Thread for Things That Made You Frown Today

[diethx]

Also...that reminds me. I wanted to share here my theory about gayness, and get the opinion of others (especially gay people).

This is the way I see it... There is no morality in being either gay or straight. It is a part of who you are and how you were born. However, I am one of those that see it as a genetic defect...but no more so than a person born with Down syndrome as a crude example. Even to a lighter degree, you can look at it the same as someone born with the gene that leads to alcoholism or (in my case) a genetically passed inattentive ADHD. This is purely evident by the fact that nature intended us to procreate, and if we were all gay then we would die as a species. We would probably be properly fucked too if every single person was an alcoholic or had ADHD.

Now I don't believe that a gay person can change who they are and be straight, any more than someone with Down syndrome could make a perfect score on a LCAT. Therefore, I find it both unfair and wrong to suggest to a gay person they should abstain from sex. Maybe one day science will give us a medical way to treat/cure the disorder that causes people to be gay, but even if it did would a gay person choose it? I do fully support gay marriage and equal rights because...why not? It doesn't interfere with my own perceived 'sanctity of marriage' and I don't understand legally why they should be treated any different. On a personal level, I also believe that our God intended us to all have our own strengths, weaknesses, and character flaws in all things including genetics. It is a part of what makes us unique and, as history has many examples, many times it is the people with the most adversity that go on to make the biggest positive contributions to our world.

So that is my 2 cents. I could never say that to a gay person because the only ones I know in the real world are those at my job and my mother has two gay friends (a couple) that are pretty cool in my book. I wouldn't say that to them in case they would be offended.

...

[Paradii]

It's the old chicken and the egg paradox. Does believing in a god make you stupid or does being stupid make you more likely to believe in a god?

[Suppressed Poet]

It's the old chicken and the egg paradox. Does believing in a god make you stupid or does being stupid make you more likely to believe in a god?

Why do you ridicule people who believe in God?

I don't believe I have done anything to the contrary to provoke you. If that is your belief, cool and I respect that, but I think it is very ignorant to say a person is stupid for believing in God.

And with that /end God talk because we are talking about gays. I'd like to hear someone's thought on the matter before I venture into no Internet territory.

[Candor]

It's the old chicken and the egg paradox. Does believing in a god make you stupid or does being stupid make you more likely to believe in a god?

...or does your need to insult people who believe in God make you a worthless moron?

[Atlanteax]

I could never say that to a gay person because the only ones I know in the real world are those at my job and my mother has two gay friends (a couple) that are pretty cool in my book. I wouldn't say that to them in case they would be offended.

But that does not stop you here or elsewhere, apparently.

[diethx]

Why do you ridicule people who believe in God?

I don't believe I have done anything to the contrary to provoke you. If that is your belief, cool and I respect that, but I think it is very ignorant to say a person is stupid for believing in God.

And with that /end God talk because we are talking about gays. I'd like to hear someone's thought on the matter before I venture into no Internet territory.

This is true - you aren't stupid for believing in god. You're just fucking stupid. Maybe you were born that way. Maybe it's a mutated gene. Maybe one day we'll have treatment for the terminally fucking stupid. I can only hope you'd be willing to partake in the healing when that point comes.

[Suppressed Poet]

I'm sorry, did you say something Diethx? I thought we agreed you were too low in the caste system to have any interaction with me.

[Tisket]

no more shitting my pants on the way to work because I can no longer control my bowels

This just needed quoting.

[Paradii]

Why do you ridicule people who believe in God?

I don't believe I have done anything to the contrary to provoke you. If that is your belief, cool and I respect that, but I think it is very ignorant to say a person is stupid for believing in God.

And with that /end God talk because we are talking about gays. I'd like to hear someone's thought on the matter before I venture into no Internet territory.

When you bring your religion into your argument for why you believe something that has nothing to with religion. Your religion becomes available for scrutiny.

[Paradii]

I would just like to point out that the concept that homosexual is a maladaptive trait is only "true" when you are considering evolution at the wrong scale. At the organism level, homosexuality decreases your fitness (fitness being a amalgamation between survival and reproductive output). However evolution acts at the gene level, and there is this concept of inclusive fitness, in which if your relatives (close or distance) successfully reproduce, your shared genetic material is passed on, thereby you get an "inclusive" benefit for your kin reproducing. So, where does homosexuality come in here. Well off the top of my head, I can come up with some hypotheses where homosexuality would improve the fitness of a family group. In the dawn of humanity, in the hunter-gather period and before, matings were most likely not monogamous, the most dominant males most likely procured the majority of the matings, and kept harems of females and children under his protection. In this situation, the presence of homosexual males related to this dominant male would improve his fitness, while providing an inclusive benefit to the homosexual male. The homosexual male would provide both a source of food collection and protection of the clan while not proving conflict for mating with the dominant male.

Also, homosexuality is not a human-centric behavior, it has been repeatedly found throughout higher order organisms, and in all primates if I am not mistaken. We can argue that humans have been able to release themselves from most evolutionary pressures, allowing for maladaptive traits to not be removed from the general populace, but other organisms are still heavily influenced by the pressures of evolution. So the argument that homosexuality is maladaptive, and yet continues to exist in other species that are still undergoing selection, is not highly likely.

However, when you bring a mystical deity into the argument that hates gays, its a lot easier to say gays suck.