It is amusing that some people fulminate about so-called activist judges, and yet when judges in California legalize gay marriage by a strict reading of the Constitution, conservatives rush to get a referendum on the ballot for November that would restrict marriage to a man and a woman.
Food for thought: a mere forty one years ago, the marriage of Senator Obama’s parents would not have been recognized in sixteen states, because there were strict laws against a mixed race marriage…until some gosh-darned activist judges ruled that law unconstitutional.
When are those who are busy minding other peoples’ business going to tumble to the fact that any two people who wish to marry are the same race–the human race–whether they have different skin or like gender? There cannot be different grades of equality. Marriage, which once was something strictly arranged by parents, typically for financial gain, is in a constantly state of change and gay marriage is simply the next logical step in its evolution…presuming that critics of gay marriage believe in evolution.
PAD
• 
So instead offend Christians. Yeah, big improvement.
I have failed to say “Merry Christmas” to Christians probably on every day for the past 40 years. I don’t know that I’ve offended one yet by doing so.
Only if, as in the case of “equal-but-separate”, it results in the people involved losing out on benefits or getting second-class treatment. The whole point of the proposed ‘civil union’ was to give exactly the same treatment, under another name.Yes, the whole point was to find some way from preventing homosexuals from having access to actual marriage, a separation that only benefits those who don’t want to treat it as equal. This is the sort of separation that the California court looked at and found wanting.
“A man who engages in heterosexual behavior and a man who engages in homosexual behavior are both still males. It is their behavior that we are focusing on to differentiate them.”
The white person who wishes to marry a white person and a white person who wishes to marry a black person are both still white. It was also their behavior that was used to differentiate them.
“In the cases where marriage between people of different races was forbidden it seems to me what was evil about this situation was that
some races were considered less than or other than human.”
And so if all races had been considered equally human, you would have no problem with laws restricting who you could marry based on race?
“I think the argument from design is the easiest to grasp. Simply put the fact that the anatomy of males and females interact in a lock and key fasion implies strongly they are natures’s design.”
Well, that presumes design intent, a concept which has a lot of logical leaps built into it. But folks who know nature will also know that species come with a lot of variation, and variation is healthy for a species.
The “design” argument was also used to support anti-miscegenation laws. The races were found on different continents, obviously designed to keep them apart (the rulings would have you believe.)
Amusingly, the “it will lead to incest” argument does not note that there is no possibility of malformed children resulting from homosexual incest. Thus to prevent incest, we should ban heterosexual marriage and sexual relations and mandate that all marriages and sexual relations be homosexual. Just to be sure we don’t go down that slippery slope to “children of incest”, y’know.
Okay I have a question for anyone who has the answer.
The evolution of marriage. 2 people nomatter what social aspect may separate them should not be judged by others right? so let me list a few examples and please let me know when it is ok and when it is not. 1 interracial 2 homo 3 necro 4 bëšŧìálìŧÿ 5 pedo
PAD, there is a humongous difference between interracial and homosexuality. if you where black you can prove this physically cause you are black. so you were born black and you have no control over this decision. but Homosexuality has never been proven 100 percent to be a born trait. it could have been any number of variables in ones life to make this decision. just like people who have fetishes, they are psychological dissorders and until someone can prove that homosexuality is not in the same category as necro beast and pedo among the few of many categories, i can not easily jump into the bandwagon that whatever you want is okay with me. Eitherway, one of my best friends is gay and he also shares this view. Oh well.. seems relativism will reign in the near future.
“let me list a few examples and please let me know when it is ok and when it is not.”
Trivial. 3-5 by definition involve participants who cannot give consent. Whatever “consenting adults” choose to do between themselves, no matter how “normal” or “fetish” it may be considered by society as a whole, is nobody else’s concern. Government has no more business regulating marriage than it does church services or tupperware parties.
“Homosexuality has never been proven 100 percent to be a born trait.”
No, but neither has Heterosexuality. If you abhor Relativism, you can’t make appeals to numbers. Either Heterosexuality is Good and Right because it perpetuates the species – at which point the goverment *must* ban all forms of birth control and deny all rights of marriage to childless couples – or it is just another lifestyle choice. Absolutism cuts both ways.
1) Necro, beast, and pedo involve sex with stuff not able to give consent.
2) Born trait or not, people don’t make a “decision” to sexual attraction. Do you “decide” to be attracted to blondes? Do you “decide” to fall in love with woman A, instead of woman B? You do not choose who you’re attracted to.
3) I don’t ask for your or anyone else’s approval. I’m okay with you not being okay. I have no doubt that there are many things about you that I’m not too hot about, but hey, it’s your life, and as long as you’re not hurting me, you do whatever you want with your life, just allow me the same courtesy.
The phenotype is that the species depends on the female to have a drive for the male gender, which may be so strong it passes onto her male offspring, and on the male to have a drive for the female gender, which may be so strong it passes onto his female offspring. Phenotype.
Without the sex drive, species of animals would die out, because no animal wills its fertilization. I can only ask again, do you only have a sex drive when you think about it, or is it more like your breathing, where it continues without your willing it into being?
Oh, yeah, forgot:
“if you where black you can prove this physically cause you are black.”
How does that work, exactly? If both your parents are Black? One? One Grandparent? How much “Black” does one need to be Black? Does one drop of Black blood in your veins make you the slave? Does one drop of White blood make you the master?
And even if we choose to ignore those questions because they are the result of “the mixing of the races” and therefore “wrong” to begin with, we still have to define “Black”. Just as there is a wide phenotypical range of what we would classify as “African American”, there is a pretty wide range of “African”. Is an Egyptian “Black”? Who is more “Black”, the Somalian or the Zulu? Congolese or Ethiopian?
You will have more luck finding the “Gay Gene” than the “Black Gene”. If you don’t want Relativism, you really want to stay away from the complex interaction of gene complexes and environmental factors. (Are you still “Japanese” if a Western diet of meat has made you taller than both your parents? Are you still White if a point mutation has transformed your wet, European ear wax into a dry form common to East Asians?)
I’m giving 10-1 odds that “mushroomer” is not likely to return to respond to any of the posts that answered him.
TWL
Well well well, either your last statement was posted to stir me to return(reverse psycho) or, oh, who cares. I have nothing better to do at the moment. Well I could be reading Tigerheart. Which by the way, is superb. I believe that you TWL have nothing to worry about. As time will move on, we will see the majority of the world side with you, thus all forms of topics including gay marriage and what not, which conform to the idea of, “do what you will, and let me do as I will” will reign over the earth. Thus Gods will will not. if there is a god. But that is not the point. The age of consent will lower as children definitely do have the ability to make choices and people will be writing in their wills that they would like to donate their bodies to the necro league of America. Either that, or parents will give the OK for things to happen to their kids at the authority that they will be given… In time.
Back to black. what I was saying about races is that I believe that we all started out basically the same and over time we got darker and lighter etc. So, originally we were the same. So, banning inner racial marriage is silliness. Gay tendencies are and have always existed as well. But if gay marriage was allowed from the beginning of mankind, that gene would have been extinct. Yet we stand here today with the phenomenon of gays being as common as a ring finger. Why is marriage so important? Why not live together for life. To get government tax cuts? Why not call it something else? Like Garriage?
I guess if this is ok then I could get married to 365 people.. If we all consent to it.
I noticed that I am in the minority here, please take it easy on me. Thanks in advanced.
“PAD, there is a humongous difference between interracial and homosexuality. if you where black you can prove this physically cause you are black. so you were born black and you have no control over this decision.”
If you are born male, you can prove this far more definitively than proving you were born black. The questions in the legality of marriage were not in what you were born with, but rather in how what you have matches with what someone else has, whether that be race or gender.
And there were (and still are) plenty of people who see a “disorder” in wanting to be with someone of another race, just as there are those who see it in wanting to be with someone of the same gender.
Why would tolerance for gay marriages could have eliminated a gene “from the beginning” but not now? What are you talking about?
“But if gay marriage was allowed from the beginning of mankind, that gene would have been extinct. ”
Even if there were a single gay “gene”, that statement would assume not only that there is no such thing as a recessive gene, but also that marriage and childbirth throughout history has been based on romantic attraction. There still would have been plenty of gay folks in arranged or coerced marriages, plenty of folks willing to do what it takes to get a baby even if it isn’t what they most dream of in bed.
The age of consent will lower as children definitely do have the ability to make choices and people will be writing in their wills that they would like to donate their bodies to the necro league of America. Either that, or parents will give the OK for things to happen to their kids at the authority that they will be given… In time.
I sincerely doubt it. If you look at history it would seem that, if anything, we have become less tolerant of child marriage as we advanced. Girls married off at 14 or 15 was fairly common, not so much now. Looking around the world it is usually the backwards societies that still practice this, while countries like Japan are facing the problem that as they become wealthier and achive greater rights for women the age of marriage advances to the point where the growth of the population has been put in serious jeopardy. No reason to think we will be the exception.
And as for necrophilia…I think you’re beating a dead horse. (www.instantrimshot.com)
Seriously, while gays have always been around and been accepted in some ways in most societies and seen their rights steadily increase in ours, there is absolutely no such history for necrophiliacs (the love that cannot speak its name). You’re comparing apples and raisins.
But if gay marriage was allowed from the beginning of mankind, that gene would have been extinct.
That argument makes sense if homosexuality is purely genetic. My opinion is that, while ther could be a genetic component, it is more likely controlled by biochemistry, possibly of the mother during pregnency. There was a facsinating study that cliamed that the liklihood of a boy being gay was directly linked to his birth order–the 3rd boy was far more likely to be gay than the first or second.
This kind of thing is worth pursuing since there are other traits that one would think might have be eliminated from the gene pool if they were of purely genetic origin.
as for polygamy, it won’t be allowed for the simple reason that the potential costs to society of widespread polygamy are too great. Not that anyone should think about persecuting people like Jonathan. Very few people are going to even try to have that kind of household (although if one considers all the people who keep lovers/mistresses on the side you could argue that some form of it isn’t that uncommon). the real harm comes from the cultists/harem seekers, which, like those looking for child brides, is something more typical of societies that have yet to catch up.
My statement was not intended as a goad, mushroomer — merely a statement of opinion. I’ll admit that I’m impressed you came back, though — many don’t.
It’s difficult to respond to most of what you say, though, since it’s either hyperbolic or not really making a coherent point.
I will say, however, that the phrase “do as you will and let me do as I will” is not quite the one I’d hope everyone lives by. The old phrase “if it harms no one, do as you will” is significantly closer. Pedophilia most definitely causes harm, both physical and emotional — homosexuality does not, and I remain completely unconvinced that letting GLBT people marry causes any sort of harm in any sort of way. Feel free to try to convince me, but I don’t anticipate you being successful.
But if gay marriage was allowed from the beginning of mankind, that gene would have been extinct.
Please explain this.
And if you think marriage is unimportant except for tax cuts, all I can say is, if you’ll pardon the phrase, “you’re doing it wrong.”
TWL
So many things to answer, not enough time.
1) If it is justified to deny homosexuals the right to get married to each other but it is not justified to deny racial intermarriage because homosexuality is a choice (supposedly) and being black is not, then it is right to deny a Jew and a Christian the right to marry because being Jewish is a choice.
Obviously this is absurd. It also shws how irrelevant it is whether homosexuality is a choice or not. There is no good reason to deny any one of these the right to marry or to require a ny of them to be satisfed with something other than marriage. Conversly there is a good reason to deny children the right to ge married (as we deny them the right to vote, drive and drink) because of immaturity. Nor is it considered a great violation of civil libarties because being child is a temporary condition. Because the actual time of maturity varies 18 is usally picked as a rough estimate. Sometimes 21. In Ireland the drinking age s 24, I think.
Personaly I don’t think homosexuality is a choice. Since my heterosexuality certainly isn’t.
2) Rene, in my post before I was trying to present the point of view of the people who oppose gay marriage because I believe understnding it helps me understand better my position.
What you need to understand is that they are less concerned by the fact that you are gay thanby the fact that by being gay you present the option of being happily gay to their children and co-religionists.
Imagine you lived in a reverse world where gays had all the rights but most people viewed homosexuality as contemptable. A hit TV show called Will and Grace would be about a married couple who runs a sexual reorientation camp. A reality show whould have fiv straight men teaching gays to be less flamboyant. The would have family values parades. And schools would teach that homosexuality is a mental disease. Obviously , You wouldn’t want you children to grow up in such a world. you would want to change that although legally you had all the rights. You would want to change society. And this is exactly what scares thtem. Because we lived in such a world until recently, and it was changed under their feat to the slightly (but insufficiently) more tolerant world we live today.
The point I’m trying to make is that the conflict is not only about laws and constitution, but also on the social level, on the level of ideas. Part of the problem of the opponents of homosexuality is that they want to use laws to prevent this social change.
3) The design argument against homosexuality, as well as the other two that were presented (the purpose f having babies, natural law), are all prety much the same argumnt masquerading behind the same argument.
The mask is a naturalistic argument: since it is a fact of the natural world that (a) gentialia are shaped in a crtain way or (b) that sexual drive developed in humans to get them to reproduce, then (c) the moral conclusion is that homosexuality is wrong.
This argument falls because of something called in philsophy the natural fallasy. The truth is that you can’t actually derive a moral conclusion from a natural fact. For example, you can’t conclude from gravity that humans shouldn’t fly. Nor can we morally conclude that since homosexuality is a natural fact that homosexuality is right.
Unless you assume that natural fact is a reflection of a will of a deity. Which is the only real argument. But since religions and religious interpretations it is better not to let one eligion dictate its beliefs to others. that’s called the seperation of church and state.
4) Wasn’t the point of the rejection of seperate but equal that seperate is inevitably unequal even if materially it is equal?
5) Polygmy nois not a function of the Muslim faith. It existed in Arab society prior to islam. Islam did not reject it but set limitations to it. I think the limit s four wives.
Islam is patriarchal, but so are most religions, and for the same reason, because they were developed in societies that were all patriarchal. Today some segments of these religions try to adapt to a less patriarchal world. Others find it more difficult. In Islamit seems that the change is harder.
5) Morality is not a fact of nature or logic and canot be proven by looking to them — it is a fact of anthropology and should be saught in human interaction. However that does not make it any less real, just different tthan what people who were looking in the wrong places expected. The fact that morality is not a naturl or logical or theological fact des not mean that value judgements don’t exist or are impossible, only that they have different foundations. Humans seem to be capable of mutually intelligable discussions abut morality.
Tim, I think he was arguing that if gays had been allowed to marry they would have and been far less likely to have entered into hetrosexual unions that produced children and continued the gene.
Now it’s true that recessive genes are less likely to vanish than dominant ones that reduce evolutionary fitness (which I am defining strictly in terms of liklihood of passing on one’s genes)but I seriously doubt that homosexuality is as simple as Mendellian pea traits. It would have been obvious by now if that were the case.
Correct me if I’m wrong but shouldn’t even a recessive trait be reduced in prevalance if it reduces fitness? Which raises the question of why some seemingly negative genes have continued…maybe they have a benefit no longer obvious to us (No question that ADHD would have been an advantage in cavemen days).
Homosexuality is a dsorder in the sense that it causes the sexual drive to function differently than it usually does.
But why would this justify reducing the rights of homosexuals?
That would be like denying diabetics the right to eat sugerless cake because they can’t have regular cake.
————–
“we have become less tolerant of child marriage as we advanced.”
Yes. Because contrary to wht some peple think, the rejection of the moral system that opposes homosexuality did not mean the rejection of any moral system, but its replacement or adaptation to another one that puts more value on individual wellbeing. Under that system underage marriage is very bad while omosexuality isn’t.
—————
I see no reason why non-Jews should be offended if greeted by Merry Christmas anymore than Christians should be offended if greeted with a hapy holidays or happy Chanuka.
then it is right to deny a Jew and a Christian the right to marry because being Jewish is a choice.
Wouldn’t it be the other way around? Being Jewish is, I would think, primarily an ethnic identity. Most–not all, I know–Jews can trace their ancestory back to the tribes of Israel while Christians are more likely be of any race. So it would be Christianity that should be treated as the choice.
Your greater point stands.
In Ireland the drinking age s 24, I think.
Really??? Wow, there goes another stereotype.
Correct me if I’m wrong but shouldn’t even a recessive trait be reduced in prevalance if it reduces fitness? Which raises the question of why some seemingly negative genes have continued…maybe they have a benefit no longer obvious to us (No question that ADHD would have been an advantage in cavemen days).
It’s my understanding that “fitness” is a poor way of putting it. The thing that determines whether a gene gets passed down is whether it influences how likely you are to reproduce. Creating an example off the top of my head, a gene that made you more likely for women to get cancer after they underwent menopause wouldn’t tend to get selected out. I realize that a genetic traits that encouraged homosexuality would intuitively be bred out as the people who possess them wouldn’t tend to reproduce themselves. However the prevalence of homosexuality in all sorts of animals in the natural world argues against it.
I’ve read arguments that having a sibling that’s homosexual could be advantageous as a reproductive strategy as your sibling would be more likely to be available care for and protect offspring. So although you’re not likely to have children yourself, your nieces and nephews would benefit from your protection and be more likely to survive and reproduce themselves and pass on genes that are kind of like yours.
Bottom line, if homosexuality is actually genetic and it was seriously disadvantageous as a reproductive strategy, it shouldn’t be showing up in about 10% of the population.
My wife and I were sitting on the couch, with me watching television while she checked her e-mail and read the news on my laptop. “George Takei is getting married!” she said. “Good for him!”
I agreed wholeheartedly.
I’m pretty right-leaning on most issues, but this isn’t one of them. Honestly, I have a hard time believing that George Takei’s pending marriage hurts me or society in any way. I’m actually happy for him. Seeing that my marriage is now only 12 days old, I remember the excitement leading up to one’s wedding day pretty clearly, and I hope he’s as happy as I am.
In fact, I have only two major issues with the idea of allowing homosexuals to marry one another:
1.) I fear that attempts will be made to browbeat religious figures to perform marriage ceremonies that their religion don’t allow. Given our litigious society, I have no problem whatsoever imagining a homosexual couple suing a relatively conservative pastor because he refused to perform their marriage. (Though, this isn’t so much an objection to homosexual marriage as it is an objection to out-of-control lawyers.)
2.) I don’t know what to call a homosexual’s spouse. Are both members of a lesbian marriage wives? Are both members of a male-male marriage husbands? (Okay, this isn’t a “serious” issue, I’m being a bit silly. Still, I do always stumble when I mention my boss’s wife in conversation. It just sounds odd to say “her wife.”)
Correct me if I’m wrong but shouldn’t even a recessive trait be reduced in prevalance if it reduces fitness? Which raises the question of why some seemingly negative genes have continued…maybe they have a benefit no longer obvious to us (No question that ADHD would have been an advantage in cavemen days).
Yep — we’ve discussed this before here, actually, but now I just managed to find some more information.
A recessive gene is behind sickle cell anemia. One copy of the gene makes you more resistant to malaria — clearly a good trait for much of human history. Two gives you sickle-cell anemia.
One copy of the ∆F528 mutation gives you resistance to cholera. Two gives you cystic fibrosis.
So maybe one copy of whatever gene is linked to homosexuality just makes you intelligent and adaptable. The second one makes you more so, plus gay. 🙂
I’ve little to no doubt that homosexuality has a genetic *basis*, but I also suspect it’s a great deal more than simple genetics. What the orientation definitely isn’t is a choice.
(And David, I think Bill was using “fitness” in the biological, reproductive sense, since in that sense it means pretty much exactly what you said.)
In Ireland the drinking age s 24, I think.
Actually it’s 18.
Really??? Wow, there goes another stereotype.
Nah — one could argue that it’s just making up for lost time. 🙂 (And I have enough Irish ancestry that I’m allowed to make that joke!)
TWL
It’s my understanding that “fitness” is a poor way of putting it. The thing that determines whether a gene gets passed down is whether it influences how likely you are to reproduce.
That’s the technical meaning of fitness in genetics, more or less. (It’s one of those terms that can be confusing if you’re not sure which sense it’s being used in.)
“Wouldn’t it be the other way around? Being Jewish is, I would think, primarily an ethnic identity. Most–not all, I know–Jews can trace their ancestory back to the tribes of Israel while Christians are more likely be of any race. So it would be Christianity that should be treated as the choice.”
Jewish is both a national or ethnic and a religious identity. It’s a religion of a people basically. Most Jews can’t actually trace ancestary back to the tribes of Israel, it’s more a belief. However this is not that important since the cultural historical connecton of the Jews going back for many years should be obvious to most. There is also a genetic connection, although that’s less important. Some genetic research suggests that a generic connection can be traced back 2000 years, but I have no way of judging this claim. The historical-cutural connection is more obvious, as is evident by the continued existence of Jews.
In any case, Jews can choose to stop being Jewish by rejecting their identity and adopting another. Different groups differ in their willingness to accept this change . Nazis won’t because for them the race is important, others will. I’m not sure what’s the stand of Orthodox Judaism.
“In Ireland the drinking age is 24, I think.
Really??? Wow, there goes another stereotype.”
I think this shows that young eople drinking is perceived as more of a problem actually. I got carded when I was in Dublin. I think I was 24 at the time or 23. I remember that I was allowed in the bar so maybe the age was 23.
—- And now back to our regularly cheduled gay discussion —
Micha, I know it is not cool to openly praise people on Internet debates, but I am, as always, impressed by your well-thought replies. I’m sorry if it seemed like I was harshly disagreeing with you. The issue is an emotionally-charged one for me. But I pretty much agree with what you say, and I can understand the fears of some conservatives (even while not agreeing with them).
Robin – As a gay person, I don’t think any religious leader should be coerced or forced to perform a gay marriage. Respect goes both ways, and religious persons do have a right to safeguard their customs, as long as everyone involved is an adherent.
What I find more likely to happen is the birth and strenghtening of new religions willing to accept homosexuality. Some already do, if I’m not mistaken.
Rene, you weren’t to harsh. I just wanted you to kno where I’m coming from. YOu obviously have more invested in it emotionally than I do.
A woman who passes on her drive to hook-up with men would compensate for any gay male children by the larger volume of children she would be inclined to have from her amorous nature. The same for men and their daughters. No gays would ever have to pass on any genes at all for homosexuality to persist in humanity.
“In any case, Jews can choose to stop being Jewish by rejecting their identity and adopting another. Different groups differ in their willingness to accept this change . Nazis won’t because for them the race is important, others will. I’m not sure what’s the stand of Orthodox Judaism.”
Really, a Jew can become also something else by embracing another identity, but no more loses the Jewish recognition than a black woman would lose her black identity by becoming Jewish. The position of Orthodox Jews is that if your mother was a Jew, you’re a Jew. This becomes important in various ways. Orthodox Jews won’t proselytize the religion to non-Jews, but they will gladly try to bring a Jew into the fold. And the right of return to Israel is based on that interpretation of Judaism.
(In fact, we learned at one point that my mother’s conversion to Judaism was not rigorous enough for some folks. So I’m Jewish enough for Hitler, not Jewish enough for Israel.)
Of course, the thought that the “gay gene” might be bred out of the human race through marriage might encourage some folks to support open and recognized homosexuality just to “cure” the human race of it…
The most recent genetic studies of identical twins has cast serious doubt on genetics being the major factor in homosexuality. The percentages of homosexuality between identical twins (Who share 100% of their DNA) and fraternal twins (50%) was not significant. 6.7% and 7.2% showed homosexuality in both twins, which does not indicate very much genetic component, if any.
Obviously you have to replicate these findings before making much hay of them. Earlier studies did show some correclation but the methods used to find volunteers probably injected some bias into the results.
The birth order hypothesis goes something like this–every male pregnency a woman has results in the HY atigens coming under increasing attack by her immune system, resulting in boys who have not has a full “masculinisation” of their brains (Which is what the HY antigens are supposed to do).
It’s an interesting idea, though one can easily see where this could lead–it would probably not be too difficult to counteract this. Or encourage it, for that matter.
There seems to be considerably less research on possible female homosexuality causes.
6.7-7.2% is slightly higher than what’s considered the rate of the general population. At that rate, it sounds like if one twin is gay, you can pretty much count on the other twin being gay as well.
“Mike at June 19, 2008 11:54 PM”
Ah, but how much is the result of uterine environmental conditions and exposure of the mother to various environmental factors during pregnancy, and how much due to “genetics”?
Nat, I don’t want to hijack a thread dealing with homosexuality to discuss issues dealing with Jews and Israel. The issue is highly complicated and highly politicized, both with regard to liberals in Israel vs. orthodox Jews and between those who like and those who dislike Israel’s Jewishness. There’s also a liberal high court accused of over-activism in this story. Similar accusations appear concerning the recognition of gay relationships.
Because there is no separation of religion and state Israel has very advanced secular laws and legal precedents concerning unofficial relationships, including of gays. I think a Lesbian marriage was recognized by the court some years ago. However, I’m not a lawyer or a legal scholar. So you’ll have to do more research if you really want to know about any of these issues.
The law of return has been accused of being too similar to the Nazi definition of Jewishness. If any of your grandparents is ethnically Jewish you are eligible to emigrate to Israel but you would not be recognized as Jewish by the Orthodox establishment if your non-Jewish mother did not have an orthodox conversion. However, if your only connection to Judaism is a non-orthodox conversion of your mother then I’m not sure the law of return applies, although I’m not sure. There was a controversial court ruling on this several years ago. I don’t know what’s the Nazi stand for someone who is not racially Jewish in any respect.
I’m not sure Orthodox rabbis consider a Jew who actively converted to Christianity — like the Archbishop of Paris — as Jewish without reverse conversion. I know that a converted Catholic monk who was ethnically Jewish appeared before the court years ago asking for entry based on the right of return, but I don’t know what was the result. His name was brother Daniel. But it is true that it is difficult to stop being Jewish if you are an ethnic Jew. There is a quotation: “Israel, even if it sinned, is still Israel.”
I’ll try to find out more on our Friday meal tonight.
—————–
“In Ireland the drinking age s 24, I think.
Actually it’s 18.”
I’ll defer to your expertise on this.
I remember being in Dublin back in 98 or 99 and seeing a sign in a bar and having to show my passport. Maybe it was the specific bar. Maybe I have a bad memory. Maybe the law changed. It wasn’t really the focus of the visit.
In any case, I’m not sure how much effect drinking age has on actual drinking. My parents were in a Sabbatical in Oxford in 99-2000, and they noted some heavy drinking among teens. There seems to be an increase in Israel too.
“In Ireland the drinking age s 24, I think.
Actually it’s 18.”
…months.
PAD
6.7-7.2% is slightly higher than what’s considered the rate of the general population.
Is it? I’ve heard everything from 1% to 10%. Is there an accepted official rate?
At that rate, it sounds like if one twin is gay, you can pretty much count on the other twin being gay as well.
How? the study says that for identical twins if one is gay there is a 6.7% liklihood that the other is gay as well. Or to put it another way, if your identical twin is gay you have a 93.3% chance of being straight. Which, the authors say, is pretty much the same odds as anyone else has.
Actually it’s 18.”
…months.
Well, not for the HARD stuff.
TWL
In other words, for a set of twins, there’s a ~0.4% chance they’re both gay.
I’ve heard the convention portrayed as that we all demonstrate varying degrees of homo- and heterosexuality, so to say someone is 100% straight or gay has no fidelity to reality. The inability to comprehend this is particularly goofy in light of the similarities people exhibit between genders. We don’t refuse to kiss our partners on the features we carry ourselves. The only 100% straight romances would be between morlocks and eloi.
That’s why I ask every once in a while if before our sex drives kick in and after it wanes, aren’t we all at least a little bit fággÿ. Small children demonstrate the need gush on people in a non-sexual way, and old people are always reaching out to touch anyone on the hand with their wrinkly old skin (not saying that out of disgust).
There’s a new study floating around now about how MRIs are showing similarity in brain shapes between straight women and gay men, and straight men and gay women. With the low rates of twins where both of them are gay, it seems likely something happens in-utero that enables the preference for a gender counter to the obvious complimentary gender-fitting to gain prominence.
In other words, you can’t declare war on homosexuality without declaring war on your own hetero-partner’s attraction to you, in which case the question becomes: how much do you hate your relationship that nurturing your partners disinterest in you doesn’t affect your quality of life?
Without wanting to drag the “Jewish” thing much further, I should note that the “not Jewish enough for Israel” is more a reaction to some arguments that were taking place in Israel about a quarter century back then actual official status then or now; the only time where the Jewishness of my generation of my family has been denied was when trying to secure an officiant for my brother’s wedding.
I really don’t follow any current arguments on “return” very closely; I’m unlikely to invoke that right.
In other words, for a set of twins, there’s a ~0.4% chance they’re both gay.
No, it’s 6.7% for identical twins, 7.2% for fraternal twins.
Obviously, one factor to look into is how they define hetero and homo. If you are defining sexuality as whether or not you exclusively kiss only those parts you yourself lack, well, I guess you will list most people as at least partially gay. But that would not seem to be the usual way of defining it.
Then they’re in line with the general population, math major. Which means if one twin is gay, you can pretty much count on the other twin being gay as well.
There is something about the birth order thingie. After reading about it somewhere, I became intrigued and conducted an impromptu poll among my friends (all of them gay).
A huge majority of them have older brothers. Not all, evidently.
I know it’s unfashionably Freudian, but I also think that certain formative childhood experiences have some influence in “activating” homosexuality.
(And no, this does NOT validate some conservatives’ idea that people “decide” to be gay, since kids have no control over the sort of household they’re raised in)
But anyway, a depressing fact I discovered by talking with my gay friends, is that few of them had good fathers. It would be an over-simplification to say “bad fathers make their sons gay”, but there is something to this old stereotype too.
Most of their fathers (and mine) fall into one of four categories: The absent father that left the household early; the obnoxious macho dad always intimidating the kid; the wimpy and inefectual father totally ruled by the wife; or the control freak dad (often religious) trying to regulate every aspect of the kid’s life.
Few of them had fathers that were just regular guys, and still fewer had supportive, loving, present fathers.
Obviously this is anecdotal. It also may be that most straight males have had equally bad fathers (and then I weep for the state of fatherhood today). It could also be possible that our dads were somehow reacting to subtle (or not-so-subtle) early cues of our gayhood? I really don’t know.
Which would include or exclude Larry Craig’s wide stance?
Which brings into question the mother’s intolerance of instead choosing no relationship at all.
Well Nat, to connect the two subjects, I guess being Jewish and being gay leads to questions of identity. And in both cases you have people who want to define your identity for you.
Then they’re in line with the general population, math major. Which means if one twin is gay, you can pretty much count on the other twin being gay as well.
I have no idea what you’re talking about. The study says that if one identical twin is gay there is only a 6.7% chance that the other twin is gay. Not 100% which is what it would have to be for what you’re saying to be true.
Or to put it another way, if one twin is gay there is only about a 1/15 chance of the other twin being gay. Did you mean to say that you can pretty much count on the other twin NOT being gay as well? That would still be wrong but closer to reality.
The reason you have no idea what I’m talking about is because you don’t let the complete compatibility of your facts with what I say interfere with your relentless need to challenge me.
…or it could mean that you don’t let the fact that you often make no sense stop you from being confused that others often cannot make sense of what you’re saying.
It’s ok. In Mike’s world 6.7% and 100% are the exact same thing.
Better to play the fool and get some attention than be a ghost, where nothing he does registers with anyone.
Posted by Peter David at June 20, 2008 06:34 AM
“In Ireland the drinking age s 24, I think.
Actually it’s 18.”
…months.
PAD
Hey!! Leave us Irish folk out of this *hic*
Maybe Mike is the one who needs remedial math.
You had no problem comprehending 6.7% comprising 100% of anything in the text I’ve bolded, áššhølë.
Thank you for not invalidating anything I’ve said.