Gay Pandering

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

So is the abolition of slavery and Germ theory. Just because its new does not mean its wrong

Ah, now with slavery you might be on to something, except that the "slavery" you mean is that peculiar colonial kind that was, frankly, weirdly sadistic. In any case, there are still lots of slaves and indentured servants, even where it is illegal. That's been true for at least a thousand years, hell Wulfstan of York tried to ban slavery in England in the time of King Cnut.

[Fisherking]

A modern aberation from only the last 20 years against at least 5,000 years of human society.

I think at various point in the past you will find it was expectable.

Some cultures more than others, of course.

In some cases societies expected everyone to marry and have children. As long as they did that any extramarital activities were okay with them. The Norse in particular took this view.

[Strike For The South]

Ah, now with slavery you might be on to something, except that the "slavery" you mean is that peculiar colonial kind that was, frankly, weirdly sadistic. In any case, there are still lots of slaves and indentured servants, even where it is illegal. That's been true for at least a thousand years, hell Wulfstan of York tried to ban slavery in England in the time of King Cnut.

Wulfstan of York is a bleeding heart

So what is the cutoff? 1000 years?

[PanzerJaeger]

Hi PJ, sorry I have been busy but you deserve a reply.
You seem to be on a crusade. Crusaders often get a bit over excited and see injustice in everything.

Be they religious or social crusaders there comes a time to step back and take an objective view of things.
Passion for a topic can be good so long as you don’t let it cloud your judgment.

A crusade? This is turning out to be more of a sociology lesson. I have a very close gay friend and I have seen firsthand the struggles he has gone through (if only 'spoiled child' was the worst he'd been called), largely based on ignorance, bigotry, and misinformation.

I cannot change people's minds, but I can correct factual misinformation such as erroneous claims that:

-gay people demographically come from and belong to an affluent background
-gay people are predominantly white
-gay people decide to place themselves into a minority group
-gay people are seeking special (victim?) status in society
-gay people suffer no social inequities
-gay people are not subject to harassment and violence based on their orientation

You don’t want to take anecdotal evidence? What other kind is there on this topic?

That of years of scientific research:

"Research suggests that the homosexual orientation is in place very early in the life cycle, possibly even before birth. It is found in about ten percent of the population, a figure which is surprisingly constant across cultures, irrespective of the different moral values and standards of a particular culture."

Homosexuals are normal human beings. They are as capable of being well adjusted in society as anyone. On what grounds should they demand exception?

Again, what are they demanding that would make them an exception?

Making yourself stand out can be a signal to predators and trouble makers that you are making your self available.

You again seem to be implying that gay people are in fact to blame for the harassment and violence perpetrated against them.

Could you tell me what Mr. Price could have done to prevent his savage beating? How could he have stood out less?

And what about young Seth Walsh. What could he have done after being stupid enough to share with his friends that he was gay to avoid the vicious, brutal bullying that made up a large part the rest of his life?

My argument is that in this case the money is better spent on food banks, aid for the poor of all groups, and so on is better than funding another gay outreach group, particularly in the Seattle area.

That is quite the evolution from your original posts.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

The article complained that the money was spent on racial and gender groups not including gays.

Battered wives, blacks, Amer-Indians, and Hispanics usually tend to be a bit needier than upper middle class predominantly white people, even if they decide to place themselves into a minority group.

It just seems a lot of self promotion and much designed for shock value to me. Gays can’t call themselves an oppressed underclass in economic terms but want money to promote a social agenda.

If they are more deserving than the others they should do something to show it.

I appreciate your newfound compassion for the poor. However, the author of the article you posted never suggested dipping into welfare funds to support gay causes. He said:

Even though gay people make up roughly 5 percent of the population, zero tax dollars that they pay go into diversity funding and community building to help gays. That money goes instead to diversity funding and community building for racial, gender, youth and senior folks.

So, in actuality, this has absolutely nothing to do with siphoning money away from poor people, but the allocation of 'diversity funds' - a wholly separate set of accounts.

Now, I'm not a big fan of any diversity funding, but if society is going to provide such monies, why shouldn't gay people be included? Just like blacks, women, and handicapped people, they have a non-chosen difference that has put them at a social disadvantage in the recent past.

In fact, unlike those other groups, they are still suffering from social inequities, and should thus arguably move to the top of the 'diversity list'.

As to teen suicide the strongest indicators for that likelihood is membership in another sub culture. In fact everything you say about gays, with the exception of marriage, also applies to them.

They are Goths.

Do we need outreach and networking groups to support them too. And maybe new clauses in the civil rights laws?

I am rather undecided. What about you?

Homosexuality is not a chosen subculture, it is a trait.

I would also like to see some stats on that claim, as it would seem odd that such a delination would be recorded by law enforcement.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

I think at various point in the past you will find it was expectable.

Some cultures more than others, of course.

In some cases societies expected everyone to marry and have children. As long as they did that any extramarital activities were okay with them. The Norse in particular took this view.

Yes that's true, in Pagan societies at least, but that only supports my point. Vikings didn't marry each other, they married women.

[Fisherking]

PJ,

I am glad you found it was from diversity funds! That makes a big difference, and I think we would agree on that topic.

However:
Your Quote Scientific Research: was more bunk. There are too many studies that start with an agenda and claim they found the answer they were looking for.
That was another study disproved shortly after it was released.

I gave you the current conclusions of the Psychological community.

Sexuality is fluid and part of a growth process. It is not fixed.

It is not a trait.
It is not a disorder.
It is not a disease.
It is not genetic.
It is not developed in the womb.
It is not a treatable ailment.
It is no wholly by choice.
It is not a curse of God.

The American Psychological Association defines sexual orientation as such: Sexual orientation is an enduring emotional, romantic, sexual, or affectional attraction that a person feels toward another person. Sexual orientation falls along a continuum. In other words, someone does not have to be exclusively homosexual or heterosexual, but can feel varying degrees of attraction for both genders. Sexual orientation develops across a person's lifetime—different people realize at different points in their lives that they are heterosexual, gay, lesbian, or bisexual.

It may be more dramatic, but it is little different than ones tastes in food or music. It can change over time.


As to Goths, studies at the University of Glasgow show a higher likelihood of suicide and or self harm.

It still remains unclear if it is the culture or just that those drawn to it may be more likely to harm themselves.

Still, it is a preference, and no more likely to be controllable than any other preference.

Likes and dislikes are actually very powerful motivations.

This is not flippancy, it is fact.

[PanzerJaeger]

PJ,I am glad you found it was from diversity funds! That makes a big difference, and I think we would agree on that topic.

However:
Your Quote Scientific Research: was more bunk. There are too many studies that start with an agenda and claim they found the answer they were looking for.
That was another study disproved shortly after it was released.

I gave you the current conclusions of the Psychological community.

Sexuality is fluid and part of a growth process. It is not fixed.

It is not a trait.
It is not a disorder.
It is not a disease.
It is not genetic.
It is not developed in the womb.
It is not a treatable ailment.
It is no wholly by choice.
It is not a curse of God.

The American Psychological Association defines sexual orientation as such: Sexual orientation is an enduring emotional, romantic, sexual, or affectional attraction that a person feels toward another person. Sexual orientation falls along a continuum. In other words, someone does not have to be exclusively homosexual or heterosexual, but can feel varying degrees of attraction for both genders. Sexual orientation develops across a person's lifetime—different people realize at different points in their lives that they are heterosexual, gay, lesbian, or bisexual.

It may be more dramatic, but it is little different than ones tastes in food or music. It can change over time.

Here is the complete APA statement. I'll let the document speak for itself.

What causes a person to have a particular sexual orientation?

There are numerous theories about the origins of a person's sexual orientation. Most scientists today agree that sexual orientation is most likely the result of a complex interaction of environmental, cognitive and biological factors. In most people, sexual orientation is shaped at an early age. There is also considerable recent evidence to suggest that biology, including genetic or inborn hormonal factors, play a significant role in a person's sexuality.

It's important to recognize that there are probably many reasons for a person's sexual orientation, and the reasons may be different for different people.

Is sexual orientation a choice?

No, human beings cannot choose to be either gay or straight. For most people, sexual orientation emerges in early adolescence without any prior sexual experience. Although we can choose whether to act on our feelings, psychologists do not consider sexual orientation to be a conscious choice that can be voluntarily changed.

Can therapy change sexual orientation?

No; even though most homosexuals live successful, happy lives, some homosexual or bisexual people may seek to change their sexual orientation through therapy, often coerced by family members or religious groups to try and do so. The reality is that homosexuality is not an illness. It does not require treatment and is not changeable. However, not all gay, lesbian, and bisexual people who seek assistance from a mental health professional want to change their sexual orientation. Gay, lesbian, and bisexual people may seek psychological help with the coming out process or for strategies to deal with prejudice, but most go into therapy for the same reasons and life issues that bring straight people to mental health professionals.

Also relevant to your position that they should not 'stand out'.

Why do some gay men, lesbians, and bisexuals tell people about their sexual orientation?

Because sharing that aspect of themselves with others is important to their mental health. In fact, the process of identity development for lesbians, gay men and bisexuals called "coming out" has been found to be strongly related to psychological adjustment; the more positive the gay, lesbian, or bisexual identity, the better one's mental health and the higher one's self-esteem.

And just because:

Why is it important for society to be better educated about homosexuality?

Educating all people about sexual orientation and homosexuality is likely to diminish anti-gay prejudice. Accurate information about homosexuality is especially important to young people who are first discovering and seeking to understand their sexuality, whether homosexual, bisexual, or heterosexual. Fears that access to such information will make more people gay have no validity; information about homosexuality does not make someone gay or straight.

[Strike For The South]

All gay people on television are white and upper class

Therefore All gay people must be white and upper class

SCIENCE

[Fisherking]

So, you seem to have learned what I told you was true.

Your major contention and sticking point seems to be in your next to last point.
I hope you don’t think that sharing ones feelings is the same as being situationally inappropriate.

We typically share feeling with those we trust and understand us. To do so in a setting where others may ridicule and abuse that trust is not normal behavior.

One is normal human caring and the other could be caused by a disorder or behaving as a spoiled child.

Clear?

[Fisherking]

All gay people on television are white and upper class

Therefore All gay people must be white and upper class

SCIENCE

No Strike there are actually demographics that show that a preponderance of the group fit the category. Sorry I don’t have a scanner.
It is of course a generalization and it crosses every racial and ethnic group to be sure.

[Strike For The South]

No Strike there are actually demographics that show that a preponderance of the group fit the category. Sorry I don’t have a scanner.
It is of course a generalization and it crosses every racial and ethnic group to be sure.

So you're telling me that being white & having money makes it eaiser for one to come out and admit there sexuality?

Does being on the down low mean anything to you?

Rejecting a gay culture they perceive as white and effeminate, many black men have settled on a new identity, with its own vocabulary and customs and its own name: Down Low. There have always been men – black and white – who have had secret sexual lives with men. But the creation of an organized, underground subculture largely made up of black men who otherwise live straight lives is a phenomenon of the last decade... Most date or marry women and engage sexually with men they meet only in anonymous settings like bathhouses and parks or through the Internet. Many of these men are young and from the inner city, where they live in a hypermasculine thug culture. Other DL men form romantic relationships with men and may even be peripheral participants in mainstream gay culture, all unknown to their colleagues and families. Most DL men identify themselves not as gay or bisexual but first and foremost as black. To them, as to many blacks, that equates to being inherently masculine.[9]

A poor black kid risks a hell of allot more than a rich white kid in cmoing out

All Panzer has done is post scientific links and all you have done is say "Not true"

SMH
That's why the demographics are skewed, not because they are pre disposed to being spoiled or vice versa

[Fisherking]

So you're telling me that being white & having money makes it eaiser for one to come out and admit there sexuality?

Does being on the down low mean anything to you?


A poor black kid risks a hell of allot more than a rich white kid in cmoing out

All Panzer has done is post scientific links and all you have done is say "Not true"

SMH
That's why the demographics are skewed, not because they are pre disposed to being spoiled or vice versa

It is a topic as fraught with controversy as about anything you will find.

There are so many factors that it makes it a quagmire. It would also be better if we had some international studies to go over. US research is notorious for reaching conclusions before the studies begin. It is a black hole little different than global warming.
There is controversy over the number also but 5% is the current PC answer. Environmental factors might be a reason for a large increase. And also for the demographics. Whether you are right or easier living may be a factor remains to be seen.
If you decide to switch to a psyc major be sure you’re strong at debate.

[PanzerJaeger]

So, you seem to have learned what I told you was true.

And what would that be?

In all honesty, nearly everything you've said about homosexuality in this thread has been demonstrably false and borderline bigoted. You've tempered your position from earlier posts, but they point to your true feelings on the subject.

Your major contention and sticking point seems to be in your next to last point.
I hope you don’t think that sharing ones feelings is the same as being situationally inappropriate.

You seem to be under the impression that the only gay people who face social issues are those who are 'situationally inappropriate'. This is incorrect.

[Fisherking]

I have said the very same things all the way through. They match what you posted from the APA.
You don’t see that, or you don’t want to see that?
It would seem that either you are reading something that isn’t there or you reached a conclusion before you began.
What I said was without compassion. What you said was all compassion and emotion.

I suggest you reread it when you are calm and reevaluate those statements.

It would seem that you resort to personal attack to discredit what was said.

[Strike For The South]

Fisherking, my good man, If you are going to simply disregard scientific studies as biased then I don't know what other angle we can debate this from.

You're claim that enviromental factors may be at play implies not so subtley that this is at least something that should be avoided

What I find odd though is you somehow equate homosexuality to be a product of eaiser living (which is proved false but those studies are wrong!)

Personally I think you are taking the medias portrayel of what gay is and supposing it on the entire community

I've known some tough queens in my life, including my lifting partner.

But there is no debating with someone who so dogmaticly refuses to look at the science

[PanzerJaeger]

I have said the very same things all the way through. They match what you posted from the APA.
You don’t see that, or you don’t want to see that?
It would seem that either you are reading something that isn’t there or you reached a conclusion before you began.
What I said was without compassion. What you said was all compassion and emotion.

I suggest you reread it when you are calm and reevaluate those statements.

You posted:

The article complained that the money was spent on racial and gender groups not including gays.

Battered wives, blacks, Amer-Indians, and Hispanics usually tend to be a bit needier than upper middle class predominantly white people, even if they decide to place themselves into a minority group.

It just seems a lot of self promotion and much designed for shock value to me. Gays can’t call themselves an oppressed underclass in economic terms but want money to promote a social agenda.

If they are more deserving than the others they should do something to show it.

This is factually incorrect on three counts.

-Gay people are not predominantly upper class
-Gay people are not predominantly white
-Gay people do not choose to be gay

It also makes the highly questionable leap of projecting the opinion expressed by one man in one blog about one small suburb south of Seattle onto the entire gay community, concluding that they want money to promote a social agenda. Despite repeated requests, you have not provided any substantiation that this is a greater trend.

Finally, it is a substantial departure from your later, more sanitized argument.

My argument is that in this case the money is better spent on food banks, aid for the poor of all groups, and so on is better than funding another gay outreach group, particularly in the Seattle area.

Which completely leaves out the racial dynamic you introduced in the first post and, by the way, frames the article in economic terms completely divorced from what was actually written.

It would seem that you resort to personal attack to discredit what was said.

Am I acting like a spoiled child?

I have no interest in personally attacking you. The only reason I have been engaging you (and not ignoring this thread for the dressed up troll that it is) is because I do not believe you are coming from a position of malice, at least not conscious malice, but instead ignorance and a bit of fear.

[HoreTore]

Homosexuality is a choice. That means that yours truly, a heterosexual male, is perfectly capsble of getting a boner from watching gay porn.

/sarcasm

I do, however, get a boner every time I hear a conservative/religous guy claim homosexuality to be a coice, because if it is, it must mean that the guy is actually capable of getting a boner from watching gay porn.

And he's probably give it a try. Which makes him a FLAMIN' HOMOSEXUAL!!!! Better fix his mental state before he goes camping with the choir boys.....




Edit: watching PJ defend gay rights like this also gets my reproductive organs working....

[Crazed Rabbit]

Something to note:

Washington state has civil unions and other rights for gay people, including the right not to be fired for sexual orientation.

So this is not a state unfriendly to gay people.

What this seems like is some guy complaining that the government isn't doing enough for him because it doesn't subsidize his interests. Apparently the city should do 'diversity funding' and 'community building' for gay people.

I don't think the city should do that for any group, much less a <5% group were a complaint is he has to drive an hour to go on a date.

Considering the problems in the world and the city that's nothing. So good on him for starting the facebook group, but his cause doesn't deserve government funds.

one small suburb south of Seattle

Federal Way isn't a suburb.

CR

[Fisherking]

Thanks for not thinking I am being deliberately bigoted PJ.
What I am doing is just taking a provocative position on the topic.

for Strike:
The cited studies:
I am not disregarding them. Just informing.

When they are proved wrong or discredited in review it doesn’t mean they are taken off the internet.

I am sorry if you thought that I was just disregarding science.

I didn’t accuse anyone of deliberately using wrong data. Should I?

Of course not! Even after being discredited you find them cited by people who know better.
So far as science can determine, homosexuals are perfectly normal and typical humans. Studies to prove otherwise seem to fall on their face.
If you wish to use tainted works we can prove the world is flat.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
It is the same with the pc figure of 5% of the population is gay or lesbian. The actual percentage of those who identify themselves as homosexual is 1.51%.
Naturally it does not cover those who may wish to hide it or who struggle with it, however, historical estimates have usually run at about 2 to 2.5%.

Why indeed is the figure exactly double?
--------------------------------------------------------------





The only point I differed on with the APA was a deliberate one. It is how ever misleading. A very tiny percentage have reported that it was choice. Should that be totally disregarded? Therefore I did list choice.
My main point was the need for the money to go to a less than needy group.
Poor people gay or otherwise should come a head of the type of organizations proposed in the article and the topic.

I was not expecting PJ’s passionate response but tried to deal with it in a somewhat deflected manner.

Where violence against gays is cited I have pointed out high risk behavior by the group which could lead to violence.
Where a supposed need to “stand out” or show ones orientations is brought up I simply bring out that it may not be appropriate in some setting.

A few years ago this is what some gay group were advocating. Shocking the public into recognition. It is not the best course unless you also wish to see a rise in incidents. In other words, trolling.

Does this mean only the “bigots” are to blame?

Homosexuality cuts across all groups at roughly the same frequency, therefore in the United States this means that some 75% are white.

Median Income:http://www.mediabuyerplanner.com/ent...sehold-income/

I think that speaks to the factuality of my position.

Don’t draw the conclusion that I hold gays & lesbians totally responsible for all violence against them.
Don’t think I do not support public education on this or other topics.

Homosexuals being normal have no more need than anyone else to be provocative.
When behavior is meant to incite a response, that behavior is as much to blame as the responder.
This is just my disagreement with the tactics and not the minority group.

As to SFTS’s comment on tough Queens; Categorizing and stereotyping is just wrong. Some of the most masculine men and feminine women I have known were homosexual in orientation.
I knew a former linebacker for a Pro Football team who was homosexual, but I wouldn’t want to call the man a Queen.

There is a great deal of misinformation on the topic and it seems to be coming from both sides to support their position.
This too seems to be normal human behavior, no?

And no PJ you are not acting like a spoiled child, you just get passionate about your topics.

edit: I am getting old and needed the mental exorcise, but now I think I need a nap.