Big religion has a tendency to cultivate its own 'experts' to head their little crusades. There are those PhD-holding creationists out there who had their science studies funded by Churches, just to get a pseudo-credible spokesman.
I've heard and believed arguments from members of the LGBTQ community that marriage shouldn't be the _first_ priority of activists when there are so many other issues of legal discrimination to be addressed. Even with the proposed legislative changes there are still a bunch of problems apart from marriage - in particular the full recognition of gay families and access to adoption. Activists also need to address other issues of violence and discrimination.
I have a gay friend who has taught in a Catholic school forever. His work colleagues don't know of the existence of his partner of thirty years. He might be more motivated to fight against discriminatory employment than fight for gay marriage.
Just as many women don't support (what they believe is) feminism, the LGBTQ community is made up of people who fight for gay rights and people who don't. However, although even many activists are not personally interested in the idea of marriage, most understand that this recognition is essential to full equality. It's a no-brainer, just a matter of when and how to campaign.
Ah, good old DREADNOUGHT is still out there, shitful as ever.
He does make one valid point:
Rather, and too often, heterosexual politicians, commentators and others have preferred to listen to self-appointed gay community spokespeople, usually activists on the extreme fringe, rather than consulting widely to get the views of diverse and dynamic same sex-attracted Australians.
I'll raise you a pot and call you a kettle, or something...
From personal experience I can say that Heard is a self-aggrandising bullshitter and defamer, and he's as credible a commentator on the gay community as George Pell.
And what happens in the Confessional,with the Heard you man!?
Shane: that comment isn't valid at all. Gay and lesbian rights activists are usually just those who can be bothered doing something about equality.
For example, officers of the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Rights Lobby are elected by a large membership who pay a small annual fee for the privilege. Where is the evidence of "extreme fringe" tendencies? And who better else for politicians to listen to than the elected leadership of a representative body?
If you have toilet paper, the Hun is surplus to requirement!!!!!
Anne, (correct me if I'm incorrect Shane) but i believe that Shane's is merely calling out the hypocracy of Heard and directing Heards point directly back at him, and nobody else, especially officers of the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Rights Lobby.
But maybe im mistaken, im kinda dumb apparently :)
If you have toilet paper, the Hun is surplus to requirement!!!!!
Nup - you're wrong. The shit would encounter Bolt and much like the same poles of a magnet touching it would then be fired back up your arse.
Erk, embarrassment. Oh dear. Sorry Shane. Mumble mumble...
John "Dreadnought" Heard is a lying, hateful, hypocritical psychopath. He claims to be "pious" because he has gay lusts and doesn't "indulge in them". (Even if this were true, he'd still be a dangerously unhinged man.) But the fact is, John Heard is a liar. He ALLEGEDLY hires male prostitutes and goes to discreet "sex on premises" venues like all the other right-wing closet cases. He must be riddled with STDs (maybe even the big one), and yet he's still persisting with the line that it's Godly to stay chaste and continue to treat gays like the scum they are/he is. He can't let himself live free - and he wants all other gays to suffer his shame. He is pure scum.
In fairness to the gay guy there, there is a point. Putting aside the questions of superannuation etc, why would a gay person possibly want to be married? What 'official' ceremony would give them legitimacy? Why would they not be better off creating their own tradition?
Marriage was simply invented as a way to control economies, and that applies to both heteros and homos. Why should either curry favour with those who control this dubious tradition?
Because unlike you, THR, gays are looking for a meaningful relationship would lock them up into a commitment. Commitment and a pledge to faithfulness in a relationship carries meaning to people's lives in a way that your decadence in terms of your political belief couldn't allow you to appreciate.
And if marriage weren’t a fulfilling institution you wouldn't see so many people trying and some trying again to make a go of it.
So you shouldn't judge others by your own decadence in terms of your Marxist cult. Judge gays as being basically normal people who for the most part are conservative and looking for commitment and meaning to their lives.
They aren't numbers or part of the “ masses” as your reigious cult tells you. They’re individuals with different aspirations and different needs.
THR, i think the point is, even if gay marriage is "self-indulgent crap" (to quote heard quoting altman), it is self-indulgent crap to which gays are morally entitled.
never heard of Heard before. hope to never hear of Heard again.
Bushbasher, you should hear his stance on abortion and termination.
His view is that even medically necessary medical intervention to save a mothers life is murder, if it results in the death of the child. He believes that no woman has the right to choose her own life over that of her child, nor does any doctor, and not does any husband/partner/legal guardian.
I struggle to understand why anyone takes Heard seriously, and how long he has been taken seriously for. He smacks of the annoying bloke at the back of a lecture who insists on constantly interrupting and annoying everyone with ridiculous points.
He's all very undergraduate really.
He is proof of my theory that there is such a lack of actual opposition to gay rights that the journalists, in seeking an alternate view, end up interviewing quacks like him, and the unrepresentative Family Association.
well, keri, he's catholic ...
actually, you may be presuming more than you should about my views on abortion. but on heard being a nasty, self-aggrandizing shithead, i think everybody here is in tune.
Bushbasher, no church mandate has ever suggested manslaughter to a mother in favour of non-interventionist medical care.
I presumed nothing about your views on abortion. It's just another example of how he takes a view, puts his own spin on it and attributes it to being "Catholic" or "Gay" and thinks he speaks for all members of that group.
I'm Catholic and I would never condone the kind of views he spouts.
hi, keri. sure, i'll take your word for it. my understanding was that there was big catholic debate over whether abortion in any way should be proscribed (vatican II ? maybe i'm just making this up). but i didn't think heard's position was particularly uncommon amongst catholics.
Bushbasher - my understanding from conversations with ethicists from the Melbourne Archdioces' is that the Catholic Church has been very careful never to mandate or prescribe a view that a mother must die rather than allow a medically necessary termination to be carried out. It's your classic "grey area" where the "conscience of the individual must guide"
It was certainly discussed at Vatican II, but I'm not sure that there was a concrete mandate on it. That's what I've been told by theoligists I've discussed it with.
I'll certainly check that my understanding is correct and report back.
Right. I've spoken to my learned theological friend, and we've both had a look at the Humanae Vitae - which was the document issued as a result of Vatican II - and the only mention made is this:
”On the other hand, the Church does not consider at all illicit the use of those therapeutic means necessary to cure bodily diseases, even if a foreseeable impediment to procreation should result there from—provided such impediment is not directly intended for any motive whatsoever”
That's the only statement that points towards the issue either way.
What reeeeally gets my goat about that opinion peace by Heard is that he starts off claiming to talk for gays AND lesbians, and then uses so-called 'evidence' purely based on responses from gay men. Last i checked, gay men and lesbians lead very different lives. And he does it consistently in various other media forms that i have read/heard- using stats and opinions about gay men and then branding lesbians with it as well, with no proof, evidence or fact WHATSOEVER.
He's a dick.
In recent news on this front California has lifted the ban on same sex marriage which is quite a progressive step forward.
yeah, evshow i was just reading that. glenn greenwald had a big post. sounds pretty damn obvious as a constitutional argument.
keri, thanks for that. (anad sorry to have disappeared from the thread). very interesting. i still think in the discussions within (before?) vatican II, there might have been even more liberal positions represented, but i have no idea where i read that.
Not sure about that, Bushbasher. I know a lot of things were clarified at that time, such as contraception issues, but the general line hasn't changed much since Vatican II.
John Heard is a relentless homocontrarian papist who has long evaded critical questions by branding his interlocutors as unrepresentative "homoactivists".
No-one should hold their breath for long waiting for him to explain how he thinks that HIS views are more representative of a majority of gay men AND lesbians (the latter of which he conveniently excludes from his rants because they do not fit well with the snide insinuations, malleable statistics and sweeping generalisations he makes about gay men).
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