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cossie
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On fire! |
Location: Exiled in North East Engl...
Registered: July 2003
Messages: 1699
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Just joking, of course - without a sense of morality we could hardly regard ourselves as civilised.
Hmm. This is all pretty hypothetical, so we can all rabbit on interminably if we wish - and, believe me. I'm easily tempted! However, I do think that we should be consistent in constructing hypothetical models; there are three concepts to be accommodated - medical capability, social mores and ethics. I agree with Deeej that discovery of a 'gay button' is inherently unlikely, but in any event we need to project ourselves at least 50 or so years into the future to contemplate such a thing. Looking at the United Kingdom, because that's the place I know best, I genuinely believe that full tolerance of the gay lifestyle will be the norm within that timespan, so I entirely agree Dee's contention that social pressures against gays should largely be disregarded, except in relation to their inability to procreate naturally, to which aspect I'll return in a moment.
I take Timmy's point about Down's Syndrome, and I am well aware that Down's children are noted for being particularly affectionate. But the hard truth is that a significant proportion of parents cannot cope with a Down's syndrome child, so many of them are institutionalised. It is certainly true that even in that situation many have apparently happy and fulfilling lives, and I accept that there is a strong basis for ethical argument against termination of a Down's foetus - but I don't really see a parallel with gayness. In any event, most terminations of this sort are in cases where the foetus can be shown to suffer from, or to be a carrier of a debilitating or fatal genetic disorder. In theory, at least, such terminations will eventually eliminate the disorder from the gene pool.
That, I suppose, brings us to ethics. Will ethics develop in a similarly progressive way? I have my doubts! However, it is surely contrary to our existing ethical principles that a 'gay' foetus should be terminated simply because it would not be likely to procreate. At the most basic level, many gay people DO procreate - I did! - and I suspect that even with universal tolerance some will continue to do so.
And so to Deeej's suggestion that being gay confers no advantages. I simply don't think that's true. In my lifetime I've had quite a few periods of confusion, but I can honestly say that the problem has always been how to cope with being gay - I have never wished that I WASN'T gay, because I have derived a great deal of enjoyment and satisfaction from my orientation. I accept that 'social mores' probably drove me to seek a 'conventional' lifestyle in my twenties, but I don't regret that, either. By and large, I'm pretty happy with my lot. But I'm very conscious, and have ALWAYS been very conscious, that several aspects of my character which others seem to find attractive are deeply rooted in my gay persona. In other words, even though I married and have children, being gay has made me a better person than I would otherwise have been.
So, in short, I don't think that there IS a moral case for eliminating gayness (though it was an interesting thought!) and I believe with absolute conviction that there can never be an ethical case for putting the 'gay button' in the hands of anyone but the individual concerned.
For a' that an' a' that,
It's comin' yet for a' that,
That man tae man, the worrld o'er
Shall brithers be, for a' that.
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marc
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Needs to get a life! |
Registered: March 2003
Messages: 4729
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> I'm playing devil's advocate here...
> Who here would not have preferred to be straight, if they could have been? And even if you are happy *now*, how could your parents (or you, looking back) have known that when you were conceived? Statistically speaking, you'd be more likely to be happy if you were straight.
Now you sound like the doctors and therapists in the institutuin that attempted to turn me when I was 14.....
I prefered to me who I was/am.
>
> For that matter, do we even have any right to have a say in the matter?
No.... not by any stretch of imagination.
>
> Being gay is just an impediment to living a normal, happy life.
I find this last comment to be based without a shread of thought and as such most insulting!
If you are not having a normal happy life then I suggest you get off line and go find a life for yourself. You certainly will not find it here. If you think you will then you are deluding yourself.
Life is great for me... Most of the time... But then I meet people online... Very few are real friends... Many say they are but know nothing of what it means... Some say they are, but are so shallow...
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marc
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Needs to get a life! |
Registered: March 2003
Messages: 4729
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Condecsending?
Ya think??????
Life is great for me... Most of the time... But then I meet people online... Very few are real friends... Many say they are but know nothing of what it means... Some say they are, but are so shallow...
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Hmmm...thats okay. Opology accepted, though you'd have a hard time offending me, in any case
A truth told with bad intent
Beats all the lies you can invent
-William Blake
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I know its an experiment, and i might or might not agree, but the point is, im disagreeing simply because I can, and always will, try to chalenge any argument, after all, if an argument cant stand up to scrutiny, its not thought out well enough.
Even though I sometimes agree with people, I like to create arguments that counter their arguments, just to see which stands up, and therefor has a larger chance of being right.
It's always interesting to take on the masses in an argument, and try to get out on top, though u rarely do, it always excersizes your mind
And mostly I try to think out the arguments that will be sent back at me, and try to write a theory that can stand against the might of disagreement. (sorry for mixing of ideas here)
Thanx, Prof Dee
A truth told with bad intent
Beats all the lies you can invent
-William Blake
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Gays and religion
Homosexuality is not a choice
Debate shifts to nature vs. nurture, further testing Vatican teachings
ellen goodman
BOSTON — Somewhere along the way, the dividing line over gay issues picked up and moved. It’s no longer between red and blue states, or left and right wings, but between nature and nurture. Or to be more precise, between those who believe that homosexuality is a choice and those who believe that homosexuality is innate.
Remember the moment in the 2004 debate when CBS’ Bob Schieffer asked Bush and Kerry whether they thought homosexuality was a choice? The president answered, “I don’t know,” and the senator replied, “We’re all God’s children.”
Well, it turns out that the more you believe homosexuality is innate, the more accepting you are of gay rights.
A full 79 percent of people who think human beings are born with a sexual orientation support gay rights, including civil unions or marriage equality. But only 22 percent of those who believe homosexuality is a choice agree.
The same line can be found in the religious world between those who regard homosexuality as a (bad) choice and those who see it as (biological) trait.
The most conservative Protestant churches that talk about the homosexual “lifestyle” prohibit gay ministers. Religious liberals who see sexual orientation as an inborn trait are more open to gays in the pulpit.
All and all, Americans seem reluctant to condemn people for who they simply are.
What then do we make of the Catholic Church’s banning — and perhaps purging — of gay priests? The much-leaked and much-awaited document from the Vatican says the church “cannot admit to the seminary or to Holy Orders those who practice homosexuality, present deep-seated homosexual tendencies or support the so-called gay culture.”
What was painful to many Catholics was the obvious scapegoating of gays for the church sexual abuse scandal. But there was something less obvious.
Thirty years ago the Catholic Church accepted the view that some were definitively gay. Church teachings said “they do not choose their homosexual condition.” Nevertheless, the new document doesn’t just ban gays who “practice” homosexuality, breaking the vows of celibacy. It bans all those with homosexual “tendencies.”
In the strange new backsliding language of the Vatican, homosexuality is a “tendency.” The church doesn’t define tendency, nor does it say whether such a tendency is biological. Voluntary or not, it marks a man permanently.
As Matt Foreman, a gay activist raised Catholic, says, “Doesn’t matter what you do or believe or practice. If you are gay, there is no making that better in the eyes of the church.”
Ironically, the only exemptions are offered to men who were not “real” homosexuals but “transitory” ones. They’re given a pass, in the words of a Vatican cardinal, for “some curiosity during adolescence or accidental circumstances in a state of drunkenness or particular circumstances like someone who was in prison for many years.” A drunk or ex-con is OK; a chaste, gay seminarian is not.
The same cardinal said that banning gays from the priesthood was no more discriminatory than “if a person who suffers from vertigo is not admitted to a school for astronauts.” Such a dizzying analogy overlooks the fact that gay men are already among the stars of the priesthood.
The document does more than denigrate the priests who have given their lives to the ministry. In the face of a conflict between biology and sin, the church has labeled homosexuality as “intrinsically disordered.”
Let’s remember that the evidence is with those on the nature side of the dividing line. While we don’t know the precise biology, the weight of research suggests that sexual orientation is something we are born with.
Perhaps there is a “gay gene.” Perhaps the Japanese scientists who found how a gene alters the sexual orientation of the fruit fly will find a similar switch for people.
Science may well offer some future shocks. Imagine, for a moment, we could tweak the “gay gene” in a petri dish or a womb. What would the religious right, which opposes homosexuality and embryonic research, say about eliminating the “sin”? What would the left, which favors reproductive choice but is appalled at the idea of “curing” a population of homosexuals, say?
For now, however, the church has run directly into a conflict. Increasingly, Americans accept homosexuality as something that isn’t chosen and cannot easily be changed.
Meanwhile, the Catholic Church has moved in the opposite direction, rejecting men with “deep-seated tendencies.”
Once, even the most conservative and patronizing churches proclaimed they could love the sinner and hate the sin. The new pope’s Vatican has labeled homosexuals themselves as the sin. The case is closed, and so are the doors to the seminary.
© 2005 Washington Post Writers Group
http://www.centredaily.com/mld/centredaily/news/opinion/13344199.htm
A truth told with bad intent
Beats all the lies you can invent
-William Blake
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Oh, I have stirred up a can of worms, haven't I?
>> Who here would not have preferred to be straight, if they could have been? And even if you are happy *now*, how could your parents (or you, looking back) have known that when you were conceived? Statistically speaking, you'd be more likely to be happy if you were straight.
> Now you sound like the doctors and therapists in the institutuin that attempted to turn me when I was 14.....
I was making the argument in the hypothetical existence of a "button" which would simply ensure that a child was straight before he was born. He would know no alternative.
In your case, the doctors evidently had no idea what they were doing, and were guided by hysteria in the place of solid science. Even if there was the slighest prospect that they could have made any difference, entirely without cruelty, I would still absolutely support the right of a 14 year-old (or an any-year-old) to make up his own mind.
>> Being gay is just an impediment to living a normal, happy life.
> I find this last comment to be based without a shread of thought and as such most insulting!
On the contrary, I thought about it a great deal before posting it. It might be phrased in an insensitive way, but it is also true for the vast majority of people.
It does not mean that being gay PREVENTS you from having a normal, happy life. It means that it makes it harder. Which means that if you now have a normal, happy life then it is entirely to your credit, and I respect you for it.
You cannot honestly be telling me that if you had not been gay, your life would have been just as hard as it has been, are you?
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marc
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Needs to get a life! |
Registered: March 2003
Messages: 4729
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There is a world of difference between what a person chooses, what a person has no control over and what is imposed upon him.
Normalcy is directly dependant on what needs a person has as an individual and the needs of those within his circle of aquaintances.
As for making a life harder, (I assume you mean more difficult) I see no basis for that conclusion.
I have seen some hard times in my life due to the fact that I am gay... but, I also had doors opened for me that allowed for opportunities not accorded to "most normal" people. These made it possible to persue a creative element of my life that allowed myself to afford my education thus leading to an excelent carreer.
See... What life is all about is not whether you are gay or str8... It is about taking chances and making decisions that are right for you. It is about making the best of each and every set of circumstances however easy or difficult each may seem.
Everything life has to offer is within each person's grasp... It is up to each person to do their own reaching.
If life seems somewhat less than you (read imperical you here) expect it is your own fault.
Life is great for me... Most of the time... But then I meet people online... Very few are real friends... Many say they are but know nothing of what it means... Some say they are, but are so shallow...
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The conversation seems to be moving on to a slightly different topic, so I'd better let it; unsurprisingly, arguing the merits of a sort of "Brave New World" does seem to run completely alien to just about everyone's core beliefs.
Most people will do their best to overcome hardship. If they are born into poverty, but make their fortune and rise above it, they will think themselves lucky. If they are born into poverty and never quite escape it, but have a happy and productive family life they will, again, think themselves lucky. If they happen to be gay, undergo terrible treatment at the hands of others, but finally find a partner and settle down into idyllic happiness, they will also think themselves lucky.
You can't really extrapolate from the individual level, especially where one has the benefit of hindsight, to the general level. After all, for all those people who make good, there are others who didn't. Generally speaking, I still stand by my statement that being gay will make it more difficult to achieve one's aims in today's society. That is changing, and that is good. After all, the "gay switch" does not, and probably will not ever exist, so those of us who are gay will just have to find a strategy for dealing with it.
I'm not quite sure how you inferred that I was blaming being gay for my own, personal, difficulties. On the contrary, I would have had them regardless of whether I was gay or straight. However, except for selfish reasons, I would not wish being gay upon a person. That is quite different from believing that there is something wrong with being gay, though.
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marc
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Needs to get a life! |
Registered: March 2003
Messages: 4729
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Deeej wrote:
I still stand by my statement that being gay will make it more difficult to achieve one's aims in today's society. That is changing, and that is good. After all, the "gay switch" does not, and probably will not ever exist, so those of us who are gay will just have to find a strategy for dealing with it.
Your aims will be difficult to achieve only if you continue to dwell in the chance of failure.
For all the drips in society there are as many that aspire beyond their ambiant culture. But one thing in all aspects of society holds true. Someone has to haul the garbage and the world needs ditch diggers as well.
>
> I'm not quite sure how you inferred that I was blaming being gay for my own, personal, difficulties. On the contrary, I would have had them regardless of whether I was gay or straight. However, except for selfish reasons, I would not wish being gay upon a person. That is quite different from believing that there is something wrong with being gay, though.
How I inferred...... You are responsible for yourself....
Life is great for me... Most of the time... But then I meet people online... Very few are real friends... Many say they are but know nothing of what it means... Some say they are, but are so shallow...
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>> I still stand by my statement that being gay will make it more difficult to achieve one's aims in today's society.
> Your aims will be difficult to achieve only if you continue to dwell in the chance of failure.
True... but "more difficult" doesn't mean the same thing as "difficult".
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marc
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Needs to get a life! |
Registered: March 2003
Messages: 4729
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Yup.....
but the more you dwell the more difficult it becomes.
Life is great for me... Most of the time... But then I meet people online... Very few are real friends... Many say they are but know nothing of what it means... Some say they are, but are so shallow...
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Deeej wrote:
> Most people will do their best to overcome hardship. If they are born into poverty, but make their fortune and rise above it, they will think themselves lucky.
Most people that I know who were born into poverty, but worked hard and sacrificed to EARN their fortune do not consider themselves lucky.
If a person made a fortune by winning the lottery, THAT would be lucky.
(\\__/) And if you don't believe The sun will rise
(='.'=) Stand alone and greet The coming night
(")_(") In the last remaining light. (C. Cornell)
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cossie
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On fire! |
Location: Exiled in North East Engl...
Registered: July 2003
Messages: 1699
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The implication of some of the comments above is that we stand or fall - or make or lose our fortunes - by our own efforts. Personally, I think that such a proposition is both smug and offensive. OK, there are lots of successful people who have risen to the top with the aid of intelligence and ability - but there are also lots of people who have just as much intelligence and ability but who have failed to reach the same heights. The difference is luck - not necessarily being born with a mouthful of the proverbial silver spoon (though that helps!) but often by simply being in the right place at the right time.
Almost anyone who has worked for a large organisation will know of senior personnel who are able to talk impressively but seem to lack any understanding of the way to lead or motivate others. Equally, they will know of junior personnel upon whom everyone relies for advice but who have never been given an opportunity to demonstrate their leadership potential. Advancement may depend upon the recommendation of a superior who actually feels challenged by his junior - or alternatively it may follow the successful outcome of a project which was largely devised by someone else. It all comes back to luck.
Obviously, the more dynamism or entrepreneurial ability we possess, the more likely we are to succeed - but luck still has a part to play, and I find it difficult to respect anyone who suggests otherwise.
I was born into the rural working class, but have (reluctantly!) adopted the commuter lifestyle and have enjoyed considerable success in my chosen career. I reckon I had the innate qualities required, but I doubt if those qualities would have been of much use to me without the benefit of a free education to university level, and a chance remark by a friend's father which led to a change of career when I was 25 or so.
I don't really think I'm any happier than my father was; we both achieved contentment in our lives - but I had a lot of luck and thus acquired more wealth.
Society encompasses saints and sinners, optimists and pessimists, leaders and followers, gays and str8s. What we are is only one of many factors which determine what we may become, but it IS a factor. I cannot therefore resist Deeej's logic in suggesting that being gay POTENTIALLY adds to life's difficulties - you need only consider the obvious example of finding your prospects of advancement in the hands of someone unsympathetic to gays, but obviously there are dozens of ways in which homosexuality could influence the opportunites made available to you. That's what I believe Deeej means when distinguishing 'more difficult' from 'difficult'. If further evidence is required, consider a pool of 100 'unmatched' people in search of a life partner. Assuming a gay population of 10%, the 45 straight guys each have access to 45 potential str8 female partners, and vice versa. The 5 gay guys have access to only 4 partners, and the same goes for the girls. Furthermore, a str8 approaching a member of the opposite sex has a 90% chance that the person approached is potentially a life partner; the corresponding percentage for a gay approaching a member of the same sex is 8.2%. Now if that doesn't make life more difficult, what does?
Re-reading the above, my ramblings don't seem all that coherent, but I guess that's what happens when the topic of the thread keeps going of at tangents!
For a' that an' a' that,
It's comin' yet for a' that,
That man tae man, the worrld o'er
Shall brithers be, for a' that.
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cchd
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Getting started |
Registered: May 2004
Messages: 16
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There is a risk (at least from my viewpoint) that if a magic genetic pill was available to ensure that all off-spring were straight we (as in all mankind) might miss out on some major development (whether this be some new scientific discovery, art or whatever).
The creation of major things by an individual arises from all the influences that have been experienced by them, being gay included. We as a species may miss out on something really important by doing something that appears to be sensible.
To balance this, we might eliminate unnecessary suffering for those people born gay who aren't accepted by parents/friends/local customs/etc.
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