The Atlantic - Latest Comments in Why bother

Re: Why bother

ryan — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 05:26:49 -0000

Cosby grew up in an urban neighborhood that wasn't terrible just because it was working-class poor. He wrestles with the changes he has seen there and elsewhere in the context of his own history, which is a long history. This is more commendable then sitting back and enjoying his money.

with hispanics now the largest minority, the democrats can begin pandering to hispanics and not paying so much attention to blacks. politically active Asians, for some reason, seem to veer Republican.

Re: Why bother

PhoenixRising — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 13:12:42 -0000

TNC-

In not smacking down that whole "growing up in a gay household" deal, I not only left room for misunderstanding, I leapt right past the most jarring part of the comment.

Except the point was symbolized by that comment. There are Black folks who will happily take the point position in the fight to destroy gay families being waged in 48 states by religious bigots, wrapped in the armor of Black history and oppression.

So maybe I missed it, but I thought your point was: So how does one engage with that history effectively? How do we acknowledge the assaults on family integrity that this person (if he's old enough) and his ancestors have survived, while disputing his conclusions about what's right for the state to do?

And bluntly, that's an important issue that gay folks who insist on getting rights by persuasion are going to need to deal with.

Re: Why bother

PhoenixRising — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 13:01:39 -0000

I never said that I didn't believe folks weren't born gay. I said it's something, that, if necessary, you can hide...I can't hide being Black. Even if everything happens over the phone.... My Black self had to show up, and it was a crap shoot as to whether the opportunities were still there once I arrived in person, for I ' sound White' on the phone.

Your comments have all been specific to your personal experience and that's highly valuable to the vast majority of white gays, who don't have a close relationship with any Black person. So applause for explaining this concept--how these struggles are different-in simple and direct language. That's why I keep coming around here.

However, this particular one shines a light on one of the similarities that is being underused (e.g not used) in the framing of gay civil rights for people of color. You know exactly what it's like for gay folks to interact with a prejudiced world.

You sound White on the phone, which means that many times you get to make a hard and painful choice: Do I go to the interview/look at the apartment having closeted the fact of my Blackness until we're face to face? Or do I signal my race beforehand?

Because I don't believe that you have nothing on your resume, or no verbal symbolism, that would allow you to signal your race to avoid the confrontation with prejudice, I ask you to consider that feeling and that choice in the light of, That is what gay people have to do with their own parents. Teachers. Bosses. Coworkers. Friends. Decide whether to avoid or confront.

I'm not suggesting that this deeply personal choice, whether to violate your own right to access everything out there just as if you were White and not the target of prejudice, or risk having your rights violated up close and personal, is The Same Thing as Jim Crow. I'm suggesting that I think you know exactly, personally, emotionally, what the price is for gay people to exercise that easy option to hide.

I'm not sure how to package this for political consumption. All I know is, passing only works for those few who can cut off all their support from their community and live in fear of being 'outed' --that's as true for mixed race people as for gay people.

And many, many people of color have been told that they would have more opportunities if only they would cover up what makes them distinct. Dreadlocks are outside the dress code in many, many workplaces. So straighten that hair and stop complaining that we're prejudiced! is a position that American Airlines took to a Federal appeals court and WON with. Seriously.

I think there are common threads here.

Regardless, I will keep my sacred vow to dope-slap the next rich white gay man who tells me he's just like Rosa Parks. Because that is beyond annoying and racist and entitled.

Re: Why bother

klg19 — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 22:46:18 -0000

One of the reasons I value your blog is the privilege of observing your process of understanding both the world and your response to it. It a marvellous experience.

Thank you for responding personally to me in yesterday's comments, and for clarifying the part of the quoted post to which you were responding. Once you bolded it, and got me to see where you were starting from, it made entire sense.

In not smacking down that whole "growing up in a gay household" deal, I not only left room for misunderstanding, I leapt right past the most jarring part of the comment.

I really love you for writing this, not just because it helps explain where my own confusion came from, but because it's a really grown-up thing to say (I couldn't figure out a way for that not to sound patronizing, so please just take it as read).

Thank you--for your thoughts, and your self-examination, and your respect for your readers and yourself. I really look forward to your words each day.

Re: Why bother

Hugo Pottisch — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 22:27:24 -0000

Adina,

You make a good point. it is different when a white person calls gay rights a civil rights issue compared to a black one. but I am sure we can all agree that it is a human rights issue. nobody owns that universal title... except humans of course.

Re: Why bother

Galleymac — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 22:22:46 -0000

@Hugo -- my bell curve yadda yadda wasn't directed at you. I was riffing on Sean's statements on choice.

Re: Why bother

Hugo Pottisch — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 22:08:10 -0000

sgwhiteinfla

I am sorry. you are right. I was taking off in the wrong direction in our dialogue. what i perceived as clarification from my side in the heat of the moment was in fact convincing and probably preaching to the chore. yes - you have shown how a person can make an argument for choice. i think i was at times confused if you are speaking for yourself or the hypothetical yes-voter and his sentiments regarding choice who you were portraying. I will try to be more careful.

thank you nevertheless for the discussion - albeit i might have made it difficult and repetitive for you. ciao.

Re: Why bother

Adina — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 21:55:30 -0000

re: gay rights and civil rights movement

I think the language used is a matter of audience.

The civil rights language may be positively motivating for white and non-black allies, who do see gay rights as part of a series of historical changes to extend first class citizenship to blacks, women, gay folk.

The language is clearly alienating to many black folk who feel that their struggle is unique, and who can fault them?

The issue is similar to using the holocaust as an analogy to genocide. Some/Many Jewish people are offended by any comparison to ethnic mass-murders elsewhere, and who can fault them? These people will stop listening to a Darfur appeal that mentions the holocaust.

Different arguments are needed to motivate different groups of people.

Re: Why bother

sgwhiteinfla — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 21:50:20 -0000

Hugo

You keep talking but you are in an echo chamber right now. You are saying what YOU believe with no basis in fact to back it up. I am trying to show you how someone who doesn't believe the way you do can come to their own conclusion. Again just because YOU believe it doesn't make it a fact. You can type until you get carpel tunnel but I have already shown how a person can make as credible an argument for choice as you make for birth. So have fun with it brah. I am not the one who needs to be convinced anyway lol

Re: Why bother

Hugo Pottisch — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 21:25:02 -0000

sgwhiteinfla

ok I think that now I got you. you cannot chose. you were born straight. You like women, always have and always will. but you also know of valid arguments against being born straight. that means you also know of valid arguments for having been born non-straight, aka gay. "straight" gays like men, always have and always will. it is about them. but we get to decide so it is about you and me too.

we are on the same page then with you and SeanH. That is what we have been saying all along.

there are definitely different flavors out there. some straight like us (you, SeahH, and me). one solid color. and some non-straights like pete here. another, yet different, solid color. pete would not want to be associated with this discussion i guess. for him, I guess, things are as simple as for you and me. he likes men as much as we do women. then there definitely are some sexual muds like my dear sis. not a solid color.

when a gay is attracted to anther man - this other man is as much male as you, sgwhiteinfla, are black. there is the same inflexibility in changing that as the king of pop had when it comes to changing skins. you can try to hide your sexual intercourse but that does not change the fact that a gay sleeps with another black.. eh man.

let's call it the nature component in addition to culture. otherwise, if it were mere culture/nurture, there would be no gays in say Iran or.. everybloodywhere since the beginning of ape history. In fact - there have been gays long before the first white human has emerged.

right now - we straights, black and white, hold the voting majority and can prevent pete from practicing the bonding rituals that he has been taught since childhood for various reasons. lasting social progress also requires some social stability and we all long for stable and reliable relationships as an ideal. the interesting point here, to me, is that in the light of social stability - people voted against gays being able to practice more stability. why? what twisted arguments have been used to convince people that voting against more family stability is pro family stability?

It really is a lose-lose for everybody once you think about it. why then have people really voted against social progress AND more stability and conservatism? is homophobia in the end still stronger than the family aspect per se? or is it really simple religion at work - defending its rotten turf everywhere. i am changing my mind constantly regarding the influence of the different fears in this cocktail (hehehe... cock-tail, cock.. tail... get it, get it? WHAT? shut up!) . certainly is interesting.

Re: Why bother

Thomas R — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 20:44:22 -0000

To go back a ways I think the difference in California is that the black vote was noticeably different than the white vote. In Florida 60% of whites, and 71% of blacks, voted for banning gay marriage according to CNN's admittedly unreliable exit polls. Still I'm betting it is true a significant majority of Florida whites voted for the ban. Californian whites are much less churched, and much less socially conservative, than average for American white people. This doesn't mean they're all stereotyped Californian liberals, but I think white Californian conservatism is more in other areas. Like national defense, prison sentencing, immigration, anti-socialism, etc.

On a difference with black civil rights gay people are not discriminated at from birth and can "pass for straight" in most cases. In the Jim Crow era a black child who spoke with a thoroughly white Midwestern accent would still have faced all the standard discriminations. A gay child probably won't face any legal discrimination. Also before "Loving v Virginia" several states would imprison blacks for marrying whites, but so far as I know none of the bans on Same-sex marriage come with legal punishments. If a Justice of the Peace Same-sex marriages you in Florida I don't think you can go to jail, but if they interracially married you in Florida circa 1960 you could go to jail.

Re: Why bother

rikyrah — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 20:43:40 -0000

I never said that I didn't believe folks weren't born gay. I said it's something, that, if necessary, you can hide.

I can't hide being Black. Even if everything happens over the phone, as it has done for me sometimes in terms of employment, housing, business opportunities, sooner or later, I have to show up. My Black self had to show up, and it was a crap shoot as to whether the opportunities were still there once I arrived in person, for I ' sound White' on the phone.

Re: Why bother

sgwhiteinfla — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 20:25:16 -0000

Hugo

I am simply giving you a valid argument against being born gay. And again I gave you specific examples. If someone is born gay straight or other then thats what they are, there is no experimentation. I was born black, I will never get to switch to white or chinese. Thats the only situation where there would be inflexibility. If someone believes being gay is a choice that gives them tons of flexibility. It means you get to choose who you are attracted to not that being attracted to someone is demanded as it would be if you were born one way or another. There is no way to make a definitive argument either way and I think I have proven that. I like women, always have always will so this isn't about me. It is what it is.

Re: Why bother

Justin — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 20:24:17 -0000

I didn't read the comment thread on that last post, or this one, for that matter, but I'll just say that I thought your original point was clear enough. Maybe you didn't do enough CYA for writing on the internet--someone who didn't know your writing might get confused or whatever. But you're always going to have people misrepresenting what you write, and you can't write well if you're trying to make it impossible for them to misread. Eventually, you just have to have confidence that you've made a point, and that readers who take time will see it.

Re: Why bother

Hugo Pottisch — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 20:10:41 -0000

sgwhiteinfla

i think you got something wrong here. I do agree with SeanH that there are different flavors among us all (for genetic and environmental reasons as with everything). some mainly straight and some mainly gay, some both. experimenting is not like liking (you do recall your own beergoggle argument).

but I still do not get you. are you saying that you can somehow force yourself into feeling attracted to anybody? are you saying that you can see yourself being attracted only to men for a lifetime if you wished.. but you just don' want to?

that indeed would be impressive sgwhiteinfla - unless you simply call yourself "bi"? apprently you have no choice but to "be able" to like both sexes fully? I wished i had your skills - i imagine the supply of people who can be sexually attractive to you is virtually limitless..

it's all good with me except for some slight envy. I am for gay rights (and bi rights. my sister is too. but she does not use the term: force/trick/rape herself to like both men and women... she usually tries to force herself to not-like somebody and she usually struggles..)

rikyrah

I do not think that there is a competition going on about who has been oppressed more or worse. No doubt - in this country, the US, it has been animals and blacks who have seen their natural needs and rights infringed the most. But let me guess - you do not want to be compared to an animal - even though they are suffering to the literally limit of what constant antibiotics can support.

but in this day and age - blacks can choose who they want to marry. they can marry blacks and whites or brown or.. unless of course they are black and gay.

if you are a black gay then you cannot marry your loved one. how stupid is that? black gays do not choose to be attracted to other men any more than tiger woods "chooses" to fancy blonds.

given the homophobia among blacks and whites - why on earth would any black man choose to be gay? what they WOULD CHOOSE is to remain unhappy, frustrated closet gays - but not the other way around. really - where does this idea originally come from? I posted a letter by Huey P. Newton who admits to have been brainwashed by this "just a choice" idea and who questions its merits...

without full equality for gays - the implication is that you cannot hope, that one day, you will see a publicly gay president. all presidents in this day and age have to be married and religious. period - these are the two main criteria. preferably with children.

and you are telling me - only because you think that blacks have suffered more - that gay rights are not comparable to women, black or say animal rights?

do you know that Hitler had actually order the murder of quite many Germans. Germans who actually supported the Nazis and their ideas... only problem was that they reminded Adolf of his own inner nature... nobody wants a mirror if it only reminds you that you need constant make-up? Adolf was short and dark - yet he wanted to weed out all who were not tall and blond.. enough said.

NO! it is insane enough that we had to go through this step-by-step instead of universally. First men get rights - then and only then white women - then and only then blacks, then and only then gays.. then... this is sad.

we have the ultimate test - still waiting for us. everything so far has been preparation foreplay according to the ancient books. we coming closer to the roots of all our problems according to zeus, gandhi and exodus... heaven on earth or hell?

Re: Why bother

Robert M — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 19:08:32 -0000

This is the best post you have written. I had to read it a couple of times and sit and think about how you articulated what the real threat is; residual fear in the African American community of rights taken or not given

One day we as whole will get past this. It is just a matter of conquering fear.

Re: Why bother

rikyrah — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 18:56:18 -0000

Rikyrah, would you (or anyone else) mind giving a quick explanation of why? I'm a straight, white, non-religious guy so from my total outsider's perspective they both so obviously seem to be civil-rights issues that I just can't quite wrap my brain around rejecting the comparison.

It's the whole, well, if you have to, you can hide that you're gay. Nobody asks you to check off gay on any application.

When a White man who went to jail has a better chance of getting a job than a Black man who didn't, please understand that I'm not, nor will I ever believe that being White and Gay is remotely comparable to being Black in this country. This isn't to wrap myself in any ' victim' cloak - it's just being blunt about United States History.

I've had open Black gay friends since high school. But, when we've been stopped by the police, had nothing to do with them being gay. It had to do with DWB. When we're followed around in department stores, has nothing to do with them being gay. It's SWB.

I know that I can seem sort of strident, but I'm just trying to be honest.

Re: Why bother

sgwhiteinfla — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 18:54:00 -0000

Hugo says

It is rare not to encounter some homosexual experiments in English boarding schools for example. there are some real open and closet gays among them later but most boys do not turn out homosexual or bi. despite the pink shirts they like to wear.

Check out how easily I can turn this around.

So if the contention is that you are born gay which obviously confirms the converse that you are also born straight, wouldn't that mean that you would NEVER want to experiment? If you were straight wouldn't experimenting with homosexual activity totally repulse you at your core? And if you were born gay could it ever truly be considered "experimenting"

Now as to what I assume is snark about boys who are molested, shouldn't it hold firm that if you are born straight (confirmed again by the born gay contention) you will NEVER choose to be gay no matter what kind of abuse is done to you? Same premise for being in jail. If you are born straight doesn't that presume that even in the total absence of the opposite sex you will never even consider same sex relations?

These are the kinds of opposite views that make the choice/born argument to me just an exercise in futility for anybody actually trying to advance their belief on the situation. Unless science comes up with a gene or something (which I actually think will cause more trouble than anything else) that is connnected to homosexual behavior the argument will go on and on.

Re: Why bother

Hugo Pottisch — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 18:25:31 -0000

SeanH

Just read your posts and I am with you on this one. obviously it differs from individual to individual what your ratio to male/female is. I have read of research that claims that the bell curves, that Galleymac was referring to, are opposite for women and men. Ie most men are either straight or gay and most women are bi. but i do not quite believe it that females and males are that different (the research was done by men only..).. it and it is also irrelevant.

i am attracted mainly to women and have always been. there are men who I find attractive and sexy. however, when it comes to thinking about a sexual act with another men who I find attractive - I struggle, as so many do. i have not come to a stage in my imagination where it does not get gross for me at some point. which is strange - as I do not mind anal sex with women at all (and no - not all the time but....). as you say - who knows what could happen in prison. still - not my choice. nor is the choice of mainly gays... nor the choice of those who are mainly bi. maybe gays would sleep with women too if they ended up in the female tracts of prisons?

to sgwhiteinfla's point about boys who have been molested later turning out gay. I suppose the majority of gays and lesbians have first tried it with the opposite sex and were not all raped? at least I hope so - as this would represent a far bigger problem than the one we are discussing.

It is rare not to encounter some homosexual experiments in English boarding schools for example. there are some real open and closet gays among them later but most boys do not turn out homosexual or bi. despite the pink shirts they like to wear.

Re: Why bother

SeanH — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 18:05:49 -0000

I just want to point out that none of your arguments are backed up by facts and are by in large your own opinion.

Oh, agreed. I certainly don't feel like I'd be at all justified telling anyone they're wrong for believing differently and don't think any less of anyone who thinks I'm full of it. I take your point on not using it as a justification for gay marriage, but I think it works fine as a partial explanation for why I'll never agree with anything short of full gay marriage rights.

By the way the one thing I can dispute that you said is that the statistics say the number of boys who are molested by men growing up to be gay is a LOT higher than boys who are molested by women growing up to be gay.

I'd never heard that, but I don't doubt it. I don't mean to give the impression that I believe our preferences are set in stone by nature from birth. Our brains continue developing until adulthood so there likely are plenty of childhood influences that affect preferences later in life. No way is there some kind of gene or fetal development change that gives someone a fetish for women's shoes for instance, so it can't all be nature with no nurture component.

I guess I'm just saying that however I became a straight man, I don't feel I have any concious choice about whether or not Salma Hayek or George Clooney engage my interest sexually and I don't believe a gay man has any more choice about it than I do.

Re: Why bother

Hugo Pottisch — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 17:59:56 -0000

sgwhiteinfla

yo... I know that everybody here is supporting gay rights and that there are good arguments for it and I am not challenging you personally at all. we all agree that sexual orientation should not.. what about those who do not agree with us and even less that the church and the state should be separated. but freak... I still do not know if people, including yourself, think that they can choose or not.

yes.. there is hidden point i wanted to come to in all this - namely the act of anthromorphising and also the opposite of it. when it comes to animals - I have met people who claim that they do not have sex like we human animals do. some say they only do it to reproduce and not because they enjoy it. others say that it is the other way around and that we humans are different because we can also do it only for reproduction (like the bible..). both are non-sense. we straight humans are normal animals. gays are normal animals.

but this point is hidden insofar as I know that one could not use it to take away the fears of a religious homophobe who fears for his family and children.

Galleymac

I am not asking what makes somebody gay. i know that we all here would support gay rights - so it does not matter to us (if it is choice or not). but it does matter to those yes-voters. they are, seriously I believe, thinking that they are losing perfectly fine and normal grand-daughters and sons to this rockn' roll, hustler nonsense fade...

I have read here that mothers and fathers want to learn more about homosexuality in case their own children happen to be gay. it works the other way too - parents wanting to protect their children and themselves from it in fear that... knowing if one can actually choose or not would... again - not for us.. but for yes-voters, help.

I actually think that many parents of gays do not want to hear and know that their son or daughter does not choose. i'd be so much easier to see it as a rebellion of some sort etc?

(i am not talking about a statistical bell curve that you have mentioned where one can show how many percent are straight, bi or gay.. what good is that in this context?)

but my guess is that we are all a tad sexually insecure, straights and gays.. that makes it messy and also fun. Here some old Socrates on why women should have rights (The Republic by Plato, Book V).

Then, if women are to have the 
same duties as men, they must  
have the same nurture and education?  
 
Yes.  
The education which was assigned to 
the men was music and gymnastic. Yes.   
 
Then women must be taught music and  
gymnastic and also the art of war?  
 
That is the inference, I suppose.  
I should rather expect, I said,  
that several of our proposals, if  
they are carried out, being unusual,   
may appear ridiculous.  
 
No doubt of it.  
Yes, and the most ridiculous thing  
of all will be the sight of women  
  naked in the palaestra, exercising  
with the men, especially when they   
are no longer young; they certainly  
will not be a vision of beauty, any 
more than the enthusiastic old men  
who in spite of wrinkles and ugliness  
continue to frequent the gymnasia.  
 
Yes, indeed, he said: according to   
present notions the proposal would  
be thought ridiculous.  
 
But then, I said, as we have  
determined to speak our minds,  
we must not fear the jests of  
the wits which will be directed   
against this sort of innovation;  
how they will talk of women's  
attainments both in music and  
gymnastic, and above all about  
their wearing armour and riding  
upon horseback!  
 
Very true, he replied.   
Yet having begun we must go  
forward to the rough places  
of the law; at the same time  
begging of these gentlemen for  
once in their life to be serious.  
Not long ago, as we shall remind  
them, the Hellenes were of the  
opinion, which is still generally  
received among the barbarians,  
that the sight of a naked man  
was ridiculous and improper;  
and when first the Cretans and  
  then the Lacedaemonians introduced  
the custom, the wits of that day  
might equally have ridiculed  
the innovation.  
 
No doubt.  
But when experience showed that  
to let all things be uncovered was   
far better than to cover them up,  
and the ludicrous effect to the  
outward eye vanished before the  
better principle which reason asserted,  
then the man was perceived to be a  
fool who directs the shafts of his   
ridicule at any other sight but
that of folly and vice, or seriously
inclines to weigh the beautiful by
any other standard but that of the good.

socrates was serious about equality - to the dot (being able to serve in the military and nakedness. where are women oppressed the most today and what do they wear? and why are there feminists out there who are actually against women showing flesh like men do?). some good arguments I reckon that have nothing to do with: could a woman choose to be a woman and not a man. still - it took about 2300 years... again never mind.

Re: Why bother

sgwhiteinfla — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 17:06:28 -0000

SeanH

I just want to point out that none of your arguments are backed up by facts and are by in large your own opinion. I am not saying that in a bad way so I hope you don't take it that way. My point is another person can come right behind you and voice their opinion as the exact opposite off yours and there would be no way to say who was right and who was wrong. By the way the one thing I can dispute that you said is that the statistics say the number of boys who are molested by men growing up to be gay is a LOT higher than boys who are molested by women growing up to be gay. But again the fact that either side of the argument can be debated in an intelligent fashion to me says that there is no black and white on the topic. Therefore its probably best to avoid trying to use it as a justification for gay marriage. See also my previous post to this one.

Re: Why bother

Galleymac — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 17:01:16 -0000

Oh, oh, Hugo -- I think the VAST MAJORITY of our fellow citizens (okay, I just assumed U.S. there, sorry :-D) have a grossly imperfect understanding of the separation between church and state and how it protects them.

As for what "makes" someone gay (I guess this is in addendum to Sean H? Or just general), again, I don't care, but I've found one of the more convincing arguments to be the bell curve -- not THAT bell curve! -- maybe about 10 percent of the populace is born utterly gay, and 10 percent utterly straight, and the rest fall on a continuum of possibility, whether or not there is a situation in which it manifests.

Re: Why bother

sgwhiteinfla — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 16:56:59 -0000

Hugo Pottisch

Maybe you missed this quote of mine from above.

Now black people should stand with Gay people when their civil rights are being infringed upon or taken away

You see to me the born/choice argument in the gay marriage discussion is unproductive. I can make just as serious an argument for choice as you can for birth right. But what it boils down to is that regardless, nobody should be discriminated against for their sexual preference.

Thats why I say that the Miscengation laws are so applicable to or I should say analagous to the gay marriage ban because they both involve the government intervening in who you want to marry. I don't think the people back during the Loving Supreme Court case had to argue that the particular white man involved in that court case was born attracted to black women in order to get the law overturned nor to get support from the country at large for getting the law getting overturned. He chose a black woman for marriage nothing was wrong with that. And similarly gay people should be able to choose who they want to marry whether people believe they were born gay or chose to be gay. But if you try to use the "born" argument with someone who doesn't believe it to convince them that gays should be allowed to marry then odds are they will start equating the argument of choice/born with the argument of whether banning gay marriage is right/wrong. And thats a very high stakes game to be playing and I personally don't think its necessary.

It is always good to know WHY somebody opposes something but it doesn't mean its smart to try to convince them they are wrong by challenging that belief.

Re: Why bother

Ninja Zombie — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 16:56:16 -0000

Tony Comstock: "For that matter, if we want to talk about homophobia at large, it wouldn't hurt to talk about the erotophobia that pervade are culture. We have a sitting Supreme Court justice who thinks the state has the constitutional power to outlaw masturbation (and homosexual intercourse too.)"

Although erotophobia plays a role, it's not the dominant factor here.

Many politicians and citizens believe the proper function of the state is to outlaw/regulate cigarettes, fatty foods, video games, colored contact lenses (for cosmetic, not vision correction purposes), spinning hubcaps, butterfly knives and cheese aged less than 30 days.

In such a climate, why would it be a surprise that they also consider regulation of sex an appropriate function of the government?

Or, consider the converse if activities happening in private between consenting adults is not the business of the government (as alleged by most gay activists), what does that say about minimum wage laws or other such regulations of private conduct?

(Note: I'm not advocating regulations on gay sex. I oppose regulations of gay sex, minimum wage laws, and young cheese. Just pointing out that regulating gay sex is hardly inconsistent with prevailing views on both the left and right.)