Saturday, January 16, 2010

Protect the Children!



Hello everyone...My last article of the week is addressing Prop 8's third point that it was enacted to "protect children". So get out your tinfoil hats to protect you from homosexual brainwaves and lets recite Prop. 8's mantra again shall we?.... "Its all about the children!"...."Its all about the children!"

This is arguably the oldest argument used against gay and lesbian people. Its purpose is to link homosexuality to pedophilia and to cast gays as villians out to destroy innocence and the fabric of American life. It is also the flimsiest of all arguments that the Prop. 8 legal defense has made thus far, in their effort to defend the ban on allowing same-sex marriage. In reality, all that Prop. 8's defense has done so far is reiterate the same thinly vieled homophobic statements that were used during the election to scare the average citizen into voting their way. Their still using the same playbook. However, their argument only has the capacity to move the average person into believing that, somehow kids are in danger, if you first hold a certain set of assumptions. Such as...


That homosexuality is communicable:

Proximity to gay people makes you gay...did you know that? Mere exposure to their ideas is enough to make you a "mo"...a homo that is.

After I came out to my mother, I remember that my she sent my younger brother a letter requesting that he kidnap me in order to get me away from the "homosexual influence" that was causing me to believe I was gay. Its sounds silly to me as I type this...but it happened. Whats worse is alot of people believe in the idea of "homosexual influence".

How this relates to the Prop. 8 case is their assertion that if same-sex marriage is allowed than more children will grow up thinking that it's o.k. to be gay and will see a same sex marriage as a viable alternative to an opposite sex one........excuse me but..../facepalm..........seriously, no child is going to grow up looking at who to marry the same way they do when considering whether to have strawberry or lime jello. To believe this is to completly ignore the fact that your born with your sexual orientation hardwired and to stubbornly cling to the "its a choice" argument. However lots of people do and ignore tons of scientific studies and even the evidence of their own eyes because that's the way they were brought up to believe.



My response to those who argue that I chose homosexuality is to challenge them to go against their own sexuality for a while. I challenge them to really do it, not a half hearted attempt, but with the same level of self annihilating desperation that most gay people feel before they come out to themselves....when we are trying desparately to deny our gayness....that kind of try.  I challenge them to see how much they get arroused kissing someone of the same sex...I challenge them to get excited about seeing that person and to imagine building a life with them. Not surprisingly, no one has taken me up on this. The point of this being, that most of the people who use the "its a choice" argument don't examine their own sexuality or fret about it the way alot of gay men and women have to in order to come to a place of acceptance.....so why in the world would you assume that children would just randomly chose it?

In addition....there are so many gay people everywhere in our society both out loud and deep in the closet. If it was merely proximity to homosexuals that made you gay then everyone would already be gay. Consider that the next time that pretty nurse without the wedding ring is giving you your flu vaccine....it just may contain gay cooties.

Homosexuals recruit and the schools are in danger:

Thank you so much Anita Bryant for this lovely rationale. Bryant said,"As a mother, I know that homosexuals cannot biologically reproduce children; therefore, they must recruit our children."

Newsflash..... even if you got rid of every single gay person on earth, more of us would be born...right into your oh so heterosexual and religious families. We don't recruit anyone and we are just like you. We want to love, build families, have satisfying careers, and exist without fearing for out safety. You will notice that I did not add "swell the ranks" to that list. Thats because it doesn't happen. I don't wake up in the morning with a directive from the gay shadow council to meet my conversion quotas or face expulsion from the order...But there are those that believe that homosexuality has a corosive quality...you know, like the dark side. "Once you start down the path of homosexuality, forever will it dominate your destiny!" While homosexuals don't recruit...certain religious organizations do. Perhaps that bears a bit more scrutiny.

Seriously parents...if your child is heterosexual, they will always be so. If they are gay, thats not likely to change either despite our best attempts to the contrary.(don't even bring up reparative therapy unless you want to really screw up your kids) No amount of convincing is going to change that fundamental trait. You might say...But what about gay teachers and schools and all those impresionable minds? Arent gay teachers teaching kids its alright to be gay? Not in any of the schools my children are attending. They have never addressed homosexuality or gay marriage....ever......and I live in a very liberal portion of California. The instances the Prop. 8 crowd used of homosexuality being taught in schools had nothing to do with teaching kids that they too could join the glorious gay revolution. What they were actually teaching was respect for others. read on...




Schools have come under major fire legally, with regards to bullying. They have been forced to come down hard on it or face liability to allowing it to continue. This I have seen in my sons school. It has become a pretty major theme. If we want to teach little Johnny that its not o.k. to throw rocks at his African-American classmate and call him names...then we have to include those who are also on the "most bullied list". That would include gender, those of different religions, different races, and sexual identies. This is a far cry from teaching them to BE these things. In essence, all they are teaching is one of Jesus's most important rules, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you". But this effort by the schools was cast as a homosexual recruitment campaign and it was recieved by a public that was primed to see teachers and judges as "activists" instead of legitmate authorities....or even human beings.

Even if something is tought in schools that we don't agree with, its our job...our responsibility as parents, to set the record straight with our kids. The schools don't teach alot of things that falls on us as parents to teach. Things like, faith, work ethics, ethnic identity, perseverance, resiliency....the list goes on. So why do you think that, just because the school would want to teach something that you disagree with, that your ability as a parent to instruct your children has been compromised? Look at all you teach them everyday without even realizing it.

However, this idea is so connected to the one above it that I tortured myself in considering whether or not to give it it's own category. I feel it deserves it because its tone is different from the one above. This one sets us apart as predators. Inhuman. The kindest interperatation casts us as having a sickness.
Like most of these arguments, they are emotional in nature, and hauling out all the facts and figures that show that the majority of pedophiles are heterosexual and that many are family members to the victims does little to change hearts and minds. All of that falls on deaf ears when danger to children is invoked. Thats what makes this such a malicious and cruel argument. Not only does it cast gays and lesbians in with some of the most reviled people in humanity...it uses children as human shields to hide the ignorance of a group of people that knows nothing about gay people....this is the single mmost damaging argument ever put forth against gay people.

Marriage is a procreative device:

When they used this one in the courtroom I almost fell off my chair. I couldn't believe they had the nuggets to use this one in front of a judge. The idea that marriage is in existance for the purpose of creating and raising children ....while noble a notion it  may be....excludes many from the heterosexual community as well. By their reasoning then infertile couples should not be allowed to marry ...nor the elderly....and if you have had any form of contraceptive surgery...kiss your marriage rights goodbye. If you have no intention of siring children, then why would you want to get married being that is what marriage is for....at least according to them it is.




I'd like for my readers to consider for a moment why social workers have begun to reach out to gays to foster and adopt children. Is it because a radical homosexual lobby pushed for it?.....no, that would never be reason enough. Is it because liberal social workers and adoption agencies are running their own social experiments?.....Hell no! Gay couples often have to fight there way through the system against anti-gay adoption workers and authorities.  and The why follows next. Ignoring California's non-discrimination laws for a moment: The reason same-sex couples are being reached out to by the adoption community is because there are more children that need homes than there are heterosexual couples to place them with. There are thousands of kids in the foster/adoption system and the sad reality is that many of them will age out without knowing any kind of permanent family. In addition, nearly every one of those kids came from heterosexual couples..often married ones.
different-sex families are superior.

"kids need a mommie and a daddy to thrive"

I used to believe this was true myself. Even up to the point that where we had Selena and Daniel, but now I can't believe that anymore. I thought that, In a perfect world, it would be great if all of us got to keep our mommies and daddies and that nothing bad would ever separate us from them. However, if it wasn't for a set of heterosexual parents. Selena and Daniel wouldn't be with us in the first place. Everyday kids are hurt and abandoned by those who they rely on to take care of them and to see them into adulthood. My husband and I know that we are never going to take the place of our kids mom...but we can be the best dads that we can be and I think thats all thats required of any of us.



To those that leave awfull comments on our Youtube channel about how screwed up our kids are going to be when they grow up.....I first count to ten to avoid reaching through the computer and popping them in the nose...then I challenge them. If its so important for a kid to be in a heterosexual family to grow up healthy, then they need to put their money where their mouth is and go foster some of the thousands of kids sitting in the system. What sex  your parents are doesn't matter...you don't even have to have two. Kids just need to have at least one parent who loves them, and gives a dam enough to be present, to give them the boundries and guidance they need. to answer their milliions of questions, to bandage the skinned knees, to go toe to toe with the schools, to give them there time and attention, to give them love. You don't have to be straight or married to do any of these things...you just have to care.

I will say again...that, growing up, I knew a few kids being raised by same-sex parents. I got to see how they grew up and what became of them and, on the whole, they grew up just like anyone else. They had the same triumphs, passages, strengths and weaknesses of kids who grew up in with straight parents.

Plus, doesn't the assertion that you have to have a mommy and a daddy to be healthy relegate children of divorced, widowed, and single-parent families into the "assumed damaged" category? That would include me and a good many of the people I knew growing up. Not many of us made it to our adult years without losing a parent somewhere along the way. As much as those events hurt, they also gave me a core of strength that helps me guide my kids through their emotions and questions regarding their birth parents. What was once loss...became a strength. To assume that any of us are broken because we didn't have two different-sex parents in the home is an arrogant argument.

I refuse to see my kids as broken because they have two dads. I KNOW that they are loved and cherished. They were not something that happened to us one drunken night, we pursued them. We chose them. They will get the best of our time, attention, and our hearts for the rest of their lives. When I watch them sleeping, my heart glows. I feel sad when I see how big they are getting and miss the tiny kids they once were....even at the same moment I am excited for all they learn and become.

So what do children need to be protected from? A world that treats them as if they are not important. They need to be protected from calousness, selfishness, and a life lived without knowing that they are truly and completely loved. Where they don't have to look at adults with fear and suspicion, hiding food under their beds so they can eat tommorow, hiding scars so their friends won't see. That is what kids need to be protected from and it has nothing to do with sexual identity.

34 comments:

  1. Keeping with the Star Wars misquote earlier, it is as if they see us as the Sith. We are seduced to the Dark Side by someone and learn from them the ways of the gay. Then we use our dark influence on the ones in the middle who haven't polarized against us using our powers of "common sense" and "scientific evidence."

    Of course the idea that we chose homosexuality is beyond ridiculous. If I had to guess, 99% of adolescents/teens that are beginning to realize they are gay would "choose" to be straight.
    If we choose to be gay, why were the gays killed in Nazi Germany and are being killed even today in some Muslim countries.

    When people against gays say "Well I don't know any gays that live where I do", thats because you either create an environment or live in a location where being openly gay isn't an option.

    On a different side I know several Christians in the Bible Belt that have mostly positive views on gays, compared to some others in the same church, because they know one or two gays or lesbians.

    As for the procreative stance and your response, I don't have much to add besides that I have a Great Aunt and Great Uncle that never had children and not because they couldn't, and they have been happily married for 20+ years.

    This stuff about needing a mom and a dad is bull. I know a guy who grew up without a dad because he just never had one in his life and he has done just great in his life. If children grew up in a neighborhood/environment (completely hypothetical) with contact only with men or only with women, I could definitely see how that could be problematic for a child's development. Children need to be exposed to both sexes preferably through family or friends, but it doesn't have to be in who raises them.

    Just because a mom and dad are present doesn't mean that this is what is best for the kids, especially if one adult if abusive to the other and/or to the kids. Like you said, these kids in foster care arrived there because of the coupling of two heterosexual people, some that are married.

    In an ideal world, kids do need to know that sometimes a man and woman love each other and other times it could be m/m or w/w.
    I didn't know what gay was until 6th grade and then thanks to MTV. Unfortunately until it is 'proven' (like thats gonna happen) that homosexuality isn't a choice, this will be viewed as indoctrination and will not be allowed and will be up to the parents to teach their kids at least that same-sex love does exist.

    I've been trying to think of a good analogy to explain coming out to a straight person without it being obvious. That way the anti-gays will have to think about it before ignoring it, since they seem to think this is when we "choose" to be gay and don't understand the struggle we have gone through to actually come out.

    Brian and Jay, you guys and your kids are awesome and I hope to have a family like yours someday. I'm keeping up with the transcripts from the trial and the Defense's arguments are pathetic. Now we just need the Supreme Court to uphold the Constitution and the 14th amendment as their job description says and not to let their personal prejudices keep America in the dark.
    I would love to move to Canada (although they prob wouldn't let me) for their marriage laws and how they use the metric system. If it just wasn't so damn cold up there because I don't usually see snow here in Atlanta. If you ignore these past two strange weeks.

    BTW I just watched Wanda Sykes stand up show on HBO and it was hilarious. She talked a good bit about being a married lesbian and a new mother and compared being black to being gay. (being gay is harder)

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  2. Great entry Bryan. I know I say that all the time but they're all awesome and thoughtful which I love.

    On homosexuality being communicable, as a gay person it's so hard for me to understand why this isn't obvious to people, but it just goes to show how important education and raising awareness is. It definitely makes me ashamed of my own closeted status, as I know I could be doing a lot more to raise awareness with those around me simply by them knowing what I really am and mere exposure to somebody like that in their heterosexually-dominated lives. I know I have been terribly ignorant of homosexuality for the majority of my life. I didn't even realize that homosexuality truly existed for real until I realized I was one.

    On homosexuals recruiting, like being communicable I have realized that even if those things were true, why would that be so bad? Even if we assumed for a moment that homosexuality COULD be transferred or was a choice, why would that be a bad thing? Sex by itself isn't bad for society or harmful to people unless other things go along with it like STDs or if it's like sex addiction, but these are heterosexual problems as well. The whole recruiting thing is so ridiculous, but I can only hope that the people making decisions are decently intelligent enough to know how stupid those arguments are. Even if homosexuals WERE recruiting though, why would this bad? It's not really any different from a political group or a church recruiting members. If homosexuality is a "lifestyle," why would it be so evil to have a lifestyle-based group recruiting children or people into their group? I'll post more but my parents are around.

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  3. Hi Brian.

    Nice post. Glad I found your blog. I already subscribe to you on YouTube and love your output.

    You and your family are doing a great job educating those individuals who are still ignorant and bigoted. The arguments these people put forth have no solid foundation, and you point that out beautifully.

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  4. I'm back to finish my comments. I don't know if you saw my long debate with a poster (nnjhansen or something) who trolls Sean Chapin's YouTube videos, but basically his entire premise relied on marriage = procreation license. Besides the oversimplistic and cold reduction of the institution to a mere license scheme, that logic is just flawed (as you've pointed out) and based on unnecessary generalizations. Unfortunately for those who aren't critical thinkers, the procreation license might be enough of a justification for somebody to believe, so I'm really hoping the people making court decisions are a lot smarter/less biased than the individuals who made decisions based on that inconsistent and hypocritical premise.

    My post is long so I'm going to make separate posts.

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  5. On children being raised by gay parents, I admit at one time I also felt that having children being raised by a m/f and their biological parents was best. But eventually I came to realize that like all generalizations, you have to look at things on a case by case basis. Having "good parents" is best, and everything else (ethnicity, gender, biological parents, adopted parents, etc.) is all secondary. If you've got a mom and dad but they suck at parenting or are downright negligent or cruel, what good is that? And even if you are comparing great biological parents, that doesn't lessen the ability or qualities of adopted parents or gay parents who may also make great parents. Still, even knowing this, it wasn't until I saw your depfox videos on YouTube that I actually saw a gay family and saw just how beautiful and awesome one could be. Theory became reality, and I saw an example right in front of my eyes. It just shows how important your efforts and visibility is to educating the public.

    I am so grateful to you guys for sharing your family. You inspire, you educate, you motivate, and so much more. Don't ever doubt your work or get discouraged. You've completely changed my outlook (or at least energized it) in regards to a variety of different topics (like my lifestyle choices, possibly coming out, possibly living a "gay lifestyle," possibly adopting, making my dream house as cool as yours, etc.)

    Being gay and also college educated I did eventually learn that what's "normal", the majority, the status quo, typical, and/or expected isn't necessarily best. Or the only way. And I can understand why most people haven't learned that. People tend to think there is 1 way or a best way or ideal way of doing things. People say the ideal situation is for a child to be raised by a man/woman. But what's really ideal? What does that mean? It's the majority situation for obvious reasons, but that hardly necessitates it being the best way or even ideal one. People just need to learn that different people/ways of doing things doesn't automatically bad, worse, or damaged. People may have expectations but those expectations are generally based on socialization from either education, those around them, etc. And as I eventually realized, we all live in highly limited environments which constrain our expectations and education for what we think is possible or optimal.

    I don't blame people for not realizing this. I didn't realize this for most of my life, and for a long time I felt "damaged" for being gay. I didn't get to live the ideal dream life I had always imagined myself to have. Most people don't have that unique perspective or have to work to find/redefine happiness like we have. It just means people need to be educated to broaden their horizons, imaginations, and expectations for what's possible. That there can be a diversity of fulfilling lives or ways of doing things. Whether that be marriage, child-raising, or lifestyle, there can be more than 1 way of doing things and they can co-exist at the same time. An alternative fulfilling option doesn't have to weaken or destroy the standard "normal" one.

    At the end of the day, people who make many of these political decisions or have strong opinions generally aren't educated on the issues. They don't even know gay families, stay distant from gay people, and just remain ignorant on a variety of topics without truly trying to understand the other side. It's why I'm so thankful of your work. One day I hope to make such a difference myself.

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  6. Homosexuality taught at schools

    This point proponents of Proposition 8 make is absolutely misleading! If schools decided to introduce some kind of sexual education, then they have to consider that heterosexuality is not the only form of human sexual behavior. So, either they must remove everything that has anything to do with sexual education (leaving parents to deal with those issues as they see fit), or sexual education must include raising awareness that there are several different types of sexual preferences that must be considered.

    And I am not talking about teaching videos that show the techniques and positions to have sex! But that’s what people think when they hear words “sexual education.” Oh, but it’s not really about that! It’s about love and commitment, it’s about being honest with yourself and understanding your feelings, it’s about not being frightened with the stigma of homosexuality. At the end of the day, it’s about treating people the way you want to be treated yourself, it’s about living free of prejudices and making your own decisions. That’s why it is important to talk about same-sex relationships with children, just like talking about opposite-sex relationships; and it’s clear that the last thing to discuss there is coitus!


    Marriage as a liability to make people stay together after an accidental pregnancy

    This argument is just insulting! Basically, they say that if two people are married and the woman gets accidentally pregnant, the fact that they are married will be very serious for them to stay together to raise this child in a family. Now, that may be a very conservative way of thinking that this is for the good of children, but this is wrong.

    If marriage is the only reason for them to stay together, it’s a sham family! If two people do not love each other enough to raise their child together without being pressured into it by the fact that they are married, then they only make themselves miserable and unhappy, they enslave themselves inside this marriage, they cut themselves off from the world where they could have find their true love — and this is a major stressor on people.

    Miserable and unhappy parents cannot have a happy family and raise a happy child! This is the fact of life! So, is it worth it to make people stay committed if it makes them unhappy? How ‘bout “the pursuit of happiness” from Declaration of Independence (that’s me lawyer-talking to those State Senators and Judges who decided that this is the reason why heterosexual marriage is superior to homosexual one)? Excuse me, but this kind of explanation only upholds limitations that make people unhappy but responsible for the well-being of the child. Who says you have to be in a marriage with the mother of that child to support them and to be a part of their life? Yes, you have financial responsibilities, but they should not come at a price of your happiness as a human being! We all have a right to love who we want, and we should not be made to stay in the family where we are not happy! But that’s what our Courts and Senate promote and use as an excuse to forbid same-sex marriage!

    On the other hand, homosexual people want to have children just as much as their heterosexual counterparts, but in this case they cannot have a child by accident, which only means that homosexual people actually really want to raise kids, without being browbeaten by the society to get married in order to have a legitimate child and give one a stable home. Is that worse than an unwanted accidental pregnancy? Would those people (who didn’t want to have a kid in the first place but were forced into it) make better parents than those who desperately wanted to have kids but couldn’t have them without special procedures? What’s better for a child — parents who didn’t want one but had to have one and raise one, or parents who couldn’t have one naturally but did everything they could to give their love to any child they could raise as their own?

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  7. Is marriage really only about procreation?

    It is naive to think that the main and only purpose of marriage is procreation. Many people have kids outside of wedlock, and this is not something that was invented 20 or so years ago, these things used to happen all the time throughout the history. For religious people marriage is an important way to legitimize their relationships and their children in the eyes of their religion first, than in the eyes of the society, and finally in the eyes of the government. But does it mean it’s the only purpose of marriage?

    In Perry v. Schwarzenegger experts showed us that marriage has many other purposes and in general serves for the good of the society. Married people, not matter whether they have kids or not, have a better health and a better standard of life (because they have a family to support, a companion to love and cherish, and they want to be healthy and wealthy to ensure the future of this relationship, to make it stronger); they also feel better about themselves being in a married relationship (because marriage is a universal way of recognizing a sexual couple as a unit of the society, it is highly praised and valued in our society); they also feel they have reached their goals to be happily married, realized their child dreams (it is important when our biggest dreams come true — it gives us a great satisfaction and a sense of achievement, also a feeling of being lucky to find a person of our dreams who shared our love to them).

    All of these things (and many more) have nothing to do with procreation per se, but is it not important for the society to have healthy, wealthy, happy people? Is it not the most important thing in our lives? What do we live for, anyway? We live to be happy and we live to make other people happy, to make the life better and better day by day! And if marriage is something that gives us this feeling, this is its major purpose, not the procreation!


    The real role of parents in a child’s life

    Opponents of marriage equality often say that it is extremely important for any child to have both mother and father to look up to. Let’s analyze if it’s true.

    Human beings are societal creatures. We live in the society full of other people. Centuries ago people mostly lived in small towns and villages, they never had time or money to travel to see the world and other people there, they had no schools, they couldn’t read, they had no books, they had no theaters, no cinemas, no TV, no internet… All they had was their family, their parents, and a local community which, I imagine, was not too keen to participate in the process of children’s upbringing. The family was what shaped every human being. It was all people knew.

    But now things are different! Our children have day care, schools, friends, summer camps, television, movies, theaters, books, music, sports and other after school activities, internet that gives instant access to any possible information there is! There’s so much that I can’t even name all of it! And parents are only a little part of child upbringing. Kids have a real chance to learn from so many other people, not just their parents who sometimes have literally no time for their children.

    The conclusion is, the mommy’s and daddy’s roles in the child’s upbringing is overrated in our modern society! The society itself became the educational and nurturing body that shapes the young minds! So, it’s really not that important anymore if a child has both his/her biological parents, or just one of them, or none of them and is being raised by a homosexual couple who adopted this child! There’s always the society that actually shapes its future full members. Kids have all these new and fancy ways to learn about everything in the world, they don’t need to be raised in a full traditional family anymore! All they need is to be loved and feel welcomed!

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  8. Incredible post Bryan, and to everybody who commented as well - the comments were just as interesting as the original.

    I'm hearing more and more about immigration to Canada on this blog (ok, really only twice now, but that is more than never...), and I'm curious if applying as a political refugee is warranted considering the "caste-ness" of being gay in some parts of the world. I doubt it, and it is a means that I wouldn't recommend exploring right now(our current federal government attempted to overturn the right of Gay Marriage when it first came into power in 2005), but I wonder if it has any philosophical grounding at all...

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  9. Wow!...I am totally overwhelmed by the amount and quality of all the comments you guys left on this post! I don't even know where to begin......ARRRGGG! Why must my readers be so thoughtfull!....woe is me.....

    But serieously...I sat down to check up on comments and nearly sprayed my coffee at the screen when I saw how many there were. Later,...after I finished said bucket of coffee, I finally got to the bottom of the comments and was totally blown away....awsome job everyone.

    Bryan

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  10. @ canadianhumility -
    If Obamacare doesn't pass, or Palin is ever voted into office, I am coyote-ing my way across the border.

    I was very ashamed to be an American, and Californian, and a former Jersey girl, when our supreme court upheld the divisive act, and, created a subdivision at that, allowing 18,000 same-sex couples to remain married, almost as if dangling a carrot in front of the aspiring to marry couples.

    I am a monster Simpsons fan, and what comes to mind is Reverand Lovejoy's wife, always ranting, "What about the children?! Won't someone please think of the children?"

    I voted no on 8 because I was thinking of the children. While the yes on 8 side was saying how legalizing same-sex marriage is the slippery slope to pedophilia and beastiality, I was saying that vetoing it would be the slippery slope back into inequality, injustice, segregation, anti-semitism, and racial unrest. For no good reason at that.

    What baffles me most is that the highest funder, responsible for funding 40% of their erroneous and bigoted campaign, was the mormon church of Utah. It used to be legal to hang a mormon in 1980. One would logically think that after being a target, you would not go make others a target.

    One of my protest signs read, "30,000 children will starve to death today, and not see age 5. And yet, we spend $40 million dollars breaking families apart. How exactly are we protecting the children?"

    I have argued the point that some children are sold into marriage in other countries. You want to protect our children? Go help those kids out of a pedophiliac relationship.

    Speaking of pedophiles, the mormon church is widely known for their compounds and their polygamous relationships, where they offer their 14 year old girls up for a good gang bang. Those in glass houses ... blame the gays.

    This brings to mind "Briggs Initiative" in which they tried firing homosexual teachers because they were a risk at sexually abusing the students. Milk went on air, stating solid fact that 95% of pedophiles are HETERO!

    Someone was telling me that terrorists are sent to terrorist camps where they are brainwashed as children and taught to hate. That is fairly abusive in and of itself. This mirrors the phobes and haters in our united states and their intolerance perfectly.

    Teaching your child to hate is NOT protecting them.

    Since prop 8 has passed, and children were taught that celebrating diversity was WRONG, there have been two hateful incidents in a nearby school.

    Someone had copycat'ed the "Kick A Ginger" episode of South Park, and beat up a red-headed kid. Most recently, a couple days ago, a Jewish student had a Swastika etched into his BMW.

    It seems like my prediction of the aftermath was correct.

    I have to say this, and voice my concern. I thought prop 8 would obviously not pass. I heard nothing but constant "dings" at the phone banks, signifying we got another "no" vote.

    I thought that even though their entire smear campaign was refuted on all levels, including a presidential level, that it was an obvious shoe-in, and that equality would win.

    continued ...

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  11. I think the problem was with complacency (and the obvious lies at their end). We need everyone to vote, and signatures galore to get it on ballot. Every one needs to cause a domino effect of voting. Remind everyone to register, and where to go, and where the booths are, etc. Have them each remind five people and so forth ...

    Every minute we sit here waiting for the outcome of the federal trial, their side is raising funds to appeal it, or cleverly reword the newest definition of marriage.

    If keeping with tradition, the old biblical translation was that a man would AQUIRE a wife. And he was legally allowed many, while the wives were not allowed to stray.

    It used to be tradition to hang a black man for reading a book. It used to be tradition to burn a woman at the stake for being a suspected witch because she opted to tread water instead of drown.

    If we are going to ban homosexual marriage or kill gay people because god considered it a sin, all seafood restaurants need to be closed, as, the bible says that eating any form of shellfish is a sin.

    So is getting a tattoo (even one of Jesus Christ), being fatherless, shaving your beard, and the list goes on.....

    I would love if anyone had any footage to the trial. I understand it won't be televised, but I think they are allowing cell phones and puters in there.

    Anyone know? Thanks!

    ladybugmagic - www.marshmallowhugs.ws

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  12. @Bryan

    It’s all your fault, hehe! Your posts are incredible, they inspire us to talk about things you bring to our attention. This inspiration is why we suddenly have the right words. You’ve mentioned a couple of times that I should be writing my own blog, well, the problem is I don’t have a muse to inspire me the way you and Jay inspire us here and on YouTube! I envy you because you have your muse, obviously! As soon as I find that little fairy who will inspire me in my bed (whoopty-doo)… umm, end of sentence.



    @canadianhumility

    Neal, I’ve thought about political refugee status for gays, but I think you can apply only if you live in a country that actually officially prosecutes people for being gay. Somewhere in the middle of the Uganda scandal with that “Kill the gays” bill, I’ve heard some gay Ugandan man was seeking refugee in the UK, and he was denied it at first, then he had to go back to Uganda and wait for several months to get the papers ready and to finally get the status of refugee, and that’s the country (Uganda) that currently throws gays in jail for 14 years to life! I seriously doubt that Canadian government would be glad to welcome gays from countries where they are not being directly persecuted. But Uganda, Iraq and the like — they seriously risk their lives.

    As for those attempts to overturn the marriage equality law — gay-haters are everywhere, I don’t have any illusions that in Canada everyone is OK with that. But comparing Canada and Russia, I can say with all the authority my living in Russia gives me: Canada is way better in terms of treating homosexuals. And it’s very easy to believe me when you see that high-profile politicians openly call us the worst names in the media, and the religious leaders use the media to openly tell their followers to take sticks in their hands and go outside to flog gays who will dare to come out on a Gay Pride Parade in Moscow (we still haven’t had a single parade, every time gays try to do it they’re being physically abused by gay-haters & the police and jailed).



    @ladybugmagic

    You know, I couldn’t wrap my mind around to understand why Prop 8 was passed: in 2008 I wasn’t so politically involved and was more curious about who became the next President, so I didn’t know anything about the campaign behind Prop 8. But now, when the trial began, I familiarized myself with some of the TV ads available on YouTube… that was really disturbing to watch… I couldn’t believe my eyes. Also I couldn’t believe gay-h8ers did not remove those videos from YouTube after all this time, like they’re not ashamed of that most dirtiest campaign I’ve ever seen! Lies, blatant lies, and yet people believed them! Alas!

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  13. @ K!r!lleXXI

    I think their youtube films will serve as their "evidence" at the trial.

    I think this was a well funded, and very well strategized campaign. The religious right knew to strike when we were up for presidential election, to allow that chaos to overshadow some of prop H8.

    They went for the core; they knew what would reach people. We just overcame two terms of W's tyranny with the homeland security act enabled.

    Our citizens were hella concerned that they could be detained without legal assistance in the event of a home invasion without a warrant.

    People here fear big government, and somehow, and I really don't see the analogy, the yes on 8 side made it seem like legalizing same-sex marriage gave more power to the government. That is how they played it, and won some of the vote.

    Their claim was that overruling the original ban was ignoring the vote of the people. They seem to selectively choose parts of the constitution and the bible in their campaigning.

    They seemingly forget that the rights of a minority can not be voted away by the rights of a majority, which is why we have a constitution in place. Someone had once said that "a democracy could be two wolves and one sheep deciding what is for dinner."

    They had signs saying their freedom of speech was at risk. They said that churches would lose tax exemption status if not marrying two members of the same gender. They said they could be sued for hate speech if refusing to recognize the two newlyweds as "married".

    They lied all around. They cropped photos without permission of a class celebrating their lesbian teacher's wedding (which their parents threw a surprise party). They said our children would be forced to learn about same sex marriage in school, using that photo as their "proof".

    They neglected to mention the parents of the children involved had planned the surprise, and of course failed to mention that one parent opted out of it.

    The parents went on air and demanded they take those photos down and out of their campaign. Did the yes on 8 side issue a public apology and any clarification? NO!

    They allowed the public to believe that kids are forced to learn and embrace things against their parents' wishes, which, of course, influenced the vote.

    There is a nifty little disease called "AIDS", among many others. I am a firm believer in sexual education and preventative and protective measures. That would entail giving all information on all sexual activity to children in schools.

    Some parents would rather their children contract some incurable or stigmatic illness than to educate them and teach them about contraception and spermicides, because their religious beliefs tell them to oppose premarital sex. They choose to bury their head in denial rather than think their teen may be active, with a same-sex or other-sex partner.

    They are not only putting their children at risk, but, as a community at large, they are putting EVERYONE at risk.

    Who are they to jeopardize anyone's lives? Let alone civil freedoms.

    But, alas, as the head of California schools has stated repetitively, no student would be taught any cirriculum without parental consent, and we have an opt out policy (which explains why there are so many teenagers having babies in toilets at the prom.)

    I know I am tangenting, but their hateful campaign hurts a lot of people on multi-faceted levels.

    It seems so obvious to people like you and me, and other followers on this blog. I knew we had prop 8 in the bag. I just knew it, and I was broken hearted and disgusted with my fellow citizens for a lot of last year.

    2010: Marriage Equality Again.

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  14. Democracy must be something more than two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner.
    (James Bovard, 1994)

    I love this phrase, I even saved it in my quotes file so I could present the original and give the credit to the author. This sentence exactly indicates that there are limits to democracy, and we have to understand that! Sadly, even legislature and judicature won't look in the face of the facts, for they are the same bigoted old people who hate gays and afraid of them. Just like decades ago Americans were scared of Communists.

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  15. You know...I truly believe that there is a deep current of homophobia in general society. I see it when we have large gay rights protests with thousands of attendees and it gets absolutely no attention on the news. anything gay positive gets glossed over...and I don't mean just on fox either...i mean all over.

    Ladybugmagics comment about the "dings" at the phone banks makes me wonder how many people claimed they were going to vote against prop 8 so they wouldn't appear to be anti-gay....but when they hit the voting both did just the opposite.

    The public at large is still o.k. with belittling and ignoring us. I think its a basic prejudice that exists on a subtle level in the majority of the public that allowed Prop 8 to pass.....all prop 8 had to do was tap into it.

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  16. I agree Kirille that quote is amazing. I've saved it too now!

    I agree with you too about our society being homophobic Bryan. I think we need some new words for notions of homophobia. At it's core, it's supposed to mean an irrational fear of homosexuality. But it's often used as a synonym for the "racists" equivalent of hatred against homosexuality/homosexuals. I definitely think fear and hatred are linked, but it might be best if we had specific terms (that are well known) for fear, hatred, etc. It becomes an out for people to say, "I'm not homophobic" and truly believe it because they may be using 1 definition of it while ignoring its other aspects.

    Ideally, we would be in a society where social groups are equal with one another. For disadvantaged and marginalized groups though, the first step is tolerance and then acceptance. Right now we are reaching that basic first step of finally becoming tolerated. Obviously it's not enough, but I think that is why people can feel like they are not bigots or homophobes. Because many people are perceiving reality through religious lenses, merely to "tolerate" homosexuals and the "homosexual lifestyle" is a big deal to them. Tolerance is not acceptance or equality, it's the bare minimum. To those types of individuals who think tolerance = equality, they've already given us so much, how dare we ask for more? That's the kind of mindset that leads to arguments like, us gay people are powerful now and aren't disadvantaged minorities and are being treated equal because we can still marry members of the opposite sex like everybody else *eyeroll*

    I agree that the prejudice against homosexuals totally exists on the subtle level. And right now, it's still not just subtle. It's overt. Not having gay marriage, being belittled in real life and in the media, the clear and widespread ignorance on a variety of homosexual topics and the large amounts of misinformation or distorted viewpoints due to rigid beliefs--how could there not be prejudice? There's a reason I'm still in the closet, and I live in one of the more gay-friendly states/nations too.

    The gay community and movement has come amazingly far, but it's still VERY new and there's still a long way to go. Even if legislation changes, the most difficult part will be changing hearts and minds. And for some people, that's just not practically possible. Not to say any of us should give up trying to educate or get discouraged at all, but we should understand the reality of the situation and the amount of work that has to be done. The other Civil Rights movements of the 60s (I think it was the 60s) took much longer to achieve their respective gains and sometimes it took Wars to achieve real change.

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  17. @ K!r!lleXXI –

    Thank you so much for posting the original quote. I use it a lot, and it is nice to have the name of the person who coined it.

    On communism … that is the stance that the insurance companies are making in their plight against universal healthcare. They fear monger, and say employing such a policy will lead us directly into socialism or communism, playing off fear combined with ignorance.

    Similar to the same propaganda and strategy used against marriage equality. Fear and ignorance.

    @ GayFamilyValues

    I don’t know how to say this without sounding like a jackass, so I am just going to say it. I fully understand the need for some gay people to closet themselves, much like Jews would walk around with false Christian papers, to stay alive in nazi Germany.

    I felt a glimpse of what fear is associated with coming out. A small glimpse, and nothing in comparison to what many gay people suffer. I had a ginormous NO ON 8 sign in my rear window, and I was driving somewhere with my boyfriend and another man friend.

    A car full of four punk kids saw us at a convenience store, and started to simulate oral sex with their hand, and called the man friend and my boyfriend the F bomb.

    The friend started opening the door to go hammer into the kids and they scattered, but I thought, what if I had been driving alone? And those four kids outnumbered me?!

    When standing solo on the streets with my rainbow sign, two people called me a “lesbo”, one told me to suck him off, and one shouted out the window the word “F*G”.

    I found that one the most interesting, given that I am a girl, and the proper hate speech would be “D*KE”.

    He was so filled with taught hate, that he didn’t care what he called me, as long as it was hateful.

    There is an inherent homophobia worldwide, and I know that it starts with the mocking, and then leads to worse, like hate crimes, bashing, murder, etc.

    I think it would be eradicated if there was no shame within one’s self. I want everyone to come out, loud and proud. But, of course, the phobes will harm people that do.

    It is very oppressive. They create an outcast by instilling fear and shame into them, and when they try to overcome it, they are violently responded to. It’s horrific.

    And if not the gay community, those same people would find someone else, as history has shown us.

    Do your children watch your youtube channel? How do you explain to them the hateful posts?

    And, a segway that deserves mention. I truly believe that James Dobson needs charges pressed against him on multiple counts of child abuse in his “reparative therapy” camps. I think if a class action lawsuit were filed against him, and others of his type, we would make headway. But Dobson needs to do jailtime.

    I am hoping my “dings” were genuine. I got a few on the fence, too, and that helped narrow down the reasoning as to why people were confused.

    Some of the dings were very reassuring, and I got a person almost angry with me. She said, “Why don’t you just leave them (homosexuals) alone? Let them get married!”

    The way she said it, was like she thought I was on the opposing side. And for some reason, her anger made me feel good.

    ladybugmagic - www.marshmallowhugs.ws

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  18. @ u3q2v -

    I remember an ad I heard on KFI actually saying something to the effect of "We have tolerated them, and now they want us to accept them?!"

    I called the radio station and spoke with the manager, who said they didn't have a political stance. I said to them they lost a listener, because they can so "no" to an advertisement and they didn't.

    I wish you all the success if and when you "come out". It's hard to think that you can't walk down the street holding your boyfriend or girlfriend's hand.

    What bums me out most, is I am growing misenthropic, to the point of being like them (the bigots/haters). I am usually willing to converse and learn about people, but when they take such small yet precious luxuries from people, it makes me just want to hate them, without dialogue.

    I only try to entertain conversations because it will advance more understanding and the equality movement, but sometimes I just kneejerk a similar hatred back at them.

    If anything is contagious or communicable in any of this, it is hate.

    ladybugmagic - www.marshmallowhugs.ws

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  19. @u3q2v

    You’ve raised an interesting point. Homophobia is the fear of homosexuals (“phobia” means “fear”). That’s why some people say they are not homophobic, meaning they are not afraid of homos, but at the same time they hate homos or just feel some kind of disgust towards homos… There must be another word for it. Moreover, people must understand that it is not good to hate or be disgusted by some group of people based on worn-out prejudices.

    Tolerance. That’s all we ask for, really. Several months ago I’ve started a campaign on the local message boards website for people in my city in Russia calling for tolerance to gay people. Well, I ended up being called a tolerast (from words tolerance & pederast, obviously). People were so blind, they were demanding to ban me from that website for promoting of homosexuality, whereas the only thing I was promoting was tolerance, and I repeatedly stated my firm belief that homosexuality is inherent, uncommunicable, and immutable… as if someone wanted to listen… On the same website I got into a discussion of homosexuality with an Orthodox priest presenting evidence and sheer logic. He ended up threatening to kill me (I kid you not), he also said that he will gladly go to jail for that knowing he did a service to the people and that God will forgive him for killing a human being because that man was gay. I challenged him to go through with this because I was not gonna stop. Well, I’m still alive and kicking. Those people do not understand that they only pushed me over the edge towards my total acceptance of my homosexuality that I eventually fully embraced.

    So, my point is, the Orthodox Church in Russia is standing completely against homosexuals and firmly believes gay people should be killed as God commanded it (lies, He never commanded such thing, there is no Eleventh Commandment saying “Kill ye gays as ye worst enemies!”). There is no space for tolerance at all. Whereas Catholic Church kinda agreed they should be at least tolerant stating they should hate the “sin,” not the “sinners.”



    @ladybugmagic

    I saw you posted that video of Ellen DeGeneres about a 15-year-old boy who was killed by his peer because the first one was gay and asked the other to be his Valentine. 15 years old, and they already hate so much and think being homosexual or even being an object of attention of a gay person is such a horrible thing that the only thing you can do to wash your shame off is to kill that homo to show everyone how not-homo you are.

    I’m kinda in the same position. I’m in love with a young man whose sexuality is unknown to me. So, I can’t bring myself to tell him about my feelings, I’m scared he would not react well, he may not be gay at all (in Russia, no one is wearing their homosexuality on public, you never know who might be gay). And this is just another example of what hatred does to us.

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  20. I think the word we may be looking for to describe the sense of entitlement and and priveledge that many heterosexual people feel toward the gay community is:

    heterosexism

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  21. Great post Bryan. I am stll trying to figure out who "recruited" me!!
    BTW..I just wanted to urge all Mass. residents to vote against Scott Brown(R) for the Senate race there. In his site he strongley states "I think marriage is between a man and a woman." Also the National Organization for Marriage is calling people oh his behalf to support him. I do not thik Scott will support ANY equal rights for LGBT people.

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  22. @ladybugmagic

    Thank you for the kind words ladybugmagic. I have never been in any relationship or done anything with a guy/girl so there hasn't been too major of a need for me to "come out". Up until relatively recently, I was going to try to marry a girl (opposite sex) and live the heterosexual lifestyle. I'm pretty sure though that this won't be possible (without hurting that woman). It's ridiculous that society would rather pressure people like me into marrying and doing the "straight lifestyle" even if it's against our nature and will ultimately cause people a lot more harm (including straights).

    @Kirille

    Very insightful and sad to here how Russia (or your area) deals with homosexuality. I'm sorry to hear how restricted it is over there. The self-loathing and internalized shame for being gay definitely is one of the many examples of how marginalized we are by our societies. But yeah, in your case, things are way more worse over where you are and I hope everything works out for you.

    @depfox, oh good to know. I'm sure there's words for all kinds of things. Eventually, I imagine they will become more mainstream. Heterosexism is a good word to describe heterosexual privilege. So we have a word for fear of gays (homophobia) and heterosexual entitlement (heterosexism). I imagine prejudice is covered under heterosexist, like how "sexist" refers to how some guys are prejudiced against females. Do we have a word for "hatred of gays"? Besides "bigot" which while useful is kind of general.

    @ladybugmagic

    I understand what you mean about having a kneejerk reaction to bigots and struggling with whether to sink down to their level or take the high road. My personal way of doing things is that I will adapt to the individual that I'm dealing with. Initially, I used to always take the high road thinking that I would want to treat people the way I'd like to be treated. Sort of Ghandi non-violent resistance type deal. I've come to sort of respect the more militant fight back Malcom X type approach though. Too much understanding and idealism will just lead you to getting stepped on.

    At the end of the day, this is about politics and power not morality. It's about emotions and not rationality or truth. Appealing to equality and justice to those who just don't give a shit or are serving what they believe to be a higher power or morality (like a religion) will just end up with us being disappointed. So then we need to change our approach--logical, emotional, moral, legal, political, etc. If I know with great certainty that the person is too far gone to be reasoned with then usually I'll just sink down to their level and return their immaturity back at them. Not that it's productive, it just makes me feel better. If anything I would imagine they might understand that form of communication more.

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  23. Greek miso- means hate, thus “misanthrope,” “misandry,” “misogyny.”

    So, misohomosexualism is hatred of homosexuals.

    ---------------------

    Or, Latin odium (hatred, it's also an English word with the same meaning).

    So, homoodium is, again, hatred of homosexuals (-sex- part is omitted like in the word homophobia). It's shorter, easier, and there are derivative words: homoodious people (homo-hateful).

    =====================

    Ah, whatever… Let the people with Master's Degree in English invent new words.

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  24. @ K!r!lleXXI

    Regarding the orthodox priest - I think he is a bible literalist misreading the quotes about Soddom and Gommorah and the one listed in Leviticus 20:13 - "If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman, it is detestable. They must be put to death, their blood will be on their own heads."

    I am actually not sure how much the Russian translation differs from the English translation.

    When the bible was written, it was written in a Hebrew nation trying to grow. They knew at the time that life was in the male seed, and only thought women were there for incubatory services.

    They knew that two men together could not produce offspring, so they wrote it in the bible, to elevate their citizens to a "holiness" code. Kind of like a courtesy clerk at a supermarket refers to themselves as a "bagging engineer".

    When people use the Adam and Eve/procreation argument, the general rebuttals come up: contraception, infertility, artificial insemination, vysectomies, etc.

    I found a new argument, that a theist gave me when trying to prove that the virgin mary was real: Parthenogenisis.

    That is the ability to reproduce without the fertlization of an egg. Some species can do that. Perhaps "god's will"? I used their own argument against them. Nothing feels better than that.

    I was going to post where Ellen said that she was raised by heteros, surrounded by them, but still, she is a lesbian. The recruiting/assimilation idea is ludicrous, but, truly, you can not penetrate thick religious skulls.

    I think, I cannot say for sure, we have maybe a 20% rate of the churches in the US supporting homosexuality, but it may be more, may be less. But, we are making advancements.

    I think we should define the "haters" as what they are. Haters. Or, the word "schmuck" comes to mind.

    It tends to be the christian right/conservatives/religious fundamentalist that tend to be the haters. They are also the same holy and loving people who would rather their fellow citizens die out of want of medical care than reach a little deeper in their pockets to make healthcare a right.

    They often site the amounting deficit as their reasoning. Idea. Take the hundreds of millions, if not billions, spent, somehow lawfully, by all the haters and segregationists and those defending marriage, and allot it toward universal healthcare.

    And practice some true christianity.

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  25. @ u3q2v

    Out here in Cali, the schmucks/haters/bigots would not just place one "Yes on 8" sign (depicting a happy hetero family of mom, dad, big brother, little sister, dog named rover), but they would place 15 in a concentrated area. That let gay people know, "We don't just hate you, but, we hate you fervently."

    I took four of the fifteen down before getting tackled by good god-fearing religious people. The "No on 8" sinners picked me up, and hugged me.

    I apoligized to them profusely, because I grew into an animal, ravaging all those "Yes" signs. I may have pushed their plight for love back, and I felt an apology was due to them.

    Not the religious beyotches.

    I remember the "Yes's" chipper attitude. They were in the streets with their lying signs about parental rights in schools and free speech, and bigger government, etc.

    Their signs and their presence basically suggested that our creator (whoever that may be) made a "mistake" when creating homosexuals.

    And that, to me, is very offensive. But, they were there, singing, and offerred me a fucking brownie.

    A fucking brownie.

    A fucking brownie!

    What the hell? You are out there, encouraging homosexuals to kill themselves, inferring that god hates them, promoting making them a second class citizen, and yet, you think you are loving because you offerred me a brownie?!

    I told them I wouldn't eat it because they probably laced it with the same koolaid they drank.

    I think they were the people that pissed me off most. The phony nice. The ones who thought they were good people doing this.

    I am watching "America is with Haiti" per pres Obama. Okay, nice for pr purposes, but, lets just be honest the christian American way.

    If you are a gay Haitian, stay in the rubble and die. If you are Black, oh, oops ... And, if you don't have medical insurance, you will have to die.

    I do applaud President Obama's speech to the human rights campaign, but ready for my timeline now. I think that Hillary Clinton, and our two former presidents have Haiti going in the right direction. I think that deploying 30,000 troops to Afghanastan is going to "end the job" now.

    Our two most urgent needs are underway, so, now, lets focus on marriage equality. Or, at least, delegate the responsibility to someone, and let's get a move-on.

    ladybugmagic - marshmallowhugs.ws

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  26. @ladybugmagic

    I looked up Russian translation: it’s really close, the phrasing is absolutely indistinguishable. But, you know, I’ve heard these both translations are wrong: it’s not “If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman,” it’s actually “If a man lies with a man in the same bed he lies with a woman,” which brings us to the simple adultery — a man should not cheat on his wife, even with another man, because he’s already married, to a woman.

    Why they felt the need to address this issue once again, apart from mentioning it in the adultery clause? I think, the adultery clause was meant to ensure that every man knows all the kids his wife produced are, in fact, from his seed; otherwise why would he raise children of other men if his wife was not faithful to him (I believe, that is the real reason to stigmatize any sex outside of marriage)? So, because they knew homosexual sex does not produce kids (and therefore it is “safe” and thus more desirable) they just linked it to adultery (if a woman must be faithful to her husband, then a man must be faithful to his wife, too, it’s only fair).

    Parthenogenesis and Virgin Mary. Unfortunately for this argument, parthenogenesis in human females may only result in birth of a female child, but Mary had a boy — Jesus. So, it couldn’t be parthenogenesis. If God, in fact, performed his divine intervention, it was anything but parthenogenesis.

    Ellen. Well, I was raised by heteros, surrounded by heteros, I don’t know personally anyone who’s gay in Russia, absolutely no single person! And yet I’m gay! And I look back at my childhood and I see all those clues that should’ve tipped me off, if only I knew about homosexuality at the time. This is the reason why children these days come out at 14, 11, even 7 years old — information is now available, they have a chance to learn about it and understand why they are different and what’s it called.

    Full disclosure. I’ve already told my pedophile encounter story on Bryan’s blog. In short: when I was a teenager, a pedophile was trying to lure me somewhere away from people on the street to… well, you know… rape me. I managed to get away from him eventually, but we’ve had a contact — in a bus he was rubbing against me getting aroused and having a good time with his eyes rolled up, and later we said our goodbyes by shaking hands. I understand this actually feeds people’s theories that gayness is communicable and I got it from him by direct contact; and also it clearly states that that guy was a gay man and a pedophile (kinda says, “aha! that’s the same thing! just like we’ve told ya!”). In my defense I can only say that I knew I was different way before this encounter happened, I just didn’t know how different I was. Why am I mentioning this? Well, just like with faith in God and everything, I never assume anything to be true if I have my doubts and there’s not proof. I give them the benefit of the doubt — maybe there is some way to infect people with something that makes them gay. We don’t know that. I just wanna be truthful, I don’t want to hide this fact of my life just because it contradicts my beliefs, for in that case I would be a Big Fucking Liar.

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  27. @ K!r!lleXXI

    The common argument in my area and on LA Times and Sacbee was that legalizing same-sex marriage was somehow the slippery slope into legalizing pedophilia.

    I must say, you are lucky to have come out of that situation alive.

    Much like I am a proponent for teaching sex ed (both same-sex and other-gender sex) in schools, I also think "stranger-danger" should also be taught.

    Kids will easily fall for the "will you help me find my lost puppy?" gimmick, and usually wind up dead.

    Pedophilia is actually a mental disorder, and they have a high chance of repeating the act. I asked my uncle (a psychiatrist) about it once, during prop 8.

    I am immediately disturbed by pedophiles, and I questioned myself: does that make me a bigot?

    I rethought it and assuaged myself with my basic principle: I support anyone who chooses to live where they don't take anyone else's rights from them. Abusing a child is taking their rights away from them.

    From the research I have done, I found that science has found a genetic link with homosexuality, pertaining to males so far:

    When one twin is gay, the other twin has a 70% chance of being gay, which is a higher percentage if genes played no role in sexual orientation.

    When a mother has multiple boys, her body recognizes the male fetus as a foreign object and creates more female antigens and antibodies, thus "feminizing" the fetus.

    If my parthenogenisis argument failed, (bummer), the fact that there are nearing 500 species with documented homosexuality can replace it.

    But, again, people combat that with "free will", or "reparative therapy".

    My abhorrance for James Dobson (Focus on the Family) grows by the minute. He needs to be indicted and jailed. I hate him.

    Someone needs to do something about him. He is a terrorist living in the US, OVERTLY. I am going to start researching how to eradicate him.

    ladybugmagic - www.marshmallowhugs.ws

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  28. @ladybugmagic

    Yeah, I’m freaking lucky to be alive in this “beautiful” world. :-/

    Absolutely agreed on pedophilia: it’s not bigotry to be disturbed by it because there is only one sufficient argument we need to consider — minors cannot give an informed consent to have sex with adults, and without an informed consent adults only take advantage of children (moreover, many times pedophiles don’t even ask for a consent and go ahead with rape against the child’s wish), and we all know how it usually ends.

    In addition to what you’ve mentioned about causes of homosexuality: it’s far more likely for a gay man to have a gay uncle on his mother’s side (which is statistically non-coincidental) than on his father’s side (which is statistically coincidental)… it means “homosexuality gene” is passed on from mother to son.

    Parthenogenesis. I’m afraid I rushed into a conclusion that it couldn’t have been parthenogenesis that caused Maria to conceive Jesus. She could’ve conceived a girl (genetically speaking — XX), but this girl could have a very-very rare developmental problem — inability to produce estrogens (female sex hormones) or to respond to them; at the same time, every woman usually produces and responds to androgens (male sex hormones) as well, so if estrogens could not do their job, androgens took over to form a mannish body (with fully or partially formed male genitalia and other male features of the body, like broad shoulders and narrow pelvis); that way Jesus (genetically female and phenotypically male) could have been a result of parthenogenesis, but, as you see, the combination of two incredibly rare processes like parthenogenesis and estrogen-immunity is highly unlikely to occur, yet it is possible.

    Parthenogenesis is not documented in humans at all; as far as science is concerned, it never happened. Yet, it’s really easy to overlook such an event: most women by the time of their childbearing age are sexually active and have sexual partners, so, even if they conceive through parthenogenesis, they would most likely think this child was conceived with the sperm of their partner. I believe, we should study the cases when daughters look so much like their mothers, as if they were twins (compare their DNA); simply put, parthenogenesis is pretty much cloning, that’s why the baby-girl should look like her mother and should have almost the same DNA.

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  29. @ K!r!lleXXI

    "the combination of two incredibly rare processes like parthenogenesis and estrogen-immunity is highly unlikely to occur, yet it is possible."

    Perhaps a miracle was performed?

    I must say, I went to catholic school growing up and now in my thirties am a declared athiest.

    I stumbled upon the most horrific site when looking for stuff on reparative therapy. I want James Dobson in jail. I am honestly going to call lawyers and see what they tell me can be done about him. I don't know how he has not been arrested or sued before. Or, has he?

    So, I found this, "What is the harm in reparative therapy", and it lists some suicides and attempts associated with it.

    http://whatstheharm.net/reparativetherapy.html

    I got curious and read the whats the harm page on being a child.

    http://whatstheharm.net/children.html

    And, then, one of the stories lead me to this page, brace yourself, though. It's an even tougher read than the first two. And make sure you have your pop-up killer on.

    It's about exorcisms that have ended in deaths. The most notable I read was about a boyfriend ramming a crucifix in his girlfriend's nose, to the point at where it reached her brain. And about a whack job mother who beat her son to death with a brick, forcing her daughter to hold him down. It was to beat the devil out of him, literally.

    http://www.unsolvedmysteries.com/usm81745.html

    All this in the name of god. Lovely.

    ladybugmagic - www.marshmallowhugs.ws

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  30. @ladybugmagic

    Funny you mentioned religions. I’m only in my mid-twenties, so maybe I’m not there yet (atheism), but I kinda have my own theory of this whole thing and how it works together. With the help of only one assumption (pretty serious one, I must admit) and sheer logic I was able to solve a paradox that finally let me put things in the right order and to explain everything I felt needed to be explained. And now I’m fairly satisfied with that theory of my own. In accordance with this theory, I don’t “believe” in God per se, but I’m 99% sure he/she/whatever-it-is exists (I leave 1% for the unforeseen and extraordinary scenario in which my assumption is wrong or inapplicable). And God I’m talking about is really different from the one people usually picture. I don’t even know why am I saying that here. Probably, to indicate that I can’t really find common ground not with religion followers, nor with atheists, on matters that involve the Creator.

    After visiting those links I’m glad I don’t have a common ground with believers. My theory is based on realistic views on God and his place in out lives. And those things people do in the name of God, are horrendous, they show how much out-of-touch with reality those people are.

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  31. @ K!r!lleXXI

    Those people are the ones who voted "yes" on prop 8.

    I have a closet crush on Marilyn Manson. Not that I think he is very attractive but I just love hearing him speak. He is brilliant.

    He said on Politically Incorrect some twelve years ago, when Bill Maher pointed out that at his concerts, he will rip pages out of the bible, or wipe his ass with the American flag, "[These controversial things] are designed to make people think, but the point with the bible or a flag is to say 'It's only as valid as you make it in your heart.' A piece of paper, or a piece of cloth doesn't mean anything, it's what you believe. And I want people to think about what they believe. I want them to consider if everything they believe is what they want to believe, or if that's what they have been told that they have to believe."

    I am not sure if you visited my blog in depth, but I have a video feed of "For The Bible Told Me So", which shows how the religious right deliberately uses misquotes from the bible to target homosexuals. As they have in the past against members of the African American community, women, other minorities, etc.

    And I also have the movie "zeitgeist" on it.

    I think, since we can create life, by planting seeds, or breeding animals, and now, even human cloning, that we are our own god. And life is our bible.

    I am more a naturalist, and I believe that mother nature will get us for our gluttony. And bad karma around the world.

    I can't believe in god in a world that allowed for slavery and the holocaust, and prop h8, and the complacency in overcoming all the man-made bull dookie.

    And, someone may say the devil placed those naughty things here, but it was the god-fearing folk, as well as those who wrote our constitution, that owned slaves, or hated the Jews, etc....

    What's almost a strange twist of irony, is that it is genes that made gay people gay. And its genes that made by boyfriend sick. Or, rather, his parents somehow both lacked a gene, and he has his illness. One little itty-bitty gene. And now he is coughing up blood.

    God, or nature? Human, by the way, has already patented the cystic fibrosis gene.

    What god would allow that corporate greed?

    And right now, good christian americans are flocking to send blankets to Haiti, but won't extend healthcare to their own citizens, or they don't insist that AZT be handed out freely in Milawi, where one million children are orphaned due to AIDS and HIV, many of whom, themselves, have the virus.

    Cause, how will the conservative religious right profit? Even though the bible forbids capitalism.

    I have a bumper sticker I made: Organized Religion is a Weapon of Mass Destruction.

    ladybugmagic - www.marshmallowhugs.ws

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  32. Wow. Holy cow; you've got a great dialogue going here. Great points. Great family. I just stumbled across your videos and blog (my son caught me watching one of the videos and got a kick out of it; he has the same exact Bakugan T-shirt as Daniel), and I'm just captivated by your journey and your family. I've spent the better part of this evening watching your adoption videos and reading this, but I'll have to keep up with your stuff.

    I've never understood the "kids need a mommy and a daddy" thing. First, you're right; kids are abandoned by biological parents every day. Second, I've always taken this to mean that kids need a provider and a nurturer. A mom can be both. A dad can be both. A heterosexual or gay or lesbian couple can -- one can "be" predominantly nurturing and the other the provider/protector, or they can share the roles. It's just about loving kids. Really, who cares about the rest?

    I'm happy to have found your blog!

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