Marriage and gay couples don't mix.

[shokhead]

Wow,i didnt see that your such an a$$hole. $uck you and where you live. Now thats blowing right up your a$$. Enjoy.

[Resident Loser]

...such an erudite and clever response...was it USC or Cal State that can claim you as one of it's own.

BTW, a$$hole is acceptable, although I prefer @$$hole...and as for $uck you, you probably want to use the more understandable f*ck you...the other one may be considered a flirty come-on by some...

jimHJJ(...p!$$ off...)

[shokhead]

LOL alot. That was funny. We all have a right to think the way we do. I have a problem with gays being married and you dont,thats fine. Yep,i am lazy at my punctuation but because we disagree you have to bring that up? If it makes you feel better about yourself then go ahead,i can take it but why dont you answer this. 2805 running 603's with less then 10ft to each speakers,what gauge should i use. Be helpful now.

[Resident Loser]

...where in the world did you get this idea?

SH: "I have a problem with gays being married and you dont,thats fine..."

RL: If it doesn't sound too snotty...here's another clue...I have that same problem...we actually agree...

SH: "Yep,i am lazy at my punctuation but because we disagree you have to bring that up?"

RL: As stated, we don't disagree, so that's not the reason...but, let's leave well enough alone...

In answer to your question, I'd use the heaviest gauge zip that would fit into the assorted binding posts of the gear involved...IMHO heavier copper facilitates signal transfer, although others will talk about inductance and impedance and "inner details" and whatever...personally, I don't buy into the whole wiring thing...

jimHJJ(...there is some rule of thumb, but, like many other things I ignore it...)

[piece-it pete]

Smokey,

Thanks for stating the best, most lucid reason anyone has posted.

This is why public decency is so important, why Janet should keep her breasts to herself, and Howard, well, should just shut up . This has been understood for many many centuries, various cultures' misdeeds/missteps notwithstanding.

Kids DO model their parents, not a shred of doubt. And whatever they grow up in is normal. This is why the Supreme Court has always allowed various words to be censored, even today, and has not accepted the recent challenge to Floridas' ban on adoption by gay couples, allowing it to stand.

There's other secular reasons. Diluting the definition of marriage makes it meaningless, ie if it means everything it means nothing. If denying gays the benifits of marriage is immoral and wrong then denying those benifits to singles, polygamists, and yes even the animal and kid crowd is by logical extension immoral and wrong too.

If one wants to refute this here I'd sure like to hear a better reason than "that's not true" or "don't be rediculous". The extension is valid, as proven by the pro-gay "marriage" Mass. legislators who argued the very thing during their debate ("I could not in good conscience tell my neighbor he was wrong").

GF, I agree with you, however the gay lobby is forcing the issue into Federal territory by arguing that the sancticty of contract clause of the US Constitution covers this and they may be right. They are sueing the various States to FORCE them to accept marriage contracts legitimized by other States, regardless of their own State constitution. This is happening as we speak, and is serious. The only way to stop this is to amend the US Constitution. There is no other way.

I have to add to the "dead white men" thing. Not only did they create the most sucessful nation the world has ever known, what will soon be the first (and only) multiracial democracy in existence, but also died by the hundreds of thousands to right that particular wrong. If the Founders had forced abolition to be a requirement in the Constitution, the US would not be, and some of the southern colonies undoubtably would have suceeded in creating the empires (built on slavery) that they invisioned ringing the Gulf of Mexico.

Please forgive my spelling, I'm at work and NOT contributing to the GNP!!

Pete

[Sir Terrence the Terrible]

Smokey,

Thanks for stating the best, most lucid reason anyone has posted.

While not dismissing Smokes concern, I do not think his reasoning is particularly sound. There is absolutely not one body of evidence that proves that children raised by gay parents are less nutured, less protected, or less cared for. In the absense of any study, it is hard to support the notion that gay parents are not good for children.

This is why public decency is so important, why Janet should keep her breasts to herself, and Howard, well, should just shut up . This has been understood for many many centuries, various cultures' misdeeds/missteps notwithstanding.

A bare breast in and of itself is not indecent. In Europe you see breasts all the time on television, no big deal. The problem is that Americans have turned the nude body into something filty,dirty, and sexual, something Europeans find hilarious about us. Public decency based on American standards means that this kind of narrow minded thought process will continue.

Kids DO model their parents, not a shred of doubt. And whatever they grow up in is normal. This is why the Supreme Court has always allowed various words to be censored, even today, and has not accepted the recent challenge to Floridas' ban on adoption by gay couples, allowing it to stand.

Kids DO NOT model their parent sexuality, and there is plenty of evidence to support that view. The supreme court decision not to hear this case further acerbates Florida's foster care system, a system that has seen hundreds of children die, and thousands totally neglected. Florida has so many children they are unable to place, that the system is literally falling apart under its own pressure. Children are left to languish in a system that shuts out a particular group of people because of their sexuality, not because they are unqualified to raise a child. And let's face it, more than 35-40% of the children in foster care in up in the court system while in their late teens or early adulthood(PBS stats). And all this from a people that supposidly concerned about a child well being.

There's other secular reasons. Diluting the definition of marriage makes it meaningless, ie if it means everything it means nothing. If denying gays the benifits of marriage is immoral and wrong then denying those benifits to singles, polygamists, and yes even the animal and kid crowd is by logical extension immoral and wrong too.

The logic in the latter half of this response is totally rediculous. Marriage is already meaningless. Right now you can get married, and in less than 24 hours get that marriage annulled. If it were so meaningful, that would not be possible. 50% of all marriages fail within the first 3-5 years, so where is the meanfulness of this institution? Denying COMMITTED gay relationships the same benefits as committed heterosexual relationships is totally immoral, wrong, and ultimately damaging to a segment of our population, a segment that contributes as much to our society as all of you do. Single gays and straights don't get marriage benefits, they are single. Polygamists are not to be compared to COMMITTED gay COUPLES, and they shouldn't be compared to anyone that has made a committment to one person(not three). Gay COMMITTED relationships are no different than straight ones. They love their partners just like a man loves his wife. They are as devoted to their partners as a man is to his wife. They are as committed to creating a nuturing environment as a straight couple. The only difference is their names are Adam and Steve, and not Adam and Eve. Betty and Barbara, and not Betty and Bob. Any moral judgement on their lifestyle is born out of ignorance, and bias, two things that never make for a logical thought process.

If one wants to refute this here I'd sure like to hear a better reason than "that's not true" or "don't be rediculous". The extension is valid, as proven by the pro-gay "marriage" Mass. legislators who argued the very thing during their debate ("I could not in good conscience tell my neighbor he was wrong").

I do not think allowing COMMITTED gay couples to marry delutes anything. I think if anything else it gives it continueity. It would emphasize the COMMITTMENT as the standard for marriage, not the sexuality. We are so hung up on the male/female part, that the committment of the two has been lost in the fray. Marriage should be a COMMITTMENT to one another regardless of your sexuality. If this is just too much for many to handle, then give COMMITTED gay relationships a name that is recognized by the feds, and all the benefits the word marriage has. That should not be a problem if you are not biased against committed gay couples. If you do have a bias, then committed gay couples should not have to pay for your narrow minded ignorance.

GF, I agree with you, however the gay lobby is forcing the issue into Federal territory by arguing that the sancticty of contract clause of the US Constitution covers this and they may be right. They are sueing the various States to FORCE them to accept marriage contracts legitimized by other States, regardless of their own State constitution. This is happening as we speak, and is serious. The only way to stop this is to amend the US Constitution. There is no other way.

The gay lobby is forcing the issue because too many people here is this country do not want to honor what is written in its constitution. Guaranteed rights for all Americans, and the right to equality. In the current climate, equality is only extended if you are straight, and what is consider to others as the "norm". If straights can get married in California, and be recognized in Nevada, why can't committed gay couples get the same treatment?

I have to add to the "dead white men" thing. Not only did they create the most sucessful nation the world has ever known, what will soon be the first (and only) multiracial democracy in existence, but also died by the hundreds of thousands to right that particular wrong.

What good is calling this the first multiracial democracy when blacks, latino's and gays are still discrimnated against. What good is it to the black guy who goes off to war for this country, and still cannot rent an apartment in certain areas, or is subject to the corporate glass ceiling when looking for a promotion. Only a white person could glorify this kind of hypocrasy, after all they were the ones that benefited from this kind of arraingment.

If the Founders had forced abolition to be a requirement in the Constitution, the US would not be, and some of the southern colonies undoubtably would have suceeded in creating the empires (built on slavery) that they invisioned ringing the Gulf of Mexico.

So let me get this straight, it is was okay to demorilize, hang and kill black people just so the southern colonies couldn't create and empire based on more slaves? It was okay to maim, rape, and destroy the lives of a certain racial group just so this country could exist? This kind of sick thought process makes me friggin want to vomit! Pete, I cannot believe you wrote this. I guess the blacks in this country should have thank their slave masters for saving America to the detriment of their own race. What a huge sacrifice to make just so the whites in this country are more comfortable.

[Resident Loser]

...or so goes the saying...Oh yeah, kids don't pick up on things...I suppose that's why there are so many wannabe pimps, hos and gangstas? Or those who aspire to emulate those overpaid "athletes" who are pretty much of the same mindset of those earlier mentioned groups...nope not a chance, right? Or like my atheist co-worker who will not allow his kids to decide for themselves whether or not there is a god by forbiding them contact with people or books who might put contrary notions (contrary to his) into their heads?

As for your defense of the European mindset, another "oh, yeah!"...the same folks who brought us countless wars and persecution and were responsible for bringing slavery into the new world...these are the ones that you tell us laugh at out puritanical mindset? Sex...sex sells...sex is everywhere in the good old USA...even under the desk...in the Oral...whoops, sorry...Oval office(or at least adjacent to it)...You are right, a bare breast is not indecent...however there is a time and a place for everything...half-time at the Superbowel ain't neither of them! But I(and countless others) are the problem, not the ones who done the deed...I see it so clearly now!

And, at the risk of repeating...21st century mindset applied to the 18th and 19th...

Slavery existed at least in biblical times and probably prior to that...It was a world where the indifferece to lives and near slave labor conditions existed for nearly all people...Atlantic trade slave ships were manned by abductees who died in numbers as great as the slaves they helped transport...the sailors subjected to flogging and starvation, practices of the same sort in the British Navy.

It was commomplace that slaves were worked to death, particularly on the sugar plantations of the Caribbean. Between 1660 and 1807, ships brought over three times as many slaves as they did Europeans. It wasn't just British colonies that slaves were sent...they were an equal opportunity provider: Haiti, Cuba, Brazil...it was simply business as usual...filling the coffers of the Imperial economy and that of the Church of England, itself a great slaveholder in Jamaica.

Haiti may have been owned by France(one of those laughing Europeans), but Britain supplied it with slaves...who were worked to death because it was cheaper to replace them as they died, than to sustain them...the market for slaves was lucrative. It is said that Haiti produced more foreign trade than all of the thirteen colonies of North America; uprisings and insurrections could not be tolerated...not good for the bottom line. The French AND the British sent forces to Haiti...in fact the Brits sent a larger army against Haiti than it had sent to fight in the American Revolution...

The industrial revolution was fed in part by paupers children, 6-, 7-, and 8-year-olds who worked 13 hours a day through seven-year "apprenticeships"...they to died from overwork and and were simply replaced by others...not "slaves" in the strictest sense of the word but, merely indicative with the prevailing indifference to life in general...but I digress...

The role England played in sustaining slavery in the colonies is underscored by the fact that abolition became law in Vermont in 1777 and in Massachusetts in 1780...and eventually became the "peculiar institution" peculiar to the South. As a part of the compromising that eventually gave birth to the US Constitution...importation of slaves was to be prohibited as of 1808...so whatever your opinion, it only stands to reason that working-to-death became untenable...unfortunately, slaves were property(like it or not) and contributed to the good old bottom line...and not just for the slaveholders, but for the country and government as well...the North was entering the industrial revolution and most of that part of the country was unsuited for slave labor-based enterprise such as farming...none of this should be considered an excuse, merely a presentation of socio-economic facts.

Christ was crucified...as a child it scared the He!! outta' me...killed in such a horrible way...how could they do this to my Savior...later on you find out it was SOP for the Romans...nothing special...a product of it's time.

Until the ACW, those compromises held this nation together, and a part of the grand vision of Southern independence was in fact to annex Mexico, Central America and as much of South America as could be managed...and it would be a slave-based economy as Pete correctly points out...and BTW, years after British emancipation, they came quite close to intervening in our Civil War...on the side of the slave states...

As for the rest, there are many who are sick and tired of hearing the same ol' same ol'...discrimination is illegal by law, if not in practice and THAT has more to do with human nature than anything else and that can't be legislated...I can't live where I might like to, there will always be someone somewhere who has the ability to legally say no, just because of my age or religion or amount of kiddies or what I earn or my job, get used to it...Ceilings? I don't think that holds too much water...at least in what I have seen transpire...more like "reverse discrimintaion" bein' a blue-collar white boy ain't opnin' many doors for me...not PC dontcha' know ...

Additionally, squandering the inroads afforded by the civil-rights legislation doesn't really add too much credibilty to those who can't pass muster and just b!tch about it...

"...So let me get this straight, it is was okay to demorilize, hang and kill black people just so the southern colonies couldn't create and empire based on more slaves? It was okay to maim, rape, and destroy the lives of a certain racial group just so this country could exist?..."

You really should try to get all your ducks in a row...who said these things? Your POV really tends to screw things up don't it?

"...What a huge sacrifice to make just so the whites in this country are more comfortable..."

Discounting of course the 640,000 who died in what ostensibly became a war for emancipation...

And I know you don't care, don't read or care to respond...this is posted for those who might.

jimHJJ(...a bien tot...)

[ericl]

Smokey,

Thanks for stating the best, most lucid reason anyone has posted.

This is why public decency is so important, why Janet should keep her breasts to herself, and Howard, well, should just shut up . This has been understood for many many centuries, various cultures' misdeeds/missteps notwithstanding.

Kids DO model their parents, not a shred of doubt. And whatever they grow up in is normal. This is why the Supreme Court has always allowed various words to be censored, even today, and has not accepted the recent challenge to Floridas' ban on adoption by gay couples, allowing it to stand.

There's other secular reasons. Diluting the definition of marriage makes it meaningless, ie if it means everything it means nothing. If denying gays the benifits of marriage is immoral and wrong then denying those benifits to singles, polygamists, and yes even the animal and kid crowd is by logical extension immoral and wrong too.

If one wants to refute this here I'd sure like to hear a better reason than "that's not true" or "don't be rediculous". The extension is valid, as proven by the pro-gay "marriage" Mass. legislators who argued the very thing during their debate ("I could not in good conscience tell my neighbor he was wrong").

GF, I agree with you, however the gay lobby is forcing the issue into Federal territory by arguing that the sancticty of contract clause of the US Constitution covers this and they may be right. They are sueing the various States to FORCE them to accept marriage contracts legitimized by other States, regardless of their own State constitution. This is happening as we speak, and is serious. The only way to stop this is to amend the US Constitution. There is no other way.

I have to add to the "dead white men" thing. Not only did they create the most sucessful nation the world has ever known, what will soon be the first (and only) multiracial democracy in existence, but also died by the hundreds of thousands to right that particular wrong. If the Founders had forced abolition to be a requirement in the Constitution, the US would not be, and some of the southern colonies undoubtably would have suceeded in creating the empires (built on slavery) that they invisioned ringing the Gulf of Mexico.

Please forgive my spelling, I'm at work and NOT contributing to the GNP!!

Pete

Pete,

I read your original argument

First, obviously, you have the right to say what you like. I also have the right to call it BS and homophobia. Saying that an argument is based in hatred and homophobia is much different than saying that you are not entitled to your opinion. I am open to the possibility that you can be against gay marriage without being the least bit homophobic, but generally, it seems very unlikely. And let us be clear, practically speaking there is little difference between racism and homophobia. obviously homosexuals are not a race, but the discrimination and hostility they experience is the same.

Do those of you who are so set against this idea have many gay friends? ANY gay friends? not acquantances, neighbors, or former coworkers, but people to whom you are very close, like immediate family members or best friends. If you do, you must know that they did not choose their sexuality. Can you honestly say to yourself that someone would just one day decide to become an outcast, a second class citizen? Have you seen the process of someone coming out to their family and friends? Why would anyone put themselves through that? These are people we are talking about, just like you. Please, just put yourselves in those shoes for a little bit.

I brought up the interracial thing because RL's argument is the same argument segregationists were making against integration. It was different. It made them uncomfortable. "The very fabric of our society will fall apart" they said (don't forget the suthern drawl).
Should we be revisiting the segregationists arguments and policies?
Sure, there are decent people who feel this way, but it is pure hogwash, born out of fear.
The fact that racism is common throughout the world does not make it legitimate.

There is a huge population of gay couples who spend their lives committed to each other who have no hosptial visitation rights, no inheritance rights, no family rights, etc. The list goes on. They love each other and want to make lifelong commitments under the law and their god. They deserve those basic rights that hetero married couples take for granted. In the eyes of the law they are complete strangers.

Call me weak, but it is the extension of gay marriage to bestiality or child rape that is truly weak. We are talking about two consenting adults here, and a very siginificant percentage of the world population, who contribute positively to all levels of society. Equating homosexuality with child molestors or bestiality is indeed nothing more than a ridiculous and offensive cop-out which cannot be taken seriously.

gotta go to sleep.

eric

[shokhead]

Well you have the right to be gay and thats ok. I have the right to think its not ok for same sex marriage. Sorry but marriage is between a man and women. I guess we differ but thats ok to.