Pastor Says

[thir]

You hardely need a religion being manipulated by an asshole or group of assholes to find this kind of bigotry in action amongst any cultural group.

Its my opinion that homophobia completely transcends religious belief as well as politics and philosophies.

I think it all hangs together - it has got to have come from somewhere sometime, and I think that has to be religion. Religious ideas live on after the religion itself may have taken a back seat, people are just not very aware of it.

[Punish_her]

I think it all hangs together - it has got to have come from somewhere sometime, and I think that has to be religion. Religious ideas live on after the religion itself may have taken a back seat, people are just not very aware of it.

not at all, people don't like one another because they're different and that's all there is to it: they're just different. The Japanese committed horrible crimes against the Chinese in WW2 and the Koreans for the better part of the 19th century and Japan was a staunchly anti-Christian place. Homosexuality is a prticularly easy target because it does seem unnatural to many (for example, if everyone was a homosexual, the human race would die out). But the reason does not matter.
Furthermore, historically, places that were highly tolerant of homosexuality were notably mysognynistc as well: ancient greece being an example. They were okay with homosexuality because they viewed women as inferior to men, and for men to be happy with love it would need to be with an intellectual and moral superior (hence, the relationships were older man/young boy, with a teacher/student dynamic). women were essentially used for breeding and domestic duties

[Thorne]

The Japanese committed horrible crimes against the Chinese in WW2 and the Koreans for the better part of the 19th century and Japan was a staunchly anti-Christian place.

But also a very spiritual (i.e., religious) culture where the Emperor was considered divine!

if everyone was a homosexual, the human race would die out

Did it ever occur to you that homosexuality may be nature's way of telling us that there are too many people on the planet already? If we don't stop breeding like rabbits we're going to die out anyway, from lack of resources.

Furthermore, historically, places that were highly tolerant of homosexuality were notably mysognynistc as well

Almost EVERY culture, with few exceptions, have been misogynistic! It has nothing to do with homosexuality. It has everything to do with religious based proscriptions on women.

women were essentially used for breeding and domestic duties

Sounds like America before 1970. And it sounds suspiciously like what the Republicans seem to want us to go back to.

[Punish_her]

But also a very spiritual (i.e., religious) culture where the Emperor was considered divine!

Spiritual in the sense that it was completely fascist (ie personal well-being subservant to a monarch), which shows that secular extremism not only exists, but can cause as much damage as religious extremism.

Did it ever occur to you that homosexuality may be nature's way of telling us that there are too many people on the planet already? If we don't stop breeding like rabbits we're going to die out anyway, from lack of resources.

Not in the slightest. if it's genetic, then it existed in our gene pool long before we became 6 billion strong, and back when we were a mere 5,000 bipedals we needed all the numbers we could muster considering how poorly equipped we are to survive in the wild.

Almost EVERY culture, with few exceptions, have been misogynistic! It has nothing to do with homosexuality. It has everything to do with religious based proscriptions on women.

What's the evidence for that? Maybe societies are historically patriarchal because everytime they encountered a matriarchal one, it was destroyed through conflict. The Celts were historically matriarchal and they were conquered and absorbed by the romans then the saxons then the angols. the south american indigenous tribes were matriarchal and they were nearly exterminated by the spanish and portoguese. the africans tribes are thought to have been matriarchal and they were enslaved and colonized if patriarchal societies tend to be more aggressive and technologically advanced (which would have been enormously beneficial from the beginning of time to 150 years ago), then of course there will be more of them.

Sounds like America before 1970. And it sounds suspiciously like what the Republicans seem to want us to go back to.

you mean that time when women were statistically happier and more satisfied with life before the sexual revolution?
here's an interesting question if religion is so damaging to women? Why is ther enormous evidence that a polygymous society is beneficial to women?

[thir]

Spiritual in the sense that it was completely fascist (ie personal well-being subservant to a monarch), which shows that secular extremism not only exists, but can cause as much damage as religious extremism.

I would guess that we can all agree that facist societies are not exactly fun either.

Maybe societies are historically patriarchal because everytime they encountered a matriarchal one, it was destroyed through conflict. The Celts were historically matriarchal and they were conquered and absorbed by the romans then the saxons then the angols. the south american indigenous tribes were matriarchal and they were nearly exterminated by the spanish and portoguese. the africans tribes are thought to have been matriarchal and they were enslaved and colonized if patriarchal societies tend to be more aggressive and technologically advanced (which would have been enormously beneficial from the beginning of time to 150 years ago), then of course there will be more of them.

You seem to me to label any society that isn't dominated by men as a matriarchy, but I think that is an over simplification. I also read you as seeing every conquest of a country (of which there have been countless during history) as owing to being lead by a matriachy.

you mean that time when women were statistically happier and more satisfied with life before the sexual revolution?

Interesting. What statistics are those?

here's an interesting question if religion is so damaging to women? Why is ther enormous evidence that a polygymous society is beneficial to women?

What evidence? This is the first I have heard of this, especially since polygamy is often not even voluntary for women.
That, to the best of knowledge, also goes for the mormons, where men marry several much younger women, often under 15. There was a program with Dr Phil I saw one boring day in which he complained bitterly that nobody interveded, though a significant number of brides were under age.

[Punish_her]

You seem to me to label any society that isn't dominated by men as a matriarchy, but I think that is an over simplification. I also read you as seeing every conquest of a country (of which there have been countless during history) as owing to being lead by a matriachy.

incorrect reverse logic, not every conquered nation was a matriarchy, but every matriarchy was conquered. not the same

Interesting. What statistics are those?

from upenn: http://bpp.wharton.upenn.edu/betseys..._Happiness.pdf
freakonomics: http://www.freakonomics.com/2007/10/...en-so-unhappy/
huffington post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/marcus..._b_289511.html

What evidence? This is the first I have heard of this, especially since polygamy is often not even voluntary for women.
That, to the best of knowledge, also goes for the mormons, where men marry several much younger women, often under 15. There was a program with Dr Phil I saw one boring day in which he complained bitterly that nobody interveded, though a significant number of brides were under age.

well that's just a crock of shit. contrary to what some people think, women cannot be forced into marriage. not even the mormons do that, as they give the girl the chance to leave the religion at any time (furthermore, they often force to leave for a period of time around 16 so she can decide what she truly wants for herself). John Stossel had a feature about polygamy and sister wives, and they seemed happy and even advocating it. but here's some evo psych for you:
we are a historically polygamous psecies, geneticists have shown we are decided from 2 to three times as many women as men. think about it in these terms:
would the average woman want to be ryan reynald's third wife? or john smiths first and only wife? i rest my case
and before you say "that'sdumb, nuh-uh!" http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/...it-polygamy-an it's completely true
furthermore, dr phil is not there to actually confront any real issues, he's there to entertain and get ratings, most of which are from women

[Thorne]

well that's just a crock of shit. contrary to what some people think, women cannot be forced into marriage. not even the mormons do that, as they give the girl the chance to leave the religion at any time

Which generally means leaving her family, too. ANY sanctions constitute coercion, you know. Telling a young girl that she's free to go out on her own if she doesn't want to do as she's told is no different than threatening her with stoning. It's one of the 'features' of religious training.

(furthermore, they often force to leave for a period of time around 16 so she can decide what she truly wants for herself)

I know the Amish do something like this, but I wasn't aware that the Mormons also did it. But again, having to give up everything you've ever known, your church, your family, your friends, in order to have some freedom of choice in who you marry is still coercion.

we are a historically polygamous psecies, geneticists have shown we are decided from 2 to three times as many women as men. think about it in these terms:

Well, considering that many cultures practiced polygamy, and even those who didn't sometimes allowed rulers the right to bed women on their wedding nights, it's not a surprising finding. You also have to take into account the idea that even in supposedly monogamous societies, men tended to 'spread the wealth'. An ancient Roman man would only have one wife, who would bear his heirs and keep his house, but he would generally have at least one mistress, more if he could afford it, to see to his sexual needs. And even when it is not culturally acceptable, men tend to make use of mistresses and prostitutes. Not too surprising that there would be more female lines of descent than male, then.

would the average woman want to be ryan reynald's third wife? or john smiths first and only wife?

A bigger question might be whether someone like Ryan Reynolds would accept an 'average' woman as ANY wife? Having fame (though I admit, I had to look him up, and I still don't recognize him) and wealth, he is able to get almost any women he wants. Why would he settle for less than perfection? But there are plenty of women who would rather have the stability of a John Smith than have to play second or third fiddle.

Yes, there is an obvious genetic benefit to having more than one wife, providing you can care for all of them, and all of the children. The benefits of having more than one husband can be great as well, though not as genetically beneficial. In a culture where the men are considered providers, having more than one such provider would be of immense benefit to wife and children. Why don't we see more people pushing for wives with multiple husbands, then? Or households with multiple wives AND husbands?

Primarily because we men don't like to share our property. And, historically, women have always been considered property. In many parts of the world, they still are. And denying them the right to choose their own health care, to choose whether or not to have children, is little more than telling them that they are still property, even in an 'enlightened' society like ours.

[thir]

incorrect reverse logic, not every conquered nation was a matriarchy, but every matriarchy was conquered. not the same

I do not get this. Most of cilivilisations that have been in history have been conquered, whether matriarchy or not!

from upenn: http://bpp.wharton.upenn.edu/betseys..._Happiness.pdf
freakonomics: http://www.freakonomics.com/2007/10/...en-so-unhappy/
huffington post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/marcus..._b_289511.html

upenn: "Diener (2000) notes that one of the hallmarks of subjective well-being is that it
is subjective, stating that “objective conditions such as health, comfort, virtue, or
wealth” are “notably absent” and, while influencing subjective well-being, “they
are not seen as inherent.” This aspect of subjective well-being makes understanding
what is behind declining female happiness a challenging task, yet decoding the
paradox identified in this paper may be the key to a better understanding of subjective
well-being."

freakecnimics: "3. There was enormous social pressure on women in the old days to pretend they were happy even if they weren’t. Now, society allows women to express their feelings openly when they are dissatisfied with life.

4. Related to No. 3 in the preceding paragraph: these self-reported happiness measures are so hopelessly garbled by other factors that they are completely meaningless. The ever-growing army of happiness researchers will go nuts at this suggestion, but there is some pretty good evidence (like this paper by Marianne Bertrand and Sendhil Mullainathan) that declarations of happiness leave a lot to be desired as outcome measures.

Stevenson and Wolfers don’t take a stand on what the most likely explanation might be. If I had to wager a guess, I would say Nos. 3 and 4 are the most plausible."

huffingtonpost: says clearly that the trend is that men start out sad but become happier as they get older. women start out happy, but get sadder as they get older.
Is that hard to understand??

well that's just a crock of shit.
contrary to what some people think, women cannot be forced into marriage.

What planet are you living on?? Of course they can, and are!

not even the mormons do that, as they give the girl the chance to leave the religion at any time (furthermore, they often force to leave for a period of time around 16 so she can decide what she truly wants for herself).

So, the choice is leave all you have been told is right and proper, and your family, and your society and everything you know, or go out into the unknown in a world you do not know?

The two teenagers who had run off and who were in the show, said they missed their families horribly, but could not stand being married at 15 with someone they hardly knew.

John Stossel had a feature about polygamy and sister wives, and they seemed happy and even advocating it. but here's some evo psych for you:

I do not know who John Stossel is, but know myself of one group that lived happily polygamy and have heard of others. Noone says is it wrong or impossible, given voluntary participation by all.

we are a historically polygamous psecies

Nonsense!

, geneticists have shown we are decided from 2 to three times as many women as men.

I do not understand what is meant by this

think about it in these terms:
would the average woman want to be ryan reynald's third wife? or john smiths first and only wife? i rest my case

You lost me here. Do you mean the mormon's John Smith? But most people would like to be one man's wife, as we see in countries where you can choose.

and before you say "that'sdumb, nuh-uh!" http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/...it-polygamy-an it's completely true

"Contrary to popular belief, most women benefit from polygynous society, and most men benefit from monogamous society. This is because polygynous society allows some women to share a resourceful man of high status. George Bernard Shaw (who was one of the founders of the London School of Economics and Political Science where I teach) put it best, when he observed, “The maternal instinct leads a woman to prefer a tenth share in a first rate man to the exclusive possession of a third rate one.”"

LOL - what nonsense! Most women want to be a 10th wife rather than having one for themselves? Do you see women of today clamouring to get polygamy relationships???

There is a poly group who wants group marriages, but that is with every concievable combination.

furthermore, dr phil is not there to actually confront any real issues, he's there to entertain and get ratings, most of which are from women

So you think women are entertained by a show showing how bad polyamory is? You know, I think you are right there.

[leo9]

contrary to what some people think, women cannot be forced into marriage.

That would be news to the special units in every police force in this country set up to protect young Asian women from forced marriages. And we're not talking about just the emotional force a family can bring to bear, we're talking about girls who know they will be hunted down and killed if they run away. Still, no pressure, right?

not even the mormons do that, as they give the girl the chance to leave the religion at any time (furthermore, they often force to leave for a period of time around 16 so she can decide what she truly wants for herself).

"You have a perfectly free choice, dear. You can do what God wants, or you can leave your home and your family and the one true Church and damn your soul to Hell forever. Up to you."

[leo9]

Not in the slightest. if it's genetic, then it existed in our gene pool long before we became 6 billion strong, and back when we were a mere 5,000 bipedals we needed all the numbers we could muster considering how poorly equipped we are to survive in the wild.

The population pinch had a massive effect on our evolution, because of genetic drift in a small group. But it didn't put a premium on breeding, otherwise we wouldn't have come out of it with more dependent infants with longer childhoods. And a percentage of homosexual individuals isn't actually any bar to breeding. One male is all a clan really needs to keep the females fertilised (why some other primate species live in harems,) and before the turkey baster was invented, any lesbian who wanted a child badly enough could shut her eyes, grit her teeth and lie still for the few minutes necessary.

And we were never poorly equipped to survive, otherwise we wouldn't have spread all over the world before we got past the hunter-gatherer lifestyle. On the contrary, most cultures that don't get rid of their surplus population by migration or war have had to evolve ways to limit their fertility, such as restrictions on marriage, taboos on sex, exposing female babies or the like.

[thir]

Leo9
"Did it ever occur to you that homosexuality may be nature's way of telling us that there are too many people on the planet already? If we don't stop breeding like rabbits we're going to die out anyway, from lack of resources."

Punish Her
"Not in the slightest. if it's genetic, then it existed in our gene pool long before we became 6 billion strong, and back when we were a mere 5,000 bipedals we needed all the numbers we could muster considering how poorly equipped we are to survive in the wild."

I do not follow this argument. If our genes were exactly the same as then , we would still look like those bipedals and Darwin with his ideas of slowly but ever changing genes would be all wrong.

[Thorne]

I do not follow this argument. If our genes were exactly the same as then , we would still look like those bipedals and Darwin with his ideas of slowly but ever changing genes would be all wrong.

No one is saying we are exactly the same now as then. And IF there is a genetic predisposition for homosexuality, there's no reason to think it wouldn't be a more recent mutation, though we know there were homosexuals existing at least in Biblical times, at least for the last 10,000 years. That's an eye-blink in terms of genetic mutation rates, though.

But not all genetic changes need be slow. Environmental stresses, including overcrowding, can speed changes along far more rapidly than previously believed. Still, you're talking many generations to see even small changes. Not something you will see in a single lifetime.

[Punish_her]

No one is saying we are exactly the same now as then. And IF there is a genetic predisposition for homosexuality, there's no reason to think it wouldn't be a more recent mutation, though we know there were homosexuals existing at least in Biblical times, at least for the last 10,000 years. That's an eye-blink in terms of genetic mutation rates, though.

But not all genetic changes need be slow. Environmental stresses, including overcrowding, can speed changes along far more rapidly than previously believed. Still, you're talking many generations to see even small changes. Not something you will see in a single lifetime.

there are some documented cases of man on man action in the wild, bonobos are horny monkeys and the men frequently engage in sexual escapades, but even then, the entire population sis considered "bi-sexual" because its more for sex and a social bonding mehcanism

[denuseri]

Leo9
"Did it ever occur to you that homosexuality may be nature's way of telling us that there are too many people on the planet already? If we don't stop breeding like rabbits we're going to die out anyway, from lack of resources."

Punish Her
"Not in the slightest. if it's genetic, then it existed in our gene pool long before we became 6 billion strong, and back when we were a mere 5,000 bipedals we needed all the numbers we could muster considering how poorly equipped we are to survive in the wild."

I do not follow this argument. If our genes were exactly the same as then , we would still look like those bipedals and Darwin with his ideas of slowly but ever changing genes would be all wrong.

It's not so much the genes themselves as the switches being turned on or off to activate them...which can be influenced by environment (and our environment is more than just a matter of climate and general locality IE dessert, arctic etc but also urban and social settings including levels of affluence effecting one's immediate surroundings and it is rapidly changing as we proceed through the modern era).

[thir]

It's not so much the genes themselves as the switches being turned on or off to activate them...which can be influenced by environment (and our environment is more than just a matter of climate and general locality IE dessert, arctic etc but also urban and social settings including levels of affluence effecting one's immediate surroundings and it is rapidly changing as we proceed through the modern era).

But you are still saying hat the genes we have are the same as millions of years ago. According to Darwin this is a rank impossibility - the law of evolution is change according to a mix of random mutations and changing circumstances.

I assume (correct if wrong) that you mean the 'hard-wired' idea that genes in our brain are exactly the same as then, and that they are so detailed that they can decide our behaviour now, with these 'switches'. No one have been able to prove that such 'switches' excist, they are just an idea - in the face of the many seriously working biologist who tear their hair and point out that genes can not express such detailed behaviour.

[leo9]

Did it ever occur to you that homosexuality may be nature's way of telling us that there are too many people on the planet already? If we don't stop breeding like rabbits we're going to die out anyway, from lack of resources.

Actually, this is one of the reasons I point out to sociobiologists for an evolutionary argument for homosexuality. Most mammals that live in groups have some mechanism for limiting the population, usually by having only certain individuals breed. Given that communal childcare seems to be part of human evolution (for instance, women without children can lactate if they suckle somone else's baby regularly,) it would be pro-survival for a clan to have a percentage of males who not only aren't interested in mating but have more "feminine" behaviour, and are therefore more likely to help with childcare.

I don't actually believe this theory, because it depends on assuming that stereotypical "gay" behaviour is genetically determined. But sociobiologists do believe that such minutiae are not only genetically programmed but have survived unchanged since we were cracking flints in Olduvai Gorge, and it amuses me to turn their logic back on them.