Reflections, Reflections

I didn't have time yet to play with it, but it sounds amazing! (JavaJive blogs on it)



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I had questions about the way this story was reported (spun?) too: what exactly did the doctor say and did he say it in a snide way? Or is this just another self-obsessed fat lady? Read the comments here at Wizbang, some are quite amusing.

Furthermore he comments:

I am dumbfounded at this anonymous complainer. She apparently feels she has the right to be obese and not be called that, not even by the doctor she is seeing to help her live out a healthy life. And if she doesn't get her way, she'll make damned sure that that doctor pays the price for telling her the truth.

tsk, tsk, if it isn't the same thing homo activists do all the time...

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Very interesting article from Psych Today on the subject of cohabitation and its consequences for marriage.

Some evidence indicates that women have less control over the progress of the cohabiting relationship. She may assume they're on the road to marriage, but he may think they're just saving on rent and enjoying each other's company. Research by sociologist Susan Brown at Bowling Green State University in Ohio has shown there's a greater chance cohabiting couples will marry if the man wants to do so. The woman's feelings don't have as much influence, she found: "The guy has got to be on board. What the woman wants seems to be less pivotal."

And look at this:

Cohabiting men may carry their uncertainty forward into marriage, with destructive consequences. A 2004 study by psychologist Scott Stanley, based on a national phone survey of nearly 1,000 people, found that men who had lived with their spouse premaritally were on average less committed to their marriages than those who hadn't. By contrast, cohabitation didn't seem to change how women felt about their partners.

This below is always a problem, specially in a liberal culture:

Based on this finding and others, Stanley, director of the Center for Marital and Family Studies at the University of Denver and another originator of the inertia theory, believes women should be especially wary of moving in before getting engaged. "There are plenty of young men who will say, 'I'm living with a woman but I'm still looking for my soul mate,'" he says. "But how many women know the guy is thinking that way? How many women are living with a guy thinking he's off the market, and he's not?" Men also get trapped in troubled relationships, admits Stanley, but women are more likely to bear the brunt of ill-considered cohabitation decisions for the simplest reason -- they are the ones who have the babies. ...

This is interesting:

Cohabiting relationships, by their nature, appear to be less fulfilling than marital relationships. People who cohabit say they are less satisfied and more likely to feel depressed, Susan Brown has found. While the precarious finances of many cohabiters has something to do with it, Brown also points to the inherent lack of stability. Long-term cohabitation is rare: most couples either break up or marry within five years. "Cohabiters are uncertain about the future of their relationship and that's distressing to them," she says.

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The strange new truth, according to census figures, is that the single largest chunk of American households now consists of people who live alone. No spouse or partner, no kids or other relatives, no roommate or boarder. Alone.

What impact will 27 million Americans living alone have on the culture?

Rockstar Games (creators of the infamous Grand Theft Auto) have created a new video game called "Bully."

SKINHEAD thug wins a bloody playground fight with a classmate, before hunting down a teacher as his next victim. This is Bully. A new video game that's been called the sickest ever, a sadistic orgy of violence where you win points for being the most vicious yob in a reform school.

News of the game's release comes as research suggests that playing violent video games makes youngsters more aggressive.

Or maybe not. While the game - which I sincerely hope is rated M for Mature - may be cathartic for those adults out of school who wish to indulge in a bit of electronic revenge, you have to wonder what the effect might be on any kid whose parent lets them spend lots of unsupervised time in video game carnage.

I don't even know what to say, this is so sick and irresponsible. It's that "being in Nazi Germany feeling" I talked about in an earlier post. Where is the outrage? Where are the sane people who would not allow this?

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Sente-se no ar um vazio de movimentos, um silêncio quente e um fio de luz intenso que parece vasculhar todas os espaços por ocupar. Damos uns passos em frente, lentos, escutando o maciço que assola os ouvidos com a imobilidade do mundo, tacteando uma areia seca presa ao coração que nos entorpece as mãos e nos rasga a língua.

O fim de Portugal é universal II

Portugal transformou-se num sol, quente, coberto de fogo, vermelho e amarelo como as labaredas, cada vez menos verde como a sua bandeira. Não há que nos indignarmos, não existe surpresa suficiente para isso. Tudo isto é simples e cândida normalidade, a nossa banalidade, os nossos pés enterrados no quotidiano. Por isso, Portugal é uma estrela luminosa que consome os que cá vivem mas dá luz e vida a seres longínquos. Quem serão eles, visto que nós já sabemos quem somos?

Um deles, que banha na luz do In-totalidades e Impensável está aqui.

Agosto

Sob a fixidez luminosa de um sol tórrido, os automóveis avançam em fila na direcção do mar. O descanso no horizonte alimenta a proficuidade do trabalho. A cidade esvazia-se, a praia enche-se: simples transferência de cenário.Com um pouco de normalidade, as mesmas pessoas cruzam-se nos mesmos lugares de sempre. O cérebro avança de férias, o corpo escurece e espera levar de volta o escalpe moreno do ócio – um escalonador social. Fui, vi, fiz, e tenho prazer. Se, por azar, um dia as nuvens nos estragam a praia, pavoneamo-nos no centro comercial, existe um em todo o lado. Os mapas repetem-se, o calor aumenta, o trabalho espera uma maciça recarga e o corpo ejacula.

The poetics of these two Portuguese writers is beautifully inspiring.

What joy if I will ever be able to write like this in any language.

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From PostSecret:



And I bet these customers feel just as fired up as if they had drunk the real thing.

Too funny :-D
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Another round of articles showing that Playing violent video games can heighten aggression - Review of research shows.

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The new pope is travelling around, correctly criticizing flaky religious consumerism.

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Another article in a similar vein, criticizing the Dem's "born-again-religious-conversion-after-the-2004-defeat":

DEMS: Website religion page does not a moral party make
J. Grant Swank, Jr.

Ironically, the more the Dems go for appearing as the "values political party," the more they lose their souls. How can that happen? It can happen by lying in order to appear honest.

The more the Dems manufacture a spiritual presence while being void of genuine spirituality, the more the Dems damn themselves.

It’s as if the Dems actually conclude that real values persons are stupid. Values persons have reached their values foundation because of much thinking, research and living out real time convictions. Values just don’t happen. They grow in time because of being tested against the adversities of life.

Therefore, when Dems conclude overnight to be values friendly to America, they don’t understand that an overnight conversion like that just doesn’t happen. In fact, the Dems are acting out political opportunism and not a spiritual experience. Therefore, all the more the Dems are losing out in the spiritual department.

[more...]

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This "lying to appear honest" is exactly what homo activists do.

Here is the latest part of another discussion on homosexuality at Angry in the Great White North blog:

The ancient Greeks and Romans knew something about what we now call "gays" in the media. In reality, there is little 'gay' about this lifestyle choice.

European history has had an ebb and tide relationship with this phenomenological choice by certain males dissing biological relations with women even as 'the women's movement' elevates 'gay' males to sacrosanct status. Go figure...

In freedom, we have choice; but choice should not entail promotion at the expense of objective factual reality of what this choice means. Martin 'Liberal' "human rights" laws try to stifle objective information about such a choice.
Posted by: edward mills at August 11, 2005 01:58 AM

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Edward -

Nonsense. This constant and consistent attempt by right wing groups to create "objective" information about people they wish to vilify is as revolting as the ways the left has contributed to degrading individual choices in other parts of life.

The argument about promotion would have been more convincing had society quietly allowed same-sex marriages in the first place. Instead, the history is about nailing an entire group of people to the cross - first by claiming they are mentally ill and using bogus research to support the notion, then by claiming they were too promiscous to have meaningful committed relationships. Obviously both positions were despicably wrong.

One wonders how any group can argue about the superiority of their moral viewpoint when they have willingly engaged in outright deception to crucify an entire class of people, and yet demand that they themselves be treated as an individual. Our society has a history - and that history involves the existence of gay citizens even when there wasn't a single representation of them in any format of media or public statement. Of course, that made it easier for the dominant group to develop all kinds of myths about gays to reinforce their own insecurities.

One of the most outrageous things we see today is the attempt by American "family" groups to cart out the oldest, most horrifying attitudes and present them as "objective" information. One such recent directive by James Dobson explains how to instruct your child on proper gender identification in order to prevent them from becoming gay. These directions include having the father shower with the son so the child can see the size of Dad's peepee.

This isn't the 13th Century. If some people need superstitious nonsense to make them feel better about their innate hatred of others, then at least learn how to accept that reality about yourselves. And if that leads anyone to self-hatred, then you might get the first clue about how effectively you've worked for centuries to force gays to live that for their entire lives.
Posted by: Kevin at August 11, 2005 10:33 AM

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Kevin -

You like to spout off demonizing others as bigoted, hate filled witch hunters, but yet continually choose to ignore some of the horrible truths of homosexuality.

This is a lifestyle CHOICE that is typified by:
- Higher than average STD transmission, including AIDS; coupled with abnormally high levels of regular unprotected sex with many partners
- RISING HIV infection rates regardless of modern education
- Higher than average depression, alcoholism, and suicide rates.
- Lower life expectancy as a whole
- Supression of treatment that has helped many Ex-Gays; regardless of many people admitting improvement and happier lives
- A biological phenomenom incapable of sustanance without support from the heterosexual community

Until I see the homosexual community deal with its own problems, I find little sympathy for their public escapades.
Posted by: Toad at August 11, 2005 04:39 PM

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Toad -

Since you are talking about MY life (and I'm assuming it isn't YOURS) exactly what is your experience in gathering information and interaction with this community that you claim to have so many "facts" about?

Again, you seek legitimacy for your own bigotry by attempting to compare statistics between the gay population and the heterosexual population. There are two different cultural/social situations there. Why? Because people like you created the environment that encouraged a culture of depression and self-hatred based on manufacturing blatant and hostile lies.

Moreover, there are no studies which indicate homosexuals are incapable of reproduction - their reproductive abilities are not inhibited. Women still produce eggs and men produce sperm. They are not dependent on the heterosexual community.

It is rather arrogant for you to believe anyone should accept or give you credibility on whether homosexuality is a "choice" - frankly, unless you've experienced making such a choice, you really don't have any basis for a speculative opinion. And since you failed to explain to us when you made your own choice to become heterosexual, you again detract from your own basic argument.

Attempting to fake interest in the causes of homosexuality ring quite hollow when it really has nothing to do with you. Perhaps if you would focus on the social and health ills caused by the history of heterosexual behaviors, you could draw the same conclusions about the well-being of that orientation. Surely there have been enough incidents of in-family relationships, birth defects, unfaithful partners, STD transmissions,deadbeat spouses, alcoholism and drug addiction to label the entire heterosexual population incapable of meeting the obligations of monogamous relationships.

How would you know what the rates of promiscuity are among the gay population? Are there even definitive census figures about the number of identified gay citizens in the country? Do you honestly believe that a gay citizen should even think of giving credibility to "research" where the base population cannot even be identified and represented?

If you don't want to be called a bigot and a witch hunter, then stop behaving like one. If might frustrate the hell out of Right wingers, but frankly, you are incapable of conducting research about the very people you put in the social closet. Wasn't that the whole point of putting them there in the first place?

The worst place you could even attempt to go is to some junk statistics - and I don't care where the sources are. You cannot classify an entire group of people based on a random speculative study of a population in which the numbers have not even been identified. Of course, if you'd like to apply those same principles to research about heterosexuality, how difficult do you think it is to locate some drug addicts, sex offenders, divorced dads, irresponsible child abusers, and rapists and manufacture "facts" about the instability and danger of the heterosexual choice? That would be far easier to create than this kind of nonsense - after all, since this thread was about marriage, how many institutions are usually supported by the taxpayers indefinitely with a nearly 50% rate of failure?

Deal with your own social ills and stop projecting your standards on my community. Conservatives failed for decades to consider our lives worth spending any amount of time and money on - the sudden interest is flattering, in a sense, but much too little and way too late. Figure out some other way to make yourself feel superior to other human beings.
Posted by: Kevin at August 11, 2005 05:49 PM

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I may be missing something, not being Canadian, but here in the USA, a competent adult can leave a will which has the force of law no matter what his relatives want. This is what I don't get about the whole "perk" thing. Why wait for the govt. to do it for you when you can designate a beneficiary for your insurance or pension plan of your choosing, execute a medical power of attorney, a financial power of attorney, a will, hold your real estate as joint tenants w/right of survivor ship, etc. etc. The only thing the left to the govt. is your social security and today, with most people working, most people collect on their own, rather than their spouses anyway. What other "perks" is marriage going to get you other than not having to do any of this yourself? Of course, any responsible hetero couple will have done all of this anyway to make sure things are buttoned up.

That said, marriage wasn't about perks historically but about paternity, family, protection for women who couldn't work outside the home until modern times, about division of labor when obtaining food and preparing it was a full time occupation in itself, it was about how people grouped themselves to propagate and survive as we moved from agriculture to manufacturing to office, from large family groups to the nuclear family. And that's my .02.
Posted by: MC at August 11, 2005 09:19 PM

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To my first comment on this post, David responded with: "The thousand 'perks' are specifically related to being married and not to having children. Examples would be the flow of pension funds, the sharing of health benefits, taxation rates, deductions, property and inheritance rights, hospital visitation rights..."

I concede that there are "perks" for married people without children, though I will argue that the original intent of many of these "perks" was to give families a financial break ("sharing of health benefits, taxation rates, deductions", etc.) or otherwise promote and aid in the stability of the family (though obviously there are powerful counter-forces that would break up families). Why? Because generally speaking marriages have historically assumed the social "burden" of producing and raising the next generation. So again, since marriage no longer serves a public purpose (at least not in the context of Bill C-38), we should do away with marriage as a public institution, or restore it's original definition and promote it's original purpose.

Back to the words that inspired Angry in T.O.'s post spoken by a typical gay activist: "Generally speaking, marriage should be for love." This is puzzling because we can't just marry anyone that we love, such as family members (related or adoped) and friends. What the gay lobby has been trying to do is get society to buy into their claim that their long-term relationship of "love" is essentially the same and as valuable to society as a marriage between a man and a woman. But the only difference between two "pals" who would get married and live together (as in the case that inspired this discussion), and two gay people who get married and live together is the sexual component.

There is no way that the gay lobby can say that their "love" is more important to society than the love between "pals" or siblings, for example. Why wouldn't two "pals" (opposite or same gender) who are prepared to accept the legal commitments want to enjoy the "perks" of marriage if gay couples can enjoy these "perks"? Of course, roommates together for the long-run weren't looking to get "married", but why not now? The term "marriage" doesn't mean anything anymore (it's basically a synonym for long-term legal relationship), so why not enjoy the "perks" doled out by our ever so generous and compassionate government.
Posted by: dragev at August 11, 2005 09:40 PM

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MC - that is all partially true. However, wills can and ARE challenged, and the most popular historical examples of this in the gay community was when distant relatives were able to use the "mental illness" designation approved (until 1973) by the APA as evidence that the deceased couldn't have been of sound mind when designating heirs. If we go even farther into that history, gays would attempt to "adopt" each other in order to secure some form of legal recognition and protection.

It should go without saying that if a simple will and other simple arrangements that "single" people can use were adequate protections, the government would have no need to install over 1000 statutes defining particular relationships with automatic or special treatment. Moreover, laws governing those without spouses ONLY recognized LEGAL family members for everything as simple as a funeral arrangement. And there are plenty of experiences among gays of being shut out of their own partner's funerals by the family of the deceased simply because they did not "approve" of their relationship.

In essence, the State's role in many of those statutes is supposed to ensure the smooth transfer of property and disposal of bodies, etc. . .not to designate them as marriage only arrangements. However, it was conservatives who decided these were perks of marriage, even though many of these events are not only universal, but uniquely individual moments in life.

We know that society has changed and understand the history, including those parts which excluded women from owning property and limited their resource ability if they were unable to marry or were widowed. I don't know of any time in human history where there were exactly as many marriageable males ans marriageable females in the population, so for whatever "natural" reason, perfectly capable reproducing heterosexuals were eliminated from participating in this custom.
Posted by: Kevin at August 11, 2005 11:34 PM

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Dragev -

I don't believe that Bill C-38 fundamentally changed any of the purposes of civil marriage in the least. Much greater changes in the function of marriage evolved over time, so I'll assume here that advocating society move back to the "original" intent means that either the tribal leader, the government, or the patriarch make the selection for spouse for the children. This would also require reinstuting the tradition of dowries and transfer of land for the "purchase" of the daughter's hand.

As for the concept of marriage for "love", that is purely a heterosexual development that started taking much deeper root in culture about 300 years ago. Love is the ideal on which marriage is founded upon now - there aren't many popular songs about wanting to buy a wife to procreate with. . .
And trying to compare choices to limitations without families doesn't work either. The State has long had an interest in preventing marriages in which birth defects could seriously damage a subsequent child, particularly when that may impose large costs upon the state for upbringing. And in many states in the U.S., some provisions for familial matrimony do exist - in my own state, for example, first cousins may marry as long as the woman is over 50 and cannot produce a child.

If you want to restore marriage to its original intention, then it would be the responsibility of adults to defer to the choices of their parents or the government in securing partners purely to maximize property ownership and create a next generation that would meet certain genetic characteristics desired by society.

Your attempt at providing insight into what you characterize as "love" between members of the same sex is not only arrogant, but obviously based on nothing. You have no more right to an opinion about the validity of a love relationship between gay partners than you do the love between any heterosexual couple, and you should certainly have enough personal experience in life to see that relationships vary widely among every pair of partners of any orientation. To try to degrade them to mere friends or roommates is a product of your own insecurity rather than any real knowledge about their feelings, particularly since that statement wouldnt' be limited to a generic description of one kind of relationship as if it doesn't exist in the others. We all know better than that - heterosexuals invented the marriage of convenience, the marriage for money, the marriage for citizenship, and thousands upon thousands of marriages that are never consummated. Does the State police the heterosexual couple after the first couple of months to guarantee they are not living just as friends? Does the State arbitrarily dissolve the hetero relationship without the consent or request of any partner if it hasn't met some list of requirements?

Nope.

And there is some way you can tell me that Britney Spear's 24 hour marriage is somehow more valuable to society than the 40 years a gay couple has spent together raising children and taking care of each other? That Elizabeth Taylor's multiple weddings somehow has more social value? Get over it - the benefit to society is the encouragement of a monogamous, committed relationship for life. Conservatives can't complain about gays being "promiscuous" and then deny them access to the only institution created that encourages monogamy and commitment. Nor can they contend that we should be ordered to remain celibate for our entire lives because you have some sort of disorder about something that doesn't involve you.


Posted by: Kevin at August 11, 2005 11:54 PM

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Kevin-I'm glad you see the reason in what I wrote. And yes, 30 years ago, wills were broken just as you said. And as a little girl in the 1950's, the only options I thought I had for careers were nurse, teacher, secretary or homemaker. Times change and I think they have changed rapidly for both women and gays. Straight, married people have problems with wills too. I'm a 2nd wife of a man w/ 2 children from a previous marriage. If he didn't specify the division in his will, our state would divide his estate into equal 1/3's. Although I raised his children and we all get along, our intent is that, should he predecease me, the money all goes to me for my old age and then the remainder (there should be plenty) is left to the kids. This is a long winded way of saying that marriage does not automatically make things happen the way you want. You still have to take responsibility for your own wills, property, etc.

In fact, I just got back for a week vist w/ a dear friend in San Francisco, a gay man who 3 years ago lost his partner of 28 years. They had property, mingled funds, lives and of course, love. I don't really see what marriage would have changed. Once again, they had done all the legal work years ago.

Coming from the 60's, 70's when we wanted the freedon the be together without a marriage license, I have to say that a lot of the gay marriage push looks like an attempt to get $ out of companies in the form of health insurance and govts. in the form of social security (or whatever you have in Canada). I don't think many younger people realize that women either collect on their earnings or 1/2 of their husband's earnings, whichever is higher. In a gay couple, how will you collect the social security? That is almost moot as just about everyone works anymore and will collect on their own earnings but I have heard social security as an argument in the US for gay marriage. Can you imagine the confusion?
Posted by: MC at August 12, 2005 09:38 AM

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I pondered for a long time about whether to respond to Colin's basic insecurities or not. The attempt by heterosexuals to create the term "heterophobia" to illustrate some fantasy that gay citizens are phobic about straights is a rather quaint notion. Usually this is grounded on some kind of fictional assumption that either gays, if they weren't heterophobes, would somehow submit to the Right's reparative therapy camps to repair them, or it relates to the natural reaction of heterosexuals who naturally don't feel that it is fair to ask them to live by the same standards by which they judge entire groups of other citizens.

In the former case, history explains to us that heteros who advocate such a policy really didn't need any kind of scientific evidence of a dysfunction; they merely had to make one up and devise appropriate torture devices, like shock treatment to images that affect a gay man's penis, or Hitler's rather interesting research into castration in order to change the gender.

In the latter case, heterosexuals attempt to create an illusion that they are somehow victimized by being classified as part of the group which utilized such barbaric approaches - and in which case they flee behind the castle walls of "don't hold ME responsible for the actions of those before me." Yet they fail to grasp the similarities in their own attitudes and concepts with those same ancestors, opting to contend that they alone are entitled to treatment based on their own individual behavior regardless of the antics of other members of their social group.

The problem remains the double standard, and yet even that challenge is denied recognition in favor of cliches like "heterophobia." As it is, there is some degree of truth in the notion that gays have much more evidential reasons to be phobic of straights than vice versa. . .after all, who wouldn't be wary of a group of people who tried just about every deceptive idea to deprive another set of people of human dignity and basic rights?

Perhaps if they took on the responsibility of being the object of those actions for a change, rather than the perpetrator of this nonsense, they would have a much deeper understanding of the world around them and might qualify having an opinion that is based on something of substance.

Posted by: Kevin at August 12, 2005 06:44 PM

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Dragev writes: I concede that there are "perks" for married people without children, though I will argue that the original intent of many of these perks was to give families a financial break...

I have no doubt the government wants to give families a tax break but the perks we're talking about here are not those. Marriages "perks," as you point out, are not restricted to families with children. And child rearing "perks" are accessible to people who are unmarried. These are two separate sets of laws with different intents.

Perks that refer to or are associated with child rearing are separately defined and distinct from marriage rights. Where one gives you a tax break or a support payment the other gives you access to your spouse in the hospital and time off work for their funeral. These child rearing "perks" and marriage "rights" are distinct.

But this really isn't the point. Allowing homosexuals to marry, as you would any two responsible adults, has no effect on heterosexual reproduction, nor does it have any impact on any "perks" or "rights" heterosexuals currently enjoy. This is really a non-issue yet some groups are straining ferociously to make it a religious one.

As for the two heterosexual men who want to marry for the tax break, more power to them. If they feel they can live happily that way and the arrangement does offer them some benefit then who am I to stick my nose into their personal affairs?
Posted by: David at August 13, 2005 07:47 PM

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The ancient Greeks and Romans knew something about what we now call "gays" in the media. In reality, there is little 'gay' about this lifestyle choice.

Oh Edward, homosexuals don't choose their sexual orientation. That's a gift from God. And as for the Greeks and Romans, they were just as ignorant about homosexuality 2000 years ago as conservatives are today.

In freedom, we have choice; but choice should not entail promotion at the expense of objective factual reality...

Since when have homophobes ever used facts to criticize homosexuality? You yourself a textbook case of someone who misinforms. Social conservatives thrive on lies and selective biblical interpretation.
Posted by: David at August 13, 2005 08:16 PM

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Toad: "You like to spout off demonizing others as bigoted, hate filled witch hunters, but yet continually choose to ignore some of the horrible truths of homosexuality."

You didn't mention that:
- pro-homo activists use every phony rhetorical device possible. ‘Gay’ is a euphemism. ‘Homophobia’ is a blame-shifting rhetorical device. ‘Gay-marriage’ is a contradiction in terms.

- pro-homo activists lie about what the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association has recently disclosed: "Domestic violence is a hugely ignored health issue in the LGBT communities, affecting one in three LGBT relationships."

- pro-homo activists lie about other bad consequences of homosexualizing society: creating in people's minds a stereotype of every older single person as a closeted homosexual - which entails much more homosexual harassment of these individuals by homo and bisexuals

-pro-homo activists push for closeted homosexual prostitution, including adolescents, and pornography, and cover for the homo pedophiles they know about, including NAMBLA and child abuse tourism in developing countries

-garbage of homos now posit themselves as "authorities" in sexuality, simply because they are not heterosexual, as if being sexually disfunctional made one an authority on anything

- pro-homo activists waste millions of dollars on absurd research looking for a homo gene that does not exist

- homosexuals and bisexuals have taken the concept that a homosexual orientation is not wrong to mean that anything done within homosexuality is approved of (not matter how diseased, unethical, or violent) - and they often label it as the pursuit of their sexual freedom
Posted by: Alessandra at August 14, 2005 02:04 PM

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Toad: "You like to spout off demonizing others as bigoted, hate filled witch hunters, but yet continually choose to ignore some of the horrible truths of homosexuality."

These so-called "horrible truths about homosexuality" you mention exist between your ears and not in reality.

I remember when Falwell went on television and declared to his flock that AIDS was God's punishment on sodomites. They believed this man without question. The fact that the majority of people with AIDS are heterosexual never even enters the consciousness of religious conservatives. Lies and misinformation are the tools of cowards.

You didn't mention that: - pro-homo activists use every phony rhetorical device possible. 'Gay' is a euphemism. 'Homophobia' is a blame-shifting rhetorical device. 'Gay-marriage' is a contradiction in terms.

Gay groups and the scientific and medical communities have been exemplary in their use of facts. And nowadays the courts are also beginning to separate facts from religious nonsense. The religious right, which has no facts to work from, has taken its cue from the Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels. If you repeat a lie often enough people will believe you. That's no surprise when you consider that the Pope himself is a former member of the Nazi party.

As for terms like "gay" and "gay-marriage" those are heterosexual constructs, as are "fag," "queer," "fruit," and the like. If you don't like them then stop using them and they'll go away. Homosexuals don't use the term "gay marriage" heterosexuals do.

And in Massachusetts, Canada and Spain there is no such thing as "gay-marriage". There is only "marriage" but conservatives keep making up euphemisms to appease their bigotry. Please criticize yourselves for the language you invent and the misinformation you propagate.
Posted by: David at August 14, 2005 04:39 PM

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Good one, David ! ! !

It absolutely amazes me how far these people will go to justify their hatred. And it has increasingly helped me understand why the number of conservative public officials (at least in the U.S.) seem to have the greatest problem with their own personal sexual behavior.

I've come to the conclusion that they need to restrict same-sex couples and vilify a long list of behaviors because through law because that is the only way they are capable of disciplining themselves.
Posted by: Kevin at August 15, 2005 01:09 AM

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"Gay groups and the scientific and medical communities have been exemplary in their use of facts. "

I'm glad no one aside from anti-pro-homosexuals uses the euphemism "gay". You have proved my point.

That's your kind of "fact," isn't it? Facts for pro-homosexuals are nothing but in-your-face lies.

We could do nothing but blog on how homo activists (whether inside or outside medical communities) have lied and distorted reality about human sexuality according to their lack of conscience, or character.

"Domestic violence is a hugely ignored health issue in the LGBT communities, affecting one in three LGBT relationships."

To use the word "gay" to describe such a horribly violent group of people is a Goebbels type joke, is it not?

Or is the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association another boogie-man religious right group?

"Lies and misinformation are the tools of cowards."

Not only cowards, but of violent people. That's why pro-homos use them so much.

Not only that, but to characterize anyone and everyone who can criticize the problems with homo and bisexuality as having the same views as Falwell shows how ignorant you are.

But we know being extremely ignorant suits you just fine.
Posted by: Alessandra at August 15, 2005 07:24 AM

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Oh btw, Kevin, most people who are critical of non-heterosexuality (including homosexuality) are not *afraid* of homosexuality - so the label "homophobe" is just another ignorant rhetorical device.

It seems you can't speak without spouting off a bunch of ignorant labels constantly.
Posted by: Alessandra at August 15, 2005 08:59 AM

---

Nonsense, Allessandra.

People who aren't afraid of homosexuality wouldn't have any reason to be using rhetorical devices. Your obvious inability to develop any understanding of real character serves as your own foundation for phobia - the assumption that somehow instinctive heterosexual sexual reactions (those aren't choices, are they?) are indications of goodness and innate character.

One does wonder how heterosexuals could perpetrate so many varied sexual crimes when their very existence should negate such possibilities. In your fantasy, domestic violence was invented by recognizing the existence of gay families, another easy way to defer heterosexual responsibility for their own behaviors.

It's not uncommon for certain conservatives to suffer a cerebral misfire when claiming to understand groups with whom they rarely associate. But I've seen no figures that indicate there are overwhelming domestic violence rates in gay relationships, and I've known many over the years. That it may exist I certainly don't doubt - just as Alessandra surely isn't so naive to pretend that wifebeating hasn't been a fixture of heterosexual marriage since women were first declared property. That alone should negate the sanctity of marriage for anyone, don't you think?

Since you seem to believe it is in your domain to write about my life as if you have so much experience in it, I believe labeling you for what you are is certainly appropriate. It may be refreshing to you to not think of yourself as a Falwell supporter, but ignorance comes in many forms and loves to justify itself in superstition.
Posted by: Kevin at August 15, 2005 12:32 PM

---

I'm glad no one aside from anti-pro-homosexuals uses the euphemism "gay". You have proved my point.

Alessandra, I agree that nowadays most Americans use the term "gay" to refer to homosexuals. But that's because heterosexuals have made this part of the popular vocabulary.

That's your kind of "fact," isn't it? Facts for pro-homosexuals are nothing but in-your-face lies.

We can't take your denials at face value. You need to prove that what you're saying is true and that what we're saying is false. But there is a caveat.

Within a generation I believe most will come to understand that homosexuality is not a choice. When that happens your religion, which has advocated distortions and lies for so long, will be badly undermined. Spread your lies with caution because when the reckoning comes we're going to attack your intolerant belief system with the sledgehammer of truth.

We could do nothing but blog on how homo activists (whether inside or outside medical communities) have lied and distorted reality about human sexuality according to their lack of conscience, or character.

The medical communities aren't lying to you. Someone else is. If you want to disagree with the national medical, psychiatric and psychological associations you'll need more than a few cherry-picked quotes from Leviticus.

"Domestic violence is a hugely ignored health issue in the LGBT communities, affecting one in three LGBT relationships."

You're simply propagating misinformation. You have no genuine facts to work from.

To use the word "gay" to describe such a horribly violent group of people is a Goebbels type joke, is it not?

"Gay" is merely a euphemism for homosexual. The Goebbelsesque element is found in misleading statements that declare homosexuals to have very short life spans, that one in three LGBT relationships involve domestic violence or that AIDS is a gay disease, etc.

Not only cowards, but of violent people. That's why pro-homos use them so much.

Alessandra, you're the first person who's ever accused homosexuals of being violent. As soon as the military realizes how dangerous we homos are the "Don't Ask Don't Tell" policy will fall by the wayside. Finally, we can bolster our armed forces with those fierce hair stylists and interior decorators.

Not only that, but to characterize anyone and everyone who can criticize the problems with homo and bisexuality as having the same views as Falwell shows how ignorant you are.

You are more than welcome to criticize anything you like, that wasn't the point. However, when you present misinformation as the truth, like Mr. Falwell does, then you'll be considered just as foolish as he is.
Posted by: David at August 15, 2005 02:38 PM

---

I wrote: pro-homo activists lie about what the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association has recently disclosed: "Domestic violence is a hugely ignored health issue in the LGBT communities, affecting one in three LGBT relationships."

David wrote: You're simply propagating misinformation. You have no genuine facts to work from.

Either you think Alessandra = the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association (false), or you are completely ignorant about their research and public statements (true), or you are illiterate (congnitively true).

In any of the above cases, you are proof of what their research shows: "Domestic violence is a hugely ignored health issue in the LGBT communities"

Notice the "ignored" above? Ignore the problem is exactly what you do. And I might add, everytime research proves a violence problem with homosexuals, what do homo activists do? Deny, lie, ignore.

Completely irresponsible and having long-term destructive results.
Posted by: Alessandra at August 17, 2005 12:39 PM

---

Within a generation I believe most will come to understand that homosexuality is not a choice. When that happens your religion, which has advocated distortions and lies for so long, will be badly undermined.
-------------------------------
My religion? It's quite ignorant of you to deposit a certain religion on me, given that you don't know what religious/spiritual beliefs I have.

As we can see, ignorance suits you just fine. Furthermore, people don't need a specific religion to propagate lies and distortion, that's what you do in every post.

I am starting to see society move a little bit to grasp that human sexuality is not determined by some little inexistent gene, but it's an incredibly complex sphere of the human mind and of individual development and/or dysfunction, not to mention cultural and social conditioning, aside from choice questions.

Given how ignorant and fanatical and irresponsible pro-homosexuals are, and their terrible job in public education regarding the complexity of human sexuality and its problems, how effective they will be in spreading their self-serving lies about homosexuality is something that remains to be seen.

At the same time that people like you will spread your ignorant, misinformed, simple-minded views of human sexuality, the questionings of the shifty underpinnings of your mindset will increase with time.

We look forward to that.

Posted by: Alessandra at August 17, 2005 12:58 PM

---

People who aren't afraid of homosexuality wouldn't have any reason to be using rhetorical devices.
================
This is so irrational that I did wonder if I should spend time responding. We know that it will go over your head, but other people might catch the drift.

Since you are also using rhetorical devices, according to your logic, you must be profoundly afraid of homosexuality.

No rationality in your posts whatsoever...

However, the point is: people criticize pro-homosexuality because it entails a myriad of destructive and detrimental attitudes and practices. Similar criticism is made to other sexuality problems (pro-pornography, pro-prostitution, pro-SM, pro-pedophilia, etc). It's not a question of fear, but of knowledge and responsibility.

Posted by: Alessandra at August 17, 2005 01:13 PM

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The medical communities aren't lying to you. Someone else is. If you want to disagree with the national medical, psychiatric and psychological associations you'll need more than a few cherry-picked quotes from Leviticus.
--------------------------------------
I don't recall using quotes from Leviticus. You can't argue with what I write, always bringing in these stupid strawmen arguments.

In case you didn't know, the medical community is not a solid block of pro-homosexual morons.

In addition, if you ever care to read about medical history, by the way, you will see that medical, psychiatric, and psychological associations have propagated enormous lies/misinformation about a variety of issues at different points in time. What you take as dogma today, which is an echo of certain political factions, will be completely debunked in the future.

It is only a question of time.

There was a time, for example, when people from these associations that you idolize believed that the shape of the head of someone determined if they were going to be a criminal. Sometimes it's the shape of the head, sometimes it's an unexistent gene, blame human behavior on anything that does not entail responsibility and knowledge, social conditioning, culture, choice, psychological and character dysfunctions, and certain people are happy.

Posted by: Alessandra at August 17, 2005 01:28 PM

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Alessandra -

Your failure to compare statistics that you claim come from the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association with those numbers involving heterosexual families is part of what makes your motives suspect. Moreover, your insistence that homosexual relationships are therefore "destructive and detrimental" is even more nonsensical. Talk about information that goes over the head - hon, where I come from, people would be asking you what your inherent interest is in the relationships of these people, when it is obvious that you attempt to hold them to a different standard than you would hold heterosexual relationships.

While I'm sure that in your own mind, you've chosen to believe that somehow other people are required to make life sacrifices for your social insecurities, it must be difficult to understand why these same people have rejected that notion. Perhaps, if we assume here that you are a woman, we should take your gender back to the days where your role was more biblically correct and your place in relationships to men was clearly and irrevocably defined.

Let me point out one obvious issue with studies of populations of gay citizens, even those conducted by some gay organizations. There is no population census. Get it? It becomes rather difficult to point out things like "2 out of 3" gay households love pink flamingoes because no one knows how many gay households there are. You see, that is the magic of oppression - when you institutionalize and stigmatize a group of people long enough, there isn't any count of them because, well, society has been pretending they don't really exist. So, while I haven't perused this Medical Association study, I highly doubt it was completely representative because they would have limitations that, for example, a study of heterosexual relationships would have simply because there is a definitive total of numbers to draw a sample from.

However, your domestic violence argument, even if it were true, would be rather meaningless. For centuries, domestic violence among heterosexual marriages was not only rampant, but part and parcel of the relationship, since the woman was regarded as property. And since that is, frankly, much more the picture of traditional marriage than the modern version which heterosexuals have embraced today, I'd venture that all the pretense about pretending "traditional" definitions of marriage seem to easily overlook such historical notions.

However, when you attempt to stake the claim that an entire group suffers simply because of choice (which isn't supported bymuch more than junk science created especially for wingnut organizations) it doesn't help your case at all. Most social dysfunctions that gays suffer are generally attributable to the wondrous ability of people like you to stigmatize them enough to create them - a fabulous method of asserting a bit of hetero S/M fantasy into crucifying the lives of others. I suspect your anger at gays rejecting your "facts" has more to do with their rejection of the whole of the "less than you" argument, something that seems part and parcel of the right wingnut agenda.

I'll be more than happy to consider your argument, provided you place yourself back into the proper and traditional role that a woman should play - which would, unfortunately, limit the ability to interact on any intelligent level with men.

It is curious that you only attempt to cite one study, fail to compare it to figures about domestic violence among hetero relationships (wouldn't this mean that marriage should have been dissolved centuries ago?) and then try to pin a bunch of wished for stereotypes upon the gay population. Even more impressive, you want to do this while preserving your own rights, fought for by those who came before you.

Sorry. We ain't buyin' it. No one is going to consider you an expert about gay relationships except those who desperately look for some other way to stigmatize others.

As for your rhetorical device remarks, there are certain areas where someone is entitled to special rights - in particular, writing about my own life. You are the outsider in that respect and have no personal stake in the curious obsession right wingnuts have over people they prefer not to interact with in their culture.

Perhaps the discussion should be about the elimination of heterosexual marriage for some of the very same reasons you've mentioned.
Posted by: Kevin at August 17, 2005 10:03 PM

---

Your failure to compare statistics that you claim come from the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association with those numbers involving heterosexual families is part of what makes your motives suspect.
--------------------------------
You claim these stats aren't from the Homo Medical Association, prove it.

You claim the study is not true, prove it.

Otherwise you are just another shoddy homo trying to cover up an ugly facet of reality with your false claims and fanatical denial.

This is what makes your motives so shoddy, the aim of every fanatical homo is to lie about any very real ugly aspect of the GLBT population. The only way homos are going to succeed in legitimizing their stupid mindset is by lying about all their serious problems.

"Moreover, your insistence that homosexual relationships are therefore "destructive and detrimental" is even more nonsensical."

Pro-homosexuality, with its ignorance and irresponsibility, is highly destructive. You and David, and all your lies and misinformation here, are but a small example.

"However, your domestic violence argument, even if it were true, would be rather meaningless."

Only the most inhumane kind of people think domestic violence is trivial. Your stupid obsession with homosexuality and lying about how much of domestic violence exists in the GLBT population shows that homos are usually highly unfit to do research and public education. What you do is dictated by shoddy selfish politics, not ethics.

"Let me point out one obvious issue with studies of populations of gay citizens, even those conducted by some gay organizations. There is no population census."

The lack of precision with which one can stipulate the percentage of homos and bisexuals does not invalidate every study. Researchers are aware of the problem.

And what you said shows how disgusting homo activists are when they want to affirm that the percentage of homos everywhere is the same. They can't know who's what for sure, they are just lying about the genetic percentage claim, since we get different percentages in different times/places.

Regarding the percentage stats, if anything, we know that a number of married people (that homo activists would call hetero folks simply because they are married), are bisexual.

In any case, people like you only confirm what the study stated, you ignore the problem of domestic violence and everything you write here is but a different attempt to be in denial and lie about it.

"Most social dysfunctions that gays suffer are generally attributable to the wondrous ability of people like you to stigmatize them enough to create them"

That's another irresponsible bit of homo propaganda that is getting unmasked. When we look at how violent and lacking in character so many GLBT people are, it is clear these are problems that have little to do with homo social approval, specially since many of the violent or unethical homos are fanatical pro-homos. This is the same as saying pedophiles are conflicted because society doesn't approve of them. Total homo propaganda. You need to stop blaming the external world for all the crap you keep engendering inside.

Most homos are just too stupid and dysfunctional to deal with their homosexuality, just like many pedophiles are uncapable of dealing with their pedophilia.


"fail to compare it to figures about domestic violence among hetero relationships (wouldn't this mean that marriage should have been dissolved centuries ago?)"

Why should we need to make comparisons with any other population to have veracity? If you find cigarette smoking killed 3 out of 10 people you don't need to compare it with auto accidents (which might have killed 1 out of 10 people) to prove your cigarette study is true.

Everyone knows there is a big domestic violence problem in society (among the heterosexual population) and we don't need to compare with the homo population to say it exists for real.

"Perhaps the discussion should be about the elimination of heterosexual marriage for some of the very same reasons you've mentioned."

I imagine you say this because you only know dysfunctional relationships. You have no idea what a good heterosexual relationship is like, much less a marriage. All you want is to destroy in society that which you cannot have, simply because you don't want to deal with all your mental problems.

"You are the outsider in that respect and have no personal stake in the curious obsession right wingnuts have over people they prefer not to interact with in their culture."

You are just too irresponsible to understand that I don't need to be a pedophile to write about pedophilia. What you don't want is for people to point out how many problems your mindset has. Everyone has the right to know of and discuss human sexuality/psychology.

You think only pedophiles have the right to say what is right about adult and child sexual interactions? Just because a person is a pedophile, it doesn't mean they know anything about what is healthy/unhealthy. Same with homosexuals.

It just so happens every person has every right to talk about everything that happens under the sun.

Posted by: Alessandra at August 20, 2005 07:24 PM

.

Israel is removing the Gaza settlers.

Later today, Israel's Cabinet was to vote on removing the last three Gaza enclaves along with four in the West Bank.

Israeli officials said they planned to speed up this week's timetable. The last Gaza settlements should be empty by tomorrow, and the army plans to begin clearing two settlements in the northern West Bank on Tuesday.

While there still could be some pockets of resistance, the focus already is turning to where the Israelis and Palestinians go from here.

For Israel, there still is much to be done. The military must dismantle its outposts, demolish thousands of homes, relocate Jewish cemeteries and hand over the land to the Palestinians.

Then, it will fall to the Palestinians to use the momentum to begin sowing the seeds of an independent state.

Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas signed a decree yesterday appropriating Jewish settlement land for public use once Israel's evacuation of Gaza is complete, and he scheduled postponed Palestinian legislative elections for Jan. 25.

Abbas faces some serious obstacles.

Israel plans to build a new high-tech barrier around the Gaza Strip and is hesitant to allow Palestinians to reopen the airport. Without free access, many Palestinians worry that the Israeli pullout won't end the occupation but will isolate impoverished Palestinians in the crowded coastal area.

Most men between the ages of 16 and 35 have long been barred from leaving the region, and many worry that Israel won't ease travel restrictions.

More than anything, Palestinians are worried that the pullout will not mark the start of renewed peace talks but the end.

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon pushed through the pullout as a unilateral move after growing frustrated with stalled peace talks and the violent Palestinian uprising. The death of longtime Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat paved the way for a new era of potential compromise, but Abbas is off to a shaky start.

Palestinian militants are testing Abbas' strength and determination to rein in armed groups. The militants view the pullout as a triumph not for moderation and compromise but for violent confrontation.

I don't read much about the Palestinian/Israeli interminable conflict, so I don't know in-depth what is happening there. However, I always hope for a sign that someone is finally acting in a way that will enable them to work out a minimally peaceful co-existence solution. The formation of a Palestinean state seems primordial to me, and, without that, there will be no real progress. How to achieve the formation of a modern Palestinian state is another matter. As many articles point out, the road is fraught with landmines. Nevertheless, a seed for hope is now planted. I hope that this step will be something other than a theatricral act, an exception to the rule regarding their current violent quagmire negotiations.

.

OK, one of the few times I actually liked one of these blog tag "games."

From Chickenlittle and Onkroes:

id-•i-•o-•syn-•cra-•sy - a structural or behavioral characteristic peculiar to an individual or group. Write down 5 of your own idiosyncrasies, then if you wish, tag 5 people.

1) I have two kitchen sponges, one to wash dishes and one to clean counters, appliances, etc. And I can't stand if people take the counter sponge and use on dishes (or when they just have one sponge and wipe everything with it)! Argh, all that (imaginary?) yuck going onto your dishes.

2) I will take a straw (for a drink) from a container and turn it around before putting it in my drink, the idea being if someone before me with real dirty hands came and smeared all their yuck on a bunch of straws when they went to pluck theirs, I won't touch it with my lips! :-DDD how paranoid this sounds...

3) I have now started to listen to radio music and a lot of tv programs together, and I keep switching my attention to either one, depending which one gets more boring or interesting.

4) I would also rather die than use someone else's toothbrush.

5) I can't stand my keyboard or mouse to be dirty, but much more horrible is to have to use someone else's sticky keyboard. One time I cringed when I was asked to use the putrid black-smeared keyboard of the president (no less!) of a company I worked for in the past. As soon as I finished doing what he asked, I excused myself and went running to the restroom to wash my hands!! Arggggghh. That was awful.

My goodness! How many absurd mistakes did the police make??? From the little that was reported now: it seems all the mistakes hinge on one central one - the wrong "positive identification." The minute the mistaken "positive identification" was made, the guy's coffin was nailed.

It does makes you wonder if they were all just a bunch of mistakes, given how careless and grossly wrong they were, doesn't it?

And did you notice the distortion between what was first reported and what they explain now? The guy was not wearing a suspicious long coat, he was wearing some plain, normal jeans outfit. He wasn't carrying anything bulky. He didn't run at all while entering the station, he only did so to try to hop on the train.

Where did all that previous pile of nonsense come from? Not a single reporter got the story straight in the first place?

Oh, the darling media...
.

From JavaJive - This above is from a "haze" pollution problem in Malaysia (which I had never heard of before).

At first glance, I thought it was humorous, almost a joke, like one of those "weirdos of the world" picture and news. Then, sparks flew and the serious thought about having an air filter or pure oxygen/air alternative in a mass delivered, commercially available format came to mind.

I also live in a horribly polluted area. If you walk or drive in the worst areas, the stench is unbelievable, the intensity of the carbon monoxide often makes you literally noxious when out on the streets. So couldn't cars/homes have something similar to what this guy did? We have bottled water, bottled food, bottled gas/electricity, why can't we have bottled air?

I've seen pictures of those trendy bars/lounges where people sit around breathing some oxygen tube. But that's not practical. I'm talking about something that you could put in your home or vehicle. It would either help filter out some of the air pollutants or it would deliver to you cleaner air/oxygen and get mixed with the polluted air, so in the end you had a less polluted mix.

As you can see, I understand nothing of air quality problems, components, filtering systems, etc.

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Google put its plan to scan and copy books from five of the world's top libraries on hold on Thursday, citing copyright problems.

The company announced its Google Print programme in October 2004 as a way "for publishers to make their books discoverable by the millions of people who search on Google" and began the laborious process of scanning in millions of copyright and non-copyright books.

According to Google's Print Product Manager, Adam Smith, this process has been halted so "any and all copyright holders can tell us which books they'd prefer that we not scan if we find them in a library". To give publishers time to respond to Google's request, Smith says his company "won't scan any in-copyright books from now until this November".

Google's plans to organise the information of the world has already come up against stiff opposition. The basic book copyright in the US, for example, explicitly states that "no part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means".

As Smith points out in his statement, publishers who join Google's "Publishers Program" and let the company copy their books will get the benefits of having them "put into Google.com search results" and Google will direct potential buyers to their Web site, "provide ongoing reports about user interest in individual books and the books will also earn revenue from contextual advertising".
[...]

Google Print's usefulness as a search engine for the published world is likely to be severely tested if results have to be tailored around the actions of publishers.

I am totally in favor of having a world online library. Certainly all the non-copyright books need to be online. And translated into several languages, if possible.

I can see the problems with the copy-right material. If you searched enough and properly, you could actually piece together a copy-righted book for free, just by joining the search results. That does away with the protection capacity of the copy-right as it now exists. However, to not be able to search millions of books when we have the technology to do it and which is also a very beneficial endeavour if copy-rights are respected, is also a terrible thing.

On the other hand, if authors (and publishers) could get paid in other forms other than royalty dues, we could put the books online for free and not have any of these problems.

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QKL left a real good link (Psychiatric Association Debates Reclassifying Pedophilia) in a previous comment. I already knew of this sequence of events, but here it is, listed in this article. It's amazing how apathetic society is on this issue.

One more move by fanatical pro-homos to legitimize their mental problems, since they are too irresponsible to deal with them constructively and sanely.

Some mental health professionals attending an annual APA convention May 19 in San Francisco proposed removing several long-recognized categories of mental illness - including pedophilia, exhibitionism, fetishism, transvestism, voyeurism and sadomasochism - from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM).

I'm sure there were Germans in the 30s who felt what I feel now. This is how a decent person felt living in Germany then: you see all around this scum of people getting into power positions and doing more and more insane and absurd things, and society just plods along, quite often, in a supportive manner. Orwellian.

.

I totally agree with what Angry in the Great White North wrote, replying to a question on Canada's new legalizing of same-sex "marriage":

"I would have to say I agree with a lot of what you write normally. However, have you overlooked the fact that a relationship between a man and a woman could be abused in the same manner under the old law?"

AGWN: Good point. But in the old days (ie, before this summer), marriage was understood by all to mean man+woman having sex and making babies. That not all couples actually did that didn't alter the meaning. The form of marriage still worked for these people who did not want to perform the function of marriage.

But to make marriage work for same-sex couples, we had to change the form of marriage itself. We had to rip out all the guts of marriage, since any mention of children made it exclusively heterosexual. When you take out children, sex becomes irrelevant too. We've hollowed out the form of marriage so that anyone can fit into it. That leads to this purely financial relationship since the new form encompasses them, whereas the old form did not. When you do that, and you look at the old laws about bigamy, you have to wonder whether the laws even make sense anymore.

---

Marriage was pulling away from the babycentric roots (easy divorce, social tolerance/acceptance of infidelity, etc), and people have been warning about that for quite some time. However, while it was still a heterosexual institution, it still was connected, however tenuously. When it morphed into a right, and the demand was made to make it apply to same-sex couples with no differences whatsoever, the only solution was to destroy what understanding remained about the function of marriage in society (a means of guaranteeing the paternity of children). Marriage was now about couples and their feelings, and no longer about children and responsibility.

Any attempt to maintain marriage as the primary socially acceptable vessel for procreation and the rasing of children would necessarily make heterosexual marriage different in nature from homosexual marriage, and that was deemed unacceptable.

Final nail in the coffin, as it were. Now that marriage is dead and buried, weird marriage zombies are on the rise, such as this straight marriage for tax reasons.

Via Clayton.

WHAT'S LOVE got to do with it?

Bill Dalrymple, 56, and best friend Bryan Pinn, 65, have decided to take the plunge and try out the new same-sex marriage legislation with a twist -- they're straight men.

"I think it's a hoot," Pinn said.

The proposal came last Monday at a Toronto bar amid shock and laughter from their friends. But the two -- both of whom were previously married and both of whom are looking for a good woman to love -- insist that after the humour subsided, a real issue lies at the heart of it all.

"There are significant tax implications that we don't think the government has thought through," Pinn said.

Dalrymple has been to see a lawyer already and there are no laws in marriage that define sexual preference.

Good discussion about this incident, and same-sex marriage in Canada at Angry in the Great White North.

Re one tiny post:


Kevin -

You like to spout off demonizing others as bigoted, hate filled witch hunters, but yet continually choose to ignore some of the horrible truths of homosexuality.

This is a lifestyle CHOICE that is typified by:
- Higher than average STD transmission, including AIDS; coupled with abnormally high levels of regular unprotected sex with many partners
- RISING HIV infection rates regardless of modern education
- Higher than average depression, alcoholism, and suicide rates.
- Lower life expectancy as a whole
- Supression of treatment that has helped many Ex-Gays; regardless of many people admitting improvement and happier lives
- A biological phenomenom incapable of sustanance without support from the heterosexual community

Until I see the homosexual community deal with its own problems, I find little sympathy for their public escapades.
Posted by: Toad at August 11, 2005 04:39 PM

---

My comments:

You didn't mention that:
- pro-homo activists use every phony rhetorical device possible. ‘Gay’ is a euphemism. ‘Homophobia’ is a blame-shifting rhetorical device. ‘Gay-marriage’ is a contradiction in terms;

- pro-homo activists lie about what the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association has recently disclosed: "Domestic violence is a hugely ignored health issue in the LGBT communities, affecting one in three LGBT relationships."

- pro-homo activists lie about other bad consequences of homosexualizing society: creating in people's minds a stereotype of every older single person as a closeted homosexual - which entails much more homosexual harassment of these individuals by homo and bisexuals;

- pro-homo activists push for closeted homosexual prostitution, including adolescents, and pornography, and cover for the homo pedophiles they know about, including NAMBLA and child abuse tourism in developing countries;

- garbage of homos now posit themselves as "authorities" in sexuality, simply because they are not heterosexual, as if being sexually disfunctional made one an authority on anything;

- pro-homo activists waste millions of dollars on absurd research looking for a homo gene that does not exist;

- homosexuals and bisexuals have taken the concept that a homosexual orientation is not wrong to mean that anything done within homosexuality is approved of (no matter how diseased, unethical, or violent) - and they often label it as the pursuit of their sexual freedom.

.

A San Francisco man who says he was devastated after he was identified as gay on a national Spanish-language radio show will be paid $270,000 by Univision Radio, an arbitrator has ruled.

Roberto Hernandez, 45, was driving to work in 2002 when he received a phone call from a man who said that he met Hernandez at a San Francisco gay bar. The caller then announced that the conversation was being broadcast live on the "Raul Brindis and Pepito Show," based in Houston.

Hernandez worked for the local station that broadcast the show, and sold advertising for the program. He said he was so depressed by the incident that he could no longer work.

"It's a nightmare," Hernandez said. "How do you live with such an embarrassment in your life? How do you live when someone makes your life so insignificant? "

Hernandez had been discreet about disclosing his sexual orientation before the incident, not even telling his family.

Arbitrator Rebecca Westerfield found on Friday that Hernandez had suffered emotional distress but dismissed claims of sexual harassment. She said that Hernandez had no choice but to quit his job and was owed workers' compensation.

Hernandez was awarded $250,000 and nearly $20,000 in economic damages because of the emotional distress that led to seven months of unemployment after quitting his job.

Univision attorneys declined to comment on the case.

---

Does anyone stop to think how much $270K could do to help children that need shelter or services to protect them from abuse? How much it could do to help the abandoned elderly live better? To feed families who are going hungry? To buy doctor appointments for those without insurance?

What's the homo crap complaining that he was "outed" if he goes to gay bars? By going to gay bars, he is announcing to the world what he is and then he wants to get paid 270K for not being able to lie to everyone about it? Society now has pay $270,000 to everyone homo that can't trick and fool everyone about what/who they are?

"It's a nightmare," Hernandez said. "How do you live with such an embarrassment in your life? How do you live when someone makes your life so insignificant? "

How does talking about the truth regarding homos make their life "insignificant?"

If he is embarrassed, then at least his conscience is telling him he should change. That's what he doesn't like.

He said he was so depressed by the incident that he could no longer work.

What a piece of trash. I know poor parents who work 18 hours a day in the most horrible conditions to feed their kids, and who don't have the homo luxury of getting "depressed" about anything. Imagine if every poor person that works some crappy job were now to sue for being unhappy with their job environments and get $270K. We have come to the point where homos can now sue for their psychological diseased hysterics over society discovering what they like to lie so much to everyone.

That's why I am in favor of outing everyone. Right now. Get the crap into view. It would be nice to put web cameras in front of every gay bar in every town. Get the slime from under the rocks.

Arbitrator Rebecca Westerfield found on Friday that Hernandez had suffered emotional distress but dismissed claims of sexual harassment. She said that Hernandez had no choice but to quit his job and was owed workers' compensation.

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Hernandez isn't satisfied because, he says, the FCC didn't deal with the deeper issue of the humiliating trick and offensive language involving his sexual orientation.

Monica Taher, who monitors minority issues for the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, says the FCC is not staffed to monitor Spanish-language media, which get away with far more by way of indecency and anti-homosexual material than English-language media.

Which raises the question: Would an English-language station escape sanctions if it similarly used trickery to humiliate a black man while throwing the "N word" around?

The question this raises for me is: why are Americans so comfortable with degrading and humiliating people in private, but they make a big deal out of it if it is done in public?

The cancerous secret of a liberal society, perhaps? Pornography is usually just one big compendium of degrading and humiliating people in a variety of formats and contexts.

Why don't the GLAAD pigs or other N-word hysteric defenders fight to abolish pornography, if they claim to be so profoundly against humiliation?

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Macromedia executives cited "extensive research with our customers" as the reason behind the decision [ to drop Freehand, its illustrator software], and not its impending acquisition by Adobe Systems--which current sells a competing product called Illustrator. Adobe announced in April that it would buy Macromedia for $3.4 billion.

Gasp! I only heard of this today! :-)

Is Adobe on its way to become an analogous Microsoft? At least the former (and Macromedia) make good software products.

(I hate Dreamweaver though)
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Kylie's ordeal boosts check-ups

Media coverage of pop diva Kylie Minogue's battle with breast cancer prompted an "unprecedented" rise in the number of Australian women seeking early screening for the disease, the author of a medical study has said.

The 37-year-old pop superstar canceled her Australian "Showgirl" tour in May after she was diagnosed with cancer and underwent surgery to remove a lump from her breast.

A study published in the most recent edition of the Medical Journal of Australia examined the number of mammogram bookings made by women over 40 at four government-run clinics that provide free screening.

Researchers found that the number of reservations made for breast exams rose by an average of 40 percent during the two weeks after the pop superstar's diagnosis was made public.

The number of women who made a booking for an initial, or first-time, mammogram rose by nearly 101 percent during the same period, the study found.

The study's author, Simon Chapman, said the increase in first-time mammograms was "unprecedented," despite years of public health campaigns advising women to seek early screening for the disease.

Which only goes to show that public health educators are lagging behind in their media savvy tactics to reach women, and are wasting money with reasonably ineffective education campaign techniques.

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Psychologists have gained insight into how people judge their personal health risks. The findings suggest that people aren't horribly off the mark as long as they do not rely on media reports and stick to what's happened to people they know.

"do not rely on media reports" - lovely, eh? ;-)

The media, as always, such a wonderful source of unbiased information and public education.

I have to say, though, that the media is responsible for some positive results regarding public health education, but they could do such a better job...

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I'm not really a pop person, but easy pop I like. Just listened to this song, which I like, mostly because of the way Lemar sings it.


"If There's Any Justice"


Ohhh,
Ye-ah-ah,
Yeah,
I would be your man,
You would be my girl,
Oh yeah,
I beleive,
I do,

If there's any justice in the world,
I would be your man,
You would be my girl,
If i'd found you first you know its true,
He would be alone,
I would be with you,

When you decide, dont let me down,
Coz there's nothing to be certain in my life,
And you've seen a thousand times
There's not much justice in the world
If there's any justice in your heart,
You love pity it changed,
Ease it into heart,
Oh no,
Why dont you remember how it feels,
Not to give a damn,
For anyone but me

I cant believe you'd be decieved,
Changing memories from truth to fantasy,
Where there's nothing left but tears,
And there's not much justice in the world

Just because he's wrapped around your finger,
Don't fool yourself with dreams that might appear,
If in time you'll stop and trust your feelings,
The truth is out there somewhere
It's blowing in the wind

If there's any justice in the world,
I would be your man,
You would be my girl,
Oh yeah,
If i'd found you first you know its true,
He would be alone,
I would be with you,

When you decide, dont let me down,
Coz there's nothing to be certain in my life,
And you've seen a thousand times
There's not much justice in the world

If I should lose you girl you know,
That theres not much justice in the world

If there's any justice in the world,
You're gonna be my baby,
You're gonna be my baby,
You're gonna be my baby!

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A San Diego "gay pride" organization is facing some public and potentially legal backlash after a convicted pedophile was discovered working at their recent festival.

Last month, AgapePress reported that two pedophiles who are registered as sex offenders under Megan's Law were working as volunteers for the three-day San Diego Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Pride Festival, which took place over the July 29-31 weekend. After public outcry, the organization issued a press release -- before the festival -- saying the pedophiles had been removed from their positions. According to the San Diego Union-Tribune, law enforcement and community groups had threatened to boycott the event unless the sex offenders stepped down.

But according to James Hartline, a San Diego Christian activist who is a former homosexual, a local newspaper reporter showed up at the festival on Saturday and found one of the pedophiles working. Hartline says the city needs to take action.

"This parade [on Saturday] and this festival occur on city property -- and [the homosexual groups] benefit from city funds by having this event," he explains. "So there's huge political ramifications based on the fact that many of these city officials participated in this event after being promised that the pedophiles were not going to be involved."

The convicted sex offenders, he says, are a threat to the safety of society. "The federal government and state law enforcement have put these individuals on [the] Megan's Law website for a reason: that they're not rehabilitated and that they are a danger to society -- and they want society to be aware of who they are."

The activist contends it is an issue of credibility as well. "[T]hese people actually covered up for them and lied, at least when their employee was involved," he notes. And according to Hartline, at the same time the group said they removed the pedophiles, the pro-homosexual organization announced it was putting in a process to review their volunteers. That, he maintains, is also "questionable."

Participating in the parade last weekend were San Diego Deputy Mayor Toni Atkins -- who is openly homosexual -- City Attorney Michael Aguirre, San Diego mayoral candidate Jerry Sanders -- who is the city's former police chief -- and numerous other state and county politicians. Hartline feels it should be scrutinized "as to why these city officials and law enforcement are even involved in this event in the first place."

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As I have mentioned before, the homo parade could be totally composed of pedophiles and the people who attend it would clap just as much. Pro-homosexuals are obsessed with homosexuality, and don't care about anything else. They live in a state of severe selfish denial.

Related:
Dyke gets 5 1/2 years of jail for setting her ex-lover and another woman on fire; The Worst Instrument of Crime; Criminalizing Thought - Hate Speech/Crime Legislation;
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A 'Vigorous' Beginning for N.Va. Preemie
Girl Doing Well After Birth By Brain-Dead Woman

Susan Anne Catherine Torres, whose mother, Susan Torres, was declared brain-dead but kept on life support for three months so her child might live, continued to do well yesterday at an Arlington hospital a day after her mother died.

The baby, 13.5 inches long and weighing 1 pound 13 ounces, was born by Caesarean section at Virginia Hospital Center on Tuesday, about 13 weeks premature.

[Good God, a 1 pound baby - you go Susan Anne, sweetie, hang in there!]

Susan Torres, of Arlington, lost consciousness May 7 when a cancerous brain tumor began to bleed. A few days later, she was declared brain-dead with no hope of recovery.

Jason Torres, the baby's father, who slept at his wife's side for three months, decided to make their story public in the hopes of raising money to help pay staggering medical bills. The family posts updates from time to time on a Web site, http://susantorresfund.org .

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Cmon, rescue people, get your act together...

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Update:
As probably everyone has heard by now: They made it!



[I can imagine how they felt when they opened the hatch and climbed out.]

The managing director of the British firm involved in the rescue - Rumic - told the BBC the operation had taken several hours.

"There were a lot of fishing nets which we had to cut away, but there were no steel cables, although some of it did look like steel. Initial reports could have suggested there were steel rather than nylon nets," Roger Chapman told the BBC.

"But it was a fairly long operation, with quite a lot of cutting, but eventually when most of it was freed, the submarine blew a ballast tank and came free and shot to the surface."

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The UK robot craft which saved seven Russian sailors stranded on the Pacific Ocean floor was operated by a civilian team used to tricky marine operations.

The remote-controlled Scorpio 45 is operated for the Ministry of Defence by Cumbria-based firm James Fisher Rumic.

Its "submarine rescue assets" are on standby to free stricken vessels, or to keep endangered subs supplied with air and other necessities until rescue.




The Scorpio is about the size of a double bed, and carries cameras, sonar systems, propulsion systems, hydraulic power, electrical power, pumps, cutting equipment, and also has a manipulator arm.

The unmanned craft is used in situations that are too dangerous or too deep to send divers.

It can operate down to depth of 925m, with the depth being determined by the length of its umbilical cable.

It is fitted with three cameras and cable cutting equipment to cut steel cable up to 70mm diameter.

Speaking from the Rumic headquarters in Dalton-in-Furness, managing director Roger Chapman said that the Scorpio team the firm had sent to Russia was always kept at 12 hours notice for mobilisation.

It also attended the scene of the stricken Russian submarine Kursk in 2000 but on that occasion was not given permission to intervene.

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The quick Russian request for international help was in stark contrast to the failed operation to save the Kursk, which sank in the Barents Sea after an explosion on board; 118 sailors perished in the submarine, at least 23 of them living a number of hours until the oxygen on the craft ran out.

“Taking advantage of this opportunity, I would like to express gratitude to our sailors, particularly our Pacific Fleet sailors, and everybody who extended a helping hand to us — primarily of course the British navy, the naval forces of the United States of America and the naval forces of Japan,” Interfax quoted Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov as saying on Sunday.


Pavel Felgengauer, a Moscow defense analyst, said the decision to ask for help was easier because unlike the Kursk, the mini-sub holds no military secrets.

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[So the Russian government has made a proper fanfare about how thankful they are for the international cooperation exercised in the rescue operation. Sad to think that none of this fanfare would be there today if this mini-sub had been another vessel with military secrets.]

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Funny post on Bonglish:

Many Bengalis do have a problem pronouncing English vowels. Cheek very often becomes chik."Konkona has red chiks". Swimmingpool becomes sweemingpull and Sen becomes Shane. So they end up saying, "Are you going to the sweemimgpull Shane?".

There is a story of one Mr Bannerjee who visited the TISCO plant in Jamshedpur many years ago.He was taken around the plant by one Mr.Chatterjee who asked him whether he knew metaalurjee(metallurgy). He replied,"No,I am Banerjee". Then Bannerjee asked Chatterjee,"so,you makes still here?"."Yes,we make stiill here"."Do you make still in small pieces"."No,we make them still in long shits(sheets).

[read more...]

I'm speechless.

I just went through this wonderful interactive presentation showing the process of making folios (see above) in the Middle Ages and the gigantic amount of highly detailed miniature work is just insane. I think it's a little incomprehensible for us, living with our millions of technology gadgets and highly computerized and industrialized way of doing things, to conceive having a job like this. We couldn't take it psychologically.


Have a look! From the Fitzmuseum in the UK. (Your browser needs to have Flash, if it's a newer version of any browser, you have it).

Look at this illustration! (click on option to enlarge)
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Never had a problem for more than 3 years using a PC with Windows and then... one fine day last week it happened. I got the ugly message it wouldn't boot. Tried repairing the Windows system installation, didn't work. Tried reinstalling, not enough space. Tried chkdsk, didn't fix anything. Tried going into the manual console and exiting to DOS, to the C: drive, the system won't let me delete files so that I can have more free space to try to reinstall. In the midst of all of this, five thousand attempts at rebooting. Nothing. Sigh.

So it was time to play with disaster, since I only had a bit of the stuff on the computer backed up. I had actually been in the process of backing up files when disaster struck. Isn't it wonderful to try to fix your boot sector when you know practically nothing about such things?

First, 3 thousand searches on the web for a free utility for the task. Some of them sounded so gobbledygook nerdy, that it was frightening to think how much you could wreck your system trying to use it without having much of a clue what you are doing. I skipped those, although they looked powerful.

Then I came upon a 30-day free trial copy of BootIt NG (download here). Made the bootable diskette, start running it in the shot computer. First distressing problem: the program says it's better to install itself in its own partition, but it will need to create it (i.e. wipe something else to do it, as I understood) or it can try to install it in a shared partition - what do I want? Jeez, as long as you don't explode my disk (Mission Impossible smoking self-destruct cassette tape appears in my mind), I don't care... I try the shared one first, hoping that it won't destroy anything, the program says "No, it has to be the new made for itself only partition." Why did you ask me in the first place then? Coy, are we?

It says BootIt installation was successful - now remove the diskette and restart the computer. For a second, a glimmer of hope, could it have been that simple? Have I just succeeded in getting around the hours of booting headaches above?

Computer restarts, looks for boot in diskette, then CD-ROM, and then the screen goes black and cursor sits on top left corner, blinking... blinking... blinking...

How it likes to blink. Downheartedness sets in. So I restart and enter into BootIt again. I get all these new icons on screen. Well, that's an improvement. I have no clue what they are for and am disheartened with the thought of having to go read 50 manual pages of nerdy confusing instructions to find out what the little icons are for. (Not that the manual is badly written, it's just such an unfamiliar subject). Check manual, manual doesn't help much. I shall explore, go back to BootIt. Start clicking on all options, boot from this, restart, wait and stare, get blank screen with blinking cursor, boot from that, restart, stare while it tries to boot, get blank screen, click here, change this, restart, stare, click, restart, stare, you get the lovely idea...

I start checking every menu in BootIt, every option, every button, until, at one point, I hit the property buttons for a partition entry and for the first time, the program asks me: I found a problem with X (didn't write it down), do you want me to fix it?

Do I want children to be happy? Do I want spring to come around again? For the life of me, please... Actually I didn't think that, because by this time I was already conformed with failure. It appeared that this tool was not going to solve it, I was patting myself on the back, good try, onto the next one, let's just finish clicking on the few remaining not yet seen menu buttons, and then go onto to searching for another tool and start the process all over again, wasting another 5 hours with booting games, before it was clear the latter wouldn't work either, etc., etc.

So for the umpteenth time, I reboot... and... and... then it happened! I see blue appear! My heart smiles, but cautiously. I wait, then it's the stupid Windows logo, and yes, it's booting! I hold my breath waiting for something to go wrong at any moment, but the computer finally hums as if nothing had ever happened. Obviously BootIt fixed whatever was corrupted. I check the disk and all the files appear to be there without any losses.

I'm even scared to reboot it again right now, just to make sure it was really fixed. But it looks goooooooooooooooooooooood!

Such a genius... ;-)

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