Korean Job Discussion Forums

[sportsguy35]

[Freezer Burn]

Peoples opinions on this matter only comes from second or third hand knowledge, unless you are gay, then how can you really understand the issues that we face.
Its fine to sit there and quote the bible and tell tales of morality and sin, but again its not your life to live and we deserve the same rights as everyone else has, We dont segregate races anymore, why should we segregate sexuality.

[sjk1128]

[red dog]

Good points, sjk1128, and I hope things work out for you and your partner. I did think you were a bit harsh earlier, though ... allowing same-sex marriage is a big step for society and I'm still kind of surprised Canada has moved forward so far so fast. Hopefully other countries will follow suit, but it's going to take time.

[sjk1128]

There were 19 years between California overturning its laws banning mixed race marriages and the Supreme Court's ruling on the matter (in 1967) which forced all states in the USA to do likewise. In the course of history, this is not much time, but in an individual's life it's at least a third of adulthood. How many couples who really loved each other did that keep apart in one way or another? How many children did not receive their rightful inheritance? The cost in human suffering caused by discriminatory legislation against a minority group is immeasurable while the price the majority in power pays for ending it is minimal or non-existent.

When two men are waiting, and one is under water, the man under water grows weary of the wait much quicker than he who breathes freely. I make no apologies for wanting my air now. Anyone who does not want to give it to me is a cruel bigot who should identify himself so that his argument for keeping it from me can be viewed by all for public scrutiny. And, red dog, that is no harsher than the cold reality in which I live.

I have seen many arguments here about religion, but not one sound argument NOT based on religion - or morals that stem from religion - about why marriage rights should not be extended to me. Do people really think the law should be based on religious beliefs? Otherwise, how do you explain opposing gay marriage - essentially a legally binding contract into which any two adults can enter in America unless they are of the same gender?

Here ya go 30 % conservatives who voted "against" in this poll: Try to divorce yourselves for a moment from ideas of white veils and God smiling down from heaven on your special day. In terms of the law, we're talking about a legal contract with all sorts of property rights, immigration rights, and so forth. So why should the law disallow two adults from signing such a legally binding document if they want to? What special criteria exist here that make it so outlandish? There is no other contract denied to a huge segment of the population so arbitrarily. There is certainly no other contract to which anyone is denied access solely on the basis of being a "sinner." So if you someday fall into a life of sin, should the church influence the government to not allow you to sign a rental contract, or a will, or any other legal document until you "come back to the fold?" Who gets to decide if your sin is sufficiently grave to warrant denying you access?

[red dog]

Sorry if I offended you, sjk1128 -- I didn't mean to, and for the most part I agree with what you're saying. I'm sure that by coming here and sharing your experience you've changed many people's minds about gay marriage -- I already supported it, but you've certainly helped me understand these issues in more depth.

[Ya-ta Boy]

[Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee]

[canuckistan]

Gays marrying and having a proper contract to govern inheritance/benefits/medical decisions doesn't bother/affect me one bit and the state has no business sticking their noses into citizens' personal relationships or how they wish to formalize them.

There once was a time not too long ago when heteros living together unmarried wasn't ok.

[Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee]

Here are all the pics



















http://isna.ir/Main/NewsView.aspx?ID=News-556874

[articulate_ink]

I've been in sjk1128's shoes. About 10 years ago I was in a relationship with a Taiwanese man; we lived together in Washington DC, and his visa ran out while we were together. We spent a lot of money and endured a lot of anguish trying to resolve his legal status. This experience crystallized my feelings on the marriage issue. Had we been a heterosexual couple, there would never have been a problem: I could have married him, he could have gotten residency, and that would have been the end of it. Ultimately, the relationship didn't work out, for reasons that had little to do with his legal status. In fact, marrying him would have been the worst mistakes of my life. I was been in my mid-20s at the time; what did I know? But I should have had the option. When he got sick in the middle of the night I took him to the emergency room and held his hand. (I paid his doctor bills, too.) When I called in sick at work the next day and was told I technically wasn't allowed to use my own sick leave because we weren't technically a married couple, I told my employer that she could technically accept my immediate resignation if else but "I hope he feels better soon" came out of her mouth. I won that round. At least something went right for us. As I said, things didn't work out, but the casual presumption that same-sex relationships are less valid than heterosexual ones makes me very calmly furious.

When people try to proclaim that homosexuality isn't natural, I want to ask them about their credentials in any of various fields: anthropology, genetics, biology, zoology, history, psychology. If you're neither gay nor a specialist in one of these areas, then there's no reason for you to comment on whether it's natural or not. You're out of your depth.

My own experience as a gay man is fairly typical. I can say this because one thing gay people tend to do, as we meet and get to know each other, is compare coming-out stories: how long have you known, how did you figure it out, how old were you, what were your first sexual and romantic experiences like, etc. I figured out that I was gay around the age of eight. That number has come up surprisingly often in these conversations. Something in the development of boys leads those of us who are gay to identify our feelings around that time, even if we are far from ready to act on them. At fifteen, I was head over heels for my best friend... and I was terrified to say or do anything about it, so I kept my mouth shut and hoped no one at school would guess. (Everyone knew.) At eighteen, I was finally ready to begin admitting what everyone else in my life had already figured out. And now, seventeen years later, I've come full circle: I'm in Korea and kind of keeping it under wraps for the second time in my adult life. It's a very surreal experience.

Denying same-sex couples (I don't like using the word gay as a noun) the right to marry is not logical.

If you want to claim the need to maintain a traditional definition of marriage, well, times change. Enough has been said about excluding mixed-race couples from marriage, for example, that I don't need to add anything.

If you want to claim marriage as a basis for procreation, then by that logic you exclude infertile couples, seniors, and those who choose not to have children. To take this lunacy a step further, what if a hetero couple has a child, and it dies? Do they then have to get a divorce? Or immediately make another baby?

If you want to claim a slippery-slope defense of the marriage ban, you're walking on a fine but indefensible line. Bestiality is irrelevant. An animal cannot be a partner in a marriage. My hypothetical cat could not take me to the hospital and put my co-pay on its credit card and call in sick the next day at work. We're talking about marriage between consenting adults, not animals and not minors. Polygamy is less irrelevant. While it's an arrangement that people may find discomfiting, whose business is it to evaluate the members' love, sincerity, or commitment?

If you want to claim a religious defense, well, frankly, I don't care how you feel, and I don't care that you will claim that a majority of Americans feel the same way. One interpretation of one religious document is too narrow to govern a nation as large and diverse as the US... or Canada, or the UK, or Australia or New Zealand. Slavery was once justified on religious grounds. So were anti-miscegenation laws. And check out those pictures above; there's religion in action for you. Those pictures sum up my feelings on the subject of what God supposedly wants very well.

A homosexual orientation is not a choice. Anyone who claims otherwise is ignorant. Period. There's a significant amount of evidence to suggest a genetic cause, and the studies done on the human limbic system (if you don't know what that is, Google it or check Wikipedia) bear this out better than most. However, sexual orientation is a complex phenomenon that involves emotions, behavior, and social conditions. The element of choice comes into play when you identify your own orientation and decide to live consistently with the way you're made. Unless you are in physical (or, as in the case of certain sub-barbaric countries, mortal) danger, living openly is a healthy thing to do... if you can accomplish it. To live in secrecy and to lie about your basic self is painful. It involves daily insults to your basic humanity. It shuts out the people who think they are close to you. If people think this is what God wants, then I have no interest in their God.

It's not an arrangement you make to get sex. You're still gay when you're not in bed (or wherever you get naked with somebody special).

Being gay is also not a lifestyle. That word, unfortunately, was bandied about back in the 70s when gay activism was just getting established. Unfortunately, it has never gone away. Now it comes back to haunt us. There are gay lifestyles, certainly, just as there are straight ones. Some gay people live in major cities, go to huge parties, live extravagantly, dress fashionably, and do all the other stereotypical things. But many don't do those things and aren't interested in them. There is no monolithic way to be gay. In fact, the idea that there is a gay community is misleading: it's like saying there's a left-handed community.

It's not a mental illness. If you think it is, what do you know that such disparate bodies as the American Psychological Association and the Chinese government don't? If they were convinced, shouldn't you be?

Having said all that, I think we can safely conclude that I'm squarely in the pro-marriage camp. Civil unions are fine if they're available to straight people too. Equal opportunity for all. And to all a good night.

[Alias]

Now that gay marriage is legal in Canada I'm assuming that if a Canadian citizen marries a person of the same gender who happens to be a citizen of a different country, then it is possible for his/her partner to aquire Canadian citizenship.

This must be good news for gay Canadians working abroad.

[TheUrbanMyth]

[The Lemon]

[The Man known as The Man]

Is it officaila policy of the Iranian government to be against Canadian women to work there as journalists?