Pope Francis: Who am I to judge gay people?

[Gerald]

http://i1358.photobucket.com/albums/q764/gasturbin/_69003335_69003334_zpsf2f48d75.jpg (http://s1358.photobucket.com/user/gasturbin/media/_69003335_69003334_zpsf2f48d75.jpg.html)
The Pope's position on gay people appears to contrast with that of his predecessor.

Pope Francis has said gay people should not be marginalised but integrated into society.
Speaking to reporters on a flight back from Brazil, he reaffirmed the Roman Catholic Church's position that homosexual acts were sinful, but homosexual orientation was not."If a person is gay and seeks God and has good will, who am I to judge him?"

The Pope needs to Promote Their ideas.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-23489702

Note: 29 July 2013 Last updated at 12:54 GMT

[Cybermat47]

I like this new Pope! :yep:

Apparently he's gotten rid of that golden throne too!

[Stealhead]

Well that belongs to the Vatican(the throne) not the Pope so he did not get rid of it he just does not use it.

You know this reminds me of a book I found and scanned through once it was claiming how the Catholic Church was supporting communism by helping poor people and what not.:06: It was obliviously propaganda written by a hard core anti-communist anti-Catholic Protestant.I do not recall the exact title but it was a 1970's era book it does not matter anyway as it was nothing more than a propaganda rag.

I am not a Catholic by the way but I have no problem with Catholics or any religion really unless your goal is to make Hello Kitty real or something like that.

[Schroeder]

Was about time. He doesn't seem to be as conservative as a lot of people have feared.:up:

[Skybird]

He also said that women should play a more active role, but that they should not be priests. So his turning away from conservatism has limits.

On TV I just saw him minutes ago, in the same press meeting in a plane he also condemned lobbies in general (when being asked whether there was a gay lobby in the Vatican) and said that all kinds of lobbies are bad. Score!

His comment on gays is just sound reason, and when combining it with his remarks on lobbyism in general it is not much different than what I think and say, too: leave gays as what they are, stop making a big issue of it (both in good or bad), do not discriminate them but also stop pushing gay agendas down the throat of people and society all the time.

My view of marriage and family is unchanged, of course. And I do not expect this pope to change the church's view of gay marriages. Nor has he so far.

[WernherVonTrapp]

I think the Pope is right. There is only one judge, and it's not me either. I'm still very busy trying to remove the plank from my own eye.

[Skybird]

Why not using that plank for keeping the eyelid open so that you see better? :D :O:

[Mittelwaechter]

I am atheist, but I think this Pope could be a great leader for those who do believe but still have an open mind. A modern, realistic and liberal-minded Pope - as far as this is possible.

He may be a problem for the conservative, narrow minded bullheads, those fanatic christians who own the air superiority over their traditional, only true ethical values.

Let's hope he will not be put out of the game violently.

[Cybermat47]

^^^

+1

Except I'm agnostic.

Still, great Pope :yep:

[WernherVonTrapp]

He may be a problem for the conservative, narrow minded bullheads, those fanatic christians who own the air superiority over their traditional, only true ethical values.

Let's hope he will not be put out of the game violently.The best way to recognize a true Christian is not by the what he/she calls themself, but by the fruit they bear. You cannot be a true Christian and then bear bad fruit.:up:

[Nippelspanner]

Awwww, how very nice and kind of this hypocrite to "not judge gay priests". We should all be happy and grateful... :nope:

The hell is wrong with your memory guys?
That guy is quite known for his anti-gay talks after his election and before.

One example: http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/new-pope-francis-called-homosexual-marriage-a-machination-of-the-father-of/

Also, he did not say "Who am I to judge" regarding gay people in general, he actually said: “If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge?” - and that was related to gay priests, not gays in general.
An interesting read on this (http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2013/07/29/what-pope-francis-really-said-about-gays-and-no-it-not-new/)

What the pope thinks about gays and gay marriage, he said clearly in the past, before and after his election, like calling homosexuality a "disease".

He is just as conservative as the guy before him,maybe even worse.

[Mittelwaechter]

I was not aware of his former statements about homosexuality until the recent news.

Maybe he learned from this gay clerical circle in Rome that this attribute is not a disease but a very human nature like being blue eyed or left handed.

“If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge?” reads to me "If someone is gay..." not "if some priest is gay...".

I'm sure the Pope will have a second chance to clear this statement.

[Armistead]

Let's see, you can be gay, but if you have gay sex, then you're sinful. I'm sure that's a comfort for gay people..

[Nippelspanner]

I was not aware of his former statements about homosexuality until the recent news.

Maybe he learned from this gay clerical circle in Rome that this attribute is not a disease but a very human nature like being blue eyed or left handed.

“If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge?” reads to me "If someone is gay..." not "if some priest is gay...".

I'm sure the Pope will have a second chance to clear this statement.

He did not mention priests in that sentence - but gay priests were the topic when he said that, if I am not mistaken. Also, if he does make a difference between a gay christian or gay non-christian person (and he does, not every human being is the same to him) then everything he says or does is irrelevant to me anyways. Why would I look up to someone who thinks in such stupid extremes? Cause someone declared him the holy friggin pope and covered him in clothes that could feed a starving village somewhere for half a year? This "system" and religion (religion in general) is so flawed, so wrong, so fake and stupid, it makes me sick.

And now I see some people state "Oh, looks like hes OK after all" just because of this one silly line, that was also taken out of context.
I know, charisma can be a powerful weapon, mankind experienced this very often. Yet, I wish people would not be so naive sometimes and think things through more often.

[CaptainHaplo]

This Pope was offering one of the truism of faith:

Love the sinner but hate the sin.

He said they needed to be integrated into society. OK nothing wrong with that. He said it isn't his job to judge them - and he is right on that score as well - judgment belongs to the Almighty.

Yep, he still says homosexual acts are a sin - and they still are. Note he qualifies - if they search for the Lord - because faith says that the Lord can give you the strength to overcome sin - thus a homosexual who comes to the Lord with a "good will" - a desirous heart to follow - will be given the ability to overcome their homosexuality - in whatever way the Lord sees fit (perhaps having them choose celibacy).

He has his faith in the Almighty and His power, not that of man. Rake him over the coals if you want, but he condemned the sin - not the sinner. There is a difference - one that many can not or will not (by choice) accept.

And I am not even Catholic.....

[Nippelspanner]

This Pope was offering one of the truism of faith:

Love the sinner but hate the sin.

He said they needed to be integrated into society. OK nothing wrong with that. He said it isn't his job to judge them - and he is right on that score as well - judgment belongs to the Almighty.

Yep, he still says homosexual acts are a sin - and they still are. Note he qualifies - if they search for the Lord - because faith says that the Lord can give you the strength to overcome sin - thus a homosexual who comes to the Lord with a "good will" - a desirous heart to follow - will be given the ability to overcome their homosexuality - in whatever way the Lord sees fit (perhaps having them choose celibacy).

He has his faith in the Almighty and His power, not that of man. Rake him over the coals if you want, but he condemned the sin - not the sinner. There is a difference - one that many can not or will not (by choice) accept.

And I am not even Catholic.....

This is ridiculous.
"Overcome their homosexuality"? Are you trolling me, or are you serious?
It is BS like that I was referring to earlier.
By declaring homosexuality a sin, he absolutely condemned "the sinner".

How can homosexuality be a sin or even a "disease"?! It is a part of nature, always has been. Last time I checked, nature existed before someone wrote a funny book of fairy tales. Oh, yes, sure... God created earth and us...and everything... :03:

[Cybermat47]

^^^

You're right, Nipplespanner. We must help these Christians overcome their Christianity.

Just to clarify, being a Christian isn't evil, but reading the Bible is.

[Mittelwaechter]

This Pope is the first one I know who has some kind of liberal ideas. He may be the right one to bring his sheep further into our present time. Don't expect him to deny the bible or its common rules. Don't expect him to make too lage steps out of tradition and the fairy land.

As far as I understand gay sex is a sin in the bible. To tell his sheep they shall respect gay people is a huge step forward. Let him turn them slowly or they will revolt.
He will not tell them anything totally controverse to the bible. Maybe he believes himself.

It's hard for a kid to learn that Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny are only tools to rule them, to make them behave well.
For endless centuries no one has told them that god is just another tool to rule them and to make them behave well. People grow and live in the believe there is a mighty father taking care of them, just as it was with their real father and they feel comfortable with it. They like it and they have an anchor in stormy seas.

It's everybody's own decision to think, doubt and realize or to stay with the flock of sheep cared for by their god - represented by a man that is elected for this job.
It's only important for the world, that religion and believe is a privat fun and has to stay out of politics. The same counts for the big money in my opinion.

I think this Pope may be a good prayer for christianity to get rid of some dust.
We have to wait and see if his fate is to be an Obama or if he really has the chance to change his church for the better.

[Skybird]

Maybe he learned from this gay clerical circle in Rome that this attribute is not a disease but a very human nature like being blue eyed or left handed.
It surprises me time and again how desperately people try to declare homosexuality a wanted feature and genetic design, and compare it to any other genetic feature. It is that NOT, and the latest report on so-.called epigenes does not show this statement of mine to be wrong, but supports it (it got tremendously misinterpreted in the media since it was published earlier this year):

Let'S have a closer look on epigenes. Scientists are relatively sure that for most people, their homosexual orientation has been put into their cradle genetically. We have striong reasons to assume this since longer time now. This does however not mean that it is an option of naturally wanted genetic variation in individual traits, like eye colour. Because homosexual orientation is not transported to a person by naturally evolving genetic informaton in the existing genes, but by an accidental mishap in the regulation of the process of splitting/reproducing genes: this is what the latest finding about epigenes mean.

Epigenes are temporarily existing informations that in themselves bear no information used for deciding the future individual's physical and psychological status. They get activated when a genetic reproduction of the genes have started, and they regulate the way, the manner, the fashion in which this process takes place. After the reproduction cycle of a given gene is completed, epigenes disappear again, and their regulating information with them. At least that is how it should be. Homosexuality does not appear when this indeed the case, there are no genetic informations or markers for homosexuality. At least nobody has ever discovered any so far.

But sometimes, an accident happens, and the epigenes do not disappear, dissolve again, but maintain to be there - and then their information could get embedded in the regular genes as well, although this should not, and is not meant to be, and is not needed at all. If this happens, then this defective completion of the epigene's function - temporary regulation of a temporary process - leads to the forming of an homosexual identity, which turns out to be the result of this temporary epigenetic information being turned into a lasting piece of the lasting overall genetic code. The existence of the homosexual identity is revealing that there went something wrong and that epigenes misfunctioned: they should have gone again, but have not.

Let'S try to illustrate it in a metaphoric picture. Assume genes to be transport trucks and the informaiton being the cargo they carry, and the traffic process of these trucks being the genetic reproduction process. Epigenes would compare to traffic cops regulating the traffic when the traffic hits a crossroad, for example, or there is a problem on the street: normally, you have no traffic cops on the streets regulating traffic by hand, when you see them, then there is a problem, a car accident maybe, or a broken traffic light or whatever. The cop is not meant to transport the goods the trucks carry. The cop only tells them whether to move left or right at a crossroad, for example. After the trucks have passed the hotspot, the cop is no longer needed, and is left behind.

Homosexuality then would emerge when the cop for reasons of miscommunicating with his HQ or being a confused mind starts to board trucks and drive on with them, or using his police car to share some goods and participate in the transport business. Nothing dangerous there, nothing serious or alarming - still something that should not be, and is not normal in that the situation - traffic cop cars being used for regular transports along with regular transport trucks - is not what it should be like. Traffic cops should regulate traffic when needed, and where not needed, they are not there. The transport business should be run by the transport trucks. And the genetic splitting and reproduction should copy the information aboard the genes, not the temporarily existing information that regulates how this process should be running. Epigenes are not part of ordinary genes. They only get formed when needed, then should stop being there again.

This is the latest findings of science on genetic basis for homosexuality. It has a genetic basis, yes, yet it is not the result of a natural or normal process going well, but it indicates that something has gone wrong, it is an accidental, naturally not wanted and not needed result: epigenes not dissolving again after the real vital genetic information got reproduced in gene splitting, but prevailing and embedding their process-regulating information into the regular genom. And that end results represents, in all politeness, a deformation of the gene. This is what is meant when refusing to label homosexual as "natural". It is realp in that the phenomenon exists, but it is not natural in representing a naturally wanted end state of things, nor does it represent a natural variation in traits and characteristics like eye colour.

Homosexuality is "normal" in that it can happen to exist. It is not normal in the meaning of representing a wanted genetic design transported by genetic information in the splitting gene. There are no known genetic markers for homosexuality. It is an accidental result of a process going wrong, and temporarily existing information that should just regulate the splitting process itself becomes lasting and gets included in the gene's code - while it should not do that at all. It is an accident, no wanted natural genetic evolution. Car accidents happen. They are real and a part of reality. Nevertheless nobody would label them as "naturally" representing what car traffic is about, and that cars are driven to crash them. You do not start your carwith the inention to crash it. The accident is a reality, but it is neither a wanted part of reality, nor is it what car design and driving effort in any way aims for. Car design and driving effort aim for car traffic without accidents. And if any of this fails - then you get an accident.

Eye colour, on the other hand, is genetically encoded in the normal gene, it is not just temporarily existing, and is existing for the sake if itself, not as an interim agent for other gene's functions.

All this is no excuse to discriminate homosexuals, of course, even more so since the results of this accident do not pose a thread or risk at all. It happens. However we should really stop trying for reasons of being politically correct and socially oh so sensible to give the impression that homosexuality is a human trait with its own genetic encoding in the genes like any other physical or psychological trait encoded in the genes. It simply is not, and any ideologically motivated protest will not change that. There is no gene discovered that carries the information for becoming homosexual. It is not a natural result of genetic splitting, like skin colour, height, sex, eye colour. Live with it.

[Mittelwaechter]

Very interesting and thanks for the eloquent information.

So eye colour is a bad example, true. But what about to be left handed? Could this be caused by the same circumstances? Or did they find a genetic marker for this feature?

And don't be 'surprised'. :03:
I never stated homosexuality to be a 'wanted feature' by nature but a natural state. I guess the feature - if wanted - would be the end of our species.

Not that this would be a problem for the planet. Maybe your explanation is a security feature? The unwanted police behaviour may be triggered by overpopulation?

The mother may live in very cramped surroundings, in a climate of war and fight for resources and she breeds a child uninterested in reproduction to regulate the overpopulation?

In any case it is nothing to blame the gay persons for and we should accept and consider their sexual orientation as completely equaly righted - including marriage and child adoption.

[Skybird]

As far as I know science still has not made a finalverdict on whether left or right hand being dominant is egnetically marked or not. I tend to think that it is a consequence from other factors, and thus an implication:

It is known that the left side of the brain controls the right side of the body, and the right side of the brain the left side of the body. The brain centre for speech is located in the left brain hemispheree for the huge majority of people, with very small groups only having that centre in the right side of their brain, or having speech functionality distributed over both brain hemispheres. This is no causal link between speech and hand dominance of course, but there is a strong correlation between this socalled lateralisation, and hand dominance. So while there maybe indeed are no genetic markers deciding whether your left or right hand is dominant, this nevertheless could be indirectly genetically determined by the genetic code deciding on the lateralisation inside the brain: where you have you speech centre in your brain (and then assuming that there is some kind of a link between speech and finemotoric action with hands, which necessarily includes cognition, neuroscience and psychology into the overall assessment). Complex stuff - we still do not know for sure, it seems. If there is such a link as the correlation seems to indicate, it probably hints at an advantage in the history of evolution if the species has one hand dominant and more capable than the other, and having the neural control for that located in the same brain hemisphere like that for verbal communication. Speech and tool-using, both with strong references to this other phenomenon: practical intelligence. I cannot nail it down precisely, but maybe you have the same association here like I have when putting these qualities together. To me, in a way it makes sense. But I would not want to write a paper about it.

On the marriage and child adoption equality that you mention, I of course strongly object, due to the vital importance of families for any human society, and the psychological differentiation I make between a mother and a father, also, I want the family status being given spoecial protection and appreciation by society, and I see no merits being scored fro two women or two men being homosexual and living together. They are free to do so, already now, but it deserves no special recognition or appreciation, it is no service to society to live together as they are, or to be gay/lesbian. While some children become orphants, or loose one parent to death of divorce or other factors, this nevertheless is no desirable nor a natural(in the meaning of normal) circumstance). And a female mother is not the same like a homosexual man and a male father is not the same like a lesbian women. Mother and father serve different role models, and women and man tick differently anyway. I consider it wanted by nature that children get educated by both, and that this - or the absence of this - influences emotional, cognitive and intellectual development. We know for exmaple that childrne beign risen by one parent only have a significantly higher,a much higher probability to develope a personality disorder or a neurosis later in their lives, from their 30th year on. A mother and a gay man are two very different things, and the latter cannot compensate the absence of the first. That is not an issue of wanting or not wanting, loving or not loving, but an issue of traits people carry - or carry not.

The epigene issue is saying that homosexuality is an accident, not a natural genetic design option, and that goes queer with many people, who now aggressively imply that homosexuals should be lowered by calling them the result of an accident. Well, maybe all life on earth is the result of a cosmic accident, an event with extremely low probability to happen. I do not think of gays as the incarnation of a biological accident, but I insist on not normalising what is not normal. Being an albino or siamese twin does not strip the effected individual its human rights and dignity, but still what happened to them are genetic defects, and it has as a result that they are not human people represnrting a nhaturl normality oh human species. They are exceptions. Homosexuals also are exceptions, of a different kind. Transgenderism is an exception, and probably is not a wanted design option by nature, since it makes no sense: it is an accident, something went wrong at some point. Let's recognise the fact as fact, and accept it as a reality without distorting that reality for emotional or ideological reasons. when you are born with three instead of four fingers, that also is an accident, something went wrong. It makes you different. It does not negatively hinder you in your abilities, most likely, accept certain things having to do with the way you can grab things, that is all.

Normality is to recognise these things as they are, without trying to censor their perception or lobbying for them to gain priviliges. There is no merit won by having three instead of four fingers. A three-fingered person deserve no special recognition or appreciation for it. He also do not deserve being discriminated for it.

[Armistead]

^^^

You're right, Nipplespanner. We must help these Christians overcome their Christianity.

Just to clarify, being a Christian isn't evil, but reading the Bible is.

Why is reading the bible evil? Certainly, they're many ways to interpret it, but doesn't make it evil. What's evil is when doctrines are created that harm people.

As far as the Catholic church, it's nothing more than a system to control people lives and wealth through men. I love the debate when Hitchens and Fry against RCC " Is the Catholic church a force for good?" Really exposed the RCC for what it is.

[Mittelwaechter]

@ skybird

Your arguments against gay families are not persuasive to me. All this 'behavioural abnormality' you describe is not only with gay people but with most of the people considered to be normal.
Parents who have been violently abused by their parents tend to do the same to their childeren sooner or later.
Our kids are exposured to all stupid life experience and bad behaviour, all mental chaos and all social malformation, all prejudices and all brain f from their 'normal' parents.
Any crazy sociopath is entitled to grow some kids if only he or she is straight.
It makes no sense at all to tell gay people they shall not marry and have children. Not to live their lives the way they want to.

My personal experience with homosexuals is, they are nonviolent and very social, creative and funny. They rarely take extreme positions and are very open minded. They are nice, cultivated couples and unimportunate individuals.
I think they are at least as ideal to raise kids as any other parents. They live an example of diversity, proving that 'difference' is no reason for social exclusion. A good lesson to learn for all of us, including their kids.
I know enough heterosexual couples and singles way more absurd and socially incompetent to be justifiable parents. No one would ever hinder them to marry or breed children.
Our society should grant the freedom for both sexual orientations to express their personality and to found a family.
And for the sake of the children these families should be cared for by the law as usual.
A special treatment for gay families is only necessary right now, because we make them special. Let them live as every other couple and let them have kids to care for.
We will lern there is no difference before long. I guess we may even learn the gay parents may be more caring. Who knows?

And accidents happen. That's normal. Diversity is normal, mutation is normal, individuality is normal...
That's life.


Edit:
Even you and me could be 'accidents'. A little hole in our fathers rubber sock you know...
Our whole existence may be based on an accident, not just our sexual orientation. Should we be treated special in that case?

[CaptainHaplo]

"Overcome their homosexuality"? Are you trolling me, or are you serious?
I am being serious.

By declaring homosexuality a sin, he absolutely condemned "the sinner".

No - it isn't. You see, having homosexual desires may very well be a part of a person's nature. That does not mean they must partake in the ACTIONS. It is no different than a heterosexual man who lusts after a married woman - aka "his neighbor's wife". The desire may be natural - but it becomes a sin if the person does not put it away - because ultimately failing to do so may lead them to engage in action to fulfill that desire. This is a common attempt by those that want an action to be declared morally "ok" to try and do - equate the act with nature. Sorry, not going to fly.

Remember - this isn't about your standards - its about the religious standards that predate you by more than a millennia.... So trying to use your judgment to make something "ok" is whistling in the wind.

How can homosexuality be a sin or even a "disease"?!
Because their theology - whether you like it or not - says so.
Your problem is that you don't like the stand the theology takes, so your trying to castigate its position - even though it has said this for far longer than you have been alive.

It is a part of nature, always has been.
So has sin.

Last time I checked, nature existed before someone wrote a funny book of fairy tales. Oh, yes, sure... God created earth and us...and everything... :03:

And in the end you simply denigrate the entire theology because you don't agree. Well, there you have your answer - you don't agree. Don't expect a logical debate when your position entails nothing other than "that religious idea is a stupid fairy tale". That isn't how debates work - not to mention that while religion can not prove itself true, you can not disprove it - therefore it remains an unknown - and your position of it being "a fairy tale" amounts to a belief, nothing more. Your beliefs are no more sacred or accurate to anyone else as theirs are to you.

[Mittelwaechter]

http://abload.de/img/reminderaoyid.jpg

Sorry, but desire is way older than sin.
Sin is a manmade concept to control people. The priests as part of the rulers duet told the people how to behave well, how to accept their fate and how to function properly within the system of slavery and opression.

[CaptainHaplo]

Sorry, but desire is way older than sin.
Sin is a manmade concept to control people. The priests as part of the rulers duet told the people how to behave well, how to accept their fate and how to function properly within the system of slavery and opression.

Again - that is your opinion/belief - unless you somehow can disprove an Almighty. Its great to have an opinion - but yours are no more valid than a Catholic's - or any other person of faith. Even if their faith is in the great spaghetti monster as god.

[Gerald]

Amen.

[Oberon]

Here we go again...

[AVGWarhawk]

unless your goal is to make Hello Kitty real or something like that.

Wait, what? Hello Kitty is not real. :o

[AVGWarhawk]

Sorry, but desire is way older than sin.



Yes, by about a minute. Just before Eve handed the apple to Adam. :hmmm:


:O:

[Skybird]

Wait, what?! The statement that there are trees in the forest should not be older than the statement that a god put them there, because the claim that a god out them there could not be disproven? What was first: the perception and realisation that there are trees, or the question why they are there? ;) Only one of the two optional answers is correct. ;)

Haplo, is this another of your queer attempts to put belief on same and equal status eye to eye with reason and knowing? Man, I really wish you would leave believing as what it is : just believing something. Nothing more it is.

Claims on deities having been the cause of something, are something that is being added to the existing world that already has been there before there was an organism as advanced enough to wonder why there is a world - the question why it is there cannot appear before somebody found that a world exists for sure. The one we live in, that is. Before you can ask questions on the existence of something - you must have taken note of its existence.

Natural drive to reproduce, and desire in humans (all this clever trickery of natrure that brings us together with another being to contribute to the survival of the species :) ), without any doubt is much older than any claim, idea, concept on monotheistic and before: polytheistic deities, theories on solar sunspot activity, and the invention of book printing. That we can say with great certainty for a simple reasopn: we can give relatively precise dates for when polytheistic theologies first developed, and when the first monotheistic concepts appeared, and when the later started to seriously push back the first. And yes, before monotheism there was polytheism. And there was a time with humans living that did not even know any form of theism at all. ;)

[Mittelwaechter]

For me it is enough to understand the concept and it's advantage.

At the beginning of reason mankind realized the relation between cause and effect. You drop a stone at my foot and I feel pain. I sleep instead of feeding the fire, now it's out and we suffer. People's actions were responsible for certein effects. All the effects impossible to understand - rain, thunder, fertility, death etc. - were transfered to some invisible and mighty people. These gods were a mirror of the peoples perception on earth. No one single person was responsible for everything in their clans. There were more dominant members with more experience and power, older and younger family members with different tasks and manners. The people imagined a celestial family - even a dynasty - to be resposible for all these wonders and mysterious effects they could not explain.
All ancient civilisations are not monotheistic but pray to different gods - to families and dynasties of gods.

But a monotheistic religion is way easier to manage and the superior holy priest is only one person who decides what games to play, what songs to sing and what rules to follow.
The secular rulers preferred to deal with this one guy instead of several dissent priests for every god with different points of view.
The monotheistic religion was adapted by the people, because the one and only god was way more mightier than all the old gods together. This one and only true god was the source of all life, master of all effects, the glorious father of the own childhood in relation to the former gods and the only prophet of the truth. You know the kids at school talking about their cool fathers? Same situation. My daddy is the coolest of all...

The combo of worldly, secular power and religious, clerical power ruled the world for centuries. They kept the people poor and busy plus uneducated and fearsome. The mighty ones were educated and smart enough to maintain the system. Religion and god are tools to manipulate the people, to make them obey and to accept their fate.
Those who define good and evil, friends and foes, good and bad behaviour control the world until today.

The people don't learn the truth about this god and his function. The social community expects you to believe. It is a tradition and it feels good to have a mighty father that cares for your soul.
The people like the concept, because they know it from their own childhood. Those were the days when life was easy and you were not responsible for everything. Just behave well and your father is happy with you and at the end of the trip you get an icecream.

[Skybird]

@ skybird

Your arguments against gay families are not persuasive to me. All this 'behavioural abnormality' you describe is not only with gay people but with most of the people considered to be normal.

I cut it short becasue we have been there bfore, in past discussions, and I do not want to endlessly repeat in detail what I already said there. It's a bit more complex than you paint things as. Development psychology (I once studied that) and mother-child attachement and the concept of so
-called Bonding (Bowlby) plays a role in my thinking, since these have very strong scientific backing and it is almost crooinal to ignore them. And some more. But I was about that in greater detail already in past threads on homosexuality. Other factors that must be taken into account are genbder role modelling, and the sometimes subtle, sometimes obvious differences an male and female values, and male and female ways of approaching and teaching children. I know that modern ultra-feminists, under the label of genderism now, claim that there are no gender differences between boys and girls and that it all can be socially engineered. It's just that endless repeating of already since years and decades scientifically proven wrong claims and misinformations does not make such wrong claims any less wrong.

Hell, what inane times I live in!? Children need a male father and a female mother. That should be obvious and natural so that any discussion about even this should be seen as completely needless. Can children grow without one of the two! Heck, yes, obviously they can. The quresiton is what this means for their inner development. What does it tell you that there is a significant correlation between a raise in probabilities for developing a personality disorder or a severe nueorosis - in them main: depression beyond the age of 30 when you have grown up with just one parent, and the other missing? One example. Or the correlation between the growing likelihood of showing conspicious behavior (aggression, lack of concentration, extreme introversion or extroversion, boycotting behavior within the social environment or school) and the absence of one parent in the household?

And just for the record, a gay man is no female mother. A lesbian woman is no male man. The one cannot serve as a rolemodel of the parent that lacks. What makes PC people so cvertain that they can afford to declare that children do not need a mother and a father when nature has designed our dual-sexual species with the sexual traits we have, and that effect so muczh more than just our reproduction behavior, but also our emotions, thinking, interests, priorities, perception, cognition? I recommend to liosten to mother nature here. She said "one mother and one father", and that's it. It cannot be by random chance only that this is the by far most dominant social model of families since several thouand years. It probbaly is ike that becasue iot has paye doff and is a model whose value has been well-proven.

A drunken scumbag ruining a family is no argument against a functional family as an ideal. One could as well speak against marriage becasue some men trat their women badly (and statistically more women staret fights and become physically aggressive in relations towards their men than the other way around - a statistic fact that most people do not know and that is almost never included in public discussion, and is actively hidden by feminists.



Parents who have been violently abused by their parents tend to do the same to their childeren sooner or later.

The existence of dysfunctional families as you describe them is no argument against my defence of the need for functional families. In fact you only support my demand.


My personal experience with homosexuals is, they are nonviolent and very social, creative and funny. They rarely take extreme positions and are very open minded. They are nice, cultivated couples and unimportunate individuals.
I think they are at least as ideal to raise kids as any other parents. They live an example of diversity, proving that 'difference' is no reason for social exclusion. A good lesson to learn for all of us, including their kids.

And my experience is that these are cliches if being generalised like you do here. Some gays I can immediately recongise, within seconds, it si the way they move, speak, their gesture, mimic, habitus, habits, way they dress- some of these factors, or all of them. And other gays surprised me when learning they were gay, they appeared to be completely "normal", were angry about hysteric gay activists giving them all a bad name with their public misbehavior and CSD exhibitionism. Gays can also be lazy, malicious and underhganded, crminanl, mentally paralysed - I'm sure they can, becawseue I do not idelise them anbd think they are a very mixed group like all mankind and thus have white sheep and black sheep as well. BTW, I knew two gays at university. And both shared my views and arguments on gay marriage and adoption. They were sharp critics of the political correctness frenzy that has led to the madness of today - and I knew them already in the early 90s! ;)

You realise why I tell you this, yes? Maybe it is no good idea to start arguing with "that guy living in the appartement down the floor who is a really friendly gyu and I happen to know him." Arguing like that, using cliches, does not get you that far.


I know enough heterosexual couples and singles way more absurd and socially incompetent to be justifiable parents. No one would ever hinder them to marry or breed children.

One wrong does not make correct a different wrong. I said it above: you only support my demand for functional families., What you point at again is dysfunctional families. I also demand safe street traffic. You could deny that as well - by correctly pointing out that all car accidents include cars. But what woudl your argument be there? ;)


Our society should grant the freedom for both sexual orientations to express their personality and to found a family.
Homosexual activism and lobbying is far more omnipresent in emdia and oublic lkife, than you seem to have realsied. In most Wetsenr states peopk,e are freee to maintain friendhsips and rrelatiosn with whom they want. People are free to live as nymphomanic or abstinent as they want, there is no state regulation on sexuality accept that pedophiles are kept out of schools and kindergardens (and even that some crazy types want to change). I cannot think of any place or time in human history where people have been more free to express their precious personality by sexuality. I personally cannot communicate well with blenders and d!ckheads and I also fail to see a link between IQ or character, and the number of orgasms somebody can have within ten minutes. But nevertheless - everybody is free to live and fnck like he wants. How much more expression of personality by sexuality can you want...?


And for the sake of the children these families should be cared for by the law as usual.
I agree. Just that a family is not a completely arbitreary thing in constellation. A very burgeoise thoguht of mine - that'S why especially the left hates it so much and Marx called for the destruction of "family". There can be no omnipresent left collectivism as long as the social core cell of society is the burgeoise family.

For the sake of children adoptions should only be allowed in constellations that give the child a mother, a father, social and material stability and protection. Nature never had it in mind that homosexuals found families. Maybe you have noted that homosexuals cannot create babies?! Want to come with the idea of factory babies now? Well, ask Mattel.

A special treatment for gay families is only necessary right now, because we make them special. Let them live as every other couple and let them have kids to care for.

Normality is not achieved by special treatments. Yes, let them live as couples, but recognise that homosexual and heterosexual couples are different, like men and women are both humans, but different still. Adoptions by homosexuals I only will when the kid is the biological kid and has lived with of one of the two adults before. In fact, the adoption then is only the adoption by just one of the two adults.

For thew record it must be mentioned that having two gays or two lesbians as your parents, at school can make you object of massive mobbing and mean behavior. Children can be cruel. This may not appear as a desirable fact of life, nevertheless it is a fact of life.


We will learn there is no difference before long. I guess we may even learn the gay parents may be more caring. Who knows?
Must we? According to the thought police, probably, they indeed force it down our neurons since long time now. Who knows, you ask Must we really speculate? Speculations are just that: speculation. I don't care for speculations. You give the impression that gays indeed are the better, the nobler, the kinder, the holier humans, and for the second time now. Well. I prefer to see them as humans, mostly similar, slightly different from the majority of people.

And accidents happen. That's normal. Diversity is normal, mutation is normal, individuality is normal...
That's life.

You have not gotten what I tried to explain on epigenes, if you still compare it to mutations and normal diversity. Homosexuality is no mutation, nor a genetic trait for diversity. It has no known genetic marker. If such a marker will ever be discovered, then this still has to happen. Until then - epigenes.


Edit:
Even you and me could be 'accidents'. A little hole in our fathers rubber sock you know...
Our whole existence may be based on an accident, not just our sexual orientation. Should we be treated special in that case?
I remember quite clearly that I said quite that in an earlier reply, haven't I? ;) And I said that we do not know.

[Skybird]

A German interview with a church critic that makes clear that the pope's statements are being hopelessly blown up and claimed as being sensational where they are very conservative indeed and do not even leave what already is written in the church catechism anyway. Time for some over-enthusiastic people to come back to their senses.

http://www.spiegel.de/panorama/gesellschaft/interview-mit-theologe-david-berger-zu-franziskus-und-schwulen-a-913893.html

Will set up a link again if they happen to translate it for the international edition tomorrow. Not certain they do, however.

[Gerald]

A German interview with a church critic that makes clear that the pope's statements are being hopelessly blown up and claimed as being sensational where they are very conservative indeed and do not even leave what already is written in the church catechism anyway. Time for some over-enthusiastic people to come back to their senses.

http://www.spiegel.de/panorama/gesellschaft/interview-mit-theologe-david-berger-zu-franziskus-und-schwulen-a-913893.html

Will set up a link again if they happen to translate it for the international edition tomorrow. Not certain they do, however. Sky! Do over the night...so we have it tomorrow :up:

[Skybird]

Sky! Do over the night...so we have it tomorrow!


http://img33.imageshack.us/img33/7538/iwo4.jpg (http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/33/iwo4.jpg/)

[Jimbuna]

Here we go again...

Rgr that.

[Cybermat47]

Why is reading the bible evil? Certainly, they're many ways to interpret it, but doesn't make it evil. What's evil is when doctrines are created that harm people.


I was making a joke about how atheists are acting more and more like the so called 'religous nutjobs' they oppose.

[Mittelwaechter]

@ skybird

I do understand the whole theme is a very important one for you and you are very well informed about the biological or assumed mental background.
You want to care for a healthy kids development, because you think it is totally 'unnatural' to have two male or two female parents. You fear the kids will lack something male or female in their childhood, what pops up in their thirties as some kind of mental disease. You accept any problems for the kids in your natural family because they are natural. You wish there would be no problems, but they are at least natural.

Do you have any scientific proof for your asumption of later mental problems? And especially in comparison to 'natural' raised people? Do we even have enough material to make a statement?

My personal experience with homosexuals is not based on any cliches but on personal experience. I met more than a few in my life. A friend of my parents, a male assistant of the fairy type as an elder superior with a ridiculus hairpiece, several business partners and a former 'to be my sister in law'. I once had a very cultivated offer while waiting for a pizza. My wife runs her own business and I meet two of her gay customers now and again. I realize right now the female fraction is only one.
You are absolutly correct, there are criminals and dark minded amongst the gays too. It seems to me they are less dominant than in heterosexual orientated groups. Sorry, I can't change my personal impression.

This all is no excuse to hinder gay people to have families with kids. I guess any kid would accept any obscure mental disease in their later life in exchange for a loving and caring childhood. That's with the natural raised people similar. They can get it and the others can get it either. But your parents stay your parents. These two people of your family you have a special feeling for; either positive or negative.
What would a gay parented bonded child answer, questioned if it wants to have it's second daddy/mommy replaced by a 'natural' opposite sex?

If your fear is based on facts, would it be a solution to ensure the gay parented kids have other sex teachers and kindergardeners? Do grand parents count? Uncles and aunts? A family is more then two parents.

Until today the kids were/are dominantly raised by their mothers. The fathers were/are all day long at work. Did/Do the kids suffer from this dominant female parenting?
And how is this female dominance in kindergardens and basic schools to be interpreted? Is it natural or simply a matter of fact the kids have to deal with and have to adapt to?
Do you think many in their thirties suffer a mental desease, because the female factor in their youth was so dominant?

Mobbing is a problem for kids, true. Especially for foreign kids, black kids, yellow kids, too small or too huge kids, sleepy or too clever kids, shy or mommy kids, redheads or rednecks, uncool or poor kids, kids with old sneakers and outdated cell phones or fat mommys... - for kids in general as for adults who can't deal with it. Add the gay parents attribute and it shoots through the ceiling?

I accept your doubts and your natural approach, but I think your fears are unreasonably high.
Kids are very adaptive and open-minded gay parents will probably try to balance any dominant sex actively. Maybe more than regular parents just to prove the critics wrong.

Would we try to do the best for our children? Give them a chance to show their egality.


P.S. We don't have to go again. Give me a link to read your other arguments if possible.

[Skybird]

@ skybird

I do understand the whole theme is a very important one for you and you are very well informed about the biological or assumed mental background.
You want to care for a healthy kids development, because you think it is totally 'unnatural' to have two male or two female parents. You fear the kids will lack something male or female in their childhood, what pops up in their thirties as some kind of mental disease. You accept any problems for the kids in your natural family because they are natural. You wish there would be no problems, but they are at least natural.

Nonsense. You do not see the difference between individual cases and statistics (which always describe huge populations, nor do you seem to care for the difference between functional and dysfunctional families, exceptions and general normative rules.


Do you have any scientific proof for your asumption of later mental problems? And especially in comparison to 'natural' raised people? Do we even have enough material to make a statement?

Statistical data that repeatedly crossed my way since studying, sometimes due to studying, mostly when reading around in the past 20 years or so in media and such. I am no expert on these things, that does not hinder me to remember that I have read it. I also read more in present times on genderism ideologists - and how there claims that children are sexual tabula rasas that can be socially engineered to be boy og girl is being slammed and proven wrong time and again my medical and psychological research. Or better: has been slammed already. Since decades. I also got plenty of feedback from former colleagues and studying friends who - differently than me - have stick to the job field and became actively jobbing/working in the social field or psychology.


My personal experience with homosexuals is not based on any cliches but on personal experience. I met more than a few in my life. A friend of my parents, a male assistant of the fairy type as an elder superior with a ridiculus hairpiece, several business partners and a former 'to be my sister in law'. I once had a very cultivated offer while waiting for a pizza. My wife runs her own business and I meet two of her gay customers now and again. I realize right now the female fraction is only one.
That are single cases you happen to meet, but you gave them as a ageneral rule. I tried to demosnrtate that when giving you my individual single cases of examples, but you seem to have not gotten the point. Who is the more typical gay, I ask you: the few ones you met or the few ones I happened to know?

Typical gay...?


This all is no excuse to hinder gay people to have families with kids.

It is, but it is my minor argument against gay adoptiuons anyway, and always has been in past discussions. My main argument is that I want the institution of family - mother, father, their children - being specially protected because the institution itself (not even the individuals personal fates) is of utmost vitla importance for the community, there can be no future without couples making babies, and why should they if it brings them into poverty only, ridicule and disadvantages? The ability to create babies is what needs to be pürotected and appreciated by society, and even when there are older people marrying and noit having babies anymore: legislation and social general schemes need to base on the general rules, not the esxceptions from the rules, else any legislation sooner or later drowns in a mess of eceptions, expetions from exceptions, added exceptions from exception frome xvcpeitons, and so on - the bureaqucratuc nightmare we have in the amdinstraiton and court system today. The fathers of Wetsern consttotuioopns seem to have understood that. The German one for example bases family still on the millenia-long proven understanding of it - one mother, one father, their children - and it explicitly puts families under the special protection by and thus into a priviliged status within society. At least that is what the Basic Law says. The rpatrci8ce looks differently, of course, the institution is under massive attack, political left ideologists want to destroy it, feminists want to destroy it, economy wants to destroy it, conservative help to destroy it for mere opportunism as well. Having family increases significantly the risk of sliding down the social ladder and into poverty later in your life. All that is devastating in effect, and leads not only to a collapsing psychohygienic climate, but I also remind of the desastrous economic costs of what we call now the overaging of the population, and the dramatic consequences it has for finances, communal adminstration and its costs, economy, and so on.

I accept no more damage done to families by rendering the term meaningless and destroying its status even more - by relativising it and giving others who do not contribute like families do , the same priviliges. I am single, and I do not want this status the constitution demands for families, nor do I want to benefit from any material advantages that - in theory - should go along with it.

And while I am it it, gay marriage last but not least is about tax reliefs as well. And that is a discrimination of single like me. Gay couples do nothing more for society, than I do, so why should they be set up any better than I am in tax laws? Or like any friendship between two people there are? Or collegues drinking a beer together after work? Are gay couples hindered to live together already? No. To do what they want? No. Separate, if they want? No. They are already free to do that. I am all for them being given rights regarding legacy questions (I am against legacy taxes in general and so demand people having the right to give and dow with their property like they decide without the state stealing so much of it). And that a close friend could be given the right to decide for oneself in case once becomes ill and cannot decide anymore. But in principle all that already is possible right now.

But the campaign runs that people should see gay couples married as something special. But I refuse to care for other people's private life, and I want everybody to keep his private things private (else it is not private). I refuse to be interested, and I explicitly refuse to pay special recognition and attention to it. I reject to need to take note of how wonderfully married somebody else. I just don't care. And I refuse to call them special. To me, the whole idea of gay marriage is just laughable, and a hilarious joke, if not a bitterly poisonous irony. And no, of course I do not see any special merits in being gay. The slogan "gay pride" is absurd to me, for being gay is no reason to be proud, like length of my haircut or skin colour is no reason to be proud for me.

All this special stuff is something that the two gay people I ealrier mentioned, hated like the plague. They realsied that it is hysteria, and that it gives them a bad name. They wanted to just live, without ever making a big deal about there orientation (like I and all people i know also do not make any big deal about their orientation). But in case of gays of lesbian activists - is that good enough, to be like any other? No. It must be in the media. headlines. Parades. Protests up and down the street. Every day. At the same time our schools are corroding, our social structures fall apart, social isolation of people is growing, state budgets collapsing, economic races with Asian markets get lost, financial fundaments erode, costs for living grow beyond our heads, and so much more - one would guess we should have plenty of much much more important stuff on our minds than just an extensive report of the last CSD and how it shut down the town. The point is - this whole activism is not about being given equal status and normality. It is about being lifted above normality, and being given not equal but special status.

And you say that "these things are obviously very important to me?". Do I read some derogative or marginalising basic attitude in that?


I guess any kid would accept any obscure mental disease in their later life in exchange for a loving and caring childhood.
Who are you to judge or assess that?! Who are you to decide that question on behalf of other people - those whom you hand over to suffering such a fate - and claiming yourself they would accept it? That is just your personal - and quite disputable - idea. Maybe because you do not know what can hide between that term , mental disease (I mentioned personality disorders and neurosis, btw).


That's with the natural raised people similar.

So for example a probability for getting cancer of let'S say 2% and a probability of let'S say 10% are the same to you. That's a kind of math that I refuse to follow. I believe in well-done statistics, nothing beats well-done statistics. And when well-done statistics show that a certain risk grows by so and so much and the raise is being shown on a reasonably low error level to be "significant" (statistically that means it does not exist by by random chance or natural fluctuations only), then this is something that I take into account, instead of ignoring it and claiming "a raised probability and a lower previous probability for developing personality problems later on essentially means nothing".

They can get it and the others can get it either.
No, they cannot. Obviously.

But your parents stay your parents. These two people of your family you have a special feeling for; either positive or negative.

Not before you have given a child to them. But there is no excuse why one should want that if there is no need to and the alternative of having a woman and a man as mother and father. Gender role modelling one of the reasons I mentioned. Obviously,m there are more. You argue reverse in time, from the future you have created back to the past. By that you want to show that it all does not matter. But causality does matter - it makes stuff and effects moving. We must not want to start movements at the future you are pointing at.


What would a gay parented bonded child answer, questioned if it wants to have it's second daddy/mommy replaced by a 'natural' opposite sex?
What would it answer twenty years later after having run university, studied social and development psychology and got input on some examination a nnd research projects of the past 50 years and statistics that it cannot ignore? Honstely said, I have no clue, because I do not know these two hypothetical persons, not in the present and not in the future. But I know that hardly two persons ever say exactly the same.


If your fear is based on facts, would it be a solution to ensure the gay parented kids have other sex teachers and kindergardeners? Do grand parents count? Uncles and aunts? A family is more then two parents.
Can school, Kindergarden, friends compensate for an absent mummy or daddy?

Sometimes fate strikes hard, an accident happens, a shooting wear goes on. That these things must set in to try to give some ease and compoensation. But they cannot do that in full. And so it is stuoid to inetntioanlly aim at a situation where a mummy or daddy are missing from beginning on. That counts regarding couples irresponsi8bly making a baby althioguh they know they will no9t stay together and a relation woudl not work. That is true also for adoption. There is no reason and no excuse to give a child to a foreign couple where the one parent, mummy or daddy, and all the needed rolemodelling that it also provides, is missing from all beginning on. And no human has a right to have another human submitted to his own interest for the mere reason that he exists and makes claims. To allow adoption for the argument of strengthening equality of gay marriages, is a juristic scan, and in principle says the child'S interest is to be seen as lower than that of a right activists. And that is a crime. Against humanity, I shall say.

In adoption decisions, not the adopting couples interest are the priority. The child's interests are the priority.


Until today the kids were/are dominantly raised by their mothers. The fathers were/are all day long at work. Did/Do the kids suffer from this dominant female parenting?
Look at the massive feminisation of educational policies over here, kindergarden and schools, and then we talk again. There is massive damage, but it comes not so much from the role model of "mother", but feminism, which are two totally different things. radical feminism is not about femnism, but is about a ugly carricature of feminine qualities.

Have you ever read D.H. Lawrence? The change in the old England that came from industrialisation, the men crammed into mines and factories, the families left behind?

Too much or too little of anything is always not good.


And how is this female dominance in kindergardens and basic schools to be interpreted? Is it natural or simply a matter of fact the kids have to deal with and have to adapt to?
It is ideological acting. The kids have no choice, they get thrown into it, and then there they are. BTW, we have data, I read from doctors and researchers int he field, that show that too early kindergarten visits indeed damage the immune system due to stress, and that said stress levels have a negative influence on later school performance, and cognitive and intellectual development and personalities development. That the pharmaindustry invents many syndroms to sell new or old drugs as a remedy, turns an already alarming situation into a really confusing mess. I know many teachers, ba chance, even form my own family. Not pleasant what they have to report. Not at all.

I leave it here and stop in this thread, since I think we two will not get anywhere from here on anyway, and this matter I have discussed several times before, and I do not want to spend half the day typing again. And maybe its better to put on the breaks before things become nasty again, like they often did before.

Cheers,
Sky

[Wolferz]

No comment.:-?

[Jimbuna]

No comment.:-?

Good comment.

[Mittelwaechter]

As I understand we have no stressable data for or against gay parents.

Maybe we should allow to collect some?

:)

[Stealhead]

Everyone is a freak anyway so what does it matter in the grand scheme of things if a person is gay?:hmmm:

None really besides the fact that they enjoy the company of the same sex in sexual encounters.People put way to much thought into what other consenting adults do in their sexual lives
it has never made sense to me.

Do people really sit there and think "I wonder if Tom and Nancy perform sexual acts with each other that I would approve of" it seems so apparently humanity will always have busy bodies.

[Skybird]

Sky! Do over the night...so we have it tomorrow :up:
Okay, I have translated it now and sent it to the Spiegel's chief editor. He immediately accepted it and set it up for immediate release. Here it is: :smug:

LINK: Pope Francis' comments are bad for Catholic gays (http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/theologian-pope-francis-comments-are-bad-for-catholic-gays-a-914121.html)

:woot:

[Gerald]

Well done Sky! Spiegel must be satisfied with your job :arrgh!:

[CaptainHaplo]

Its always ironic and funny to see these arguments by the pro-gay crowd...

Someone supports homosexuality because "its perfectly natural" pointing out quite correctly that homosexuality exists in nature.

So they want the standard to supposedly be "if nature makes it happen, it must be ok".

Then - when issues like having a family come up, they want to change the standard since even in nature, homosexuality never allows for offspring....

It is this "moving the goalposts" and inconsistent standards that makes the demands of the pro-gay crowd equate to "special standing". Just one example of many.....