Sodom and Gomorra were neither Judged by God as wicked nor destroyed because of homosexuality

Most of my opponent’s arguments consist of nothing more than regurgitating as many verses as possible, without providing textual evidence that links his supplied scriptures to his position. And for the few times that he does attempt to provide proof, his interpretations of that evidence are more based on subjective ambiguity rather than objective empiricism. Con disagrees with my position regarding Judges 19-20, and states “Notice that they BOTH knew her AND abused her. The two terms are not used synonymously; and futher, after knowing and abusing her, she still was not dead.” He yet again tries to disprove my point without even first understanding it. When I analyzed how the word ‘know’ was used in Sodom and Gomorra, I explicitly stated that 1) the word know has been used with several different meanings in scripture, 2) that we could determine it’s meaning based on the context in which it was written in, and on the other words in the verse that give credence to its contextual meaning, and 3) that when the word know is used in direct reference to a sexual connation, then it can be seen as such. For example, Lot mentioned his daughter’s virginity, and the Benjamite man mentioned his daughter's virginity (maiden) before they offered them to the angry crowds. This shows sexual connotation. However, a hostile mob showing up to demand that a citizen bring out their male strangers, so that they can know them has shown no ‘contextual’ evidence linking it to a sexual implication. We cannot assume that just because a woman is threatened with rape, that a man too would automatically, or has automatically been subjected to the same treatment. In Judges 19:22 the men of Gibeah demanded their neighbor to bring out the Levite man so that they could know him. This was in the exact same manner that the men of Sodom demanded Lot to bring out the angels. However, in Judges 20:5, the Levite man himself tells us that the intentions of the men of Gibeah wanting to know him, was so that they could kill him. Wouldn’t the intentions of the people of Sodom and Gomorrah be more likely to parallel that of the intentions of the men of Gibeah? Or are we to believe that the intentions of the men of Sodom and Gomorra would have more likely been to commit rape against Lot’s male guests, even though there’s no evidence pointing us towards this interpretation; and even though the evidence of similar events that we ‘do’ have, point towards murder instead? Conclusions must be made on facts, not conjectures, and the fact is, that we have written in scripture, a man’s personal testimony of the vile intentions of a murderous mob, which wanted to ‘know’ him for the sole purpose of killing him. In a desperate attempt to piece together a fragmented and inconclusive argument, Con brings up Leviticus 18:22, and Ezekiel 16:49-50. He claims that the word for abomination mentioned in Ezekiel, is also the same word for abomination in Leviticus 18:22. This I agree with him on, except he fails to mention that everything in chapter 18 of Leviticus is also labeled an abomination (Leviticus 18:26). This means that a man having sex with his daughter/niece, a woman having sex with her son/nephew, having sex with your first cousins, sacrificing your children, BESTIALITY, having sex with your neighbor’s wife, etc are ALL abominations. What evidence leads us to the conclusion that Leviticus 18:22 (which is datable in its supposed condemnation of homosexuality) is the abomination that Ezekiel is talking about, as opposed to bestiality or incest? There is nothing, save for personal bias that leads someone to the conclusion that leviticus 18:22 was being referenced in Ezekiel. We do however know that Con has yet to provide a verse in which homosexuality was specifically mentioned as a sin of Sodom and Gomorra, and now we know that the intentions of the people in these cities had nothing to do with raping God’s angels, but murdering them. This leads us to the conclusion that people have been reading their own anti-homosexuality views into a story that had nothing to do with homosexuality in the first place. We also have a second story in the Bible that parallels the that of Sodom and Gomorra. In this story we learn that when a crowd of angry people show up demanding that they be allowed to know the stranger in their land, that their intentions were to murder that stranger. We also learn that these men gang raped a woman, and because of their vile behavior, God judged their city as wicked and worthy of destruction. Therefore, I conclude that Sodom and Gomorra were neither judged as wicked, nor worthy of destruction by God because of homosexuality. Furthermore, while I appreciate my opponent taking the time to debate with me, I must point out the fact that he continuously disregarded my terms for this debate. He accepted in full my definition of homosexuality, but continued to argue that a man trying to rape another man is homosexual conduct, when according to my definition, it is not. The definition I supplied was not an attempt to keep my opponent from winning this debate based on semantics, but because the definition of rape is scientifically different from the definition homosexuality (or heterosexuality for that matter). So while participating in CONSENSUAL sexual conduct with the same sex is considered homosexuality, rape or attempted rape (even when against someone of the same gender) does not constitute as homosexuality. It constitutes as rape. My opponent completely ignored this even after he openly agreed to my definition of homosexuality. That alone should be grounds for disqualification.