If I believed X was a ‘sinner’ would I be able to discriminate against that person?
This whole thing is starting to sound more like the ridiculous so called ‘Christian’ argument in the USA where people discriminate against gays because their God told them to.
This is the 21 century and this nonsense must stop.
I wonder about the other two cases. There is nothing in the bible that says you HAVE to wear a cross, so what is this about, so why are they demanding that right on religious grounds. In fact being brought up as a Roman Catholic I have a couple of jewellery crosses. I won’t wear them because as far as I’m concerned the cross is a false idol, and you should not worship false idols!
In both cases of crosses they have the right to wear a cross. The nurse could not wear it round her neck as it could be grabbed by a patient but could wear it as a broach. Not good enough for her. The BA woman was told by BA she could wear it and was offered £8,500 compensation. The tribunal found no discrimination though and that is what she is appealing. The CLC have wound both up.
In nursing I can tell you that jewellery is strongly frowned upon. It is simply a matter of protection. Angry or confused patients can grab the, have done in the past and can cause significant injury.
You’re not really supposed to even wear a wedding ring.
A wedding ring could not easily cause harm. That is health and safety gone mad. And why is there no argument for people beiong allowed to wear a cross at their own (slight) risk, especially if it may bring benefits in opening conversations?
In certain clinical areas I would accept the argument re infection control, but in some clinical areas either there are already so many uncontrollable risks this negligable one (ie wedding bands) is of little if any significance or infection control is barely relevant due to the issues at hand
Hahaha The God Question… No-one has found any evidence for a god, but Shell knows its existence, which out of thousands that have been believed in, is the real one, and also claims to be so in tune with that god’s mind, he knows god’s plan for everyone else. Typical christian humility.
Charles Darwin’s explanation for why we are here can also apply to the evolution of the universe. A ‘designer’ of the cosmos would have to be intelligent, complex and highly improbable. Evolution – which SHell doesn’t believe in of course – tells us that such things appear late in the life of the universe, not at the beginning. Shell just pushes the problem one stage back. If a god is outside time, then why take ’6 days and 6 nights’ anyway? Begs the question…. Science has moverd on – anti-matter offers interesting avenues of exploration too. Shell logic: ‘we don’t know for sure, therefore god did it’.
Adrian, I advise you to go back through your comment and enumerate the different times when you have put words into my mouth which you cannot document.
I share with you a strong scepticism towards those who take the easy way out by saying ‘We can’t explain X therefore God did it’ without arguing this either logically or scientifically – or even giving a picture of what ‘God did it’ might mean to someone who was there to observe. It is at present the case that the idea of everything (ie a universe of more stars than grains of sand) having originally been squeezed into a space smaller than a full-stop is unsatisfactory for 2 reasons: (1) it is more improbable than any fairy tale; (2) it does not even explain the existence of what constituted that full-stop. In addition (3) scientists know how inadequate it is and therefore postulate without evidence that the universe ‘has always been there’ or that there are multiple universes – which just increases the problem – and without evidence.
Look at it think way, you may make assumptions about harm but why do you think the male G-Spot is where is it?
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I’ve not heard of any harm because of anal sex it’s a typical Christian response because they just keep wanting to make issue all the time. They can’t think about anything else but sex then project that it’s us that are pervs.
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Thank Gaga, Gay men, Lesbians just get on with our lives rather than poke our noses in to everyone elses.
Are you being purposely obtuse? Rings don’t feature in hospitals because of the ban so how can you expect to find evidence of injuries they caused??
If you care enough, why don’t YOU contact the BMA or similar for information about the reasons the ban was introduced and when? Remember to ask them for a number of research studies though because I’m sure you won’t accept a simple common-sense answer or pictorial evidence of individual injuries or infections.
QED? :D You might have a PhD but you’re making yourself look very stupid! This isn’t a thread about hospital rules. If you’re so concerned at proving me wrong YOU look up the evidence.
There are plenty of examples of injuries from jewellery over the years and, in recent times, infections such as MRSA. YOU look them up if you care so much. Or maybe offer your vast expertise to the RCN and the BMA. I’m sure they’d be very grateful.
Much as I love a pedant, you’re just being rather annoying – I said jewellery because otherwise you’d have said “Ah, but what about necklaces?” or something similar but mainly because it’s not only rings that are banned, but other jewellery.
Now:
Rings can harbour infection; they can pierce latex gloves thus increasing the risk of infection to both nurse and patient; rings, particularly those which are raised in any way, can cause injuries when lifting a patient; nurses need to scrub their hands/use disinfectant and that can damage rings or the finger the ring is on if one’s in a hurry; nurses have to do intimate examinations where a ring could cause discomfort or injury to the patient etc etc.
All of that came from a nurse. No doubt I’ve missed bits out of what she said or misremembered details, but the basic points remain. If you want actual figures for ring injuries or infections traced to rings, you’ll have to contact the RCN or similar.
Of course this can happen – the question I asked is how often it actually does happen. This ban has not always been in place, so figures/evidence would be available from the period beforehand. You are speaking as though you already know it caused significant risk. Without being in possession of stats, it’s clear that you can know no such thing.
Re: God question: the physical world cannot be explained *by* the physical world, since that would be circular. Causation cannot be explained by further causation. That would also be circular. And so on. Therefore people posit that there must be something of a different nature that is able (unlike anything in the present physical world) to be self-existent and/or creative. This is not something anyone is very expert in – it is a great mystery – but it looks like a logical necessity unless we are missing something. We are in a universe with more stars than grains of sand. ‘It just happened’ is meaningless. ‘It has always been there’ begs the question. Jesus’s testimony to God (and that of many particularly wise people) is also significant.
Dr CS, I don’t see the relevance of the degree of risk – ie how often it might happen. Surely if there is ANY risk, then it’s better to be safe than sorry – both out of consideration for the patient, and, sadly, also to avoid legal claims along the lines of ‘that could have been avoided if you didn’t wear that ring’?
Rules vary, as I understand it, depending on where the nurse works. Some hospitals allow one plain band with no stones so, for example, most wedding rings would be OK, others ban all rings.
My relative (the nurse I referred to above) also pointed out – and I’m trying to phrase this delicately – that she would prefer not to expose her precious rings (precious in a sentimental way) to the unavoidable ‘dirt’ in hospital.
Re: God. Yes, there’s a lot we still don’t know about the physical world, but I think the answers are more likely to be provided by science than God. As our knowledge grows, we learn more and more and can explain things that previously were complete mysteries.
I understand what you’re saying about there needing to be something different outside of the physical world to initiate it (I explained that clumsily – sorry) but I don’t see why that couldn’t be another different process rather than a creator.
You talk about going round in circles, but I don’t necessarily see that as a ‘wrong answer’. Some things are circular and some of the theories I’ve read talk about a returning universe, a cycle of universe birth and death and re-birth. Now I know you’ll ask what initiated that cycle and that’s a fair question, but I was taught that god had just always been there, so why can we not posit that some physical process or processes have always been there?
“people posit that there must be something of a different nature that is able (unlike anything in the present physical world) to be self-existent and/or creative.”
Can you be more specific and tell us which “people” posit this speculation? The same concept is found in primitive societies of the Amazon or the Andaman Islands of India.
Here are a few examples of studies which show some, no or significant risk in wearing of rings in a clinical setting
Clearly there is a potential risk, and in some scenarios that risk should be eliminated. But as I said in another post – not all clinical scenarios will justify this
You say that if there is any risk one should not so domsthing. Everything you have done this morning contained some element of possible though unlikely risk. Even staying in bed has its own risks. So the question is whether the risks are sufficient to warrant banning it. This can only be determined statistically. If statistics indicate a substantial risk I am in favour of a ban on rings. But I have never seen such stats.
There are some environments where because of the disparity between stats – some supporting the argument there is a significant risk of wearing rings, others saying this is unsubstantiated – that given the wider situation, its right that rings are permitted. However, some such as neo natal critical care (to give one example) where I think it would be immoral to take any risk whether hypothetical or proven.
If we asked these people “is it OK for me to discriminate against someone because of the colour of their skin?” they would be horrified and say no. And yet these “christians” are asking for exactly the same thing – My homosexuality is an innate characteristic, as much a part of me as the colour of my eyes or my skin. Refusing goods/services because of innate characteristics is fundamentally seen as wrong. Religion IS a choice. Choices cannot trump fundamental rights. The argument is that damned simple.
I agree, Valksy, but not all protected groups raise the same response.
For instance, it is contrary to the Equality Act to discriminate against someone on the grounds of age. If a person in a shop refused to serve a teenager then I doubt such a refusal would raise such a high level of moral outrage.
Similarly, it is contrary to discriminate against someone on the grounds of marriage. Yet if an employer refused to allow a single person to take holidays on certain dates or refused to promote a married man because of his family commitments, we would consider it wrong but it might not attract the same level of moral outrage.
Yet again, it would be contrary to the act to discriminate against someone because they were an environmentalist or if they believed that climate change was nonsense (on the protected grounds of belief). If, however, an employer chose not to hire a climate-change denier, that might not generate such a level of moral outrage.
There is much outrage at discrimination against gay persons with many people saying that Christians must be forced to follow the law and that breaking the law, of itself, is unacceptable. However, it would appear that it is not the breaching of the law which causes the outrage but the underlying conduct, regardless as to whether or not it is prohibited.
I agree mostly. But for some, being Christian isn’t a choice. It’s something they’re born into, brought up around and celebrate.
That doesn’t make all Christians hateful of gay men and women.
My colleague is a black Christian, Jamaican descent. Goes to church and is heavily involved with her faith. She is one of the most accepting, open minded and warm people I’ve ever met.
She acknowledges that there are many who find the whole gay thing hard to fathom but she is a firm believer is making a judgement on how the person IS..rather than what they’re into.
On one hand we accuse the religious of bigotry and yet on the other we don’t give the vast majority of christian men and women out there a chance for them to support us. We just assume wrongly that they’re all spiteful.
Yes, I know that it’s an odd belief. I’m not a christian. But if something gives someone a little faith or hope – who are we to stop them having that.
@Mendirin….
……”we don’t give the vast majority of christian men and women out there a chance for them to support us. We just assume wrongly that they’re all spiteful”.If that is the case why don’t they as that vast majority speak up and be heard. Yet they all frequent churches and such wher bigotry is preached every week and to be frank i find it hard to believe that they are supportive. Why would anyone want to be a member of an organisation that is at odds with their own beliefs, ie; that discrimination is wrong. Some of these xtians wantt us dead for fcuk sake. How many Jews were members of the Naz! party i wonder?……. because that is what this “vast majority” compare to.
It is a difficult issue we have sparred on many times, and although we are clearly in agreement on some aspects of the complex argument there are some strands where we profoundly disagree.
I wholeheartedly agree that it would be beneficial both to the LGBT communities and to those of whichever faith who are LGBT accepting to be more vocal – although some are, but the media is not interested when there is a lack of conflict (to be fair), that said – that should not prevent them trying harder to be more vocal.
I find the whole frantic anti-faith venom from some on PN (and elsewhere) to be comparable to other ideological scenarios. There is almost a simplistic approach from both sides – those who are anti-gay and of faith sometimes fail to see humanity in gay people, and some LGBT people who are virulently anti faith allow their ideology to cloud the fact that there are strands of belief that do not fit their narrow definition of Christian etc.
continued
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If you empathized with an Israeli (bear with me for a second) whose daughter had been murdered by a suicide bomber on a bus in Bethlehem, they would acknowledge the human despair, hurt, loss and suffering that you identified with. Equally, if you empathized with a Gazan whose son had been in a cafe that was struck by an Israeli rocket attack and died as a result of the injuries they incurred then they would also feel the loss, hurt and suffering in a similar way to the Israeli family. However, ask a Palestinian to understand the hurt of the Israeli family or vice versa and it is likely (from various reputable academic sources who have tried to address the juxtapositions) they would fail to understand or comprehend the others sorrow.
I feel some of the antagonism of faith vs LGBT has similarities and sometimes a lack of ability to understand others views and situations.
You can subscribe to the excellent and informative free weekly newsletter from the NSS by clicking on this link to their homepage: http://www.secularism.org.uk/
Lol @ refusing to serve someone because they are gay
Yes, because it specifically says in the bible, “ye shall not sell mars bars to the unclean”
There was a case a while back about a Christian couple who ran a private b&b from their own private residence refusing to let a gay couple stay. This, i can respect, given that it’s their home. But for a general premises such as a shop, it’s bang out of order (not sure what the cases here are, they may not be shops) I’d just take what I wanted and leave. Their loss.
As long as the Christian couple were charging for accommodation, had to abide by fire regulations, have planning permission and pay business rates and taxes (which they did) then their B&B was a business like any other. Besides, in accordance with regulations as applied to such premises, their private accommodation was separate.
Actually it isn’t their home. As soon as it becomes a B&B it becomes a place of business and therefore is covered by all of the same rules and regulations as any other business. The fact that they also live in their business premises does not preclude them from following all laws be they to do with discrimination, employment or health and safety.
Bobbleobble knows perfectly well that it is also their home. The privileging of business over family is precisely what is wrong with this country. Family is of course more important than money.
@bobbleobble…
…..actually it is also their home …living over the shop so to speak. I used to run a B&B and it was my home as well as a business and it was inspected every year to enable licencing.
I agree it is their home. I agree they should be entitled to choose who to accept into both their home and their business – eg there is no dispute that people who are abusive or hygenically offensive etc etc can be refused admission to a leisure centre, hotel, cafe etc etc.
However, they can not discriminate with regards business on clearly prejudiced issues eg refusing to accommodate someone because they are Muslim, bisexual, disabled etc
These restrictions clearly do not apply to their own private residential area which they will have, nor at times they choose to close their business
You see the difference yet between wicked hatemongers and peaceful people who simple care about people like they are suppose to. there is a teacher in london starting charites for the lgbt families victums unit those families harmed emotionally and otherwise children bullied and traumatized, do you see the charity and kind heart moved to empathy and care and concern for others verses, the monsters who lie aabout being christians who abuse and harrass people and start trouble and kaos every where they go , bothering peopkles families and children, what more do you need to no about who is the evil person , the liars who are abusing our society, and calling themselves christian, or real people who do not go around calling themselves christian , and helping fight for humanity , and showing kindness , and charity, these people are the real christians, do you idiots get this, its not the one lying about being a christians and doing evil hateful evils to others, its the real good samaritans
Ahh. You seem like a really nice person. Jesus would be proud of you. But Carrie, don’t go to any high school proms feeling angry. It’ll be a blood bath. And just a small question. You seem to think that christians are very good people. How do you explain the christians like the pope or george bush or the far right christians in USA or the christians who want to change the law so they can discriminate against us etc. etc.
I didn’t read Carrie’s comment like that. I thought she was saying that behaving in a hateful manner wasn’t exactly christian and those who do so should look to other Christians who behave in a better way.
None of that means she’s a Christian (although she may be).
If Christians were true Christians they would follow the WHOLE of the Bibles teachings not select chapters and verses… And we all know that is totally impossible for them to do!
That is not right. The bible is not to be taken literally and some parts of it are of more relevance than others. What you have said is actively deprecated in theological study.
First, I don’t insist that any of it should be taken literally and neither do any modern serious theological academics. Second, I cannot see the logic that if some part of it were to be taken literally then it had to follow that all of it should.
It seems to me as if you are the one trying to crucify yourself upon a cross of gold. I prefer to update the meaning of texts in line with modernity and modern understanding.
If one accepts that the bible was written by men, then one can point to those points which are more relevant or to those stories which can be updated. The same is true of any form of literature or poetry. Rarely is something “all or nothing” – everything in life comes in shades of grey and biblical interpretation is no exception. For myself, I welcome compromise and discussion over dogmatism in all areas.
De Villiers – you are saying that ‘modern serious theological academies’ do not insist that *’any’* of the Bible be taken literally. Any???? If anyone were at academy level they would never make such an utterly sweeping statement. How all or nothing can you get? Does that mean that *every* single literal claim (Jesus was born, Jesus was crucified, Pontius Pilate was gov or Judea, Paul visited Ephesus) could be false? Can’t you be a bit more nuanced? Because (despite what you say about modern academies) modern academies sure would be.
Jonpol and Jockstrap-
You perfectly illustrate the adage that the bigger the generalisation (especially about a vast topic) the less intelligent the person. One would never guess from your words that what people call ‘the Bible’ is in fact a collection of 66 (for Catholics 73) different books by different authors in many different genres. Try generalising about that!
“Jonpol and Jockstrap-
You perfectly illustrate the adage that the bigger the generalisation (especially about a vast topic) the less intelligent the person.”
Where exactly would I find this adage?
Is there an adage to illustrate a person like you who resorts to insults in a casual exchange of ideas, or haven’t you noticed that no-one here is taking you seriously?
Of course not! The Bible is a library not a book. It is a multi-author library at that. And it is written in many genres of literature (metaphorical not among them, with the lovely exception of the Song of Songs). So why generalise in an all or nothing way? I thought only fundies did that.
Having repeatedly asked you to comment on the topic of this thread; having successfully resisted being drawn into the quagmire of your irrational attempts to besmirch a normal sexual orientation, a sexual orientation described as normal by all the major psychological and psychiatric associations in the entire world, a world which has evolved considerably since it was thought to be flat, covered by a heavenly bubble and sitting on the flames of hell, a hell where confusion such as the workings of your twisted mind torments the damned souls while the stench of burning sulfur fills the air, and having recieved absolutely no sign of feedback from you, I can assure that you if you blow your phd out your ear, the little wheels in your brains may start to work again and in no time you will have achieved the greatest of human achievements, i.e. thinking for oneself.
To redeem yourself and NARTH, act now, my boy, and comment on the issue at hand.
I have commented on it already. On any topic at any time, all those who have something new to add are always welcome to advise, and must remain so. The more different bodies advise, the fuller and more accurate one’s picture will be. The fewer, the more biased it will be.
What is the relevance of something being ‘normal’. The selfishness and greed shown in the recent riots is also a very ‘normal’ human tendency indeed. You are correct in referring psychiatrists and psychologists here, as they are precisely the profession who thinks that the one-dimensional approach of asking ‘is X normal?’ is all that is required. They fundamentalistically ignore the question ‘is it beneficial or harmful?’.
In fact, much of the research done by mental health professionals is dedicated to those who have suffered by the Church in the past and to those who will rise to lead it into a new era of greatness.
Moreover, medical experts, many of whom have been educated to the strictest interpretation of the faith, have been forced to recognize that magisterial pronouncements from religious authorities do not solve dilemmas of conscience, and do not absolve the right and the duty of acting according to the dictates of one’s individual conscience.
For example, what would you do if your wife were carrying a fetus with no brain and you were forbidden by church authorities to have it aborted?
Further still, I can name at least 11 medical associations in the USA and the UK who are deeply disturbed to see the results of years of research, including statistics, being intentionally misconstrued by NARTH in order to demonize a minority group such as the LGBT community.
Jock S Trap – you can’t *still* be so unintelligent as to believe that all opposition to homosexuality is ‘phobia’. Even an 8-year-old could think of other possible reasons for opposition.
Yike I hope you are not numbered among the tolerance brigade. There is only one intelligent position to take on tolerance. Only beneficial things should be fostered/encouraged. Only harmless things should be tolerated. Only harmful things should not be tolerated.
If tolerance is a principle for life, that means that *everything* should be tolerated. Even you don’t believe that. So how come you are using ‘tolerance’ without qualifying it thus: ‘tolerance of X’. Most tolerance-advocates want their own peccadilloes to be tolerated and are fed up with truth-telling people reminding them that their behaviour may in certain areas not be tolerable.
“Only beneficial things should be fostered/encouraged. Only harmless things should be tolerated”
Ok, but I suspect you’re including homosexuality in your list of ‘harmful things’ and THAT is what I disagree with. My being gay doesn’t harm anyone else nor does it harm me. If I were to choose to have unsafe sex, yes, that could be harmful, but the harm there is caused by the unsafe sex not by my being a lesbian.
We can ALL lead healthy lives if we take care – and by healthy I include all the many ways of protecting one’s health. Also, we are ALL entitled to a loving relationship with the person we care about and I can’t see why you, I’m assuming, would seek to limit my right to do so.
If I’ve assumed wrongly there, I’d be delighted, but I truly think you have something against gay people in particular.
homophobia has a number of definitions to be simplistic and restrict oneself to one of those definitions ie that regarding fear of homosexuality is at best simplistic and at worst, falls into the trap you have identified elsewhere of being, a generalisation that is so broad it lacks intelligence.
Homophobia can also be an aversion and not necessarily a fear – some of your comments do appear to be an aversion and thus accurately portrayed as homophobic
I agree with you now, it was just my immediate impression having read a few replies on here – I think Dr CS is more articulate and intelligent than Pepa but equally dangerous and wrong
Hi Iris
How do you get to the position that a given lifestyle (e.g., homoesexuality) must be regarded as healthy or potentially healthy without further discussion. That requires investigation and evidence before such a ‘conclusion’ is reached. Many are not anxious to access the results of such investigation because of the possible ramifications for their lifestyle.
For example, what are 2 gay men supposed to do together that is not medically unhealthy? Anal intercourse, rimming and fisting are grossly dangerous. Have you ever investigated how thin the lining of the rectum is especially in younger people? Oral ‘intercourse’ becomes risky where above 1 or 2 partners are involved, a ridiculously low number by the standards of the gay world.
Stu
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I have pondered on that one too. Chris Shell – pepa. I think it is, personally.
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He didn’t get anywhere before and this is a new tact that equally isn’t getting him anywhere.
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Shame he doesn’t have a clue on debating.
You really are over obessed with Gay sex ain’t you Chris’ Shell.
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I mean there is nothing wrong with anal sex, I don’t hear you condemning women who do it, just two men. Same with rimming.
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As for fisting, my God man what are you on. Not only is that a small proportion of Gay men but again I don’t hear you saying the same about women who do it, again a small proportion.
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You seem to pick up on a awful lot of ‘Gay’ sex which makes you Very obsession and appear closeted.
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It seems you trying to only attempt to pick what you consider to be the worst of a particular group of people.
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I gather you are also Keith on the other thread to sees all with disgust too.
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Get your head out of the sewer, Mr. Your just making yourself look like one sick pervert coz all you see is sex.
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We are people you know.
All you are doing is taking a group of people you clearly disagree with and clearly know nothing about and make assumption and generalisation about us.
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Kinda makes you the sick twisted one don’tcha think?
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Can’t see if your Gay why how people have sex is a) really any of your concern, we don’t do it and b) why you need to be so obsessed.
Dr CS, firstly being gay is not a lifestyle. If you’re merely talking about sex, then say so. My point is that anyone who lives an unsafe life is at more risk – whether that operson be straight/gay/old/white/Asian etc etc. The risk is created by the unsafe actions of the person. A gay person who leads a healthy life is less at risk than a straight person who leads an unhealthy one.
Regarding anal sex – clearly you have a far greater interest in this than me. I don’t mean to be rude but what on earth are you thinking/reading about gay sex so much? I thought your interest was religion.
You had earlier mentioned that gay men had fewer options regarding sex – that’s just wrong. Gay men and women have exactly the same ‘equipment’ as straight men and women, and don’t have access to any further choice of sexual acts. We’re all the same! We can all choose from a selection of sexual acts.
As for your insinuation about gay men and oral sex – seriously, what kind of stuff do you READ online?
Good one, and excellent presentation rebuttals all the way.
If you’ll forgive a momentary divergence from this topic, I am simply attempting to focus this interesting discussion on civil rights, which I believe was the original issue of this article:
August 12, 2009 – On this date, in a reminder that elections do matter, President BARACK OBAMA posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Gay Civil Rights pioneer HARVEY MILK. Also honored at these ceremonies was the tennis legend BILLIE JEAN KING.
Indeed, me being Gay should just mean that I am attracted to men yet Chris’ Shell immediately becomes obsessed with it being about sex.
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Clearly because he cannot think about anything else.
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Then he has the cheek to try and make out we’re the ones who are unhealthy.
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Deluded much?
Thanks for that, Jonpol. I’m a particular fan of Harvey Milk. And no problem – you weren’t interrupting. Dr CS’s gay sex obsession was creeping me out a bit anyway. I thought we were going down the route beloved of our dear friend, Mr DS.
eh,eh… you know very well the DS had crossed my mind, didn’t you .. :-)
I believe this thread will be stopped by PN when it hits 600 comments, so here is one thing I would like to add:
“The debate about sexuality within the churches has often been mean and vituperative. Much more attention needs to be paid to those like Bishop Christopher Senjonyo, who articulate a strong Christian case for compassion and justice towards the persecuted LGBT minority in Africa, both inside and outside the churches,” commented Simon Barrow, co-director of the religion and society think-tank Ekklesia. (from ukgaynews.com)
As for Dr CS here, I’m guessing he is every bit as peculiar to the mainstream churches as he is to us.
Also, if there is any truth to his claim that he is a Cambridge graduate, then one of these days Cambridge will catch up to his twisted hate mongering and deliberate antagonism of a legitimate minority group and nullify his degree, bless his sole.
Uh oh, –freind–Listen this what i am telling you , you must stop people from using the word christian and god and all the names, in bible false prohets, or just mega church men and women who have gotton rich off of brainwashing poor people and trying to tell them to do what they do and not do what they dont want them to do , to dislike the people they dont like and to like the other bad people who are like them, bush is evil and so is the other men and women like bachman that use that name, that send hate attacks after other famiies, bush having affairs with condolizza rice, and staying drunk in all the papers, do you really think his is a real christian, he also hund out with the colored negro false pastor that rapped all of those under age boys , he just settle the lawsuit for it, this was bushes running buddy, they are all linked to other evil people and the skeletons and skulls to that his club, look it up , its the klu klux klan, i did, he isnt the only senators name in that
“Yeah, but… no but, like I was sayin’…” I think Carrie could do with using a few more full stops in her posts and a few less random tangents!
But I’ve been known to write a fair few running sentances myself, so I don’t want to judge ;)
I fvcking love carries’ posts. especially when read in vicky pollard style. thanks for that top tip pavlos. genius. But carrie calling someone a colored negro is a bit weird.
Good news…so the only people causing confusion amongst everyone. employees and employers are the EHRC? So much for their so called intention of saving costs and aggro into an already settled issue..
So glad to see the Christian Inst are peeved with Angela Mason, sure would like to have a statement from the EHRC confirming what she said…
That’s reassuring news. I’m hopeful that the NSS bring some considered thought to the affair. But I still find it distasteful that this is even being discussed when it refers to christians asking for the right to discriminate. What next? Christians asking for their prejudice against black people to be allowed by the state? After all, some Christians have used the Bible to justify racist attitudes in the past.
Iris, do you have any references to back the statement ‘some Christians have used the Bible to justify racist attitudes in the past’? If so, please post here?
If proven by documented evidence, the above could be a very poweful statement to support equality.
Personally, equality is always & only achieved in the absence of harm: wearing crosses causes no harm and should be permitted; whereas, professionals in public roles should never be allowed to harm others by refusing to serve or engage with others, in the disguise of religous bigotry. This theory can be strongly applied to women who, even in this day, are refused contraceptive treatments in the name of religious objection… shocking! The NHS is a public service: funded by ALL tax payers (regardless of background) & open to everyone (regardless of background)…
As a healthcare professional, I see a discrete yet shocking level of religious bigotry against contraceptives. This must stop.
Actually, john c, Iris is right. Sadly, folk down the ages have used the Bible to justify all sorts of erroneous notions, including the superiority of the white race.
I don’t get your contraceptive point though. Please can you elaborate? This has widespread ramifications e.g. prescribing to minors without parental consent or ignoring the case for abstinence and abortion e.g. in the case of the morning after pill. I am not sure of the RC teaching these days?There clearly is a debate to be had – but we may be going off topic!?
In the United States religious institutions (at least those for white people) played a significant role in racial oppression up to very recent times. Those groups and individuals clinging to racial bigotry still can be heard citing “Christian” beliefs to back up their prejudices.
This citation (http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_slav.htm) links to a discussion regarding Christianity and slavery rather than more modern aspects of racism, like miscegenation laws [you can find a discussion of Loving v. Virginia here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loving_v._Virginia) that includes references to religious groups beginning to oppose these views but not to the role that other groups played in supporting these discriminatory viewpoints].
This does not of course mean that all religious groups or religious people are racists, homophobes, trans phobes, or just plain bad. For whatever reason, perhaps because Christianity also played a very positive role in the Black Civil Rights Movement in the US, most white religious people (attending historically racist institutions) seemed to be willing to let that part of their churches teaching slink away as quietly as possible as time went on.
Iris: I know how strongly you feel against racial discrimination and of course it is wrong and in my view no right thinking Christian should hold such views and certainly not be allowed to exercise these in the workplace or in public office. However, many Christians do feel sex between members of the same sex is wrong in a way that being black isn’t, based on their beliefs and while not wanting to be discriminatory, do wish to be able to act according to their conscience. For example, how can a Christian counsel a gay couple in how to improve their sex life when they dont believe that couple should have a sex life in the first place?
Hi JohnB. Thanks for answering re the ‘biblical racism’ above. Firstly, let me stress I am not implying that all Christians are/were racists or homophobic.
But to answer your points, Christians NOW may feel that being black isn’t ‘wrong in the same way being gay is’, BUT in the past some of those same people could indeed have felt is was just as wrong.
I don’t want to repeat racist rubbish here, but I’m sure you know what I’m talking about. That is progress, in the same way that an improving attitude to women is progress. I hope that Christians will soon progress towards an understanding that LGBT people aren’t ‘bad’ anymore than straight people are – no better, no worse.
I would think that counselling people about their sex lives was a poor career choice for a Christian. How many people are virgins when they marry now, for example? How many people re-marry after divorce (ie commit adultery according to the Bible)?……..
(continued)….Would a Christian counsellor question straight people about their marital state and what precisely they do in bed?
Briefly, I don’t feel it’s up to ANY counsellor to judge someone else’s sex life. Firstly, it’s very weird and slightly creepy; secondly, it’s none of their business. Unless the person is seeking RELIGIOUS counselling re their sex life, I don’t see what place religious comments have in secular counselling.
I don’t foist my agnosticism on the pupils in my class because it’s my job not to, and I don’t expect other employees to foist their beliefs on me when they should just be doing their job.
If the hypothetical Christian is themselves gay and chooses not to have sex, that’s up to them, but it’s NOT up to them to interfere in other people’s lawful love lives – particularly when it only seems to be one group of people they’re discriminating against.
We will never know if the same people who felt, in the past, black was bad would now say gay is not ok. I have learnt that we are all victims of our own prejudices and are limited by our own narrow world view, knowledge and experience. Even so, I would like to think that a Christian who sincerely wants to follow their Lord will act in accordance with principles such as truth, meekness and righteousness. For me, that is my main guiding principle.
I absolutely endorse the idea that LBGT are no better and no worse (taken as a whole) than straight folk. In fact the Bible declares we are ALL sinners and we all need to repent. Sadly LBGT folk are often soft targets since their so called sin is always there. But what about hetero sin, lack of compassion, ignoring the plight of the poor, pride, unkindness and we can go on? Christians certainly need to me consistent on these matters.
@JohnB…
….not that i want to defend racist xtians, but when you and others say it was thought by xtians in the past that Black was wrong that is not quite correct. They thought black people werent human and as such unfit for the “word of god” Indeed they actively forbede black people from learning to read so they couldn’t read the bible, probably the most evil and fraudulant books ever written by man.
No doubt Paddywurds there have been Christians in the past that regarded black people as less than human but I doubt there were many.
As for black people being unfit for the word of God, that is ludicrous. The impact of western missionaries on black majority populations have been tremendous. Not only did they teach the word but they showed practical compassion also.
As for the merits of the Bible, given its author was ultimately Almighty God, who is good, you can draw your own conclusions what I think.
(continued) I have no doubt that in your teaching etc. you respect all points of views and not impose your own. I try to do likewise in my own work. Yet when I have the chance to preach, I do so as that is what Christians are meant to do, but always in the appropriate setting. I do feel privileged having folk from all religious persuasions and none and of all sexual preferences as friends.
I chose the counsellor example as I see the argument against b&b owners not letting rooms to gay couples or registrars not conducting same sex civil unions etc. I understand counsellors are not meant to be judgemental etc. If I were a counsellor, I would feel uncomfortable acquiescing to a cause of action that is wrong. That was the dilemma of the Relate counsellor who was sacked. In a pluralistic society that gay couple should be served but equally peoples’ consciences should be respected. Allocating the case to a counsellor who could serve this couple seems to me to be a reasonable solution.
But I understood that the counsellor in question had no problem counselling other ‘sinners’ – eg the unmarried, the divorced, etc. If he could manage to do that, then why not gay people?
To me, that comes across as personal bigotry – ie he cites his religion as the reason he wishes to discriminate against gay people yet his religion is nowhere in evidence when he counsels other people who, according to his professed beliefs, are just as much sinners.
That’s illogical, hypocritical and mean-spirited, in my opinion.
JohnB, I also don’t understand why you aren’t as worried as I am about the slippery slope of accommodating beliefs. We both have reason to fear racism in our personal lifes.
Racism might be frowned on but there are still many racists around (religious and non-religious, of course). Can you not see that allowing a Christian to refuse to serve a gay person ‘because of their beliefs’ would mean that anyone with racist beliefs could refuse to serve a black person and would need to have their beliefs accommodated.
I think you’re a reasonable person, but there are many less reasonable, less kind, and more prejudiced in our society and we should always bear in mind that just because we wouldn’t wish to do something it doesn’t mean that others wouldn’t either.
I’m trying to avoid personal references here, but think what that would mean for both you and me. What a horrible situation that would be. Somebody refused service because of their skin colour….
Ok Iris: I think I get your point – similar I would say to that of challenging Christian registrars who will marry divorcees etc. but not conduct civil partnership ceremonies.
I don’t know all details to come to a firm view, but if each one of us is a sinner, a counsellor intent on challenging sinful behaviour could find it difficult to counsel anyone if of the view that behaviour is ok.
I doubt this man is a bigot or a homophobe but rather he honestly believes he can help some of the other sinners coming to him, according to his remit, but in the case of the gay couple there will be tensions that would put extreme strains on the counsellor client relationship.
In my naivety, I once believed counselling was about helping people reach right decisions. In our relativistic world the notion of right and wrong is rendered meaningless. Shame, because I would have thought folk who know the truth could, if balanced with grace, make the best counsellors.
…. Having to wait to one side humiliated while someone is found to serve them. And yes, that COULD happen. It’s the logical progression of allowing people opt-outs because of their beliefs. Such a divisive society is not something to aim for, surely?
That’s why we have the Equality Act to ensure that we’re all treated equally. I’m not a Christian but I CERTAINLY don’t want an opt-out allowing me to refuse to deal with Christians. Why would ANYONE seek permission to discriminate?
I trust that you’re a good person, so all I’d say is don’t be fooled by the CLC and make up your own mind about whether you agree with their actions because their motivation isn’t quite as innocent as they portray it, in my opinion. I think they are seeking special rights for Christians and are pushing very aggressively to be involved in politics in the same way some US Christian groups are.
Enjoy your mowing, JohnB :D Re the counsellor, I’m sure he often had to talk about situations that seemed wrong to him – sex before marriage, for one. All I object too is his singling out of gay people to refuse to deal with.
Truthfully, I suspect that most LGBT people wouldn’t wish to see such a Christian counsellor anyway. So if his religion was the priority for him, he could be a CHRISTIAN counsellor, be self-employed or employed by a church, and that way LGBT people could avoid him if they chose and Christians could actively seek him out. But in a public job, employed by someone else, he’s not permitted to discriminate.
Iris: thank you for your customary courteous response. I know we disagree on a number of points but I do see (perhaps not as clearly as you) the concerns you raise.
I am not here to defend CLC and will take note of your word of caution. But I do get their weekly email summarising issues of concern and find myself often agreeing with them and feeling glad they are prepared to take up these causes despite the ridicule.
Let me assure you that I have nothing against gay folk and often I accept their valid concerns. Equally, I feel Christians also have valid concerns regarding the practise of their faith although a bit of persecution can be a good thing.
More importantly, I do see a conflict between two world views – Christian and secular, and honestly believe the rejection of Christian principles to be detrimental to our society.
But again, I appreciated our exchange and for you making your points.
And I appreciate your courtesy too, JohnB. I also appreciate your open mind and your willingness to discuss and debate in a respectful manner as opposed to some other people on Pink News. I like talking to you even though we sometimes disagree. :D It’s interesting to hear your concerns because you state them in a polite and reasonable way. I know your faith is important to you.
I would hope that many of the principles you call Christian are shared by those who have no faith. I’m sure there are many overlaps.
Thanks also Iris. You too enjoy today – the sun is shining and there is always hope and beauty.
It would be wrong to think being gay and Christian to be mutually exclusive. Clearly, there are those with feet in both camps. I feel particularly for them as the conflicts, frequently highlighted in in PN, must seem acute at times.
I am mindful that we all share a common humanity and, coming out of our exchanges, concerns such as social justice. I wish you well :-)
@downtown dave..
….foolishly I clicked on your link to see what it was about and was astounded that in 2001 someone could believe such rubbish. I was heartened tho to see you only had three members probably family i suspect. You really do need to have a long talk with a proffessional sometime soon. I hope you are not allowed out alone to be honest.
Equal Marriage Rights regardless of gender or sexual orientation – We petition the government to pass legislation that establishes equal rights to marriage, regardless of gender or sexual orientation. In a society where the law has already recognised the integrity and rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans people to have relationships and love, protected from discrimination: we ask for legislation that enshrines equal marriage rights for all. We believe the underlying law of the land should detach equal rights to marriage, from religious objections and practices, since the state is not a religion. We call on the government to remove the clear discrimination and unfairness which presently exists. New marriage legislation, based on justice, equality, and non-discrimination will in no way undermine marriage……etc
….Would a Christian counsellor question straight people about their marital state and what precisely they do in bed?
Briefly, I don’t feel it’s up to ANY counsellor to judge someone else’s sex life. Firstly, it’s very weird and slightly creepy; secondly, it’s none of their business. Unless the person is seeking RELIGIOUS counselling re their sex life, I don’t see what place religious comments have in secular counselling.
I don’t foist my agnosticism on the pupils in my class because it’s my job not to, and I don’t expect other employees to foist their beliefs on me when they should just be doing their job.
If the hypothetical Christian is themselves gay and chooses not to have sex, that’s up to them, but it’s NOT up to them to interfere in other people’s lawful love lives – particularly when it only seems to be one group of people they’re discriminating against.
No problem Iris. I am sure you are pretty normal and sane. I have just been taken to task on the bad side effects of caffine – but point take though (and responded to above). O well, I better sign off for now – need to mow the lawn lol – but first I will have a cup of coffee.
Valksy, you speak of innate characteristics. One thing everyone can agree on is that babies are of an ethnic grouping from birth onwards. It is agreed by all that things are not that simple with regard to sexuality, and for three large and separate reasons. First: there is a choice element. Second: there is an environment element. Third: the genetic element is denied (on present evidence) even by the head of the Human Genome Project. So why would anyone speak as though this were not the case? We need more education, more logic, and more honesty on these matters.
What choice? Gay people don’t choose to sleep with the same sex any more than straight people wake up one day and choose to sleep with the opposite sex. If you somehow feel your sexuality was a ‘choice’ them perhaps you’re bisexual and just need to realise that.
Christopher, I couldn’t disagree with you more. I don’t even think you understand what homosexuality is. Presumably you are straight? Also, what type of doctor are you? I’m hoping that you are not any form of medical professional, because they are some very dangerous views.
Firstly, in the vast majority of cases there is no choice. Yes, you choose to have same sex sex (i.e. homosexual activity) but that is not what defines a homosexual. I believe sexuality is defined by our sexual desires, not our sexual activities. After all, I knew I was bisexual before I ever had sex. Same goes for straight people, they don’t need to have same sex sex to establish whether they’re homosexual or not, they know they’re straight – they were born that way. Sexuality is about who you lust for sex with, not who you have sex with. My friends younger brother is 8 years old, and I strongly suspect he is gay or will one day find out he is gay. He doesn’t even know what sex is, so I find it hard to accept your choice argument.
Which brings to your second point, which I do agree with to an extent. Some peoples environment can influence their sexuality, but this is very rare in my opinion. E.g. Gay sex in prisons involving hetrosexual men. These men aren’t gay, they’re just participating in gay sex. Same goes for married men who come out as gay in later life. They were always gay, but denied it and chose to have sexual relations with a woman (which doesn’t fulfil their needs)
You last point about genetics isn’t entirely true. Just because we don’t understand something yet doesn’t mean we won’t be able to understand it in the future. But there is much evidence that sexuality is genetic, i believe I’m part of this evidence. I was born this way, so it doesn’t get more genetic than that.
Liar, Christopher Shell. First, Francis Collins was not the ‘head’ of the genome project – and secondly he made no such statement. There is plenty of evidence, cf Kariolinska Institutet et al., to show genetic influences. Often in relation to the epigenome (twins study, which you misrepresent) Why don’t you argue your case with the Lancet or the British Medical Journal? Oh yes, I know: other experts in this field would show you up to be an idiot.
If Francis Collins was not the head of the genome project, what was he?
It is precisely peer-reviewed papers in journals on the level of Lancet and BMJ that bring such negative conclusions re homosexuality.
I did not deny genetic influences (comparative predispositions) – but for every tendency in the world some people are logically going to be comparatively more predisposed than others. You can’t sideline the elephant in the room, which is that we should follow the predispositions to beneficial things, and not follow those to harmful things. I am a Dr in altered states of consciousness in the early church and its ancient Mediterranean background.
1) Your evidence for god.
2) What your purpose is here on a gay site?
3) Why you refuse to accept that the answer to unsafe sex is education.
4) Why you wish to single out one group of humanity – LGBT people – for your attention.
5) Why you’re so obsessed with what other people may or may not do in bed?
You’ve side-stepped al the questions about your purpose here and the point of what you’re claiming.
Hi Iris-
(1) See my answer above.
(2) Because if people only talk to people who agree with them they never learn anything. Far from being preferable this would be lamentable.
(3) This is easy! The last 40-45 years are the period of sex education in earnest. *Precisely* the same as the period of underage sex, extramarital sex, teen abortions, STDs etc.. QED.
(4) I don’t. I talk to many different groups of people. You don’t know me.
(5) This I have already answered. Society is composed of individuals, and those individuals need to be people of integrity or everyone else suffers in innumerable ways.
Thnak you for answering. Re your answer to 3) I think it is simplistic (no insult meant). People DIED from STDs centuries ago, so it was no golden age. In addition, women died FAR more often in childbirth, so again no golden age. Also, you talk about STDs and then appear to criticise the very sex education that would help inform people of the ways to prevent them. That doesn’t make sense to me.
Re your answer to 5) – I’d like more about what you mean by ‘people of integrity’. How can you tell how much integrity a person has by what they do in bed??
Integrity is linked to sexual conduct because the more partners one has the more soul-ties one develops and the more mixed up one’s identity therefore is as an individual.
I agree that people used to die from STDs but it is obviously medicine (as opposed to the morality of sexual conduct) that has advanced to prevent their doing so. Anyway they still do die in droves from AIDS etc. – *even* in an age of much more advanced medicine.
I never once mentioned the term (cliche) ‘golden age’. All I said was something true, that the less promiscuity is treated as a normal part of life the less it will take place. The societies where it is talked about least are the ones where it takes place least. It is all over our newspapers and our education system in the west, and consequently all over our actual lives as well.
It’s just a shame that people who choose religion feel justified in debating other people because of how they were born yet if you do it to their chosen religious lifestyle they’d be hell to pay!
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Hi I’m Gay and it In’t up for debate. This is who I am. Unlike Chris’ Shell bigotry, I didn’t choose it, it was how I was born and remains my life of which I am very proud.
But promiscuity is something that straight people do too. Watch Jeremy Kyle and despair, Dr CS. And do you not think that the way gay people were treated in the past (forced to hide, side-lined, etc) may have led to a sub-culture?
Do you not think that treating gay people as equal to straight people and allowing them access to marriage would help?
I don’t mean to denigrate anyone, but it is harmless to assess that Dr CS would have benefited from being a more effective listener on this thread, instead of moralizing at every turn.
Honestly, I’ve read and re-read this thread, and I have learned nothing new from this troll.
No – they don’t, because I know of no medical institution that draws conclusions anywhere close to yours. And neither does Francis Collins. It appears you aren’t a doctor in a medical field, but a theological one.
So, I don’t recognise your qualification to talk as an expert on psychological issues.
Since, for the overwhelming majority of gay people, homosexuality is not actually harmful, even though statistics on STDs are indeed terrible, you have no business to meddle in the affairs of others.
It is more likely, that since gay people have been ostracised and discriminated against, that they had to form a separate social scene, that such STDs or alcohol problems are exacerbated. The bottom line, is that there are many diverse sexual orientations, and many ways of living a good life. Stable gay relationships, of which there are many, are one way. You just cannot shoehorn everyone into a ‘traditional nuclear family’ – for many this is hell on earth.
I am by no means an expert on psychology. But I seem to be aware of the conclusions of psychological/statistical peer-reviewed papers to an extent which those who need to be aware of them are not.
Hi Stu
If you are saying ‘people are allowed to talk about only one topic at the moment’, who are you to say that? We can talk about whichever topic we like. Including the riots, about which I have talked much, albeit not on this site.
@ Dr Christopher Shell,
We do know that in humans sexual orientation is fixed if not from birth then in very early infancy, we do not know what mechanismis, if there is any one mechanism, that is responsible for the 3 most common and normal human sexual orientations heterosexual, bisexual and homosexual. It is generally accepted now that a persons sexual orientation involves a combination of genetic, hormonal and environmental factors plus possibly a myriad other unknown factors that may be different for each individual.
We do now know that sexual orientation is not chosen and that there is no legitimate evidence at all that sexual orientation can be changed at will or by any form of “therapy”. A persons sexual orientation is not an illness to be cured.
@ Dr Christopher Shell,
Regarding choice, it would be highly perverse for a person of homosexual orientation to go against his orientation & choose an opposite sex partner, it does happen where there is general hostility to homosexuality, living life as a closet gay in an opposite sex relationship is mostly a survival tactic. In certain communities, the homosexual person who is not living in the closet may be ostracised, they may be at risk of verbal or physical assault, in other cases and situations they will be at risk of anti-gay laws and may risk arrested and incarceration simply because they refuse to be celibate or to pretend they are straight.
Though it is not possible to deliberately change one’s own or another persons sexual orientation, in a small number of individuals their orientation does appear to change as they mature, perhaps as they become more self-aware as opposed to living up to earlier powerful demands of religious, social & peer pressure.
But the bone of contention is not something called ‘orientation’. I know very well – and it is a good thing – that some people prefer the company of their own gender. However, the particular acts that some of these people are involved in are the bone of contention. Christians are opposed speciafically to sodomy etc.: homosexual *acts*. There is no evidence from nature that they serve a natural purpose. There is plenty of medical/pathological evidence, however, that they are harmful.
“Christians are opposed speciafically to sodomy etc.: homosexual *acts*.”
So if you want to be a good christian, don’t act that way.
And if you want a perfectly healthy long life, purify the air before you breath it, remove genetically modified organisms and all contaminated foods from your diet, wear a code 30 sunscreen, and drink pure water only.
I said ‘proverbially’. Tourists are shown a site bang next to the Red Sea. But what we are talking about is the Bible story and what it is intended to mean, not about whether it is true.
@Dr Christopher Shell
As it is not possible to deliberately change one’s sexual orientation, it would be perverse indeed for a person of homosexual orientation to choose to engage in penile-vaginamy simply because others felt it was a more appropriate mode of sexual expression.
That leaves only celibacy, possibly the most unnatural state for any person to live in, it is a complete denial of one’s very humanity and there would need to be a very good reason for a person to choose to live one’s life as a celibate, I can’t think of a reasonable one.
The sin of Sodom was the townspeoples failure to provide safe hospitality to strangers, neither homosexuality nor homosexual practice is mentioned in the Biblical tale as one of the sins of Sodom if you go back to the source. The attempted gang rape and humiliation of angels by otherwise heterosexual townsmen does not describe homosexuality, it does describe the brutality and violent rape often then used to humiliate one’s enemies.
Not true Pavlos – see the source story, which in some places is word-for-word the same, in Judges 19. The focus is on sex not hospitality. In fact, if we understand know as ‘acquaint ourselves’ lack of hospitality (‘that we may know them’) was the one thing these guys were *not* guilty of. Whereas if we understand it as ‘have sex with’ then it was precisely that offer which demonstrated them to be bad people.
Yes, it IS true, Dr CS. Or maybe you know more than Jesus? In Matthew he specifically criticises inhospitality and links it with the destruction of Sodom:
14 And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet.
15 Verily I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment, than for that city.
Your hateful interpretation is a twisting of Jesus’ words, and not what many Christians believe. But then not all Christians feel the need to use the Bible to justify their own personal prejudices.
Hi Iris-
There are several things wrong with what you say:
All he is saying is that Chorazin and Bethsaida are, for reasons of inhospitality, worse than the proverbial-worst-cities. Those said proverbial worst cities became the proverbial worst for reasons other than inhospitality.
Also: you have not answered my other points. The men outside the house ‘wanted to know’ the guests – that is precisely hospitable, not the reverse. Or if they wanted to know them carnally, then that was the bad thing that led to their being ranked so badly – hence hommsexuality was ranked as bad. So whichever way we translate ‘know’ the result is the same. Also consult the source in Judges 19 where it is clear that the emphasis is on sex.
And an additional point: Sodom and Gomorrah were proverbially sinful. From what you say, they had only one sin: the fabled ‘sin of Sodom’. But that is completely impossible. For if they had had only one sin they swould not have been proverbially sinful. They would have been proverbially saintly.
Have you heard the one about the boy who would not grow up and who lived in Never-Never Land, where a humongous alligator had bitten the hand off the captain of a pirate ship …and then a fairy, yea, just like a sugar plum fairy that could fly and everything and could sprinkle some pixie dust on the bum of the shaggy dog and he ran down a rabbit hole…er…oh no..that’s another campfire tale… the one where the Queen used to say: Off with his head !!!
Dr CS – ‘The men outside the house ‘wanted to know’ the guests – that is precisely hospitable, not the reverse. Or if they wanted to know them carnally, then that was the bad thing that led to their being ranked so badly – hence hommsexuality was ranked as bad.’
‘Know’ is taken to be carnally. I agree. But no, it was NOT homosexuality that was ‘bad’. The sin was rape – the men wanted to RAPE the strangers. It’s also implied that the potential rapists were STRAIGHT men wishing to rape to humilate the strangers. Male rape was and is a show of power.
Yes, Sodom’s sins were many, but inhospitality was considered a far, far worse ‘sin’ than today. One was supposed to shelter and feed strangers, not rape and/or rob them.
We ahve already established that it is completely impossible that the most sinful city of all should have just one sin. Rape, homosexuality, doubtless inhospitality as well. The list goes on.
Yes, we agree that Sodom was bad in many ways, but you’ve added ‘homosexuality’ to your list there and I see no evidence for that. Where did god explain that he was destroying Sodom because there were gay people there? And why just Sodom as, of course, there would have been gay people all over the world?
@Dr Christopher Shell
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Curious how you think the sin of Soddom and Gomorrah is related to sodomy per se.
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For some one with a PhD in theology, you should at least know the range of alternative theological arguments, rather than just those from extreme fundamentalist branches of Christinaity.
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Why have you neglected the argument that the sin of Sodom and Gommorah, is the sin of inhospitality. Moreover, when guests are invited to your party,it is inhospitable to rape them rather than greet than dutifully.
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Regardless of the sexual practice, rape is rape, and it is not very hospitable.
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Your logic is impossible. Lot offered his daughters to the would-be intruders to avoid rape?
So he avoided rape of a general kind by facilitating rape of a particularly nasty kind to himself: i.e. the rape of his own daughters?
Surely you can see the illogic of this interpretation and consequently that rape cannot be centrally the sin in mind. It is the sodomites not Lot who are castigated in subsequent literature for vile acts (e.g. letter of Jude in New Testament). Conclusion: within the story (factual or fictional) there was something that was considered considerably worse than the rape of one’s own daughters. What was that thing if not homosexuality?
I do not agree with this priority myself, but we are talking about what the story is actually saying.
Dr CS, my interpretation is perfectly logical and fits with the story. Yes, Lot offered his daughters to be raped. Why? Plenty of possible reasons:
1) Women were valued less than men.
2) Lot knew that God was watching and wanted to stop the rape of the strangers so chose the lesser of two evils in order to protect the guests.
3) Lot realised the strangers were angels and thus protected them by offering his daughters (see 1)
Lot wasn’t exactly a paragon of virtue anyway, in my opinion. He later had sex with his own daughters. And no, I don’t believe he was too drunk to realise.
The Sodom story then is a cautionary tale, composed over a period of time, generated by any number of creative bards, eventually written, on papyrus I suppose, passed on from generation to generation, and given divine authority at some point, as if to tell the children to avoid contact with city dwellers who were not, as they were, among god’s chosen people.
Hi Iris and Lee
I missed a fourth point: circumstances (though I suppose that overlaps with environment).
No I am only a PhD not a medic.
Contrary to what you say, Lee, the environment factor is massive. There are multiple hundreds of percent rises in likelihood of claiming lesbianism among campus students as opposed to non-university-educated; or gayness among urban as opposed to rural (not just for migration reasons).
You’ll agree with the proposition that ethnicity is apparent from birth and sexuality is not. Even if sexuality were apparent from birth to a smaller extent than ethnicity (as opposed to not at all, which is in fact the case) then this would prohibit the standard argument that sexuality and ethnicity are *equivalents* with regard to innateness. This is a test of honesty.
I agree: the main touchstone is ‘who does X lust after?’ – but this may’ve come about in a variety of ways. We are all inclined to certain things we know are harmful,& regularly choose against them.
I kinda think your missing the point. Re: university students being more likely declare their actual or alleged homosexuality, I would suspect your statement is factual. However, this i would inclined to think that this is due to 2 factors 1) universities tend to be full of young, open-minded inviduals, which makes it easier to declare their homosexuality 2) unfortunaltely claiming to be lesbian/bisexual appears to be “cool”, particularly among young women (therefore not all these people are homosexual, they just claim to be).
But do I think that exposure to university lifestyle increases the likelihood of “turning” gay? No, of course not. I went to university, I was bisexual before I got there. In fact, I knew I was bisexual from the age of about 10, due to having crushes on boy girls and boys.
Re: rural people being less likely to “be” homosexual, again, I have no doubt that this statement is factual to an extent. However have you considered that rural communities are more close minded, hence making it more difficult for people to come out? Cities do not “turn” people gay. I think this is a ridiculous arguement.
Of of course ethnicity is apparent from birth, It’s a visible characteristic. However, just because something isn’t visible doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. Take hereditary diseases, for example.
Also, your comment suggesting homosexuality is harmful is offensive. I would appreciate if you could present some evidence for this (other than the fact that gays in certain parts of the world are more likely to have HIV, this I accept). I’m bisexual, it’s never done me any harm. The harm caused to homosexuals does not come from their homosexuality, it comes from prejudice, much like the type of prejudice that you are displaying right now. I used to have real issues with my sexuality, to the point where I considered suicide. Do you honestly think in that situation if I could choose not to be bisexual, that I wouldn’t do this? Thankfully I’ve matured, and I’ve learned to accept my sexuality. I’ve just very worried that there is a lot of young men and women out there who are suffering severe mental trauma, due to arguements such as the ones you’re presenting.
Re homosexuality being harmful or beneficial, the question should be rather whether any evidence can be found that it is beneficial. Whichever way one looks – since homosexuals score *massively* higher on average in STDs (esp AIDS, anal cancer, recent new strains of gonorrhea and syphilis), promiscuity, low life expectancy, drug use, failure to make genuinely monogamous bonds and/or shortness of relationships. The list just goes on and on.
The triple point about ethnicity is that (1)there is no environmental/circumstantial element nor possibility of one (contrast the 2 Australian identical twins studies re sexuality, &c.); also, (2) no choice element, and no possibility of one; also, (3) a clear (rather than an undiscovered and hypothetical) genetic element. This is why people find it difficult to regard as honest those who link ethnicity and sexuality so closely. Can add more but word-limit! :o)
Sorry, but that’s not true. For example, the LEAST likely group to get HIV/AIDS is lesbians. The current rise in chlamydia is amongst STRAIGHT adults. Are you basing your figures on some of the fundamentalist Christian ‘evidence’ because your comment about life expectancy suggests you are – I remember how fundies twisted and misrepresented that.
Did you choose to be straight? No, and I didn’t choose to be gay – in fact, like Lee above, I resisted it. My sexuality does absolutely NO harm to you or society in general. What’s your problem? That’s a genuine question not an insult. Are you here to make a specific point? If so, what?
Again, I think your prejudice is clouding your judgement. Yes, there are risks associated with sexuality activity, more so homosexual activity involving men. But are you honestly suggesting that due to these risks homosexuals should remain sexless? Ask yourself what is more harmful:
- denying your sexuality, and leading an unfulfilled unhappy life (of which you only get one)
- accepting your sexuality, enjoying your sexuality, whilst accepting the risks involved, and leading a happy fulfilled life
And the above points apply equally as much to heterosexuals. I’m presuming you are heterosexual, so on that basis, are you celibate? After all, every time you engage in sex there are risks involved. Here in the UK we are seeing a recent epidemic of STDs among young heterosexual teens, not homosexuals.
And re: questioning the benefits of homosexuality – I think this statement is ludicrous. The benefits are
the same as that of heterosexual sex (sexual satisfaction, improved quality of life due to increased sense of worth/happiness, finding love) minus the fact that homosexuals do not produce offspring. I’m presuming that you will argue that the lack of reproduction means that is less beneficial? In which case, would you discourage people from masturbating for example? I’m curious as to why you think heterosexual sex is any more beneficial, because the reproductive argument is a weak one (it’s probably even a bigger benefit in fact, when you consider that the major crisis facing the human race it’s over population)
Re: ethnicity – of course ethnicity is more inherent characteristic of a human being than homosexuality. You’re right, you have literally no choice about it, and your environment cannot impact upon it. In certain cases, a person’s environment can impact upon a person’s sexuality (e.g. child abuse), but this is immaterial compared with the people who, like me, have absolutely no
choice. I can choose to not engage in homosexual sex, but I cannot choose not to be a homosexual. Take for example those 2 teenage boys who were put to death in Iran for being homosexuals. You’d have a hard time arguing that their environment caused their homosexuality, given the risk involved and a lack of any homosexual influence. Also, are you suggesting that anyone can just choose to be homosexual/heterosexual? In that case, why wouldn’t every homosexual in the world pick heterosexuality, given the prejudice that means life is generally more difficult than for their heterosexual peers.
My “environment” didn’t make me bisexual:
- I’m 24
- I live in a loyalist stronghold in Northern Ireland, surrounded by some of the most extreme Christians on the face of the earth (homo is a no go)
- I have strong relationships with both my parents
- I don’t have any gay/bisexual friends
- I have never set foot in a gay club (apparently the music is crap lol)
- I don’t even really believe in the
of having gay clubs etc, but would rather that everyone in society could integrate (although I can understand why gay clubs exist, given the prejudices in society)
- I have never had sexual intercourse with a man
- I have a girlfriend, a rather beautiful one that, and we’ve been together for almost 5 years now, and are wonderfully happy
- I have no problem attracting girls (I don’t look like a “gay”, so men don’t generally hit on me)
I’m curious as to what part of my environment you think shaped my bisexuality? I’ll tell you what shaped it, hot guys at school lol. Some of my first crushes were on boys. Do you choose who you are attracted to? I doubt it very much.
You can’t believe we should act on all our impulses. Each of us has impulses which we avoid because we know they would bring more harm than good. Why is it that single guys don’t make advances to 15 women every day on the way to work – even though their impulses may tell them to?
Hamish, your dad is a minuscule sample. Introduce me to one trained statistician who takes seriously samples of one person, and privileges them over samples of thousands and millions of people when they are trying to gain an accurate picture and an accurate average.
You have the advantage of hearing the personal story of a gay man here, yet you scoff at hm in favor of… “the stats of thousands and millions of people” …. are you insane?
No – ‘less beneficial’ comes from the list of multiple harmful consequences I made earlier (averages of life expectancy, STDs, promiscuity, drug use etc.).
Dr Christopher – I’ve heard this a thousand times. The whole “if gay people stopped being gay they’d all lead fulfilled healthy hetero/ celebate lives” canard. Erm no.
You blithely ignore the fact that the entire human race seeks intimacy, and if I said to you “you’re obliged to be celebate and ignore your hetero impulses to eliminate any possibility of ever catching an STD” you’d most likely tell me to mind my own f***ing business, that you’re a grown adult and able to form carnal relationships with any consenting adult you choose. You may also point out that I’m projecting my own prejudices onto you, because I don’t personally enjoy hetero sex and seek to dictate terms for everyone else. As someone once put it, “I don’t like mustard, so no mustard for you”!
Besides ex-gay therapy has been debunked by every mainstream psychology institute. You can take a gay to straight sex, but you can’t make him enjoy it. In fact many have tried in order and many have resorted to suicide
are you implying that Gays contribute less beneficially to the civilized world ?
There is a Chair in Gay Studies, at Harvard University, a rather well-respected place, a place more respected than christian churches, judging by the attendance, a Chair perfectly capable of rhyming off the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, of delving centuries into western and eastern civilizations, uncovering hidden truths, belying christianity’s re-interpretation of human experience, giving credit where credit is due, validating the immense contributions of homosexual men and women, and certainly not confusing the victims and the causes of disease.
Are you implying that straight males are virgins when they marry? And they are monogamous after they marry? And that they provide a civilized home environment for a child?
Straining to understand your meaning is tiresome, Chris.
Dr CS: ‘marriage civilises, and therefore encourages the virginity-monogamy thing. Gay males leave themselves not open to this civilising influence.’
No, people choose to remain virgins prior to marriage ie before they experience it’s ‘civilising nature’.
And it’s not ‘gay males’ who exempt themselves from marriage, it’s the law in many countries. If you wish ‘gay males’ to experience the joys of marriage, then make (civil) marriage gender neutral and allow LGBT people to have the same ‘incentives’ as straight people.
@ Dr Christopher Shell, The reason we aren’t open to marriage is no choice of ours we legally can not get married.
Oh and another thing my dad was very heterosexual and married and he still slept with any woman with a pulse so obviously marriage didn’t civilise him much.
@Dr Christopher Shell
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Where did you buy your PhD from?
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The reason I say this is becasue your soundbites or just that, not the reasoned arguments, evidence or analysis of some one with a doctrate level of education!
Yet all your ‘facts’ are based soley on assumptions. You know nothing. You clearly didn’t know that we refer to ‘safer sex’…
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Dodgy, to say the least.
“In any case, who is the brighter, those who refer to statistical evidence or those who avoid doing so?”
Given that you are driven by a need to outshine others, why don’t you add relevance to your remarkable intelligence and comment on the topic of this thread?
It is my understanding that Chris’ PhD is in Altered States of Consciousness in the Mediterranean in the 3rd Century A.D….
He did say that somewhere… sounds like paradigms shifts to me.. unless he’s talking about the delirious effects of Southern Italian wines as opposed to those of Spanish vineyards…
mmm..now what Faculty would teach such a thing at Cambridge??
mmm..by the 3rd century, the early church was better administrated than the Roman Empire, wasn’t it?
Then Constantine came around and the persecuted became the persecutors. Philo was clearly homophobic, eh? And let’s just not mention Augustine… talk about denial..but the the anti-gay hate industry was good to them, I suppose, bless their soles. Free thought was only possible if it was christian free thought eh? Poor Hypatia. The church was quite uncharitable in its attempt to unify doctrine, wasn’t it? I wonder what god was doing before he made heaven and earth. Oh, never mind…how would you know… oh, oh, here come the Huns…hello Dark ages..
Anyone who is concerned about truth can see the lies currently surrounding homosexuality, and anyone who loves truth wants to put them right. Hans-Christian Raabe was sacked from the Home Office for saying what 8 scientific papers *strongly* found to be the case (extremely disproportionate correlation between homosexuality and paedophilia) and no scientific papers anyone has ever named to me (despite repeated requests) have found otherwise. This is a case of non-researchers trumping consensus of painstaking researchers. As such everyone who either is an academic or cares about truth will be concerned.
Dr CS. I have seen a paper referring to the sexuality of paedophiles and I wish i could find it now (I promise you that is wholly true). It was explaining that the adult categories of gay, straight, bisexual couldn’t be so widely applied to paedophiles because the attraction for them was the ‘childness’. Men often abuse boys because, as men, they often get more access to boys rather than girls. That’s a brief summary of what I read.
If anyone else knows what I’m referring to, please post the link here.
The lies are coming from people like you, chris..and you know it.
“Christian homophobes have misused my writings on the biology of homosexuality, particularly “Gay Genes, Revisited,” published in Scientific American in November 1995. In it I reported on weaknesses in the claims of scientists—and particularly the geneticist Dean Hamer, “discoverer” of the “gay gene”—that homosexuality has a genetic basis.”
Is there any evidence that homosexuality is harmful (in itself)?
or could ask:
Can any of the “evidence” that homosexuality is “harmful” that is purported actually demonstrate harm based on attraction to the same sex?
The facts you allege about STI (STDs is not a term endorsed for 10 years plus in medicine) are not true. The biggest growth area in terms of syphillis, gonorrhea and HIV is heterosexuals. FACT
The correct surname is Shell. Gay people are well-more-than-average promiscuous on average. Aggregates/totals derive directly from averages, which is why averages are so important in deciding whether certrain things should be encouraged/permitted.
But since you refer to no peer reviewed article that recommends discrimination against gay people – in fact every medical, psychiatric and psychological institution in the civilised world calls for LGBT equality – we can discard your highly selective, unscientific data, just like we ignore creationist lunatics who try to get ‘intelligent design’ taught in schools.
If “Dr Christopher Shell” does not name his source material, references nor provide links to them we should feel free to dismiss his comments as anecdotal anti-gay bull.
Check the multiple references to others’ (not Christians’) surveys gathered by Gagnon and Brown in the link to my letter to CEN posted earlier. Of course, these concern only one subtopic: promiscuity. Each other subtopic has an large amount of backing literature too.
Robert Gagnon is ideologically opposed to homosexuality, he skews his interpretatiion of research to fit his prejudices. Gagnons work is not scholarly as he appears quite unable to keep a dispassionate and unbiased approach from the subject he is dealing with.
Gagnon is very popular prop for those who believe the Bible trumps science, reason and experience, when considering sexuality issues.
Gagnon is not the source of a single one of the surveys in question. He merely gathers their evidence together for others’ convenience. You didn’t seriously think hs is a statistical researcher, did you?
No, my partner is an Econometrician and Statistician so I’m unlikely to have made that mistake.
I am aware that Gagnon has a PHD in Theology (not a real academic subject in my opinion) and has witten on homosexual practice in the Bible from which I have read various excerpts in the past.
Gagnon reveals the populist ideological basis of his writing by not differentiating between various types of allegedly same sex activity referred to in the Bible. Gang rape, pederasty, prostitution and ritual same sex activity are all called “homosexual practice”
If there is so much evidence, why did you choose to use the study about the rate of promiscuity in gay men in a specific group in San Francisco to make your initial point there? It’s like collecting data from a group of straight swingers and then using that to assert that straight people are promiscuous.
You imply you were spoilt for choice for evidence yet you chose research that was easily dismissed when more details about the research was revealed – why?
Hi Iris – this point I already refuted in the 2nd of my 2 letters to CEN. The non-SF evidence paints the same sort of pretty shocking picture as the SF evidence, as is apparent from many surveys from many countries.
Hi Pavlos-
Well, if all four of them involve same-sex intercourse, then are you claiming it is incorrect to call them all homosexual practice? That would be a strange claim. However, Gagnon is a very precise writer and no-one on this site (unless they are a person who does not care about evidence or truth) can believe your claim he confuses these together without your giving chapter and verse.
No, Dr CS. You miss the point. The Bible does NOT refer to loving, consensual adult same sex relationships. It criticises certain kind of gay sex eg temple sex, certain kinds of gay prostitution, straight men having gay sex, etc etc. Yet to claim that that means it condemns ‘being gay’ is as stupid as claiming that the Commandment against adultery means that ‘god doesn’t like straight sex’.
Hi Iris.
You say you don’t believe the non-SF evidence points strongly the same way (albeit the percentages are a little less extreme) as the SF-evidence.
Then please consult the evidence I cited in the letters in question before making such a judgment, then you will be in a position to make a judgment on the topic.
Alas, no. Because then I gave his ‘arguments’ the return treatment in the paper next week, and he couldn’t reply (either that, or not to publishable standard).
‘No sex education’ succeeds. We had very peremptory sex education till the early 1960s. And what were the fruits? They were either hundreds or thousands of times better than today. In terms of age of first intercourse, number of partners, attendees at birth control clinics, rates of extramarital intercourser, abortions, divorces, cohabitation, STDs….
Sometimes the evidence is so colossal that it cannot be seen – a bit like you never ‘see’ the ocean liner you travel on – only the gangplank and individual bits of the ship.
Dr CS – even if you had evidence showing that gay men were more promiscuous than similar straight men, what would that MEAN? You don’t get it, do you. All you’re seeking to do is demonise a group of people by using fundie sites to trawl around for ‘evidence’ – but for what purpose? If it’s not vindictiveness,what is it?
We’ve refuted this kind of evidence SO many times on Pink News, and it’s not only that I don’t want to repeat myself, it’s that it’d be more productive to bang my head against a brick wall than try to get through to you. You’re blinded by your dislike of gay men and your obession with gay sex, and you can’t see the wood for the trees.
I must have missed the refutation. Which papers did you cite? The two sources I mentioned cite over 20 between them on this one subtopic of promiscuity.
Do you know what, I have heard the answer ‘I could refute your arguments but I cannot be bothered to now’ many times. I believe it is an excuse covering for lack of evidence, but please prove bme wrong. Molesworth in ‘Down Wiv Skool’ etc. used to answer exam questions with ‘larfably easy’. What he did not do was actually answer the question.
NO – listen. I’m ACCEPTING your evidence hypothetically, OK? My question is WHY? Why do you keep on about this? If gay men are more promiscuous, then the answer, as I’ve suggested above, is more focussed education, just as it is for straight teens regarding chlamydia.
Education has been trumpeted as teh *only* answer for 40 years. The very 40 years in which things have got steadily and alarmingly worse. Whereas those communities (and those periods of UK history) which accepted these things are not suitable for young people to talk or think about got and get far, far better results. No contest. The education solution is indefensible.
Ah, so you believe exposure to sex education encourages earlier sex – is that right? I don’t think having sex too early is a good idea at all for many reasons, but I would hope that sex education makes that clear aswell – that one should be emotionally mature aswell as physically mature before having sex.
The fact is that some young people do ignore such education – and we can often predict who that’ll be. So that’s another problem to tackle. Either the education should be more graphic (eg the idea of showing older teens pictures of STDs, for example), simplified if necessary, or those at risk should be followed up and given extra support if necessary.
NO sex education would fail because many would still be tempted to have sex and thus run the risks of STDs and pregnancy. Young people still had sex before sex education, but largely in ignorance. How can that be good?
I am neither for nor against sex education. Nor is any intelligent person. All intelligent people agree that it entirely depends on what the contents of that education is, and on what kinds of behaviour are normalised by it. I am against UK sex education in ther period 1967 to date, because by means of the kinds of behaviour normalised it has become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Whereas simultaneously plenty of parents (and possibly even teachers!!) have provided their children with highly praiseworthy sex education.
Dr Shell wrote
“Gay people are well-more-than-average promiscuous on average. Aggregates/totals derive directly from averages,”
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Provide peer reviewed evidence!!!
There is almost too much of it to cite. Check the article-conclusions gathered by Gagnon, Satinover and Brown. (Need I say: they wrote none of it themselves, and none of it was written by evangelicals. They merely quote it.)
Yes, I am. i don’t ‘say’ that it is the case. It is the case, statistically, and when I speak about it I just reproduce what the statistics have already said. What is important is that people be honest enough to refrain from having an opinion or view that is not based on statistics.
Do check what I actually said, though. You are correct about chlamydia, but how does that make the claim untrue that homosexuals have a much higher rate of STDs in general overall? You are also correct about lesbians in that one respect – but because the gay male rate is so shocking then the combined gay rate remains well above the combined straight rate – as I said.
Most of the points you have raised are valid, and true to some extent (other than the choice, environment thing). But come on, so what if gays are more promiscious? So what, if they are more likely to be involved in drugs? (not even sure if this is true?) So what, if there are less likely to be monogamous?
I occassionally take drugs, doesn’t make a bad person or harmful to society (I’ve a great career, I own my own home, I do a lot of voluntary work for local charities).
None of these things do anyone any harm, in my opinion. In fact, it would suggest to me that homosexuals are more determined to get what they want from life, rather than what “society” expects of them.
I’m curious as to how these factors affect you and your life, as a heterosexual.
Thank you for answering re your identity, Dr CS. I don’t know what particular statistics you’re referring to, but your catch-all statement annoyed me because it was untrue as I said regarding lesbians. So you’re saying that gay MEN have higher rates of STDs? Is that correct? And what are you going on to posit from that if it is true?
Gay men statistically are no more promiscuous than heterosexual men. Gay men are simply more open and transparent than their straight counterparts. Many of my straight colleagues and friends regularly cheat on their wives and girlfriends. It simply comes down to opportunity. Also Gay men until recently have had no encouragement to enter into committed relationships by society.
Gay men are more inclined to undergo regular testing for STDs. Let us remember that the rate of STDs is based solely on diagnoses. Straight people are less likely to undergo regular STD testing until extreme symptoms exist. Therefore the rate of straight diagnoses cannot be reasonably measured for accurate comparison or statistical purposes. This anomaly is widely acknowledged by Dr.s and scientists. Statisticians also acknowledge that the HIV increase in the UK is largely attributed to immigration from Africa and India where HIV is epidemic among the heterosexual population.
@Christopher Shell
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You have stopped using your Dr prefix
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Is this because to date you consistently fail to quote any evidence from a reputable peer viewed journal.
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A word of warning, the Cameron group Journal is universally ignored!!
Chris Shell, why do you insist on inventing and manipulating statistics? Not a single reputable unbiased scientific or medical journal backs up any of your claims. All of the studies that you claim to prove your muddled points were conducted/funded by religious organisations. The problem with these studies is that the results are predetermined and the studies were manipulated to provide the required results. This is why christian science is regarded within the scientific community as Mickey Mouse science. I think we can safely disregard Chris Shell as cheap quack!
Entirely untrue. Only a very small percentage of surveys on homosexuality have been done by ‘religious’ organisations. I cannot off hand think of a single one that I am relying on which has been done by such an organisation. Please quote chapter and verse when referring to studies, as I did in the link above.
Actually, thats not true. Religion does all it can to try and discredit who we are and will produce ‘surveys’ to try and prove your load of fictitious crap.
OK then, please quote ‘religious’ peer-reviewed journal surveys on homosexuality. Otherwise we will take you not to be telling the truth. The ones I rely on are practically all secular. If you want the low-down on peer-reviewed surveys on homosexuality plus any of life expectancy, drug use, promiscuity, correlation with child abuse, STDs, urban/rural background, campus/noncampus – then just ask.
Yep because here in Britain we’re seeing first hand examples of how heterosexual people are healthy and how they bring up ‘healthy’ children.
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It’s not the LGBT community rioting is the ‘healthy’ (cough) straight community and Their children.
Nurturing the myth that heterosexual marriages have a civilizing effect while in fact they are over-populating the planet, horrendous side effects and all, you are ignoring headlines in favor of manipulated statistics, chris.
Does it? You know that for a fact do you Chris’ Shell (I refuse to call you Dr on account You clearly ain’t!) or are you doing that great thing of sailing in on a boat called ‘Assumptions’ down that great river of de Nile? Me thinks so!
I tend to use the term communities whether referring to LGBT people, heterosexual people or a mix … There are various communities we all are part of to one extent or another and not restricted to where we live or work geographically. To suggest otherwise is fatuous
Not victimise. If I didn’t say what I am saying I would not be speaking the truth. And some people’s consciences do not allow them to lie about the true state of the statistical evidence..
But as you’re not an expert in the prevention of STDs, I don’t get why it matters to you. If you truly wanted to help, you’d be involved in sex education or similar.
And do you frequent, for example, sports forums where there are many young men and tell them about the dangers of chlamydia and the like?
@Dr Christopher Shell
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I am still waiting for you to post links to emprical research, in peer reviewed journals, which supports your views below.
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1. LGBT people are more likely than heterosexuals to be paedophiles
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2. LGBT people are more sexually promisicus than heterosexuals
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3 LGBT people are more likey to contract STDs than heterosexuals.
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POST YOUR LINKS TO RESEARCH IN THE NEXT 24 HOURS, other wise we are more thant justiifed in taking the veiw that you are only here to spread lies and misinformation about LGBT people..
Hi JohnK
All studies of paedophilia/ephebophilia known to me indicate that there is a *very* disproportionate correlation to gay men:
K Freund et al., Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy’84.
P Cameron et al., Psychological Reports’86.
JMW Bradford et al., Psychiatric Journal of University of Ottawa’88.
WD Erickson, Archives of Sexual Behavior’88.
K Freund & R Watson, Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy Spring’92.
P Cameron, ‘The Gay Nineties’ (1993).
EO Laumann, The Social Organisation of Sexuality (1994).
JR Hughes, Clinical Pediatrics’07.
On promiscuity (which is closely bound-up with STDs) the disparity is again massive. Google my correspondence with Benny Hazlehurst in the Church of England Newspaper a few months ago, and if you like consult the more-than-20 papers cited (not written) by Gagnon and Brown (references given in the correspondence).
A gay person was born gay and will always be gay. They did not choose to become gay so why on earth should a person of faith have the right to refuse goods or services to a gay customer.
Sexuality comes before religion and the courts need to recognise this. We’re effectively putting myth before fact.
Equality law above all else should be reason free from passion.
Maybe you should show us the gene for heterosexuality first? No-one’s asserting there’s a ‘gay gene’ (although there may be some genetic combinations and interplay of genes that make homosexuality more likely).
And – again – what on earth has this got to do with this article re the NSS?
There are studies currently being done which say it is the amount of testosterone you get in the womb which determines sexuality this idea that all things from birth are genetic is bullsh!t.
Correct. I have also read about hair whorls, lefthandedness, and being younger/-est brother. But the statistical fruits of homosexuality remain dismal.
The existence of something rather than nothing, and even the possibility of such existence. And then the nature of that which actually exists (the anthropic principle). These are two awe-inspiring bodies of evidence that invite us to broaden our minds.
Dr CS – forgive me but I didn’t understand a word of that. You had previously mentioned that we should rely on evidence – so where’s the evidence for God? You (I think!) imply that there’s more likely to be something rather than nothing, but how does this suggest there’s a god? The ‘something’ could be anything – a physical process, a chemical reaction.
People used to think that a god drew the sun across the sky but we now have evidence that shows us this is untrue. Presumably they also thought there must be ‘something’ moving the sun – they were just ignorant of the exact physics and so chose to label it ‘god’.
Iris- a physical process undertaken by what physical matter? How was that physical matter there in the first place? A chemical reaction by what chemicals? How were those chemicals there in the first place?
Dr CS – I don’t know the answer to your questions about physical matter and I’m not a physicist so i won’t bore you with my uneducated guesses, but my point still remains – just because we don’t understand something, it doesn’t follow that the answer is ‘God’.
That’s the first time I’ve ever heard that definition, Dr CS – seriously! To me, it seems a very LAZY answer. Moreover, why, in the case of god, do you not demand your usual evidence?
I totally concur that environment has an impact. Academically there is plenty of material to support this and I have plenty of observational experience that would suggest this. The amount of impact would vary from situation to situation, some would be minimal, some a greater impact.
That said, I also state that there is clear scientific evidence of genetic involvement.
To ignore either aspect is disingenuous and closing ones mind.
Lee, your comment is unbelievable. If there is no sexual/marital stability, there is no societal stability. This is demonstrable in multiple ways. People with stable ‘trad’ families do clearly better at school and are clearly less prone to depression and related problems. DIvorce is the most shattering experience other than bereavement. Embracing the sexual revolution means wishing this negative experience on countless millions more people than would otherwise experience it. Embracing the sexual revolution also means multiplying child abuse – look how the stats have gone up since the 1960s, because of the multiplying of live-in boyfs, stepfathers. Anyone who approves and normalises such alternative families is therefore anti-social and does not care about harming others indirectly.
In the 1950s there were essentially two drugs and two STDs – now there are many killer varieties of both. Intelligent people would wish to learn from a society advanced enough to keep both down to just two
Then marriage would benefit gay people too, Dr CS. Monogamous gay people (of which there are many) could benefit from all the good things you say marriage brings.
They don’t want to. They regularly want to remain promiscuous. I gather that the take-up rate even for civil partnerships even for gays ‘in a relationship’ is around 5%. The overlap here is with adolescent behaviour and irresponsibility.
Correct. But marriage has a civilising effect. It leads to greater longevity and greater happiness, as every survey proves. This means it brings in its train -on average – a healthier lifestyle and more stable behaviour.
Re what you say about divorce statistics, you could not be more wrong. Divorce statistics are very low apart from in sexual revolution societies where they are very high. This proves conclusively that the problem lies not with marriage itself but with the sexual revolution which is the common denominator in societies which fail on this score.
Oh, and I noticed your comment about marriage increasing longevity. I read that for MEN who are married that is true, but for women not so.
However, I’d like to get married – so why, if it’s such a great thing and if you’re so disappointed that, as you claim, not many gay people want to get married, are you not up there at the front in our campaign for equal marriage shouting out the benefits for gay people and encouraging us all to get married?
“Divorce statistics are very low apart from in sexual revolution societies where they are very high. This proves conclusively that the problem lies not with marriage itself but with the sexual revolution which is the common denominator in societies which fail on this score.”
You have conclusive proof based on statistics… really ??? you have conclusive proof ??
“…”It leads to greater longevity and greater happiness..”
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mmm another uneducated assumption. May I remind you of Rudolf Brazda, last of the Pink Triangles who has died aged 98.
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Your assumptions are ridiculous and all they do it lead on homophobic fears of seeing the LGBTQI as anything as normal and just like you. Maybe it’s because it’s a threat to you because you’re so insecure you’d have to question yourself but deal with it and stop taking it out of us.
What utter crap again.
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The difference now is that people are no longer forced to stay in failed relationships, where many end up violent and resentful.
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Think it says more about you that you’d rather people were like that.
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I have to ask is this because you believe the old nutters excuse of where a womans place is and all that with the man in charge?
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It has nothing to do with the sexual revolution one bit.
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It has Everything to do with bigotted people who won’t accept change or a better more equal society.
Again I remind you that tripping the sustainable population of the only planet we have and then neglecting to provide basic human rights such as food and shelter indicates to me that heterosexual activity is no longer a beneficial and civilizing contribution to society regardless of profitable religious and dogmas written in stone.
Chris, if you are so intelligent at rejecting harmful change, go ahead and reject global climate change then…and don’t wait until your basement is flooded.. do it now, sunny boy.
Eh? SOME gay people may not want to, just like some straight people may not want to. I would never have a CP – not because I’m not monogamous (I am) but because I want to MARRY the person I love. That is one reason for a low uptake of CPs. There are others.
Ah, I see. I debate if you are a doctor being that you not only seem completely uneducated but clearly making assumptions about the LGBT community because knowing the truth, that we are just the same as everybody else, scares you.
I certainly hope you are not just the same as everyone else. Since then you would be clones and unable to think for yourselves. Which I am sure is not the case.
I am still a human being with all the emotions and feelings, you know. I also love in the same way. It is irrelevent if that love is to someone of opposite or same sex. The world would be a far better place if people stopped interfering in things they not only don’t want themselves but who are intend on stopping others when they have no right to.
Christopher Shell PhD, you clearly have little or no knowledge of history. Stable ‘trad’ families may have been of some use in sustaining an image of social stability but, as you should well know, were often not sexually exclusive – for the men at least. And to be reporting statistics on marital stability from the US, the country that led the nominally Christian world in making divorce socially acceptable is somewhat ironic, wouldn’t you say?
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Your observations on child abuse too are fatuous, given the degree to which such matters were not reported or recorded in the past.
I reported USA figures deliberately for one reason. Namely: if even the USA can hit 80%, then other countries’ figures will be higher. Which makes marital faithfulness astonishingly widespread.
So you genuinely believe that 80% of all married people in the US will never have sex with anyone other than their partner till death does them part? Bless.
I certainly don’t believe that. Why not? Because it is not what the stats say. The stats said (I think around 15 years ago) that of those *presently* married in the USA 80% had been completely faithful *to date* (and possibly also *to their present partner* – I don’t recall). So there are either 2 or 3 changes to be made to your presentation of what is actually being said here. 80% is still a good figure, and it is nowhere near in the same ballpark as the gay stats – which is of course my main point.
Oh, for goodness’ sake! How can you have comparable statistics about gay relationships, because 15 years ago the were no lawful gay relationships! Can you not see how flawed your attempt at logic is?
Eh? Has there not been plenty of time in the last 15 (actually 50) years for statistical research on such matters? I think all the studies I refer to come from a generation after 1959 when homosexuality was legalised in the UK.
Civil partnerships did not become law in the UK till 2004. If you’re going to be scrupulous about comparison, you cannot possibly compare couples who are unable to marry only with legally married couples.
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You also seem curiously unaware that homosexuality was not decriminalised in the UK until 1967.
Yeah I wrote 1967 and then deleted it – but to be honest I think it was a 2-stage decriminalisation 1959 & ’67 (Wolfenden report)? I may be wrong. Wouldn’t you agree that this 8-year gap does not change the main point that my statistics come from well after 1967?
A good way to get the statistics you need for your argument, Dr CS – let gay people marry, wait a requisite number of years and then compare the marriages of those gay people and a comparable group of straight people.
Here’s another thing you might wish to consider. I have no desire to marry someone of the opposite sex, but I don’t feel the need to start up a campaign to ban straight marriage, nor do I take great interest in the sex lives of straight people (because straight sex is of no interest to me).
In addition, no straight man I know shows the slightest bit of interest in what gay men do in bed. Indeed, I’ll go further – no normal person cares what other consenting adults do in bed.
To let gay people ‘marry’ would be to deny the most basic lessons of nature. Why do you discriminate against groups of three or more people in allowing ‘marriage’. There is only one thing that is biologically limited to two (two being the number you are irrationally biased in favour of). It is not sex or bonding (which can both easily involve more than two), but childbirth through one man and one woman. So same-sex partnerships are excluded from the one thing where nature privileges the number two.
Chris’ Shell you keep going on about 2 this and 2 that (well wotcha know me and my man make 2) but you do seem to be speaking an awful lot of ‘Number 2′!
Jock – answer the question. Nature highlights the number two in only one way: a heterosexual way (childbirth). So what is the connection between gays and 2 that allows discrimination against 3,4, and other numbers?
You sure talk a lot of fundie Christian talk for someone who seemed affronted at being called a Christian, Dr CS.
Marriage is NOT just for procreation. many married couples choose not to have children, can’t have children, use Assisted Conception, etc etc.
LGBT people are no less fertile than straight people and can and do have children. In fact, they make very good parents because we don’t have ‘accidents’.
Nature does no such thing actually, the chosen lifestyle of Religion does.
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Nature includes none discriminating love however religion does not.
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Nature doesn’t discriminate and preach hatred, however religion does..
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Need I go on? I don’t think so. We get the picture and to be quite honest, it’s not like your load of nonsense isn’t something we’ve all heard before. It’s just something to justify your warped twisted mind but hey why don’t you keep your hatred bottled up and leave us to our happy individuality and life of lovelyness.
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Jealous much?
Perhaps the good doctor has a profound sense of mission, like a fisherman trying to catch the big fish and expecting a divinity to intervene in his favor at the right moment, like a soldier carrying out orders regardless of how ridiculous they seem to himself, or again like an employee trying to eek out a living without a useful education or trade.
Nature privileges the number 2 in childbirth (1 man, 1 woman: only that combination of 2 people). Sex and bonding need not involve 2 people. So name just one way in which the number 2 should receive biased treatment over higher numbers in the case of homosexual people.
Hi Iris
I’m not affronted at being called a Christian. The opposite: I am thrilled, privileged etc to be a Christian. It is the best. But my arguments depend not on dogmatic Christianity (which would make them invalid) but on logic, reason and common sense, and statistics. When the statistics change, my view automatically changes with them. I don’t have views separate from the statistics.
On overpopulation: It is impossible for me to understand the conscience (or lack of one) that would allow anyone to kill another human being. The conscience must ahve dgone through a ruthless deadening process akin to brainwashing to allow itself to do that.
Nature made me the way I am, just as it did you.
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However Chosen religion chooses to not accept and discriminate who I am. (Some not all)
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Being that many think nature and God are the same thing and your not supposed to question God esp on his/her/its creation then doesn’t that make you and your lot a big steaming pile o’ hypocrite?
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Me thinks so.
This is the first time we hear you mention logic, reason and common sense. You have consistently insisted that your opinions are more intelligent than ours because they are based solely on statistics.
Also you said:
“On overpopulation: It is impossible for me to understand the conscience (or lack of one) that would allow anyone to kill another human being. The conscience must ahve dgone through a ruthless deadening process akin to brainwashing to allow itself to do that.”
I frankly am at a total loss to understand why you immediately associate overpopulation with the killing of another human being. Beside the fact that it cannot be blamed on the LGBT community, It is plain enough that overpopulation could not possibly occur if heterosexuals were aware of the beneficial or harmful effects of their sexual activity on the global population.
As for the ethics of killing, the entire subject seems to have escaped your attention.
To try to stifle his own gay urges? Or to try to make himself feel better by denigrating others?
I’m going for the first of those due to his assertion that you can choose to be gay (that suggests he’s felt gay feelings and rejected them) and due to the fact that for a ‘straight’ man he spends a huge amount of time obsessing over gay men.
My interest is derived from my being a truth-seeker. The greatest cover-up in the UK & USA today surrounds the gay issue. Truth-seekers want to bring the truth to light.
“The greatest cover-up in the UK & USA today surrounds the gay issue.”
What?? Are you serious?
Do you have any idea how much is covered up by multi-nationals corporations who deprive native populations of their lands and minerals, leaving death and pollution behind?
Your use of the “greatest’ effectively defines your exaggerations, doc.
I think recent events in UK politics have demonstrated that an LGBT issue is not the principle area in which there has been cover up. I would argue completely the opposite – that transparency has been the major issue that has been prevalent in LGBT issues – and seeking true equality (not being treated the same but valued equally and recognising professional requirements transcend ideological viewpoints) is a clear expression of this
In terms of cover up – try Catholic child sex abuse, EDL, hacking etc etc
Dr CS, I’d add my call for you to please link to statistics you think have been covered up – ie ones you consider particularly important.
I don’t believe they’ve been covered up. I seem to remember reading numerous articles about risks of certain things in certain groups of people, including LGBT people.
I don’t accept this. I think all the comments I’ve made are objective, reasonable, and without prejudice, unlike some of yours.
For example, I should point out that I’m a an atheist, but I haven’t attacked your beliefs etc or tried to deny your rights to hold such beliefs (which are just that, beliefs, as opposed to homosexuality/bisexuality, which are fact). I respect your right to be a Christian, and hope this brings you happiness. I don’t think I’ve a right to tell you how to lead your life; it’s a shame you don’t offer the same courtesy to others
“If there is no sexual/marital stability, there is no societal
stability.”
Out of curiosity, are you opposed to gay marriage?
I’m bisexual (apparently the most promiscuous of all groups), and I’m monogamous. In fact, I’m planning to propose later this year.
I also don’t accept your statement. I think people with children should try to resolve all issues and remain together, for the sake of
I don’t remember saying I am a Christian – though of course it is true that it is Christians who evoke facts and statistics on this topic where others would do anything to avoid them. The arguments against gay behaviour are nothing to do with Christianity. They are to do with reason, logic, statistics, and medicine.
If I believed X was a ‘sinner’ would I be able to discriminate against that person?
This whole thing is starting to sound more like the ridiculous so called ‘Christian’ argument in the USA where people discriminate against gays because their God told them to.
This is the 21 century and this nonsense must stop.
I wonder about the other two cases. There is nothing in the bible that says you HAVE to wear a cross, so what is this about, so why are they demanding that right on religious grounds. In fact being brought up as a Roman Catholic I have a couple of jewellery crosses. I won’t wear them because as far as I’m concerned the cross is a false idol, and you should not worship false idols!
In both cases of crosses they have the right to wear a cross. The nurse could not wear it round her neck as it could be grabbed by a patient but could wear it as a broach. Not good enough for her. The BA woman was told by BA she could wear it and was offered £8,500 compensation. The tribunal found no discrimination though and that is what she is appealing. The CLC have wound both up.
In nursing I can tell you that jewellery is strongly frowned upon. It is simply a matter of protection. Angry or confused patients can grab the, have done in the past and can cause significant injury.
You’re not really supposed to even wear a wedding ring.
A wedding ring could not easily cause harm. That is health and safety gone mad. And why is there no argument for people beiong allowed to wear a cross at their own (slight) risk, especially if it may bring benefits in opening conversations?
But it could harbour germs. And yes, it could cause harm. Why do you think any rings a patient’s wearing are removed or taped before an operation?
In nursing you don’t just take risks for yourself but of others too.
Yes to all that. But how often does it actually happen that a ring causes harm?
Well, hopefully never if the guidelines are followed…
In certain clinical areas I would accept the argument re infection control, but in some clinical areas either there are already so many uncontrollable risks this negligable one (ie wedding bands) is of little if any significance or infection control is barely relevant due to the issues at hand
Hahaha The God Question… No-one has found any evidence for a god, but Shell knows its existence, which out of thousands that have been believed in, is the real one, and also claims to be so in tune with that god’s mind, he knows god’s plan for everyone else. Typical christian humility.
Charles Darwin’s explanation for why we are here can also apply to the evolution of the universe. A ‘designer’ of the cosmos would have to be intelligent, complex and highly improbable. Evolution – which SHell doesn’t believe in of course – tells us that such things appear late in the life of the universe, not at the beginning. Shell just pushes the problem one stage back. If a god is outside time, then why take ’6 days and 6 nights’ anyway? Begs the question…. Science has moverd on – anti-matter offers interesting avenues of exploration too. Shell logic: ‘we don’t know for sure, therefore god did it’.
Adrian, I advise you to go back through your comment and enumerate the different times when you have put words into my mouth which you cannot document.
I share with you a strong scepticism towards those who take the easy way out by saying ‘We can’t explain X therefore God did it’ without arguing this either logically or scientifically – or even giving a picture of what ‘God did it’ might mean to someone who was there to observe. It is at present the case that the idea of everything (ie a universe of more stars than grains of sand) having originally been squeezed into a space smaller than a full-stop is unsatisfactory for 2 reasons: (1) it is more improbable than any fairy tale; (2) it does not even explain the existence of what constituted that full-stop. In addition (3) scientists know how inadequate it is and therefore postulate without evidence that the universe ‘has always been there’ or that there are multiple universes – which just increases the problem – and without evidence.
What I was asking for was a case-history of even one ring causing harm, or evidence for how many times per year a ring actually does cause harm.
Look at it think way, you may make assumptions about harm but why do you think the male G-Spot is where is it?
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I’ve not heard of any harm because of anal sex it’s a typical Christian response because they just keep wanting to make issue all the time. They can’t think about anything else but sex then project that it’s us that are pervs.
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Thank Gaga, Gay men, Lesbians just get on with our lives rather than poke our noses in to everyone elses.
Are you being purposely obtuse? Rings don’t feature in hospitals because of the ban so how can you expect to find evidence of injuries they caused??
If you care enough, why don’t YOU contact the BMA or similar for information about the reasons the ban was introduced and when? Remember to ask them for a number of research studies though because I’m sure you won’t accept a simple common-sense answer or pictorial evidence of individual injuries or infections.
yuk, yuk…
Which provides precisely no evidence that rings are actually dangerous. Not an iota. QED.
There you are with the fake ‘Dr’ again.
Please answer the question – if you can.
QED? :D You might have a PhD but you’re making yourself look very stupid! This isn’t a thread about hospital rules. If you’re so concerned at proving me wrong YOU look up the evidence.
There are plenty of examples of injuries from jewellery over the years and, in recent times, infections such as MRSA. YOU look them up if you care so much. Or maybe offer your vast expertise to the RCN and the BMA. I’m sure they’d be very grateful.
Or is this your clumsy attempt at disrupting the thread?
When did I say ‘jewellery’? I said ‘rings’.
Are rings not jewellery?
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How do you not get that bacteria from rings/jewellery can be harmful, particularly to sick patients?
Much as I love a pedant, you’re just being rather annoying – I said jewellery because otherwise you’d have said “Ah, but what about necklaces?” or something similar but mainly because it’s not only rings that are banned, but other jewellery.
Now:
Rings can harbour infection; they can pierce latex gloves thus increasing the risk of infection to both nurse and patient; rings, particularly those which are raised in any way, can cause injuries when lifting a patient; nurses need to scrub their hands/use disinfectant and that can damage rings or the finger the ring is on if one’s in a hurry; nurses have to do intimate examinations where a ring could cause discomfort or injury to the patient etc etc.
All of that came from a nurse. No doubt I’ve missed bits out of what she said or misremembered details, but the basic points remain. If you want actual figures for ring injuries or infections traced to rings, you’ll have to contact the RCN or similar.
Now, as you’re so keen on evidence, I’m still awaiting your evidence for god – actual evidence not ‘we don’t know the answer so it must be god’.
Of course this can happen – the question I asked is how often it actually does happen. This ban has not always been in place, so figures/evidence would be available from the period beforehand. You are speaking as though you already know it caused significant risk. Without being in possession of stats, it’s clear that you can know no such thing.
Re: God question: the physical world cannot be explained *by* the physical world, since that would be circular. Causation cannot be explained by further causation. That would also be circular. And so on. Therefore people posit that there must be something of a different nature that is able (unlike anything in the present physical world) to be self-existent and/or creative. This is not something anyone is very expert in – it is a great mystery – but it looks like a logical necessity unless we are missing something. We are in a universe with more stars than grains of sand. ‘It just happened’ is meaningless. ‘It has always been there’ begs the question. Jesus’s testimony to God (and that of many particularly wise people) is also significant.
Dr CS, I don’t see the relevance of the degree of risk – ie how often it might happen. Surely if there is ANY risk, then it’s better to be safe than sorry – both out of consideration for the patient, and, sadly, also to avoid legal claims along the lines of ‘that could have been avoided if you didn’t wear that ring’?
Rules vary, as I understand it, depending on where the nurse works. Some hospitals allow one plain band with no stones so, for example, most wedding rings would be OK, others ban all rings.
My relative (the nurse I referred to above) also pointed out – and I’m trying to phrase this delicately – that she would prefer not to expose her precious rings (precious in a sentimental way) to the unavoidable ‘dirt’ in hospital.
Re: God. Yes, there’s a lot we still don’t know about the physical world, but I think the answers are more likely to be provided by science than God. As our knowledge grows, we learn more and more and can explain things that previously were complete mysteries.
I understand what you’re saying about there needing to be something different outside of the physical world to initiate it (I explained that clumsily – sorry) but I don’t see why that couldn’t be another different process rather than a creator.
You talk about going round in circles, but I don’t necessarily see that as a ‘wrong answer’. Some things are circular and some of the theories I’ve read talk about a returning universe, a cycle of universe birth and death and re-birth. Now I know you’ll ask what initiated that cycle and that’s a fair question, but I was taught that god had just always been there, so why can we not posit that some physical process or processes have always been there?
@chris -
I understand what you are saying.
Basically you said:
“people posit that there must be something of a different nature that is able (unlike anything in the present physical world) to be self-existent and/or creative.”
Can you be more specific and tell us which “people” posit this speculation? The same concept is found in primitive societies of the Amazon or the Andaman Islands of India.
Please tell us your source…
@chris -
You said:
“Jesus’s testimony to God (and that of many particularly wise people) is also significant.”
Which ‘wise people’??? John Chrysostom, maybe? Tertullian? NARTH?
@ Dr Christopher Shell
Here are a few examples of studies which show some, no or significant risk in wearing of rings in a clinical setting
Clearly there is a potential risk, and in some scenarios that risk should be eliminated. But as I said in another post – not all clinical scenarios will justify this
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19301805
http://www.nursingtimes.net/whats-new-in-nursing/rings-increase-infection-risk/1440240.article
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0020748908000588
Because ‘have always been’ explains nothing.
You say that if there is any risk one should not so domsthing. Everything you have done this morning contained some element of possible though unlikely risk. Even staying in bed has its own risks. So the question is whether the risks are sufficient to warrant banning it. This can only be determined statistically. If statistics indicate a substantial risk I am in favour of a ban on rings. But I have never seen such stats.
There are some environments where because of the disparity between stats – some supporting the argument there is a significant risk of wearing rings, others saying this is unsubstantiated – that given the wider situation, its right that rings are permitted. However, some such as neo natal critical care (to give one example) where I think it would be immoral to take any risk whether hypothetical or proven.
Thanks for the leads. That is what good dialogue is about: facts, evidence, and research. I am on holiday till 29th.
If we asked these people “is it OK for me to discriminate against someone because of the colour of their skin?” they would be horrified and say no. And yet these “christians” are asking for exactly the same thing – My homosexuality is an innate characteristic, as much a part of me as the colour of my eyes or my skin. Refusing goods/services because of innate characteristics is fundamentally seen as wrong. Religion IS a choice. Choices cannot trump fundamental rights. The argument is that damned simple.
I agree, Valksy, but not all protected groups raise the same response.
For instance, it is contrary to the Equality Act to discriminate against someone on the grounds of age. If a person in a shop refused to serve a teenager then I doubt such a refusal would raise such a high level of moral outrage.
Similarly, it is contrary to discriminate against someone on the grounds of marriage. Yet if an employer refused to allow a single person to take holidays on certain dates or refused to promote a married man because of his family commitments, we would consider it wrong but it might not attract the same level of moral outrage.
Yet again, it would be contrary to the act to discriminate against someone because they were an environmentalist or if they believed that climate change was nonsense (on the protected grounds of belief). If, however, an employer chose not to hire a climate-change denier, that might not generate such a level of moral outrage.
So what’s your point?
There is much outrage at discrimination against gay persons with many people saying that Christians must be forced to follow the law and that breaking the law, of itself, is unacceptable. However, it would appear that it is not the breaching of the law which causes the outrage but the underlying conduct, regardless as to whether or not it is prohibited.
I agree mostly. But for some, being Christian isn’t a choice. It’s something they’re born into, brought up around and celebrate.
That doesn’t make all Christians hateful of gay men and women.
My colleague is a black Christian, Jamaican descent. Goes to church and is heavily involved with her faith. She is one of the most accepting, open minded and warm people I’ve ever met.
She acknowledges that there are many who find the whole gay thing hard to fathom but she is a firm believer is making a judgement on how the person IS..rather than what they’re into.
On one hand we accuse the religious of bigotry and yet on the other we don’t give the vast majority of christian men and women out there a chance for them to support us. We just assume wrongly that they’re all spiteful.
Yes, I know that it’s an odd belief. I’m not a christian. But if something gives someone a little faith or hope – who are we to stop them having that.
@Mendirin….
……”we don’t give the vast majority of christian men and women out there a chance for them to support us. We just assume wrongly that they’re all spiteful”.If that is the case why don’t they as that vast majority speak up and be heard. Yet they all frequent churches and such wher bigotry is preached every week and to be frank i find it hard to believe that they are supportive. Why would anyone want to be a member of an organisation that is at odds with their own beliefs, ie; that discrimination is wrong. Some of these xtians wantt us dead for fcuk sake. How many Jews were members of the Naz! party i wonder?……. because that is what this “vast majority” compare to.
@Paddyswurds
It is a difficult issue we have sparred on many times, and although we are clearly in agreement on some aspects of the complex argument there are some strands where we profoundly disagree.
I wholeheartedly agree that it would be beneficial both to the LGBT communities and to those of whichever faith who are LGBT accepting to be more vocal – although some are, but the media is not interested when there is a lack of conflict (to be fair), that said – that should not prevent them trying harder to be more vocal.
I find the whole frantic anti-faith venom from some on PN (and elsewhere) to be comparable to other ideological scenarios. There is almost a simplistic approach from both sides – those who are anti-gay and of faith sometimes fail to see humanity in gay people, and some LGBT people who are virulently anti faith allow their ideology to cloud the fact that there are strands of belief that do not fit their narrow definition of Christian etc.
continued
…
If you empathized with an Israeli (bear with me for a second) whose daughter had been murdered by a suicide bomber on a bus in Bethlehem, they would acknowledge the human despair, hurt, loss and suffering that you identified with. Equally, if you empathized with a Gazan whose son had been in a cafe that was struck by an Israeli rocket attack and died as a result of the injuries they incurred then they would also feel the loss, hurt and suffering in a similar way to the Israeli family. However, ask a Palestinian to understand the hurt of the Israeli family or vice versa and it is likely (from various reputable academic sources who have tried to address the juxtapositions) they would fail to understand or comprehend the others sorrow.
I feel some of the antagonism of faith vs LGBT has similarities and sometimes a lack of ability to understand others views and situations.
point taken, Stu…
Thanks, Jonpol
Perfectly said, Valksy.
hear hear
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Lol @ refusing to serve someone because they are gay
Yes, because it specifically says in the bible, “ye shall not sell mars bars to the unclean”
There was a case a while back about a Christian couple who ran a private b&b from their own private residence refusing to let a gay couple stay. This, i can respect, given that it’s their home. But for a general premises such as a shop, it’s bang out of order (not sure what the cases here are, they may not be shops) I’d just take what I wanted and leave. Their loss.
As long as the Christian couple were charging for accommodation, had to abide by fire regulations, have planning permission and pay business rates and taxes (which they did) then their B&B was a business like any other. Besides, in accordance with regulations as applied to such premises, their private accommodation was separate.
Actually it isn’t their home. As soon as it becomes a B&B it becomes a place of business and therefore is covered by all of the same rules and regulations as any other business. The fact that they also live in their business premises does not preclude them from following all laws be they to do with discrimination, employment or health and safety.
If it is not their home, where is their home?
Bobbleobble knows perfectly well that it is also their home. The privileging of business over family is precisely what is wrong with this country. Family is of course more important than money.
@bobbleobble…
…..actually it is also their home …living over the shop so to speak. I used to run a B&B and it was my home as well as a business and it was inspected every year to enable licencing.
@Paddyswurds
I agree it is their home. I agree they should be entitled to choose who to accept into both their home and their business – eg there is no dispute that people who are abusive or hygenically offensive etc etc can be refused admission to a leisure centre, hotel, cafe etc etc.
However, they can not discriminate with regards business on clearly prejudiced issues eg refusing to accommodate someone because they are Muslim, bisexual, disabled etc
These restrictions clearly do not apply to their own private residential area which they will have, nor at times they choose to close their business
You see the difference yet between wicked hatemongers and peaceful people who simple care about people like they are suppose to. there is a teacher in london starting charites for the lgbt families victums unit those families harmed emotionally and otherwise children bullied and traumatized, do you see the charity and kind heart moved to empathy and care and concern for others verses, the monsters who lie aabout being christians who abuse and harrass people and start trouble and kaos every where they go , bothering peopkles families and children, what more do you need to no about who is the evil person , the liars who are abusing our society, and calling themselves christian, or real people who do not go around calling themselves christian , and helping fight for humanity , and showing kindness , and charity, these people are the real christians, do you idiots get this, its not the one lying about being a christians and doing evil hateful evils to others, its the real good samaritans
Ahh. You seem like a really nice person. Jesus would be proud of you. But Carrie, don’t go to any high school proms feeling angry. It’ll be a blood bath. And just a small question. You seem to think that christians are very good people. How do you explain the christians like the pope or george bush or the far right christians in USA or the christians who want to change the law so they can discriminate against us etc. etc.
I didn’t read Carrie’s comment like that. I thought she was saying that behaving in a hateful manner wasn’t exactly christian and those who do so should look to other Christians who behave in a better way.
None of that means she’s a Christian (although she may be).
If Christians were true Christians they would follow the WHOLE of the Bibles teachings not select chapters and verses… And we all know that is totally impossible for them to do!
That is not right. The bible is not to be taken literally and some parts of it are of more relevance than others. What you have said is actively deprecated in theological study.
I don’t agree. If you are going to insist that one part of the bible has to be taken literaly, then ALL parts of the bible must be taken literally.
First, I don’t insist that any of it should be taken literally and neither do any modern serious theological academics. Second, I cannot see the logic that if some part of it were to be taken literally then it had to follow that all of it should.
It seems to me as if you are the one trying to crucify yourself upon a cross of gold. I prefer to update the meaning of texts in line with modernity and modern understanding.
Then why bother with it at all if only the bits that suit are theologians personal interpretations are believed.
If one accepts that the bible was written by men, then one can point to those points which are more relevant or to those stories which can be updated. The same is true of any form of literature or poetry. Rarely is something “all or nothing” – everything in life comes in shades of grey and biblical interpretation is no exception. For myself, I welcome compromise and discussion over dogmatism in all areas.
De Villiers – you are saying that ‘modern serious theological academies’ do not insist that *’any’* of the Bible be taken literally. Any???? If anyone were at academy level they would never make such an utterly sweeping statement. How all or nothing can you get? Does that mean that *every* single literal claim (Jesus was born, Jesus was crucified, Pontius Pilate was gov or Judea, Paul visited Ephesus) could be false? Can’t you be a bit more nuanced? Because (despite what you say about modern academies) modern academies sure would be.
Jonpol and Jockstrap-
You perfectly illustrate the adage that the bigger the generalisation (especially about a vast topic) the less intelligent the person. One would never guess from your words that what people call ‘the Bible’ is in fact a collection of 66 (for Catholics 73) different books by different authors in many different genres. Try generalising about that!
@Chris –
You said:
“Jonpol and Jockstrap-
You perfectly illustrate the adage that the bigger the generalisation (especially about a vast topic) the less intelligent the person.”
Where exactly would I find this adage?
Is there an adage to illustrate a person like you who resorts to insults in a casual exchange of ideas, or haven’t you noticed that no-one here is taking you seriously?
You can generalise it anyway you want but the fact remains – The Bible is written by Over-Inflated male egos whose only intent is to control.
Of course not! The Bible is a library not a book. It is a multi-author library at that. And it is written in many genres of literature (metaphorical not among them, with the lovely exception of the Song of Songs). So why generalise in an all or nothing way? I thought only fundies did that.
The bible has also been defined as a collection of campfire tales of Bronze age nomads.
Written by over-inflated male egos to control the population and nothing more.
@chris -
Having repeatedly asked you to comment on the topic of this thread; having successfully resisted being drawn into the quagmire of your irrational attempts to besmirch a normal sexual orientation, a sexual orientation described as normal by all the major psychological and psychiatric associations in the entire world, a world which has evolved considerably since it was thought to be flat, covered by a heavenly bubble and sitting on the flames of hell, a hell where confusion such as the workings of your twisted mind torments the damned souls while the stench of burning sulfur fills the air, and having recieved absolutely no sign of feedback from you, I can assure that you if you blow your phd out your ear, the little wheels in your brains may start to work again and in no time you will have achieved the greatest of human achievements, i.e. thinking for oneself.
To redeem yourself and NARTH, act now, my boy, and comment on the issue at hand.
I have commented on it already. On any topic at any time, all those who have something new to add are always welcome to advise, and must remain so. The more different bodies advise, the fuller and more accurate one’s picture will be. The fewer, the more biased it will be.
What is the relevance of something being ‘normal’. The selfishness and greed shown in the recent riots is also a very ‘normal’ human tendency indeed. You are correct in referring psychiatrists and psychologists here, as they are precisely the profession who thinks that the one-dimensional approach of asking ‘is X normal?’ is all that is required. They fundamentalistically ignore the question ‘is it beneficial or harmful?’.
No, they don’t.
In fact, much of the research done by mental health professionals is dedicated to those who have suffered by the Church in the past and to those who will rise to lead it into a new era of greatness.
Moreover, medical experts, many of whom have been educated to the strictest interpretation of the faith, have been forced to recognize that magisterial pronouncements from religious authorities do not solve dilemmas of conscience, and do not absolve the right and the duty of acting according to the dictates of one’s individual conscience.
For example, what would you do if your wife were carrying a fetus with no brain and you were forbidden by church authorities to have it aborted?
Further still, I can name at least 11 medical associations in the USA and the UK who are deeply disturbed to see the results of years of research, including statistics, being intentionally misconstrued by NARTH in order to demonize a minority group such as the LGBT community.
Wondering why ‘Mr Shell’ needs to change his name for each comment page to display his blatant homophobia?
Jock S Trap – you can’t *still* be so unintelligent as to believe that all opposition to homosexuality is ‘phobia’. Even an 8-year-old could think of other possible reasons for opposition.
Er – what exactly are you responding too, pepa, oops sorry ‘Christopher Shell’
“Even an 8-year-old could think of other possible reasons for opposition”
But few 8 year olds are as intolerant and nasty as you thankfully.
Yike I hope you are not numbered among the tolerance brigade. There is only one intelligent position to take on tolerance. Only beneficial things should be fostered/encouraged. Only harmless things should be tolerated. Only harmful things should not be tolerated.
If tolerance is a principle for life, that means that *everything* should be tolerated. Even you don’t believe that. So how come you are using ‘tolerance’ without qualifying it thus: ‘tolerance of X’. Most tolerance-advocates want their own peccadilloes to be tolerated and are fed up with truth-telling people reminding them that their behaviour may in certain areas not be tolerable.
“Only beneficial things should be fostered/encouraged. Only harmless things should be tolerated”
Ok, but I suspect you’re including homosexuality in your list of ‘harmful things’ and THAT is what I disagree with. My being gay doesn’t harm anyone else nor does it harm me. If I were to choose to have unsafe sex, yes, that could be harmful, but the harm there is caused by the unsafe sex not by my being a lesbian.
We can ALL lead healthy lives if we take care – and by healthy I include all the many ways of protecting one’s health. Also, we are ALL entitled to a loving relationship with the person we care about and I can’t see why you, I’m assuming, would seek to limit my right to do so.
If I’ve assumed wrongly there, I’d be delighted, but I truly think you have something against gay people in particular.
@chris -
Harmless or harmful to the City of God, no doubt…
Please define these two adjectives and identify the philosophy that sustains them in your mind..
For example, are you talking about a criteria based on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights?
Do you have have an opinion on Human Rights, Doctor Shell?
@Dr Shell
homophobia has a number of definitions to be simplistic and restrict oneself to one of those definitions ie that regarding fear of homosexuality is at best simplistic and at worst, falls into the trap you have identified elsewhere of being, a generalisation that is so broad it lacks intelligence.
Homophobia can also be an aversion and not necessarily a fear – some of your comments do appear to be an aversion and thus accurately portrayed as homophobic
Is Dr Shell aka Pepa or Pepa’s alter ego?
Stu, I don’t think so. Pepa is very different, I think (just my opinion).
@Iris
I agree with you now, it was just my immediate impression having read a few replies on here – I think Dr CS is more articulate and intelligent than Pepa but equally dangerous and wrong
Hi Iris
How do you get to the position that a given lifestyle (e.g., homoesexuality) must be regarded as healthy or potentially healthy without further discussion. That requires investigation and evidence before such a ‘conclusion’ is reached. Many are not anxious to access the results of such investigation because of the possible ramifications for their lifestyle.
For example, what are 2 gay men supposed to do together that is not medically unhealthy? Anal intercourse, rimming and fisting are grossly dangerous. Have you ever investigated how thin the lining of the rectum is especially in younger people? Oral ‘intercourse’ becomes risky where above 1 or 2 partners are involved, a ridiculously low number by the standards of the gay world.
You are the only ‘thing’ that causes harm Chris’ Shell.
Well you and that attitude of yours!
Stu
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I have pondered on that one too. Chris Shell – pepa. I think it is, personally.
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He didn’t get anywhere before and this is a new tact that equally isn’t getting him anywhere.
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Shame he doesn’t have a clue on debating.
You really are over obessed with Gay sex ain’t you Chris’ Shell.
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I mean there is nothing wrong with anal sex, I don’t hear you condemning women who do it, just two men. Same with rimming.
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As for fisting, my God man what are you on. Not only is that a small proportion of Gay men but again I don’t hear you saying the same about women who do it, again a small proportion.
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You seem to pick up on a awful lot of ‘Gay’ sex which makes you Very obsession and appear closeted.
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It seems you trying to only attempt to pick what you consider to be the worst of a particular group of people.
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I gather you are also Keith on the other thread to sees all with disgust too.
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Get your head out of the sewer, Mr. Your just making yourself look like one sick pervert coz all you see is sex.
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We are people you know.
All you are doing is taking a group of people you clearly disagree with and clearly know nothing about and make assumption and generalisation about us.
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Kinda makes you the sick twisted one don’tcha think?
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Can’t see if your Gay why how people have sex is a) really any of your concern, we don’t do it and b) why you need to be so obsessed.
Dr CS, firstly being gay is not a lifestyle. If you’re merely talking about sex, then say so. My point is that anyone who lives an unsafe life is at more risk – whether that operson be straight/gay/old/white/Asian etc etc. The risk is created by the unsafe actions of the person. A gay person who leads a healthy life is less at risk than a straight person who leads an unhealthy one.
Regarding anal sex – clearly you have a far greater interest in this than me. I don’t mean to be rude but what on earth are you thinking/reading about gay sex so much? I thought your interest was religion.
You had earlier mentioned that gay men had fewer options regarding sex – that’s just wrong. Gay men and women have exactly the same ‘equipment’ as straight men and women, and don’t have access to any further choice of sexual acts. We’re all the same! We can all choose from a selection of sexual acts.
As for your insinuation about gay men and oral sex – seriously, what kind of stuff do you READ online?
@ Iris -
Good one, and excellent presentation rebuttals all the way.
If you’ll forgive a momentary divergence from this topic, I am simply attempting to focus this interesting discussion on civil rights, which I believe was the original issue of this article:
August 12, 2009 – On this date, in a reminder that elections do matter, President BARACK OBAMA posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Gay Civil Rights pioneer HARVEY MILK. Also honored at these ceremonies was the tennis legend BILLIE JEAN KING.
Indeed, me being Gay should just mean that I am attracted to men yet Chris’ Shell immediately becomes obsessed with it being about sex.
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Clearly because he cannot think about anything else.
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Then he has the cheek to try and make out we’re the ones who are unhealthy.
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Deluded much?
Thanks for that, Jonpol. I’m a particular fan of Harvey Milk. And no problem – you weren’t interrupting. Dr CS’s gay sex obsession was creeping me out a bit anyway. I thought we were going down the route beloved of our dear friend, Mr DS.
@Iris -
eh,eh… you know very well the DS had crossed my mind, didn’t you .. :-)
I believe this thread will be stopped by PN when it hits 600 comments, so here is one thing I would like to add:
“The debate about sexuality within the churches has often been mean and vituperative. Much more attention needs to be paid to those like Bishop Christopher Senjonyo, who articulate a strong Christian case for compassion and justice towards the persecuted LGBT minority in Africa, both inside and outside the churches,” commented Simon Barrow, co-director of the religion and society think-tank Ekklesia. (from ukgaynews.com)
As for Dr CS here, I’m guessing he is every bit as peculiar to the mainstream churches as he is to us.
Also, if there is any truth to his claim that he is a Cambridge graduate, then one of these days Cambridge will catch up to his twisted hate mongering and deliberate antagonism of a legitimate minority group and nullify his degree, bless his sole.
This is a good development. The state itself should remain secular – not neutral that America but actively secular like France.
This is a good development. The state itself should remain secular – not neutral like America but actively secular like France.
Uh oh, –freind–Listen this what i am telling you , you must stop people from using the word christian and god and all the names, in bible false prohets, or just mega church men and women who have gotton rich off of brainwashing poor people and trying to tell them to do what they do and not do what they dont want them to do , to dislike the people they dont like and to like the other bad people who are like them, bush is evil and so is the other men and women like bachman that use that name, that send hate attacks after other famiies, bush having affairs with condolizza rice, and staying drunk in all the papers, do you really think his is a real christian, he also hund out with the colored negro false pastor that rapped all of those under age boys , he just settle the lawsuit for it, this was bushes running buddy, they are all linked to other evil people and the skeletons and skulls to that his club, look it up , its the klu klux klan, i did, he isnt the only senators name in that
Carrie, If I read your posts out loud and really fast in the style of Vicky Pollard I find it much easier to understand.
“Yeah, but… no but, like I was sayin’…” I think Carrie could do with using a few more full stops in her posts and a few less random tangents!
But I’ve been known to write a fair few running sentances myself, so I don’t want to judge ;)
I fvcking love carries’ posts. especially when read in vicky pollard style. thanks for that top tip pavlos. genius. But carrie calling someone a colored negro is a bit weird.
Good news…so the only people causing confusion amongst everyone. employees and employers are the EHRC? So much for their so called intention of saving costs and aggro into an already settled issue..
So glad to see the Christian Inst are peeved with Angela Mason, sure would like to have a statement from the EHRC confirming what she said…
That’s reassuring news. I’m hopeful that the NSS bring some considered thought to the affair. But I still find it distasteful that this is even being discussed when it refers to christians asking for the right to discriminate. What next? Christians asking for their prejudice against black people to be allowed by the state? After all, some Christians have used the Bible to justify racist attitudes in the past.
Iris, do you have any references to back the statement ‘some Christians have used the Bible to justify racist attitudes in the past’? If so, please post here?
If proven by documented evidence, the above could be a very poweful statement to support equality.
Personally, equality is always & only achieved in the absence of harm: wearing crosses causes no harm and should be permitted; whereas, professionals in public roles should never be allowed to harm others by refusing to serve or engage with others, in the disguise of religous bigotry. This theory can be strongly applied to women who, even in this day, are refused contraceptive treatments in the name of religious objection… shocking! The NHS is a public service: funded by ALL tax payers (regardless of background) & open to everyone (regardless of background)…
As a healthcare professional, I see a discrete yet shocking level of religious bigotry against contraceptives. This must stop.
Align with women/black rights
Actually, john c, Iris is right. Sadly, folk down the ages have used the Bible to justify all sorts of erroneous notions, including the superiority of the white race.
I don’t get your contraceptive point though. Please can you elaborate? This has widespread ramifications e.g. prescribing to minors without parental consent or ignoring the case for abstinence and abortion e.g. in the case of the morning after pill. I am not sure of the RC teaching these days?There clearly is a debate to be had – but we may be going off topic!?
John,
In the United States religious institutions (at least those for white people) played a significant role in racial oppression up to very recent times. Those groups and individuals clinging to racial bigotry still can be heard citing “Christian” beliefs to back up their prejudices.
This citation (http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_slav.htm) links to a discussion regarding Christianity and slavery rather than more modern aspects of racism, like miscegenation laws [you can find a discussion of Loving v. Virginia here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loving_v._Virginia) that includes references to religious groups beginning to oppose these views but not to the role that other groups played in supporting these discriminatory viewpoints].
This does not of course mean that all religious groups or religious people are racists, homophobes, trans phobes, or just plain bad. For whatever reason, perhaps because Christianity also played a very positive role in the Black Civil Rights Movement in the US, most white religious people (attending historically racist institutions) seemed to be willing to let that part of their churches teaching slink away as quietly as possible as time went on.
Iris: I know how strongly you feel against racial discrimination and of course it is wrong and in my view no right thinking Christian should hold such views and certainly not be allowed to exercise these in the workplace or in public office. However, many Christians do feel sex between members of the same sex is wrong in a way that being black isn’t, based on their beliefs and while not wanting to be discriminatory, do wish to be able to act according to their conscience. For example, how can a Christian counsel a gay couple in how to improve their sex life when they dont believe that couple should have a sex life in the first place?
Hi JohnB. Thanks for answering re the ‘biblical racism’ above. Firstly, let me stress I am not implying that all Christians are/were racists or homophobic.
But to answer your points, Christians NOW may feel that being black isn’t ‘wrong in the same way being gay is’, BUT in the past some of those same people could indeed have felt is was just as wrong.
I don’t want to repeat racist rubbish here, but I’m sure you know what I’m talking about. That is progress, in the same way that an improving attitude to women is progress. I hope that Christians will soon progress towards an understanding that LGBT people aren’t ‘bad’ anymore than straight people are – no better, no worse.
I would think that counselling people about their sex lives was a poor career choice for a Christian. How many people are virgins when they marry now, for example? How many people re-marry after divorce (ie commit adultery according to the Bible)?……..
(continued)….Would a Christian counsellor question straight people about their marital state and what precisely they do in bed?
Briefly, I don’t feel it’s up to ANY counsellor to judge someone else’s sex life. Firstly, it’s very weird and slightly creepy; secondly, it’s none of their business. Unless the person is seeking RELIGIOUS counselling re their sex life, I don’t see what place religious comments have in secular counselling.
I don’t foist my agnosticism on the pupils in my class because it’s my job not to, and I don’t expect other employees to foist their beliefs on me when they should just be doing their job.
If the hypothetical Christian is themselves gay and chooses not to have sex, that’s up to them, but it’s NOT up to them to interfere in other people’s lawful love lives – particularly when it only seems to be one group of people they’re discriminating against.
Hi Iris
We will never know if the same people who felt, in the past, black was bad would now say gay is not ok. I have learnt that we are all victims of our own prejudices and are limited by our own narrow world view, knowledge and experience. Even so, I would like to think that a Christian who sincerely wants to follow their Lord will act in accordance with principles such as truth, meekness and righteousness. For me, that is my main guiding principle.
I absolutely endorse the idea that LBGT are no better and no worse (taken as a whole) than straight folk. In fact the Bible declares we are ALL sinners and we all need to repent. Sadly LBGT folk are often soft targets since their so called sin is always there. But what about hetero sin, lack of compassion, ignoring the plight of the poor, pride, unkindness and we can go on? Christians certainly need to me consistent on these matters.
@JohnB…
….not that i want to defend racist xtians, but when you and others say it was thought by xtians in the past that Black was wrong that is not quite correct. They thought black people werent human and as such unfit for the “word of god” Indeed they actively forbede black people from learning to read so they couldn’t read the bible, probably the most evil and fraudulant books ever written by man.
No doubt Paddywurds there have been Christians in the past that regarded black people as less than human but I doubt there were many.
As for black people being unfit for the word of God, that is ludicrous. The impact of western missionaries on black majority populations have been tremendous. Not only did they teach the word but they showed practical compassion also.
As for the merits of the Bible, given its author was ultimately Almighty God, who is good, you can draw your own conclusions what I think.
(continued) I have no doubt that in your teaching etc. you respect all points of views and not impose your own. I try to do likewise in my own work. Yet when I have the chance to preach, I do so as that is what Christians are meant to do, but always in the appropriate setting. I do feel privileged having folk from all religious persuasions and none and of all sexual preferences as friends.
I chose the counsellor example as I see the argument against b&b owners not letting rooms to gay couples or registrars not conducting same sex civil unions etc. I understand counsellors are not meant to be judgemental etc. If I were a counsellor, I would feel uncomfortable acquiescing to a cause of action that is wrong. That was the dilemma of the Relate counsellor who was sacked. In a pluralistic society that gay couple should be served but equally peoples’ consciences should be respected. Allocating the case to a counsellor who could serve this couple seems to me to be a reasonable solution.
But I understood that the counsellor in question had no problem counselling other ‘sinners’ – eg the unmarried, the divorced, etc. If he could manage to do that, then why not gay people?
To me, that comes across as personal bigotry – ie he cites his religion as the reason he wishes to discriminate against gay people yet his religion is nowhere in evidence when he counsels other people who, according to his professed beliefs, are just as much sinners.
That’s illogical, hypocritical and mean-spirited, in my opinion.
JohnB, I also don’t understand why you aren’t as worried as I am about the slippery slope of accommodating beliefs. We both have reason to fear racism in our personal lifes.
Racism might be frowned on but there are still many racists around (religious and non-religious, of course). Can you not see that allowing a Christian to refuse to serve a gay person ‘because of their beliefs’ would mean that anyone with racist beliefs could refuse to serve a black person and would need to have their beliefs accommodated.
I think you’re a reasonable person, but there are many less reasonable, less kind, and more prejudiced in our society and we should always bear in mind that just because we wouldn’t wish to do something it doesn’t mean that others wouldn’t either.
I’m trying to avoid personal references here, but think what that would mean for both you and me. What a horrible situation that would be. Somebody refused service because of their skin colour….
Ok Iris: I think I get your point – similar I would say to that of challenging Christian registrars who will marry divorcees etc. but not conduct civil partnership ceremonies.
I don’t know all details to come to a firm view, but if each one of us is a sinner, a counsellor intent on challenging sinful behaviour could find it difficult to counsel anyone if of the view that behaviour is ok.
I doubt this man is a bigot or a homophobe but rather he honestly believes he can help some of the other sinners coming to him, according to his remit, but in the case of the gay couple there will be tensions that would put extreme strains on the counsellor client relationship.
In my naivety, I once believed counselling was about helping people reach right decisions. In our relativistic world the notion of right and wrong is rendered meaningless. Shame, because I would have thought folk who know the truth could, if balanced with grace, make the best counsellors.
Ah well, back to the mowing …
…. Having to wait to one side humiliated while someone is found to serve them. And yes, that COULD happen. It’s the logical progression of allowing people opt-outs because of their beliefs. Such a divisive society is not something to aim for, surely?
That’s why we have the Equality Act to ensure that we’re all treated equally. I’m not a Christian but I CERTAINLY don’t want an opt-out allowing me to refuse to deal with Christians. Why would ANYONE seek permission to discriminate?
I trust that you’re a good person, so all I’d say is don’t be fooled by the CLC and make up your own mind about whether you agree with their actions because their motivation isn’t quite as innocent as they portray it, in my opinion. I think they are seeking special rights for Christians and are pushing very aggressively to be involved in politics in the same way some US Christian groups are.
Enjoy your mowing, JohnB :D Re the counsellor, I’m sure he often had to talk about situations that seemed wrong to him – sex before marriage, for one. All I object too is his singling out of gay people to refuse to deal with.
Truthfully, I suspect that most LGBT people wouldn’t wish to see such a Christian counsellor anyway. So if his religion was the priority for him, he could be a CHRISTIAN counsellor, be self-employed or employed by a church, and that way LGBT people could avoid him if they chose and Christians could actively seek him out. But in a public job, employed by someone else, he’s not permitted to discriminate.
Iris: thank you for your customary courteous response. I know we disagree on a number of points but I do see (perhaps not as clearly as you) the concerns you raise.
I am not here to defend CLC and will take note of your word of caution. But I do get their weekly email summarising issues of concern and find myself often agreeing with them and feeling glad they are prepared to take up these causes despite the ridicule.
Let me assure you that I have nothing against gay folk and often I accept their valid concerns. Equally, I feel Christians also have valid concerns regarding the practise of their faith although a bit of persecution can be a good thing.
More importantly, I do see a conflict between two world views – Christian and secular, and honestly believe the rejection of Christian principles to be detrimental to our society.
But again, I appreciated our exchange and for you making your points.
And I appreciate your courtesy too, JohnB. I also appreciate your open mind and your willingness to discuss and debate in a respectful manner as opposed to some other people on Pink News. I like talking to you even though we sometimes disagree. :D It’s interesting to hear your concerns because you state them in a polite and reasonable way. I know your faith is important to you.
I would hope that many of the principles you call Christian are shared by those who have no faith. I’m sure there are many overlaps.
Enjoy the rest of your weekend. :)
Thanks also Iris. You too enjoy today – the sun is shining and there is always hope and beauty.
It would be wrong to think being gay and Christian to be mutually exclusive. Clearly, there are those with feet in both camps. I feel particularly for them as the conflicts, frequently highlighted in in PN, must seem acute at times.
I am mindful that we all share a common humanity and, coming out of our exchanges, concerns such as social justice. I wish you well :-)
@JohnB
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How is your Plymouth Breathren minsitry these days?
Hi JohnK: PB ministry is going ok. How is yours? Hope you are well. Regards :-)
Well done to the NSS.
I am a member. Please people – make a small donation to them or, even better, become a member.
Maybe the can advise these people, http://www.queerty.com/catholic-church-pays-102-million-and-names-12-molester-priests-in-child-sex-abuse-settlement-20110805/
It’s good that Jesus is coming back soon to help sort out these matters. http://atheistlegitimacy.blogspot.com/
You lot would probably execute him. Wingnut.
@downtown dave..
….foolishly I clicked on your link to see what it was about and was astounded that in 2001 someone could believe such rubbish. I was heartened tho to see you only had three members probably family i suspect. You really do need to have a long talk with a proffessional sometime soon. I hope you are not allowed out alone to be honest.
Seperate issue but there’s a new (I think) epetition been set up for marriage equality
http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/1826
Equal Marriage Rights regardless of gender or sexual orientation – We petition the government to pass legislation that establishes equal rights to marriage, regardless of gender or sexual orientation. In a society where the law has already recognised the integrity and rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans people to have relationships and love, protected from discrimination: we ask for legislation that enshrines equal marriage rights for all. We believe the underlying law of the land should detach equal rights to marriage, from religious objections and practices, since the state is not a religion. We call on the government to remove the clear discrimination and unfairness which presently exists. New marriage legislation, based on justice, equality, and non-discrimination will in no way undermine marriage……etc
….Would a Christian counsellor question straight people about their marital state and what precisely they do in bed?
Briefly, I don’t feel it’s up to ANY counsellor to judge someone else’s sex life. Firstly, it’s very weird and slightly creepy; secondly, it’s none of their business. Unless the person is seeking RELIGIOUS counselling re their sex life, I don’t see what place religious comments have in secular counselling.
I don’t foist my agnosticism on the pupils in my class because it’s my job not to, and I don’t expect other employees to foist their beliefs on me when they should just be doing their job.
If the hypothetical Christian is themselves gay and chooses not to have sex, that’s up to them, but it’s NOT up to them to interfere in other people’s lawful love lives – particularly when it only seems to be one group of people they’re discriminating against.
Sorry – I obviously need more coffee! That comment should be to JohnB above and is hopefully in the right place now so ignore this one.
No problem Iris. I am sure you are pretty normal and sane. I have just been taken to task on the bad side effects of caffine – but point take though (and responded to above). O well, I better sign off for now – need to mow the lawn lol – but first I will have a cup of coffee.
Valksy, you speak of innate characteristics. One thing everyone can agree on is that babies are of an ethnic grouping from birth onwards. It is agreed by all that things are not that simple with regard to sexuality, and for three large and separate reasons. First: there is a choice element. Second: there is an environment element. Third: the genetic element is denied (on present evidence) even by the head of the Human Genome Project. So why would anyone speak as though this were not the case? We need more education, more logic, and more honesty on these matters.
What choice? Gay people don’t choose to sleep with the same sex any more than straight people wake up one day and choose to sleep with the opposite sex. If you somehow feel your sexuality was a ‘choice’ them perhaps you’re bisexual and just need to realise that.
Christopher, I couldn’t disagree with you more. I don’t even think you understand what homosexuality is. Presumably you are straight? Also, what type of doctor are you? I’m hoping that you are not any form of medical professional, because they are some very dangerous views.
Firstly, in the vast majority of cases there is no choice. Yes, you choose to have same sex sex (i.e. homosexual activity) but that is not what defines a homosexual. I believe sexuality is defined by our sexual desires, not our sexual activities. After all, I knew I was bisexual before I ever had sex. Same goes for straight people, they don’t need to have same sex sex to establish whether they’re homosexual or not, they know they’re straight – they were born that way. Sexuality is about who you lust for sex with, not who you have sex with. My friends younger brother is 8 years old, and I strongly suspect he is gay or will one day find out he is gay. He doesn’t even know what sex is, so I find it hard to accept your choice argument.
Which brings to your second point, which I do agree with to an extent. Some peoples environment can influence their sexuality, but this is very rare in my opinion. E.g. Gay sex in prisons involving hetrosexual men. These men aren’t gay, they’re just participating in gay sex. Same goes for married men who come out as gay in later life. They were always gay, but denied it and chose to have sexual relations with a woman (which doesn’t fulfil their needs)
You last point about genetics isn’t entirely true. Just because we don’t understand something yet doesn’t mean we won’t be able to understand it in the future. But there is much evidence that sexuality is genetic, i believe I’m part of this evidence. I was born this way, so it doesn’t get more genetic than that.
Liar, Christopher Shell. First, Francis Collins was not the ‘head’ of the genome project – and secondly he made no such statement. There is plenty of evidence, cf Kariolinska Institutet et al., to show genetic influences. Often in relation to the epigenome (twins study, which you misrepresent) Why don’t you argue your case with the Lancet or the British Medical Journal? Oh yes, I know: other experts in this field would show you up to be an idiot.
And what are you a ‘Dr’ in?
If Francis Collins was not the head of the genome project, what was he?
It is precisely peer-reviewed papers in journals on the level of Lancet and BMJ that bring such negative conclusions re homosexuality.
I did not deny genetic influences (comparative predispositions) – but for every tendency in the world some people are logically going to be comparatively more predisposed than others. You can’t sideline the elephant in the room, which is that we should follow the predispositions to beneficial things, and not follow those to harmful things. I am a Dr in altered states of consciousness in the early church and its ancient Mediterranean background.
I repeat: If Francis Collins did not head up the Human Genome Project, why do we always read that he did?
I am still waiting…
Zzzzz….
yea right, as if you have answered all our questions, chris..
Jonpol, if there are any questions I have not answered, list them numerically and I will try to answer them point by point.
1) Your evidence for god.
2) What your purpose is here on a gay site?
3) Why you refuse to accept that the answer to unsafe sex is education.
4) Why you wish to single out one group of humanity – LGBT people – for your attention.
5) Why you’re so obsessed with what other people may or may not do in bed?
You’ve side-stepped al the questions about your purpose here and the point of what you’re claiming.
And, some of us have had more important things to worry about in the last 72 hours, than promptly replying to this!
Hi Iris-
(1) See my answer above.
(2) Because if people only talk to people who agree with them they never learn anything. Far from being preferable this would be lamentable.
(3) This is easy! The last 40-45 years are the period of sex education in earnest. *Precisely* the same as the period of underage sex, extramarital sex, teen abortions, STDs etc.. QED.
(4) I don’t. I talk to many different groups of people. You don’t know me.
(5) This I have already answered. Society is composed of individuals, and those individuals need to be people of integrity or everyone else suffers in innumerable ways.
Thnak you for answering. Re your answer to 3) I think it is simplistic (no insult meant). People DIED from STDs centuries ago, so it was no golden age. In addition, women died FAR more often in childbirth, so again no golden age. Also, you talk about STDs and then appear to criticise the very sex education that would help inform people of the ways to prevent them. That doesn’t make sense to me.
Re your answer to 5) – I’d like more about what you mean by ‘people of integrity’. How can you tell how much integrity a person has by what they do in bed??
Integrity is linked to sexual conduct because the more partners one has the more soul-ties one develops and the more mixed up one’s identity therefore is as an individual.
I agree that people used to die from STDs but it is obviously medicine (as opposed to the morality of sexual conduct) that has advanced to prevent their doing so. Anyway they still do die in droves from AIDS etc. – *even* in an age of much more advanced medicine.
I never once mentioned the term (cliche) ‘golden age’. All I said was something true, that the less promiscuity is treated as a normal part of life the less it will take place. The societies where it is talked about least are the ones where it takes place least. It is all over our newspapers and our education system in the west, and consequently all over our actual lives as well.
It’s just a shame that people who choose religion feel justified in debating other people because of how they were born yet if you do it to their chosen religious lifestyle they’d be hell to pay!
-
Hi I’m Gay and it In’t up for debate. This is who I am. Unlike Chris’ Shell bigotry, I didn’t choose it, it was how I was born and remains my life of which I am very proud.
But promiscuity is something that straight people do too. Watch Jeremy Kyle and despair, Dr CS. And do you not think that the way gay people were treated in the past (forced to hide, side-lined, etc) may have led to a sub-culture?
Do you not think that treating gay people as equal to straight people and allowing them access to marriage would help?
@ Iris -
I don’t mean to denigrate anyone, but it is harmless to assess that Dr CS would have benefited from being a more effective listener on this thread, instead of moralizing at every turn.
Honestly, I’ve read and re-read this thread, and I have learned nothing new from this troll.
Indeed, Jonpol – except, of course, about the ‘great government cover up’ he mentioned. Soon it’ll be barcodes and the New World Order, I fear.
No – they don’t, because I know of no medical institution that draws conclusions anywhere close to yours. And neither does Francis Collins. It appears you aren’t a doctor in a medical field, but a theological one.
So, I don’t recognise your qualification to talk as an expert on psychological issues.
Since, for the overwhelming majority of gay people, homosexuality is not actually harmful, even though statistics on STDs are indeed terrible, you have no business to meddle in the affairs of others.
It is more likely, that since gay people have been ostracised and discriminated against, that they had to form a separate social scene, that such STDs or alcohol problems are exacerbated. The bottom line, is that there are many diverse sexual orientations, and many ways of living a good life. Stable gay relationships, of which there are many, are one way. You just cannot shoehorn everyone into a ‘traditional nuclear family’ – for many this is hell on earth.
Absolutely we have more important things over the last few days
Pepa/Dr Shell seem to think otherwise from their idyll (which I find less than idyllic!)
I am by no means an expert on psychology. But I seem to be aware of the conclusions of psychological/statistical peer-reviewed papers to an extent which those who need to be aware of them are not.
Hi Stu
If you are saying ‘people are allowed to talk about only one topic at the moment’, who are you to say that? We can talk about whichever topic we like. Including the riots, about which I have talked much, albeit not on this site.
@ Dr CS
Absolutely, people should be free to talk about whatever they like at whatever time provided it does not damage others.
That said, my comment was merely a reflection on your impatience at a lack of response to your comment
@ Dr Christopher Shell,
We do know that in humans sexual orientation is fixed if not from birth then in very early infancy, we do not know what mechanismis, if there is any one mechanism, that is responsible for the 3 most common and normal human sexual orientations heterosexual, bisexual and homosexual. It is generally accepted now that a persons sexual orientation involves a combination of genetic, hormonal and environmental factors plus possibly a myriad other unknown factors that may be different for each individual.
We do now know that sexual orientation is not chosen and that there is no legitimate evidence at all that sexual orientation can be changed at will or by any form of “therapy”. A persons sexual orientation is not an illness to be cured.
@ Dr Christopher Shell,
Regarding choice, it would be highly perverse for a person of homosexual orientation to go against his orientation & choose an opposite sex partner, it does happen where there is general hostility to homosexuality, living life as a closet gay in an opposite sex relationship is mostly a survival tactic. In certain communities, the homosexual person who is not living in the closet may be ostracised, they may be at risk of verbal or physical assault, in other cases and situations they will be at risk of anti-gay laws and may risk arrested and incarceration simply because they refuse to be celibate or to pretend they are straight.
Though it is not possible to deliberately change one’s own or another persons sexual orientation, in a small number of individuals their orientation does appear to change as they mature, perhaps as they become more self-aware as opposed to living up to earlier powerful demands of religious, social & peer pressure.
But the bone of contention is not something called ‘orientation’. I know very well – and it is a good thing – that some people prefer the company of their own gender. However, the particular acts that some of these people are involved in are the bone of contention. Christians are opposed speciafically to sodomy etc.: homosexual *acts*. There is no evidence from nature that they serve a natural purpose. There is plenty of medical/pathological evidence, however, that they are harmful.
@chris -
You say:
“Christians are opposed speciafically to sodomy etc.: homosexual *acts*.”
So if you want to be a good christian, don’t act that way.
And if you want a perfectly healthy long life, purify the air before you breath it, remove genetically modified organisms and all contaminated foods from your diet, wear a code 30 sunscreen, and drink pure water only.
Not a good Christian, just a sensible human being.
Define sensible.
I said ‘proverbially’. Tourists are shown a site bang next to the Red Sea. But what we are talking about is the Bible story and what it is intended to mean, not about whether it is true.
Did I say Red Sea? I meant Dead Sea.
@Dr Christopher Shell
As it is not possible to deliberately change one’s sexual orientation, it would be perverse indeed for a person of homosexual orientation to choose to engage in penile-vaginamy simply because others felt it was a more appropriate mode of sexual expression.
That leaves only celibacy, possibly the most unnatural state for any person to live in, it is a complete denial of one’s very humanity and there would need to be a very good reason for a person to choose to live one’s life as a celibate, I can’t think of a reasonable one.
The sin of Sodom was the townspeoples failure to provide safe hospitality to strangers, neither homosexuality nor homosexual practice is mentioned in the Biblical tale as one of the sins of Sodom if you go back to the source. The attempted gang rape and humiliation of angels by otherwise heterosexual townsmen does not describe homosexuality, it does describe the brutality and violent rape often then used to humiliate one’s enemies.
Not true Pavlos – see the source story, which in some places is word-for-word the same, in Judges 19. The focus is on sex not hospitality. In fact, if we understand know as ‘acquaint ourselves’ lack of hospitality (‘that we may know them’) was the one thing these guys were *not* guilty of. Whereas if we understand it as ‘have sex with’ then it was precisely that offer which demonstrated them to be bad people.
Yes, it IS true, Dr CS. Or maybe you know more than Jesus? In Matthew he specifically criticises inhospitality and links it with the destruction of Sodom:
14 And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet.
15 Verily I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment, than for that city.
Your hateful interpretation is a twisting of Jesus’ words, and not what many Christians believe. But then not all Christians feel the need to use the Bible to justify their own personal prejudices.
Hi Iris-
There are several things wrong with what you say:
All he is saying is that Chorazin and Bethsaida are, for reasons of inhospitality, worse than the proverbial-worst-cities. Those said proverbial worst cities became the proverbial worst for reasons other than inhospitality.
Also: you have not answered my other points. The men outside the house ‘wanted to know’ the guests – that is precisely hospitable, not the reverse. Or if they wanted to know them carnally, then that was the bad thing that led to their being ranked so badly – hence hommsexuality was ranked as bad. So whichever way we translate ‘know’ the result is the same. Also consult the source in Judges 19 where it is clear that the emphasis is on sex.
And an additional point: Sodom and Gomorrah were proverbially sinful. From what you say, they had only one sin: the fabled ‘sin of Sodom’. But that is completely impossible. For if they had had only one sin they swould not have been proverbially sinful. They would have been proverbially saintly.
@chris -
wow…
Have you heard the one about the boy who would not grow up and who lived in Never-Never Land, where a humongous alligator had bitten the hand off the captain of a pirate ship …and then a fairy, yea, just like a sugar plum fairy that could fly and everything and could sprinkle some pixie dust on the bum of the shaggy dog and he ran down a rabbit hole…er…oh no..that’s another campfire tale… the one where the Queen used to say: Off with his head !!!
oh my, talk about an inhospitable attitude, eh?
@Chris -
You said:
“And an additional point: Sodom and Gomorrah were proverbially sinful.”
Can you back that up with statistics, logic, reason or common sense?
Perhaps there is some archeological evidence that these cities existed…
Dr CS – ‘The men outside the house ‘wanted to know’ the guests – that is precisely hospitable, not the reverse. Or if they wanted to know them carnally, then that was the bad thing that led to their being ranked so badly – hence hommsexuality was ranked as bad.’
‘Know’ is taken to be carnally. I agree. But no, it was NOT homosexuality that was ‘bad’. The sin was rape – the men wanted to RAPE the strangers. It’s also implied that the potential rapists were STRAIGHT men wishing to rape to humilate the strangers. Male rape was and is a show of power.
Yes, Sodom’s sins were many, but inhospitality was considered a far, far worse ‘sin’ than today. One was supposed to shelter and feed strangers, not rape and/or rob them.
We ahve already established that it is completely impossible that the most sinful city of all should have just one sin. Rape, homosexuality, doubtless inhospitality as well. The list goes on.
Yes, we agree that Sodom was bad in many ways, but you’ve added ‘homosexuality’ to your list there and I see no evidence for that. Where did god explain that he was destroying Sodom because there were gay people there? And why just Sodom as, of course, there would have been gay people all over the world?
@chris -
You said:
You said:
“And an additional point: Sodom and Gomorrah were proverbially sinful.”
Can you back that up with statistics, logic, reason or common sense?
btw, this is another one of the questions you left unanswered, doc..
“Penile Vaginamy”
Where have I heard that sort of phrasiology before ….
Hmmmm
@Dr Christopher Shell
.
Curious how you think the sin of Soddom and Gomorrah is related to sodomy per se.
.
For some one with a PhD in theology, you should at least know the range of alternative theological arguments, rather than just those from extreme fundamentalist branches of Christinaity.
.
Why have you neglected the argument that the sin of Sodom and Gommorah, is the sin of inhospitality. Moreover, when guests are invited to your party,it is inhospitable to rape them rather than greet than dutifully.
.
Regardless of the sexual practice, rape is rape, and it is not very hospitable.
.
Hi iris
Your logic is impossible. Lot offered his daughters to the would-be intruders to avoid rape?
So he avoided rape of a general kind by facilitating rape of a particularly nasty kind to himself: i.e. the rape of his own daughters?
Surely you can see the illogic of this interpretation and consequently that rape cannot be centrally the sin in mind. It is the sodomites not Lot who are castigated in subsequent literature for vile acts (e.g. letter of Jude in New Testament). Conclusion: within the story (factual or fictional) there was something that was considered considerably worse than the rape of one’s own daughters. What was that thing if not homosexuality?
I do not agree with this priority myself, but we are talking about what the story is actually saying.
Dr CS, my interpretation is perfectly logical and fits with the story. Yes, Lot offered his daughters to be raped. Why? Plenty of possible reasons:
1) Women were valued less than men.
2) Lot knew that God was watching and wanted to stop the rape of the strangers so chose the lesser of two evils in order to protect the guests.
3) Lot realised the strangers were angels and thus protected them by offering his daughters (see 1)
Lot wasn’t exactly a paragon of virtue anyway, in my opinion. He later had sex with his own daughters. And no, I don’t believe he was too drunk to realise.
@Chris –
Thank you.
The Sodom story then is a cautionary tale, composed over a period of time, generated by any number of creative bards, eventually written, on papyrus I suppose, passed on from generation to generation, and given divine authority at some point, as if to tell the children to avoid contact with city dwellers who were not, as they were, among god’s chosen people.
Hi Iris and Lee
I missed a fourth point: circumstances (though I suppose that overlaps with environment).
No I am only a PhD not a medic.
Contrary to what you say, Lee, the environment factor is massive. There are multiple hundreds of percent rises in likelihood of claiming lesbianism among campus students as opposed to non-university-educated; or gayness among urban as opposed to rural (not just for migration reasons).
You’ll agree with the proposition that ethnicity is apparent from birth and sexuality is not. Even if sexuality were apparent from birth to a smaller extent than ethnicity (as opposed to not at all, which is in fact the case) then this would prohibit the standard argument that sexuality and ethnicity are *equivalents* with regard to innateness. This is a test of honesty.
I agree: the main touchstone is ‘who does X lust after?’ – but this may’ve come about in a variety of ways. We are all inclined to certain things we know are harmful,& regularly choose against them.
I kinda think your missing the point. Re: university students being more likely declare their actual or alleged homosexuality, I would suspect your statement is factual. However, this i would inclined to think that this is due to 2 factors 1) universities tend to be full of young, open-minded inviduals, which makes it easier to declare their homosexuality 2) unfortunaltely claiming to be lesbian/bisexual appears to be “cool”, particularly among young women (therefore not all these people are homosexual, they just claim to be).
But do I think that exposure to university lifestyle increases the likelihood of “turning” gay? No, of course not. I went to university, I was bisexual before I got there. In fact, I knew I was bisexual from the age of about 10, due to having crushes on boy girls and boys.
Re: rural people being less likely to “be” homosexual, again, I have no doubt that this statement is factual to an extent. However have you considered that rural communities are more close minded, hence making it more difficult for people to come out? Cities do not “turn” people gay. I think this is a ridiculous arguement.
Of of course ethnicity is apparent from birth, It’s a visible characteristic. However, just because something isn’t visible doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. Take hereditary diseases, for example.
Also, your comment suggesting homosexuality is harmful is offensive. I would appreciate if you could present some evidence for this (other than the fact that gays in certain parts of the world are more likely to have HIV, this I accept). I’m bisexual, it’s never done me any harm. The harm caused to homosexuals does not come from their homosexuality, it comes from prejudice, much like the type of prejudice that you are displaying right now. I used to have real issues with my sexuality, to the point where I considered suicide. Do you honestly think in that situation if I could choose not to be bisexual, that I wouldn’t do this? Thankfully I’ve matured, and I’ve learned to accept my sexuality. I’ve just very worried that there is a lot of young men and women out there who are suffering severe mental trauma, due to arguements such as the ones you’re presenting.
Great comment, Lee. Spot on about so many things.
Re homosexuality being harmful or beneficial, the question should be rather whether any evidence can be found that it is beneficial. Whichever way one looks – since homosexuals score *massively* higher on average in STDs (esp AIDS, anal cancer, recent new strains of gonorrhea and syphilis), promiscuity, low life expectancy, drug use, failure to make genuinely monogamous bonds and/or shortness of relationships. The list just goes on and on.
The triple point about ethnicity is that (1)there is no environmental/circumstantial element nor possibility of one (contrast the 2 Australian identical twins studies re sexuality, &c.); also, (2) no choice element, and no possibility of one; also, (3) a clear (rather than an undiscovered and hypothetical) genetic element. This is why people find it difficult to regard as honest those who link ethnicity and sexuality so closely. Can add more but word-limit! :o)
Sorry, but that’s not true. For example, the LEAST likely group to get HIV/AIDS is lesbians. The current rise in chlamydia is amongst STRAIGHT adults. Are you basing your figures on some of the fundamentalist Christian ‘evidence’ because your comment about life expectancy suggests you are – I remember how fundies twisted and misrepresented that.
Did you choose to be straight? No, and I didn’t choose to be gay – in fact, like Lee above, I resisted it. My sexuality does absolutely NO harm to you or society in general. What’s your problem? That’s a genuine question not an insult. Are you here to make a specific point? If so, what?
Again, I think your prejudice is clouding your judgement. Yes, there are risks associated with sexuality activity, more so homosexual activity involving men. But are you honestly suggesting that due to these risks homosexuals should remain sexless? Ask yourself what is more harmful:
- denying your sexuality, and leading an unfulfilled unhappy life (of which you only get one)
- accepting your sexuality, enjoying your sexuality, whilst accepting the risks involved, and leading a happy fulfilled life
And the above points apply equally as much to heterosexuals. I’m presuming you are heterosexual, so on that basis, are you celibate? After all, every time you engage in sex there are risks involved. Here in the UK we are seeing a recent epidemic of STDs among young heterosexual teens, not homosexuals.
And re: questioning the benefits of homosexuality – I think this statement is ludicrous. The benefits are
the same as that of heterosexual sex (sexual satisfaction, improved quality of life due to increased sense of worth/happiness, finding love) minus the fact that homosexuals do not produce offspring. I’m presuming that you will argue that the lack of reproduction means that is less beneficial? In which case, would you discourage people from masturbating for example? I’m curious as to why you think heterosexual sex is any more beneficial, because the reproductive argument is a weak one (it’s probably even a bigger benefit in fact, when you consider that the major crisis facing the human race it’s over population)
Re: ethnicity – of course ethnicity is more inherent characteristic of a human being than homosexuality. You’re right, you have literally no choice about it, and your environment cannot impact upon it. In certain cases, a person’s environment can impact upon a person’s sexuality (e.g. child abuse), but this is immaterial compared with the people who, like me, have absolutely no
choice. I can choose to not engage in homosexual sex, but I cannot choose not to be a homosexual. Take for example those 2 teenage boys who were put to death in Iran for being homosexuals. You’d have a hard time arguing that their environment caused their homosexuality, given the risk involved and a lack of any homosexual influence. Also, are you suggesting that anyone can just choose to be homosexual/heterosexual? In that case, why wouldn’t every homosexual in the world pick heterosexuality, given the prejudice that means life is generally more difficult than for their heterosexual peers.
My “environment” didn’t make me bisexual:
- I’m 24
- I live in a loyalist stronghold in Northern Ireland, surrounded by some of the most extreme Christians on the face of the earth (homo is a no go)
- I have strong relationships with both my parents
- I don’t have any gay/bisexual friends
- I have never set foot in a gay club (apparently the music is crap lol)
- I don’t even really believe in the
of having gay clubs etc, but would rather that everyone in society could integrate (although I can understand why gay clubs exist, given the prejudices in society)
- I have never had sexual intercourse with a man
- I have a girlfriend, a rather beautiful one that, and we’ve been together for almost 5 years now, and are wonderfully happy
- I have no problem attracting girls (I don’t look like a “gay”, so men don’t generally hit on me)
I’m curious as to what part of my environment you think shaped my bisexuality? I’ll tell you what shaped it, hot guys at school lol. Some of my first crushes were on boys. Do you choose who you are attracted to? I doubt it very much.
You can’t believe we should act on all our impulses. Each of us has impulses which we avoid because we know they would bring more harm than good. Why is it that single guys don’t make advances to 15 women every day on the way to work – even though their impulses may tell them to?
Hamish, your dad is a minuscule sample. Introduce me to one trained statistician who takes seriously samples of one person, and privileges them over samples of thousands and millions of people when they are trying to gain an accurate picture and an accurate average.
@Chris -
You have the advantage of hearing the personal story of a gay man here, yet you scoff at hm in favor of… “the stats of thousands and millions of people” …. are you insane?
Blow it out your ear, you pompous jackass.
No – ‘less beneficial’ comes from the list of multiple harmful consequences I made earlier (averages of life expectancy, STDs, promiscuity, drug use etc.).
Dr Christopher – I’ve heard this a thousand times. The whole “if gay people stopped being gay they’d all lead fulfilled healthy hetero/ celebate lives” canard. Erm no.
You blithely ignore the fact that the entire human race seeks intimacy, and if I said to you “you’re obliged to be celebate and ignore your hetero impulses to eliminate any possibility of ever catching an STD” you’d most likely tell me to mind my own f***ing business, that you’re a grown adult and able to form carnal relationships with any consenting adult you choose. You may also point out that I’m projecting my own prejudices onto you, because I don’t personally enjoy hetero sex and seek to dictate terms for everyone else. As someone once put it, “I don’t like mustard, so no mustard for you”!
Besides ex-gay therapy has been debunked by every mainstream psychology institute. You can take a gay to straight sex, but you can’t make him enjoy it. In fact many have tried in order and many have resorted to suicide
less beneficial.. ???
are you implying that Gays contribute less beneficially to the civilized world ?
There is a Chair in Gay Studies, at Harvard University, a rather well-respected place, a place more respected than christian churches, judging by the attendance, a Chair perfectly capable of rhyming off the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, of delving centuries into western and eastern civilizations, uncovering hidden truths, belying christianity’s re-interpretation of human experience, giving credit where credit is due, validating the immense contributions of homosexual men and women, and certainly not confusing the victims and the causes of disease.
What a lie! What risks are involved when two virgins marry? This is standard practice in so many cultures.
They’re free to do what they like, but chances are they’ll be very bored.
The thing you’re praising there is virginity, Dr CS. The two virgins could equally be two men or two women and would have an equal lack of risk.
Yes. But there are not so many gay male virgins, because of the civilising effect of marriage.
Assuming again Christopher Shell, I see.
@chris -
you say -
“…there are not so many gay male virgins, because of the civilising effect of marriage.”
In other words, because of the civilizing effect of marriage, there are not so many gay male virgins.
There is something utterly meaningless about this sentence.
Jonpol – marriage civilises, and therefore encourages the virginity-monogamy thing. Gay males leave themselves not open to this civilising influence.
Are you implying that straight males are virgins when they marry? And they are monogamous after they marry? And that they provide a civilized home environment for a child?
Straining to understand your meaning is tiresome, Chris.
Why can’t you write more clearly?
Dr CS: ‘marriage civilises, and therefore encourages the virginity-monogamy thing. Gay males leave themselves not open to this civilising influence.’
No, people choose to remain virgins prior to marriage ie before they experience it’s ‘civilising nature’.
And it’s not ‘gay males’ who exempt themselves from marriage, it’s the law in many countries. If you wish ‘gay males’ to experience the joys of marriage, then make (civil) marriage gender neutral and allow LGBT people to have the same ‘incentives’ as straight people.
@ Dr Christopher Shell, The reason we aren’t open to marriage is no choice of ours we legally can not get married.
Oh and another thing my dad was very heterosexual and married and he still slept with any woman with a pulse so obviously marriage didn’t civilise him much.
Good point Hamish…but we wouldn’t want to spoil the good doctor’s academics with examples from real life, would we…. then again, why not…eh, eh..
@Dr Christopher Shell
.
Where did you buy your PhD from?
.
The reason I say this is becasue your soundbites or just that, not the reasoned arguments, evidence or analysis of some one with a doctrate level of education!
I bought it from Cambridge, and it was free!
In any case, who is the brighter, those who refer to statistical evidence or those who avoid doing so?
Yet all your ‘facts’ are based soley on assumptions. You know nothing. You clearly didn’t know that we refer to ‘safer sex’…
-
Dodgy, to say the least.
@Chris -
You said -
“In any case, who is the brighter, those who refer to statistical evidence or those who avoid doing so?”
Given that you are driven by a need to outshine others, why don’t you add relevance to your remarkable intelligence and comment on the topic of this thread?
Dr CS, Is your PhD in Theology by any chance?
It is my understanding that Chris’ PhD is in Altered States of Consciousness in the Mediterranean in the 3rd Century A.D….
He did say that somewhere… sounds like paradigms shifts to me.. unless he’s talking about the delirious effects of Southern Italian wines as opposed to those of Spanish vineyards…
mmm..now what Faculty would teach such a thing at Cambridge??
Correct – faculty of divinity. Not first century AD but first 3 centuries. Early church and ancient Mediterranean background.
mmm..by the 3rd century, the early church was better administrated than the Roman Empire, wasn’t it?
Then Constantine came around and the persecuted became the persecutors. Philo was clearly homophobic, eh? And let’s just not mention Augustine… talk about denial..but the the anti-gay hate industry was good to them, I suppose, bless their soles. Free thought was only possible if it was christian free thought eh? Poor Hypatia. The church was quite uncharitable in its attempt to unify doctrine, wasn’t it? I wonder what god was doing before he made heaven and earth. Oh, never mind…how would you know… oh, oh, here come the Huns…hello Dark ages..
Then what made you so obsessed with gay people, Dr CS? When did you start thinking about us so much? Before your PhD? After?
Anyone who is concerned about truth can see the lies currently surrounding homosexuality, and anyone who loves truth wants to put them right. Hans-Christian Raabe was sacked from the Home Office for saying what 8 scientific papers *strongly* found to be the case (extremely disproportionate correlation between homosexuality and paedophilia) and no scientific papers anyone has ever named to me (despite repeated requests) have found otherwise. This is a case of non-researchers trumping consensus of painstaking researchers. As such everyone who either is an academic or cares about truth will be concerned.
Dr CS. I have seen a paper referring to the sexuality of paedophiles and I wish i could find it now (I promise you that is wholly true). It was explaining that the adult categories of gay, straight, bisexual couldn’t be so widely applied to paedophiles because the attraction for them was the ‘childness’. Men often abuse boys because, as men, they often get more access to boys rather than girls. That’s a brief summary of what I read.
If anyone else knows what I’m referring to, please post the link here.
@chris -
The lies are coming from people like you, chris..and you know it.
“Christian homophobes have misused my writings on the biology of homosexuality, particularly “Gay Genes, Revisited,” published in Scientific American in November 1995. In it I reported on weaknesses in the claims of scientists—and particularly the geneticist Dean Hamer, “discoverer” of the “gay gene”—that homosexuality has a genetic basis.”
— John Horgan, Scientific American
Hi Iris
If what you are saying is true, the level of bisexuality among paedophiles must be very high. Can anyone quote literature in favour of that?
Dr CS, they wouldn’t be categorised as bisexual either. The attraction is to children.
Hi Iris
I didn’t mean that. I meant: what proportion of paedophiles / ephebophiles have ‘form’ with regard to both genders and not just one?
You could spin it the other way
Is there any evidence that homosexuality is harmful (in itself)?
or could ask:
Can any of the “evidence” that homosexuality is “harmful” that is purported actually demonstrate harm based on attraction to the same sex?
The facts you allege about STI (STDs is not a term endorsed for 10 years plus in medicine) are not true. The biggest growth area in terms of syphillis, gonorrhea and HIV is heterosexuals. FACT
above comment in response to Dr CS
Hmm – well when their percentage infection rate reaches anywhere near than of gay men come back to me.
How do you define percentage infection rate?
Do you dispute the figures of the WHO and HPA?
pepa, oops sorry Chris’ Shell doesn’t do facts and figures… sound familiar?
Indeed, are you THIS Dr Christopher Snell who says that gay people are pronmiscuous?:
http://www.anglican-mainstream.net/2011/05/14/letter-to-cen-gay-questions/
The correct surname is Shell. Gay people are well-more-than-average promiscuous on average. Aggregates/totals derive directly from averages, which is why averages are so important in deciding whether certrain things should be encouraged/permitted.
Apologies for mis-typing your name. I’ve almost made that mistake in other places here – not rudeness, I have a friend with a very similar name.
But since you refer to no peer reviewed article that recommends discrimination against gay people – in fact every medical, psychiatric and psychological institution in the civilised world calls for LGBT equality – we can discard your highly selective, unscientific data, just like we ignore creationist lunatics who try to get ‘intelligent design’ taught in schools.
If “Dr Christopher Shell” does not name his source material, references nor provide links to them we should feel free to dismiss his comments as anecdotal anti-gay bull.
Check the multiple references to others’ (not Christians’) surveys gathered by Gagnon and Brown in the link to my letter to CEN posted earlier. Of course, these concern only one subtopic: promiscuity. Each other subtopic has an large amount of backing literature too.
Robert Gagnon is ideologically opposed to homosexuality, he skews his interpretatiion of research to fit his prejudices. Gagnons work is not scholarly as he appears quite unable to keep a dispassionate and unbiased approach from the subject he is dealing with.
Gagnon is very popular prop for those who believe the Bible trumps science, reason and experience, when considering sexuality issues.
Gagnon is not the source of a single one of the surveys in question. He merely gathers their evidence together for others’ convenience. You didn’t seriously think hs is a statistical researcher, did you?
No, my partner is an Econometrician and Statistician so I’m unlikely to have made that mistake.
I am aware that Gagnon has a PHD in Theology (not a real academic subject in my opinion) and has witten on homosexual practice in the Bible from which I have read various excerpts in the past.
Gagnon reveals the populist ideological basis of his writing by not differentiating between various types of allegedly same sex activity referred to in the Bible. Gang rape, pederasty, prostitution and ritual same sex activity are all called “homosexual practice”
Gimme five, Pavlos !
If there is so much evidence, why did you choose to use the study about the rate of promiscuity in gay men in a specific group in San Francisco to make your initial point there? It’s like collecting data from a group of straight swingers and then using that to assert that straight people are promiscuous.
You imply you were spoilt for choice for evidence yet you chose research that was easily dismissed when more details about the research was revealed – why?
Hi Iris – this point I already refuted in the 2nd of my 2 letters to CEN. The non-SF evidence paints the same sort of pretty shocking picture as the SF evidence, as is apparent from many surveys from many countries.
I don’t believe that, Dr CS. And I still question why you chose such a dodgy study if there were so many great ones to choose from.
NARTH and its cohorts are renowned for misrepresenting research.
Hi Pavlos-
Well, if all four of them involve same-sex intercourse, then are you claiming it is incorrect to call them all homosexual practice? That would be a strange claim. However, Gagnon is a very precise writer and no-one on this site (unless they are a person who does not care about evidence or truth) can believe your claim he confuses these together without your giving chapter and verse.
No, Dr CS. You miss the point. The Bible does NOT refer to loving, consensual adult same sex relationships. It criticises certain kind of gay sex eg temple sex, certain kinds of gay prostitution, straight men having gay sex, etc etc. Yet to claim that that means it condemns ‘being gay’ is as stupid as claiming that the Commandment against adultery means that ‘god doesn’t like straight sex’.
Hi Iris.
You say you don’t believe the non-SF evidence points strongly the same way (albeit the percentages are a little less extreme) as the SF-evidence.
Then please consult the evidence I cited in the letters in question before making such a judgment, then you will be in a position to make a judgment on the topic.
Isn’t it enough that Rev. Benny Hazlehurst dumped all over your conclusions in the Anglican newsletter?
Alas, no. Because then I gave his ‘arguments’ the return treatment in the paper next week, and he couldn’t reply (either that, or not to publishable standard).
… any other possibilities come to mind?
‘No sex education’ succeeds. We had very peremptory sex education till the early 1960s. And what were the fruits? They were either hundreds or thousands of times better than today. In terms of age of first intercourse, number of partners, attendees at birth control clinics, rates of extramarital intercourser, abortions, divorces, cohabitation, STDs….
Sometimes the evidence is so colossal that it cannot be seen – a bit like you never ‘see’ the ocean liner you travel on – only the gangplank and individual bits of the ship.
Never mind your meaningless similes, Chris, where is the evidence of this colossal cache of pre-sex liberation statistics… ??
Dr CS – even if you had evidence showing that gay men were more promiscuous than similar straight men, what would that MEAN? You don’t get it, do you. All you’re seeking to do is demonise a group of people by using fundie sites to trawl around for ‘evidence’ – but for what purpose? If it’s not vindictiveness,what is it?
We’ve refuted this kind of evidence SO many times on Pink News, and it’s not only that I don’t want to repeat myself, it’s that it’d be more productive to bang my head against a brick wall than try to get through to you. You’re blinded by your dislike of gay men and your obession with gay sex, and you can’t see the wood for the trees.
Here! Here! Iris, Well said!
I must have missed the refutation. Which papers did you cite? The two sources I mentioned cite over 20 between them on this one subtopic of promiscuity.
Do you know what, I have heard the answer ‘I could refute your arguments but I cannot be bothered to now’ many times. I believe it is an excuse covering for lack of evidence, but please prove bme wrong. Molesworth in ‘Down Wiv Skool’ etc. used to answer exam questions with ‘larfably easy’. What he did not do was actually answer the question.
NO – listen. I’m ACCEPTING your evidence hypothetically, OK? My question is WHY? Why do you keep on about this? If gay men are more promiscuous, then the answer, as I’ve suggested above, is more focussed education, just as it is for straight teens regarding chlamydia.
What is your PURPOSE in mentioning all this?
Education has been trumpeted as teh *only* answer for 40 years. The very 40 years in which things have got steadily and alarmingly worse. Whereas those communities (and those periods of UK history) which accepted these things are not suitable for young people to talk or think about got and get far, far better results. No contest. The education solution is indefensible.
Ah, so you believe exposure to sex education encourages earlier sex – is that right? I don’t think having sex too early is a good idea at all for many reasons, but I would hope that sex education makes that clear aswell – that one should be emotionally mature aswell as physically mature before having sex.
The fact is that some young people do ignore such education – and we can often predict who that’ll be. So that’s another problem to tackle. Either the education should be more graphic (eg the idea of showing older teens pictures of STDs, for example), simplified if necessary, or those at risk should be followed up and given extra support if necessary.
NO sex education would fail because many would still be tempted to have sex and thus run the risks of STDs and pregnancy. Young people still had sex before sex education, but largely in ignorance. How can that be good?
I am neither for nor against sex education. Nor is any intelligent person. All intelligent people agree that it entirely depends on what the contents of that education is, and on what kinds of behaviour are normalised by it. I am against UK sex education in ther period 1967 to date, because by means of the kinds of behaviour normalised it has become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Whereas simultaneously plenty of parents (and possibly even teachers!!) have provided their children with highly praiseworthy sex education.
Dr Shell wrote
“Gay people are well-more-than-average promiscuous on average. Aggregates/totals derive directly from averages,”
.
Provide peer reviewed evidence!!!
There is almost too much of it to cite. Check the article-conclusions gathered by Gagnon, Satinover and Brown. (Need I say: they wrote none of it themselves, and none of it was written by evangelicals. They merely quote it.)
Yes, I am. i don’t ‘say’ that it is the case. It is the case, statistically, and when I speak about it I just reproduce what the statistics have already said. What is important is that people be honest enough to refrain from having an opinion or view that is not based on statistics.
Do check what I actually said, though. You are correct about chlamydia, but how does that make the claim untrue that homosexuals have a much higher rate of STDs in general overall? You are also correct about lesbians in that one respect – but because the gay male rate is so shocking then the combined gay rate remains well above the combined straight rate – as I said.
Most of the points you have raised are valid, and true to some extent (other than the choice, environment thing). But come on, so what if gays are more promiscious? So what, if they are more likely to be involved in drugs? (not even sure if this is true?) So what, if there are less likely to be monogamous?
I occassionally take drugs, doesn’t make a bad person or harmful to society (I’ve a great career, I own my own home, I do a lot of voluntary work for local charities).
None of these things do anyone any harm, in my opinion. In fact, it would suggest to me that homosexuals are more determined to get what they want from life, rather than what “society” expects of them.
I’m curious as to how these factors affect you and your life, as a heterosexual.
Thank you for answering re your identity, Dr CS. I don’t know what particular statistics you’re referring to, but your catch-all statement annoyed me because it was untrue as I said regarding lesbians. So you’re saying that gay MEN have higher rates of STDs? Is that correct? And what are you going on to posit from that if it is true?
Gay men statistically are no more promiscuous than heterosexual men. Gay men are simply more open and transparent than their straight counterparts. Many of my straight colleagues and friends regularly cheat on their wives and girlfriends. It simply comes down to opportunity. Also Gay men until recently have had no encouragement to enter into committed relationships by society.
Gay men are more inclined to undergo regular testing for STDs. Let us remember that the rate of STDs is based solely on diagnoses. Straight people are less likely to undergo regular STD testing until extreme symptoms exist. Therefore the rate of straight diagnoses cannot be reasonably measured for accurate comparison or statistical purposes. This anomaly is widely acknowledged by Dr.s and scientists. Statisticians also acknowledge that the HIV increase in the UK is largely attributed to immigration from Africa and India where HIV is epidemic among the heterosexual population.
@Christopher Shell
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You have stopped using your Dr prefix
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Is this because to date you consistently fail to quote any evidence from a reputable peer viewed journal.
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A word of warning, the Cameron group Journal is universally ignored!!
Where do you want me to start? Even the link posted earlier mentions over 20 such peer-reviewed journal articles when consulted.
Chris Shell, why do you insist on inventing and manipulating statistics? Not a single reputable unbiased scientific or medical journal backs up any of your claims. All of the studies that you claim to prove your muddled points were conducted/funded by religious organisations. The problem with these studies is that the results are predetermined and the studies were manipulated to provide the required results. This is why christian science is regarded within the scientific community as Mickey Mouse science. I think we can safely disregard Chris Shell as cheap quack!
Entirely untrue. Only a very small percentage of surveys on homosexuality have been done by ‘religious’ organisations. I cannot off hand think of a single one that I am relying on which has been done by such an organisation. Please quote chapter and verse when referring to studies, as I did in the link above.
Actually, thats not true. Religion does all it can to try and discredit who we are and will produce ‘surveys’ to try and prove your load of fictitious crap.
OK then, please quote ‘religious’ peer-reviewed journal surveys on homosexuality. Otherwise we will take you not to be telling the truth. The ones I rely on are practically all secular. If you want the low-down on peer-reviewed surveys on homosexuality plus any of life expectancy, drug use, promiscuity, correlation with child abuse, STDs, urban/rural background, campus/noncampus – then just ask.
Yep because here in Britain we’re seeing first hand examples of how heterosexual people are healthy and how they bring up ‘healthy’ children.
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It’s not the LGBT community rioting is the ‘healthy’ (cough) straight community and Their children.
Nurturing the myth that heterosexual marriages have a civilizing effect while in fact they are over-populating the planet, horrendous side effects and all, you are ignoring headlines in favor of manipulated statistics, chris.
In other words, does your balloon ever land?
Exactly Jonpol…. Well put!
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Oh how the fools fall….
There’s no such thing as ‘the straight community’ since it covers a diverse 90-odd percent of us! I don’t even trust the term ‘the gay community’.
So how about accepting that we’re all human beings then? That’d be nice.
Does it? You know that for a fact do you Chris’ Shell (I refuse to call you Dr on account You clearly ain’t!) or are you doing that great thing of sailing in on a boat called ‘Assumptions’ down that great river of de Nile? Me thinks so!
I tend to use the term communities whether referring to LGBT people, heterosexual people or a mix … There are various communities we all are part of to one extent or another and not restricted to where we live or work geographically. To suggest otherwise is fatuous
Hi Iris
I didn’t accept you are human beings? What did I say you were? Ring-tailed lemurs? Show me where I said that.
Of course you are human beings. It is we humans that cause most of the problems on this planet.
So why seek to victimise just one group of human beings?
Not victimise. If I didn’t say what I am saying I would not be speaking the truth. And some people’s consciences do not allow them to lie about the true state of the statistical evidence..
Yeah, right! yawn!
With you lot it’s any excuse to poke you nose in and bully.
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Can’t live and let live, can you have to shame others somehow, or so You think.
But as you’re not an expert in the prevention of STDs, I don’t get why it matters to you. If you truly wanted to help, you’d be involved in sex education or similar.
And do you frequent, for example, sports forums where there are many young men and tell them about the dangers of chlamydia and the like?
@Dr Christopher Shell
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I am still waiting for you to post links to emprical research, in peer reviewed journals, which supports your views below.
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1. LGBT people are more likely than heterosexuals to be paedophiles
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2. LGBT people are more sexually promisicus than heterosexuals
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3 LGBT people are more likey to contract STDs than heterosexuals.
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POST YOUR LINKS TO RESEARCH IN THE NEXT 24 HOURS, other wise we are more thant justiifed in taking the veiw that you are only here to spread lies and misinformation about LGBT people..
Hi JohnK
All studies of paedophilia/ephebophilia known to me indicate that there is a *very* disproportionate correlation to gay men:
K Freund et al., Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy’84.
P Cameron et al., Psychological Reports’86.
JMW Bradford et al., Psychiatric Journal of University of Ottawa’88.
WD Erickson, Archives of Sexual Behavior’88.
K Freund & R Watson, Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy Spring’92.
P Cameron, ‘The Gay Nineties’ (1993).
EO Laumann, The Social Organisation of Sexuality (1994).
JR Hughes, Clinical Pediatrics’07.
On promiscuity (which is closely bound-up with STDs) the disparity is again massive. Google my correspondence with Benny Hazlehurst in the Church of England Newspaper a few months ago, and if you like consult the more-than-20 papers cited (not written) by Gagnon and Brown (references given in the correspondence).
You will gather that I have been on holiday till today, but am now back for a few months.
A gay person was born gay and will always be gay. They did not choose to become gay so why on earth should a person of faith have the right to refuse goods or services to a gay customer.
Sexuality comes before religion and the courts need to recognise this. We’re effectively putting myth before fact.
Equality law above all else should be reason free from passion.
Your first line is an unevidenced assertion. Genetics, please.
Maybe you should show us the gene for heterosexuality first? No-one’s asserting there’s a ‘gay gene’ (although there may be some genetic combinations and interplay of genes that make homosexuality more likely).
And – again – what on earth has this got to do with this article re the NSS?
I don’t know what you mean by ‘heterosexuality’. What you refer to as some kind of subjective preference is where every animal comes from!
facetious…
So you CAN’T produce a heterosexuality gene then? Why not just say so?
There are studies currently being done which say it is the amount of testosterone you get in the womb which determines sexuality this idea that all things from birth are genetic is bullsh!t.
Correct. I have also read about hair whorls, lefthandedness, and being younger/-est brother. But the statistical fruits of homosexuality remain dismal.
You are using statistics that have been twisted out of shape by NARTH, and you know it, Chris.
You have also failed miserably at giving us a link to these statistics. I do wonder why.
some christians are crazy loonie people the 21th century is here get a life. your fake god helps no one
So it is intelligent always to go with the majority? Or with the fashion? Cowardly, more like. Whatever happened to going with the evidence?
The evidence for God? Please show us.
The existence of something rather than nothing, and even the possibility of such existence. And then the nature of that which actually exists (the anthropic principle). These are two awe-inspiring bodies of evidence that invite us to broaden our minds.
interesting what brain cells can … er …create… er…imagine…
Dr CS – forgive me but I didn’t understand a word of that. You had previously mentioned that we should rely on evidence – so where’s the evidence for God? You (I think!) imply that there’s more likely to be something rather than nothing, but how does this suggest there’s a god? The ‘something’ could be anything – a physical process, a chemical reaction.
People used to think that a god drew the sun across the sky but we now have evidence that shows us this is untrue. Presumably they also thought there must be ‘something’ moving the sun – they were just ignorant of the exact physics and so chose to label it ‘god’.
Iris- a physical process undertaken by what physical matter? How was that physical matter there in the first place? A chemical reaction by what chemicals? How were those chemicals there in the first place?
There is no reliable proof that god does or does not exist.
How do you feel about the NSS going to the International Court of Justice to defend the human rights of the LGBT community?
Dr CS – I don’t know the answer to your questions about physical matter and I’m not a physicist so i won’t bore you with my uneducated guesses, but my point still remains – just because we don’t understand something, it doesn’t follow that the answer is ‘God’.
Yes it does – because that is how we define God, as the great and mysterious source of things that cannot otherwise be explained.
That is one conception of god…could you quote your source, please.
That’s the first time I’ve ever heard that definition, Dr CS – seriously! To me, it seems a very LAZY answer. Moreover, why, in the case of god, do you not demand your usual evidence?
@chris..
your source, please… what is the origin of your concept of god?
@chris:
you said -
“because that is how we define God”
Who is “we”?
Absolutely Jonpol
No evidence that God does or does not exist
However, there is scientific evidence of genetic involvement in sexual preference and that environment can have some impact.
To suggest this is not the case is to live in denial and demonstrates a closed mind
not suggesting Jonpol is in denial – but some contributors on this thread clearly are
Hi Stu
You say ‘environment can have some impact’. Correct. I have been saying all along that it has a massive impact.
@Dr CS
I totally concur that environment has an impact. Academically there is plenty of material to support this and I have plenty of observational experience that would suggest this. The amount of impact would vary from situation to situation, some would be minimal, some a greater impact.
That said, I also state that there is clear scientific evidence of genetic involvement.
To ignore either aspect is disingenuous and closing ones mind.
Lee, your comment is unbelievable. If there is no sexual/marital stability, there is no societal stability. This is demonstrable in multiple ways. People with stable ‘trad’ families do clearly better at school and are clearly less prone to depression and related problems. DIvorce is the most shattering experience other than bereavement. Embracing the sexual revolution means wishing this negative experience on countless millions more people than would otherwise experience it. Embracing the sexual revolution also means multiplying child abuse – look how the stats have gone up since the 1960s, because of the multiplying of live-in boyfs, stepfathers. Anyone who approves and normalises such alternative families is therefore anti-social and does not care about harming others indirectly.
In the 1950s there were essentially two drugs and two STDs – now there are many killer varieties of both. Intelligent people would wish to learn from a society advanced enough to keep both down to just two
Then marriage would benefit gay people too, Dr CS. Monogamous gay people (of which there are many) could benefit from all the good things you say marriage brings.
They don’t want to. They regularly want to remain promiscuous. I gather that the take-up rate even for civil partnerships even for gays ‘in a relationship’ is around 5%. The overlap here is with adolescent behaviour and irresponsibility.
Marriage and sexual promiscuity are not mutually exclusive. Do you imagine, for example, that female prostitutes’ clients are only single men?
Correct. But marriage has a civilising effect. It leads to greater longevity and greater happiness, as every survey proves. This means it brings in its train -on average – a healthier lifestyle and more stable behaviour.
The ever-rising divorce statistics suggest that happiness is clearly not always the outcome of marriage, don’t they?
Re what you say about divorce statistics, you could not be more wrong. Divorce statistics are very low apart from in sexual revolution societies where they are very high. This proves conclusively that the problem lies not with marriage itself but with the sexual revolution which is the common denominator in societies which fail on this score.
Or from only men having the controlling choice, as mentioned below.
Oh, and I noticed your comment about marriage increasing longevity. I read that for MEN who are married that is true, but for women not so.
However, I’d like to get married – so why, if it’s such a great thing and if you’re so disappointed that, as you claim, not many gay people want to get married, are you not up there at the front in our campaign for equal marriage shouting out the benefits for gay people and encouraging us all to get married?
@ chris shell -
You said:
“Divorce statistics are very low apart from in sexual revolution societies where they are very high. This proves conclusively that the problem lies not with marriage itself but with the sexual revolution which is the common denominator in societies which fail on this score.”
You have conclusive proof based on statistics… really ??? you have conclusive proof ??
I smell bull manure..
“…”It leads to greater longevity and greater happiness..”
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mmm another uneducated assumption. May I remind you of Rudolf Brazda, last of the Pink Triangles who has died aged 98.
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Your assumptions are ridiculous and all they do it lead on homophobic fears of seeing the LGBTQI as anything as normal and just like you. Maybe it’s because it’s a threat to you because you’re so insecure you’d have to question yourself but deal with it and stop taking it out of us.
What utter crap again.
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The difference now is that people are no longer forced to stay in failed relationships, where many end up violent and resentful.
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Think it says more about you that you’d rather people were like that.
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I have to ask is this because you believe the old nutters excuse of where a womans place is and all that with the man in charge?
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It has nothing to do with the sexual revolution one bit.
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It has Everything to do with bigotted people who won’t accept change or a better more equal society.
Jock, you are indeed unintelligent if you ‘accept change’. What intelligent people do is accept beneficial change, and reject harmful change.
Again I remind you that tripping the sustainable population of the only planet we have and then neglecting to provide basic human rights such as food and shelter indicates to me that heterosexual activity is no longer a beneficial and civilizing contribution to society regardless of profitable religious and dogmas written in stone.
* tripling the population
Chris, if you are so intelligent at rejecting harmful change, go ahead and reject global climate change then…and don’t wait until your basement is flooded.. do it now, sunny boy.
Eh? SOME gay people may not want to, just like some straight people may not want to. I would never have a CP – not because I’m not monogamous (I am) but because I want to MARRY the person I love. That is one reason for a low uptake of CPs. There are others.
Ah, I see. I debate if you are a doctor being that you not only seem completely uneducated but clearly making assumptions about the LGBT community because knowing the truth, that we are just the same as everybody else, scares you.
I certainly hope you are not just the same as everyone else. Since then you would be clones and unable to think for yourselves. Which I am sure is not the case.
I am still a human being with all the emotions and feelings, you know. I also love in the same way. It is irrelevent if that love is to someone of opposite or same sex. The world would be a far better place if people stopped interfering in things they not only don’t want themselves but who are intend on stopping others when they have no right to.
right on, Jock…
the sadistic inquisitor lacks common sense.
Christopher Shell PhD, you clearly have little or no knowledge of history. Stable ‘trad’ families may have been of some use in sustaining an image of social stability but, as you should well know, were often not sexually exclusive – for the men at least. And to be reporting statistics on marital stability from the US, the country that led the nominally Christian world in making divorce socially acceptable is somewhat ironic, wouldn’t you say?
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Your observations on child abuse too are fatuous, given the degree to which such matters were not reported or recorded in the past.
I reported USA figures deliberately for one reason. Namely: if even the USA can hit 80%, then other countries’ figures will be higher. Which makes marital faithfulness astonishingly widespread.
So you genuinely believe that 80% of all married people in the US will never have sex with anyone other than their partner till death does them part? Bless.
I certainly don’t believe that. Why not? Because it is not what the stats say. The stats said (I think around 15 years ago) that of those *presently* married in the USA 80% had been completely faithful *to date* (and possibly also *to their present partner* – I don’t recall). So there are either 2 or 3 changes to be made to your presentation of what is actually being said here. 80% is still a good figure, and it is nowhere near in the same ballpark as the gay stats – which is of course my main point.
Oh, for goodness’ sake! How can you have comparable statistics about gay relationships, because 15 years ago the were no lawful gay relationships! Can you not see how flawed your attempt at logic is?
Eh? Has there not been plenty of time in the last 15 (actually 50) years for statistical research on such matters? I think all the studies I refer to come from a generation after 1959 when homosexuality was legalised in the UK.
Civil partnerships did not become law in the UK till 2004. If you’re going to be scrupulous about comparison, you cannot possibly compare couples who are unable to marry only with legally married couples.
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You also seem curiously unaware that homosexuality was not decriminalised in the UK until 1967.
Yeah I wrote 1967 and then deleted it – but to be honest I think it was a 2-stage decriminalisation 1959 & ’67 (Wolfenden report)? I may be wrong. Wouldn’t you agree that this 8-year gap does not change the main point that my statistics come from well after 1967?
You are: the law didn’t change till 1967. And do your statistics come from well after 2004? I think not.
A good way to get the statistics you need for your argument, Dr CS – let gay people marry, wait a requisite number of years and then compare the marriages of those gay people and a comparable group of straight people.
Here’s another thing you might wish to consider. I have no desire to marry someone of the opposite sex, but I don’t feel the need to start up a campaign to ban straight marriage, nor do I take great interest in the sex lives of straight people (because straight sex is of no interest to me).
In addition, no straight man I know shows the slightest bit of interest in what gay men do in bed. Indeed, I’ll go further – no normal person cares what other consenting adults do in bed.
To let gay people ‘marry’ would be to deny the most basic lessons of nature. Why do you discriminate against groups of three or more people in allowing ‘marriage’. There is only one thing that is biologically limited to two (two being the number you are irrationally biased in favour of). It is not sex or bonding (which can both easily involve more than two), but childbirth through one man and one woman. So same-sex partnerships are excluded from the one thing where nature privileges the number two.
Chris’ Shell you keep going on about 2 this and 2 that (well wotcha know me and my man make 2) but you do seem to be speaking an awful lot of ‘Number 2′!
Jock – answer the question. Nature highlights the number two in only one way: a heterosexual way (childbirth). So what is the connection between gays and 2 that allows discrimination against 3,4, and other numbers?
@Chris -
Is the planet overpopulated, or not?
You sure talk a lot of fundie Christian talk for someone who seemed affronted at being called a Christian, Dr CS.
Marriage is NOT just for procreation. many married couples choose not to have children, can’t have children, use Assisted Conception, etc etc.
LGBT people are no less fertile than straight people and can and do have children. In fact, they make very good parents because we don’t have ‘accidents’.
Nature does no such thing actually, the chosen lifestyle of Religion does.
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Nature includes none discriminating love however religion does not.
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Nature doesn’t discriminate and preach hatred, however religion does..
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Need I go on? I don’t think so. We get the picture and to be quite honest, it’s not like your load of nonsense isn’t something we’ve all heard before. It’s just something to justify your warped twisted mind but hey why don’t you keep your hatred bottled up and leave us to our happy individuality and life of lovelyness.
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Jealous much?
Perhaps the good doctor has a profound sense of mission, like a fisherman trying to catch the big fish and expecting a divinity to intervene in his favor at the right moment, like a soldier carrying out orders regardless of how ridiculous they seem to himself, or again like an employee trying to eek out a living without a useful education or trade.
Yep, I think you make a valid point Jonpol.
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Personally I think he is as phoney as he use of the term ‘Dr’!
Nature privileges the number 2 in childbirth (1 man, 1 woman: only that combination of 2 people). Sex and bonding need not involve 2 people. So name just one way in which the number 2 should receive biased treatment over higher numbers in the case of homosexual people.
chris,wtf are you talking about?
Hi Iris
I’m not affronted at being called a Christian. The opposite: I am thrilled, privileged etc to be a Christian. It is the best. But my arguments depend not on dogmatic Christianity (which would make them invalid) but on logic, reason and common sense, and statistics. When the statistics change, my view automatically changes with them. I don’t have views separate from the statistics.
On overpopulation: It is impossible for me to understand the conscience (or lack of one) that would allow anyone to kill another human being. The conscience must ahve dgone through a ruthless deadening process akin to brainwashing to allow itself to do that.
Nature made me the way I am, just as it did you.
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However Chosen religion chooses to not accept and discriminate who I am. (Some not all)
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Being that many think nature and God are the same thing and your not supposed to question God esp on his/her/its creation then doesn’t that make you and your lot a big steaming pile o’ hypocrite?
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Me thinks so.
This is the first time we hear you mention logic, reason and common sense. You have consistently insisted that your opinions are more intelligent than ours because they are based solely on statistics.
Also you said:
“On overpopulation: It is impossible for me to understand the conscience (or lack of one) that would allow anyone to kill another human being. The conscience must ahve dgone through a ruthless deadening process akin to brainwashing to allow itself to do that.”
I frankly am at a total loss to understand why you immediately associate overpopulation with the killing of another human being. Beside the fact that it cannot be blamed on the LGBT community, It is plain enough that overpopulation could not possibly occur if heterosexuals were aware of the beneficial or harmful effects of their sexual activity on the global population.
As for the ethics of killing, the entire subject seems to have escaped your attention.
So you ARE a Christian? But you say that your arguments aren’t based on just Christian ‘proof’?
Right, so when exactly did you wake up and get such an interest in LGBT people?
More to the point, Iris, Why did he get such an interest?
To try to stifle his own gay urges? Or to try to make himself feel better by denigrating others?
I’m going for the first of those due to his assertion that you can choose to be gay (that suggests he’s felt gay feelings and rejected them) and due to the fact that for a ‘straight’ man he spends a huge amount of time obsessing over gay men.
Yep, I’d go with the first one too. Such a shame that such anger can lead to such a miserable life in denial.
Oh, I thought logic, reason and stats were intimately related.
what about common sense?
Common sense too. Common sense is a sort of experience-based instinct or wisdom.
And when and why did you become so interested in gay people, Dr CS?
My interest is derived from my being a truth-seeker. The greatest cover-up in the UK & USA today surrounds the gay issue. Truth-seekers want to bring the truth to light.
“The greatest cover-up in the UK & USA today surrounds the gay issue. Truth-seekers want to bring the truth to light.”
But what do you think they’re covering up??
@chris -
You said;
“The greatest cover-up in the UK & USA today surrounds the gay issue.”
What?? Are you serious?
Do you have any idea how much is covered up by multi-nationals corporations who deprive native populations of their lands and minerals, leaving death and pollution behind?
Your use of the “greatest’ effectively defines your exaggerations, doc.
I think recent events in UK politics have demonstrated that an LGBT issue is not the principle area in which there has been cover up. I would argue completely the opposite – that transparency has been the major issue that has been prevalent in LGBT issues – and seeking true equality (not being treated the same but valued equally and recognising professional requirements transcend ideological viewpoints) is a clear expression of this
In terms of cover up – try Catholic child sex abuse, EDL, hacking etc etc
right on ,Stu… the LGBT issues have never been so transparent…
Iris, They are covering up practically all of the peer-reviewed statistics. They practically never get discussed by the gay or gay-friendly.
@Dr CS
So show us these peer reviewed articles and research so we can evaluate the veracity of such evidence
Dr CS, I’d add my call for you to please link to statistics you think have been covered up – ie ones you consider particularly important.
I don’t believe they’ve been covered up. I seem to remember reading numerous articles about risks of certain things in certain groups of people, including LGBT people.
“Lee, your comment is unbelievable.”
I don’t accept this. I think all the comments I’ve made are objective, reasonable, and without prejudice, unlike some of yours.
For example, I should point out that I’m a an atheist, but I haven’t attacked your beliefs etc or tried to deny your rights to hold such beliefs (which are just that, beliefs, as opposed to homosexuality/bisexuality, which are fact). I respect your right to be a Christian, and hope this brings you happiness. I don’t think I’ve a right to tell you how to lead your life; it’s a shame you don’t offer the same courtesy to others
“If there is no sexual/marital stability, there is no societal
stability.”
Out of curiosity, are you opposed to gay marriage?
I’m bisexual (apparently the most promiscuous of all groups), and I’m monogamous. In fact, I’m planning to propose later this year.
I also don’t accept your statement. I think people with children should try to resolve all issues and remain together, for the sake of
I don’t remember saying I am a Christian – though of course it is true that it is Christians who evoke facts and statistics on this topic where others would do anything to avoid them. The arguments against gay behaviour are nothing to do with Christianity. They are to do with reason, logic, statistics, and medicine.