Conference quark::mennotes-v1

    Frankly, I'm not crazy about watching people have sex at all, whether
    they're on the screen or on the sidewalk, straight or gay, attractive
    to me or not... The old "close the bedroom door (or burrow into the
    haystack, etc.) and reappear the next morning with pleased expressions"
    scenes were fine with me. ;-)
    
    But I fail to see what one's taste in entertainment has to do with what
    one feels is right. Freedom of speech, for example (which many
    Americans seem to think is a good idea) means that people shall not be
    prohibited from speaking their minds even if we personally don't like
    what they're saying; but it doesn't mean that we have to buy tickets to
    their movies.
    
    A more realistic scenario, were homosexuality to be generally accepted,
    would be that no one would care whether the newly-reunited couple at
    the airport gate, hugging and kissing with rapturous abandon and
    obvious joy, were of the same sex or not.
    
    -b

    I don't enjoy seeing HETEROSEXUAL sex scenes, so I don't see that it
    will make a difference for me. And oddly enough, many men enjoy seeing
    two women sexually stimulating each other. 
    
    Admittedly this is Mennotes, but your suggestion brings up an
    incredible amount of taboos. No one has ever denied that most people
    want homosexual acts kept out of sight. I think it would offend enough
    people so that it wouldn't sell. And movie-makers know it wouldn't
    sell. So we won't see it.
    
    But, was there lesbian sex in Basic Instinct? I didn't see it, but I
    was under the impression that the movie grossed a LOT of money. So,
    evidently, we're ready to see SOME of it.
    
    I have a feeling gay sex on the screen will probably end up with an X
    rating. Giving people the right to choose whether to watch it.

    I have rented Basic Instinct, but not viewed it yet.
    
    As for the X rating, I don't think so.  I can see a time when sex
    scenes will be common between homosexuals as are hets now.  I'm not
    talking graphic scenes.  But rolling in the sheets, kissing, you
    know... typical hollywood love making scenes.
    
    One won't know what kind of relationships they'll find.
    

    re .2
    
    The lesbian relationship in Blatant Instinct is quite blatant.  The
    story line hinges on it.

I wouldn't go to see Lethal Weapon N because of the violence.  I don't like
the way that violence is glorified and used as entertainment.  I think the
violence in films such as Lethal Weapon is truly disgusting.  So I don't
go to see them.

If someone else likes this stuff, fine.  If my son asks to go see it, I
will tell him "no" and explain why.

Like anything else in our society, sex and violence is showing up in films,
books, on TV and everywhere else because "it sells".  If LW 10 (gack, what
a thought!) features a gay sexual relationship and people pay to see it,
then what's the problem?  If they don't pay to see it, you probably won't
see LW 11.  

			Steve

    Since gays represent only 10% or so of the population, that means that
    the ratio of sexual activity between opposite-sex couples and same-sex
    couples in society at large is probably in the range of 9:1 or so (not
    accounting for the fact that people's sexual activity doesn't always
    match their sexual orientation).  So if movies were to mirror society
    to a certain extent, then I doubt that would would see a situation
    where sex scenes will be common between same sex couples as opposite
    sex couples.  If movies matched society, perhaps every tenth sex scene
    or so would involve a same-sex couple.

    Realistically, though, I tend to doubt it, because, in my view, a big
    part of Hollywood romance is that it is selling fantasy to the
    audience.  It has been that way ever since movies began, when really
    hot scenes involved nothing more than a passionate kiss.  But those
    passionate kisses have always been there, because that's what a lot of
    people like to see.  Same-sex romances are unlikely to appeal to as
    much of the audience because heterosexuals of either sex are unlikely to
    identify with the characters during those passionate scenes.  That
    doesn't mean that heterosexual audiences cannot enjoy a good story line
    involving same-sex couples; it simply means that the passionate scenes
    have a special fantasy appeal beyond the story line per se, and they
    would have less of an appeal if they involved people of the same sex.

    And, for what it's worth, I can think of two movies right off hand that
    involved romance/sex between two women.  One was "Lianna", directed by
    John Sayles (who also directed "Eight Men Out", "Matewan", "Return of
    the Secaucus Seven", to name a few), and the other I forget the name
    of, but it had "Desert" in the title ("Desert Hearts"?).

    -- Mike

add to the same sex rolling in the sheets scenes The Hunger, and  Bitter Moon
just off the top of my head that I've seen lately... ... same as a few other 
people in here,  I know I'm pretty open minded, however in the majority of 
situations I'm not too into watching sex scenes in a movie unless it's relevant
to the story line...  and again like others I probably wouldn't end up watching 
LW stuff anyway... 

    Sounds like an unusually realistic and entertaining edition of "Lethal
    Weapon".  Finally, a good explanation for the interminable team-up!
    
    Ray

    I don't really give a rat's ass about the two nimnuls in LW movies. 
    The gratuitously violent theme of LW, with or without sex of any kind
    whatever, is repugnant to me.  (I don't watch Dirty Harry movies,
    either.)  If the premise in .0 had been offered with a less disgusting
    background, say, that of Network News, I might consider whether the
    question is worth answering.
    
    -dick

    
    
     Any real estate agent having read the last few would not doubt
    begin selling acres of moral high ground at a high price. " I don't
    care about the sex, it's the violence that upsets me."
    
    Ad choking sounds,
    David

    Re .10: Uh, does that mean you don't believe there are people who'd
    rather watch scenes of people having sex than of people smashing each
    other's brains out? Or just that you don't believe the "movie-going
    public" feels that way?
    
    -b

    I like sex and violence both.  But you have to admit that "Lethal
    Weapon" hasn't been holding its own in the sex department...
    
    Ray

    
    
    >uh, doe sthat mean that you don't believe there are people who'd
     rather watch scenes of people
    
     No.. It means I think there are alot of people skirting the issue
    at hand..
    
    David

    "Skirting," eh. _You're_ the one who brought up "Lethal Weapon". ;-)
    
    o If the issue you're trying to raise has more to do with the "liberal"
    people's willingness to accept public displays of homosexual behavior -
    as in, are they just giving lip-service to gay rights, and would they
    really not want any gays moving in next door - then I think the movies
    are a bad example. More to the point, I'd say, would be whether people
    would be shocked to stumble across a couple necking in a car and find
    that both of them were male, or to be introduced to their friends'
    daughter's SO at a wedding and find that the SO was also female.
    
    o If your issue really is whether people who believe in equal rights for
    homosexuals would be equally willing to watch filmed homosexual love
    scenes as hetero ones - whatever the answer, do you think it would
    prove that people aren't as liberal as they claim to be? As I mentioned
    before, defending a group's civil rights does not require one to choose
    all one's entertainment on the basis of whether it features that group
    or not.
    
    However, in the interests of un-skirting (hmmm, sounds risque): if the
    scene you describe in .0 were to appear, I, for one, would be
    delighted. I think they'd make a _lovely_ couple.
    
    -b

    
    -1 -B
    
     Ahh, like you have me mixed up with the author of the basenote..
    
    
    David

    Oops, been darting back and forth too much.
    
    Still applies, though. Which issue did _you_ think was under
    discussion?
    
    -b

    
    
    -1
    
      I suspect the underlying issue for the basenotes is wether or not
    homosexuality is right or wrong, all the  debate over
    violence and sex in the movie is colateral(sp)..
    
    David

    Okay, I'll answer David's query about whether homosexuality is right or
    wrong.  No.  Homosexuality is not right.  Neither is homosexuality
    wrong.  Homosexuality is.  Period.  And given that it appears to be
    built into the nature of gays, it looks as if it it won't go away.  So
    we'd all better learn to live with it.  To hate in the name of one's
    chosen deity is directly to contravene the tenets of virtually all
    religions regarding love.
    
    -dick

    re .0, I passed the test.  I wouldn't blame anyone for wanting to do it
    with Mel Gibson.
    
    Lorna
    

    sorry, Lorna, I don't!
    
    actually, I thought the actress playing Glover's daughter was kinda
    cute...
    
    There have been a number of gay-subject films out; I've seen "Desert
    Hearts" which was fairly graphic in it's sexuality (I once interviewed
    for a job with the woman who directed it, many years before) and it
    didn't bother me particularly; I think I was more shocked the first
    time I saw two gay men passionately kiss up live and close. It had
    never dawned on me at that point that men did that with each other.
    And after another gay friend took me to a Latino transexual strip show,
    I think my capacity to be shocked was pretty well trashed.
    
    At the same time, I tend to avoid gay subjects as I just don't have the
    conciousness, or interest. I respect their right to do what they want,
    but excuse me if I'm not interested.
    
    The box office will always have the last word, and there will continue
    to be an audience for 'small' films about gays, but probably not too
    many big budget ones, unless there is some univeral aspect that
    attracts a mass audience. People vote with their wallets in the
    entertainment world, and probably not too many are interested in seeing
    gay men have sex, in the wider audience.
    
    -roger
    
    
    

    
    
    Dick,
    
      It was not my query, it was my assersion with regards to interpreting
    the basenote.. Read first, it kan help wooof understanding:-)
    
    David

    
    
    > to hate in the name of ones religion
    
     To constantly take someones position and call it hateful, then stand
    back and look at it from the moral high ground is directly " Old hat."
    
    
    David

RE:  Note 851.18  SMURF::BINDER 

>    we'd all better learn to live with it.  

Some would say, treat it.

>To hate in the name of one's chosen deity is directly to contravene the tenets
>of virtually all religions regarding love.

Manson's deity was to cause suffering.  A college in Mass, I believe, is laying
claims that adults that desire sex with young children is also their deity.

Don't ask be to learn to live with it.  I don't accept things just because
"they exist."

    re .23
    
>Don't ask be to learn to live with it.  I don't accept things just because
>"they exist."
    
    When you understand that the onus is on you to show why something
    should not be done, and thus far with homosexuality you've failed
    miserably, you'll have taken a giant step forward.

    re .25
    
    The notion that you must show why something should not be done is not
    just my opinion.  It is one of the fundamental premises of a liberal
    society without which our society as we know it could not exist.

The comparison of gays and paedophiles is insulting to gays.

The element that holds the firmest ground with these type of 'rights' 
is that those involved are consenting, and thus adults

Don't know about over in the states but in the UK a child is not
able to consent - ie: their saying they want to have sex *still* isn't 
consent, on this basis it makes a big difference. 

Actually, a situation similar to the hypothetical one in the base note did
happen.  Apparently, among fans of Star Trek, it is popular to write new
stories based on the familiar characters, many of which have been published
and sold.  I once read that one of these stories described a gay love affair
between Kirk and Spock, and the reaction of the general crowd of Trekkers was,
shall we say, not restrained.

			Steve

    There seems to be some confusion around the gay rights issue. Gays do
    not want 'SPECIAL' rights they want the SAME rights as anyone else. Why
    people are homosexual.....from the latest research (I don't have the
    name ...it was in the gene research field) it certainly looks like
    being homosexual is genetic....like having blue eyes as opposed to
    brown eyes. There is no 'cure' as there is no disease. A greater
    understanding and acceptance of the differences of all would help this
    world we live in. There is too much hatred towards others just because
    they are different from what , in a particular society, is perceived
    as 'correct'. The question I ineviably get is ' What about your son...
    what if he is approached by a homosexual." My response is  " I 
    would expect the same type of behaviour from him if he was approached
    by a heterosexual female........a polite reponse indicating that either
    he wasn't interested or a polite response indicating that there may be
    some interest. Nothing more nothing less certainly no threat to him.
    I would expect the same response irregardless of race and religion too.
    So......am I liberal in my viewpoints...perhaps. I like to think of
    myself as humanitarian in my viewpoints.
    
      

    
    
     -1
    
     According to the latest and greatest " brain sex" programs, aired on
    the discovery channel, gay sexual orientaion does not occur naturally,
    but in fact occurs only  while in the womb(baby) the mother experiences
    severe stress. This causes some part of the body to underdevelop(the
    babies( I donot recall its name, thylmus?? ) and in this occurs 
    in the male fetus then its relative size(of the unknown organ) is more 
    like that of a womans and hence the arguement is that gays are 
    genetically altered and subsequently prefer men etc etc severe 
    readers digest version..
    
    
    David

Dwight,
  When you say that you don't accept things just because "they exist" exactly
what are you trying to say ? I can understand not liking something, but not
accepting reality seems to be a very different situation. 
  There are a few things in this life that I don't like but I have found that
once I accept the things I can't change, I have a lot better shot at happiness.
I accept the situation and the fact that I seem to dislike it, whatever the case
may be. This act then allows me the freedom to look at myself and see why it is
I have this feeling of dislike. My own feelings of dislike, repugnance, hate, or
anger all originate within me. I need only the courage to look within for the
answers.
  As for the premise of .0, I can't say that I would be undisturbed. I can say
that it wouldn't keep me from going to movies. I don't think that Gibson and 
Glover would be compatible though so we probably don't need to worry.

Live and let live
Karl

A note relating to homosexuality is opened in a notesfile. 
How many replies will it take before someone makes a link 
with bestiality, pedophilia, mass murder, etc.?

The first one in this string, I think, is 851.23. Not bad. 
It's usually 4 or 5.

Mike

    
    
    -1   Sad but true.. If people disagree with homosexuality they should
    simply disagree with it, not compare it..
    
    
    David

    Re .30: Uh, not that I'd presume to doubt the accuracy of a show on the
    Discovery Channel, but are you sure that _they're_ sure that gay sexual
    orientation occurs *only* because of some kind of in utero stress? (I do
    recall some research suggesting that a high percentage of gay men had
    similar <whatever it was>-gland structure and size to that of women,
    but their data set was small to begin with and was taken almost
    exclusively from gay men who'd died of AIDS - not exactly a
    representative sample. Nor, as far as I can see, does this explain the
    occurrance of lesbianism.
    
    For that matter, one might just as well say that heterosexuality is the
    result of the lack of certain stimulating types of in-utero stress. ;-)
    
    -b

    
    Basenoter, I failed your test.
    
       Even tho I'm in favor of "To each his own".
    
    The idea of slapping down 20 bucks to see Lethal Weapon 10
    ( will be 20 bucks by the time # 10 is out ) to watch two guys
    making it for 10 minutes is not my idea of entertainment.
    It's a turn off.
    
    

    
    -b
    
      Its a hypothesis. I do not recall an explanation for lesbians 
    presented on the show. 
    
    David           p.s.  I cannot swear to the accuracy of my reporting
                         :-)

>    to watch two guys making it for 10 minutes
    
    Well, presumably, they'd keep the banter going ("You really ARE
    crazy!") and hop out of bed in time to blow up a few cars...  Besides,
    I bet Danny Glover can make it for longer than 10 minutes.
    
    Ray

    
     Ray,  
           Well....as long as they blow up a few cars.....than that's 
    different !
    
       Oh and, by Lethal Weapon #10, Mel Gibson,at age 75, will be a 
    lethal weapon ... as long as he has his walker.
    
     

    Re .37
    
    > 							       ...  Besides,
    > I bet Danny Glover can make it for longer than 10 minutes.
    
    I suppose certain members of this conference might take offense at the
    subtle (and probably unintentional) racist implication that blacks are
    better in bed...
    
    -dick

    OK, then, I bet Joe Pesci can make it for longer than 10 minutes.
    
    Ray

    
    
    ...he man is that a crack about Italians..
    
    
    
    David Dybentelli :-)

>    ...he man is that a crack about Italians..
    
    Certainly not, but thanks for the compliment.
    
    Macho Ray

    
    
    > but thanks for the compliment
    
     Ah collecting obnoxious and offensive bonus points are we :-)
    
    
    David

    
    
    > How open minded are you about sexuality
    
     Just noticed this in a different light. Doesn't the question posed
    in the title of this topic presuppose that persons that disagree with
    the lifestyle are close minded ???
    
    David

    re .29, I agree with your note 100%.  You expressed my feelings very
    well.
    
    re .28, I've always suspected that Spock and Kirk were lovers.  :-) 
    Nobody likes their friends that much. :-) :-)
    
    
    re .37, I bet he can, too.  :-)  What about Gibson, though?  (One thing
    I do know is that *I* could do it with Gibson for more than 10 mins.)
    :-)
    
    Even though my past life and my inclinations would seem to indicate
    that I'm heterosexual, I've always been interested in homosexuality. 
    I'm not sure why, unless it's just that I've always been drawn to
    things that are different, and alternative lifestyles and choices and
    options appeal to me.  Anyway, I recently saw a movie called The Living
    End, which is about two gay men who find out they're HIV+.  It's a very
    good movie, anyway, but the two main characters are also gorgeous and
    there was one scene where they were making love in a shower and I found
    myself enjoying it quite a bit.
    
    Lorna
    
    
    

>    re .37, I bet he can, too.  :-)  What about Gibson, though? 
    
    I'm afraid I would've made the same joke about any co-star of Gibson's,
    'cause it was, well, this is unkind of me, but it was sort of a joke
    against Gibson, y'know, since he seems so excitable and all...  If
    you're reading this, I'm sorry, Mel.  At least I didn't make any
    "short" remarks.
    
    I know a number of women who enjoy various sorts of gay male porn, BTW. 
    (The Kirk/Spock stuff is almost exclusively written by and circulated
    among women, according to an essay by Joanna Russ.)  It seems to be the
    same impulse that makes pseudo-lesbian porn sell to het men:  You only
    get the good parts.
    
    Ray

       I enjoy the 'Roseanne' show.  Martin Mull was Roseanne's boss at a
       Mall Coffee shop.  He was gay.  It was part of life.  Now Sandra
       Bernhardt and Morgan Fairchild are Lesbian lovers.  The comedy of
       the show (IMO) is enhanced not detracted.

       When we tear down the fear of any group of people we see that they
       are not all that different from any one else.

       I'm not a fan of Pat Robertson's 700 club.  I don't threaten his
       advertising sponsors I simply choose one of the other 51 channels.
       Since I don't watch his show does that mean anything other than it's
       not my 'Cup of Tea'?

       Patrick

    
    	....you call this the MENS notes? Come on... from what I just read
    it sounds like there's alot of kite flying going on.
    
    					             	-LUCKY

    Re .48
    
    Okay, enlighten me.  What is "kite flying"?
    
    -dick
    

    
    
    	Being gay is like flying a kite. You can spot'em a mile away.

    Why don't you just come right out and make your point?

    
    
    	I reiterate .50

    If you think you can spot all homosexuals "from a mile away" then you
    are woefully na�ve -- there are homosexual men and women in your
    facility that you simply can't "spot." 
    
    					andrew

Perhaps Mr. (I think) MacDuffie would care to enlighten us as to what 
he can "spot from a mile away" that makes him so sure he can tell if a
person is gay.  From the number of gays I've run across, I've yet to find
anything which could be spotted from even a foot away.

			Steve

    Is Mr MacDuffie having us on here?  Or is he serious?  If the former,
    then I - for one - don't appreciate his callous attempts at humour.  If
    the latter, then he is indeed incredibly na�ve.
    
    -dick

    Aha!  I have it.  Mr MacDuffie is admitting obliquely that he possesses
    the fabled 'gaydar" that enables gays to recognise each other.
    
    I applaud you, Mr MacDuffie, for your openness.
    
    -dick

    
    
    	Sorry you guys are such sensitive 90's types. Can I buy you each 
    a cup of coffee at my favorite sandwich shop on Main Street in Worcester?
    
    
    	

    RE: .58

    "coffee"  at a "sandwich shop" ?  That sounds like a real *myn* to me.

    A real *man* would buy someone a beer at the local dive.

    Bubba

    
    	Bubba,
    
    	How about if the "Sandwich shop" also turned out World championship
    caliber Professional boxers. Would that change your opinion?
    
    							-LUCKY

Maybe they specialize in knuckle sandwiches.

    re .58, .59, everything on Main St., in Worcester, is a dive! ha-ha
    
    Lorna
    

    Okay, I get it -- I wasn't sure whether you were being deliberately
    obtuse, or whether you were merely stupid.  Now I know which...
    
    					andrew

    
    		Andy...
    
    		Les be friends
    
    
    		

    It's Andrew --
    
    No thanks -- I choose my own friends.

    ...and since this seems to matter to you: I'm heterosexual
       (that means I'm attracted to women).
    
    					andrew

    
    	It tells me alot more. Believe me. You can take the apron
    off now and join the men.
    
    

    
    
       Hey Lorna,  Didnt we meet on Piedmont Street awhile back?
    
    
    

    re .70, I don't think so.  I value my life and my time too much to hang
    out in that part of town.
    
    Lorna
    

    Lucky,
      If I read you right then you are saying:
    a. Homosexual men are not real "men"
    b. You are offering an invite to do knuckle sandwiches for lunch.
    Is this basically correct? Sorry if I am belaboring the obvious, but I
    find it difficult to believe that anyone is that dense, much less a DEC
    employee.
    
    Karl

    Nah .. Karl ... he's just making reference to the so called manly art
    of boxing so as to disparage my remarks about a coffee and sandwich
    shop as being for the "unmanly".  I think I'll invite Mr. Lucky to
    one of the more famous two-bit honky tonks out in West Texas -
    professional boxers wouldn't stand a chance out there ('cause Texans
    don't play fair).

    Bubba

A few notes back, mention was made about how to tell if a man is gay or not.
With some men, it is probably hard to tell on the surface, until certain
dialogue is made.  But, seems that with many homosexual men, there is something
about them that says it clear.  And I know I ain't the only person to pick up
on it.  Comedians refer to it all the time, and many a TV show or movie will
make it obvious.  Is that just Hollywood?  I don't think so.

I know that I've been able to pick out many a homsexual male from the way they
talk and from their mannerisms.  I've seen my peers pick'em out as well. 
Wonder why many/most homosexual men protray feminine characteristics?  

I believe that someone also mentioned that there were many a homosexual in the
work enviornment that one wouldn't know of.  While there is probably some truth
to that, that person should not fool himself.  Many a homosexual employee has
been recognized by the way they handle themselves.

And sometimes, bisexuals can be spotted too.  A guy is married, so you assume
he likes women, yet... he also gives off 'signals' that says he also leans the
other way.

    re .74
    
>Wonder why many/most homosexual men protray feminine characteristics?  
    
    Since most don't you can stop wondering.

    You think so?
    
    I'm not so sure.

    Okay, Dwight, we can buy that.  You're not so sure.  And it's easy to
    understand why.  You're living in a world that appears to bear little
    resemblance to the real one, so of course you haven't figured out how
    the real world works.
    
    -dick

I think, Dwight, that you've been misled by the very stereotypes which you
use as a basis for your argument, as well as some of those who choose to
be "outrageous".  None of the gays I've met in "normal life" have any of the
stereotypical characteristics, and those are the "out" gays.  I'm sure I
know many more who are not "out" and I'd never suspect.

I'll agree that if you get to know someone well, you may be able, in some
cases, to get a good idea as to their sexual orientation, but this should
not be extended to imply that there's some sort of lavender letter that
all gays wear on their foreheads.

				Steve

    Let me say, I know of a few gays here at DEC.  They surely do have the
    characteristics that I'm talking about.  They are the typical
    stereotypes in the way the carry themselves and talk.
    

 By the same token, some people are more sensitive than others to subconscious
clues, aka having "gaydar" or not.

 You seem to be saying that if your gay friends hadn't told you about their
orientation, you'd have had no inkling of the situation. I have a tough
time believing that all your gay friends keep things so carefully concealed
that there is no outward indication, so if what you say is true perhaps you
are just insensitive to the minor clues that often indicate homosexuality.
One needn't wear a frilly dress and boa to arouse suspicion, you know. (And I
suppose it needs to be said that not all cross dressers have alternative
orientations.)

 This is not to say that I think I know everyone around me who's gay, but
I guess right a fair percentage of the time. And I have been dead wrong a
few times. And mightily surprised on more than one occasion. So it's not
perfect, but I don't see that there's any value to be added to deny that
it is frequently possible to ascertain one's orientation by taking stock of
some of the visual and auditory cues.

 The Doctah

    
    Dwight, I hope this will not offend you.
    
    Assume for a moment that 5-10% of all the men in Digital are gay.
    Now, think about how many men you know in your building. Then think
    about how many men you are sure are gay.
    
    Now: do the numbers match?
    
    If so, then I'll give you credit for a sensitive "gaydar". If not, then
    perhaps you can accept the idea that only a SMALL percentage of gay men
    are "campy".
    
    Among people I know fairly well, if I only see them in the company of
    their own sex, and they NEVER mention any sort of companionship of the
    opposite sex, or any interest in it, I often leave it open to the
    possibility that they are gay/lesbian. I especially find this true
    among some of the women who give me incredible grief for my
    relationship choices. (All of my friends give me SOME grief...)
    
    But I have worked on my gaydar, because its important to me that my
    language be more inclusive of all orientations. I would never use
    gaydar as a means of screening people in order to avoid them. And it
    isn't THAT good anyway.
    
    On top of that, Dwight, I sincerely hope you never make a mistake with
    those stereotypes. There are many straight men who are "sensitive
    types". It happens to MANY men who are raised exclusively among women
    as well as some who aren't. And it does NOT mean that they are gay. I
    honestly think that you would be highly insulted if anyone thought you
    were gay. But, it could happen. Someone could think you're fronting.
    Lots of gay men have done an incredible job of gay-bashing to hide
    their own orientations. So: PLEASE be careful about jumping to
    conclusions. There are some straight men, sensitive though they might
    be, who might bash your brains out over that kind of mistake. Equally,
    there are probably some gay men, "macho manly men" though they may be,
    who wouldn't mind pulverizing you for some of the comments you've made
    about gays. 

    
    The last few responses have been very interesting to me.  I believe
    Lauren hit a big topic ...  the assumptions we make about our world and
    how we react because of these assumptions.
    
    I lived in the SF area for a year and it was a real eye-opener for me
    ... as a single hetro male my dealings with women were the same. 
    However, my inital meetings with men where quite different, especially
    since I set off lots of folks "gaydar".  I had never realized the
    different "rules for encounter" I had with men and women until this
    experience.
    
    I have always been somewhat careful when first meeting a women so there
    would be no misinterpetationsa of my behavior (whether it be interest
    or no interest) while not giving any thought to my actions when I met a
    man. While in SF my actions became much more similar in both cases. 
    
    Take care,                                              
    Greg
                                              

    I believe you can tell a person's sexual orientation simply by watching
    them when they aren't aware, and observing whom they follow with their
    eyes.
    
    Works almost flawlessly.

    I think I know what Dwight was talking about, and for the record, I
    have to back him up a bit.   For a period of my life, I lived in the
    company of *very* gay men.  When I say *very* I really and truly mean
    men you didn't require 'gaydar' to pick out.  Lisping speech, 'girly'
    mannerisms, and so forth.  I recall being moderately surprised at the
    time to discover that Yes, Virginia, There are Swishy Gay Men.  Wasn't
    just like one or two examples, either.   
    
    (disclaimer insert:  yes, I know not all gay men act stereotypically. I
    don't think Dwight said that all do.  I read his comments as saying a
    lot do.  I happen to agree.  A lot do.  Not all, many not most, but a
    lot.)
    
    Perhaps the media does focus on the more flagrant types.  Probably
    because these folks are more open about their lifestyle than the
    ones who appear as 'just part of the crowd'.  However, saying that
    these stereotypes don't exist is just like saying that all gay men fit
    a stereotype (and for that manner, gay women).  It's incorrect.
    
    My two cents,
    
    kim

    The conscious use of stereotypes can be useful (or humorous, or
    relaxing, since everyone knows the rules of the game) to some members
    of the stereotyped group.  For gay men, it can be a subtler, (perhaps
    superficially) easier way of "coming out", for example.
    
    The problem with using stereotyped behavior is that it confirms the
    confusion of "stereotype" with "essence".  As we see in this
    notestring.  However, sometimes you just gotta say "Flock 'em if they
    can't take a joke."
    
    Ray

    
    	RE: .83
    
    	Mike,
    
    	Yep...you can spot'm a mile away. Like as if they were flying a kite.
        At times, I can almost hear the lisping whining voice in notes too:')
    	
    								-Top Cat

    Go ahead, start identifying.  Prove your point.

Go away McFluffie, you bore me.

    
    
    	And here I am being civil, SLIPDICK.

Go away McPoofie. Doesn't it embarass you in the least to flaunt your obvious 
deficiencies in public like this. Now there's a nice boy, just crawl back under
your nice warm rock and we'll all pretend you never existed. 

    I think it's useful in a topic like this to be reminded that such guys
    exist.
    
    Ray

    
    
    
        Hey Lucky,    How do you shut this gaydar off! last few notes 
                    has it screaming!!!
    
                                          

    Arguing over how to "spot the gay" seems like a pointless waste
    and a pretty odd pastime even if you develop the skill.

    I thought we're supposed to talk about manly stuff in this notesfile,
    like shaving, and why electric razors are a big fraud and running a
    dust buster over your face would probably be equally as effective.

    Martin

>    Arguing over how to "spot the gay" seems like a pointless waste
>    and a pretty odd pastime even if you develop the skill.
    
    Depends on whether you do anything with the "information"...
    
    Ray

    
    Oh wow, talk about an education!!! You mean electric razors are bad???
    
    All the black men I know swear by them. They don't like "close shaves"
    because their hairs curl in or something like that. There's a whole
    topic on it in blacknotes...
    
    Guess the mileage varies...

    'ren;
    
    Typically, the beards of black men are curlier than non-blacks; a close
    shave increases the chance that one (or more) of these curly beard
    hairs will become ingrown, and infected.  Consequently, it's entirely
    possible that black men prefer electric razors, even if they don't
    leave one's chin "baby-butt smooth."

    Yeah, black guys tend to get razor bumps. 
    
    Hmm, you'd think that white guys with way curly hair would have the
    same problem, but I never heard one say anything about it.  Maybe that
    explains those weird things on Cary Grant's face...
    
    But if your hair is naturally straight, it's preferable to shave as
    close as possible.  That way you don't have to shave as often.
    
    Ray

re .97:

Nonsense.  It's preferable to grow a beard.

    Oh, you ZKO mountain men...
    
    Ray

>    But if your hair is naturally straight, it's preferable to shave as
>    close as possible.  That way you don't have to shave as often.

 Or just condition the people around you to expect you only to shave 
every other day...

 :-)

>          <<< Note 851.50 by MEMIT::MACDUFFIE "Top Cat was a Ding" >>>

    
    
>    	Being gay is like flying a kite. You can spot'em a mile away.

       I knew a guy in College who had this same backward misconception. 
       He made the mistake of saying this to our College's 265 lb nose
       tackle who was gay.  It wasn't pretty.

       Patrick

    
    
    	Patrick...
    
    	What did he do?....tackle him...ooooh.
    
    	That ain't the point and you know it. 
    
    							-Top Cat

Re: .103

Why should you?  I interpret your statement as suggesting that a 265lb
football player who happens to be gay would automatically want to engage
in anal intercourse with any male who happened to be present.  If this
is what you meant, it shows a rather narrow and inaccurate understanding of
what "being gay" means.

					Steve

    Re .104
    
    You do know, Steve, that it is precisely this misconception that the
    military use to ban gays in their ranks.
    
    -dick

>        <<< Note 851.102 by MEMIT::MACDUFFIE "Marquis of QUEENSbury" >>>
>                           -< Too damn sensitive... >-

    
    
>    	Patrick...
    
>    	What did he do?....tackle him...ooooh.
    
>    	That ain't the point and you know it. 
    
>    							-Top Cat

       Then what IS the point?

  <<< Note 851.103 by PCCAD::RICHARDJ "Bluegrass,Music Aged To Perfekchun" >>>


       Just for the record this particular man chose to be celibate.

       Patrick

    I deleted .103 because it was probably offensive to those who are gay.

    My apology if this was the case.

     Jim (who has a contrite heart)

    
    	Yeah but Jim..the gay folks have no problem insulting you and then
    rubbing their life style in your face.  Get back in there!
    
    							-Top Cat
    
    				

    RE:Dave

    Although I don't accept homosexuality as being normal, 
    I have nothing against those who are gay and would not
    want to hurt them. The remark I made was stupid !

    
    Jim

    
    	Can't beat honesty. Thanks Jim.

    
    
        Like Jimbo always says,  "Once a hopper...."
    
       Hey Lucky,  Am I in MENNOTES or GAYNOTES ??
    
    

    Hey Stanley, where do you sit in MRO1?

.109> Yeah but Jim..the gay folks have no problem insulting you and then
.109> rubbing their life style in your face.

Ok, MacDuffie, here's your chance to shine.  Question for ya', and a
serious one.

I see you've used the words "life style" with respect to gay folks.  I know
a few gay people and darned if I can see any difference between what "they"
do every day and what your "normal" heterosexual couple does every day ...
with the single exception of the fact that the object of their affection
is a member of the same sex.

I've heard this term "gay lifestyle" over and over and over again - and -
quite frankly I haven't the foggiest idea as to what the Hell it is.  If
you would, please, 'xplain it to me.  Quite frankly, I'm in the middle
of rednecksville and we don't see a lot of "them" out here.  Please hep
a po' country boy understand this ... you seem to be someone who doesn't
mind speaking out.

Now, in all seriousness ... what do you perceive (or know) the "gay life
style" to be?

Bubba

    
    I think that when Lucky mentions the gay life-style, he is referring to
    their relationships.  Yea, I'm sure homosexuals watch tv, listen to
    music, hunt, fish, fly kites, play house, etc., but I don't think that
    is what most people refer to when they use the phrase.
    
    But Lucky can speak for himself.
    

    
    you should run   elf.

    I have to second Bubba's question.  Homosexuality is in my mind no more
    a "lifestyle choice" than heterosexuality.  As Popeye said, "I yam what
    I yam."  If you're straight, you're straight.  If you're gay, you're
    gay.

    I admit freely that some small number of straights may become confused
    by family situations presenting messed-up role models, such that these
    people *think* they're gay; and I think it likely that some number of
    gays get similarly messed up and think they're straight.

    These people, both types, are probably highly neurotic, and it wouldn't
    surprise me to find that the maladjusted straights among them are the
    origin of most of the "poofy" stereotype.  If you're a straight boy and
    are so screwed up that you think you're gay, then you're likely to
    think that the ordinary "masculine" traits aren't for you because
    they're the way a straight man behaves - so you'll adopt the "feminine"
    mannerisms that you see around you.  Which means that (many of) the
    poofy "gays" aren't really gay at all...

    -dick

.116>< -< Bubba, aren't you in California? >-

Yep.  Bakersfield.   'bout 150 miles north of Los Angeles, 300 miles
south of San Francisco .. in the San Joaquin valley.  Oil country.
About 2/3 of the people here are from West Texas and Oklahoma.  Very
redneck town.  Very white-anglo-Saxon-heterosexual-Protestant-male
dominated place.  Some LA folk came up here and organized a gay "pride"
parade - four people showed up.

My question to Mac Duffie was serious.  Correct.  Let him answer.

Bubba

    An interesting analogy that I have heard this morning on the local
    radio station. And that is a comparison between Dracula and a gay.
    As we did the Monster Mash in the early 60's and learn to hid under
    our desk. The dance of death, it was called. 

    The analogy of Dracula and gays might be a subliminal thought of the 
    homophobia that many of us hets posses. 
                                   

    .121
    
    This is just a thought, no I am not trying to make a mountian out of a
    mole hill here.
    
    If there is something that can help us all understand what is the make
    up of it all vs the bashing between the two factions that is the
    helping of the understanding.
    
    

	RE: .115 Beeler

        Bubba,

        You're an intelligent man. You know what is meant when HETS talk
about their dislike of the gay lifestyle. I understand that probably in 
the Gay community this type of flaming behavior is frowned upon, but it's 
still there. What's the percentage of gays that act like this? I don't know. 

	HETS are referring to the general feminine comportment of Gays, 
the gesturing, the lisping, the swinging of their ass's as they walk like 
a dog with a burr up its crack. The makeup, the jewlery, the entire physical 
picture, the attempt of a man to look pretty. These characteristics are the 
first things HETS notice, then we see or hear about the parades, the 
Congressmen keeping sex boys (Barney Frank), The political conventions, 
the Gay Life radio commercials, the inch by inch encroachment into our daily 
lives of the gay contingent, AIDS. All this coupled with Bible school classes,
church, and the Sodom and Gamora story. The whole 'shot group' just doesn't 
look good. (I have a few guns too)

	Then there's the sex part. There's the image of two guys going at
it. It's alot to ask of HETS to accept as normal, especially when just 20 
years ago it was all in the closet. So, Bubba, I take it your two gay 
buddy's are cool and don't flaunt the gay lifestyle in your face. Ask them
what they think about flaming homosexuals and we may have some common ground.

							Regards,
							-Dave

RE:  Note 851.119 SMURF::BINDER 

>        Homosexuality is in my mind no more a "lifestyle choice" than
>        heterosexuality.  As Popeye said, "I yam what I yam."  If you're
>        straight, you're straight.  If you're gay, you're gay.

        I don't think that is the issue.  For example, if a guy's bread
        "ain't all baked", he's got problems and yes... he is what he is.
        If Popeye was a pervert, he is what he is.

        Saying, "I'm a (whatever) and I can't help it, is not a logical
        reason to excuse all actions linked to the problem.  That's like an 
        alcoholic saying, "I've got a drinking problem... but I still have
        to drive."  Or like telling Charles Manson, "you're a killer, but
        it's not your fault."  Maybe it isn't his fault, but that isn't the
        issue.  The issue is the associated problems with being a killer.
    
        I think most HETS that don't support homosexuality feel that it's
        a perversion as it's not the norm.  And while homosexuality may not
        be choice, the ACT IS BY CHOICE.
    
        I can have a drinking problem, but I have to DECIDE that I ain't
        going to drink.  If we used the excuse, "I can't help it... it's
        the way I am",  then we could excuse other taboo items, including
        rape.  "I saw her and was over-whelmed.  I wanted her and couldn't
        control my actions.  It's not my fault.  It's the way I am."  In
        court, there is a scape goat for this.  It's called claiming to be
        INSANE.  And many HETS feel this abnormal behavior is a form of
        mental problems that lie buried within the homosexual.

    
    	RE: 851.124
    
    Quite correct, Dwight.  Homosexuality is not the norm.  In fact,
    I don't know of any other species other than humans that practice
    homosexual acts (?). But then again, we call ourselves "Homo Sapiens".
    I guess I just haven't evolved enough - I'm still proud to think 
    like a Gorilla.
    
    TC

    re .124
    
>        I think most HETS that don't support homosexuality feel that it's
>        a perversion as it's not the norm.
    
    This classic error of logic renders your argument and its conclusions
    utterly invalid.  Something is not necessarily a perversion simply
    because it is not the norm.  Not, of course, that you understand what
    the norm is.  You make another classic error of logic in assuming that
    only that which is most common is normal.  
    
    I could spend some time explaining the difference, but you clearly are
    immune to reason, so I won't waste my time.
    
    Oh, and in .123 you confuse camp with gay, which is yet another error.
    
    You're really piling up the errors (there are more I haven't
    mentioned).  It's impressive, in a bizarre way, to see how many you can
    cram into your purile argument.

    re .125
    
    The evidence for homosexual behaviour among various animal species is
    so widespread that you have obviously shut your eyes and refused to
    look.  Why not try a change of tactics and do some research before
    taking up disk space?

.125> Quite correct, Dwight.  Homosexuality is not the norm.  In fact,
.125> I don't know of any other species other than humans that practice
.125> homosexual acts (?).
    
    Stanley, it wouldn't hurt you to educate yourself on the subject
    before you make statements like the one above.
    
    When you say homosexuality is not the norm, you're quite right, but,
    when you say no other species practice homosexual acts, you're quite
    wrong.
    
    By the way, blond hair and blue eyes aren't the norm, either.

    	It has been shown in several species that homosexuality is a
    typical response to overcrowding. It is the overcrowding that is
    abnormal since it has normally been limited by war, famine, plague, and
    obviously these are all more desirable than homosexuality.
    
    	A couple of our former neighbours led a homosexual lifestyle. One
    of them was managing director of a small company and the other did the
    company accounts. They were quite different. One of them I very much
    doubt if you would have suspected of being homosexual if you had not
    known he lived with his "brother". He was a short, swarthy, and rather
    dour Frenchman who was always seen either in a very formal business
    suit or in gardening clothes.
    
    	The other dressed rather flamboyantly, and introduced himself to my
    wife soon after we moved in as neighbours as "Hello, I'm Charles. Me
    and my brother are in perfume". It turned out that the business was a
    wholesale perfume business.

    Not just overcrowding.  Homosexual behavior can arise under a few
    abnormal circumstances ... overcrowding is one, denial of normal
    sexual relations is another.
    
    It's called "situational homosexuality" and it's in any reputable
    medical reference :
    
    "Preferential or exclusive homosexuality has to be distinguished from
     situational (facultative) homosexuality, frequently exhibited by males
     and females confined for long periods with members of their own sex,
     as on board a ship or in prison.  Usual sexual behavior is resumed on
     release from such environments."  [ The Merck Manual, 1987, p1500 ]

    
    > overcrowding is one
    
    
     Question for yah Zar. If the person did not come from a crowded
    neighborhood then they should not be gay, right?
    
    David

  >>>>>>  Hey Stanley, where do you sit in MRO1?

    Lookout Stan!! Happy Boys Parade coming down the aisle past you cube!!
    Keep your back in the corner !!!
    
    
     Buttdinga, as soon as i can figure out how to stretch rubber gloves
     over my 16 OZers we can meet for a pop..   

         -Helmot
    

    
    RE: UTROP1::SIMPSON_D
    
    >>>Oh, and in .123 you confuse camp with gay, which is yet another error.
    
    	Nope, not me. The real error here is The happy parade and it's 
    participants. But if you really want to get into it, it seems that you're 
    really searching, I mean *really* searching hard for an argument that'll 
    standup to our anti happy stance. Sorry if the truth hurts, but you gotta 
    be a man about it.
    
    							-Top Cat

    MacDuffie et al.,
    
    Your psrsistent error is in painting all, or even a majority of, gays
    as "faggots."  Almost all the homosexual men I know would stand out in
    the average crowd, not as "camp" but rather as being well-educated,
    *very* normal people.  I have known a grand total of two gay men who
    exhibited the "kite-flying" behavior you seem to attach to all gays.
    The problem is not in the transmission, boys, so I suggest that you
    adjust your sets - perhaps to receive more channels, including the ones
    that are part of the real world.
    
    I will also quarrel with your (and others') use of the word "normal." 
    Homosexuality is not *normative*, true.  But to say that it is not
    *normal* is to speak without knowing the facts.  Nobody yet knows ALL
    the facts, so it is actually not possible to say whether homosexuality
    is normal - in the light of what's normal for a given individual. 
    After all, left-handedness is not normative, either.  But I doubt you'd
    say that it's not normal for those who are left-handed.
    
    Situational homosexuality and preferential homosexuality are not, as
    Dave and Mike have been at pains to point out, the same thing.  A
    situational homosexual will usually revert to his or her preferential
    sexual pattern when relieved of the situation in question.  A
    preferential homosexual will not - thereby reinforcing the case for its
    being the normal state for that person.
    
    -dick

.130> Question for yah Zar. If the person did not come from a crowded
.130> neighborhood then they should not be gay, right?
    
    I'm not sure what you're asking ... are you asking if homosexuality is
    less common in people born and raised in crowded environments?
    
    Remember that situational homosexuality is classified separately from
    traditional homosexuality.

    William, if you want to question my manhood, do it to my face.
    
                <<< QUARK::NOTES_DISK:[NOTES$LIBRARY]MENNOTES.NOTE;2 >>>
                         -< Topics Pertaining to Men >-
================================================================================
Note 851.131      How OPEN-MINDED are you about homosexuality?        131 of 134
TFH::CRUE "Dont drop the soap in SOAPBOX"            13 lines  26-DEC-1992 10:14
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


  >>>>>>  Hey Stanley, where do you sit in MRO1?

    Lookout Stan!! Happy Boys Parade coming down the aisle past you cube!!
    Keep your back in the corner !!!
    
    
     Buttdinga, as soon as i can figure out how to stretch rubber gloves
     over my 16 OZers we can meet for a pop..   

         -Helmot
    

>>>    William, if you want to question my manhood, do it to my face.
    
          
     Oh whats da matter mikey, did your kite get caught in the
   telephone pole wires again...

      Jeepers...    

         -Helmot
    

    William, if you want to question my manhood, do it to my face.
    
            <<< QUARK::NOTES_DISK:[NOTES$LIBRARY]MENNOTES.NOTE;2 >>>
                         -< Topics Pertaining to Men >-
================================================================================
Note 851.136      How OPEN-MINDED are you about homosexuality?        136 of 136
TFH::CRUE "Dont drop the soap in SOAPBOX"            12 lines  27-DEC-1992 15:31
                            -< Mikey wont like it! >-
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


>>>    William, if you want to question my manhood, do it to my face.
    
          
     Oh whats da matter mikey, did your kite get caught in the
   telephone pole wires again...

      Jeepers...    

         -Helmot
    
    

    
    
    
       I'll be sitting on the hood of your car at 5:05  
    
    
           Just to talk of course :')
    
    

    
    	Zarlenga?
    
    	What's with you wanting to know where we sit?..do you sniff 
    seats or something....get a life man.

re:               <<< Note 851.124 by COMET::BERRY "Dwight Berry" >>>
                                    -< so? >-

>        Saying, "I'm a (whatever) and I can't help it, is not a logical
>        reason to excuse all actions linked to the problem.  That's like an 
>        alcoholic saying, "I've got a drinking problem... but I still have
>        to drive."  Or like telling Charles Manson, "you're a killer, but
>        it's not your fault."  Maybe it isn't his fault, but that isn't the
>        issue.  The issue is the associated problems with being a killer.

       DUI is a crime.  Murder is a crime.  Homosexuality is NOT a crime.
       
>        I think most HETS that don't support homosexuality feel that it's
>        a perversion as it's not the norm.  And while homosexuality may not
>        be choice, the ACT IS BY CHOICE.

       Some homosexuals, like some heterosexuals choose celibacy.
       
>        I can have a drinking problem, but I have to DECIDE that I ain't
>        going to drink.  If we used the excuse, "I can't help it... it's
>        the way I am",  then we could excuse other taboo items, including
>        rape.  "I saw her and was over-whelmed.  I wanted her and couldn't
>        control my actions.  It's not my fault.  It's the way I am."  In
>        court, there is a scape goat for this.  It's called claiming to be
>        INSANE.  And many HETS feel this abnormal behavior is a form of
>        mental problems that lie buried within the homosexual.

       I think a better example would be to say to a Black person:  "OK,
       you're Black, you were born Black and you didn't have a say in that
       but you should at least ACT White because only 13% of the the
       population is Black and therefore Black is not the norm.  ACT the
       norm.'

       Patrick

    
.139> What's with you wanting to know where we sit?..do you sniff 
.139> seats or something....get a life man.
    
    I sometimes find myself in other buildings and I like to stop by and
    see noters, since so few are anything like the images they present from
    behind a keyboard, where they can't be seen.
    
    For example, you, William and Stanley could be real pussycats in
    person, in spite of your rough and tumble notes styles and the level
    of aggression and violence your notes present.
    
    
    Gotta say this much for you, MacScruffy, at least you told me where
    you sit, Stanley clammed right up and William just keeps stalling...

    
    
    Zar,
    
      I think it was you that suggested that homosexuality is a by product
    of overcrowding?? My question (restated) it this. If a person grew up
    in a neighberhood that was not overcrowded, then they should not be
    gay, right?? Take away the cause and you change the effect?
    
    
    David

    David:
    
    Overcrowding is *a* cause of homosexual behavior, not *the* cause;
    Mike Zarlenga has stated this -- twice.  If you take away overcrowding,
    then you take away one cause for one type of homosexual behavior.

    
    -1
    
     Thank you. 
    
    David

Also, you have to look at this at a larger level than the individual to see
the trend develop.

			Steve

.142> of overcrowding?? My question (restated) it this. If a person grew up
.142> in a neighberhood that was not overcrowded, then they should not be
.142> gay, right?? Take away the cause and you change the effect?
    
    It's not _the_cause_, it's one of the many environmental factors that
    can trigger situational (not traditional) homosexuality.
    
    If it were the sole cause, then removing it would make the effect go
    away.

    
    
    > at a larger level
    
    
     I do not understand your point. Would you please explain further..
    
    David

    So prisons are a *case* of over crowding and behavior? And what if you
    find someone with these behaviors in the country? Do they stop behaving
    like that or is it implanted? 
    
    

Re: .147

I meant you have to look at trends over entire populations, not individuals.


				Steve

.123> ...this type of flaming behavior.... but it's still there.
.123> What's the percentage of gays that act like this? I don't know. 

I don't know either, but, I'd venture a guess that it's somewhere
in the neighborhood of much less than 1/10th of 1%.

.123> the general feminine comportment ... gesturing ...lisping ...
.123> swinging of their ass's ... makeup ... jewlery ... physical 
.123> picture ... the attempt of a man to look pretty.
.123>  These characteristics are the first things HETS notice..

So *this* is how you spot a gay person!  Ok, I guess this fits with
Liberache .. but .. how in the world would you have told that say ..
Rock Hudson was gay?

.123> ..the parades ... Congressmen keeping sex boys (Barney Frank) ...
.123> political conventions ... Gay Life radio commercials ... inch by
.123> inch encroachment into our daily lives of the gay contingent, AIDS.

The parades .. yep .. looks like a zoo to me.  Then again, I'd guess that
this represents less than 1/10th of 1% of the general homosexual population.

Agreed.  I think Barney is slime but ... quite frankly I wouldn't like
to know *anything* about the sex life of members of Congress ... it would
in all probability seriously depress me.

I have no earthly idea what a "Gay Life" radio commercial is.

As to AIDS .. a lot of straight people have died of aids .. and .. they
surely were not gay perhaps didn't even know anyone who was gay - or
perhaps I don't understand your point as to "encroachment".

.123> So, Bubba, I take it your two gay buddy's are cool and don't flaunt
.123> the gay lifestyle in your face. Ask them what they think about flaming
.123> homosexuals and we may have some common ground.

Well .. I said "a few" and not "two" .. and some are females and I don't
call 'em "buddies" ... but that's immaterial.  In any case, yes, there
is some sentiment that "I_wish_these_people_would_just_go_away".

It's the same with me and the USMC.  Being an ex-Marine I always go ballistic
when I see some newspaper article or hear on the news that "Ex-marine Did
This_that_or_the_other".  Seems as they don't acknowledge the Air Force,
Army, Coast Guard, or Navy .. but if it's an ex-Marine that seems to make
news.

.124> I think most HETS that don't support homosexuality feel that it's
.124> a perversion as it's not the norm.

Others have responded to this "norm" issue .. but ...

Every heard the term "The Few.  The Proud.  The Marines"?  They are a very
selective branch of the armed services and of the entire population of
people who served in the armed services - proportionately very few served
in the USMC.  The USMC is not the "norm".  I did my time in the USMC in
Vietnam.  Now, if you intend to tell me that I'm a perversion because
I'm not the "norm" ... well ... so be it.

.124> And while homosexuality may not be choice, the ACT IS BY CHOICE.

Ok .. I guess we can agree on that.
    
.124> And many HETS feel this abnormal behavior is a form of mental
.124> problems that lie buried within the homosexual.

Serious question.  Do you suppose there is a "cure" for this problem?

Assume that it was discovered that there was a genetic basis for this
thing called homosexuality and through genetic engineering it was possible
to reverse or "cure" homosexuality.  Should there be some sort of law
that mandated this cure?

Bubba

    
    
    Steve,
    
     Thanks.
    
     To all,
    
     It occurs to me that I should point out that I am NOT opposed to
    homosexuals.. I just want to understand why?? It is an unusual thing.
    As the son of a preacher I hear the classic arguements against the
    gay relationship, God prophesied that in the end times men will trade
    the natural for the unnatural etc etc..
    
    SOP David

    re .123,
    
    And I suppose that Mardi Gras and the carnival in Rio is a good example
    of how heterosexuals behave.  And adult bars with exotic dancers is a
    prime example of what all heterosexual men love to watch and do.  
    
    If I were gay and this were the only exposure to heterosexual men I had
    seen, I would consider them pretty aqbnormal also.  
    
    Blaming AID's on Gay persons is about as effective as blaming bullets
    for every gun-related murder in the country.  Aids is now the leading
    cause of death for women of childbearing age in New York, NY, as well
    as several other large cities.  Aids is a communicable, incurable,
    fatal disease.  Not a curse by some wrathful god.
    
    Meg  

	Bubba,

	The gay life radio commercials go something like this:

	First there's some somber music playing in the background and then 
a voice is heard, it's hard to ascertain whether its a male or a female, the 
voice is muffled somewhat, like the sound of a voice coming from the otherside
of a door...(a closet door perhaps:-). The voice meets the beat of the somber 
music with it's pitch:

	"if you're gay, or gay life intrigues you?"

	And then it goes on,...but by then I've tuned it out. These commercials 
are aired regularly on the radio in the Boston area. This is an example of the
encroachment I mentioned earlier...I personally don't want to hear it.

	In another note, I think it was SIMPSON who declared that the only
thing that separates most gay men from others (that he knows of) is that they
are educated men. As with Rock Hudson, and the educated men, the gay man tends
to take it to an extreme by being overly refined, refined to the point of
being ladylike. They demonstrate their sexual preference by their speech, using
delicate, feminine words, they take care of their nails... wear rings...their
mannerism signal their preference because they're employed to "attract". As 
with Rock Hudson, I suspect it wasn't difficult to peg him as gay. Wearing 
those silk bibs around his neck and all. So educated or not, a gay man will 
reveal himself as gay either with the persona of a whore or a debutante.

	BTW: I did my time by serving in the Infantry jumping out of perfectly
good airplanes, that certainly isn't the norm either. Regardless, I don't
see how the analogy fits when we're discussing sexuality.

								Regards,
								-David

    RE: .153
    
    David,
    
    There certainly is some truth to what you are saying about 
    various stereotypes - stereotypes don't materialize out of
    thin air after all.   I'm gay and I know lots of gay people
    and several of them *do* fit the image you apparently have
    in your mind of what a gay male is like.  I don't keep up with
    what the latest stereotypes are supposed to be (at least those
    that straight people use to identify who's gay and who's not) -
    though I suppose I fit some and don't fit others....
    
    In any case, the problem is there are so many gay people who
    do NOT fit the stereotypes.  The majority, I'd wager...
    I guarantee you that one day (maybe one day soon) you will be 
    *very* surprised to find out that someone you had pegged as a 
    traditional, conservative, masculine, tough-guy is in fact, gay.   
    
    /Greg
    
    P.S. with all the "Together" ads and "Singles Line" ads and
         dating-game TV shows, etc, etc, etc, ad nauseam, is it
    	 *that* hard to begrudge ONE ad for a gay dating/phone 
    	 service?  I mean, what about free speech and all that?
    
         FWIW, I cringe when I hear the ad copy myself:
    
    			"Are you living a gay lifestyle?"
    			"Do you wish you could?"
    
    	For one thing, I don't believe you can create gay desires
        in someone who simply does not have them to begin with -
        and for another thing, my life is more than just style :-)
    
    P.S.S.
    
    	In response to the base note - I wouldn't pay $7 to see
    	LW10 or whatever.  Mel Gibson's physical attributes are
    	outweighed in my opinion by the homophobic remarks he's
    	made over the years.   Still - if someone were to give
    	me the video....:-)
    
    

.153> .."if you're gay, or gay life intrigues you?"
.153> And then it goes on,...but by then I've tuned it out.

Darn ... it could have gone on to say "then if you'll open your heart
to Jesus Christ you can be cured of this dreadful disease".  Has anyone
else heard this?  Can you finish this ad?

.153> In another note, I think it was SIMPSON who declared that the only
.153> thing that separates most gay men from others (that he knows of) is
.153> that they are educated men.

Separating gay men from heterosexual men?  Yes, it does seem that I saw
some statistics to the effect that a lot of homosexuals were more educated
than that of their heterosexual counterpart.  Interesting.  I wonder as to
the root cause of this ability for homosexuals to be better educated?  Can
you speculate on this?

.153> As with Rock Hudson, and the educated men, the gay man tends to take
.153> it to an extreme by being overly refined, refined to the point of
.153> being ladylike.

Well, quite frankly I never saw Rock Hudson as being "ladylike" (especially
when I think of his part in the movie "Giant") and I don't know of the "silk
bibs" that you speak of.

.153> They demonstrate their sexual preference by their speech, using
.153> delicate, feminine words, they take care of their nails... wear rings
.153> ...their mannerism signal their preference because they're employed
.153> to "attract".

I hear tell that there's a lot of gay people in the military.  I wouldn't
suspect that they'd even get past boot camp if they're all like this -
or - maybe they're all good actors and are just in there to recruit or
seduce others?

.153> So educated or not, a gay man will reveal himself as gay either wit
.153> the persona of a whore or a debutante.

This is indeed enlightening.  The only thing that bothers me now is that
of the female gay person ("lesbian").  How does one spot them?  Any
distinguishing characteristics?

.153> BTW: I did my time by serving in the Infantry jumping out of perfectly
.153> good airplanes, that certainly isn't the norm either.

A big 10-4 on that!!  I spent some time at Benning and I guarantee you I
thought those people were definitely ... not "normal". :-)

.153> Regardless, I don't see how the analogy fits when we're discussing
.153> sexuality.

Oh .. just banter around the issue of what's "normal" and what's not "normal".
Within this context I think that we've both discovered that to some extent
neither of us is "normal" in every aspect of the word.

Bubba

    re: .153
    
    	My God, Palmer _must_ be gay. He is a well dressed man after all!
    	And those men who wear suits, oh my, them too! All them software
    	engineers whose work is done with clean keyboards, boy, no auto
    	grease under their finger nails, must be gay! 
    
    	You would have a field day in Europe. I can hear it now "ALL FRENCH
    	MEN ARE GAY! Many wear s-h-o-e-s and dress well in non-denim fabrics!!
    	SAVE ME! They are all too REFINED to be attracted and attractive to 
    	women!   LOOK OUT, he's wearing a _silk_ tie!"
    
    	good grief charlie brown...
    
    	-Erik

    RE: In general

    What is the problem with "effeminate", "swishy" men BTW?

    Leaving aside the homosexual aspect of it (if that is possible),
    suppose there were a straight man who acted "faggy" - is that bad?

    We tell women who want to succeed in business that they have to
    be eager and tough and aggressive, "like men" (if one were to
    agree that such characteristics are inherently masculine) - we
    seem to revere these qualities in whomever posses them, although
    I'd have to say women do have a harder time with it, often being
    referred to as "bitches" should they be *too* aggressive...

    In any case, if we can find the positive aspects of women who
    have what we traditionally define as masculine traits, why do we
    (men) have such a hard time with other men who have traditionally
    feminine traits?

    So *what* if a man lisps, or trims his nails, or dresses nice?
    What is the big deal?   Why are some guys so contemptuous of
    "sissies?"

    I think I recall reading that such contempt may derive from a 
    deep-seated insecurity in the person who exhibits it, but I'm
    open to discussion on the subject...

    /Greg

    he he he...
    
    re: -1
    
    >I think I recall reading that such contempt may derive from a 
    >deep-seated insecurity in the person who exhibits it, but I'm
    
    Yea...I heard once that, that's why these same men buy BIG MANLY
    TRUCKS!  A 'certain' insecurity, if you get my drift!
    
    jeremy

.153> -< MARINE vs PARATROOPER >-

Marines win ... No contest ... unless you're 101st Airborne ... they's good
fighting folks ... but Marines still win.

Jerry Beeler
Captain, USMC
[2nd Division]

.157> So *what* if a man lisps, or trims his nails, or dresses nice?
.157> What is the big deal?   Why are some guys so contemptuous of
.157> "sissies?"

For the very same reason that "sissies" can be so very  contemptuous  of
men  who  exhibit  (what  some  consider  to be) stereotypical masculine
traits like drinking, hunting, two-steppin',  football,  flannel  shirts
and  jeans,  country  and western music, guns, the military - and on and
on.  Believe me, it's a two way street on this issue!!

.157> I think I recall reading that such contempt may derive from a 
.157> deep-seated insecurity in the person who exhibits it...

Couple this with what I said above and I agree with you, 100% !!!

They don't call me "Bubba" without warrant ...  and I get pretty  damned
sick and tired of people telling me that I should "change" - and be more
huggy-kisse-touchie-feelie.   I am what I am and that's all there is  to
it.  I associate with who I want for whatever reasons I want - that just
happens to be what this great country of ours is all about.  I  tend  to
feel  very   uncomfortable   around  the   classical  "sissy".   Call me
"insecure" or any of the other politically correct words ...  my  middle
name is "Teflon" - believe me - I don't give a royal damn.

Yours truly,
Bubba

    
    
         I think we need an EAP here... 
    
    
         I thought i was gone!!
    
    
      

    
    
       Greg,     Thanks for the note.
    
              -Helmot
    

RE:  Note 851.150 MORO::BEELER_JE

>So *this* is how you spot a gay person!  Ok, I guess this fits with
>Liberache .. but .. how in the world would you have told that say ..
>Rock Hudson was gay?

I watched a show on Hudson once, after he died of aids.  Many Hollywood people
were interviewed, some actors, some camera crew, ... all kinds of positions. 
Remember Bubba, Hudson was an actor.  You only saw the character he protrayed. 
Those that knew him and worked with him said that everyone... (repeat,
everyone), knew he was gay.  And not because he came right out and said so, but
because of his 'actions' around the set.  I also remembered him sometimes being
seen in a scarve, not considered to manly.

>As to AIDS .. a lot of straight people have died of aids .. and .. they
>surely were not gay perhaps didn't even know anyone who was gay - or

This is a common reply to anyone who ever suggest that homosexuals
get/cause/die from aids.  Of course EVERYONE can get aids.  Of course aids will
spread even faster with the help of HETS.  And innocent children will die from
aids.  But this is a problem which stems from the homosexual community,
originally.  Now that others get it, they can holler, "we ain't the only ones",
.... like that takes some guilt off of them for their unsafe and unhealthy
sexual practices.  My opinion.  No one will ever convince me otherwise.

>Others have responded to this "norm" issue .. but ...

Folks in notes like to pick apart words.  Many will even go to Webster and
dissect a word to pieces... while KNOWING what was meant.  That's silly, but a
typical notes ritual.  Not the kind of stuff that happens in a REAL
conversation... but happens all the time in notes.  How many times have you
ever heard a lot of BS expelled over the use of a word in real conversation?
How many people stop the person speaking and grab dictionaries?  When I see
some idiot do that in notes, I generally over-look them... and usually hit the
NEXT key without finishing the note... or at the very least... skip over that
paragraph. (NOTE TO BUBBA:  I'm not calling you an idiot)  If a father noticed
that his son was not acting in the "usual" way, he'd think ... geeze, his
behavior isn't "normal."  Now would your wife say, "Normal?  Compared to what? 
Marines?  A different race?  Democrats?"  Hell, she'd KNOW what you were
saying.  Nuff said on all this big_a_do over the word 'normal'.

>Serious question.  Do you suppose there is a "cure" for this problem?

Haven't heard of one.  Have you?  But I have not heard of cures for many of
todays health problems, including aids, cancer, heart attacks, etc.  Is Manson
mentally ill?  If so, is there a cure for his mental disorders?  If there is,
then why don't we inject it into his veins and let him live a healthy normal
life.  (Define normal... like Hell I will)  And before some idiot steps in and
says, "How dare you compare Manson to a homosexual", let me say... it's an
analogy to "curing".  Kiss my as..prin if you don't like it.

>Assume that it was discovered that there was a genetic basis for this
>thing called homosexuality and through genetic engineering it was possible
>to reverse or "cure" homosexuality.  Should there be some sort of law
>that mandated this cure?

What about Pedophilia?  If we find a cure, should we treat people for this? 
After all, some colleges are saying it's "normal" for these folks to like
having sex with children.  Should they be forced to take treatment?  Or are we
infringing upon their iddy_biddy rights?  Now before another idiot says, "Stop
comparing pedophilia to homosexually cause there is the "consent" issue", let
me say... it's STILL AN ANALOGY.  Answer it.  And kiss my as...prin if you
don't approve.  You don't have to.  It isn't required.

You're really asking a loaded question about curing and such.  Gets back to
real morals, which this country is very lacking in today.  Now before another
PC idiot says, "Define what is moral", let me just say, kiss my as...prin.  Now
this question is not unlike should we pull the plug on a person dying of cancer
and suffering... or should we keep them alive and continue to burn them with
radiation treatments.  A whole nuther can of worms.  Maybe you should start
another topic on that one, Bubba.

    
     I think that last set of replies, dealing with how to spot gays
     belongs in a different Notefile......you know, in SOAPBOX under
     the topic: "Myths. one and all!"
    
                                             Edd

    I had to reply to 851.163...before you go pointing fingers about AIDS
    you had better get your facts straight...no pun intended. Gay people
    did not 'cause' AIDS by any stretch of the imagination. If you had
    bothered to research anypart of this horrible disease you would have
    found the beginnings in the so called 'straight' world.The cry about
    AIDS was first heard back in the late 60's early 70's and it was
    from impoverished countries dealing with lack of proper sanititation,
    lack of even adequate medical support,lack of food. You may find it
    convenient to 'blame' gays but you are way out of line here. 
    You are also making a presumption that all follow a Judea-Christain
    religion with your reference to Sodom and Gomorah. Please...that is
    not the only religion in the world and many millions of people do
    not share that particular view.
    
    For a company that prides itself on valuing the differences in it's
    employees....it is evident that this message is not getting across.
    Why ....in heaven's name...people are so afraid of someone's sexual
    orientation is beyond me. Get it right. Gay people(and I noticed only
    one note mentioning lesbians) DO NOT go around trying to hit on every
    straight person they see. The majority of sexual crimes in this country
    are committed by heterosexual males. (Source: Records of Crime Stats-
    Federal gov't. report last year's version).
    
    ....and last....but really what has got me steamed up the most....
    is the obvious discrimination stated in this note under the 'guise'
    of discussion. 
    
     
    

    RE: .160
    
    > For the very same reason that "sissies" can be so very  contemptuous of
    > men  who  exhibit  (what  some  consider  to be) stereotypical masculine
    > traits
    
    Well we could get into a childish "you started it" type argument,
    but that doesn't answer the question.  Are you telling me that every
    guy that ever pushed a "sissie" around on a school playground was
    *first* ridiculed by that sissie for belching or wearing mis-matched
    socks?   
    
    No, I didn't think so.
    
    So that still leaves us with the "why?"
    
    /Greg
    

.150> Serious question.  Do you suppose there is a "cure" for this problem?

.150> Assume that it was discovered that there was a genetic basis for this
.150> thing called homosexuality and through genetic engineering it was possible
.150> to reverse or "cure" homosexuality.  Should there be some sort of law
.150> that mandated this cure?

      I think this is interesting...  Suppose homosexuality _IS_ the cure?
      A few people (PASTIS::MONAHAN comes to mind) have touched upon this 
      theory in that homosexuality may be a natural result of an imbalance
      trying to right itself (or something to that effect).  It seems that
      although homosexuals have the same capacity for Love as heterosexuals,
      the result of the union of two homosexuals can't be reproduction...

      So, if this theory were valid, what is the role of the homosexual and
      what are the mechanisms in the "environment" that would trigger 
      homosexuality as a genetic result?

    re:-1
    
    No one 'knows' where AIDS began. Anything to the contrary is purely
    speculation. There are many theories and all have some validity. 
    
    As to valuing diversity......both sides of the coin 'must' be valued if
    diversity is valued. That includes paranoia against gays, lesbians,
    hets, animals, bosses.........If one has to value someone elses
    difference, that persons difference must also be valued.
    
    Personally, I despise the condesending manner in which people write
    under the disguise of 'educating' others who oppose certain
    politically correct attitudes. It's those opposing attitudes that
    create the checks and balances that prevent the cup from tipping.
    
    In recent years, in an effort to meet goals or objectives or to
    'appear' to be forward or future looking, companies have taken things
    to extremes. First it was blacks and hiring quotas, then Asians, and
    recently it's women and now gays/lesbians. This over-reaction creates
    more problems than it cures. There's always a backlash and that
    backlash is the previous 'minority' getting less attention. Pretty soon
    we create a non value added bureaucracy creating more self serving
    issues........I'm not saying that attention and correction weren't
    needed or waranted, it's that the overattention or overcorrection only
    created a stronger position against the minority.
    
    I think that people need to state their position, justify it if they
    feel it necessary and go on. Don't make it a crusade to attempt to
    change or "educate" an opposing veiwpoint by extracting his/her
    viewpoint and doing network pyschoanalysis of every word printed.
    
    Attitudes are changed by actions.......not words.
    
    ken

    RE: .163 (Dwight Berry)

>This is a common reply to anyone who ever suggest that homosexuals
>get/cause/die from aids.  Of course EVERYONE can get aids.  Of course aids will
>spread even faster with the help of HETS.  And innocent children will die from
>aids.  But this is a problem which stems from the homosexual community,
>originally.  Now that others get it, they can holler, "we ain't the only ones",
>.... like that takes some guilt off of them for their unsafe and unhealthy
>sexual practices.  My opinion.  No one will ever convince me otherwise.

    There is an element of truth to this.  Only an idiot would suggest
    AIDS did not spread via homosexual male sex in this country.  But
    that isn't a logical argument "against" gay people, Dwight.  For
    one thing, gay women are probably the least likely to get AIDS, but
    they too are homosexual.  For another, straight sexual practices
    can be considered dirty and unhealthy as well (consider herpes,
    hepatitis, gonorrhea, syphilis - and AIDS).  Finally, AIDS will some
    day be cured - and there was a time in the past when AIDS was not an
    issue.   I assume you object to homosexuality at all times and in all
    places, right?

    You see, if you want to use "disease" as an argument, you have to
    consider where that argument will take you (and where it won't).
    Since the AIDS argument doesn't address female homosexuals, and
    since it ignores the disease spreading characteristics of heterosexual
    sex, it is an invalid argument.   You can continue to use it if you
    wish, but it doesn't serve any purpose other than to make you look
    bad.

>Nuff said on all this big_a_do over the word 'normal'.

    Apparently not enough has been said (or you weren't listening).
    It isn't "normal" to have red hair and freckles - since most people
    don't... But we don't say that.   We don't say to red-heads that
    they are "abnormal" - something else is involved in making that
    judgment.    The point of 'picking a word apart' is to show that
    the casual use of that word as an attempt to put down entire
    groups of people isn't logical.

    We aren't sitting here having a family chat about some theoretical
    issue you know.   Real people are involved.  Your statements about
    gays are statements about *ME* (since you aren't bothering to
    qualify anything you say, I can only assume you are talking about
    all gay people).  

    You certainly have a right to make generalized statements, but if you 
    want to be taken seriously (and I'm assuming you *do* want to be taken 
    seriously) - you damn well better be prepared to back up what you are 
    saying.

    Regarding your comments about Charles Manson and the analogy to
    "curing"....   You ought to do a bit more research on this topic.
    You wouldn't *believe* what has been done to gay people in an attempt
    to "cure" them.   From psychological therapy, and mind-altering drugs,
    to electric shock "treatment" and torture - it's all been tried time
    and time again (I can provide references if you want).

    Guess what?   The treatments didn't work.

    And another thing, when you are making an analogy it ought to fit
    somehow, and the people you are trying to convince ought to be able
    to relate (otherwise you won't have any common understanding and you
    won't get anywhere).   This is the problem with your comparisons of
    gay people to mass murderers and child molestors.    You see, many
    people here know gay people (and some *are* gay).   We know that
    gay people don't go around hurting others the way that mass murderers
    and child molestors do.   Now it seems clear that you think two
    men having sex is nearly as bad as murder or the rape of a child, so
    that explains why *you* think you have made a valid analogy - but you
    have yet to explain *why* (remember, the AIDS issue has been dismissed).   

    RE: your pedophilia analogy

    It seems odd that you would actually have to have the difference 
    explained to you, but I will make an attempt....

    It may very well be true that some doctors in some college somewhere
    are now saying that, for some people, an attraction to children is
    "normal" - and some doctors say that for some people, a desire to
    kill is "normal" and for some people a desire to drink too much is
    "normal."  

    But just because a desire is considered to be "part" of someone, that
    doesn't mean we automatically say it is OK to act on that desire.
    Before we do so, we have to look at the *effect* of saying OK.
    We also have to consider the legal implications.   We can't just make
    arbitrary decisions in the United States about what is and is not
    legal.  We have a Constitution to think about.

    The reason I don't believe we will ever change our position with 
    regard to pedophilia is that we have *seen* the effects of adults
    having sex with children - the bottom line is that it is abuse.
    Children are physically and emotionally scarred - sometimes for 
    life.   These wounds can be measured objectively in a clinical
    setting.  These wounds are also direct proof that the rights of
    the children have been violated.   So we have strong moral and
    legal reasons to prohibit sex with children.

    Now contrast this with homosexuality.  There is no pattern of
    physical and emotional scarring caused by homosexual sex. 
    No one has their rights violated when two consenting adults
    decided to engage in intimate physical activity. Psychologically,
    gay people have been determined to be "normal" - we don't have some 
    kind of mental problem.  This just happens to be the way a small 
    percentage of humans (a small percentage of many animal species in
    fact) turn out.  Period.  Does this sound like child abuse?

    It is true that some gay people do have serious emotional problems,
    but so far it appears that in many cases these emotional problems stem 
    from living in a society in which gay people are hated.   Frankly, it
    surprises me that more gay people aren't messed up, considering the
    hell many of us went through as kids and teenagers, trying to find 
    some reason to believe we were worthwhile human beings...  And
    considering the abuse we are subjected to today (could you imagine if
    we were having a similar discussion about blacks or Jews? - Think about
    it.)

    Finally, if you *really* want to talk about morals, let me know.  
    You can start by explaining how euthanasia and homosexuality are
    connected.

    /Greg

re: 851.163
>What about Pedophilia? If we find a cure, should we treat people for this? 
>... Now before another idiot says, "Stop comparing pedophilia to homosexually 
>cause there is the "consent" issue", let me say... it's STILL AN ANALOGY. 
>Answer it. And kiss my  as...prin if you don't approve. You don't have to. 
>It isn't required.

You're right. In your mind, this is a valid analogy. So let 
me also assume it's valid and answer the question. 

What about Pedophilia? If we find a cure, should we treat people for this?
Yes. Because pedophilia is child molestation. An adult is sexually abusing 
a child. The adult should be punished and, if there is a cure, treated.

What about homosexuality? If we find a cure, should we treat people for this?
No. Being sexually attracted to someone of the same sex is not something 
that should be punished or something that needs treatment. You're not hurt. 
I'm not hurt. No one is hurt.

What about homosexual pedophiliacs? If we find a cure, should we treat 
them for this?
Yes. Because pedophilia is child molestation. An adult is sexually abusing
a child. The gay person should be punished and, if there is a cure 
for the pedophilia, treated.

Mike

    
    Greg, thanks for speaking up.
    
    Getting "theoretical" about homosexuality causes a great deal of pain
    to members of the Mennotes community who are gay. While there are many
    straight men in this conference who have strong aversions to homosexual
    behavior, it is absolutely appalling to see the way its being
    expressed.
    
    Many of you are talking about human beings, some of whom you know, in
    very ugly, demoralizing, demeaning terms. While it is not my place to
    act like an overprotective mother, its hard to believe that those of
    you who are doing this have given ANY thought to the fact that you're
    discussing real people, people who actively contribute to the running
    of this company, people who help make Digital successful. And what
    you're saying is disruptive to a working environment where people with
    many different value systems must co-exist peaceably.
    
    No matter how you feel about it, one's sexuality and sexual orientation
    is a fundamental core of the self. To trample it indiscriminantly is to
    verbally abuse the person. Similarly, religion falls in the same vein.
    No one, including myself, has the right to bash a religion further than
    to state that you disagree, even vehemently with its policies or
    practices. You cannot say that a religion has no right to exist
    without devaluing those who practice it. 
    
    I can understand saying that you are vehemently opposed to homosexual
    practices and behaviors. But somewhere a line has to be drawn so that
    PEOPLE are not rendered as second-class citizens by remarks about
    sexual behavior. 
    
    Being gay should NOT make anyone a second-class citizen unworthy of his
    or her rights to co-exist peaceably in this country. 
                                                         

I'm a guest in this file (alumnus?), so I'll keep it brief (by my
standards).  I guess I'd like just to make a plea that people try to
be open-minded, intelligent, and disciplined about the issue of gay
people.  The problem with most of these notes is that there are too
many instances of over simplification.  And the only way to get a
handle on what gay people are like and how we affect society is to
spend lots of time with gay people, lots of time examining data (there
are many instances of homosexuality in animals, for instance), and
lots of time separating related by different issues (AIDS and gay
issues, for instance). 

Anyone who has spent a significant amount of time with lots and lots 
of different kinds of gay people can tell you that there are a lot of 
us who are blue collar, uneducated, sloppy, and [insert the opposite 
of the stereotype].  Anyone who has spent time with us can also tell
you that there are gay people who fit the stereotypes to a T.  Anyone
who has spent time with gay folks can tell you that AIDS ravaged our
communities first, in the USA, along with IV drug users.  (But can you
tell me why it's almost never mentioned that gay men--with the help of
lesbians and bi folks--built the multi-million dollar AIDS
organizations, and have done more to stop the spread of the disease
than any other group of people, including politicians and doctors?)  
Anyone who has been to a gay pride parade knows that these claims of 
them being a "freak show" are completely unfounded, that 75%-80% of th 
participants, if not higher, wear shorts, sneakers, and a tee shirt, 
and look pretty much like anyone in the suburbs?  (Boston had over 
100,000 people at their parade, and there must have been about 30 drag 
queens and 30-40 people in leather.  Why does the straight media 
misrepresent us so much?)

What does it all mean?  What does it mean for a gay man (or straight!) 
to be effeminate?  If you think it means that the man is weak and 
ineffectual, then how come I know lots of effeminate men who play 
sports, who are brave, and who conduct themselves with inspiring 
integrity in the face of tough adversity?  (I'd call them "tough," 
tougher than a lot of uneducated straight boys I know.)  

What does it mean when AIDS appears first in the gay and IV drug
communities?  Why do some people automatically draw the conclusion
that gay sex is dirty and harmful to society?  Especially when it's
possible to have lots of sex with lots of partners and never get AIDS?
(I *know* this is possible; I haven't been a nun during the eighties,
so I'm talking from experience.)  How do you factor in the strictly
monogamous gay couples?  If gay sex is dirty and fosters AIDS, how do
you factor their gay sex into the equation?  Could it be that AIDS
transmissions have more to do with certain unprotected sex acts, and
that the genders of the participants isn't really relevant?

It's complicated.  Unless you've spent a lot of time with gay
people--going to gay pride parades, reading gay literature, attending
gay plays, following news stories, going to bars, watching gay
sporting events--then how can you have a knowledgeable opinion?  
If I said that I have a couple of computer scientists for friends, 
wandered past a computer convention once, listened to half a 
radio commercial for a computer product, and had a few friends in 
college who were computer scientists, does that make me an expert in 
computer science?  Of course not.  So, why do so many of you speak so 
authoritatively about homosexuality, a topic that you know very little 
about, never mind not having studied it to any degree.

And some people think that, in order for me to be a good doo-bee
regarding Valuing Diversity, I have to value your ill-informed
opinions.  Well, no I don't.  (It just means that I shouldn't totally
judge you because of your ill informed opinions in one area.)  One of
the basic tenents of Valuing Diversity is that you get at the truth by
examing stereotypes and assumptions (sloppy thinking), not by honoring
half-baked notions. Valuing Diversity is not blind loyalty or
political correctness, it's an emotional and intellectual discipline
that requires work, confrontation, exposure to people who are
different, and communication. 

'nuff said.

Take care, y'all.

							--Gerry

| <<< Note 851.74 by COMET::BERRY "Dwight Berry" >>>



	Well, a little late in jumping in, but better late than never! :-)

| A few notes back, mention was made about how to tell if a man is gay or not.
| With some men, it is probably hard to tell on the surface, until certain
| dialogue is made.  

	WRONG. There are MANY men who are 100% heterosexual that have a voice
that you would consider gay (lisp, choice of words). These may be things that
describe effeminate men, but NOT homosexual men. That should be pretty obvious
to see.

| I know that I've been able to pick out many a homosexual male from the way they
| talk and from their mannerisms.  I've seen my peers pick'em out as well.
| Wonder why many/most homosexual men portray feminine characteristics?

	SOME homosexual men may have effeminate characteristics, as well as
SOME heterosexual men. These things DO NOT mean that someone is gay. Plain and
simple.

| I believe that someone also mentioned that there were many a homosexual in the
| work environment that one wouldn't know of.  While there is probably some truth
| to that, that person should not fool himself.  

	You are 100% correct on this. They should NOT fool themselves. Hiding
it really gets them nowhere. But the reason that most do hide it to themselves
is because of how they think 'others' will react to them. Judging by what some
have written in this conference it's no wonder why. Look at En Vogue's song,
"Free Your Mind". One line says free your mind, the rest will follow, be color
blind, don't be so shallow. If you listen to the entire song it's about the
stereotype of someone who is black. How you can't base people on a stereotype.
Look at everyone as people and you will get somewhere. If someone isn't harming
you or anybody else, why make a big deal about it just because they are
different than you?

| Many a homosexual employee has
| been recognized by the way they handle themselves.

	And many a homosexual has been unnoticed by the way they handle
themselves. Many straight men have been wrongly written off to be homosexuals 
by the same standards you used to point out gays. Stereotypes don't really tell
you anything about the person, and in MOST cases gives you the WRONG outlook
about someone.


Glen

| <<< Note 851.79 by COMET::BERRY "Dwight Berry" >>>



| Let me say, I know of a few gays here at DEC.  They surely do have the
| characteristics that I'm talking about.  They are the typical
| stereotypes in the way the carry themselves and talk.

	Hey Dwight, I know many a gay who don't fit your stereotype. In fact, 2
people I knew were seen by 'other' gay men as being 100% heterosexual. Your
stereotype fiting just doesn't work.




Glen

| <<< Note 851.117 by COMET::BERRY "Dwight Berry" >>>



| I think that when Lucky mentions the gay life-style, he is referring to
| their relationships.  Yea, I'm sure homosexuals watch tv, listen to
| music, hunt, fish, fly kites, play house, etc., but I don't think that
| is what most people refer to when they use the phrase.

	Do you mean what goes on in their bedrooms Dwight? 



Glen

| <<< Note 851.123 by MEMIT::MACDUFFIE "Marquis of QUEENSbury" >>>




| You're an intelligent man. You know what is meant when HETS talk
| about their dislike of the gay lifestyle. I understand that probably in
| the Gay community this type of flaming behavior is frowned upon, but it's
| still there. What's the percentage of gays that act like this? I don't know.

	Dave, have you ever took the time to find out?

| HETS are referring to the general feminine comportment of Gays,
| the gesturing, 

	Can you name a few? 

| the lisping, 

	Are you saying Dave, that lisping is ONLY done by homosexual men?

| the swinging of their ass's as they walk like a dog with a burr up its crack. 

	Hmmmm...... you will have to point this one out to me Dave. I know MANY
MANY gay people. I can't say anyone walks in the manner you described. 

| The makeup, 

	Yes, some do where make-up. Does this mean that almost all your heavy
metal and rock bands are made up of homosexuals? They all where make-up too.

| the jewlery, 

	Many straight men where jewlery Dave. Does this mean that ANY man who
wears the stuff is gay?

| the entire physical
| picture, the attempt of a man to look pretty. 

	Dave, I know many straight men who could fit this picture you're
painting. Kind of fills holes into your analogy, doesn't it?

| These characteristics are the first things HETS notice, 

	And these are also traits of MANY straight men. But I'm sure you've
already classified them as being gay, right? Please correct me if I'm wrong.

| then we see or hear about the parades, 

	Dave, how about next year you go to one. See for yourself and not from
others. See what the ENTIRE thing is about.

| the Congressmen keeping sex boys (Barney Frank), 

	Yeah, and Ted Kennedy has done a great job at making the straight
people look good too. Please, can we be real?

| The political conventions,

	Yeah, that republican convention was just filled with love..... NOT!
More like hatred. 

| the Gay Life radio commercials, 

	You probably like those commercials as much as I like the Barry and
Elliot commercials. I really hate listening to them. But you know, they still
play them even though I object to them. Let me ask you Dave, would you object
to commercials that dealt with teen suicide? Even though most teen suicides
have something to do with homosexuality? (as released in a report back in
September I believe)

| AIDS. 

	I've seen your AIDS argument. Pretty sad.....

| All this coupled with Bible school classes,
| church, and the Sodom and Gamora story. 

	Dave, have you ever read the entire Sodom and Gomorrah story or are
going by the one or two lines that a lot of Christians pluck out to try and
make their point? Reason being is I have known many Christians who have said
the reason for the destruction of the 2 cities was because of homosexuality.
The Bible lists MANY reasons for the desruction. None of them deal with
homosexuality. In ONE city the towns people wanted to have sex with the 2
angels that were visiting in Lot's house. Homosexual sex does not equal
homosexuality. It is a PART of the entire picture, but one does not need to be
homosexual to have homosexual sex. It was right after the towns people wanted
to have sex with the angels that led to the final straw for that cities
destruction. But then why did the other city get destroyed? It was because of
MANY OTHER things. The wanting to RAPE the angels was JUST the last straw. 
Have you read it at all? If not, why use it as any type of reasoning? To use 
false information in your reasoning as you have doesn't help support your 
ideals. :-)

| Then there's the sex part. There's the image of two guys going at
| it. It's alot to ask of HETS to accept as normal, especially when just 20
| years ago it was all in the closet. 

	Hey! No prob. You don't need to accept it as being normal. You know
why? Because it's NOT. You're heterosexual. The normal sex for YOU is between a
man and a woman. The normal sex between homosexuals is between two men or two
women. To us, heterosexual sex isn't normal.

| what they think about flaming homosexuals and we may have some common ground.

	Dave, from someone who is gay, but not a "flaming homosexual" as you
like to put it, I have no problem with those who fit into that catagory. I know
many straight and gay men who actually fit your guidelines. Someone's
mannerisms says NOTHING about the person. Get to know someone for who they are,
not what they are (or what you perceive them to be). That's what's really 
important. Ever misjudge someone before Dave?



Glen

    I'll sure be glad when you finally work yourself up to the .170 range
    of replies so that the game of endless "?" will end.

| <<< Note 851.153 by MEMIT::MACDUFFIE "Marquis of QUEENSbury" >>>




| And then it goes on,...but by then I've tuned it out. These commercials
| are aired regularly on the radio in the Boston area. This is an example of the
| encroachment I mentioned earlier...I personally don't want to hear it.

	What do you do when other commercials come on that you don't want to
hear? I know for me I just change the station.

| As with Rock Hudson, and the educated men, the gay man tends
| to take it to an extreme by being overly refined, refined to the point of
| being ladylike. 

	Dave, MANY straight men I know also show these qualities. They AREN'T
gay. Why do you feel the need to categorize everyone like this?

| They demonstrate their sexual preference by their speech, using
| delicate, feminine words, 

	Dave, I'm being serious when I ask this, can you please list what some
of those feminine words are. I have a hard time understanding this point.

| they take care of their nails... 

	Gee, my father takes care of his nails too. He's heterosexual. He tries
to keep them short and clean. I had always thought he just believed in good
hygiene. Little did I know his REAL reasons....... Dave, if you don't care to
take care of your nails, that's fine. Maybe what you are confusing here are
your stereotype for a "real man" with your stereotype for a gay man?

| wear rings...

	yeah, I know what you mean. Those wedding rings just show how ga.....
oh, straight people wear those, don't they....

| their mannerism signal their preference because they're employed to "attract". 

	Yeah Dave, those straight guys that fit your stereotype of the gay mail
are just screaming for some guy to pick them up. :-)

| As with Rock Hudson, I suspect it wasn't difficult to peg him as gay. 
			 ^^^^^^^

	The key word is SUSPECT. Did you know that he was gay before it was
revealed? If so, how long beforehand? I know I never had any indication of it
until it was released.

| So educated or not, a gay man will
| reveal himself as gay either with the persona of a whore or a debutante.

	Please, as I'm sure many would like to hear, describe how someone who
is gay has the persona of being a whore and how you are able to distinguish it. 




Glen

    As far as movies go...have you seen Basic Instinct yet?  I would
    probably be rather amused by it. (homosexuality). I don't think it
    would bother me at all.  This is the 90's after all. 

.169> No one 'knows' where AIDS began. Anything to the contrary is purely
.169> speculation. There are many theories and all have some validity. 
    
    True, but at the same time, all the etiological data to date shows
    that this virus was originally a heterosexual affliction in Africa.

    re:.181
    
    True Mike......
    
    I personally believe that the CIA or KGB labs screwed around with a
    virus. Its purpose was, IMO, to cause instant death via biological
    warfare. I read a paper where it may have been released on the
    Serangeti as a test on monkeys. When the monkeys didn't die, it was
    believed to be a failure. The monkeys passed it on, men were bitten,
    they passed it on. In one particular man, possibly gay, possibly bi,
    it took a mutant form and he passed it on to the gay community.
    Bi-sexual men then contracted the desease and the rest is .......not
    yet history.
    
    I hate hearing anyone blame anyone else. Blame is irrelevant, a cure
    needs to be the focus. I worry for my children......
    
    Ken

.173> Unless you've spent a lot of time with gay people--going to gay
.173> pride parades, reading gay literature, attending gay plays, following
.173> news stories, going to bars, watching gay sporting events--

Dummy me.  Here I thought that for the most part gay people were basically
no different than anyone else and now I find that they have their own
parades, literature, plays, bars, sporting events ... etc.... and that
one has to go to these things to get to "know" gay people.

Bubba

| <<< Note 851.183 by MORO::BEELER_JE "Eine Nacht auf dem kahlen Berge" >>>



	Only you Bubba...... :-)

| .173> Unless you've spent a lot of time with gay people--going to gay
| .173> pride parades, reading gay literature, attending gay plays, following
| .173> news stories, going to bars, watching gay sporting events--

| Dummy me.  Here I thought that for the most part gay people were basically
| no different than anyone else and now I find that they have their own
| parades, literature, plays, bars, sporting events ... etc.... and that
| one has to go to these things to get to "know" gay people.

	Bubba, one reason why gay people have different things than stright
people is that gays at times feel ailienated at the views some straight people
have towards them, or, I guess we could compare it to your favorite subject,
the military. There were many different branches you could have gone into, but
you chose the marines. The same goes for anything. In sports you can have the
choice to play with straight people, gay people, white people, black, mixture
of any listed, etc. You play where you think you're gonna have the most fun
(unlike professional sports where you play where you'll get the most money :-).

	Hmmm.... something I just thought of. For those who say they can spot
gay people, name me some baseball players that are gay. I know many who are.
In fact one will be in the hall of fame eventually. I'm sure you should be able
to tell who they are. 



Glen

    RE: .183

    Well it *is* true, Jerry.   One doesn't get to "know" gay people
    by hanging out with a single gay couple in the 'burbs - you need that 
    couple in the 'burbs *AND* you need the gay singles in the cities and
    the lesbian co-op in the country and everything in between....that
    is if you want to have a well-rounded view and be able to talk 
    intelligently about the subject.

    Whether all homosexual people fit in or not, there *are* many, sizable
    gay communities, as there are Jewish communities and Irish communities
    and Italian communities (and southern conservative republican
    communities).  Gay specific literature, art, bars, sports, etc...
    exist.  Period.  The fact they exist (in *large* numbers) means that
    a fair amount of information about gay people can be derived from
    these sources.  In fact, anyone seriously interested would be foolish
    to ignore such richness and diversity (IMO).

    It almost sounds as though you think your own cultural preferences are
    universal - or that there is some single "straight" community and only
    gay people have gone off and created something unto themselves.   I
    believe you ought to rethink that - if indeed that is your perception.

    "No different from anyone else" refers to one's humanity, not one's choice 
    of reading material, entertainment or companionship.

    Finally, there are very specific reasons for the existence of "gay
    enclaves" - basically, we had very little choice.  When you are ostracized
    and *prevented* from being a part of the majority, your only option
    is to create something of your own...

    /Greg

.182> they passed it on. In one particular man, possibly gay, possibly bi,
.182> it took a mutant form and he passed it on to the gay community.
    
    If you're referring to the first person to have contracted HIV, it was
    probably a heterosexual man living in Africa, in the late 50s, skinning
    monkeys.  It wasn't until much later (approx 20 years) that this disease
    became prominent in the homosexual community.

RE:  Note 851.165 TOLKIN::DUMART                                       

>    You are also making a presumption that all follow a Judea-Christain
>    religion with your reference to Sodom and Gomorah. Please...that is
>    not the only religion in the world and many millions of people do
>    not share that particular view.

I never mentioned any of this.  You are the one who had better get their facts 
straight.
    
>    For a company that prides itself on valuing the differences in it's
>    employees....it is evident that this message is not getting across.

I don't accept the companies view, (legal scare), of anything outside of doing
my job.  The stance that the company is FORCED to take on homosexuality is to
keep them out of law suits.  I don't accept such a stance as my own social
conscious.  My morals are based on my own upbringing and judgement... not
whatever company I happen to be working for.  I won't bastardize myself this
way.

>    Why ....in heaven's name...people are so afraid of someone's sexual
>    orientation is beyond me. 

Afraid?  Subsitute "disgusted" for "afraid".

>    The majority of sexual crimes in this country
>    are committed by heterosexual males. (Source: Records of Crime Stats-
>    Federal gov't. report last year's version).

Weak arugement to convince me that homosexuality is a healthy practice.

RE:  Note 851.184 JURAN::SILVA 


>	Bubba, one reason why gay people have different things than stright
>people is that gays at times feel ailienated at the views some straight people
>have towards them, or, I guess we could compare it to your favorite subject,

Why don't they just keep their mouth shut and play the sport?
Answer, cause they may often have the mannerisms we talked about and the
straights can pick them out, right?  If they kept their mouth shut about their
sexual lifestyle AND if they didn't have the physical stereotype... then who'd
ever be the wiser?  Hence, they need their on "flag football" league.

>	Hmmm.... something I just thought of. For those who say they can spot
>gay people, name me some baseball players that are gay. I know many who are.
>In fact one will be in the hall of fame eventually. I'm sure you should be able
>to tell who they are. 

Well, watching a baseball isn't the same as watching someone conduct themselves
in a regular, (stay clear of the word normal Dwight), scenario.  If we watched
them off the field, we could probably spot many of them.  Personally, I find
baseball a BIG bore and don't watch it.

| <<< Note 851.188 by COMET::BERRY "Dwight Berry" >>>




| >	Bubba, one reason why gay people have different things than stright
| >people is that gays at times feel ailienated at the views some straight people
| >have towards them, or, I guess we could compare it to your favorite subject,

| Why don't they just keep their mouth shut and play the sport?
| Answer, cause they may often have the mannerisms we talked about and the
| straights can pick them out, right?  

	Dwight, you know, you really bring a smile to my face. I guess you
found out the "real" reason why some homosexuals will play sports on gay
teams..... I wonder if those straight men who you would consider gay because of
their mannerisms feel about playing sports period? They probably feel the same
pressure that a gay man would feel, that they don't fit in, if they make any
mistakes they will be ridiculed, things like that. You see Dwight, it's people
who have a narrow view of what people are (and those people usually never
really take time to get to know someone) that make it so not just gay men, but
men in particular to not want to play sports. It's the failure factor. I myself
like playing on both straight and gay teams. As far as mannerisms go Dwight, 
you have still not answered many questions. If someone is effeminate, does that 
automatically make them gay? If someone has a lisp, does that automatically 
make them gay? Have you ever misjudged something(one)? If I used your view of 
things to make a judgement about you, it wouldn't be pretty. But I don't know 
you so I honestly can't make any type of REAL judgement. How is it that you can?

| If they kept their mouth shut about their
| sexual lifestyle AND if they didn't have the physical stereotype... then who'd
| ever be the wiser?  

	Again Dwight, what of the straight men who fit YOUR description of
someone who is gay? Also, I can't speak for everyone, but I don't go around and
talk about my SEXUAL LIFESTYLE with straight people as I would hope they would
not do that with me. I still get the impression that you have a major hang-up
over the sex issue. If so, why not just put it aside and JUST look at the
person? 

| Hence, they need their on "flag football" league.

	Dwight, I would LOVE to have you meet some of my friends. Play football
with them and then tell me that they need their own flag football league. The
way you catagorize people is really strange indeed. Could one reason be, just
maybe, that other's could play on (insert type of team) because other friends
they have are playing on the same teams? Hey, there is a novel idea.....

| Well, watching a baseball isn't the same as watching someone conduct themselves
| in a regular, (stay clear of the word normal Dwight), scenario.  

	Why? You say you can spot them a mile away, right? You should be able
to tell them apart just by their mannerisms. So go for it. Or, could it be that
you REALLY aren't capable of doing it? I would also wonder how many straight
men you would end up choosing. 

| If we watched
| them off the field, we could probably spot many of them.  

	I still wonder how many of them would be straight. You can't catagorize
people Dwight (well, honestly anyway) without knowing them. I could easily say
that you're gay, and the reasons that you dislike gays so much is because you
are trying to hide your true feelings, but that's dumb. I don't know you. I
can't seriously make a statement like that.



Glen

What about people who box regularly? Assuming that a cure for boxing is 
found, should boxers be forced to take the treatment? What about people 
who assault and batter people on the street? If we find a cure, should we 
treat people for this? Or are we infringing upon their iddy_biddy rights? 
Now before another idiot says, "Stop comparing boxing to assault and battery 
cause there is the "consent" issue", let me say... it's STILL AN ANALOGY. 
Answer it.  And kiss my as...prin if you don't approve. You don't have to. 
It isn't required.

Mike

>    <<< Note 851.190 by MICROW::SEVIGNY "Denial is not a river in Egypt" >>>

    
    
>    Why is it that many cringe when they see (or think of) a same-sex
>    couple being physical instead of simply being non-interested?

       Good point.  Why is it that most heterosexual men find two women
       having sex erotic and two men disgusting?

       patrick

>    Why is it that many cringe when they see (or think of) a same-sex
>    couple being physical instead of simply being non-interested?

 Probably the same reason seeing someone kis a truly ugly member of the
opposite sex makes one cringe- it just seems to be a repulsive thought.
I think that people frequently consider how they'd feel in others' situations,
and the thought of kissing a member of the same sex is just a downright turnoff.

 Why this seems to be taken to such an extreme by some people has been
a subject of significant debate. It would appear that many people are
incapable of saying "so what?"

>       Good point.  Why is it that most heterosexual men find two women
>       having sex erotic and two men disgusting?

 Maybe because heterosexual men are far more likely to imagine themselves
joining the two women than the men. It is a common fantasy for a man to
want two women at the same time.

re: making analogies. 

I haven't looked up the word "analogy" in the dictionary because I know 
how much certain noters hate it when you, as Dwight put it in .163, 
"go to Webster and dissect a word to pieces". So I'm using what I think is 
the commonly accepted meaning of the word.

When someone makes an analogy, there's some implication that two things 
are similar in some ways. For example, if I'm trying to explain cricket to 
an American, I might say that blah-blah in cricket is analogous to 
blah-blah in baseball. 

When someone tries to make an analogy between "curing" a homosexual and 
"curing" a mass murderer or a person who rapes children, it implies that 
there is some similarity in the two behaviors.   

I find this extremely offensive because I just can't see any similarities. 
Maybe if I could see the similarities, I wouldn't find it so offensive. 
Can you provide any insights on this, Dwight?

Mike

    
    Doctah,
    
    > many people are capable of saying " So what"
    
     And many do. They are however many people that feel like Dante when
    he said, " The deepest part of hell is reserved for those who remain
    neutral during a moral crisis."  I think the primary question that we
    all keep coming back to is " Why do men find other men sexually
    attractive."  Anatomically the parts do not fit in a homosexual
    relationship, hence, the logical heterosexual relationship seems to
    have been replaced for the illogical. Many hets(like me) are not
    jumping to conclusions, but instead are asking " Why do you do that."
    
    David
    

    
    
    -1
       Should have been  " Incapable".
    
    
    Sorry,
    David

re: 851.188

>Well, watching a baseball isn't the same as watching someone conduct themselves
>in a regular, (stay clear of the word normal Dwight), scenario.  If we watched
>them off the field, we could probably spot many of them. Personally, I find
>baseball a BIG bore and don't watch it.

First point: Yes, you might be able to spot *many* of them. The point is 
that you would also *miss* many of them. Which is exactly what SILVA 
and others have been saying.

Second point: OK, so you don't watch baseball. How about boxing? Presumably 
you see many boxers "in a regular scenario", in the locker room, etc. 
Can you pick out the gay boxers? All of them? Many of them? Are you ever wrong?

Mike

    
    
             SCRUFFY WOULDNT DO IT!!!
    
    

re: 851.200
>What difference does it make?  (The answer to any of .-1's questions.)
>Why the focus on identifying them?  What significance does that have?

No significance at all to me. But it seems to make a big difference to 
people like Dwight. Identifying homosexuals is important because they're 
similar in some ways to Charles Manson and to people who have sex with 
children. They all engage in disgusting behavior and they need treatment.

Mike

    RE: .197

    David,

    Interesting questions.   Some possible ways to think about responding....

    Why do women find men attractive?   Why do men find women attractive?

    Can those questions be answered without referring to sexual acts?

    Why to heterosexual people engage in oral sex?  The parts are not
    anatomically designed for that purpose, are they?

    Regarding logical .vs. illogical behavior - take sports.  Baseball,
    basketball, tennis, gymnastics, weight-lifting, track and field (and
    more) - all seem like logical means to engage in physical activity for 
    the purpose of competition, sense of achievement, fun, etc... Boxing and 
    football on the other hand seem illogical to me because, with boxing,
    the whole point of the "sport" is to physically abuse someone (yes I
    know there is a great deal of skill and stamina involved, but that isn't
    my point). With football, injury is often the end result (the stats on 
    professional football injuries are pretty bad, so I hear).  Why do people 
    subject themselves to such things?  It seems even *more* illogical for 
    someone to like boxing than for someone to be gay (IMO).

    Now, we can further analyze why such sports are popular and we can find
    some seemingly logical reasons....  The aggressive impulses stem from a
    long history of mankind needing to fight to stay alive (a survival
    instinct of some sort perhaps?)   Well maybe the same could be said for
    homosexuality.  Perhaps homosexuals evolved as a means of population
    control - or perhaps (as some Native Americans believe), gay people
    serve some special spiritual purpose.  Some of the ancient Greeks felt the
    best way to raise young men was via a mentor-type relationship that
    included sex.  Certainly their society produced significant
    achievements in art, science, philosophy..... Are these things related?
    I don't know.

    I guess the bottom line is this.  Gay people exist.  We have always
    existed.  We have been studied and studied and it seems that, although 
    we don't have a definitive answer as to *why* we are the way we are, our 
    nature is "constitutional" (i.e. is an inherent part of our being) and is
    harmless.

    Given that - it seems illogical to me that such a big deal is made
    about it...

    /Greg

>They are however many people that feel like Dante when
>    he said, " The deepest part of hell is reserved for those who remain
>    neutral during a moral crisis."

 How is it a moral crisis when you are not involved? Are they not consenting
adults? What justifies a pronouncement by you that what they are doing
constitutes a moral crisis?

>" Why do men find other men sexually attractive."

 I used to ask myself this question alot. I used to think alot like you do.
In response to a challenge, I became acquainted with gays, to find out what
they were all about. I carried my preconceptions with me. Sure, many of my 
preconceptions had some merit. But boy, oh, boy did my preconceptions leave 
out ALOT of the gay people out there. A few people that I knew came out to me.
Some were a surprise, others were not. I learned alot. I believe that some
people just react to same sex stimuli instead of opposite sex stimuli. And
it's not just about sex. There is love and caring and nurturing going on here.

>Anatomically the parts do not fit in a homosexual
>    relationship, hence, the logical heterosexual relationship seems to
>    have been replaced for the illogical.

 It's an instinctual thing. When you see a woman and you get a combination
of physical and emotional effects as a result of seeing her, you are not
choosing to do this- you are not in control. It just happens. Why is it
so difficult to accept that for others, the same exact thing just happens
with members of the same sex?

> Many hets(like me) are not
>    jumping to conclusions, but instead are asking " Why do you do that."

 I think it's what comes natural for them. It's difficult for you to understand
because you don't share similar feelings (and neither do I), but I think
the difference is that I've seen gays just being themselves and have
come to accept that they are just doing what comes naturally to them. Jokes
and belittling comments aside- it's really not such a big damn deal.

 the Doctah

    	I think it comes down a basic belief within......
    
    	Some folks believe that homosexuality is a choice. Some folks will
    write a litany that it is, in fact, not a choice, but a genetic
    attraction. Still others believe that it is a dysfunction.
    
    	Homosexuality, if a choice, becomes an arena for argument much the
    same as abortion. If it is a genetic thing, is it a genetic disorder?
    
    	If your libido is toward members of the same sex ....fine. Just
    don't revel in it to the distraction of others. Wear a sign that
    declares yourself......whatever. Then let it go!!!! Hets don't make it
    point to walk around professing their hetness....I don't ever remember
    having a parade for straights. I in my opinion, it gets to the point
    where homosexuals want confrontation..."I'M GAY......WHAT DO YOU HAVE
    TO SAY ABOUT IT?!?!" My answer is "So what, get outta my face!" IMO
    again, it appears that it's a scream for attention and once that
    attention is gotten what else do they want? 
    
    	Ya see.....I keep hearing things like..."all we want is.....to be
    left alone, walk the streets safely, not be attacked, not be ridiculed,
    have equal rights...blah blah blah." I all I want is to be left alone,
    walk the streets safely, not be attacked, blah blah blah......get it?
    	
    	Then comes the aggravation...."Gays want to march in St. Patty's
    Parade". Why does the gay community have to carry a gay banner? Why do
    they have to make life miserable for people who want to perserve a
    tradition? Why do they have to destroy some elses' enjoyment to make a
    statement? These are type of things that will prevent acceptance of the
    gays from happening. And there are times that I honestly believe that
    that is the intent, because once accepted.....they will not be the
    center of attention......
    
    
    	Just some random thoughts as I eat my split pea soup....
    
    K

    Reading through this string has impressed me with the VIOLENT feelings
    (yes violent) many have against Gays or people with life styles
    different to what the reader can personally identify with.  
    
    (Why am I so suprised, the history of the World is riddled with
    examples of intolerent people slamming on others). 
    
    I am not Gay, (therefore I can't personally identify with being Gay
    based on my own feelings), but I don't feel threatened nor hatred 
    toward Gays either.  What is it with some of you guys?  Do Gay people
    personally threaten your sense of masculinity?  What has their Gayness
    have to do with YOUR masculinity anyway?  
    
    Whether Society likes it or not there ARE people with life styles which
    are different from the majority and the sooner we all learn to live
    with it the better off we will all be.
    
    Jeff

| <<< Note 851.205 by SALEM::KUPTON "Red Sox - More My Age" >>>




| If your libido is toward members of the same sex ....fine. Just
| don't revel in it to the distraction of others. Wear a sign that
| declares yourself......whatever. Then let it go!!!! Hets don't make it
| point to walk around professing their hetness....

	Yes you do. Everytime someone has a wedding ring on it tells others
that he's married. Ever talk about your girlfriend/wife? Ever check out any
women that may be walking in the halls? Ever talk about these women to others?
Think about it, if we talked about our boyfriend, had pictures in our offices,
checked out the local "stud" in the hall or even tried talking about it, would
you view that as us pushing ourselves on you?

| I don't ever remember having a parade for straights. 

	Who says you couldn't?

| I in my opinion, it gets to the point
| where homosexuals want confrontation..."I'M GAY......WHAT DO YOU HAVE
| TO SAY ABOUT IT?!?!" My answer is "So what, get outta my face!" IMO
| again, it appears that it's a scream for attention and once that
| attention is gotten what else do they want?

	Gee, I had thought the parade was about us being proud of who we are
and of our past. Gee, thanks for the er.... new and interesting view...

| Ya see.....I keep hearing things like..."all we want is.....to be
| left alone, walk the streets safely, not be attacked, not be ridiculed,
| have equal rights...blah blah blah." I all I want is to be left alone,
| walk the streets safely, not be attacked, blah blah blah......get it?

	Apparently you don't. 

| Then comes the aggravation...."Gays want to march in St. Patty's
| Parade". Why does the gay community have to carry a gay banner? 

	Why do the different Irish groups have to carry their banner? Each
group is one thing, IRISH. Any banner that anyone carries just tells what group
they are from. Nothing more, nothing less.

| Why do
| they have to make life miserable for people who want to perserve a
| tradition? Why do they have to destroy some elses' enjoyment to make a
| statement? 

	Was it the gays who made some feel as though their day was destroyed?
OR, was it the fact that these people need to get over their prejudices?

| These are type of things that will prevent acceptance of the
| gays from happening. 

	No, it's the prejudices of other people that might keep it from
happening. But I seriously don't think that will happen.

| And there are times that I honestly believe that
| that is the intent, because once accepted.....they will not be the
| center of attention......

	Yeah, just think, not worrying about being beaten up because we're gay,
to not worry about not getting a job or housing because we're gay, to be seen
as what we are, people..... nah! Why do that? I'd be MUCH happier just being
the center of attention! Get real please.....




Glen

			Nice note Jeff.



Glen

    RE: .205

    (Is it ken?)

    I'd like to try to honestly answer your questions about what you
    perceive as the "in your face" behavior exhibited by some gay people.

    First, it might be useful to try to walk in the shoes of a gay person
    for a moment and consider how you might feel reading some of the
    comments made in this file just in the past few days.  

    Then multiply those comments several hundred times over the course of 
    your life. Throw in physical abuse, denial of equal rights, the constant
    drumbeat of "hate the sin! hate the sin! hate the sin!" - the possible
    separation from your family.....   I say this because I think if you
    really want to understand why gay people are becoming more and more
    vocal about who we are, you need to understand what is motivating us.

    You state that you never see hets professing their heterosexuality.
    I see it quite differently.   Every time you mention your wife or your
    children you are professing your heterosexuality.   Such displays
    are *everywhere* - on billboards, in magazines, on TV and radio, in
    the office and in the movies and in restaurants and hotels and sports
    arenas.   I don't begrudge the straight world any of that.  I just
    want my share.  

    By the way, have you ever actually seen a discussion about gay issues
    come up because a person said "I'M GAY......WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO SAY 
    ABOUT IT?!?!"   Aren't these discussion usually started over something
    much less strident and "in your face" (at least on the part of gays)?
    Something like a news article about a gay couple that wants to get 
    married, or a silly note about gay sex scenes in popular movies?  
    I guess what I'm saying is, isn't a lot of the vocal activity (at least 
    in notes) regarding gay issues a *response* to something?

    The point I'm getting at here is that nearly all of the activity 
    you see on these issues is a result of gay people finally deciding
    to fight what they perceive as an injustice.  Now we can argue about
    the extent and/or degree of the injustice, but don't you think
    injustice is worth talking about?

    As for gay pride parades....  We don't throw them to impress straight
    people.  They aren't for you.  They are for us.   We have gay pride
    because we are proud of surviving (thriving even) in a world that
    hates us, and because we want to celebrate the diversity in our
    communities and because we want to have fun.   Lots of different
    nationalities do the same thing.  Ever been to the North End of
    Boston in August?  Given the reasons, a het pride parade wouldn't serve
    much of a purpose.  Does this make sense?   I really do want to be
    clear...

    By the way, I agree that there are probably some activists out there
    who's primary goal (though even they may not know it) is to get
    attention just for the sake of getting attention (as opposed to trying
    to wake up a sleeping bureaucracy).   But you can find that kind of
    thing in *any* type of political activity.  

     The mistake would be assuming that all gay people are alike, that all 
     visible actions taking place involving gays are for the same purpose,
     and that what you are seeing in the mass media involving all of this is 
     representative/truthful.

    /Greg

    
    re .205
    
    I hear you Ken. I, like Mark, have tried to expand my understanding of
    gay issues. I spend some time in the gay notes file. And I have had
    lesbian friends for most of my adult life, long before Digital.
    
    The people you are talking about are often the radical fringe. The
    people who throw condoms, who disrupt parades, who participate in
    demonstrations. The people who "put it in your face".
    
    And yes, its d*mned difficult for straight people to have much
    appreciation for what they're doing. It seems, at best, obnoxious and
    rude, and at worst, insulting, inflammatory, unacceptable and
    unpardonable.
    
    BUT: there is (sometimes) method to the madness. A lot of it is coming
    from people who are fed up with taking a LOT of abuse just because of
    something they don't feel is a choice.
    
    *I* feel that the analogy to civil rights for black Americans has some
    merit. No, gay people have never been enslaved. But they have been
    beaten and killed, and denied their basic rights for a long time. They
    have often lived in great fear, and under great strain for being
    "abnormal", according to society. In fear of their jobs, their homes
    and their safety. There came a point where some of them stood up and
    said: "HEY! We're men (and women) and we're not going to take this any
    more." And now they are fighting BACK. And the operative word is "back".
    Because many, many gay people would be very quiet and relatively
    inconspicuous if it weren't for society's enormous pressure to conform
    to a mold which they don't fit.
    
    Honestly, there's only one letter difference between she and he. It is
    because of our own expectations that OUR ears often perk up when
    someone uses the "wrong" pronoun. But that's all it is. And our
    imaginations. A straight male might say, "we're going out tonight,
    we're celebrating her promotion", and a gay male might say "we're going
    out tonight, we're celebrating his promotion."  In the workplace, this
    kind of sentence should be okay. And it is no more reasonable to assume
    that the celebration includes sex for the gay couple than the het
    couple. 
    
    And yet, a person could get fired for that sentence in the state of
    Colorado. A person could have his car turned over or torched for that
    sentence. A person could be beaten up walking to his car for that
    sentence. And this is NOT a good thing. THIS is what "gay pride" is
    trying to combat. That gay people should not have to live in fear of
    reprisal all their lives. And SOME gay people have taken this to quite
    an extreme. But you should not label all gay people with the extremist
    brush. They want to become visible because they see this as the ONLY
    way to ensure that the beating stops. That the killing stops. That the
    threat to their lives stops. And that they no longer live in fear.
    
    There is a slogan: Silence is Death. 
    
    It challenges the notion that gays should stay closeted. Because there
    is a strong opinion that if the het community knew, REALLY knew, how
    many gay people there were and how "normal" their lives were, other
    than the sex of their loved ones, then perhaps the killing and
    ostracism would stop. But as long as most gay people stay closeted,
    protecting themselves from that ostracism, then the average person who
    believes that he or she doesn't know many gay people can continue to
    state vehemently that ALL or MOST gay people are strange/weird/faggy,
    etc. 
    
    Gay *activists* are a minority. Highly visible, yes, but still a
    minority. The support they get from the gay community stems primarily
    from an appreciation for the baby steps which have been taken to make
    being gay safer. Its not necessarily the method or means which are
    applauded, but the gains have been undeniable. If there was another
    way, a BETTER way to try to win safety for gay people, I'm sure it
    would be tried. But right now, increased visibility seems to be it.
    Obnoxious though *some* people do get.
    
    
    BTW, Digital's policies are designed primarily to enable its employees
    to co-exist peaceably. Not to force a change in ones attitude about
    homosexual behavior. It is OKAY to be repulsed by it. Just like I think
    pornography is disgusting. And some people are very uncomfortable about
    menstruation. Nor do I want to see open-heart surgery. Or an autopsy.
    It is OKAY to not like the things that some people do. But its also
    important to maintain respect for co-workers. So, draw the line at
    saying: please don't talk about X around me, it makes me uncomfortable. 
    While at work, we really need to ease up on statements which put
    down other co-workers.
    
    D*mn, I got preachy again. Ken, I'm not trying to preach at *you*.
    Honest. Its just a realization that there are people who stand behind
    you, who agree with you, who are silent, that maybe, just maybe, might
    give some thought to what I'm saying. Please bear with me...

.206> Reading through this string has impressed me with the VIOLENT feelings
.206> (yes violent) many have against Gays or people with life styles
.206> different to what the reader can personally identify with.  

I don't know that I'd use the word "violent" for the simple reason that
there's an implication of violence when that word is used.  I would say
"very strong" feelings.

I'm a co-moderator of a conference called CHRISTIAN-PERSPECTIVES and will
personally guarantee you that I've seen the very same attitudes, perhaps
even "stronger" in their opinions, between people of one faith and people
of other faiths and between different interpretations of the Christian faith,
just to mention a few.

I can draw some analogies to the faith differences and this difference of
homosexuality.  There are those who believe "A" and there are those who
believe "B".  In some cases there is not and never will be a middle ground.
There will continue to be dramatically differences of opinion - and - I'm
not all that sure that this is bad .. I may not agree with others opinions
and I most assuredly have my opinion.  Is this bad?

Sure, as long as it doesn't escalate to physical violence (like the
Protestants and Catholics in Ireland .. the Jews and the Arabs, etc)
a diversity of opinion is just as important as a diversity of cultures.
We all learn from it.  No?  Yes?

.206> I am not Gay, (therefore I can't personally identify with being Gay
.206> based on my own feelings), but I don't feel threatened nor hatred 
.206> toward Gays either.  What is it with some of you guys?

I've been watching this string carefully .. and .. I have not seen ANY
indication that people feel *threatened* or *hatred* toward gays.  If
I'm wrong, correct me.  There has been some stereotypical descriptions
of gays .. but for the most part I have not seen any threats or hatred
or any indication thereof.
    
The current trend is the discussion of the sight of different sex acts
and watching them.  Believe me, there will be DRAMATICALLY different
opinions on this issue!  Hey, someone doesn't want to watch two men kiss
or have sex .. that, to me, does not even come close to threats or
hatred of gays.  It's just saying .. hey .. I don't want to watch that.
There's nothing in the world wrong with this .. is there?

Don't let the emotion of differences of opinion be incorrectly translated
into "threats" or "hatred".  Sure, it can end up that way, but, I have not
seen it in this string of notes.

Bubba

    
    
    Doctah,
    
    > How is it a moral crisis when you are not involved?
    
      I did not realize opinion on the morality of sexual behavior had to
    be subjective...
    
    > what justifies a pronouncement by you that what they are doing
    constitutes a moral crisis
    
      I didn't. But since you bring it up why don't you tell me what the
    qualifiers/criteria are, for stating what is right or wrong..
    
    > I used to think alot like you do
    
      You have no idea how I think about this Mark. Heres a clue, I don't
    hate gays. I have gay friends. I have told all here in this conference
    that I came from a religious family and hence I MUST get answers to the
    questions my mind generates..
    
    > In response to a challenge
    
      Me too. I just scrutinize a little more than you do :-)
    
    > Why is it so difficult to accept for others
    
    1>)  Because Daddy kissed Mommy in the morning, not another man..
    
    2.) The male parts naturally fit into the females.
    
    3.) The sperm fertilizes the egg.
    
    4.) The bible said  alot about the signs of the end times. Men with men
     as if with women trading what is natural for what is unnatural,
    burning in their desires for each other.. I am struggling with 20 years
    of christian up bringing.. 
    
    David
    
    
    
    

.212> The people you are talking about are often the radical fringe.

.212> Gay *activists* are a minority. Highly visible, yes, but still a
.212> minority.

.212> The people who throw condoms, who disrupt parades, who participate in
.212> demonstrations. The people who "put it in your face".

In my humble opinion - absolutely correct.  To judge the many by the
inane attitudes of the few is wrong but I know as well as any other
adult that it is a natural human emotion to do so.

If you put the numbers to it you'll soon find out that the number
of activists and people that participate in/support/etc .. the gay
'pride' parades is probably a statistically insignificant fraction
of the entire population of homosexual individuals.

.212> BTW, Digital's policies are designed primarily to enable its employees
.212> to co-exist peaceably. Not to force a change in ones attitude about
.212> homosexual behavior. It is OKAY to be repulsed by it.

BINGO!  You're absolutely correct.  All we have to do is work together
and produce the products and services that keep the company going.  There
is no prerequisite, expressed or implied, that one has to embrace or *not*
be repulsed by homosexuality any more than there is any prerequisite that
you embrace or reject Christianity.

.212> While at work, we really need to ease up on statements which put
.212> down other co-workers.

Whole new subject and a very difficult area.  I know a married couple
who has been trying to have a baby for a long time .. nothing works ..
he told me that he is so thoroughly disgusted and repulsed by any
talk of abortion when him and him wife would love so dearly to be able
to conceive a child ... and when he hears talk of abortion it makes
him feel thoroughly sad.  Obviously he's adult enough to know that there
will be differences of opinion on this subject .. same applies here.
We're all adults.
    
.212> D*mn, I got preachy again.

Go ahead and preach.  For the most part I won't even read notes that
are much over 20 or so lines .. but .. when I see your name as the
author I read every line .. every word.  We may not agree on everything
but you make a lot of sense.

Bubba

    
    David, even if it IS a sign that the end of the world is near, I'm not
    sure that I understand why you would blame those involved.
    
    There were a lot of predicted calamities as well, if I recall (I am NOT
    well versed on Revelations) and yet we accept them and respect them as
    part of nature. If the Bible spoke of a plague, would we get angry at
    everyone who became sick? Or simply take it as a sign? If there truly
    is a "growing" number of gays in the world, in keeping with
    Revelations' predictions, I don't think any negativity toward them is
    going to change the fact that they are a "sign".
    
    Take it a step further, if the world is ending as stated in the Bible,
    I thought this was okay, i.e. an inevitable event to accept and
    possibly rejoice over.

    
    -1
    
     > why you blame those involved
    
     I don't blame, but also do not put a blue ribbon on them and shake
    hands....
    
    > and respect them as part of nature
    
     What?? According to the same bible the gay persons will be spending
    an eternity in hell, not an eternity shaking hands with people and
    giving interviews on what it was like to participate in being a sign
    of the times..
    
    > If the bible spoke of a plague, would you get angry at the sick
    
    No, nor would I throw a party for the parasite that caused the
    sickness.
    
    David
    
     

    217 replies to get to the crux of the matter:  God said it, I believe
    it , and that settles it.
    					John
    

| <<< Note 851.218 by LEDS::LEWICKE "That Hideous Strength----Polyester" >>>



| 217 replies to get to the crux of the matter:  God said it, I believe
| it , and that settles it.

	John, can YOU tell me where in the Bible it says this? Or, are you just
going by what other's have said? 



Glen

    	I don't agree with it, but that is all that there is to the
    arguments against homosexuality here. 
    						John
    

    Bubba, I mean violence in the sense of (in some cases) physical attack
    in the outside world, AND violence in the sense that Gay people are
    often emotionally attacked with verbal abuse.
    
    Reading between the lines, comments such as: "I will be waiting for
    you on the hood of my car", and 'its a good thing I don't know where
    your cube is',  etc. is, to me only one step removed from a physical
    attack upon the people those comments are directed at.  I believe
    the legal term is assault?  Battery would be the physical attack. Since
    the context is a discussion about Gay people I read in 'violent
    emotions' toward Gay people in the context of this discussion in
    those cases where those types of comments are being made.
    
    My point is to explain how I can see 'violence' in this string.
    
    Fortunately there are others in this string who are not coming across
    as 'forcefully' as some are. 
    
    Everybody has a right to their own feelings but I am amazed at the
    apparent depth of the feelings (negative) toward Gay people.  I
    wouldn't want to have to live my life under the verbal, physical, 
    and emotional attacks which I observe Gay people having to endure.
    Its amazing so many have the guts to come out of the closet at all.
    
    Jeff
    
    

    re .31 (whew!!) 
    
    Let me get this straight (excuse the pun): 
    
    if a man is "into" other guys, he is gay
    if a man is into other men but also likes women, he is a bisexual
    if a woman likes other women, she's a lesbian
    
    what about the man who crossdresses but is not gay?
     is that a whole other category?  if a man crossdresses and then has
    sex with another man, is he bisexual or just a crossdresser?  what
    about men who ENJOY seeing other men crossdress?  what if this man
    while crossdressed, picks up a female who is a lesbian, what does that
    make that man? 
    
    augh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! this is getting confusing!!   
    

    
    
    John Lewicke
    
    
  > 217 replies to get to the crux of the matter
    
    No!  My remarks in 217 get to my psyche, my heart felt problems, my
    past upbringing, and finally my heart felt need to talk with the gay
    community and understand them.. Yes God gave us a brain, but he also
    gave us a heart, we are not called to have " Blind hearts."
    
    David

.221> Bubba, I mean violence in the sense of (in some cases) physical attack
.221> in the outside world, AND violence in the sense that Gay people are
.221> often emotionally attacked with verbal abuse.

OK .. I really got the impression that you were talking about this forum.
    
.21> Reading between the lines, comments such as: "I will be waiting for
.21> you on the hood of my car", and 'its a good thing I don't know where
.21> your cube is',  etc. is, to me only one step removed from a physical
.21> attack upon the people those comments are directed at.

OK .. I can see how you arrived at this conclusion .. I am at a disadvantage
because I know one of the individuals who made the remarks and know that he
is basically a reasonable and very intelligent person.  Not only that, but
the bantering that was going on in the extracts that you post are between
two *straight* people!!

.21> Since the context is a discussion about Gay people I read in 'violent
.21> emotions' toward Gay people in the context of this discussion in
.21> those cases where those types of comments are being made.

Again .. the two people making those remarks were both straight....
    
.21> My point is to explain how I can see 'violence' in this string.

I see where you're coming from but most assuredly did want to distinguish
between "violence" and "differences of opinion" in this area.  Sure, there's
a fine line somewhere but for the most part, as someone said, the quality
discussion - though diverse - has been proceeding quite nicely.

.21> Everybody has a right to their own feelings but I am amazed at the
.21> apparent depth of the feelings (negative) toward Gay people.

Interesting perspective - that the feelings are "negative".  There has
been some disagreement and some stereotypical descriptions.  Because
a person says that all gay people talk with a lisp - is that negative?
If so, is it negative because you perceive it to be negative or you're
absolutely positive that the author wanted it to be negative.

Someone said that they are repulsed by the sight of two men kissing or
having sex .. or that the thought of two men having sex was repulsive.
As Karen said .. that's fine.  One may certainly feel that way.  I do
not call that "negative".

Perhaps I'm just too damned easy-going .. and give everyone a high degree
of respect for their opinion (whether I like it or not).

Bubba

Re: .222

Cross-dressing (transvestism) has nothing to do with sexual orientation, and
is also unrelated to transsexualism.

			Steve

| <<< Note 851.222 by POWDML::ROSADO >>>




| what about the man who crossdresses but is not gay?
| is that a whole other category?  

	Hmmmm... what it is is someone who is heterosexual and dresses in
women's clothing. I would imagine you classify them as being heterosexual
crossdressers. The crossdressing part has nothing to do with one's sexual
orientation.

| if a man crossdresses and then has
| sex with another man, is he bisexual or just a crossdresser?  

	Depends. If the man who crossdresses has sex with both sexes, can have
the same �emotional ties with both, then the man would be a bisexual
crossdresser. If the man is having sex with another man just for the sake of
having sex and there is no �emotional ties what so ever, then the person is a 
heterosexual crossdresser who has had homosexual sex. And lastly, if the
person has sex AND the �emotional ties with just men, then that person is a
homosexual crossdresser. 

� Emotional ties meaning the same way a man is attracted to a woman, by their
  touch, feel, emotions, etc can also be done with man/man, woman/woman, man
  with woman/man, woman with man/woman.

| what about men who ENJOY seeing other men crossdress?  

	Hmmmm..... what does this have to do with one's sexual orientation?

| what if this man
| while crossdressed, picks up a female who is a lesbian, what does that
| make that man?

	Heterosexual. Not that I didn't think your questions were a strange,
pathetic, warped attempt at humor, but I think if you really took at look at
what you wrote, at what is being talked about in here, one could very easily
say that you haven't been paying attention. One could also easily say that you
really need to get OUT more. :-)

| augh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! this is getting confusing!!

	Confusing? Nah..... just pathetic.....


Glen

    whats pathetic about it Glen?
    

    
    
    
             Wow,  i just saw my first "Gay Parade"
    
    
           What did they sound the horn in Gaynotes.
    
          Calling ALL GAYS  Calling ALL GAYS!
    
          I dont care how you wrap it... 
    
           My DIFFERENCE is "ITS NOT RIGHT"  Please VALUE IT
    
      -Helmot
    
    
    

>          <<< Note 851.205 by SALEM::KUPTON "Red Sox - More My Age" >>>
>                              -< Lunch Thoughts >-

>    point to walk around professing their hetness....I don't ever remember
>    having a parade for straights. 

       I suggest you book reservations for New Orleans for Tuesday, 23 Feb
       1993.  You will see the most outlandish displays of 'hetness'.

       I think the current round of homophobic behavior comes largely from
       biblical thought.  Revelations does paint a picture of the end of
       the world that could be compared to modern times but people have
       been comparing it to their current culture for the last thousand
       years or so.  But people can't very well get on a plane and fly to
       Moscow and harass Boris Yeltsin; it's easier to blame homosexuals,
       thinking that if they can irradicate the culture of the symbols that
       seem to fit the bible reference they can put off the apocolypse.

       patrick

    Since the Bible has appeared as a support for homophobia I have
    reposted the following.  Unfortunately, Bonnie isn't with DEC anymore,
    but I think she'd approve of its reuse here.
    
    
        <<< LGP30::DKA300:[NOTES$LIBRARY]CHRISTIAN-PERSPECTIVE.NOTE;1 >>>
                 -< Discussions from a Christian Perspective >-
================================================================================
Note 91.3                     Christianity and Gays                    3 of 2251
WMOIS::B_REINKE "bread&roses"                      1063 lines  30-OCT-1990 10:24
                        -< Homosexuality and the Bible >-
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    This material was also entered originally in a different file
    and I received permission to repost it.
    
    __________________________________________________________
    
    
    
              -< HOMOSEXUALITY AND THE BIBLE - by Walter Barnett >-
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    	Most Christians are still uneasy about homosexuality.
    Even Gay Christians themselves often share this uneasiness,
    because we have all been brought up in the same Christian
    tradition.  There are many causes for the uneasiness; but the
    one cause which seems most important in the minds of all is
    the conviction that the Bible condemns homosexuality, in itself
    and in all its manifestations.
    
    	In recent years a slow change has begun to occur in Christian
    attitudes towards homosexuality and homosexual persons.  Some
    Christians, while maintaining the traditional attitude for
    themselves, have become prepared to admit that it is not necessary
    in secular society to punish homosexuals for behavior which
    is permissible to heterosexuals.  On this basis, most Christian
    churches have now made formal statements supporting the right
    of homosexual people to protection against discrimination.
    
    	Some Christians have gone further and acknowledge that
    the particular virulence with which some people have attacked
    and condemned homosexual acts and homosexual persons is totally
    unjustified, if a caring person weighs the relative importance
    given to homosexual behavior in the Bible, and especially if
    he or she respects the attitudes appropriate for a Christian
    when dealing with fellow human beings.  Some theologians and
    a number of Gay Christians, working from a growing understanding
    of the biblical texts, have come to the conclusion that the
    Bible does not exclude homosexual people from the Christian
    fellowship, within bounds analogous to those applied to
    heterosexuals.

    	The Bible does mention homosexual behavior in extremely
    negative terms in a handful of widely scattered verses, but
    modern research has turned up considerable evidence casting
    doubt on the traditional interpretation of these passages
    -- an interpretation that had borne tragic consequences for
    homosexuals throughout almost the whole of Christian history.
    The purpose here is to examine this evidence, together with
    some of the light science has shed on the subject of psychosexual
    development, in the hope that it will lead to a more informed
    appraisal.
    
    	The critical fact generally unknown to or overlooked by
    heterosexuals is that homosexuality is something quite distinct
    from homosexual behavior and even from homosexual desires or
    lust.  Homosexuality is an emotional and affectional orientation
    towards people of the same sex.  It may or may not involve
    sexual acts, though of course it usually does.  On the other
    hand, homosexual acts can be and are performed by BOTH homosexuals
    AND heterosexuals, and homosexual desire or lust is probably
    experienced occasionally by most heterosexuals.  (The most
    common instances of extensive homosexual behavior by heterosexuals
    occur in those situations such as prisons where heterosexual
    partners are unavailable.)  This is why those who possess this
    same-sex emotional orientation abjure the term homosexual and
    call themselves by their own slang word Gay.  The word homosexual
    for them overemphasizes the specifically sexual element in
    their feelings.  Because it was coined by the scientific community
    to label them, it also carries overtones of clinical pathology
    which they reject.  Since 1974 the American Psychiatric
    Association and American Psychological Association have both
    officially disavowed this implication of the label, but the
    Gay community continues to reject the word.  So even in general
    usage "Gay" is replacing "homosexual" just as "black" or
    "Afro-American" has replaced "Negro."
    
    	Most people grow up to want and seek an intimate and loving
    relationship with a person of the opposite sex.  Gay people
    on the other hand are those who have discovered that they want
    and seek such a relationship with a person of the same sex.
    Why and how this variant occurs is not now and probably never
    will be the subject of any pat explanation because it is the
    consequence of a wide range of factors, some of which are
    environmental and some possibly hereditary or physical.  What
    is important, though, from the point of view of sin is that
    most Gay people have no conscious recollection of ever having
    chosen this orientation any more than the ordinary heterosexual
    ever consciously chose to want the opposite sex.  It is simply
    a given in their emotional make-up, an integral part of the
    personality.  And they sense that nothing on earth will ever
    change this, just as the ordinary heterosexual cannot imagine
    changing into a homosexual.
    
    	Some people are truly bisexual; they find both sexes equally
    interesting and attractive.  These however are few and far
    between.  The orientation of the great majority is fixed and
    definite, towards either the opposite sex or their own.  This
    is not to deny that many people engage in some experimentation
    on both sides of the fence before they know for sure which
    side is home, but it is a mistake to conclude from this fact
    that all people are basically bisexual.  It is equally a mistake
    to conclude that all people are basically heterosexual and
    a few are lured away into homosexuality by seduction.  The
    truth rather seems to be that human sexuality is initially
    free-floating and unattached, that an emotional interest in
    one sex or the other develops very early in life, and that
    this interest then comes increasingly to the fore as puberty
    and adolescence bring on explicitly sexual fantasies and behavior.
    
    	The reason therefore why Gay people seek out others of their
    own sex and engage in sexual behavior with them is not that
    they are incapable of bridling their lusts or are perversely
    determined to disobey God but simply because the option open
    to the rest of humankind -- a heterosexual relationship and
    specifically marriage to a partner of the opposite sex -- is
    not open to them.  Legally of course it is open, but emotionally
    not.  It would for them be living a lie -- a sin against their
    partner as will as themselves.  Such a relationship does not
    perform for them the function it is meant to perform -- to
    satisfy, to recreate, to replenish.  Unlike the heterosexual
    they feel completed only by a person of the same sex.
    
    	This is not to say that Gay people are incapable of
    heterosexual behavior.  Many can perform heterosexual coitus
    just as many heterosexual people are capable of engaging in
    homosexual acts.  But if given the choice they will prefer
    a partner of the same sex, not out of mere perversity but because
    it is only a partner of the same sex who satisfies them
    emotionally.
    
    	Now in order for anything to be a sin there must be a
    possibility of a moral choice.  Where there is no choice there
    can be no sin.  So if one's sexual orientation is not a matter
    of choice, it cannot be a sin to be a homosexual.  True, it
    may be admitted, but one does have the choice of committing
    or not committing homosexual acts.  This boils down to saying
    that whether or not homosexuality -- the orientation -- is
    a sin, homosexual behavior invariably is.
    
	The cruelty of this position is that it leaves only one
    option open to Gay people who take their relationship to God
    seriously -- the option of total and complete lifelong celibacy.
    Because as already noted the option open to the rest of the
    world -- heterosexual marriage -- is immoral and unethical,
    yes SINFUL, for a Gay person.  But the Church would never dream
    of imposing such a burden on heterosexuals.  Even the Roman
    Catholic Church which requires celibacy of its priests has
    always admitted this to be a special calling for those select
    few to whom God has given the ability to accept it; it is not
    for everyone.  Heterosexual Christians should beware of doing
    like the Pharisees of old, laying on the backs of other people
    a yoke they themselves would find impossible to bear.
    
    	Actually the Bible appears to unequivocally to condemn
    only three things: (1) homosexual rape; (2) the ritual homosexual
    prostitution that was part of the Canaanite fertility cult
    and at one time apparently taken over into Jewish practice
    as well; and (3) homosexual lust and behavior on the part of
    heterosexuals.  On the subject of homosexuality as an orientation,
    and on consensual behavior by people who possess that orientation,
    it is wholly silent.  The orientation as such was apparently
    unknown to or at least unrecognized by the Biblical authors.
    If we may assume that the Biblical authors were themselves
    all heterosexual this would not be at all surprising.  For
    that matter it has only been since about 1890 that the science
    of psychology began to recognize homosexuality as a distinct
    entity.
    
    	In the first place homosexuality and homosexual behavior
    are never anywhere in the Bible mentioned either by Jesus
    Christ himself or by any of the Old Testament prophets.  If
    it really were a sin in God's sight surely he or they or both
    would have inveighed against it.  This fact should be of cardinal
    importance to the thinking of any person who purports to follow
    Jesus.
    
    	The story of Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis 18 and 19 has
    traditionally in Christianity been thought to demonstrate God's
    condemnation of homosexual behavior.  All this because the
    Hebrew word meaning "to know" in Genesis 19:5 had been interpreted
    to mean "have sexual intercourse with."  "They [the townsmen
    of Sodom] called to Lot, 'Where are the men who came to you
    tonight?  Bring them out to us, that we may know them.;"
    
    	In the story God informs Abraham that these two cities
    will be destroyed because of their great wickedness, but the
    wickedness is never specified.  Abraham persuades God to spare
    the cities if even ten righteous men can be found in them.
    Two angels then come to Sodom to investigate and are given
    hospitality by Abraham's nephew Lot.  All the townsmen both
    young and old surround the house and demand to "know" the two
    strangers, but Lot refuses to surrender them up and offers
    instead his two virgin daughters.  When this offer is rejected,
    the angels pull Lot inside and shut the door, striking the
    townsmen blind so that they grope about in darkness.  The angels
    than urge Lot and his household to flee the city to escape
    its destruction.
    
    	Actually in the Bible this Hebrew word "to know" rarely
    means sexual intercourse.  Apart from this story and the
    counterpart tale in Judges 19, it has that meaning in only
    about fifteen instances out of more than 900, and in all those
    few instances it denotes HETEROSEXUAL coitus (as, for instance,
    in Genesis 19:8).  Some scholars believe that here, because
    of the circumstances, it has only its usual meaning of "become
    acquainted with."  Lot himself was a resident alien in Sodom,
    and for such a person to harbor two other foreigners within
    the city's gates could well rouse suspicion that they were
    spies looking for weaknesses in its defenses that a potential
    enemy could exploit.  The townsmen therefore had a perfectly
    justifiable excuse for demanding that the two strangers show
    themselves so that their identities and the purpose of their
    visit could be ascertained.  Lot's reaction however indicates
    at least that there was some serious mischief afoot, and his
    offering the townsmen intercourse with his two virgin daughters
    to keep them from doing anything to his guests does seem to
    support the notion that the mischief was specifically sexual.
    
    	Even if the sexual interpretation is correct, the sin of
    Sodom does not necessarily lie in homosexuality or homosexual
    behavior.  Rather, this wicked thing that Lot enjoins the townsmen
    not to do is rape pure and simple, and gang rape at that. 
    Rape is not a sin peculiar to homosexuality; it occurs far
    more often in a heterosexual context.  Its sinfulness lies
    not in the context, whether heterosexual or homosexual, but
    in the victimization of the nonconsenting partner.
    
    	In our reading today of this story we overlook a little
    known fact -- that in the entire ancient Near East hospitality
    to sojourners and travelers was not seen to be, as with us,
    merely a voluntary option but was rather a sacred religious
    duty.  See Leviticus 19:33-34; Matthew 25:35, 38 and 43.  Thus
    whatever the townsmen intended, any kind of mistreatment or
    indignity inflicted on Lot's guests would be a sin.  It would
    violate the sacred obligation of hospitality.  And indeed this
    latter is the sin or wrong Lot's own words indicate in verse
    8 -- "Don't do anything to these men, FOR YOU KNOW THEY HAVE
    COME UNDER THE SHELTER OF MY ROOF."  (Emphasis added.)  This
    interpretation is further buttressed by the fact that the story
    presents in such marked contrast to the behavior of the Sodomites
    the elaborate hospitality shown the angelic visitors by Abraham
    and Lot.
    
    	Finally it is worth noting for future reference that sexual
    intercourse between humans and angels -- two different orders
    of creation -- would in itself have been wrong in the eyes
    of Jews, who would remember that in Genesis 6:1-8 the disaster
    of the Great Flood comes hard on the heels of a charge that
    the "sons of God" (presumably angels) took to wife the daughters
    of men.
    
    	The idea that the Sodom story is not an indictment of
    homosexuality is no new-fangled interpretation.  Most later
    Jewish commentary on it both inside and outside the Bible does
    not make out the sin of these cities to be homosexuality or
    homosexual behavior.  According to Isaiah 1:9 and ff. and 3:9,
    it was a lack of social justice; according to Ezekiel 16:46-52
    it was disregard for the poor; and according to Jeremiah 23:14
    it was general immorality.  Though ancient Rabbinical literature
    -- the _Talmud_ and _Midrashim_ -- often refers to Sodom in
    connection with the sins of pride, arrogance and inhospitality,
    it contains only one mention of anything homosexual, namely
    a _midrash_ emphasizing rape and robbery of strangers.  ("The
    Sodomites made an agreement among themselves whenever a stranger
    visited them the should force him to sodomy and rob him of
    his money.")  It is primarily among Jews heavily influenced
    by Greek and Roman culture, namely Philo of Alexandria and
    Josephus, that we find the homosexual interpretation, and it
    is probably from Josephus that the interpretation eventually
    found its way into the Christian Church.

    	In the New Testament two passages -- 2 Peter 2:4-9 and
    Jude 6-7 -- refer to Sodom and Gomorrah as examples of God's
    judgement on the wicked in such terms as apparently adopt a
    sexual interpretation.  The former refers to the townsmen as
    licentious or "unprincipled in their lusts," and the latter
    says that they gave themselves to fornication and went after
    different flesh.  Neither passage contributes anything more
    than this on the subject.  But it is important to bear in mind
    that both authors may have been thinking not of homosexual
    intercourse but of intercourse between different orders of
    creation (humans and angels).  Both authors refer to God having
    likewise judged the angels who sinned, and Peter refers to
    the story of the Flood.  Consequently both were probably only
    reiterating the view found in some Jewish writings from the
    same general period, namely the Testament of Naphtali 2:4-5,
    and Book of Jubilees 7:20-22, 16:5-6, and 20:5-6.  The view
    found in these other writings is that the Sodomites were cursed
    for having changed the order of nature by running after angels
    just as the angels had been cursed at the flood for having
    gone a-whoring after the daughters of men.
    
    	Jesus himself mentions Sodom and Gomorrah but only to say
    that they will be judged less severely than the towns that
    rejected his disciples or refused to repent even after witnessing
    the works he performed (Matthew 10:14-15 and 11:20-24.  Luke
    10:10-12 and 17:28-29).  None of these passages tells us his
    interpretation of the Sodom story, though the fact that he
    linked the name of Sodom with refusal to welcome his disciples
    may give us a hint.  And the parallel to the Sodom story reported
    in Luke 9:51-56 in which James and John the sons of Zebedee
    beseech Jesus to call down from heaven destruction by fire
    on an inhospitable Samaritan town provides at least some
    confirmation that Jesus and his disciples held to the more
    prevalent view within Jewish tradition that the son depicted
    in the Sodom story was inhospitable treatment of travelers
    rather than homosexuality or homosexual behavior.
    
    
    	The story in Judges 19 of the outrage at Gibeah is very
    similar to that of Sodom and Gomorrah, and some scholars consider
    the one derived from the others.  Here again the Hebrew word
    "to know" is used (Judges 19:22), and the host's offer of two
    females as diversion implies that it is to be taken in a sexual
    sense.  In this story, however, the male guest pushes his
    concubine out the door, and the townsmen of Gibeah "know" and
    abuse her all night long, as a result of which she dies.  Yet
    this story goes on to say explicitly (Judges 20:4-5) that the
    townsmen's intention was to KILL the male guest.  So the mischief
    that was afoot here was not merely sexual, even homosexual
    rape; it was murder.  And it ended in a heterosexual gang-rape
    that took the woman's life.
    
    	Even if the original intent of both the townsmen of Sodom
    and those of Gibeah was homosexual rape, obviously both stories
    are about heterosexual males who indulge in it as a sport.
    Otherwise the offer in both stories of females as a diversionary
    sexual object makes no sense.  To extend such an offer to
    homosexual males would be pointless because it would hold no
    interest for them.
    
    	In Deuteronomy 23:17-18, in 1 Kings 14:24, 15:12 and 22:46
    and in 2 Kings 23:7 and in Job 36:14, there are references
    to a _kadesh_ (singular) or to _kedeshim_ (plural), which literally
    mean "holy man" and "holy men."  Some translations of the Bible
    render these terms by the English word sodomite(s).  The passage
    in Deuteronomy forbids Israelite men to become such, and likewise
    forbids an Israelite woman to become a _kedeshah_ -- the same
    word in the feminine gender.  Modern Bible scholars believe
    these terms refer to priests and priestesses of the Canaanite
    fertility cult, and evidence outside the Bible supports the
    inference that both types of cult functionaries engage in sexual
    intercourse with male worshipers as part of the ritual.  Indeed
    the Deuteronomy passage by poetic parallelism appears to equate
    _kedeshah_ with the Hebrew word of a female prostitute (_zonah_).
    The 38th chapter of Genesis and Hosea 4:12-14 also support
    this equation.  thus the better translation of _kadesh_/_kedeshim_
    would be "male cult prostitute(s)."

    	Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13 enjoin the men of Israel not
    to "lie with a male as with a woman," for which the latter
    verse invokes the death penalty.  It is stated to be _to'ebah_.
    This Hebrew word, generally translated as 'abomination' in
    English, is used in the Old Testament to refer to idolatry
    and to practices associated with idolatry.  and indeed the
    whole context of these injunctions is a polemic against the
    Israelites imitating the defiling practices of the Canaanites
    whom they displaced in Palestine.  Thus again, the prohibition
    is probably directed against the practice of ritual homosexual
    prostitution as found in the Canaanite fertility cult.  In
    any event the intent cannot be to condemn all homosexuality
    and homosexual behavior because there is no prohibition whatever
    in Leviticus against women having sexual relations with other
    women.  This can hardly be explained as an oversight or on
    the basis that what women do is never of any consequence, because
    these chapters do contain explicit prohibitions against BOTH
    male AND female intercourse with an animal.  So if homosexual
    behavior is supposedly such an evil in god's sight, why does
    Leviticus forbid it only to males and not to females?
    
    	Apart from the association of MALE homosexual acts with
    Canaanite idolatry, the answer probably lies mainly in a concern
    for the "seed" of life rather than a concern about homosexuality
    -per se-.  The Hebrews like other ancient peoples had no accurate
    knowledge of conception.  They did not know that women produce
    eggs which the man's sperm fertilizes, but apparently thought
    that the seed came solely from the man; when "sowed" in a woman
    it would grow into a new being just as seed from plants will
    sprout and grow when sowed in the earth.  They likewise did
    not know that matings between different species are sterile.
    Thus men must not expend their seed in other males where it
    would be unproductive, or in animals where it might result
    in a "confusion" such as a centaur.  Women are forbidden to
    receive seed from an animal for the same reason, but because
    presumably they have no seed, what they do among themselves
    is inconsequential.
    
    	Also, in the patriarchal society of the ancient Hebrews,
    the status and dignity of the male was held to be inviolable,
    so much so that even the women of the house must be sacrificed
    to preserve it if need be, as in the Sodom and Gibeah stories.
     In the ancient Near East it was not uncommon for the victors
    in war to rape vanquished kings or warriors as a mark of utter
    subjection and contempt.  The Hebrews unlike the Greeks may
    thus have associated male homosexuality with disrespect and
    debasement of the male sex and viewed it as intolerable for
    that reason.  Moreover, any society that exalts the male sex
    over the female may tend to associate male homosexuality  with
    effeminacy.  It therefore becomes tabooed to keep the dominant
    sex from being assimilated to the status of women.
    
    	Even if these Levitical injunctions are to be read as an
    absolute prohibition against males engaging in homosexual behavior
    under any and all circumstances, it is worth asking why this
    should be deemed binding on Christians when so many other
    injunctions of the Pentateuch are not.  For instance these
    same chapters of Leviticus make punishable by banishment the
    sin of a man having intercourse with his wife during her menstrual
    period (Leviticus 18:19 and 20:18). Leviticus also forbids
    the wearing of cloth made of two different kinds of fibers,
    say for instance cotton and polyester! (Leviticus 19:19). 
    And what about Exodus 22:18, requiring that witches be put
    to death?
    
    	The only three remaining Biblical passages that conceivably
    touch on homosexual behavior are found in 1 Corinthians 6:9,
    1 Timothy 1:10 and Romans 1:18-32.
    
    	In 1 Corinthians 6:9 Paul asks his readers, "Do you not
    know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God?"
     He then proceeds to list certain categories of people as examples
    of those who will not inherit the kingdom.  In this list two
    of the Greek words, namely _malakoi_ and _arsenokoitai_, have
    usually been rendered in English translation by a single term
    such as "homosexuals," "sodomites," "sexual perverts," or
    "homosexual perverts."  And in 1 Timothy 1:18-11 Paul says
    that the Law is not laid down for the just but for the lawless
    and disobedient, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy
    and profane, and he then proceeds to list specific examples.
     In this list again appears the Greek word _arsenokoitai_.
     Actually in neither case to we know whom Paul meant by these
    terms, because he does not elaborate.
    
    	There was no Greek word corresponding to the English word
    "homosexuals," because as a rule ancient Greeks who practiced
    homosexual intercourse were at the same time married and therefore
    heterosexually involved as well.  Ancient Greek did have common
    words for such people who indulged in homosexual intercourse
    -- for instance, _paiderastes_, _pallakos_, _kinaidos_,
    _arrenomanes_ and _paidophthoros_.  If Paul had  really intended
    to refer to such people he would probably have used one of
    those terms, but he did not.  Instead he used two terms that
    are not plain references to such people.
    
    	The word _malakoi_ is the plural of _malakos_ which literally
    means "soft."  In the moral context _malakoi_ would therefore
    signify people who were "loose," "dissolute," "morally weak"
    or "lacking in self control," and this is the sense accorded
    this word in the King James Version and in J.B. Phillips's
    and Edgar J. Goodspeed's translations.  (The word "effeminate"
    in the King James Version did not mean to English-speaking
    people in 1600 what it means to us today.)  Some have claimed
    that there is support in ancient Greek literature for applying
    this term to the passive partner in sexual intercourse between
    males -- hence the Jerusalem Bible's translation 'catamites.'
    As already noted we have no way of knowing for sure which
    of these two possible meanings Paul intended, because he does
    not elaborate.
        What Paul meant by the term _arsenokoitai_ is even more
    difficult to ascertain.  It is a relatively rare and obscure
    word -- a compound of _koitai_ (literally, "those who engage
    in sexual intercourse") and _arseno_ (literally, 'male' or
    'masculine').  We do not know whether the prefix _arseno_ refers
    to the subject or the object of the intercourse.  If the subject,
    then the meaning is "males for sex," that is, male prostitutes.
    And this rendering ("male concubines") is the one given this
    word by the most scholarly ancient translator -- St. Jerome
    -- in his translation into Latin of the late 4th Century A.D.
    known as the Vulgate.  If on the other hand _arseno_ refers
    to the object of the intercourse, then the meaning is "those
    who have sexual intercourse with males."  Modern lexicons
    refer to some usages in ancient Greek that support the meaning
    "the active partner in anal intercourse."  Thus they conclude
    that Paul used _malakoi_ and _arsenokoitai_ to denote,
    respectively, the passive and active partners in homosexual
    anal intercourse (hence the Jerusalem Bible's rendering
    'catamites' and 'sodomites').  But if this be the case it is
    odd that the early Greek fathers of the Church such as St.
    John Chrysostom did not so interpret these terms.  They found
    no reference to homosexual behavior in this passage of 1
    Corinthians.

    	Whatever Paul meant by these terms they are in no event
    either so clear or so all-inclusive as to encompass the entire
    class of people we describe today by the English word "homosexual"
    or the slang word "Gay."  These two passages can therefore
    hardly supply a reliable basis for condemning all such people
    as sinners.
    
    	Paul does speak definitely about homosexual behavior in
    the first chapter of Romans.  But he is not primarily addressing
    himself to that subject but to the sin of idolatry and its
    consequences.  He states that because men exchanged the glory
    of the immortal God for idols they were delivered up by God
    in their lusts to unclean practices and disgraceful passions.
    "Their women exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural,
    and the men gave up natural intercourse with women and burned
    with lust for one another.  Men did shameful things with men,
    and thus received in their own persons the penalty for their
    perversity.  They did not see fit to acknowledge God, so God
    delivered them up to their own depraved sense to do what is
    unseemly" (Romans 1:26-28).
    
    	In the case of the men, the plain meaning is a reference
    to heterosexuals giving up intercourse with the opposite sex
    and turning in perverseness to homosexual lust and behavior.
    The passage says nothing about people whose orientation is
    homosexual and who therefore are in no wise perverting their
    nature as they perceive it.  (In this connection it bears noting
    that most such people discover their orientation in childhood,
    before they know it has a name or that the adult world considers
    it to be a moral issue.  And many of these were then and still
    are deeply religious.  To hold that this passage in Romans
    was meant to include all such people is to give it a coverage
    that the thoughts, language and context will not bear.)
    
    	In the case of the women, this passage, which is the only
    one in the entire Bible that could conceivably refer to sexual
    relations between women, does not clearly bring homosexual
    intercourse within its purview.  The statement that "their
    women exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural" does not
    necessarily refer to homosexual intercourse.  It may just mean
    that the women exchanged coitus for heterosexual fellatio or
    anal intercourse.  We have no way of knowing what Paul considered
    to be 'natural' or 'unnatural' in the way of heterosexual
    behavior.  Only on the supposition that the statement about
    women was intended by Paul as a shorthand parallel to the more
    explicit statement about men is sexual intercourse between
    women included.  And even if it is included, the plain meaning
    if the passage is that the women exchanged one for the other
    (heterosexual for homosexual).  It therefore says nothing about
    lesbians -- those women who like the Greek poet Sappho see
    beauty and desirability only in other women and have always
    felt that way.
    
    	It is worth noting that the adjectives Paul uses when he
    is speaking specifically of these sexual consequences of idolatry
    are "unclean," degrading," "disgraceful," "shameful" and
    "unseemly."  It is only when he gets to the nonsexual consequences
    such as greed, envy, murder, deceit, gossip, slander, insolence,
    boastfulness and mercilessness that he uses the word "wickedness"
    and "evil."  Which is some indication that in his mind even
    the sexual perversion he is describing is more properly classified
    as a disorder than as a sin.  He likewise states that it is
    unnatural and dishonorable for a man to wear his hair long
    (1 Corinthians 11:14), but few today would conclude therefrom
    that men who wear their hair long are sinning.  Nor would Samson
    and other ancient Hebrew Nazirites.
    
    	Finally, even if we take it for granted that Paul considered
    homosexuality and homosexual behavior a sin, we cannot avoid
    asking whether this attitude of his is God's own or whether
    it may not be merely the result of the cultural conditioning
    of his time and place in history together with his own personal
    predilections and prejudices, like his attitude towards long
    hair on men.  This question is especially needed because when
    dealing with this subject it is easy to forget that there are
    other attitudes of Paul which many Christians today are convinced
    did not come from God.
    
    	Let us look at Paul's view of marriage first.  Although
    he consistently denied that anyone who chooses to marry is
    thereby sinning, he says that those who choose not to marry
    do better; that marriage brings troubles, which he would spare
    his readers; and that it diverts attention from the business
    of the Lord to the pleasing of the spouse (1 Corinthians 7:25-40.
    See also 1 Timothy 4:1-3, where the forbidding of marriage
    is called a demon-inspired doctrine.)  In this he admits (verse
    25) he has no command from Jesus, but he still asserts he thinks
    he has the Spirit of God in these counsels.  Though he says
    that sexual intercourse is the right and duty of both parties
    to a marriage (verses 3-5) he prefaces this with the remark
    that "it is good for a man not to touch a woman" but because
    of the temptation to immorality each man should have his own
    wife and each woman her own husband (verses 1-2).  And he follows
    it in verses 8-9 with the counsel that the unmarried would
    do well to follow his own example in remaining single if they
    can do so without burning up with passion.  Even allowing for
    Paul's belief that the end of the world was imminent, these
    statements betray to the modern reader a real lack of appreciation
    of the enormous benefits and blessings of marriage.  Few
    Christians today would agree with Paul that marriage is merely
    or even primarily an antidote to the temptation to fornicate,
    is a bag of troubles, or is a hindrance rather than a help
    in serving the Lord.  And most would reverse his assertion
    about touching so that it would read instead, "It is good for
    a man to touch a woman and vice versa!"

    	Paul often seems to equate sin with obedience to the body's
    desires.  See Romans 6:12, 7:21-25, 8:13 and 13:14.  He expressly
    inveighs against fornication or otherwise refers to it as a
    sin no less than seven times in his letters (1 Corinthians
    6:9, 6:12-20; 1 Corinthians 10:8; 2 Corinthians 12:21; 1
    Thessalonians 4:2-8; Ephesians 5:3-5; Colossians 3:5-7; 1 Timothy
    1:10).
    
    	Jesus on the other hand had very little to say about sex.
    Matthew makes it appear that Jesus, like Paul, urged celibacy
    for those who could manage it.  In Matthew 19:1-12, in response
    to his disciples' comment that it is better not to marry if
    in God's sight marriage is indissoluble, Jesus is reported
    to have said that "not all men can receive this precept, but
    only those to whom it is given.  For there are eunuchs who
    have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have
    made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven.
    He who is able to receive this, let him receive it."  But
    neither of the other synoptic gospels mentions this saying,
    though both recount Jesus's teaching about divorce of which
    Matthew makes it a part.  See Mark 10:1-12 and Luke 16:18.
    And Paul, who is plainly aware of Jesus's teaching on divorce
    (see 1 Corinthians 7:10-11), seems unaware that Jesus ever
    urged celibacy on anybody.  See 1 Corinthians 7:25.
    
       	For Jesus the word "sin" does not appear to have had,
    as it seems to have for us today, a primarily sexual connotation.
    He himself was apparently accused of having been the product
    of fornication (see John 8:41), and he mentions fornication
    only once, including it along with adultery in a list or catalog
    of various sins to illustrate that what defiles a person are
    the things that proceed from the heart rather than those that
    enter the stomach (Matthew 15:19; Mark 7:21).  Apart from this
    catalog, he touches upon the sin of adultery in only three
    contexts, and in all three his primary concern is not with
    adultery itself but with something else that he must have felt
    was much more important.  In one -- the Episode of the woman
    caught in adultery -- he saves the "sinner" from being stoned
    to death by reminding her accusers that they, being sinners
    too, have no right to judge her (John 8:2-11).  In another
    his concern is with divorce.  He undermines the entire practice
    of divorce by, in effect, forbidding as adultery any remarriage
    of either party (Matthew 5:31-32 and 19:3-9; Mark 10:2-12;
    Luke 16:18).  In the third context his concern is with those
    who pride themselves on their own righteousness by pretending
    that sin lies solely in acts and behavior rather than in the
    attitudes of the heat.  He says in effect that the man who
    looks at another woman with heart full of lust is just as guilty
    of adultery as the one who goes to bed with her (Matthew 5:27-28).
    
    	Christians sometimes seem to think and act as if sexuality
    were not one of God's most glorious gifts to us but a snare
    and a trap.  They seldom stop to ask themselves how a good
    God could make us so sexual and sexual activity so pleasurable
    and then condemn us for enjoying it.
    
    	Another area in which Paul's attitudes and emphases are
    rejected by many Christians today is the status of women. 
    His assertions about women speak for themselves.  In 1 Corinthians
    11:3-15 he says that woman's head is her husband; that man
    is the image of God, whereas woman reflects the glory of man;
    and that man was not created for woman's sake, but woman for
    the sake of man.  Again elsewhere he adheres to the notion
    that marriage is a subordination of the woman to the man in
    all things rather than an equal partnership (Ephesians 5:22-33;
    Colossians 3:18-19; Titus 2:5).  Finally, in 1 Corinthians
    14:34-35, he says that women are to keep quiet in all the
    congregations, that they are not permitted to speak, and that
    it is shameful for a woman to speak in church.  This attitude
    is repeated in 1 Timothy 2:11-15:  "A woman must be a learner,
    listening quietly and with due submission.  I do not permit
    a woman to be a teacher, nor must woman domineer over man;
    she should be quiet.  For Adam was created first, and Eve
    afterward; and it was not Adam who was deceived; it was the
    woman who, yielding to deception, fell into sin.  Yet she will
    be saved through motherhood...."
    
    	Paul expresses no inkling of the enormous evil of human
    slavery.  Instead of urging Christian masters to free their
    slaves, he only counseled them to treat their slaves fairly
    and the slaves to obey willingly and not to seek their freedom
    (Colossians 3:22, 4:1; Ephesians 6:5-9; 1 Timothy 6:1-2; Titus
    2:9-10; and Philemon).  Yet there is perhaps no Christian alive
    today who does not believe human slavery to be absolutely and
    fundamentally opposed to the will of God at all times and in
    all places.
    
    	A last example is Paul's attitude to civil authority. 
    He tells Christians to submit to the authority of the state,
    for there is no authority except from God, and those that exist
    have been instituted by God.  So that whoever resists the
    authorities resists what God has appointed and will incur
    judgment.  For rulers are not a terror to good conduct but
    to bad (Romans 13:1-7).  See also Titus 3:1.  All this rings
    hollow to people who in the 20th Century saw Hitler and his
    Third Reich inflict the Holocaust on millions of hapless Jews,
    Gays, Gypsies and others and the Second Word War on countless
    millions more of innocent victims.  Jesus on the other hand
    was under no such illusions about the power of the state. 
    He realized that political power is in the Devil's keeping
    (Matthew 4:8-10; Luke 4:5-8).

    	To some people all analysis of the Biblical texts relative
    to homosexual behavior is pointless.  For them it is plain
    as day that God made people male and female, and for good reason.
    In the oldest account of creation -- the Yahwist -- the purpose
    is said to be companionship; God creates woman to be  be a helper
    fit for man (Genesis 2:18-25).  In the later Priestly account
    (Genesis 1:26-28), the purpose of reproduction is emphasized.
    In any event, so the argument goes, God intended each sex for
    the other; therefore, homosexuality is beyond the pale of God's
    plan for the creation and _ipso facto_ sinful.  This is a point
    of view that must be faced, but before doing so it is necessary
    at least to show that the Biblical passages that touch explicitly
    on homosexual behavior do not, except by special prejudicial
    interpretation, condemn either homosexuality or consensual
    sexual behavior between Gay people.
    
    	What then of the view that God made male and female for
    each other?  As someone crudely put it, if God had intended
    homosexuality to be normal we would have had Adam and Bruce
    instead of Adam and Eve.  This misses the whole point.  The
    point is not to deny that God had a plan in making people into
    males and females.  The point is that it does not follow from
    this that homosexuality is a sin.  God may very well have intended
    the male-female relationship to be the general plan without
    at the same time meaning to condemn as sin every variation
    from that plan found in nature.
    
    	Nature as it actually exists is full of variations from
    the apparent overall design.  Some people are midgets.  Some
    are albinos.  Some are sterile.  Some have peculiar allergies
    that the rest do not have.  Some are left-handed.  It used
    to be commonplace before the advent of modern science to attribute
    all such extraordinary conditions to sin, as in the gospel
    story of the man born blind (John 9:1-2).
    
    	In the sexual sphere itself one has only to read a scientific
    treatise like John Money's and Anke Ehrhardt's _Man and Woman,
    Boy and Girl_ to discover that there are quite a few people
    in this world who are neither male nor female but somewhere
    in between.  Yet surely these intersexes are not condemned
    to choose between celibacy and sin merely because they do not
    fit into the male-female dichotomy.  Some such anomalies occur
    because of unusual genetic combinations that arise in nature
    like an XXY or an XO sex chromosome rather than the usual XX
    (female) or X (male).  Others occur because of hormonal
    imbalances during the period of gestation.
    
    	Robert Stoller's _Sex and Gender_ depicts yet another
    variation in psychosexual development -- transsexualism.  The
    transsexual is a person who physically is a normal male or
    normal female but who through an unusual early childhood
    environment develops the self-image or identity of the opposite
    sex.  Once this gender identity becomes fixed, usually about
    the age language is acquired, it is well nigh irreversible.
    If these people are then compelled by society or by the medical
    profession's devotion to "natural law" to live as the sex their
    physical make-up dictates, they suffer untold and unending
    anguish.  Thank God human compassion is now leading many doctors
    to throw all their preconceived notions of what is natural
    to the winds and change the body to fit the mind!
    
    	The point is that homosexuality, like hermaphroditism and
    transsexualism, is and always will be a minority variation
    in sexual development, physical and emotional.  So far as we
    can ascertain, none of these variations is unique to our own
    culture or to our day and age; rather, they are universal.
    They occur not because of sin or the fallen condition of humanity
    but simply because nature is not uniform.  Moreover, sexual
    orientation like gender identity is a component of personality
    universally acquired in the process of growing up.  Once so
    acquired, it is extremely difficult if not impossible to alter,
    because nobody can go back and re-live that growing-up process
    differently.  What has occurred is similar to the phenomenon
    of "imprinting" that we observe in birds and animals.
    
    	So to assert that homosexuality is normal means only that
    it is a variation universally found in nature, like
    left-handedness.  Unfortunately many people confuse the word
    "normal" with the word "normative;" they interpret the assertion
    to mean that everybody should be Gay, that homosexuality is
    competing with heterosexuality for everyone's allegiance, which
    is nonsense.

    	The norms of conduct found in the Bible are addressed to
    the generality of humankind.  Its failure to address the specific
    situation and problems of many minorities does not mean that
    those minorities are excluded from God's kingdom unless and
    until they somehow conform.  This is obvious in the case of
    left-handedness or albinism.  Nobody pretends that these
    minorities are abhorred by God simply because they run counter
    to the general pattern and the Bible does not recognize their
    existence.  But what of the minority who are sexually sterile?
    They certainly disobey the commandment of Genesis 1:28 to
    be fruitful and multiply and there is plenty of evidence that
    in Biblical times this was taken as cause for reproach.  See,
    for example,  Luke 1:25.  Today, largely because science has
    taught us that sterility just happens and because in an
    over-populated world we no longer see much need for procreation,
    the judgement of Christians is more compassionate.  We do not
    consider sterility a sin nor do we condemn sterile people to
    a life of celibacy.  And the judgment should be the same in
    the case of homosexuals.  And perhaps would be, if homosexual
    behavior and desire were confined to the category "homosexuals."
    The fact that it is not so confined accounts for what little
    the Bible has to say on the subject and likewise muddies people's
    perceptions considerably, to the extent that many refuse even
    to admit there is such a category.  They see in every practitioner
    of homosexual acts only a willfully perverted heterosexual.
    
    	It would be far more in keeping with the spirit of Jesus
    to open our eyes to the diversity in the world around us and
    rejoice in it rather than decry it.  Surely God does not condemn
    any body merely for being different from the majority.  God
    takes each of us as we are and, in the framework of who and
    what we are, then calls each of us to renounce evil and live
    a life full of goodness and love.  And it is just as possible
    for a person to be Gay or transsexual or an intersex and to
    follow in this pathway of Jesus Christ as for the ordinary
    male or female heterosexual.  None is required to give up sex
    in order to qualify, though any one can choose voluntarily
    to do so.
    
    	The lack of specific Biblical norms addressed to the
    homosexual minority does not mean that Gay Christians, unlike
    heterosexual Christians, are free from all ethical constraints
    on their sexual behavior.  What those constraints are in view
    of the absence of the institution of marriage is a whole issue
    in itself.  The purpose here is only to reappraise the traditional
    view that homosexual genital acts are always and for all people
    everywhere a sin.
    
    	Some have argued that although Jesus was silent on the
    subject of homosexuality and homosexual behavior he nevertheless
    implicitly condemned it.  They point to his teaching that God
    from the Beginning made people male and female and for this
    reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined
    to his wife and the two shall become one flesh (Matthew 19:3-9;
    Mark 10:2-9).  This, they say, together with his disapproval
    of fornication and adultery, confines sex to the relationship
    between husband and wife thus outlawing homosexuality.  But
    this is building a very important case -- condemnation of
    homosexuality -- on a very slim reed.  In the one teaching
    all Jesus was doing was quoting the Genesis accounts of creation
    as proof texts for his assertion that marriage is indissoluble.
    And in both it and the others he is actually talking only
    about heterosexual relationships.  To use them as evidence
    of another intent -- to disapprove homosexuality -- is stretching
    a point too far, because it is quite possible for any person,
    including Jesus, to hold to these teachings of his about
    heterosexual relationships and still be convinced that homosexual
    acts are not a sin for homosexuals.
    
    	In fact, Jesus plainly states that heterosexual pairing
    is not an integral part of the spiritual order.  In response
    to a riddle of the Sadducees designed to show up the foolishness
    of belief in the resurrection, he says flatly that in the
    resurrection people neither marry nor are given in marriage.
    And if his answer was intended to be responsive to the
    circumstances posed in the question, it also means that marriages
    contracted in this life do not carry over into the life hereafter
    (Matthew 22:23-33; Mark 12:18-27; Luke 20:27-40).
    
    	The Sadducees' riddle points up a significant contrast between
    Judaism and Christianity.  There was a strong emphasis in Judaism
    on immortality through procreation.  A man lives on after death
    through his children, grandchildren, and other descendants.
    Thus in Deuteronomy 25:5-10 the law of the Levirate marriage
    to which their riddle refers prescribed that if a man died
    childless his brother must take the dead man's wife as his
    own and produce a son for him to bear his name, so that the
    dead man's name would not be blotted out of Israel.  Jesus'
    answer to the riddle as Luke reports it shows that even in
    his mind the institution of marriage exists because of human
    mortality, so that with the absence of death the need for it
    will disappear (Luke 20:36).  Barrenness was viewed as such
    a curse that any male whose testicles had been crushed or whose
    penis had been cut off was excluded from the assembly of the
    Lord (Deuteronomy 23:1).  Yet Isaiah prophesied, "thus says
    the Lord:  To the eunuchs who...hold fast my covenant, I will
    give in my house and within my walls a monument and a name
    better than sons and daughters...an everlasting name which
    shall not be cut off" (Isaiah 56:4-5).  With the coming of
    Jesus Christ personal immortality through the resurrection
    replaced immortality through procreation, and Isaiah's prophecy
    was fulfilled as God's Spirit reached out through Philip to
    bring the Ethiopian eunuch into the kingdom (Acts 8:26-40).

    	The last verse of Isaiah's prophecy reads, Thus says the
    Lord God, who gathers the outcasts of Israel, I will gather
    yet others to him besides those already gathered" (Isaiah 56:8).
    Is it not possible that today God's Sprit is reaching out
    again in fulfillment of the prophecy, this time to gather into
    the kingdom another outcast -- the homosexual -- who like the
    eunuch was previously excluded for sexual reasons?  The two
    are in fact close kin.  For both, sexual intercourse is inherently
    nonprocreative, and eunuchs in the ancient world were widely
    associated with homosexual activity.
    
    	Implicit in all the discussion so far is the assumption
    that sin and evil are synonymous, that evil is what is hurtful
    to others or to oneself, and therefore nothing is a sin which
    hurts nobody.  Consensual homosexual acts between Gay people
    are therefore not sinful because they hurt no one.  The basis
    for these premises is Jesus' own assertion that the Law and
    the Prophets can be summed up in one command -- always treat
    others as you would like them to treat you (Matthew 7:12; Luke
    6:31).
    
    	On the subject of Jesus one other matter deserves attention.
    There is no evidence whatever in the New Testament that Jesus
    had a sexual relationship with anybody, male or female.  But
    it is incontestable that he experienced deep love for a member
    of the same sex.  The whole Gospel of John purports to embody
    the recollections of an eyewitness who is referred to only
    as "the disciple whom Jesus loved." (John 21:20-24).  Church
    tradition has inferred that this disciple was John the son
    of Zebedee, but the gospel itself makes no such identification.
    Whoever he was, he was a man, and the clear implication is
    that he was especially beloved by Jesus, because the same gospel
    states that Jesus also loved his other disciples very much,
    for instance Martha and Mary and Lazarus (John 11:5) and those
    present at the Last Supper (John 13:34, 15:9 and 15:12-13).
    
    	Other indications in the Gospel of John bear this out.
    At the Last Supper this disciple is lying close beside Jesus,
    and when Jesus announces that one of the disciples will betray
    him Simon Peter, instead of querying Jesus himself, signals
    to this disciple to ask Jesus who is meant.  It is stated then
    that this disciple leaned back against Jesus' chest and asked,
    "Lord, who is it?" and Jesus vouchsafed the answer only to
    him (John 13:21-30).  The incident makes clear that an emotional
    relationship existed between Jesus and the disciple close
    than that which existed between him and any other, including
    Peter.
    
    	On the cross Jesus sees his mother standing nearby together
    with other women and this disciple he loved.  He tells his
    mother that the disciple is her son, and the disciple that
    she is his mother, almost as if to say that this man now stands
    in his stead.  And the gospel states that from that time onward
    the disciple took her into his care (John 19:25-27).
    
    	That Jesus should entrust his mother to the care of this
    disciple is particularly noteworthy when it is remembered that
    he had brothers and sisters, any one of whom to our minds would
    seem a more likely candidate.  Indeed, these brothers together
    with his mother apparently were part of the believing community
    in Jerusalem after the Ascension (Acts 1:14), and one of them
    -- James -- later became its president and remained so until
    his martyrdom about 62 A.D.
    
    	This disciple Jesus loved is the first to reach the empty
    tomb upon Mary Magdalene's report and the first to believe
    in the Resurrection (John 20:1-10).  He is also the first to
    recognize the risen Jesus in the appearance at the Sea of Galilee
    (John 21:1-7).  Indeed it came to be believed that Jesus had
    wanted this disciple to live on until he came again and had
    therefore in effect predicted that this disciple would not
    die, so that the resulting misapprehension had to be laid to
    rest by a careful explanation of the incident that gave rise
    to it (John 21:20-23.  All this presumably because the disciple
    had in fact died by the time the Gospel of John was published.)
    
    	All this is said not to argue, as some have done, that
    Jesus was himself homosexual.  We do not know enough either
    to affirm or deny such a statement with certainty.  Bur this
    we can say:  he is universal -- not the exclusive property
    of any group.  Rather, the purpose is to make two much more
    important points.  The first is that anybody who, like him,
    has openly and deeply loved another person of the same sex
    cannot possibly lack sympathy for and understanding and acceptance
    of homosexuals.  He would be bound to know and comprehend their
    plight.  Any among them then who seeks a true friend can be
    sure of finding one in the greatest friend of all -- Jesus Christ.
    
    	The second point is that he calls us all to a life of love
    -- love blocked or bounded by no barriers of any kind, whether
    of nation, race, religion, social status or sex.  In Christ
    there is neither Jew nor Greek, neither slave nor free, neither
    male nor female (Galatians 3:28).  We are commanded even to
    love our enemies.  In the light of this gospel of Jesus Christ
    -- the supreme Prophet of Love, the Messiah who demonstrated
    that God IS love -- how can we, any of us, shut ourselves off
    from loving others of the same sex through fear of being branded
    homosexual?  For many people in our culture do precisely that,
    especially men.  In this as in everything else, Jesus points
    the way through the example of his own life to the ideal humanity
    towards which we are all called.  He plainly loved people of
    the same sex as well as people of the opposite sex.  Gender
    was no barrier for him.  It should not be for us either.  And
    if for some people loving others of the same sex carries a
    sexual component, there should be no cause for reproach. 
    It is just a consequence of the God-given diversity of humankind.
    
    	In any case, it is no exaggeration to say that the 
    persecution of Gay people that had been characteristic of Western
    culture almost since the time of Constantine must be laid directly
    at the door of the Christian Church, and this evil record of
    malevolence and bigotry is hardly compatible with the life
    and teaching of the one that Church claims as Lord and Savior.
    HE was a friend to those who were despised by all the nice,
    decent people of his day, namely the prostitutes and tax
    collectors.  The gospels say that this was because it is the
    sick (sinners) who need a physician (Jesus), but it seems likely
    that he consorted with them because he preferred their company
    to that of people like the lawyers and Pharisees who reduced
    the righteousness God requires to a little rule book of "Do
    this" and "Don't do that!", thus consigning to oblivion goodness
    and love and honesty and justice and mercy and generosity and
    kindness.  It was for Pharisaism and legalism that Jesus reserved
    HIS righteous indignation.  According to him justice and
    lovingkindness are the "test" fruits of the Spirit of God,
    not propriety and conformity.  So stop and think about it.
    What on earth do goodness and love and honesty and justice
    and mercy and generosity and kindness have to do with whether
    or not a person prefers the opposite sex to his or her own?
    
    	Few heterosexuals who do not have a Gay friend or relative
    have any comprehension of what it is like to grow up Gay in
    America.  Imagine how it would feel to be constantly despised
    and jeered at by your peers and told by both church and society
    that your desire for love is sick and a sin and a crime.  With
    such pervasive stigma to face, most Gay people end up hiding
    their orientation for years.  They absorb the hurt and the
    pain rather than be honest and risk exposure.  Many do their
    best to turn themselves into heterosexuals, even going to the
    extreme of marrying a person of the opposite sex and having
    children, only to discover that the experience changed them
    not one whit and succeeded only in spoiling other people's
    lives as well as their own.  Many have spent countless hours
    and dollars in fruitless efforts to change themselves through
    psychotherapy.  The assertion that all these people are
    deliberately bucking the current and _choosing_ to be Gay is
    just not credible.
    
    	If the Church of Jesus Christ were really seeking to follow
    his leading it would see that its traditional stance on
    homosexuality has caused and is still causing far more evil
    and suffering for homosexuals than they through their supposed
    sinning have ever caused, and would stop hurting them and set
    out instead to relieve their suffering and right their wrongs.
    Since 1969 more and more Gay people in America have stopped
    lying and come out of the closet and taken up the struggle
    to obtain legal safeguards for the basic human rights denied
    them for two thousand years -- the right to life, to liberty,
    to love and enjoy each other, to employment, to housing, and
    so on.  The Church is faced with a choice.  Either it will
    seek to make amends for the evil it has done them in the past
    or it will continue to encourage those who would hound and
    persecute them in the name of God.  This is exactly what the
    Church's traditional stance on the sin question does.  It supplies
    the persecutors with precisely the fuel they need for their
    fires, because nothing strengthens prejudice so much as having
    some way to ascribe it to God.  It also forces Gay Christians
    to lie and hide in order to remain within the Church.
    
    	Heterosexual Christians, who are and certainly will always
    remain by far the great majority in the Church, need to ponder
    whether on this question of sin the two-by-four may not be
    in their own eye and only a speck of sawdust in the eye of
    their homosexual brothers and sisters.  If they must insist
    that homosexual genital acts are a sin for themselves, let
    them do so.  They have some Biblical warrant for that.  But
    who are they to judge homosexual acts to be a sin for homosexuals
    -- people whose emotional make-up and whose inner struggles
    they know nothing about?  Leave the judging to God.  God's
    own Spirit within each of us is capable of doing whatever
    convicting of sin needs to be done.  As long as heterosexual
    Christians keep on asserting that they know all there is to
    know about God's will in this matter, they will only succeed
    in accomplishing two things for sure -- fanning the flames
    of persecution and driving more and more people away from Jesus
    Christ.

    RE: .228
    
    >I dont care how you wrap it...
    >
    >My DIFFERENCE is "ITS NOT RIGHT"  Please VALUE IT
    
    
    And how do you suggest we do that?
    
    /Greg

    
    
    
    > current homophobia comes from biblical
    
     
     Hows that?
    
    David

    re: .224 Your points are well taken Bubba.  Truely, perception is in the
    eye of the beholder I am am no exception to that.  Yes, I may have read
    in more negative remarks than were intended by the authors.  I  am
    conditioned to 'expect' a great deal of negative behavior toward Gays
    from my observations of the way they are often treated.  So, one tends
    to see what one is looking for.
    
    Notes is tough because banter may not come across as banter due to the
    lack of observable body language and expressions on the writers faces.
    
    That tells me that it is essential to be VERY clear about how one
    writes in notes because all the audience HAS to go on is exactly
    what you have written.
    
    Smile
    
    Jeff
    

>    <<< Note 851.232 by COMET::DYBEN "Grey area is found by not looking" >>>

    
    
    
>    > current homophobia comes from biblical
    
     
>     Hows that?
    
>    David

       See 851.230

re .230:

Mr. Barnett misrepresents Jewish theology and Biblical interpretation
in a number of ways.  I don't have time to reply now (in fact I haven't
read the entire article), but I'll try to get to it later.

.221> Reading between the lines, comments such as: "I will be waiting for
.221> you on the hood of my car", and 'its a good thing I don't know where
.221> your cube is',  etc. is, to me only one step removed from a physical
    
    For what it's worth, I didn't ask where Stanley and William sat as a
    way to veil a threat of physical violence.  I did it to see how brave
    they really are, in spite of all the tough talk.
    
    And I didn't take the "I'll be waiting on the hood of your car" as a
    threat, either.  Should I be scared of someone who's afraid to tell me
    where he sits in a building?!  I don't think so.

    re: .197
>     And many do. They are however many people that feel like Dante when
>    he said, " The deepest part of hell is reserved for those who remain
>    neutral during a moral crisis."
    
    	I'll start with a nit, but since you regard Dante as a moral
    authority I have more to follow.
    
    	Dante in his "Divina Commedia" assigned the deepest part of Hell
    to those who betrayed their rightful lords, and gives as examples
    Brutus, Judas Iscariot, and Satan himself. For those who refused moral
    decisions he writes (in one of my translations) 
    	"Heaven chased them out so as not to become less beautiful
    	And the depths of hell also rejected them
    	Lest the evil might find occasion to glory over them"
    In other words, they are in a sort of uncomfortable limbo.
    
    	As for homosexuality, for Christian homosexuals who did not contain
    their lust, but died repentant, he has exactly the same penance in
    Purgatory as for heterosexuals who did not contain their lust. It is
    the highest point in Purgatory, and all there, whether homosexual or
    heterosexual are equally certain to reach Paradise eventually.
    
    	For homosexuals who were not offending against their own moral law
    (pre-Christian) they are in the highest part of Hell, where the only
    punishment is deprivation of the sight of God. He gives as specific
    examples Julius Caesar and Socrates.
    
    	Homosexuals who offended against their known moral law are punished
    in Hell in the same circle as bank managers. His tutor (whom he
    obviously respected highly) is here. Dante himself was very evidently
    heterosexual in spite of having a respected homosexual tutor, which is
    anecdotal evidence against the "bad influence" theory.
    

    
    
    
     My reason for quoting Dante was not for the purpose you stated.
    Thanks for the tuition bonus tho' :-)
    
    
    David

    The following entry is a paper I just did for work toward my 
    undergraduate degree in Management at Lesley College.  It is 
    rather long....so those with workstations take heart!

    justme....jacqui




















       							Jacqui Gardner
    							SPORTS & SOCIETY
    							December 9, 1992



        			THE GAY GAMES



    	"Pursuing athletics can be a way of casting oneself as 'acceptable'

    	in orthodox culture" states Brian Pronger in his recent book on
    
    	THE ARENA OF MASCULINITY.(Pronger)  Dr. Tom Waddell, a former 1968

    	United States Olympic decathlete who placed sixth at the age of
    	
    	thirty in the Mexico Summer Olympics, appears to have had this in 

    	mind when he founded the in Gay Olympic Games to be held in San 

    	Francisco in 1982.  This was to be "an athletic festival dedicated,
    
    	but not restricted, to homosexuals, an event designed to foster 

    	both gay pride and the Olympic ideal:  'To educate people through

    	sport in a spirit of better understanding....'"(Schaap)
    	

    	Dr. Waddell's use of the word OLYMPIC led the U.S. Olympic Committee
    	
    	to obtain an injunction against the Gay Games using this in their

    	title in any form.  This distressed him to the point that he said,

    	"I say Gay Games to a gay person and you know what reaction I get?

    	Just imaging:  Drag races? Pocketbook races?  What do you mean, 

    	Gay Games?"(Schaap)  This injunction was not used against any other

    	group/organization that would utilize this term OLYMPIC.  It

    	was taken all the way to the Supreme Court of the United States 

    	where a vote of five to four upheld the decision to disallow the

    	Gay Games usage of the word OLYMPIC in its present and future.  
    
    	"Driver Kozo Murakami demonstrates his high-tech, one-wheel vehicle
    
    	during the annual Idea Olympics earlier this month in Tokyo.  The 

    	vehicle balances on a disk that spins like a hula-hoop."(MN)  This

    	photo caption demonstrates society picks and chooses who in this 

    	world is entitled to basic human rights!

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THE GAY GAMES




    	As the MC of the opening ceremonies of the Gay Games II, Rita Mae

    	Brown had the opportunity to elaborate on the basic tenent of the
    	
    	Gay Games.  "And I emphasize 'gay' in Gay Games.  These Games are

    	very important to us, not just because they bring us all together,

    	but because here we show the world who we really are.  We're in-

    	telligent people, we're attractive people, we're caring people,

    	we're HEALTHY people, and we're proud of who we are."(Coe)


    	A participant from the Boston area had the opportunity to be

    	part of the Gay Games II that were held in San Francisco in the 
    
    	summer of 1986 as a member of the Boston Gay Men's Basketball 

    	Team.  Gerry Fisher, a thirty-one year old male who openly

    	acknowledged his gayness in 1983, spent three hours one night 

    	in November of this year telling me about his and what he

    	felt were his team's experiences about being gay and participating

    	in those Games.  He indicated to me that he had never heard of 

    	the Gay Games before being asked to be a part of the league that

    	would be going to the Games.  He feels that the participation in

    	these Games was based on brotherhood/sisterhood community; a medal

    	is considered secondary.  

    	
    	His memories of this event are a combination of what happened here 
    
    	in Boston before going to San Francisco, the flight out, the Games

    	itself, and the flight home.  These memories fall in line with my 

    	readings in THE ARENA OF MASCULINITY and how society acknowledges 

    	the gay world.  During these three hours I wanted to ask him if he 

    	had read this book.  I finally did ask him.  His reply was to look

    

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Jacqui Gardner
THE GAY GAMES




    	surprised and ask to see a copy of the book, which I immediately

    	pulled out of my satchel for him to see.  


    	Before going to participate in the Games, Gerry and his Boston 

    	teammates spent many hours practicing on the basketball court.  

    	They would play against each other.  To give the team a better 

    	handle on live competition, Gerry set up a practice game with 

    	a team who had just won their work's league championship.  This 

    	team was comprised of straight men and one openly gay male (Gerry).  

    	The practice game exhibited some interesting societal dynamics

    	(Gerry played with his Boston Gay Games teammates for this event).  

    	The talent level was fairly close.  Teamwork was the goal of the

    	practice game.  Gerry stated that his gay team played strictly on 

    	testosterone.  These gay men were out to prove to themselves they 

    	could beat the straight men.  They put an all-out effort that practice
    	
    	night.  They were vicious players throughout the game.  They kicked

    	butt.  It was if they were playing the game of their lives.  In a way 

    	they were!  They did not just beat the straight men, they destroyed 

    	them.  Clearly they had something to prove and did.  They went on to 

    	the Games.  They lost in spades.  They were passive and disorganized.

    	Their medal game had been played back on the Boston court.  The Aus-

    	trailian gay basketball team pegged them as "those girls from Boston

    	were real big but were real soft".


    	Gerry also talked about the dynamics of playing as an openly gay 

    	male with his work teammates and how he saw them in this practice

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Jacqui Gardner
THE GAY GAMES



    
    	game.  He was in the unique position of having played on both teams.

    	The straight players knew they had been playing gay men but didn't 

    	acknowledge the gay issue before, during, or after the game.  The 

    	only part of the night the straight players validated was the 

    	basketball.  Gerry could understand this as an aspect of societal 

    	norms.  What surprised and puzzled Gerry were the actions of his gay

    	team in that they just played the game and went home.  He joined 

    	the members of his work team for socializing after the game.  As

    	long as he kept his gayness to himself with his straight team, he

    	was perceived acceptable which is how society deals with the gay 

    	issue.  He felt that his gay teammates should have joined in the 

    	socializing.  In a way, he felt they coped out.


    	The Boston Gay team went onto San Francisco as group on a regular 
    	
    	commercial flight with no negative incidents.  While in town for

    	the games, Gerry noticed that the San Francisco newspapers did 

    	not cover the Games as a sporting event but as human interest 
    	
    	buried in the back pages of the sports section.  The results of

    	the events were not reported.  The participants were visible to

    	each other in the tourist areas but not to society during their

    	ten days there.  He commented that most of the Gay Game partici-

    	pants wore identifiable shirts and pins like the Olympic member do.

    	He contrasted his experience of being invisible to society during

    	this time with his perception of the openess the Olympic players 

    	have with society acknowledging them as atheletes.


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Jacqui Gardner
THE GAY GAMES




    	The commercial airplane flight back to Boston was an emotional 

    	mixture for Gerry.  It was depressing, powerful, and relaxing.

      	The flight started off with a predominately gay group from the 

    	Games.  The other passengers didn't join in their talks about 

    	the Games.  At each stop more and more players 	disembarked to 

    	re-enter their lives.  Gerry found at the Newark airport he was 

    	"sad, pissed off".  Here he had just spent the past ten days 

    	being validated as a basketball player and human being and he was 

    	now having to say goodbye to those like individuals who had rein-

    	forced those parts of him.  He had to come back into "society" 

    	from an arena where he had not been different.

    	
    	"Gay Games IV, in conjunction with the Stonewall '25 celebrations,

    	will be the largest gathering of the lesbian and gay community in

    	the history of the world and an extraordinary demonstration of our 

    	community's diversity, talent and spirit.  Men, women... gay, les-

    	bian, queer and none-of-the-above... young and old... people of 

    	every ethnic and cultural background... HIV+ and differently-abled...

    	Gay Games IV will present the true diversity of our community and

    	be an event like no other."(UNITY '94)  These two events in the life
    
    	and history of the gay community will be celebrated in the United 
    
    	States in the state of New York.  Stonewall was a major turning 

    	point that happened one night in the Village section of New York 
    
    	City when gay men turned on their oppressors and fought back.  Many

    	were hurt.  This marked the birth of the present day gay movement.

    	The gay community stood up and demanded to be validated.  The fight

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Jacqui Gardner
THE GAY GAMES




    	still goes on in society today in many subtle and blatant ways.  

    	The hope of UNITY '94 is to heal the wound in society and show that

    	all people can work together in peace and harmony.  The vision that

    	Dr. Tom Waddell conceived back in the early 1980's is being carried

    	on from San Francisco in 1982 and 1986, from Vancouver in 1990, for-

    	ward to New York in 1994.  


    	The reason large cities are chosen for these Games is safety.  

    	Safety for the participants.  A place where there is a large, active,

    	efficient gay community that is organized enough to handle all the

    	issues that surround putting on this event.  Cities like Boston have

    	not been in the running as the homophobic culture is too prevelant.

    	The events scheduled include not only some sport record sanctioned 

    	events like swimming but band concerts, film series, and other art 

    	events that showcase the talents of the gay community throughout the

    	world.  The underlying goal is to flood the chosen city with the

    	positive aspects of the gay community.  Acceptance into the mainstream

    	of life like the majority of human beings enjoy as a default needs 

    	to come to the gay community.  One way the gay community is working

    	this important issue is through sports.  Sports and society...may

    	they work together peacefully.



    	

    	

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Jacqui Gardner
THE GAY GAMES




    			    	BIBLIOGRAPHY




    	Coe, Roy M.  1986.  A SENSE OF PRIDE, The Story of Gay Games II.
    	San Francisco:  Pride Publications.

    	MIDDLESEX NEWS (MN), November 29, 1992; "LOOK MA! ONE WHEEL!",
    	p 1G.

    	Pronger, Brian.  1990.  THE ARENA OF MASCULINITY; Sports, 
    	Homosexuality, and the Meaning of Sex.  New York:  St. Martin's 
    	Press.  			
    	
    	Schaap, Dick.  1987.  "Death of an Athlete."  SPORTS ILLUSTRATED
    	67 no. 4, July 27:  pp 26 - 32.  

    	UNITY '94.  1992.  "GAY GAMES IV, The Event that will Change Your 
    	Life."  NEW YORK IN '94, INC.  Brochure.

    
    Interesting...
    
    	Gerry, I hope that you will positively express to the newspapers
    carrying Gay Games IV how important it is to cover the games as sports
    events. I think it would also be "interesting" and possibly VALUABLE
    for the champions of the the various competitions to issue a city-wide
    challenge to any amateur straight team or player to come and contest
    with them.
    
    	Or, just find a way to encourage more straight teams to
    participate, by yanking their chains a bit. But, then again, doing this
    would make the Gay Games a big "teaching vehicle". And I know that folks
    get tired of that sometimes...

    Interesting .. Boston being in one of the few states which has so
    called "gay-rights" laws .. yet ..."cities like Boston have not been
    in running" as a potential location for this event.

    Bubba

    Yes, amazing that in two years the entire state hasn't turned
    into a paradise, isn't it?
    
    /Greg

.239> ..medal is considered secondary.  

Can anyone *visualize* Mike Ditca saying "winning is secondary .. all
we want to do is promote brotherhood/sisterhood and play a good game".

.242> Yes, amazing that in two years the entire state hasn't turned
.242> into a paradise, isn't it?

		Prerequisite_for_gay_games :== paradise ?

Bubba

    
    No Jerry, I think the prerequisite for the Gay Games is a city where it
    is HIGHLY unlikely that there will be violent protest. And I don't
    think that Boston can guarantee that at this point. While there may be
    laws against discrimination in housing and employment, I wouldn't be
    surprised if openly gay couples are still subject to a certain amount
    of harrassment, if not violence. Black people in Boston certainly are.
    Heck, we get beaten up and harrassed by the police!
    
    Maybe Provincetown would be a good place for the games in terms of
    general safety of the participants, and even Cambridge might be liberal
    enough to deal with it, but Boston proper?  No.
Rathole:
    
    BTW: I am totally annoyed with you right now - I think your discussion
    in Soapbox about Amendment 2 and being a vet doesn't make you a
    "minority" is highly negative. I'd like to believe that having
    Affirmative Action within Digital doesn't mean that people who don't
    fit any minority categories get to automatically look down their noses
    at all who do and assume that if their personnel records reflect their
    minority status that they got in by means OTHER THAN qualifications and
    potential/proven ability. 
    
    No, I would not be at Digital without Affirmative Action. They gave me
    a chance as a summer intern, they liked what I could do, and they hired
    me back as a full-time engineer. It gave me a chance, it opened a door.
    But it was MY hustle, and MY talent, and MY ability and MY
    determination that got me THROUGH the door. 
    
    

    >Can anyone *visualize* Mike Ditca saying "winning is secondary .. all
    >we want to do is promote brotherhood/sisterhood and play a good game".

    	NFL .nes. Olympics (or reasonable facsimiles thereof).
        Are sporting events focused on things other than winning
    	completely alien to you?  Assuming they aren't, do you have
    	any objections to such events?

    > -< Ain't no sisters in the NFL ... >-

    	What does this mean?

    >Prerequisite_for_gay_games :== paradise?

    	No.  But your assumption seemed to be that any state that
    	had passed such a law would necessarily be a prime candidate
    	for these games.

        My reply was sarcastic, but I thought my point was clear.
    	Just because MA has an anti-discrimination law that protects
    	g/l/b folk, doesn't mean Boston is a suitable city for the
    	gay games.  Those controlling the major sporting venues in
    	Boston may not be as receptive as their counterparts in New York 
        or San Francisco and the organizers decided they'd rather not
    	have to deal with that (to cite just one possible example). 

    /Greg

.244> No Jerry, I think the prerequisite for the Gay Games is a city where it
.244> is HIGHLY unlikely that there will be violent protest.

I'll pleed absolute and resolute ignorance here.  I was not aware that
Boston was a likely place for violent protest.

.244> BTW: I am totally annoyed with you right now - I think your discussion
.244> in Soapbox about Amendment 2 and being a vet doesn't make you a
.244> "minority" is highly negative. I'd like to believe that having
.244> Affirmative Action within Digital doesn't mean that people who don't
.244> fit any minority categories get to automatically look down their noses
.244> at all who do and assume that if their personnel records reflect their
.244> minority status that they got in by means OTHER THAN qualifications and
.244> potential/proven ability. 

No such indication was express or implied.  If in fact such was read into
what I wrote please accept my most humble and resolute apology for under
no circumstances was such intended.  If you send mail and point me to
the location where I may have implied "looking down noses" I will correct
it as soon as humanly possible.

Bubba

    re .246
    
    I re-read 1427.19 in Soapbox. That was the note that bothered me. You
    talk about not wanting to be judged or promoted based on Affirmative
    Action. Well, frankly, nobody does. Everyone wants to be judged fairly
    based on talent, merit, ability and potential. (Okay, okay, there are
    plenty of scuzballs who want to be judged based on who they know, what
    quota they fall under, who their dad was, what lodge they belong
    to,etc. but let's leave them out, they obviously come in ALL shades!)
    
    So, I guess what bothered me was your vehemence, because it masks the
    good that AA can do by directing employers to seek out qualified minorities
    when they would not have previously. And what makes a minority
    qualified? The same thing that makes anyone else... and if you can hire
    so-and-so's son based on "potential" then you may as well hire some
    earnest, scrubbed-behind-the-ears minority for that same "potential".
    
    I think its wrong to promote or even hire someone JUST BECAUSE they are
    a "protected minority". But if they are a protected minority AND
    they're just as talented as the next applicant, why not? And that's
    what AA is *supposed* to do. In fact, its to counteract the fact that
    some people who are *just as talented* but have been historically
    passed over.
    
    A lot of people who are against AA seem to forget what its for, and WHY
    people came up with it. All I can say is: come up with something
    better. Something that keeps subtle widespread discrimination from
    slamming doors in the faces of eager minorities who want to work, want
    to perform, want to succeed, want to excel, and have what it takes. We
    exist. We are valuable. But only when the blinders of racism are
    lifted.
    
    I will step down from the Soapbox now and return to our regularly
    scheduled program...     

    
    
    -1
    
     If you were an employer wouldn't you want to hire the *best* over all
    employee, not the *best* within a specified category of persons??
    
    
    David          

    
    Re: -.247
    
    
    	Bingo - Thank you - Thank You - Thank You !!!
    
    	Could not have said it better myself!
    
    Ken
    

>    <<< Note 851.248 by COMET::DYBEN "Grey area is found by not looking" >>>

    
    
     
>     If you were an employer wouldn't you want to hire the *best* over all
>     employee, not the *best* within a specified category of persons??
    
    
>    David          

       The problem is that *best* isn't always obvious.  Let me give you an
       example.  I used to work for a company that sold and serviced heavy
       equipment for mining and construction.  I got to know a lot of
       people in that business.  I went to a job site in Utah and
       discovered that ALMOST ALL the big haul trucks were driven by women. 
       I thought this was pretty unusual.  I asked the Super about it.  He
       told me that he was forced to hire a woman at one point.  She had
       the proper drivers license but he was very leery.  He sooned
       discovered that her truck had the least tire damage.  (This was a
       big deal because these tires have about an 8 foot diameter and cost
       a few thousands dollars a piece).  He couldn't explain it until he
       rode with her.  She would slow down and drive around debris that the
       men would drive over.  He started hiring more women for this job.

       My point:  Until you get a little diversity into your work
       environment you really don't know what *best* is.

       Patrick

    
    
    
    -1
    
      And if after allowing the diversity in hiring  to occur you are
    convinced the *best* were not hired, you cannot do anything about
    it. The definition of best is certainly a tough one, but once you
    define it you should then apply it equally to all types of applicants.
    But that would probably just lead to someone suing cuz the definition
    of best was somehow biased by those terrible white males :-) Ever
    watch the firing line that interviewed the Japanese execs etc etc? They
    had some interesting observations about our glorious hiring criteria.
    
   " Now I see here on your application you were a victim" 
    
    ...and then Atlas shrugged,
    
    David 
    
      

>    <<< Note 851.251 by COMET::DYBEN "Grey area is found by not looking" >>>
    
>       And if after allowing the diversity in hiring  to occur you are
>    convinced the *best* were not hired, you cannot do anything about
>    it. The definition of best is certainly a tough one, but once you
>    define it you should then apply it equally to all types of applicants.
>    But that would probably just lead to someone suing cuz the definition
>    of best was somehow biased by those terrible white males :-) Ever
>    watch the firing line that interviewed the Japanese execs etc etc? They
>    had some interesting observations about our glorious hiring criteria.

       By this line of reasoning Digital would never have hired women
       because everyone knows that women can't make it in the High Tech
       field and the most qualified people for the job would be men.  Men
       will never ask for Maternity leave.  Their wives will take care of
       the kids when they're sick.  And men never have PMS so the *best*
       person for the job would be a man.  Right?

       Patrick

       P.S. If you look around you, you will see that the TFSO programs
       have included women, blacks and hispanics as well as white males.
       Kind of disproves that once you hire them you can't get rid of them
       doesn't it?  If the quota regulations are so effective how come the
       unemployment rate is four times higher amoung blacks?

    
    
     Patrick,
    
     Our competitors don't give a damn if our products were built by the
    most racially balanced work force or not. That women need maternity 
    leave is a financial reality an employer must consider, it does not
    make them evil, it does not make them sexist. If I were going to combat 
    I would want the best, not the politically correct. Give minorites the
    respect they are deserving of, remove the training wheels, lets
    compete again... p.s. I am in favor of a national child care program.
    
    David

    As long as we are on the subject of diversity .. and the recruitment
    of minorities .. let's couple it with the subject matter of this
    note?  Homosexuals are a minority.  Should Digital Equipment
    Corporation (or any other corporation for that mater) actively recruit
    homosexuals?
    
    After all .. as 851.250 says "Until you get a little diversity into
    your work environment you really don't know what *best* is."

    Bubba

    
    
     Alright here goes the neighborhood :-)  I'l play devils advocate. 
    Gays are not a true minority.  Besides this, can you imagine the litmus
    test for proving someone is really gay and not just trying to get a
    free ride??
    
     " Sir could you prove your a homosexual"  .. This would be the straw
    that broke the camels back, we are so damn divided now the last thing 
    we need is another minority on the victims list......
    
     Atlas is shrugging,
    David
    
     

    When I was at the Univ. of Colorado in Boulder, I was a Resident
    Advisor in the dorms.  As such, I attended a lot of "sensitivity
    training," including homosexuality.
    
    The session facilitator, who was openly homosexual (by which I only
    mean that he TOLD us that he was gay, not that he looked or acted gay),
    told some stories about life in the local gay/lesbian community.  He
    said, in kind of a humorous way, that the g/l choir always had trouble
    finding female sopranos and male baritones.  He took this to be
    anecdotal evidence of a biological cause for homosexuality.
    
    Next he stated the obvious; that nearly all measurable natural
    populations can be described by the normal distributions.  Then he
    gained total silence in the room by asserting that human sexuality can
    be described by the normal distribution, too:  with total heterosexuals
    on one tail of the curve, and total homosexual on the other end.  This
    means that (in his opinion) that most of the population is to one
    degree or another, bisexual!!
    
    . . . yeah, I have trouble believing this, too, but it's certainly
    food for thought.
    
    ASIDE:  I think it was .239 (the essay about the Gay Games) stated that
    the "Gay Olympics" was the only organization sued by the USOC for using
    their tradmarks.  That's not entirely true.  Gateway High School, near
    Denver, used to be known as the Gateway Olympians, and used a torch and
    the Olympic rings as their logo.  The USOC sued them, too; now Gateway
    is known as the "Olys" and uses only the torch for their logo.

    Re: .255
    
    How many men do you know who would claim to be gay just to get a job? 
    Why not instead claim Native American descent--another difference
    that's difficult to prove, and one that carries much less stigma in our
    society.  Gay people *are* a minority, just not one that is always
    legally recognized (or was that your definition?).
    
    
    Re: .254
    
    The thing about "invisible differences" is that they make the workplace
    diverse without any particular special effort.  Why go to pains hiring
    gay people when they're already around?

    I don't think the quote you extracted from .250 quite applies here,
    because the diversity is *already* in our work environment--it just 
    goes largely unrecognized or unacknowledged.  Also, I don't believe
    that one's sexuality in and of itself makes a difference to one's job
    performance.  *However* all other things being equal, I think that an
    arbitrary gay person would choose to work in (thus perform better in) a
    work environment that accepts the difference, and not a place where
    his/her sexuality would be the subject of mean-spirited comments and
    jokes.
    
    --Pat

    
     If it meant the difference between having his family eat, or standing
    on the corner with a "will work for food" sign, I think some men may 
    reconsider claiming to be gay to get hired. I knew a guy who would use
    this angle to pick up women in the bars, before the aids scare of
    course, and found it to be rather succesfull. 
    
    TC
    

    Right, but look at the second part of my question in the context of
    note .255.  Given the option of presenting one's self as a member of a
    different minority that does not share the level of stigma held against
    gay people, why would somebody choose to state that he's gay?
    
    --Pat

    "If then one could contrive that a state or an army should entirely
    consist of lovers and loved, it would be impossible for it to have a
    better organization than that which it would enjoy through their
    avoidance of all dishonour and their mutual emulation; moreover, a
    handful of such men, fighting side by side, would defeat practically
    the whole world. A lover would rather be seen by all his comrades leaving 
    his post or throwing away his arms than by his beloved; rather than that, 
    he would prefer a thousand times to die. And if it were a question of
    deserting his beloved or not standing by him in danger, no one is so
    base as not to be inspired by Love himself with a spirit which would
    make him the equal of men with the best natural endowment of courage"
    
    	Quotation from a translation of Plato, advocating that the army
    should be composed entirely of homosexuals. I suppose that in these days
    of sexual equality they might have to have separate lesbian battalions 
    to meet this ideal.

>    	Quotation from a translation of Plato, advocating that the army
>    should be composed entirely of homosexuals.
    
    Plato, surprising as it may seem, is advocating no such thing.  In his
    time there was no concept of homosexuality as a psychic identity, and
    Greek contained no word for it.
    
    Sexual relations between men were socially acceptable under certain
    restrictions but were never considered incompatible with either their
    notion of masculinity or the male duty of marrying and raising
    children.  The restrictions revolved around the relative status of the
    participants due to social rank and age, and accordingly dictated which
    sexual practices were acceptable and which not.
    
    The linguistically unhappy label homosexual first appeared in German in
    1869, and in English in 1892, and was intended to be a morally neutral
    clinical descriptor of a specific mental condition.  It marked the end
    of the age-old view of homosexual behaviour as being a common
    temptation for all men, and ushered in the modern view of homosexuality
    as an orientation.
    
    Thus, while Plato clearly saw benefits from close emotional and sexual
    ties between soldiers he could not have and did not advocate a
    homosexual army as you or I would understand it.

.259> Given the option of presenting one's self as a member of a
.259> different minority that does not share the level of stigma held against
.259> gay people, why would somebody choose to state that he's gay?

Why?  For one reason to avoid military service.  France is one of the NATO
countries which has no legislation or written codes with respect to homo-
sexuals in the military.  They are allowed to serve in the French military
as long as they do not harass other members of their units.  However ...
gays and lesbians can avoid being drafted by claiming their homosexuality
is incompatible with service life.  Additionally it is not uncommon for
someone who is not homosexual to CLAIM to be so that he/she can avoid
French military service.

Bubba

    re .262
    
>someone who is not homosexual to CLAIM to be so that he/she can avoid
    
    If you remember, Bubba, it wasn't all that uncommon a method of
    avoiding the draft during Viet Nam.

>    <<< Note 851.253 by COMET::DYBEN "Grey area is found by not looking" >>>
    
>     Our competitors don't give a damn if our products were built by the
>    most racially balanced work force or not. That women need maternity 
>    leave is a financial reality an employer must consider, it does not
>    make them evil, it does not make them sexist. If I were going to combat 
>    I would want the best, not the politically correct. Give minorites the
>    respect they are deserving of, remove the training wheels, lets
>    compete again... p.s. I am in favor of a national child care program.

       Every company in the world is evolving.  As we approach the end of
       this century we are moving at a rate and speed never seen on this
       planet.  Diversity makes us better.  It's almost a microcasm of the
       Capitalistic Competitor ethic.  The Post Office is giving us better
       service since Federal Express came onto the seen.  UPS is now
       delivering overnight. That's diversity on a Company level; different
       entities seeing things from a different set of filters and bringing
       their individuality to the table.  The result is *better* products. 
       An automobile with a V6 or V8 engine today will do 0 to 60 faster
       than they did 20 years ago with less fuel.  The Japanese, Germans
       and Americans approached this goal from different angles but I don't
       think that Detroit would have even tried without the pressure put on
       them from outside.

>Note 851.254      How OPEN-MINDED are you about homosexuality?        254 of 263
>MORO::BEELER_JE "Johnny Paycheck time ..."           10 lines   6-JAN-1993 20:12
>                     -< If AA then why not include *all*? >-

>       As long as we are on the subject of diversity .. and the recruitment
>       of minorities .. let's couple it with the subject matter of this
>       note?  Homosexuals are a minority.  Should Digital Equipment
>       Corporation (or any other corporation for that mater) actively
>       recruit homosexuals?

       Gays and Lesbians are not asking for quotas or "Special Rights".
       
>       After all .. as 851.250 says "Until you get a little diversity into
>       your work environment you really don't know what *best* is."

       If as a culture, we had been more opened minded we wouldn't have
       needed The Civil Rights Act.  We wouldn't have needed a
       Constitutional amendment to give women the right to vote.  We
       wouldn't have gone beserk when Rock and Roll came on the music
       scene.  We wouldn't have the environment that encouraged the
       shooting of Martin Luther King Jr. or JFK or John Lennon.  If we
       learn to "Celebrate Diversity" we'll thrive.  If we don't I believe
       we'll go the same route as the British Royalty; a series of
       embarrassments followed by a loss of function.

       Patrick

    
    I think the idea of "recruiting" a group of people who are invisible is
    absurd. Instead, I think the point is to make the environment safe, and
    you will have your "quota" and possibly more.
    
    I'm sure there are g/l/b people in every major firm, business and
    institution in the country. There may even be up to 10% in a lot of
    them. BUT, we'll never know unless we as a nation make it safe for gay,
    lesbian and bisexual people to identify themselves as such without
    severe repercussions. And I don't see it coming...

    re .265
    
>    severe repercussions. And I don't see it coming...
    
    Not in Colorado, anyway...

.262>someone who is not homosexual to CLAIM to be so that he/she can avoid
    
.263> If you remember, Bubba, it wasn't all that uncommon a method of
.263> avoiding the draft during Viet Nam.
    
    You are absolutely correct.
    
    Bubba

.265> I think the idea of "recruiting" a group of people who are invisible is
.265> absurd.

The Los Angeles Police Department specific targets some recruiting efforts
to gays and lesbians.  Is that "absurd"?

Bubba

| <<< Note 851.268 by MORO::BEELER_JE "Johnny Paycheck time ..." >>>




| The Los Angeles Police Department specific targets some recruiting efforts
| to gays and lesbians.  Is that "absurd"?

	Depends on why they are doing it in the first place Bubba. You could
insert any minority in place of gay/lesbian and come out with a reason. If
gay/lesbian people were looked at as not being able to do the job based just on
the fact that they are gay and not on any type of qualifications, no, it is not
absurd at all. In fact the only time I could ever really see it as being absurd
is if they (whoever) wanted a whole precinct to be gay. This could mean that
other's were not hired because they were (insert favorite thing). 




Glen

    
    
    
    > how many people do you know would clain to be gay just to get a job?
    
      One.. :-)
    > gay people are a minority
    
      No there not. They fail the 3 prong test.
    
    David

    
    
    
    < would this discriminate against a heterosexual minority?
    
     I don't know, show me a heterosexual minority.  On the subject of war
    I suspect a large number of people fear that the gay male would not
    be a good fighter,why? to emotional, to feminine. I disagree with the
    notion and am supportive of Clintons position..
    
    David

    >No there not. They fail the 3 prong test.
    
    What is the 3 prong test?
    
    /Greg

    
    > show a heterosexual minority
    
    not long ago and maybe still - women in general were a minority.
    
    Ken
    

    
    Greg,
    
     Not sure of all three prongs but one of them is the financial
    test,that is to say that the gay community is financially deprived
    in one way or another. I've heard it stated before that the gay comm 
    on average  is financially better off than the rest of us..
    
    David
    

    But isn't that true of Jewish people as well, David?
    
    Are religious groups legit minorities?
    
    /Greg

    
    
     Greg,
    
      Yes, good point. I suspect know one thinks the Jews are morally
    misbehaving.  They choose to be Jewish and can choose not to be.It is
    undetermined as of yet what causes a person to be a homosexual. It is
    not undetermined as to why people react the way they do to homosexuals.
    Some may argue they  are a minority by choice, or a minority not
    of choice, but not worthy of minority status. i.e. A person may choose
    to have a relationship with a rubber duck, this makes them a minority
    of choice unless they can prove they have no choice, if they prove they
    have no choice then society may argue that they are in fact a minority
    and suffer the consequences, but they are unworthy of M status because
    there is no real difference to value.
    
    David  

Women are a numerical majority in the US, by about 52% to 48%.

			Steve

    
    
    >>I've heard it stated before that the gay comm  on average  is
    >>financially better off than the rest of us..
    
       I've heard it too.  I sure as hell like to see some proof!!!  Until
    then, it's a statement without merit.  Gay people fill the whole
    spectrum of income levels, just like non-gay people.  Gee, what a
    surprise.
    
           Greg

    RE: .276
    
    This may be true, David, but your statement "but not worthy of minority
    status" begs the question.  To make such a value judgement, one must
    first accept the premise that you *are* dealing with a minority (e.g.
    an identifiable group that differs from the larger group of which it is 
    a part).   
    
    Someone stated "gays are a minority" and you said "no they are not" and
    refered to a 3 prong test.  Is the test a measure of the legal meaning
    of minority, the socially acceptable meaning of minority, or is it a 
    logical "proof" that a (theorectical?) group is a minority?
    
    /Greg

    Oh - regarding the "gays make more money" thing...

    On the one hand, I'd say that is a valuable piece of marketing
    information (you will see more and more stuff targeted at the
    "gay market" in the coming months/years).

    On the other hand, the sample population is biased.  Self-identified
    gays, willing to answer detailed questions about income levels and
    spending habits most likely have overcome numerous obstacles to get
    where they are - overcoming those obstacles (in my experience) takes 
    an education and a lot of persistence and hard work - qualities that
    happen to lend themselves to earning a decent living.

    So, while useful in some respects, a survey of the economic status
    of gays being used as proof that anti-discrimination laws aren't needed 
    because all gays are rich is.....illogical.  The survey doesn't say
    that "all gays are better off" - it says some are.  Perhaps more, as a 
    group, perhaps not - I'd say perhaps not since we don't have data on
    closeted gays.  And none of this means unfair discrimination doesn't 
    happen.

    /Greg

    
    Greg,
    
     The 3 prong test is what ( I think) the supreme court uses. Certainly
    the gay community as a group are a numerical minority, the question
    that really begs to be asked is " Are you not in fact apart of a larger
    group that does not suffer the problems associated with being a true
    minority.. A white gay male without any outword signs of being gay(
    Like wearing a button that says " Yo im gay, i'm here to stay, get used
    to it" does not appear to be a minority. A black male who was gay and
    did not show the outword signs does not have  the same luxury of being
    able to identify with the ruling class.. So what the hell does all this
    mean. I don't know. I do not support legislation that supports anymore
    persons getting on the Victims R Us bus, but I would not want gays
    discriminated against. I live in Colorado and recently voted yes on
     A 2. Later on I regretted the decision, but would be willingl to
    support some add ons to the bill. I suspect I am typical of alot of
    people. I don't hate gays, I don't understand the attraction, yet there
    is alot I don't understand, like, why did Prez Clinton and wife decide
    to send Chels to a private school ... :-)
    
    David
    

    Re: Military service
    
    Being drafted into military service is a good point--one that I had not
    thought of because that was well before my time :-)   However, that is
    not an argument for a hiring program that favors gay people.  
    [Bubba--didn't I once ask you what the military does with people who
    claim to be gay in an unsuccessful attempt to avoid the draft?]
    
    Re: minority; three-prong test
    
    One of my points in .257 was that gay people are not really recognized
    as a legal minority, as .270 clearly reiterates.  And certainly they
    don't deserve a "free ride" to employment.  However, they are clearly a
    numerical minority.  And, they suffer from much of the same systematic
    discrimination and civil rights infractions historically endured by
    other minorities.  How does this not qualify them for a "victims list"
    that you mention--not necessarily one pertaining to employment?
    
    Re: Atlas shrugging at easy employment for gay people
    
    John Galt would be at least as dismayed by the exclusion of a
    competent, ambitious person on the basis of sexuality.  This is the
    real problem.  As stated earlier, an employment advantage isn't the
    goal of gay people--they want equal ground and a fair chance.
    
    --Pat

    
    
    
    > and none of this means unfair discrimination 
    
      Some would argue that it's not unfair discrimination.
    
    David
                                                       

    
    
    Pat,
    
    
      I suspect Ayn Rand would have leaned a little more towards the idea
    of meritocracy than affirmative action. The speech( wasn't it great)
    used  in the book, for that matter the whole book, bealt alot with
    the politically correct crowds attempts to interfere with private
    business. The moochers and smoochers  were the monkies on Atlas's back.
    
    David

    Rand's meritocracy certainly stopped at gays.  Had Reardon been gay,
    when he got to the Colorado utopia, her one dimensional (and I'm
    being generous there) characters there would have been absolutely
    ideologically consistent to shun the poor fellow.
    
    At the very least they would almost certainly sell Reardon nothing.
    And just as certainly purchase absolutely nothing from him.
    
    Value given for value received.  Since he was a worthless gay, well....
    
    He would have been "free" to choose to stay and die of starvation.
    Maybe he might have hiked up to the outskirts of the utopia and squated
    on some land in the hope that he could eek out a sustenance in the
    mountains (if they didn't come after him to defend their property
    rights).  Or he could have become a "looter" in the paradise and of
    course met his just fate.
    
    But most likely he would have been expected (since he was a rational
    man) to simply leave.
    
    								-mr. bill

.282> (what the) ... military does with people who claim to be gay
.282> in an unsuccessful attempt to avoid the draft?

Depends.  I never saw it from the induction side.  There were those
in my unit who claimed to be gay .. some just to get out when they
were really straight .. some who were indeed gay.  They were always
sent to the shrink (after a stay in STB).  If the shrink decided that
they were indeed gay .. they were surveyed.  If the shrink decided
that they were not gay - they stayed.  We surveyed only one person
that was "discovered" to be gay.

Bubba

    [looks like a rathole opening up]
    
    Well, it's been a couple of years since I read Atlas Shrugged.  I
    extrapolated John Galt's reaction based on the philosophy represented
    in the book, one facet of which is illustrated by the quote,
    
    	"Your body is a machine, and your mind is its driver, and you must
    	drive as far as your body can take you, with achievement as
    	the goal of your road."
    					John Galt
    
    
    I know little about the background of the book, though I do know that
    Rand wrote it to further objectivism.  Given this as the primary
    objective and no contradictions in the text (that I remember), I think
    it's valid to exclude her unrelated personal opinions from discussion. 
    
    The question becomes a choice between "What would John Galt have said
    if the only goal were to further objectivism" and "What would Galt have
    said if Rand were using him as a vehicle to promote all of her personal
    opinions".  Since I can see valid arguments for either choice, I think
    we could probably debate this point indefinitely :-)  How about
    agreeing on a stalemate?
    
    --Pat

    
    
    
    > stalemate
    
      Given the fact that I support equal rights I suspect there really was
    not an arguement..
    
    David

    Not unless you were still playing devil's advocate :-)

    
    
    touche'
    
    David

.255> Gays are not a true minority.  Besides this, can you imagine the litmus
     
    Sure they are.  So are Italians.  So are Michaels.  So are Zarlengas.
    And Michael Zarlengas are a scarce minority.
    
    Hey, I didn't choose any of those, I was born with them.
    
    The point is ... we're ALL members of a minority, if you look close
    enough.

If you're really interested in Ayn Rand and objectivism, there's a whole
notes file on it !  It's

ELRIC::OBJECTIVISM


Do not press kp7

    i really don't get the problem with this issue...
    
    if a heterosexual of the opposite sex makes moves on/to you, you can
    say 'yes' or you can say 'no', depending on your preference for the
    individual and the moves being made...
    
    if a homosexual person makes moves on/to you, you can say 'yes' or
    you can so 'no' if you are so inclined....period.  End of subject.
    what is the big deal here?  Who appointed anyone the guy who gets
    to decide what you or I get to feel or do....and WHO, in his right
    mind, honestly believes it is valid to expect homosexuals to not
    have sex with anyone because people get upset when they THINK ABOUT
    IT?  Get real!  Sex the is the basic driving force of life on this
    planet...before anyone here decides it is fair to expect the
    homosexuals among us to stop having sex, I suggest they go 'cold
    turkey' for a year and then tell us about it.
    
    re: valuing diversity - if this means including hysterical hatred
    of others because of their skin color, sexual orientation, or
    religeon, then I don't buy it.  If a person chooses to hate, in
    private, and in silence, then nothing can be done.  If a person
    chooses to act on this hate, by word or action, then someone is
    the target of that hate...and that is an abridgement of his/her
    right to work/live in an environment which is 'safe'.  No sane
    human being is required to support that hate, nor should they
    tolerate it.
    
    
    
    
    the whole idea that it is anyone else's business is ridiculous

    
    -1
    
     Who is the lecture directed @  ??
    
    
    David

    re: .261
>    Plato, surprising as it may seem, is advocating no such thing.  In his
>    time there was no concept of homosexuality as a psychic identity, and
>    Greek contained no word for it.
    
    	I am not sure what you mean by "psychic identity", but Plato
    clearly had the concept that some men preferred men as lovers while
    others preferred women. To quote from slightly further on
    
    "Besides, even among the lovers of their own sex one can distinguish
    those whose motives are entirely dictated by this second Love; they do
    not fall in love with mere boys, but wait ubtil they reach the age at
    which they begin to show some intelligence, that is to say, until they
    are near growing a beard. By choosing that moment in the life of their
    favourite to fall in love they show, if I am not mistaken, that their
    intention is to form a lasting attachment and a partnership for life;
    they are not the kind to take advantage of the ignorance of a young boy
    to deceive him, and are then off with a jeer in pursuit of some fresh
    darling. If men were forbidden by law, as they should be, to form
    connexions with young boys, ....."
    
    	He clearly from the first part recognises that there are same-sex
    and other-sex preferrences in different people. His following
    life-style description would probably meet with the approval of many
    men in this conference who are now described as homosexual.
    
    	He later on gives examples of (and approves of) male-female bonding
    that is as strong, though since the Athenian army was all male he would
    not have been advocating this in the context of the army.
    
    	In general the Greeks had the concepts, even though they may
    sometimes have had to resort to a phrase. Remember it is to Sapphos of
    the island of Lesbos that we owe the modern word "lesbian".
    
	My interpretation of your "Greek contained no word for it" is just
    that they didn't have the stress between homosexuals and heterosexuals
    that appears in modern American society. There was no need for a word
    since on the rare occasions when a distinction was needed (such as in
    the philosophical arguments of Plato) a phrase would do. They obviously
    from the above passage had a concept of an age limit for sexual
    consent, though they had no word for it and no law about it. English
    has no word for it either, and has to make do with a phrase. If it was
    a topic of everyday conversation someone would invent a word or form an
    acronym ("the alscon should be raised to 17":-) but that lack of a word
    doesn't imply the lack of a concept.
    
    	I was hoping there would be more follow up on ancient Greek culture
    since it shows that a society without homosexual-heterosexual conflict
    is possible, and that maybe modern U.S. society is aberrant. The lack
    of a word doesn't mean there were no homosexuals in ancient Greece, or
    that they didn't have the concept; it just means that it was not even a 
    big enough deal to coin a word for it. 

    The renowned science fiction writer, Frank Herbert, wrote in one of the
    "Dune" books of a widely feared army.  This army was feared because of
    the ferocity and reckless abandon with which they fought.
    
    It turned out that this particular force was made up of almost entirely
    homosexual soldiers, who fought without fear of death because they were
    so stigmatized by the (fictional) society that they did not value their
    own lives.
    
    So, is an army better if the soldiers love their comrades-in-arms, or
    if they hate themselves?

    Doesn't matter... it was as you said... sicence fiction.
    

    re: .293
    
    >    the whole idea that it is anyone else's business is ridiculous
    
    A broad brush, eh?
    

    re .295
    
    You've caught me without my sources to hand, but here goes.
    
>    	I am not sure what you mean by "psychic identity", but Plato
    
    Prior to the late eighteenth century the notion of a strict demarcation
    in sexual orientation was unknown.  All people were considered capable
    of all acts.  In the West what we now call homosexual behaviour was
    simply one form of sin amongst others.
    
    By psychic identity I mean the identification with a group whereby, in
    this specific case, you define yourself in terms of orientation.  When
    gays today stand up and proclaim themselves as a group they are doing
    the literally unthinkable little more than a century ago.  Then there
    was only behaviour.
    
>    	He clearly from the first part recognises that there are same-sex
>    and other-sex preferrences in different people. His following
    
    Indeed he did, but you've neglected the Greek notions which underly
    this.  To cut a long story short, the Greeks believed that people were
    once creatures with three heads and six pairs of arms, legs and
    genitalia.  They upset the gods and were physically separated into
    human beings.  They thus ascribed romantic love to the search for the
    rest of yourself, and what we would call homosexual love they - and
    Plato - ascribed to what amounts to a case of mistaken identity.  They
    had no word for homosexual (orientation) as we know it because they did
    not recognise it as natural, although it is fair to say they weren't
    particularly worried about it either.
    
    This is separate to, and Plato recognised this, sexual behaviour.  As I
    said earlier, certain forms of homosexual behaviour were permissable to
    what we would call heterosexual men.  These forms did not threaten and
    indeed were considered compatible with their notions of masculinity. 
    For example, as long as the man was the penetrator, or active partner,
    the sex of the passive partner didn't matter.  It was acceptable for
    the male to be passive only if he was socially inferior, whether by
    rank, status or age.
    
    Thus, Plato's army would have consisted of pairs of men, defined by age
    and status.  It would not have consisted of homosexuals as we define
    them, whereby romantic love between men of relatively equal status was
    evident.
    
>    since it shows that a society without homosexual-heterosexual conflict
>    is possible, and that maybe modern U.S. society is aberrant. The lack
    
    Modern Western society is aberrant in this sense.  We abandoned the age
    old notions of the permeability of sexual desire in favour of rigid
    definitions that, in my opinion, serve more to hurt than help.  That
    there was no such conflict in societies such as the Ancient Greeks was
    precisely because these notions did not exist; in effect their
    societies embodied Kinsey's sexual scale and the fact that people fit
    into different parts of the scale at different times in their lives was
    much more evident and acknowledged.  A Greek youth was expected to be
    passive until he reached manhood, whereupon he was expected to alter
    his behaviour.  
    
>    of a word doesn't mean there were no homosexuals in ancient Greece, or
    
    This is an essentialist position that I reject.  The Greeks didn't
    identify themselves in this way and it is wrong for us to impose our
    labels and concepts on them.  I take the social constructivist view
    that we invent different ways to identify ourselves within society and
    that these consepts will change of time and place.  In this sense there
    were no homosexuals in ancient Greece because they didn't see themselves
    as such.  There were, of course, men who today would declare themselves
    homosexual and behaved accordingly, but there was no notion of
    homosexuality for them to cling to and accordingly no psychic identity
    as such.

    Wow!!   It is a delight to provoke a reply like yours!
    
    	The only thing I can find to answer at the moment is :-
>    For example, as long as the man was the penetrator, or active partner,
>    the sex of the passive partner didn't matter.  It was acceptable for
>    the male to be passive only if he was socially inferior, whether by
>    rank, status or age.
    
    	Later in the book Alcibiades is represented as attempting to seduce
    Socrates in the manner that a woman would attempt to seduce a man.
    Alcibiades was of noble birth, was ruler of his own household, and had
    already been publicly decorated for bravery in battle. This is
    obviously an attempt to glorify Socrates, but there is no indication
    that any of the other people involved did not find it "acceptable".
    Alcibiades was certainly superior to Socrates in rank and status,
    though probably not age.
    
    	In any case, both Plato and many modern homosexuals will tell you
    that the relationship is much more important than details of 
    "active partner"/"passive partner". Alcibiades and Socrates are
    represented as "lovers" but it is uncertain whether there was ever any
    physical consummation. Certainly the attempt at seduction was described
    as ending in failure.

    re .300
    
    I forgot to add, for a discussion of the nature of the essentialist
    versus the social contstructionalist (or nominalist) positions see the
    first three essays in 'Hidden from history'.
    
    Whenever you seek to take the ancients as models you must be vey
    careful to understand them in their own terms.  I have already
    mentioned that the Greeks defined masculinity in terms of who pentrated
    and who was penetrated.  The Romans took a slightly different view, and
    were concerned about the passage of semen.  For this reason, while
    their position on intercourse was the same as the Greeks', they were
    vehemently opposed to a man giving fellatio, although to be fellated
    was acceptable.  Why?  Because in their terms it was masculine to give
    the seed but not to accept it.  But when discussing fellatio it is very
    dificult to think of the fellator as passive, which was the Greek view.
    
    The West subsumed the Greek ideas rather than the Roman, although why
    is unclear.  For this reason in our society fellatio has never been
    stigmatised to the same degree as anal intercourse.  But we also
    conflated the idea of penetrator/masculine and penetrated/feminine with
    our own particular ideas about beauty.
    
    For the Greeks beauty was an ideal to which both sexes could aspire,
    whereas in the West beauty is associated almost exclusively with women. 
    It is easy to see how the combination of the two, for example, led via
    the Mollies of eighteenth century England to modern camp, which is the
    predominant stereotype of gays today.

    Re .296
    
    The Herbert story wasn't from the Dune series, it was "The Dosadi
    Experiment."
    
    re .297
    
    Your casual dismissal of science fiction as a valid genre marks you as
    effete and narrow-minded.  For your improvement, I will point out that
    the book I cite here, "The Dosadi Experiment," bears an urgent learn-
    from-history message against atrocious experiments in mass psychology
    of the sort that were performed by the Nazis on the Jews.  Another SF
    classic, "The Mote in God's Eye," speaks out strongly about humankind's
    refusal to control our population and the horrors that we can expect if
    we don't straighten out.  The list goes on...
    
    Don't be so blithe about dismissing a kind of literature until you
    *know* what it has to offer - or not.
    
    -dick

.297> Doesn't matter... it was as you said... sicence fiction.
    
    Then let's examine reality.
    
    The Isrealis do not discharge homosexuals.
    
    They have one of the world's most respected and successful armed forces.

    
    -1
    
      Good point. Do you know if they have a quota system in Israel?
    Affirmative Action?
    
    
    David

RE: .302

>    The Herbert story wasn't from the Dune series, it was "The Dosadi
>    Experiment."

        Thanks for the correction, Dick!  Sorry about playing "fast and
        loose" with the facts, but it was late, and I didn't feel like
        digging through my old paperbacks.
                        
        At any rate, my point in making that reference was exactly like
        Dick said; Science Fiction writers, because of the very nature of
        the genre, take the current state of society and extrapolate or
        exaggerate to give us a warning about where we're going (or like
        in Star Trek, show us the promise of the future).
                                        
        Certainly, we're not near creating shock troops out of our homo-
        sexual population, but it's hard to argue that the society as a
        whole does not value homosexual individuals.  Tragically, suicide
        often becomes an option for people who feel unaccepted, so it's
        not hard to see how Herbert came up with squads of suicidal
        homosexual shock troops as a plot device.
                                                
        Take it at face value.  It IS a work of fiction.  But look at all
        the other works of fiction which have had a profound impact on
        real life human thought.
         
        Of course, most of those works were probably burned at one point
        or another.               

        Jon

<    <<< Note 851.304 by COMET::DYBEN "Grey area is found by not looking" >>>
<
<    
<    -1
    
<      Good point. Do you know if they have a quota system in Israel?
<    Affirmative Action?
<    
    
   David,

   Yes they do, sorta.  Everyone gets to be in the service it's part of
   their national defense scheme.

   Allison

    
    
    Allison
    
      Does that include palestinians?
    
    
    David

<      Does that include palestinians?
    
    
   David,

   No, they are not Isreili citizens.  Since there is no draft currently
   in this country the question is somewhat moot.


   Interesting how a topic ages and changes.  I had to look back to the
   base note to realize why many do not wish to answer the question posed.
   I understand, it's easier to debate why something should not exist than
   admit discomfort.  Either a person is uncomfortable or they aren't.  I
   would hope they understand why they feel that way.

   It's not an issue for me, beyond some truly amusing reading here.

   Allison

RE:  Note 851.308 VIDSYS::PARENT 

>   I understand, it's easier to debate why something should not exist than
>   admit discomfort.  Either a person is uncomfortable or they aren't.  I
>   would hope they understand why they feel that way.

Oh no.  Not the phobia crap again...  Discomfort?  Everyone has some discomfort
about something.  If I don't like the way I see society going, then I might be
uncomfortable about it.  Sure.  Does that make one a surpressed homo?  Hardly. 
No more than being uncomfortable about murder is because one is a murderer
inside.

Yes, I understand the way I feel.  Your mileage may differ.  You can accept it
as the norm... or not.  I don't want my kid exposed to their perverted life
style in the theater, which is what the base note was about.

And I for one, don't give a flying ____ about what Plato thinks... or anyone
else for that matter.  I keep my own score.  Not that I read the replies about
Plato, but I skimmed them and saw him mentioned.

    
    
    Well, Mr. Berry, you, in your last reply, basically called several
    hundred (perhaps more) of your fellow employees perverts.  Are you
    happy about that?  The fact that someone follows a different path makes
    them a pervert?  You walk your walk.  I walk mine.  You feel you didn't
    have a choice as to the path.  I feel I don't have a choice as to the
    path.  But, please remember, you do HAVE to work with these people --
    and you almost assuredly DO work with gay people.  You probably even do
    so in a way which isn't discriminatory -- I don't know you and can't
    say for certain.  But, if there are other gay people that read this
    conference and have followed your noting here, most assuredly THEY now
    feel very uncomfortable working with YOU.  Can you live with that?  
    It's not what you say -- it's how you say it......
    
       Greg -- who's said more than a few things he regrets

    re .309
    
>And I for one, don't give a flying ____ about what Plato thinks... or anyone
>else for that matter.
    
    Pretty much sums things up, doesn't it?  It'd be a shame to learn
    something.

   Dwight,

   Your milage differs, good for you.  

< Does that make one a surpressed homo?  Hardly. 

   Very true.  Nor did I say it would.  Oh, and "homo" is gutter slang.


<Yes, I understand the way I feel.  Your mileage may differ.  You can accept it
<as the norm... or not.  I don't want my kid exposed to their perverted life
<style in the theater, which is what the base note was about.

   The base note proposed a preposterous scene.  So all things considered
   some of the reactions are quite in line with cinematic garbage.  I make
   that comment only after seeing LW the origonal though.  I might add LW
   did have to much sex of the mostly garden variety as protrayed in cinima.
   I presume that stuff is prefered, but then it also protrays perverted
   version of heterosexual lifestyle.

   Allison






   

    It seems pretty clear to me the author of the base note didn't
    intend to discuss anything - this is made quite plain when
    one attempts to rebut a series of his "arguments" and is subsequently
    ignored.   Not that I'm surprised.  Mr. Berry's notes on this
    subject are like a broken record - nothing about them has 
    changed in years.  Oh the packaging is more fanciful and the rhetoric
    a tiny bit more subdued, but what's underneath is exactly the same.

    Now its not that I think MENNOTES isn't an appropriate place to
    simply complain about something; lots of guys do that here.  But
    I'm really starting to resent the fact that, under the guise of
    open discussion, gays and lesbians continue to be the targets of 
    slander and insult, month after month and year after year (both here 
    and in various NOTESFILES across the network).

    How long would we tolerate a "discussion" of the "problem" of
    mixed race relationships or the open expression of Jewish religious 
    traditions if people expressed their feelings using terms like 
    "perverted" "disgusting" and "unnatural?"

    Certainly racists and anti-Semites are entitled to their feelings.
    But what are our obligations when it comes to providing such people with
    a platform to express their views?  I'm just curious....

    FWIW - even if there were a majority decision to suppress such ignorant
    opinions, I would not support censoring them - just as I do not support
    censoring the homohating bigotry expressed in this string.   After all,
    my use of terms like "bigotry" and "ignorant" could be considered
    insulting (though not slanderous, IMO) and I don't want my point of
    view silenced.

    /Greg

        RE: .314  Ray,

    > In ending Dwight has a perfect right to say what he said, without 
    > being called a bigoted homo-hater, unless he was joyriding around town
    > fag bashing for kicks, etc. 
    
    I agree with the first part of this sentence, but the second part is
    illogical.  For him to have a right to saying anything he wants without
    being called on it denys *my* right to say what I want.
    
    I do not throw around words like "bigot" lightly.  I know some people
    who object to homosexuality on religious grounds.  I respect that (so
    long as they don't try to infringe upon my rights).  I also respect
    someone who simply feels "uncomfortable" around gay people - I can
    even respect someone who is disgusted at the thought of same gender
    sex!   But there is such a thing as good manners and respect for other
    people.   If he doesn't like gay sex he doesn't have to participate in
    it nor does he have to watch it.  Period.   If he's going to complain
    about it and use words like "disgusting" and "perverted" and argue
    that I go back into the closet - well I'm going to respond to that.
    
    > But if he is minding his own business and
    > something is put in his face that is opposed to his up-bringing, then 
    > he should be able to say, well that's not nice.
    
    Nothing was "put in his face" - *he* concocted the absurd scenario in
    the basenote simply to rant against gay people.   The underlying 
    message is that *I* have to restrict my actions to make *him*
    comfortable.   Well I'm sorry but I'm not going to buy into that
    agenda - whether it conflicts with his up-bringing or not.
    
    I have to go....  More later, perhaps.
    
    /Greg
    

        RE: .314  Ray,

    > In ending Dwight has a perfect right to say what he said, without 
    > being called a bigoted homo-hater, unless he was joyriding around town
    > fag bashing for kicks, etc. 
    

Ray, is it really ok? Does one have to use physical force to cause harm to
others or can words do the trick? Words can hurt and cause a lot of pain to
someone just as physical force could (one emotionally, one physically). Ray,
you and I have had many a conversation where you were bothered by the words
of others. Just by your last note you were upset because the activists called
you a homophobe and a racists. So I ask you, is it really ok?


    > But if he is minding his own business and
    > something is put in his face that is opposed to his up-bringing, then 
    > he should be able to say, well that's not nice.


Ray, is Dwight REALLY minding his own business if he's calling us disgusting?
Hardly. Once he opens his mouth he is getting involved in the topic at hand. If
he doesn't want to get involved, then he can hit next unseen. If he views his
points, then he's involved. Remember, he was the one who started the base note.



Glen
    

    > But if he is minding his own business and
    > something is put in his face that is opposed to his up-bringing, then 
    > he should be able to say, well that's not nice.

   This is an interesting juxtapostion as if memory serves he posed the
   base note.  In that case who is minding whos business?

   Allison

RE:  Note 851.315 CRONIC::SCHULER 

>    Nothing was "put in his face" - *he* concocted the absurd scenario in
>    the basenote simply to rant against gay people.   

Was it absurd?  Your opinion.  My opinion is that ONE day... that scenario may
take place.

>The underlying  message is that *I* have to restrict my actions to make *him*
>comfortable.   

Wrong.  This had nothing to do with YOU and YOUR personal actions.  It has to
do with the homosexual agenda pushing its way into the spot light... into the
entertainment business.  You and others have drifted away from that thought,
turning this string into another gay parade.  First ya go after the boy scouts,
traditional parades... now my note!  :)

>Well I'm sorry but I'm not going to buy into that agenda - whether it conflicts
>with his up-bringing or not.

And I shall not hedge on my views either and buy into YOUR agenda.
    
If I cross the line in here, I'm sure the mods will let me know.  And listen, I
don't mind being called a bigot.  Really.  I say lots of things and tell lots
of jokes that I can't put in here.  I'm sure you feel similar.  I'm not a bigot
when it comes to race.  I'm white.  I married a mexican lady.  When it comes to
homosexuals... well have have no respect for their agenda nor their unhealthy
and risky lifestyle.  Now if that makes me a bigot, fine.  I can live with
that because I keep score.  What you say is water off the ducks back.

Have a nice day, the lot of you.

| <<< Note 851.319 by COMET::BERRY "Dwight Berry" >>>



| Wrong.  This had nothing to do with YOU and YOUR personal actions.  It has to
| do with the homosexual agenda pushing its way into the spot light... into the
| entertainment business.  

	Gee Dwight, heterosexualness has been pushing itself in the
entertainment business for quite some time now. That's ok though, right?
Why not look at us as though we are er.... human? After all, we are. I will
say that I feel VERY sorry for your kids (if you have any) if any of them 
are gay. With your viewpoints about us I can easily see that the kid has
a chance to feel very unloved and could add to the #1 reason that teens commit
suicide. Pretty sad if you ask me.....

| You and others have drifted away from that thought,
| turning this string into another gay parade.  First ya go after the boy scouts,
| traditional parades... now my note!  :)

	Go after? If you mean by pointing out your views so you can actually
see them, then you're right. But responding to your hat.... dislike of us is
becoming an everyday thing....

| I'm not a bigot when it comes to race.  I'm white.  I married a mexican lady.  

	Dwight, you know, you sometimes make NO sense at all. You say you
married a Mexican lady so that doesn't make you a bigot. Hmmm.... I disagree.
You have your impression of how men should be. Anyone that doesn't fit into
that mold is labeled gay. You don't like gay men. Who's to say that you
like every other color? Your notes do make me wonder sometimes.....

| When it comes to
| homosexuals... well have have no respect for their agenda nor their unhealthy
| and risky lifestyle.  

	I have to agree with you here Dwight. About the risky lifestyle part. I
mean, imagine, walking down the street and having a carload of people stopping
and beating the crap out of you. Risky? Yeah.... but much more by views like
YOURS than anything else.....

| Have a nice day, the lot of you.

	Gee Dwight, maybe someday you'll actually mean it....



Glen

| <<< Note 851.318 by USDEV::LEVASSEUR "MOVE SPACES TO PERSONAL_NAME." >>>




| I'm just curious as to how many people who are
| struggling to eek out their existance are sick of hearing about gay
| this and gay that and value this and value that.

	Ray, it was the views of other's that made gays speak up. I wonder
how many gays got sick of hearing how they are lesser than human beings, can
get denied housing/jobs, get beaten up, just because they are gay. Sorry, if
people would just see everyone as people firs��t and any label they want to
attatch 2nd, then we would need no activists for any type of human rights.





Glen

    
    
    And I pity any gay people that work with you, or, heaven forbid, *for*
    you, Dwight.  You really frighten me!  Your ignorance of gay people,
    other than what you see in the papers and on television (what you call
    the *agenda*) is overwhelming.
    
           GJD

	Greg, I think one has to first be interested in taking some time to see
what each person has to offer and to actually see who each person is.....



Glen

    Homosexuals keep talking about walking down the street and getting
    beaten up... like it happens down every street, everyday.  There are
    lots of crimes taking place every hour but you guys are stretching this
    a bit, don't cha think?  I'm not hearing or seeing it.  I ain't part of
    it.
    
    Quit playing old tapes.

    re .324
    
    Not in every street, perhaps, but certainly every day.  You don't see
    it because you don't want to.  You've made that clear enough.

    
    
    And, simply put, many (most?) of the gay bashings go unreported as such
    because of the stigma that people like you, Dwight, attach to being
    gay.
    
    I've been bashed twice myself.  One incident involved a car full of
    youths who decided to let go a shotgun blast in the general direction
    of me and several of my friends.  Luckily they were far enough away
    that the pellets only bounced off our coats.  They were yelling "fags"
    as they drove by.  We reported it to the police (there was a station
    only a couple of blocks away).  They took down our names and then told
    us they were busy and that we should leave.  The second incident took
    place last summer while I was roller-blading.  A couple of high-school
    students decided I was a fag based only on what I was wearing (blank
    spandex work out shorts) and decided to give me a rough time.  It's
    amazing what a roller-blade to the testicles and wrist-guards plunged
    into the rib-cage can do to a person.  I left them laying on the
    ground.  I walk away with a couple of bruises and scrapes from where I
    fell down and with a good feeling, having defended myself.
    
       Greg

    Re .324
    
    > Homosexuals keep talking about walking down the street and getting
    > beaten up...
    
    Most other crimes, Dwight, are perpetrated on the basis of full equal
    opportunity.  "You got money, Jack, shit, I don't care what color you
    are or who you sleep with, give me your wallet."  Gay bashing is a
    crime of bigotry, and that specific fact makes it worse than other
    crimes.
    
    You're not Jewish, are you Dwight?  Well, then, you missed out on that
    one.  How about Russian?  No?  Polish?  Ukrainian?  Irish?  German? 
    Chinese?  Vietnamese?  Japanese?  No?  Catholic?  No?  Oh, then, you
    have nothing to worry about.  Unless you should by some mistake happen
    to visit some of the places where being a WASP is dangerous to your
    health...like Northern Ireland...  Jeez, Dwight, some of my best
    friends are bigots.
    
    Grow up.  Take your head out of the sand and see that people are
    people.  Period.
    
    -dick

    
    What crap!  
    
    Some of you put words in my mouth.  Others talk of beating up
    teenagers.  You associate me being a bigot with people beating the
    snot out of you.  I don't beat up homosexuals, less they give me a
    reason to.
    
    You guys must be sending mail off-line, eh?
    
    I don't believe half of what you spout.  The "I'm a poor victim that
    gets my butt beat for no reason" ain't convincing me.  I think it's way
    over stated.

    
    
    Maybe you don't inflict physical violence, Dwight -- I sure as hell
    hope you don't.  Attitudes like yours are seen, by some, as license to
    inflict such violence.
    
    And, by the way, every work I wrote in the last note is true.  You're
    the one who's got it coming out his ears.
    
             GJD

    
    
    And, no, there's been no mail sent.  Are you feeling just a little
    insecure 'bout things?  (Said in my best church-lady voice.)
     
        GJD

    
    
    And, by the way, Dwight, I don't go around beating up teenagers.  When
    someone attacks me, however, I *will* defend myself.  All in all, I
    thought I handled myself pretty well (and let them off easy)
    considering I was on rollerblades and there was two of them.
    
          GJD

    RE: Dwight
    
    So what is your point?  Are you suggesting that since (in your 
    opinion) only a few people get beat up because they are gay as opposed to
    a lot of people, that we should just pretend it doesn't happen at all?   
    How do *you* suggest gay people respond? And what about other things like 
    housing and employment discrimination?  I suppose all the gay employees of 
    the Cracker Barrel restaurant chain who were fired specifically because 
    they were gay should have just quietly walked away?  And we ought not
    do anything to help gay teens who decide suicide is a better
    choice than the risk of facing parents/friends who might respond with
    comments similar to the ones you've made in this topic?  Nor should
    we help those who do come out (or are found out) and get thrown out 
    of their homes and wind up living on the streets (as happened to my
    best friend)?
    
    Seriously, tell us what you think we should do?
    
    I think people have been more than reasonable in trying to
    respond to your concerns, Dwight (ref. previous responses
    that specifically addressed the base note).  You, on the
    other hand, have not shown any willingness to be reasonable
    in return.   You either ignore opinions, evidence and facts that
    are at odds with your point of view, or simply assert we are
    lying/making things up/exaggerating.  
    
    Are we making any progress here?
    
    /Greg
    

    
    Dwight I'll answer your note in .324.  You don't see it because of
    hetero media types like you that don't give a ----  about the gays.  It
    seems that it just isn't newsworthy material.  What if the tables were
    turned and it was the hetero's getting beat up for who they are - you'd
    screem bloody murder and push the issue.  So get off your agenda
    pushing soap box and become part of the real world.
    
    Ken
    

.327> crime of bigotry, and that specific fact makes it worse than other
.327> crimes.
    
    I disgaree with this idea.
    
    Crimes driven by bigotry are no worse or better than the same crimes
    driven by other motives.
    
    Remember, as soon as you decide one motive is worse than another, you
    have also decided one is better than another.  I refuse to do that.

.332> housing and employment discrimination?  I suppose all the gay employees of 
.332> the Cracker Barrel restaurant chain who were fired specifically because 
.332> they were gay should have just quietly walked away?  And we ought not
    
    Was that ever proven?  Even Consumer Reports seemed to think it was a
    vaporous allegation.

and what standard of proof would you believe?

Do you agree that a restaurant chain targeting for termination employees
who give the appearance of being gay is a discriminatory and bigotted act?

DougO

	What I find really amusing about all of this is that Dwight still feels
he doesn't beat up on gays. Well Doug, maybe in the physical sense you don't,
but with your words you cut with a knife. You say you don't hear about it
happening so you don't think it goes on. Maybe you should get out more and you
will see. In Boston they have something similar to the gardian angels (but
their name escapes me right now). They had them on all 3 local news stations
last year. They walk the streets to help protect those who could get bashed.
They are usually found in the areas that the bars are located. If bashings
don't happen, why did the 3 stations (4,5 & 7 decide to give them coverage?
BECAUSE IT IS A VERY REAL PROBLEM! Dwight, I sincerly hope that someday your
get opened. I only hope that it doesn't happen because someone you know
get's bashed!




Glen

>Well Doug, maybe in the physical sense you don't,

eh?  I assume you meant to refer to Dwight throughout.

DougO

.336>Do you agree that a restaurant chain targeting for termination employees
.336>who give the appearance of being gay is a discriminatory and bigotted act?
    
    That would depend.  If that means outrageous campy behavior or coming
    onto other male co-workers, then no, it's not discriminatory.  If it
    means being gay, but being otherwise professional, then yes, it is
    discriminatory.
    
    Clarify.  What actions were they accused of?  Has any charge stuck?

RE:  Note 851.332 CRONIC::SCHULER 

>    Seriously, tell us what you think we should do?
 
Get help.

RE:  Note 851.333 MIMS::STEFFENSEN_K 

Oh, here we go.  If you buck the gay agenda, you're ignorant, a bigot,
and you need some homosexuals to enlighten you.
    

RE:  Note 851.337 DEMING::SILVA 

People like you will believe that anything agin the gay agenda is beating up on
homosexuals.  

And we can site examples ALL DAY.  I can site stories about terrible things
that homosexuals have done... to others... including CHILDREN.

We could toss that kind of mud forever.

Dwight, 
Has it ever occurred to you that you may have taken too many 
blows to the head at the Academy?

Mike

    
    
    That's right, Dwight, let's bring the CHILDREN into it.  Have there
    been gay people that have abused children - yes.  Have there been
    non-gay people that have abused children - yes.  The implicit (and
    sometimes explicit) association of homosexuality and pedophilia is
    ridiculous.  
    
        GJD

    Some of this may really not be Dwight's fault.  The local paper is not
    covering the attacks on those who openly oppose(d) ammendment two in
    town.  I take a Denver papaer as well and they listed 10 seperate
    incedents ranging from extreme vandalizism (Windows being broken in
    houses with "Hate free home" window stickers, to threatening phone
    calls to people who have written letters to the editor opposing
    ammendment 2 in the local rag, to people with "Celebrate Diversity" or
    "hate is not a family value" bumper stickers being run off the roads on
    highways surrounding ammendment two, with the person flashing up a card
    with a homosexual slur as they drive off.
    
    While I have no idea what the so called "gay agenda" is, the person who
    tried intimidation tactics on me when I was driving home yesterday made
    his agenda perfectly clear.
    
    Meg  

    RE: .340 Note 851.340 by COMET::BERRY
    
    >>
    >>    Seriously, tell us what you think we should do?
    >>
    >Get help.
    
    For what?  And who from?
    
    Care to offer a more substantive answer?
    
    ***
    
    Regarding the Cracker Barrel thing - I remember reading an
    interview that was done with a lesbian who was fired  - also,
    I believe the head office denyed then confirmed the policy (and
    then changed it, I think - after activists staged numerous "sit ins"
    at various Cracker Barrel restaraunts...)
    
    /Greg
    

    
    
    
     Hey, can we all just please get along here:-) God I have always wanted
    to use that.. Now on to more serious stuff.... My conclusion..
    
    Gay people are the same as the rest of us with the notes exception that
    they have sex with the same sex. This does not seem to make biological
    sense. Despite this apparent abnormality( no malice intended) gays
    have every right to have every opportunity that would naturally be
    apart of any heterosexuals benefits. Gays should be allowed to serve in
    the military. They should be allowed to marry(and divorce). They should
    not be given IMHO special laws to protect them, instead, all laws
    should be applicable to every type of person such that know one is
    excluded..
    
    Thanks for all the insights,
    
    David

| <<< Note 851.342 by COMET::BERRY "Dwight Berry" >>>


| People like you will believe that anything agin the gay agenda is beating up on
| homosexuals.

	That's where you're wrong Dwight. You can assume all you like but
you'll probably never know because you won't take any time to really find out.
I do feel sorry for any loved ones that are gay.... Now, there are MANY things
that SOME of the vocal homosexual people have on their agenda that *I* don't
agree with. What I want to see Dwight, is that everyone, regardless of who they
may be, as long as they aren't hurting anyone, are seen and treated as people.
Is that so hard to understand? 

| And we can site examples ALL DAY.  I can site stories about terrible things
| that homosexuals have done... to others... including CHILDREN.

	I always love when people give examples. Most of the time it shows
their ignorance. :-) Dwight, it isn't just homosexual people, black people, 
white people who do things wrong, it's people in general. Your list that you
could provide could be made to fit into any catagory. 

	You mentioned in one note that you think people want you to get to
know a gay person. Interesting thought. I bet you know many right now and don't
even know it. I wonder what your thoughts towards them would be if you found
out they were gay? Would it change? 

| We could toss that kind of mud forever.

	We'll leave that for Muddy Mudskipper... ;-)




Glen

re: .342
>I can site stories about terrible things that homosexuals have done... 
>to others... including CHILDREN.

Has anybody denied that these terrible things happen?
Do you deny that most child sexual abuse is committed by heterosexuals?

Mike

| <<< Note 851.347 by COMET::DYBEN "Grey area is found by not looking" >>>



| Gay people are the same as the rest of us with the notes exception that
| they have sex with the same sex. This does not seem to make biological
| sense. 

	Of course it doesn't David, you're heterosexual. :-)

| gays have every right to have every opportunity that would naturally be
| apart of any heterosexuals benefits. Gays should be allowed to serve in
| the military. They should be allowed to marry(and divorce). 

	I think we agree on this David!

| They should
| not be given IMHO special laws to protect them, instead, all laws
| should be applicable to every type of person such that know one is
| excluded..

	You know David, I agree with you 100%. We shouldn't be granted any
special laws. One law should apply to everyone. The problem is that it doesn't
happen. When it does, great! Until then, there are some things that do have to
have laws to protect those who could be hurt (talking more than physical and
more than just gay folk).



Glen

    
    Glen,
    
     Well if all gays are as handy with rollerblades as some are, I 
    suspect there is no real concern.. Can't you see it now the next type
    of movies " Watch as Stevie Segal crushes the racist New York gangs
    with " Roller ball break dancing gymkata." I would pay to see this:-)
    
    
    David

	Gee David, you have such a way with words! ;-)




Glen 

    For what it's worth, I don't buy into the statement that "words can
    harm."
    
    I know they can be a precursor to physical violence, but by themselves,
    they do no real damage.  In my opinion, of course.
    
    I disagree with Dwight on this issue, but I don't see a connection
    between what he's written and physical violence against gays.

    
    
    
    > Gee David, you have such a way with words;-)
    
     I is literahte
    
    david

>    For what it's worth, I don't buy into the statement that "words can
>    harm."
>    
>    I know they can be a precursor to physical violence, but by themselves,
>    they do no real damage.  In my opinion, of course.
 
My concern with that statement is that while words don't do any PHYSICAL harm,
words (and in my opinion, Colorado's Amendment 2) create an atmosphere where
people (who may have been pre-dispositioned to violence anyway) feel it's
OKAY to commit physical violence against gays.

This is not to mention the horrible damage words can do to youngsters who
may be insecure about their own sexuality; regardless of the sexual orientation
of a young person.

Jon

    We might as well agree to disagree.
    
    I've made my opinion known, and you, yours.
    
    There's no easy wwy to resolve a difference of opinions when that's
    the extent of the discussion.  Agree to disagree?

> If it means being gay, but being otherwise professional, then yes, it 
> is discriminatory.

That isn't the question I asked.  I asked if it was bigotted and discriminatory.

And yes, that is what Cracker Barrel did.  They fired people who 'looked' gay.
In the south, that can mean a woman with a short haircut.

DougO

    <<< Note 851.353 by HDLITE::ZARLENGA "Michael Zarlenga, Alpha P/PEG" >>>

>    For what it's worth, I don't buy into the statement that "words can
>    harm."
 
	You may not, but the law does.

Jim

	Hmmmm...... have you ever checked into that claim you make that words
don't hurt? Have you read about it at all? All the experts say the same thing.
What proof do you have that proves words don't hurt? Ever get into a shouting
match with a wife/girlfriend and say something you really wished you hadn't
said? Something that hurt another? 



Glen

    
    re:.357
    You didn't answer my questions, Doug.  Do you plan to?  What was proven?
    
    re:.358
    Ahhh, burnt by sloppy wording again ... in cases of libel and slander,
    surely.  The harm I was talking about was physical harm.  People were
    comparing talking badly about gays to beating up gays  Is there any law
    on any book in any state where you can assault and batter someone with
    words?
    
    re:.359
    As soon as we start crying foul over words, we might as well start
    rewriting the First Amendment.  I'll rephrase ... I personally am big
    enough to differentiate between words and actions, and I do not buy
    into the theory that words can harm in ways similar to actions.
    
    Better?
    

>>>   Clarify.  What actions were they accused of?  Has any charge stuck?

Of your two questions, I answered the first.  You seem to have missed it.
Here, read again.

>> And yes, that is what Cracker Barrel did. They fired people who 'looked' gay.

'charge'?  Do you mean, were they brought to trial?  No, bigotry is evidently
perfectly legal in the states where Cracker Barrel operates, as now in Colorado.
I believe Greg answered the question, though, in .346; they at first denied the
policy, then defended it, then changed it.

DougO

<    <<< Note 851.360 by HDLITE::ZARLENGA "Michael Zarlenga, Alpha P/PEG" >>>
<    
<    re:.359
<    As soon as we start crying foul over words, we might as well start
<    rewriting the First Amendment.  I'll rephrase ... I personally am big
<    enough to differentiate between words and actions, and I do not buy
<    into the theory that words can harm in ways similar to actions.
    
    
   I'm inclined to agree with you as an adult.  I do feel your missing
   something about language and perceived harm by the victim.

   Very likely I could call you most any thing is you'd shrug and rightly
   consider me a fool.  However, let's speculate a bit.  You have a son
   say age 10 and he's not very adept at athletics, a klutz.  One day
   he comes home upset because the other boys were calling him names,
   names like queer, faggot and some I won't write.  You investigate and
   it was true and going on for most the year so you complain to the 
   offending boys parents.  The parents response to you "It's only words".

   Is that the same thing?  Did it hurt the kid?  Should it be stopped
   since they didn't physically hurt him?

   I suggested the scene as it happens to some kid who is likely not
   gay and somebody suffers.  The peer that is gay gets the message
   of potential harm or at least the message that if your gay your
   trash.  That is the message, and it is a reinforced message if only
   by incidental complicity.

   I argue it's wrong because those words in this language are by default
   statement of badness.  They are used in a perjoritive way as if you
   are one of those people you are very bad.  It would be no different.
   Yet children learn that and the ideas the represent.  Sometimes they
   misapply them.

   You may disagree or feel this is too artificial, that's ok.  But first
   put yourself in the position of that kids parent.  Just maybe there is
   something to talk about.

   Allison

    re:.362
    
    Don't you think this is a bit off-track?
    
    I was (I know I didn't mention it, but I assumed we all knew) talking
    about adults, not 10-year-olds.

.303> Then let's examine reality. The Isrealis do not discharge homosexuals.
.303> They have one of the world's most respected and successful armed forces.

.304> Good point. Do you know if they have a quota system in Israel?
.304> Affirmative Action?

No, they do not discharge homosexuals and yes they have one of the most 
respected and successful armed forces - however - let's not jump to any
conclusions with respect to "open-mindedness" and homosexuality and the IDF.

Those (in the IDF) who are found to be gay or proclaim their homosexuality
must (read that as "mandatory") undergo a minimum of two weeks psychological
testing in order to remain in the service.  Their files are flagged, tagged.
They are usually barred from positions requiring top security clearances and
are rarely (knowingly) assigned to combat units.  Promotions come very slowly.

Homosexuality is still viewed as abnormal both in the military and in Israeli
society.  One should also realize that there is no "separation of church
and state" in Israel as in the United States.  In Israel the church *is*
the state.

Anyone want to model our program for homosexuality and the military after
that of the IDF?

.360> I personally am big enough to differentiate between words and actions,
.360> and I do not buy into the theory that words can harm in ways similar
.360> to actions.
    
.363> I was (I know I didn't mention it, but I assumed we all knew) talking
.363> about adults, not 10-year-olds.

Mike and David have hit one of my hot-buttons .... that being that we are
for the most adults and should be able to distinguish between words and
actions.  One of my "complaints" with some of the so-called hate crime
statistics is that they consider and rate "verbal abuse" right along with
"physical" hate crimes.

Bubba

At a decided risk .. perhaps staking the side of the underdog (Dwight)
I feel compelled to ask a few questions.  It's very late and I'm very
tired but I've done my best to read through the replies that have
been posted since I left town last week.  As a matter of fact - I've
read through these replies three times!

The only think that comes to mind is the phrase from "Cool Hand Luke"
which says: "What we have heah' ... is a failure to communicate".

.332>  Dwight ...Seriously, tell us what you think we should do?
.332>  ...You...have not shown any willingness to be reasonable in return.

Let me turn this around - what do *you* want Dwight to do? Better yet,
what do you want him to say that you would consider to be "reasonable"?

Oh .. don't worry .. after you post your list of "reasonable" responses
that you think Berry should make .. I'll ask the same thing of him.

What happened here?  All of a sudden it went to Hell in a hand basket
with a lot of name calling and insinuations .. 

Bubba

    	The implication in .0 was that words (and other forms of
    communication) can cause at least discomfort, if not actual harm. In .0
    the example was homosexuals causing discomfort to heterosexuals, while
    recent examples in this string have been the other way round.
    
    	I have no idea what "Lethal Weapon 10" might contain since there
    seems to have been no attempt so far to dub the series into French.
    Unless "lethal weapon" is merely a euphemism for the male sexual organ
    I would more object to my children� seeing it for its violence content
    than for its sexual content.
    
    	And while it was not exactly violence, I have lent a can of
    paraffin to the next door (homosexual) neighbour to clean tar off his
    gate posts. He said at the time that it must have been done by a
    business rival, but I have my own opinion.
    
    �Two of my children are over 18 and can make up their own minds.

<    	I have no idea what "Lethal Weapon 10" might contain since there
<    seems to have been no attempt so far to dub the series into French.
<    Unless "lethal weapon" is merely a euphemism for the male sexual organ
<    I would more object to my children� seeing it for its violence content
<    than for its sexual content.
    
     No one else does yet.  LW has only gotten to LW2 or 3, LW10 is likely
   far from the drawing boards.  I would expect it to contain gratutious
   sex and violence, the first two did.  While they did entertain me I'd
   never suggest it for teenagers or children.

   Allison

<    <<< Note 851.363 by HDLITE::ZARLENGA "Michael Zarlenga, Alpha P/PEG" >>>

<    re:.362
    
<    Don't you think this is a bit off-track?
    
<    I was (I know I didn't mention it, but I assumed we all knew) talking
<    about adults, not 10-year-olds.

   I got the impression that the concept of "stick and stones... but
   words can never hurt me" was what you were putting forth.  I was trying
   to suggest that is not true and what adults do propagates into 
   childrens language.  It is off the base topic some.  I feel it was
   relevent to what you were trying to point out.  There is no obligation
   to continue that thread.

   Allison

    RE: .365

    What could Dwight respond with that I might consider reasonable?

    Well for starters, he could acknowledge the blatantly obvious flaws
    in his "reasoning" for denigrating gay people.   He goes beyond the
    simple statement that he personally is put off by homosexuality and
    instead makes insulting statements about gay people being perverted
    and living a "disgusting, unhealthy lifestyle."  

    I am in excellent health (thank you very much) and don't like being
    called a pervert.  Is that too much to ask????   Besides, it has
    already been explained that using "unhealthy lifestyle" as a reason
    for attacking gay people is illogical (read, unreasonable).

    I also find his comments about the prevalence of gay bashing to be
    unreasonable.  He clearly is not in possession of any facts concerning
    the issue.  Don't you (Jerry ) think it unreasonable to accuse people
    of exaggerating (or even lying) when you yourself don't know the truth?

    FWIW - I think the comments made here that are unreasonable are
    perfectly obvious and I think *you* know what they are just as well as
    I do.  The only remaining issue is whether people decide to use 
    intelligence and reason rather than gut reaction based on stereotypes and 
    misinformation to continue this discussion.

    /Greg

    Greg, I think Dwight is an example of my personal name:
    
    "Qui scire uelit ipse debet discere" -> "He who would like to know must
    himself learn."  The English equivalent is "You can lead a horse to
    water but you can't make him drink."  You can't teach somebody
    something if he's not ready/willing to learn it.
    
    I don't think Dwight is ready to learn what many people's experiences
    have shown to be true about gays, i.e., that they are plain ordinary
    people whose natural biological orientation is to same-polarity sexual
    relationships.  There are some kite-flyers and some that *nobody* can
    tag, not even another gay.  Same-o same-o with kite-flying straights.
    
    -dick

.369> Well for starters, he could acknowledge the blatantly obvious flaws
.369> in his "reasoning" for denigrating gay people.

Sticky wicket here not the least of which is "blatantly obvious flaws"
in his reasoning.  I'm not sure what those blatant flaws are and believe
me, in my reading of this entire string I've looked for them.  He has
one hell of a difference of opinion on some things but .. that's life.

.369> He goes beyond the simple statement that he personally is put off by
.369> homosexuality and instead makes insulting statements about gay people
.369> being perverted and living a "disgusting, unhealthy lifestyle."  

I can understand and respect that you may feel that this is insulting.  I
ask - is it entirely possible that he did not mean it to be genuinely
*insulting*?  I know, very well, that there are some animal rights activists
who consider me to be "perverted" and "living a disgusting, unhealthy
lifestyle" for the simple reason that I enjoy a good steak and love to
take my .30-.30 out and blast Bambi out of the woods.

Don't get me wrong - it *is* possible that he did mean to be insulting -
but - I'll give you better than even odds that he did not.  I'm not taking
sides with him nor am I saying that I agree with everything that he says.
All I'm trying to do is look for a little common ground for understanding.

.369> I ...  don't like being called a pervert.

I can understand that.  I remember (well) once when I came home in a uniform
and was called a "murder" and "pervert".  Sure, I was repulsed - at first -
but came to realize where those name-callers were coming from why they
were saying what they did.

.369> Is that too much to ask????

Difficult to answer.  The English language is lacking in a number of
respects and when coupled with the inherent inadequacies of this
medium ... I don't know the answer.  I looked up the definition of
"pervert" and "perverse".  One definition was that of "an aberrant
sexual practice".  OK .. aberrant is straying from the norm or "right
way".

Do me a favor - look up the words "pervert" and "perverse" - see if they
are really as obnoxious and insulting as they're normally interpreted to
be.

.369> Besides, it has already been explained that using "unhealthy lifestyle"
.369> as a reason for attacking gay people is illogical (read, unreasonable).

This is what originally bothered me about this string and provided the
impetus for multiple readings.  I didn't see any expressed or implied
statements to the effect that gay people should be attacked.

.369> I also find his comments about the prevalence of gay bashing to be
.369> unreasonable.  He clearly is not in possession of any facts concerning
.369> the issue.  Don't you (Jerry ) think it unreasonable to accuse people
.369> of exaggerating (or even lying) when you yourself don't know the truth?

I don't know what "the truth" is because I haven't really been able to clearly
ascertain what the question is!  I can understand *some* of Dwight's concerns
concerning "bashing".  I, myself, have been dismayed to find that (as I said
elsewhere) some of the "bashing" statistics include verbal abuse.  This
serves to cloud the issue and lead to exaggeration and misunderstanding on
both sides of the issue.

Yes, any-bashing is TERRIBLE.  Yes, physical abuse does exist.  Yes, there
is no cause for such abuse.  Yes, it is on the rise. Yes, it must be stopped.
Anyone could argue endlessly about the statistics and percentages.

.369> I think the comments made here that are unreasonable are
.369> perfectly obvious and I think *you* know what they are just as well as
.369> I do.

I certainly don't agree with everything that is said here.  All I'm trying
to do is that of finding some common ground upon which people can discuss
seriously diverse issues without this incessant name-calling and hurt
feelings and cries of "insulting".  I'm trying desperately to put myself into
the shoes of the other person and see where they're coming from and why.
I respect all opinions.  I try to understand them.  I'll never cease doing
that.

.369> The only remaining issue is whether people decide to use 
.369> intelligence and reason rather than gut reaction based on stereotypes and 
.369> misinformation to continue this discussion.

I'm not going to place myself in a position of trying to decide what is
"intelligence and reason" and what is "gut reaction".  What you consider
intelligence and reason may well be gut reaction to someone else and what
you consider gut reaction could well be viable intelligence and reason by
someone else.  It's all a matter of perspective.

All I'm asking is that we try to settle down and quit the attacking - whether
or not you and/or I agree with someone else is no reason for either of us to
to so show the same type of reverse hatred that we purport to dislike.  Soon
it degenerates and no one "wins".

A good example is that of the word "bigot". Dwight doesn't mind the word
at all - I've been called a "homophobe" so many times that the word has
totally lost it's relevance and meaning.  I can see where Dwight is coming
from on this point.

Another example is that of the Amendment 2 in Colorado.  Some of my best
friends voted FOR it.  I certainly don't call them homophobes or bigots
because of that.  I understand where they're coming from and why the voted
for it.  However, there *are* those who say that anyone who voted for 2
is a "bigot" and a "homophobe".  This is patently W-R-O-N-G.
    
We could go on and on .. all I want to do is see some COMMON ground for
a little understanding of each other's position on this very sensitive
issue.  I am not sure as to where that common ground is but I would sure
like to see EVERYONE working toward it.

Bubba

    Thanks, Dick - I realize this.  I don't actually hold out any
    hope that my interaction with any specific individual here is
    going to make a difference to that individual.  You don't 
    experience a paradigm shift without something much more personal
    taking place, in my opinion.
    
    /Greg
    

    Re: .371
    
    Be careful with dictionary definitions.  Dictionaries don't usually
    provide connotations that would change the reader's interpretation of
    particular words.  Connotations can be as important to communication as
    the words themselves--a consideration that .371 doesn't address, but
    one that makes a difference in emotionally charged topics such as this.
    
    --Pat

    Mr. Madden;

    I am in total agreement with you and admittedly did not address this in
    my note for the simple reasons of brevity.  The "connotations" that you
    speak of are even more pronounced in VAX Notes as the reader is left
    with nothing more than the bare phosphor on the screen for interpretation.

    As long as (relative) calmness and (reasonable) understanding (and NOT
    jumping to conclusions) prevails ... there is no doubt but that we can
    all accomplish something toward a common goal of understanding and
    respect.  That's what it's all about  .. isn't it?
    
    Bubba

    Bubba

    RE: .371

    There comes a point, Jerry, where one feels diplomacy isn't 
    working. If there were any indication of mutual respect and 
    a desire to rationally discuss this, you would never have seen 
    me refer to particular points of view as "bigoted" or "homophobic."   
    I don't use those words lightly.

>It's all a matter of perspective.

    I disagree.  Some of it is very much a matter of logical
    reasoning and knowledge of facts.  Personal feelings/values are
    a different matter, but that isn't what we were discussing.
    Someone originally raised this "unhealthy lifestyle" issue.  That
    is not a matter of perspective - it is a matter of looking at
    the evidence and drawing a conclusion based on that evidence, not
    on some stereotype of gay male behavior or some half-baked notions 
    about the AIDS epidemic.   Oh - regarding the word "attacked" - no,
    no one said they wanted to physically attack gay people - I was using
    the word the same way you do below - I was referring to the slurs and 
    insults.  And give us all a break, please.  Calling anyone perverted and 
    disgusting is indeed an insult.  I don't need to go look up those words 
    in a dictionary

>All I'm asking is that we try to settle down and quit the attacking - whether
>or not you and/or I agree with someone else is no reason for either of us to
>to so show the same type of reverse hatred that we purport to dislike.  Soon
>it degenerates and no one "wins".

    Reverse hatred?  Where have I indicated an attitude about any
    group of people that could be in any way construed as "hatred"
    (or disgust, or even dislike) for that group?   *That* is a sign
    of a bigoted attitude.  Now I don't claim to be free of all forms of
    prejudice, but I believe prejudice is based on ignorance and
    since I don't care to advertise my ignorance on a subject (or
    group of people), I don't parade my prejudices.

    Finally, while I can certainly relate to your purported desire to respect 
    and understand other's opinions (gee, it almost sounds like you want to 
    "value differences"), I don't spend every minute of my noting time in 
    "diplomat" mode.   I believe I was respectful and courteous in my
    initial responses to this string.  I also believe that while my statements 
    about the attitudes displayed by Mr. Berry are harsh, I think they are 
    justified.

    /Greg

    <<< Note 851.360 by HDLITE::ZARLENGA "Michael Zarlenga, Alpha P/PEG" >>>

    
>    Ahhh, burnt by sloppy wording again ... 

	And again....

>Is there any law
>    on any book in any state where you can assault and batter someone with
>    words?
 
	Look up the legal definition of assault. You will find that
	you can assault someone without ever touching them.

Jim

	Physical harm caused by words?  Let's try a hypothetical situation
	just for fun (hey, this is as realistic as the premise in .0). . .

	You own a small business in a small "conservative" town.  Rumors
	begin that you are gay (right or wrong, it doesn't matter).  Because
	of the prevailing attitude in the town, people stop using your
	service or product, and your business goes bankrupt.

	The emotional stress doesn't give you a black eye or broken ribs,
	but anyone who's been working for Digital lately can tell you the 
	physical harm that stress can create.

	I don't know if this adds any light to the conversation, but the
	whole discussion reminds me of a line from a rock song by Rush:

		"How can anybody be enlightened?
		 TRUTH is, after all, so poorly lit"

	Have a great weekend!

		Jon

    Denver District Court Judge Jeff Bayless ruled (at about 4 pm MST today) 
    that Amendment 2 shall not take affect pending a court ruling on the
    amendment's Constitionality.
    
    Look for this one to drag on in the courts for quite a while!

.375> There comes a point, Jerry, where one feels diplomacy isn't 
.375> working.

Absolutely.  You have a "breaking point" and so does Berry, so do I.
You've both obviously reached your individual points.  Nothing wrong 
with that - we all have different levels beyond which nothing productive
will happen.

Being a student of history .. when diplomatic relations cease the
next step is usually war.  Sure, there are times when war is the
only alternative.

I don't like wars.  If I have to fight - I will.  You can bet your
last dollar that I will fight to win but I'm going to my best to
continue "diplomatic discussion" for as long as humanly possible.
I shall do so here.

.375> Someone originally raised this "unhealthy lifestyle" issue.  That
.375> is not a matter of perspective - it is a matter of looking at
.375> the evidence and drawing a conclusion based on that evidence...

May I push this just a little further?  I gave the example of an animal
rights activist thinking that everyone who eats meat is leading an
unhealthy lifestyle.  Is anyone right or wrong "based on the evidence"?

Take, for example the devout Christian and ask his perspective of someone
who is a devout atheist or agnostic.  Will the devout Christian sincerely
and resolutely believe that the atheist lives an "unhealthy lifestyle"?
In all probability - yes.  Is there any "right" or "wrong" based on any
evidence?  No.

It is a matter of perspective.  Again .. perhaps Berry had every intention
of insulting and casting deragatory remarks.  I don't know.

.375> And give us all a break, please.  Calling anyone perverted and 
.375> disgusting is indeed an insult.

Perhaps so.  As I said .. we all have different breaking points.

.375> Finally, while I can certainly relate to your purported desire ..
                                                    ^^^^^^^^^
Is this indicative or some indication of insincerity on my part?
I won't put words into your mouth .. it's just my ... perspective.

.375> ..it almost sounds like you want to  "value differences"

I don't "value" differences .. I respect differences.

Bubba

Captain's log:  "Final entry."

Folks keep talking about this basenote scenario being 'unreal' ... and have
an attitude that it'd never happen.  Sure, not today, but perhaps in the
future.  Can't those people even think it 'remotely possible'?  Years ago,
many people thought we'd never get to the moon... or that the world was flat.
Is Star Trek impossible?  Maybe people like me can't conform to what the future
is destined to become.  Like Kirk had a hard time trusting the Klingons... and
unlike Kirk, Picard... will do well in the next generation... though if a war
broke out... I'd want Kirk to lead the fleet.

I see this note has turned into another topic where the homosexual agenda has
taken over.  I don't have the time nor the desire to fight that fire, so I
suppose the folks supporting the gay agenda can chalk up another victory.

Or did they?


Let me say that while this string may have become a call to the gays to show
Dwight Berry to be a bigot ... let me add that this topic... this conference
... is NOT the voice of the readership.  I have received several mail messages
from people out there who share many of my thoughts and concerns ... people who
are afraid to come out in the open as no one wants to take a pounding as I
have... or others like me.  One person was brave enough to step out.  I guess
my background as a fighter of karate and boxing since age 17 has made me a bit
brash.  Whatever.  But I see this string as going nowhere... least for me.

I'm leaving this string and this conference.  I left it once because I saw it
to represent the PC club for the most part, though some of my friends like the
Z_Man, Bubba and others note here and I certainly don't label them as PC'ers.
No, I don't agree with them either on some issues, but I don't know of anyone
who agrees 100% with anyone else.  Bubba is very practical and logical in
searching for the 'common ground' and makes a lot of sense to me.  Z_Man is one
of the 'best read' b*st*ards that you'll find anywhere on the planet!  If you
want to find out something, chances are, Z has read about it and still has the
issue!  I've met him and drank beers with him.  Good man.  But I don't belong
here.  This conference isn't for me as it usually doesn't give me much insight
or serve me 95% of the time.

You'll not read anymore of my bigoted notes.  I have made my positions clear on
the subject of homosexuality and I let the homosexual noters here turn me and
this topic into something that I didn't want.  I see homosexuality as being a
perverted practice, so I am now name calling.  Yet I am quickly labeled as
ignorant, uniformed, and a bigot.  This is notes, so I have to watch my step.
Out of notes, off of DEC soil, I don't have to be so polite if I don't wanna.

I would hope that if I had busted some policy or over-stepped my grounds that
Steve would quickly let me know and delete my notes.  He's done it before.  I
don't hold it agin him either.  It's his job.  To date, he has deleted nothing
in this string... at least not written by me.

In closing, let me say that I did recently receive some information... the kind
of info that I really appreciated and was pleased to receive and read.  It made
me back up and rethink some of my views.  It came from a gay.  This gay does
NOT support the gay agenda.  In fact, this person takes a very firm stance
against it and dissociates themselves with it.  This person really opened up to
me and shared some feelings and thoughts about themselves that reached down
inside me and made me give a good listen.  I was touched by much of what this
person told me.  This is the kind of person that helps people like me
understand their position a little more and provoke thought.

But I STILL hope I never see a movie like LW-10 !

"Destination Captain?"

"First star to the right and on till morning..."

.380> Folks keep talking about this basenote scenario being 'unreal' ... and have
.380> an attitude that it'd never happen.  Sure, not today, but perhaps in the
.380> future.  Can't those people even think it 'remotely possible'?  

Obviously, Dwight never saw "Kiss of the Spider Woman."  ;-)

Good luck, Mr. Berry.  You're obviously a fighter, and I have to admire you
for that, if I can't agree with you on this particular issue.

Jon

.380> Folks keep talking about this basenote scenario being 'unreal' ... 
.380> an attitude that it'd never happen.  Sure, not today, but perhaps in the
.380> future.  Can't those people even think it 'remotely possible'?  

You're absolutely correct, Mr. Berry.  It most assuredly *can* happen.  I
have seen things on prime time television that ten years ago I would have
thought virtually IMPOSSIBLE and out of the question.

And no, Mr. Berry ... I don't want to see the LW-10 scenario either.

.381> Good luck, Mr. Berry.  You're obviously a fighter, and I have to admire
.381> you for that..

A hearty agreement.  I genuinely admire a person that demonstrates courage of
their convictions - my particular agreement or disagreement with the issues
is of little or no consequence.  Although it may not be politically correct
to admire one who fights (not just physically) under adverse circumstances ...
I most assuredly do.

Though I sincerely regret the departure I understand and respect Mr. Berry's
reasons for leaving the note and the conference. I concur in Jon's wishes of
"good luck".  I shall seek out Mr. Berry the next time I come to Colorado
and look forward to meeting him in person - not only to perpetuate a friendship
but to show him that Z-man is a wimp when it comes to beer-drinking.

Good luck, Dwight!

Bubba

| <<< Note 851.380 by COMET::BERRY "Dwight Berry" >>>



| Let me say that while this string may have become a call to the gays to show
| Dwight Berry to be a bigot 

	Actually Dwight, I'm sure the thought came to many without anyone ever
saying a word.... how? Well.... with your own words.

| ... let me add that this topic... this conference
| ... is NOT the voice of the readership.  I have received several mail messages
| from people out there who share many of my thoughts and concerns ... people who
| are afraid to come out in the open as no one wants to take a pounding as I
| have... or others like me.  

	Dwight, I think everyone here know's that there are many other's like
you. Really, no one is disputing that. I'm sure everyone would agree with you
when you say that you received mail by others. Where we don't seem to have 
any facts is in the area of this topic/conference being or not being the voice 
of the readership. It's funny to think in mennotes that the majority wouldn't 
speak up..... like it would suddenly change like that..... :-)

| One person was brave enough to step out.  I guess
| my background as a fighter of karate and boxing since age 17 has made me a bit
| brash.  Whatever.  

	Hmmmmm..... I thought it had more to do with your words, myself.... the
reasons you listed above might have something to do with your views though....
it's tough to say.

| But I see this string as going nowhere... least for me.

	Because many really don't agree with what you are saying? Because many
are offering very good inputs that refute your examples (many which haven't as
of yet been backed by any facts)? Hmmmm.....

| I'm leaving this string and this conference.  I left it once because I saw it
| to represent the PC club for the most part, though some of my friends like the
| Z_Man, Bubba and others note here and I certainly don't label them as PC'ers.

	This being a PC notesfile? Hmmmmm......

| No, I don't agree with them either on some issues, but I don't know of anyone
| who agrees 100% with anyone else.  Bubba is very practical and logical in
| searching for the 'common ground' and makes a lot of sense to me.  

	I'm not so sure that common ground will be found. I have read many of
Bubba's responses to many issues. Yes, he can be VERY diplomatic, but at the
same time his notes remain the way they started out, either for or against any
given issue. Which is fine. But whenever a tough question has been asked, then
there is a note by Bubba playing devil's advocate. Which in itself is fine too,
if the origional question were answered first. Like I said, diplomatic, yes, 
anything else.....

| Yet I am quickly labeled as
| ignorant, uniformed, and a bigot.  This is notes, so I have to watch my step.

	Dwight, you are the one who has offered NO proof to back your claims.
Many people in this file have offered you proof against what seem to be "your
views". Give proof to back your claims and then you have something.....

| Out of notes, off of DEC soil, I don't have to be so polite if I don't wanna.

	True....... funny how that ends up in a note that has talked about
violence.....

| In closing, let me say that I did recently receive some information... the kind
| of info that I really appreciated and was pleased to receive and read.  It made
| me back up and rethink some of my views.  It came from a gay.  This gay does
| NOT support the gay agenda.  In fact, this person takes a very firm stance
| against it and dissociates themselves with it.  This person really opened up to
| me and shared some feelings and thoughts about themselves that reached down
| inside me and made me give a good listen.  I was touched by much of what this
| person told me.  This is the kind of person that helps people like me
| understand their position a little more and provoke thought.

	Gee, I bet I could name that person in one try! :-) No, not me......
Funny, this person also doesn't support gays to do something that he's been
doing for years......  hmmmmm.......





Glen

.383> Where we don't seem to have any facts is in the area of this
.383> topic/conference being or not being the voice  of the readership.

Read for comprehension, Glen.  You'll never know what the real voice
of the *read*ership is for the simple reason that the mechanism is
not available to tell how many people are *read*ing this conference
(that is to say, and not replying openly).

.383> It's funny to think in mennotes that the majority wouldn't 
.383> speak up..... like it would suddenly change like that..... :-)

Read for comprehension, Glen.  Read Dwight's commentary about the "parade".
A lot of people just don't have the time nor the inclination to deal with
stuff like that.

.383> Because many really don't agree with what you are saying? Because many
.383> are offering very good inputs that refute your examples (many which
.383> haven't as of yet been backed by any facts)?

Read for comprehension, Glen.  I don't know the "many" who really don't
agree with what Dwight is saying.  I don't know what "very good inputs"
are refuting examples .. and as to "facts" ... I can count the "facts"
on a few fingers - the emotions are innumerable.

.383> I'm not so sure that common ground will be found.

This is called a "defeatist" attitude.

.383> Give proof to back your claims and then you have something.....

(1) what "claims" is he making and (2) what proof would you accept that
those claims are ... false?

As to Mr. Berry's correspondence ...

.383> Funny, this person also doesn't support gays to do something
.383> that he's been doing for years......
           ^^^^
I have read Dwight's note more than once and can't find a single indication
that the individual Dwight is speaking of is a "he".  This is called
"jumping to conclusions".

Read it again, Glen.  For comprehension.

Bubba

| <<< Note 851.384 by MORO::BEELER_JE "Johnny Paycheck time ..." >>>



| .383> Where we don't seem to have any facts is in the area of this
| .383> topic/conference being or not being the voice  of the readership.

| Read for comprehension, Glen.  You'll never know what the real voice
| of the *read*ership is for the simple reason that the mechanism is
| not available to tell how many people are *read*ing this conference

	Errrr.... Bubba, that IS what I said. Reread the exerpt you took from
my note and you will see I said the same thing. The words "being or not being"
sort of give that indication.

| .383> Because many really don't agree with what you are saying? Because many
| .383> are offering very good inputs that refute your examples (many which
| .383> haven't as of yet been backed by any facts)?

| Read for comprehension, Glen.  I don't know the "many" who really don't
| agree with what Dwight is saying.  

	Bubba, Dwight was talking about those who were writing in this file to
his notes. Based on that it seems as though only about 5-10% of the people 
agree with him.

| I don't know what "very good inputs"
| are refuting examples .. and as to "facts" ... I can count the "facts"
| on a few fingers - the emotions are innumerable.

	Emotions are high Bubba, but why not list those "facts" that you can
count on a few fingers? I'd be interested in seeing that.

| .383> I'm not so sure that common ground will be found.

| This is called a "defeatist" attitude.

	Bubba, Dwight has already stated his views. He has also stated that he
doesn't want to listen to anything different than his views, while all we ask
for is a little fact to back those very views. It appears anyway, that none
will be given. If there is a defeatists attitude, well, it ain't coming from
us....

| .383> Give proof to back your claims and then you have something.....

| (1) what "claims" is he making and (2) what proof would you accept that
| those claims are ... false?

	Bubba, as for what claims he is making, go back and reread HIS notes
and you will see. As far as what proof would be accepted, no one can really
say. I don't know what proof he has to begin with. 

| .383> Funny, this person also doesn't support gays to do something
| .383> that he's been doing for years......
             ^^^^

| I have read Dwight's note more than once and can't find a single indication
| that the individual Dwight is speaking of is a "he".  This is called
| "jumping to conclusions".

	True Bubba, but a very good jump from what I can see..... and I'm sure
deep inside you know I'm right too..... but then again......maybe I'm not.
Should I list the name?




Glen

    	I honestly believe that this topic has gone totally into the rat's
    hole, out again and is running toward a toxic waste pool.....
    
    	The Topic asks: How Open Minded are *YOU* about homosexuality?
    
    	Now some folks have stated that they are very open minded and have
    little or no problems with it. They feel comfortable and are at ease
    with the subject and those who embrace it liberally.
    
    	On the other hand, some folks have stated that they are very
    uncomfortable with the subject, the practices, and the beliefs. Thay
    stated the reasons why.....
    
    	Now all of a sudden, the people who are not open minded about it
    are wrong, bigots, fag bashers, etc. What I've been witness to, is the
    ability of some to twist the written word and assume a statement meant
    more than was written. A liberty that many people take in notes. Here
    an example: "I went across the street for a cup of coffee." The
    response comes back: " You walked across the street to the coffee shop
    and had a little Columbian." No one said anything about walking, a
    shop, or Columbian coffee. Then the original noter has to defend and
    redefend and redefend because he didn't embrace the politically correct
    stand of the moment. 
    
    	Another problem is that some of us are not gifted with the use of
    the written word. Statements appear to be terse, often very harsh. That 
    inability to write in a style other than straight forward and honest
    often leaves the author open for attacks.
    
    	The other style of response is the one I hate most....where a
    response asks questions that the original author never even alluded to. 
    Example: So you don't believe that XXXX have the same rights as anyone
    else...?? Response: 'I never said anything about XXXX not having the
    same rights....I think that they shouldn't have special rights." Now
    the person has been baited into the arena and has no weapons.
    
    	Stop the badgering of people with different points of view. They
    have their right to disagree. Right or wrong, they have the right to
    freedom of thought, speech and assembly. 
    
    	The other problem is "I'm only trying to explain to XX that he's
    got this wrong." Ever think that maybe...just maybe he's not wrong? 
    Maybe you're wrong. Maybe......you're both wrong.
    
    	If you ask a question that requests an individual response, then
    you must expect an individual answer. This is NOT 1+1=2. This is a
    question of feelings, beliefs, and upbringing. Those things will not be
    changed by badgering or assaulting the person's point of view. If
    anything it confirms them.......and the people confirming them are the
    ones who wish to see the change.
    
    Ken
       

I know he's gone, but someone asked earlier what Dwight could 
possibly say that would make people happy (or satisfy them, 
or some such thing). Here are a few things I would have liked to hear. 

1. Saying that "curing homosexuals" and "curing pedophiles" is an analogy 
implies that there's some similarity in the two behaviors. There is no 
similarity between loving (emotionally and physically) another human being 
and raping children.

2. I know that some homosexuals abuse children. However, most child abuse is 
committed by heterosexuals. 

3. Bashing someone because of their sexual orientation is a civil rights 
violation that should be prosecuted.

4. Discrimination in housing or employment on the basis of sexual orientation 
is a civil rights violation that should be prosecuted.

5. Telling gays/lesbians to "get help" if they're being bashed or 
discriminated against, is like telling assault and battery victims "Don't 
worry, just get help."

6. If I found out that one of my closest friends was gay, I wouldn't treat 
him any differently. We would continue to be good friends and to do all of 
the things we used to do. I would fight for (or at least vote for) laws that 
give him protection against discrimination because of his sexual orientation.

7. I realize that most gays and lesbians do not engage in the kinds of 
activities that I find particularly offensive, such as dressing up in 
outlandish outfits and marching in parades or throwing blood at priests in 
a cathedral. Most of them lead a lifestyle similar to any heterosexual 
working person. 

8. I use the term "homosexual lifestyle," but I can't tell you what that means.

9. I have said that gays want special rights, but I really can't think of 
one thing they want that is "special."

Mike

>       <<< Note 851.364 by MORO::BEELER_JE "Johnny Paycheck time ..." >>>
>                               -< The IDF ....  >-
>society.  One should also realize that there is no "separation of church
>and state" in Israel as in the United States.  In Israel the church *is*
>the state.

       When Colorado For Family Values pushes their religious agenda here
       in Colorado to discriminate against Gays and Lesbians we residents
       of Colorado Springs realize that the "Seperation of Church and
       State" only works one way.

       They are not too happy that a Denver Judge ruled that Amendment 2
       could not be put into law last Friday.
       
>actions.  One of my "complaints" with some of the so-called hate crime
>statistics is that they consider and rate "verbal abuse" right along with
>"physical" hate crimes.

       In Colorado, Police do not count ANY assault on Gays and Lesbians as
       hate crimes, be it verbal or physical.

       Patrick

    
    -1
    
    > When Colorado for Family Values pushes their religious
    
     It was not the CFV that pushed it, they presented it, the voters by
    a majority vote " SAID YES" and pushed it into law. I voted YES on
    A2 and regretted that decision later on, but I swear to God if I see
    one more pathetic knee jerk liberal actor telling an audience to ban
    Colorado I will personally gather signatures for the Recall on Romer
    and start attending church with Doctor Dobson..  The local gay
    community have painted themselves as spoiled brats that are gonna make
    everybody suffer cuz they lost on A2. I wonder if they stopped to
    ponder the effect of a ban on Colorado?? It sure as hell will not
    effect the courts ulitimate decision, they are immune to the ban. The
    people that are suffering are the ones that DO NOT have the immediate
    authority to change the law but sure as hell are less likely to after
    this stunt..........
    
    Flame-off
    David

.386> -< ReRead the Topic ...stop the badgering >-

Want to talk "badgering"? Take a look at response .387.

.386> I honestly believe that this topic has gone totally into the rat's
.386> hole, out again and is running toward a toxic waste pool.....

You got that right.  Al Gore would have this note declared an environmental
disaster.
    
.386> The Topic asks: How Open Minded are *YOU* about homosexuality?

Amen, amen, amen.  Some people are .. some aren't .. some just plain
don't give a damn.  For those who aren't (what others consider to be
"open-minded") they're to do as .387 indicates and fall on their sword
to make others happy.  Incredible.

Bubba

.387> I know he's gone, but someone asked earlier what Dwight could 
.387> possibly say that would make people happy (or satisfy them, 
.387> or some such thing). Here are a few things I would have liked to hear. 

And someone who doesn't agree with all of your elements is perhaps
a "bigot" and not "open-minded" and .. even .. neigh ... "homophobic"?

I'm not putting words into your mouth .. I'm asking a question.

Bubba

    re .391
    
    No, Bubba, someone who doesn't agree isn't necessarily any of the
    things you name.  Unless he or shee exhibits a categorical
    unwillingness to consider the *possibility* that he or she might be -
    even in part - wrong.  Then he or she is closed-minded or, depending on
    the topic, a bigot.
    
    At least one of the people noting in this string has exhibited such an
    unwillingness by making remarks categorizing all gays without exception
    as kite flyers (effeminate or otherwise "unusual" in behavior).  But
    the simple fact is that not all gays behave in that manner; hence the
    person's remarks are demonstrably in error, yet the person simply
    repeated the claim as fact.  That is an example of closed-minded
    bigotry.  Period.
    
    -dick

    
    > that he or she might be even part - wrong
    
     Can't somebody be totally right?
    
    David

.392> ...remarks categorizing all gays without exception as kite flyers
.392> (effeminate or otherwise "unusual" in behavior).  But the simple
.392> fact is that not all gays behave in that manner; hence the person's
.392> remarks are demonstrably in error, yet the person simply repeated
.392> the claim as fact.  That is an example of closed-minded bigotry. Period.

I'll certainly agree that such remarks are "demonstrably in error".  As
to "closed-minded" .. don't know .. what's the difference between closed
minded and uneducated?

As to "bigot" .. well .. the definition is: one obstinately or intolerantly
devoted to his own church, party, belief, or opinion.   We may all be
"bigots" to some extent.

Bubba

Getting back to the base note .....

The base note doesn't provide a good test of my acceptance or non-acceptance of
homosexuality. Films are there for entertainment and to tell a story. If the bed
scene was part of the story and necessary for me to understand some basic aspect
of a character or the story line - then I'd accept that. You can question the 
necessity of sex scenes (and violence too) in many films - they're often there 
to titillate and excite.

In the Crying Game, the innocent relationship between a hetero man and a tran-
sexual is explored. Innocent in that the hetero man doesn't know that the guy
is a transexual. They build a relationship and then comes the bed scene. I 
enjoyed the film - it was well done but that doesn't test my support of homo
sexual life, or relationships.

Homesexuals are people. They have feelings, loves, hates and all the rest. Why 
shouldn't society accept them - by that I mean not to discriminate against them -
and to provide for them within the social structure.

I wouldn't raise my son to believe that homosexuality was normal. I wouldn't
raise my son to believe that he should not only have a girlfriend but he should
try out the boys too. I would however raise my son to accept that homosexuals are
people and that they live on this planet too.

Paul.

| <<< Note 851.394 by MORO::BEELER_JE "Johnny Paycheck time ..." >>>



| I'll certainly agree that such remarks are "demonstrably in error".  As
| to "closed-minded" .. don't know .. what's the difference between closed
| minded and uneducated?

	When someone says that he isn't willing to listen to anyone to be
educated, then that is closed minded. 

| As to "bigot" .. well .. the definition is: one obstinately or intolerantly
| devoted to his own church, party, belief, or opinion.   We may all be
| "bigots" to some extent.

	Agreed. But most people, when it's pointed out to them, at least try
and see if what is being said is actually true. 



Glen

                      <<< Note 851.395 by GYMAC::PNEAL >>>
 
<In the Crying Game, the innocent relationship between a hetero man and a tran-
<sexual is explored. Innocent in that the hetero man doesn't know that the guy
<is a transexual. They build a relationship and then comes the bed scene. I 
<enjoyed the film - it was well done but that doesn't test my support of homo
<sexual life, or relationships.

   If this example is to illustrate that things can be tasefully done
   when the subject is not understood and can conflict with our knowledge
   of the way things should be, that is a valid example.  Do not confuse
   homosexuality with transsexuality, they are very different things and
   deal with very different issues in a persons life.  Many people do not
   understand homosexuality, introducing something that is rare and not 
   understood by the general public would further confuse the issue.

   Allison

.395> The base note doesn't provide a good test of my acceptance or
.395> non-acceptance of homosexuality.

You are absolutely correct.  I could probably count the number of movies
that I've seen in the last 10 years on ... well .. probably 5 fingers.

I thoroughly enjoy what is commonly called the "classics" and still think
that one can make good movies without the language and sex that seems
to pervade the movies of today.  Not only does the language and sex turn
me off but this constant violence_for_the_sake_of_violence is just as
bad.

Indeed .. I can swear like a Marine and I like sex .. but .. that's not
what I go to the movies to see - as such - I most assuredly could care
less about the scene that is described in the base note - I don't want
to see it but that does not make me a homophobe or a bigot.  Really a
mute point for I have not and will not see any of the LW movies.

Ah .... for the days of "Casablanca", "African Queen", "Citizen Kane" ..
and others ....

The SAD fact of the matter is that sex and violence sells ... a very
sad commentary on society.

Bubba

.393>    > that he or she might be even part - wrong
    
.393>     Can't somebody be totally right?
    
.393>    David


Maybe you're asking this question rhetorically, but, I'd say the answer
is "no."

I had a high school teacher who used to like to say, "There are ALMOST no
absolutes in the universe."  So, no somebody can't be totally right. . . 
usually.

By the same token, somebody can't be totally wrong, either, and we should
remember that when "attacking" a person's viewpoint which we find
disagreeable.

The "right" answer, especially in an emotionally charged matter, may be
unknowable.  We can only stick to our opinions.  Maybe there really is no
common ground.

Jon

851.365 (MORO::BEELER_JE)
>Let me turn this around - what do *you* want Dwight to do? Better yet,
>what do you want him to say that you would consider to be "reasonable"?
                                                           

851.387 (CADSYS::BELANGER)
(this note was written by me)
>someone asked earlier what Dwight could possibly say that would make people 
>happy (or satisfy them, or some such thing). Here are a few things I would 
>have liked to hear.
      

851.390 (MORO::BEELER_JE)       
>Want to talk "badgering"? Take a look at response .387.

Give me a break. You asked "what do you want him to say that you would 
consider to be "reasonable"?" and I listed 9 things I consider to be 
reasonable. If you don't want the answer, don't ask the question.

By the way, which of my statements do *you* think are unreasonable? 

Mike

851.391 (MORO::BEELER_JE)
>And someone who doesn't agree with all of your elements is perhaps
>a "bigot" and not "open-minded" and .. even .. neigh ... "homophobic"?
>I'm not putting words into your mouth .. I'm asking a question.

Again, *you* asked what Dwight could say that would sound reasonable to me. 
I responded. If Dwight had said the things I listed in .387, he would have 
sounded (at least more) reasonable to me.

And, yes, if a person keeps bringing up how homosexuals rape children, 
knowing full well that most child abuse is comitted by heterosexuals, I'd 
call him a bigot and a homophobe. If a person keeps saying that gays want 
"special" rights that heterosexuals don't have, but can't name one of 
these special rights, I'd call him a bigot and a homophobe. If a person finds 
out his closest friend is gay and then calls that person "disgusting" and 
"perverted", I'd call him a bigot and a homophobe. 

What the hell do "bigot" and "homophobe" mean to you?

Mike

>    <<< Note 851.389 by COMET::DYBEN "Grey area is found by not looking" >>>
>                         -< Winning Support for A2.. >-

    
>     It was not the CFV that pushed it, they presented it, the voters by
>    a majority vote " SAID YES" and pushed it into law. I voted YES on

       Who paid for all the TV commercials and Gazette Telegraph Ads,
       the voters or CFV?
       
>    A2 and regretted that decision later on, but I swear to God if I see
>    one more pathetic knee jerk liberal actor telling an audience to ban
>    Colorado I will personally gather signatures for the Recall on Romer
>    and start attending church with Doctor Dobson..  The local gay
>    community have painted themselves as spoiled brats that are gonna make
>    everybody suffer cuz they lost on A2. I wonder if they stopped to
>    ponder the effect of a ban on Colorado?? It sure as hell will not
>    effect the courts ulitimate decision, they are immune to the ban. The
>    people that are suffering are the ones that DO NOT have the immediate
>    authority to change the law but sure as hell are less likely to after
>    this stunt..........

       What could the Gay and Lesbian community have done that would get
       national attention better than a boycott?

       Do you think the local Gay and Lesbian community are 'spoiled brats'
       because they challenge the Constitionality of A2?

       Patrick

>       What could the Gay and Lesbian community have done that would get
>       national attention better than a boycott?

I think they're doing the right thing by attacking A2 in the courts.  Mayor
Webb of Denver said right after the election (and justifiably) that voters
in Colorado are quite "contrary" (his word).  We won't react to boycotts by
rolling over and saying, "yes, yes, you were right all along."

I think it's clear (if you believe opinion polls) that the boycott serves
only to galvanize support on both sides, not many minds were changed.

I believe that opponents of Amendment 2 will eventually win in the courts,
but the boycott won't be the reason.

Jon
 

       <<< Note 851.394 by MORO::BEELER_JE "Johnny Paycheck time ..." >>>

>what's the difference between closed
>minded and uneducated?

	The willingness to be educated.

Jim

>                    <<< Note 851.401 by CADSYS::BELANGER >>>


       I would like to add something that sometimes gets forgotten;
       that some Gays and Lesbians do not have sex; ie they are celibate
       just like some Heterosexuals.  Thus when someone says that
       "Homosexuals are disgusting." it says to me that they cannot
       distinguish between individuals and their behavior.

       Some heterosexuals have same sex (prison) but are not homosexual. 
       Many, if not most, Gays and Lesbians I know have had sex with
       members of the opposite sex, but remain Gay or Lesbian.

       Patrick

>    <<< Note 851.403 by COMET::BRONCO::TANGUY "Armchair Rocket Scientist" >>>
>                             -< take 'em to court >-

>>       What could the Gay and Lesbian community have done that would get
>>       national attention better than a boycott?

>I think they're doing the right thing by attacking A2 in the courts.  Mayor
>Webb of Denver said right after the election (and justifiably) that voters
>in Colorado are quite "contrary" (his word).  We won't react to boycotts by
>rolling over and saying, "yes, yes, you were right all along."

       I see a distinction between the two tactics.  IMO the boycott was to
       call attention to A2 on a national level mostly for people outside
       of Colorado.  The court challenge was to get A2 ruled
       unconsitutional and thus thrown out.
       
>I think it's clear (if you believe opinion polls) that the boycott serves
>only to galvanize support on both sides, not many minds were changed.

>I believe that opponents of Amendment 2 will eventually win in the courts,
>but the boycott won't be the reason.

       Agreed.

       Patrick

.400> Give me a break. You asked "what do you want him to say that you would 
.400> consider to be "reasonable"?" and I listed 9 things I consider to be 
.400> reasonable. If you don't want the answer, don't ask the question.

You are absolutely correct .. I did use the word "reasonable" ... my apology
for not taking better care in my inquiry (which was originally directed at
Mr. Schuler) and my response.

.400> By the way, which of my statements do *you* think are unreasonable? 

What is reasonable is certainly a matter of perspective.  You obviously 
consider your requests to be reasonable - and I'm sure others will do the
same.  I would certainly consider them "reasonable" but would not agree
with some of the elements that you requested - that is to say - I would
not request the same elements as you've requested and were I in Berry's
shoes I would not agree to all of them, as I do not agree with all of
them.

.401> If Dwight had said the things I listed in .387, he would have 
.401> sounded (at least more) reasonable to me.

I'll see if I can respond to your statements.

.401> What the hell do "bigot" and "homophobe" mean to you?

These days ... very little.  The terms have been so seriously diluted as to
have lost their significance.  By example, friends of mine who voted FOR the
Amendment 2 in Colorado have been called "bigoted" and "homophobic".  This
is simply not true.

This is regrettable.

Bubba

looks like you ducked the hard questions, Bubba.  Belanger said explicitly
" By the way, which of my statements do *you* think are unreasonable? " and
all you did was shilly-shally about matters of perspective.  He answered your
question, you owe him the same courtesy, I think.

DougO

>1. Saying that "curing homosexuals" and "curing pedophiles" is an analogy 
>implies that there's some similarity in the two behaviors.

I missed the "implication".  Sure, there are those who believe that there
is a one-to-one relationship but I'm not at all sure that this was intended
here.  Perhaps it was.  Perhaps it wasn't.  I don't believe there is a 1-1.

>2. I know that some homosexuals abuse children. However, most child abuse is 
>committed by heterosexuals. 

Statistically, I believe that you are correct.

>3. Bashing someone because of their sexual orientation is a civil rights 
>violation that should be prosecuted.

Bashing anyone is wrong and such acts should be prosecuted without preference
to race, color, creed, national origin or sexual orientation with respect to
the crime and punishment.

>4. Discrimination in housing or employment on the basis of sexual orientation 
>is a civil rights violation that should be prosecuted.

    Sorry, I'm not a fan of "legislation" in areas such as this.  I don't
    know if Dwight would agree to this.  I wouldn't.

>5. Telling gays/lesbians to "get help" if they're being bashed or 
>discriminated against, is like telling assault and battery victims "Don't 
>worry, just get help."

I think that a lot of people jumped to conclusions on this statement - perhaps
poorly worded on the author's part.

>6. If I found out that one of my closest friends was gay, I wouldn't treat 
>him any differently.

I'm not sure that this was said anywhere .. that he would treat a friend
(who was found out to be gay) differently.  Correct me if I'm wrong.
I could personally care less if a friend was gay.
    
>I would fight for (or at least vote for) laws that 
>give him protection against discrimination because of his sexual orientation.

I could not and will not agree with this.  I don't consider "fighting for" and
"voting for" legislative protection to be prerequisite for NOT being called
a bigot or homophobe.  I do not support nor will I vote for any legislative
"gay rights" and I certainly have more than one gay friend who is in complete
agreement with me on this subject.

>7. I realize that most gays and lesbians do not engage in the kinds of 
>activities that I find particularly offensive, such as ...

How could he possibly agree to this?  I think that it was patently obvious
that he has few or no gay friends - how could he "realize" this?

>8. I use the term "homosexual lifestyle," but I can't tell you what that means.

Ha! Ha! Ha!  Most homosexuals can't tell you what it means!

>9. I have said that gays want special rights, but I really can't think of 
>one thing they want that is "special."

I don't know where (in this string) this has a basis .. you may be right ..
I don't know.

Bubba

| <<< Note 851.407 by MORO::BEELER_JE "Johnny Paycheck time ..." >>>




| .401> What the hell do "bigot" and "homophobe" mean to you?

| These days ... very little.  The terms have been so seriously diluted as to
| have lost their significance.  



	Bubba, what did it mean to you before?



Glen

    Oh .. and if you want them individually categorized as "reasonable" and
    "unreasonable" from MY perspective .. let me know.
    
    Bubba

| <<< Note 851.409 by MORO::BEELER_JE "Johnny Paycheck time ..." >>>



| >4. Discrimination in housing or employment on the basis of sexual orientation
| >is a civil rights violation that should be prosecuted.

| Sorry, I'm not a fan of "legislation" in areas such as this.  I don't
| know if Dwight would agree to this.  I wouldn't.

	Can you explain why? I'm curious about this.

| >I would fight for (or at least vote for) laws that
| >give him protection against discrimination because of his sexual orientation.

| I could not and will not agree with this.  I don't consider "fighting for" and
| "voting for" legislative protection to be prerequisite for NOT being called
| a bigot or homophobe.  

	I agree with you on this Bubba. But only depending upon the reasons
behind why they wouldn't vote/fight. If the reason is because they really don't
care one way or the other, then fine. It's acceptable. Not a very well liked
response, but acceptable. I wouldn't call that person a bigot or homophobe.
Just someone who could care less either way. BUT, if the reason(s) for not
wanting to vote/fight are out of hate, then they are both a bigot and
homophobe. 

| I do not support nor will I vote for any legislative
| "gay rights" and I certainly have more than one gay friend who is in complete
| agreement with me on this subject.

	Can you tell us why?

| >7. I realize that most gays and lesbians do not engage in the kinds of
| >activities that I find particularly offensive, such as ...

| How could he possibly agree to this?  I think that it was patently obvious
| that he has few or no gay friends - how could he "realize" this?

	Bubba, I think it had to do with him NOT wanting to even realize this.
Many gays were telling him otherwise and he still thought the same. Many
heterosexuals said the same (which made me think that they took some time to
find out) and his view hadn't changed. So his realizing it has NOTHING to do
with it. His NOT wanting to has everything to do with it.

| >8. I use the term "homosexual lifestyle," but I can't tell you what that means.

| Ha! Ha! Ha!  Most homosexuals can't tell you what it means!

	What does it mean to you Bubba?




Glen

.412> Can you explain why? I'm curious about this.

"Can" I or "will" I?  Yes, I can.  Will I?  No.  I tire of this
diatribe and don't like fighting battles that are not worth winning.

.412> Can you tell us why?

"Can" I?  Yes.  Will I?  No.  See above.
    
RE: "the homosexual lifestyle"
.412> What does it mean to you Bubba?

Damned if I know.  I have very few gay friends, but, they tend to
hysterical laughter when I ask them (inane) questions such as this.
    
Bubba

>>> RE: "the homosexual lifestyle"
>>> .412> What does it mean to you Bubba?
>>>
>>> Damned if I know.  I have very few gay friends, but, they tend to
>>> hysterical laughter when I ask them (inane) questions such as this.
    
>>> Bubba
    
    . . . and just what, I might ask, is the "heterosexual lifestyle."
    
    Yeah, it's an inane question.
    
    
    				Jon
    

.414> . . . and just what, I might ask, is the "heterosexual lifestyle."

Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!  Love it!  I can answer this one!

I just showed my next door neighbor this question .. she said: "it's
when a male and female get married, two years later - the guy and his
next door neighbors [like Bubba] are messing up the living room with
smoke, snacks, yelling, screaming and cussing while the Dallas Cowboys
are playing - hollering for more snacks and beer from the kitchen while
the wife is trying to calm a one year old baby and at the same time
running the supply train for snacks and beer to the living room that
makes the logistics for Desert Storm look like a kindergarten exercise.

"After the football game the guys keep talking about how good Dallas was and
how bad Buffalo is and they proceed to the local brewery to have *more*
snacks, yelling screaming and cussing while the wife stays home and
changes the baby .. vacuums the floor .. fumigates the house .. washes the
dishes ... and ... FIXES DINNER for the guys".  "That", she says, "is the
heterosexual lifestyle".

Bubba

.360> And again....
    
    No, not really.  I was careful that time and wrote assault and batter,
    not assault or batter.

    re: "curing homosexuals"
    
    Actually, I think the problem with the phrase "curing homosexuals" has
    nothing to do with any other similar statements ("curing pedophiles")
    but rather that a cure implies a disease.

	You know Bubba, I knew you wouldn't answer the questions. What I have
been seeing happen with you is whenever a question is asked of you to explain
your position, you end up doing one of 3 things. You either avoid it as you
have done so well in this topic, twist it around to ask the same question to
the other person without ever answering it or you send mail. You never seem to
make your "real" position known in notes. It's funny, actually, if you look at
it.....



Glen

>1. Saying that "curing homosexuals" and "curing pedophiles" is an analogy
>implies that there's some similarity in the two behaviors.

>>I missed the "implication".  Sure, there are those who believe that there
>>is a one-to-one relationship but I'm not at all sure that this was intended
>>here.  Perhaps it was.  Perhaps it wasn't.  I don't believe there is a 1-1.
                                                             
Let's say that I say "Boxing should be banned. After all, assault and battery 
is a criminal offense." Any "analogy" there? Is it a good analogy? Would you 
understand it if boxers got a little upset being compared to criminals?
             
>2. I know that some homosexuals abuse children. However, most child abuse is
>committed by heterosexuals.

>>Statistically, I believe that you are correct.

Yeah, but can you understand what's happening here? It's like repeating the 
myth over and over that Jews control the world banking system even though 
you know it isn't so. No harm meant, right?


>4. Discrimination in housing or employment on the basis of sexual orientation
>is a civil rights violation that should be prosecuted.

>>Sorry, I'm not a fan of "legislation" in areas such as this.  I don't
>>know if Dwight would agree to this.  I wouldn't.

Guess we disagree here. To deny a competent, fully-qualified person a job 
based solely on that person's sexual preference is a civil rights violation 
that should be prosecuted.

>6. If I found out that one of my closest friends was gay, I wouldn't treat
>him any differently.

>>I'm not sure that this was said anywhere .. that he would treat a friend
>>(who was found out to be gay) differently....

This is a question that was asked repeatedly, and that Dwight never bothered 
to answer. He might have answered "I wouldn't treat him differently," in 
which case I would have had no quarrel with Dwight. He'd be saying that 
sexual orientation doesn't matter. But he might have answered "Yes, it would 
make a difference. Homosexuals are perverted disgusting individuals 
living an unhealthy lifestyle." In which case I'd call him a homophobe.

>7. I realize that most gays and lesbians do not engage in the kinds of
>activities that I find particularly offensive, such as ...

>>How could he possibly agree to this?  I think that it was patently obvious
>>that he has few or no gay friends - how could he "realize" this?

Because if gays are approximately 10% of the population and the number of 
people engaging in such activities is a couple of hundred or a few thousand, 
that means that "most gays and lesbians do not engage in the kinds of
activities that I find particularly offensive." Simple math. 

Mike

    
    
    	re:  .415	Bubba's next door neighbor's definition of
    			the "heterosexual lifestyle."
    
    
    	 ;-)  gawd, i don't miss that scene at all!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
    
    

    <<< Note 851.416 by HDLITE::ZARLENGA "Michael Zarlenga, Alpha P/PEG" >>>

    
>    No, not really.  I was careful that time and wrote assault and batter,
>    not assault or batter.

	Possibly only a technical violation. ;-)

	Assault and battery are actually two seperate crimes. You can be
	convicted of either or both depending on the circumstances. Physical
	contact is NOT required to be convicted of assault.

Jim

.417>  re: "curing homosexuals"

I hope they find a cure for Democracts first!
    
.418> It's funny, actually, if you look at it.....

I know what you mean .. I spend a great deal of time laughing.

.420> 	re:  .415	Bubba's next door neighbor's definition of
.420> 			the "heterosexual lifestyle."
.420> ;-)  gawd, i don't miss that scene at all!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Wazza' matter .. you don't like the Dallas Cowboys?  :-)

Bubba

	Yeah, you might have been laughing, but will the real Bubba ever stand
up? That's a question I'm sure will never be answered......... at least not in
notes anyway.....





Glen

.419> Let's say that I say "Boxing should be banned. After all, assault
.419> and battery is a criminal offense." Any "analogy" there?
.419> Is it a good analogy? Would you understand it if boxers got a little
.419> upset being compared to criminals?
      
Yes, I see the reason for your concern.  I did not draw the same conclusions
from Mr. Berry's statements .. but I most assuredly see where you're comin'
from.
       
.419> Yeah, but can you understand what's happening here? It's like repeating
.419> the myth over and over that Jews control the world banking system even
.419> though  you know it isn't so. No harm meant, right?

Yes, I see, again, where you're coming from.  I can identity with this in
that it really irks me when I see/hear "Ex-Marine does this_that_the_other"
and it's normally related to some kind of violence.  If the guy was Coast
Guard, Air Force, Army .. probably no mention .. but .. ex-Marine .. that's
different.

.419> Guess we disagree here. To deny a competent, fully-qualified person a
.419> job based solely on that person's sexual preference is a civil rights
.419> violation that should be prosecuted.

Yes, we can agree to disagree here.  I don't believe that any "legislation"
is a viable solution to this type of problem.

.419> This is a question that was asked repeatedly, and that Dwight never
.419> bothered to answer.

Ok, sorry, I missed this.

.419> Because if gays are approximately 10% of the population and the
.419> number of people engaging in such activities is a couple of hundred
.419> or a few thousand, that means that "most gays and lesbians do not
.419> engage in the kinds of activities that I find particularly offensive."
.419> Simple math. 

The statement, as applied to Mr. Berry .. is for all practical purposes
impossible for him to agree to.  How could he (or anyone for that matter)
know that "the number of people engaging in such activities is a couple
of hundred or a few thousand"?

However, I do see why you made the statement.

Bubba

<>7. I realize that most gays and lesbians do not engage in the kinds of
<>activities that I find particularly offensive, such as ...
<
<>>How could he possibly agree to this?  I think that it was patently obvious
<>>that he has few or no gay friends - how could he "realize" this?
<
<Because if gays are approximately 10% of the population and the number of 
<people engaging in such activities is a couple of hundred or a few thousand, 
that means that "most gays and lesbians do not engage in the kinds of
<activities that I find particularly offensive." Simple math. 

   Myths, another:

   Of the 10% that are homosexual some percentage pratice the unhealthy
   acts refered too by implicit reference.

   Of the 90% remaining heterosexuals how many also practice the same
   unhealthy acts, plus a few more?  

   Obviously it's unhealthy if homosexuals do it but it's ok for
   heterosexuals...  I can be literal without using language that 
   is graphic or banned for those who don't understand the inferences.

   Allison

    Let's talk "unhealthy acts" ... Hell .. I drive the Los Angeles
    freeways at least once a week ... *THAT* is an "unhealthy act" !

    Bubba

| <<< Note 851.424 by MORO::BEELER_JE "Johnny Paycheck time ..." >>>




| .419> Let's say that I say "Boxing should be banned. After all, assault
| .419> and battery is a criminal offense." Any "analogy" there?
| .419> Is it a good analogy? Would you understand it if boxers got a little
| .419> upset being compared to criminals?

| Yes, I see the reason for your concern.  I did not draw the same conclusions
| from Mr. Berry's statements .. but I most assuredly see where you're comin'
| from.

	What conclusions did you come to Bubba?

| .419> Guess we disagree here. To deny a competent, fully-qualified person a
| .419> job based solely on that person's sexual preference is a civil rights
| .419> violation that should be prosecuted.

| Yes, we can agree to disagree here.  I don't believe that any "legislation"
| is a viable solution to this type of problem.

	What do you consider to be a viable solution Bubba?





Glen

    
    Allison,
    
    > how many heterosexuals
    
     For hets it is a deviation from the norm, for gays it is the only
    option.  No moral judgement intended.....
    
    David

    Mr. Silva;

    You have authored 29 responses in this string.  Contained in those 29
    responses is approximately 70 questions of various ilk.  You have vastly
    exceeded your enqueue limit.

    Please try again later.

    Bubba

    Re .428
    
    > For hets it is a deviation from the norm, for gays it is the only
    > option.
    
    Not so.
    
    Research by Kinsey, Masters and Johnson, and others indicates that it
    is not a deviation from the norm for hets.  It is merely a deviation
    from what people sanctimoniously dictate to others as the norm.
    
    -dick

    Re .429
    
    Maybe if you'd answer some of Glen's questions instead of evading them
    or deflecting the blow, he'd stop asking them.
    
    -dick

.431> ... he'd stop asking them.

    Huh?

    Do you also believe in Santa?  :-)

    Bubba

    
    > none for you either
    
      No Dick I'm not interested. Masters and Johnson did not say what
    you stated they did.  It is not a societal pressure foisted on 
    unsespecting persons. It is simply a FACT that the penus fits into
    the vagina , and the sperm fertilizes the egg. You can deviate from the
    OBVIOUS intended anatomical design of your love connections...
    
    David

>>| Yes, we can agree to disagree here.  I don't believe that any "legislation"
>>| is a viable solution to this type of problem.
>>
>>	What do you consider to be a viable solution Bubba?
>>
>>
>>Glen

I know you're addressing this to Bubba, buy let me give it a shot.

That's obviously a very tough question to answer.  I think, though, that I
can make a pretty safe generalization that folks out here in the Wild West
are pretty distrustful of ANY additional legislation.  Hence the apparent
"backlash" against gay rights which resulted in Amendment 2. I think that 
that thinking is what caught the attention of 53% of Colorado voters.  
"Governments shall pass no law. . ." is a phrase which has I nice ring to it!

I started typing here with the hopes that I could come up with an alternative
to legislation, but I'm running dry here.  Hey, I'm an electrical engineer,
not a social engineer!!  All I can say is that more rules and regulations on
the book is not an attractive answer to the problem;  may be necessary, but
a bitter pill to swallow.

Jon

.433>                     . . . It is simply a FACT that the penus fits into
    >the vagina , and the sperm fertilizes the egg. You can deviate from the
    >OBVIOUS intended anatomical design of your love connections...
  
Very true, but I think Masters & Johnson DID WRITE that "many" heterosexual
couples engage in activities which would most likely not result in fertilizing
an egg!!

"penis fits into the vagina, and sperm fertilizes the egg" sure sounds boring!!
Sure that is the anatomical intent, but. . .

Enough said. . . I'll start blushing

    
    > in activities which would most likely not result
    
     Why whatever are you talking about:-) I never said they didn't. I
    simply said they had the option to deviate from the norm, but the
    norm was still an option with their mate. Not so in a gay relationship.
    
    David

| <<< Note 851.429 by MORO::BEELER_JE "Johnny Paycheck time ..." >>>



| You have authored 29 responses in this string.  Contained in those 29
| responses is approximately 70 questions of various ilk.  



	Bubba, thanks for taking the time to not only count up how many
responses I got, but also how many questions were asked. What I was wondering
though is how many of those questions were asked of you? (btw, you don't need
to include this one) As Dick said (you beat me to it Dick), if you had answered
the questions asked of you instead of what seems to be you evading them, then
who knows what would have happened? Would more questions be asked? Maybe, and
probably. But then I would know what your position on this subject (and
various parts of it) was. I never knew it was wrong to ask questions. I thought
that's where people find the answers. I'll ask one more question Bubba, will
you answer the questions asked of you to the best of your ability? 




Glen

    If Glen would provide his questions on 8-1/2" x 11" paper, typed,
    double spaced, and bound volumes .. I'll give it a shot.
    
    Bubba

    David, the norm of sexual behavior is *not* only the activity that
    results in fertilization of an ovum.  The norm, if you go by the
    generally accepted definition of the word "norm," is what the majority
    of people *do*.  Sexual practices that do not result in fertilization
    are the norm for both gays and hets.  That they are gays' only choice
    is not the point.
    
    -dick

    
    Dick,
    
     > sexual practices that do not result in fertilization are the norm
    > for both  gays and hets
    
      But the option remains for the hets doesn't it Dick. The parts fit
    in a heterosexual relationship.
    
    no moral judgement,
    David

.437> ...if you had answered the questions asked of you instead of
.437> what seems to be you evading them....

"seems to be evading"?  Wrong.  I was ignoring them.  There is a BIG
difference.

.437> I'll ask one more question Bubba, will you answer the questions
.437> asked of you to the best of your ability? 

When I answer questions I ALWAYS do it to the best of my ability, within
the limits of the English language, allotted time and resources.

Next question?

Bubba

<    > how many heterosexuals
<    
<     For hets it is a deviation from the norm, for gays it is the only
<    option.  No moral judgement intended.....
    
   David,

   There is a list of acts that are not for procreative purpose and hets
   [as you call them] do participate as man and woman in there practice.
   Not all, but then most people keep their sexlife private so how would
   we know?  The experts like Masters and Johnson suggest fairly common
   practice.  The definition of sodomy does not differentiate same sex 
   from opposite sex.  Sometimes it's just hidden in a word, like forplay.

   Of course picking up a women in a bar is normal, is that unhealthy?

   No moral judgement intended by me either.  

   Allison

    Re .440
    
    > But the option remains for the hets doesn't it Dick. The parts fit
    > in a heterosexual relationship.
    
    Well, then, David, the *real* sick ones must be the ones for whom the
    parts fit but who choose to do it differently anyway.  How does it feel
    to discover after all these years that *you* might be the pervert?  
    
    > no moral judgement,
    
    Pfui.  Casuistry is seldom quite so transparent as your remarks on this
    topic have been.
    
    -dick

.442>      . . . The definition of sodomy does not differentiate same sex 
.442>   from opposite sex.  

I just read in the paper today that in Nevada homosexual sodomy is against
the law (though very rarely enforced) while hetersexual sodomy is NOT proscribed
by law!

(Reno wants to have the Mayors' Conference that was pulled from Colorado 
Springs due to the boycott)

    
    
    Dick,
    
    > *you* might be the pervert
    
     I never once suggested that anyone who deviated from the design
    specs was a *pervert*.. Please stop erecting straw men.
    
    David    p.s. When I say no moral judgement intended  I mean no moral
           judgement intended.. You do not know me well enough to ass-u-me
           otherwise.....
    

    
    
    Allison
    
    > picking up
    
      This sounds strangely similiar to my son saying to me " the Jones do
    it why can't we."
    
    David

    
    
    > casuistry
    
      For those of you who have yet to purchase your own *Binder* decoder
    ring, heres the definition :-)
    
     Casuistry: Plausible but false reasoning etc etc..
    
     tuition bonus visa via David Dyben
    
     Pedant:: One  who pays undue attention to book learning and formal
    rules or details without having true insight or understanding(2) One
    who exhibits his/her learning or scholarship ostentatiously..

<.442>      . . . The definition of sodomy does not differentiate same sex 
<.442>   from opposite sex.  
<
<I just read in the paper today that in Nevada homosexual sodomy is against
<the law (though very rarely enforced) while hetersexual sodomy is NOT proscribed
<by law!

   Oh my, in the state that allows prostitution.  


    

<    > picking up
<    
<      This sounds strangely similiar to my son saying to me " the Jones do
<    it why can't we."
    
   David,

   I'm applying equivelence to the act not the moral value.  What the
   Jones's do is another matter.  For the my purpose hetrosexual sex
   between non-monogomus unmarried partners is unhealthy and no different
   than homosexual sex with non-monogomus unmarried partner.  The
   specifics of what act is performed the risks are exactly alike and
   equally foolish.

   The point is calling homosexual behavour unhealthy is just a myth
   as any disease they can contract heterosexuals can and do with
   frightening frequency.

   Allison

    
    
    Allsison,
    
     > I'm applying equivelence 
    
     Your right, I stand corrected...
    
    
    David

    Umm ... what's wrong with being a pervert?

.451> Umm ... what's wrong with being a pervert?

And a serious answer Z-man ... 

Absolutely nothing.  "Perversion" is for the most part in the eye
of the beholder.  The first definition in the dictionary is "to
cause to turn aside or away from what is good or true or morally
right".  Big deal .. who's going to decide what is "good, true,
or morally right"?

The other definition is "to cause to turn aside or away from what
is generally done or accepted".  Great .. I never was a fan of
the missionary position - the "generally done and accepted" position.
So, I'm a pervert?  Big deal.

Sure, there are some socially acceptable standards and morals to
which we all ascribe (such as taking a bath every Saturday, need it
or not) and I'm sure that turning from those could from most
perspectives be called a "perversion".

Some people take the word "pervert" to be immediately bad, degrading,
demoralizing, etc .. OK .. fine.  I can respect that.

This is the point that I tried to get across when Berry said that
homosexuality (I took him to mean the sexual act) was a perversion.

Bubba

    Alright, I was beginning to worry.
    
    I gotta get back to the dungeon now ...  ;')

    	The vast majority of sexual activity, and therefore what is
    "normal", is for pleasure, not for making babies. When I fondle my
    wife's breasts there is little chance of her becoming pregnant as a
    result. She might have exactly the same physical sensations and exactly
    the same chance of pregnancy if a woman was doing the fondling.
    
    	Of course there are some people who believe that if you make the
    risk of pregnancy too low then you are defying God's intentions, but
    they apply that to heterosexuals as well as homosexuals.
    
    	If "normal" sex is for pleasure then you have no reason to exclude
    homosexual activities. If "normal" sex is for making babies then you
    have to exclude close to 100% of heterosexual activities. If "normal"
    means what the majority of people do then you might have to exclude
    everything, rather like trying to find a majority in the French
    parliament ;-)

    I am the only normal one participating in this note.  The rest of you
    are perverts.
    
    Yours truly,
    Bubba
    

The question isn't whether penis-in-the-vagina intercourse is normal and 
whether other sexual activities where "the parts don't fit" is perverted. 

The question is: If you apply the labels "perverted," "disgusting," and 
"unhealthy" to homosexuals because they engage in certain sexual activities, 
do you also apply the same terms to heterosexuals who engage in those same 
activities? If not, why not?

Mike

    
    
    Monahan,
    
    > "normal", is for pleasure, not for making babies
    
     I commend you and others for brilliantly  missing the point.
    
    David

    Re .445
    
    >> *you* might be the pervert
    
    > I never once suggested that anyone who deviated from the design
    > specs was a *pervert*..
    
    David,
    
    See .452, where Bubba has correctly applied *his* Binder Decoder Ring
    to show that a pervert is simply one who deviates from the accepted
    "norm" - which is exactly what you yourself have been claiming gays do.
    
    As for casuistry, I'm sorry you had to use your Binder Decoder Ring; I
    thought most college graduates would know what the word means from
    having studied symbolic logic or debate.  My error.  But I reiterate
    that your remarks here have exhibited casuistry.  How, you ask?  By
    being an example of this very old aphorism:
    
        Qui non accusatus se ignoscit ipsum accusat.
    
    	He who excuses himself when not accused, accuses himself.
    
    -dick

    RE: the "anatomically correct" argument...
    
    It is flawed, IMO.
    
    Who is to say that the *ONLY* purpose of certain body parts is
    pro-creation?  For one thing, such parts already serve a dual
    "natural" purpose.  Just because such parts are ideally suited to a
    task does not mean there can be no other legitimate use(s).
    
    From the rate of injuries sustained by professional football players,
    one could easily argue that the human body wasn't designed for such
    activity.  Do we therefore make value/moral judgements about those
    who play football because what they are doing is....deviant?
    
    RE: David - I realize you've said you aren't intending to make a moral
        judgement - I accept that.  So I'm curious what your point is after
    	all?
    
    /Greg
    

    
    
    Greg,
    
     Thanks for asking.. I have sat back and read the battle between the
    gay community and the christian community for quite awhile now. It
    seems to have polarized each camp. One side or the other eventually
    runs towards the moral high ground, and from that position they thunder
    down judgements, all the while skirting the issues. I simply want to
    bring up the real issues. Why do I feel that homosexuality is odd? I
    spell it out honestly in my previous entries  and listen to honest
    non-moral high ground responses.. I want to understand. I am not anti
    gay, but, I will ask the tough questions that everybody thinks about
    but nobody asks. I do not hate gays, hell come on out to Colorado
    Springs, lets go down to MEadow Muffins and watch the crab races and
    do shots of Kamikazees. I would even go to a gay club (terrified)..
    You can meet my 6 year old son, bounce him on your knee, listen to
    him talk about his trip to Disney world with his mother and my money:-)
    
    David

    David - I really appreciate your response.  I have never felt you
    were being judgmental in these discussions, or that you were trying
    to insult anyone.   I'm trying to understand too...which is why I
    ask questions :-)
    
    If I ever get out to Col. Springs again (beautiful place, even if I
    do disagree with the strong political winds blowing from that area
    of the state) I'll look you up...
    
    /Greg 
    
    PS = Crab races?  :-)
    

    
    
    > crab races?
    
     Yeah it's a meadow muffins traditional. They set the crabs(2"size) in
    the middle of a table and the first one to get to the outer edge wins
    the race. 
    
    David

    Re .460
    
    David, thank you for your thoughtful remarks.  I withdraw my charge of
    casuistry; I see now that you have been only trying to forestall the
    "moral high ground" issue's being held up against you.  I think you've
    been trying to say, "Come, let us reason together as men [sic]."  
    Roger wilco.
    
    -dick

    
    -1-2
    
     Alright, alright, enough of the mushy stuff :-) :-) :-)
    
    David

    As per your request, Mr. Binder, check out the conference
    LGP30::CHRISTIAN-PERSPECTIVE and you'll find the same questions
    asked by Mr. Silva - and - my answers.
    
    Begin at note 91.861 and proceed forward.
    
    Bubba

| <<< Note 851.441 by MORO::BEELER_JE "Johnny Paycheck time ..." >>>



| .437> ...if you had answered the questions asked of you instead of
| .437> what seems to be you evading them....

| "seems to be evading"?  Wrong.  I was ignoring them.  There is a BIG
| difference.

	Actually Bubba, I was being nice when I said evading..... The end
results are still the same whether you evade or ignore.... you seem to never
answer any questions that would show your position or the real you.....





Glen

| <<< Note 851.465 by MORO::BEELER_JE "Johnny Paycheck time ..." >>>



| As per your request, Mr. Binder, check out the conference
| LGP30::CHRISTIAN-PERSPECTIVE and you'll find the same questions
| asked by Mr. Silva - and - my answers.

	I remember that one Bubba. I remember that a lot of it was done .....






			in mail......



Glen

    Re .465
    
    > As per your request...
    
    Hey, Bubba, I didn't *request* it, I merely suggested - in response to
    your mail message - that it might be a way to avoid wasting so much
    disk space.  But thank you for the pointer.
    
    -dick
    
    Ps.
    
    >  ... Mr. Binder
    
    Aw, c'mon, gosh and all, d'ya hafta be so all-fired *formal*?  :-)

.468> Hey, Bubba, I didn't *request* it, I merely suggested - in response to
.468> your mail message....

You're right .. my apology.

.468> ..that it might be a way to avoid wasting so much disk space.

Who cares about the disk space?  My fingers get tired!  If things go
too divergent or too personal I will resort to mail.  Some people seem
to key on this.

.468> Aw, c'mon, gosh and all, d'ya hafta be so all-fired *formal*?  :-)

I am a man of honor, dignity, truth, justice, and, the American Way.  I
speak softly and carry a big stick.  I have talent on loan from God.
I am a person of consummate courtesy .. and respect ... therefore resort
to such formalities out of respect (even though you are a Yankee, and,
perhaps a liberal).

Just don't get on my bad side .. :-)

Yours truly,
Rush<!! .. er .. Bubba

	WOW! Now I've read everything! :-)



Glen

By the way, all this stuff about parts fitting is relative. 
Depends on the size of the parts.

Mike

.471> Depends on the size of the parts.

    Look .. my note said "and carry a big stick".  Let's not get personal
    here.

    Bubba

    
    
       God never said he was in the business of ensuring orgasms and I
    never said that oral sex was abnormal. I have admitted that the idea
    of men with men and women with women strikes me as not a designer
    preference. You exist because hetero sexual behavior.
    
    david

    Perhaps, but it seems to me that God could have done a slightly better
    job of making the parts fit together.
    
    -- Mike

    David,
    
    One problem with the God argument is that it doesn't tolerate the known
    fact of evolution.  (Let us not, please, start a peripheral discussion
    about creation v. evolution.  Evolution is fact.  Only the mechanisms
    whereby it occurs are rightly termed theories.)  Another problem with
    it is the cry of "There's only one God, and my God is better than your
    God!"  Will the real God please stand up?
    
    Homosexuality is not unique to humans.  It has been observed in several
    other species, including bedbugs, geese, and some apes.
    
    It's been well demonstrated that there is such a thing as mutation.  In
    the same way that homosexual creatures might be the result of mutations
    from a heterosexual stock, it is equally likely that heterosexuals are
    mutated from an asexual stock.  Since the earliest known organisms were
    in fact asexual, they could be described as the "designer model," and
    it is quite easy to argue therefrom that heterosexuality isn't actually
    "designer preference," either.
    
    -dick

.474> Perhaps, but it seems to me that God could have done a slightly better
.474> job of making the parts fit together.

Ok, Mike .. suppose God came to you and said: "Yo! Mike, I've got to build
the human body(s) - and I realize that men may love men and have sex with
men and women may do the same with other women ... any suggestions?".
    
What would you tell Him .. so that the parts WOULD "fit together"?

Bubba

	Dick (.475),

	I think you're mixing means of reproduction with sexual preference
	among species which reproduce via sex.

	"Asexual" is not a sexual preference like homo- or heterosexuality.
	Humans are sexual beings, regardless of their preference.

	Jon

    Bubba, I was suggesting that though our bodies are designed to
    reproduce through intercourse, God could have done a better job of
    making the male part fit with the female part so as to more easily
    produce female orgasms during intercourse.  I wasn't even considering
    the question of sexual activity between people of the same sex.
    
    -- Mike
    

    Re .477
    
    Jon,
    
    No, I'm not mixing means of reproduction with sexual preferences.
    
    Read my remarks carefully.  Or, better, I'll reiterate them in
    different words.
    
    I was responding to David's suggestion that same-sex activity is not
    "designer preference."  He implied that the reason for such behaviors'
    not being "designer preference" was that the parts don't fit together. 
    
    My response was to the effect that, if same-sex activity is really not
    "designer preference" then maybe opposite-sex activity is also not
    "designer preference" because the original models, the ones that might
    lay some claim to having been "designed" instead of having evolved, had
    *no* sexual activity or preference.
    
    -dick

Re:  .479

Sorry Dick, I'm wracking the ol' noggin, and I'm still not getting it.

I don't think homosexual behavior is a mutation from heterosexual behavior
in the same way as sexual beings evolved from asexual organisms.  I guess
the key TO ME (from what I've read) is that sexual preference is a biologically 
based BEHAVIOR, which differentiates it from being a biologically based method 
of reproduction.

But I think this is straying from the point of this note; as if we've all 
done a fabulous job of sticking to the point previously in this string! 

Jon

 ;-) 

	Gee, all this stuff about parts not fitting correctly..... hmmmm.....
Makes one wonder what they are talking about....... ;-)



Glen

re: 851.474 JURAN::VALENZA
>it seems to me that God could have done a slightly better
>job of making the parts fit together.

Yeah, but things could be worse. I saw this show on PBS where they showed 
these animals that swim millions of miles to get to the same beach every 
year. The male squirts his stuff on some eggs in a hole in the ground. Then 
he smokes a cigarette and starts swimming a million miles to get back to 
where he came from. 

All in all, I like the way our system works. Improving it 
would be a matter of making it work more often.

Mike

    Yep ... I can't swim that far .... so leave things the way they are.
    
    Bubba

    
    
    > only 1,460 days till  he's gone
    
      ha ha ha ha your crazy beeler :-) :-)
    
    David

I'll respond to the original .0 and leave the bashing and arguing to others.

Frankly, I believe in free will.  If I don't like something, I don't watch it.
Hence the fact that I seldom watch the evening news anymore (I figure, if it
is important, I'll hear it anyway and I'm sick to death of exploitative,
content-free news).  The only time I have ever been seriously disturbed by
the existence of homosexuality in males has been those infrequent times when
someone made a pass at me.  On only one occassion was more than one "no"
necessary.

It still made me feel kinda uncomfortable.  As for seeing men engaged in
physical displays of affection, it doesn't bother me (I suppose because I
don't internalize it.  When I see women or het couples engaged in PDA I tend
to find it arousing 'cause I could want to be there).

I don't know if you would classify it as open minded, but it is me.

80)

.485> I don't know if you would classify it as open minded, but it is me.

In that this concept of "open-minded" is the essence of this note I'll
comment on this.... YES you are most assuredly open minded.  I would
be MOST interested in hearing if others thought you are open-minded
(whatever that is).

Bubba

| <<< Note 851.485 by DELNI::JIMC "receiver of the sun" >>>




| The only time I have ever been seriously disturbed by
| the existence of homosexuality in males has been those infrequent times when
| someone made a pass at me.  On only one occassion was more than one "no"
| necessary.

	Jim, one way to look at it so it may help is as if a female who you
weren't attracted to asked you out. Hmmm.... maybe you have the same feelings
about both?

	As far as you being open minded, basing it on what you wrote is hard.
On this subject matter you do seem to be. As far as feeling uncomfortable, I
wouldn't worry about it too much. But like I said, one way might be to look at
it in the same light as if a woman was asking you. Anyone else have any
suggestions?




Glen

	I agree whole-heartedly with .485!!

	When the guys around here start complaining about the possibility
	of being approached by a gay man, I usually reply, "Well now do
	you understand why women complain about unwanted sexual advances?"

	It's the same sort of discomfort, if for slightly different
	reasons.


	Jon

I would say that .485 is reasonably open-minded about the base note.

.487> ... basing it on what you wrote is hard.  On this subject matter you
.487> do seem to be.

"seem to be"?  Just what would you like for him to say (other than what
he's said) that would convince you?

Bubba

    Don't bury me...but I would like to ask a question if I may of those of
    you who are homosexual.  Why do you think you are??  Do you think you
    were born gay, or became gay?  Did you have any influenceto become gay?  
    I'm really trying to understand homosexuality better.
    
    Gina

    Hi Gina,
                                                            
    I was aware that I was gay since I was 5.  I always remembered liking
    my older brother's friends and I used to love watching Steve Reeves in
    Superman.  ;^)
    
    Was I sexually attracted to guys even at that young age? Yes. While I
    may not have understood the mechanics of what I was doing and why, I do
    remember having many fantasies about other boys.  I also knew well
    enough that I was "different" and kept my mouth shut. I also remember 
    feeling (and still do) a certain, "connection" with men. A bond that I
    could never share with a woman or heterosexual men.
    
    Hope this answers some questions for people, of course, this is only
    one gay man's experiance.
    
    
    Scott

    
    
    Scott said it very well!  I would add, if I may, that you might want to
    change the question and ask it of yourself?  Why are you heterosexual? 
    When did you realize you were heterosexual?  Etc.  I think you'll have
    trouble answering the questions with a great deal of exactness (is that a
    word?).  Some (many?) gay people surpress their feelings for lengthy
    periods of time (some for their entire life) only to, eventually, in a
    sense, throw up their hands and say "I'm tired of pretending to be what
    I'm not -- I'm gay, and I'm not going to hide it any more."  How they
    then "act" on that realization varies widely.  Like many straight
    people, many gay people first act on their gayness by sexual
    experimentation (MUCH more dangerous these days), but most (I believe)
    like me, quickly learn that being gay is more than about having sex
    with a person of the same sex.  It's about bonding, about being in
    love, about romance -- all the same type of things that straight
    couples do.  Unfortunately, gay relationships also can be about pain,
    breakup, infidelity, etc.
    
    I sometimes find it amazing that (some) straight people think gay
    people are so very different then themselves.  For example:  I used to
    (when I wasn't traveling so much for DEC) sing with the Windy City Gay
    Chorus (a very find musical organization -- recognized nationally for
    the high calibre singing).  I invited one of my pastors and her
    boyfriend to one of our concerts, and we had drinks afterward.  She
    remarked that she was surprised that gay men would sing love songs to
    each other -- it just had never dawned on her that we could be
    "romantic" in our dealings with each other.  
    
    We're the same as you -- except for the object of our affection.  The
    "difference" is that because of that one exception, we are sometimes
    (often?) ridiculed and discriminated against.  If more people would
    "see" how the majority of gay people live their lives rather than just
    the visible minority (who don't speak for the majority, at least not
    all the time), I think things could be different.  It's this reasoning
    that "causes" people like myself to be upfront about our orientation. 
    I'm not ashamed of what I am because I have no control over what I am. 
    The only thing I have control over is how I behave -- I try (and am not
    always successful, I'd be the first one to admit) to behave in a manner
    that all people would be proud of, not just gay people.
    
    
           Greg

    RE: .492 and .493

    Ditto for me as well.  It's just something I've always known - 
    even before I had a name for it.

    There are some guys I know who did not realize same sex attraction until
    later in life, but the majority of gay men I've talked to all say
    pretty much the same thing - no matter what their socio-economic
    background, ethnic/religious heritage, or family/living situation during 
    childhood.

    Confusing all this is a lack of understanding by both gay people and
    straight people (and bi people) of bisexuality, the so-called Kinsey 
    scale and the possibility the sexual orientation of some individuals
    may actually change over time.  Personally, when I hear someone say
    they "decided" to be gay (and I have heard that from a handful of
    people on some talk shows) I usually attribute one of the above
    mentioned "confusing" factors.   The whole subject is so charged and
    the vocabulary so new to so many, that an in depth discussion that
    might uncover some of these subtle differences never happens in the
    public eye.

    /Greg

    Greg,
    
    Could you describe the "Kinsey scale?"  I'm wondering if this is the
    same scale as described by a counselor I met in Boulder:
    
    Sexual preference/behavior of all humans described by the bell curve, 
    with those persons who are "100%" heterosexual at one end of the scale,
    and 100% homosexual at the other tail.  Thus the largest percentage of
    the population having some urge toward both sexes.
    
    I've only heard this theory once, never to be confirmed. . .
    
    
    Jon

    I have applied the question, "why am I heterosexual?".  You are right,
    I don't know why, I was just born that way.  
    
    I have always thought that gay people are born that way also, but have 
    heard thay gay people are made not born and since I am not gay I really 
    don't know.  I could never understand that argument because why would 
    anyone choose to be gay knowing how society reacts to them, you know?
    
    
    I refuse to believe that people decide to be gay, or become gay due to 
    deviant behavior.  It doesn't make any sense to me why anyone would
    decide to be gay if they had a choice.  
    
    
    Is my thinking in line??
    
    Gina

    
    >>why would  anyone choose to be gay knowing how society reacts to them,
    >>you know?
    
    I *really* appreciate these questions, Gina!  Truly!!
    
    The question I extracted is exactly the one I asked of my parents when
    I told them I was gay and they immediately had two reactions.  First,
    they were sure it was *their* fault.  I may not like everything about
    my parents (who does?), but they, all in all, did a hell of a good job
    raising me and *nothing*  they did made me gay.  Second, the offered to
    pay for a "cure".  There is no cure, because there is no disease.  I
    have heard of gay people who have gone through some type of therapy
    (usually conducted by some tight-sphinctered conservative church group)
    that purports to "change" gay people.  It may change their behavior,
    and they may even get married and have children and all the other
    heterosexual stuff (as if gay people weren't already doing that), but
    it doesn't change the essence of who the people are.  I would guess,
    in fact, that after their *cure* they are miserable people, having to
    hide their true feelings and desires.  This is all my opinion, of
    course.
    
        Thanks,
    
           Greg

    Re .496
    
    Gina,
    
    I don't think gay people are made.  They are born.  But - and this is a
    big but - people can be made to be gay, at least insofar as that
    person's conscious activity goes.  Think carefully on the subtle
    semantic difference between being a gay person and being a person who
    is made to "be gay."
    
    Bad role models, psychological pressure, many environmental influences
    can push a person who is not sure of his or her sexuality one way or
    the other.  Most of the time, the push seems to be toward the hetero
    side, but part of the time it's not.  I don't think pushed people are
    really ever happy or comfortable in their enforced roles.
    
    I think that many people think being gay is a choice because they don't
    want to face the fact that their religious prohibitions are not based
    in reality but are rather based on the way some person or persons long
    ago thought things *should* be.  I cite as a parallel example the case
    of James Porter, a former priest who during the early 1960s was busily
    molesting children in Fall River and New Bedford, Massachusetts.  He
    was not removed from the priesthood - he was not even removed from
    parish duty.  He was instead moved to another parish, finally to one in
    another state, where he continued until 1973 as a parish priest, still
    molesting children.  The Catholic Church's representatives today admit
    candidly (if unofficially) that the case was improperly handled.  They
    say correctly that in the '60s and '70s it was simply not known that
    the disease called pedophilia was a chronic disease, almost invariably
    incurable.  It was thought that just talking to him would be enough.
    
    Today we're on the verge of being able to verify, with scientific
    authority, what many people already know to a moral certainty, i.e.,
    that being gay is innate to a nontrivial minority of the population. 
    But religious and moral arguments die hard.  And that is what gays are
    up against; that is what I, as a thoughtful, caring person must battle
    against as and when I can.
    
    -dick

    
    
    Great note, Dick!
    
       GJD

    While I've always thought that most people are born either gay or
    straight, I can understand why some women might *choose* to be gay. 
    For example, I have always been attracted to men - almost from infancy,
    I think! - :-) - but sometimes I have been in relationships with men
    where I felt so hurt and confused trying to get along with them, that I
    thought that if only I could somehow force myself to become physically
    attracted to other women, that I would then finally be able to have,
    with another woman, the type of relationship I have always wanted to
    have with a man.  
    
    I not saying that people can choose, but that, in the case of women, I
    can understand why some women might want to *try* to choose, for a
    number of reasons, among them, after a certain age there aren't enough
    men to go around, and some of them are so creeping and/or mean, etc.,
    that they just aren't acceptable choices.  So, a woman might decide
    that she would rather have a relationship with another woman than none
    at all.
    
    I wouldn't think that straight men would have any reason to choose to
    be gay, though, since, for the most part, straight men pretty much have
    the upper hand in the world anyway, or so it has always seemed to me.
    
    Lorna
    

    Thanks for your notes Lorna, Dick and Greg.  They have given me some
    insight.  Can I ask if any of you are christians?  Do you feel that
    christianity left you out in the cold?  I have known people to leave
    their gay lifestyle to become christians, not that they change their
    really being gay, but don't live the lifestyle any longer.  I
    personally can't imagine trying to live as a gay person when I'm
    heterosexual, you know??
    
    Gina

    ... a tangential question on "open-mindedness" and homosexuality.

    Do people here think that Colin Powell (and members of the JCS) and
    Norman Schwartzkopf are "open minded" with respect to homosexuality?
    They all oppose lifting the ban on homosexuals in the military.

    Bubba

    
    
    I consider myself a Christian, but don't necessarily believe in all the
    dogma.
    
    *****
    
    To answer Jerry's question:  No, I don't think they are being open
    minded.  I believe they are "living" under the stereotypical believe
    that all gay men are promiscuous and that gay servicemen are going to
    be stalking people in the showers and in the foxholes, which is
    nonsense.
    
    I heard someone yesterday talk about having to establish "rules of
    conduct" if gays are admitted into the military (like they're not
    already there).  Seems to the me the rules would be simple:  If you
    sexually harass or approach someone who doesn't wish to be approached,
    you're but is in a sling, regardless of the orientation of the people
    involved.
    
           GJD

    
    Hey Bubba, Hows it going amigo??
    
    To answer your question in .502, No!
    I should also admit though that I haven't been following it all
    that closely so I also don't have any idea what rational they used.
    Still, regardless of their reasons, I still say NO!
    
    Hell, if people want to serve their country via the military, 
    they should be welcomed and applauded for wanting to do so.
    
    						Regards
    
    							Hank

Re: .503

Would that the heterosexuals in the military follow the "rules of conduct"
you propose!  There are numerous publicized (and undoubtedly more 
unpublicized) cases where hets sexually harassed and attacked others.  By
comparison, the gays in the military would appear to be paragons of virtue.

				Steve

    Re .501
    
    Gina, I am not a Christian.  I was one but I've rejected the Christian
    faith because of this and other fundamental issues around what I have
    come to believe any god must be.
    
    I may not have made my own sexual polarity clear in my notes in this
    string.  Greg Diercks and Greg Schuler and Glen Silva know that I'm
    hetero, so it's only fair that you should know, too.
    
    -dick

.504> Hell, if people want to serve their country via the military, 
.504> they should be welcomed and applauded for wanting to do so.

The military branches discriminate based on weight, height, physical
ability etc .. that does not say that they aren't "open-minded" about
those individual classifications. The simple fact of the matter is that
it may effect combat effectiveness.  If someone believes that combat
(and that's what the "bottom line" is) effectiveness will be be less
than perfect with homosexuals in combat units ...  does that necessarily
say that they're not "open minded"?

(Let's TRY to keep to the "open-minded" issue here)

Bubba

    	When I was in the military 25 years ago I was sexually harrassed by
    a gay who outranked me.  There was another gay who liked to sit on a
    "shelf" above the urinals and admire the view.  I have heard and read
    numerous stories from other people that indicate that sexual
    harrassment by gays in the military was not uncommon as far back as
    WWII or as recently as a few years ago.
    	During my era the only way that sexual harrassers were disciplined
    was by court martial if they were witnessed performing a homosexual act
    on government property.  I never heard of any sort of action being
    taken for anything short of that. 
    	I have no objection to gays in the military, but if they are
    admitted, I would hope that some sort of sexual harrassment policy with
    teeth would be implemented.  The blanket statement that there would be
    no homosexual predators if gays were openly admitted is naive at best.
    	
    	As one who has been sexually harrassed by gays both in and out of
    the military, I find the statements that sexual predation and
    pedophilia by "normal" gays is uncommon to be very far from the truth. 
    My experience may be somewhat skewed because I apparently was rather cute
    when I was younger.  
                                 		John
    

                     <<< Note 851.501 by GLDOA::MCBRIDE >>>



    | Can I ask if any of you are christians?  

	Yes, I am. 

    | Do you feel that christianity left you out in the cold?  

	No, not at all. I think what it basically comes down to is certain
religions have left us out in the cold. But Christianity goes far beyond what
any religion ever could. Thank God for that! :-)

   | I personally can't imagine trying to live as a gay person when I'm
   | heterosexual, you know??
    
	I tried living as a heterosexual for many years. It just didn't work. I
was engaged twice and called it off as I wasn't in love with the person. There
was always something missing. I KNEW what it was, but wouldn't allow myself to
fix the problem. It's fixed now and I have been so much happier being me than
when I tried to hide myself. So I know where you're coming from on this (well,
in a reversed role anyway.... ;-)




Glen

| <<< Note 851.502 by MORO::BEELER_JE "Only 1,460 days 'till he's gone" >>>



| Do people here think that Colin Powell (and members of the JCS) and
| Norman Schwartzkopf are "open minded" with respect to homosexuality?
| They all oppose lifting the ban on homosexuals in the military.

	It would depend Bubba. What are their reasons for not wanting the ban
lifted? That's where one would be able to determine if they are open minded
about this or not.



Glen

| <<< Note 851.508 by LEDS::LEWICKE "If it ain't broke, don't buy it." >>>




	John, I do understand what you are saying. But if they come up with
anything, I hope it is something that states NO ONE can have sex.. blah blah..
as I'm sure many women who have served in the military could tell you stories
of being harrassed by straight men. A rule like that would be all inclusive and
doesn't make any group worse than the other.



Glen

| <<< Note 851.507 by MORO::BEELER_JE "Only 1,459 days 'till he's gone" >>>



| The simple fact of the matter is that
| it may effect combat effectiveness.  If someone believes that combat
| (and that's what the "bottom line" is) effectiveness will be be less
| than perfect with homosexuals in combat units ...  does that necessarily
| say that they're not "open minded"?

	Bubba, can you think of what the reasons might be for someone to
actually say this? 

	Also, you have stated you have gay friends. Have any of them served in 
the military in a combat situation? If so, how well did they perform? The
platoon?




Glen

re: 851.507 (MORO::BEELER_JE)
>If someone believes that combat (and that's what the "bottom line" is) 
>effectiveness will be be less than perfect with homosexuals in combat 
>units ...  does that necessarily say that they're not "open minded"?

No, it doesn't. Being open-minded means that you are capable of altering 
your views when faced with evidence that contradicts those views. 
I don't know whether Colin Powell or Norman Schwartzkopf are open-minded. 

However, I think that *I'm* open-minded. I believe that combat effectiveness 
will remain the same. I believe this because there are gays in combat units 
now. If you can present convincing evidence that it will reduce combat 
effectiveness, I'll change my mind.

Mike

re: 851.508 LEDS::LEWICKE
>I have no objection to gays in the military, but if they are admitted, I 
>would hope that some sort of sexual harrassment policy with teeth would be 
>implemented. The blanket statement that there would be no homosexual 
>predators if gays were openly admitted is naive at best.
                                                             
First of all, no one (in this string, at least) has made a  "blanket 
statement that there would be no homosexual predators if gays were openly 
admitted." Of course there will be some. 

Second, everyone (in this string, at least) has agreed that some sort of sexual 
harrassment policy with teeth is needed. It's been needed for a couple of 
centuries. It should apply to everyone, regardless of gender or sexual 
orientation. Whatever the penalties are for harrassment by heterosexuals 
should apply to gays and lesbians. Gays/lesbians are not seeking 
"special" rights. 

Mike

    re .493
    
    It has taken me a while to understand that gay men and romance aren't
    mutually exclusive. I always thought that romance was something women
    cooked up and thrust upon men, and men dug in their heels and obliged
    in the hopes of scoring later. And that gay men, not having to deal
    with women and their ridiculously different notions of how the world,
    and love should be, just got down to business.
    
    In fact, I assumed that gay men are typically more "male" just because
    they never let any women temper their maleness.
    
    And then I met a few queens...
    
    At this point, I *still* think that some gay men reject all that they
    view as female, because its just not attractive to them. And that
    includes romance, frilly lacy clothes, cattiness and gossip, demeurity
    and flirtation etc. And there are other gay men who think it fits them
    and they adopt it, half in jest, as camp. And there are still other gay
    men who fall somewhere in between, and have a healthy balanced respect
    for women, but aren't sexually attracted to them.
    
    The irony of all of this is that it reflects how poorly I relate to
    MEN, gay or straight. Some of my concepts of men are simply
    unprintable. I'm trying to correct them. Its an uphill thing.

.508> When I was in the military 25 years ago I was sexually harassed by
.508> a gay who outranked me.

I suspect that the "outranked" may be one of the reasons why a great deal
of stuff like this goes unreported ... in the same sense that a great deal
of female harassment goes unreported.

.510> What are their reasons for not wanting the ban lifted?

Deterioration of unit integrity.  Combat effectiveness.

.512> Bubba, can you think of what the reasons might be for someone to
.512> actually say this? 

Yes.

.512> Also, you have stated you have gay friends. Have any of them served in 
.512> the military in a combat situation?

Yes.

.512> If so, how well did they perform? The platoon?

You've taken liberties with the plural "they".  I knew only one gay person
while I was in combat.  To the best of my knowledge I was the only one that
knew that he was gay.  We went through a few rocket attacks together and he
was just as scared as anyone else.  One patrol together.  He was very good
with a blade.  I didn't know that he was gay until *AFTER* these events.  He
was separated from our unit.  He didn't make it through the next rocket
attack.

.513> No, it doesn't. Being open-minded means that you are capable of altering 
.513> your views when faced with evidence that contradicts those views. 
.513> I don't know whether Colin Powell or Norman Schwartzkopf are open-minded. 

I don't know what "evidence" exists that says that "out" gays are not
detrimental to combat effectiveness and unit integrity.  I'm not willing
to "experiment" when possible failure means loss of life.
    
.513> However, I think that *I'm* open-minded. I believe that combat
.513> effectiveness will remain the same. I believe this because there are
.513> gays in combat units now. If you can present convincing evidence that
.513> it will reduce combat effectiveness, I'll change my mind.

I believe that combat effectiveness has a high potential of changing.  I base
this on the fact that I have been in combat.  Any number of much less trivial
things can cause unit effectiveness to deteriorate.  I, for one, will not
take unnecessary chances with other people's life.  Had I known that the
individual referenced above was gay (in advance) - I would in all probability
have surveyed him.

.514> Gays/lesbians are not seeking "special" rights. 

I've never seen any convincing argument that says someone has a "right" to
serve in the military.

As I said earlier .. the military discriminates based on a number of things,
and they are for the most part based on combat effectiveness ... should they
drop these discriminatory practices? I do not believe that the military is
not "open-minded" when it comes to people who are too short or too tall or
over weight or etc ... it's a matter of the ultimate goal of the military
the effectiveness with witch they can do their assigned job.

Bubba

| <<< Note 851.516 by MORO::BEELER_JE "Only 1,459 days 'till he's gone" >>>

	Hey Bubba, one thing about your p-name. You said if he were elected you
would leave the military. Has/will this happen?

| .510> What are their reasons for not wanting the ban lifted?

| Deterioration of unit integrity.  Combat effectiveness.

	I guess the 2nd reason is a result of the first? I think that only
because if someone isn't able to handle combat, it wouldn't matter if they were
gay or not. If I'm wrong, please let me know. 

	Now, about the first reason. I can see where some might have a problem
with this. But what about it is making them feel this way? Once that is found
out, then people will know what should be done. If it's because they don't like
gays, then transfer somewhere else, get out of the service or grin and bear it.
If anyone had a problem with someone else, wouldn't they be offered these same
options? They are in there now, and it works, no reason why it can't work with
"out" gays. To deny someone the oportunity based on one's physical fitness is
one thing. To do it because someone doesn't like someone is another. There is
your difference Bubba.

| .512> If so, how well did they perform? The platoon?

| You've taken liberties with the plural "they".  I knew only one gay person
| while I was in combat.  To the best of my knowledge I was the only one that
| knew that he was gay.  We went through a few rocket attacks together and he
| was just as scared as anyone else.  One patrol together.  He was very good
| with a blade.  

	So then it isn't the person's job performance that would be the issue,
but how others feel towards him/her?

| I didn't know that he was gay until *AFTER* these events.  

	Based on what you knew about him, would knowing he was gay beforehand
really made a difference? If so, why?

| .513> No, it doesn't. Being open-minded means that you are capable of altering
| .513> your views when faced with evidence that contradicts those views.
| .513> I don't know whether Colin Powell or Norman Schwartzkopf are open-minded.

| I don't know what "evidence" exists that says that "out" gays are not
| detrimental to combat effectiveness and unit integrity.  

	You keep saying having out gays in the military would be detrimental to
combat effectiveness and unit integrity. Do you have any facts you would like
to share with us?

	Also, if you could clarify for me, you talk about "out" gays. Are you
saying those who are not "out" are different?

| I'm not willing to "experiment" when possible failure means loss of life.

	IF someone isn't capable of doing their job, then yes, they shouldn't
be in combat. But it wouldn't matter if they were gay or not. If they are
capable, then they should be there (again, doesn't matter if they are gay or
not).

| I believe that combat effectiveness has a high potential of changing.  I base
| this on the fact that I have been in combat.  Any number of much less trivial
| things can cause unit effectiveness to deteriorate.  

	Such as.....




Glen

|  it's a matter of the ultimate goal of the military
| the effectiveness with witch they can do their assigned job.

	If that's the case, then as long as each individual can do their job,
then there should be no problems, right?



Glen

The rest of you can hit <Next Unseen> .. I'm playing 20 questions with Glen.



.517> I guess the 2nd reason is a result of the first?

Yes.

.517> I think that only because if someone isn't able to handle combat, it
.517> wouldn't matter if they were gay or not. If I'm wrong, please let me
.517> know. 

You are wrong.

Let us suppose that you are working on a significant project for Digital.
You and another co-worker are assigned (because of your respective talents)
to work very closely together for 18 hours a day ... 7 days a week .. for
the next eight weeks.  This guy has made it clear to you that he does not
like homosexuals, he doesn't care about working with them, he doesn't want
to eat in the same restaurant with them, share a rest room with them .. etc.
He thinks they are perverted, disgusting, immoral and ... everything else.

Your co-worker is one heck of an engineer .. the best in his field.  Now,
are *you* going to do your job .. just fine and dandy ... no inhibitions
what-so-ever ... no deterioration of your ability to do a job - and work
with this guy for next eight weeks and do a good job?  This guy's feelings
toward homosexuality will never enter your mind?

.517> Once that is found out, then people will know what should be done. If
.517> it's because they don't like gays, then transfer somewhere else, get
.517> out of the service or grin and bear it.

Not viable.  If you think for one second that I'd transfer 79 guys because
there's one "problem" in the unit you're seriously mistaken.

.517> There is your difference Bubba.

Glen, this is not a "social club".

.517> So then it isn't the person's job performance that would be the issue,
.517> but how others feel towards him/her?

Yes.
    
.517> Based on what you knew about him, would knowing he was gay beforehand
.517> really made a difference? If so, why?

Yes, it would have made a difference.  Why?  Glen, for Christ sakes - we were
in a COMBAT zone.  That is no place for valuing differences!!!!

.517> You keep saying having out gays in the military would be detrimental to
.517> combat effectiveness and unit integrity. Do you have any facts you would
.517> like to share with us?

I said it once - I'll say it again.  I have BEEN in combat.  That is a F-A-C-T.
There are a LOT of things which can cause unit integrity to deteriorate and
if you think for one nano-second that homosexuality isn't one of them you're
(possibly) living in never-never-land.

.517> Also, if you could clarify for me, you talk about "out" gays. Are you
.517> saying those who are not "out" are different?

How the Hell would I know .. they're not "out".

.517> IF someone isn't capable of doing their job, then yes, they shouldn't
.517> be in combat. But it wouldn't matter if they were gay or not. If they are
.517> capable, then they should be there (again, doesn't matter if they are
.517> gay or not).

Yeah.  Right.  Real simple.  No problems.

.517> Any number of much less trivial  things can cause unit effectiveness
.517> to deteriorate.  
.517> Such as.....

One example.  Sgt <x>.  Damned good with an M-60.  The guy could strip one
and put it back together faster than anyone I've ever known.  He was also
accurate to the point of being uncanny.  All in all a good soldier.  He liked
young girls - by "young" I mean 10 years old - for sex.  Rough, abusive, dirty
sex.  The guys found out about it .. hated his guts.  This didn't have a thing
to do with his ability to kill.  I should have kept him in the unit?

I transferred him.  Told him to keep his mouth shut and his <deleted> in his
pants or *I'd* kill him.  Last I heard he cleaned up his act and did what
I suggested.

.518> ...then as long as each individual can do their job, then there should
.518> be no problems, right?

Yes, Glen, no problems.  Everything will be just peachy.

Bubba

   RE: gays born that way.


   While researching a related topic years ago I happend upon information 
   I would describe as frightening.

   Before the late '70s homosexuality was treated as a psychosexual
   disorder and was treated by various means:
   	
   	The most promising was ECT, electroconvulsive shock therapy.
   	This treatment is used to temporarilly erase memory, sometimes
   	this is permanent. Homosexuals were routinely treated this way
   	with treatments of a series of shocks several times a week plus
   	conventional psychotherapy.  It was believed to work.  Frequently
   	the patient was signed in involentarily by relatives.

   	The results over long term were that all reverted back to being
   	homosexual or committed suicide rather than face the treatments.

   	Aversion therapy was also tried and promised hope, the common
   	technique was to use homosexual pornography to arouse the patient
   	and apply a painful shock to the patients penis.  Same results
   	and the last treatment.

   	Drugs were also used, testosterone amoung them none were 
   	effective, or they reduced the sex drive to the point the
   	patient was not interested in sex at all.  Since the desirable
   	outcome was functioning heterosexual patient not a chemically
   	castrated man; that too was abandoned.

   	Of all the theories and case histories I read only homosexual
   	men were considered.

   	Eventually, the scientific community began to realize that this
   	is an unchangeable part of a persons psychosexual construction.
   	It would be unethical to try and create a homosexual person by
   	treating a heterosexual in any way, and it is contemporary belief
   	that would be unsuccessful as well.  Yet to do this to a
   	homosexual male was not considered unethical  Homosexuality has
   	since been removed from diagnostic text as a disorder that can or
   	needs to be corrected or requiring treament in itself.  It does
   	however advise counsuling at aid the patient in accepting
   	themselves so they can cope in an unaccepting society.

   Allison

    
    
    Many years ago a Man by the name of Alan Turing was discovered to be
    gay.  He was given hormonal treatments to curb his sexual urges.  These
    hormones caused him to "grow" female breasts.  He killed himself.
    
    Alan Turing (of "Turing machine" fame) is seen as one of the founding
    fathers of theoretical computer science.  Had he lived 25 more years,
    heaven only knows what other advances he might have made.

    Re: 520 Thanks for entering that note, very interesting.
    
    Gina

    Well it's a good thing for the thousands of gay and lesbian officers
    and soldiers who don't want to loose their jobs that Jerry doesn't have 
    any say in whether the ban is lifted or not
    
    By the way, Jerry, your continued characterization of the desire
    to lift the ban as a "valuing differences" ploy, is growing tiresome,
    not to mention offensive (knowing you loathe the VoD philosophy, I
    can only interpret your use of the phrase as an insult).
    
    For those in the military today who fear their professional careers
    are at stake, the lifting of the ban is far FAR more than a "social
    experiment."   This isn't a mamby-pamby, touchy-feely, politically 
    correct triviality being pushed by ignorant, anti-military people.
    
    It is a long needed reversal of an unjust policy that even Dick Cheney
    (former Secretary of Defense) referred to as "somewhat of an old
    chestnut."  The military itself hasn't been able to come up with a
    single logically consistent and factually supported arguement to
    support the ban (and they certainly have tried!!).  What we are seeing
    now is speculative fear mongering.  Annecdotes from those "who've been
    there" who say "it can't be done."
    
    Well I've seen testimony from gay and straight military people who 
    disagree with you.  Some of them are still serving at this very moment 
    and don't have to remember back twenty years.   I'm not dismissing 
    your experience, but I think *current* experience and direct knowledge 
    of the way things are today is more valuable.  
    
    Everything changes eventually.  Even the United States Marine Corps.
    
    /Greg
    

    
    
    Greg ( and others)
    
    
     When I read Maj Beelers side of the story I hear selfless devotion to
    the team,goal,esprit de cor( I butchered that). When I read yours I see
    me and my rights, I got it coming to me. Perhaps if you had children
    you would know the need for Summum Bonum( I butchered that too) that
    phrase means " The ulitimate good."  We need to look at the situation
    and reach the " Summun Bonum" not I got my rights. The reality is the
    many people will ( without malice or any other moral high ground straw
    man) view the acceptance of gays in the military as BAD. 
    
    David

FROM .519

> I said it once - I'll say it again.  I have BEEN in combat.  That is a F-A-C-T.
> There are a LOT of things which can cause unit integrity to deteriorate and
> if you think for one nano-second that homosexuality isn't one of them you're
> (possibly) living in never-never-land.

Well, hopefully, it's not never-never-land, just "someday-in-the-future-land!"

Please correct me if I'm wrong about this (I've never served, and am not a 
student of military history):

Isn't it true that at one time in the past, blacks were not allowed in the
military, for the same reason?  First excuse, blacks were supposedly not
capable of serving adequately; an excuse which evolved into "blacks will 
cause a breakdown of unit integrity."

Eventually, blacks were allowed in, but on "black-only" units.  Same reason
again.

Today, I think I'm safe in saying that having blacks in the military has no
detrimental effect on unit integrity.  Will it take as long to realize this
is also true for gays?  Seems obvious that the "problem" is caused by uptight
heterosexuals, not by gays.

Jon

.523> Well it's a good thing for the thousands of gay and lesbian officers
.523> and soldiers who don't want to loose their jobs ...

I'm not personally acquainted with thousands of gay and lesbian officers
and soldiers but as my contacts within the military industrial complex are
still rather strong I have had the occasion to talk to a few.

.523> Jerry doesn't have any say in whether the ban is lifted or not.

Quite the opposite, I have a great deal of "say" as does every American
citizen with pen and paper or a good word processor.  The pen is *infinitely*
more powerful than the sword.  I'm writing letters .. are you? (PS - I did
not say that the ban should not be lifted).
    
.523> By the way, Jerry, your continued characterization of the desire
.523> to lift the ban as a "valuing differences" ploy, is growing tiresome,
.523> not to mention offensive...

I would never enter anything with the objective of offending anyone.  If
you find anything that I say offensive, you need only to let me know and
I will do my best to change the wording so as to not be offensive - or
delete the note in its entirety.  I do my best to reply to inquiries and
state my opinion without being offensive.

If by the very act of stating a position (with which some may not agree)
I am judged "offensive" I will certainly cease to state my opinion. I say
this with neither rancor or bitterness.  I am very serious.

.523> (knowing you loathe the VoD philosophy, I can only interpret your
.523> use of the phrase as an insult).

I do not loathe the VoD philosophy nor do I believe that I have ever said,
explicitly or implicitly, anything of the nature.  If I am incorrect in that
I have said something which has perhaps been misinterpreted due to my poor
choice of words please let me know.  Your interpretation is incorrect and
I most assuredly do not mean the phrase to be insulting and categorically
deny that I "loathe the VoD philosophy".
    
.523> For those in the military today who fear their professional careers
.523> are at stake, the lifting of the ban is far FAR more than a "social
.523> experiment."

You are absolutely correct.  Those with whom I am personally acquainted
see it as FAR more than a social experiment.

.523> What we are seeing now is speculative fear mongering.  Annecdotes
.523> from those "who've been there" who say "it can't be done."

I'm sure that there are those who may voice an opinion which is somewhat
divergent from yours (and those who will voice an opinion divergent from
mine!).  As a result of this difference you may view their opinion as fear
mongering.  This is perhaps a natural human emotion.

There are those who say "it can't be done", I'm sure.  I am not of this
opinion.  I believe that it can be done but that it will take time, perhaps
a great deal of time.  It may require sacrifices on the part of all of those
involved.  There is NO reason to "push" this.  Full integration is not going
to happen overnight.  It may take years.  It will take years.

.523> Well I've seen testimony from gay and straight military people who 
.523> disagree with you.  Some of them are still serving at this very moment 
.523> and don't have to remember back twenty years.   I'm not dismissing 
.523> your experience, but I think *current* experience and direct knowledge 
.523> of the way things are today is more valuable.  

General Schwartzkopf has "been there", and quite recently.  I personally
consider very him to be VERY open-minded and an incredibly fair person.
Most assuredly I do not consider him a fear monger but he is a realist.
There have been times when I've had my doubts about Powell, but he is "there"
and is competent.  Both have significant reservations about this issue.

.523> Everything changes eventually.

"Eventually" is the operative word.

If you find anything in this note offensive please let me know and I'll
be more than happy to change/delete it.

Bubba

.524> When I read Maj Beelers side of the story I hear selfless devotion to
.524> the team,goal,esprit de cor ... When I read yours I see me and my
.524> rights, I got it coming to me.

I've been researching this issue of a "right" to serve in the military.
I have not had much success.  During this research I purchased a book
"My Country, My Right to Serve" by Mary Ann Humphrey.  It related the
experiences of gay men and women from WWII to the present.  I read it
from cover to cover.  There was not one word relating to "right" to serve.
I'm still looking .. I'm still asking .. but to little avail.

.524> Perhaps if you had children you would know the need for Summum Bonum
.524> ...that phrase means " The ultimate good."  We need to look at the
.524> situation and reach the " Summun Bonum" not I got my rights.

I am in complete and (politically incorrect) agreement with you Mr. Dyben.
There have been times in my life when I knew damned good and well that I
should have some "right" to do something - that I was qualified - that I
could do a good job ... but ... I also knew damned good and well that my
presence or voice could be detrimental to the ultimate goal that was sought.
I backed down.  I've done it before, I'll do it again.  Believe it or not
I do it with pride - pride in knowing that I have the guts to do what's
right.

This has nothing to do with a lack of the courage of my convictions to any
goal.  Quite the contrary - it is the courage of my convictions which causes
me to step back.  I'm much more interested in the common good than I am in
some personal aggrandizement.

.524> The reality is the many people will ( without malice or any other
.524> moral high ground straw man) view the acceptance of gays in the
.524> military as BAD.

And the reality is that it must be dealt with in a methodical and well
thought-out manner.

Bubba

PS - Thanks for the promotion but it's not Major Beeler.  It's (former)
Captain Beeler.

.525> Well, hopefully, it's not never-never-land, just
.525> "someday-in-the-future-land!"

You're right.  Good point.  Well taken.

.525> Isn't it true that at one time in the past, blacks were not allowed
.525> in the military, for the same reason?  First excuse, blacks were
.525> supposedly not capable of serving adequately; an excuse which evolved
.525> into "blacks will  cause a breakdown of unit integrity."

You are correct on a number of counts.  The wording used to exclude blacks
was almost identical to that of the language used to exclude homosexuals.
Let's take one step back from that.  I "grew up" during the 60s so a lot
of what I'm saying is from personal experience.  A lot of what I'm saying
has come from personal interaction with black soldiers from WWII forward.

The black person was considered to be inferior to the white person.  For
the most part there was NOT a "morality" issue.  Perhaps it was considered
to be "immoral" to make a white person work with a black person .. since
the black person was considered to be inferior ... but there was no real
moral issue.

A black soldier needed to prove that he was equal to or better than that
of a white person - and he did.  This (for the most part) dispelled the theory
that the black person was an inferior.

The issue of homosexuality is most assuredly NOT one of "inferiority" in
the same sense that it was with the black soldier.  Like it or not the
issue of homosexuality is considered to be that of a MORAL issue.  I know
that it's not and perhaps you know that it's not, but, the reality of the
situation is that homosexuality *is* perceived as being a moral issue. No,
it's not right, but, it's reality.

A soldier who is perceived as immoral can prove him/herself all day long
but for the most part he/she will be perceived as STILL being immoral.
There is, in my estimation, a huge difference between the rejection of
the black soldier and the rejection of the homosexual soldier.  As such,
these must be approached differently.  This is why Colin Powell was upset
when he was faced with people who compared the issue of blacks to that of
the homosexual.  They are two different issues.

.525> Eventually, blacks were allowed in, but on "black-only" units.  Same
.525> reason again.

You're wrong here.  The all-black (combat) units were formed during WWII.
President Harry Truman signed (well after WWII ended) the order allowing
full racial integration of the military and it was this order which disbanded
the all-black units.

.525> Today, I think I'm safe in saying that having blacks in the military
.525> has no detrimental effect on unit integrity.

Yep.  Look at the Chairman of the JCS.

.525> Will it take as long to realize this is also true for gays?

Perhaps.  Any hurry?  No, I could only wish that this would all just be
a memory and homosexuality was a "so what?" and everyone got along.  Reality
stinks at times.  But it is reality.

Bubba

    
    
    > Capt Beeler
    
     
      I thought it was General :-)
    
    David

.523> ...but I think *current* experience and direct knowledge of the
.523> way things are today is more valuable.

I've given this some thought.  You're right.  Bill Clinton is hence
disqualified from doing anything about this situation.

Bubba