FaramirK

Is it? First of all, you have to assume that the rich are so generous that they will give No, everyone can afford to be charitous, and my beliefs demand that I be...recieving kindness form some one is so much more meaningful than getting a government food stamp in the mail...

This approach starts from the idea that gay couples are in deficit, that their child-rearing skills are to be questionned because they are biologically incapable of giving birth to a child. Of course, this assumes that we're talking about gay men - lesbians can obtain artificial insemination through methods no more anomalous than any heterosexual couple with fertility problems. However, the main point is that the child-rearing has little or nothing to do with the biological ability to produce children. I've never read any studies on what the qualities of a good child-rearer are, but I imagine that love for the child and a stable relationship figure prominently, and the biological ability to produce children does not. This sounds to me like discrimination couched in very reasonable language. The idea is that 'we', the heterosexuals, shall sit in judgement over 'them', the gays, and 'they' shall not adopt children until they have produced evidence with which 'we' are satisfied. Most countries now have equality legislation, and that means the burden of proof lies with the opponents of gay adoptions to find some reason why it's wrong. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> true, it must be switched around. the opponents must show why gay couples shouldn't be allowed to adopt children... <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Fair enough, but I would rather just defer that decision to the majority in a democracy. I am morally opposed to Homosexuality, but my morality should never be imposed on someone else, and giving the opposing view equal rights to say that I'm wrong keeps the society much more free than starting to say who is and isn't allowed to belief what.

Without Genesis, my faith is meaningless, so I'll keep it thanks...and I find my faith my more inspiring than yours. Its a matter of personal choice. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I respect your attitude towards all the criticism you have receieved. thanks for the oppertunity to let us understanding eachother clearer. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Forgive me, I can't tell if your being sarcastic or not. :"> I sometimes have a hard time fully understanding more subtle meanings in modern english, it's not even my second language...it's all the way at third. I'll go with my original hunch and say your being serious: I grew up in a country where my family was persecuted for their faith in Christianity. I escaped this by joining the Communist Party, and professing atheism. It wasn't hard to see that Orthodoxy was pretty much a puppet of whatever power was in charge. I have to say though, that the Communist Party was one of the most brain dead organisations I ever discovered. They flatly refused to admit that the Soviet Union had made any mistakes. The war in Afghanistan was really hard to justify in my own mind...the oppressed, poverty stricken afghans were supposed to welcome our troops and help us destroy the muslim rebels and embrace workers paradise, and instead they fought us and died for their God. I began to study the Koran, and found that he was a very angry deity indeed. I remember one Afghan prisoner saying he would rather be tortured to death by us than face Allah as one of the unfaithful. I wasn't to impressed with Islam, but I did begin to study the Bible, unknown to my peers at first. The God of the bible seemed equally enraged at sin as Allah, but unlike Allah, he had died for me. After much deliberation, I converted to Christianity. The country was getting more tolerant, and I didn't really feel very persecuted any more. The original Soviet Constitution allowed for religious freedom, and I stayed in the party, hoping people like Gorbachov would reform the party. The rest is history. Ol' Regan made us write a check we couldn't cash... In finally left the party in 2001 when the branch of the Party I was in refused to accept that the Communists had engineered a famine in the Ukraine in the 30's, despite eye-witness accounts and undeniable proof. Many of the American Christians I met seemed to want to create a conservative christian nation out of the US, and I thought that might be a good thing, until I found that history painted a pretty bleak picture of the experiments in "Christian Government". Much to the disgust of many of my Christian aquaintences, I began to disagree with their striving to create a Christian Theocracy, and instead decided to back whichever government party sought to offer the most freedom to everyone. I have not lost any of my belief that the Bible is both literal and true. But I have decided that it is best for everyone to be left to their own devices. I feel that I can adhere faithfully to my chosen faith and still be tolerant and even compassionate to those whose believes completely contradict mine. While I realise that my belief in the Genesis creation may seem archaic or even ignorant, but I believe it with all my heart. I also believe that you all have the right to disagree. Many have died because no one was willing to fight and die for the rights of another. There are more mass graves in Russia than I care to think about, filled with those who disagreed with the ruling power. And if I have to risk my life to protect the freedom of an atheist to believe Atheism is true, I will, because in protecting they're freedom I am protecting my own. But my faith has survived a long time, and I will not simply disregard/modify it with every whim and speculation of the opposition. And as long as people like Nur Ab Sal call for the banning of all faiths except one that pretends all the contradictory beliefs in the world can actually be right at the same time, I live in constant fear that the persecution of my faith will one day rise again, and the world will again fall into the nightmare of despotic thought-control.

Actually, I believe almost all the religions have creation stories that can either be taken as an allegory or generalised enough to make evolution possible. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> this is just one of many things i find a bit strange with christianity. who decides what in the bible can be taken metaphorically and what should be taken literally? i guess every time science disproves something from the bible, it is considered an allegory...? " Well, you raise an excellent point, one that christians should ponder before they bend their beliefs. Me personally, I take it literally, unless the text specifically shows it to be an allegory. Yes, I believe God created the world according to the Genesis account. Flame away.

No one in modern society was taxed into poverty. Poverty is a result of low wages, not high taxes. When someone has to work 3 jobs just to keep his family above the poverty line, and corporations are reporting record profits, thats not taxes fault. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Actually, thats not true. Government greed has ended alot more governments in bloody revolt than greedy corporations.

Without Genesis, my faith is meaningless, so I'll keep it thanks...and I find my faith is more inspiring to me than yours. Its a matter of personal choice. EDIT: Changed it to sound less critical.

Yeah those damn liberals. If it wasn't for them you'd still have slavery! And no social security! Or Public schools! I mean, America is just better off without them. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> oh please!!! if those liberals hadnt come in and screwed up everything we might not have the problems we do today. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I'm no liberal...but what do you have against them, not everything, but give us one or two reasons to work with...

The purpose of a society is to protect the freedoms of the society's participants. To this end, the government should provide emergency services, such as police, a military, and possibly roads. Anything else is something that must only be participated in on a voluntary basis. It is not purely a matter of "every man for himself", because people derive happiness from helping others often as much as from helping themselves. Private charity can provide many of the things that government provides, and it can provide it without taking money off of people without their consent and threatening them with imprisonment if they don't pay. Societies existed before socialised medicine, they existed before social security, and they existed before drug prohibition, and given the dictionary definition, I don't see how any system of governemnt from anarchism to Libertarianism to Fascism wouldn't be going along with "A group of humans broadly distinguished from other groups by mutual interests, participation in characteristic relationships, shared institutions, and a common culture." <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Its a good argument. It seems that one of the main causes of poverty is an over-taxing authority anyway. Imagine how low taxes would be if the Government cut down to only paying for public transport, emergency services and the military! And I agree that charity is better than Social Welfare...

Actually, I believe almost all the religions have creation stories that can either be taken as an allegory or generalised enough to make evolution possible.

Now that is a flame bait interpretation of the facts. Hmm, didn't mean to flame at all, but with hind-sight my grammar choice can be interpreted as a horrible put-down to homosexuals. Consider the statement withdrawn. I merely ment to say that the general consenxux was to allow gay couples to adopt...

Well, I thought about the whole single parent thing, and how single fathers have raised girls and single mothers have raised boys without a partner the same sex as their child, and already conceded that two of the same gender could raise children too, so thats the end of that discussion as far as I'm concerned.

That was it originally, but it was just way too civil, so it kind of switched to gay marriage thing, and we've sort of hit a dead zone there, coming to the conclusion that since marriage is so casual now, there is no reason to exclude homosexuals... The thread attracted no fanatical right-wingers, so the flaming was minimal.

Agreed. But every culture has a tradition of how children are to be raised, and some sort of marriage custom. Every culture has a way of organising families, its the foundation of society. No society, has ever had gay marriage and gay couples raising children. There are even cultures where men and women are exclusively homosexual until they are married, and even they don't have gay marriage.

As an Atheist, what is your creation belief?

I don't want people to be discriminated against at all, but disqualifying someone isn't always negative discrimination. I again ask how well two gay men would relate to a little girl, but since there are so many singleparent families today, I think its a moot point if society already has such a casual view of marital fidelity. I can't speak for every christian, but I don't mix my religion with my social agenda to support a free society. My questioning gay couples legally adopting children has nothing to do with my personal views of homosexuality. I only suggest that the children may be baised against heterosexual relationships, since the idea of a "gay" family unit is a synthetic invention, not a result of natural process.

Well I wasn't flaming, so stop skirting the issue. I wrote this a few pages back and your statement warrents its return.

If you ban something, you are 'intolerant' to it. Your statement is ridiculous. People like you are the most intolerant...right up there with the fringe-right Christians in the USA. And I think you are giving Volitare a little too much credit...

Granted, but should they be allowed to adopt children? Do you disagree with the above? Which is why one persons morality should never be forced on another. I guess its up to you, as the author to say when we've go off-topic.

If thats how society defines marriage, then same sex couples should have the same right.

I'd still be interested in hearing your opinion. You are correct that we will probably never agree morally on Homosexuality, but as far as your opinion on the purpose of marriage/child raising in a modern free society, fire away. I can't see any vaild reason for adoption of children by a married gay couple. If you have some, please share. My basic argument is this: Homosexual relationships should be protected from persecution in a free society. Homosexual and heterosexual relationships based on love/companionship etc are different from Family Building which is exclusively heterosexual, simply because thats how human reproduction functions. Question out of real curiosity... Why does the gay rights movement want to synthetically copy heterosexual marriage? The Ancient Greeks and Romans were open to homosexuality, and they never confused marriage with homosexuality. Thoughts? Please don't flame, I am obviously not a homophobe...

Very law of the Jungle-ish, but I see what you are saying. I personally believe that the government should cover military, public transportation, Hosptials and Crime. Thats it.

It's a pretty functional bird, albeit unique in its one right. It's wings are fully formed, so thats no proof of some transformation from wingless to winged. There are no fossils of animals between "specialized aquatic animal" and "specialized land mammal", so the link is theoretically possible but unfounded. Using an atheistic evolutionist's rational (with a hint of satire) we could assume that hedgehogs and cactus are also cousins, since they are similar too. Well, most of the "moral" atheists I met grew up in a very watered down judeo-christian environment where you are generally expected to treat life with dignity. With Atheism comes the mandate that there is no authority higher than you - and that is very, very dangerous. Yeah, I was part of one of those experiments, thanks. Morality based on Mob-rule majority? No thanks. All the research myself and others have done on social behaviour within a group shows that in a group, people no longer feel personally responsible, because they're "just carrying out orders", and "everyone else is doing it". That is why I wish some country would write a constitution in stone that said "Life is sacred above all, Life is to be free from civil regulation of thought, speech and non-violent action", and then let me move there.

And its people like you, who totally disagree with my beliefs and yet tolerate my right to hold them, that build free, happy societies...

Why? I don't understand? Is it really that hard for people to have an exclusive moral belief and a tolerant social action? Thats practically my mantra...unshakeable faith in my religion and ultimate tolerance towards anyone who opposes it. The skewing of the thread towards Christianity is more indicative of the collective backgrounds of the posters, rather than the relative comporable merits of religions, per se. The Catholic and Orthodox Churches heirarchy are based on Imperial systems borrowed from Rome, not biblical truth. In countries with STD infection off the map (like Russia), waiting to find someone to settledown with (married or no) is the safest way to avoid infection. If you decide to take the risk, then please use contraceptives...the catholic ban on such things are not found in the bible.

How about ALL or you think they come out of the ocean with a pair of wings already developed? Bats are mammals and they have wings and fosil evidence shows the first mammals were wingless. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Oh boy... Finding a fossil of a wingless mammal older than one of a bat does not prove mammals grew wings by random mutation! Random mutation of genetic code to produce wings in a wingless animal is a fairy-tale! There is no proof or even evidence...just faith.