Canada, My Canada - What's Next?

[Paddy]

[Paddy]

Oh, my friend (who shall rename nameless) said with tongue firmly in cheek, that 'homophobes should encourage marrige. If gay people don't have to 'live a lie' as they often used to, then they will die out'.

erm... well apart from the assumption that homosexuality is bred, it does give pause for thought.

[gt40]

The fact that they want to 'redefine' marriage seems to indicate that marriage as it is defined does not include homosexuals.
Please, call it something else then.

[Gurm]

Oh, let's not get into the "genetic homosexuality" thing.

Homosexuals hate that line of reasoning, because either way they lose.

If it's NOT genetic, then it's either voluntary or taught. THAT opens them up to the old "corruption of the youth" charges. Bleh.

If it IS genetic, then it's technically a birth defect. THAT opens them up to ... people trying to "cure" it, as well as insurers refusing to insure because homosexuals traditionally end up with more STD's, etc. etc.

Either way, they're screwed - so most homosexuals refuse to venture down that road nowadays.

Perhaps I should have said earlier that the CURRENT homosexual culture is MORE encouraging of promiscuity than the CURRENT heterosexual culture. I think if you look throughout history you'll find that this has ALWAYS been the case.

Perhaps I am old fashioned.

I am not homophobic. I think that the gay couple across the street are nice people, we have drinks and dinner with them, etc. But frankly, I think "marriage" involves a man and a woman, a bride and a groom, a husband and a wife.

And I'm pretty mixed on the "homosexual parents" thing, too. While I think many of these people would make fine parents, I have to wonder what it does to a kid's psyche to NOT have a mommy at all - or a daddy. To INTENTIONALLY subject a child to this - which many psychologists consider to be the basis for SERIOUS problems later in life... is just too questionable to me.

Like it or not, there are two sources of morality at the current time - "best for self/society" morality, and religious morality.

Both of these moral sources indicate that homosexuality is an aberration. Whether any of us personally have a problem with it or not is irrelevant. It does nothing to further the species and in fact is detrimental to the population... and 9/10 religions think it's bad.

Since "marriage" is, in essence, a moral institution...

Again, I'm babbling, going in a million directions. Maybe I should have slept last night instead of beating my head on CSS code. *shrug*

- Gurm

[Brian Ellis]

A rose is a rose is a rose. If two people make vows that they will love and cherish each other for the rest of their living days -- and respect these vows -- then it matters not two hoots whether it is called a marriage, a union, a partnership or anything else. It means the same bloody thing, whether you like it or not.

[GNEP]

Except for the tax/legal (dis-)advantages.

[agallag]

I can think of very many examples of hetero couples that shouldn't be allowed to have children. If there's a homosexual couple that are in love enough to want to get married, they'd probably have a better chance of raising well adjusted kids than some screwed-up redneck ex-cons who happen to be heterosexual.

[Admiral]

Marriage... bah

Both of my granparent's marriages were screwed and so is my parent's. At least that's my feeling on it.

My father's parents, two Scorpios, pretty much stung eachother all of their lives, or should I say that my grandmother stung most. They like died 300km apart in different cities after living most of their old days apart, still married though.
Anyway, they raised my father, a natively potential narcisistic Capricorn, to be evan more narcisistic than his nature.

My mother's parents, my grandma a Virgo (going on 76 this September and only grandparent I have left) and grandpa a Sagittarius. Well, my grandma is a rather pessimistic person and bit of a spender while my grandfather liked to keep things well in the budget. The woman bursted when my grandpa would put expenses down on paper and turned there weren't enough money left for what she wanted.
My mother, a gentle Taurus had to cope with her father's mistrust in her and her mother's pessimism and outbursts.

Down to my parants' marriage. You can imagine that what my mother needed was trust and understanding, not an egotistical pompous ass as a husband and further more, the mother-in-law in the house for like 10 years picking on everything, never satisfyed. Mother-in-law dies, husband happens to go through middle age crisis, starts cheating on her. She finds out, they decide for divorce together, going for not understanding eachother (don't know the judicial term in English), not adultery. Judge says "huh... after twenty years and with two, still minor, kids ?!". They drop the divorce plan, his affair died out anyway by then. Things go on "as usual", by his "You should do as I say !", "Firstly you should think at me" creed, if you'd believe he actually said that and keeps saying this today
Kept on cheating, some escapades only I know of, till... well till age took a tall on his deceitful good looks. Not being much of a charmer and having lost his major asset, he's not having much luck today ~sigh~
I'm yet again proven that time has an ironic sense of justice.
Wished my mother had enough balls to go for divorce based on adultery, though when it came for advice from her parents on what to do, instead of them saying "Leave the bastard, take the kids and come stay with us", they went on "How would you manage alone with two kids ? Don't worry, his crisis would pass"

So you see, you don't need gay people to taint the concept, institution, principal of marriage... straight people, as it's been said in this thread before, can do it just fine, if not better.
To me marriage is the final step in a harmonious "soul to soul" relation and I don't give squat if it happens to be two guys or two women instead of the old recipe.
And it's nice to see that gay people can benefit from the legal advantages of it now.

I sort of promised myself I would never get married, though I promised myself many things and not always kept the promise

[paulcs]

The promiscuity argument doesn't work with lesbians. And the rate of STD transmission amongst lesbians is extremely low.

Paul

[drslump]

human beings have usually sex for pleasure not to have children.
So what's the problem if it is homo, hetero or bisexual?

But anyway we think of family as a Father and a Mother, perhaps we should be more open-minded and start thinking of a family as an union of human beings who take care of each other and raise children.

As for promiscuity, I'm heterosexual and I'm promiscuous. Sadly I'm not lucky with girls

ciao, Ivan

[The Rock]

AZ: I don't really hate gay people. Just the kind you described (the quote button ain't working here at work). The flaming ones. They disgust me. I don't want to stomp them to death or anything, but I have very little patience for those people, almost to the point where I wish they all lived in their own damn city (San Francisco maybe). I don't wish them ill will, but for some reason they just strike a bad nerve. Where I was raised, gay people were looked down on (much worse than some places I'm sure). EVERYone hated gays. Its not that I'm "in the closet" (I'm hetero), and they don't "threaten my masculinity" or anything silly like that. I just hate the posturing the flamers put on. I'm surprised that when they introduce themselves they don't say "hi, my name is whatever, and I'm gay". I HATE the fact that they wear their sexual preference on their forehead like some anti-macho badge of honour. I wish they'd act like hetero people do. You don't see the average hetero crowing about sexual preference (although some macho fools DO do this).

[Gurm]

I've actually had gay guys (why is it always the guys?) introduce themselves to me that way:

"Hi, I'm Steve (pronounced TH-teve... WHY must gay men pretend to have a lithp?) and I'm GAAAAYYYYY!"

*sigh*

'Course this was before Julie kicked his ass for asking if I'd like to suck his... *ahem* nevermind.

- Gurm

[Wombat]

Got sent this today. It makes a good point.

<IMG SRC="http://archive.salon.com/comics/boll/2000/03/16/boll/story.gif">

So, <B>who</B> doesn't take marriage seriously?

[Brian Ellis]

The really camp gays are just the tip of the iceberg. Most homos and bis are just like you and me, absolutely indistinguishable from the heteros -- and usually very discreet into the bargain. About a year ago, a close college friend whom I've known for over 50 years, happily married with family, admitted to me he was bi and had had a couple of homosexual love affairs (not adventures). I never for a moment thought that he was anything but hetero, but he never had an extramarital hetero affair. However, he is still a friend (and nothing more, I hasten to add!!!!!!!!!)

[Drizzt]

I have no problems at all with gay (I'm nearly bi), but "marriage" is a different thing.

Personally I think there are two way of being married.
One way is the religious marriage, wich is in front of your God and should be a problem for its "church" to establish if a homosexual marriage is a good or bad thing.

The second way is the civil marriage, which is by definition a simple contract between two people who can then get some "help" from the society. And, in this case, I don't see why don't let homosexuals being legally "married".


Moreover, what people bring in their hearts and souls is not my problems. One can have a religious marriage and do not believe in God, one can have a civil marriage and deeply believe in marriage as an union of souls.