What do you think of gay marriage?

ltndncr59 wrote:

<quoted text>
My apologies for having a few words that I cannot, for whatever reason, manage to spell correctly, no matter how hard I try. And no, the application I use to post here doesn't have a spell check installed. At least 'exsist' LOOKS like the word it represents.'Atonomy' does not.

Actually they both do, and I had no difficulties whatsoever understanding either post.

That said, would you care to comment on the rest of the post?

There wasn't all that much I saw worth commenting on, but I can spare a couple minutes.

- "Second, homosexuality has been observed in over 1,000 species of animals, including most, if not all known species of mammals. So homosexuality is most definitely natural."

Observing something doesn't make it natural. Something being natural doesn't make it right or good. Cancer is natural - so is ebola.

- "That being said, if it is natural, and enduring, there must be a purpose for it."

Like proving a negative this is a statement that can NEVER be concluded to be the case, but it can be proven wrong with a single instance. Presbyopia and cancer are both natural and enduring, but what could their purpose be? The truth is they both represent flaws in the "natural" repair mechanisms of biological organisms. Since we know such flaws both exist and endure, how can you prove that the homosexuality you claim exists in "nature" isn't one of them?

- "Homosexuality has exsisted [sic] in every society on earth since the beginning of recorded history, and anthropological remains indicate it was present well before then."

Please tell me more about this latter claim. I want the specifics of the "anthropological remains" that show the existence of homosexuality prior to recorded history.

- "And as for your assertion that male parts don't fit within male parts, I beg to differ. My husband's and my 'parts' fit together just fine, and in a way that is very natural and pleasurable for us."

You have a very bizarre definition of "natural". That people will continue to perform actions they find pleasurable is obvious. Some people find S&M or B&D pleasurable, and to them it is merely something they do with their chosen partner. It's hardly "natural" though. Eating doughnuts is pleasurable too, but it can hardly be called natural since it will result in obesity and possibly diabetes if overdone. Choosing to do something does not make it "natural".

- "And it's none of your business, to boot."

Excuse me Mr. Falsely Indignant, but NOBODY either commented on or asked about YOUR sex life. Volunteering information and then complaining that it's "none of your business" isn't a rational act.

Will these comments on the rest of your post suffice?

Hi Dys. I'm going to assume this was addressed to my post. If it wasn't, please ignore this reply.

Dyssonance wrote:

What, exactly, is "gay sex"?

If you don't already know this, I cannot help you without getting bogged down in a semantics debate I don't have time for. Try a google search.

How would one "learn" to enjoy something like that -- specifically.
two questions.
I await your answers.

The exact same way one learns to enjoy smoking or drinking beer. Specifically:
Step 1 - See it, hear about it, consider it, dream it up, be curious about it, not necessarily all of these or in any particular order.
Step 2 - Learn something about it, try it, deal with any difficulties encountered (coughing, gagging, nausea, etc) and try it again.
Step 3 - Decide that the pros outweigh the cons and continue the behavior, in this case, smoking.

Help any?

TxTraveler wrote:

Hi Dys. I'm going to assume this was addressed to my post. If it wasn't, please ignore this reply.
<quoted text>
If you don't already know this, I cannot help you without getting bogged down in a semantics debate I don't have time for. Try a google search.
<quoted text>
The exact same way one learns to enjoy smoking or drinking beer. Specifically:
Step 1 - See it, hear about it, consider it, dream it up, be curious about it, not necessarily all of these or in any particular order.
Step 2 - Learn something about it, try it, deal with any difficulties encountered (coughing, gagging, nausea, etc) and try it again.
Step 3 - Decide that the pros outweigh the cons and continue the behavior, in this case, smoking.
Help any?

Whoa!! You have waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyy over intellectualized this. What you are forgetting about is the emotional component. I was 16 once and questioning my sexuality, hoping to God I was at least bisexual, I got a girlfriend, we did it several times, full on, the str8 version of the rather graphic description I made earlier. It just did not do it for me. The emotional component flat lined. I was 16, so if you just breathed on me, I got hard, that wasn't the issue, the issue was not feeling it emotionally. When I had my first guy, wooooohooooo! there it was, everything I had hoped for and more. So, I have to disagree, it was not a learned behavior. Believe me, I tried, I really didn't want to be exclusively gay, and get a life of BS from the heterofacist.

TxTraveler wrote:

<quoted text>
The simple truth is that at some point in your past you learned to enjoy gay sex. I never took that class, and that's the difference between us.

Again, you assume without proof. Growing up in the Midwest in the 50's and 60's I had no idea of the possibility of sex with another man. As I began to understand more, given my new knowledge that not only could I have sex with another male, but that I could love one with a fierce love that I had never experienced with a woman.

Much of my feelings, actions and fantasies going back as far as I could remember made sense, finally. I understood why I had wanted to matter to certain boys as the most important person in their lives, and them in mine, since at least age 8, and had never had similar feelings for girls.

I understood how another boy's smile could make my whole day, where if a girl friend was angry with me, it just didn't upset me or turn my world upside down in the same way.

It wasn't until I was 21, almost 22, that I began meeting gay men who were my peers. By this point I had already had sex with girls in high school. It was sort of basically OK, but emotionally not much different from masturbating with a friend. I thought of these girls as "girlfriends," and really thought that I would marry one of them one day, not knowing any better. Some of them remain friends to this day.

But the first time I had sex with another man, it was a completely different experience, that I could feel in the depths of my body and that shook my soul.

Your idea that I learned to be gay from gay experience is just so much smoke, trying to patch up your understanding of the way the world works by striving after wind.

I am not very interested in the percent that various factors played to my sexual orientation. Combination of genetics, interuterine hormones, very early experiences. I know that certainly by kindergarden my orientation was already determined.

I have been blessed to have met my husband, my Intended One and to have married him, living together for 26 years and now married according to the law of the State of California and the Law of Moses and of Israel since June 20th.

I have sworn a vow to him and before G-d to defend that marriage and to be with him in joy and sorrow, health and sickness, and whatever else life and the good Lord may bring our way, and I don't intend to stand idly by while bigots like you seek to destroy my marriage and to void our vows to each other.

TxTraveler wrote:

<quoted text>

You have a very bizarre definition of "natural". That people will continue to perform actions they find pleasurable is obvious. Some people find S&M or B&D pleasurable, and to them it is merely something they do with their chosen partner. It's hardly "natural" though. Eating doughnuts is pleasurable too, but it can hardly be called natural since it will result in obesity and possibly diabetes if overdone. Choosing to do something does not make it "natural".

You would seem to have the bizarre definition of "natural." A thing is said to be natural if it is found in nature, rather than human made. A thing can be natural whether or not it is moral and whether or not it is healthy.

Leaving aside the question of whether donuts can be considered natural, it is certainly for a dog to eat all the food that it finds, either within a human home or within the wild. The dog may eat too much and become obese, it may eat something that is toxic or eat may eat its own puppies right after giving birth to them. None of these actions are "unnatural."

There are repeated studies posted on this Board showing that homosexual coupling, even long term coupling occurs in many species. Natually. Your claim of it being unnatural becomes an exercise in nonsense.

Further, you cannot then turn arund and claim that homosexuality is immoral because it is unnatural, when we have just established that it is natural.

What you are arguing is that being actively gay does not meet your personal standards of morality. But no gay person is trying or cares about your standards of morality.

More circular reasoning and begging the question.

The Golem wrote:

<quoted text>
Again, you assume without proof. Growing up in the Midwest in the 50's and 60's I had no idea of the possibility of sex with another man. As I began to understand more, given my new knowledge that not only could I have sex with another male, but that I could love one with a fierce love that I had never experienced with a woman.
Much of my feelings, actions and fantasies going back as far as I could remember made sense, finally. I understood why I had wanted to matter to certain boys as the most important person in their lives, and them in mine, since at least age 8, and had never had similar feelings for girls.
I understood how another boy's smile could make my whole day, where if a girl friend was angry with me, it just didn't upset me or turn my world upside down in the same way.
It wasn't until I was 21, almost 22, that I began meeting gay men who were my peers. By this point I had already had sex with girls in high school. It was sort of basically OK, but emotionally not much different from masturbating with a friend. I thought of these girls as "girlfriends," and really thought that I would marry one of them one day, not knowing any better. Some of them remain friends to this day.
But the first time I had sex with another man, it was a completely different experience, that I could feel in the depths of my body and that shook my soul.
Your idea that I learned to be gay from gay experience is just so much smoke, trying to patch up your understanding of the way the world works by striving after wind.
I am not very interested in the percent that various factors played to my sexual orientation. Combination of genetics, interuterine hormones, very early experiences. I know that certainly by kindergarden my orientation was already determined.
I have been blessed to have met my husband, my Intended One and to have married him, living together for 26 years and now married according to the law of the State of California and the Law of Moses and of Israel since June 20th.
I have sworn a vow to him and before G-d to defend that marriage and to be with him in joy and sorrow, health and sickness, and whatever else life and the good Lord may bring our way, and I don't intend to stand idly by while bigots like you seek to destroy my marriage and to void our vows to each other.

Your eloquence far exceeds mine, in fact you make me feel like a ruff-neck..lol Your post was/is very moving. I too, felt like you, and was moved to my core and very soul when had my first boyfriend.

Sean D wrote:

<quoted text>
Your eloquence far exceeds mine, in fact you make me feel like a ruff-neck..lol Your post was/is very moving. I too, felt like you, and was moved to my core and very soul when had my first boyfriend.

Wow! Thanks. I hope that what I post is mainly for other Queer folk, and secondly to help our friends understand what our love means.

I don't care much what the phobes who have hardened their hearts against us think. They will have to live with their own bile.

I am scarcely the writer that Dylan Thomas was, but I think he expressed my motives in his own great poem:

In My Craft or Sullen Art

In my craft or sullen art
Exercised in the still night
When only the moon rages
And the lovers lie abed
With all their griefs in their arms,
I labour by singing light
Not for ambition or bread
Or the strut and trade of charms
On the ivory stages
But for the common wages
Of their most secret heart.

Not for the proud man apart
From the raging moon I write
On these spindrift pages
Not for the towering dead
With their nightingales and psalms
But for the lovers, their arms
Round the griefs of the ages,
Who pay no praise or wages
Nor heed my craft or art.

-- Dylan Thomas

TxTraveler wrote:

Hi Dys. I'm going to assume this was addressed to my post. If it wasn't, please ignore this reply.
<quoted text>
If you don't already know this, I cannot help you without getting bogged down in a semantics debate I don't have time for. Try a google search.
<quoted text>
The exact same way one learns to enjoy smoking or drinking beer. Specifically:
Step 1 - See it, hear about it, consider it, dream it up, be curious about it, not necessarily all of these or in any particular order.
Step 2 - Learn something about it, try it, deal with any difficulties encountered (coughing, gagging, nausea, etc) and try it again.
Step 3 - Decide that the pros outweigh the cons and continue the behavior, in this case, smoking.
Help any?

No, sexual orientation is not a learned behavior, but an instinct, and science backs up that claim. So no matter how elegant you think your responses are, your opinion does not change the facts one iota.

Besides, unless by default you are bisexual and projecting onto others, you should be able see from your own personal perspective that you are heterosexual because you find women attractive, but you do not choose what women are attractive for whatever reasons... rather, you see what you like and know you like it. It's as simple as that.

Why some think there is any use debating this I'll never know for sure. Though, it is my best guess that allowing one's self to accept that sexuality as an innate quality of self blows the doors wide open to also having to accept the unfairness of treating non-heterosexual people differently.

Josh in New Orleans wrote:

<quoted text>
No, sexual orientation is not a learned behavior, but an instinct, and science backs up that claim. So no matter how elegant you think your responses are, your opinion does not change the facts one iota.
Besides, unless by default you are bisexual and projecting onto others, you should be able see from your own personal perspective that you are heterosexual because you find women attractive, but you do not choose what women are attractive for whatever reasons... rather, you see what you like and know you like it. It's as simple as that.
Why some think there is any use debating this I'll never know for sure. Though, it is my best guess that allowing one's self to accept that sexuality as an innate quality of self blows the doors wide open to also having to accept the unfairness of treating non-heterosexual people differently.

Here! Here! That is why so many reject science. If they were to accept it, then that would make us alright. They accept the science behind eye color, yet, sexuality they can't.

Sean D wrote:

<quoted text>
Here! Here! That is why so many reject science. If they were to accept it, then that would make us alright. They accept the science behind eye color, yet, sexuality they can't.

:0) Yep, and there is even a scientific term for it: cognitive dissonance.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_disson...

The Golem wrote:

<quoted text>
Again, you assume without proof. Growing up in the Midwest in the 50's and 60's I had no idea of the possibility of sex with another man. As I began to understand more, given my new knowledge that not only could I have sex with another male, but that I could love one with a fierce love that I had never experienced with a woman.
Much of my feelings, actions and fantasies going back as far as I could remember made sense, finally. I understood why I had wanted to matter to certain boys as the most important person in their lives, and them in mine, since at least age 8, and had never had similar feelings for girls.
I understood how another boy's smile could make my whole day, where if a girl friend was angry with me, it just didn't upset me or turn my world upside down in the same way.
It wasn't until I was 21, almost 22, that I began meeting gay men who were my peers. By this point I had already had sex with girls in high school. It was sort of basically OK, but emotionally not much different from masturbating with a friend. I thought of these girls as "girlfriends," and really thought that I would marry one of them one day, not knowing any better. Some of them remain friends to this day.
But the first time I had sex with another man, it was a completely different experience, that I could feel in the depths of my body and that shook my soul.
Your idea that I learned to be gay from gay experience is just so much smoke, trying to patch up your understanding of the way the world works by striving after wind.
I am not very interested in the percent that various factors played to my sexual orientation. Combination of genetics, interuterine hormones, very early experiences. I know that certainly by kindergarden my orientation was already determined.
I have been blessed to have met my husband, my Intended One and to have married him, living together for 26 years and now married according to the law of the State of California and the Law of Moses and of Israel since June 20th.
I have sworn a vow to him and before G-d to defend that marriage and to be with him in joy and sorrow, health and sickness, and whatever else life and the good Lord may bring our way, and I don't intend to stand idly by while bigots like you seek to destroy my marriage and to void our vows to each other.

Golem, we grew up about the same time, except I remember, as a child, the late 40's. Our experiences are much the same, except I accepted and acted on my orientation at a much younger age, about 14. I have been with my spouse 31-1/2 years, and am as happy today as I was the day he told me he loved me, and I told him I loved him. We will be married this fall, and we fully expect to have a full retirement, and pass to the next world loving and caring for each other. It is so sad that people have to live their lives hating and oppressing others, when they should revel in the love and companionship of another person. That love, alone, is enough to fill our lives with happiness.

Ralph wrote:

<quoted text>
Golem, we grew up about the same time, except I remember, as a child, the late 40's. Our experiences are much the same, except I accepted and acted on my orientation at a much younger age, about 14. I have been with my spouse 31-1/2 years, and am as happy today as I was the day he told me he loved me, and I told him I loved him. We will be married this fall, and we fully expect to have a full retirement, and pass to the next world loving and caring for each other. It is so sad that people have to live their lives hating and oppressing others, when they should revel in the love and companionship of another person. That love, alone, is enough to fill our lives with happiness.

What a sweet love story! You have beat the record of many heterosexual couples that I know.

I hope that you have another 31 1/2 years together!!!!

fooper wrote:

what happened to separation of church and state? what happened to separation of catholic priests from little children? talk about sins and morals. hypocrites.

OK separation of church and state, so why is the state trying to make it legal, give special rights, and say you have to recognize their marriages. The Bible says no, but the government wants to make it yes. You can't have it both ways.

Good Ship wrote:

<quoted text> I WILL FORCE MY VIEWS ON YOU...

Thank you. I like you believe it is wrong. I don't hate them, just their actions. None of us are perfect. But I think my biggest gripe is they don't want equal rights, they demand special rights. Where does it end.

Lynn wrote:

<quoted text>
OK separation of church and state, so why is the state trying to make it legal, give special rights, and say you have to recognize their marriages. The Bible says no, but the government wants to make it yes. You can't have it both ways.

We are not asking for it both ways. The government is here for all the people and should be formed to serve all of its people. The Bible on the other hand is only for those who believe it. You are entitled to live your life by biblical rules. No one is forcing you not to. Just don't try to force the rest of us to live by it.

What special rights are you referring to? The way that I see it all that gays are asking is to be allowed to marry legally the people that they love and to receive the same benefits that other married couples receive. What is so special about that?

Same thing would hold true for equal employment and housing laws. Would you want to be denied housing or fired because your straight? When was the last time you were denied medical treatment because you are straight?

So just what are these special rights you were talking about?

Lynn wrote:

<quoted text>
Thank you. I like you believe it is wrong. I don't hate them, just their actions. None of us are perfect. But I think my biggest gripe is they don't want equal rights, they demand special rights. Where does it end.

What special rights are we demanding?

brad wrote:

<quoted text>To disenfranchise Americans on the legal definition of marriage.
To undemocratically force Americans to provide discriminatory benefits and subsidies for a lifestyle choice that most find immoral.
To penalize the employers of homosexuals by forcing them to provide expensive benefits to anyone a homosexuals decides to name as a partner or spouse.

And how is this different? You str8's already have these rights, and in fact employ them with alarming frequency.

Lynn wrote:

<quoted text>
OK separation of church and state, so why is the state trying to make it legal, give special rights, and say you have to recognize their marriages. The Bible says no, but the government wants to make it yes. You can't have it both ways.

Do you think civil marriage and religious marriage are the same? If so, please explain.

Ralph wrote:

<quoted text>
Golem, we grew up about the same time, except I remember, as a child, the late 40's. Our experiences are much the same, except I accepted and acted on my orientation at a much younger age, about 14.

My best wishes to the two of you. May you have many more anniversaries to celebrate. The only thing I'm jeaous of are the 7 years I wasted, being afraid of myself as a sexual being. You must have someintersting stories about gay life in the early days.

Lynn wrote:

<quoted text>
Thank you. I like you believe it is wrong. I don't hate them, just their actions. None of us are perfect. But I think my biggest gripe is they don't want equal rights, they demand special rights. Where does it end.

If you didn't hate us, you wouldn't be lying about us.