<p>@MLD – well there IS an unfortunate incidence of drug use in the LGBT community (not all of us but an unhealthy percentage), it’s not exactly because of the persecution but yeahhhh…</p>
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Word, well said.</p>
<p>Drug use in the LGBT community might be more connected to disproportionate rates of homelessness, suicide (and likely depressions) of gay teens and adults. The LGBT community is marginalized at best, constantly harassed at work. People are thrown out of homes and are harassed every day because of how they identify. Might that trigger drug dependency? Not for everyone, yeah, but for some people.</p>
<p>But yeah. I really don’t care how my roommate identifies next year. Yes, of course I would care if they were sexually harassing me, making inappropriate advances, etc. But that isn’t a product of their sexuality, that would be a product of them just being a terrible person - just like (well, worse than) if they were stealing my stuff or something.</p>
<p>^What Raspberi said</p>
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<p>Yes, because why would psychological and social factors affect drug use? That’s just silly! That’s why they don’t call it the biopsychosocial approach in psychology… Oh… wait…</p>
<p>it just sounds like you are playing the race card when it comes to drugs… even though its not really a race</p>
<p>One thing supporters of homosexuality do which offends me is the use of the word “homophobic.” They say they are disrespected by society, but I find the term homophobic disrespectful on the part of the homosexuals. It is insulting, because we are not afraid of gays, we do not hate gays or anything like that. We simply have views about homosexuality that you do not agree with, so you insult us by calling us “homophobes.”</p>
<p>You say you aren’t tolerated by society, but you are intolerant of the people who disagree with you. That doesn’t seem very fair, does it?</p>
<p>Itach, the the types of marriage you mention, sterile couples, couples past menopause etc. are so rare that there isn’t much point in addressing those groups. Most couples aren’t aware of their sterility at marriage anyway. Allowing such couples to be married does not affect marriage laws, because the definition of marriage does not have to be redefined to accommodate the unions of these couples.</p>
<p>How is intolerance of those who are intolerant of the LGBT community unfair? Are they not allowed the same rights as heterosexual people? ;)</p>
<p>Which rights are they not allowed to have? They can get any of the legal rights they want without having marriage laws changed. Preventing the adjustment of marriage definitions does not impact their lives in any way, so I don’t know what you are talking about.</p>
<p>Read this.</p>
<p>[The</a> Secular Case Against Gay Marriage](<a href=“404 Not Found”>The Secular Case Against Gay Marriage) </p>
<p>On another note, most supporters of gay marriage are liberals. Many liberals also support abortion, which is much more so than the gay marriage issue, a violation of human rights.
Holding both political opinions in my opinion does not make sense because the gays are fighting what they believe is their own right, yet they deny another group of people the right to live. </p>
<p>[3D</a> Ultrasound Photos, 3D Ultrasound Images](<a href=“http://4d-ultrasounds.com/3d-ultrasound-photos/index.htm]3D”>http://4d-ultrasounds.com/3d-ultrasound-photos/index.htm)</p>
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<p>There is another ****ed up thread to go to if you wanna start that argument.</p>
<p>This is how I see it. Whether you think being gay is a choice or biological. Whether gay people creep you out or you are fine with them. Whatever you position, why is it so bad to let them get married? How does it affect you at all?</p>
<p>MLDwoody, it doesn’t really affect the gays. Read the article I linked to. Gays can already get any legal benefits such as survivorship and visitation rights which they say they need to be married for. The point I am arguing does not affect the gays in any way, it only addresses government regulation of marriage.</p>
<p>There is no reason to get angry, MLDWoody. Can’t we keep this civil? The only point of view I am arguing from is my own logic. Not anger or hate or intolerance or anything like that.</p>
<p>@Al – what “definition” of marriage are we talkin’ here, the one we’ve had since the 1950s? Or how about the one from the 1800s? We could do the definition of marriage the monarchs used, to basically gain land power and princes. Or there’s always the definition of marriage from Biblical times, one man and as many women as he could afford to have.</p>
<p>I keep hearing this “redefinition of marriage” argument, it’s already been redefined endlessly. The definition we have of marriage now has not existed since time immemorial. </p>
<p>It’s true now, that we can get ‘some’ of the benefits we’re looking for through marriage, that is true. But we can’t get all of them, there are still things denied to us that are given to straight-married couples without a thought. But… please consider this, even the few things we can actually get, are not always honored. There’s a very famous case I recall about a lesibian couple in Fresno, CA who were kept apart after one of them had a very nasty seizure. They weren’t sure if she was going to die or not, and the doctors would not let her partner see her even though she had all the legal paperwork. She finally managed to find a sympathetic doctor who’d let her in. Domestic Partnerships and Civil Unions confer a 2nd class status that allow those things to take place. That leads into my next point: the word marriage itself carries a connotation that DPs and CUs do not, the word has baggage, has weight attached to it. When you say “Oh, I’m DP’ed” “Oh I’m CU’ed” people don’t know what that means, “Oh, I’m married” – pretty much everybody knows what that means. </p>
<p>Whenever people who advocate against marriage equality are backed into the corner, they’ll usually go for the redefinition argument… barring that, “marriage is for the children” but again, I have to point out the flaw in that is if marriage is for kids, then all married couples would, by wrote, HAVE to have kids. Those who could not have kids then (ie: those infertile couples I mentioned before) could not technically be married. Since there’s no legal recourse to keep them from being married, logically marriage cannot be about having sex and producing children.</p>
<p>(((As a side note: Liberals are not “pro-abortion” they are “pro-choice” they do not see the fetus as a living breathing being yet, so it’s not denying a life to them. It’s giving a choice to women, giving women the right to control their bodies, but as MLD said this is an argument for another thread))).</p>
<p>About the homophobia thing? I know you might not have heard all of the things that have been said about us, but some of them are… pretty damn hateful and nasty. Take Fred “God Hates f@gs” Phelps for instance. He’s a nasty piece of work, the label “homophobic” is actually too nice to describe this monster. There aren’t a lot of words in the English language that do justice to how offensive, sociopathic and downright evil Phelps is. But lest you say he’s an isolated incident, I present Bryan Fischer who has said, amongst other things “Only gays were savage enough for Hitler” “Gays in the Millitary gave us, Six Million dead Jews” and I actually have an LGBT news site that has a huge 10-15 line paragraph just filled with links to “press releases” this guy has said where he’s made insanely offensive comments. Bryan Fischer still gets to come on CNN, MSNBC and Fox News as the “opposition” to LGBT rights whenever there’s a debate. His opinion is still highly respected enough by the opposition to let him speak for them, to be one of their faces. So he’s not fringe kooky like Phelps is, people listen to this guy, with opinions like the ones I just presented. Make no mistake - a wide swath of the population hates LGBT people, would, given the chance, injure LGBT people. These are homophobes, these are bigots. This is where the label comes in. We are disrespected by society, we are oppressed, I mean look at the talk we’re having now. Although I’m being civil and so are you, the honest truth is if LGBTs weren’t oppressed, weren’t discriminated against, weren’t treated like the evils of society, you and I we wouldn’t even be having this conversation right now. What if we were talking about Black people, or Native Americans, or Asians? Holding the kinds of views people hold about LGBTs would immediately be seen as racist and their argument discredited. What about women? The argument would be seen as sexist? To give an example of something people choose (to preemptively counter an “its a choice, those aren’t” argument): what if this were about religion, if it was someone who was Jewish? Or Buddhist? Or Muslim? People choose their religion. If someone said something anti-semetic, or against Buddhists or Muslims, their comments would be called xenophobic and their argument invalidated. The fact that in 2011, we have to have this conversation, and have it repeatedly suggests that something is very, very wrong here. Respectfully.</p>
<p>Definition of marriage: 1 man, 1 woman.</p>
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<p>I do hope you read my entire post</p>
<p>Actually, I have never been backed into a corner. I am only arguing with facts, and I am not desperate at all. You are trying to manipulate this argument through emotional claims and labeling my position in the argument, i.e. “Many gays do drugs because they are persecuted by the world,” “You are using that argument because you have been backed into a corner,” but I am arguing only with straight facts. For your argument about having kids, just read the article link I posted. That counters your argument very well and shows why it is faulty.</p>
<p>And Fred Phelps? You can’t be serious. The WBC is NOT anything close to a typical conservative viewpoint on gay marriage.</p>
<p>The WBC is a hate group, and does not represent the views of anyone but themselves.</p>
<p>Question: How will homosexual marriage benefit society as a whole? What positive effect will it have on society or what negative effects will it have on society and why?</p>
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<p>No, that’s really why there’s a higher incidence of LGBTs in the drug culture. They get kicked out of their homes by parents who become incapable of loving them once they find out they’re LGBT, they fall into a pattern of depression and homelessness, and these two things help breed the drug culture more than anything. Why did their parents stop loving them when they found out they were LGBT? Usually because of the things they’ve been fed about LGBTs, which are almost entirely false. Hence the persecution of LGBTs led to them disowning their own child, which led their kid to developing drug habits when they could no longer deal with the pain of the world. </p>
<p>I used Fred Phelps because he’s the most obvious. Your claim was basically that homophobia doesn’t exist right? I used him to show it does. I also used Bryan Fischer, who is a mainstream social conservative of very high rank.</p>
<p>^It benefits society by allowing people freedom and lessening oppression. The negative effect is that the insurance benefits will be expensive. But allowing black people to be actual people was expensive too but that doesn’t mean that it’s okay to oppress them because it’s cheaper. </p>
<p>Not all people who support gay rights are pro-choice. I am an ardent supporter of gay
rights and secularly pro-life. I would also call myself fiscally conservative. Don’t make generalizations about people.</p>
<p>FALSE </p>
<p>I did not say homophobia does not exist. I said it was unfair to label an opponent of homosexual marriage as homophobic just because the person opposes your viewpoint. The term is used far too much to brand any opponent of homosexual marriage as homophobic. The truth is, the vast majority of opponents of homosexual marriage are not homophobic, but just do not believe homosexual marriage is right or makes sense, and it is not good for our country.</p>