Answered Questions Re: Miss California

[linguist]

What about those of us that don't even believe your Jesus guy even existed? He was most likely a compilation of several people with miracle retroactively attributed to him in the style that was quite common at the time to give to famous figures.

or those of us who may accept his existence, even believing that he was a great teacher with a lot of important things to say, a man of love and of peace, but still just a man.

to quote a song, "what a man was 2000 years ago means nothing at all to me today."

[the_std]

I don't know why Jesus or any kind of religion was brought up here. Your religion has no place in the law. Period. It doesn't matter what Jesus did or did not say. If your religion is your motivation for your feelings against gays, it has no place in the law whatsoever.

[Rubystars]

I've got to admit I'm with Blas on this - I admire the fact that you're sticking to your guns. I admre this for two reasons.

Thank you.

I don't like pick'n'mix religions where people choose bits from established religions that they like and discard the ones they dislike.

You're creating more atheists, for which I am truly grateful

I'm probably not completely innocent of the first one. I do try to not go off on a limb too much though. As for the second one, I do believe in free choice and free will. I'm not going to force people to follow my religion.

Ever worn cloth made from more than one fabric? Husband ever cut his hair? Eaten pork or shrimp? The laws that Jesus came to fulfill the law include those aspects (I may be paraphrasing).

I think what most Christians believe is that Jesus himself fulfills it for us. Most Christians that I've heard say that because it's very difficult for people to follow all the commands of the Bible (I think there are around 613), that Jesus fulfilled most of those for us. Some Christians disagree with this (Messianics) but the majority don't follow the law letter for letter anymore.

Galatians 3:13-14


Gal 3:13 Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed [is] every one that hangeth on a tree:

Gal 3:14 That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.

Who says it's a moral situation? Ah, a bronze-age tribal history translated many times and adhered to by people in another country as if it's fact. In short, the religious say that only they can define morals, that only their morals are correct, and therefore that they are the only authorities.

As you said, this should be a wider democratic issue, but it's also a civil rights issue. I don't believe that a religious text should be used to deny a segment of the population the same rights as everyone else.

Rapscallion

I would like to make clear that I don't want there to be laws prohibiting homosexuality itself. That would be against democratic principles. I don't want to legislate morality in the sense of forcing everyone to conform to my moral standards. I would like to keep the government from openly condoning immoral things though. That's a fine distinction perhaps but one that I think is important, because when the government does something, it is in part representing me as well as those other people.

[Flyndaran]

...
I would like to make clear that I don't want there to be laws prohibiting homosexuality itself. That would be against democratic principles. I don't want to legislate morality in the sense of forcing everyone to conform to my moral standards. I would like to keep the government from openly condoning immoral things though. That's a fine distinction perhaps but one that I think is important, because when the government does something, it is in part representing me as well as those other people.

I'm sorry but that sounds too much like the old separate but equal nonsense told by those who don't hate blacks, but simply don't want to condone things like interracial marriage.
Again, religiously defined morality has no place in law.

[Rubystars]

Funny. Though I don't think atheists can be created.
They are either born like me, or come to that conclusion after educations.

Most of the atheists I've spoken to were former Christians who were exposed to some really wacky people growing up that turned them off to religion for good. I don't really blame them for feeling that way, considering the kind of weird stuff that I heard people saying when I have attempted to go to church.

[Rubystars]

I'm trying to get to everyone's posts so if I don't reply right away then don't think I'm ignoring anything. There's just a lot to reply to.

[Flyndaran]

Most of the atheists I've spoken to were former Christians who were exposed to some really wacky people growing up that turned them off to religion for good. I don't really blame them for feeling that way, considering the kind of weird stuff that I heard people saying when I have attempted to go to church.

That's belittling thier beliefs.
To most of us atheists ALL those religious beliefs are wacky.

I was a born atheist born to two loving liberal christians. My atheism has nothing to do with what I was told about religion. It comes from a complete inability to believe those fanciful stories. I was six when I realized that adults actually believed all the stuff they told me in sunday school. It wasn't just a game of make up silly stuff.

[BroomJockey]

Most of the atheists I've spoken to were former Christians who were exposed to some really wacky people growing up that turned them off to religion for good..

I stopped being Christian when no one could ever give me straight answers. Absolutely no wackiness at all. Just a belief system that seemed patently absurd at the most basic level.

[Rubystars]

So... you get... to pick and choose which to follow? So you've picked the parts which appeal to you, and discarded that which doesn't, since you don't need to follow every letter?

I'm probably not completely innocent of it, but I try to be consistent for the most part. I don't think that Gentiles are under the restrictions of halacha (Jewish law). I explained some of this in another reply I did on this thread with a scripture. I think it was my reply to Rapscallion.

I stopped being Christian when no one could ever give me straight answers. Absolutely no wackiness at all. Just a belief system that seemed patently absurd at the most basic level.

I've heard of that happening a lot too. I've even had trouble getting answers for my questions. Ironically enough sometimes it was non-Christians that I got more information from. I like to ask questions on some Jewish message boards because they often have very deep knowledge of their parts of the Bible. For NT of course I have to try to find Christian sources and that's not always easy for the kinds of questions I ask.

[blas87]

I pick and choose. Some years, I observe Lent. Others, I don't.

I couldn't pick what to give up this year, so I said F it.

[Rubystars]

That is a very valid reason to consider it invalid. If you cannot prove that something is harmful, there should be no law against it. Period. How is that even a debatable point?

Conservatives would consider wide acceptance of homosexuality as being harmful in its own right. However what we're really debating here is whether gay marriage ought to be made official by government recognition. I'm not looking to "outlaw" gay marriage ceremonies, although I don't agree with them.

[Rubystars]

do honestly believe it wasn't that way in the 50s? crime was rampant in the large urban areas like new york, chicago, and l.a. there are always going to be some areas that have higher crime than others no matter what decade you look in, even within the same city. i grew up in houston, in the pasadena area to be exact. i know how high crime was there. then i moved to katy. not so much crime.

I answered this one but I don't think I answered the actual questions in the post. I just responded to the part about Katy vs. Pasadena. Sorry. I'm actually getting an Excel spreadsheet to list each post and the post numbers I responded to them with so that I can try to make sure I've covered all my bases here.

Yes I believe that the 50s were in general a safer time than decades after the 50s. However if crime is going down again, then that's of course a good thing. I hope it stays that way and goes even further down. I don't really trust the idea that it is just as safe now as it was then though.

[the_std]

Conservatives would consider wide acceptance of homosexuality as being harmful in its own right. However what we're really debating here is whether gay marriage ought to be made official by government recognition. I'm not looking to "outlaw" gay marriage ceremonies, although I don't agree with them.

You missed a word. I said "prove". You offer no proof.

[Wingates_Hellsing]

The distinction between the two sides which I think is quite important is that Ruby sees gay marriage as a condoning of homosexual behavior and therefore an immoral thing to do.

The fact of the matter is that not only have politicians and other influential people already weighed in on the matter by both condemning and condoning homosexuality, but Ruby and the rest of us don't see the current situation the same way.

Ruby sees it as neutral because Ruby doesn't believe there is inequality.

We see the deprivation of the, while not essential per-se, perfectly justified right for people to marry whomever they love enough to wish to. The current system oppresses and condemns gays by placing them at a legal disadvantage.

What we seek is a system that neither condemns nor condones anything, but rather allows for people to live their lives as they see fit on equal footing.

I'm going to go back to semantics for a moment, to point out that should we use the 'different phrase or word' for gay marriage, there would need to be a massive overhaul of any an all laws that take marriage into account so that they also take homosexual unions into account. And since separation is inherently unequal, it only makes sense to redefine legal marriages as being between two consenting adults and not necessarily two opposite genders.

You have every right to refer to homosexual unions differently, and to teach other people to follow your example. But using a definition-based argument to justify depriving homosexuals is incredibly nonsensical. Definitions change just as culture has changed which must in the natural course of history has brought religion to change with it.

IMO most Christians feel deprived lately not because they're losing equality, but because the judeo/christian belief system is losing absolute dominance, something that is incredibly bad for equality (the dominance, that is)

This country needs to be from a legal standpoint totally blind to as many arbitrary things like race, and sexual orientation as possible. There's no reason to stop gays from marrying unless you think that they, either inherently or through their actions are less human than heterosexuals. The kind of persecution and bigotry this country has waged wars to end.

[Flyndaran]

I believe it was a supreme court justice that said marriage is a civil right. He may have been talking about old laws forbidding interractial marriage, but it is perfectly aplicable to gay marriage.