The Gay Megathread (see mod note on post #2212)

Brown Bomber · 24-10-2012 05:10PM

Sin City wrote: »

Surely you weretaught informed that drugs were bad and you still went and did them .

Correct.

Sin City wrote: »

Secondly you met these men while at drug parties, so lets just assume that most of the attendies would be fairly shady charecters

This would be a false assumption. Generally regular people.

Sin City wrote: »

Hetrosexuals can be preditory too, its not a homosexual trait.

I have no doubt that you are correct but my own experiences showed otherwise.

Sin City wrote: »

That behaviour wasnt normal by most people standards, you just met with pervs and peadoes who just happened to be homosexuals

Maybe, but now that i think of it what is most creepy is that these predatory episodes decreased the older I got.

Brown Bomber · 24-10-2012 05:15PM

28064212 wrote: »

What does "the norm" mean, in your opinion? Are homosexuals abnormal?

Norm = typical, unless I am mistaken.

28064212 wrote: »

That's some remarkably bizarre reasoning. Is teaching heterosexuality as the norm responsible for statutory rape?

Of course not. I was just giving my own personal perspective on how I feel it may have affected me personally.

doctoremma · 24-10-2012 05:26PM

Brown Bomber wrote: »

Correct.

This would be a false assumption. Generally regular people.

I have no doubt that you are correct but my own experiences showed otherwise.

Maybe, but now that i think of it what is most creepy is that these predatory episodes decreased the older I got.

At least three instances of confirmation bias here.

1. Of course the people at the parties were "regular people". After all, you were there, fully participating, and you're a regular person, are you not? Obviously, to someone who doesn't go to parties to take drugs, you might all appear a bit shady.

2. You're a man. In order to experience a heterosexual instance of predatory behaviour, the aggressor would have to be a woman. Now, I'm not suggesting for one minute that women can't be predatory. But I would wager that a man doesn't always perceive aggressive behaviour from a woman as "predatory" or "threatening". You may not have experienced predatory heterosexual behaviour because you don't view it as predatory.

3. Extending from above. I'm not going to deny that a predatory person might not intentionally target someone vulnerable (e.g. young). However, as you get older, maybe you WERE hit on as often, you simply stopped viewing them as predatory approaches?

24-10-2012 05:29PM

Brown Bomber wrote: »

Norm = typical, unless I am mistaken.

Are homosexuals abnormal? What language would you be advocating is taught to children in this regard? Abnormal? Not normal? Less normal? "Differently" normal?

Brown Bomber · 24-10-2012 05:46PM

doctoremma wrote: »

At least three instances of confirmation bias here.

1. Of course the people at the parties were "regular people". After all, you were there, fully participating, and you're a regular person, are you not? Obviously, to someone who doesn't go to parties to take drugs, you might all appear a bit shady.

Which would be a fair assesment to make if anyone else had actually witnessed what I've witnessed. They haven't

doctoremma wrote: »

2. You're a man. In order to experience a heterosexual instance of predatory behaviour, the aggressor would have to be a woman. Now, I'm not suggesting for one minute that women can't be predatory. But I would wager that a man doesn't always perceive aggressive behaviour from a woman as "predatory" or "threatening". You may not have experienced predatory heterosexual behaviour because you don't view it as predatory.

FWIW I have been on the receiving end of such tactics by an older woman as a child. An aunt of a close friend. I'll spare you the details but I can assure you that I am/was aware of the behaviours of both male and female.

doctoremma wrote: »

3. Extending from above. I'm not going to deny that a predatory person might not intentionally target someone vulnerable (e.g. young). However, as you get older, maybe you WERE hit on as often, you simply stopped viewing them as predatory approaches?

There were occasions as I got older but they are markedly different. I worked in a pub with a gay guy and we'd often go to the George together at the weekends. I can assure you that the approaches are entirely different towards an adult and a teenager.

The approach to an adult is essentially the same as man to a woman imo. The approach to a child is far more intense, threatening and lewd.

Brown Bomber · 24-10-2012 05:50PM

28064212 wrote: »

Are homosexuals abnormal? What language would you be advocating is taught to children in this regard? Abnormal? Not normal? Less normal? "Differently" normal?

When I say homosexuality is not the norm I am speaking proportionally. In the same way that Mormonism is not the norm. That doesn't mean I think Mormons are "Abnormal? Not normal? Less normal? "Differently" normal?"

What language would you be advocating is taught to children in this regard?

Homosexual, and let people find their own truths.

24-10-2012 06:22PM

Brown Bomber wrote: »

Homosexual, and let people find their own truths.

So... use heterosexual, and let people find their own truths? Exactly what the Australian schools are doing?

Ambersky · 24-10-2012 06:36PM

I was pleasantly surprised to find the Redemptorists inviting in a lesbian and a gay man to give the homily on courage at a recent Novena in Dundalk.
So many lesbians and gay men feel excluded from their churches and some are deeply pained by this.
Not everyone understands that christian churches exclude or silence lesbian and gay members so it may be necessary to remind some readers of the kind of things that have come out of the Vatican as official statements.
Sometimes the exclusions come in a direct form

No authentic pastoral programme will include organizations in which homosexual persons associate with each other without clearly stating that homosexual activity is immoral

or as a general statement of disorder

Although the particular inclination of the homosexual person is not a sin, it is a more or less strong tendency ordered toward an intrinsic moral evil; and thus the inclination itself must be seen as an objective disorder.

http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_19861001_homosexual-persons_en.html
Signed by Ratzinger himself
It can be difficult for many to even want to stay in a church that has that view of them but if you love your church it can come as a deep wound.

The reading at the Novena Mass Im linking to here was on the Good Samaritan which was highly appropriate seeing as Samaritans were a group of people Jews in Jesus time had difficulty thinking of with anything other than revulsion. It was an act of courage to associate with Samaritans in Jesus time and it seems the Redemptorists at least are following in his footsteps.

You can skip to about 5.20 mins if you like

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qo5fVaqtvRs

nozzferrahhtoo · 25-10-2012 07:53AM

Brown Bomber wrote: »

I have no doubt that you are correct but my own experiences showed otherwise.

Only because your experience was by definition limited. Being a boy you were hardly going to experience directly what a girl experiences at the hands of predatory males. This is the problem with using anecdote as evidence, it is limited by definition to your own experience and possible continuum of experience.

Brown Bomber wrote: »

Maybe, but now that i think of it what is most creepy is that these predatory episodes decreased the older I got.

No surprise there. The whole point of being predatory is that one goes after the vulnerable. The older one gets the less vulnerable one tends to get. Again this has nothing at all to do with homosexuality on any level, or this thread. Girls experience the very same thing at the hands of heterosexual males.

The danger here is to take something that is true about predatory males as a whole and to try and pretend it has anything at all to do with homosexuality specifically. That would be little more than opportunistic propaganda spin were someone to attempt it.

Penn · 25-10-2012 09:18AM

Brown Bomber wrote: »

On a personal level I am glad that these kind of views weren't pushed into my consciousness as a teen. In my mid-teens in the 90's I was big into the drug scene as were a lot of homosexual men and my path would converge with theirs in parties etc more often than not.

I was then an awkward, boyish looking 15-year-old who looked a lot younger who was at these parties off my head on drugs and alcohol. I was propositioned on numerous occasions by predaratory middle-aged to elderly gay men at these parties in very direct and sometimes aggressive manners.

I hate to imagine what might have happened if I was left under the impression that their behaviour was somehow normal because of what I was thought at school.

I've highlighted what I feel is the key point there, Brown Bomber. They were on drugs. Therefore, their behaviour was not normal. You clarified in a later post that in your opinion, "norm = typical" and that by "norm", you are speaking proportionally. Proportionally, homosexual men don't behave like that. In your experiences at these drug parties, the amount of homosexual men acting that way may have been in the majority. However, that's because it was a drug party, which means the majority of the homosexual men there would have been on drugs. Similar to how Mormonism might not be the norm, but if you're in a Mormon church, it would be.

Your example of Mormonsim not being normal when viewed as a proportion is also relative here. The subset of homosexual men at those drug parties were not "normal" when viewed as a proportion of all homosexual men. Not only that, but the fact that you, as a young-looking 15 year old, were at these drug parties, is also not "normal".

I think you're partially basing your opinion on a very non-normal situation with many non-normal factors.

I'd also theorise that perhaps if you had some form of education in school which taught you about the normal homosexual lifestyle, you would have easily recognised that the behaviour of the homosexual men at these drug parties was not normal.

25-10-2012 10:25PM

Brown Bomber wrote: »

What is normal though?

You defined it earlier using the term "proportionally", why are you looking for a new definition now? Are you really suggesting that the behaviour you describe is the norm for homosexuals?

Brown Bomber wrote: »

There are homosexual groups that are advocates of pederasty etc http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_Man/Boy_Love_Association

And there are heterosexual groups that are advocates of pederasty and paedophilia. It's not the norm within either group

Brown Bomber · 25-10-2012 10:55PM

28064212 wrote: »

You defined it earlier using the term "proportionally", why are you looking for a new definition now? Are you really suggesting that the behaviour you describe is the norm for homosexuals?

I'm not looking for a new definition to be fair. "The norm" and "normal" are two different things. Homosexuality imo is normal but certainly not the norm in the same way that red hair is not the norm (and normal). I'm all for education programmes that instill in students the idea that homsexuality is normal but not this school programme which wants to punish people for the thought crime of holding the view that heterosexuality is not "the norm" - when it clearly is, in every society, in every nation in the world.

25-10-2012 11:02PM

Brown Bomber wrote: »

I'm not looking for a new definition to be fair. "The norm" and "normal" are two different things. Homosexuality imo is normal but certainly not the norm in the same way that red hair is not the norm (and normal). I'm all for education programmes that instill in students the idea that homsexuality is normal but not this school programme which wants to punish people for the thought crime of holding the view that heterosexuality is not "the norm" - when it clearly is, in every society, in every nation in the world.

In what way is it "punishing people"? You appear to have applied a very specific definition of norm to this program that doesn't appear to be borne out in the slightest.

Brown Bomber · 25-10-2012 11:56PM

28064212 wrote: »

In what way is it "punishing people"? You appear to have applied a very specific definition of norm to this program that doesn't appear to be borne out in the slightest.

norm (nôrm)n.1. A standard, model, or pattern regarded as typical: the current middle-class norm of two children per family.
2. Mathematics a. A mode.
b. An average.
c. The length of a vector.

The schools programme, according to the article at least, would see students punished for expressing their views that heterosexuality is "the norm", when the vast majority of people are attracted to the opposite sex.

NuMarvel · 26-10-2012 01:32AM

Brown Bomber wrote: »

The schools programme, according to the article at least, would see students punished for expressing their views that heterosexuality is "the norm", when the vast majority of people are attracted to the opposite sex.

Might have been best to do some research of your own:

Here's the Telegraph article referred to on the LifeSiteNews website. You'll note that paper has conflated "the norm" (used in the report they refer to) and "normal" (as per the headline). Given that we all agree here that "the norm" and "normal" are two different things, it's fair to say that the reporting by the Telegraph and LifeSiteNews is misleading.

And here's the editorial, including a lovely line that tells us that phrases like "You're/That's so gay" isn't actually a reference to homosexuality. Which is news to me, but I digress. By the way, that's the kind of language in the playground that the programme wants to eliminate.

Then, here's the press release from the NSW Dept of Education confirming that "the material raised in today's Daily Telegraph was prepared by a third party and will not be approved by the Department of Education for use in NSW classrooms." LifeSiteNews doesn't refer to this at all, even though their article was published the day after the Dept's press release.

Finally, here's some background information about the Proud Schools Programme:

Proud Schools is a $250,000 program aimed at tackling homophobia in schools.

The pilot program began this year involves around 12 public high schools across Sydney, the Hunter and the Central Coast.

The aim of the program is to build on the culture of understanding and respect in NSW schools and includes:

Professional development:
In NSW we have sophisticated training materials to help promote awareness among school staff of racial and sexual discrimination, but there are limited training opportunities to help teachers improve their awareness and understanding of discrimination and abuse of same-sex attracted or gender questioning students. Professional learning will be developed that will include key modules for school leaders and school staff.

Supporting resources
Work is being conducted to inform the development of the program and to identify the kinds of resources and support materials available to support staff and students participating in the program. It is important that we identify early in the program how best to assist schools build their capacity to support same-sex attracted and gender questioning young people.

Student workshops
Consultation sessions will be conducted with NSW students to find out what they think needs to be done to help address homophobia in schools.

Parent Workshops
Experience has shown that when school communities work together real improvements in promoting understanding and reducing discrimination can be made. In every pilot school a parent information workshop will be held to explain the aim and goals of the pilotprogram and to seek their input about how the pilot program can be tailored to suit the needs of their local community.

Steering group
A steering group comprising government and non-government agencies has been established to monitor the pilot program. At the end of the pilot it is anticipated that the steering group will provide a series of recommendations that will inform the development of a final Proud Schools program that can be rolled out across the State.

So, the moral of the story is not to take the word of a website that isn't able to publish an article about issues affecting gay people without using the word homosexualist over, and over, and over again.

Brown Bomber · 26-10-2012 04:38AM

And below is how the Proud Schools Consultation Report defines “heterosexism”.
The minister dismissed this material as “third party”, which is misleading.
As its title page states, the report was commissioned and funded by the Department of Education specifically to inform the Proud Schools pilot program. It was provided to the Proud Schools steering committee where it formed part of ongoing discussions.

Ambersky · 27-10-2012 05:13PM

One of the issues I write about a lot on Boards is the issue of the protection from abuse of children and vulnerable adults.
I am willing to challenge men or women from any religious background or no religious background and I have found in doing so that more or less the same avoidance strategies are employed by all.
We have had discussions here on comments made by David Norris a prominent Gay activist and comments made by prominent members of the Christian churches some of which were surprisingly similar.

That simularity isnt all that surprising really because we are more the same than we are different in many ways, but I think it is a pity we seem to view each other so differently.
For example when a man inappropriately solicits a young man some people will then question homosexuality as a "lifestyle" and question the intrinsic morality of homosexuality.
When a man inappropriately solicits a young woman, heterosexuality as a "lifestyle" is not brought into question. I don't think I have ever heard anyone seriously posing a question about heterosexuality as a lifestyle and heterosexuality itself is never considered immoral.
That is what I consider to be the meaning of heterosexism.

There are abusers among the heterosexual community and there are abusers among the homosexual community, trying to measure which group has the most abusers is futile. If each group looked to their own and could see abuse clearly in their own communities, families, churches, schools etc it would be fantastic. But of course we as people tend to want to look to others to see their faults not our own.
Arguments attempting to put homosexuality back in a section for the abnormal don't make any difference to abused people or help to change abusers behavior they only help to perpetuate shame and blame.
If we have learned anything it must be that unhealthy shame, repression and secrecy are the very ingredients needed to create the situations that foster abuse.
Instead surely we should be doing all we can to help people grow into a healthy sexuality with consenting adults of an appropriate age or choosing celibacy consensually but also as healthy sexual adults.

Again I will post the link to the Novena mass where the homily is given by two normal homosexual people in the spirit of inclusivity and welcome.
What a difference this would make to people to grow up with.
Courage Do Not Be Afraid is the theme of this mass.
These Gay people are normal, they are the kind of people I associate with and party with now and when I was younger, we have grown up together, but I suppose normal is not what people want to talk about or want to see.
This video is all about being normal, growing up the same as others and wanting to be included. How simple is that. It is a plea from the heart.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qo5fVaqtvRs

Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akp11lNCvnQ

georgieporgy · 30-10-2012 12:24PM

Ambersky, heterosexuals who solicit members of the oppisite sex (other than their spouses) are referred to as fornicators or adulterers. And their actions are forbidden in christianity. Just as sex activity between members of the same sex is likewise forbidden.

Ambersky · 30-10-2012 12:52PM

My point is this doesnt bring their heterosexuality into question.
They remain heterosexual fornicators or adulterers a kind of deviant branch of heterosexuality but we remain safe in the belief that heterosexuality is ok.

Homosexuals who inappropriately approach or have sex with children or vulnerable adults are seen as proof that homosexuality itself is deviant, not a deviant branch of a homosexuality that expressed appropriately is ok.
And within Christian churches Homosexuals cant have spouses to be unfaithful to as they are not allowed to get married and remain faithful to that person as a married partner.

This is the double standard.

georgieporgy · 30-10-2012 01:40PM

Ambersky wrote: »

My point is this doesnt bring their heterosexuality into question.
They remain heterosexual fornicators or adulterers a kind of deviant branch of heterosexuality but we remain safe in the belief that heterosexuality is ok.

Homosexuals who inappropriately approach or have sex with children or vulnerable adults are seen as proof that homosexuality itself is deviant, not a deviant branch of a homosexuality that expressed appropriately is ok.
And within Christian churches Homosexuals cant have spouses to be unfaithful to as they are not allowed to get married and remain faithful to that person as a married partner.

This is the double standard.

Ah, I see what you mean. Let's compare it to eating. Some people suffer from bulemia or anorexia. These are nice people but we refer to their condition as an eating disorder. Something they have to struggle with and overcome if they are to live normal healthy lives.
We don't all have eating disorders. Some of us have sexual disorders. That's not all. There's a whole list of mental and physical disorders out there.

doctoremma · 30-10-2012 02:02PM

georgieporgy wrote: »

Ah, I see what you mean. Let's compare it to eating. Some people suffer from bulemia or anorexia. These are nice people but we refer to their condition as an eating disorder. Something they have to struggle with and overcome if they are to live normal healthy lives.
We don't all have eating disorders. Some of us have sexual disorders. That's not all. There's a whole list of mental and physical disorders out there.

Yes. But we label something a "disorder" if it causes a negative outcome (as you allude to re: eating disorders and incompatibility with normal health). I don't see how homosexuality can be considered a disorder, even less so when compared to medical disorders.

tommy2bad · 30-10-2012 02:31PM

georgieporgy wrote: »

Ah, I see what you mean. Let's compare it to eating. Some people suffer from bulemia or anorexia. These are nice people but we refer to their condition as an eating disorder. Something they have to struggle with and overcome if they are to live normal healthy lives.
We don't all have eating disorders. Some of us have sexual disorders. That's not all. There's a whole list of mental and physical disorders out there.

Oh man! you went their, disorder, as in the presumption that their is some order from which to deviate.
How about the idea that their is an order that includes both homo and heterosexual behavior? Neither one is the a disorder.

georgieporgy · 30-10-2012 03:53PM

doctoremma wrote: »

Yes. But we label something a "disorder" if it causes a negative outcome (as you allude to re: eating disorders and incompatibility with normal health). I don't see how homosexuality can be considered a disorder, even less so when compared to medical disorders.

We're talking moral disorder, not medical disorder. For people who think morals mean nothing then that would not be a problem I suppose.

anorexia, for example, is first and formost a moral disorder. But it has physical consequences, as do all moral disorders.
http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_19861001_homosexual-persons_en.html

30-10-2012 03:58PM

georgieporgy wrote: »

We're talking moral disorder, not medical disorder. For people who think morals mean nothing then that would not be a problem I suppose.

anorexia, for example, is first and formost a moral disorder. But it has physical consequences, as do all moral disorders.
http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_19861001_homosexual-persons_en.html

A "moral disorder" is entirely in the eye of the beholder. Many people would consider Catholicism to be a moral disorder.

And you might consider anorexia to be "first and formost a moral disorder", but you will not find anyone in the medical or scientific arena that agrees with you

tommy2bad · 30-10-2012 03:58PM

Anorexia is a moral disorder???
What planet are ye on?
Who's morals? again the presumption that their is some universal standard to which we must hold and be held by people who think they know what that is.

Benny_Cake · 30-10-2012 04:03PM

georgieporgy wrote: »

We're talking moral disorder, not medical disorder. For people who think morals mean nothing then that would not be a problem I suppose.

anorexia, for example, is first and formost a moral disorder. But it has physical consequences, as do all moral disorders.
http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_19861001_homosexual-persons_en.html

I certainly accept that morals exist, however, eating disorders such as anorexia or bulimia are absolutely not "moral disorders". I speak from knowing sufferers unfortunately.

georgieporgy · 30-10-2012 09:04PM

28064212 wrote: »

A "moral disorder" is entirely in the eye of the beholder. Many people would consider Catholicism to be a moral disorder.

And you might consider anorexia to be "first and formost a moral disorder", but you will not find anyone in the medical or scientific arena that agrees with you

A 5 second google found this one:
Eating disorders are not "the symptom of an underlying mental disorder, as is often argued. They are the symptoms of ordinary morality, which is just being taken seriously -- or more seriously than usual" (257). http://ndpr.nd.edu/news/25100-understanding-eating-disorders-conceptual-and-ethical-issues-in-the-treatment-of-anorexia-and-bulimia-nervosa/

30-10-2012 09:14PM

georgieporgy wrote: »

A 5 second google found this one:
Eating disorders are not "the symptom of an underlying mental disorder, as is often argued. They are the symptoms of ordinary morality, which is just being taken seriously -- or more seriously than usual" (257). http://ndpr.nd.edu/news/25100-understanding-eating-disorders-conceptual-and-ethical-issues-in-the-treatment-of-anorexia-and-bulimia-nervosa/

A 5 second Google also got the author's qualifications. A doctorate in Philosophy. She is not qualified to make such a call

georgieporgy · 30-10-2012 09:28PM

Benny_Cake wrote: »

I certainly accept that morals exist, however, eating disorders such as anorexia or bulimia are absolutely not "moral disorders". I speak from knowing sufferers unfortunately.

I too know sufferers and have treated their dental needs.
I know I sound cruel. But you have to be cruel to be kind sometimes. Would you agree that alcoholism is a moral disorder? Drug addiction? Kleptomania? Mythomania?
Or is everything just an unfortunate condition beyond our personal control?
"I can't help it, I'm addicted" "I'm a victim"

Corkfeen · 30-10-2012 09:38PM

georgieporgy wrote: »

I too know sufferers and have treated their dental needs.
I know I sound cruel. But you have to be cruel to be kind sometimes. Would you agree that alcoholism is a moral disorder? Drug addiction? Kleptomania? Mythomania?
Or is everything just an unfortunate condition beyond our personal control?
"I can't help it, I'm addicted" "I'm a victim"

You're illustrating your ignorance of serious mental issues. They are not bloody moral disorders... Would you say depression is a moral disorder too? And one can be addicted to drugs both physically and mentally, is the physical withdrawal false or a moral manifestation? Your idea of moralising mental illness is deeply unsettling...

The Gay Megathread (see mod note on post #2212)

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