New York New York!

It's no more than you deserve, for making it a personal issue.

Who doesn't around here???

You don't, that's for certain.

I get sucked into it, replying in kind... I am not saying I am free of guilt, but rather that innocence is a rare quality here or anywhere, and even that is a political position rather than established fact...

The best brain on this site belongs to one too gutless to share his thoughts... I know what his problem is, but to him that knowledge makes me a troll... Yet, I am not a troll... I would much prefere to talk about the issues than about personalities because ultimately our view of truth will change our personalities who ever we are...Thanks

You are welcome.

I lost track of this thread.

It's impossible to cogently respond to a post that is so obtuse farmerman.

You seem to be arguing that liberals didn't champion gay rights 70 years ago for the same reason most people didn't advocate seat belts or oppose cigarettes.

So the reason is ignorance?

70 years ago, liberals didn't know that homosexuals were deserving of the same rights as anyone else? What scientific studies, akin to those associated with seat belt usage and smoking, were published in the ensuing years that convinced liberals with facts that homosexuals deserve equal rights?

Let's both bookmark this discussion, because I guarantee you that 10 years from, liberals will have a new victim around which to fashion a cause.

I will be asking: "Why didn't you care about them 10 years ago?"

You will be responding: "You just hate liberals."

Yes, but that'll still be correct, right?

Yaknow, the real fun in the way our country is moving, socially, is watching the great Bigot Freak-out that ensues. It's..... delicious.

Cycloptichorn

You don't seem to understand Fido.

While incestual relationships are very likely to lead to bad results for the participants, who are we to make force this wisdom upon individuals who want to boink their brothers or daughters?

That the practice leads to genetic destruction for the whole is meaningless to the liberal who believes that it all about the individual's desires...when the topic is pleasure.

When an individual wants to teach their children that God hates homosexuals, that intrudes upon the collective and must be prohibited.

In the meantime, we seem to have lost JCBoy.

Good question, Finn. That's why I do think incestuous marriages ought to be legalized next.


On this point, however, I disagree. The practice does not lead to genetic destruction. We know this from ancient Roman census data, back when Egypt was a province of the Roman Empire. Incest was not just legal there and then, it was often mandatory under Egyptian law. The Roman statistics do show that non-incestuous communities in Egypt had higher life expectancy than incestuous ones, other things being equal. But the incestuous ones were nowhere near extinction or even decline. Genetic destruction through legal incest isn't a fact, it's a fantasy.

Yup.

In all likelihood, 10 years from now I will find Liberals intellectually and morally bankrupt, but will I "hate" them? I doubt it. I save hate for the handful of people I would like to see suffer and die. Right now there is only one. The other two have sufferend horribly and died.

However this will not preclude folks like you from inisisting that I hate liberals.

This is far too reflexive a response for it to be in any way modified by context.

What will (sadly) be delicious is when the results of Liberal thinking and policy eventually results in the fall of America, and every Liberal denies ever holding such beliefs.

Or, to be more hopeful, Liberals are thwarted and America flourishes, and many Liberals deny every holding such beliefs.

This nation flourished under liberalism. The downward slide actually came with Nixon and Reagan and was accelerated by the Bushes. When the nation falls, look inward, all you teabaggers.

It was just a joke, Finn.

You really need to lighten up.

Regarding Liberal thinking:

Instead of leading to the fall of America, it has lead to the greatness of America.

Our strength lies not in our slavish hewing to the way things were done in the past, but rather, or flexibility and suppleness of thought; our willingness to examine new, and dare I say, better, ways of doing things in the future.

That is what is special about our country: we are adaptable in ways that more traditional cultures are not.

And no matter how many Finns stand in the way, we'll keep working to adapt.

Until all are equal; all are recognized.

I'd tell you to get used to it, but you've apparently been living here all your life, and aren't yet, so why would I expect you to change now?

By the way: why do you write this way? Do you just not know how to form a coherent paragraph?

Cycloptichorn

I'm not a fan of A2K members who insist on footnoted posts, but I do appreciate that someone's simple assertion of "what we know" is hardly the final word on a matter.

I don't believe your assertions. What I know is that culturally accepted incest has existed primarily within elite (or royal) familes that are consumed by purity of lineage.

One need only study the Roman emperors and the Hapsburgs to appreciate how in breeding is harmful.

Funny Thomas. This may be unfair, but I'm betting that at least once in your life you've cast aspersions on incestuous hillbillies in Appalachia. When it comes to royals however, divine intervention apparently ensures that the power of their majestic seed overcomes the nagging realities of genetics.

Incest is not a biological problem?

Good. Then we no longer need to worry about the dilution of biological diversity in the Gaia ecosystem.

Pheww...I was worried there for a while.

But let's, for now, put aside biological concerns about incest.

You favor the legalization of incestuous marriages based, I believe, on the premises of adult consent.

That a Liberal might make this argument is incredible, but then you may not be a Liberal.

If this is the case it speaks well of your intellect, but poorly of your morality. If you are not compelled to defend incestuous marriages because of what you believe your Liberal tribe demands, you can't be considered a drone.

Your insistence on defending incestuous marriages, however does suggest that you are depraved in the sense that perceived personal choice concerning pleasure trumps even your common sense, let alone your Liberal programing.

One need not be liberal or conservative to understand that "consent" within family relationships is hardly the same as "consent" among strangers.

Whether or not incest should be a cultural taboo, it clearly is.

Perhaps there are four or five biologocally related couples who are capable of forming independent choices about incest, but they most certainly are the rare exception...and perhaps all live in Germany.

When a father and a daughter "consent" to have sex and marry, who really believes that the daughter's consent has not been strongly influenced, if not coerced, by the complex parent-child relationship?

I don't think that you are truly depraved, but I do think that you will argue a point beyond what you actually believe.

It certainly did flourish under liberalism, however Liberalism and liberalism are two totally different concepts, and for you, as a Liberal, to lay claim to the legacy of Western liberalism is ridiculous.

He's nesting with me.

My Gosh Cyclo, you claim to embrace the Liberal notion of pushing the boundaries of the status quo, and yet you insist that my writing style conform to your perception of what is acceptable.

Hypocritical?

No, it can't be because you are a Democratic hack who would rather die than be guilty of hypocricy.

In any case, I will match my writing style against yours any week, any day and any hour.

No matter how precisely Cyclo follows the rules of proper grammar (a fact I feel sure can easily be refuted) his comments are merely cut and pastes from Democratic talking points.

Perhaps they follow a proper template, but they lack any originality and substance.

You don't have to take it from me, take it from my source. It's Arthur P. Wolf and William H. Durham (eds): Inbreeding, Incest, and the Incest Taboo: The State of Knowledge at the Turn of the Century. University of California Press ( 2004)


That is unfair. I have never cast such aspersions.


You have taken a chance on being unfair to me (and were), so let me take a chance on being unfair to you: Thirty years ago, when gays were a socially stigmatized community of alleged creeps, you would have told me exactly the same if I had argued for the legalization of gay sex.

In any event, my general approach to social stigmata is to start from a presumption of laissez faire, and to consider if the stigmatizers can present a strong-enough case to override the presumption. In the case of incest, I have yet to see a persuasive case for outlawing it, even though I looked. Same for polyamory, by the way.

You didn't provide me with a link to your single source which is certainly not required, but in terms of the practicality of debate in this forum you might as well be suggesting a I simply accpet your contentions.

I feel certain that I can find a source that disagrees with yours and so we will be be back to square one. If you believe I cannot, challenge me to find one.

OK you've not cast apsersions on incestuous Appalachian hillbillies. I acknowledged it might be unfair to assert you have. I accept this as fact, and it makes you far less of a hypocrite, but it doesn't significantly alter the substance of my argument.

As I was unfair, so were you. Fair enough, but still the case.

30 years ago I would not have equated homosexual relationships with incestuous ones. In fact, 30 years ago I had no problem with homosexual relationships...nor do I today. Criminalizing gay sex was insidious 30 years ago as it is today.

I began my commentary in this thread with an assertion that I don't hate, or fear homosexuals, that I don't believe they are eternally damned by God, and I don't believe their practices should be illegal. Unfortunately, albeit expected, this caveat meant nothing to the folks who insist upon demonizing anyone who is not in lock step with their thinking.

If you do not support state recognized gay marriages, you are a homophobe who wants to deprive innocent Americans of their basic rights simply because of the strength of your hate.

You've been selective in your reply as is your right but let me push a couple of points on you for a response.

Mutual adult consent in an incestuous relationship is highly suspect.

If incest doesn't present a genetic problem for humans than the necessity of bio-diversity is overplayed by its proponents.