Lots of 'I love you guys' and very few specifics.  I hope the President has a nice cup of shut-the-f***-up and actually does something.  He's showing a Clintonesque level of courage on this issue, and the disgraceful thing is that Clinton didn't sell himself as the civil rights candidate, whereas Obama did. 

I'm pinning my hopes on the National Equality March, not on Obama and HRC, whose job over the past 15 years has been to explain to GBLT activists why it's just so inconvenient for Democrats to do anything on gay rights.  No wonder that Obama picked this venue for his speech; he's surrounded by professional ass-kissers who think having him there is a major step forward for gays.  Not quite.  If these folks were black in Apartheid South Africa, they'd probably think that being allowed to work in the police force is an incredible act of magnanimity on behalf of the white government.  The entire scene was quite pathetic, the smooth-talking non-actor schmoozing with cohorts of apologists. 

He's trying to cause as many Republican heart attacks as he can.

CH

I think Obama's speech was good. People are expecting too much of him in a hurry. Everything takes time.

Videos

I am guessing that Obama will leave same-sex marriage to the jurisdiction of state legislatures while speaking out in favour of same-sex civil unions.  I wish we had gone for the civil union solution in Canada.

i surely don't.

Equalty isn't a half of cup of coffee.

Euqality isn't separate but equal buses.

Equality is ....everyone has same access.

"I think Obama's speech was good. People are expecting too much of him in a hurry. Everything takes time."

I'm sorry but this is defeatist BS, and I'm calling you out on it.  How can LGBT Americans demand equality if they don't believe in it themselves because hey, the President's real busy and doesn't have the time of day to deal with your silly equality issues?  That's what every politician who refused to do on anything gay rights has said, that it's not convenient right now.  Obama's the President of the US; when isn't he going to have to a lot on his plate?  How much longer are gay Americans who have to put up with discrimination on a daily basis have to wait?  Until the economy is in perfect condition, until there's no troops overseas, until the Democratic Party feels its election prospects are good enough...when is convenient enough to stop treating a group of people as second-class citizens?  

You know who has a lot on their plate?  The LGBT service-members who have to wrestle not only with the horrors of war but the isolation and excruciating stress of having to lead a double-life so as not to compromise their careers and their pensions.  The countless couples who are looking at a loved one falling ill or dying without any legal recourse in terms of insurance or inheritance.  The millions of LGBT employees who have to worry about losing their jobs in these economic times if a higher-up decides they don't like the fact they're gay.  Tell these people that it's too inconvenient for the President to actually give a damn about them. 

Obama can end Don't-Ask with the stroke of a pen through an executive order.  He can do it, and yet he hasn't; instead, he's put the ball in Congress' ballpark when he should be leading them, not the other way round.  Every day, more and more gay service-members are fired under his watch and he refuses to do anything about that.  He can prevent all those lives and careers from being wrecked and yet he hasn't because he doesn't think there's enough political advantage in that.  That's cowardice, and its shamefulness is compounded by the fact that this guy sold himself as the civil rights candidate, whose own success depended on the sacrifice of people who refused to engage in the kind of cynical politicking that he is currently practicing.  Shame on him. 

His speech to HRC didn't offer any specifics, any time-tables, any plan-of-action.  He just restated the things he's said countless times before on the campaign trail, without indicating whether he'd tackle them now or at some point in the future when he feels his political fortunes are secure enough.  It was a disappointing, and the 200,000 protestors standing in front of the Capitol are well justified in their anger towards this President and the professional lobbyists at HRC whose job has been to sell the Democratic Party to gays, not actually achieve any meaningful civl rights legislation. 

On this issue, next to an orator like Obama who says a lot and does nothing, I much prefer an unglamorous, dithering number cruncher like Paul Martin.  At the end of the day, it's the fairness and reasonability of a government's laws that most affects people's lives, not the rhetoric of statesmen.  You'll listen to a rousing speech by Obama and feel very good about yourself, but that wont stop gay service-members from losing their jobs until the law is changed.  Call this crass pragmatism, but that's what good politics is about - getting the details right.  So far, Obama has said and done nothing about the details, but he's made a lot of the well-monied queens who attend lavish fundraisers feel good about themselves. 

Fuck him.  There you go, I said it.  Fuck him, for taking the inequality of millions of his own citizens in such a stride.

I too would like to see things happen faster. The thing is that I recognize that things are changing. A few months ago federal employess gained rights and benefits for their same-sex partners. It was still incomplete but would that have EVER happened under Bush? Also don't ask/don't tell will end. I'd love for it to end today but that's not how things work. Obama also said that he wants congress to repeal the "defense of marriage act" (a misnomer if ever there was one).

From taking office we're told that pulling out of Iraq will be 18 months, assuming nothing goes wrong. The stimulus package will take a year and a half to two years to have a lot of impact. The debate over health care will run months and then if a bill is passed it'll be phased in over years. If we pass the energy standards bill being discussed it's all about meeting very modest targets by 2011 to 2013. Things are changing but it's not realistic to think things will stop on a dime, do a 180 and shoot off like a rocket. I think it could be amped up a bit, but probably only a bit.

jon is right, of course. Things take time. If there is time. And there's the danger.We don't have time. When that happens, your democratic processes can simply break down.

The US could certainly have become independent in time, as Canada did. But people of 1775 didn't think there was time to get it done in a peaceful way.

People in the US are sick. And, if they don't have money, they don't have time to wait for the system. The US will be out of Iraq if things go well - but they almost certainly won't go well. Time will then come to have a different meaning for both sides.

The clock is also ticking on a huge issue that few have faced up to. The US is broke. The money pouring out now, the money for social welfare, for pensions, for basic services, to support Israel, to buy off Pakistan, to fight Afghnistan - is all borrowed, and the chances of borrowing more get slimmer every day.

We don't have the luxury of time. And when that happens, democracy itself starts to break down.

As far as I know, under the US constitutional make up marriage is a state issue.  And if it isn't clearly listed as either state or federal it becomes state by default.  (as opposed to Canada where if something is not clerly defined it is assumed to be a federal issue--and of course in Canada the definition of marriage is federal while the licensing of marriage officiants and the issuing of marriage licenses is provincially determined)

As to the civil union issue, the only way that is equality is if the ONLY legal status, regardless of the genders involved, is civil union.  Personally I wouldn't be opposed to this, particularly if only government employees could grant that status--no church officila could do the legal stuff, thereby leaving churches free to bless and celebrate relationships regardless of legal status.

Government has no business legislating which adults can get married.

I am not sure.  But the issue is why the government should have a role.  (Discussing purely the civil union side of the issue, governments have no role in the faith-based, celebrating the relationship, people making a covenant with each other side).

Legal unions provide certain partnershp rights and responsibilities.  LEgal unions provide for the care of each other.  Legal unions provide for a levle of family stability (this is arguably not as true as it once was).  THe government has a role in developing these htings and in enforcing them.

The government has a role in helping to ensure that people enter these relationships freely and safely.

There is a role, but what it is can be a matter of arguement.  ANd certainly how that role is played out is up for debate.

"The thing is that I recognize that things are changing. "

On gay rights, things aren't changing, and if they are, it's not because of anything Obama has done.  HIs biggest achievement on the issue to date is appointing an openly gay ambassador to New Zealand (whose partner of course, wont be covered under the State Department's spusal benefits).  I guess that's good, but it's not 'change we can believe in.' 

At the federal level, on this issue, nothing has changed since the Bush years.  Except that Bush didn't exploit gay people by getting their hopes up, whereas Obama is. 

I don't think that there should be any law against any and all marriage-forms involving consenting adults.

Good point. I agree.

If this is the case, then polygamy, sibling marriage, and parent-child marriage are all on the table.  Before you dismiss this as being a slippery slope argument, cases involving each of these are before the courts in several countries including Canada, Germany, France, and Australia.

If marriage is a human right, then humans have the right to get married.  Would you deny a human right to the humans listed above?

If marriage is a human right, then humans have the right to get married.If marriage is a human right, then humans have the right to get married."If this is the case, then polygamy, sibling marriage, and parent-child marriage are all on the table. "

Comparing incest to two consensual adults forming a relationship.  Nice DC, your intelligence is breath-taking. 

And marriage may not be a human right, but equality is the basis of all rights, and when you have an institution that says one group of people is different, then that violates the principle of equality.  It becomes discrimination.  It's like banning black people from sitting on certain public park benches and saying that it's okay, because being able to sit on a bench isn't a right.  That line of argumentation is incredibly stupid.  When the law discriminates unreasonably, it loses its legitimacy.  After all, why should we follow it if singles out one group of people for different treatment? 

As for your suggestion that civil unions are a solution, they're not.  We had them in Canada, and the Supreme Court said very clearly that they're discriminatory.  You can't have opposite-sex couples having access to marriage rights in a way that same-sex couples do not.  Just because civil unions are a step above not having any recognition at all doesn't mean that they still don't signify second-class citizenship.  This is no more a solution than being allowed to sit only at the back of the bus (hey, at least we're letting the n****rs on the bus, right?) 

Anyways, I'm not interested in having this argument yet again.  We're talking about Obama. 

First, I am not sure if marriage should be considered a human right. Now to answer your question, while I do not personally stand in favor all the marriage-kinds that you mentioned, I believe they should all be legal provided that they are between mutually consenting adults who are not under any coercion-kind.

I won't comment on your intelligence, only on your lack of civility.  If you are not interested in having this discussion, then don't, but there is no reason to be insulting. 

People over the age of consent are considered consenting adults.  The fact that one is a parent and the other the child, or that they are siblings, or that they are more than two, is exactly what is being contested.  If you don't want to talk about that, fine, but it is coming to a courtroom near you in the not too distant future.  As I said, such cases are already before the courts and not becuase the people involved have been charged with incest or polygamy, but because they are demanding the right to live together as husband(s)  and wife (wives).  They are demanding this as a right.

"The right to marry whoever one wishes is an elementary human right compared to which “the right to attend an integrated school, the right to sit where one pleases on a bus, the right to go into any hotel or recreation area or place of amusement, regardless of one’s skin or color or race” are minor indeed. Even political rights, like the right to vote, and nearly all other rights enumerated in the Constitution, are secondary to the inalienable human rights to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” proclaimed in the Declaration of Independence; and to this category the right to home and marriage unquestionably belongs."

Hannah Arendt, on anti-miscegenation laws in the US

"People over the age of consent are considered consenting adults.  The fact that one is a parent and the other the child, or that they are siblings, or that they are more than two, is exactly what is being contested.  If you don't want to talk about that, fine, but it is coming to a courtroom near you in the not too distant future.  As I said, such cases are already before the courts and not becuase the people involved have been charged with incest or polygamy, but because they are demanding the right to live together as husband(s)  and wife (wives).  They are demanding this as a right."

What does this have to do with same-sex marriage?  Just because one group  of people is misusing the language of rights we should continue treating a group of second-class citizens unfairly?  This whole slippery-slope hysteria is offensive, and yes, stupid.  Two consenting adults who want to commit their lives to one another are not on the same moral plane as an incestuous family, and if you think they are, your moral barometer is clearly off kilter.  It's not 'coming to a court-room near you"; that's bullshit manufactured by the religious right, along the lines of Obama's 'death-panels.  They have no arguments against same-sex marriage or socialized healthcare, which is why the only strategy they have left is to attempt to scare people about all the horrible things that will happen if we let loving couples get married or refuse to leave 50 million Americans without health insurance to the whims of chance and the insurance lobby.   

The law is very clear that incest is abusive, and for practical reasons that have nothing to do with 'the sanctity of the family" and everything to do with harm, exploitation, consent and power-relations.  It's not going to be overturned, and if it is, it has nothing to do with same-sex marriage.  Other than that, can you give me a citation of those news stories?  I'm very curious to find out just how depraved we're about to become now that gay couples can get married. 

As for the whole civility thing, you dehumanize an entire group of people by comparing their most fundamental feeling to incest, and you expect civility, clearly because you don't see the utter callousness of your remarks.  You're either stupid or you've refused to empathize with an entire class of human beings, and neither of those things is very worthy of respect. 

free, thanks for the reply, but I am not interested in discussing anything with you as long as you resort to name-calling.

Have a nice life.

What name-calling?  There's a difference between morally outraged polemic and incivility.  You can't, and don't want to tell the difference because you obviously have no argument and are therefore retreating with your tail in-between your legs. 

Seriously, if your sensibilities are so delicate, why bother discussing anything at all?  

Beshpin:

Before you go spouting off on what is adn is not genetic, don't you think you should learn about genetics first?

ROFLMAO...

So let me get this straight....

No really, let me get through this before I bust a gut....

You're proposing that this little pdf, from an unknown in behavioural genetics, published by  the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality, a self-proclaimed  anti-gay organization of dubious credibility and obvious bias that promotes "reparative therapy" as the cure for homosexuals... this little pdf, that is neither perr reviewed, nor published in any respected periodical in the medical community.... this little pdf which contains no relevant data, no experiment outline, in fact contains nothing more than the opinion of this dude who contradicts everything the entire medical community says about the subject....

This little pdf is your submission which you think is going to prove that homosexuality is not inherant?

Are you serious??

Isn't this a little bit like quoiting from Answersingfnesis.com as proof that all biologists are wrong? (then again, maybe you wouold do that)

Are you sure you're even taking psychology at all, Beshpin? If so, someone needs to fire your teacher for not slapping some sense into you.

Why don't you toddle off now and learn the basics of science, and come back when you've got something serious to show us.

And get some help for that homophobia of yours.

" Am I supposed to allow you to crap on me because I have opinions that align with people who act out of hatred?"

No, you're supposed to grab a brain and stop telling the experts how wrong they are.

"Go do your homework and learn about behavioural genetics." 

This is not about whether or not genetics is a 100% determinant.  You're arguing on a straw-man, which you do regularly, because were you to confront actual arguments, you'd have to start thinking - a very serious threat to that narrow world of yours.  This isn't about genetics, it's about decency and respect. 

Please address my point about harm, and about what gay people ought to do seeing we're so unhealthy. 

In your opinion... and we all know how much that's worth.

Burden of proof Beshpin. Another scientific concept you should learn.

You made the positive claim first. You need to provide credible, peer reviewed, scientific evidence that genes don't cause behaviour.  An non-peer reviewed article published by a political organization that has a definate bias does not constitute scientific evidence. Something like the written diary of a paramecium, where the animalcule relates his/her decision to discriminate against the slime mold down the street might work too, since if genes don't cause behaviour then paramecium must make thoughtful decisions, right?

Once you do that, it then becomes my burden of proof to show that genes can cause behaviour. Fortunately I have the entire credible and peer reviewed Biology community, including the entire discipline of ethology, to back me up. So I won't have any problem in that regard.

So put up or shut up Beshpin. Give us something other than the rambling opinion of another homophobe, from a organization of homophobes, to work with.

. . . why must people turn everything on this site into a fight? I mean soon there will be people going to the "Last poste thread" just so they can start a fight...

I liked Obamas speach. I thought it was a great speach. I don't think he is taking his time just to f**k with us. I think things take time in this crazy world and after waiting so long that another day, week, month...hell, another year (imho) would be better then it never happening at all. And remeber, when it does happen which it will then we can all turn to those who think that we are chosing to be hated, judged, mocked, discriminated against and killed and we can smile and walk away because another part of our master plan has been accomplished!

And now, for the first time ever, our LGBT, age old master plan!

1. be hated for thousands of years

2. be hated hundreds of years

3. slowly gain accseptance

4. marry into loving families

5. ????

6. PROFIT!

peace

.

Even though the link between genetics and human sexuality has been firmly established, to the point where there is consensus in the medical and biological community...

To those people who absolutely MUST see homosexuality as a choice, the option they might be wrong is simply not available.

To those people who simply MUST see the earth as flat, the option they might be wrong is simply not available.

To those people who simply MUST see evolution as impossible , the option they might be wrong is simply not available.

To those people who simply MUST see the gravity as a hoax, the the earth will always suck.

Thank you witch. It's been proven conclusively but the fundys live in a reality free bubble where it's still a choice. I know a girl that I went to school and church with. She's very conservative on most things. It turns out she's a lesbian. She went through misery being in that small town and that conservative Baptist church and that's with relatively few people knowing. If it was possible to choose a sexual orientation she would be straight. She tried very much to be but it's impossible to choose. GOD made her a lesbian and it is HIS will that she be a lesbian. GOD did not make anyone a thief or a murderer or a child molester. None of those things are genetic. Being gay or black or female is all hard-wired into our brains and our bodies when we are born. Those other things are not. There is a lot more to it that just believing it's not a sin. It's true that it isn't sinful. The belief that it is sinful is because of people relying on flawed translating of the scripture.

The reason it matters is the law. I work at Wal-mart so I'll use that as an example. If Wal-mart said "we won't allow black people to be cashiers or sales floor associates because they "look ghetto" and we don't want that image people would be rightly outraged. It would also be discriminatory and illegal for very good reason. Now Wal-mart can (and does) say that it's employees can't come in to work in dirty or ratty clothing because that looks cheap and unprofessional. They could (but don't) bar us from having great big mohawks and lots of piercings showing. Those things are choices. Being black or gay or redheaded or left handed or short are not choices. Having a mohawk or visible tattoos aren't sinful but some employers won't hire you if you have them and that's within their rights to do so. They can't however not hire you based on a demographic factor like race or sexual orientation. Therefore this is a lot bigger than is it a sin or not. Equal treatment under the law including non-discrimination and marriage equality is what it's about.

Well put. You do realize, of course, that those statements can be flipped around the other way.

This is true. There probably are people who MUST see the earth as spherical, and therefore are unwilling to listen to objective evidence to the contrary.

The problem is, we'll probably never know, because those people also have objective evidence, and reality, on their side. Do they believe the Earth is a sphere because it's reality, or because they believe it for all the wrong reasons? Very dificult to determine.

OTOH, it's easy to determine that those who MUST see the Earth as flat are doing so for all the wrong reasons, because there is no objective reality on their side to confuse the issue. Likewise for those who MUST see homosexuality as a choice.

Can't help but notice that you picked to mention the one that most people don't disagree on. Most will easily admit that the earth is spherical (or approximately so). As you know, however, there is greater disagreement over things such as whether homosexuality is a choice, and evolution/Creation.

I did pick the most obvious one, the one that takes the least amount of highly technical data to understand.

The other two are not in disagreement to any significant degree among the people who are equipped by education and expertise to understand them. The analogy still holds.

---------------------

Translated:

I'm disappointed. I thought you'd come up with at least one more article from a self-appointed "Science Watchdog" organization, and try to pass it off as peer reviewed science.

I guess even those fallacies have limits

...DG watches besh slowly figuring out that folks like free_thinker are all about despising and insulting everyone who doesn't think like them.  Free thought? Dialogue?  lol, yah right.  If folks like free had political power, there would be lots of ... "camps" to help the rest of us "get our minds right."  A CULTURAL REVOLUTION!!!!  Just like the one we are having now.

Gee anoither fundie martyr wannabee generating his own persecution....

What're the odds?

Fighting intolerance is not intolerant, any more than fighting crime is criminal.

"...DG watches besh slowly figuring out that folks like free_thinker are all about despising and insulting everyone who doesn't think like them. "

Yes, it must be difficult when uninformed, unintelligent and inarticulate bigots are proven wrong by their intellectual superiors.  However, there is nothing undemocratic about this: a necessary consequence of having the freedom to voice idiotic opinions is for the non-idiotic to be able to laugh at them. 

"Dialogue"

I've honoured ever single one of your responses with a point-by-point rebuttal.  You, on the other hand, have whined and whined about how mean we're being by arguing that you're wrong.  I can't have dialogue if you don't engage. 

"If folks like free had political power, there would be lots of ... "camps" to help the rest of us "get our minds right." "

For someone who comes from the former Soviet Union to hear a whiny North American idiot compare not having their political opinions worshipped to concentration camps, this is blatantly offensive.  I'm sure Alexander Solzhenytsin, who survived Stalin's gulags, would empathize entirely with the oppression inherent in having one's homophobic policies defeated by a democratically-elected Parliament. 

That is certainly my feeling and that is a damned good description of yourself.  Oh wait, I think I got it backwards.  You mean YOU were the intellectual superior.  Oh.  

btw, smugness is not an intellectual category.  You are most definitely extremely smug, but that is not the same as intelligence.  As for being "proven wrong," see below.

Both Obama and the Dalai Lama share my opinion of same-sex marriage.  Except that the Dalai Lama also thinks homosexuality is wrong.  That's where Obama and I disagree with him.  But then, you think are intellectually superior to such homophones, lololol.  I guess such subtle differences are wasted on the angry villagers with the torches, with you in the lead, frothing at the mouth, screaming "homophobe." 

Funny, it is not surprising that you are from the former Soviet Union. I guess you learned your lessons well!  So where will you build your Gulag for the "homophobes"?

So did Hitler.

Don't you just hate it when fallacy of appeal to authority comes back to bite you in the ass?

Wow, DG

Impressive "civil discourse". I can see how hard it is when people just aren't capable of being civil in  return.  Such a heavy burden you bear. Hopefully your opponents are able to take the high road just as you have demonstrated

Gee Beshpin, could you possibly get any more offensive and belligerent?

Calling people worthless, and insulting people for whom English is a second language in teh space of a few minutes, plus the gratuitous use of extermely foul language.

Who exacvtly are you trying to impress? Or are you just trying to get martyred too?

Beshpin, I don't see how being gay can be biased in this conversation.  If you want to know about the GBLT experience there are many people on this forum that you could ask.  There are many here who are old enough to remember when it was pretty much social suicide to be GBLT, acceptance was not something that could be found easily and the closet was the place to be. 

There are too many people who have chosen death over being gay for me to possibly believe that it is a choice.  Hell, I've seriously considered it.  If you want to have a dialogue, have a dialogue.  Ask questions, don't declare that you know all there is to know about the GBLT experience.  Why don't you start by asking people if they choose their sexual or gender identity?  You could ask if people have tried to have a sexual or gender identity other that the one that they have and how that worked out for them.

The sole purpose of your belief is to try diminish people who are not like you. I am glad that there are people like free-thinker who flatly refuse to be dimished by you.

As far as genetics.  My son has a rare genetic mutation on one gene.  The symptoms of this one mutated gene can include severe skeletal deformities, dwarfism, extreme thinness, and glaucoma.  My son has the genetic mutation but has very very mild symptoms.  A slight deformity in a couple of his bones that do not cause any physical disablity or are even evident outside of an x-ray.  One gene, one mutation, symptoms ranging from severe disablity to barely evident.

"Both Obama and the Dalai Lama share my opinion of same-sex marriage.  Except that the Dalai Lama also thinks homosexuality is wrong.  That's where Obama and I disagree with him.  But then, you think are intellectually superior to such homophones, lololol. "

Another freedom fighter, one who commands more moral authority than even Barack Obama, compared unequal treatment of GBLT people to Apartheid.  That's an emotionally inflammatory comparison, and yet he still made.  He refused to let moral confusion somehow excuse this evil, or take away from its gravity.  His name is Bishop Tutu, and he wasn't one to mince words on this issue because he personally lived through Apartheid. 

I completely agree with the idea that politics is a matter of mediating the interests of people, which means that compromise are absolutely essential.  However, there are certain matters whose very substance disappears when you start to compromise them, and legal equality is the best example.  Either everyone is equal, or some are unequal, in which case no one is equal.  The moment you start establishing categories of people to whom the same rights do not apply, you no longer have equality, you have privileges.  That's a pretty far-reaching position, but equality is by its very nature, radical. 

The same goes for things like torture, or the death penalty.  You either think it's okay to torture people or you don't.  There's no in-between, no "moderate" torture.  Torture is torture, and its effect comes out of it being entirely unambiguous.  Similarly, you either support killing prisoners or you don't; you can't half-murder them. 

On this issue, history has presented a very clear test: are gay people equal, and subject to the same rights as everyone else, or are they unequal?  Once again, there's no moderate answer to this.  Obama, who presents himself as the civil rights candidate, has by supporting civil unions shamefully opted for inequality albeit in less explicit form.  Deep down, the former constitional law professor from Chicago probably thinks banning same-sex marriage is groundless, but he's willing to keep that position under wraps in order to gain political traction.  I don't know if that's worse than being explicitly homophobic.  I guess time will tell.

He's not the first person of moral standing to support positions that are completely untenable.  I struggle to find a single historic figure that we look up who was morally blameless in the kinds of causes he supported.  Churchill was an arch-imperialist; Attlee put Britain on the path to nuclear weapons; Roosevelt tolerated segregation; Kennedy was not immune to the charms of the US military; John A put hanged Riel and instituted the head tax and so and so on. 

Beshpin, why on earth would you have any opinion on homosexuality and its acceptableness unless you are homosexual? It has no bearing on your existance whatsoever.  The only possible reason is to diminish others who are not like yourself.  The only reason to diminish others is to make oneself feel superior.

If I get you right, you are saying that homosexuals do not choose to be homosexual but if one is homosexual his/her only acceptable choice is to be celibate.  That is completely insane.  Most humans require loving and intimate relationships to say that the only acceptable choice of people who are attracted to their own gender is to not enter into such relationships is..well I can't even think of a word for such foolishness. 

No, your views do not have the validity of free_thinker's and witch's and my views.  Your views exist for the sole purpose of putting others lower than yourself.  Maybe that makes you feel superior but I'm afraid that it in no way raises you up.  I just can't get my head around the way that you pass judgement on the acceptablity of an entire group of people who aren't harming anyone and just trying to go about their business.  I can't for the life of me figure out why you would put so much effort into putting others down.  It makes no sense to me.

Yes, and you're entitled to be prejudiced and bigotted. You're entitled to purport to have knowledge about genetics you don't. You're entitled to claim as fact things that are wrong....

And we're entitled to call you on it.

You don't have to explain yourself again, you have made yourself very clear.  Despite your protestations that you don't feel superior to homosexuals everything else that you say belies the truth.  You can say it a million times and it won't make it true, although it may make you feel better.

Comparing same sex relationships with murder is absolutely absurd and disgusting.  Are you saying that there should be a life sentence for same sex relations?  Is that your implication?  I personally haven't been murdered (obviously)  but I did know two people who have been, which makes your ignorant comment even more vile.

Beshpin, I guess that what you said was impossible to read as an analogy because you compared something that has a victim (murder) and something without a victim (homosexuality).  Although all the homosexuals have committed suicide because they internalized beliefs like yours could be considered victims.   All the GBLT people who have been bashed or murdered because others share your beliefs could also be considered victims.

You said that you don't believe that gays choose to be gay.  Whether it is genetic or not then becomes a moot point.  If gays don't choose to be gay any more than blacks choose to be black then, by your own definition, gays are a minority worthy of human rights protection.

Witch, I admire your passion for exposing the sheer idiocy of Beshpin's claims, but whether or not homosexuality is completely biologically determined is secondary.  The law - and in general, human decency - doesn't make that a requirement.  There are three general tests for determining whether a specific category needs to be protected from discrimination: 

1.) Is the defining characteristic immutable?

2.) Can it be changed without causing significant harm to the individual?

3.) Is there a history of discirmination against this ground?  

For all three questions, the answer with sexual orientation is a resounding yes.  Biology isn't even a consideration, which is why religion and nationality are protected.  You can easily change your religion - in some cases, it's as simple as saying one word three times - just as you can cancel the citizenship of your country of birth or get a new one.  Yet, you can't force someone to renounce their religion or their nationality against their will without seriously harming that person's decency, and that's why we put these characteristics in the same category as race or gender (which too, can be changed). 

Besh doesn't seem to get this.  He seems to think that not being gay is as simple turning a switch on and off.  Perhaps, for the sake of consistency, he should advocate for the removal of religion or political affiliation from protected grounds because hey, changing your faith takes just saying a few words - no big deal, right?  

The idiocy behind Besh' responses is just how arbitrary his standard of what being a normal and therefore healthy human being is: whether or not your sexual practices are those of the majority, and anal sex.  I don't know how the percentage of people who share your sexual practices became a standard for determining whether someone can have a full life or is forever destined to live like a slave, a pervert or a person with brain damage, and I've stopped trying to find a rationale.  There isn't one. 

Besh' standard for determining who's a mentally and morally fit human being is entirely arbitrary, which shows just how easily minute differences can be used to write off entire groups of people as being different than the rest of us normal folk.  Take Muslims.  Their women sometimes wear peculiar headgear, they feel the urge to fast based on mysterious moon patterns, they pray with an unnerving regularity...and so on.  Surely they're not like us.  They're too different.  Yes, maybe they're human, but not human the way we are; they're a bit closer to slaves, or children, or the unfit of mind.  

Besh seems to believe that such beliefs can be held in a pluralistic vacuum, where they don't have any adverse effects on the group in question.  But they can't.  If an entire group of people is not above slavery, then maybe they don't deserve the same rights.  Maybe, being like slaves, they can't handle them.  Maybe we need to intervene - on their behalf, of course - to show them the proper way of life.  Besh opposition to same-sex marriage, or the duty of public servants to serve all members of the public including GBLT ones, contradicts his assertion that his beliefs on this issue have no consequences on the lives of gay people, but they very clearly do. 

What's telling about Besh - what most clearly demonstrates his callousness towards the well-being of this entire group of people - is that he doesn't seem to understand why we're so offended.  He compares us to slaves, and the effects of our love lives to murder, and yet doesn't see how that comparison could be dehumanising.  That's why we have all this puffery about us not respecting his point of view: he thinks his attitudes are entirely decent, and the indignant response to them can surely have no other source than our intolerance.  Most bigots are very clear about not liking a particular group of people.  Besh belongs to a far more reprehensible category, because he doesn't see his dehumanisation as something in the least bit out of the ordinary.

I'm reminded of a point Hannah Arendt made in Eichmann in Jerusalemn, about how Eichmann was shielded from having to think about the consequences of his actions because he saw the world through stock-phrases and cliches that made what he was doing sound harmless, or neutral.  We see something very similar here.  Behind Beshpin's objective-sounding distinctions between normal and abnormal lies a very clear intent to separate and dehumanise. 

All of this highly dispiriting.  After the Aremenian genocide, the Holocaust, the Stalinist terror and the Ukrainian famines, the Cultural Revolution, the Khmer Rouge, Rwanda, Bosnia, Darfur, and so on and so on, you'd think that we would have realized by now just how dangerous it is to divide people between the normal and therefore more human and the abnormal and therefore perverted based on entirely arbitrary distinctions.

That's a very good point. It's actually been pointed out in regards to hate crime laws that include sexual orientation it's real or perceived. In other words you don't have to be gay in order to invoke that part of the hate crime law. I forget the exact numbers but a lot of people attacked due to homophobia aren't gay. In some cases they straight people that ardently support gay rights and are attacked for that but more often they straight people who "seem" gay. A high school kid who's not athletic, doesn't date much, maybe he's more intellectual and less macho and he gets beaten up. For that matter if anyone was ever attacked specifically because they're straight that would legally qualify although it's hard to imagine that happening. I suppose as a retaliatory move following an attack on someone gay, it's possible. There have been cases of racially based hate crimes where white attacks black, who in turn attacks white, who in turn attacks black, so and so on. Regardless these laws will serve to protect everyone whether they're gay, perceived to be gay, or straight as can be.