rlr@pyuxn.UUCP (Rich Rosen) (06/26/84)
> It's amazing how offering a dissenting opinion on homosexuality and quoting > a favorite Bible reference in your .signature file gets you labeled as a > fundamentalist and a bigot. I think having a "dissenting opinion" about people's individual rights can be extrapolated fairly easily. Hitler has a "dissenting opinion" about the rights of Jews to live. Opinions are fine and dandy, until they propose interference in the lives of other people. There's nothing really to stop you from still having such opinions (except perhaps some logic and compassion), but hopefully there would be just enough reaction to stop them from being carried out as "law". Your bible provides many such "opinions". > Sexual behaviour involves intimate human relationship (not like eating > oysters) and therefore has a moral impact on individuals and society. > I believe that the moral impact is generally detrimental to individuals > and society. I think that homosexuality (like other things considered morally > "wrong" ) contributes, to the extent of its pervasiveness in society, > to the instability of human relationships in society. I view homosexual > relationships as generally unstable and insecure. Therefore I do not have > any confidence in the ability of homosexual relationships to accomplish > things important to the continuance of a healthy and stable society. > (i.e. raising children well). Funny, I would probably use the same adjectives to describe any human relationship :-). What Paul sees as important is the preservation and perpetuation of the "society" as he now knows and understands it. Apparently, to him, this is more important than the wants and needs of the individuals in that society. [This notion permeates much autocratic religious thought.] To preserve a fleeting notion, an idea, a set of rules (called "society") rather than preserve the rights of individuals is an abomination. Children could be raised quite well outside of what Paul considers to be the only "correct" method. > Of course, this belief will fall apart "upon scrutiny". That is because > it is based on my general observations and involve an assessment of > complex social interaction, not empirical scientific data. That is what > social "science" is and, in that respect, it is not science at all. To > prove my convictions in any real scientific way would require an impossible > experiment. e.g. to raise the level of homosexual practice in society > (or some microcosm of it) to a strongly influencial level while trying to > remove other "detrimental" factors that could be blamed for the society's > demise, and see what happens over a few generations. It's amazing how some people see any changes to the world as "detrimental" to society. What these things may really be detrimental to is the power structure of the society, in that the changes may wash away the power inherent in the existing social structure. With any change comes some uncertainty (and, of course, other changes), and the potential power-losers take advantage of the general public's fear fo such change by saying "if we go back to the way things were, when men ran their households and women knew their place and negroes (yup, they say negroes) behaved like they're supposed to, we'd all be happy and STABLE." Unfortunately (for those who say these things), changes like personal freedom and self-determination eradicate their power base. Unfortunately for them, fortunately for the rest of us who value personal freedom. Perhaps this is why Paul sees any such changes in people's freedoms as "society's demise"... > The views of groups that actively > promote Chauvanism or Racism are actively suppressed and opposed > because women and racial minorities "just are". There is no question > of the rightness or wrongness of gender or race. But is sexual preference > really in the same category? I think not. And if Gays want to put it > there they need to demonstrate empirically that sexual preference is a > matter of genetic makup. That would even make it possible to predict > the sexual preference of an individual. But, as I see it, the "scientific" > conclusions psychologist make about "intrinsic" sexual preference is > based largely on post hoc assumption. It's completely irrelevant whether or not we're talking about genetics or personal choice. By that argument, you might allow murder as a way of life for those with excessive hormone levels. What IS relevant is the personal freedom of individuals, and that the only rational limits on those freedoms are restrictions that prevent interference in other people's lives and freedoms. > The second implication seems to take it for granted that the Bible > is wrong, that in a "secular society" only secular values are right. > Blindly accepting the Bible as an unquestionable authority may be > foolish, but is doing the same for a different authority (secular > values), or rejecting Scripture prima facie as untrue, any less foolish? No, it is no less foolish. That is why societal rules should be arrived at rationally, and the reason behind their existence should be clearly laid out. Paul, you know you would actually have input into the selection of those rules in such a society; but you'd have to come up with more substance than "it says so in the bible" or "I find it morally offensive" (whatever that means). > Enough said. It is apparent to me that submitting a dissenting view > to this group is only inviting trouble, no matter how reasonable you > try to be. I don't wish to be viewed as an enemy, or hater, of homosexuals > but it seems hard to avoid here. I recognise > the right of anyone to reject any moral standard or adhere to any one > they want to. I do not advocate forced imposition of my standard on > anyone. I do, however, claim the right to believe it, teach it to > my children without interference, reccomend it to others willing to consider > it, and to be able to do so on an equal basis with others who do the > same with their moral beliefs. But since that bothers so many here > I'm going to go away. Yes, I imagine it would be very hard to avoid being viewed as a hater of those people whose lives you see as wrong and whom you ridicule for living their lives in a fashion you dislike. Again, your opinions are your own. Your "right" to teach it to your children (sounds like "drive the 'truth' of it home to your children without allowing them the opportunity to think") sounds like an imposition in and of itself, and it wouldn't be too far afield to equate your imposition of such narrow vision on your children with the child molesting that so many fear would come from homosexuals. (Actually, most of that molesting that those people fear is done by heterosexuals, so I guess they should put a stop to the spread of *heterosexuality*, then :-) Yes, since people are bothered by those who point fingers and belittle the lives of other people, perhaps you should go away. I thought this discussion was supposed to have been moved out of this newsgroup anyway. -- If it doesn't change your life, it's not worth doing. Rich Rosen pyuxn!rlr
saquigley@watmath.UUCP (Sophie Quigley) (06/28/84)
As an aside on child molesting and homosexuality. According to all
statistics I have seen on the study, there is a much greater percentage
of heterosexual molesting than homosexual molesting. I've never seen
statistics adjusted to the percentage of homosexuals in the population,
but those statistics probably don't exist.
I would be much more scared if my daughter had a male heterosexual teacher
than if my son had a male homosexual teacher, but for some reason, people
usually worry about things the other way around. Maybe I'm in a very
paranoid mood today (in which case I am very often in that mood) but I
can't help thinking that this is so because people care more about little
boys than little girls in general. Sigh.
Sophie Quigley
...!{clyde,ihnp4,decvax}!watmath!saquigley