Reflections, Reflections

Nov 22, 2006, 17:27 WEST PALM BEACH, Florida — Florida authorities have opened a criminal investigation into the sexually explicit computer messages that disgraced lawmaker Mark Foley sent to male former interns.

“It was a preliminary inquiry before, but we found the basis to open up a criminal investigation,” Kristen Perezluha, a spokeswoman for the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, said on Nov. 16. She would not elaborate.

The FBI is investigating whether Foley broke federal laws with his messages to teenaged former congressional pages and the House Ethics Committee is looking into whether senior Republican officials hid what they knew about the messages.

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And what would the basis to open up a criminal investigation be, I wonder?

Not too hard to at least come up with some guesses.

How much will be publicly known, after the investigation, is the question.

Is this the real deal behind how Borat (Sacha Cohen) made his movie? I hope we get to find out and, if so, that the villagers win big time in court. However, unless they get some heavenly sent kick-ass lawyer, their chances of fighting some mega-rich law firm are close to nill. The press could always help though, by raising a stink.

Borat film 'tricked' poor village actors

By BOJAN PANCEVSKI and CARMIOLA IONESCU, Mail on Sunday Last updated at 21:25pm on 11th November 2006

When Sacha Baron Cohen wanted a village to represent the impoverished Kazakh home of his character Borat, he found the perfect place in Glod: a remote mountain outpost with no sewerage or running water and where locals eke out meagre livings peddling scrap iron or working patches of land.

But now the villagers of this tiny, close-knit community have angrily accused the comedian of exploiting them, after discovering his new blockbuster film portrays them as a backward group of rapists, abortionists and prostitutes, who happily engage in casual incest.

They claim film-makers lied to them about the true nature of the project, which they believed would be a documentary about their hardship, rather than a comedy mocking their poverty and isolation.

Villagers say they were paid just £3 each for this humiliation, for a film that took around £27million at the worldwide box office in its first week of release.

Now they are planning to scrape together whatever modest sums they can muster to sue Baron Cohen and fellow film-makers, claiming they never gave their consent to be so cruelly misrepresented.

Disabled Nicu Tudorache said: This is disgusting. They conned us into doing all these things and never told us anything about what was going on. They made us look like primitives, like uncivilised savages. Now they,re making millions but have only paid us 15 lei [around £3].

[...]

The crew was led by a man villagers describe as 'nice and friendly, if a bit weird and ugly', who they later learned was Baron Cohen. It is thought the producers chose the region because locals more closely resembled his comic creation than genuine Kazakhs.

The comedian insisted on travelling everywhere with bulky bodyguards, because, as one local said: 'He seemed to think there were crooks among us.'

While the rest of the crew based themselves in the motel, Baron Cohen stayed in a hotel in Sinaia, a nearby ski resort a world away from Glod's grinding poverty. He would come to the village every morning to do 'weird things', such as bringing animals inside the run-down homes, or have the village children filmed holding weapons.

Mr Tudorache, a deeply religious grandfather who lost his arm in an accident, was one of those who feels most humiliated. For one scene, a rubber sex toy in the shape of a fist was attached to the stump of his missing arm - but he had no idea what it was.

Only when The Mail on Sunday visited him did he find out. He said he was ashamed, confessing that he only agreed to be filmed because he hoped to top up his £70-a-month salary - although in the end he was paid just £3.

He invited us into his humble home and brought out the best food and drink his family had. Visibly disturbed, he said shakily: 'Someone from the council said these Americans need a man with no arm for some scenes. I said yes but I never imagined the whole country, or even the whole world, will see me in the cinemas ridiculed in this way. This is disgusting.

'Our region is very poor, and everyone is trying hard to get out of this misery. It is outrageous to exploit people's misfortune like this to laugh at them.

'We are now coming together and will try to hire a lawyer and take legal action for being cheated and exploited. We are simple folk and don't know anything about these things, but I have faith in God and justice.'

If the village does sue the film-makers, they won't be the first. Last week, two unnamed college students who were caught on film drunkenly making racist and sexist comments took legal action, claiming the production team plied them with alcohol and falsely promised that the footage would never be seen in America.

Many other unwitting victims of Baron Cohen's pranks have also spoken out against the way they were conned and - unsurprisingly - the rulers of Kazakhstan have long taken issue with the image Borat paints of their vast, oil-rich nation.

The residents of Glod only found out about the true nature of the film after seeing a Romanian TV report. Some thought it was an art project, others a documentary.

The Mail on Sunday showed them the cinema trailer - the first footage they had seen from the film. Many were on the brink of tears as they saw how they were portrayed.

Claudia Luca, who lives with her extended family in the house next to the one that served as Borat's home, said: 'We now realise they only came here because we are poorer than anyone else in this village. They never told us what they were doing but took advantage of our misfortune and poverty. They made us look like savages, why would anyone do that?'

Her brother-in law Gheorghe Luca owns the house that stood in for Borat's - which the film-makers adorned by bringing a live cow into his living room.

Luca, who now refers to Baron Cohen as to the 'ugly, tall, moustachioed American man', even though the 35-year-old comedian is British, said: 'They paid my family £30 for four full days. They were nice and friendly, but we could not understand a single word they were saying.

'It was very uncomfortable at the end and there was animal manure all over our home. We endured it because we are poor and badly needed the money, but now we realise we were cheated and taken advantage of in the worst way.

'All those things they said about us in the film are terribly humiliating. They said we drink horse urine and sleep with our own kin. You say it's comedy, but how can someone laugh at that?'

Spirea Ciorobea, who played the 'village mechanic and abortionist', said: 'What I saw looks disgusting. Even if we are uneducated and poor, it is not fair that someone does this to us.'

He remembered wondering why the crew took an old, broken Dacia car and turned it into a horse cart. He said: 'We all thought they were a bit crazy, but now its seems they wanted to show that it is us who drive around in carts like that.'

Local councillor Nicolae Staicu helped the crew with their shooting, but he claims he was never told what sort of movie they were making, and that they failed to get a proper permit for filming.

Staicu, who had never dealt with a film crew before, said: 'I was happy they came and I thought it would be useful for our country, but they never bothered to ask for a permit, let alone pay the official fees.

'I realise I should have taken some legal steps but I was simply naive enough to believe that they actually wanted to do something good for the community here.

'They came with bodyguards and expensive cars and just went on with their job, so we assumed someone official in the capital Bucharest had let them film.'

Bogdan Moncea of Castel Film, the Bucharest-based production company that helped the filming in Romania, said the crew donated computers and TV sets to the local school and the villagers. But the locals have denied this.

Indeed, when local vice-mayor Petre Buzea was asked whether the people felt offended by Baron Cohen's film, he replied: 'They got paid so I am sure they are happy. These gipsies will even kill their own father for money.'

[...]

But feelings in Glod are running so high that The Mail on Sunday saw angry villagers brandishing farm implements chase out a local TV crew, shouting that they had enough of being exploited.

It is small comfort that few, if any, of them will get to see the Borat film. Not a single villager we spoke to had ever been able to afford a trip to the nearest cinema, 20 miles away.

Perhaps that's the real reason why film-makers chose Glod in the first place.

Reader comments (10)

Labels: Borat, liberals, movies

This is a discussion that sprung up in a previous post "Explaining desire and sexuality - how both of the two dominant explanations (choice vs genes) are wrong." The debate presents some of the main clashes in the current views, attitudes, and values about sexuality.

Good point about sexual desire versus sexual orientation.

I think sexual orientation was invented to sabotage the debate about homosexuality and to imply a set and unchangeable sexuality so people would be forced to accept it.

I also agree with you that sexuality being very complex is very likely a blend of biological instincts and psycho-emotional-social influences.

I don't agree with you about race being only "superficial physical characteristics".

http://www.goodrumj.com/RaceFaq.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Rac..._in_biomedicine

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race
qkl | 10.28.06 - 1:12 pm | #

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Alessandra,

I'm trying to follow the tortured logic of your reasoning here. In what world can homosexual behavior be both a "choice" AND a "dysfuntion"? The two definitions are mutually exclusive.

Your argument that the "choice" is not in having the desires, but in acting on them...well, sure, and grass is green. But it's the having of the desire that makes one a homosexual, not acting upon it.

It is interesting that you write so eloquently about the complexities of psychological development in the formative years, and yet are unable to appreciate that this holds just as true for the "healthy" heterosexual as the "dysfuntional" homosexual. Virtually all of the visual cues for sexual attraction are a matter of enculturation - a quick survey of the tastes of past generations and other cultures make this quite clear. Sexuality and desire are almost infinitely mutable.

And yet...homosexuality is cross-cultural. It exists and has existed everywhere in the world. Funny, that.

Sexual desire begins in the abstract. Even heterosexual adolescents have to LEARN to find bodies of the "other" attractive - there is always an "ick" factor at the beginning. Before the physical specificity of the act (culturally influenced) is the emotional stance (arguably innate) which fixates on a particular gender.

Why do gay men and women have markedly different personalities than straights? Why are lesbians tough, and gay men more effeminate? Why are their brain structures diffent from heteros? Why are these differences any MORE the product of cultural influence than the defining traits of heteros?

Until you can make meaningful distinctions between what is nature and what is nurture in the "healthy" hetero psyche, you have no scientific grounds for making these distinctions regarding the homosexual.
Andrew S Taylor | Homepage | 10.29.06 - 10:14 pm | #

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I'm trying to follow the tortured logic of your reasoning here. In what world can homosexual behavior be both a "choice" AND a "dysfuntion"? The two definitions are mutually exclusive.

Your argument that the "choice" is not in having the desires, but in acting on them...well, sure, and grass is green. But it's the having of the desire that makes one a homosexual, not acting upon it.
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Look at what you asked:
"homosexual behavior be both a "choice" AND a "dysfuntion"? "

Why is a sexual dysfunction any different than any other dysfunctional behavior? Only in a case where someone has absolutely no control of their mental faculties, will they not be able to choose how to behave. Most people have a lot of choice, even though there are circumstances where your choices are limited, depending on the severity of a person's mental dysfunctions, environmental constraints, etc, but it still doesn't take away your responsibility.

It's not only acting in the sense of the sexual, it's what you do about your sexual dysfunction in the sense of how you view it, how you understand it, if you cultivate it, legitimize it, condone it; if you are able to understand or perceive other psycho-emotional problems connected to it as opposed to believing that you are like a reptile following your instinct and therefore everything you do is justified about your sexuality.

Think of a pedophile, once he/she perceives they are pedophiles, they have the choice of saying, "Well, that's just the way I am, time for my little pedophile pride parade," or they can go figure out what's making them a pedophile in the first place and strive to change it.

In a broader sense, every human being has choices to make regarding sexuality. Not exactly the focus of this exchange, but think of the behavior many Italian guys display of passing their hands over young women's behinds in public - women they are not acquainted with. In a world of idiots, they would claim, "Well, I'm a heterosexual guy, this is the result of my orientation and attraction to beautiful women. I'm just following my genes." And if they were really cynical, they could add, " and anyone condoning my heterosexuality is just a big prude, a sexually repressive bigot, that is not allowing me to freely express my heterosexuality."
alessandra | Homepage | 10.30.06 - 3:36 am | #

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But it's the having of the desire that makes one a homosexual, not acting upon it.
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I think a lot of what we think about ourselves and about others influences what we feel desires for, along with a ton of unconscious stuff. Which partly explains how social conditioning shapes different desire aspects in different populations across time and space.

So, first of all, the construction of the concept of desire as "reptilish" in the sense that it is not an outcome of a complex life process is totally false. And that is one more problematic aspect of the "sexual orientation" concept.

Desire is multi-faceted and always an outcome of a complex life process and cannot ever be reduced to just "gender orientation." the dimension of human sexuality or desire is immensely more complex than that.

It is like saying that the only difference between a pedophile and a healthy adult is that they have an "age orientation" difference.

That's the level of idiocy one finds with the sexual orientation concept. There are profound differences with the mental dysfunctions found in a pedophile, in a diverse array of their psychological dynamics, that are very complex and go way beyond this produced desire result of having sexual "attraction" towards children or adults.
alessandra | Homepage | 10.30.06 - 3:56 am | #

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And yet...homosexuality is cross-cultural. It exists and has existed everywhere in the world. Funny, that.
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That is a very ignorant statement, because it's dogmatic, not based on fact. No one knows what every culture in the past has been like. What we do know is that they had babies and reproduced. This is not proof of homosexuality.

Also, there are still living indigenous cultures today that do not have contact with anthropologists, and we don't know what they are like in any way (family, violence, sexuality, religion). But they continue to reproduce. Doesn't prove homosexuality.

So your homosexuality universality claim is based on dogma, not fact.

We also know that different cultures present diverse rates of incest, pedophilia, homo and bisexuality, sexual violence.

What is truly universal about the human species is that it's heterosexual, one of it's most fundamental characteristic.
alessandra | Homepage | 10.30.06 - 4:05 am | #

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Alessandra,

Thank you for your thorough and thoughtful response. I apologize for my typos.

I agree with almost everything you say re: the developmental complexities of human sexuality. In particular, I like how you put it here:

"Desire is multi-faceted and always an outcome of a complex life process and cannot ever be reduced to just "gender orientation." the dimension of human sexuality or desire is immensely more complex than that."

I agree with this 100%. What I'm not getting is how you can go from this, to your statement equating homosexual attraction with pedophelia, bestiality, and other dangerous fetishes. There is a big leap of logic here that you seem to think is inevitable, but which I am completely missing.

Human sexuality is not just about "function". This may be true of animal sexuality (reptilian instinct, as you put it) but animals are very non-discriminate with their "instincts." Just watch the behavior of any un-neutered male dog - for whom pillows, human legs, and other dogs of either gender are one and the same.

Human beings, unlike animals, have much more complicated - and noble - aspirations for their sexual drives, including notions of beauty, love, familiy, spirituality, etc. Pedophelia - which may just as easily be hetero as homo - stems from a severe emotional dysfunction, involving fears of adulthood and powerlessness, almost always the result of childhood abuse.

You don't seem to allow for the fact that most homosexuals - like most heterosexuals - prefer other adults, and seek responsible adult relationships in which love, commitment, family, etc. are concerns just as they are in hetero relationships.

You haven't demonstrated that heterosexuality is the ONLY norm for a healthy adult, and that homosexuality is therefore deviant. Your claims that homsexuality in any circumstance - even between adults -is intrinsically harmful seems to rest on the categorical assumption that it is the product of negative experiences or childhood trauma; in short, that it can be traced to damaging formative experiences in the same way that pedophelia can be. This is your assumption - but I've yet to see you support it with facts, or even a sound theory. As far as I can tell, these are two utterly different phenomena.

As for my alleged ignorance of cultural history - all I can say is that, in my own extensive readings and conversations with anthropologists and historians (I know more than a few), I've never heard of anyone finding evidence of a human society wherein homosexual behavior was absent. Ancient Greece, Renaissence Italy, Yoruba tribes, Iroquois...you name it. It's been an established fact of any culture anyone's ever bothered to study. You are correct that this fact is neutral as to the morality of homosexuality - but that applies to your arguments as much as mine.
Andrew S Taylor | Homepage | 10.30.06 - 11:41 pm | #

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Regarding your "Italian male" example, this is similar to the point I am trying to make. If you allow that there can be negative or harmful expressions of heterosexuality which are enculturated, and not intrinsic to heterosexuals per se, then why not allow the corollary - that there may be negative expessions of homosexuality, also enculturated, that are not instrinsic to homosexuality per se. Or, even better, the contrapositive - that one may also enculturate positive expressions in the homosexual as well as in the heterosexual.
Andrew S Taylor | Homepage | 10.30.06 - 11:46 pm | #

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As for my alleged ignorance of cultural history - all I can say is that, in my own extensive readings and conversations with anthropologists and historians (I know more than a few), I've never heard of anyone finding evidence of a human society wherein homosexual behavior was absent.
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I'll address the larger question in your comment later, and show why your thinking is problematic, but this is a tangential point.

Regarding your claim that you have never heard of society that did not have homosexuality, have any of your authors written that every single society that has existed included homosexuality? Do they offer conclusive proof?

In order for someone to prove that, they would need to compile a list of every single society that has existed --which first of all is impossible. But they could compile a list of every society that has been discovered by us, which wouldn't be conclusive proof, but better than just listing a few groups. Then they would have to demonstrate there is clear proof for every single one of them that homosexuality existed. One society that does not show homosexuality would demonstrate the dogma is false. Furthermore, a society that does not offer proof is a possibility that there lies a proof that the dogma is false.

I wager no credible author has ever been able to pull together such a list.

I also have seen several homo-obsessed authors, who think in dogmatic ways like yourself and do a hoax of a social science. They see two female ornaments in a tomb and then exclaim, "We have found clear evidence there was homosexuality is this society."

I would also be curious to know, in every society where there is more than the fanatical idiotic claims to homosexuality like the ones above, what data exists about rape, adultery, incest, prostitution, harassment, slavery, women's subordination, domestic violence.

The second point, which is also important, is that this question of whether something is universal is an instrument of legitimization and normalization, equal to the question of violence in human societies. There are many people who will categorically affirm that every human society is partially violent, and that it is impossible for humans as a society not to be violent. What these people are trying to do from an ideological perspective is to legitimize violence in society as unchanging and intrinsic, therefore it should be expected, tolerated, and considered "normal." Furthermore, the idea that is transmitted is one of submission to the problem, "there is nothing you can really do about it, because it will always happen."

It is what you are trying to do with the question of homosexuality here.

Regarding violence, no one knows for certain if every human society has been violent, in fact, there are authors that offer interesting proof that this is a state in dysfunctional societies like ours, but not intrinsic to the human species.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.01.06 - 7:47 am | #

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A,

Since you are making two distinct points here, I'll address them separately.

1. The statement that "all societies contain homosexuals" is a falsifiable statement. It would be falsified by finding a society that did not. This is no different than falsifying the statement that "all sheep are white" by finding a black sheep.

It is a basic rule of science that any assertion be falisiable. If there is no way to imagine evidence that could prove a statement false, then there's no basis for accepting it as truth.

That being said, there is such a thing as a reasonable vs. an unreasonable burden of proof. Do I need to land a spaceship on Pluto to know it exerts a gravitational pull like, Earth, Mars, the Sun, and every other object in the cosmos? Why must I prove that every society included homosexuals, any more than I must prove that every society included people with ten fingers? Just think of all those finger-less skeletons we've dug up!

I fail to see why you find my statements "dogmatic." In the societies I mentioned, the evidence is exhaustive. Ancient greek philosophers like Plato wrote extensively about homosexual love - in the Symposium one character even proposes an all-gay "army of lovers." I'm not making this up, it's there, in the text. Read it yourself. Renaissence artists like Da Vinci, Caravaggio, and Michaelangelo were known homosexuals. The latter even used young male models for female figures in painting and sculpture, including all the female figures in the Sistene Chapel (he just painted breasts on 'em). We know this because he and his contemporaries wrote about it. Even Sister Wendy talks about this - it's hardly a conspiracy by leftists to re-write history.

Many native American tribes held same-sex marriages. This has been known for centuries and you can read about it in centuries of scholarship, or even in the direct testimony of those societies themselves. Nobody is "inventing" this stuff.

2. Universality does not make it legitimate. Agreed. What makes something legitimate? What is your standard? If you believe that, in a free society, adult men and women have the right to involve themselves with other men and women as they choose, so long as the arrangement is free of coercion or force, then what makes homosexuality illegitimate? We are adults - free human beings responsible for our own happiness - not reproduction machines.

You continually portray homosexuality as something that only occurs in coercive or abusive situations - children being molested or raped, and so forth. This is what strikes me as being terribly ignorant. While some of your criticisms of assumptions made by the mainstream left are valid - you commit the same fallacies yourself in a different form. Do you really believe that all homosexuals are sex predators?

Another thing you're doing is attributing arguments to "liberals" that are never actually made. No one has said that homose
Andrew S Taylor | Homepage | 11.01.06 - 5:46 pm | #

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Got cut off...no one has said that homosexuals are blameless.

But your silliest straw man is the "sexual orientation" label. No one speaks of a "feet orientation" or a "dog orientation" because no one equaltes this with homosexuality. Why do you? The only thing that they have in common is that they are "not heterosexual." It's like saying that a black sheep and a tomato are the same because neither is a white sheep.
Andrew S Taylor | Homepage | 11.01.06 - 5:52 pm | #

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I'll reply later to why the justification for your dogmatic homosexuality claim above is false.

"You continually portray homosexuality as something that only occurs in coercive or abusive situations - children being molested or raped, and so forth. "

Strawman. Malicious insertion of the word ONLY above. It is you that continuously tries to portray my thinking with this negative stereotype.

I am writing a reply to this.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.02.06 - 3:32 am | #

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You can continue to list your straw mans, because there are some I will want to address in my post. Others are too logically bankrupt and a waste of time to respond to.

"What I'm not getting is how you can go from this, to your statement equating homosexual attraction with pedophelia, bestiality, and other dangerous fetishes."

Straw man. (as in the comment above - you purposefully took out the mention of diaper orientation and distorted the comparison into a "dangerous fetish" comparison)

'Human sexuality is not just about "function". This may be true of animal sexuality (reptilian instinct, as you put it) but animals are very non-discriminate with their "instincts."'

Diversion. What is the primordial function of human sexuality?

'Or, even better, the contrapositive - that one may also enculturate positive expressions in the homosexual as well as in the heterosexual.' plus 'If you believe that, in a free society, adult men and women have the right to involve themselves with other men and women as they choose, so long as the arrangement is free of coercion or force, then what makes homosexuality illegitimate?'

Because the main point that I am addressing is how legitimizing homosexuality is part of a larger system of sexual violence, and the maintenance and denial of this system – of which you are a part of.

"Human beings, unlike animals, have much more complicated - and noble - aspirations for their sexual drives, including notions of beauty, love, familiy, spirituality, etc."

False. Sexual drives do not produce love, etc. If the drive produced love, there would not be sexual violence, because every product of sexual drive would be loving. It is the capacity to love that permits a human being to have a loving sexual behavior, not the other way around.

"Pedophelia - which may just as easily be hetero as homo - stems from a severe emotional dysfunction, involving fears of adulthood and powerlessness, almost always the result of childhood abuse."

False. It is not almost always the result of childhood abuse. However, what is true is that pedophilia, like homosexuality, like bestiality, is caused by complex cultural and developmental factors and not by genes. And they are all dysfunctional.

"Why must I prove that every society included homosexuals, any more than I must prove that every society included people with ten fingers?"

Because you are making a universality claim, equating homosexuality to an intrinsic biological human characteristic like having 10 fingers. If homosexuality were equal to having 10 fingers, then every human being would be a homosexual. But in fact, having 5 fingers on each hand can be more appropriately an analogy to heterosexuality. Humans who have 6 or 3 or other than 5 fingers on each hand have a deformed and dysfunctional hand. Which would be a good analogy to homosexuality, actually. And although we could probably find a deformed hand somewhere in the lineage of ev
alessandra | Homepage | 11.03.06 - 1:44 pm | #

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... And although we could probably find a deformed hand somewhere in the lineage of every society, it would still be a dysfunctional characteristic.

"What makes something legitimate? What is your standard? "

For one, if it's part of system of sexual violence, it's not legitimate.

"You don't seem to allow for the fact that most homosexuals - like most heterosexuals - prefer other adults, and seek responsible adult relationships in which love, commitment, family, etc. are concerns just as they are in hetero relationships."

Straw man. Most adults are not responsible regarding sexuality (on an individual or society level) or we would not have an epidemic of numerous forms of sexual exploitation, harassment, and violence. Your systematic attempts to divert attention from how much modern sexuality is dysfunctional and harmful are part of the cultural maintenance of a larger system of sexual violence, through diversion, trivialization, and denial.

"You continually portray homosexuality as something that only occurs in coercive or abusive situations - children being molested or raped, and so forth."

Straw man.

"The only thing that they have in common is that they are "not heterosexual."

Totally false. They have tons of things in common, and that includes endless things in common with homosexuality.

"No one has said that homosexuals are blameless.

Totally false. When a pro-homo liberal slime like Elais categorically states that homosexuals never perpetrate harassment or violence against heterosexuals, and there are a lot of liberals who are into these denial of homosexual violence lines, it is very serious.

"Why are lesbians tough, and gay men more effeminate?"

I take it that is your case?
alessandra | Homepage | 11.03.06 - 1:45 pm | #

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If things worked according to your views youde be splayed out in a ditch doing nothing but serciving ever man who came your way in an attempt to get pregnant. Sex is afterall nothing but a primordial urge/need for reproduction right; theres not a single higher emotion at work in the concept of sex, nor does sex play any role in the formation of romantic ideals correct?

Id like you to imagine being attracted to a member of the same sex, assuming you are heterosexual. Imagine being held by, kissed, etc. Now, youre probably repulsed or at least feel no attraction to this concept. This is the exact some situation for a homosexual regarding a member of the opposite sex.

Homosexuality was removed from the list of psychological disorders for a reason.

Also, if you respond do so as one statement, instead of dissecting the entire post and repeating it.
Alba | 11.03.06 - 6:33 pm | #

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Apologies for my spelling errors, I should have read myself a bit more prior to hitting publish.
Alba | 11.03.06 - 6:37 pm | #

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Ah, I think I see your strategy of argumentation now. By stating "straw man" after each quote, you don't have to rebut them. Very clever!

So then, here's your main thesis:

"Because the main point that I am addressing is how legitimizing homosexuality is part of a larger system of sexual violence, and the maintenance and denial of this system – of which you are a part of."

So you are, in fact, equating my pro-gay stance with a pro-violence stance, right? You told me that this was a "straw man" earlier, yet it IS the argument you are making - if I support sexual liberty, I'm empowering child molesters and spouse beaters.

Before I point out a gaping hole in the logic of your views on this matter, allow me to show where you misread my statements:

You said:"Sexual drives do not produce love, etc. If the drive produced love, there would not be sexual violence, because every product of sexual drive would be loving. It is the capacity to love that permits a human being to have a loving sexual behavior, not the other way around."

I did NOT say that sexual desire produced love. I said that humans have ASPIRATIONS FOR their sexual desires - i.e., putting them to a higher use than momentary gratification.

"It is the capacity to love that permits a human being to have a loving sexual behavior, not the other way around."

This is exactly the argument I would make in favor of gay rights.

"homosexuality...is caused by complex cultural and developmental factors and not by genes."

Scientific studies are continualy suggesting the opposite - as in the birth order study which found that homosexuality can be traced to conditions in the womb (link below):

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/ art...2244075,00.html

I read all the major science publications on a regular basis, including NYT, BBC news, Scientfic American, etc. - study after study points to homosexuality as a pre-determined state, not an aberration of childhood development.
Andrew S Taylor | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 12:33 am | #

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"Your systematic attempts to divert attention from how much modern sexuality is dysfunctional and harmful are part of the cultural maintenance of a larger system of sexual violence, through diversion, trivialization, and denial."

I might just as easily say that you trivialize sexual violence by equating it with the harmless fun had by adults. By lumping everything into a "system", you erase the distinction between consent and non-consent - no distinction could be more crucial in a freedom-loving society. You also, by extension, make EVERYONE but those as pure as thyself responsible for the actions of people like Foley. How is my sex life responsible for his? Or anyone else? The man made a choice (not of his "orientation", but the expression thereof). He made the wrong one. That's HIS damn fault, and NOT mine or anyone else's. You can't make "society" responsible for the actions of an individual unless you're prepared to say that Foley is a "victim" of society. I humbly submit that we are grown adults, and that we don't get to blame "the system" when we do wrong by others.

But, here's my big question...how does a same-sex relationship between two adults produce violence between OTHER people? You've yet to demonstrate a meaningful connection here. What is this "system"? Do you mean...having the freedom to make our own decisions? To chose our lovers? The priests who abused children did not have that freedom. They were not permitted any fulfilling sexual relationships as adults, and this repression poisoned their moral judgement...oh,wait, you think the church and the republican party are all pro-gay libertarians, don't you? I begin to see the hopelessness of my task here.

Question - do you actually believe that all this activity - abuse, homosexuality, etc., did NOT occur fifty or one-hundred years ago? Or five-hundred? Do you believe that this stuff is RECENT?? Remember, the people claiming abuse by priests are recounting events from their childhood, in some cases thirty or forty years in the past. This stuff is as old as the church. That's the nature of repression.
Andrew S Taylor | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 1:05 am | #

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If things worked according to your views youde be splayed out in a ditch doing nothing but serciving ever man who came your way in an attempt to get pregnant. Sex is afterall nothing but a primordial urge/need for reproduction right; theres not a single higher emotion at work in the concept of sex, nor does sex play any role in the formation of romantic ideals correct?
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Straw man.

You didn't answer the question: What is the primordial function of human sexuality?
alessandra | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 5:02 am | #

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AS:"What I'm not getting is how you can go from this, to your statement equating homosexual attraction with pedophelia, bestiality, and other dangerous fetishes."

Alessa:Straw man. (as in the comment above - you purposefully took out the mention of diaper orientation and distorted the comparison into a "dangerous fetish" comparison)
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AS: Ah, I think I see your strategy of argumentation now. By stating "straw man" after each quote, you don't have to rebut them. Very clever!
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Alessa:That's right. If you want to argue what I write, and you have a valid argument, it is even worth a response. If you want to distort what I write into a stupid version, I won't waste time correcting your distortions every single time.

You can start by correcting the straw man above (bogus "dangerous" equation) and arguing the original point - that is, if you have any arguments.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 5:07 am | #

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Homosexuality was removed from the list of psychological disorders for a reason.
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Yes, the same main reasons why they took out pedophilia. It is part of our current system of legitimizing sexual violence.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 5:11 am | #

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Id like you to imagine being attracted to a member of the same sex, assuming you are heterosexual. Imagine being held by, kissed, etc. Now, youre probably repulsed or at least feel no attraction to this concept. This is the exact some situation for a homosexual regarding a member of the opposite sex.
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What a stupid comment. What exactly is your point?

There are people who are repulsed by having sex with animals, or feel indifferent, and there are those people who yearn for it, that is, they have an animal sexual orientation.

And? What of it?

There are homosexuals who get turned on by raping boys, there are those who sexually harass youngsters, those who like sadistic practices with homo prostitutes. And there are those who don't.

I'd like you to imagine what the mind of a sexually predatory lesbian is like, the kind that likes to sexually harass other women and then play a homosexual victim card. I'd like you to imagine what Foley's mind is like. I'd like you to imagine what Paul Shanley's mind is like. Then I'd like you to imagine why they were able to get away with homosexual predatory and harmful behavior for so long.

Maybe your attitudes and actions lie in the answer.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 5:27 am | #

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"Your systematic attempts to divert attention from how much modern sexuality is dysfunctional and harmful are part of the cultural maintenance of a larger system of sexual violence, through diversion, trivialization, and denial."

I might just as easily say that you trivialize sexual violence by equating it with the harmless fun had by adults.
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Straw man. I don't equate the two.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 5:29 am | #

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Also, if you respond do so as one statement, instead of dissecting the entire post and repeating it.
Alba | 11.03.06 - 6:33 pm | #
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I suggest you go get help to put it all together for you - a little on the slow side, aren't we?
alessandra | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 5:36 am | #

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By lumping everything into a "system", you erase the distinction between consent and non-consent - no distinction could be more crucial in a freedom-loving society.
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I don't erase the distinction, but it's part of this system nevertheless.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 5:38 am | #

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You also, by extension, make EVERYONE but those as pure as thyself responsible for the actions of people like Foley. How is my sex life responsible for his? Or anyone else?
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Wrong. We all have different types and levels of responsibility regarding the current system of sexual violence in society. The question is not how your sex life is responsible for this, but how are your attitudes and values, and consequently your actions and inactions responsible for this? And the same question goes for everyone in society, including myself.

You've given several examples of how your pro-homosexual ideology contributes to maintaining homosexual violence in society. You spend time and energy here arguing about sexual orientation, but I wager you have never made a single comment pushing for more investigation and prosecution to be made regarding homosexuals who may be harassful, predatory, or abusive. Post any past comment of yours in this respect and prove me wrong, if you can. Everything you say is to the effect of trivializing homosexual violence/harm and erasing it from consciousness. I wager you are just an egotistical irresponsible homo, who supports numerous processes of sexual exploitation and violence, either by indifference, inaction, collusion, or direct participation in cover-ups, whether in discourse or real life.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 5:52 am | #

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I read all the major science publications on a regular basis, including NYT, BBC news, Scientfic American, etc. - study after study points to homosexuality as a pre-determined state, not an aberration of childhood development.
Andrew S Taylor
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Well, no wonder you know so little about human psychology. The NYT, the BBC, USA Today, ABC news are psychobabble, not science. Little soundbytes of propaganda designed to fulfill the tiny minds of their naive viewers.

You still haven't addressed the question of a diaper orientation or a foot orientation. What causes a human being to have this? Is there a gene?

And since you agree that pedophilia is not caused by genes (although your other statements about its causes are wrong), you still haven't addressed why several human experiences can fundamentally change a person's brain and psychology to the point of sexually desiring children and why the same or other experiences cannot change the axis for hetero or homo orientation.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 6:00 am | #

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((Question - do you actually believe that all this activity - abuse, homosexuality, etc., did NOT occur fifty or one-hundred years ago? Or five-hundred? Do you believe that this stuff is RECENT?? ))
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No, I believe it has been ongoing.

((Remember, the people claiming abuse by priests are recounting events from their childhood, in some cases thirty or forty years in the past. This stuff is as old as the church. That's the nature of repression.))
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I would like a clarification on your homosexual abuse theory.

Are you stating that the unacceptance of homosexuality as normal by homosexuals and by society causes homosexuals to abuse minors in significant numbers? Or is it the combination of homo priests that normalize their homosexuality in an environment of unacceptance of homosexuality that caused the homo priests to abuse minors?
alessandra | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 7:45 am | #

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Apologies for my spelling errors, I should have read myself a bit more prior to hitting publish.
Alba | 11.03.06 - 6:37 pm | #
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Oh, and if you didn't get enough of a hint in my reply regarding your ignorant obnoxiousness above, the problem with your comments is not in the spelling, but in the tone and the content. Either improve both the next time you post a comment, or you can try another blog, because mine wasn't made for your mental and emotional litter.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 7:56 am | #

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I did NOT say that sexual desire produced love. I said that humans have ASPIRATIONS FOR their sexual desires - i.e., putting them to a higher use than momentary gratification.

(clarified.)

"It is the capacity to love that permits a human being to have a loving sexual behavior, not the other way around."

This is exactly the argument I would make in favor of gay rights.
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Which is exactly the same argument that NAMBLA puts forth regarding man-boy "love." So does the APA by the way.

If you are incapable of loving a woman in a healthy way, you'll redirect all that interest somewhere else.

You also haven't addressed the "same as us - only when convenient " question. Do you think homosexuals are just like heterosexuals in every respect except they desire same-sex people?

Regarding your homo gene dogma, is there a gene for bisexuality?
alessandra | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 8:09 am | #

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I'll lay out my position - a perpetrator of sexual violence or abuse should be persecuted to the full extent of the law, and should receive society's condemnation, whether they were hetero or homo. This is not just my opionion - it holds up for most of the gay community as I know it (and I do know it very extensively although - contrary to your assertion - I am not myself gay, but, in fact, a married heterosexual).

NAMBLA might hold a different view, but I know for a fact that NAMBLA does not represent the views of most gays. In fact, most gays find NAMBLA to be sick and creepy. Most of the gays I know are in long-term relationships with men or women their own age - just like heteros. They buy houses in the suburbs and want a normal life. Their reaction to people like Foley et.al. is not to protect them because they're gay, but to expose and persecute them by the same standard we would heteros. YOU, I'm afraid, are the one guilty of erected straw men with your whole gay mafia stereotype.
Andrew S Taylor | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 3:13 pm | #

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"You didn't answer the question: What is the primordial function of human sexuality?"

The question is not properly framed. The human sex drive allows us to reproduce. But "sexuality" is a product of our advanced minds, not just our glands. Animals do not have "sexuality" because they are not self-aware, and do not have culture and society.

If you believe that "functionality" is the only moral guide to sexual behavior, then why should pleasure of any kind be moral? You would reduce the sex-act to a chore of argiculture - ploughing a field and planting a seed - devoid of all the functionless-yet-pleasing acts like say....kissing.

Humans express love and affection. It is COERCION or FORCE that does harm. We assume - correctly - that children cannot choose properly, and so we naturally regard any sex acts with children as abuse - as we should. The "orientation" is irrelevant - abuse is abuse, coercion is coercion.

But what two consenting adults do is their own business.

Can you give even one specific example of how being pro-gay means that one implicitly supports sexual violence?
Andrew S Taylor | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 3:24 pm | #

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"You still haven't addressed the question of a diaper orientation or a foot orientation. What causes a human being to have this? Is there a gene?"

There can be no gene for these specific behaviors, but there could conceivably be a gene that predisposes one to fetish-behavior in a general way - as an emotional stance (perhaps similar to OCD). I don't know. That's still an open question, scientifically. Why must there be one cause? In one person, it could be developmental, in another a manifestation of a genetic tendency, and in a third a combination thereof.

What matters, though, it how someone deals with these urges. If they find someone who shares them, then fine. If they want to "cure" them by seeing a shrink, also fine. If they force another person to indulge in them, then they are violent criminals, and should be prosecuted.
Andrew S Taylor | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 3:30 pm | #

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"you still haven't addressed why several human experiences can fundamentally change a person's brain and psychology to the point of sexually desiring children and why the same or other experiences cannot change the axis for hetero or homo orientation."

We develop sexual urges when we are still children (i.e, 10 or 11 or so), and the first objects of attraction are other people our own age. If we fail to mature emotionally as we grow older due to other emotional shortcomings, we might become sexually attached to childhood associations (and hence, children). Also, if we were abused as children, we might seek to overcome that sense of powerlessness by becoming the perpetrator as adults. This process works the same for heteros and homos - the "orentiation" is irrelvant to the development of sexual maturity.

Can an experience turn a hetero into a homo? Or vice-versa? Sure! Just visit any prison full of violent criminals. "Institutional homosexuality" is a real phenomenon. Sexual attraction is VERY mutable - and there may be some sound evolutionary reasons for why it should be. But this does not rule out the fact of genetic predispositions. The fact that straight men can turn to gay sex in prison does not mean that they weren't born straight. They fact that a gay man can also be turned "straight" by institutional force - by church groups for "reforming" gays, for instance - does not mean that they weren't born gay. I'm sure you can see the logic of this.

The problem is that you assume homosexuality is a "dysfunction" in the first place. It may, in fact, be a natural and necessary consequence of the fact that GENDER is developed in the womb long after conception - the same "primordial" organs can become male or femal based on a few chemical cues. Men have nipples, after all.

Please read the birth-order study I linked to above.
Andrew S Taylor | Homepage | 11.04.06 - 3:48 pm | #

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http://home.messiah.edu/~chase/h...enera/ twins.htm

http://www.religioustolerance.or...g/ hom_caus3.htm

http://www.worldpolicy.org/globa...ient/ twins.html
qkl | 11.04.06 - 9:45 pm | #

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I'll lay out my position - a perpetrator of sexual violence or abuse should be persecuted to the full extent of the law, and should receive society's condemnation, whether they were hetero or homo.
===========================
Your position is dishonest because it is impossible to persecute harassers, exploiters, and abusers if there is no mass investigation, mass prosecution, no appropriate laws, no funding, no educational programs, no environment to support victims to do so. This is the current state of sexual exploitation and violence in society and all your discourse actions have as a result the maintenance of this system of sexual violence.

In fact, your position is criminal in the sense that you are waiting for the crime to happen to then "prosecute it to the full extent of the law." Have you ever written anything to push for a mass investigation? No. If there are million of sexual exploitation and abuse cases, we have a mass epidemic, we have a profoundly dysfunctional society regarding sexuality. Your discourse actions only serve to perpetuate it and neglect it, not to expose it and change it. Furthermore, your claim that this is a free society is a fraud, because freedom is not synonym to sexual harassment and torture. And yet, it is this monstrously violent society with millions of victims that you call "free." What a diseased mind, what an egotistically diseased mind, you need to have to call this society "free." Your view is the apex of neglect to the question of sexual violence in society.

I wrote above:
"You spend time and energy here arguing about sexual orientation, but I wager you have never made a single comment pushing for more investigation and prosecution to be made regarding homosexuals who may be harassful, predatory, or abusive. Post any past comment of yours in this respect and prove me wrong, if you can. Everything you say is to the effect of trivializing homosexual violence/harm and erasing it from consciousness. I wager you are just an egotistical irresponsible homo, who supports numerous processes of sexual exploitation and violence, either by indifference, inaction, collusion, or direct participation in cover-ups, whether in discourse or real life."

You have nothing to show for yourself that contradicts what I have stated above. Thank you for proving me right.

Another problem is that the "full extent of the law" is often a slap in the wrist for several types of sexual aggression and denigration. What are you doing about this? Nothing. Have you ever written anything to change this? No.

To how many groups that are working to combat prostitution do you give money to?

None, because your attitudes and values support sexual exploitation and denigration of human beings.

I think your discourse actions and your behaviors are the real clue to what a fraud you are in regard to the problem of sexual violence and dysfunction in society.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.06.06 - 9:12 am | #

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AT: "It is the capacity to love that permits a human being to have a loving sexual behavior, not the other way around."

This is exactly the argument I would make in favor of gay rights.
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Alessa: Which is exactly the same argument that NAMBLA puts forth regarding man-boy "love."
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My reference to NAMBLA was referring to their exact same discourse strategy to legitimize their dysfunctional sexuality.

The NAMBLA political and ideological charter is a long list of *noble* aspirations, just as you put forth for normalizing homosexuality.

The interesting thing about NAMBLA is that it shows that sexually dysfunctional people can a) be in total denial about their dysfunction, b) insist that society adopt their dysfunctional view of sexuality, c) spend time and energy trying to change society to their perspective, instead of fixing their own sexuality dysfunctions. Complete intersection with yourself and your pro-homo views.

So, you are quite wrong that you don't have a lot to do with NAMBLA, and as I wrote here (http://alessandrab.blogspot.com/2006/10/studds- first-open-nambla-c_116126831308333883.html), your views and those of other pro-homos do intersect a lot more too, even though on a discourse level, evidently, you won't admit it. NAMBLA exists - what have you done about it? Nothing.

Your liberal sexuality views and actions are therefore just one more example of a system of violence encouched in a discourse of noble ideals, something that is almost a rule for all systems of violence. The Nazis are also a good example. Even though you have shown yourself incapable of grasping what I have written about Hitler, if one examines how he came to power, it is evident that it was because he was extremely capable of articulating a set of very noble ideals, which really hid a monstrous social system.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.06.06 - 9:27 am | #

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Their reaction to people like Foley et.al. is not to protect them because they're gay, but to expose and persecute them by the same standard we would heteros. YOU, I'm afraid, are the one guilty of erected straw men with your whole gay mafia stereotype.
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It will be interesting to see what happens to Foley. My wager is that I'll have one more example of how collusive with homosexual exploitation pro-homos are.

Why do you think Foley should be prosecuted?
alessandra | Homepage | 11.06.06 - 9:35 am | #

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"You didn't answer the question: What is the primordial function of human sexuality?"

The question is not properly framed. The human sex drive allows us to reproduce. But "sexuality" is a product of our advanced minds, not just our glands. Animals do not have "sexuality" because they are not self-aware, and do not have culture and society.

If you believe that "functionality" is the only moral guide to sexual behavior, then why should pleasure of any kind be moral?
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Straw man. I wrote "primordial function," not the *only* function. This is a very important distinction.

If an adult man is only capable of having sex with watermelons, he is dysfunctional from an adult sexuality perspective. His incapability to have a healthy sexual relationship with a woman is a result of a mountain of psycho-emotional problems. Same with a guy who can only have sex with sheep, or kids, or other men. They can spend their lives legitimizing their dysfunction or they can try to fix it. Same with society.

And when we have the above intersect with a full-blown system of sexual violence, then the pro-homo position is a terrible one for many reasons outlined in my blog and in this exchange.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.06.06 - 9:45 am | #

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Responding to qkl's science article posts:

The information in those three links actually reinforces the point I was making by linking the BBC article. Read carefully! I did not say it was 100% genetic. I said that the evidence suggested that it could be traced to CONDITIONS IN THE WOMB. See the difference? Those studies you linked fit in perfectly with that thesis. This, coupled with a genetic tendency (not an absolute determinent) could explain the whole thing.


From a Boston.com article:

"As identical twins, Patrick and Thomas began as genetic clones. From the moment they came out of their mother's womb, their environment was about as close to identical as possible - being fed, changed, and plopped into their car seats the same way, having similar relationships with the same nurturing father and mother. Yet before either boy could talk, one showed highly feminine traits while the other appeared to be "all boy," as the moms at the playgrounds say with apologetic shrugs.

"That my sons were different the second they were born, there is no question about it," says the twins' mother."
Andrew S Taylor | Homepage | 11.06.06 - 1:20 pm | #

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Alessandra said:

"In fact, your position is criminal in the sense that you are waiting for the crime to happen to then "prosecute it to the full extent of the law." Have you ever written anything to push for a mass investigation? No.[....]What a diseased mind, what an egotistically diseased mind, you need to have to call this society "free." Your view is the apex of neglect to the question of sexual violence in society."

"Waiting for the crime" is how is works here, lady. I'm sorry, but that's the price of freedom - innocent until proven guilty. Move to North Korea if you don't like it.

You know, it's interesting. The stongest word I've used against you this whole time has been "ignorant." And yet you, from the very beginning, have used abusive language, calling me "sick, diseased, selfish, egosistical." I have tried to be polite - you continue to be insulting and infantile. Well, I'm done trying to show you respect.

It's interesting, too, that you should bring up Hitler. You have a lot in common with him. Like Hitler, you seem to advocate "mass investigations" of private citizens, whether or not there is evidence of a crime. Are you arguing that people should be presumed be guilty by implication? Because they belong to a group you don't approve of? I'm complicit in sexual violence because I won't support one of your pogroms? You are, in every way, an enemy of a free society.

Contrary to your assertion, we already have countless support networks and resources for victims of sexual violence, as well as measures like Megan's Law.

You cannot pre-emptively prevent crime to the extent you'd like without tearing up the Bill of Rights - which I'm sure your fascist little mind would love.

Btw, Hitler did not "hide" his wishes to purge society of gays, Jews, gypsies, and all other "deviants". He may have hid the methods, but not the agenda. The agenda is one of the prime reasons for his rise to power. Interesting you should find his goals "noble."
Andrew S Taylor | Homepage | 11.06.06 - 1:40 pm | #

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You have had plenty of time by now to enagage in something resembling a rational argument. You could have rebutted my arguments reasonably, without the abuse, or examined the logic of the article I linked to. You totally missed my point about "universals" - because you clearly don't understand how science works.

Your tactic all along has been this: obfuscation. You keep insisting that homosexuality is a "dysfunction" without making one argument as to WHY is it like some object fetish. I have come at this point from several different directions. You have ignored all the points, and simply repeated the same accusaion - "men and dogs and kids and diapers: it's all the same!"

If you think all of the science I've quoted is "pyschobabble" then say WHY. Refute the science with a scientific argument! Well, you can't. Your mind doesn't go there.

I can see I really overestimated you. You seem literate - I assumed you were an adult, that you could think, and were capable of some intellectual nuance. My mistake. You are a frightened little fascist child.

If you really cared about victims of sexual violence, you would not blame them for their plight. Some very close friends of mine have been raped. Apparently, it's their fault for being liberals! Well, you should be happy us pro-homo liberals are getting why we deserve. Yes, there's a lot of love and support coming from Alessandra for those have been hurt.

Seriously, I hope you are not in a position wherein you counsel victims of rape or abuse. You would only compound their misery.
Andrew S Taylor | Homepage | 11.06.06 - 1:54 pm | #

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"Waiting for the crime" is how is works here, lady. I'm sorry, but that's the price of freedom - innocent until proven guilty. Move to North Korea if you don't like it.
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False. This is ridiculously false, in fact. Do the FBI and the CIA wait for all crimes to happen to then take action? Take the case of terrorism - are they investigating people before they strike - or are they waiting for the attackers to attack and then "prosecute them to the full extent of the law"? Do you condemn them as North Korea-type agencies?

How are you going to know who is a harasser or abuser if you don't investigate on a mass level? We know for a fact that these aggressions are happening on a mass level in the private sphere. Someone who advocates that the state should not protect people from sexual aggression before it happens has a criminal mind. Contrary to your claim, every single stastistics available on number of victims versus number of prosecutions show that there is a gigantic disparity between the total of victims and the total of perpetrators who are prosecuted. The majority of abusers are NEVER prosecuted, not to mention sentenced. I challenge you to show data that proves this wrong. Otherwise, your claim is false, it is a lie. You are very comfortable with a society that has tens of millions of sexual aggression victims, and where the overwhelming majority of perpetrators have total impunity, it is your kind of freedom, but it is not mine.

Your anti-investigation and anti-prevention recipe is equal to someone saying that society should just sit and wait for a bomb to fall on its head if there is clear evidence that this will likely happen, albeit we can't know exactly when or where without an investigation.

"You could have rebutted my arguments reasonably, without the abuse, or examined the logic of the article I linked to. "

In fact, it is you who fail to examine my arguments rationally. A mass investigation is needed for prevention of sexual aggression and to prosecute current perpetrators. If you object to that, you are part of this criminal system. Just like corrupt CEOs who object to audits in the corporate world. Or polluters who object to mass investigations across the globe to reveal who is doing damage to the environment.

What is your objection to investigating private citizens? It is in the private sphere that the great majority of sexuality aggressions occur, it is the sphere that needs to be investigated (along with others).

I think you have attitudes and values that are highly detrimental to society, that are diametrical to freedom, and that are a part of a system of sexual violence. The fact that you want sexual violence to run rampant without investigation is a criminal and condemnable attitude. If you don't like to have this pointed out, perhaps a better course of action would be to re-examine your attitudes.

« Are you arguing that people should be presumed be guilty by implication
alessandra | Homepage | 11.07.06 - 7:03 am | #

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"Are you arguing that people should be presumed be guilty by implication? Because they belong to a group you don't approve of?"

Straw man. An investigation is not a condemnation. Why are you so afraid of an investigation? You sound a lot like polluters who don't want an investigation to happen because it will show they are guilty.

We know for a fact that there are at least hundreds of thousands of sexual abusers that are acting with impunity because there is no investigation. What is your position? Let it go rampant, do not investigate. It is a criminal stance. If there were a mass investigation the result would be that a lot of these aggressors would be discovered. Is that what you are so afraid of? Why? Maybe there are some among your friends, your family? Is that the real underlying reason for your fear of an investigation?

As to your ridiculous straw man that I would like to only investigate « certain groups ,» maybe you should read what I write before you comment. Another malicious distortion.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.07.06 - 7:06 am | #

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Btw, Hitler did not "hide" his wishes to purge society of gays, Jews, gypsies, and all other "deviants". He may have hid the methods, but not the agenda. The agenda is one of the prime reasons for his rise to power. Interesting you should find his goals "noble."
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Straw man. What a show of dishonesty.

"it is evident that it was because he was extremely capable of articulating a set of very noble ideals, which really hid a monstrous social system."

Let's show how dishonest you are. Hitler rose to power by making speeches that the German people would rise above their down-trodden and destructed state, that they would show the world they were capable, strong, noble, bla bla bla. This is a historical fact (that he did this). He extensively and effusively articulated a series of noble ideals. Another historical fact. To say that Hitler was not good in articulating ideals is a lie, we have extensive proof of this. It was partly what enabled him to climb to a leadership position. To say that stating these historical facts equals one to share Hitler's "goals" shows the most tawdry dishonesty in a debate. Stooping low, eh?

I wrote, "What his discourse hid is a monstrous social system." You have to be completely dishonest to equate the listing of historical facts with sharing Hitler's views, that is to distort my views ("monstrous social system") to equate "finding his goals noble."

Your attempt to demonize and equate my views with fascism, Hitler, etc., is therefore clearly dishonest, bearing on total absurdity.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.07.06 - 7:26 am | #

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A nice recap of how Hitler manipulated "ideals" to gain political power:
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A key element of Hitler's popular appeal was his charismatic ability to convey wounded national pride caused by the Treaty of Versailles, imposed on a defeated German Empire by the Allies. The German Empire had lost territory to France, Poland, Belgium and Denmark along with admitting sole responsibility for the war, giving up her colonies and her Navy and paying a staggering reparations bill. Since most Germans did not believe that the German Empire had started the war (and did not clearly understand until later they had been defeated) they bitterly resented the terms. The party's early attempts to garner votes by blaming these humiliations unilaterally on "international Jewry" were not successful with the electorate, but the party's propaganda wing learned quickly and began a more subtle propaganda combining anti-semitism with a spirited attack on the failures of the "Weimar system" and the parties supporting it, calling them the November Criminals.

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So are you going to insist that Hitler did not articulate ideals to gain power and to implement a monstrous social system?

Are you going to continue insisting that anyone who states these historical facts agrees with Hitler's goals? You will need to put in jail every author of basically every book about Hitler then - because by your dishonest and tawdry distortion, each and every WWII historian is now a "fascist."
Anonymous | Homepage | 11.07.06 - 7:40 am | #

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We develop sexual urges when we are still children (i.e, 10 or 11 or so), and the first objects of attraction are other people our own age.
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False. Human sexuality cannot be reduced to "urges." Our brain is impacted from the time we are born regarding sexuality, because sexuality involves relating to ourselves and others, personality development, psychological development. One could argue that it might even go earlier, before birth, but after birth is good enough for the discussion. To ignore that a person's psychology is developing from the time a baby is born is to equate humans to reptiles.

Furthermore, humans can develop dysfunctionally, "development" does not equate "healthy progress" or we wouldn't have any problems in the world.

"Objects" of attraction are not the same, they are not universal.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.07.06 - 7:55 am | #

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Andrew: (Pedophelia - which may just as easily be hetero as homo - stems from a severe emotional dysfunction, involving fears of adulthood and powerlessness, almost always the result of childhood abuse.))
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Not true. If the majority of victims are female, and the majority of the perpetrators are male, and this has held constant for several generations, the claim that pedophilia is almost always the result of past childhood abuse is false.

Otherwise the majority of perpetrators would now be female (or change gender at every generation or show a huge amount of female homosexual abuse at every other generation). This is not happening.

The claim that most abused children will go on to abuse distorts the fact that 1) there are many abused children that do not grow up to be abusers; 2) there are many abusers that have never been abused and abuse as a result of their criminal attitudes and values regarding sexuality - which are the product of environment and personal history, not genes.

This idea that abuse is predominantly a re-occurrence by the abused makes society overlook how much culture influences child abuse practices and pedophilia.

The same is true for sexual harassers, the majority of perpetrators were not victims of sexual harassment themselves. Many rapists have never been raped themselves. I'm not stating the opposite, that abuse victims never abuse, they can and do, but they are not the major component of aggression perpetrators.

Your abuse myth puts the only root of the violence problem at a past abuse experience and not the sexually violent culture present in society - which you call "freedom."

Your myth hides how much sexuality is enmeshed in an axis of power and harm - not any noble aspiration. That is the question you are not addressing, the fact that in this monstrously violent society many people have the ugliest aspirations for the sexual desires. This is your idea of freedom.

The claim that most abused children will go on to abuse is also a generalization smear on all the victims that do not abuse anyone further on in life.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.07.06 - 8:12 am | #

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You keep insisting that homosexuality is a "dysfunction" without making one argument as to WHY is it like some object fetish.
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Quite on the contrary. Several responses addressed exactly this point, including the primordial function of human sexuality, how humans can be dysfunctional regarding sexuality (veering towards any other human, animal, or inanimate object), how humans are not reptiles but suffer profound changes from the time they are born, and these changes will shape their minds regarding personal relationships, including the sexual sphere. The human mind can be deformed in every direction regarding sexuality, through a deformed development, gender is not different than all the other possible axes.

So to say that a person can have a "situational" pedophilia is one thing, which I agree can happen. But this is not correct regarding many pedophiles who have never known another state of sexuality, just like many homosexuals. Because the problem stems from a dysfunctional development over time, from possible the earliest times, deeply molding their psychological structure and not a temporary set of abnormal circumstances.

For a person who has only know a certain state of mind, if they are completely ignorant about psychology, they may *feel* like they are "born to be like this," but it doesn't make it true.

So situational sexual dysfunction is not the same as developmental sexual dysfunction, which entails a much more profound deformative molding of structures of human psychology.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.07.06 - 8:38 am | #

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...gender is not different than all the other possible axes.
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I meant gender in the sense of heterosexuality or not, same-gender attraction or opposite-gender.

Actually, a thought just occurred. It would be best to change the term "opposite gender" to "complementary gender," because this is really what it is.

Beautiful, magnificent, wondrous, life-giving heterosexual complementarity. We are not a homosexual species, we are of two sexes. Every wondrous baby is the result of heterosexuality.
alessandra | Homepage | 11.07.06 - 8:48 am | #

Alessandra increases her meager vocab with the little synonym game on the left side column. I will not have lived without knowing what pinguid means. (Actually, no big meaning - it sounds like it would yield something a little more clever :-) Great idea for an Internet little game though. Do I have to mention that I have been getting 100% correct answers almost every day? Hah :-) It's actually easier than in reading, because I usually know a couple of the words and then I just guess the rest, and with a possible definition posted, it's easier than just coming across the word by itself or in a sentence that doesn't automatically furnish you the meaning by deduction.

And accuser still insists he has more credibility than Haggard. Equally lacking is what I would say.

Haggard says he bought the meth pills but threw them away. (Again and again and again? I didn't see mentioned how many times he was supposed to have done it.)
Right. Sounds like proof he got hold of a clever lawyer.

The accuser is a homo bodybuilder prostitute. A profile for credibility, isn't it? He probably saw a nice opportunity for blackmail, even if it's the new political type of blackmail, i.e., legitimize homosexuality or I'll out you. Haggard sounds like the typical closeted bisexual slime, increasingly found in religious circles, pretending to be a nice married guy.

I think they both stink and they both lack credibility. Probably the truth lies kind in the middle of both of their stories. Without more information however, it's all guesswork.

Step Down And The Press Steps Up

Let's say you're, oh, I don't know, an evangelical preacher who has been accused of having a three-year sexual relationship with a male prostitute while using crystal meth. Media outlets aren't sure how to play the story, since no evidence, other than the word of the escort, has surfaced. What do you do?

One hint: Don't step aside. When Mike Jones told a Denver radio station about his alleged relationship with Rev. Ted Haggard, who opposes gay rights (and presumably meth use, though I'd have to confirm that), many media outlets reacted cautiously. The Denver Post ran a small story. The national media waited to see how it would play out. But when Haggard stepped down, the kind of action that offers a solid news peg, he gave the press a green light to have at the story.

In fairness, it looks like Haggard had little choice – according to the acting senior pastor at Haggard's church, "there is an admission of some guilt" from Haggard. Wrote the acting senior pastor in an e-mail to Church members: "It is important for you to know that he confessed to the overseers that some of the accusations against him are true."

As y'all know, I say, get them OUT.

If he were in the Republican party, he would have been immediately admitted to the same Foley rehab facility. His lawyer could always add an unknown alcohol addiction to the already known meth addiction, the poor thing. Not only alcohol, but meth too. Should we take out our handkerchiefs? Another victim of the bottle and the little pills made him go after a homo prostitute.

Did you come across the reported information of how much Foley's luxury resort, I mean, pederast coddling rehab facility costs per day? Minimun $1300 a DAY.

I would be happier if he had been thrown in a half-way house in a bad part of Detroit, but you know, I have that thing called scruples about how not to coddle sexual predators, it's not in vogue nowadays. I did not see a single article report who is paying for Foley's resort spree.

And Haggard's wife? Was she into it?

Maybe she can take solace here.

I had a most funny conversation with an acquaintance telling us how her husband likes to stash all his possession accumulated over decades in their bedroom.

"Honey," she would vainly try to tell him, "we now have a very big house, with lots of other rooms and storage places for all our things, no need to put them all in our room!"

No use. Hubby, if left to his own doings, will try to store everything under his pillow if possible. ;-) And they have now acquired a trailer vehicle, so maybe hubby will remodel master bedroom to make his new toy fit in their closet. ;-)

I have gone from a rather accumulating personality to a "give-it-away!" one. I love to get rid of things. I feel like I'm recycling the air, life, everything. Isn't that funny?

Maybe I should start a consulting service. "Are you afraid you have accumulated too much stuff but can't bring yourself to say goodbye to it? Useless mountains of junk cluttering every little knack of your cherished abode? Let a professional handle the matter for you. Swiftly and with unsurpassed agility, I will clean out your possessions for a very reasonable fee. Before you can say any ifs, ands, or buts - it's a-gonner!"

And I have a cold again. Today marks the one-week anniversary, with each day presenting a different symptom. Nothing really bad, but just enough to make me have one horribly sedentary week. On Monday, I thought I was pretty much OK and I went to play sports and almost died. And today, more than any other day, I just craved the entire day to have one sugar fix after another, just to get that morose feeling out of my system. But gladly, I didn't do it, just had a lovely piece of strawberry pie for dessert at lunch. I have discovered a nearby supermarket that makes wondrous pies for a bargain price every week. I feasted on a pear pie the week before last. But this week's special was a chocolate flan pie (not my taste). I like flans but not in pies, I like them by themselves or with caramel sauce. So I bought a strawberry pie, at 50% more than the bargain price, but lovely nevertheless.

I also saw at the same place they are selling a gym step. And I keep postponing buying it because I have a feeling I won't use it. I like running or cycling watching TV at the gym, but at home, it always puts me off for some reason. I am now trying to find a nice gym, but I don't even know if there are any in my area. The last one I went to see was horrible.

Listened to "Classic Twang" at accuradio all afternoon.

Hats off to O'Reilly for excoriating the success of sadistic cultural products, which are all promoted and consumed under the banner of freedom.

On this Halloween, the No. 1 movie in the USA is "Saw III," a sadistic slasher flick designed solely so its audience can enjoy graphic depictions of human suffering.

[...]

There is nothing worthwhile about seeing graphic displays of unspeakable violence. And if you enjoy that, you might want to find out why to protect yourself and others.

I recommend you listen to the audio version or read the article.