I was told I was a Certifier. Not sure I liked that.
do you think being gay is a choice?
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Empty Hands
Senior Master
Clearly God hates African heterosexuals. David Duke was right!!
As to AIDS, my data says its point of origin was Africa, based on a mutation of a simian virus, tracing back to somewhere between the late 1800's and the 1950's.I was told I was a Certifier. Not sure I liked that.
Considering that all those evil Egyptian babies died in 1 night, and that nuking 2 cities from space takes minutes, not decades, these 60+ years of AIDS seems a bit, ah, not loving and merciful to me. You know, considering the 7 year incubation slow, decaying death, full of pain and anguish. Any God who would do that sort of thing is, well, a jerk.
Of course, the argument that AIDS is "Gods Gay Punishment" implies a number of things.
1 -That "God" has lousy aim
2 -Doesn't care about killing innocents
3- Doesn't take proper safeguards to ensure the right people "get it".
Now, this leads me to wonder if the same "God" also was behind the SCUD Missile system, and guided my eye surgery.
Explain to Ryan White, that he was just "collateral damage" in "Gods war against the evil Gay Empire".
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I've owned probably 6 dogs, loved em all. I just like cats more, and had only owed 2 prior to getting the 3 kibble chompers I now have.
You might be right, in fact I think experience does have a lot to do with forming "you". But there are some things that are just in the basic coding.
I have a mouth, my gf has a mouth. If a female mouth can work on my gear, theoretically so can a male one.
Both men and women have butt holes. Enough said.
So, the idea of tab P in slot V for the act of reproduction while a valid idea, it denies the idea that P into V/A/M for pleasure.
So, unless we're going to deny sterile couples from copulation, you can't limit your argument to mere reproduction capability.
I'm cool with that. Now, can anyone help me find the phone number for that Cylon extermination group?
A few of my friends are. They're like everyone else to me.
Ironically, I've found several of the heaviest "gay men bad" folks to have large lesbian porn collections. Take that one as ya will.
I agree and disagree. I think some folks are just wired that way from the start, some develop it as they go, and some never do.
But there's no evidence that kids exposed to the so called "gay lifestyle" will be more or less gay than anyone else.
So, it's as much a choice as a wiring matter.
Frostbite
Blue Belt
The origins of HIV/AIDS have never been attributed to homosexuals. Contemporary theories on its origins tie it to a strain of Simian Immunodeficiency Virus which occurs in monkeys that is nearly identical to HIV. And no, they don't think humans got it from buggering monkeys, although I suppose that isn't outside the realm of possibility. One theory is that it was hunters coming into contact with infected monkey blood. Other theories tie it to improper use of hypodermic needles and even being spread by heterosexual prostitutes. One theory is that HIV was already running rampant in Africa for years before it showed up in the western world but due to poor medical care and other diseases running rampant, it wasn't identified right away.
Even if AIDS was part of God's master plan to rid the world of gays, which, incidentally, I think is ridiculous and more than a little insulting, the group at the biggest risk of increasing infection worldwide is heterosexual women. Also, worldwide, 90% of new HIV infections in both genders are attributed to heterosexual sex. So I guess God's plan backfired.
Not to turn this into a religious discussion but it's my understanding that the current Christian idea of God is that he is the creator of all and that he's infallible. If that was the case, why would he create homosexuals knowing ahead of time that they're going to fail (by having gay sex), and then try to exterminate them after they did exactly what he expected them to do? Moreover, why, if he's infallible, would his plan for extermination backfire so badly?
Edit: Damn you Bob Hubbard for beating me to the punch!
One of the most annoying and amusing things for me as a Jew is the way everyone else has taken over 'ownership' of the Bible. Quoting from it to enforce any rules they think they want to enforce or put across any view they want.
Firstly the stories and commandments in the Bible were created for a specific audience, a people who had been kept in slavery and were then freed. They had no real cultural identity nor much of a way of surviving so they needed rules to live by. The reason it took 40 years in the desert to travel what could have been done in weeks was that the Jewish people need to outgrow their slave mentality and become a strong functioning nation. Hence the Bible with it's stories on how to live and how not to live, with it's dietary laws, agricultural advice and legal requirements. It taught slaves how to govern themselves, become free and hopefully become good people. It showed them how good people behaved and why they should be good people. However while it showed them the way free choice was always given, they could choose not to listen and go their own way. No one had the right to stop them. Basically, G-d only wanted volunteers. that's why he offered the Jews a covenant to be their G-d.
The nation wasn't big, even the biggest nations then weren't big by our standards. You couldn't ignore what was happening among the people, everything people did affected others so there were rules laid down in the commandments like no adultery, no homosexual acts (there's no law against homosexuals, homosexual love or attraction, it being felt that love between two people of the same sex was as natural as heterosexual ones, it was the sex act that was considered wrong), no stealing, no murder etc. In a small community all these things would affect a great many people whereas these days it wouldn't. Now it won't break up the community if two men decided they want to be a couple but it would have caused a huge strain on a small community where marriage between a man and woman was the most productive for the community bringing with it children.
These rules were written for a specific people at a specific time to enable the survival of the people when life was fragile. The Jewish people made a covenant with G-d at the time, most of us chose to carry on honouring that contract. Over time, wise heads have changed many of the laws so they are relevant to the times. They are still being changed by the will of the Jewish people. The law is a living entity, it must change with the times. Apart from the ultra orthodox who still believe homosexual sex acts are wrong, the general feeling in Judaism is that when the commandments were given homosexuality wasn't understood. It feels that the benefits of marriage between a man and a woman should be highlighted rather than frown on same sex marriages. While the different parts of Judaism believe differently on the 'causes' of homosexuality and whether same sex marriages among Jews are good or bad, just about everyone agrees it's inhumane and unJewish to make gays and lesbians feel like outcasts or treat them as sick.
Why then are modern non Jews insisting on sticking to the very old laws that weren't made for them? They haven't updated the Biblical laws but quote them directly causing huge pain for a great many. If you choose have a contract with G-d and he asks that you don't do a thing, you don't do it. You don't have the right however to decide for any other person how they should live their lives. If someone is gay and wants to marry their same sex partner, you don't have to like it but you have no right to stop them. You certainly don't have the right to think that G-d will strike them down nor that he would punish them, why would he? They haven't a contract with Him!
If you take the laws written for someone else, you have to take all of what comes with it and you have to accept that free will is given to everyone. Each of us has the right to behave as we think we should in regards to our own behaviour and as long as that doesn't hurt anyone else and gay relationships certainly don't just by being gay,no one has the right to interfere or ban such relationships.
I really don't understand why people use someone elses laws, someone elses words and stories to justify what they think and impose it on the rest of us.
Firstly the stories and commandments in the Bible were created for a specific audience, a people who had been kept in slavery and were then freed. They had no real cultural identity nor much of a way of surviving so they needed rules to live by. The reason it took 40 years in the desert to travel what could have been done in weeks was that the Jewish people need to outgrow their slave mentality and become a strong functioning nation. Hence the Bible with it's stories on how to live and how not to live, with it's dietary laws, agricultural advice and legal requirements. It taught slaves how to govern themselves, become free and hopefully become good people. It showed them how good people behaved and why they should be good people. However while it showed them the way free choice was always given, they could choose not to listen and go their own way. No one had the right to stop them. Basically, G-d only wanted volunteers. that's why he offered the Jews a covenant to be their G-d.
The nation wasn't big, even the biggest nations then weren't big by our standards. You couldn't ignore what was happening among the people, everything people did affected others so there were rules laid down in the commandments like no adultery, no homosexual acts (there's no law against homosexuals, homosexual love or attraction, it being felt that love between two people of the same sex was as natural as heterosexual ones, it was the sex act that was considered wrong), no stealing, no murder etc. In a small community all these things would affect a great many people whereas these days it wouldn't. Now it won't break up the community if two men decided they want to be a couple but it would have caused a huge strain on a small community where marriage between a man and woman was the most productive for the community bringing with it children.
These rules were written for a specific people at a specific time to enable the survival of the people when life was fragile. The Jewish people made a covenant with G-d at the time, most of us chose to carry on honouring that contract. Over time, wise heads have changed many of the laws so they are relevant to the times. They are still being changed by the will of the Jewish people. The law is a living entity, it must change with the times. Apart from the ultra orthodox who still believe homosexual sex acts are wrong, the general feeling in Judaism is that when the commandments were given homosexuality wasn't understood. It feels that the benefits of marriage between a man and a woman should be highlighted rather than frown on same sex marriages. While the different parts of Judaism believe differently on the 'causes' of homosexuality and whether same sex marriages among Jews are good or bad, just about everyone agrees it's inhumane and unJewish to make gays and lesbians feel like outcasts or treat them as sick.
Why then are modern non Jews insisting on sticking to the very old laws that weren't made for them? They haven't updated the Biblical laws but quote them directly causing huge pain for a great many. If you choose have a contract with G-d and he asks that you don't do a thing, you don't do it. You don't have the right however to decide for any other person how they should live their lives. If someone is gay and wants to marry their same sex partner, you don't have to like it but you have no right to stop them. You certainly don't have the right to think that G-d will strike them down nor that he would punish them, why would he? They haven't a contract with Him!
If you take the laws written for someone else, you have to take all of what comes with it and you have to accept that free will is given to everyone. Each of us has the right to behave as we think we should in regards to our own behaviour and as long as that doesn't hurt anyone else and gay relationships certainly don't just by being gay,no one has the right to interfere or ban such relationships.
I really don't understand why people use someone elses laws, someone elses words and stories to justify what they think and impose it on the rest of us.
Behold, the power of dislike.
Do you mean I dislike people? I don't in the least, I'm just tired of people being hurt by people who quote parts of the Bible they think means what they want it to mean instead of what it does mean to the people it was writen for.
OMG I am sorry... no...that's not what I meant at all!
I agree with you.
And, I meant that when a person dislikes another person, or group of people...or when a person has an agenda to push...it seems as if any reason that supports the dislike, or supports the agenda...becomes OK in the mind of the protagonist.
About 100 years ago, some of the exact same arguments about marriage were being made in this country...only then it was about interracial marriage instead of gay marriage. Its heartbreaking to me to see the rhetoric that was being used against people getting married that didn't have matching amounts of melaninin in their skin. Logic, science, common sense, human decensy, all being trumped so one person can push something on someone else. This is what I mean by the power of dislike.
I don't like seeing it happen whether the target is gays or whether the target is evangelical Christians or Arabs, or blacks or Jews or white men or anyone else. If we as individuals are proud of who we are and are happy with who we are, then there is no reason to denegrate someone else or to implore someone else to change. However if we are not happy with who we are or proud of who we are, the place where change starts is the mirror, and not the soapbox.
Or, in the words of Yogi Bhajan, be the change you wish to see in others.
Didn't think you did Carol!
Why don't people simply mind their own business? That's the plain and simple answer. If my friends are happy in whatever relationships they are in I'm happy for them. I try not to judge anyone who's not a politician as it's none of my business. Politicians and 'celebrities' set themselves up to be looked and and questioned by us so it's fair to judge them if they want our support but only in as far as their public performances or acts are concerned.
Choice or nature? who cares? everyone has a right to happiness and as long as it hurts no one it really, really doesn't matter what sexual orientation people are. Only busybodies and interferers who like to pry and spoilt things think they have the right to decry what people do in situations like this.Where are they when the babies are being tortured to death by sadistic adults? when Baby P here was having his fingrtips cut off and his back broken, where were the Bible bashers and do gooders then, why didn't they save him or were they too busy hating same sex married couples? If you want to do something constructive for the love of G-d and for humanity the haters should get out and do something to help the people who need it, the battered children, the starving, the war refugees, the sick, the lonely and the bereft. Stop hating, stop preaching get out and do something!
I'm just so fed up and tired of people quoting the Bible to justify themselves. Get your own book please, leave mine alone.
Why don't people simply mind their own business? That's the plain and simple answer. If my friends are happy in whatever relationships they are in I'm happy for them. I try not to judge anyone who's not a politician as it's none of my business. Politicians and 'celebrities' set themselves up to be looked and and questioned by us so it's fair to judge them if they want our support but only in as far as their public performances or acts are concerned.
Choice or nature? who cares? everyone has a right to happiness and as long as it hurts no one it really, really doesn't matter what sexual orientation people are. Only busybodies and interferers who like to pry and spoilt things think they have the right to decry what people do in situations like this.Where are they when the babies are being tortured to death by sadistic adults? when Baby P here was having his fingrtips cut off and his back broken, where were the Bible bashers and do gooders then, why didn't they save him or were they too busy hating same sex married couples? If you want to do something constructive for the love of G-d and for humanity the haters should get out and do something to help the people who need it, the battered children, the starving, the war refugees, the sick, the lonely and the bereft. Stop hating, stop preaching get out and do something!
I'm just so fed up and tired of people quoting the Bible to justify themselves. Get your own book please, leave mine alone.
zDom
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I agree and well, disagree.
I agree that the self-righteous judgemental types shouldn't be using "your book" to beat other people up.
But I also reject the idea that just because I lack a genetic connection to the book that I shouldn't be able to use it to benefit myself
FWIW, I don't think G-d created AIDS to punish homosexuals. I think of the Bible, rather, as the Designer's Manual —*very useful for living a better life!
Historical context aside, if you live life under the terms of the contract (great description, btw) outlined in what we non-Hebrews call the Old Testament, you avoid a lot of trouble in your life.
I don't think G-d listed a kosher diet or a prohibition against homosexual sex because he likes to deny us pleasure, so much as he was aware of the natural consequences of non-kosher diets and homosexual sex.
It's like telling a 2-year old not to touch the stove when they've never been burned. There really isn't any use in trying to explain to them. You tell them NO! and then they either obey, and happily go on their toddler lives without a second-degree burn, or they disobey — causing themselves unnecessary pain and you, as the parent, a empathetic pain of watching them go through something they really didn't have to.
It's NOT the parent PUNISHING the child for touching the stove! So yea, those religious wackos are WAY off base. AIDS is just a natural consequence of choosing to indulge in homosexual sex.
I've run into the natural consequence myself: fornication very often leads to broken hearts, for example.
Some of us just just prefer to touch the hot stove despite the consequences (shrug). And bacon is yummy.
I tried bacon of course lol, too salty and pork chops tasted just ugh.
I seee no reason why non Jews shouldn't use the Bible if they wish, there's some pretty good advice in there ( for all sorts of things including how to make love properly) I just don't want people use it as something to hit others over the head with.
zDom, I think you hit the nail onthe head when you said it was a designers manual. Whether it was 'divine word' or G-d giving us some wise people to write it, the Torah remains a very good manual for living reasonably happily and without too much grief. The Talmud must be used along side it though, I think it's the lack of the Talmud that makes non Jewish users of the Bible miss out very important points and issues. The Jewish religion is a very questioning one and we are constantly debating laws and texts seeking modern answers to modern problems.
I'm not saying we are better than anyone else, I believe religions are like petrol ( ok gas lol) many different brands and names but they all do the same job. I just don't want people using my religion to hurt people.
I seee no reason why non Jews shouldn't use the Bible if they wish, there's some pretty good advice in there ( for all sorts of things including how to make love properly) I just don't want people use it as something to hit others over the head with.
zDom, I think you hit the nail onthe head when you said it was a designers manual. Whether it was 'divine word' or G-d giving us some wise people to write it, the Torah remains a very good manual for living reasonably happily and without too much grief. The Talmud must be used along side it though, I think it's the lack of the Talmud that makes non Jewish users of the Bible miss out very important points and issues. The Jewish religion is a very questioning one and we are constantly debating laws and texts seeking modern answers to modern problems.
I'm not saying we are better than anyone else, I believe religions are like petrol ( ok gas lol) many different brands and names but they all do the same job. I just don't want people using my religion to hurt people.
Gordon Nore
Senior Master
No, it isn't. Read the previous posts, which contain factual information on AIDs which cannot be found -- no matter how hard you want it to be there -- in the Old or New Testaments.
Sure it is. Just like blindness is a natural consequence of masturbation and chapped lips a natural consequence of oral sex.
I think you may have misread zDoms posts, he said quite plainly that he didn't believe that AIDs was made by G-d to punish homosexuals.
He was and I'm sure he'll correct me if I'm wrong, meaning that AIDs exists and if you choose to have homosexual sex you stand a very high chance of contracting it. I don't think he was apportioning blame or saying it was written exactly that way in the Bible. Gay sex carries health risks by it's nature ( I'm not going to go into details why on this thread) so it was proscribed by the Bible. In Biblical times heterosexual sex carried health risks as well. In the days before antibiotics, health knowledge and hygiene most things were a risk so the writers of the Bible sought to minimise as many risks as possible. Hence for example rules like washing your hands before eating and not eating shellfish!
Life today is different and there aren't as many risks even with AIDS.
Hetro sex stll does carry man risks. Herpes isn't curable. Neither is the so called "super" gonorrhea. Unwanted pregnancy's. Not to mention leaping out a second story window when daddy gets home can be quite hazardous on a horny teen male. LOL!
But I find the idea that a 60-100 year old disease, that targets hemophiliacs and blood transfusion patients, and just anyone unlucky enough to get some blood on them, to be a rather poor idea of "Divine Retribution" against something that's been going on for oh, 3,000+ years at least. Actually I find it rather, stupid.
Of course, the idea of a Christian falling back on the Old Testament is odd, since the idea of Jesus was to create a new contract with god. A "New" Testament if you will that replaced the old one, and turned God from this angry to-be-pleased god to this loving father god. But that's a debate for another thread I think.
Again, I don't think "Gay" is really a choice. Who, in their right mind, would choose a life of persecution legislated discrimination, internal confusion, denial, and public misinformation?
But I find the idea that a 60-100 year old disease, that targets hemophiliacs and blood transfusion patients, and just anyone unlucky enough to get some blood on them, to be a rather poor idea of "Divine Retribution" against something that's been going on for oh, 3,000+ years at least. Actually I find it rather, stupid.
Of course, the idea of a Christian falling back on the Old Testament is odd, since the idea of Jesus was to create a new contract with god. A "New" Testament if you will that replaced the old one, and turned God from this angry to-be-pleased god to this loving father god. But that's a debate for another thread I think.
Again, I don't think "Gay" is really a choice. Who, in their right mind, would choose a life of persecution legislated discrimination, internal confusion, denial, and public misinformation?
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And, actually, the primary vector of HIV/AIDS transmission worldwide is heterosexual sex. This has been especially true in Africa, where it's thought to have originated.....
I don't believe it's a choice either but if it were I wouldn't think any differently. Finding someone you love and who loves you is the best thing in the world regardless of your sexual preferences. I don't condone promuscuity by anyone, male, female, gay or straight. I'm old fashioned that way though I don't believe you have to marry to be happy, I think perhaps legally in the case of wills and taxwise you may be better properly married.
Frostbite
Blue Belt
This was how I interpreted his post as well, although, I would've made the distinction of anal sex, since that's really where the risk lies and applies equally to heterosexuals. Anal sex carries a lot of risk factors with it because of the absorbative characteristics of the rectum, the ease with which the tissue can be damaged, causing exposed blood vessels, and the fact that feces are responsible for the transmission of diseases like E. Coli and parasitic infections like trichomaniasis. Those risks transcend gay or straight.
Er yes I took it as read that people understood that lol and wasn't going to go into details! I took it as read too that people would understand the risks were the same for all parties.
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