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On the other hand
Joined: 19 Apr 2003
Location: I walk along the avenue
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 Posted: Thu Jan 07, 2010 9:24 am Post subject: |
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| In South Africa, they do have gay marriage, which surprised me. However, I don't think there is necessarily tons of tolerance in the country for homosexuals. |
No, they rank well behind even the most conservative western nations for tolerance of homosexuality.
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| The 2007 Pew Global Attitudes Project: "Should homosexuality be accepted by society?" |
(That's 49% saying yes.)
I'm not exactly sure why South Africa was so ahead of the curve on gay-marriage. I've heard the influence of Desmond Tutu, a liberal cleric, had something to do with it.
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Koveras
Joined: 09 Oct 2008
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| Posted: Thu Jan 07, 2010 9:41 am Post subject: |
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| I'm curious why people aren't picking up on the distinction I've made between homosexuals and gays or the gay movement. You can profitably make the distinction without agreeing with anything else I've said. |
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NovaKart
Joined: 18 Nov 2009
Location: Iraq
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| Posted: Thu Jan 07, 2010 9:59 am Post subject: |
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| So if I'm understanding you right, you don't have a problem with homosexuals but you don't like people totally deconstructing traditional society. Unfortunately traditional society didn't have much of a place for homosexuals. Isn't there a way homosexuals can have the rights and respect of the general society without totally changing it? |
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Adventurer
Joined: 28 Jan 2006
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| Posted: Thu Jan 07, 2010 10:11 am Post subject: |
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| NovaKart wrote: |
| So if I'm understanding you right, you don't have a problem with homosexuals but you don't like people totally deconstructing traditional society. Unfortunately traditional society didn't have much of a place for homosexuals. Isn't there a way homosexuals can have the rights and respect of the general society without totally changing it? |
Societies, historically, have been organized between relations between males and females being together. The Greeks did have relationships between males to some extent, and that was part of their traditional society. I don't see why homosexuals can't have civil unions or the right to simply bequeath their fortune to a male person they love or care about and have them visit in a hospital. Too many homosexuals died without being able to have their loved one there, because the person wasn't a "family" member. At least, if one respects individual rights, that should be looked at. |
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NovaKart
Joined: 18 Nov 2009
Location: Iraq
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| Posted: Thu Jan 07, 2010 10:18 am Post subject: |
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| I would also add that gays should be able to bring their foreign partner to live in their home country the way straight couples can. And gays should be able to be open about their relationship without mockery and abuse, at least not any more so than the general population is subjected to that. When I say open about their relationship I don't mean flaunting it, just not having to hide it. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Thu Jan 07, 2010 8:19 pm Post subject: |
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| Koveras wrote: |
| As you've probably noticed by now, I place the gay movement within a much larger context of deconstruction; it's certainly significant that it originated in the indiscriminate counterculture of the sixties and seventies. Sometimes I shift back and forth, without explaining it, between the one level and the other: between, in my mind, subversion in general and the gay movement. I believe that that has been the cause of some of the our confusion. |
Well, that's fine, but for future reference: I feel the adoption of tolerance of homosexuals can be undertaken independent of other social movements, and I feel it should be considered as such. It's unfair to link tolerance of gays inherently to the behavior of the much larger movement in question.
| Koveras wrote: |
| I also would like to note that the quanitity of taboos is not important to me. |
Okay, so if quantity of taboos is not important to you, then when old taboos are replaced with new taboos, the only real basis of your complaint can be quality of taboos, which I'm not sure how you measure. Care to elaborate?
| Koveras wrote: |
| I'm referring to every taboo. In addition to the ones you brought up, I will add: the ones against casual sex; against public, physical displays of affection between the sexes; effeminacy in men; masculinity in women; indecorum in dress and carriage; irreverance to authority; victimizing oneself; pursuing pleasure; forgetting duty; I could go on. The gay movement had its hand in deconstructing all of it and I'm dumbfounded if you disagree. Nor did they - speaking on the general level now - 'replace' them: they simply crossed them off: doesn't matter, doesn't matter, doesn't matter. |
Okay, let's accept that the gay movement involves ditching those taboos. You've said the quantity of taboos doesn't matter, so in order for this to be a bad thing, these taboos must provide some measurable, important quality to our society. What do they provide that we're so in need of, such that their removal is an unmitigated bad?
| Koveras wrote: |
| I agree that there is popular hostility to the idea that they do matter. It's that paradox: tolerance's intolerance of intolerance, or a taboo against taboos. Riffing on what you said later, I also suppose you might say that formerly there was a taboo against not having taboos. To that all I can say is, if you agree with it, you haven't really comprehended the idea of culture as interior form. |
No, I do not feel intolerance of intolerance equates to a taboo against taboos. Further, I don't feel formerly there was a taboo against not having taboos. A taboo against intolerance is a taboo in it's own right, it's not a lack of taboo; it's a taboo against a particular belief (or at least the expression of said belief). This movement is not a movement against taboos in general. It opposes very specific taboos only.
| Koveras wrote: |
| You're concentrating on words without seeing the essence. Egalitarianism, on both the individual and cultural planes, is opposed to actual differences. |
I don't think so. Egalitarianism in its ideal form admits to differences, but limits the impact of those differences to things directly relevent to said differences. In a purely egalitarian society, for instance, a higher salary equates to more purchasing power, but not to more political influence. Being a female equates to being able to give birth to a child, but not to being strictly limited to particular lines of work. Actual differences still exist, but irrational inferences aren't drawn from said differences.
| Koveras wrote: |
| It's opposed to class, creed, gender, nation, civilization, race. Any liberal will admit this proudly. |
Excepting perhaps class, no, I don't think egalitarianism needs to be opposed to these things. Perhaps you could say egalitarianism is opposed to ethical inequality based on these things, but I don't think these things in and of themselves are incompatible with egalitarianism. With references to gender, for example, in an egalitarian society gender could be recognized -- and the fact that average capability differed between the genders could be recognize -- but individuals would still be allowed to pursue whatever sort of employment they could prove themselves capable of without prejudgment based on their gender. Difference persists, but irrational inferences are not drawn based on said differences.
| Koveras wrote: |
| I agree that victorian and post-romantic middle-class culture is singularly hostile to differences. I am not in favour of that culture. Sometimes I may conditionally be in favour of it. |
Okay, so when said culture was having it's values deconstructed, was it a good thing or a bad thing, and how does it differ from what is happening currently?
| Koveras wrote: |
| Still mesmerized by quantity, I see. |
I had been under the impression you were the one interested in quantity. Since instead you seem to be focusing on quality, I await further explanation about what makes individual taboos good or bad. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Thu Jan 07, 2010 8:21 pm Post subject: |
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| NovaKart wrote: |
| I would also add that gays should be able to bring their foreign partner to live in their home country the way straight couples can. |
Agreed.
| NovaKart wrote: |
| And gays should be able to be open about their relationship without mockery and abuse, at least not any more so than the general population is subjected to that. |
No one has the right to be free of mockery. While I personally would not mock a gay couple who was open about their relationship, and frankly would find someone who did mock it to be quite juvenille, individuals must retain the right to mock what they find worthy of mockery.
I don't think you should have to hide your relationship, but I also don't think people should have to hide their feelings about your relationship if you make it clear to them you're in a relationship. You should have the same legal protections as everyone else, that's all. If Koveras notices you and your lover holding hands, infers you're in a relationship, and wants to say, "You know, you two are really destroying our culture," then he has the right to say it. Would you really want it to be otherwise? |
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geldedgoat
Joined: 05 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Thu Jan 07, 2010 11:55 pm Post subject: |
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| Koveras, does your objection to altering the current legal defintion of marriage extend beyond it merely being a change in our cultural norms? |
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NovaKart
Joined: 18 Nov 2009
Location: Iraq
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| Posted: Fri Jan 08, 2010 2:08 am Post subject: |
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| That's why I said more than the general population. I'm not saying gays have to be totally free of mockery and I'm not suggesting any kind of law against it. What I'm saying is that it shouldn't be any more acceptable in general society to make a homophobic slur than a racial one . |
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Koveras
Joined: 09 Oct 2008
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| Posted: Fri Jan 08, 2010 11:01 am Post subject: |
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| NovaKart wrote: |
| So if I'm understanding you right, you don't have a problem with homosexuals but you don't like people totally deconstructing traditional society. Unfortunately traditional society didn't have much of a place for homosexuals. Isn't there a way homosexuals can have the rights and respect of the general society without totally changing it? |
Depends what you mean. If you mean would homosexual sex be criminal, the answer is no. Homosexuals won that fight in the sixties and seventies; good for them. At that point, the men, instead of siding with liberal, individualist, and multicultural forces, should have reintegrated with European culture - and here I'm not talking about a culture that goes back a few centuries, but back to the Hellenes and earlier. Throughout much of that history the watchword has been acceptance of private vices so long as they don't harm public morals. Would homosexuals get married and prance in the streets? Would they be legally protected against private discrimination? Would effeminacy and lustfulness be considered morally acceptable? No. |
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NovaKart
Joined: 18 Nov 2009
Location: Iraq
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| Posted: Sat Jan 09, 2010 6:18 am Post subject: |
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| So you think that homosexuality should not be illegal but you think that gays should keep totally quiet about their relationships. Straight people can get married and prance around in the streets displaying their heterosexuality but not gays. They have to keep quiet and pretend to leave a private life as a bachelor(ette), come up with excuses for not being married, endure gossip about their private life, etc. Or else get married to someone they're not at all physically attracted to. Sounds great. |
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On the other hand
Joined: 19 Apr 2003
Location: I walk along the avenue
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| Posted: Wed Jan 20, 2010 12:36 pm Post subject: |
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Anti gays in Uganda have resolved to mobilize Ugandans to stop buying goods from United States and the other countries which are threatening to cut aid to Uganda due to the controversial anti gay bill.
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But Sempa says that the United States and her allies who are threatening Uganda over the anti gay bill are not the only countries in the world where Uganda can import goods. "Uganda can buy goods from some Asian countries which are today economic giants. We can buy from China, India and other countries who respect our dignity."
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On the other hand
Joined: 19 Apr 2003
Location: I walk along the avenue
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| Posted: Wed Jan 20, 2010 12:39 pm Post subject: |
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David Bahati, the Ugandan MP who authored an anti-gay bill currently passing through the country, has reportedly been disinvited from a prayer breakfast with US president Barack Obama.
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CentralCali
Joined: 17 May 2007
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| Posted: Wed Jan 27, 2010 9:11 pm Post subject: |
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| Fox wrote: |
| If a mormon man marries several women, he'll probably file for civil unions with all of them. |
If a Mormon man does that, then he'll be kicked out of the Mormon church. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Wed Jan 27, 2010 9:16 pm Post subject: |
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| CentralCali wrote: |
| Fox wrote: |
| If a mormon man marries several women, he'll probably file for civil unions with all of them. |
If a Mormon man does that, then he'll be kicked out of the Mormon church. |
Don't certain Mormons still do it? Mormon fundamentalists? |
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