece to the puzzle comes from an excellent apologetic about this very subject. In it we find this:
Aeschines (390-314? BC), in his work Against Timarchus, acknowledged that there were laws on the books that prohibited sexual harassment or assault of young boys.5
1. He further records that Greek law prohibited male prostitutes from holding office in civic affairs, or participating in religious observances.
2. He recognized that laws that regulate moral conduct are the best means of establishing and maintaining an orderly society.
3. This work indicates that there were laws prohibiting these things, and that the punishment was fine or death, depending on the severity of the offense.
So, even in Greece, you had a behavior that was rejected as unnatural, and never accepted in a moral category as “the norm.” So nothing John cites or references would support Prop 8 or the peoples will in California to keep marriage what it has been, a relation between a man and woman (specifically, one man and one woman).
CONCLUDING THOUGHTS
Per John’s usual modus operandi, he has connected ideas that have no relation or equal to the current issue, and are by themselves arguments against his position. But I wanted to end with a recent response to a friend that deals with this “mean” that Plato references, the “good” that any society should strive towards. And while I am a Christian and think that theism gives the most powerful “mean” to the “best and noblest, a man may live in the happiest way possible,” one should keep in mind that one can do the same even as an atheist. Here is my response:
(Nature Uncaring) True. Dawkins for instance says rape being morally wrong in our current culture is as inconsequential as us evolving 5 rather than 4 fingers. So morally speaking nature is cruel, without — that is — a matrix placed on it that is above nature. Something only the theistic worldview can offer. That being said, we can access the “book of nature,” if you will, to codify things that exist, like: the “law of gravity,” the “law of conservation,” the “law of thermodynamics,” the “law of motion.” These have always existed, but at some point were “discovered,” or codified. Similarly the “laws of thought” (logic) have always existed, but Aristotle codified many of them.
Nature (if that is all you believe in) has created a “way,” an “institution” that mankind has always accessed, and was codified in the cultural sense throughout mankind’s history. So much like Calvin Coolidge saying the “men do not make laws – they do but discover them,” making laws an “ought” should be grounded in something larger than man (like the judges did in the Nuremberg Trials). But you can also merely describe, which I did in a series of questions from you many years ago (http://tinyurl.com/ahxedmf):
————————————- However, there is a “created order,” or, even a natural order (if you do not believe in God). My argument for heterosexual (between a man and a woman) unions is usable both by the atheist (non believer in God) and the theist (a believer in God – in the Judeo-Christian sense). Here is the crux of the matter in regards to “nature’s order:”
✤ “…take gold as an example, it has inherent in its nature intrinsic qualities that make it expensive: good conductor of electricity, rare, never tarnishes, and the like. The male and female have the potential to become a single biological organism, or single organic unit, or principle. Two essentially becoming one. The male and female, then, have inherent to their nature intrinsic qualities that two mated males or two mated females never actualize in their courtship… nor can they ever. The potential stays just that, potential, never being realized…..
✤ “….Think of a being that reproduces, not by mating, but by some act performed by individuals. Imagine that for these same beings, movement and digestion is performed not by individuals, but only by the complementary pairs that unite for this purpose. Would anyone acquainted with such beings have difficulty understanding that in respect to movement and digestion, the organism is a united pair, or an organic unity?”
So you see, the two heterosexual organisms that join in a sexual union cease being two separate organisms for a short time and become one organism capable of reproduction. This is what the state and the church are sealing in a marriage, this intrinsic union. The homosexual couple can never achieve this union, so “natures order” has endowed the heterosexual union with an intrinsic quality that other relationships do not have or could never attain. Both the atheist and theist can argue from this point, because either we were created this way or we evolved this way. Either way, nature has imposed on the sexual union being discussed. —————————————–
I will make the point as well, that as society moves away from the matrix our Founding documents are overlay’ed with, the human (the gay man/women specifically) will have his humanity threatened. You see, in the Judeo-Christian matrix, the homosexual has intrinsic worth. (The authors of the book “Relativism: Feet Firmly Planted in Mid-Air” make this point in deeper philosophical argument than I.) And as people move further away from nature’s order, a form of “worth” anarchy will break out. Two people that saw this first hand comment well on the matter. The first is the author of “The Gulag Archipelago,” by Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn. He says this in his Templeton Address:
More than half a century ago, while I was still a child, I recall hearing a number of older people offer the following explanation for the great disasters that had befallen Russia: Men have forgotten God; that’s why all this has happened.
Since then I have spent well-nigh fifty years working on the history of our Revolution; in the process I have read hundreds of books, collected hundreds of personal testimonies, and have already contributed eight volumes of my own toward the effort of clearing away the rubble left by that upheaval. But if I were asked today to formulate as concisely as possible the main cause of the ruinous Revolution that swallowed up some sixty million of our people, I could not put it more accurately than to repeat: Men have forgotten God; that’s why all this has happened.
What is more, the events of the Russian Revolution can only be understood now, at the end of the century, against the background of what has since occurred in the rest of the world. What emerges here is a process of universal significance. And if I were called upon to identify briefly the principal trait of the entire twentieth century, here too, I would be unable to find anything more precise and pithy than to repeat once again: Men have forgotten God.
The failings of human consciousness, deprived of its divine dimension, have been a determining factor in all the major crimes of this century. The first of these was World War I, and much of our present predicament can be traced back to it. It was a war (the memory of which seems to be fading) when Europe, bursting with health and abundance, fell into a rage of self-mutilation which could not but sap its strength for a century or more, and perhaps forever. The only possible explanation for this war is a mental eclipse among the leaders of Europe due to their lost awareness of a Supreme Power above them….
Men have forgotten God.
Tammy Bruce, a lesbian, notes our current culture:
————————- Even if one does not necessarily accept the institutional structure of “organized religion,” the “Judeo-Christian ethic and the personal standards it encourages do not impinge on the quality of life, but enhance it. They also give one a basic moral template that is not relative,” which is why the legal positivists of the Left are so threatened by the Natural Law aspect of the Judeo-Christian ethic.”
[....]
The moral vacuum did rear its ugly head during the 1960s with the blurring of the lines of right and wrong (remember “situational ethics”?), the sexual revolution, and the consequent emergence of the feminist and gay civil-rights movements. It’s not the original ideas of these movements, mind you, that caused and have perpetuated the problems we’re discussing. It was and remains the few in power who project their destructive sense of themselves onto the innocent landscape, all the while influencing and conditioning others. Today, not only is the blight not being faced, but in our Looking-Glass world, AIDS is romanticized and sought after…
Tammy Bruce, The Death of Right and Wrong: Exposing the Left’s Assault on Our Culture and Values (Roseville: Prima, 2003), 35, 97. —————————-
CHANGE OF DIRECTION AND QUESTION:
SO, LET US MOVE to what “matrix” you see as being the most beneficial to human worth [especially to the gay man/woman] out of the only available to mankind. The seven world views. But out of the biggies (pantheism, theism, and atheism), which do you see the one lifting mankind up to the pinnacle of an ontological worth not found in nature?
And this is key, which direction will afford the American experiment the maximum liberty COUPLED WITH what Nature and Nature’s Laws/Author has wrought for the happiest “mean” we can attain? This is the battle and question before mankind right now… however, as Gay Patriot pointed out in the post entitled, Silencing and slurring those with politically incorrect views, much of the voting population are “low-info” (non-thinking) people who have lost the art to do anything other than “resort to name-calling and ostracism of individuals who oppose their cause.”
A liberal professor takes umbrage with this new wave of non-thinking, and even says it harms the intellectual “mean,” if you will, of the liberal person this thinking infects. And as you can see in two discussions I was in recently (here, and here – same person) any semblance of maturity in dialogue and learning and admitting, maybe, just maybe, the positions taken are in fact not a tenable position. but in our society where people elevate opinion as truth, and pride in Narcissism is the prevailing guide… you will never get much beyond being called sexist, intolerant, xenophobic, homophobic, Islamophobic, racist, bigoted (S.I.X.H.I.R.B.). Or as Doug Mainwaring says in his article that Gay Patriot linked to, “anti-science, homophobic, misogynist, racist, xenophobic, Neanderthal.”
Political correctness seeks to silence all opposition to the advancement of progressive ideology. Those who manipulate the power of political correctness appear on the surface to be the good-hearted, the vulnerable, and the victimized. Whether as individuals, as organizations, or as cultural groups, they present a picture of innocence and goodness, of unparalleled magnanimity and empathy. Yet like Anthony, their appearance is deceiving. They demand total fealty. And if you don’t think the “happy thoughts” they want you to, their outward appearance gives way to vindictiveness and the same swift, disproportionate punishments that little Anthony meted out.
They want to be constantly affirmed, never challenged, never questioned, never judged. If they sense you don’t agree with them, you are immediately judged to be a “bad person, with bad thoughts.” They intimidate you into silence, until outwardly you only express happy thoughts, i.e., expressions of vigorous agreement with and the moral goodness of their will. For individuals and organizations who do not bend to their will, like Anthony, they wish their detractors out to the cornfield. Their version of the cornfield is the constant threat of social isolation, of being unloved and disrespected.
Pick any issue currently being advanced by progressives — same-sex marriage, state-mandated free contraception, abortion, man-made global warming and strict gun control, to name a few. Publicly question or resist any of these and be prepared to be judged as an anti-science, homophobic, misogynist, racist, xenophobic, Neanderthal.
Until people begin to inform themselves on how to think, we will never have good legislation in most states. States that have the “perfect storm” of rational thinking and dialogue (like New Hampshire) come up with the greatest liberty and “good” for their citizens in this experiment we call the States… however, John is far from this experiment’s stated goals by the authors of supporting the New Government and the Constitution:
“…we have no government, armed with power, capable of contending with human passions, unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge and licentiousness would break the strongest cords of our Constitution, as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” ~ John Adams
Now, before I post the exact same critique of the above “meme/quote” I placed on a friends mom’s FaceBook, I wish to note a few things about the “interaction” that followed. Firstly, this action taken by D.N. (friend’s mom) proves yet again that conservatives are much more tolerant than liberals. A study shows that “liberals more likely to block social-media friends over political differences,” here is Daily Caller’s take:
According to a new poll from the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project, self-described liberals are twice as likely than self-described conservatives to block material on social networking websites that they find politically disagreeable.
Thirty-six percent of social media users said they have blocked, “unfriended” or hidden someone because of politics, but left-leaning participants were far more likely to have taken that action to express disagreement about a friend’s political views.
“Liberals are the most likely to have taken … steps to block, unfriend, or hide” disagreeable political messages, Pew concluded. “In all, 28% of liberals have blocked, unfriended, or hidden someone on SNS [social networking sites] because of one of these reasons, compared with 16% of conservatives and 14% of moderates.”
Sixteen percent of liberal users said they blocked someone who posted something specific that they disagreed with, compared to eight percent of conservative users.
Liberals are also far more likely than conservatives — 11 percent compared with 4 percent — to completely delete friends from social networking sites because they disagree with their politics.
There has been no word — nor will there likely be any — about whether liberals will enjoy reading this story. Many, if the Pew study is to be believed, will just block it from their news feeds.
Which happened, I was “unfriended.” But here is the kicker, the week prior D.N. got onto my FaceBook and essentially called me a small minded racist bigot! And I quote our conversation:
(She said) “Black people and white people weren’t allowed get married years ago either… if small minded, bigoted people had their way it would still be that way. Gay marriage Is NO different…. religious folks who believe and support same sex marriage ?? They must not be real religious people.”
(I Responded) In other words, a discussion to you is calling me and other readers here “bigots,” and impugning the character of religious gays by creating straw-man arguments of what I (we) say/mean? And when I politely point this out by not pointing out how you name call and use “cards” (sexist, intolerant, xenophobic, homophobic, Islamophobic, racist, bigoted ~ S.I.X.H.I.R.B.)….
An interesting thought just came to mind as well. In our previous conversation she mentioned that there are religiously left-leaning people, and that I shouldn’t hold back or discount their thinking, but take into account their thinking BECAUSE they are religious. This was not clearly stated by her, but it was implied. Yet, she apparently does not see the self-refuting aspect of the graphic she posted on her own FaceBook and her previous statement to me. How convenient that she doesn’t practice what she expects others to hold to. If you are conservative and religious, you have no right to force your feelings on people. If you are liberal and religious, game-on!
I didn’t unfriend her? She got onto my FaceBook and called me a racist bigot. Yet, I pointed out the flaws in Judge Judy’s quote and for this, I was ex-communicated. Why? Because leftism is the dominant religion of her being. Here is what I wrote, and what I was doing is making two points that the Judge characterized wrongly the debate with:
1) that this is a solely religious argument, and; 2) she herself is pushing her morality on others.
Here we go:
This isn’t a religious argument? For instance, here is an atheist gay man explaining why he is against same-sex marriage:
—————————————————— One of the most respected Canadian sociologist/scholar/homosexual, Paul Nathanson, writes that there are at least five functions that marriage serves–things that every culture must do in order to survive and thrive. They are:
✫ Foster the bonding between men and women ✫ Foster the birth and rearing of children ✫Foster the bonding between men and children ✫Foster some form of healthy masculine identity ✫ Foster the transformation of adolescents into sexually responsible adults
Note that Nathanson considers these points critical to the continued survival of any culture. He continues “Because heterosexuality is directly related to both reproduction and survival, … every human societ[y] has had to promote it actively . … Heterosexuality is always fostered by a cultural norm” that limits marriage to unions of men and women. He adds that people “are wrong in assuming that any society can do without it.”
Going further he stated that “same sex marriage is a bad idea” …[he] only opposed “gay marriage, not gay relationships.”
And then I posted this short video of another gay man explaining the importance of marriage and how same-sex marriage will undefine it:
Then I zeroed in on the statement that religious people are “forcing their morality on other.” I quoted the following mock-conversation to make the point clear via an old philosophy paper of mine:
You Shouldn’t Force Your Morality On Me![1]
✤ First Person: “You shouldn’t force your morality on me.”
♚ Second Person: “Why not?”
✤ First Person: “Because I don’t believe in forcing morality.”
♚ Second Person: “If you don’t believe in it, then by all means, don’t do it. Especially don’t force that moral view of yours on me.”
=====================================
✤ First Person: “You shouldn’t push your morality on me.”
♚ Second Person: “I’m not entirely sure what you mean by that statement. Do you mean I have no right to an opinion?”
✤ First Person: “You have a right to you’re opinion, but you have no right to force it on anyone.”
♚ Second Person: “Is that your opinion?”
✤ First Person: “Yes.”
♚ Second Person: “Then why are you forcing it on me?”
✤ First Person: “But your saying your view is right.”
♚ Second Person: “Am I wrong?”
✤ First Person: “Yes.”
♚ Second Person: “Then your saying only your view is right, which is the very thing you objected to me saying.”
=====================================
✤ First Person: “You shouldn’t push your morality on me.”
♚ Second Person: “Correct me if I’m misunderstanding you here, but it sounds to me like your telling me I’m wrong.”
✤ First Person: “You are.”
♚ Second Person: “Well, you seem to be saying my personal moral view shouldn’t apply to other people, but that sounds suspiciously like you are applying your moral view to me. Why are you forcing your morality on me?”
Self-Defeating
“Most of the problems with our culture can be summed up in one phrase: ‘Who are you to say?’” – Dennis Prager. So lets unpack this phrase and see how it is self-refuting, or as Tom Morris[2] put it, self-deleting.
When someone says, “Who are you to say?” answer with, “Who are you to say ‘Who are you to say’?” [3]
This person is challenging your right to correct another, yet she is correcting you. Your response to her amounts to “Who are you to correct my correction, if correcting in itself is wrong?” or “If I don’t have the right to challenge your view, then why do you have the right to challenge mine?” Her objection is self-refuting; you’re just pointing it out.
The “Who are you to say?” challenge fails on another account. Taken at face value, the question challenges one’s authority to judge another’s conduct. It says, in effect, “What authorizes you to make a rule for others? Are you in charge?” This challenge miscasts my position. I don’t expect others to obey me simply because I say so. I’m appealing to reason, not asserting my authority. It’s one thing to force beliefs; it’s quite another to state those beliefs and make an appeal for them.
The “Who are you to say?” complaint is a cheap shot. At best it’s self-defeating. It’s an attempt to challenge the legitimacy of your moral judgments, but the statement itself implies a moral judgment. At worst, it legitimizes anarchy!
[1] Francis Beckwith & Gregory Koukl, Relativism: Feet Planted in Mid-Air (Baker Books; 1998), p. 144-146.
[2] Tom Morris, Philosophy for Dummies (IDG Books; 1999), p. 46
[3] Francis Beckwith & Gregory Koukl, Relativism: Feet Planted in Mid-Air (Baker Books; 1998), p. 144-146.”
I ended with the “you aren’t doing this debate/discussion/national dialogue and good by posting un-truths like the above Judge Judy quote” type finisher. As she unfriended me she said I was saying wacko things? Personally, the above is astute, full of knowledge and close to the heart information by gay men.
In a final word to me, D.N. mentioned that one of her sons said this would happen? What would happen? She would not be unfriended for calling me a small minded racist bigot on my own FaceBook, but that she would unfriend me after Gay men spoke to the immutability of the heterosexual union? Her son said that would happen? I don’t think so.
And she is one who would say that the right is creating an air of divisiveness. What a crazy, unthinking, low-voter information world we live in.
One last point not included in the original conversation, but that I believe to be salient to the tactic used by Judge Judy and the myriad of other who think such statements make sense. Use Judge Judy’s words in regards to these other examples where Christianity led the way, “They have no right to impose their feelings on the rest of us.”
…Such “exclude religion” arguments are wrong because marriage is not a religion! When voters define marriage, they are not establishing a religion. In the First Amendment, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” the word “religion” refers to the church that people attend and support. “Religion” means being a Baptist or Catholic or Presbyterian or Jew. It does not mean being married. These arguments try to make the word “religion” in the Constitution mean something different from what it has always meant.
These arguments also make the logical mistake of failing to distinguish the reasons for a law from the content of the law. There were religious reasons behind many of our laws, but these laws do not “establish” a religion. All major religions have teachings against stealing, but laws against stealing do not “establish a religion.” All religions have laws against murder, but laws against murder do not “establish a religion.” The campaign to abolish slavery in the United States and England was led by many Christians, based on their religious convictions, but laws abolishing slavery do not “establish a religion.” The campaign to end racial discrimination and segregation was led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., a Baptist pastor, who preached against racial injustice from the Bible. But laws against discrimination and segregation do not “establish a religion.”
If these “exclude religion” arguments succeed in court, they could soon be applied against evangelicals and Catholics who make “religious” arguments against abortion. Majority votes to protect unborn children could then be invalidated by saying these voters are “establishing a religion.” And, by such reasoning, all the votes of religious citizens for almost any issue could be found invalid by court decree! This would be the direct opposite of the kind of country the Founding Fathers established, and the direct opposite of what they meant by “free exercise” of religion in the First Amendment.
[....]
Historian Alvin Schmidt points out how the spread of Christianity and Christian influence on government was primarily responsible for outlawing infanticide, child abandonment, and abortion in the Roman Empire (in AD 374); outlawing the brutal battles-to-the-death in which thousands of gladiators had died (in 404); outlawing the cruel punishment of branding the faces of criminals (in 315); instituting prison reforms such as the segregating of male and female prisoners (by 361); stopping the practice of human sacrifice among the Irish, the Prussians, and the Lithuanians as well as among other nations; outlawing pedophilia; granting of property rights and other protections to women; banning polygamy (which is still practiced in some Muslim nations today); prohibiting the burning alive of widows in India (in 1829); outlawing the painful and crippling practice of binding young women’s feet in China (in 1912); persuading government officials to begin a system of public schools in Germany (in the sixteenth century); and advancing the idea of compulsory education of all children in a number of European countries.
During the history of the church, Christians have had a decisive influence in opposing and often abolishing slavery in the Roman Empire, in Ireland, and in most of Europe (though Schmidt frankly notes that a minority of “erring” Christian teachers have supported slavery in various centuries). In England, William Wilberforce, a devout Christian, led the successful effort to abolish the slave trade and then slavery itself throughout the British Empire by 1840.
In the United States, though there were vocal defenders of slavery among Christians in the South, they were vastly outnumbered by the many Christians who were ardent abolitionists, speaking, writing, and agitating constantly for the abolition of slavery in the United States. Schmidt notes that two-thirds of the American abolitionists in the mid-1830s were Christian clergymen, and he gives numerous examples of the strong Christian commitment of several of the most influential of the antislavery crusaders, including Elijah Lovejoy (the first abolitionist martyr), Lyman Beecher, Edward Beecher, Harriet Beecher Stowe (author of Uncle Tom’s Cabin), Charles Finney, Charles T. Torrey, Theodore Weld, William Lloyd Garrison, “and others too numerous to mention.” The American civil rights movement that resulted in the outlawing of racial segregation and discrimination was led by Martin Luther King Jr., a Christian pastor, and supported by many Christian churches and groups.
There was also strong influence from Christian ideas and influential Christians in the formulation of the Magna Carta in England (1215) and of the Declaration of Independence (1776) and the Constitution (1787) in the United States. These are three of the most significant documents in the history of governments on the earth, and all three show the marks of significant Christian influence in the foundational ideas of how governments should function.
Wayne Grudem, Politics According to the Bible [Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2010], 31, 49-50.
This is a short, 6-point reason why I believe same-sex marriage should not be “normalized” by society as a whole — THAT IS, gay-unions should not be placed in importance, culturally, as equal in its benefiting society. Gender differences are important and have a great and lasting benefit to society. It always will. THIS should be celebrated and understood in the meaning of marriage. All while not chasing gays to the outskirts of society or denying them civil-unions. (My positions below would not be against civil unions, to be clear.) Again, this is not meant to be an in-depth expose, but merely a statement, or cumulative case against “normalizing” this type of relationship. Gay men and women are people who deserve love, respect, AND God’s grace from his believers (some of which are in fact gay). At the same time we can practice that while standing firm against having government authorizing something that is not the bedrock of its foundations, that is, relationships wrought by nature or God as the ideal for producing AND raising offspring in.
➊BECAUSE JESUS SAID — I start out with this because every Christian should. We have a reference point, a guide, and it should be consulted — first, along with Natural Law and biology/nature, as well as other great moral and religious thinkers:
✞“Without guidance, people fall, but with many counselors there is deliverance” (Proverbs 11:14);
✞“Plans fail when there is no counsel, but with many advisers they succeed” (Proverbs 15:22);
✞“…for you should wage war [culture war] with sound guidance—victory comes with many counselors” (Proverbs 24:6).
Before reading the following, when I posted the points below originally, I got this response from one reader:
➳ ➳ J.M.
I don’t have time to read this right now but it’s very telling that you started your reasoning with the word Jesus. People aren’t going to agree with you just because Jesus does.
➳ ➳ ME
And that is why most of my points are non-Biblical. But if people argue from the Bible, they should argue [from it] correctly… which was my main point with J.S.’s cousin.
There is a deeper issue at work in this discussion, and it is this:
“… I was riding in a cab in London and happened to mention something about Jesus to the driver. Immediately he retorted, “I don’t like to discuss religion, especially Jesus.” I couldn’t help but notice the similarity of his reaction to my own when the young Christian woman told me that Jesus Christ had changed her life. The very name Jesus seems to bother people. It embarrasses them, makes them angry, or makes them want to change the subject. You can talk about God, and people don’t necessarily get upset, but mention Jesus, and people want to stop the conversation. Why don’t the names of Buddha, Muhammad, or Confucius offend people the way the name of Jesus does? I think the reason is that these other religious leaders didn’t claim to be God. That is the big difference between Jesus and the others.” (Josh and Sean McDowell, More Than a Carpenter [Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 2009], 9.)
Jesus Himself claimed to be the great “YHWH” (Hebrew), or, the “Ego Eimi” (Greek) of the Old Testament (Exodus 3:14; John 8:48-59). So not only was Jesus referring (Matthew 19:4-6) directly to the ideal of the biological union (two becoming one) in Genesis 2:24, AS-WELL-AS the ideal God wanted all nations to follow, He was in a sense “quoting Himself.” So Jesus spoke very publicly about the homosexual “relationship.” HE spoke in Leviticus as well when mandating actions for all nations (mankind) in Leviticus 18:21-22, Leviticus 20:13. As well as being involved in inspiring Romans 1:26-27, 1 Timothy 1:8-10. One last example from a previous dialogue, someone mentioned to me that, “Jesus never mentions homosexuality in the bible.”
➳ ➳ To which I respond:
You are wrong, Jesus specifically mentions the ideal in Matthew 19:4-6:
He answered, “Haven’t you read in your Bible that the Creator originally made man and woman for each other, male and female? And because of this, a man leaves father and mother and is firmly bonded to his wife, becoming one flesh—no longer two bodies but one. Because God created this organic union of the two sexes, no one should desecrate his art by cutting them apart.” (The Message Bible ~ Red is Jesus)
Jesus was making note of gender and gender importance in this union, which should be celebrated as the ideal for a healthy society. In a Constitutional Republic, which can compromise and debate, civil-unions are what should be allowed. That does not mean I or others will cease in our moral case and concern for those we love, but it means a gay man or woman can know that any well-thought-out opposition comes from a place of love and not bigotry. My goal as a Christian is to be persuasive enough to change hearts and minds, all while being a friend and confident. That is a tough line to walk. But as a member of the larger American “body-politic,” I need to recognize our form of government and keep IT safe against progressive attacks. In this endeavor I count many gay friends and acquaintances.
Again, to be clear, much like some atheists taking proselytization as a bigoted attack against their non-faith, others (Like Penn Jillette’s example to the right) can choose to realize that it is done out of love and concern. Similarly, the LGBT community can choose to take this concern (above and below) as a personal attack against them, or, choose to realize it is done from a place of love and concern. Approaching life as one of the other as well will dictate in a small way if one is happy and has a wide variety of friends/acquaintances, or a miserable life — the “woe is me” complex, or “victicrat” mentality Larry Elder refers to often — surrounded by a small group of “mini-me’s” regurgitating thoughts in a sound-room. This last thought should be seen as a challenge to believers as well.
➋GENERAL HEALTH — To explain why I end a couple of points with “THIS is the loving thing to do,” is because I was challenged with Scripture to “love my neighbor.” The person was equating acceptance of same-sex marriage with love. So I responded with the really loving thing to do.
If one of my boys came up to me and mentioned they were gay, my first concern would be their physical health. The death rate and the passing of bacteria directly into the blood stream in the gay relationship is very high. The CDC, to use one example, says that In 2008, “men who have sex with men (MSM) accounted for 63% of primary and secondary syphilis cases in the United States.” The gay population of men is about 1.6% of the U.S. population. “… [N]ature designed the human rectum for a single purpose: expelling waste from the body. It is built of a thin layer of columnar cells, different in structure than the plate cells that line the female reproductive tract. Because the wall of the rectum is so thin, it is easily ruptured during intercourse, allowing semen, blood, feces, and saliva to directly enter the bloodstream. The chances for infection increases further when multiple partners are involved, as is frequently the case: Surveys indicate that American male homosexuals average between 10 and 110 sex partners per year (L. Corey and K. K. Holmes, ‘Sexual Transmission of Hepatitis A in Homosexual Men,’ New England Journal of Medicine; and, Paul Cameron et al., ‘Sexual Orientation and Sexually Transmitted Disease,’ Nebraska Medical Journal). Not surprisingly, these diseases shorten life expectancy” (http://tinyurl.com/8jr3tt2). (Other diseases of course include HIV, and also: gonorrhea, herpes, hepatitis A and B, a variety of intestinal parasites including amebiases and giardiasis, and even typhoid fever at much higher rates.)
An in-depth study by a large insurance company which provides quotes from more than 200 insurers to people across the US, pointed out that gay men have a life expectancy 20 years shorter than heterosexual men (http://tinyurl.com/bnuspjv). An ALL POINTS BULLETIN going out to the Left: the gay lifestyle takes more years off of one’s life than smoking. Where are all the campaigns trying to save lives? Do you not care about gay men and women?
Here is a graph from the CDC tracking Syphilis from 2007-2011, something NARTH says that the newest 2012 report “finds that STDs continue to threaten the health and well-being of millions of Americans, particularly gay and bisexual men and young people.”
Source: CDC
Click to enlarge
“Trend data available for the first time this year [speaking about the updated 2012 CDC report] show that primary and secondary syphilis cases – the most infectious stages of the disease — are increasing among gay and other men who have sex with men, who now account for more than 70 percent of all infections. If not adequately treated, syphilis can lead to paralysis, dementia and death. Syphilis infection can also place a person at increased risk for HIV infection. Given the high prevalence of HIV in the gay community, increasing syphilis infections among gay and bisexual men are particularly troubling.” (NARTH)
So if a homosexual male truly loved his partner, he would abstain from any sodomy type acts (this included hetero as well). If someone has a true friend who happens to be gay, they will in moments of friendship, counsel them to do the same — that is, curb gay sexual acts. In other words, society allows people to smoke, but it doesn’t encourage the action. I grew up in an era where “Marlborough” was on Formula One cars, TV shows had smoking, etc No more, and the truth about the consequences of smoking is passed on to young people. The homosexual lifestyle is not a healthy choice, and it isn’t an alternative lifestyle. And it shouldn’t be held up to young minds as being equal — talking health wise — to the hetero lifestyle. While showing my son love, I would challenge him to curb his desires, as society should as well.
THIS is the LOVING thing to do.
➌SAME-SEX MARRIAGE IS AT ODDS WITH THE CONSTITUTION — Same-sex marriage as pushed by liberals is in direct conflict to enumerated protections in the Constitution. In Massachusetts, and now it is happening in Illinois. The oldest (in the nation), most successful foster and adoption care organization has closed its doors because they would be forced to adopt to same-sex couples. Lets peer into who this would affect:
☕“Everyone’s still reeling from the decision,” Marylou Sudders, executive director of the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (MSPCC), said yesterday. “Ultimately, the only losers are the kids,” said Maureen Flatley, a Boston adoption consultant and lobbyist. (http://tinyurl.com/a5ypfle)
So these marriages hurt many heterosexual persons as well as children in finding families. And “religion/religious institutions” are specifically protected via that founding document, the Constitution — gay marriage is not. Which is why many of the conservative gay men and women I know rejects the agenda by the Left in this push. There are other areas this affects the heterosexual, as do all “special rights” and not “equal rights.” But the above example should show this is not a neutral idea.
The formal effect of the judicial decisions (and subsequent legislation) establishing same-sex civil marriage in Canada was simply that persons of the same-sex could now have the government recognize their relationships as marriages. But the legal and cultural effect was much broader. What transpired was the adoption of a new orthodoxy: that same-sex relationships are, in every way, the equivalent of traditional marriage, and that same-sex marriage must therefore be treated identically to traditional marriage in law and public life.
A corollary is that anyone who rejects the new orthodoxy must be acting on the basis of bigotry and animus toward gays and lesbians. Any statement of disagreement with same-sex civil marriage is thus considered a straightforward manifestation of hatred toward a minority sexual group. Any reasoned explanation (for example, those that were offered in legal arguments that same-sex marriage is incompatible with a conception of marriage that responds to the needs of the children of the marriage for stability, fidelity, and permanence—what is sometimes called the conjugal conception of marriage), is dismissed right away as mere pretext. 1
When one understands opposition to same-sex marriage as a manifestation of sheer bigotry and hatred, it becomes very hard to tolerate continued dissent. Thus it was in Canada that the terms of participation in public life changed very quickly. Civil marriage commissioners were the first to feel the hard edge of the new orthodoxy; several provinces refused to allow commissioners a right of conscience to refuse to preside over same-sex weddings, and demanded their resignations. 2 At the same time, religious organizations, such as the Knights of Columbus, were fined for refusing to rent their facilities for post-wedding celebrations. 3
Now, the above examples do not have to be the case. Civil-unions can co-exist alongside marriage and religious institutions if the Left isn’t in control of the culture war. Which is also why many gay men and women stand arm-and-arm with people against same-sex marriage and exploitation or twisting of nature (the “genderless” agenda). Gay Patriot eruditely points out that it has been done, and when done correctly, can be a wonderful thing:
In New Hampshire, for example, then-Governor Lynch vetoed a bill passed by the legislature recognizing same-sex unions in his state. He was personally opposed to gay marriage. After the veto, responsible voices reached out to him and helped craft a religious liberty clause to tack on to the legislation. With that amendment in place, the legislature voted again; the governor signed the new law. Same-sex couples would get the benefits of marriage. And religious groups had a guarantee that they could continue to define marriage in accordance with the dictates of their faith.
This understanding and firm stand against the progressive agenda is needed, especially from the gay community. One astute post on the matter points out that the views of what constitutes marriage within the LGBT community are varied and wide:
The reasons for gay objections to same-sex marriage are varied. Some are moral, some political, some religious. Some gay individuals believe that marriage should not be state-sanctioned at all; that it should be a purely civil matter. Others believe that if the government subsidizes marriage with financial benefits, it should subsidize marriages that promote the traditional nuclear family with a mother and father. Still others take a more stereotypical view, and claim that homosexual relationships are more about sex and lust than love.
Whatever the rationale, it’s important to note that homosexuality is a sexual orientation, not a social or political group – opinions among LGBT individuals are as varied as LGBT individuals themselves. As same-sex marriage becomes more commonplace across the U.S., don’t automatically rely on gay men and women to support it.
Which is why many gays are against this relation being celebrated as equal to that of the heterosexual underpinnings of society, see number six for some more examples.
➍MUTABLE CHARACTERISTICS — Homosexuality is often times due to trauma early in the person’s life. So, for instance, my mom knew quite a few lesbians throughout her life as a hippie/druggy, who now loves Jesus but through life choices lives in a mobile home park… where a few more lesbians are friends with my mom and her husband. She told me that they had all been abused by some older man (often a family member) when they were young. Also, the men I have known well-enough to intimate to me their early lives also have corroborated such encounters (one was a family member, the other not). Which brings me to a quote by a lesbian author I love:
✿ “Here come the elephant again: Almost without exception, the gay men I know (and that’s too many to count) have a story of some kind of sexual trauma or abuse in their childhood — molestation by a parent or an authority figure, or seduction as an adolescent at the hands of an adult. The gay community must face the truth and see sexual molestation of an adolescent for the abuse it is, instead of the ‘coming-of-age’ experience many [gays] regard it as being. Until then, the Gay Elite will continue to promote a culture of alcohol and drug abuse, sexual promiscuity, and suicide by AIDS” (Tammy Bruce, The Death of Right and Wrong: Exposing the Left’s Assault on Our Culture and Values [Roseville: Prima, 2003], 99).
You see, much like this man who had a sex operation, lived as a woman for 8-years, and then was forced to deal with his early life after taking some courses to get a degree in counseling via U.C. Irvine, his gender problems came because of trauma at a young age (http://tinyurl.com/b5c9elj). To put a stamp of approval via society on a “choice” that is caused by anothers “choice” in making these relationships equal, is doing more harm to the individual that good (as Walt Heyer also points out in his book, mentioned in the link). Many have changed their sexual orientation from gay to hetero, as shown above. But if this is the case, then it is very UNLIKE ethnic origins (http://tinyurl.com/anrvm64).
THE LOVING thing to do is to allow society to not make the private actions of individual illegal, but not to normalize these actions when there is another root cause, or a combination of root causes, other than genetics.
A liberal society might, then, find it prudent to ignore homosexuality. It might well deem it unwise to peer into private bedrooms. However, this is not the issue before us. Today the demand is that homosexuality be endorsed and promoted with the full power of the law. This would require us to abandon the standard of nature, the one standard that can teach us the difference between freedom and slavery, between right and wrong. (Source)
➎FIRST TIME IN HISTORY — No society, no great moral teacher, no major world religious founder ever approved of the normalization of the homosexual lifestyle (http://tinyurl.com/amskd6o). This is the first generation to want to legalize gay-marriage. “Marriage,” has been defined a certain way for eons (man + woman or women). Changing the definition in a society for the first time in world history is the EXTREMIST position. Do you understand? The left has done a bang-up job in making those who want to keep the definition as “one man one woman” as the extremists. Persons — hetero and gay — who want to keep marriage as “one man one woman” are not the extremists.
➏ NATURE WROUGHT THIS RELATIONSHIP FOR SOCIETAL MEANS (WHETHER GOD OR BY NATURE) — The male and female are two separate organisms that are the only species in humankind (“Homo sapiens”) that have the potential in becoming a completely different organism. Matrimonial law in the West has recognized this and realized that this organism is the basis and bedrock to society and to raising children. Whether God instituted this fact, or nature, it doesn’t matter. Natural Law (capital “N” and capital “L”) whether in the Hayekian or the Lockian formulation (without God or with God) both settle on State being involved in making this relationship the bedrock to raising healthy children — all things being equal. Which is why one of the most respected Canadian sociologist/scholar/homosexual, Paul Nathanson, writes that there are at least five functions that marriage serves–things that every culture must do in order to survive and thrive. They are:
✶Foster the bonding between men and women
✶Foster the birth and rearing of children
✶Foster the bonding between men and children
✶Foster some form of healthy masculine identity
✶ Foster the transformation of adolescents into sexually responsible adults
Note that Nathanson considers these points critical to the continued survival of any culture. He continues “Because heterosexuality is directly related to both reproduction and survival, … every human societ[y] has had to promote it actively . … Heterosexuality is always fostered by a cultural norm” that limits marriage to unions of men and women. He adds that people “are wrong in assuming that any society can do without it.” Going further he stated that “same sex marriage is a bad idea” …[he] only opposed “gay marriage, not gay relationships.”
In our sometimes misguided efforts to expand our freedom, selfish adults have systematically dismantled that which is most precious to children as they grow and develop. That’s why I am now speaking out against same-sex marriage.
By the way, I am gay.
A few days ago I testified against pending same-sex marriage legislation in Minnesota’s Senate Judiciary and House Civil Law Committees.
The atmosphere at these events (I’ve also testified elsewhere) seems tinged with unreality—almost a carnival-like surrealism. Natural law, tradition, religion, intellectual curiosity, and free inquiry no longer play a role in deliberations. Same-sex marriage legislation is defended solely on grounds of moral relativism and emotions.
Pure sophistry is pitted against reason. Reason is losing.
[....]
Same-sex marriage will do the same, depriving children of their right to either a mom or a dad. This is not a small deal. Children are being reduced to chattel-like sources of fulfillment. On one side, their family tree consists not of ancestors, but of a small army of anonymous surrogates, donors, and attorneys who pinch-hit for the absent gender in genderless marriages. Gays and lesbians demand that they have a “right” to have children to complete their sense of personal fulfillment, and in so doing, are trumping the right that children have to both a mother and a father—a right that same-sex marriage tramples over.
Same-sex marriage will undefine marriage and unravel it, and in so doing, it will undefine children. It will ultimately lead to undefining humanity. This is neither “progressive” nor “conservative” legislation. It is “regressive” legislation.
Here is the crux of the matter in regards to “nature’s order:”
✪ “…take gold as an example, it has inherent in its nature intrinsic qualities that make it expensive: good conductor of electricity, rare, never tarnishes, and the like. The male and female have the potential to become a single biological organism, or single organic unit, or principle. Two essentially becoming one. The male and female, then, have inherent to their nature intrinsic qualities that two mated males or two mated females never actualize in their courtship… nor can they ever. The potential stays just that, potential, never being realized…..
✪“….Think of a being that reproduces, not by mating, but by some act performed by individuals. Imagine that for these same beings, movement and digestion is performed not by individuals, but only by the complementary pairs that unite for this purpose. Would anyone acquainted with such beings have difficulty understanding that in respect to movement and digestion, the organism is a united pair, or an organic unity?”
So you see, the two heterosexual organisms that join in a sexual union cease being two separate organisms for a short time and become one organism capable of reproduction. This is what the state and the church are sealing in a marriage, this intrinsic union. The homosexual couple can never achieve this union, so “natures order” has endowed the heterosexual union with an intrinsic quality that other relationships do not have or could never attain. Both the atheist and theist [gay and straight] can argue from this point, because either we were created this way or we evolved this way. Either way, nature has imposed on the sexual union being discussed.
So the optimal design by nature or God for the rearing of children is found in this organic union. Many gay men and women realize this, people like Doug Mainwaring (in the video above), Al Rantel (was a radio personality), and Paul Nathanson (Canadian sociologist quoted above), Tammy Bruce (a favorite author of mine), Rupert Everett (actor), and someone like Walt Heyer (who had an operation to become a “woman,” is now living as his birth gender [a man] and is married w/kids). When talking about this subject and a person says you are a bigot or intolerant for not wanting to support Same-sex marriages, mention the above.
➐ RESOURCES — I have written extensively on the natural law aspect of this topic (actually, I compile others thinking on the matter), and even have a chapter on it in my book. A link to it (my chapter) and other writings (mine as well as others posted to my blog) can be found in this “link-fest” from one of my “Notes” from my Facebook:
Must See Excerpt
See excerpts of a few pages that challenge the idea from conservative leaning libertarians that marriage has no public value.
5-Books:
Same-Sex Matters: The Challenge of Homosexuality
Homosexuality and American Public Life
What Is Marriage? Man and Woman: A Defense☚
Homosexuality and the Politics of Truth
Ex-Gays?: A Longitudinal Study of Religiously Mediated Change in Sexual Orientation
A Cordial `Clambake` on the Mutability/Immutability of Homosexuality (round 1) ~ Conversation Series
In all my discussions with people about the “hot-button issue” of today, same-sex-marriage, I see a theme. And that is, bias. Not an admitted bias, or a healthy bias, one flirting with fascism. “FASCISM! How can you say that Papa Giorgio!?” Easy, a position is taken not on the reasonableness of the argument taken, but by painting the other side as bigoted, in a sense, evil, one wields power (through legislation) over a person who disagrees with such a proposition:
“Everything I have said and done in these last years is relativism by intuition…. If relativism signifies contempt for fixed categories and men who claim to be bearers of an objective, immortal truth… then there is nothing more relativistic than fascistic attitudes and activity…. From the fact that all ideologies are of equal value, that all ideologies are mere fictions, the modern relativist infers that everybody has the right to create for himself his own ideology and to attempt to enforce it with all the energy of which he is capable.” ~ Mussolini
Mussolini, Diuturna pp. 374-77, quoted in A Refutation of Moral Relativism: Interviews with an Absolutist (Ignatius Press; 1999), by Peter Kreeft, p. 18.
(Moving on) I came across a great short post to start out my example of an actual discussion where I and others on my Facebook (gay or straight) are painted as bigots if they disagree with the liberal-progressive view of the debate. Here it is, and it comes from Kevin Halloran’s site:
In this conversation, I tried to give examples, explain, analogize, and the like. Finally I just had to point out that the person involved was acting like a child in name-calling. I will post the two conversations going on with the same person, separately. Two separate issues engendered conversation via a linked article posted to my Facebook wall, “Gay Marriage Is the Media’s Vehicle, Destination Is to Destroy the Church.” I will post the shorter of the two conversations so one can get a feel for what I am dealing with.
The first subject challenged from within the article dealt with this sentence:
If anyone wants to argue that the same government currently forcing religious institutions to purchase the abortion pillthrough ObamaCare will not eventually use civil rights violations in order to attempt to force the Church to perform same-sex marriage ceremonies — good luck with that. (emphasized)
Here is her first challenge:
DEB
What’s an abortion pill? The morning after pill is not an abortion pill- don’t be ignorant.
ME
“Also known as mifepristone, mifeprex, RU486, or medication abortion, the abortion pill is an FDA-approved medication which results in abortion. In most cases, the abortion pill ends pregnancy safely and privately in the comfort of your own home…. Mifepristone, taken orally, blocks the action of the pregnancy hormone progesterone. This causes the pregnancy to detach from the uterine wall and stop growing. Misoprostol, a prostaglandin medication, is also used to cause uterine cramps which expel blood and the pregnancy tissue from the uterus.”
I will repeat: “…the abortion pill ends pregnancy…. This causes the pregnancy to detach from the uterine wall and stop growing.” It is the ending a boy/girls life during a stage of their growth.
DEB
The morning after pill is not an abortion- that is ridiculous
ME
I quoted a medical website Deb in regards to RU486. It ends, in the beginning stages what is — IS — a viable human life.
DEB
Completely untrue- the medical site is not legitimate.
At this point I went to the makers website and grabbed from their “facts” section the following (again, directly from their website):
ME
From Mifeprex’s own website Deb:
Q: Is Mifeprex used to prevent pregnancy?
A: No. Mifeprex is used to end an early pregnancy. It is not indicated for use to prevent pregnancy. Emergency contraception drugs are indicated to prevent pregnancy.
Q: At what point during pregnancy is Mifeprex approved for use?
A: Mifeprex is FDA-approved for ending early pregnancy. Early pregnancy means it is 49 days (7 weeks) or less since your last menstrual period began.
Okay, she didn’t respond after that. Maybe the corner seemed too tight, because she came out swinging on another issue. She basically used a tactic very popular on the Left nowadays. That is, paint your opposition as evil, or as Prager would say in his acronym: S.I.X.H.I.R.B. “Bigot” is the “B” in that acronym, in case you were wondering.
Here we go:
DEB
Black people and white people weren’t allowed get married years ago either… if small minded, bigoted people had their way it would still be that way. Gay marriage Is NO different
…just my opinion.
To be clear, she just equalized the belief in the traditional definition of marriage with prejudice and racism. (Moral equivalency is the track record of the Left.) Thus, the person removes the need to deal with a response. I mean, who would want to argue with a racist and a bigot? This has caused a laziness in the liberal community and interferes with the intellectual growth and learning curve. In fact, a liberal professor says this hurts the youth he see’s going through his class. Yet, this same harmful egalitarian name-calling is what is the bulwark of the Democrat Party.
SIXHIRB Hurts Intellectual Growth
A liberal professor interviewed in Indoctrinate U explains that protecting and teaching from one ideological viewpoint insulates students who are liberal to properly defend and coherently explain their views in the real world — outside the classroom. This excerpt is taken from two parts, Part 1 is here, and Part 2 is here.
Continuing with my response:
ME
(Topic change. Like when I answer the challenge about the Bible not being changed over a 2,000 year period, and instead of camping out and seeing if their own challenge was correct… the skeptic will bring up how a good god could exists if there is so much evil around. Never doing the hard work of regulating their thinking to see if it comports to truth.)
Deb, you are using a non-sequitur argument (“an argument in which its conclusion does not follow from its premises”). It is fallacious thinking, and whether it is your opinion or not has no bearing on the sloppy logic involved. In other words, your personal truth is incoherent.
Being black/white/asian/etc is immutable. A black man cannot cease being a black man, his characteristic is unchangeable, and thus fit under the 14th amendment. People change their sexual preference all the time, there are many cases of gays and persons who even have gone all the way through a sex change that deal with their core issues and renounce being gay, or the opposite gender. In other words it is a mutable characteristic.
The other point is that there is scientific differences between the genders (male/female). There is not between a male black man and a male white man….
[QUOTE] The argument, repeated so often that it sounds incontestable, is this: Just as parts of American society once had immoral laws that forbade whites and blacks from marrying, so, today, society continues to have immoral laws forbidding men from marrying men and women from marrying women. And just as decent people overthrew the former, decent people must overthrow the latter.
[....]
But the equation is false.
First, there is no comparison between sex and race.
There are enormous differences between men and women, but there are no differences between people of different races. Men and women are inherently different, but blacks and whites (and yellows and browns) are inherently the same. Therefore, any imposed separation by race can never be moral or even rational;
On the other hand, separation by sex can be both morally desirable and rational. Separate bathrooms for men and women is moral and rational; separate bathrooms for blacks and whites is not.
The second reason the parallel between opposing same-sex marriage and opposing interracial marriage is invalid is that opposition to marriage between races is a moral aberration while opposition to marrying a person of the same sex is the moral norm. In other words, none of the moral bases of American society, whether religious or secular, opposed interracial marriage — not Judaism, not Christianity, not Judeo-Christian values, not deism, not humanism, not the Enlightenment. Yes, there were religious and secular individuals who opposed interracial marriage, but by opposing interracial marriage, they were advocating something against all Judeo-Christian and secular norms, all of which saw nothing wrong in members of different races intermarrying (members of different religions was a different matter).
On the other hand, no religious or secular moral system ever advocated same-sex marriage.
[....]
But as objectionable as hubris is, false comparisons are worse. And there is no comparison between different races and the different genders. There are no inherent racial differences; there are significant differences between the sexes. To the extent that racial groups are different, they are only because their cultures differ. But a black man’s nature is not different from that of a white man, an Asian man, an Hispanic man.
The same is not true of sex differences. Males and females are inherently different from one another. We now know that even their brains differ. And those differences are significant. Thus, to oppose interracial marriage is indeed to engage in bigotry, but to oppose same-sex marriage is not. It simply shares the wisdom of every moral system that preceded us — society is predicated on men and women bonding with one another in a unique way called “marriage.”
Comparing the prohibition of same-sex marriage to prohibiting interracial marriage is ultimately a way of declaring the moral superiority of proponents of same-sex marriage to proponents of keeping marriage defined as man-woman. And it is a way of avoiding hard issues such as whether we really want all children to grow up thinking it doesn’t matter if they marry a boy or a girl and whether we really want to abolish forever the ideal of husband-wife based family.
Geez- how great your opinions are and your quotes- you must be right? And those religious folks who believe and support same sex marriage ?? They must not be real religious people.
Hours before the Supreme Court is scheduled to hear oral arguments Tuesday over California’s ban on gay marriage, hundreds of same-sex marriage supporters will gather a block away from the courthouse at an interfaith church service to ask for God’s “love and justice” and to pray for “the dignity of all souls as a religious value,” according to organizers. Afterwards, the coalition of Jews, Muslims, Catholics, Mormons and Buddhists, among other religious and secular representatives, will march to the courthouse steps to rally in support of gay marriage, with thousands of attendees expected.
Again, I want to point out what Deb is saying. The logical conclusion of her above statement is essentially this: “religious people believe in same-sex marriage, therefore, either you are saying they cannot be religious [true Buddhists, true Christians, etc], or religion and same-sex marriage are not in conflict.” She has accused me, essentially, of judging whether someone is (of my faith) is saved or not. Truly religious or not. I have never said such a thing in this or previous conversations. Although, I can show the inherent self-refuting aspect of non-Christian religions. But that is neither here-nor-there. We continue:
ME
I know religious gay people Deb? That has nothing to do with the conversation? What does a gay man or woman being a Christian have to do with anything? Please, answer this statement you made, that is — AGAIN — a non sequitur: “…religious folks who believe and support same sex marriage ?? They must not be real religious people.”
How does the argument you made follow from the premise? Do you think that changing law and culture of all mankind and religious faith is followed from such an argument? An argument that is fallacious and emotionally rooted? Painting those who do not agree as calling others inauthentic? You really should spend a few minutes and listen to this whole 16-minutes. I mean listen — don’t verbalize out loud, walk away, etc. Sit down and listen, for 16-minutes: http://youtu.be/kDh4gZ2yaMg
You are saying if one is religious and supports something, then they must be authentic and what they support must be healthy for society. Have you connected the dots yet that this tact you use, like this from a previous conversation, “don’t believe in abortion, don’t have one,” is merely an emotional plea. “Religious” folk yell “God hates fags!!!!” ~ because they are “religious” they must also base their conclusions on the sound understanding of Scripture? Right? Your reasons that you have intimated as to how you vote are a great marker to how most vote:
“don’t believe in abortion, don’t have one,” “don’t believe in slavery, don’t own one”
This does nothing to deal with the baby being human or not.
You seem to be saying that because religious people support SSM, it is therefore (ergo; walla; alakazam) good for society to put its stamp of approval on. So I can say, USING YOU LOGIC DEB, that,
“Because religious people smoke, society should accept it as a healthy lifestyle.” People who disagree with you you would deride thusly: “…religious folks who believe and support smoking?? They must not be real religious people.”
(Argumentum ad passiones: is a logical fallacy which uses the manipulation of the recipient’s emotions, rather than valid logic, to win an argument.) Do you see Deb? I am asking you a serious question right now. “Do you see how your appeal to emotion is not an argument at all?” It makes no sense. So when the media talks about “low-information voters” ~ well.
[....]
I expect you to be an adult and answer AT LEAST that last question Deb. At some point in one’s life, hiding behind the facade of adulthood doesn’t protect one from dealing with real, important, issues… and how one comes to conclusions and changes society with those resources. Jusssst mayybee… this is a clarion call for you to become serious with that thing rattling around up there. Move to “stage two thinking” in other words. Put down the romance or mystery novels, and pick up a book. This is class time here on my FB.
And for those reading this exchange, a good person can be against SSM: “Why a Good Person Can Vote Against Same-Sex Marriage” (http://tinyurl.com/c7asq6u)
//////////////////////////QUOTE
…. The history of left-wing policies has largely consisted of doing what feels good and compassionate without asking what the long-term consequences will be; what Professor Thomas Sowell calls “Stage One Thinking.” That explains, for example, the entitlement state. It sounds noble and seems noble. But the long-term consequences are terrible: economic ruin, a demoralized population, increasing selfishness as people look to the state to take care of their fellow citizens, and more.
By redefining marriage to include same sex couples we are playing with sexual and societal fire. Just as the entitlement state passes on the cost of our good intentions to our children and grandchildren – unsustainable dependency and debt — so, too, same-sex marriage will pass along the consequences of our good intentions to our children and grandchildren – gender confusion and the loss of motherhood and fatherhood as values, just to cite two obvious consequences.
It is not enough to mean well in life. One must also do well. And the two are frequently not the same thing.
There are reasons no moral thinker in history ever advocated same-sex marriage.
DEB
Shaun [she misspells my name] – your comments and attitude are a bit rude and bully like- in my opinion. You are pushing me further away. Maybe it is just your superior brain? Lol
ME
Deb, your arguments you make, here, are arguments that are fallacious. You chase yourself away.
Have you never…
never[?]
… had your ideas challenged in a cogent way before? Do you think persons that understand proper thinking, argumentation internalize their hearing you talk about important topics in the manner you do and wag their head? You came here and expressed yourself, I cannot explain how this expression is incoherent? Would you just stop saying such loosey-goosey things here and continue to make them (non-sequitur/argumentum ad passiones) elsewhere to others. Maybe even in public? You should take the above as an opportunity to hone your arguments… or continue in non-thought/incoherence.
If being shown how your arguments are fallacious, and this angers you, I cannot help you in this. The onus is on you in how you respond or take correction. Taking correction well in our relativistic society is tough, granted. I applaud you for wading into my FB, but when you do come here ~ good, rational, linear thinking is often required… especially for changing the meaning of something for the first time in mankind’s history, and thinking there will be no societal consequences.
So you are saying correction to bad arguments chases you away? Making incoherent statements brings you closer?
DEB
I don’t want an argument… I would enjoy a discussion maybe that’s the difference
ME
You have to make points in a discussion that are coherent. You are making statements that make no sense… literally? You are tugging on peoples heart strings without engaging their mind. People should vote with the later by-the-by. Too many people vote with their emotions.
You accused me (and others) of something, but you didn’t catch it apparently. Which is fine, when you talk in the language of post-modern thought, many do not realize what they are logically concluding. Maybe you can tell me what the logical conclusion of YOU (@Deb) were telling people (really, half of the United States citizens) they believe — tell me, please:
QUOTING DEB: ⚑ “Black people and white people weren’t allowed get married years ago either… if small minded, bigoted people had their way it would still be that way. Gay marriage Is NO different…. religious folks who believe and support same sex marriage ?? They must not be real religious people.”
Please explain why I am being — how did you put it — rude and bully like — and you are not?
[....]
In other words, a discussion to you is calling me and other readers here “bigots,” and impugning the character of religious gays by creating straw-man arguments of what I (we) say/mean? And when I politely point this out by not pointing out how you name call and use “cards” (sexist, intolerant, xenophobic, homophobic, Islamophobic, racist, bigoted ~ S.I.X.H.I.R.B.), you are being chased away?
[....]
Deb? Can you see how you are encapsulating discussion wrongly? You can answer with a simple “yes” or “no.”
DEB
No
ME
So, Deb, calling me a bigot, and saying Jesus, Moses, Buddha, and other major world religious founders, texts, great moral thinkers are ALL bigots… is NOT rude. But me pointing out that in those statements are things learned your first semester in philosophy (how to think properly) at any university (non-sequiturs, straw-men, and argument from emotion) is rude and borderline bullying?! What a crazy world we live in. Talk about elitist thinking.
Take note as well that Deb is calling Tammy Bruce (a lesbian), Paul Nathanson (a gay man), and someone like Walt Heyer (a man who was surgically changed into a woman [mutilated], and now lives as a man again) bigots as well. Oh the twisted thinking involved in the left. (*Dramatic back of hand to the forehead pose*)
Maybe they (the gays mentioned above) just don’t know better and they need people like Deb and other elitist thinking progressives to change their mind for them… not with sound argumentation and linear thinking… just by calling them names. And painting them as bullies if they disagree.
Can you believe this?
What came to mind next is all the leftist clap-trap that Republicans are creating an atmosphere of dissent and polarization, which is my next point in the conversation:
In case you didn’t know Deeez, it is Republicans polarizing and dividing the American political landscape.
DEB
Main Entry: big·ot Pronunciation: \ˈbi-gət\ Function: noun Etymology: French, hypocrite, bigot Date: 1660 : a person who is or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices ; especially : one who regards or treats the members of a group (as a racial or ethnic group) with hatred and intolerance — big·ot·ed \-gə-təd\ adjective — big·ot·ed·ly adverb It’s not for me to say… Everyone can decide for their self if the are or are not a bigot.
ME
Again, you are calling gay men and women bigots, not me. You are calling the majority of religious people bigots, not me. No one is treating a race or ethnic group (immutable characteristics), or in this case gays (mutable characteristics) “with hatred and intolerance.” You are inferring this via fallacious — emotional — argument to win a point in your own mind and to paint the opposition because you cannot answer them.
Most of the people I have dinner with (that are gay) are ones who would want judges (all judges) to stay out of the decisions states make. And these gay men (and women) would want exceptions made for religious institutions and organizations. The Democratic Party does not.
Again, to be clear, YOU have called all major world religious founders and religious leaders and great moral thinkers as well as gay men and women BIGOTS, simply because they disagree with you.
If you had answered “Yes” earlier, you would have shown some humility in understanding what you have done // are doing.
I myself do not hang around with racists, bigots, or the like. Why on God’s green earth would you argue, call names to, discuss, anything with one? Deb? Unless you don’t believe your own rhetoric.
[....]
And to be clear Deb, you did call me, other gays, and a large swath of religious people bigots. You *DIDN’T* let others make up their own mind. So you were not truthful when you said, “It’s not for me to say.”
⚥ Again, you said: “Black people and white people weren’t allowed get married years ago either… if small minded, bigoted people had their way it would still be that way. Gay marriage Is NO different”
Ergo, people who disagree with you, are bigots. No wiggle room. And now I firmly believe you when you said, “I don’t want an argument…”, I know. You would rather paint others as bigots, racists, and ignorant. And if someone shows you how your “discussion” is fallacious with any semblance of intelligence, they are bullies.
DEB
Not sure why you care what I think since my ideas are so fluffy and I get them from romance novels or whatever. I think the people who protested inter racial marriages where bigots and the same can be said of those whose protest gays right to wed. My opinion… Which is not allowed is Sean’s world – right?
ME
Just because you have a right to an opinion does not mean you have a right to whitewash people as bigots by making (*echo chamber noise effects to make the point clear*) NON-SEQUITUR, EMOTIONAL APPEAL, AND STRAW-MAN statements about people. It is fallacious thinking/speaking. So you are saying that your opinion is wrong (incoherent) and damn all others for even pointing that out.
Another analogy, it is like you are saying, “what does the color green smell like.” It doesn’t make sense. And, not only that, your opinion is a form of bigotry itself.
The conversation has effectively stalled here. She refuses to “discuss” any more the topic… just go on making statements that have nothing to do with the topic. Living in a bubble of rhetoric and opinion, with a flare for bumper sticker verbiage. Its sad, really, because you know this is how a large portion of the voters think. What is referred to as the “low-information” voter. There is no understanding of our great history, culture, and the like. Just how one feels at this moment. Again, sad.
“Properly speaking, homosexuality does not exist among animals…. For reasons of survival, the reproductive instinct among animals is always directed towards an individual of the opposite sex. Therefore, an animal can never be homosexual as such. Nevertheless, the interaction of other instincts (particularly dominance) can result in behavior that appears to be homosexual.” ~ Dr. Antonio Pardo, Professor of Bioethics at the University of Navarre, Spain
I have been challenged with this same statement above many times, but have never posted on the topic. So here it is to be entered officially in my growing library of responses to those opposed to the traditional, historical, classical definition of marriage.
Before I get to a continuing conversation, I wanted to talk about an example I heard of a long time ago, and it has to do with the “famous” gay penguins, Roy and Silo. So popular was this pair of “gay” penguins that children’s books were produced to explain that homosexuality should be acceptable, based on this male pair of penguins. As we will see, using arguments like these often backfires on the person who thinks behaviors rooted in nature should be applauded in the Homosapien world.
Conservapedia notes that in July of 2009, the alleged homosexual penguin pair in a California zoo crumbled under the weight of nature. Peter LaBarbera reported:
San Francisco’s Fox affiliate KTVU reports: “The San Francisco Zoo’s popular same-sex penguin couple has broken up.
“Male Magellan penguins Harry and Pepper have been together since 2003. The pair nested together and even incubated an egg laid by another penguin in 2008, but their relationship hit the rocks earlier this year when a female penguin, Linda, befriended Harry after her long-time companion died.
“Zookeepers say Harry and Linda are happy and were able to successfully nest this year,” reported KTVU.
But not everyone is celebrating Harry and Linda’s newfound love. Some believe there can be no such a thing as an “ex-gay” penguin. Upon news of Harry’s decision to fly the same-sex-coop, outspoken pro-homosexual activist and anti-ex-gay crusader Wayne Besen cried fowl:
“Attempts to change sexual orientation are patently offensive, discriminatory by definition, theologically shaky, uniformly unsuccessful and medically unsound!” exclaimed a visibly angry Besen. “There is no ‘ex-gay’ sexual orientation. Harry is simply in denial. He’s living what I call the ‘big lie.’”
When will we see a book on penguin sexual behavior showing that reparative therapy works, and there can be ex-gays? And that one can choose by volition over his or her nature, when is this kids book coming? The Telegraph expounds upon this behavior in penguins more as more is known:
The homosexual behaviour of male king penguins has already been noted in zoos.
Now in a new study, scientists have found the evidence of male pairs in the wild. The research found that more than a quarter of the colony in Antarctica were in same sex partners, mostly two males.
In the past, it was claimed that penguins could not discern between the sexes because they looked alike. Male pairs in zoos in the US and Germany have hatched and reared ‘adopted’ chicks.
However the new study by the Centre for Functional and Evolutionary Ecology in Montpellier, France found that the penguins are only pairing up with other males because they are “lonely”.
There are not enough females in the colony and the males have high levels of testosterone, which drives them to engage in mating displays – even if it is with other males.
During the mating season king penguins “flirt” with potential partners by closing their eyes, stretching their heads skyward and moving them in a half-circle to “take peeks” at one another.
The male pairs engaged in the displays for short periods of time but did not bond in the same way as a heterosexual pair would, by learning each other’s calls or caring for eggs.
Professor F Stephen Dobson, one of the authors of the study published in the journal Ethology, said the number of same sex pairs was actually lower than expected. When the colony was studied over time he found all the ‘gay’ penguins chose a heterosexual partner. A female pair also ‘split up’ to raise an egg with male partner. (Emphasis added)
This “loneliness,” really high testosterone levels, is a great description the N.Y. Times gives to the Roy/Silo conundrum:
The two male chinstrap penguins had found each other in the big city. They had remained faithful. They had even raised a child. But then, not too long ago, they lost their home. Silo’s eye began to wander, and last spring he forsook his partner of six years at the Central Park Zoo and took up with a female from California named Scrappy. Of late, Roy has been seen alone, in a corner, staring at a wall.
This tale of betrayal, sexual identity and penguin lust set in Manhattan has reverberated around the world. It has “rocked the gay scene,” as the popular blogger Andrew Sullivan, who is gay, wrote in The Sunday Times of London this week.
No one was more disappointed than Rob Gramzay, the senior penguin keeper at the zoo, who said simply in an interview yesterday, “They seemed to be a good pair together.”…. (emphasis added)
“Heartbreaking!” I am sure Andrew Sullivan was beside himself… weeping and gnashing of teeth was worldwide I am sure. Okay, a “pop-culture” example removed, lets move to my discussion via Facebook. Again, to be clear, since Dr. Antonio Pardo makes it known that there isn’t an animal that’s exclusively “gay,” and we have a popular example of this in Silo “switching teams,” I see two things: 1)this can at the most be an argument for bisexuality, and 2)the mutability of homosexuality.
More on #2: if people argued and used this example to export homosexual behavior from the animal kingdom to the “animal” Homo sapiens… then for THAT to be a valid argument, one must now admit that the example has changed to show — from nature — that homosexuality is mutable.
Here I wanted to slow down some thinking of a gentleman who typically goes into long prose that have nothing to do with the topic discussed. As you can see, it took me a while to get J.R. to keep to one topic. I will include his attempt to get off topic. Many are use to this tactic and it keeps them from having to deal with any one-example specifically. Here is the statement by J.R. that got me interested in conversation with him:
✂ “Mammals of many species express homosexual behavior.”
So I started out:
SeanG (me) I would love to dialogue with you about one of your evidential claims supporting homosexuality.
☑ “Mammals of many species express homosexual behavior.”
Would you like to discuss this all too often point used/made in this discussion with me?
[....]
just let me know “yes” or “no.” I will kick off the conversation by making a couple distinctions to what the foundational views of many here are and the view that evidential claim you inserted into the conversation comes from, followed by a question. I will not attack you and will most earnestly try and respond to you with respect and sincerity.
I also understand it is a beautiful day out (at least in SoCal right now), so I or you may not be able to respond immediately to a conversational point. Work, family, etc., can take away from time like this. I will post my “legal” statement in order to set up the parameters for what is missing from these discussions behind the keyboard:
☎ “By-the-by, for those reading this I will explain what is missing in this type of discussion due to the media used. Genuflecting, care, concern, one being upset (does not entail being “mad”), etc… are all not viewable because we are missing each other’s tone, facial expressions, and the like. I afford the other person I am dialoguing with the best of intentions and read his/her comments as if we were out having a talk over a beer at a bar or meeting a friend at Starbucks. (I say this because there seems to be a phenomenon of etiquette thrown out when talking through email or Face Book, lots more public cussing and gratuitous responses.) You will see that often times I USE CAPS — which in www lingo for YELLING. I am not using it this way, I use it to merely emphasize and often times say as much: *not said in yelling tone, but merely to emphasize*. So in all my discussions I afford the best of thought to the other person as I expect he or she would to me… even if dealing with tough subjects as the above. I have had more practice at this than most, and with half-hour pizza, one hour photo and email vs. ‘snail mail,’ know that important discussions take time to meditate on, inculcate, and to process. So be prepared for a good thought provoking discussion if you so choose one with me.”
In fact, I am going to enjoy a Dogfish 60-Minute right now with the neighbors (http://tinyurl.com/5lm5ad) ~ Much thought and I look forward to conversation.
J.R. Please whatever I write take it with a totally nuetral tone. I actually don’t have a persistant perspective on any of this as I’ve just recently started researching this. As a matter of fact I live in NC and voted for the amendment to our constitution to support marriage as between one man and one woman. That’s when i really started doing some research.
SeanG (me) So no response is your response? In other words, are you asking to have an answer for such a statement? If you believe that such a statement made by you is totally neutral (either the statement or the motive behind it), why say it? I am confused, maybe you can explain better to me what the purpose of your posting was then.
One of my favorite quotes came to mind: “A liberal is a man too broadminded to take his own side in a quarrel.” ~ Robert Frost
J.R. I guess I just don’t quite understand what you’re asking. I made a statement about homosexuality in animals. Its not my opinion, its a studied phenomena. I was just making a statement. Do you understand what it means to have a discourse and alter your views from that discussion? or is this just a platform for you to voice your ideas and have a closed ear to others? I dont mean to come across as harsh but I don’t see a two sided conversation going on here. Here’s one of the links I based the state ment on. http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/07/0722_040722_gayanimal.html Oh and just so you know, i took the political questionaire from politicaltest.net and Im a severe conservative. That just doesnt make me close minded like some of them are.
SeanG (me) Okay, I can see you are beating around the bush. So I will start the conversation.
Would you agree many here have a differing view of man’s nature via Intelligent Design, in other words, God created man as something separate, different in His nature than that of the animal Kingdom? This is a simple yes or no response, FYI.
J.R. (a) Yes – is my answer although your question two different questions, yes to the second. Yes to the first as well
[....]
As I was typing my next question to keep the conversation on track, J.R. posted this next part. To which I also responded to. So my two responses should be seen as in order of what was written by J.R.:
J.R. (b)
Yes – is my answer although your question two different questions, yes to the second. Yes to the first as well
Here are my two responses, respectively:
SeanG (me) (a) Great, would you also agree that people that wish to connect animal homosexual acts to humans have a more philosophical naturalist views point that guides this connection. In other words, a “goo to you” view of human history to put it simply. This type of thinking guides such enterprises like, ohhh, evolutionary psychology. So again, the simple question is typically those making such statements are evolutionist, they would not include God in its summation of mankind?
SeanG (me) (b) J.R., we are talking about one subject. Dialoging about IT. If you and I were out having drinks, I would have the same conversation with you as I am here. this is not rocket science, or catch J.R. in a snafu101… it is a conversation to get you to think deeper about the ultimate issues, from YOUR examples.
J.R. Sean, I have spent several hours since yesterday reading through your papers and website. I value differing opinions and perspectives ( I have an aggressive atheist on my friends list that really hurts me some of the things that get posted. But i feel I need to see all aspects of any argument. I’ll be the first to say I get confused and I don’t understand a lot of the scientific jargon I read. I just try to see all sides of it.As the Bereans, I value looking for truth. 1 Peter 3:15. So I’m sorry if I have come across as anything but gentleness and respect. I would only ask the same. I have just been a little concerned by your responses that I’m being talked at, not talked with.
SeanG (me) J.R.,I am asking a simple question. Do you think the foundational view that homosexuality in the animal kingdom — as being related to mankind in any way — is a viewpoint held by philosophical naturalists? Its a simple question really.
At this point, I went and grabbed from his Facebook profile a favorite quote of his by Eleanore Roosevelt to stir up his focus:
SeanG (me) We are talking BIG ideas here ~ “Great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, small minds discuss people” -Elanor Roosevelt
J.R. I do not know it that is or not a view held by philosophical naturalists.
Now J.R. is starting to catch himself, and I applaud him actively trying to stay focused.
J.R. Okay you didnt answer my question above. What is your answer?
SeanG (me) You can work it out, for instance, National Geographic, as an organization, believes man evolved from an odorless/colorless gas which formed into solid matter, rain fell on rocks… eventually leading to us. They would posit that mankind ultimately came from the animal kingdom — and would connect importance to homosexuality in the animal kingdom as viewing man’s sexuality. Yeah?
Its simple: a theist believes mankind was created separate from the animal kingdom, and philosophical naturalist believes mankind has its roots through evolution alone. So again: Do you think the foundational view that homosexuality in the animal kingdom — as being related to mankind in any way — is a viewpoint held by philosophical naturalists (Neo-Darwinists/evolutionists)?
[....]
So Again: Do you think the foundational view that homosexuality in the animal kingdom — as being related to mankind in any way — is a viewpoint held by philosophical naturalists?
J.R. I would agree with that statement yes.
Miracles do happen!
SeanG (me)
Great! Now, if the naturalist view is correct, what is the logical conclusion of this “fact” you mentioned that National Geographic would acknowledge? Since homosexuality exists in nature same-sex marriage should be allowed in mankind’s.
One should take note that most of these homosexual acts in nature are essentially rape. The alpha male holding his power over other animals in the group.
Rape is very prominent in the animal kingdom, as well as cannibalism:
♚ “1,500 recorded species of animals preforming the ACT of cannibalism, that’s 3 times more than homosexual acts”
Take note as well that these animals are not exclusively “gay,” they do procreate after their own kind.
So Richard Dawkins, for instance, would say that rape being morally wrong is as arbitrary as mankind evolving 5 vs 4 fingers.
————————————— Justin Brierley: When you make a value judgement don’t you immediately step yourself outside of this evolutionary process and say that the reason this is good is that it’s good. And you don’t have any way to stand on that statement.
Richard Dawkins: My value judgement itself could come from my evolutionary past.
Justin Brierley: So therefore it’s just as random in a sense as any product of evolution.
Richard Dawkins: You could say that, it doesn’t in any case, nothing about it makes it more probable that there is anything supernatural.
Justin Brierley: Ultimately, your belief that rape is wrong is as arbitrary as the fact that we’ve evolved five fingers rather than six.
Richard Dawkins: You could say that, yeah. ———————————————-
Or Sam Harris saying, “…there are many things about us for which we are naturally selected, which we repudiate in moral terms. For instance, there’s nothing more natural than rape. Human beings rape, chimpanzees rape, orangutans rape, rape clearly is part of an evolutionary strategy to get your genes into the next generation if you’re a male….”
In other words, if one were to argue that same-sex marriage should be allowed because gay acts are in nature, BUT THEN NOT use the same logic for rape, cannibalism, and the like, is being disingenuous.The Judeo-Christian ethic ~ rooted in God and man’s nature as separate from that of animals ~ is the only worldview that offers respect and humanity to the gay man and woman. Rape, violence, and “alpha male” mentality (power) are something found in the naturalist worldview. These are things that our worldview says we should avoid.
Which is why a lesbian author I love said this:
▼ Even if one does not necessarily accept the institutional structure of “organized religion,” the “Judeo-Christian ethic and the personal standards it encourages do not impinge on the quality of life, but enhance it. They also give one a basic moral template that is not relative,” which is why the legal positivists of the Left are so threatened by the Natural Law aspect of the Judeo-Christian ethic. ~ Tammy Bruce
Compare that to a view that all viewpoints are equal and one should use power to enforce his (which naturalism encapsulates):
▼ “Everything I have said and done in these last years is relativism by intuition…. If relativism signifies contempt for fixed categories and men who claim to be bearers of an objective, immortal truth… then there is nothing more relativistic than fascistic attitudes and activity…. From the fact that all ideologies are of equal value, that all ideologies are mere fictions, the modern relativist infers that everybody has the right to create for himself his own ideology and to attempt to enforce it with all the energy of which he is capable.” ~ Mussolini
I have to break here and say I was hoping J.R. was going to “fact-check” my Sam Harris quote. While being a bit out of context, the full context makes the situation worse for J.R.’s vacuous case. I quoted Sam Harris as saying: “…there are many things about us for which we are naturally selected, which we repudiate in moral terms. For instance, there’s nothing more natural than rape. Human beings rape, chimpanzees rape, orangutans rape, rape clearly is part of an evolutionary strategy to get your genes into the next generation if you’re a male….”
Here is the rest:
“You can’t move from that Darwinian fact about us to defend rape as a good practice. I mean no-one would be tempted to do that; we have transcended that part of our evolutionary history in repudiating it.”
How, then, can we “move from that Darwinian fact about us to defend ‘homosexuality’ as a good practice?” Have we not “transcended that part of our evolutionary history”? Or, do political points of view dictate what we have-and-haven’t “transcended”?
This led to my final comment, final in that J.R. has yet to continue the convo:
Dr. Antonio Pardo, Professor of Bioethics at the University of Navarre, Spain, wrote:
✪ “Properly speaking, homosexuality does not exist among animals…. For reasons of survival, the reproductive instinct among animals is always directed towards an individual of the opposite sex. Therefore, an animal can never be homosexual as such. Nevertheless, the interaction of other instincts (particularly dominance) can result in behavior that appears to be homosexual. “
My hope in this post is to offer some responses to a challenge many do not know how to respond to. Also, this is posted as a model in keeping someone zeroed in on a topic at a time. Too often people will state one thing, hear an answer, and instead of dealing with the implications the instead move onto another subject. It is incumbent on us to learn how to keep the discussion on one topic/evidence at a time. It is hard, and I have to again applaud J.R., he did what some cannot do. Focus like a laser-beam… at least for a short while.
(search words: 450 species homophobia found one unnatural response answer refuted apologetics)
I have been too busy as-of-late to keep up with “Concepts,” an article in a local small paper. This recent article did, however, peak my interest and awoke me from my slumber. (As usual, you can click the graphic to enlarge to be able to read the article if so desired [below].) Per John’s modus operandi he conflates separate issues and then makes his point at the end that has nothing to do with his previous points or set-up. I myself will jump around Mr. Huizum’s article a bit, clarifying and expanding [correcting mainly] his thoughts as space surely does not allow him but it does me.
Let’s jump into this statement and where I think John, as an atheist, puts all his cookies into the “science” bag, otherwise known as “scientism.”
✂ “To my knowledge, science has not yet discovered a purpose for the universe,…”
This is key (*Big Booming Voice w/Echo Effects*): science will NEVER find a purpose for the universe. “Purpose” — as such, is the area exclusively reserved to that of philosophy and theology, not science. From reading previous article’s by John, he seems to have a distorted view of epistemology and how one expresses “truth statements” with a coherent foundation/worldview. Let us define some words and concepts as we continue on our journey brought to us by “Concepts.”
Epistemology – “the branch of philosophy concerned with questions about knowledge and belief and related issues such as justification and truth.”
C. Stephen Evans, Pocket Dictionary of Apologetics & Philosophy of Religion (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2002), 39.
What John seems to place as his “ultimate truth” is science. This view is commonly referred to as “scientism.” What is scientism, you ask?
Scientism constitutes the core of the naturalistic understanding of what constitutes knowledge, its epistemology. Wilfrid Sellars says that “in the dimension of describing and explaining the world, science is the measure of all things, of what is that it is, and of what is not that it is not.”‘ Contemporary naturalists embrace either weak or strong scientism. According to the former, nonscientific fields are not worthless nor do they offer no intellectual results, but they are vastly inferior to science in their epistemic standing and do not merit full credence. According to the latter, unqualified cognitive value resides in science and in nothing else. Either way, naturalists are extremely skeptical of claims about reality that are not justified by scientific methods in the hard sciences.
William Lane Craig and Chad Meister, God is Great, God is Good: Why Believing in God Is Reasonable and Responsible (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2009), 35.
In another article scientism is explained as well as naturalism and the differences:
CODE ~ Accidental?
One gram of DNA – the weight of two Tylenol – can store the same amount of digitally encoded information as a hundred billion DVD’s. Yes, you read correctly, I said a hundredbillion DVD’s. Every single piece of information that exists on the Earth today; from every single library, from every single data base, from every single computer, could be stored in one beaker of DNA. This is the same DNA/Genetic Information/Self-Replication System that exists in humans and in bacteria (which are the simplest living organisms that exist today and have ever been known to exist). In short, our DNA-based genetic code, the universal system for all life on our planet, is the most efficient and sophisticated digital information storage, retrieval, and translation system known to man.
…scientism (an epistemological thesis) with naturalism (an ontological thesis). Scientism is the view that we should believe only what can be proven scientifically. In other words, science is the sole source of knowledge and the sole arbiter of truth. Naturalism is the view that physical events have only physical causes. In other words, miracles do not happen; there are no supernatural causes.
One should keep in mind that a coherent worldview answers at least four important questions about life that science (especially “scientism”) cannot, getting back to purpose. Ravi Zacharias makes accessible these questions by stating that a “coherent worldview must be able to satisfactorily answer four questions: that of origin, meaning, morality, and destiny” (Ravi Zacharias, Deliver Us From Evil [Nashville, TN: Word Publishers, 1997], 219–220). Science can be used, and should be used, as a tool in making a reasonable case for purpose and meaning in life.
Science, then, is merely a handmaiden of these richer studies in life’s ultimate meaning, not the determining factor.
“Scientism is the view that all real knowledge is scientific knowledge—that there is no rational, objective form of inquiry that is not a branch of science” (Edward Feser, Blinded by Scientism [March 9th, 2010]). Which is one reason that it is self refuting, because, it itself is a philosophical proposition ABOUT science while claiming not to be (Apologetics Study Bible). Which two philosophical naturalists admit in a moment of honesty:
Lewontin: “we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.”
Searle: “There is a sense in which materialism is the religion of our time, at least among most of the professional experts in the fields of philosophy, psychology, cognitive science, and other disciplines that study the mind. Like most traditional religions, it is accepted without question and it provides the framework within which other questions can be posed, addressed, and answered.”
Again, the belief that science alone gives us knowledge is a philosophical statement, not a scientific one. This is no longer science, but the scientistic worldview of naturalism, which affirms that nature is all there is and that only science can give us knowledge. As the late astronomer Carl Sagan put it: “The cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be.”Dawkins, like Sagan, speaks more as an amateur metaphysician than as a scientist.
I dealt a little with origins in a previous review of one of his articles in the past, but the point is that John places on science’s plate a proposition that it will never be able to answer. Maybe a Tennyson poem will assist in explaining to John the meaning of the universe without God:
In writing the poem, Tennyson was influenced by the ideas of evolution presented in Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation which had been published in 1844, and had caused a storm of controversy about the theological implications of impersonal nature functioning without direct divine intervention. The fundamentalist idea of unquestioning belief in revealed truth taken from a literal interpretation of the Bible was already in conflict with the findings of science, and Tennyson expressed the difficulties evolution raised for faith in “the truths that never can be proved”.
Are God and Nature then at strife, That Nature lends such evil dreams? So careful of the type she seems, So careless of the single life;
That I, considering everywhere Her secret meaning in her deeds, And finding that of fifty seeds She often brings but one to bear,
I falter where I firmly trod, And falling with my weight of cares Upon the great world’s altar-stairs That slope thro’ darkness up to God,
I stretch lame hands of faith, and grope, And gather dust and chaff, and call To what I feel is Lord of all, And faintly trust the larger hope.
This poem was published before Charles Darwin made his theory public in 1859. However, the phrase “Nature, red in tooth and claw” in canto 56 quickly was adopted by others as a phrase that evokes the process of natural selection. It was and is used by both those opposed to and in favor of the theory of evolution. However, at the end of the poem, Tennyson emerges with his Christian faith reaffirmed, progressing from doubt and despair to faith and hope, a dominant theme also seen in his poem “Ulysses.”
If e’er when faith had fallen asleep, I hear a voice ‘believe no more’ And heard an ever-breaking shore That tumbled in the Godless deep;
A warmth within the breast would melt The freezing reason’s colder part, And like a man in wrath the heart Stood up and answer’d ‘I have felt.’
No, like a child in doubt and fear: But that blind clamour made me wise; Then was I as a child that cries, But, crying knows his father near;
Atheists themselves say that nothing matters in a universe without God giving it meaning:
Which leads me into another statement John makes near the end of the article, and, has in it a self-refuting statement of sorts. I will explain, John says:
✂ I do not think atheists are more or less happy than believers, so it is possible to live a useful life without a belief in a god. Scientists may not know what the purpose of the Universe is, but we the living find our own purpose for living, which is often just to help or be interested in others.
The mass murderer or tyrant may find his purpose in doing what he does. The rapist as well. Those actions we rightly abhor may be the ones that provide purpose or fulfillment in theirs. You see, John has no code that he can ascribe to himself and expect others to follow… outside of wish fulfillment that is.
He says that life’s meaning is “often just to help or be interested in others.” What a trite explanation of existence! Mussolini explains to John the related topic of relativism and John trying to impose HIS MEANING onto the masses, or think that the masses should agree with him when Tennyson so pointedly says that nature’s purpose is “red in tooth and claw” ~ here is another view that lines up more with John’s view rather than the Judeo-Christian ethic:
“Everything I have said and done in these last years is relativism by intuition…. If relativism signifies contempt for fixed categories and men who claim to be bearers of an objective, immortal truth… then there is nothing more relativistic than fascistic attitudes and activity…. From the fact that all ideologies are of equal value, that all ideologies are mere fictions, the modern relativist infers that everybody has the right to create for himself his own ideology and to attempt to enforce it with all the energy of which he is capable.”
Mussolini, Diuturna pp. 374-77, quoted in A Refutation of Moral Relativism: Interviews with an Absolutist (Ignatius Press; 1999), by Peter Kreeft, p. 18.
Again, let us see what another person who may understand the complexities of the issue a bit more than John shows us, and that is Malcolm Muggeridge (a British journalist, author, satirist, media personality, soldier-spy and, in his later years, a Catholic convert and writer), who said:
“If God is ‘dead,’ somebody is going to have to take his place. It will be megalomania or erotomania, the drive for power or the drive for pleasure, the clenched fist or the phallus, Hitler or Hugh Heffner.”
Ravi Zacharias, The Real Face of Atheism (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2004), 32.
I know John HOPES people see reality like he does, but he does not have a meta-narrative that is internally consistent to express to mankind the need to “help or be interested in others.” The Nazi’s thought they were doing this? Why are they wrong and John right? He has no epistemology that is internally consistent to help him ask these non-scientific questions. So while he can feel that the atheist can have a happy life, aside from this Epicurean goal, happiness is not synonymous with moral, or meaningful in the ultimate sense.
Epicurean ~ “Epicurus (341-271 B.C.) was a Greek philosopher who was born on the isle of Samos but lived much of his life in Athens, where he founded his very successful school of philosophy. He was influenced by the materialist Democritus (460-370 B.C.), who is the first philosopher known to believe that the world is made up of atoms…. Epicurus identified good with pleasure and evil with pain.” He equated using pleasure, diet, friends, and the like as “tools” for minimizing bad sensations or pain while increasing pleasure or hedonism.
Taken from Louise P. Pojman, Philosophy: The Quest for Truth, 5th ed. (New York: Oxford Press, 2002), 499; taken from a chapter from my book dealing with homosexuality and natural law, footnote #42.
I will zero in on a point that John makes, but that is lost on him in his making an either/or distinction in the extremes.
✂ “If God created the natural laws and if God were omnipotent, I would have to assume that God could also destroy them or make them unworkable or eliminate them.”
True enough, but, we can ad a third understanding to John’s statement: He [God] could intervene from-time-to-time in nature. For example, the virgin birth. The miracle was in no way the development and birth of Jesus, the miracle was in the conception. God introduced unique genetic material to Mary’s womb. The Laws of Nature took over from there. There was a standard nine month pregnancy followed by a normal birth.
Lewis defines a miracle thus: “I use the word Miracle to mean an interference with Nature by supernatural power.” He describes the integration of miraculous intervention and the natural world in this way: “It is therefore inaccurate to define a miracle as something that breaks the laws of Nature. It doesn’t. … If God creates a miraculous spermatozoon in the body of a virgin, it does not proceed to break any laws. The laws at once take it over. Nature is ready. Pregnancy follows, according to all the normal laws, and nine months later a child is born. … The divine art of miracle is not an art of suspending the pattern. … And they are sure that all reality must be interrelated and consistent.
Now, I think John also confuses some laws that he uses all the time. The Law of Morality for instance.
John Huizum has complained about the evils done in the name of religion in the past, and so posits a “law” that he expects others to see and adhere to, namely, murder in the name of God is morally, or absolutely wrong. However, in the naturalist view of the world, evil is not absolutely wrong… just currently taboo.
Books like, Demonic Males: Apes and the Origins of Human Violence (New York, NY: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing, 1997), and, A Natural History of Rape: Biological Bases of Sexual (Coercion Cambridge: MIT Press, 2000), make the point that rape — for instance — was a tool of survival in our evolutionary past, and so not “morally wrong” in any absolute sense. Not morally wrong because it aided the only real principle of nature, survival. If not absolutely wrong in the past, than theoretically rape is useful for our survival in the future. A position taken by Islamists in some part of our world surely.
Here are three short examples by atheists themselves making my point… er… really their point:
EXHIBIT A
Atheist Dan Barker Says “Child Rape Is Morally Okay”
Richard Dawkins Says Rape Is Morally Arbitrary!
Evolution and the Meaning of Life
You see, who can REALLY say Hitler was wrong? “What’s to prevent us from saying Hitler wasn’t right? I mean, that is a genuinely difficult question” ~ Richard Dawkins. Ahh, no its not. Granted, it is for the person (John) who looks to nature alone for meaning, and his HOPE is that others see his view of life.
But this “hope” wasn’t the basis for important decisions in our nations history, thank God! Like the writing of the Constitution for instance, written in the language of Natural Law, or in the Nuremberg Trials. A great example for what we are talking about here. At the Nuremburg trials, when the judges/magistrates from Germany were being defended, one of the strongest arguments was that they were operating according to the law of their own land (cultural relativism). To that, a legitimate counter-question was raised, “But is there not a law above our laws?” John Warwick Montgomery, in his book The Law Above The Law, describes their argument:
“The most telling defense offered by the accused was that they had simply followed orders or made decisions within the framework of their own legal system, in complete consistency with it, and that they therefore ought not rightly be condemned because they deviated from the alien value system of their conquerors” (John Warwick Montgomery, The Law Above the Law [Minneapolis, MN: Bethany House Publishers, 1975], 24.)
Nevertheless, the tribunal did not accept this justification. In the words of Robert H. Jackson, chief counsel for the United States at the trials, the issue was not one of power – the victor judging the vanquished – but one of higher moral law. Mr. Huizum has no foundational ethic or moral to make life meaningful in this ultimate sense. Which is the inclusion that real justice truly exists.
Men do not make laws. They do but discover them. Laws must be justified by something more than the will of the majority. They must rest on the eternal foundation of righteousness.
So far from John not seeing “the God-factor expressed in any law of nature he is aware of,” the Laws of Logic, the Moral Laws, Mathematics, and the like are glimpses into the “God-Factor.” Whether John admits to this or simply defines the proposition out of being considered (see below) is his convoluted lot in life of competing/self-refuting propositions guided by a metaphysical assumption about reality… not mine.
Professor: “Miracles are impossible Sean, don’t you know science has disproven them, how could you believe in them [i.e., answered prayer, a man being raised from the dead, etc.].”
Student: “for clarity purposes I wish to get some definitions straight. Would it be fair to say that science is generally defined as ‘the human activity of seeking natural explanations for what we observe in the world around us’?”
Professor: “Beautifully put, that is the basic definition of science in every text-book I read through my Doctoral journey.”
Student: “Wouldn’t you also say that a good definition of a miracle would be ‘and event in nature caused by something outside of nature’?”
Professor: “Yes, that would be an acceptable definition of ‘miracle.’”
Student: “But since you do not believe that anything outside of nature exists [materialism, dialectical materialism, empiricism, existentialism, naturalism, and humanism – whatever you wish to call it], you are ‘forced’ to conclude that miracles are impossible”
Norman L. Geisler & Peter Bocchino, Unshakeable Foundations: Contemporary Answers to Crucial Questions About the Christian Faith (Minneapolis, Minnesota: Bethany House, 2001), 63-64.
This leads me to my final correction of some bad thinking on John’s part. When he says, “No scientific formula ever needed an asterisk or a caveat that said ‘God willing,’” the asterick merely precedes the formula and is next to the word “science.” Without the Judeo-Christian metaphysic, science would not be possible:
…as Whitehead pointed out, it is no coincidence that science sprang, not from Ionian metaphysics, not from the Brahmin-Buddhist-Taoist East, not from the Egyptian-Mayan astrological South, but from the heart of the Christian West, that although Galileo fell out with the Church, he would hardly have taken so much trouble studying Jupiter and dropping objects from towers if the reality and value and order of things had not first been conferred by belief in the Incarnation. (Walker Percy, Lost in the Cosmos)
To the popular mind, science is completely inimical to religion: science embraces facts and evidence while religion professes blind faith. Like many simplistic popular notions, this view is mistaken. Modern science is not only compatible with Christianity, it in fact finds its origins in Christianity…
Again, Mr. Huizum seems to have strayed — as usual — far away from rational inferences based on a good understanding of the issues, rooted in history, easily accessible to him. Again, he just opines in the hope that others will dote over his “wisdom.” Not me, someone has to keep him honest.
It is funny. In this conversation (which is part two, part one can be found here) I have noticed a theme… which is, the detractors in question will bring up topics of a religious bent, even going as far as quoting Scripture; then, when corrected on the theological or historical/cultural aspects they themselves brought up — they mention why talk religion? They continue that faith is a personal thing that no one will ever agree on.
You see, they expect others to see their viewpoint on the Bible, but then when simple in text explanations (exegesis) are explained — clearly – all of a sudden you are accused of “nitpicking and going through contortions” (that is a quote). So, this second part unlike the first that dealt more with Natural Law and biology deals more with Biblical texts and proofs brought up in conversation. These skeptical positions enumerated herein are held typically by liberal progressive skeptics… which many in the conversation reject politically (that is, liberalism and progressivism). I was disappointing that many of my fellow brethren could make cogent, stat/fact filled arguments incorporating history and reason to refute liberal/progressive positions. But as soon as religion is mentioned, the previously held conservative linear thought is jettisoned for a more emotion-based, feelings styled approach that uses unfounded and unreasonable positions.
Which is why this was written with the idea that it should not be taken as a personal attack as much as a mild correction and clarion call to conservative thought even in looking at religious positions. It is a funny thing that they understand this in conversation between liberals and conservatives, but not between liberal believers and conservative believers.
I will explain with an example recently posted on this same FaceBook group regarding Ronald Reagan’s birthday. In it Chris corrects another for his egregious take on history.
Now, anyone in an emotional conversation knows that typically when people write lists of reasons why they do not believe in a particular ideology — in this case, conservative/Republican fiscal ideals and philosophy — these people will merely produce a new list when the previous one is dealt with point-by-point incorporating history, facts, and reason. You see, said-person being responded to really doesn’t want to change, or listen to reason. They JUST WANT to feel like they have reasons to reject a position. And even thought this rejection is psychologically based, a feeling that one has to have reasons in their rejection runs deep. I give an analogy in my first chapterfrom my book:
…I say “honestly asked” because often times people just ask questions to purposefully deflect their own understanding of the topic. Once you give a reasonably well thought out answer, the dishonest interviewer typically will not inculcate this response and consider changing his or her mind based on the new evidence you just gave them, they typically respond with another question. The problem is not with the topic or evidence that is being discussed, the problem might well be that the person in question just doesn’t want to re-think their position, no matter how much evidence he or she finds or is presented with. Let me explain with an example from the book, Classical Apologetics:
Psychological Prejudice
But even a sound epistemic system,[1] flawless deductive reasoning, and impeccable inductive procedure does not guarantee a proper conclusion. Emotional bias or antipathy might block the way to the necessary conclusion of the research. That thinkers may obstinately resist a logical verdict is humorously illustrated by John Warwick Montgomery’s modern parable:
Once upon a time (note the mystical cast) there was a man who thought he was dead. His concerned wife and friends sent him to the friendly neighborhood psychiatrist determined to cure him by convincing him of one fact that contradicted his beliefs that he was dead. The fact that the psychiatrist decided to use was the simple truth that dead men do not bleed. He put his patient to work reading medical texts, observing autopsies, etc. After weeks of effort the patient finally said, “All right, all right! You’ve convinced me. Dead men do not bleed.” Whereupon the psychiatrist stuck him in the arm with a needle, and the blood flowed. The man looked down with a contorted, ashen face and cried, “Good Lord! Dead men bleed after all!”
Emotional prejudice is not limited to dull-witted, the illiterate, and poorly educated. Philosophers and theologians are not exempt from the vested interests and psychological prejudice that distort logical thinking. The question of the existence of God evokes deep emotional and psychological prejudice. People understand that the question of the existence of God is not one that is of neutral consequence. We understand intuitively, if not in terms of its full rational implication, that the existence of an eternal Creator before whom we are ultimately accountable and responsible is a matter that touches the very core of life.[2]
You see, the Christian-theistic worldview does not just offer answers in religious areas and is silent in the political arena, rather, it forces one to confront popular culture, which often times demands political or cultural change. This can cause religious and non-religious persons alike to become very intolerant, especially when the topic combines a person’s religious views and that of currant affairs…
[1]Epistemology – “the branch of philosophy concerned with questions about knowledge and belief and related issues such as justification and truth.” C. Stephen Evans, Pocket Dictionary of Apologetics & Philosophy of Religion (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2002), 39.
[2] R.C. Sproul, John Gerstner, and Arthur Lindsley, Classical Apologetics: A Rational Defense of the Christian Faith and a Critique of Presuppositional Apologetics (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1984), 69-70.
One comment on the above post by ChrisH was this one by CF:
C.F.’s comment needs to be kept in mind as we look at the skeptical responses to the idea that homosexual behavior is of equal cultural levels as keeping kosher. A “good understanding” of the culture, text, language, and the like, is lacking. These detractors take SUCH STRONG, ABSOLUTE positions on the Biblical texts based on no cultural understanding… and then in the same breath accuse me (or whomever) that we are being waaayyy too legalistic and literal. Their uninformed, prejudicial position strays far away from proper hermeneutics that any ancient text (not just the Bible) deserves. To be clear, this rejection is more in line with liberalism and progressive thinking rather than the deep thinking of conservative ideals that many in this group profess. I would counsel these believers to be CONSISTENT in how they deal with tough subjects. Religious or political.
I will start the conversation with Dennis Prager correcting Obama on his (really, the liberal position) Biblical knowledge. He deals with the same topic that was presented to me by two people, fortuitously AFTER my conversation about the same topic: ShellFish! Now to the conversation.
G.C. starts out the second round of conversation by saying:
I do not get offended by Sean’s words – neither do I take them as Gospel. He is no closer to knowing God’s heart than Satan himself. And I don’t mean that as an insult, but as a simple fact applicable to ALL of us. I will tell you that the Archbishop of Miami, several Monsignors, dozens of priests, including my pastor, are very loving of my partner and I. The Church’s ‘official’ teachings are known by all, but as long as I don’t attempt to ‘marry’ my partner, my sin is no worse than the divorcee who lives with the new lover and doesn’t remarry. In my heart, I KNOW God blesses my union – damn official teachings and damn Sean Giordano (not really, but his argument here – lol). But I do accept that marriage is one man/one woman, NO divorce – what God has joined together let no man tear apart. But I’ll let God judge – I won’t. My own sister is divorced, although she’s never remarried. Again, I don’t get upset because Sean Giordano has a theological viewpoint and verbalizes it without hatred. A lib will insist that HAVING that opinion is in itself hateful and homophobic. And I’m starting to see a lot of conservative gayswithnthesame attitude on sites like GOProud. Pisses me off.
I respond:
No offense taken. Your point on how a liberal versus how conservatives react is well stated. And I am proud to be in the same camp as you my friend.
There are sins that are worse than others. We will be rewarded for the varying good works we do, and be judged for our sins. God sets up ideals very clearly in His Scripture, not SeanG’s book. And God spoke through His prophets, through the apostles, and through Himself (YHWH, Jesus). Obviously the only sin that counts is denying Christ’s nature and confessing with our mouths our need for salvation through Him.
Again, you mentioned me and the church. Neither of these “institutions” dictate what Scripture has clearly stated. ANd God wants an ideal, and the Christian especially should say:
♛ Divorce is not normative or God’s will;
♛ AND, homosexual relations are not normative or God’s will.
In other words, God hates divorce, and God hates the homosexual act. In other words, the Church (via the Bible) should discourage and not encourage divorce. Likewise, the Church (via the Bible) should discourage and not encourage homosexual behavior.
This does not mean he has withheld grace and forgiveness to the repentant believer. But the repentant believer would not continuously marry, and divorce, and piously say God blesses or condones that action. This has nothing to do with your salvation, nor, does it say that God blesses divorce or same-sex relationships. Take note as well that the original languages help you dissect the truth of Scripture (Matthew 5:32):
The Greek words for “commit” and “commits” come from the root words MOICHEUO and MOIXAO. The first word is in the aorist passive tense meaning that the act of committing adultery is completed and done against the woman. This would suggest that he subsequently has sexual relations with some other woman. This is the message of Matt 19:9; Mark 10:11-12 and Luke 16:18. The second word is in the present middle tense meaning that the woman commits adultery herself by marrying another man. Such divorces are unbiblical divorces.
[....]
Conclusion: Divorce was not in God’s original plan. God only allows it because of the hardness of hearts. The effect of this sin is just like any other sin; there are always consequences that are unavoidable. But do not forget that God forgives this sin. He forgave King David who killed and committed adultery. There is no sin God does not forgive. (Source)
Here are the very next words/list out of G.C.’s mouth [keyboard]:
Again, I respond:
Lets stick with your example of shellfish G.C., as E.M. also brought it up. I want to deal with this in a couple of ways. Firstly, the entirety of Leviticus was not written for everyone. There are parts that speak to the Jewish nation of the day (the Hebraic peoples), and other commands that included more than just the Jewish nation. We know this because God says, “Speak to the sons of Israel saying…” He gives instructions to the Israelites, not to the rest of the nations.
✂ *SNIP* ✂
Here is a list of instances when the occurrence of the phrase “Speak to the Sons of Israel saying…” is found in Leviticus, the book under consideration.
Lev. 4:2, atonement for unintentional sins Lev. 7:23, don’t eat fat from ox, sheep, or goat Lev. 7:29, procedures for peace offering to the Lord Lev. 11:2, list of animals the Israelites may eat Lev. 12:2, uncleanness after giving birth Lev. 23:24, rest on 1st day of 7th month Lev. 23:34, Feast of Booths on 15th day of 7th month Lev. 24:15, the one cursing God will bear his sin
So, we can see a host of things that dealt only with Israel.
However, there are abominations that did not apply only to Israel, but to everyone else also. Again, let’s look at Leviticus.
======== ✞ Lev. 18:22-30, “You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female; it is an abomination. 23 Also you shall not have intercourse with any animal to be defiled with it, nor shall any woman stand before an animal to mate with it; it is a perversion. 24 Do not defile yourselves by any of these things; FOR BY ALL THESE THE NATIONS WHICH I AM CASTING OUT BEFORE YOU HAVE BECOME DEFILED 25 ‘For the land has become defiled, therefore I have visited its punishment upon it, so the land has spewed out its inhabitants. 26 But as for you, you are to keep My statutes and My judgments, and SHALL NOT DO ANY OF THESE ABOMINATIONS, NEITHER THE NATIVE, NOR THE ALIEN WHO SOJOURNS AMONG YOU 27 (FOR THE MEN OF THE LAND WHO HAVE BEEN BEFORE YOU HAVE DONE ALL THESE ABOMINATIONS, and the land has become defiled); 28 so that the land may not spew you out, should you defile it, as it has SPEWED OUT THE NATION WHICH HAS BEEN BEFORE YOU. 29 ‘For whoever does any of these abominations, those persons who do so shall be cut off from among their people. 30 ‘Thus YOU ARE TO KEEP MY CHARGE, THAT YOU DO NOT PRACTICE ANY OF THE ABOMINABLE CUSTOMS WHICH HAVE BEEN PRACTICED BEFORE YOU, so as not to defile yourselves with them; I am the Lord your God.’”
========
What abominations is Lev. 18:22-30 speaking of? Contextually, chapter 17 is about blood atonement procedures, so that is for Israel, not for everyone. In Chapter 18 God says to Israel, “You shall not do what is done in the land of Egypt where you lived, nor are you to do what is done in the land of Canaan where I am bringing you,” (Lev. 18:3). So, now instead of it applying only to Israel, God mentions things that are done by Egypt and the land of Canaan. What were the things those nations did? The chapter contains the following.
Lev. 18:6-18, don’t uncover the nakedness of various relatives. Lev. 18:19, don’t have sexual relations with woman on her period Lev. 18:20, don’t have intercourse with your neighbor’s wife Lev. 18:21, don’t offer children to Molech Lev. 18:22, don’t lie with a male as with a female Lev. 18:23 don’t have intercourse with animals.
The next day, as they were traveling and nearing the city, Peter went up to pray on the housetop about noon. Then he became hungry and wanted to eat, but while they were preparing something, he went into a visionary state. He saw heaven opened and an object that resembled a large sheet coming down, being lowered by its four corners to the earth. In it were all the four-footed animals and reptiles of the earth, and the birds of the sky. Then a voice said to him, “Get up, Peter; kill and eat!” “No, Lord!” Peter said. “For I have never eaten anything common and ritually unclean!” Again, a second time, a voice said to him, “What God has made clean, you must not call common.” This happened three times, and then the object was taken up into heaven.
Peter Visits Cornelius
While Peter was deeply perplexed about what the vision he had seen might mean, the men who had been sent by Cornelius, having asked directions to Simon’s house, stood at the gate. They called out, asking if Simon, who was also named Peter, was lodging there. While Peter was thinking about the vision, the Spirit told him, “Three men are here looking for you. Get up, go downstairs, and accompany them with no doubts at all, because I have sent them.” Then Peter went down to the men and said, “Here I am, the one you’re looking for. What is the reason you’re here?” They said, “Cornelius, a centurion, an upright and God-fearing man, who has a good reputation with the whole Jewish nation, was divinely directed by a holy angel to call you to his house and to hear a message from you.” Peter then invited them in and gave them lodging. The next day he got up and set out with them, and some of the brothers from Joppa went with him.
The edict against the ethnic/religious Jew (“the sons of Israel”) was lifted in this verse. So contrary to the horrible arguments often made by Skeptics of the Christian faith, You, G.C., should not use the same horrible exegesis that non-believers use. The same can be said regarding arguments for same-sex marriage needing to be made well. (Per Mr. Blatt, whom I agree with on this point — that is, a coherent reasonable case needs to be made for same-sex marriage. A case that isn’t arbitrary, like liberals tend towards.) So to do hermeneutics need to be used well in the Christians life. No matter where it leads you (often times it leads ALL OF US to face our sins and sinful nature, right?).
Here are the very next words/list out of G.C.’s mouth [keyboard]:
You see, G.C. (as well as E.M.) do not want to accept what the Bible says at face value. They have no need for ways to approach ancient texts to allow personal opinion and deconstructionism (progressive values) to be set aside and create a model for all people to equally and fairly come to these texts to get the most truth from them. I explain this well in another post where the Bible is attacked and the people doing so are the literalists/legalists, similar to G.C. and Others. They are absolutists. Conservative Christian and Jews are not the Biblical literalists… even though they (we) are painted as such. (In other words, they incorporate what they deny, while applying straw-man positions to our side, its very convoluted on their part and why progressives typically think these attacks are acceptable.) A final word from Dr. Copan, that also touches a bit on the salvonic history involved in this discussion, that is often overlooked by the skeptics. He makes a point also about the wooden interpretation of the pharisees and has to point out that these topics (divorce, slavery, and the like) are not ideals from God but Him dealing with man’s “hardness of heart.”
… Jesus’s approach reminds us that there’s a multilevel ethic that cautions against a monolithic, single-level ethic that simply “parks” at Deuteronomy 24 and doesn’t consider the redemptive component of this legislation. The certificate of divorce was to protect the wife, who would, by necessity, have to remarry to come under the shelter of a husband to escape poverty and shame. This law took into consideration the well-being of the wife. So when Jesus spoke to the Pharisees, their wooden interpretation made it difficult to see that Moses’s words didn’t represent an absolute ethic. (Keep in mind that God’s commands involving divorce—and even slavery—are given not as ideals, but because of the hardness of human hearts [Matt. 19:81.) These Pharisees approached Scripture in a way that made it virtually impossible for them to see any further, as Jesus pointed out—to see that there was an even greater good of sacrificially serving in the kingdom by forgoing the joys and benefits of marriage (Matt. 19:10-12).
[….]
So as we look at many of these Levitical laws, we must appreciate them in their historical context, as God’s temporary provision, but also look at the underlying spirit and movement across the sweep of salvation history. As we do so, we see that the movement of Scripture consistently prohibits homosexual activity (for example), on the one hand. However, the movement of Scripture consistently affirms the full humanity of slaves (e.g., Job 31:13-15), eventually encouraging slaves to pursue their freedom (1 Cor. 7:21). As we noted earlier, slavery wasn’t commanded but permitted (as was divorce) because of the hardness of human hearts. Homosexuality is a different matter. New Testament scholar R. T. France writes that direct references to homosexual activity in Scripture are “uniformly hostile”; homosexual behavior—so common in surrounding cultures (ancient Near Eastern/Greco-Roman)—was “simply alien to the Jewish and Christian ethos.” Note too that acts—rather than mere inclinations/tendencies (whether homosexual or heterosexual)—are judged to be immoral and worthy of censure in Scripture.
So it’s wrongheaded to claim that homosexual acts were “just cultural” or simply “on the same level” as the kosher or clothing laws that God gave to help set Israel apart from its pagan neighbors. Levitical law also prohibits adultery, bestiality, murder, and theft, and surely these go far beyond the temporary prohibitions of eating shrimp or pork!
One last small dialogue from the larger strain. E.M. mentioned the following:
“Jesus never mentions homosexuality in the bible.”
To which I quoted Scripture (not to mention Jesus was heavily involved in writing Leviticus! Just Sayin’). I respond:
You are wrong E.M., Jesus specifically mentions the ideal (Matthew 19:4-6) I have continuously spoken to above.
He answered, “Haven’t you read in your Bible that the Creator originally made man and woman for each other, male and female? And because of this, a man leaves father and mother and is firmly bonded to his wife, becoming one flesh—no longer two bodies but one. Because God created this organic union of the two sexes, no one should desecrate his art by cutting them apart.” (The Message Bible ~ Red is Jesus)
This organic union is what I speak to in part one.
You can read more about how to approach text in ways any deep-thinking literary critic is trained to as well as the person seeking truth. Obviously G.C.rejects portions of Scripture to embolden his view how he views man’s nature and his own standing before God. He fashions God and His Holy Spirit to fit his conception. Not based on deep study, but of psychological wants and needs. You can click through to my other post. I caution you however, this is a step those interested in truth should take. Those not interested in literary criticism, history, hermeneutics, and the like, shouldn’t take.
These are three books I recommend to the serious student:
I was graciously invited to a site that is a depot for many conservatively minded homosexuals as well as supporters of these Republican leaning folk. For the record there are many independents and libertarian leaning guys and gals in the group as well. The person that invited me to the Facebook group, JK, soon after posted a link to one of my blog posts to help submerge me into the site’s ethos a bit. Which I did. I have to say, it makes my heart joyous that good, calm dialogue — even in disagreement — can happen. Why can it happen? Because they are conservative. No matter if I talked to heterosexual or homosexual persons from the Left about this, almost always you are hit with name-calling, pigeonholing, and straw-man arguments. So kudos to the guys and gals on the Facebook group.
Which leads me to the below. While being a bit long, I must post this dialogue here in the hopes that others will a) find what I am arguing for persuasive, and b) be able to incorporate these arguments into ones apologetic. And I must say, that the only positive argument I have seen put forth is one from the Left. That is “equality” (not liberty) being the main driving force. It is an ethic closer to the French Revolution which denied [capital "N"] Natural [capital "L"] Law but almost an earlier form of “legal positivism.” Here is Francis Canavan speaking to this topic just a bit for the person interested in this dichotomy, after which I will post the dialogue from FB:
Liberty, equality, fraternity was the slogan of the French Revolution. Liberty and equality were the Revolution’s operative goals, and fraternity was brought in as a cement to hold them together. For liberty and equality are not necessarily in harmony and, in fact, are often at war with each other. Keeping the peace between them therefore became the role of fraternity. Alas, fraternity has not been terribly successful at it, as the history of class struggle since the French Revolution has shown.
In the evolution of democratic theory in the past two centuries, two main currents have emerged from the same wellspring of radical individualism: the liberal stream, emphasizing liberty while acknowledging equality of civil rights, and the egalitarian stream equality of civil rights, emphasizing equality while preaching the liberty guaranteed by civil rights.
Liberal democracy understands rights as immunities from governmental interference. Their function is to prevent government from unduly restraining any individual’s liberty. The egalitarian conception of rights is much broader than the classical liberal one and includes a wide range of positive benefits to be conferred by government. It tends toward an equality of results rather than merely of opportunities. To put it crudely, it means not only that you are free to apply for the job, but that you get it and you keep it.
Liberal democratic thought has as its economic counterpart the ideology of capitalism and a free-market economic system. The egalitarian stream ushers in the ideology of socialism and a government dedicated to bringing about substantial economic equality among all citizens.
Liberalism as it exists in the United States today is an effort to have the best of both ideological worlds. It assigns to government the duty of fostering, not complete economic equality, but general and a more equal share in it for all citizens. At the same time, through an ever-expanding array of civil rights, it seeks to emancipate the individual from religious, moral, and social restraints that are not of his own choosing. The contemporary liberal ideal would be a country in which everyone was employed at high wages in work which he/she found fulfilling, without distinction of race, color, creed, gender, ethnic origin, educational background, or sexual preference, and could live by any “lifestyle” that he/she chose.
Contemporary American conservatism is largely a reaction to this brand of liberalism, and therefore is a mixed bag of views. Among its adherents we find “conservatives” who are really nineteenth-century liberals eager to get government off the back of business. We also find “social-issue” conservatives angered by the liberal dissolution of our public morality. Still others are “libertarians” who want no public morality at all but oppose liberalism because of the large role it gives government. Another group of conservatives are regionalists or “states-righters” who are against not government as such, but the federal government.
The ideological conflict between and among liberals and conservatives is carried on in terms of liberty and equality.
Francis Canavan, The Pluralist Game: Pluralism, Liberalism, and the Moral Conscience (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 1995), 127-128.
What is the founding zeitgesit of our country?
Remember, if marriage is just about happiness or love, then why not polygamy, polyandry, or the like (“I’ve married my sister – now we’re having our second baby” ~ Daily Mail). Because, marriage is NOT about those things. JK is the person who invited me to the group, and who promptly posted a link to one of my excerpts from a book I posted on my blog (see, right). (*Caution, RAW Language*) Without further adieu:
JK: I have not found many gays that were molested. I can only think of two that were in fact. Have you known many? I’m just wondering.
AC: I “think” I was at a YMCA camp when I was very young,I DO remember sitting on the head (lol) dudes lap and being felt up after that its a blank,I do remember crying that I didn’t want to go the next year and I was able to NEVER go back,wish I could sue LOL
JA: Yep… when I was 10 here, 17 year old next door to grandma’s got me. No entrance but got froddled. I held a long grudge until I talked to a psycologist that suggested the same sex attraction was going to happen anyways, but the event was the first same sex stimulus, etc. I think it was reported the percentages of perfectly straight men that were molested is 17%… it happens to be the same 17% for gays which indicates molestation is not the shooting gun for guys being gay.
AC: I KNOW I always have been gay,even “thought” of stuff I wanted to do BEFORE I knew what gay was and what sex was……it was like natural?
JA: On the other hand of that above statement from me. We know the act of writing, which hand we use, language or languages spoken, at young ages the brain physically modifies itself to adapt to be able to do what is taught well. I believe there may be some genetic capability to go gay, but actually playing with other boys or being molested at ages under 15 can actually concrete in the gayness and once the brain molds itself into same sex attraction, it is irreversible.
AC: I wore a pink ballarina dress to kindergarden LOL yes escaped from the nanny and ran to school in it and refused to take it off THANK GOD I aint into drag LOL but what straight boy would do that LOL
JA: Maybe because you had that gay potential, it made you more vulnerable to being used? I think that’s what happened here. The older kid asked if I wanted to do what the big kids do and took out what looked like a 12 inch dick to me, I never had an erection before then but looking at his made me get one and I was intrigued. I had no idea was sex was or that boy/boy stuff was wrong.
JPC: I only know one that was molested. And he had a very difficult life as a young man.
KC: My (maternal) first cousin (4 yrs older than me) lived with us for about a year when I was about 12 (he was in high school) and he used to fondle me. He made me jerk him off while he did me. I was afraid at first but I didn’t see that it was wrong … also, whenever I would spend the night with my school mates, we slept in the same bed and the same thing would happen. Then, in high school, I remember riding in the back seat of the coach’s car going to an away game and some of the guys would fondle each other. As far as I know, I’m the only one who has admitted of being gay. The rest are all “happily” married (or divorced). My older cousin (the one that fondled me first) is also still married. We’ve not had communication in over 20 years. Looking back, I now realized my cousin actually molested me but the fact that I liked it, is that still considered molestation?
[....]
What’s the difference in “molestation” (my cousin) and “experimentation”?
GC: I consider molestation to be an abusive situation with an adult over a child. Most of what I’ve read here falls under the experimentation category.
This is where I finally wade in. So far, as you can see, many have had a sexual encounter during a young age with someone older involved in leading these people (adult or teen) to be fondled or to fondle them.
Papa Giorgio: About me. I have over 5,000 books in my home library (politics, religion, philosophy, science, history, ethics, theology, economics, and the like) as well as many DVD documentaries/lectures/presentations that are not “Time to Kill” with Prince’s protege movies (“The Last Dragon” or “Time to Kill”). Some could argue they need to be these types of movies and I should lighten up a bit. But so be it.
————————– “By-the-by, for those reading this I will explain what is missing in this type of discussion due to the media used. Genuflecting, care, concern, one being upset (does not entail being “mad”), etc… are all not viewable because we are missing each other’s tone, facial expressions, and the like. I afford the other person I am dialoguing with the best of intentions and read his/her comments as if we were out having a talk over a beer at a bar or meeting a friend at Starbucks. (I say this because there seems to be a phenomenon of etiquette thrown out when talking through email or Face Book, lots more public cussing and gratuitous responses.) You will see that often times I USE CAPS — which in www lingo for YELLING. I am not using it this way, I use it to merely emphasize and often times say as much: *not said in yelling tone, but merely to emphasize*. So in all my discussions I afford the best of thought to the other person as I expect he or she would to me… even if dealing with tough subjects as the above. I have had more practice at this than most, and with half-hour pizza, one hour photo and email vs. ‘snail mail,’ know that important discussions take time to meditate on, inculcate, and to process. So be prepared for a good thought provoking discussion if you so choose one with me.” ————————–
About me. I have over 5,000 books in my home library (politics, religion, philosophy, science, history, ethics, theology, economics, and the like) as well as many DVD documentaries/lectures/presentations that are not “Time to Kill” with Prince’s protege [movies]. Some could argue they need to be movies and I should lighten up a bit. But so be it.
Dialogue is important, and I will discuss my many years of research on this and any topic. But if we, discuss, say rape ~ there are two levels we can discuss this on. The emotional, or the legal/ethical/etc level. When I talk rape, and universal absolutes, I will bring up books like,
▼ Dale Peterson and Richard Wrangham, Demonic Males: Apes and the Origins of Human Violence (New York, NY: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing, 1997). ▼ Randy Thornhill and Craig T. Palmer, A Natural History of Rape: Biological Bases of Sexual Coercion (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2000).
showing that if evolution (atheistic, philosophical naturalism) rules the day, that “rape” is a process used by our species (in the past, and in nature) as a way to propagate our kind. It is therefore, ethically speaking, merely [currently] “taboo.” In theism it is morally wrong at all times and places in the universe. So when we are talking “foundational aspects” of worldviews (side-note: all 10,0000 religions in the world can be broken down into 7-at-the-most worldviews), we leave the emotional and deal with the many other aspects of the issue.
———————— RAPE:
✂theism: evil, wrong at all times and places in the universe — absolutely;
✂atheism: taboo, it was used in our species in the past for the survival of the fittest, and is thus a vestige of evolutionary progress… and so may once again become a tool for survival — it is in every corner of nature;
✂pantheism: illusion, all morals and ethical actions and positions are actually an illusion (Hinduism – maya; Buddhism – sunyata). In order to reach some state of Nirvana one must retract from this world in their thinking on moral matters, such as love and hate, good and bad. —————————
ALL THAT [above] makes no difference to a woman who was raped. Especially the closer you are to the event. It is emotional. And I would never talk about the above with a women versus doting over her emotional needs. Agreed?
SO, if you cannot get into the weeds with me if you truly want to see the hurdles that need to be jumped in this discussion with thoughtful conservatives. Then you shouldn’t engage in polite, but sometimes emotional, topic such as what JK has really given his blessing to. (Never thought you would be a priest, huh JK?)
Are you — who are reading this — tracking? Sound fair? Reasonable? Take note, I am a federalist, and lean libertarian (small “l” on this). If states pass these initiatives by the consent of the people in those states (same-sex marriage), then so be it. It is how our Constitution was set up. If we want to codify marriage as between a man-and-women, legally binding for all the states. Then we need 2/3rds of Congress and 3/4ths of the states. NOT GOING TO HAPPEN. So I am only here talking about societal impacts and reasons behind many of the “choosing” of this lifestyle.
To better explain, here are two calls from gay listeners to conservative talk radio:
So know as well that I believe a very small minority (but still due to environmental reasons) do not truly “choose” this lifestyle.
We all on the same page? Somewhat? Decorum being the word in the face of personal subjects.
JK: So when I was about 10 I was kissed on the lips by a kid 3 or 4 years older. Was I molested? I was certainly surprised and knew I didn’t like it. That girl really pissed me off. When I was 12 I went to church camp as I was a very pious child. Living with, being with and showering with boys helped me to know my place in the world.
Papa Giorgio: Just got to work… I will share that I have talked to Walt and he has mentioned that the many people he helps and deal with in his ministry have sexual trauma when they are young. I shared with you two co-workers that I love (one when I worked at Borders, the other at Whole Foods). One friend had his “coming out experience” when he was 12, by a family member. The other, who was very flamboyant with his past (and shared it with anyone who would listen) had his “coming out experience” by a stranger when he was thirteen.
Also, I shared with you that my mom has known quite a few lesbians that are fellow trailer-parkers (I am sure there is some colloquial term to use better than that?) and they have all confided sexual acts done by close family or close confidants to the family.
There is also this from a favored author of mine, Tammy Bruce:
✿ Here come the elephant again: Almost without exception, the gay men I know (and that’s too many to count) have a story of some kind of sexual trauma or abuse in their childhood — molestation by a parent or an authority figure, or seduction as an adolescent at the hands of an adult. The gay community must face the truth and see sexual molestation of an adolescent for the abuse it is, instead of the ‘coming-of-age’ experience many [gays] regard it as being. Until then, the Gay Elite will continue to promote a culture of alcohol and drug abuse, sexual promiscuity, and suicide by AIDS. (Tammy Bruce, The Death of Right and Wrong: Exposing the Left’s Assault on Our Culture and Values [Roseville: Prima, 2003], 99.)
This may not be everyone’s experience JK, but it is enough for some to say that unlike color/ethnicity [immutability], that homosexuality is mutable.
I believe there are a whole strain of environmental causes (abuse, issues in the home, hormonal influence in and out of utero, etc.) But you must admit that one cause CAN BE taking an adolescent when they are sexually vulnerable, and damaging this delicate time in a youths life? Right? In other words, if this life (the gay life) is something you (the general you, not you specifically) didn’t choose, and it has been hard, you would want to then try to make sure the ideal environment to teach young men and women the proper relationship between their sexuality and the world they live in (while respecting peoples choices and private matter) would be your goal. Yeah?
Just a side-note. There seems to be an unhealthy dislike for the sexes in the gay community. This has worked its way into many areas of the same sexes who happen to be gay. For instance, when I was in jail many years ago I was a trustee (worker) that fed the jail masses. Some of those masses were the gay men, who were pretty normal in appearance and attitude. A separate group were the very feminine gay men, and the third group were transvestites. I asked why they were separated and the officer said that they would kill each other if not. Similarly, there is some good work showing that the very “butch type” female gays and men were key in helping incarcerate the many effeminate homosexuals in the camps during WWII. While the next response isn’t as extreme, it does offer up some insight into gay community and its biases brought on by nurture [or nature]? (I will emphasize where someones experience and scholarship is rejected do to gender):
JK: I believe that the clergy and social service types would get more stories like this naturally and from my own experience I never hang out with lesbians. Lesbians stay to themselves mostly as many do not like men. I love Tammy, but I will bet she doesn’t hang with the boys too often.
Papa Giorgio: By-the-by, just to explain why I posted those two calls [audio files in my first post]. I am making clear that I believe some — a very small minority — are born with no desire for the opposite sex. But in a person, like Walt Heyer’s life, much of what happened to him likewise was not his choice either. Choice sometimes comes later in life. One example from faith is this, and Ravi mentions Henri Nouwen in his response:
Ravi refers to Henri Nouwen as a Saint. Many of us cannot keep a “lid on it” like Henri did (that is Saint status in my book), but society as a whole should seriously discuss what IT should normalize or keep in the private sphere. I believe a mutable attraction is one of them. this is what serious discussion should be over.
[....]
Just saying “Tammy doesn’t know” is not good enough. She knows a lot of gay men in the field she has chosen to be in over the years. As she even states in that quote. Time to get to work. Love your way JK.
JK: I have lived in L.A. all my life and don’t know any gays that know Tammy Bruce other than listening to her on the radio. I have been in all the bars since I was a kid and have never seen her or heard her mentioned, but let’s say she is a huge fag hag lesbian. Her experiences like mine are probably skewed. I know I have slept with far more men that Tammy Bruce and the subject rarely comes up. That’s why I am trying to get some dialogue here to see what other peoples experiences have been.
[....]
Ravi also says that being a polygamist wouldn’t work in Christianity. We it worked for Solomon, Abraham, Gideon, Elkanah, Saul, and David. David had many wives and loved Jonathan more than any of them btw.
Papa Giorgio: @JK, you mentioned Bible camp. But have you studied the Old Testament (New as well) as an adult? Maybe with some reliable Bible helps by people who know the language, culture, history they comment on? Or….
and I am not trying to demean you in ANY way, these are serious questions
… have you traversed the internet to liberal and gay sites to see that the Bible has stories of polygamy? I do not mean to get religious, but since you quoted characters from the Bible, I will lightly touch on the same issue in it that I have talked about above. that is, “ideals” vs. the “private.” This same subject/object distinction takes place in your mentioning these stories.
But the question I am curious about is if you have gone to reliable sources on the matter. in other words, if you are to share stories that challenge an ideal about good music and you share stories of, I don’t know, say John Lennon. Would you have a wider more trusting conversation with the person you are conversing with if they knew you got much of your information from “John Lennon: The Life,” by
Philip Norman, who had unprecedented access to archives, interviewed over the years the Beatles, wrote the previously definitive book on the Beatles, “Shout.” Or the book “The Lennon Prophecy,” where author Joseph Niezgoda says Lennon made a pack with the devil, lauded by the once good WND site. Now crap.
So. like my analogy, have you [honestly, and this is not to judge you, I truly am curious and want an honest answer] done the hard work to see if the above statements about polygamy in the Bible make your case?
Side-note, I dealt with a popular meme in an older post on this topic. I explain some of the “hard work” here:
JK: Thanks so much Papa Giorgio. I love your insight.
[....]
I don’t actually want to change biblical marriage, but state sanctioned marriage. Nobody straight or gay should have a tax benefit over another as we are all guaranteed equal status under the law. Marriage is between you and God. The government should not be involved.
HH: Papa, Anyone who reads the OT will be horrified to read some of the strange tales it harbors.
Papa Giorgio: No, that wasn’t my question JK, I will ask again:
⚑ “So. like my analogy, have you [honestly, and this is not to judge you, I truly am curious and want an honest answer] done the hard work to see if the above statements about polygamy in the Bible make your case?”
I will continue to the main point after you respond openly/honestly to this simple question. Yes or no will suffice.
I continue, but in response to HH.
Papa Giorgio: @HH, I would recommend a book for you, two actually:
Ideals vs. Practice (per God [Jesus & YHWH]). You do not have to respond to this, consider it as a short lesson in what God has designed as an ideal (or if believing in neo-Darwinian non-God guided evolution, what nature has set as an ideal), and how we dilute that ideal. All men/women, not just homosexuals.
The interesting thing about the Bible JK, is that it records many of the foibles, murderous acts, and missteps men and women make. UNLIKE comparable writings of the day that re-wrote their histories to display a sense of perfection in both battle and life in order to lift whichever king to an almost deistic level. For instance, if the Apostles had been attempting to create a story about (lie) about Jesus’ Resurrection, they would have not inserted the first people to find the tomb empty, women. In that day and custom women’s testimony was not allowed or accepted.
This goes a long way to realize God set up an ideal. Which Natural Law does as well (which is the spirit and philosophy our Founding documents were written):
—————————————— In Matthew 19:4 we are told by Jesus that God created one “male and [one] female” and joined them in marriage. Mark 10:6-8:”But from the beginning of the creation, God ‘made them male and female.’ ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, ‘and the two shall become one flesh’; so then they are no longer two, but one flesh.” The two as one is the pattern on how marriage was to be conducted from the start. NOT three or four as one.
The Hebrew is very specific, God always spoke of man’s “wife,” as singular, not wives. Notice it also states one father one mother. It wasn’t until sin made man fall (Gen. 4:23) that polygamy occurs. Cain was cursed, Lamech is a descendent of Cain and the first to practice polygamy. The first time polygamous relationship is found in the Bible is with a thriving rebellious society in sin; when a murderer named “Lamech [a descendant of Cain] took for himself two wives” (Gen.4:19, 23).
The same Godly pattern of one man and one wife is lived by Noah. At the time of the Ark (Gen. 7:7), Noah took his one wife into the ark, all his son’s took one wife; God called Noah’s family righteous and pure. If polygamy were ordained of God, it would have made sense that Noah and his sons would have taken additional wives with them to repopulate the earth faster from the cataclysm.
This was to be a permanent union between man and woman that they might be helpful to one another (Genesis 2:18). Marriage represents a relationship of both spiritual and physical unity.
[….]
God never condoned polygamy but like divorce he allowed it to occur and did not bring an immediate punishment for this disobedience. Deut. 17:14-17: “I will set a king over me like all the nations that are around me,’ “you shall surely set a king over you whom the LORD your God chooses; one from among your brethren you shall set as king over you; you may not set a foreigner over you, who is not your brother. But he shall not multiply horses for himself, nor cause the people to return to Egypt to multiply horses, for the LORD has said to you, ‘You shall not return that way again.’ “Neither shall he multiply wives for himself, lest his heart turn away; nor shall he greatly multiply silver and gold for himself.” This is the command of God, and he has never changed it.
1 Kings 11:3 says Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines violating the principle of monogamy that he was given through the law of Moses. Consider that Solomon at one time was the wisest man in the world. In I Kings 11:4: “For it came to pass, when Solomon was old, that his wives turned away his heart after other gods: and his heart was not perfect with the LORD his God, as was the heart of David his father.” Notice Solomon became a polytheist because he was influenced in polygamy. In his case many wives, became many gods. Scripture has always commanded monogamy (Ps.128:3; Prov. 5:18; 18:22; 19:14; 31:10-29; Eccl. 9:9).
The fact is that God never commanded polygamy or divorce. Scripture says (Bible) He only permitted it because of the hardness of their hearts (Deut. 24:1; Matt. 19:8). Matt. 5:31-32: “Furthermore it has been said, “Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce. But I say to you that whoever divorces his wife for any reason except sexual immorality causes her to commit adultery; and whoever marries a woman who is divorced commits adultery.” God hates divorce as well as polygamy, since it destroys the family (Mal. 2:16). Whatever the patriarchs or any Christian did wrong does not change the fact the Bible condemns it….
JK posted a video he quickly mentioned to me at a dinner meeting with like minded conservatives:
Papa Giorgio: I have already dealt with the non-sequitur of comparing the mutable aspect of homosexuality with the immutable characteristic in color/ethnicity of one’s skin color. There is no difference between a black man and a white man. There are differences between male and female. Ann Coulter notes one black women who was questioning John Kerry:
////////////
When gay marriage was first thrust on the nation by the Massachusetts Supreme Court during the 2004 presidential primary campaign, Senator John Kerry said what was at stake was “somebody’s right to live equally under the same laws as other people in the country.”
But of course, gays do live equally under the same laws as other people. There are no special speed limit laws or trespassing laws or murder laws for gays. What gays can’t do is get married to members of the same sex. Nor can heterosexuals, immigrants, whites, blacks, the rich, the poor or the homeless.
The Democrats’ comparison of gay marriage to civil rights ultimately led to the ridiculous spectacle of Kerry basically accusing a black woman of being a bigot because she did not appreciate the comparison of gays to blacks under the equal protection clause. It had to happen.
At a “town hall” meeting in Mississippi during the campaign, a black woman in the audience asked Kerry to reject the comparison of gay marriage to civil rights. “I don’t care what they say,” she said, “there is no correlation between gay rights and civil rights in terms of what black Americans have gone through.”
In response, Kerry said it was important to recognize that “we have a Constitution which has an equal protection clause.” (Because black people had probably forgotten that.)
The woman “was not satisfied” with Kerry’s answer, in the delicate phrasing of the New York Times. She said: “My point is, homosexuality is an idea. You have never heard a doctor say, ‘Mr. and Mrs. John Doe, you have a bouncing baby homosexual.’ It’s an idea.”
Ann Coulter, Mugged: Racial Demagoguery from the Seventies to Obama (New York, NY: Sentinel [Penguin], 2012), 149-150.
/////////////
Similarly, through abuse or hormonal influence one cannot “become” “black” or “Asian,” etc. Again. Mutability vs. Immutability. Ted Olson is wrong in his view of the 14th Amendment.
[....]
I also reject the idea that marriage is a religious institution. My chapter on the matter (✌http://tinyurl.com/8unujfs✌) in my book is where I explain how civil law recognizes the already codified nature of marriage, in nature. The state does not create the ideal of one-man one-woman ideal. Just as it does not create the First and Second Amendments in the Constitution. These are…
…truths [that are] self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it…
So, for instance, Nature and Natural Law (since Grecian/Roman days) have recognized a pattern (ideal) in nature. Robert George notes this in a more modern way — analogy:
——————————– However, there is a “created order,” or, even a natural order (if you do not believe in God). My argument for heterosexual (between a man and a woman) unions is usable both by the atheist (non believer in God) and the theist (a believer in God – in the Judeo-Christian sense). Here is the crux of the matter in regards to “nature’s order:”
✂ “…take gold as an example, it has inherent in its nature intrinsic qualities that make it expensive: good conductor of electricity, rare, never tarnishes, and the like. The male and female have the potential to become a single biological organism, or single organic unit, or principle. Two essentially becoming one. The male and female, then, have inherent to their nature intrinsic qualities that two mated males or two mated females never actualize in their courtship… nor can they ever. The potential stays just that, potential, never being realized…..
✂ “….Think of a being that reproduces, not by mating, but by some act performed by individuals. Imagine that for these same beings, movement and digestion is performed not by individuals, but only by the complementary pairs that unite for this purpose. Would anyone acquainted with such beings have difficulty understanding that in respect to movement and digestion, the organism is a united pair, or an organic unity?”
So you see, the two heterosexual organisms that join in a sexual union cease being two separate organisms for a short time and become one organism capable of reproduction. This is what the state and the church are sealing in a marriage, this intrinsic union. The homosexual couple can never achieve this union, so “natures order” has endowed the heterosexual union with an intrinsic quality that other relationships do not have or could never attain. Both the atheist and theist can argue from this point, because either we were created this way or we evolved this way. Either way, nature has imposed on the sexual union being discussed.
Remember, the Constitution was written with Natural Law as its ethos. Do you wish to undermine this understanding of Nature and man’s relationship to it (It)?
[...] Small Talk [...]
HH: I don’t know why anyone wants to get married with the divorce rate well over 50%. Of course, there are economic factors when it comes to end of life or catastrophic illness decisions or taxes (can’t forget taxes). I have been saying for years the homophobes need to shut up. It’s beneficial to the economy to have weddings and divorces. It’s all about $$$.
Papa Giorgio: I am with you (in many examples, and if I ever get on a high horse), just ask my wife to knock me down from it. And I understand many a persons frustration in talking about issues with me, it is not too often I have met people who have read 2,000 books (or so) cover-to-cover and have another 3,000 (or so) for reference/future reading. Often times this knowledge can come across as prideful, and I admit that whether my fallen nature tends that direction or I inadvertently come across as an asshole — I apologize.
I have to laud YOU however JK. Many will have already broken down to personal attacks. These are tough, personal issues. And I would only want YOU to “know that which you reject.” What do I mean? Often times (and you know this from dealing with Leftists I am sure), that there is little understanding of the better arguments out there. For example, I would want a Democratic friend or family member (someone I care about) to read the following:
☮ The Road to Serfdom, F. A. Hayek;
☮ Basic Economics: A Common Sense Guide to the Economy, Thomas Sowell;
☮ The Vision of the Anointed: Self-Congratulation as a Basis for Social Policy, Thomas Sowell;
☮ A Conflict of Visions: Ideological Origins of Political Struggles, Thomas Sowell;
Etc.
Likewise, I would want you to chase after the cream of the crop arguments making the case FOR MARRIAGE (hetero) so the case for homo-marriage can begin to respond. However, as you know from dealing with the Left, often times we are left with trying to fill in fallacious thinking we encounter in order to properly respond.
This may be YOUR clarion call to revisit the issue with a new mind or drive.
I will recommend a book to start: “What Is Marriage?: Man and Woman: A Defense”
It will set you on a path to see what will surely be used as a resource in the upcoming SCOTUS review of marriage.
Much Thought and Love your way JK, Papa G
Papa Giorgio: @HH, if I can show what you have done to the dialogue. You are attempting to mute it, a sort of non-intellectual “fascism”
⌛ “I have been saying for years the homophobes need to shut up.”
No one here is a homophobe. The following is via Prager:
——————– Here is a list of terms liberals apply to virtually every idea or action with which they differ:The “Sweep Under the Rug” Argument
And here is the list of one-word descriptions of what liberals are for:
✪ Peace ✪ Fairness ✪ Tolerance ✪ The poor ✪ The disenfranchised ✪The environment
These two lists serve contemporary liberals in at least three ways.
FIRST, they attack the motives of non-liberals and thereby morally dismiss the non-liberal person.
SECOND, these words make it easy to be a liberal — essentially all one needs to do is to memorize this brief list and apply the right term to any idea or policy. That is one reason young people are more likely to be liberal — they have not had the time or inclination to think issues through, but they know they oppose racism, imperialism and bigotry, and that they are for peace, tolerance and the environment.
THIRD, they make the liberal feel good about himself — by opposing conservative ideas and policies, he is automatically opposing racism, bigotry, imperialism, etc. ———————
You can see this played out in higher education via Indoctrinate U (full movie): http://www.mrctv.org/videos/indoctrinate-u
[...] Small Talk [...]
Papa Giorgio: @ SMW, JK, and GC, and MA. Since I do not know you, and my viewpoint of man (me included) tends toward selfishness, pride, and our fallen nature, I will kindly allow people I do not know — and the fact that my close friend refused to share with me his experience until we were friends enough for him to feel comfortable enough to share them with me, to tell me nothing untoward happened to them as a child. Fine. You have read in my very specified thoughts above the following:
⚤I believe there are a whole strain of environmental causes (abuse, issues in the home, hormonal influence in and out of utero, etc.) But you must admit that one cause CAN BE taking an adolescent when they are sexually vulnerable, and damaging this delicate time in a youths life? Right?
Father issues seem to be a major CONTRIBUTOR. So do gene expressions through hormonal output in utero, diet (low cholesterol stagnates testosterone growth, high soy [milk, tofu, etc] also may have be CONTRIBUTING factor. I do not know the magic soup, but even if one were born that way, the question remains “what IS marriage.” It is not — as Danial said — happiness. [Added: the high rate of mutations in our genome since the fall: Most of the deleterious mutations in the human population arose in the last 5,000 to 10,000 years, a survey claims.]
The ideal need not be replaced. Granted, laws need to be much more open and fair to gay couples (shared property, visitation, etc) — as Ryan Anderson said in his interview (http://youtu.be/g8S9_O9Ln0M). But we are talking the big picture.
In order for the gay community to succeed you have to come out with something more than non-sequiturs and straw-men and labeling.
JK: As a preacher you are concerned foremost with religion Papa, and it’s views. As a constitutionalist I care about the views of the founding fathers when it comes to law, but I don’t really worry about things too much. Staying happy is my foremost concern.
Papa Giorgio: @JK, I am not a preacher? And I made the case for Natural Law, Biology, and the like? You brought up Solomon [religion], I merely corrected you on your self-admitted knowledge about the Biblical ideal. Religion has nothing to do with it.
[...] Small Talk [...]
GC: I had a very strong father figure and a quite Catholic mother. She did moderately drink and smoke while pregnant with me, but that was in 1959 when that was common. My brother is ‘supposedly’ straight (unmarried), although effeminate and all his friends are gay. My sister is straight, but was a tomboy as a child. I definitely think my gayness is genetic, although I know of no aunts/uncles/first cousins who are also gay (I think one lesbian 2nd cousin). But even if environmental or by choice – as an American I do have that choice between consenting adults – right?
ES: I was molested at the Age of 11 by a 35 year old man. He dressed me up like a girl and did things to me I still detest to this day. No one knows. I feel like I can share with this group.
Papa Giorgio: @GC – Yes, in all my rantings lets be clear. I think you can have any relationship you want. But matrimonial law and Natural Law since Grecian/Roman/Church times has noted the new organism created when the two become one (if you haven’t read my posts above you may…. it is a lot though, I sympathize). I am also a Federalist, so I think the states have the right to make the choice themselves, or for them to change their mind on same-sex marriage. What this does is get it out of the courts and a few judges opinions and makes your community have to make a strong case. And making a strong case entails having one. Which is why many WANT unelected officials jumping in.
You can see my little “l” come out (*No* that isn’t a name for anything) in my libertarian streak in many issues that fall to the purview of the state. For instance, where conservatives should stand on marijuana: “Marijuana and the Conservative: Where Should We Stand?“
But society as a whole should not fully endorse or put their stamp of approval on the behavior either, for reasons enumerated in the post.
GC, you also asked, “Why no one turned in Sandusky?”
Shame. Guilt. A feeling that they themselves caused the situation. In the many cases of Buddhist monks, Catholic priests, school counselors, dentists, teachers, etc. (often males molesting males [per capita, males-on-male is astoundingly high], but also males molesting females), these people have often sought out positions of authority over youth where they have the opportunity of privacy and leadership over these youth.
Schools and the church try also to hide their shame by merely shuffling around these teachers due to contractual reasons, and the Church due to embarrassment. Only to prolong the abuse.
Jimmy Savile was an equal opportunity guy:
————————————————- ☁ A total of 18 girls and 10 boys under the age of 10 were abused by Savile, with 23 girls and 15 boys aged 10 to 13…. Of the 34 rape offenses, 26 victims were female and eight male. (http://tinyurl.com/ahzmgbd)
This is about where the substantive discussion petered out. I wanted to add this larger thought to elucidate the crux of the issue. that is, this debate revolves around some very important questions one should be asking, rather than simply defining marriage as “happiness,” or claim that “love” is the binding factor of what marriage “is,” or that some warped progressive view of “equality” is the way Republicans should head. Questions like these:
Disagreements over public policies regarding homosexual conduct and relationships certainly reflect different, incompatible understandings of sexual morality connected to different ‘comprehensive views.’ Underlying and informing these different understandings are, once again, profound differences about the nature of human persons and values. Is pleasure intrinsically good and, as such, a non-instrumental reason for action? Or can pleasure, in itself, provide nothing more than sub-rational motivation? Is the body an aspect of the personal reality of the human being whose body it is? Or is the body a sub-personal part of the human being whose personal reality is the conscious and desiring self which uses the body as an instrument? Is the idea of a true bodily union of persons in marital acts an illusion? Or are marital acts realizations of precisely such a union? Do non-marital sexual acts instrumentalize the bodies of those performing them in such a way as to damage their personal integrity? Or are mutually agreeable sexual acts of whatever type morally innocent and even valuable means of sharing pleasure and intimacy and expressing feelings of tenderness and affection? (Full context embedded at end)
These are questions I see none of these conservative gay men ask themselves in all my hunting around at this group. Instead, many are happy with court room interference, much to the delight of their liberal foes. The excerpt of questions came from the book by Robert P. George, In Defense of Natural Law (New York, NY: Clarendon Press-Oxford, 1999), 213-218. Click to enlarge:
A Critique of God-Talk in “Anarchast Ep. 55 with Kelly Diamond” I do some of the critique in the video itself. As well as below. When a pastoral minded/professor friend submits his short critique I will post it along with the below on my blog and edit in the link here. Now to some commentary:
The prostitute mentioned in the video that Jesus hung out with changed, Jesus didn’t judge her because in His presence she felt the grace and justice (Law and Gospel) of God and knew she was loved first and repented, changed. Jesus didn’t “hang” with non-repentant people. He spoke often about them (the Pharisees for instance). The thief on the Cross, likewise, repented. Jesus conversed with him, and not the other unrepentent criminal. (CS Lewis says hell is locked from the inside — freedom of choice played out in the macro at Calvary.) Jesus spoke A LOT about hell (or, judgment). He also created the structure and model of discipleship, or, organized religion if you will. Not saying that religion…
▲ RELIGION: used as the Founders defined “religion” for some history 101, they meant Christian denominations (see rough drafts of the 1st Amendment: http://tinyurl.com/b5yos42)
…is not corruptible, of course it is. That is the Gospel message, man is corrupt (Romans 3:10), but this is also weighed against the Holy Spirit’s continual influence bringing to fruit the prophecy that the powers of hell will not conquer the Church (Matthew 16:18).
However, this is a big leap of logic to say anarchy will assist in this venture of incorruptibility. In the church or in man. If one reads Sowell’s “Conflict of Visions,” it is almost a primer in Calvinism.
And from it I link to this question to a Christian apologist (Ravi Zacharias) at Michigan University by a Muslim student. And Ravi explains how Jesus raised the stakes on the “Golden Rule.”
An example from Eastern Philosophy of the difference of the “golden rule.” In the “wu-wei” principle we find the meaning of this “golden rule” of Taoism, which is essentially to “do nothing,” or, to “cease.” While there is a “Golden Rule” of sorts (see: http://tinyurl.com/d2hxv), one of my professors points out that that the perfect individual in most Eastern philosophies are “placid, self-contented and indifferent toward all people and all things…” So while having some of the semantics that seem familiar to the Western thinker, the ideal position behind treating someone as you would wish to be treated as has a completely different meaning than Christianity gives it. And what was done in the above video was conflating two wholly separate ideas of the Golden Rule into one Western (Judeo-Christian influenced) meta-narrative. Something many anthropology professors do at our “higher” educational institutions: conflate, then add a meta-narrative — all while bemoaning the West culture while defining all others using it. Self-serving AND self-defeating.
The woman in the video, just after the non-sequitur comparison of the unrepentant homosexual to a crowd booing an idea not well defined — as, somehow a litmus test for heaven/salvation — does admit after her confused soliloquy that she “doesn’t get it.” I agree! She does not “get it.” Not to mention that she makes LARGE sweeping life decisions and conclusions based on a poultry of evidence and understanding, which does not endear me well to anarchy. Something also based on little evidence and understanding.
Now, I asked a friend to comment quickly on the above, this is his addition, and his comments brought to mind a quote from Malcome Muggeridge, which follows his comments.
If there is no transcendent code by which society orders itself, and under which it flourishes, then a non-transcendent code will be chosen which denies that our creational identity is the image of God. This is closely tied to the great question which shaped western history: “how shall evil be restrained?” History is a relentless teacher of its inattentive students–fallen man must be controlled, if not by the Bible, then it will be by the bayonet.
These comments, like I said, brought to mind those of Muggeridge:
“If God is ‘dead,’ somebody is going to have to take his place. It will be megalomania or erotomania, the drive for power or the drive for pleasure, the clenched fist or the phallus, Hitler or Hugh Heffner.” (One Source)
I will also point out the woman being interviewed in the video, Kelly Diamond, has some very self-refuting beliefs. For instance. In Israel you have a free market, and many Palestinians, Arabs as well as Israelis participate in it as well as being elected to the Knesset. This is information often not included in pro-Palestinian, anti-Semitic views. To be clear, no such diversity of Jews is in any Palestinian or Arab governments in the Middle-East. What we have ACTUALLY seen in areas given to the Palestinians are theocratic terrorist groups come in with a religiously radical socialist form of sharia law guided political models of governing. Why am I pointing this out? Because on Kelly Diamond’s FaceBook [http://www.facebook.com/kellylsdiamond] (h/t, G_unitttt) you see many anti-Semitic groups supported and comments. She shows a dire lack of knowledge on what Zionism “IS,” and merely takes the line of thinking these many radical theocrats do.
In episode 55 of Anarchast, these are the bullet points they include:
The logical conclusion of minimal government philosophy is Anarchism
The Free State Project
Statism as a religion
The skewed message of Jesus
The hypocrisy of most Christians
“Statism as Religion.” The interviewer, Kelly, and most anarchists believe that more government is antithetical to freedom. So why would she support the most extreme forms of governance? It boggles the mind. And this confusion is rife in the anarchy movement.
Dennis Prager comments on this (right).
In one forum the question is posed, “Anarchy vs. Dictatorship? Which would you prefer IF you had to choose? Why?” Kelly responded, very firmly: “Anarchy!!!!!” Then why would she support theocratic terrorists who want to implement a dictatorship (more government, less freedom) of sorts? Her message is lost in the fray of confusion.
John, you asked a very constructive question in regards to marriage and sexuality, let me repeat your question here:
☕ “If it doesn’t have to do with being turned on, mentally and physically, and acting upon one’s desires, then what does define our sexuality? What defines us being heterosexual?”
Keep in mind that you have caused me to search out better definitions and understandings with respect to our current conversation, so I am starting to build on past knowledge, and may only be able to answer you thoroughly in the future and not at this immediate time.
However, I believe I have come to terms with what it is that we are discussing, and I believe I can define “sexuality” in a way that you can take away from this conversation and say, “So this is where the crux of the debate lay on their side.”
Okay, let me start this long – arduous – definition of heterosexuality. First of all, the claim that the law ought to be morally neutral about marriage or anything else is itself a moral claim. As such, it is not morally neutral, nor can it rest on an appeal to moral neutrality. We are both debating a subject, and as such, both are using reference points, subject/object distinctions, and the like. We are far from being neutral and must admit we are trying to propose one mortal system over another. I am sure we are both agreed on this.
The CORE of the traditional view and understanding of marriage (remember that homosexuality has long been condemned as immoral by the natural law tradition of moral philosophy, as well as by Jewish and Christian teaching, not only that, it may have been recognized by past cultures, but never authorized… as the gay rights movement is asking for today):
Marriage is a two-in-one-flesh communion of persons that is consummated and actualized by acts that are reproductive in type, whether or not they are reproductive in effect (or motivated, even in part, by a desire to reproduce). The bodily union of spouses in marital acts is the biological matrix of their marriage as a multi-level relationship: that is, a relationship that unites persons at the bodily, emotional, dispositional, and spiritual levels of the being.
Marriage, precisely as such a relationship, is naturally ordered to the good of procreation and to the nurturing and education of children) as well as to the good of spousal unity, and these goods are tightly bound together with a healthy society.
The distinctive unity of spouses is possible because human (like other mammalian) males and females, by mating, unite organically – in other words, they become a single reproductive principle. Although reproduction is a single act, in humans (and other mammals) the reproductive act is performed not by individual members of the species, but by a mated pair as an organic unit. Germaine Grisez has made this point:
“Though a male and a female are complete individuals with respect to other functions – for example, nutrition, sensation, and locomotion – with respect to reproduction they are only potential parts of a mated pair, which is the complete organism capable or reproducing sexually. Even if the mated pair is sterile, intercourse, provided it is the reproductive behavior characteristic of the species, makes the copulating male and female one organism. Masturbatory, sodomitical, or other sexual acts that are not reproductive in type cannot unite persons organically: that is, as a single reproductive principle. Therefore, such acts cannot be intelligibly engaged in for the sake of marital (i.e., one-flesh, bodily) unity as such. They cannot be marital acts!”
Rather, persons who perform such acts must be doing so for the sake of ends or goals that are extrinsic (definitions at the end) to themselves as bodily persons: Sexual satisfaction, or (perhaps) mutual sexual satisfaction, is sought as a means of releasing tension, or obtaining (and, sometimes, sharing) pleasure, either as an end in itself, or as a means to some other end, such as expressing affection, esteem, friendliness, etc. In any case, where one-flesh union cannot (or cannot rightly) be sought as an end-in-itself, sexual activity necessarily involves the instrumentalization of the bodies of those participating in such activity to extrinsic ends.
In marital acts, by contrast, the bodies of persons who unite biologically are not reduced to the status of mere instruments. Rather, the end, goal, and intelligible point of sexual union is the good of marriage itself. On this understanding, such union is not a merely instrumental good, i.e., a reason for action whose intelligibility as a reason depends on the other end. The central and justifying point of sex is not pleasure (or even the sharing of pleasure) per se, however much sexual pleasure is sought – rightly sought – as an aspect of the perfection of marital union; the point of sex, rather, ismarriage itself. Considered as a bodily (“one-flesh”) union of persons consummated and actualized by acts that are reproductive in type.
Because in marital acts sex is not instrumentalized, such acts are free of the self-alienating and dis-integrating qualities of masturbatory and sodomitical sex.
Unlike these and other nonmarital sex acts, marital acts effect no practical dualism which volitionally and, thus, existentially separates the body from conscious and desiring aspect of the self which inhabits and uses the body as its instrument. (On person-body dualism, its implications for ethics, and its philosophical untenability, see: John Finnis, Joseph M. Boyle, and Germaine Grisez, Nuclear Deterrence, Morality and Realism [Oxford University Press; 1987], pp. 304-309.)
As John Finnis has observed, marital acts are truly unitive, and in no way self-alienating, because the bodily or biological aspect of human beings is “part of, and not merely an instrument of, their personal reality.”
But, one might ask, what about procreation? On the traditional view, isn’t sexual union of spouses instrumentalized to the goal of having children? It is true that Augustine was an influential proponent of something like this view, and there has always been a certain following for it among Christians. The strict Augustinian position was rejected, however, by the mainstream of philosophical and theological reflection from the late Middle Ages forward, and the understanding of sex and marriage that came to be embodied in the civil law of matrimony does not treat marriage as a merely instrumental good. Matrimonial law has traditionally understood marriage as consummated by, and only by, the reproductive-type acts of spouses; by contrast, the sterility of spouses – so long as they are capable of consummating their marriage by a reproductive-type act (and, thus, of achieving bodily – organic unity! This is why court annul a marriage that hasn’t reached this unity) – has never been treated as an impediment to marriage, even where sterility is certain and even certain to be permanent (as in the case of the marriage of a woman who has been through menopause or has undergone a hysterectomy).
According to the traditional understanding of marriage, then, it is the nature of marital acts as reproductive in type that makes it possible for such acts to be unitive in the distinctively marital way (“one-flesh”). And this type of unity isintrinsic, and not merely instrumental, value.
Thus, the unitive good of marriage provides a noninstrumental (and thus sufficient) reason for spouses to perform sexual acts of a type that consummates and actualizes their marriage. In performing marital acts, the spouses do not reduce themselves as bodily persons (or their marriage) to the status of means or instruments.
At the same time, where marriage is understood as a one-flesh union of persons, children who may be conceived in marital acts are understood not as an ends which are extrinsic to marriage (either in the strict Augustinian sense, or the modern liberal one), but, rather, as gifts which supervene on acts whose central justifying point is precisely the marital unity of the spouses. Such acts have unique meaning, value, and significance, as I have already suggested in this post, because they belong to the class of acts by which children come into being – what I have called “reproductive-type acts.” More precisely, these acts have their unique meaning, value, and significance because they belong to the only class of acts by which children can come into being, not as “products” which their parents choose to “make,” but, rather, as perfective participants in the organic community (i.e., the family) that is established by their parents’ marriage. It is thus that children are properly understood and treated – even in their conception – not as objects of the desire or will of their parents, but as subjects of justice (and inviolable human rights); not as property, but as persons.
Excerpts from Robert P. George, The Clash of Orthodoxies: Law, Religion, and Morality in Crisis.
Glossary
Extrinsic (Random House Webster CD-Rom) – all are relevant.
1. Not essential or inherent; not a basic part or quality; extraneous: facts that are extrinsic to the matter under discussion.
2. Being outside a thing; outward or external; operating or coming from without: extrinsic influences.
3.Anatomy. (of certain muscles, nerves, etc.) originating outside the anatomical limits of a part.
Intrinsic (Random House Webster CD-Rom) – all are relevant.
1. Belonging to a thing by its very nature: the intrinsic value of a gold ring.
2.Anatomy. (of certain muscles, nerves, etc.) Belonging to or lying within a given part.
A question posed to me years ago by one of my son’s friends:
Question 3) What is your views on gays? Are they bad? Are they going to hell? Are you born this way?
I have written heavily on this subject, both papers are on my blog at:
The homosexual man or woman is just as much a sinner as you or me. We all need Christ. To touch on the hell issue first, I believe hell is a testament to free-will, and dignity as well. C.S. Lewis mentioned that hell is locked from the inside. The only thing separating mankind from God is a belief in the finished work on the Cross. By choice people reject their Creator, they choose their path, God never imposes it. Many who are saved are not immediately pure in action, nor will they ever be. Sometimes people take decades to work through their faults (counseling, prayer, reading God’s Word, etc), so just like the person who may cheat on his wife regularly, when he comes to a saving knowledge of God, he will be challenged to change his ways and seek counseling and prayer and reference from God’s Word. The same with a gay man or woman. If they truly have a saving knowledge of God, they will be challenged by the Holy Spirit to seek biblical guidance in their life, and like many others, they will turn away from their homosexual lifestyles.
However, there is a “created order,” or, even a natural order (if you do not believe in God). My argument for heterosexual (between a man and a woman) unions is usable both by the atheist (non believer in God) and the theist (a believer in God – in the Judeo-Christian sense). Here is the crux of the matter in regards to “nature’s order:”
“…take gold as an example, it has inherent in its nature intrinsic qualities that make it expensive: good conductor of electricity, rare, never tarnishes, and the like. The male and female have the potential to become a single biological organism, or single organic unit, or principle. Two essentially becoming one. The male and female, then, have inherent to their nature intrinsic qualities that two mated males or two mated females never actualize in their courtship… nor can they ever. The potential stays just that, potential, never being realized…..
“….Think of a being that reproduces, not by mating, but by some act performed by individuals. Imagine that for these same beings, movement and digestion is performed not by individuals, but only by the complementary pairs that unite for this purpose. Would anyone acquainted with such beings have difficulty understanding that in respect to movement and digestion, the organism is a united pair, or an organic unity?”
So you see, the two heterosexual organisms that join in a sexual union cease being two separate organisms for a short time and become one organism capable of reproduction. This is what the state and the church are sealing in a marriage, this intrinsic union. The homosexual couple can never achieve this union, so “natures order” has endowed the heterosexual union with an intrinsic quality that other relationships do not have or could never attain. Both the atheist and theist can argue from this point, because either we were created this way or we evolved this way. Either way, nature has imposed on the sexual union being discussed.
Also, I do not think it is wholly genetic. I believe choice is involved as well as violence. For instance, take this thought from a pro-choice, lesbian woman, Tammy Bruce:
“ . . . . and now all manner of sexual perversion enjoys the protection and support of once what was a legitimate civil-rights effort for decent people. The real slippery slope has been the one leading into the Left’s moral vacuum. It is a singular attitude that prohibits any judgment about obvious moral decay because of the paranoid belief that judgment of any sort would destroy the gay lifestyle, whatever that is…. I believe this grab for children by the sexually confused adults of the Gay Elite represents the most serious problem facing our culture today. . . . Here come the elephant again: Almost without exception, the gay men I know (and that’s too many to count) have a story of some kind of sexual trauma or abuse in their childhood — molestation by a parent or an authority figure, or seduction as an adolescent at the hands of an adult. The gay community must face the truth and see sexual molestation of an adolescent for the abuse it is, instead of the ‘coming-of-age’ experience many [gays] regard it as being. Until then, the Gay Elite will continue to promote a culture of alcohol and drug abuse, sexual promiscuity, and suicide by AIDS.”
What she is basically saying is that there are emotional reasons, usually trauma, or circumstances that push these young boys into the choices they make in regards to their sexuality. For instance, one of my co-workers is a homosexual man. He is a wonderful guy; I would invite him to my wedding if I could go back in time. He is very open about his past, he was “initiated” into the homosexual lifestyle by a grown black man when he was 14. In other words, he was raped. Whether he feels now that he consented, or the person was a family friend or complete stranger. This act of sex with a minor by a grown man is rape. And this rape, at an age where boys are having surges of hormones and confused about a lot of things is what Tammy Bruce was speaking to. It is a psychological trauma that if not dealt with has traumatic results in one’s life. This sometimes works its way into sexual matters. There are many homosexual people, Al Rantel (790am 6pm to 9pm), to name a more popular one, that believe marriage should be kept between a man and a woman. Tammy Bruce wants it, but she, like most Republicans, want the states to decide, and not the Supreme Court.
Also, in 1993, the biggest march by the “gay” community (Elite gay community) on Washington was held, and they had this as part of their platform:
The implications of homosexual, bisexual, and transgendered curriculum at all levels of education.
The lowering of the age [12 years old to be exact] of consent for homosexual and heterosexual sex.
The legalization of homosexual marriages.
Custody, adoption, and foster-care rights for homosexuals, lesbians, and transgendered people.
the redefinition of the family to include the full diversity of all family structures.
The access to all programs of the Boy Scouts of America.
Affirmative action for homosexuals.
The inclusion of sex-change operations under a universal health-care plan.
Obviously the Elite gay community Tammy Bruce spoke of knows which age is best for “recruiting,” e.g., traumatizing.More can be said on all the above issues, but my book is not yet written. I will post three quotes from Tammy Bruce (a pro-choice lesbian):
Even if one does not necessarily accept the institutional structure of “organized religion,” the “Judeo-Christian ethic and the personal standards it encourages do not impinge on the quality of life, but enhance it. They also give one a basic moral template that is not relative,” which is why the legal positivists of the Left are so threatened by the Natural Law aspect of the Judeo-Christian ethic. (Tammy Bruce, The Death of Right and Wrong: Exposing the Left’s Assault on Our Culture and Values [Roseville: Prima, 2003], 35.)
…these problems don’t remain personal and private. The drive, especially since this issue is associated with the word “gay rights,” is to make sure your worldview reflects theirs. To counter this effort, we must demand that the medical and psychiatric community take off their PC blinders and treat these people responsibly. If we don’t, the next thing you know, your child will be taking a “tolerance” class explaining how “transexuality” is just another “lifestyle choice”…. After all, it is the only way malignant narcissists will ever feel normal, healthy, and acceptable: by remaking society – children – in their image (Ibid., 92, 206)
In a conversation that is quite typical of those I have engaged in with Ron Paul fans, I ended up provideing evidence that Ron Paul’s views on the 9/11 are misguided by showing the people involved in the conversation themselves wee misguided. The discussion was the same-ol-same-ol… Ron Paul sends his fans to vote for radical candidates that are self-attested anti-Semites and Marxists when libertarian folk like Thomas Sowell and Milton Friedman are/were lifelong Republicans, etc., etc.
What peaked my interest is that the conversation is joined by John Lofton, who is part of the site, The American View, and has many of his MP3s HERE, as well as having a blog entitled, Recovering Republican. All-in-all John and I probably agree on much. However… discussion about Ron Paul led to the 9/11 conspiracy theory. So I pick up the conversation where John hops in. (I will point out that most times I will change the name of persons from FaceBook discussions. But john is a public enough figure that I will use his full name and links):
John Lofton Oh, and Reagan gave us O’Connor!
Me Mr. Lofton, may I recommend a resource for you. It is seminary level study, and you may thoroughly enjoy it, “Politics According to the Bible.” We also got Rehnquist and Scalia (and almost Bork). Bush gave us Thomas. How many Justices did Gary Johnson and Virgil Goode get us? Zero.
Ruining the good for the perfect… your position (to the many above who are doggedly RP fans) are no better than the utopians out there because you do not ebb the utopian dreams of the left in ANY way.
Also, there are less hurricanes, earthquakes, and the like today than generations ago. These are false stats put forward by eschatological positions of the left (and unfortunately from the eschatological positions within Christianity, with which I agree with — minus the bad information and scare tactics).
[….]
By the way John… I believe you have jumped the shark. You seem to be a truther as well. And after listening to you mp3 on the subject, I would steer you to my C-O-Nspiracy page: http://religiopoliticaltalk.com/c-o-n-debunker/
John Lofton You a Christian, Sean?
Me Yes.
John Lofton Then why are you making snide, snotty remarks about being a “truther?”
Me After listening to your mp3 on the matter, you conflate two subjects, what the 9/11 truther goals are with truth/Truth. My faith has no connection to calling a spade-a-spade. I have spent lots of $$$ and time looking into many of the claims in Loose Change and other conspiracy position. I also noticed that many of these positions are lies, the opposite of truth.
“Trutherism” doesn’t ad-hoc equal truth, and to make it is a non-sequitur/straw-man argumentation.
John Lofton So what are the top 3 things in Loose Change that are “lies?” List them here, please….
Me Lets do this John. Let us talk about one item you think is strong in Loose Change (since over different editions got rid of many of their previously stated evidences).
John Lofton You made an assertion, Sean, an affirmation….please back it up. Thank you….
John Lofton So, in other words, you will not reply even briefly to my simple question, right?
Me I have thoroughly refuted Loose Changes position on two major premises, a) the Pentagon, and b) WTC-7. If you have not read a good refutations of these two major positions put forward in this “true” documentary, then choose one? Which edition? One, two, or three? How bout cell phone calls, mmm, that was in the first one. They rejected that. There are many they present, I deal with the macro one, choose one YOU feel confident about, something that would come to mind that convinces YOU or that you would like to share here as an evidence that others would be persuaded by. One. Simple, not three. One.
go…
John Lofton “Lies” means things said to DECEIVE ON PURPOSE……list those things here, Sean….
Me Investors with prior knowledge of 9/11 made millions buying out options on airline stock.
John Lofton What was said in “Loose Change,” Sean, that was a “lie,” something said ON PURPOSE TO DECEIVE?
Me That is one. There was no truth to it, and when investigated, there was no truth to it. It was stated merely to endure a conspiracy minded folk to the film. Maybe those reading this would benefit from some sanity on this topic:
Another example is the out-of-context quote from an air traffic controller who supposedly reported that they thought flight 77 was a military plane. This controllers full context (apologists should be use to this tactic used by skeptics to state certain things from the Bible but not so in context) was referring to the unsafe way the plane was flying, not that it was impossible for a civilian plane to fly like that:
★ “The speed, the maneuverability, the way that he turned, we all thought in the radar room, all of us experienced air traffic controllers, that that was a military plane you don’t fly a 757 in that manner. It’s unsafe.”
I have given you two.
John Lofton What was said, Sean, that was said TO PURPOSELY DECEIVE is my question which you have not answered?
[….]
You have loose mouth about “Loose Change,” Sean……have documented here no “lie” that was told….
Me They misquoted the second example IN ORDER TO mislead, deceive. They had no proof, evidence of the first example but merely invented it with no evidence. Both are willful acts to deceive and to engender people’s fears. It worked apparently.
John Lofton And what is your evidence they sought to mislead ON PURPOSE, Sean?
Me Both were untrue, in the first they had no way of knowing this — even if true — however, they made it up whole-cloth. In the second, they had access to the full context, but decided to truncate it in order to engender their point. A common attack on our faith. Sort of like when they talk about WTC-7 and show a picture of a small fire in one window… but refuse to show pictures of the entire building on fire or the massive damage of the World Trade Towers destroying a corner of the building, or not talking about the 15,000 gallons of fuel in the building, etc., etc. The picture engenders what they want their viewers to believe.
John Lofton For-the-record: I have neither said nor written ANYTHING saying I agree with anything in the “Loose Change” DVD. I do NOT, however, believe our government’s official story re: 9/11 and believe our government is capable of murdering 3000+ people because our government murders people now in our unGodly, unConstitutional wars; and the government has OK’d the murder of millions in the womb by abortion…..
SIDE-NOTE: Again, it is quite plain-and-simple John supported these conspiracy theories by a) obfuscating ideas of truth and trutherism, and b) by all-but endorsing Loose Change. FOR CONTEXT: one should listen to John’s MP3 on the “truther” movement and realize that I spoke out against Ron Paul’s admiration of truthers and John then [much like in his MP3] equated the mere mention of “truth” in “trutherism” as unassailable. His presentation is titled: Lying, Shameless Hatchet-Job On 9-11 Truth Seekers By Chris Bury On “Nightline” Scurrilous, Despicable But, Of Course, No Surprise; Also of note is his interview with Richard Gage, Founder Of Architects & Engineers For 9/11 Truth, Inc.; O’Reilly Lies Repeatedly About Study Re: Building 7. ON RICHARD GAGE: Here is a three part interview with Richard Gage where he is caught lying about thermite: Part 1, Part 2, and Part3. You can also see many well done articles refuting Gage’s positions quite well, HERE. While he says he doesn’t support. I would strongly suggest John does agree with Loose Change as well as Gage on these issues (after listening to his own words that is).
John Lofton You believe the government’s story, Sean?
Me John, proving one position by stating opinion and then supporting the “truth of it” by stating another example unrelated (you gave thee definition of a non-sequitur) is not a logical way to jump from one position to another. The Christian has to think well, and testing our own positions with this good thinking:
“I suspect that most of the individuals who have religious faith are content with blind faith. They feel no obligation to understand what they believe. They may even wish not to have their beliefs disturbed by thought. But if God in whom they believe created them with intellectual and rational powers, that imposes upon them the duty to try to understand the creed of their religion. Not to do so is to verge on superstition.”
Morimer J. Adler, “A Philosopher’s Religious Faith,” in, Kelly James Clark, ed., Philosophers Who Believe: The Spiritual Journeys of 11 Leading Thinkers (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1993), 207.
This is applicable to our discussion. Reason is not being used to its Godly potential here.
John Lofton You believe the government’s story, Sean?
Me Do you have a good reason for me not to?
John Lofton Why can you directly answer a direct question, Sean? You are a bit of a windbag…..
Eric RS Come on John…lets be gracious at least. He answered your leading question with a question, very much like Christ did many times.
[….]
Of course he agrees with the govt. story, unless we can prove otherwise.
Me “You a Christian, John? Then why are you making snide, snotty remarks about a fellow believer?” (Adapted from Mr. Lofton)
Do I trust my government, the heroes of America, our Founders, say one should always be weary of it. And that the Christian faith is its true guide. But as to THIS topic (9/11), yes. And you have yet to show me why I should not. Again, I think you are taking a larger issue (one trusting government in the macro), and then overlaying it to our particular (micro) discussion here. Like you saying that if our government can kill “x” amount of people through abortion, then why not 3,000 in New York?
I believe many on the pro-choice side think that killing innocent lives is wrong. They agree with us on this major point. They merely redefine the person in the womb as non-human. It is imperative that we open up dialogue with them and make a strong moral argument that convicts them to change on this position.
POST-SCRIPT: I should have also made the point that both pro-choice people and pro-life people agree that the people that perished in this particular attack were innocent people, and thus an evil immoral act.
Continuing My Thought
So yes I trust the government in this particular case. And no, as a whole the checks and balances issue is meant to try and keep government honest:
Which is why our Founders stated that, “The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government” (Patrick Henry); “Government is not reason; it is not eloquence. It is force. And force, like fire, is a dangerous servant and a fearful master” (George Washington).
I wanted to share my back-to-back experiences after being invited to two conversations by my Son on FaceBook. Almost the same attacks were used against Mitt Romeny, and almost the exact same information was used in my response. Yet, you had two different outcomes. The youngsters in the first example unfriended my son. The person in the second example admitted to hearing new information/positions he had not previously thought of, and as a result he said he will step-back and re-evaluate his own positions. Mind-you, he did not acquiesce fully, and I do not expect anyone to immediately change a long held belief about a position. All I can expect is that when new information is presented, these previously held positions are re-examined… and often times as one aligns oneself to new ideas that are true or closer to truth, they will overtime reject these previously held positions via reflection and introducing new ideals to one’s viewpoint. This is not how people work — immediate changes of thinking — even when accepting the free gift offered by God we still go through a maturing process and evolution of thought, as B.B. Warfield so aptly points out:
We are assured, indeed, that the leaven of truth, thus brought into the world and applied by the Spirit in a long process, shall in the end leaven the whole lump. Meanwhile, what is presented to observation is a conflict between the true and the false. This conflict goes on in each individual’s mind and heart. The Spirit of God does not at once so purify the hearts of those whom he visits that they may come to the knowledge of the truth, that they at once embrace the whole truth in perfect Comprehension, and live by it in perfect obedience. Their minds remain for long in partial darkness; their hearts only slowly acquire the powers of the new life brought to them. They need to cry over and over again, “0 wretched men that we are, who shall deliver us from the body of this death?” What has been implanted in them, however, is life, and it grows onward to the end appointed to it. As in the individual, so in the race the progress to the goal is slow, though sure. Little parties of those to whom the new life has come, spring up here, there, elsewhere. They see the truth more or less purely, and hold it more or less firmly, and cast it with more or less confidence into the caldron of the world’s seething thought, that it may join issue with falsehood, and in the end conquer. So we perceive a new humanity rising in the world, and by faith may see the day looming on the horizon when the whole world shall live in the full enjoyment of the true religion, practising in its completeness the true morality, which have been restored to man by God his Savior. Over this whole process, of course, God is presiding.
Below I will recreate both conversations and may even add to it as the second continues… if it goes in a congenial manner. This first conversation is the one that went sour (the graphics are enlargeable just a bit if you click them):
I was recently — today in fact, called by extension to a posting of one of my blog-posts, a “racist” and “homophobic.” So I wanted to know why and politely explained my thinking on the matter. Here is the first set of responses after my son linked to my blog:
So this is my response to the above:
(Papa Giorgio here… I will always put “(PG)” do designate my post.)
I just wanted to point out how easy it is for people to label (what is called S.I.X.H.I.R.B. ~ sexist, intolerant, xenophobic, homophobic, Islamophobic, racist, and bigoted), rather that engage in dialogue. A really good documentary made on this in academia is uploaded on my MRCTV account.
However, I do wish to ask you thoughtfully read my post and tell me your thoughts. Okay, so are you aware that monogamous/long-term homosexual couples would consider same-sex marriage a travesty for America. They stand either institution it, or want to be done on the state level, like almost every conservative I know. For instance, just today Well-known gay actor, Rupert Everett (“My Best Friend’s Wedding” and “Shakespeare in Love”), says he “can’t think of anything worse than being brought up by two gay dads.” Is his opinion racist? Homophobic?
Or another pro-choice/lesbian (and one of my favorite authors/columnists), Tammy Bruce is against same-sex marriage being rammed down our throats by the judiciary. She would agree with well respected gay sociologist and scholar, Paul Nathanson, who says this:
———————————————— [Paul Nathanson] writes that there are at least five functions that marriage serves–things that every culture must do in order to survive and thrive. They are:
• Foster the bonding between men and women • Foster the birth and rearing of children • Foster the bonding between men and children • Foster some form of healthy masculine identity • Foster the transformation of adolescents into sexually responsible adults
Note that Nathanson considers these points critical to the continued survival of any culture. He continues “Because heterosexuality is directly related to both reproduction and survival, … every human societ[y] has had to promote it actively . … Heterosexuality is always fostered by a cultural norm” that limits marriage to unions of men and women. He adds that people “are wrong in assuming that any society can do without it.” Going further he stated that “same sex marriage is a bad idea” …[he] only opposed “gay marriage, not gay relationships.”
——————————————————-
PINK TRIANGLES
The above are marking — a pink triangle — that was given to homosexuals put into concentration camps. You see, when God is removed as the “Life giver” ~ the Founder of our human worth (as our Declaration posits) ~ then human worth is relegated to societal definition. Hitler stated as much in his book, this is what conservative homosexuals understand:
“The stronger must dominate and not mate with the weaker, which would signify the sacrifice of its own higher nature. Only the born weakling can look upon this principle as cruel, and if he does so it is merely because he is of a feebler nature and narrower mind; for if such a law [natural selection] did not direct the process of evolution then the higher development of organic life would not be conceivable at all…. If Nature does not wish that weaker individuals should mate with the stronger, she wishes even less that a superior race should intermingle with an inferior one; because in such a case all her efforts, throughout hundreds of thousands of years, to establish an evolutionary higher stage of being, may thus be rendered futile.”
(Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, translator/annotator, James Murphy [New York: Hurst and Blackett, 1942], pp. 161-162.) By definition homosexuals cannot “mate.” So these “special rights” are shown to be just that, not equal, with a simple question:
“If homosexuality is really genetic, we may soon be able to tell if a fetus is predisposed to homosexuality, in which case many parents might choose to abort it. Will gay rights activists continue to support abortion rights if this occurs?”
(Dale A. Berryhill, The Assault: Liberalism’s Attack on Religion, Freedom, and Democracy)
Again, Tammy Bruce understands that rights do not come from government, but from something Bigger, and government only protects these rights. If government produces rights, then it can take them away. She says:
★ Even if one does not necessarily accept the institutional structure of “organized religion,” the “Judeo-Christian ethic and the personal standards it encourages do not impinge on the quality of life, but enhance it. They also give one a basic moral template that is not relative,” which is why the legal positivists of the Left are so threatened by the Natural Law aspect of the Judeo-Christian ethic. (Tammy Bruce, The Death of Right and Wrong: Exposing the Left’s Assault on Our Culture and Values, 35.)
Why would she posit such a thing. She is a student of history, that is one reason. For instance, people think fascism lived in Germany… it did not. It did however live in Italy, and Mussolini wrote what fascism was/is:
★ “Everything I have said and done in these last years is relativism by intuition…. If relativism signifies contempt for fixed categories and men who claim to be bearers of an objective, immortal truth… then there is nothing more relativistic than fascistic attitudes and activity…. From the fact that all ideologies are of equal value, that all ideologies are mere fictions, the modern relativist infers that everybody has the right to create for himself his own ideology and to attempt to enforce it with all the energy of which he is capable.” (Mussolini, Diuturna pp. 374-77, quoted in A Refutation of Moral Relativism: Interviews with an Absolutist, by Peter Kreeft, p. 18.)
Some sort of ethic is needed to counter relativism, otherwise it is very easy for government to usurp rights that theism (the ethos that founded our countries documents). Here Hitler makes the point that “I freed Germany from the stupid and degrading fallacies of conscience and morality…. We will train young people before whom the world will tremble. I want young people capable of violence — imperious, relentless and cruel” (Hitler, hung on the wall at Auschwitz; Ravi Zacharias, Can Man Live Without God, p. 23). So this is known well to many homosexuals… because as the government gets bigger, people’s rights get smaller.
I am curious, have you ever heard of gay people who stand against same-sex marriage? If not, the next question is, why not? Do you insulate your thinking/opinions to like minded people, books, and the like? Have you gone out of your way to ask yourself, “I believe “a” — a lot! Have I ever gone out and found a cogent, well-thought out book or person to discuss these deeper thoughts with… or should I just label them?” Granted, the latter is easier, but the former is worth it, even if the travel is a couple of years.
Take note as well that not only would the label “racist” and “homophobic” apply to a large portion of the gay community, but this type of tolerant thinking that infects the left would also apply to Buddha, Muhammad, Zoroaster, Confucius, Moses, Jesus, Plato, Socrates (i.e. the major religious founders and great secular and moral thinkers throughout time) are all wrong and bigoted. Only this generation is benighted to rise above the rest in a meta-narrative and judge absolutely the rest of history and their fellow compatriots. Just an after-thought.
These are the follow-up comments. Facts, reason, and humor got the best of them and they unfriended my son. Without an apology to me, or realizing that great dialogue/conversation could have taken place. What did happen however, is ingrained thinking that prefers “mini-me’s” surrounding themselves (with themselves) instead of being open-minded and tolerant. Here is the last posts:
(An “unfriend” soon followed that last posting.) Now, in the second conversation a young man intimated that Romney was a bigot. Not as harsh a use of language as “racist,” but, still part of the S.I.X.H.I.R.B. ~ sexist, intolerant, xenophobic, homophobic, Islamophobic, racist, and bigoted ~ that Dennis Prager so rightly talks about. Now, I used the above main response after Connor posted the following, with additional thoughts on his particular points. Which are that he is writing in on his ballot in November — Ron Paul — undermines his claim. Here is part of Connors post:
[T]he point being argued, is that I said [R]omney is a bigot. the retort was an example of the bigotry of other people, irrelevant to the topic, and a very good documentary about academia (which [I] agree with, mostly). [I] see [R]omney as a bigot because he opposes a woman’s right to choose, he opposes gay marriage, he wants to blend church and state, and he has stated that he is not concerned with the poor….
To which I responded with a translation, trying to stay on one topic rather than the many that followed his above except:
Translation for those that need it. Connor basically just called a majority of women (a higher percentage polled are pro-life than not — this number is growing by-the-way) and homosexuals (as well as every major religious founder and moral thinker) bigoted. This is the modern progressive thinking. If someone disagrees with your point, paint them as one of the SIXHIRBs… why debate the issues.
In other words… to belabor the point… calling more than half of the women in America, and about a third of the homosexual population, and every founder of the worlds great religions and moral as well as secular thinkers bigots… is a form … of… bigotry. You do not even have to be religious (for instance) to be pro-life (or against same-sex marriage):
If [to quote Connor] “opposing a women’s right to choose” makes one a bigot, then writing in Ron Paul’s name makes one a bigot as well. Why? Because Romney and Ron Paul have the same view of the issue. That is, returning the choice of the matter to the states.
I see many inconsistencies in these positions with the youth of today, and I wish they would look to some better argued positions that do not violate the laws of reason/logic — e.g., are internally self-consistent instead of self-deleting. Decisions based in our long history of of legal and moral thinking, etc., etc. I realize that Connor and the audience here is young and has some time to mature in their voting and thinking. But for God-Sakes, do not go around calling people names… because if Romney’s a bigot, then I am being called a bigot, my son is, as are others here (or their parents or family/friends, so is over half of America, as well as people who write in Ron Paul’s name. There is no way faster to lose friends and/or respect than by calling people names.
And much to the young man’s credit he responded thusly, and I will clarify a bit for him offering sincerity in my benefit of doubt:
Although I do not agree [on all your points], I retract my statement that Romney is a bigot. I feel very differently on these moral issues, but I will avoid sixhirb-ing in the future, thank you for pointing it out. Good video, but this issue hits too close to home for me to continue this discussion.
Id like to have more conversations with you in the future, it’s not often someone makes me rethink my entire approach to a topic. Caught me a bit off guard, because I usually talk circles around people. I’ve been hearing so much idiocy from people with opposing view points, that I’ve lost a bit of my receptiveness. Paul still has my vote, but thanks for opening my mind a bit more.
WOW! I was floored. This simple response showed a level of maturity I was getting use to not seeing in the younger generation. Here is my response to Connor:
Connor, you are a good man. You are head-and-shoulder above many! I do not say that because you complimented me, rather, I say it because in the face of a public dialogue you showed some humility when new evidence was presented. Kudos.
I would love to talk with you on any subject you wish in the future. I am always up for a cup-of-Joe at Starbucks (on me) or messaging me is fine as well. I did write a book that I would recommend reading the first chapter of when you get an urge to read something. I explain some crucial thinking that many do not learn about anymore.
The first chapter is entitled, “Introduction – Technology Junkies.” You should note that this years platform for the GOP has been called the most libertarian in decades, and many libertarians have switched over or back to being Republicans. One example is the Libertarian Party’s Veeep choice from 2008, Wayne Allyn Root. If you want, I can upload his interview by Michael Medved about this switch back before November for you.
Also, a site, two actually, that I will recommend for you. One is Libertarian Republican. The blogger/owner was Ron Paul’s top aid for a decade:
To his credit, he has already read my chapter. And although this is my busy season, I hope to share some coffee and conversation with this young man.
Changing Subjects a Bit In the Same Strain of Conversation
Continuing on in conversation with another gentleman in regards to the Ron Paul issue, Brett stepped into the end of the conversation and said this:
staying out of this one, go ron paul (waves flag)
To which I responded in my Religio-Political fashion:
@Brett How could you wave a flag for a guy [Ron Paul] who sent his voters to vote for a pro-Marxist/pro-Gaddafi candidate? Just a question. You are waving a flag in your statement but how can you reconcile your apparent patriotism, love of country and its ideals, with someone [Ron Paul] who sends his voters to Cynthia McKinney who hates everything about other races, this country, and would rather see Marxist ideals over our Founding ideals?
@Reader — a side-note. In my many discussions over time I have noticed something, which is this, people do not realize what someone stands for in total. They like one item, example, Ron Paul wanting to legalize marijuana. What he really wants to do is return this policing power to the states. He [RP] cannot by fiat make it so… but Ron Paul has a long history of making his politics known and there is a lot that would make any liberal young man cringe.
Another example is that often times people do not understand what one position stands for in total. So, a great example of this are people rioting in the streets of Greece, or the occupiers and their violence in our streets… many saying they are “anarchists,” but being violent for socialized health care, more benefits from the government so they [like in Greece] can continue to retire and collect benefits from the government at 55-years old, or more government control of private financial institutions, etc. etc. (A-minute-and-a-half)
What people need to do is really look inward and see if they are being consistent with what they profess. So when I took a philosophy class at COC — as a real life example — and the very first day the professor of philosophy wrote on the eraser board “There are no absolute truths,” I merely rose my hand and asked, “is that an absolute statement, if so, is it true?” She had a masters degree in poli-sci, and a masters in philosophy, and yet still showed that her particular take on things couldn’t stand its own test.
Whether in religious views or political, one needs to UNDERSTAND (caps for *emphasis*) what they are saying. People like buffet religion and politics and often conflate opposing ideas/ideals to make themselves feel good. Which is understandable… we are human and fail even meeting our own goals and ideals in life, let alone others. But this human frailty shouldn’t stop us from learning to know what WE believe, and to see if IT is able to stand on its own two feet.
This goes for my fellow Christians as well. You should be 1 Peter 3:15 believers (“…always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you…”), and not in a “Blue Like Jazz” mindset.
“He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”
Take note that Brett’s response is low on substance and high in ad hominem attacks, name calling, non-sequiturs, and the like. Not only this, but many people will talk differently on line than they would with meeting a stranger, say, in a check-out line at a store, or in a bar… it is as if politeness and reasonable thinking is “checked” at the keyboard. Its the split-personality of the 21st century:
you have your views on his policy’s and i have mine – obviously they conflict; in parting, this is what’s going to happen – Romney is going to lose because he’s too far right wing and no Mormon has ever been president, Obama will win again and then everyone will complain for about 3 months afterwards and say they’re moving to Canada which is a crock of shit because no one ever does. Then people will forget about Romney and move on and just wait it out as the country slips further down the shitter. What should have happen is Collin Pall should have ran but he didn’t want – this election is all wrong – people are too vested in themselves and not the greater good of the country and are looking too much into what they can get out of their candidate; i.e. legalize marijuana, abortion, gay rights, and health care – while that shouldn’t be the focus of the election at all. it should be the current economic status of america – which isn’t really getting better and the fed is just printing money and creating inflation that is screwing us down to nothing. but our media is too good at distracting us with smaller minded issues such as the ones i stated before; those issues in due time will come to terms and i’m not worried about them – nor do i feel anyone else should be at this point in time either. R-money is another douche fag and Obezy is just pretty preempted puppet for everyone to look at.
Now, this is where the conversation currently ends, and I will only continue it if need be. But I think my response is adequate to all the “paulistinians” out there and instructive to Libertarians considering making their vote count:
@ BRETT pleased read and watch/listen to the following and again tell me how Ron Paul will get done what you say he wants to.
I agree 100% with you when you say “while that shouldn’t be the focus of the election at all. it should be the current economic status of [A]merica…” I agree, and Romney/Ryan have a deep understanding of our fiscal problems, more than “shutting down the Fed” could solve. The Republican platform calls for an audit of the Fed, which would be the first, ever, if this happens — as well as leaning heavily on Jack Kemp’s understanding of returning to the gold standard (http://tinyurl.com/965tbzn). Which is why this has been called one of the most libertarian platforms (for the Republicans) in decades, and why many Libertarians are switching their status to GOP. One example is the former Vice Presidential candidate for the Libertarian Party in 2008, Wayne Allen Root.
Scrubbing the Fed is too conspiratorial… a viewpoint I use to wholeheartedly endorse years ago. But having a party in power with young libertarian minded conservative who have the best chance at really auditing the fed, and having Ron Paul’s son head up the venture is a chance you may not get again (at least 4-years more).
I do beg to differ on Romney losing. You should be aware of the media bias and how this is working towards a narrative that fits the worldview of this same media. For instance, I deal with this a bit in my post on why Republicans should be optimistic.
Again, Ron Paul’s take on history is woefully wrong (as is yours)… something his son understands. Between 1800 and 1934, U.S. Marines staged 180 landings abroad. For instance, from the description of a book I highly recommend, “The Savage Wars Of Peace: Small Wars And The Rise Of American Power”:
★ From 1800 to the present day, such undeclared wars have made up the vast majority of our military engagements. Yet the military has often resisted preparing itself for small wars, preferring instead to train for big conflicts that seldom come. Boot re-examines the tragedy of Vietnam through a “small war” prism. He concludes with a devastating critique of the Powell Doctrine and a convincing argument that the armed forces must reorient themselves to better handle small-war missions, because such clashes are an inevitable result of America’s far-flung imperial responsibilities. (see also my post on the beginning of our NAVY)
Brett still hasn’t clicked yet with how he is tearing down his own arguments. Since he is a Ron Paul fan I presumed that he might be into the conspiratorial take on history and a secret cabal of financiers running the world. So I shared a bit on my past thinking on this matter:
…and my affinity to such theories even going as far as involving myself with the John Birch Society in the mid to late 90′s. Continuing, I explained three “events” that caused me to question these beliefs and spurred me to really investigate these claims, references, and quotes so often used with these theories. My eventual shidt in thinking were spurred by an article in the New American article (the magazine of the John Birch Society) blaming the Oklahoma bombing on the U.S. Government; the failure of predictions made about Y2K from many I listened to; and listening to radio talk show host Michael Medved’s “Conspiracy Show” where for one day each month he takes calls only from those who believe in conspiracies. These three things caused me to compare and contrast the positions previously accepted as fact. After a couple of years of wrestling with position after position, I eventually gave up my thinking on the NWO and embraced true history….
To which Brett replied:
…you are a fucking nut-job for believing that
To which I pointed out his flaw in saying this:
Okay, you made it seem like this when you said: “R-money is another douche fag and Obezy is just pretty preempted puppet for everyone to look at.” But you should really watch how you talk to people, You should talk to someone as if you are in a public place, politely — which you are, FB is a public place.
But, yes, I was not using all my faculties in looking at all the evidence years ago. But the problem is — for you — that Ron Paul believes these things (Bilderbergers, a Jewish banker $$ cabal, that America did 9/11, etc.). I looked at the evidence and changed my mind. Ron Paul has not… instead he tells voters to go vote for an avowed Marxist, black panther/racist [past Democrat Representative]. CRAZY HUH? But write in Ron Paul.
1. Osiris
While some critics of Christ’s story utilize the story of Osiris to demonstrate that the earliest followers of Christ copied it, these critics rarely acknowledge how we know the story of Osiris at all. The only full account of Osiris’s story is from the second-century Al) Greek writer, Plutarch: “Concerning Isis and Osiris.”[4] The other information is found piecemeal in Egyptian and Greek sources, but a basic outline can be found in the Pyramid Texts (c. 2686-c. 2160 BC). This seems problematic when claiming that a story recorded in the second century influenced the New Testament accounts, which were written in the first century. Two other important aspects to mention are the evolving nature of the Osirian myth and the sexual nature of the worship of Osiris as noted by Plutarch. Notice how just a couple of details from the full story profoundly strain the comparison of Osiris with the life of Christ.
Who was Osiris? He was one of five offspring born of an adulterous affair between two gods—Nut, the sky-goddess, and Geb earth-god.[5] Because of Nut’s transgression, the Sun curses her and will not allow her to give birth on any day in any month. However, the god Thoth[6] also loves Nut. He secures five more days from the Moon to add to the Egyptian calendar specifically for Nut to give birth. While inside his mother’s womb, Osiris falls in love with his sister, Isis. The two have intercourse inside the womb of Nut, and the resultant child is Horus.[7] Nut gives birth to all five offspring: Osiris, Horus, Set, Isis, and Nephthys.
Sometime after his birth, Osiris mistakes Nephthys, the wife of hisbrother Set, for his own wife and has intercourse with her. Enraged, Set plots to murder Osiris at a celebration for the gods. During the festivities, Set procures a beautiful, sweet-smelling sarcophagus, promising it as a gift to the attendee whom it might fit. Of course, this is Osiris. Once Osiris lies down in the sarcophagus, Set solders it shut and then heaves it into the Nile. There are at least two versions of Osiris’s fate: (a) he suffocates in the sarcophagus as it floats down the Nile, and (b) he drowns in the sarcophagus after it is thrown into the Nile.
Grief-stricken Isis searches for and eventually recovers Osiris’s corpse. While traveling in a barge down the Nile, Isis conceives a child by copulating with the dead body.[8] Upon returning to Egypt, Isis attempts to conceal the corpse from Set but fails. Still furious, Set dismembers his brother’s carcass into 14 pieces, which he then scatters throughout Egypt. A temple was supposedly erected at each location where a piece of Osiris was found.
Isis retrieves all but one of the pieces, his phallus. The body is mummified with a model made of the missing phallus. In Plutarch’s account of this part of the story, he noted that the Egyptians “presently hold a festival” in honor of this sexual organ.[9] Following magical incantations, Osiris is raised in the netherworld to reign as king of the dead in the land of the dead. In The Riddle of Resurrection: Dying and Rising Gods in the Ancient Near East, T. N. D. Mettinger states: “He both died and rose. But, and this is most important, he rose to continued life in the Netherworld, and the general connotations are that he was a god of the dead.”[10] Mettinger quotes Egyptologist Henri Frankfort:
Osiris, in fact, was not a dying god at all but a dead god. He never returned among the living; he was not liberated from the world of the dead,… on the contrary, Osiris altogether belonged to the world of the dead; it was from there that he bestowed his blessings upon Egypt. He was always depicted as a mummy, a dead king.[11]
This presents a very different picture from the resurrection of Jesus, which was reported as a return to physical life.
2. Horus
Horus’s story is a bit difficult to decipher for two main reasons. Generally, his story lacks the amount of information for other gods, such as Osiris. Also, there are two stories concerning Horus that develop and then merge throughout Egyptian history: Horus the Sun-god, and Horus the child of Isis and Osiris. The major texts for Horus’s story are the Pyramid Texts, Coffin Texts, the Book of the Dead, Plutarch, and Apuleius-all of which reflect the story of Horus as the child of Isis and Osiris.[12] The story is routinely found wherever the story of Osiris is found.
Who was Horus? He was the child of Isis and Osiris. His birth has several explanations as mentioned in Isis and Osiris’s story: (1) the result of the intercourse between Isis and Osiris in Nut’s womb; (2) conceived by Isis’s sexual intercourse with Osiris’s dead body; (3) Isis is impregnated by Osiris after his death and after the loss of his phallus; or (4) Isis is impregnated by a flash of lightning.[13] To protect Horus from his uncle’s rage against his father, Isis hides the child in the Delta swamps. While he is hiding, a scorpion stings him, and Isis returns to find his body lifeless. (In Margaret Murray’s account in The Splendor That Was Egypt, there is no death story here, but simply a poisoned child.) Isis prays to the god Ra to restore her son. Ra sends Thoth, another Egyptian god, to impart magical spells to Isis for the removal of the poison. Thus, Isis restores Horus to life. The lesson for worshippers of Isis is that prayers made to her will protect their children from harm and illness. Notice the outworking of this story is certainly not a hope for resurrection to new life, in which death is vanquished forever as is held by followers of Jesus.[14] Despite this strain on the argument, some still insist that Horus’s scorpion poisoning is akin to the death and resurrection of Jesus.
In a variation of Horus’s story, he matures into adulthood at an accelerated rate and sets out to avenge his father’s death. In an epic battle with his uncle Set, Horus loses his left eye, and his uncle suffers the loss of one part of his genitalia. The sacrifice of Horus’s eye, when given as an offering before the mummified Osiris, is what brings Osiris new life in the underworld.[15] Horus’s duties included arranging the burial rites of his dead father, avenging Osiris’s death, offering sacrifice as the Royal Sacrificer, and introducing recently deceased persons to Osiris in the netherworld as depicted in the Hunefer Papyrus (1317-1301 BC). One aspect of Horus’s duties as avenger was to strike down the foes of Osiris. This was ritualized through human sacrifice in the first dynasty, and then, eventually, animal sacrifice by the eighteenth dynasty. In the Book of the Dead we read of Osiris, “Behold this god, great of slaughter, great of fear! He washes in your blood, he bathes in your gore!”[16] So Horus, in the role of Royal Sacrificer, bought his own life from this Osiris by sacrificing the life of other. There is no similarity here to the sacrificial death of Jesus.
3. Mithras
There are no substantive accounts of Mithras’s story, but rather a pieced-together story from inscriptions, depictions, and surviving Mithraea (man-made caverns of worship). According to Rodney Stark, professor of social sciences at Baylor University, an immense amount of “nonsense” has been inspired by modern writers seeking to “decode the Mithraic mysteries.”[17]The reality is we know very little about the mystery of Mithras or its doctrines because of the secrecy of the cult initiates. Another problematic aspect is the attempt to trace the Roman military god, Mithras, back to the earlier Persian god, Mithra, and to the even earlier Indo-Iranian god, Mitra. While it is plausible that the latest form of Mithraic worship was based on antecedent Indo-Iranian traditions, the mystery religion that is compared to the story of Christ was a “genuinely new creation?”[18] Currently, some popular authors utilize the Roman god’s story from around the second century along with the Iranian god’s dates of appearance (c. 1500-1400 BC).
This is the sort of poor scholarship employed in popular renditions of Mithras, such as in Zeitgeist: The Movie. For the purpose of summary, we will utilize the basic aspects of the myth as found in Franz Cumont’s writing and note variations, keeping in mind that many Mithraic scholars question Cumont, as well as one another, as to interpretations and aspects of the story.[19] Thus, we will begin with Cumont’s outline.
Who was Mithra? He was born of a “generative rock,” next to a river bank, under the shade of a sacred tree. He emerged holding a dagger in one hand and a torch in the other to illumine the depths from which he came. In one variation of his story, after Mithra’s emergence from the rock, he clothed himself in fig leaves and then began to test his strength by subjugating the previously existent creatures of the world. Mithra’s first activity was to battle the Sun, whom he eventually befriended. His next activity was to battle the first living creature, a bull created by Ormazd (Ahura Mazda). Mithra slew the bull, and from its body, spine, and blood came all useful herbs and plants. The seed of the bull, gathered by the Moon, produced all the useful animals. It is through this first sacrifice of the first bull that beneficent life came into being, including human life. According to some traditions, this slaying took place in a cave, which allegedly explains the cave-like Mithraea.[20]
Mit(h)ra’s name meant “contract” or “compact.”[21] He was known in the Avesta—the Zoroastrian sacred texts—as the god with a hundred ears and a hundred eyes who sees, hears, and knows all. Mit(h)ra upheld agreements and defended truth. He was often invoked in solemn oaths that pledged the fulfillment of contracts and which promised his wrath should a person commit perjury. In the Zoroastrian tradition, Mithra was one of many minor deities (yazatas) created by Ahura Mazda, the supreme deity. He was the being who existed between the good Ahura Mazda and the evil Angra Mainyu—the being who exists between light and darkness and mediates between the two. Though he was considered a lesser deity to Ahura Mazda, he was still the “most potent and most glorious of the yazata.”[22]
The Roman version of this deity (Mithras) identified him with the light and sun. However, the god was not depicted as one with the sun, rather as sitting next to the sun in the communal meal. Again, Mithras was seen as a friend of the sun. This is important to note, as a later Roman inscription (c. AD 376) touted him as “Father of Fathers” and “the Invincible Sun God Mithras.”[23] Mithras was proclaimed as invincible because he never died and because he was completely victorious in all his battles. These aspects made him an attractive god for soldiers of the Roman army, who were his chief followers. Pockets of archaeological evidence from the outermost parts of the Roman Empire reinforce this assumption. Obviously, some problems arise in comparing Mithras to Christ, even at this level of simply comparing stories. Mithras lacks a death and therefore also lacks a resurrection.
Now that we have a more comprehensive view of the stories, it is quite easy to discern the vast difference between the story of Jesus and even the basic story lines of the commonly compared pagan mystery gods. One must only use the very limited, general aspects of the stories to make the accusation of borrowing, while ignoring the numerous aspects having nothing in common with Jesus’ story, such as missing body parts, sibling sexual intercourse inside the womb of a goddess-mother, and being born from a rock. This is why it is important to get the whole story. The supposed similarities are quite flimsy in the fuller context.
(Click to enlarge – above & below) Just three pages from Edwin Yamauchi’s book, Persia and the Bible, These three pages are a bit unrelated… but the topic is on Mithras, and if read, you can see the connection to the above portion by Mary Jo.
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[4]Plutarch, “Concerning Isis and Osiris,” in Hellenistic Religions: The Age of Syncretism, ed. Frederick C. Grant (Indianapolis: Liberal Arts Press, 1953), 80-95.
[5] In some depictions, Nut and Geb are married. Plutarch’s account insinuates that they have committed adultery because of the anger of the Sun at Nut’s transgression.
[6] Plutarch refers to Thoth as Hermes in “Concerning Isis and Osiris.”
[7]Plutarch’s “Concerning Isis and Osiris” appears to be the only account with this story of Horus’s birth.
[8]This aspect of the story, which was a variation of Horus’s conception story, is depicted in a drawing from the Osiris temple in Dendara.
[9] Plutarch, “Concerning Isis and Osiris,” 87.
[10]N. D. Mettinger, The Riddle of Resurrection: Dying and Rising Gods in the Ancient Near East (Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 2001), 175.
[11]Henri Frankfort, Kingship and the Gods: A Study of Ancient Near Eastern Religion as the Integration of Society and Nature (Chicago: Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, 190, 289; cf. 185; cited in Mettinger, Riddle of Resurrection, 172.
[12] For the purposes of this chapter, I use the following sources and translations: E. A. Wallis Budge’s translation of the Book of the Dead; Plutarch’s “Concerning Isis and Osiris”; Joseph Campbell’s piecing together of the story in The Mythic Image; as well as other noted interpretations of the story.
[13]The latter two versions of Horus’s birth can be found in Rodney Stark, Discovering God: The Origins of the Great Religions and the Evolution of Belief (New York: Harper Collins, 2007), 204. However, Stark does not reference the source for these birth stories.
[14]The development of Isis’s worship as a protector of children is a result of this instance; Margaret A. Murray, The Splendor That Was Egypt, rev. ed. (Mineola: Dover, 2004), 106.
[15] Joseph Campbell, The Mythic Image (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1974), 29, 450.
[16]Murray, The Splendor That Was Egypt, 103.
[17]Stark, Discovering God, 141.
[18] Roger Beck, “The Mysteries of Mithras: A New Account of Their Genesis,” Journal of Roman Studies 88 (1998): 123.
[19] Roger Beck, M. J. Vermaseren, David Ulansey, N. M. Swerdlow, Bruce Lincoln, John R Hinnells, and Reinhold Merkelbach, for example.
[20] More corecontemporary Mithraic scholars have pointed to the lack of a bull-slaying story in the Iranian version of Mithra’s story: “there is no evidence the Iranian god ever had anything to do with a bull-slaying.” David Ulansey, The Origins of the Mithraic Mysteries (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989), 8; see Bruce Lincoln, “Mitra, Mithra, Mithras: Problems of a Multiform Deity,” review of John R. Hinnells, Mithraic Studies: Proceedings of the First International Congress of Mithraic Studies, in History of Religions 17 (1977): 202-3. For an interpretation of the slaying of the bull as a cosmic event, see Luther H. Martin, “Roman Mithrraism and Christianity,” Numen 36 (1989): 8.
[21] “For the god is clearly and sufficiently defined by his name. `Mitra means ‘con-tract’, as Meillet established long ago and D. [Professor G. Dumezi] knows but keeps forgetting.” Ilya Gershevitch, review of Mitra and Aryaman and The Western Response to Zoroaster, in the Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 22 (1959): 154. See Paul Thieme, “Remarks on the Avestan Hymn to Mithra,”Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 23 (1960): 273.
[22]Franz Cumont, The Mysteries of Mithra: The Origins of Mithraism (1903). Accessed on May 3,2008, http://www.sacred-texts.com/cla/mom/index.htm.
[23]Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum VI. 510; H. Dessau, Inscriptions Latinae Selectae II. 1 (1902), No. 4152, as quoted in Grant, Hellenistic Religions, 147. This inscription was found at Rome, dated August 13, AD 376. Notice the late date of this title for Mithras—well after Christianity was firmly established in Rome.
Biased: I have my own interests and personal beliefs in mind when talking to others, spiritually or politically (Proverbs 21:2; Matthew 15:19); Fallen: I am a sinner and tend towards ~ naturally ~ what is not best for me or others. In other words, I will probably let you down (Romans 3:10; 3:23; Lamentations 5:16); Sentenced: since I tend towards rebellion and selfishness, I am judged accordingly and righteously (Romans 5:12; 6:23a; Job 36:6); Forgiven: I am justified before God not through works but by faith (Galatians 2:16; Romans 6:23b; Psalm 86:5); Relational:mercy is not getting what you deserve. And grace is getting what you absolutely do not deserve (Hebrews 4:16; Ephesians 1:5; Jeremiah 15:19a).
Some Questions About Evolution that Should Be Exhumed
Oldest Language
The Chinese were prodigious historians, crafting their language to draw scenes from history, and then combing these pictures into more complex ideas. These offer great apologetic evidences for the Genesis account of history, separate from the Bible.
Biased: I have my own interests and personal beliefs in mind when talking to others, spiritually or politically (Proverbs 21:2; Matthew 15:19); Fallen: I am a sinner and tend towards ~ naturally ~ what is not best for me or others. In other words, I will probably let you down (Romans 3:10; 3:23; Lamentations 5:16); Sentenced: since I tend towards rebellion and selfishness, I am judged accordingly and righteously (Romans 5:12; 6:23a; Job 36:6); Forgiven: I am justified before God not through works but by faith (Galatians 2:16; Romans 6:23b; Psalm 86:5); Relational: mercy is not getting what you deserve. And grace is getting what you absolutely do not deserve (Hebrews 4:16; Ephesians 1:5; Jeremiah 15:19a).
