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An interesting article about the "naturalness" of homosexuality
Curious article sent to me from the NY Times. I quite litterally don't know what to make of it. Talk to me folks let me know what you think?
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/07/ar...l?pagewanted=1
Worf
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That's one of the things that I love about animals. They do what they do and they don't get judged for doing it.
I know a few people who could learn a thing or two from Roy and Silo.
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I don't know a whole lot about cause and affect, but it sure does seem to be normal. I have known many from both sides of the fence and haven't noticed that they are all that different. Everyone I know is different than I am, but I don't see any trends to speak of. I've known some guys who are rough and tough, but are just attracted to men. Others are more feminine like you would see from Hollywood. I also know some straight guys who are just as feminine. It seems to me that you just can't judge a book by it's cover. People is people.
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Originally Posted by GMichael
People is people.
And, apparently, Penguins is Penguins. :smilewinkgrin:
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Originally Posted by ForeverAutumn
That's one of the things that I love about animals. They do what they do and they don't get judged for doing it.
Great observation, FA. My boys sometimes have trouble understanding why I'm so patient with our dogs while not so much with their tom-foolery. But that comparison says more about my own expectations than anything else. (I have no idea how or whether my little anecdote relates to the subject matter of the article.)
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Originally Posted by dean_martin
Great observation, FA. My boys sometimes have trouble understanding why I'm so patient with our dogs while not so much with their tom-foolery. But that comparison says more about my own expectations than anything else. (I have know idea how or whether my little anecdote relates to the subject matter of the article.)
That makes perfect sense. When we got our cats last year, my husband (who doesn't have as much experience with animals as I do) would get mad at them when they were "bad". It took a while for me to get through to him that they don't know that they're being bad. They're just being cats. We're the ones who are judging them as "bad".
As humans, we have the ability to reason and communicate. Our social behavour is much more complicated than the rest of the animal kingdom. Morality is an important part of that society and it should be. If we acted on instinct alone, our world would be chaotic. But there are times when, I believe, morality is misplaced. And judging people for who they are sexually attracted to is one of those times.
Is it natural to be gay because penguins are? No. It's natural to be gay because that's just the way it is.
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Originally Posted by ForeverAutumn
And, apparently, Penguins is Penguins. :smilewinkgrin:
Penguins is people (in little tuxes & with webbed feet)
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I have always felt that homosexuality was natural to those who are homosexual, and heterosexuality was natural to those who are heterosexual. I never let my Christianity affect that belief, because I know that Christianity involves the less than perfect creatures called humanity. People are people no matter who they sleep with at night.
I personally do not understand what the big issue is with homosexuality. It seems to me the people that have the biggest issue with it probably have something to hide, or are not comfortable enough in their own skin to respect the differences of others. In my neck of the woods I see gay men and women doing the same lawn mowing, dog walking, and work going that I do every day. I have four very close friends of which two are gay, and I have just as much fun with them as I have with my straight friends. Sexuality does not come into play when we all get together, we just have a good time. We tease each other on occasion, but it is all in good fun, and they get as many digs at us as we get with them. I just never understood what the hubub is all about concerning gay men and women. I just do not get it.
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Originally Posted by Sir Terrence the Terrible
I have always felt that homosexuality was natural to those who are homosexual, and heterosexuality was natural to those who are heterosexual. I never let my Christianity affect that belief, because I know that Christianity involves the less than perfect creatures called humanity. People are people no matter who they sleep with at night.
I personally do not understand what the big issue is with homosexuality. It seems to me the people that have the biggest issue with it probably have something to hide, or are not comfortable enough in their own skin to respect the differences of others. In my neck of the woods I see gay men and women doing the same lawn mowing, dog walking, and work going that I do every day. I have four very close friends of which two are gay, and I have just as much fun with them as I have with my straight friends. Sexuality does not come into play when we all get together, we just have a good time. We tease each other on occasion, but it is all in good fun, and they get as many digs at us as we get with them. I just never understood what the hubub is all about concerning gay men and women. I just do not get it.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
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Then there are some frogs who can change their sex.
Worf, don't be surprised if you see someone holding up a big poster of Roy and Silo at your next Amsterdam gay pride vacation. Maybe someone will even make t-shirts, lol.
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Nature loves variety. Unfortunately, society hates it.
Thank you Worf for posting the link to the article. I wish humans could let other humans be happy the way penguins let other penguins be happy.
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Originally Posted by JohnMichael
...the way penguins let other penguins be happy.
Gay penguins?
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JohnMichael
Nature loves variety. Unfortunately, society hates it.
Thank you Worf for posting the link to the article. I wish humans could let other humans be happy the way penguins let other penguins be happy.
Notwithstanding your poignant statement on variety, you could even put it this way, JM: I wish humans could let other humans be happy the way humans let penguins be happy.
(Of course this assumes there is no penguin abuse going on out there.)
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Kinda inneresting, when you think about it....Psychology and psychiatry, which have been in good positions to legitimize or stigmatize homosexuality, have cloaked themselves up in the garb of being honest to goodness sciences. In doing so, practitioners and researchers have striven to ensure that the objects of their study were apprehendable in terms that were empirically based, quanitifiable in nature and describable in terms that do not invoke the name of the Creator in doing so.
Somehow or another, the same-sex-preference behavior of some creatures has escaped the attention of many, who would write the whole thing off as fluctuation of a hormone or based on bad parenting. Regardless of its origins, the fact remains that some same-sexed singles and pairs are perfectly content. God alone knows how much suffering has been caused by persuading homosexuals to do otherwise, whether by surgery, psychotherapy or religion.
I don't think that this article or the literature supporting it will convert many of the hard core throng who is dead-set in their antipathy towards homosexuality. At the same time, perhaps it will open the eyes of many scientific folk, whose blinders have caused them to see human couples as bonded only by pocreative impulses--and not by something as messy as affection or love.
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Welp....
I gave up on "organized" religion at the age of 12. Like my friend Laura Nyro wrote, "I was raised on the good book Jesus, till I read between the lines...." Most of my morals and the tenets I live by are universal truths, "live and let live", "treat others as you'd like to be treated" and more importantly "do no harm". Far as I'm concerned, love is love. Take it where you find it, give it when you can.
Worf
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Originally Posted by Worf101
I gave up on "organized" religion at the age of 12. Like my friend Laura Nyro wrote, "I was raised on the good book Jesus, till I read between the lines...." Most of my morals and the tenets I live by are universal truths, "live and let live", "treat others as you'd like to be treated" and more importantly "do no harm". Far as I'm concerned, love is love. Take it where you find it, give it when you can.
Worf
Words to live by, thank you.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Worf101
...love is love. Take it where you find it, give it when you can.
Worf
Probably the best statement I've read in years. Thanks.
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Maybe we should send some penguins to Uganda...they could put some bones in their beaks, do a lil' bit of A Chorus Line ad invite the Pope over...it might work wonders...
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Originally Posted by bobsticks
Maybe we should send some penguins to Uganda...they could put some bones in their beaks, do a lil' bit of A Chorus Line ad invite the Pope over...it might work wonders...
Uganda is not on my list of vacation spots. No matter how much I want to hear "What I Did For Love" performed by penguins.
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Originally Posted by JohnMichael
Uganda is not on my list of vacation spots. No matter how much I want to hear "What I Did For Love" performed by The Penguins.
I must have missed that single.:shocked:
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Originally Posted by GMichael
I must have missed that single.:shocked:
Then you, my friend, are missing out. Some of those penguins can really throw down...
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Not to mention that they are great dancers!
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Big shots! Think they're so special with them tuxedos! Bah! Sissies!
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And here I thought we were talking about this penguin:
http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a2...-tux-10409.png
He gets along with everyone.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by bobsticks
Maybe we should send some penguins to Uganda...they could put some bones in their beaks, do a lil' bit of A Chorus Line ad invite the Pope over...it might work wonders...
No you dent LOLOLOLOLOL!!!!!!
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BAH! This thread is for the birds. :rolleyes5:
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Aye...'Tis a foul thing to be sure!
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Speaking of Uganda
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009...ntence-gay-sex
Uganda considers death sentence for gay sex in bill before parliament• Minimum penalty is life in jail, under anti-homosexuality bill
• US evangelical activists pressed for restrictive measures
As a gay Ugandan, Frank Mugisha has endured insults from strangers, hate messages on his phone, police harassment and being outed in a tabloid as one of the country's "top homos". That may soon seem like the good old days.
Life imprisonment is the minimum punishment for anyone convicted of having gay sex, under an anti-homosexuality bill currently before Uganda's parliament. If the accused person is HIV positive or a serial offender, or a "person of authority" over the other partner, or if the "victim" is under 18, a conviction will result in the death penalty.
Members of the public are obliged to report any homosexual activity to police with 24 hours or risk up to three years in jail – a scenario that human rights campaigners say will result in a witchhunt. Ugandans breaking the new law abroad will be subject to extradition requests.
"The bill is haunting us," said Mugisha, 25, chairman of Sexual Minorities Uganda, a coalition of local lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex groups that will all be banned under the law. "If this passes we will have to leave the country."
Human rights groups within and outside Uganda have condemned the proposed legislation, which is designed to strengthen colonial-era laws that already criminalise gay sex. The issue threatened to overshadow the Commonwealth heads of government meeting that ended in Trinidad and Tobago today, with the UK and Canada both expressing strong concerns. Ahead of the meeting Stephen Lewis, a former UN envoy on Aids in Africa, said the law "makes a mockery of Commonwealth principles" and has "a taste of fascism" about it.
But within Uganda deeply-rooted homophobia, aided by a US-linked evangelical campaign alleging that gay men are trying to "recruit" schoolchildren, and that homosexuality is a habit that can be "cured", has ensured widespread public support for the bill.
President Yoweri Museveni appeared to add his backing earlier this month, warning youths in Kampala that he had heard that "European homosexuals are recruiting in Africa", and saying gay relationships were against God's will.
"We used to say Mr and Mrs, but now it is Mr and Mr. What is that now?" he said. In a interview with the Guardian, James Nsaba Buturo, the minister of state for ethics and integrity, said the government was determined to pass the legislation, ideally before the end of 2009, even if meant withdrawing from international treaties and conventions such as the UN's Universal Declaration on Human Rights, and foregoing donor funding.
"We are talking about anal sex. Not even animals do that," Butoro said, adding that he was personally caring for six "former homosexuals" who had been traumatised by the experience. "We believe there are limits to human rights."
Homosexuality has always been a taboo subject in Uganda, and is considered by many to be an affront both to local culture and religion, which plays a strong role in family life. This stigma and the real threat of job loss means that no public personality has ever "come out".
Even local HIV campaigns – which have been heavily influenced by the evangelical church with a bias towards abstinence over condom use – have deliberately avoided targeting gay men for both prevention and access to treatment.
"This means many gay men here think Aids is a non-issue, which is so dangerous," said Mugisha, who together with a few colleagues, has risked arrest by agitating in recent years for a change in the HIV policy.
At the same time, some influential religious leaders have warned about the dangers of accepting liberal western attitudes towards homosexuality.
Both opponents and supporters agree that the impetus for the a more hardline law came in March during a seminar in Kampala to "expose the truth behind homosexuality and the homosexual agenda".
The main speakers were three US evangelists: Scott Lively, Don Schmierer and Caleb Lee Brundidge. Lively is a noted anti-gay activist and president of Defend the Family International, a conservative Christian association, while Schmierer is an author who works with "homosexual recovery groups". Brundidge is a "sexual reorientation coach" at the International Healing Foundation.
The seminar was organised by Stephen Langa, a Ugandan electrician turned pastor who runs the Family Life Network in Kampala and has been spreading the message that gays are targeting schoolchildren for "conversion". "They give money to children to recruit schoolmates – once you have two children, the whole school is gone," he said in an interview. Asked if there had been any court case to prove this was happening, he replied: "No, that's why this law is needed."
After the conference Langa arranged for a petition signed by thousands of concerned parents to be delivered to parliament in April. Within a few months the bill had been drawn up.
[In an email to the Guardian on 30 November, Scott Lively said, "I have stated publicly that I do not support the bill as written. It is far too harsh and punitive. My purpose in addressing members of the Uganda parliament in March was to urge them to emphasise therapy, not punishment in their anti-homosexuality law." His long-standing position was, he said, that public policy should "actively discourage homosexuality but only as aggressively as necessary to prevent its public advocacy, much the way laws against marijuana are used in various states here in the US: the law is very lightly enforced, if ever, but the fact the law is on the books prevents advocates of the drug from promoting it, for example, in public schools."]
Christopher Senyonjo, a retired Anglican bishop, said the bill would push Uganda towards being a police state. "This law is being influenced by some evangelicals abroad," he said. "There's a lack of understanding about homosexuality – it's not recruitment, it's orientation."
But among religious leaders of all faiths his is a rare voice. Langa, the pastor, said the only thing lacking in the legislation was a clause for "rehabilitation" of homosexuals, whom he "loves" and wants to help. Gay rights had the potential to destroy civilisation, as the west could soon find out, he said.
"As one parent told me: 'We would rather live in grass huts with our morality than in skyscrapers among homosexuals'."
• This article was updated on 1 December 2009 to add a later comment by Scott Lively. A sub-heading - US evangelists are main activists behind measure - was amended to clarify that the evangelists were pressing for tougher laws, rather than specifically for the death penalty.
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Originally Posted by ForeverAutumn
BAH! This thread is for the birds. :rolleyes5:
Can we all just flock together?
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Sigh....
Uganda. After 100's of years of colonial rule, Idi Amin and natural disasters you'd think that poor beknighted country had suffered enough....
Apparently not.
Worf
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It's bad enough that the Uganda stew is in such a state, that meddlesome American evangelicals need to add their bit of sordidness into the pot....They should be excommunicated and denounced by their respective churches as the hypocrites and misanthropes they are. Phooey!
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I had no idea that was going on in Uganda. Thanks for the enlightenment John.
Such prejudice and hatred is completely incomprehensible to me. What is wrong with people?!
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Sadly in many areas hate crimes are still happening. In my town gay men have been murdered. Some kind and gentle men have been beaten and raped by haters as a punishment for being gay.
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Originally Posted by JohnMichael
Sadly in many areas hate crimes are still happening. In my town gay men have been murdered. Some kind and gentle men have been beaten and raped by haters as a punishment for being gay.
But wouldn't raping them make them gay too?
You need to move to my town. You would be welcome with open arms. (The town would like you too:ihih: )
Seriously though. When will people step out of the dark ages and join the 21st century? It's bad enough that there are so many people who carry hatred around for no reason; do we need whole governments taking things to a new level?
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Rape is about violence, not sex. A man raping another man doesn't make him gay, it just makes him scum.
That article was disturbing for so many reasons. But this is the statement that really stuck out for me...
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In a interview with the Guardian, James Nsaba Buturo, the minister of state for ethics and integrity, said the government was determined to pass the legislation, ideally before the end of 2009, even if meant withdrawing from international treaties and conventions such as the UN's Universal Declaration on Human Rights, and foregoing donor funding.
That people feel so strongly about this that they would withdraw from Human Rights treaties and go against the UN just boggles my mind to the point that I don't even know how to express how I feel. Butaro obviously has a very different definition of ethics and integrity than I do! :nonod:
John, where you live scares me. Come live here. There is a huge community who would welcome you. We have a wicked parade every year. And if you meet Mr. Right, you can marry him. Plus I have a house that needs decorating. You met my husband...you can see that he's no help. ;)
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Originally Posted by ForeverAutumn
Rape is about violence, not sex. A man raping another man doesn't make him gay, it just makes him scum.
That article was disturbing for so many reasons. But this is the statement that really stuck out for me...
That people feel so strongly about this that they would withdraw from Human Rights treaties and go against the UN just boggles my mind to the point that I don't even know how to express how I feel. Butaro obviously has a very different definition of ethics and integrity than I do! :nonod:
John, where you live scares me. Come live here. There is a huge community who would welcome you. We have a wicked parade every year. And if you meet Mr. Right, you can marry him. Plus I have a house that needs decorating. You met my husband...you can see that he's no help. ;)
Hey!
I invited him first Red.
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Originally Posted by GMichael
Hey!
I invited him first Red.
Do you have a parade?
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Originally Posted by ForeverAutumn
Do you have a parade?
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No need. They run our town. Most seats in the villiage council are held by non-hetteros. There are many parades, parties, and festivals all year. All you have to do is rename a few and you could say "we have a few parades each year."
It's a very artsy town. I bet you'd love it too. It's fun to walk around town and check out all the art dealers. The prices are a little crazy though. One place was charging $500 for a burnt piece of plywood. It wasn't even a whole piece! It was cut on one end. And people here complain about $35k for speaker wire.:shocked:
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Originally Posted by GMichael
And people here complain about $35k for speaker wire.
Those animals! I don't know if I could live in such a place!:shocked:
Seriously, it sounds great. Hey John, the next AR get-together is in Mike's little corner of the world. What say you?
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Originally Posted by ForeverAutumn
Those animals! I don't know if I could live in such a place!:shocked:
Seriously, it sounds great. Hey John, the next AR get-together is in Mike's little corner of the world. What say you?
I'll get the party started. Maybe I can find some kind of town schedule for all the festivals they have. I wonder which week is the festival of wood.
Wow. I found more than I was looking for. FA, check out the film on shopping in Milford. (And yes, I have met Rosie)
http://www.milfordpa.us/id3.html
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