sorry 'acceptance of gay people'

@Zaza" This is a tricky subject to discuss since you don't want to offend the gays but then again you know it's not right for any child to be put through the torment of having homosexual parents. "

No, I don't know that's not right actually. Why do you assume everyone agrees with that?

@Zaza" This is a tricky subject to discuss since you don't want to offend the gays but then again you know it's not right for any child to be put through the torment of having homosexual parents. "

No, I don't know that's not right actually. Why do you assume everyone agrees with that? There used to be a stigma associated with kids of divorce. There still is a stigma of mixed raced marriages. Are you suggesting that any 2 parents who aren't your mom and dad, or exactly like your mom and dad, are questionable?

Just finished reading this thread. Was well worth it. Quoted a few funny tracts for those newcomers who haven't the patience to read this thread through:

Sent from: jesuisbenjamin Online (61 ) Sent: Sat 04 PM
Granting rights presupposes rights can be lifted too.

Sent from: jesuisbenjamin Online (61 ) Sent: Sat 05 PM
I am vegetarian, but i ate meat before. Am i really vegetarian? What if i eat meat tomorrow just once and then no meat again for one year? Does it make me a non vegetarian then? I am vegetarian when i eat no meat and a non vegetarian when eating meat.

Sent from: Hamilton (14 ) Sent: Sat 07 PM
Its wrong.

Sent from: jesuisbenjamin Online (61 ) Sent: Sat 09 PM
Snails are wrong.... Society should not accept snails.

Sent from: Hamilton (14 ) Sent: Sat 09 PM
And anecdotal evidence! Always the best!

Sent from: Chrispminis (1121 ) Sent: Sat 11 PM
I'm tired of this anti-snail bigotry. For too long snails have experienced a glass ceiling to their advancement in our generally anti-snail social zeitgeist. While most people don't say it straight out, recent polls have suggested that Americans would rather have an atheist, a psychotic cult leader with a laser cannon for an arm, and even Ron Paul as a president than a snail as a president.

Sent from: mapleleaf (932 ) Sent: Sun 10 PM
You know I'm right, and it's KILLING you.

Sent from: bartdogg42 (650 ) Sent: Sun 11 PM
Stupid people can vote too! That's one of the beauties of a republic!

Sent from: Biddis (125 ) Sent: Mon 10 AM
So therefore why did

Should read funny/insightful/quoted out of context

Sent from: DingleberryJones Online (3445 ) Sent: Mon 07 PM...(Boy do I hate defending that crazy Canuck)
=================================================
...but you do it so well.
;0)

(I have read none of this thread, save the last three posts. Sorry. But these are my thoughts.)

Homosexuality has impacts beyond simply the two people in the relationship. In a society that accepts something like that as normal, then kids are exposed to that at an earlier age than I feel is appropriate. Already, we are sexualizing our children younger and younger. Whether or not this is a battle that is inevitably a loss, is debatable.

I also believe that homosexuality is not natural. The plumbing simply doesn't work that way. That does not mean that it is immoral, simply abnormal.

That being said, homosexuals have no fewer rights than anyone else, based merely on their sexual preferences. This is the solution I propose:

A. The federal government has no business defining what a marriage is. (Actually, the federal government has no business doing a lot of things. And I know a lot of you don't live in the USA, blah, blah, blah... :-P) There should be NO legal benefits provided by the government to married couples. IF this is to be done, it should be done by city or county governments, because that is the level at which your marriage begins to affect others - ie. you tell my four year old daughter that you and your (homosexual) significant other are married, which I contest, she is not ready to know about. (I don't have a four year old daughter, I'm nineteen. This is all hypothetical.)

B. Being "married" is a private choice: If you would like to consider yourself married, that is your choice. And if I want to choose to believe that homosexual marriages are invalid, that is my choice.

C. Many people offer the argument that companies provide benefits to married couples. To these people I say this: Offering these benefits is a (Rather intellectually dishonest) tactic designed to disguise what you are really being paid. While companies certainly have the right to do this, I believe they shouldn't. However they would simply have to define what a "marriage" is to them.

Have at it, folks. I may or may not check back to see the response to this...

'Homosexuality has impacts beyond simply the two people in the relationship. In a society that accepts something like that as normal, then kids are exposed to that at an earlier age than I feel is appropriate. Already, we are sexualizing our children younger and younger. Whether or not this is a battle that is inevitably a loss, is debatable.'

You are concentrating on the sex part, not the love part. In a normal marriage you would tell your child mummy and daddy love each other and are married, you wouldn't tell them the details of your sex life or about sex at all until they were older (not that you would explain your own sex life at all).

As for a gay couple it would simply be, mummy and mummy love each other and are married or daddy and daddy love each other and are married. SIMPLE. Marriage is about love not sex.

Yes, and I'm saying that I think, developmentally, expressing that homosexuality is normal is bad for the child. I'm not talking about the sex part...

rlumley, in a society where homosexuality was accepted, then homosexuals would not necessarily be hypersexualized as you seem to imply.

Why is two men in relationship any different to a man and a woman in relationship to a young child?

Prior to built in hetero norms, all adult kissing and lovey dovey stuff is all icky. Don't tell me you weren't grossed out by any sign of intimacy between your parents.


As for your 'solutions'.

A- Perhaps not marriages in the traditional definition per se, but the state most definitely does have an interest in defining civil unions.
Society is generally built around these pairings of humans we like to call marriages, and the state should encourage them or at least legally recgonize them and its role in regulating them.

B- Fair enough. Everyone is entitled to thier beliefs. As long as I don't try to shut you up I am allowed to think that alot of what you say is bullshit ;)

C- This really isn't about marriage, beyond the fact that yes, a married couple is often a financial union as well as a social/sexual/legal one.

"Yes, and I'm saying that I think, developmentally, expressing that homosexuality is normal is bad for the child. I'm not talking about the sex part..."

Why is it 'bad' to say something that it somewhat common is 'normal' (whatever that means)? Do you have anything to back up that belief or is it simply blind prejudice?

@rlumley - i don't understand how that can be bad for the child, love between two people will help that child to understand love and not to be predudice against those we love. Remember love can be two people in a sexual nature or between friends, family etc. If sex is uninvolved (i.e. not explained to the child) then it is viewed as a relationship like any other, therefore how can this be any more wrong than the relationship between two close male friends, or their borther and their father.

Same rights (inheritance, social benefits, etc. etc.) as married men & women: Yes! No problem. Of course!
But why ask for that legally valid contract, fully equivalent in law to a "regular" marriage, to also be called "marriage"??
That's childish, I feel - It just simply isn't the same thing, So why want to call it the same?? Always thought homosexuals wanted to accentuate their differences from us "straights"; yet here they want to be covered under the same blanket (pardon the pun) as "us" - weird....!!!

@ FS

A. What role in regulating them is that? That's my point - the government has no role in regulating them. It is none of the federal government's business who is married to whom.

Also, yes, it is simply blind prejudice. I'm an evil conservative warmonger too. :-P

I believe it's bad for the child because it's confusing to them. There is a part of the child that understands naturally that men and women are together - it is instinctive. I base this on several experiences where I have seen young children very confused by homosexuality. It may not be "damaging" per se, but I don't think a child should be exposed to it at an early age - they need to be more mature to be exposed to it. It's the same reason you wouldn't expose a child to other things too.

@Pantalone - Yes. I agree 100%. It is childish.

Like I said the driving factor between the same-sex marriage movement is the humiliation of religious people, who have been a thorn in the side of the gay rights movement, by taking over and legitimizing their most treasured institution. If this was not the case, Vermont would have stuck with Civil unions instead of moving to gay marriage.

Perhaps the government should get out of the marriage business completely. The only thing that the government should recognize is civil unions between two people, and all laws regarding hospital visits, inheritance, health benefits, etc, should be based ONLY on the civil union recognized by the government.

So when two people love each other, they have a choice, they can get a civil union, or they can get married. However, ONLY those with a civil union get the tax, hospital, etc benefits. So after you get married, if you want to be LEGALLY recognized, you need to take your marriage license to city hall and get your civil union license.

So if gays wanted to get married, they could find a church that would do it, and/or they can get a civil union license.

@rlumley - fair enough, if that has been you're experience then i guess i can see how you would have that opinion. However, i don't believe for a second that children have an instinct that men and women should be together, they learn this from birth. Fair enough young children may be confused about it if they have had no earlier experience of strong same sex relationships but again thats because they have had some form of upbringing, they have seen men and women together and not same sex relationships. It is in no way instintive though (in my belief).

A young child seeing a same-sex couple and being confused is on the same level as them seeing a Christian Arab.

"whoa thats inexplicable and confusing- maybe the world is more complex than I thought- how troubling"

Its based on experience, not nature. And even if it was, is shielding children from 'confusion' something to crusade about?

Seems very minor to me.