Newsgroups: bit.listserv.politics
Date:         Tue, 7 Apr 1992 12:25:14 EST
From:         K=A*T <MEC038@UKCC.UKY.EDU>
Subject:      Re: Response on Homosexuality - LONG POST
              7 Apr 1992 02:51:44 CDT from <sult@MIDWAY.UCHICAGO.EDU>

From:         Jay Steven Sultan <sult@MIDWAY.UCHICAGO.EDU>

> I believe that homosexuality is a sin.  This is a religous belief.

I don't share your belief but I have no problem with you
holding it.  Let me even go one step further.  Your belief
would not even necessarily make me think any less of you
and if you were a close friend of mine you would stay one
notwithstanding your belief.

> I believe that many people have homosexual urges, just as they
> have the urge to lie, cheat, or commit adultery.  Like all those
> things, it is "wrong" when a person gives in completely to the
> temptation, and becomes a lifelong liar, cheater, or adulteror.

And I believe many people have urges to engage in heterosexual
sex, eat ice cream, eat pickles, vote, lay down on grass,......
So what is your point?

And just because you picked some bad urges and then said "Like
all these, it is "wrong" when a person........" that did not
make it a logical argument.

> These are my personal beliefs.  They are taken directly from
> the Bible.

I have no problem with this either.

You see you said almost the same thing twice, which I *think*
most people would not object to but in between these two paragraphs
you squeezed in a non-logical nonsensical paragraph.

You see most of us have no problem with your religious beliefs.
It is when you *pretend* to present non-religious arguments that
bothers us.

You can compare homosexuality to murder till hell freezes over, it
will not convince me that homosexuality is wrong.  Instead of
saying the homosexuality=murder and murder=hurting other people
why don't you just come out and say how homosexuality hurts people.
And when you do this please refrain from giving us religious
reasons, for we (at least I) have no quarrel with you religious
views.  In fact do us all a favor, and send a post solely on non-
religious basis.  In that way you cannot hide behind religious
excuse every other paragraph and squeeze in your nonsense logic
in between.  (BTW: I agree wholeheartedly with Kerry's response
to your megapost).  Either do that (write a non-religious based post)
or hold your peace forever and ever.

> So, I seperate my personal beliefs about homosexuality, which are simple,
> from my beliefs about how the law should regard homosexuals, which are
> more complicated.  The goal of the law, in my opinion, is to neither
> encourage nor prohibit homosexuality lifestyle.

Why should "the law" view homosexuality any different?

And prohibiting is done in many ways.  You don't have to prohibit
something altogether, you can do it little here, a little there.
To me giving tax break to heterosexuals and not to homosexuals is a
little prohibiting homosexuals and if you are against prohibiting
homosexuality then you should be with me advocating tax breaks
for all couple whether homosexuals or heterosexuals.

And please don't cry "but we don't want to encourage homosexuality."
Look a heterosexual murderer gets to deduct himself as tax deduction.
Are we encouraging murder?  All I am asking is equal treatment of
all citizens by "the law."

> At the same time, I think laws that "encourage" or "legitimize"
> homosexuality are wrong.  So, I do not favor granting homosexuals a legal
> marrage status like that enjoyed by hetrosexual couples.  I would
> strongly resist a law that prevented me from discriminating based
> upon sexual preference.

But will you also resist a law that prohibited you from discriminating
based on religion or national origin?  I know we have gone over this
many times but you have never been able to give any credible reason
other than your religious views.  But that is the point; your
religious views should not be dictated to others.  You know that
some moslems consider all non-moslems infidels.  Will you allow
moslems to discriminate against you because you are a christian?

And regarding granting legal status to homosexual marriages:
what about the 14th?  Unless homosexuality is illegal my common
sense tells me that we should give the same tax breaks to all
people.

> So, in sum, I think that people who engage in the homosexual lifestyle
> are giving into a sinful temptation, which is wrong and should be
> changed.  I know you don't want this, and that it is somewhat insulting
> to offer it, but I would hope that you are someday able to resist these
> sinful urges.  Until that time, I think society should be tollerant of your
> actions, but not encourage them.

Should be changed???  By whom, by what method? By persuasion
or by threat and punishment?  You see I don't see why your
sense of "we should be tolerant of you until you change" does
not translate into "OK, we give you the tax break, but we would
not let you marry in our church though we welcome you for prayer
and we pray that you would change sometime?"  It is the few tax-
break dollars that I don't understand why you want to withhold
it from homosexuals?  Why do you want to hurt them by not giving
their partners health insurance so the partner would die on the
hospital bed just because Jay did not want them to have health
insurance.  THAT is not the christian way that I know.

> Also, let me say that the views of Carl and a few others who
> have spoken against the homosexual lifestyle are not my
> views, nor are my views theirs.  Do not lump us together, as
> I disagree with Carl and some others here as well.

Now, you expect Jamie to criticize Brown but I don' recall
much of you criticizing Carl.

> This is true, although I think that a pervert male who wants sex
> with a male child is both a pervert and a homosexual.

Another vicious attempt of homosexuality=murder, and murder=
hurting others, therefore homosexuality=wrong.

Look, a pervert male who wants sex with a 10 year old girl
is both a pervert and a heterosexual, too.  So what did you
achieve here other than hurting (unnecessarily) a significant
group of people?

> Furthermore, the distinction between "healty" homosexual and a pervert
> "pediphile" homosexual is a narrow one for many people.  Sexual
> abberance is easy to lump together.  This is one reason why,
> in my mind, I combine homosexuality, beastiality, and necrophelia.
> The last two do not involve consenting adults, but that distinction
> means little to my moral beliefs.  (and the members of this list spent
> a week trying to decide if a corpse can or needs to consent  :)   )

The distinction is narrow only in narrow-minded people, and here I am
not saying whether both are sinful but whether they are identical
to the degree that people cannot see the distinction.

Again you invoke your moral beliefs.  Not many people have any
quarrel with that.  I wish you would accept my challenge of writing
a post solely based on non-religious (or not specific to one
religion) and not hide behind your religious beliefs.  Remember
many people in the US don't share YOUR religious beliefs.  So if
you want your position to have ANY credibility you MUST be able
to defend them on non-religious basis.

> There are three aspects to a marrage in society: religous, legal, and
> societal.  The religous is a personal matter of course.  Some people
> consider there to be no religous content to their marrage.  In my
> religion, a homosexual marrage is a sacrelige, like a holy commitment to
> lifelong adultry done in a church.

No problem here.

> There are some churches taht consider homosexual marrages to be OK.
> Since I believe in religous tollerance, I will not say anything
> about them, but I will tell you that I am trying to convince my
> (hetrosexual) friends who belong to such a church to leave.

Now will you also advocate your friends not to rent to homosexuals,
not to hire them, not to go pick-nick with them, not to talk with
them, not to.............?

And you say you are NOT against homosexuals, that you are not
anti-gay????

> The marrage-related rights that are legal in nature are wholly conferable
> in every state by a simple contract between the two.  Given the seriousness
> of marrage, I have little sympathy for people who consider it too
> bothersome to arrange the legal details.

Jay, you are playing dumb here (or maybe you are typing fast :-)
You know that the major issue is tax breaks and health insurance
benefits and none of those can be gained by drawing contracts, as
Kerry has already noted.

> The United Staes, as a whole, is not ready for a society where there is
> no distinction between homosexual marages and hertosexual marages.
> Furthermore, such a society is an infringement of *MY* rights.

By this account the present society is an infringement of
homosexuals' rights.  You are making our arguments, Jay.

> You want me to accept you and your rights.  I do.  But, can't you accept
> me and my rights?   One of my rights is to not participate in a system
> that supports things I find religously objectionable.  If my tax dollars
> are used to encourage, or legitimise homosexuality, you tax me for a
> purpose I find objectionable.  If you make me hire homosexuals, you remove
> my right to association.

Fair enough!  Homosexuals will (as always have) accept your right
to marry and get a tax-break.  Now it is your turn to accept their
right to marry and enjoy tax-breaks.

And my tax dollars are spend in many other ways that I find objectionable.
And I am sure homosexuals find it objectionable that their tax
dollars are used to educate children of anti-gay people like you.  THAT (i.e.
spending your tax dollars for objectionable thing) is neither new
nor good enough logic to prove your point.

> I know that these arguments have been used before, as a basis for
> continuing Seperate but Equal, for example.  The court and society
> rejected them.  I find their application here to be different.  Why?
> Substitute "adultry" for "homosexual" in your demands.  Should I be
> taxed to encourage or legitimse adulters?  Should I be forced
> to hire them?

OK, let me use this angle.  *My* religion does not allow divorce
and remarrying.  All those who have remarried are adulterers.  Now
would you agree to withhold tax break from THOSE remarried couples?
And while we are at it: will you agree with me that the government
should not legally accept remarriages???

> Can you give me a reason why there is a difference between homosexuals
> and adulters that is important.  Don't make a moral argument, as I suspect
> we have different moral structuers.  Besides, morality should not be a basis
> for law.

Kerry made the point earlier.  Adulterers are breaking some kinda
(legal) agreement but more importantly they are hurting other
people.  Who are homosexuals hurting and what laws are they
breaking?

> I disagree with the Army's rationale.  I think there is a better one.
> In the military 1) homosexuals would be the target of special violence and
> 2) their presence will reduce the functionality of the unit.

But you have already condemned violence against homosexuals.  By not
allowing homosexuals in the army, are you not encouraging the
people who are causing these violence and actually give them what
they were after in the first place?

> I am in favor of women being in the military, if they meet the exact
> same standards as men, because the actually increase the unit's capability.
> The presence of homosexuals, in 1992, would lessen their ability.  maybe
> in time, as homosexuals are more accepted, that will change.  ............

But do you think that the attitudes will change if the world was
full of Jays?  And if this was decades ago and if we were discussing
blacks, will you also say that we should move slowly until the
attitude of the whites are changed?

> Ask yourself this:  would you ask that handicaped people be allowed to
> serve?  (I know that some do, but they are in specialized areas.  I would be
> in favor of homosexuals being let into non-combat and non-field units,
> such as administration.)  The handicapped would 1) get themselves hurt
> and 2) hurt the unit.  This is too high a price to pay for some abstract
> notion of equality.  People who choose to be homosexuals have rejected that
> standard themselves.

But the analogy fails with respect to (1).  Homosexuals will not
hurt themselves.

> Should the law prohibit me from discriminating on this basis?  Once again,
> I ask you what important distinction there is between homosexuals
> and racists that would make the case for homosexuals different?

Racist are breaking laws, they are hateful people.  Homosexuals
are not breaking any laws and they do not wish any harm on anybody.

> One last point?  Would you favor a law that required an employer to hire
> and provide insurance for someone who is more probable of having
> an expensive disease?  From a financial standpoint, the higher
> occurance of AIDS among the homosexual community than among the
> hertosexual community is an issue that cannot be wished away.

But as I told you before it is widely believed that proportionately
more heterosexuals are acquiring AIDS than homosexuals are.  Will
you be for higher insurance rate for heterosexuals.

> I also see that we have not addressed the issue of violence.
> No matter, as we both agree that people who inflict violence
> on homosexuals are largely cowards and that they should be
> punished strongly.  We might disagree about what causes such violence.
> I cannot and do not believe that the things I have said here cause
> such violence and should be restricted.  Nevertheless, much of what I
> have said here is a violation of my school's speech code.

I wonder what neighborhoods do these cowards live in?  Will you
give the same advice about these cowards to your friends that
you give wrt homosexuals???

> 4) KAT, are you steriotyping AIDS as a homosexual-only disease?

No, but you are......

> Jay Steven Sultan

> "Type faster."    - Issac Asimov (?-1992), when asked what he would do if he
>                     knew he only had six months to live.

If only you would type slower and give more time to thinking.

--KAT
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