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The gay wizard
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From the AP: “Harry Potter fans, the rumors are true: Albus Dumbledore, master wizard and Headmaster of Hogwarts, is gay. J.K. Rowling, author of the mega-selling fantasy series that ended last summer, outed the beloved character Friday night while appearing before a full house at Carnegie Hall.”
What does this even mean? I’m not a hateful person, and I think Believers have a lot to learn about engaging this issue, but seriously? I thought the books were over. What’s the significance of “outing” someone who doesn’t even exist? If characters only exist in words, and no words ever indicated (in books, where characters “exist”) that this imaginary wizard was gay, then what’s the point? Now, I understand that Rowling could have used this in her writing to help guide her writing of the character, but sharing it in such a fashion seems showy, pointed, precious, something. And stupid. Like George Lucas coming out and saying, “Well, Darth Vader was against the war in Iraq.”
I think it’s fair to say that homosexuality has been grandstanding in our culture for several decades now, and this is just one more example. A hundred years ago, Rowling would have been saying - after the books were done - that Harry Potter himself was very much for women’s suffrage. Ridiculous.
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Soul searching
I think it’s fair to say that homosexuality has been grandstanding in our culture for several decades now
What does that even mean?
Harison, I know what it means.
Great question. Homosexuality is practiced in a small portion of the population, relatively speaking, but its prevalence in culture, art, media, etc. - i.e., where its practice is singled out for various reasons by those who are its advocates - has the very purposeful effect, I think, of making it look more prominent, practiced, common, pedestrian, etc., than in fact it is. This is what I call grandstanding.
And stupid. Like George Lucas coming out and saying, “Well, Darth Vader was against the war in Iraq.”
*****Amen! I whole-heartedly agree. I was appalled. As a Christian who didn’t mind reading the books, I have to say this just left a horrible bad taste in my mouth. In a book that doesn’t really deal with sexuality or such issues at all beyond some mild teen-age “kissing”, I have to wonder WHY I need to know — after the fact and with no bearing whatsoever on the story — that a *fantasy* wizard was “gay” is beyond me.
It is stupid. It alienates those who liked the books. It totally ruins the Dumbledore character for me. It is something I plan to keep from my kids.
Why oh why when I read a children’s book would I even CARE what someone sexual proclivities are?? Why would the author need to reveal this.
And, your analogies were perfect. It is like saying, “Gee, and Luke Skywalker is going to vote Republican this year.” Who would care and how does it relate??
Eh, I see it more as her trying to add to the Harry Potter universe, a la Tolkien. She’s already said she’s not going to write any more books in the series, but that doesn’t mean she can’t flesh out the universe for her fans.
Stephen,
WHY do we need to know the sexual inclinations of a CHILDREN’S book character?
Do you also want to know that Winnie-the-Pooh was “bisexual” or that Nancy Drew likes “hot and heavy” swinger action?
I mean, really. Why?
Dumbledore is a nice fatherly figure. I never once thought about him as a sexual being…nor would I expect to in a children’s fantasy book. The fact that he wasn’t married did not surprise me, since NONE of the Hogwart’s teachers had a husband, wife, or significant other. (That, I did wonder a bit about, but only why they never seemed to have any family…not in reference to their sexuality.)
For shame on Jo.
What’s the significance of “outing” someone who doesn’t even exist?
A literary character doesn’t have to be a “someone” to exist. All such a character needs is a bit of ink on paper, or sound and lightwaves, and imagination. If you must, think the characters are aspects of the writer and readers. The significance of discovery is the sustaining and extension of imagination.
Wasnt the actor Ian McKellan (RIP) gay?
Yes, the actor is gay, but he is not the actor playing Albus Dumbledore in the Harry Potter movies. He played Gandolf in the “Lord of the Rings.”
TRS, it’s not a question of “needing” to know, it’s a matter of filling out the universe with facts that one does not need to know. Very few people need to know that water is H2O, or that Mt. Everest is the highest point on the planet, but they know anyway. Surely telling fans how one constructed a character is a useful thing, so that upon re-reading one can better understand where the character is coming from and why. Rowling didn’t politicize it in her book, but elaborated on how she conceived a character’s love life in response to a question.
I don’t think it is “pointless” to out Dumbledore. It just is what it happen to be, (something Harrison is going to resent) a political action.
It’s not politics I really care for, but the intention is not horrible. She is saying (at least after the fact) that the world she created is not free of homosexuality. And that’s important to do when creating fantasy worlds people are often going to hold as being more desirable than our own.
You all wont like it because you dont like gays. That’s expected and no one is thinking that you are going to clap your hands at liberal politics.
But it is important to remember that it is a very small thing! It’s not something I’m likely to think about when re-reading the books though.
Though it does color his legendary fight with Grendewald a little differently. Gay domestic violence is a serious issue!
Grandstanding? Definitely!
The BBC article points to a dispute with the screenwriter of one of the motion pictures.
Backstory is important, but this revelation confuses the issue. In the “hero’s journey” of the books, Dumbledore is the mentor. He is respected and admired. He is revered. Some would go as far to say he is the “God the Father” character in the books.
The debate over “Christians reading Potter” has raged for years. I guess we now have more fuel for the fire.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7053982.stm
Backstory is important, and I like it as much as anyone else.
But, this is also *children’s* fiction. It is a fantasy world. I don’t need to know that someone sleeps with *anyone* else.
It was bound to fuel the fire of (largely unwarranted IMO) dislike of these books amongst some Christians.
And, since Dumbledore does have a likely Christian symbolic meaning (as Rowling now admits), it almost seems to be somewhat blasphemous to portray him with a sexual side.
Honestly, I was perfectly fine seeing him as a largely “sexless” character, and I think it was really rude of J.K. Rowling to throw this in my face.
Next, I’ll find out that Charlie Brown had a foot fetish, and Lucy likes leather. sigh
Except that she didn’t throw it in anyone’s face — she answered a question. Like you said, nothing she wrote gave you any indication of such, so she can hardly be accused of trying to push a political agenda on children here. Further, she didn’t say anything about anyone sleeping with anyone else, she’s simply stating his orientation — did you object to her including the fact that Ron likes girls as being rude?
“or that Nancy Drew likes “hot and heavy” swinger action?”
Don’t stop.
No, Ron liking girls is the normal, natural, most common state of affairs, and is not controversial.
Why would anyone be surprised at anything J.K. Rowling wrote? This woman loves the world of those things which are against the Bible, is it any wonder that she decides to write in ‘homosexuality’ of her little wizard character?
Anything to get as many children as possible, interested in evil, and now homosexuality -
What do Believers expect? The Bible is clear about end times, but yet everyone acts surprised when they see all these things coming upon our world -
So you’re happy to read about a land where boy wizards run through walls to take secret trains to their magical school where they learn to cast spells and fly on broomsticks… but are offended when a character isn’t “normal, natural, [and] most common”?
Sometimes I read worldmagblog and I think, “Nobody could make this place up.”
The last two paragraphs of the article “J.K. Rowling Outs Hogwarts Character” ……. tell us just what ROWLING is up to, why would an adult would want children to “question authority” ? So we can be sure that kids should be tolerant of sin, and question authority?
rdean (1): What does [”homosexuality has been grandstanding in our culture for several decades now”] even mean?
Frank: Perhaps it could have been worded better. Maybe something like
“For several decades now, homosexuals in our culture have been grandstanding — outrageous and ostentatious — flaunting their presence and proclivities in an attempt to attain the broadest possible social acceptance.”
(But I guess some people need you to draw them a line …)
IOW, rdean, more and more homosexuals openly seek to normalize their (ahem) “practices.”
Homosexuals want to make life better down the line for your children, grandchildren, nieces & nephews. For real.
So you’re happy to read about a land where boy wizards run through walls to take secret trains to their magical school where they learn to cast spells and fly on broomsticks… but are offended when a character isn’t “normal, natural, [and] most common”?
******Yes. The first things you described are fantasy, on level with “Snow White” or “Sleeping Beauty” and her fairy godmothers. It’s called imagination.
What J.K. Rowling has now done is bring in the real world into her fantasy world. Homosexuality of a character is not only a deviant behavior made to seem “normal” by making one of the main heroes a practitioner, but, since it deals with sexuality…it is also a topic not appropriate for children’s fantasy.
Again, I don’t want to think about ANY children’s fantasy characters having sex of ANY kind.
I saw this and thought, “great, something else to explain to the kids which has no bearing on anything.” I was disappointed in Ms. Rowling–there would have been less controversial ways to answer the question.
“Like George Lucas coming out and saying, ‘Well, Darth Vader was against the war in Iraq.’”
Or perhaps like George Lucas coming out and saying that C3P0 were gay as if we didn’t already know that.
While I do not support or advocate homosexuality in any way, Mrs. Rowling’s answer seems to be a non-sequitur.
But TRS, Ron liking girls is just as sexual as Dumbledore liking boys, so I don’t see how you can complain. There’s absolutely no discussion of Dumbledore having sex, or any physical act whatsoever.
yaawwwnnnn
Perhaps the phrase “Friends of Dumbledore” will now replace “Friends of Dorothy” as the hip new gay catchphrase.
#20 - No one is forcing you to stay are they?
#28
Non sequiturs are very inappropriate sexual behaviors for adults and children, straight and gay people as well.
Even animals should not.
In fact, this post should be banned and burned.
#32
Then release the handcuffs and ankle restraint as well, please. Thank you.
ROLFL
Kim,
Did you just burp out loud?
Dumbledore is gay?!
Well that was the idea at this year’s National Forensic League tournament in Wichita — the winner in Humorous Interpretation did a selection from Harry Potter, complete with, yes, a Dumbledore pederast. I’m quite sure that this was not what Ms Rowling had in mind, still we laughed ourselves sick at the performance.
(Here I think we have the problem with movies — they take away our ability to imagine alternative readings of a text. Happily, that is where performance art such as that in forensics comes in.)
“[Rowling] was asked by one young fan whether Dumbledore finds “true love.”
“Dumbledore is gay,” the author responded to gasps and applause.
While I do not support or advocate homosexuality in any way, Mrs. Rowling’s answer seems to be a non-sequitur.”
Indeed it does. She was asked a “yes” or “no” question and chose to make a comment about a character’s sexual orientation. It was completely unnecessary.
At any rate, there is nothing ever in the novels to indicate anything about Dumbledore’s sexuality. It does add another dimension to his duel with Grindelwald, but adds no colour to anything else his character does. She ought to have just let it be.
#27: CP30…that made me laugh, Jon Rowe.
#3: Homosexuality is practiced in a small portion of the population, relatively speaking, but its prevalence in culture, art, media, etc.
Oh yea, I get it. Peanuts envy. 3% or so of the population though out history and yet, they are represented in art, music, dance, literature, business, architecture, science, military, theater and academia. And not just represented, for the most part, leading. And not just leading, but all through history. I bet anyone who reads this site can name ten gays right off the top from these fields and would have to think a while to name one evangelical. Isn’t that a hoot? No wonder the evangelicals are mad. They are so jealous, they can’t stand it. They know the only possible explanation is that God graced the gays.
Who are the evangelicals you CAN think of? Haggard, Swaggart, Baker, Roberts, Falwell, Tilton? Yep, and the reason you can name them? Because they have all been involved in SCANDAL. Hold it hold it hold it. I had to stop for a minute. I couldn’t type cuz I was laughing.
So, what do the evangelicals do? Cain much? They do everything they can to discredit the gays. All though history. I guess adversity does make you grow stronger. Gays are still represented in all those fields (except military in this country). And, they are still discredited by the evangelicals. I guess the more things change, the more they stay the same.
They say the gays have equal rights but thinking people know better (see military, hate crimes, job discrimination).
Honestly, I don’t see things changing much. Evangelicals will still hate the gays who will continue to excel in spite of the conservatives who will say that people pay too much attention to the gays who will get the attention because they excel. It’s a vicious circle with the greater portion of vicious coming from the evangelicals.
No Travis I meant I was rolling on the floor laughing at your friend of dumbledore quip but my fingers weren’t working properly.
#34 - Only you have the key.
I’m not really interested in what J.K. Rowling had to say about Dumbledore. It will go down as one more battle in the so-called “culture war”.
I’m more interested in Harrison’s comment that homosexuality has been “grandstanding” in our culture. His explanation of the term leaves much to be desired. It shows a lack of understanding about what it means to be gay.
It’s comments like that which reinforce the stereotype that conservative Christians having little empathy or understanding toward gays.
Sigh
RDean
William Wilberforce, John Newton, Thomas Freylinhausan, William Lloyd Garrison, Harriet Beecher Stowe….
We can play the name game all day - oh, and most of those so-called gay figures you are appealing to are questionable at best.
Like I said above, I truly believe it’s jealously. I turn on the TV and Will and Grace is on. I turn the channel to the Arts and they show Rudolf Nureyev dancing. I change to the religious channel and they are showing the Sistine Chappel and talking about the King James Bible. I go to the military channel and they are talking about the tactics of Alexander the Great and how they are still being taught in military schools. I go to the tech channel and they talk about the father of computer language, Alan Turing. I go to MTV and they talk about the hundreds of millions David Geffen is giving to the UCLA medical center. So I watch MTV and a special of Elton John comes on. I turn to the sports channel and they show NFL football and NBA basketball players coming out. I turn on the political channel and Barney Frank is talking.
I turn on the kids channel and they are talking about Hans Christian Andersen. I go to TV Land and they are showing Richard Chamberlain as Dr. Kildare so I go to the news channel and there is Anderson Cooper.
I used to carry around a Susan B. Anthony half dollar. Don’t forget Ellen and Rosie.
Come on. Anyone coming to this country would think it’s half gay.
Now, let’s talk about all of the things the evangelicals have done. Well, there’s, um, wait, hold on, it’s coming to me. Oh, they tried to add supernatural to science. We all know that. They tried to add discrimination to the constitution. They’re still working on that one. They have been involved in a dozen scandals (Haggard, Swaggart, Baker, there the newest one coming up with Oral Roberts Jr., I can even add an “etc.”)
They have led us to war in Iraq through Bush where they have created a radical Islamic country that has uprooted hundreds of thousands of Christians after they made “Islam” their “national religion”.
I don’t know what to say. I believe all the hate is jealousy. It’s like the ugly kid who can’t stop talking about the pretty one because the jealously is so thick. Who gave the gays all this talent if not God? If I were an evangelical, that’s the question I would be asking.
#44: We can play the name game all day
So I do a search on these people you listed. The only one I ever heard of was Harriet Beecher Stowe who wrote Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Many people don’t understand the enormous impact this book had on the US during times of slavery. A very important author So that’s one. But the others? I couldn’t even find them all and they are all from more than 150 years ago.
William Wilberforce, John Newton, Thomas Freylinhausan, William Lloyd Garrison, Harriet Beecher Stowe….
In 1743 John Newton ’s father had planned for him to take up a position as a slave master at a sugar plantation in Jamaica but on his way he was pressed into naval service, and became a midshipman aboard the HMS Harwich. Having attempted to desert, Newton was recaptured, put in irons, and reduced to the rank of a common seaman.
Obviously a different kind of fame. Not real sure what the point on that one was.
Garrison was influenced by the ideas of Susan Anthony, which is a hoot because she was a lesbian.
Obviously it’s not a good idea to play the name game with famous evangelicals. You wouldn’t win. The most famous ones could be called “infamous” and to some, “scam artists”.
RDEAN -
You certainly keep a log on watching TV. Is this what you do all day, everyday? You seem to know every single program that’s on. Do you go out much, or do you just flip the channels back and forth?
As far as Rudolf Nureyev, he’s dead. He died January 1993, 14 years ago, he hasn’t danced since - He died of AIDS -
#47: As far as Rudolf Nureyev, he’s dead. He died January 1993, 14 years ago, he hasn’t danced since - He died of AIDS -
The Arts channel plays everyone from Beverly Sills to Mario Lanza to Nureyev on Saturday mornings. I’m a channel surfer, flip flip flip. Can’t stop. Probably the only thing I watch from beginning to end is a Bulls game. Never could sit through an entire episode of “Friends”.
Speaking of AIDS. I remember when the gay community asked Ronald Reagon to find out why so many gay men were dying of cancer and he didn’t do anything because they were gay. He was president at the time. Didn’t want to get involved. Considering the how much the gays have given to the country, makes you wonder how many good people we have lost. You can see it in a movie called, “And the Band Played On”.
I’m sure good old Ronald was glad we were able to “get rid” of so many gays. Unfortunately, disease has a terrible habit of spreading. The majority of cases in Africa aren’t gays. But you knew that.
By fighting the handing out of condoms, I wonder how many of those deaths world wide could be laid at the feet of the Christians? Millions maybe? Something to think about.
“Who are the evangelicals you CAN think of? Haggard, Swaggart, Baker, Roberts, Falwell, Tilton?”
Um. No. That’s not who I would think of. Even off the top of my head, the list might start out more like: Bach, Mendelssohn, Handel, Faraday, Kepler, Boyle, Leibniz, Linnaeus, Kelvin, van Leeuwenhoek, Arthur Schawlow (co-inventor of the laser), Francis Collins, CE Koop, Rembrandt, Rubens, Durer, Vermeer, Makoto Fujimura, Francis Shaeffer, Ravi Zacharius, Abraham Kuyper, CS Lewis, CK Chesterton, Dorothy Sayers, etc, etc. And that’s going heavy on the scientists on a suspicion that there might be some people you recognize there, and doesn’t even begin to touch the list of Christians working in pop culture, or those in athletics.
Your premise fails. Maybe it’s because of an exposition of intellectual and cultural history that’s almost entirely informed by cable tv. Or maybe it’s because of a shallow understanding of what “evangelical” means. No worry. A proper education can cure both {:~)
By the way, changing your name from donato to rdean didn’t give this sort of drivel any new traction.
Take (more) care,
SG
Abstinence is the best first choice. Ronald Reagan was not responsible for homosexuals getting aids, nor did he ignore it -
Many scientists have worked on the HIV/AIDS projects. Science still hasn’t found cures for some of the deadliest cancers, that doesn’t mean they aren’t trying, it just means there is no cure yet - AIDS/HIV is no different - Just because this disease surfaced in 1980-81 doesn’t mean there would be a cure FIRST THING IN THE MORNING - Most scientists knew that homosexual sex was transmitting the disease, so it would make ONLY COMMON SENSE, to ABSTAIN, but that’s not what the homosexual community was willing to do. As far as condoms, the homosexuals could have gone to ANY drug store and purchased them. Even now, with all the public knowledge being broadcast, televised, literature, etc., it still is a problem - they can still go to a drug store and buy condoms IF THEY CHOOSE - it’s that CHOOSING part that becomes a problem -
Since the homosexual community knows TODAY how the disease is spread, why do they continue to contract HIV/AIDS?
#49: Bach, Mendelssohn, Handel, Faraday, Kepler, Boyle, Leibniz, Linnaeus, Kelvin, van Leeuwenhoek, Arthur Schawlow (co-inventor of the laser), Francis Collins, CE Koop, Rembrandt, Rubens, Durer, Vermeer, Makoto Fujimura, Francis Shaeffer, Ravi Zacharius, Abraham Kuyper, CS Lewis, CK Chesterton, Dorothy Sayers
So I get an encyclopedia and starts going through the names you list but I only get half way and then stop. A couple of things, Collins believes in evolution. Half the ones I looked at were from the 16 or 17 hundreds. Come on. You almost had to say you were a Christian just so you wouldn’t get killed and half those were never married. What does that tell you? Or if they were married, they had no kids. Very unusual. Marriage of convenience? Hmmm. And lastly, Alan M. Turing – Founder of computer science trumps Arthur Schawlow (co-inventor of the laser). I maintain that the evangelicals are jealous of the gays. So so jealous.
Sir Arthur C. Clarke
Czar Alexander I
Alexander the Great
Horatio Alger Jr.
Susan B. Anthony
Hans Christian Andersen
James Baldwin
Lionel Bart
Leonard Bernstein
William S. Burroughs
Queen Christina of Sweden
Noël Coward
James Dean
George Gershwin
Hadrian
Leonardo da Vinci
Vaslav Fomitsj Nijinsky
Cole Porter
Maurice Ravel
John Schlesinger
Stephen Sondheim
Tchaikovsky
Alan M. Turing – Founder of computer science
Oscar Wilde
Tennessee Williams
Franco Zeffirelli
And on
And on
And on
#50: Most scientists knew that homosexual sex was transmitting the disease, so it would make ONLY COMMON SENSE
You know I love to comment, but first you have to go find out what you are talking about so what I say makes sense. I saw a little kid once just yelling at a wall and not saying anything. Just yelling and yelling. He didn’t care that he wasn’t making sense. He just wanted to yell. It’s ok. It was actually entertaining. Then.
There are no real Born Again Believers who are jealous of homosexuals living in sin - No one would be jealous of a lifestyle which has led homosexuals down a path to death, through HIV/AIDS a lifestyle unrepentant of sin - You are misguided -
Hell is going to be full of talented unrepentant sinners, so what was the point of their life?
Victoria post 53,
I believe a more correct statement might be:
I believe that “Hell is going to be full of talented unrepentant sinners, so what was the point of their life?”
Unless you have objective evidence to sustain your point, I suggest your point is your belief and only your belief.
Okay…so what a fictional character in a story of fantasy once the series is over (the last volume penned, published and read) is revealed by the author to have been gay all along…what silliness. Such revelation by the author is meant to sock and spin and PR, not to add to the debate or discussion on homosexuality. Sounds like the author was reacting to the positive reviews given by some Christians on the Lewis-like ending of her fantasy story about Harry Potter. Now she couldn’t have that so she now finds a way for the Christian community to despise here again–good for sales perhaps and whatever is etched in her soul concerning the Christian faith.
Victoria, you have never been rude to me personally, so I try not to be rude to you personally.
In a discussion, about my Jewish ancestry, some one questioned how they could know I was really “Jewish.” I mentioned my real last name. There are about half a dozen famous people I can think of with that name, including an architect, a song writer, and so on.
You have a “thing” about Jews and how they have been persecuted. You warned me to be very careful about revealing it. I thought that kind of silly, but very sweet of you.
I also once told you about my cousin who went to Taiwan and learned Chinese and became a millionaire, who also became a Christian, and left much of her money to help deaf children in Taiwan because her daughter had been born deaf and was fixed with Taiwan’s first cochlear implant.
You were very moved by my story about my Christian cousin.
Everything I say on wmb (besides the silly jokes and satires, which are pretty obviously jokes, I think) is true.
But I will say, to you, Victoria, in the same way you told me to be careful, that you should be very careful about believing what people tell you. You have, I suspect, a great tendency to believe what people tell you if it sounds good to you, and I suspect you could be hurt very badly (if that hasn’t happened to you already). Be careful.
I read the first Potter book because my daughter had it and I was curious. I didn’t think it was very good. But as the series went on, I noticed it getting much better. Rowling seemed to be developing and maturing as a writer.
I haven’t read the last two or three books yet.
I wondered about the pressure she felt as she became enormously successful. With each new book, she was like a trapese artist walking across Niagra Falls again and again. She had all the money any sensible person could want. She had married again, as far as I know, quite happily, and had another child. As she completed the series was she motivated by the joy of creating art and of pleasing millions of fans, by the fear of failing and disappointing, by the feeling of having to live up to enormous responsibilities?
Never having been in anything like similar circumstances, I have no idea.
It does seem possible to me that with the project done, she succumbed to the temptation to say something that was the equivalent of Here, let me stick this thumb in your eye…”
Probably not. I get weird ideas some times.
By the way, evangelical folks, there are homosexual people in our society. They consider themselves real people, and they get weary of hearing stuff such as “God wants you to remain celibate all your life.”
Also, another one of my weird ideas is that any group that has been oppressed or picked on or whatever, eventually becomes as bad or worse than the group that picked on them as their ultimate revenge. So American Indians have fireworks stands and cigarette stands on their reservations, and own casinos on and off their reservations, and have drunks in every skid road. Blacks sell drugs on street corners often to whites, and form gangs such as bloods and crips, and get white kids to listen to rap music, and so on.
Homosexuals grandstand and decorate your homes and design your clothes and so on. Now they’re coming out as wizards.
It’s interesting what people notice and focus on.
http://www.looktothestars.org/celebrity/171-jk-rowling
Why are there more gays then evangelical making successful careers in the arts. In my experience evangelical and Christian artists in general have a few disadvantages that most artists do not.
First of all family; evangelicals are more likely to have a spouse and kids that they not only need to support but to spend time with. Artists are expected to starve for a while. You can’t do that if you have kids to feed. We are taught that it is God, Family then Career. It is hard to compete with people who have it the other way around.
Ethics, evangelicals are severely limited in how far they can go for success. They couldn’t snap up a great opportunity to work in an R rated movie or a TV show that promoted a sinful lifestyle. They couldn’t throw in a lot sensationalist sex and violence to get a publisher’s attention. And they couldn’t join in the usual dirty dealings and back biting that goes on behind the scenes.
Nepotism, liberals are fully entrenched in the media. They will and do assist and promote like-minded friends and colleagues. Anyone who has gone to the movie, tried to watch TV or read a best sellers lately can attest to the fact that it is not the most talented who make it.
And of course our own attitude. Face it we don’t encourage our children to pursue high-risk professions like the arts. Kids who do are often labeled lazy, sissy and unrealistic.
Bottom line is most of them eventually decided is not worth giving up having a family, defying our consciences and working against our personal conviction for fleeting fame.
There are several reasons why gays go into areas like the arts:
1. You go where you are most comfortable and welcome. Face it, gays have not been exactly welcome in a lot of other professions.
2. Gays are, on average, more willing to indulge their “creative” side. I think it’s because we have the “ying” and the “yang”.
2. Stereotyping. In reality, gays are represented in every field and profession. It’s just that people’s homophobia prevents them from acknowledging it.
It’s hard to be gay when you are gay. That’s why there are so many jolly gay people. No, that’s fat people. I’m getting my stereotypes mixed up. It’s hard to be different when you’re a stereotype.
I’m going to get up and go on the treadmill.
When did this “outing” of historical figures start? I dunno. Seems as though if anyone is described as a “lifelong bachelor” you start to wonder. E.g., the man who brought the first Anglo settlers into what we now call Texas was a lifelong bachelor, Stephen F Austin.
I can’t believe folks in the 19th century could not know if someone was gay back then.
Our former congresswoman from Austin, Barbara Jordan, was rumored to be gay for years but this wasnt confirmed until her life-partner did a post mortem outing.
I wonder if it’s adversity that help builds character? 3 to 5% of the population? That’s like 3 out of 100 or 6 out of 200 or 12 out of 400.
And yet, there is this huge contribution.
Look at it this way, Chritianity grew and grew rugged with it’s members were being maligned. No matter the adversity brought on by the Romans, Christianity flourished and couldn’t be stopped.
Only, it’s been the Christians maligning for the last two thousand years. Not just the gays, only they have just saved their most vicious tactics for the gays. You would think that people like the Christians, considering their history and what they bave been through wouldn’t be doing it to someone else. Especially not their own children. Does that make any sense?
“Half the ones I looked at were from the 16 or 17 hundreds. Come on. You almost had to say you were a Christian just so you wouldn’t get killed…”
Utterly ahistorical, but hysterical in more than one sense.
“…and half those were never married. What does that tell you?”
That they were never married. Concluding something beyond that without supportive evidence is irresponsible conjecture.
After reading worldmagblog for a while, I have been considering persecuting Christians again. For one thing, as RDEAN points out, Wonder Adversity build strong bodies eight ways, not to mention strong characters.
However, after reading worldmagblog for a while, I’ve observed that evangelical Christians BYOP–Bring Their Own Persecution. Just add a little Main Stream Media, puff a little, sprinkle on a little evangelical atheism, mix in a little homosexual agenda, and presto, a souffle of persecution pops up. Eat it while it’s fresh and hot though. Stale persecution doesn’t keep that well.
Let‘s also look at non-artistic contributions for a moment. How many hospitals, missions, shelters and orphanages were founded by gays? Can you name a gay Mother Teresa or Mother Hale? Who founded The Salvation Army, Goodwill Industries International? Say you’re a staving kid in a third world country, who would you rather see coming, Franklin Graham or Tennessee Williams?
I can see that gays tend to be attracted to occupations that require a self-centered intensity, but how many do you find in places where you have to bury yourself for the sake of others. You may not be able to name the evangelical who founded the hospital you’ve just been taken to, but I bet you’re glad they were there.
Random - 56
You don’t know me at all if you believe for an instant that:
My career would never have happened had I been so naïve, and gullible as you seem to think I am. Suffice it to say, you aren’t paying attention, or you purposely underestimate me, which I’m beginning to believe is the case -
Again, you failed to understand, (perhaps on purpose) what I was saying weeks ago in that post, and many other posts. I have studied WW2 not to mention the fact that I have lived among the Jews, many are my friends, its not a matter of having a “thing” about them. Jesus was a Jew, many people aren’t aware of that, or IF they are, they don’t understand it -
#64: Concluding something beyond that without supportive evidence is irresponsible conjecture.
Considering the undeniable intense pressure Christians put on each other to get married and have as many children as possible and passing on the “family name” in the 16, 17 and 18 hundreds. Not to mention someone like Handel writing “Messiah”, you can bet church leaders probably gave him a pointed discourse on the importance of appearances. Believe it. However, dashing and single noblemen supported Handel, in his “younger days”. Now, while I’m not coming right out and saying he was gay, but the fact that he was a giant in the arts and considering his personal history and strange and strained marriage between the gays and the Christians, a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.
And it’s important to point out the odd relationship between the gays and the Christians. In this country, the vast majority of gays come from Christian families who obviously never raised their children to be gay. Christian family values means disowning their own children thereby splitting up the very families they claim to want to protect? The Christians say the solution is for the gays to stop being gay. Basically, they are saying to stop existing. Obviously unrealistic.
By hating the gays, this gives the Christians visibility for their supposed war for morals. But by using their own children as scapegoats, it is the Christians that demonstrate a lack of morals thereby highlighting a self-destructive tenancy similar to the Christian “War on Science”. It’s science that allows Christians to live in the type of safety and comfort they weren’t able to enjoy at the conception of their religion.
Basically, the Christians vilify their best and brightest and reject what protects them from the evils of the world. I’m almost mystified until I think about the poor judgement shown by the current crop of Christian leaders. Starting with Haggard and the list I’ve given before. When their leaders demonstrate such poor judgement, is it any wonder that Christians are following the wrong path?
Now if Rowling had just revealed that Dumbledore was Jewish, Victoria would have been right on board.
America the Beautiful written by Katharine Lee Bates.
#66: How many hospitals, missions, shelters and orphanages were founded by gays?
Sorry, considering the very small number of gays in the world compared to the heterosexual population, and how it takes a huge number of people and large resources to build hospitals and missions and orphanages the question seems kind of dumb. However, there have been shelters built in large cities where there are larger numbers of gays to help children that have been disowned and thrown out by their loving Christian families. But you knew that.
Science, the arts, fields where a single person can make an impact are where gays excel. What other options do they have?
“the fact that he was a giant in the arts and considering his personal history and strange and strained marriage between the gays and the Christians, a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.”
In other words, you’re blowing smoke heated up by uninformed innuendo. Intellectually irresponsible conjecture.
Consider taking much more care,
SG
#71: Intellectually irresponsible conjecture.
“I have no time for anything but music” was Handel’s reply to George II’s question about his “love of women.” But the composer’s sovereign was neither the first nor the only of Handel’s contemporary admirers and associates to wonder about his sexuality. Scarcely twenty pages into his narrative, Handel’s first biographer, Christopher Mainwaring, feels obliged to address the same question: “In the sequel of his life he refused the highest favors from the fairest of the sex, only because he would not be confined or cramped by particular attachments.”
Gary C. Thomas
“Was George Frideric Handel Gay?”
Uhhh, yea, right. Confined, hmmm.
I’m sure Haggard’s followers were equally upset when they found out their hero kneeled at more than just the alter of God. They were so upset they sniffed, but they sniffed because of tears.
RDEAN: Christians are still being persecuted for their beliefs, including in the United States as well as on this blog.
This made me laugh outloud–Serious George wrote: “Your premise fails. Maybe it’s because of an exposition of intellectual and cultural history that’s almost entirely informed by cable tv. Or maybe it’s because of a shallow understanding of what “evangelical” means. No worry. A proper education can cure both {:~)”
WELL SAID.
#73: Christians are still being persecuted for their beliefs, including in the United States as well as on this blog.
It sounds good until you start examining it. The majority of Americans are Christian. They have boldly declared this a “Christian” country in an attempt to tyrannize the minority. They want to criminals some of their own children for existing. They want to push their religious beliefs onto the children of non-believers in public schools. They want to add mysticism and belief in the occult to science.
All of a sudden, it seems less of an attack on Christians than the attempt to protect America FROM the Christians. I totally get why you don’t see it that way and that makes it even worse.
“half those were never married. What does that tell you?”
I really find that inference rude and frankly, offensive. As a single person past the age that many young people marry or have a live-in boyfriend, I find it incredibly narrow-minded that my single, celibate state implies that I am a lesbian. I am very bothered by this recent tendency to look back through the lives of those in the past and determine that they were homosexual if they didn’t marry or run around indulging in fornication. It indicates a lack of thoughtfulness or logic, in my opinion
Harrison’s complaint about “grandstanding” (#3) is a classic accusation employed by authoritarian regimes of both the left and the right.
DRAMATURGE
Lot’s of people never marry, that doesn’t mean anything, except they didn’t marry - We know a lot of people who have never married, and they aren’t homosexual - Many missionaries never marry -
I would ignore those who make statements such as you have posted - It is a “lack of thoughtfulness or logic” but its most likely done to put those who haven’t married on the defensive. Those needing attention for the homosexual community will say almost ANYTHING -
In the case of those who lived hundreds of years ago, who stayed single, …….. to ‘pigeon hole’ them into a mold, (especially if they are talented) so as to raise the homosexual flag, over and over again, is obtuse -
#75: I am very bothered by this recent tendency to look back through the lives of those in the past and determine that they were homosexual if they didn’t marry or run around indulging in fornication.
I seems that you give marriage and “indulging in fornication” equal relevance. Sexual love between a married couple is a beautiful thing. It’s difficult for me to refer to it as “fornication”.
As I said in post #68: “Considering the undeniable intense pressure Christians put on each other to get married and have as many children as possible and passing on the “family name” in the 16, 17 and 18 hundreds.”
It was not unusual for marriages to be arranged in those days. Sometimes the arrangements were made when the couples were still “children”. That’s how important getting married was. These days, fewer than half of adults are getting married and more than half of those are getting divorced. No one today assumes anyone is gay because they don’t get married. Also, many gays in the past, as well as today got married to protect themselves from Christian hate and prejudice. That is unfortunate and certainly not the reason to get married. Number one reason to get married, love, number two reason, children. Are there any other reasons that matter?
However, in the past, when people didn’t get married, with the pressure from the church and family as well as such “helpers” as arranged marriage, it’s only natural that one would wonder if a normal, healthy adult were gay.
Many of you are perhaps not aware that Dumbledore DID have a boyfriend - Gellert Grindelwald.
Read for yourself:
http://www.cnn.com/2007/SHOWBIZ/books/10/20/harry.potter.ap/index.html
I think this whole idea actually came about from fans speculating on the internet, and JR went with it. Seems reasonable to me and not at all worthy of controvery. The protestations here reflect an all-too-typical evangelical bigotry.
Side note, from “How Homosexual Was Tchaikovsky?”, an article by Petr Beckmann at http://www.fortfreedom.org/other/tchaik.htm (my ital):
I lost aa great deal of respect for Rowling with this blunder. It was inappropriate and serves no purpose (other than promoting the gay agenda to those too young to properly deal with it).
I’ve read three modern biographies of Tchaikowsky and was a competitor in the 1982 Tchaikowsky competition in Moscow. The evidence is MUCH greater than implied in the above quote. But I see no point in dredging it up here.
Recall that the author of the above, Petr Beckmann, is a Czech electrical engineer (not a music historian) that also challenged Einstein’s theory of relativity. Well that makes him wrong at least twice that I can see!
It was inappropriate and serves no purpose (other than promoting the gay agenda to those too young to properly deal with it).
You guys are so paranoid. There’s no promoting or grandstanding here. It’s just an incidental take on a fictional character that has no controversial significance in the UK, but that is apparently considered inflammatory to some in the homophobic US of A.
The best thing to do with these transparent publicity stunts is to ignore them with the contempt they d-
*curses*
#67 Victoria,
That is true, I don’t know you at all. It is very difficult to get to know a person through an electronic bulletin board, and a very religious person communicating with a strongly irreligious person is not a very promising platform.
I am very aware of what happened to Jews in Germany and throughout history, often by people who believed themselves to be Christians. I was brought up on stories about these events.
As I use my last name in my work and my life everyday, in a country that has some anti-antisemitism but not much and is today mostly worried about Muslims, your comment to me in the context of this medium struck me as strange.
By and large, I talk to people here in a way that corresponds to how they talk to me. If they think I am out of line in how I communicate, I usually adjust. Night Hawk and I recently made some adjustments.
I’m not sure how and if I should adjust in how I talk with you.
This thread produces many examples of why I call myself a radical agnostic. In fact, I feel myself becoming more radicalized by the minute. I will either throw a — never mind, or go to the gym and push some Nautilus machines around.
Harry Potter is a story. Rowling is a writer with a lot of imagination and a lot of work ethic who made a lot of money. The world contains gay people as it did in the past and will in the future. Praying about it will not make much difference, but beam those prayers up, Scotty.
Hell is going to be full of talented unrepentant sinners, so what was the point of their life?
Clearly to improve the quality of life in Hell! I take as a corollary to your claim that Heaven will be filled with untalented self-righteous do-gooders. Methinks maybe you have these two places mixed up.
#80: But until then, it is also time for the influential parts of the musical establishment to stop pretending that Tchaikovsky’s alleged homosexuality is established, accepted and uncontroversial, to realize that the burden of proof is on those who claim the unusual, and to desist from their self-serving smears of a great musician.
Tchaikovsky:
“Only now, especially after the story of my marriage, have I finally begun to understand that there is nothing more fruitless than not wanting to be that which I am by nature.”
letter to his brother, February, 1878
Pretty convincing.
When the “Pathetique” symphony was first played, Tchaikovsky named it “Tragique”. Tchaikovsky referred to it as the symphony of his life. When the first review came out, a reviewer said it should have been called, “Pathetique”, thus, Tchaikovsky changed the name. One of the funniest stories I have ever read.
The only reason being called gay is a smear is because of the hate promoted by the Christians and no other reason. Perhaps Tchaikovsky’s symphony “Pathetique” should be dedicated to “Christian Morals”?
spinoz post 87,
Mark Twain is reputed to have said that he would like heaven for the climate and hell for the company.
Really, the so-called Christians on this site would be torture. I would rather spend eternity with musicians and artists. At least I would be entertained. The Christians on this site, at the very least seem really scary. I bet Jesus or God, if they existed would also want the artists and musicians. The last people he would want would be grovelers. Who likes those?
Well you all have finally pushed me over the edge. I see no other choice than to choose to become gay so that my daughter will rebel and be straight. Listen to yourself folks. Many alcoholics come from teetotaling families. Many alcoholics raise children who never touch alcohol. Both my parents smoked like chimneys. Every time in my life that I have thought I would look good smoking a cigarette I have spent the next day praying for death to set me free. I personally don’t see the point in making Dumbledore gay but hey he’s Rowlings character not mine. I have the last book have had it since the night it came out. I still haven’t made myself read it because I have been too busy hanging out here judging my neighbors. Personally I hope that I can make myself not post on any more gay threads. They just wear me out.
Many Christain families will accept a dangerous alcoholic who will steal from them to buy booze or threaten to commit physical violence before accepting a gay son or daughter who may becomes a doctor or a respected member of the community.
Odd.
Would anyone with a gay son or daughter really wish the kid wasn’t gay? That would boil down to wishing they had a different son or daughter. Just a thought.
I see no other choice than to choose to become gay so that my daughter will rebel and be straight.
Ah - the ultimate sacrifice.
Good luck with that. She might screw up and think you’re a role model.
Re: #66 (KBells),
Pay a visit to just about any major city and you’ll find a shelter for teens who’ve been thrown out of their home by their parents for being gay. We have one right here in Atlanta. Many of them have been started by, run by, and funded by the gay community. I would note that many of these kids come from Christian homes.
In addition, in the 1980’s when AIDS first surfaced, it was the gay and lesbian community who took care of and nursed people with AIDS. Many health care facilities for people with AIDS were started by and funded by the gay community. We took care of our own when straight people, including Christians, considered us “lepers”.
Finally, I would point out that gays are well represented in the “helping” professions, from health care to social service agencies to education all over this country.
In light of this, perhaps you’d like to “revise” your comments.
I declare a wahfat on this thread.
Good point, Kim, but personally I’d be saddened to see you to the “the other side.” (and I think Chloe would to)
#95 Please pay me the fee for using the term wahfat.
Anyway, I won’t hold back while I wait for an eternity to be paid my royalties. I have immediately unleashed a horde of fanatic radical agnostic terrorists who will bore anyone to death who speaks about what their ethnic, religious, or sexual orientation or sexual repression group has contributed to civilization.
Only people who lead polite decent lives will be spared from boristic attack if they display their credentials quickly enough to be spared.
RDEAN #88 & FRANK IN PHOENIX #80
Arturo Toscanini (who had a famous gay son-in-law, Vladimir Horowitz) thought Tchaikovsky’s best composition was the unnumbered Manfred Symphony of 1885, which programatically, like the poem of Byron upon which it is based, celebrates an ill-fated romantic hero who dies resisting the temptation of redemption through religion. Byron and Tchaikovsky both experienced failed marriages and accusations of illicit sexual conduct which made them social outsiders. It is not true that conservatives forced Tchaikovsky to commit suicide, however. Tchaikovsky was torn between thinking the Manfred one of his best compositions and judging it to be “grandstanding.” This ambivalence extended also to the 5th Symphony.
The great homosexual, Leonard Bernstein, a wonderful interpreter of Tchaikovsky’s music, and somebody who was not timid about “grandstanding,” refused to conduct the Manfred because supposedly he considered it trash.
From the article:
“But I am disappointed that she did not make Dumbledore’s sexuality explicit in the Harry Potter book. Making it obvious would have sent a much more powerful message of understanding and acceptance.”
Expand the scenes with Mr. D. and Harry, maybe? Or a threesome with Hagrid? Sigh. How uplifting it all would have been.
I saw this tidbit on one site about Tchaikovsky.
There was uproar galore in Russia over the beloved Tchaikovsky’s death from cholera, an illness which could have been treated if diagnosed in time. Subsequent rumors that Tchaikovsky killed himself because he was implicated in a scandal with a young nobleman seem to be based on lurid speculation.
Another place said this:
No question he was gay….Alternating between periods of elated composition and nervous breakdowns, Tchaikovsky finally married a student of his. Ai, caramba what a bad idea. She was a nymphomaniac and he tried to kill himself. Somehow he got out of it, and secured an annuity from a wealthy patroness which enabled him to give up teaching and spend his life composing and traveling. His brother, Modeste, was also gay.
Sounds like he was one messed up dude.
Scroop Moth (98): … The great homosexual, Leonard Bernstein, a wonderful interpreter of Tchaikovsky’s music, and somebody who was not timid about “grandstanding,” refused to conduct the Manfred because supposedly he considered it trash.
Frank: And now Leonard Bernstein is called “the great homosexual.”
Not “the great composer,” nor even “the great homosexual composer.”
No. “The great homosexual.” Please, tell me that was simply a typo or some error on your part.
#94 - How do they advertise their facility?
Curious how you would know: “… many of these kids come from Christian homes.”
VS,
Through ads in alternative newspapers, fliers on street poles, other social service agencies, newspaper articles, festivals/street fairs, and word of mouth.
I’ve known a few people who have worked at the youth shelter, plus interviews with the teen in the newspaper. It’s a pretty common story, especially here in the Bible belt.
Please, tell me that was simply a typo or some error on your part.
No, Frank, that was intentional. I believe Lenny was a great homosexual, right up there with John Ashbery, Andy Warhol, Gore Vidal, Allen Ginsberg and others. He was a fine. accomplished composer, but not a great composer. He was the great American conductor of the 20th C and one of the conductors of true genius of all times, who put a mark on the performance tradition of the standard repertoire. He made classical music matter. Great homosexuals are hot.
I dunno Scroop, I think Lenny was kind of a mediocre homosexual. He did live a life mostly in the closet after all! He was hot, though …
Lenny and gay pal Copland:
http://www.infopt.demon.co.uk/gbernste.jpg
Copland is a better composer, but Lenny is definitely hotter!
“Curious how you would know: ‘… many of these kids come from Christian homes.’”
Well, can you think of a reason agnostic liberals would throw their kids out of the house for being gay?
apropos to this thread is the new one on how Christians are preceived today:
/2007/10/22/when-people-look-at-us-do-they-see-christ/
Most disturbing is that the perception garnering greatest agreement among respondents is that Christianity means hostility to homosexuals. More than any other image, this best defines what Christianity is to young non-Christian Americans (80 percent of young Christians, meanwhile, confirm that it is an accurate perception of Christianity).
Gee I wonder how they got that idea?
Scroop (104) and Spinoza (105),
Which brings the matter right back to the sexual proclivities of the artists (or scientists or world leaders or fictional characters in fantasy literature).
The issue isn’t really about how well they do what it is they do; the issue is promoting their deviant sexuality (”grandstanding,” as Harrison has put it) to wear down the normal (read “straight”) world’s resistance to it and gain broader acceptance of it.
A.k.a., the lavender agenda.
Thanks for the sweet picture, Spinoza. Poor Aaron. He was so unfairly underrated as a composer, one hopes he obtained other rewards.
Lenny’s closet was pretty big and about as discreet as his adulation for the Black Panthers. He also gets bonus points for the unbelievable aesthetic criticism he took from the pages of Commentary and the National Review in the 80’s during the period of his exalted achievements in Vienna, Amsterdam, and Berlin.
“Grandstanding” was the accusation of Commentary and the National Review against Bernstein. He supposedly was indulging his subjective whims instead of the composers’ art. “Grandstanding” is such a Stalinist term, when you think of it — the criticism directed at Shostakovich.
You can’t blame homosexuals for “grandstanding”. Their difference from everyone else is thrust upon them to a large extent. In practice their “sexual proclivities” are rather ordinary. I disagree with the premise that homosexuality is a minor feature of human behavior. It’s an indispensable effect of our humanity. Personhood is inconceivable without homosexuality.
Wouldn’t Darth Vader be for the war in Iraq, being a bad guy on the dark side and all.
Yoda, Obi Wan Kenobi, and Luke Skywalker would of course be against the war.
It was a good analogy, though. If it had any relevance to the story line, she would have (should have) made it clear in the book(s).
#108 yes I see it now. Gays attending the annual Gay Agenda convention were convening at the “New items for the Gay Agenda” session and somebody piped up with: “Hey. As part of our agenda, let’s convince Rowling to have a gay Harry Potter character!” There was a bried discussion about whether this would appear as grandstanding, but it was dispelled with, “Oh who the heck cares.” Then everyone agreed immediately and it was put to a vote before the GSA (Gay Society of America) where it passed hands down.
p.s. Notice how Harrison doesn’t say that “homosexuals” grandstand, but that “homosexuality” grandstands. This difference reveals the irrational paranoia inherent in the claim. As if “homosexuality” is a person with an agenda.
It’s just a bit of personification. You see, Harrison Scott Key personifies homosexuality.” Haven’t we all known is all along?
Scroop Moth (110): I disagree with the premise that homosexuality is a minor feature of human behavior. It’s an indispensable effect of our humanity. Personhood is inconceivable without homosexuality.
Frank: Only insofar as “personhood is inconcievable” without any other sin tendency.
“Inconceivable,” that is, apart from the shed blood of Jesus Christ.
What do you call this agenda?
Swingers are growth business for US firms
Reuters | Monday, 20 August 2007
Matt Virtue, who works as a consultant at a Washington law firm, says he spends more than $10,000 a year to attend conventions, hotels and clubs where he and his girlfriend can have sex with other partners.
“Any other hobby that I was into at 40 years old is going to cost me $10,000,” he said from a hot tub he was sharing with his girlfriend and a couple with whom they had been intimate the night before. “Dude, I’m addicted to it, there is no doubt about it.”
Such enthusiasm has turned what were once private passions into a multimillion dollar business. Lifestyles Organization, the United States’ largest swinger services company, has annual sales of about $US15 million.
Swingers also bring in millions of dollars to specialty clubs and hotels in the United States as well as Jamaica, Mexico, France and elsewhere.
“We’re talking about a lifestyle, but in reality we are also talking about a business,” Robert McGinley, 73, the president of Lifestyles Organization, said during its annual convention in Las Vegas, which attracts about 900 couples.
Lifestyles Organization caters to a middle-class demographic who want to meet like-minded couples and who typically want to hide their passions from what they call “vanillas” (conventional couples).
Efforts to meet such couples outside those circles often fail, giving tour, club and convention organisers steady business.
Terri, 48, attending the convention from Boise, Idaho - who asked that her last name not be published - said she and her husband of 21 years spend as much as $US8000 a year on several weeks of swinging vacations and club visits.
At this year’s event, Anaheim, California-based Lifestyles Organization contracted out an entire hotel near the Las Vegas Strip and organised seminars and parties for middle-aged couples.
The most exhibitionist of those gathered in open hotel rooms after midnight to have sex as others watched or joined in. Some couples made small talk as they were engaged in sex, including one man who boasted that his son was in medical school.
“The other night I looked up and there were five or six people looking,” said Terri, who retired from the US Air Force two years ago. “I’m glad I was giving them a good show.”
“I’ve had three (lovers) in the past 24 hours.”
Leading sex researchers say they do not know the number of swingers in the United States, so it is difficult to pinpoint how much business the subculture represents overall.
Rick Conner, a swinger and author of an advice book for such couples, estimates there are 100,000 US swingers, of whom 20,000 are particularly active. Other swingers have suggested the number is in the low millions.
PLEASE, NO SEX IN THE RESTAURANT
Despite the unusual focus of the convention, McGinley shares the bottom-line concerns of many businessmen.
“In business there is risk and you have to decide is it a reasonable risk or not,” he said. “Behind the scenes there is a lot of planning that goes into this and a lot of going over financials, financials of the past and what is the current situation.”
He said couples paid a registration fee of $US690, out of which $US200 covered costs, leaving an overall profit of more than $US400,000. Couples pay additionally for hotel rooms and flight costs.
Lifestyles Organization faced a few unusual incidents. His staff had to halt one couple from engaging in a sex act inside the Tuscany Suites restaurant.
Conventions bring Lifestyles $US4 million in annual sales; their travel business booking swinging guests into resorts such as Hedonism II in Jamaica or Desire in Mexico bring in another $US10 million to $US12 million a year, McGinley said.
“We relax our already liberal rules to accommodate the Lifestyles Organization and make the entire resort clothing-optional,” explained Richard Bourke, general manager of Hedonism II.
He said Lifestyles Organization books $US2 million of rooms a year over six contracted weeks. Hedonism II staff are barred from intimate relations with the guests and some have been fired for violating the edict, Bourke said.
“You have resorts with big-name resort companies that are catering to it,” McGinley said. “They’re not into swinging at all, but they are into making money, and we’re the ones that provide the clients for them.”
Desire Resort and Spa in Los Cabos, Mexico opened in November with a focus on the swinging market. About half of the guests are active swingers, according to Jesus Prado Leal, a receptionist.
Several hundred clubs nationwide also cater to swingers. Jeff James, who works for Club Freedom Acres in San Bernardino County east of Los Angeles, said 225 to 260 couples visit on a typical Saturday night, paying $85 each, with a similar number on Fridays paying $US65. “It’s doubled in daily attendance in the last three years,” he said.
Swinging also boosts ancillary services such as breast enhancements and erectile dysfunction drugs. “Viagra is definitely part of the adult scene,” said Deborah, a 52-year old aesthetician grandmother from Dallas, Texas, who asked that her last name not be used. “Instead of four stars before, it’s probably five stars now.”
Perhaps related to the points RDEAN makes in post #116:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/06/25/politics/main626069.shtml
I guess everyone has forgotten the scandal that contributed to the election of Obama to the United States Senate.
AP) Illinois Republican senatorial candidate Jack Ryan, his candidacy in turmoil over sex club allegations, decided to quit his quest for Congress on Friday. “I am today withdrawing from the race,” he said in a statement prepared by his campaign.
Ryan has been struggling for political survival since Monday, when divorce records were released showing that his ex-wife, actress Jeri Ryan, said he took her to sex clubs and tried to pressure her to perform sex acts while others watched. Ryan has denied the allegations.
And so on.
rdean (116): What do you call this agenda?
Frank: So what’s your question? Do you doubt that swingers have an agenda in making/keeping their “lifetsyle” socially acceptable and legal, just like “activist” homosexuals? (By which I mean, those who wish to be/remain out of the closet.)
It is one thing when sinners are ashamed of their sins and do what they can to keep them from public view. this is bad enough.
It is something else entirely when sinners demand that the general public accept their sin.
And that is the agenda of the activist homosexuals.
Gays don’t ask the general public accept anything. Never have they asked for acceptance. They demand equal rights. This is the bait and switch of the conservatives. First of all, there are so few gays that if they were allowed civil benefits, you wouldn’t even know it.
For instance, military benefits include guaranteed first time home loan and educational benefits. Since gays are at the top in so many fields, we are just hurting ourselves by trying to keep them down. Look how we kicked out dozens of Arabic translators from the military. How many Americans died because we didn’t have enough translators?
You want to enjoy what gays bring to American culture, but intimidate them into keeping hidden. Nice.
There are so few that they have no say in how their taxes are spent. This is called taxation without representation.
Do you think it’s a choice? Could you choose?
This entire campaign against the gays is as honest as “Noah’s Ark” and “Samson” and the Garden of Eden. Just made up fantasy stories for the credible against people you have no contact with. This is why it’s so easy to hurt them. You don’t know any. Hopefully you never have a gay family member. If you do, give them my sympathy.
rdean (120): Gays don’t ask the general public accept anything. Never have they asked for acceptance. They demand equal rights.
Frank: They already have equal rights. They enjoy freedom of speech, freedom of worship, the right to keep and bear arms, and freedom of association (to name but a few). They can even marry any person of the opposite sexspecial rights within the context of their ungodly/immoral, unnatural, socially unacceptable sexual preferences and practices.
rdean (120): For instance, military benefits include guaranteed first time home loan and educational benefits. Since gays are at the top in so many fields, we are just hurting ourselves by trying to keep them down.
Frank: Huh? From rights and acceptance to military benefits?
Gays may strive to to be the top of their field. Go for it, be the best! But that has nothing to do with them also insisting that society (or people, generally) not make moral judgements about their public sexual relationships. They want their relationships to be just as public, just as sanctioned, just as acceptable to people as is the legal, socially-acceptable monogamous heterosexual relationship of marriage.
rdean (120): You want to enjoy what gays bring to American culture, but intimidate them into keeping hidden. Nice.
Frank: Nice try, but no cigar. I’ll enjoy anything enjoyable that anybody brings to American culture, and I don’t really care to know about their sexual preferences and proclivities. I don’t want them (the people) “hidden” — I want them to keep their shameful practices hidden.
And in cases where decent moral character is an issue — say, in school teachers, judges, soldiers, etc. — I expect them to keep those immoral practices and relationships hidden, or to lose the trust that people in their positions should engender among those they serve. They should not expect to have it both ways.
rdean (120): Do you think it’s a choice? Could you choose?
Frank: I don’t necessarily think that the inclination is a choice, but I certainly think it is a temptation.
And the decision to give in to the temptation is just as much a choice as it is to give in to the the temptation to get drunk, to steal, to commit adultery, or to lie.
The temptation is not a choice, but the sin is. And that is holds true for the sin of homosexual activity.
#121: They already have equal rights.
Honestly, you don’t know or are you lying?
Remember Terry Sheiavo (spelling)? Her husband was able to go against the wishes of her biological family because that is the right given by marriage.
A first cousin, even if the gay and the first cousin NEVER met, could challange a will and win in most states. Because the gay relationship, even if 35 years old, has no legal protections. But you knew that and probably don’t care.
If you are not allowed to go into the military, you can’t get military benefits. This is called connect the dots. 10,000 soldiers, including doctors, nurses, engineers and translators have been kicked out while sons and daughters, mothers and fathers have been kept over and over again for multiple tours. If you were some kid but your father is in Iraq when a gay, willing to go there could take his place, would you say yes, or for “moral” reasons, so no?
#121: I want them to keep their shameful practices hidden.
Anyone who has a gay child or brother or sister may be trying to protect them from you, who they would easily consider “shameful”.
#121: I’ll enjoy anything enjoyable that anybody brings to American culture
It’s called, “Taking advantage”.
#121: but I certainly think it is a temptation
Do you now? When do you feel this most tempted? Right after dinner? In the shower? At the airport? This was a very revealing statement.
Frank (121): I don’t necessarily think that the inclination is a choice, but I certainly think it is a temptation.
rdean (122): Do you now? When do you feel this most tempted? Right after dinner? In the shower? At the airport? This was a very revealing statement.
Frank: Cute.
Not all people are inclined toward/tempted to all sins.
I don’t happen to be inclined toward homosexuality/tempted to commit homosexual acts. (And I don’t say that with any degree of pride — I certainly have a raft of temptations/sinful inclinations myself.)
But if I were, while the temptation/inlcination may not be my “choice,” the decision to follow through with it is absolutely my choice.
#123: the decision to follow through with it is absolutely my choice.
Too many Christians say, “Love the sinner, hate the sin”. Well, to me it’s much ado about nothing. I know on this site, I have read from many people that have said they were virgins when they were married, but when the highest rate of pregnancy and STD’s are among Christian Youth then I suspect that not everyone who claims to be a virgin is telling the truth.
The other thing is that when people get older, they tend to expect other people to adhere to more rigid code. I grew up in California in the 50’s and survived the 60’s. Sure, there were some wild people, but there always is going to be some wild people. The thing with the gays is that if you are a normal heterosexual male, you don’t want to deal with another dude’s junk, to put it mildly. Add that to the intense sexual attraction to women, plus a dash of church hypocrisy, and it’s no wonder that you are saying, “They must be the most unnatural and disgusting people ever to want to do that”. Well, the truth is that what makes gays gay.
The single biggest reason men and women divorce is over sexual compatibility. So don’t tell me that heterosexual love is lust free. If you have a man who says, “Mama, gun the engine, Daddy’s home” and Mama goes, “Don’t ever talk to me like that. Sex is something you endure for babies”; this is not a lasting marriage unless someone is a masochist. I guarantee, from experience, if your mama, and I don’t mean mother, treats you like need to be treated, you will not stray. People may be together 50 years, but they spend forty trading body fluids.
So, let’s tell the gays to spend their entire life alone and unloved. THAT would be a sin. And why? Because we are social creatures. Biblical sin is invented to keep control over Bronze Age people that had no morals.
There is this idea that if you stay “pure” and “unsullied” you will go to heaven. Well I got news for you, if you are a normal guy, you have certainly had “wet dreams”. If you don’t take care of that itch, you body will do it on it’s own. THAT’S NORMAL!!!!
Please don’t go on about, “Well I don’t believe murder and orgies are normal”. That is the same old tired misleading line that Christians have used over and over and over again. No one said that were.
Sometimes I think Christians only know feast or famine. Don’t they have any self-control? Is that how the keep each other from rape and murder? Threaten each other with everlasting torment?
rdean,
Your reply is all over the map. I truly don’t know where to begin. But I think I’ll try to summarize:
Abuses of, or sinful actions within, heterosexual relationships is no argument for the acceptance of homosexual relationships as “normal.” They quite plainly deviate from God’s created order.
An example from the dietary world: People consume food and drink, not feces and urine. But just because eating food is normal and right, doesn’t mean that people can’t partake of food sinfully (e.g., gluttony). So if you had a liking for human waste, it would not be legitimate to point to how people sin with food to justify your preference for human waste.
God’s design of mankind most definitely includes a strong sexual component. The Bible does not teach “sex is strictly for making babies, so you’d best not do it because it feels good and you love your spouse’s body.” But it does teach that one of the reasons for the marital (husband/wife, father/mother) relationship is to procreate, to raise a godly seed unto the Lord. So, God’s design does include certain parts that fit together for the purpose of procreation.
Sexually, men and women fit together. Men do not fit with men, and women do not fit with women. And just in case we miss the lesson from the obvious nature of the machinery, God’s word tells us in the plainest of terms that homosexual interaction is an abomination to Him — a blatant rejection of the created order.
You wrote: “So, let’s tell the gays to spend their entire life alone and unloved.”
No, let’s tell the “gays” the truth: i.e., that God says their sexual inclinations are sinful and destructive (both temporally and eternally).
And let’s tell the “gays” the same thing we tell all other sinners: that grace, repentance, forgiveness, healing and salvation are found in Jesus Christ alone.
You never had a woman from behind? No oral sex? Poor you.
Your God, not mine. What is your vision of heaven? Harps and clouds? Candy with no cavities?
People created God. God didn’t create people. The only way I will change that statement is under torture.
I wonder if you visit a medical doctor or a faith healer?
rdean (126): You never had a woman from behind? No oral sex?
Frank: Where does such a question even come from? What does it have to do with the topic of this thread?
And why would you even think you know anything about my bedroom activities? They are none of your business — but they are blessed by God: “Marriage is honorable among all, and the bed undefiled; but fornicators and adulterers God will judge.” ~ Hebrews 13:4
It sounds to me like you have heard and believed a bunch of nonsense about what somebody else thinks the Bible teaches about the physical aspect of marriage. “No oral sex! Nothing but the missionary position! And only to make babies! Those poor, ignorant Christians!”
You really ought to take alook at the Song of Solomon sometime (and maybe even a commentary) to get a better idea of how God smiles on the husband’s and wife’s enjoyment of each others’ bodies.
#127: Frank: Where does such a question even come from? What does it have to do with the topic of this thread?
#125: People consume food and drink, not feces and urine.
Has James returned again?
rdean (124): There is this idea that if you stay “pure” and “unsullied” you will go to heaven.
Frank: That is not the idea of the Gospel, I can assure you. The Bible tells us it is too late for any of us to “stay pure and unsullied.” We are all sinners — we’re born sinners, born at enmity with God, and therefore unworthy of Heaven.
That’s the bad news.
The Good News is that we are made pure and unsullied by confessing and repenting of our sins and turning in faith to Jesus Christ — to His perfect life and His atoning death, which satisfies the justice of God in regard to our sins.
rdean (124): Well I got news for you, if you are a normal guy, you have certainly had “wet dreams”. If you don’t take care of that itch, you body will do it on it’s own. THAT’S NORMAL!!!!
Frank: I’m sorry, but I fail to see any connection between what our bodies “do on their own” — an involuntary physiological occurrance — and deciding to engage in sinful sexual acts with another person.
rdean (128),
I used the consumption of feces and uirne as an analogy — comparing natural dietary practices to unnatural. Likewise, there are natural and unnatural sexual practices.
So, back to my question: What do the sexual habits of a married couple have to do with the deviant and unnatural acts of homosexual activity?
I return to my point I’ve made at other times. I have a concept of right and wrong, however, inadequate. I consider murder and rape and torture wrong. I consider theft and harmful deceit wrong. I guess I would call this “pragmatic ethics.”
It is not based on the Bible and it is not based on a belief in “absolute values.” There are many problems with this approach. However, I do not find the approach advocated by the religious believers at wmb convincing or superior. That they advocate their beliefs very loudly and aggressively (what I call Victoria bold)or very colorfully and obsessively (what I call James cloacal) does not convince me of anything.
I am not the only secular person in the world who feels this way.
There are many issues involving sexual ethics and health, and they are worthy of discussion and concern. There are secular arguments for monogamy and for fidelity and even for chastity that are not stupid arguments. There are arguments for heterosexual marriage that are serious.
However, when people speak of homosexuality with the same intensity and aversion I feel toward murder and rape, I am convinced of nothing. When they say they are doing so out of “love,” I think, “put a sock in it and mind your own business.”
Frank, do you have an argument to offer besides a religious one to a non-religious person?
What is Ron Paul’s position?
Random Name (132): However, when people speak of homosexuality with the same intensity and aversion I feel toward murder and rape, I am convinced of nothing. When they say they are doing so out of “love,” I think, “put a sock in it and mind your own business.”
Frank: While I’d like to address more of your points, all I have time for is a brief response to this point for now.
We would be only too happy to “put a sock in it and mind our own business.” For most of western history (and particularly with the spread of Christianity), homosexual behavior has been relegated to the closet.
It has only been in the last 20 or 30 years or so that homsexual activists have felt free to come out of the closet. Not merely to let us know that they are among us (which nobody has ever really argued), but to seek broad social acceptance and equal treatment re. their perverse sexual relationships. They have demanded that scoiety accord them identical honor and sanction in the form of marriage or civil union.
Demanded. We have not come hunting for them. They have gotten in our face — in the face of normal and decent society — and demanded we accept and approve of their relationships on equal terms with heterosexual monogamy.
When the lavender lobby trots their sexual practices, and the relationships built around them, out into the public square — when “gay pride” parades flaunting all manner of perversity and debauchery are held on main streets throughout America and around the world — we think we have a right to say, “Put a sock in it, and keep your business to yourself.”
Random Name (132): I return to my point I’ve made at other times. I have a concept of right and wrong, however, inadequate.
Frank: You may not realize it, but that is a biblical teaching. Don’t take my word for it; read Romans 1 & 2. God has written His law on the hearts of all men, but they — we — all unrighteously suppress His truth, to some degree.
That is my explanation for the inadequacy of your (and my) concept of right and wrong. What is your explanation — from an evolutionary/materialist perspective, that is?
Random,
To put it another way, if your ethics, your concept of right and wrong is not based on a belief in “absolute values,” how can you be certain it is “inadequate”?
Either there reall is some absolute, authoritative source or standard of truth and values, or there is not, and every man, every society, simply makes it up as they go along.
If it is the second, then don’t sweat it — your concept of right and wrong is quite adequate.
#133: We have not come hunting for them. They have gotten in our face
Nothing like crap. You can roll it around and savor the sweet taste and fresh aroma.
Who hunted Mathew Shepard?
Alan Turing is often considered to be the father of modern computer science. He saved countless lives during WWII deciphering enemy codes. After the war, those who considered themselves “good” and “moral” hounded him out of the service. He was arrested and then tortured into admitting he loved another man. Then he was tortured in earnest in an attempt to “change” him, oh, I mean, “cure” him. Finally, he committed suicide.
Gays don’t want an idiots approval, they just want equal rights. Isn’t that what the constitution is all about?
Besides, most Christians don’t even know gays (besides outed church leaders), other than they like gay art and music and theater and literature and science and all the other things gays do. Maybe that’s the problem. Jealously?
We make it up as we go along.
Except for those people who have convinced themselves that they have a book from God, that is what the course of history looks–and it is a very bloody, unpleasant course much of the time–like to us secular people.
I have no great philosophy or system of values to offer. I am quite aware of the horrors of systems such as Communism and Naziism from secular people who offered such systems. I don’t attack Christianity as the root of all evil, but neither do I admire it as the root of all good. I think it a myth system developed over time and really consists of a case of “making it up as they went along” and convincing themselves it came from God and not from themselves.
The obsession with homosexuality was not one of their best insights, and it’s too bad they believe every word came from God. But it’s still a difficult problem. I am a heterosexual father who accepts my daughter and her “out of law” partner, much like the Cheneys do–while I don’t much admire their politics, we’re on a similar page in regard to “family values.” Gotta go to work. Nice talking with you.
A picture showing a newborn infant with a wrist band marked, “HOMOSEXUAL.” The parents are ‘marking’ this child as a “homosexual” ?
And we hear the words over and over and over again;
Even a homosexual philosopher, Gianni Vattimo can see the dishonesty, and say says “only partly true.”
Ad showing ‘homosexual’ newborn causes stir in Italy
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=071024175433.inucp5pp&show_article=1
rdean (136): Who hunted Mathew Shepard?
Frank: A couple of ignorant hick criminals who offered him a lift home from the bar in hopes of robbing him. Perhaps they discovered during the ride that he was gay, got wigged out by it, and went homicidal on him.
But he was not “hunted” by biblically-informed Christians for being gay. And when a gay person is the victim of a violent crime, it is neither automatically because they are gay, nor perpetrated by Bible-believing Christians.
As far as the Turning case, I’ll take your word that everyting you’ve said is true and accurate. “Tortured” to confess? Perhaps. “Tortured” to change him? Sounds implausible to me. But either way, I still find torture — for either/both reasons — reprehensible.
But that has nothing to do with the fact that the military ought especially to be comprised, as much as possible, of people of good moral character. Just as I expect the military to discharge a person who they learned was a car thief, an adulterer or who lied on his enlistment paperwork, I also expect them to discharge somebody who engages in sexual perversion.
rdean (136): Gays don’t want an idiots approval, they just want equal rights. Isn’t that what the constitution is all about?
Frank: They want society’s approval — and acceptance — which is exactly what a right implies. Gays wish to be allowed all the same social privileges and benefits of married heterosexuals. The Constitution is about liberty, not license. Homosexuals have the liberty to engage in whatever practices they wish to, behind closed doors, and out of public view. They do not have the right to expect their deviant relationships to be accorded the same social status and legal benefits.
rdean (136): Besides, most Christians don’t even know gays …
Frank: What? I thought they were everywhere? That they could be anybody? A family member, a co-worker, even a (gasp!) spouse!
I’ve known a few homsexuals over the years. Knew a few lesbians in the USAF. Had a couple of roomies in Germany who actually conspired to get me thrown out of our room … and a month or so later, they were called on the carpet after being busted by their next roomie doin’ the deviant nasty. (I had no idea they were homosexuals when I was their roomie.) I’ve had a couple of lesbian co-workers in my 21 years at my current employer.
And I have a cousin who is a homosexual activist, whom I grew up and went to school with, but haven’t seen in at least ten years.
And your point in all this would be … what?
But I don’t have to know a drunk to know that drunkeness is a sin. Nor would I have to know a homosexual to know that what they engage in is a sin.
rdean (136): … other than they like gay art and music and theater and literature and science and all the other things gays do. Maybe that’s the problem. Jealously?
Frank: If you mean “art and music and theater and literature that endorse or promote the gay agenda,” then no, I don’t actually like it.
But if you mean “music and theater and literature and science that are performed, created or discovered by homosexuals,” I frankly don’t care what their private sexual practices are. I judge the music and theater and literature and science by their own merits. (And one very important merit truth — hence my refusal to patronize those things that are sympathetic to the gay agenda).
And as for “jealousy”?! That’s simply too rich!! Are you implying that only gays have significant accomplishments in these fields?! Puh-leeze!! The only “jealousy” I even come close to experiencing is wishing I could play a musical instrument like this gal or sing like that guy — and I could’t possibly care less whether they’re straight or gay.
News flash, deano: I enjoy some of Elton John’s — and Leonard Bernstein’s — and Aaron Copland’s — music! I loved the “Lord of the Rings” movies, and enjoyed “Star Trek: The Next Generation,” even though they both featured prominent actors who are gay!
Years ago, my wife had an OB-GYN who we thought was gay because he was rather effeminate. A few years after we quit going to him (because our health plan changed), we saw on TV that he’d died of AIDS, and that he was also a major AIDS-issues advocate here in the Valley. (Those things alone don’t prove he was gay, buuuuuut …)
A friend of ours at church is a huge Truman Capote fan! She even taught his short story, “A Christmas Memory,” in our church’s (gasp!) Christian school!
And finally, a young man in our church was excommunicated a couple of years ago because it became known to the elders that he was gay, and he adamantly refused to repent of it. (Sadly, he died about this time last year, apparently during an asthma attack.)
Almost all sinful people have some good traits or abilities. Some even have many. And I thank God that He gifts humanity with all their traits and abilities. But He still doesn’t expect us to call that which is good “evil,” and that which is evil “good.”
Frank, thank you for your comment. I would guess we are about .002% closer to understanding each other, and finding some agreement on this topic and that is about as close as we are likely to get.
In this issue, as with the topic of atheism, I notice a kind of “mutual martyrdom,”; both homosexuals and evangelical Christians feel picked on, and talk about how the other side “persecutes” them.
As a non-Christian with many homosexual acquaintances, and a daughter who lives with another woman, I am much more sympathetic to the gay side than the Christian side.
I don’t care a whit about gay marriage, and neither, apparently to my daughter and her partner.
Frank, you express a world of stereotypes about homosexuals, as do many homosexuals about evangelical Christians. Each side focuses on examples of people on the other side who embody the worst of their side and consider them emblematic of the whole.
I do support civil unions of some sort; you (I guess) do not because that is encouraging the gay life style or some such.
As I’ve said, there is something similar (though not the same) to the problems with the civil rights movements in this argument. Christians think (my paraphrase) We don’t actively persecute you; you can follow your perverted ife style as long as you hide it and keep it out of sight of our children who might be tempted into it; however, you insist on forcing it down our throats.
Homosexuals (and I) are unwilling to accept that they are “second class” citizens. There are many homosexuals who want to be able to conduct their lives just like other citizens (or so I think and observe); many Christians can not abide this (or so I think and observe); the “culture” war carries on.
At least, homosexuals are not responsible for many abortions; do evangelicals appreciate that? No, I don’t think so.
#139: Gays wish to be allowed all the same social privileges and benefits of married heterosexuals.
You’re so funny. What are those “social priviliges” that gays want? Why is that important to them? Why would it be important to anyone?
Gays want acceptance “exactly the same” as you want acceptance by radical Islamofacist Muslims. What they want is equality. You know, all men created equal and stuff.
RN said her daughter lived with another woman but had no interest in getting married. That would last until one of them went into the hospital or wrote a will.
#139: he’d died of AIDS
Love they way you guys wave that around like it means something. Gays didn’t “cause” AIDS. AIDS causes gay deaths. In most places in the world, straights have caught up and passed the gays, but a lot. So has AIDS “evolved” into the straight disease? Like cervical cancer?
#139: Are you implying that only gays have significant accomplishments in these fields?!
Of course not. However, for their small numbers, their accomplishments are huge. Everyone can name a dozen gay artists or scientists or singers or authors or composers right off the top of their head faster than they could name a dozen states. But if you ask for an evangelical artist or scientist, many won’t be able to name one. Sorry.
As for Turing:
1931-34: Undergraduate at King’s College, Cambridge University
1932-35: Quantum mechanics, probability, logic
1935: Elected fellow of King’s College, Cambridge
1936: The Turing machine, computability, universal machine
1936-38: Princeton University. Ph.D. Logic, algebra, number theory
1938-39: Return to Cambridge. Introduced to German Enigma cipher machine
1939-40: The Bombe, machine for Enigma decryption
1939-42: Breaking of U-boat Enigma, saving battle of the Atlantic
1943-45: Chief Anglo-American crypto consultant. Electronic work.
1945: National Physical Laboratory, London
1946: Computer and software design leading the world.
1947-48: Programming, neural nets, and artificial intelligence
1948: Manchester University
1949: First serious mathematical use of a computer
1950: The Turing Test for machine intelligence
1951: Elected FRS. Non-linear theory of biological growth
1952: Arrested as a homosexual, loss of security clearance
1953-54: Unfinished work in biology and physics
1954 (7 June): Death (suicide) by cyanide poisoning, Wilmslow, Cheshire.
They used to do something called, “Reparative Therapy”. Some used drugs, other shock treatment, some used lobotomy. It was never found to be effective, but is considered unethical since not a single person has ever stopped feeling same sex attraction. What is that saying about doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results? Poor Turing, he was a young man when he died. How much have we hurt ourselves pushing religious discrimination? Who knows what else he might have accomplished?
To me, it’s the same as sending our sons and daughters over and over agian to Iraq when there are gays here that are willing to go. 11,000 kicked out of the military including nearly 1,000 in critical positions like Arabic and Farsi translation, doctors, nurses and on. Most didn’t come out, but were accused. And I bet, it’s just a guess, I bet every single one accused was accused by a Christian. I would be really suprised if an atheist even cared.
RDEAN,
Please do not jump to conclusions about what I say and write. When Washington passed a civil union law, I asked my daughter and her partner if they planned to get a union.
Their response was they had done as much as they could already to protect their rights. For example, my daughter has changed her last name to her partner’s last name. She has legally adopted her partner’s child. The sperm donor (who is involved with his daughter) has given up his legal rights as a “father.”
The have used a lawyer to set up legal documents to protect their rights in regard to illness, inheritance, and so on. They were able to protect their rights, they felt, by being prudent as much as they would get out of the civil union law.
Basically, I think we are on the same side, but please be careful how you use me as a club to beat other posters.
While it’s reasonable enough to characterize me as an idiot, my daughter is much smarter and more responsible than I am, so if you are not more careful in how you talk about us, I will have her gay friends hunt you down and dispose of you as soon as they get done with the phobes of wmb.
RN, if the child came from her partner and her partner died, the grandparents would have the right to take the child. If there were no biological connection with the child and your daughter, regardless of the supposedly legal ties, in most states, she would lose custody. In the other states, it would be at the discretion of the judge. You can’t count on legal protections when it comes to biology. The grandparents, if they exist, have not given up their biological rights.
Also,
A first cousin could challenge a will and win. The was because in the past, women and children used to be able to inherit debt beyond what is owed by an estate. This would lead to indentured servitude, which is basically slavery. No one took into account gays when these laws were written. That means that if your daughter’s partner died, first cousins who she has never met, could collect half of whatever was owned jointly by your daughter and her partner. This is true in every state in the union except those that allow civil unions. Businesses, automobiles and houses have been sold to end these claims. When it comes to money, people are greedy.
Also,
Say her partner gets into a traffic accident and goes into the hospital. Say her parents didn’t approve of their daughters “gayness”. They could legally bar your daughter from seeing her partner until their daughter was declared legally “competent”.
They may have done as much as they could to protect their rights, but the truth is, there is not really much they could do in states where there are no civil unions.
Not sure why this is a club: RN said her daughter lived with another woman but had no interest in getting married. That would last until one of them went into the hospital or wrote a will.
What it is, is sad but true, and certainly unfair. Your daughter may believe she has protected herself legally, but she may want to review her own protections.
RDEAN,
Those are valid points, though I react in two ways.
Nothing is for sure in life.
There are two struggles going on here. One is the civil rights struggle and the other is the religious/moreal struggle.
The religious posters here regard this as a moral struggle based on God’s laws for men and women. For Victoria, I guess, there is no other dimension and Frank is not far behind in that regard.
For the secular people, such as you and I, it’s a civil rights struggle. The two sides don’t speak the same language or operate on the same operating systems.
Obviously, even in conventional marriages all sort of crises and struggles come up all the time. When a heterosexual couple who once thought they loved each go to war, people get killed, people get beaten, children get kidnapped, children get taken into hiding, children get taken to other countries, and so on. Laws can only protect so much when people want to hurt each other.
By the same token, even when laws are not as strong as one might want, people can deal with each other in a loving and caring way. At the moment, all the grandparents (seven involved with this unconventional family) are on board. This could all go wrong as well, but at best family structure and legal structure should work together and support each other.
This message brought to you by Sentimental Atheistic Fools are Us.
#144: even when laws are not as strong as one might want, people can deal with each other in a loving and caring way.
I hear you, but when the mother of the grandchild is healthy naturally the grandparents are going to appear fine and dandy, after all, they want to see their grandchild. However, there have been cases that if the mother became, for some reason, incapacitated, the grandparents decide God has “punished” their sinful behavior and they have been given a sign and now they must step in and “rescue” the grandchild. You would never even see it coming. This is why civil unions are so important. Also, if something should happen to your daughter, the child she adopted might get ssn or some other government benefits, but that is iffy since she had a biological mother living. And the mother would certainly not get any benefits.
Anyone who has lost a loved one knows how utterly devastating that can be. So when your daughter’s partner would need help the most, it’s not there. Now you may be good people and she may have 20 sets of loving grandparents to count on, but unfortunately that is the exception, not the norm.
One last thought. The founders put limitations in the constitutions on the religious, NOT on atheists. This is because they perceived the religious, and rightly so, as dangerous and a threat to liberty. They demonstrate that over and over again on this site. What’s worse, they truly believe they are doing “God’s Will”. They don’t even know they are a danger. They are mystified when people tell them they are scary. They only want to introduce those that aren’t interested to Christ and the Bible. People will do horrible things in the name of “God”. But they will do them with “love”.
Random Name (140): Frank, you express a world of stereotypes about homosexuals …
Frank: Would you show me some examples? (I ask out of genuine curiosity and a desire to see my words from your perspective, not out of any defensiveness.)
Thx …
#136: they were called on the carpet after being busted by their next roomie doin’ the deviant nasty.
I just thought that was funny. When I was in the service, there was girl in the Arpac across the street that loved black guys, in bunches. It was the talk of the battalion. The two and half years I was in Germany guys were caught with girls in the barracks a handful of times. Once, when I was on leave, I came back and twenty guys in the battery had the painful pee. Apparently, they had a hooker in the battery for a couple of days sneaking her from one room to the next during inspection, sharing the goods. There was some angry talk by the Sergeant Major, but no one was busted. No one called the wild hetro gangbang the “deviant nasty”. No one even said “nasty”. No one was busted. No one was fined.
BUUUUT, there were two guys that I knew weren’t gay, but said they were just to get out of the service. Gay on Monday, home on Wednesday.
What was the name of that married familyman Republican congressman whose name kept showing up in hooker’s address books? He got a standing ovation when he returned to congress, unlike Larry, who was shunned. Well, we know the real reason the Republicans are mad at Bill, Monica wasn’t a man.
Thank God there are no double standards in this country. Deviant Nasty anyone?
Frank: I need to be a little more careful here. I will make a distinction between your posts in particular and the general posts I read here by evangelical Christians on the subject of homosexuality.
For you in particular, the main thing that struck me in the last series of posts is your identification of homosexuals positions as identical with the “lavender lobby” and that slides over into what some said in this thread as “grandstanding” and I might describe as “street theater.”
Most homosexuals, I would argue, live lives as varied as most heterosexuals. Some are liberal, some are conservative. Some dress flamboyantly, some dress sedately and conservatively. Some participate in “gay pride” parades, some sing in “men’s choruses.” Some father or bear children, some live childless lives. Some live in committed relationships, some “swing,” and “play the field.”
Some consider themselves religious believers, some are hardcore atheists. I don’t know what percentage of homosexuals want the right to “get married,” it’s probably fairly high, but it’s certainly not universal, and quite a few would settle for “civil union” if they could get it.
For you in particular, the main stereotyping that comes across to me is the characterization of street theater as emblematic of gays in general.
I’m sorry to keep picking on the Cheneys so much, but it comes with the territory of being a famous Republican. Mary Cheney thinks everything about the Republicans is wonderful except they oppose gay marriage.
That gays should “stay in the closet” is a difference of opinion. That most gays want to be able to introduce a partner at a party or social event to me is perfectly normal and reasonable; I don’t know to what extent you consider it perfectly unreasonable, but to the extent you consider it unacceptable we disagree, and to the extent you characterize “street theater” as typical of gays in general, it strikes me as stereotyping. I haven’t expressed myself well, here, and I have to make an effort to make a distinction between you and say, Victoria, whose general posting on this topic strikes me as so stereotyping and cliched that I am reluctant to engage in discussions with her.
I did not take your question as offensive in any way, though I did not express myself well.
You express yourself very well and got right to the heart of the disagreement. There are two reasons conservatives don’t like gays. One, is sex outside of marriage, of course, marriage if forbidden to them so that’s a catch 22.
The other is their religious texts were written at a time when 7 out of 10 children died. To any growing religion, the only safety is in numbers. Every religion tells its followers to have as many babies as possible, for obvious reasons. That and the nauseous feelings every straight man feels when looking at another mans junk. If I don’t like it, it must be gross and unnatural. I can’t eat cow liver or clams. If I could, I would make them abomination.
The religious have been brainwashed into believing the Bible was actually dictated by God. If you ever read the “history” of the creation of the Bible itself, it’s obvious that is just not true. But they don’t want to hear that.
The illusion that the homosexual lifestyle is a normal way of living has been successfully propagated by promoting a “victim” image for homosexual persons, and by the pseudo-science alleging a ‘gay” gene.
Of the reports alleging, or promising soon down the road, a “gay” gene, not a single one has survived scientific peer review. There is no “gay” gene.
On the other hand, the evidence does show that homosexual persons are indeed victims — but overwhelmingly of their own behavior, not that of others.
Typical homosexual behavior includes regular contact with fecal matter from oneself and from sexual partners, tragically reversing several centuries of learning about cleanliness, and thus several centuries of growing lifespan. Homosexual behavior makes no more sense than playing in the toilet.
All available evidence indicates that the lifespan of practicing homosexual persons is drastically shortened by their behavior. No reliable study indicates otherwise. The lifespan topic is taboo among homosexual advocates because the evidence is so damaging to their case.
The following information has been adapted from website: http://www.cprmd.org/ (Sorry, link gone.) References are cited in chronological order. This information represents a fair summary of the available evidence concerning homosexual lifespan. It indicates that on average, even apart from AIDS, homosexual persons will probably not live past their 40’s, an appalling loss of about 30 years, or nearly 40% of normal American lifespan.
The evidence shows homosexuality to be a compulsive and lethal addiction, not “mainstream America”.
E. Fox
http://theroadtoemmaus.org/RdLb/22SxSo/PnSx/HSx/hosx_lifspn.htm
Victoria,
We don’t inhabit the same universe. It’s a wonder to me that our messages appear on each other’s computer screens.
Let me tell you something sweetie, if you are going to pretend to do some research, do some research. Here are some more things for you to look for.
Single women live longer than married women do
Married men live longer than single men do
The number of fat people are annihilating the life expectance gains in America
One study showed that non HIV gays living in Scandinavian in civil unions lived slightly longer than married straight guys (If you were truly interested in the health and welfare of gays, you would want them to be in committed relationships, but we know better, don’t we? Don’t you secretly wish they would all just die?)
Life expectancy for blacks much lower than whites (Couldn’t they choose?)
Immigrants that come here live an average of 3 years LONGER than those born here.
Life expectancy in Africa is dropping to 30 years
Why are the statistics so much crap? Many gays will never be counted because no one really knows how many there are in the US. Only those under thirty are even likely to publicly identify themselves AS gay. All these statistics don’t mean a thing. All they are good for is determining retirement benefits.
It always makes me laugh when those that don’t believe in science but do believe in Mystical Creation try to use science to prove their point.
I just read this one, …..
Gay ceremonies common in jail, officer says
Officials refuse to release surveillance video of Marion festivities
Katie Fretland | Sentinel Staff Writer
November 1, 2007
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/crime/orl-locvideo01110107nov01%2C0%2C7667855.story
I just read this one, …..
Gay ceremonies common in jail, officer says
Officials refuse to release surveillance video of Marion festivities
Katie Fretland | Sentinel Staff Writer
November 1, 2007
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/crime/orl-locvideo01110107nov01%2C0%2C7667855.story
I just read this one, …..
Gay ceremonies common in jail, officer says
Officials refuse to release surveillance video of Marion festivities
Katie Fretland | Sentinel Staff Writer
November 1, 2007
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/crime/orl-locvideo01110107nov01%2C0%2C7667855.story
RE: the above post - ‘lesbian weddings’ in prison.
I posted the above post over an hour ago, but it never appeared until now - is everything delayed?
Doesn’t sound like there are many men around. People make due with what is available. Only someone with no feelings, someone who is heartless would expect other people to go through life without the loving touch of another human being.
Oh, uh, sorry.