Dear Iris…
THANK you for doing so much to educate people regarding God’s Law. I have learned a great deal from you, and I try to share that knowledge with as many people as I can. When someone tries to defend the homosexual lifestyle, for example, I simply remind them that Leviticus 18:22 clearly states it to be an abomination. End of debate. I do need some advice from you, however, regarding some of the specific laws and how to follow them. My important Biblically-based questions are listed below the fold. I know you have studied these things extensively and thus enjoy considerable expertise in such matters, so I am confident you can help.1. Leviticus 25:44 states that I may possess slaves, both male and female, provided they are purchased from neighbouring nations. A friend of mine claims that this applies to the Irish, but not English people. Can you clarify? Why can’t I own some Englishmen?
2. I would like to sell my daughter into slavery, as sanctioned in Exodus 21:7. In this day and age, what do you think would be a fair price for her?
3. I know that I am allowed no contact with a woman while she is in her period of menstrual uncleanliness – Lev.15: 19-24. The problem is how do I tell? I have tried asking, but most women take offence.
4. When I burn a bull on the altar as a sacrifice, I know it creates a pleasing odour for the Lord – Lev.1:9. The problem is: my neighbours. They claim the odour is not pleasing to them. Should I smite them?
5. I have a neighbour who insists on working on the Sabbath. Exodus 35:2 clearly states he should be put to death. Am I morally obligated to kill him myself, or should I ask the police to do it?
6. A friend of mine feels that even though eating shellfish is an abomination – Lev. 11:10, it is a lesser abomination than homosexuality. I don’t agree. Can you settle this? Are there ‘degrees’ of abomination?
7. Lev.21:20 states that I may not approach the altar of God if I have a defect in my sight. I have to admit that I wear reading glasses. Does my vision have to be 20/20, or is there some wriggle-room here?
8. Most of my male friends get their hair trimmed, including the hair around their temples, even though this is expressly forbidden by Lev.19:27. How should they die?
9. I know from Lev. 11:6-8 that touching the skin of a dead pig makes me unclean, but may I still play football if I wear gloves?
10. My uncle has a farm. He violates Lev.19:19 by planting two different crops in the same field, as does his wife by wearing garments made of two different kinds of thread (cotton/polyester blend). He also tends to curse and blaspheme a lot. Is it really necessary that we go to all the trouble of getting the whole town together to stone them? Lev.24:10-16. Couldn’t we just burn them to death at a private family affair, like we do with people who sleep with their in-laws? (Lev. 20:14)
Thank you again for reminding us that God’s word is eternal and unchanging.
Your adoring fan,
Gonzo
(Adapted from a viral email. Laura Schlesinger is a US radio personality who dispenses advice to people who call into her radio show. Some time ago, she said that as an observant Orthodox Jew homosexuality is an abomination according to Leviticus 18:22 and cannot be condoned under any circumstance. The original version of the above post was an open letter to Dr Laura penned by a US resident, which was posted on the Internet.)
The forces that brought about that change may also be used in future to bring about other changes – changes that we now feel improbable will become reality.
No, because they force that brought about liberalisation on homosexuality is that which said that if two people gave inform consent to a victimless crime, it wasn’t a crime at all.
Children can’t give informed consent. That’s why we have age of consent laws.
Why are the ‘gay’ fraternity so touchy when paedophiles are mentioned in the same sentence?
Because often the ignorant confuse or conflate the to, and paedophilia being seen as the greatest evil imaginable in our society, innocent gay people get battered to death.
Sammy, what is the age of consent for homosexual activity here?
“Why are the ‘gay’ fraternity so touchy when paedophiles are mentioned in the same sentence?”
Its not only the ‘gay’ community that are touchy about this! Anyone with children should be livid! Any smoke screen to where the real monsters live should be tackled with every available breath, Anyone who propogates this blatantly false filth is as bad a paedo, becuase they are simply covering the tracks of the real evil.
Looking at this thread, I see much irony merchants at work.
To return to Gonzo’s piece, I’m surprised he doesn’t already know the answers to his questions already because I’m sure some serious Christians have addressed this kind of topic on previous threads. God gave His Law to the Israelites, and specific rules from Leviticus are mentioned above, in order to show them that they could never keep all of it and thus be righteous in His presence. The rest of the Old Testament points to the One who would be able to keep God’s Law and whose righteousness would be inputed to those who recognised how far short they fell of God.
Serious Christians do not repudiate homosexuality on the basis of Leviticus. However, the Apostle Paul teaches that the expression of homosexual feelings is one sign (and just one) of the innate sinfulness of man. Also, it is clear from Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden that sexual intercourse was meant as a bonding process in which a man and a woman would be united together.
The best advocate for this position us ironically a famous gay journalist. Some years ago, Matthew Parris wrote about the subject. After declaring that he was an atheist, he said that if he was a Christian then he would have to concede that nothing in the Bible could support the practice of homosexuality.
If only Mrs Robinson had had the wit to say all of this.
Foalaphiles in your part of the world, Surely, mayoman ;>
@ Belfast Gonzo
Gonzo, excellent I was wondering when someone was going to post that up.
I have attached a youtube clip url from The West Wing which is also quality, I wish someone had taken on Iris like that.
It is important to note that the fictional President Bartlett is also a Christian, so this is not an attack on Christianity but an attack on bigots masquerading as Christians. If as Iris Robinson has said this week the bible is unchanging and ‘God’s word’ enduring then these too are all literal statements of how we should behave?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0ygcUTZ-Zk
Wow Mr Sod!
Torrential.
Your conundrum appeared to be that post-enlightenment minded people (post-modern?) cannot simultaneously respect religious and sexual difference; because the expression of some religious sentiment is antipathetic to the expression of some sexual appetite?
My response is first that tolerance is not necessarily agreement and that acceptance is not (necessarily) positive respect. Most of us are happy just to be ruler within our own herbaceous borders. Post-modern people are not (usually) on an anything-goes hippy trip. They are certainly not dealing in anything as exhausting as moral absolutes. Often they are simply attempting to establish a trade-off between conflicting instincts or interests; not just within society but within themselves. Empathising with, and thereby modelling conflicting interests is perhaps the very definition of post-modernism. That they have concluded a position (equilibrium?) whereby they accept the [removed]or existence) of homosexuality does not demand that they also, automatically accept the expression of intolerant religious views.
That Mr Sod, (I think) would be a syllogism.
Which brings me to “mathematics”. I have some little herbs in my garden. The smallest is quite unable to use a calculator yet cleverly manages to establish a range of acceptable combinations of proportions of rhubarb crumble and custard. Sometimes it’s “too much custard Sir Basil”, sometimes “too little” and sometimes “just right but can I have some more”. To my mind this implies a function by which units of “r” (rhubarb crumble) are traded for units of “c” (custard) along a curvy line of indifference (different combinations affording the same little Herby happiness). It may, as you say, be impossible to express happiness in the absolute terms of an independent measure but it is certainly possible and commonplace to weight negatively correlated but jointly favourable options against each other and to arrive at mixes (compromises?) which provide a net satisfaction which neither a 100% delivery of one option nor the other would achieve. I believe this sort of thing lends itself to algebraic expression if not, ultimately, mathematical solution.
Yours
Basil Rosemary (KHG)
Pancho.
I refer you to my earlier comment about cowardice. You know as well as I that in some quarters homosexuality is equated with paedophilia and is used as a pretext for homophobic attacks, both physical and verbal.
Now you’re retreating behind semantics rather than having the courage of being totally honest about your opinions.
See, that’s why the calls for the right to free speech over the last few days have raised a wry smile in the TAFKABO household, you shout about free speech, but you and the other homophobes don’t have what it takes to come here and speak freely, prefering instead to hide behind pedantry and wordplay, always leaving yourself an exit route in case you’re called on what it is you’re saying.
Some people say that most arguments against homosexuality stem from a fear of latent homosexuality on the part of the person speaking out.
This is obviously ridiculous, and not an argument I would make.
on a completely unrelated note here’s a quote from Pancho on the previous page.
I’ll try not to get excited when I see two men kissing but it will be hard.
Ho hum.
That’s odd.
This “[removed]” thing appeared magically in my post in place of the word “expression”. Does the Great Mind that rules Sugger dislike “expression”?
TAFKABO, just trying to follow Horseman’s advice when he advises me not to get excited.If you feel that I am playing with words, ask a direct question and I will answer yes/no/maybe. I have not shouted about free speech and on examination of my innermost depths, I don’t think I am a latent homosexual.If I was given a choice of spending the rest of my life on a desert island with a man or woman I honestly think I would choose woman – preferably attractive. How ’bout you?
Pancho’s analogy betrays an ignorance of the workings of a modern stud farm. The destination of a multi-million euro stud’s sperm will have less to do with his preference of filly, than the hand of an attendant.
Also, compared to humans, horses live significantly less diverse lives. Lives that consist mostly of reproducing and running. Yes, to remove one of those functions significantly reduces their value. That’s why we shoot them when they break a leg.
By that logic, once we’ve shot all the homosexuals, we should remove any laws, substances or devices attributable, directly or indirectly, to the homosexual population. I suggest we start with Pancho’s computer. Alan Turing
Several posters on another related thread accused me of putting up straw men despite the fact that I was able to present absolute concrete evidence to back up my claims (curiously the posters who made that accusation seem to have left that thread and moved here, I am sure they will retract their “straw man” argument at the first opportunity).
Yet this entire post must surely rank as a straw man of proportions not seen since the last scene of the “Wicker Man”.
Seriously now, genuinely, does anyone really believe that the reason a huge proportion of the population are uncomfortable with government promotion and elevation of homosexuality (and yes I do believe that homosexuality is being granted a status above other sexual lifestyles, I haven’t heard of polygamy or sado-masochism or prostitution or consenting adult incest being discussed as normal life choices in schools, have you?) is related to some obscure passages in Leviticus?
If men who prefer to use other mens’ anuses for sexual gratification seek to be left alone in the privacy of their own bedrooms I support them totally. Equally I am damned well opposed to the government saying that free citizens who find that form of sexual gratification repulsive should in any way face criminal censure for saying so, or be told that if they don’t renounce their deeply held beliefs and pretend to accept such behaviour as “normal” they could not only lose their businesses and livelihoods but could conceivably face prison time.
Freedom cuts both ways folks, the gays get left alone to do what they want and the rest of society gets left alone to think it’s cute or disgusting, either way the government minds its own damn business and leaves us alone to our own opinions.
No, Mark, because people would pretend that they weren’t really homosexual just to avoid the cull.I have to confess that I don’t have the intimate knowledge of the workings of a stud farm that you do nor was I aware that all laws,devices etc attributable to horses were removed when a horse was shot. Ya live and learn.Horses live full lives just like homos copulating and running.
Harry Flashman, damned good. Didn’t get the bit about straw men but the rest is pretty close to the mark.
USA
Still lacking empathy. It’s a good reason why you’re not Christian, just like Iris. Don’t be giving us any other excuses.
He’s here! We have lured the Beast from it’s lair!
Oh dear sweet Basil,
I think you spend to much time trying to appear a clever boy, and not enough time paying attention. Your comments, in so far as I can make sense of them, fail to address either my reply to you or my original comment. My conundrum did not mention tolerance. I will repeat it just for you :”Please inform me how an adherence to post enlightenment values and a commitment to cultural equality can be reconciled ”
A key distinction between your rather confused interpretation and what is actually written is that it is the practice of particular religious law that is persecutionary to the practice of the particular sexual appetite specifically proscribed in that law.
I’m pleased for you that you understand the difference between approval and tolerance, unfortunately we are talking about a mandated intolerance on the part of the religious law and a mandated tolerance on the part of the civil law , and your correct distinction is irrelevant.
this is the point when you stop making clear sense.
I agree with you that ‘post modern’ (I’m assuming you mean the affluent and secular people who are indigenous to western Europe, and shall explain my confusion here below) are not interested in moral philosophy. it is the apparent impossibility for reconciliation of this lifestyle with that of groups which are regimented by Moral absolutes (who’s beliefs, in the terms of my conundrum and European law, are of equal value to lassie faire moral systems of the former) that is the substance of my question. I’m wondering about your taste in herbs mate.
“they are simply attempting to establish a trade-off between conflicting instincts or interests; not just within society but within themselves”
Can you give me an example of this phenomenon, are you referring to the dynamic between conscience and appetite ? in its societal aspect this is an obscene suggestion, in terms of a commitment to gay equality, what compromise is not an act of shame for those who’s only compromise is to accept a little repression, and on the part of the faithful, who would agree to compromise the law of the universe and the highest master of all ? this dynamic in the facet of society we discuss can not exist.
Do you think its disingenuous to talk of two fundamental (and I hold, contradictory) human rights under European law (the right to freedom of religion and the right to not be harassed or discriminated against for being gay) like they can be reconciled by mutual refinement like some half baked philosophical tangents ?
Post modernism is a term of reference for particular types of art, I have referred to European morality as it was augmented by the enlightenment. The definition of post modernism is that which reacts against earlier modernist principles in the arts, as by reintroducing traditional or classical elements of artistic design, you do imply that you will substitute the term post enlightenment for post modern. Very well. I fail to see how any definition of post enlightenment values is exhibited by convoluted and pretentious mockery: your empathy is limited by your perceptions and your ability to express them, your ‘model’ is always but a product of these limited faculties rather than a mirror image of the actual object. The idea of a sort of performing art (empathy and model) informing resolution to diametrically (oi oi) opposed interests is laughable mate, sorry.
It is again quite correct of you to state that to “accept the existence of homosexuality does not demand … also, automatically accept the expression of intolerant religious views” (sic) indeed, this is the point I am making, that to reconcile the positions with integrity for both is impossible.
and basil, although I am confused that at first you said I was indulging in a sloppy syllogism and then presented your own theory as such, I must point out that neither is a syllogism, our ism of today is a method of logic whereby a minor premise is considered in tandem with a major premise to extract a consistent conclusion. given that the only premise in question is equality under the law, and that the consideration of the contradictory rights there enshrined result in a question of the laws integrity (and the morals of those who proclaim this contradictory tolerance as their own creed, I feel cynically very often), this is, take my word for it Smokey, a conundrum.
and now the bloody horticultural analogy.
the ratio you mention, that of custard to rhubarb in the suggestion that compromise in proportion is comparable to compromise of rights and ethics……, employs objects of identical purpose. a poor choice of analogy to express the dynamic of the opposed value systems of gays and (lets say) Jews who both wish to enjoy authority in society (the authority to practise your lifestyle or the opposing authority to repress said lifestyle)
“Freedom cuts both ways folks, the gays get left alone to do what they want and the rest of society gets left alone to think it’s cute or disgusting, either way the government minds its own damn business and leaves us alone to our own opinions.”
Quite right dammit!!
But you seem to be battling your own straw man there Sir Harry.
Homosexuals (and Mr Muir in particular) have not objected to not being left alone. They have not (so far as I can tell) even objected to a lack of balloons and bunting and public celebration (though Mr Muir is certainly a celebrant).
They have objected to Ms Robinson’s belief that the proper response to an assault on a British subject is to capitalise on the opportunity to advertise a constituency service to deal with his sexual disorder.
the items you seek to ratio are complimentary and not combative and therefore can function in a shared platform, thusly representing a totally different dynamic to that which informs the conundrum. equality has been granted to the opposing traditions in law, this is dysfunctional in practice and one section or the other must concede. Practical equality for opposing positions under the law cannot exist.
Did that b*tch Laura Schlesinger respond??
Actually Harry, I disengaged with you on the last thread because you started to make it an exchange of personal insults, and quite frankly I’ve better things to do.
John O’Connor
You told me yesterday that the Bible is the Word of God. So do you agree with all of these rules???
Seriously now, genuinely, does anyone really believe that the reason a huge proportion of the population are uncomfortable with government promotion and elevation of homosexuality …. is related to some obscure passages in Leviticus?
I’ve never believed that, but those passages are frequently used to justify the hatred that exists and Iris herself, like a lot of Christians do insist on having the right to “hate the sin” .
So, if we remove biblical references for the hatred of homosexuality, what are we left with?
Some people just don’t like poofs, in the same way some people don’t like black people.
As I said before, there is no logical reasoning for being so strongly repelled by homosexual acts, one must go to ancient mytology in order to find justification.
Now that is not to say one ust embrace the homosexual acts wholeheartedly, if you don’t like the idea of it, fair enough, but taking that dislike to the point where you’re interfering with someone else’s right to have a different view, and yes Harry, by complaining about government promotion of homosexuality you are indicating that you have a problem with other’s right to free expression.
The usual old shite gets wheeled out again. Haven’t these people been listening ?
Pancho’s horse :
… but the problem arises when it is flaunted in your face.
All kinds of sexuality is “flaunted in your face” of everyone, every day. Turn your TV on, or walk on Botanic Avenue on Friday at about 8pm. Do yourself a favour, though, and don’t go to Las Vegas, whatever you do. You’ll find heterosexuality flaunted in your face non stop.
The ultimate intended aim of sex is procreation.
Then what are contraceptives for, and why aren’t people like Iris complaining about the people who use them ?
Can homosexuality be ‘cured’? Who knows?
Can heterosexuality be cured ? Can asexuality be cured ? Can people who do not want to procreate, by choice, be cured ? Can people with foot fetishes be cured ? Can women who like to give orders be cured ? Can people who make no noise during sex be cured ? Once you set down the road where there is a fixed definition of what sexuality is, anything outside of that must be wrong and must merit medical attention ?
In the great liberal UK, homosexuality was a criminal offence until recently. Why is it not now? Because a very vocal and influential minority pushed and whinged and blackmailed and cajoled in all walks of life until it was made ‘lawful’.
In the great liberal UK a few hundred years back, being Catholic was a criminal offence too. Why is it not now ? Because a very vocal and influential minority pushed and whinged and blackmailed and cajoled in all walks of life until it was made ‘lawful’.
Some homos ARE paedophilic and some paedophiles ARE queer.
What does that prove ? It’s a redundant contribution to the argument.
Sorry Mr Sod,
You accuse me of not paying attention
You offer
“I will repeat it just for you :”Please inform me how an adherence to post enlightenment values and a commitment to cultural equality can be reconciled”
When I have already provided
“Your conundrum appeared to be that post-enlightenment minded people (post-modern?) cannot simultaneously respect religious and sexual difference; because the expression of some religious sentiment is antipathetic to the expression of some sexual appetite?”
Have I misunderstood your “conundrum”?
You have said that post-enlightenment society has offered tolerance to homosexuality, and that post-enlightenment society has also offered tolerance to abrahamic religion. These are tow premises. You have concluded that post-enlightenment society is therefore hypocritcal or at least wrong headed because abrahamic religion does not (in some interpretations) tolerate homosexuality, as if post-enlightenment society should expected it to.
In assigning this assumption you assign to society a (false, or sloppy) syllogism. It is clearly not logical that because A tolerates B and C, B and C should tolerate each other, but the argument is syllogistic in that two premises are used to support a third.
My point is that post-enlightenment society does not demand that all elements respect all others. Society is a marketplace in which the interests of each of these constituencies is traded with others. Each constituency does not dictate the terms of that trade other than to the extent of their comparative advantage. These terms are determined by the wider society and they are subject to the interests and ethical position of everybody else.
I tried to explain with the example of indifference curve that we (and society) make compromises between competing aims. Perhaps it would help if I pointed our that the little herb in the example you disliked so much is permitted only a maximum portion size and must therefore compromise?
“Post modernism is a term of reference for particular types of art”
It is. It is also a challenge to absolutism and the pursuit (marxist, fascist or evolutionary psychologist) of a single objective unifying truth in human relations. Post modernism asks (and it’s a fair question after the events of the last century) “whose truth?”.
I was not mocking you Mr Sod – I was genuinely wondering if by “post-enlightenment” you meant “post-modern”. As the enlightenment was a modernising project I thought the two interchangeable.
Come to think of it I wasn’t even that pretentious. I only introduced indifference curves in my own defence when you freaked out at the use of ethics and algebra in the same sentence.
Earnan
I said that the Bible is the Word of God, but that the Old Testament was evil. That is because it is man-made and designed to contrast with the God-made teachings of Jesus. THis is purposely done in order to give contrast between good and evil.
The Old Testament’s origins are in the sin of Adam and the expansion of that sin comes through the law. It fails to deter sin but instead lets it grow. But it is liked by shallow people.
So the law (Leviticus)that Iris is relying on is counterproductive but designed to attract shallow people like her, and to help to weed out those who are not Christian from those who have an understanding of Christ’s message.
The most Christian position is that homosexuals are human beings and that they deserve respect on that basis.
and yes I do believe that homosexuality is being granted a status above other sexual lifestyles, I haven’t heard of polygamy or sado-masochism or prostitution or consenting adult incest being discussed as normal life choices in schools, have you?
No, but I experienced heterosexuality and celibacy being promoted as healthy positive life choices at schoo.
@TAFKABO
“Actually Harry, I disengaged with you on the last thread because you started to make it an exchange of personal insults,”
I most certainly did not. Don’t be so daft.
“Harry, by complaining about government promotion of homosexuality you are indicating that you have a problem with other’s right to free expression.”
Er, no I am not, by criticising government policy I am exercising my right to free speech, a rather simple concept I would have thought.
I have no problem with free speech TAF old man, it is you who seem to have a problem with my right to free speech.
Harry.
I don’t come here to have spats with you.
I’m interested in the topic under discussion, nothing else.
Posted by John O’Connell on Jun 10, 2008 @ 08:55 PM
The books that make up the New Testament were so chosen as not to conflict with the authority and power of the mediaeval church: it is argued that the Gospels number four books only as it is in harmony with the Classical Greek view of the elements – Earth, Water, Air, and Fire. However, the point is books were omitted simply because of man’s frailties under their façades of being pious – like today they craved power. Take the Gospels of Mary, and Thomas – the former lady has since been rediscovered to be the mother of all disciples but yet she was ostracised as a prostitute by the early church as a means for letting women know their place in the hierarchy. The Gospel of Thomas is full of philosophical sayings that directly challenge the church so this too was left out. Even if one accepts that the 27 books define Christianity fully one must also consider the possibility that if emphasis was placed on Peter and not Paul then Christianity would simply be another cult of Judaism. And then there was Judas – don’t get me started on this most maligned disciple!
Simply point believe in what you will but as you have seen in recent years the winners and writers or history are not often the most reliable of source and sometimes you have to do your own research, which by the way the Gospel of Thomas advocates.
find a certain humourous irony in the fact that folks who often do not believe in God, or the Word of God, or who have never studied theology should so boldly issue vehemently determined Fatwa’s to believers in how they should practise or understand there own belief system.
Imagine if someone who did not practise and who had never studied medicine and who did not even believe in Scientific Medicine entering the precincts of a hospital and telling the medical staff how they should carry out surgical procedures and how the hospital should be run.
Imagine, again, a person who had never played golf, disliked the whole game and had the vaguest understanding of its inner runnuiings coming into a golf club and stridently telling the startled golfers how the game should and should not be played.
Both Doctors, nurses and golfers would all I suppose say, ‘Well if you don’t play the game, don’t make the rules’. Which seems to me very reasonable.
However Jack everybody, when it comes to religion seems to feel him/herself well qualified to be their very own Pope when it comes to religion. Despite the fact they might not believe in God, despite the fact they do not believe in the Word of God, despite the fact that they have never studied theology, despite the fact that they have never studied scripture and despite the fact they have no real knowledge, or belief in the whole religious culture which they seek to condemn.
Something they would never in a million years dream of doing with secular subjects such as say golf or medicine.
More grimly ironic is the fact that people who accuse others of intolerance are so intolerant themselves that they accuse the clergy of being child molesters.
Sauce for the goose, sauce for the gander.
If the Catholic Church was to reverse its 2,000 year old teaching on this subject it would, like the Anglican Communion implode and be destroyed. The medical staff of a hospital would not follow advise that would destroy the hospital from people with no real interest or belief in medicine, golfers would not follow advise from non golfers with no interest in golf which would destroy their club, why on Earth should the Catholic Church commit to its own destruction, from people who very often do not even belief in God and hate the Church they seek to instruct in how to behave?
I don’t suppose Iris & Robbo will be hoping that the Ulster Titans will win the The Bingham Cup* in Dublin this weekend? The IRFU will surely be in more trouble as well!
*The Bingham Cup is the second largest biennial amateur 15s rugby tournament in the world. The 2006 cup which took place in New York was the biggest yet. Thirty teams drawn from clubs around the world competed in the three day tournament. The Dublin tournament is expected to exceed these figures with over 600 participants already registered for the competition.
http://www.binghamcup.com/
Chief Executive of The Irish Rugby Football Union, Philip Browne said: “The IRFU are delighted to be associated with the Emerald Warriors in hosting the Bingham Cup, which is fast becoming one of the largest international amateur 15-a-side rugby tournaments in the world. The Tournament Director and Organising Committee are to be congratulated on bringing this tournament to Ireland and also on securing an international brand, Paddy Power, as the title sponsor for the tournament. Given the professional manner in which they have approached the Tournament to date, the event is sure to be a big success.”
It appears you have misunderstood even the subject of the post.
You decorate your rebuttal with an analogy to the market and trade, as ethics do not have physical or actual monetary value, you misrepresent the substance of the premise.
I did not mention tolerance in society but personal ethics. I asked the poster if he believed in cultural equality, and that if he did how he proposed to respect all cultures equally when they practiced (and seek to enforce) opposed positions. My original enquiry is how it can be logically consistent to afford equal esteem opposing ambitions. I insinuated then that the condemnation of religious maxims was politically convenient and that these would not be challenged so strongly if it was inconvenient.
Then you arrived basil and set about illustrating why a contention I had not made was wrong. What is remarkable is that in your enthusiasm you quote verbatim my inquiry then set about rebutting an entirely different proposition. Twice I believe. Also I felt my sole proposition was the dysfunction of the belief in universal cultural equality and I’m not sure the examples employed constitute separate premises in their own right.
Leaving aside your misunderstanding, I shall endeavour to engage with the novel premise you illiterate -
Post enlightenment societies’ member are under subjection to the law. A number of those laws penalise all forms of disparagement, discrimination and persecution of those engaged in Homosexuality. Another, and rather more complex and suspect, of those laws forbids the disparagement of religion or the giving of offence to the religious. Both of these laws cannot be maintained simultaneously with integrity. Either the liberty to openly practice homosexuality trumps the right to practise the religious duty to repress it, or the religious duty to repress homosexuality trumps the right to practice openly thereof. It will be remembered that laws are not commodities and to suggest their arranged compromise can be determined on a market basis is to forget the competitive functions of the market and the purpose of a unified legal code.
In asserting what is a pair of facts regarding law and presenting the disorganisation in law they create, I have in no way preformed an exercise in syllogistic logic. multiple premise and illustration of consequence or a conclusion drawn from such is not a syllogism. A syllogism requires a minor premises and a major premise in illustration of a rule pertaining to a definitive conclusion. the idea that a syllogism is any two statements and their consequence is a very very sloppy definition indeed.
Then you start into what seems to be some sort of crude caricature of Ferrier. The problem with your continual recourse to analogy is that you fail to establish a legitimate correspondence between your parable and the subject at hand (for example, confusing the possibility of compromise on the part of two values in regard to physical ratio on a platform with universal ethical requirements, that lack physical value, and in their application under law require the support of the entire society, or ‘plate’, to provide reference to your analogy, in order to maintain the order that is their purpose).
The same is true with your sloppy pseudo-algorithm. Let us see if we can however make sense of the A’s B’s and C’s
– It is obvious that you mean A to represent law in society, B and C the devout and homosexuals.
You then ascribe an equality of value, and assume my belief in a linear functionality of your three components, This is sloppy indeed, A being in reality a structure maintained by B, C and several others besides that regulates the conduct of B, C and others. A does not perform any action but has multiple, and, as it should be, complimentary values, its values determine and regulate the actions of B and C, and in this instance I hold that inconsistency has arisen in contradictory determinations on the part of those who determine the particular values computed to A . To assert that B and C are separate entities is to lose sight of what the figures represent. Ascribing false value and action to figures to illustrate a confused point about an irrelevant premise would be a poor basis for pretension Basil, so I’m glad to hear you restrained yourself.
It is disingenuous to claim that A performs an action that need not be duplicated by B and C. A determines the acceptableness of the actions of B and C and restrains or facilitates them accordingly. For B and C to function within A, they must be subject to it’s regulations, as B and C are components of A and not agents of equal value. Again, A does not perform actions but regulates the actions of the other subordinate figures. And again, It is in this function that B and C must conform to the values demanded by A.
“my point is that post-enlightenment society does not demand that all elements respect all others.”
Under the laws of every European society, it does exactly this. For example the obligation to respect human rights under the European convention. These rights include respect for homosexual lifestyle and religious belief and practise. (To return to current affairs) This is particularly dysfunctional with regard to the specific provisions afforded to the dignity of the Islamic faith under European law.
“Society is a marketplace in which the interests of each of these constituencies is traded with others”
Society has the capacity to organise a market, it is not itself simply a market. Laws are not subject to trade and although a compromise in certain mutual liberties by congenial parties within society may be possible in specific instances, it is not when said liberty is the liberty to practice the suppression of the contented opposing liberty as mandated by divine authority, or to flout such (supposed) authority suppressing your desired liberty under the pretences of civil law. Your analogy may resemble coherence if we were talking about the division of fields and the deliberations on their contents, but sadly not for universal ethical requirements mandated by law.
When both positions are absolute, capitulation of ones particular liberty, (the right to public life for homosexuals and the right of freedom of conscience for the religious), for one party or the other capitulation is the only solution. Trade, as we are dealing with singularly opposed absolute requirements of individual conscience under a universal and absolute authority (civil law), becomes impossible.
Then you start in with a completely nonsensical reference to consumer behaviour theory, continuing in your illegitimate trade analogy, and, I think, enjoying showing off knowledge of a theory you have clearly profoundly misunderstood. Given that the law is universal in society and not subject to trade as is not a commodity, this poor analogy strikes me as better suited to compromise in discourse or arrangements, rather than ethics required by law or rights guaranteed by law. I am beginning to wonder what your on about Basil even from a position of indulgence.
@RepublicanStones
Yes the consent issue can create a difference. Though consent is often an unrealistic fig leaf for the real motives behind age of consent laws the comparison is still probably best avoided.
Better comparisons with homosexuality would be gerontophilia (perfectly legally but faces social disapproval), consensual adult incest such as this couple,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=suRzZeMwkIg
and arguably at least some zoophilia. For example see Peter Singer’s arguments in support of non-cruel bestiality (Peter Singer is probably the world’s most famous animal rights philosopher).
I think that everyone should have the right of protest and demonstration, INCLUDING pro paedophilia, zoophilia or consensual adult incest groups who want to change the law, never mind thoose whose sexual activities are legal. However, people must be permitted to express strong disapproval of all of these things without any kind of government sanction falling on them. This is also vital for a liberal society.
Basically though, on the issue of homosexuality, we’ve largely got two sets of illiberals, religious fundies and right-on lefties who don’t base their views on individual liberty but want to see governments punishing people for doing things causing no individual harm to others, often by making up claims about harm to “wider society”.
The whole cure thing is like the plot from X-Men 3. If you haven’t seen it the US govt create a ‘cure’ for mutation by extracting the DNA or something from a mutant boy whose own power is the ability to render any mutant powerless when in his presence. Naturally the mutant community split into those who volunatrily want to take the cure so they can be ‘normal’ and fit in, and those who argue that mutation is a natural part of evolution and mutants have nothing to be ashamed about.
Assuming we’re in the realms of Iris Robinson’s parallel universe and her claim to know a cure for homosexuality isn’t fantastical bollocks, do you reckon there would be many gay people who would take up the offer? In NI anyway you’d suspect the number may be higher proportionately than other Christian countries, and to be perfectly honest, who could blame them?
But what would a ‘cured’ person’s life be like? Let’s assume a gay man turned straight has hit the dating scene and gets his first girlfriend (or maybe first in a while – you never know he could have dabbled before becoming fully gay), eventually the topic of past conquests will rear its ugly head. Would most women freak if their new fellah’s ex turned out to be a bloke called Dave? And Steve, Archie, Chris & Jonty before him?
There was an episode of Sex and the City where Amanda dated a guy who turned out to be bi and she had a hard time dealing with the fact he’d been with guys as well as girls.
I dunno, just curious…
@Sir Basil Rosemary
Homosexual “rights” activists, some of whom are homosexual, some not, have demanded things far beyond the right to private consensual activity being legally permitted. They have demanded that people should be legally banned from choosing to contract for goods and services. For example, as a web designer, if I choose to refuse to design a website for a gay nightclub I could face prosecution and ultimately imprisonment.
Compare this to adultery, of which Iris Robinson would no doubt also strongly disapprove. People are permitted to voice their strong disapproval of adultery without facing government sanction. Adultery is perfectly legal (consenting adults behind closed doors etc.), as it should be. However I would NOT face the possibility of a spell in prison if I chose to refuse to design a website for a “swingers club”.
Homosexuality should be treated, both by the letter of the law and by the behaviour of the establishment, as adultery is. At least as adultery with the consent of both spouses is. It is not. It is treated in an illiberal fashion in favour of homosexuals.
Posted by John O’Connell,
The most Christian position is that homosexuals are human beings and that they deserve respect on that basis.
I don’t believe it, that bit actually nearly makes sense (the Christian bit lacks credibility). Told you it wouldn’t be long till John O’Crap showed up.
Zoonpol
I’ve already read the Gospel of Thomas and it is to me only mildly radical. But I think you’ll find that whatever about Athanasius’ choice for the 27 books of the NT, the hand of God was there.
In contrast God firmly shows that there is no god that would meet the definition of God in the OT scriptures.
USA
Christians must have compassion and empathy unlike you. I think you haven’t realised it yet but you are in Iris’ camp, lacking empathy and compassion in your attacks on me.
A true Christian loves and forgives all of their fellow man. Why is that hard for people to accept?
Mr Sod,
In our post-enlightenment hubris we value two
precious “goods” (I don’t know why you used “commodities”).
First we value free expression. Inelastically. We demand it at ever greater price.
Second we value personal autonomy. The same way.
We recognize that to secure these for ourselves we must secure them for others; even the bent and the bigoted.
Sometimes these two goods do not conflict. In the scenario/conundrum you’ve raised they do. You say there’s a lack of integrity (moral or intellectual?) in an attempt to reconcile them.
We try anyway.
When we have to balance one good against another (free expression and personal autonomy here) we fashion a trade-off which describes the amount of each we are prepared to sacrifice for more of the other.
The trade-off we determine between the personal autonomy of homosexuals and the free expression of the devout is described by a curve (a non-linear expression). In theory we’re equally happy at any point along that curve but in practice not all the potential mixes we’d accept are available. We might demand infinite homosexual self-fulfillment as the price for freedom from the annoyance of religious witness, or global salvation and the second coming in exchange for military grade gay repression. In this the ethical are running a mental calculation on a shifting value for what they detemine to be the aggregate good and setting a floor for the acceptable position for each affected party. Lots of ethical algebra. The cynical are asking what price will shut them up so we can get on with our own lives.
So there is a point at which we no longer accomodate the exchange of some of one commodity for more of the other.
This point is clearly determined personally but aggregated, averaged and maintained at the level of society. It is arrived at through the work of market forces – the relative power of the various interested groups.
One expression of this is the law, which skips merrily along without looking over its hypocritical shoulder, each parliament sovereign and unbound by the last. I really cannot believe that you seriously doubt that the law is anything other than the market established expression of the balance of power. And you call me sweet!
If it was we wouldn’t need equity.
PS
If that wasn’t annoying enough I’d add that I threw in “sloppy syllogism” more because I liked the pornagraphic sound of it than anything else. I am pleased to have given you diversion and the occaission to trot out your display of recently cobbled philosophical erudition. I hope you found the morning’s research interesting. Anyone thick enough to think post-modernism “a type of art” clearly hasn’t much depth.
To cheer you further my use of herbs, rhubarb and custard was prompted more by Loco’s (Pancho’s Horse) references to childhood TV which sent me into whimsy than by an effort to find the most appropriate “parable”.
love and kisses.
What was that cult that believed that there were two Gods – actually wasn’t he a member of the early church? John i am glad you admitted that the God of the OT is different from the NT but yet Jesus claims over again to support the OT.
What are we to conclude?
I must confess I did not read each and every post. I came on line to respond to Pancho’s horse or anyone else who is trying to link homosexuality to paedophilia. I believe Pancho, to paraphrase him stated that now that homosexuality is legalized and accepted paedolphilia is next. I have worked with children for over 25 years now in children’s mental health centres. How anyone could ever put homosexuality in the same sentence or relate them in any way is deeply disgusting.
Children who are sexually abused are deeply hurt and emotionally scarred for the rest of their lives. These include children who are raped by same sex individuals or opposite sexed ones, in fact I deal with many more kids abused by opposite sexed ones then same sex. Notice I didn’t say homosexual peodiphiles or hetrosexual ones, these people who commit such acts are sick and there is no cure–that is prognosis is poor and they need to be locked up. To suggest that homosexual acts are the first step towards legalizing peodiphilia is ludicrous.
This is not simply because one is consensual and one is not, one is very harmful and hurts the psyche of the young person, infant, toddler for ever. They need therapy, some never recover, some choose suicide, some become perpatrators themselves through learned behavior. Many struggle with having normal relationships with anyone, particularly normal sexual relations. Because homosexual relations are now considered normal DON’T DARE SAY this is the slippery slope to legalizing sex with children–child rape in fact. You and your like are ignoramuses. YOU HAVE NO IDEA ABOUT WHAT YOU ARE SPEAKING ABOUT!
Two happy people who are same sex partners enjoying the liberties that all the rest of us enjoy can somehow lead to claims that this will result in peodilphilia being legalizd–COME ON–maybe you are the one who is mentally deranged, what next this will lead to legalizing rape! Making it okay to mutilate people and kill them before, during and after raping them, if this turns your crank? Just because two adults engage in loving relations with same sex partners you are saying that this will in turn lead to leagalizing child rape. Catch yourself on! Only sick minds equate homosexual love with child rapists, I abhor such deranged thinking.
Those of you who are claiming to be republican should be especially ashamed of yourself. I come from a republican family. We cry and complain about oppression then won’t let gay people in the St. Patrick’s day parade, in NYC anyway.
Back to my life as a child care worker–don’t even talk about paedophilia you have no idea how it harms humans. I know many around the world think of Ireland as a racist and socially backwards country–it is know wonder with you people saying what you do.
Again back to supposed republicans, “How can people be so cruel, how can people be so hard, especially people who care about strangers and speak so highly of social injustice, easy to be hard easy to be cruel…”
For the children.
CCW
PSSorry for the poor spelling but what some of you are saying is so infuriating and totally ignorant!
Good night.
Zoonpol
John i am glad you admitted that the God of the OT is different from the NT but yet Jesus claims over again to support the OT.
What are we to conclude?
The God of the Old Testament is in fact and logic Satan. The God of the New Testamentr can logically and emotionally be called God.
Jesus came to fulfill the law, not destroy it in the sense that the intention of the law is to make the world better and that is the intention of Jesus. But Jesus knows how to do it; the law is counterproductive and results in more evil.
It is the same as the SDLP and Sinn Fein at the beginning of the Troubles. Sinn FEin said they knew how but hadn’t got a clue. It resulted in more violence and more opposition to progress. The SDLP through New Testament actions knew how to do it and achieved a settlement. The New Testament triumphed over the Old Testament and the way had been made clear for progress.
New and original. What is new is not original and what is original is notw new. Therefore, Belfast Gonzo: try harder.
Comments like yours have been around at least since Thomas Paine. The Internet is full of sites slagging offf the Bible: try the skeptics’ bible for starters.
There were at least two strands of writers in the Old Testament just as there were tow or more strains in the accepted Bibles.
Homosexuals like to pain themselves as the victims so that, like Colm O’Gorman, they can leech a living. There are disease ridden (relatively speaking), selfish hedonists. You cannot support the sodomite movement and really care for common man.
Perverts like Jim Gibney just use one complex to mask or excuse another.
They now give each other “the gift”. They infect each other deliberately with HIV to be part of the club, knowing that the ordinary heterosexual tax payer will have to subisidize their medication. Of course, the sodomites’ scrounging culture should be perfectly at home in Belfast built and maintianed, as it is, on scrounging.
I have to say I am disgusted with the moderators who censor innocuous comments and yet allow posts like that last one to remain on the boards.
Baz,
“In our post-enlightenment hubris we value two
precious “goods” (I don’t know why you used “commodities”). ”
You are correct that these two concepts are valued and practised, I’m not sure your itinerary is exhaustive though, or even what it has to do with what I’m saying.
free expression is not the issue it is the practice of repression, not the expression of dissent, that we have been discussing for three days.
The simultaneous endorsement of Homosexual equality and the bestowed liberty to practise homosexuality, and the contradictory concept of cultural equality involving cultures where Homosexuality provokes capital punishment is what I have been trying to explore. you might have got this if you weren’t so interested in bizarre competitiveness.
“We recognize that to secure these for ourselves we must secure them for others; even the bent and the bigoted.”
who are ‘we’ ? Are you a silk or a police man or a veteran or something ? We, as citizens, do not secure these concepts, we endorse and enjoy them in a limited form, absolute personal autonomy and absolute free expression are both not endorsed by society, nor are they supported by reason.
We also do not recognise freedom of action. When action is mandated by law from an endorsed authority (‘God’), and the exact same action is prohibited by an endorsed authority (Civil Law), their is a conflict of interest in the party which endorses both in citizenship and sect, when the law simultaneously endorses the requirement that your religion by respected and not challenged by society, dysfunction and incoherence follow and one section of law or the other needs to be augmented in order to maintain coherence
“We try anyway.”
Do we? Or do we ignore the flaws in modern political moral philosophy and hope for the docility of the hostile party ? I do not believe that there has been any attempt in Britain to reconcile the positions of just homosexual liberty and the unjust position of the pre-eminence and enforcement of Holy Maxims. I would welcome any explanation as to how this can be done. we ignore the problem and hope to avoid terminal confrontation.
“When we have to balance one good against another (free expression and personal autonomy here) we fashion a trade-off which describes the amount of each we are prepared to sacrifice for more of the other. ”
This is a profound misunderstanding of the nature of law and of the substance of the argument. The analogy of balance in this instance is a nonsense as the concepts are impostionary to one and other. either one section of civil law or the other must capitulate to the others supremacy, this is not mutual, but singular compromise and thusly cannot be described as trade. perhaps in a broader frame work one groups position could demure from its right in exchange for benefits in other areas, this is not compromise mate, its compensation. and an acknowledgment of the need to maintain the laws consistency by the wilful removal of one sides right.
The type of graphs you refer to illustrates the relationship between people and produce, not ethics and society, I fail to see how it is applicable to the understanding of societies ethical position on behavioural phenomenon. as we are dealing with a signal issue and not multiple products, the trade analogy you employ exhaustively is simply irrelevant to the issue. Also I am frustrated to have to again remind you that we are discussing the authority to openly live in a way people disapprove of over the authority to repress said lifestyle, not ‘autonomy’ and free expression. given that the discourse involves a signal issue (sodomy) can you please to me the relevance of speaking of shifting value (given the fixed value of the object to both parties) ?
“there is a point at which we no longer accomodate the exchange of some of one commodity for more of the other”
I assume by the phrase the exchange of some of one commodity for more of the other is to represent the extent of imposition by either party on the right to practise the subject of the issue, the idea that repression of practice or pre-eminence of the right to practise can be traded or compromised is bizarre, what to you propose ? alternate days ? regions of influence ? think of the road signs basil…..
The idea that the rule of law should be subject to the varying powers of influence of the respective parties is a corruption, to say the law functions by being manipulated by the strongest is to abandon law as the rule of society and replace it with strength and policy, a bizarre formula for justice and coherence whatever your analogy.
“one expression of this is the law, which skips merrily along without looking over its hypocritical shoulder, each parliament sovereign and unbound by the last. I really cannot believe that you seriously doubt that the law is anything other than the market established expression of the balance of power. And you call me sweet! ”
sweet basil ? no ? I thought you would like that one…. try it with tuna marinara and a nice pinot. the law governs the use of power and while you describe admirably the corruption of law under the hand of policy, you do not resolve the dysfunction in the law and indeed lend us a most salient example of how nonsense and contradiction infect it, and how its operations can become harmful and fractious to the body of law itself, upon which we have a division of adherence to the law in society with the selective operation of, to all practical purposes, separate legal systems, which adds weight to my conjecture on inconsistency in the law being unsustainable.
“If it was we wouldn’t need equity.”
we need equity for the trade in valuables, the presence of the influence of equity in law is the seed of injustice and we cease to have law and have only policy. the system you propose to render the law mutually hospitable would in fact instigate the most profound diffusion of society and the rule of strength, the Republic (as in Rome but you know that already baz.) instigated law to prevent this barbarism. this is one of the dumbest things I’ve ever heard basil.
PS
“If that wasn’t annoying enough I’d add that I threw in “sloppy syllogism” more because I liked the pornagraphic sound of it than anything else.”
its alright basil, when people want to sound smart they often employ fancy words incorrectly.
“I am pleased to have given you diversion and the occaission to trot out your display of recently cobbled philosophical erudition. I hope you found the morning’s research interesting. Anyone thick enough to think post-modernism “a type of art” clearly hasn’t much depth. ”
oooh tetchy baz, I’ll tell you what, words, as we discover above, are employed sometimes by people who don’t know what they mean. sometimes words and phrases can seem so correspondent to the concept ones wishes to speaks on that such words are employed incorrectly on a regular basis, this does not change the actual definition of the word, and from your disparaging style to the less erudite, I would have expected greater discipline. perhaps your confusion in language has some bearing in your profound confusing in explaining and understanding concepts.
just for you lad…….
http://dictionary.cambridge.org/define.asp?key=61770&dict=CALD
http://www.askoxford.com/concise_oed/postmodernism?view=uk
To cheer you further my use of herbs, rhubarb and custard was prompted more by Loco’s (Pancho’s Horse) references to childhood TV which sent me into whimsy than by an effort to find the most appropriate “parable”.
your just a bit of wank really baz, I do hope your under 21.
you remind me a lot of an old friend called Richard.
oh and lastly
http://www.askoxford.com/concise_oed/law?view=uk
I wonder if you don’t need it :>
NIGHT.