From: bruceg@access.digex.com (Bruce Garrett)
Subject: Re: Measure 9 in PBS and CBS
Organization: Express Access Online Communications, Greenbelt, MD USA
Date: Sat, 7 Nov 1992 17:58:52 GMT

   nelshou1@cicero.spc.uchicago.edu (Roger Shouse) writes:

 >> > Can a society restrict any form of consentual behavior between it's
 >> > citizens for any reason it chooses, regardless of whether or not the
 >> > acts in question actually cause harm...and endure?

 > What doe endurance have to do with anything? 

        My pardon.  I'd assumed that you, like me, desire to live in a stable,
productive society.  I'd assumed you prefer to see the society we both live in
thrive and live for generations to come.  My mistake.  Now that I know what
I'm arguing with here I won't make it again.

 >> > The point is, you appear to have chosen to engage in a practice
 >> > that brings pain and suffering into the lives of tens of thousands of
 >> > decent, honorable, innocent people for no good reason: which is
 >> > promoting the isolation of a small but legitimate segment of the human
 >> > population from society based on nothing but your own personal dislike
 >> > for the way they have sex.

 > Sorry about the pain and suffering.

        Yah.  Right.  Your sympathy's worth it's weight in gold Roger...

 > You don't like it when people speak up against your political agenda, do
 > you?

        Roger you don't have a clue about what my personal politics are, all
you know about me is that I'm a Gay man and suddenly you've bestowed me with a
POLITICAL AGENDA, and not only that but you somehow know exactly what it is in
detail.  If you'd bothered to listen in to this group for a while, or any of
the other Gay or Bisexual groups here, you might get a clue that there ain't
no HOMOSEXUAL POLITICAL AGENDA, or at any rate none that anyone can agree on
much further then the fact that we all want equal rights with the other
members of our culture.  How to get to that end, how to accommodate other
political matters that seem to coincide with it, all of these are debated
regularly (and hotly) among Gay people.

        I've seen Gay people argue fiercely with each other on other networks
over a broad range of topics from the Gulf war to gun control.  I have semi
regular arguments with several Gay guys on another network who think Hardwick
verses Bowers was Correctly decided.  Did you see the arguing going on between
the Clinton supporters and the Libertarians recently?  There is no unified
homosexual political agenda, no gay mafia, no homosexual manifesto (I recently
watched a news article on the Oregon fight where a supporter of measure nine
said she'd read the "homosexual manifesto" and no sir, she didn't like it...);
but it's a defining characteristic of bigots that they can't see beyond their
built in prejudices to the face of the individual in front of them: to a
bigot, we all look alike, and we probably all think alike.

 > Get used to it, because the louder you speak, the louder your opponents
 > will become.

        Anything you get for free is worth what you paid for it: I never
thought for a moment that equality would be free.

 > You know, it's interesting.  You guys have chosen to adopt name calling
 > as a political weapon.

        Bwahahahahaha!  He calls us abnormal.  He offers no definition of
normal behavior, he just calls us abnormal.  He compares homosexuality to
prostitution, rape, child molestation, incest, and so forth.  He offers no
grounds for this view save either His "belief" or that of unnamed others who
purportedly share his views.  When I call him a bigot, and I think there is
little doubt now that the term arguably describes him perfectly, he starts to
wh, wh, wh, whhhine that I'm calling =him= names.  Is this some kind of irony
test?

        Hey Roger...why don't =you= stop calling Gay people names?  Can't help
yourself?

 > You're definitely not going to silence anyone with it either.

        Bigots always lead with their mouths...


-Bruce Garrett

Newsgroups: alt.politics.homosexuality