Dan Savage, I support you and everything that you said in your speech, and the message you are sending.  God or no, Christian or no, what right have we do condemn others, on the basis of what a book says?  Especially when people omit from their brains some of the other things that the exact same book tells them to do!  While the specific language that Dan Savage used I might not have, he did so to get the message across.  Stronger words equal a stronger message.  Whoop-Dee-Doo, he spoke out for his belief.  When Christians do that, they are called pastors, priests, however you choose to say it.  In Judaism, we call them rabbis.  When they are speaking out against Christians, we call them... what?  Rude?  Out of line?  Wrong?  Bull s***.  Why is it that some Christians have this feeling that they can decide the moral code of others?  ESPECIALLY when there are so many other Christians that ARE perfectly tolerant and can tell us their beliefs without all of this... debate, is a nice word for it.  I have no problem with Christians.  I do have a problem when people continue to follow the archaic policies of a book written thousands of years ago, at the cost of other people's welfare.  do not mistake this for me attacking the Bible.  This is me attacking it's hypocrisy and some of it's irrelevance in modern day. 

To the Christians: tolerance is key. 
To the Atheists like me: tolerance is key.
To the Homosexuals: do not let others ruin your life.
To the Masses: people are dying.  Lives are being ruined.  Do not let old policies affect today.  Live for now.  Live for what is right. Be strong, be well, be tolerant.  Love your friends, love your enemies.


Do you see what you have done?  you have started a war.

Traduweise : Actually my impression comes from an Ex homosexual speaker who spoke at a conference a year or so ago. To sum up what he said, he said that while a homosexual cannot choose his emotions or urges, he does have the choice as to how he handles them. I think you can keep all your "leading psychologists" references. A lifestyle is how you live you're life according to your world view and own moral perceptions. Trying to compare that to skin color is very sub par. And I have made arguments and explained my positions. My answers simply are not to your liking.

1 guy? thats not really sufficient as evidence.
And what do you mean by 'how he handles them'?
Sexual preference is not morality, given there are no moral problems from being gay, there are moral problems with intolerance though.
The fact is, i could find about a hundred things that every single person does that is apparently a sin, but apparently being gay is the one that requires attention?
riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiggggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhtttttt...

thenumberone : Actually I hear quite a few testimonials from ex gays that aren't even the head of ministry and say that. How you handle it means you can either take your emotions as they are live with it or you can actually seek to understand them. I brought up Dan Savage because I had just heard of it not long earlier. And frankly any sin that is growing more and more prevalent will automatically gain just a little more attention.

Its a sin to have more money than you need.
For sure thats more widespread than gays.

I would say not quite. Money in and of itself isn't always a bad thing. It is more of what accompanies it that is the problem. As far as the Bible is concerned, the love of money is very much a problem. And it is generally worthless in the overall picture. I'm focusing more on Dan Savage than just being gay.

As Hoochman said, having a lot of money in and of itself is not sin. It depends on how the person uses the money. They can live extremely luxuriously for their own pleasures, or make a serious attempt to help the poor and starving. A ton of money in the right hands can do a world of good.

Hoochman : You have made no arguments, only anounced your position and then refused to consider anything else. An argument needs to be backed with supporting premises; claiming to have heard from some mysterious, unnamed "ex homosexual" means nothing. But more than that, even your "ex homosexual" admits that homosexuality is not a choice, which nicely supports the statements made by my leading psychologists You cannot choose what gender you are attracted to, in the same way you cannot choose what your racial background is. That has nothing to do with some nonsense on "lifestyles" (whatever a lifestyle is). If you choose to suppress your natural attractions, fine. It's none of my business if people want to make themselves miserable for a conviction.

Traduweise : I have made arguments and repeated them. My argument was more around Dan Savage acting wrongly at a rally for high school students. Than you naturally found found something about that to complain about, and so eventually went on that I attack homosexuals and somehow that's excuse enough to act with immaturity and swear at high school students. Now just because stick to my guns on the issues doesn't mean I don't consider what the other guy has to say. When someone argues and than caves in to another just for the sake of open mindedness and because of the supposed experts, than that person is extremely weak minded. With this ex homosexual, he was a speaker at a seminar in a district Blitz event in Duluth MN. You can keep your psychologists. I prefer to stick to people who are actually qualified enough to make judgements on the matter. There are lots of testimonies from places like Exodus international. Actually the premise was feelings or Attractions are not chosen, they are wired. However, as to who they are for, are not wired but determined by environmental factors. For instance, if a kid was sexually abused early on and developed into an angry person later on because of his experiences, than his standards for emotionally bonding and finding someone else might just be a little different than yours or mine. Forgive me for not understanding the process of how skin color is determined genetically. If a white man spends lots of time with black people and starts to learn habits consistent with that of the average black male than I might be wrong, but I just don't think this person's skin will somehow turn black. Once again, not comparable to skin color. If a homosexual wants to date another of the same sex or decides to have multiple partners and sleep around, don't look to me to accept it or find it morally right. I'm not a bigot for that. My convictions simply lead me elsewhere. And lastly, activists protest and make national headlines and put themselves in the public view. They cannot claim that it is none of my business when they do that. They should expect people to opine and not all of them to be polite about it.

Hoochman : Your train of thought is fairly difficult to follow, but at no point did I say that your intolerance of homosexuality was an excuse for Savage to call the Bible bulls***. There are other excuses that I elaborated on; feel free to reread them if you don't understand. Sticking to your guns is one, but don't put words in my mouth.

As for your "ex homosexual", you still have given me no name, no credentials, nothing to look up at all. But that isn't important just now. I already knew from what you said about Christian denominations that you refuse to consider viewpoints that don't correspond with your own, but I didn't realise you would refuse to consider viewpoints out of sheer spite. As I said, and as the link I provided explained, what the American Psychological Association says actually corresponds to what this anonymous speaker of yours said: that attractions are wired, so to speak. Your continued refusal to even acknowledge this says all anyone needs to know about your understanding of the world.

Incidentally, there is no evidence to support the claim that sexual orientation is a result of environmental factors. Race has nothing to do with how one acts, that is culture. Race is also not determined by skin colour, that is a side effect of genetics. The genes themselves are what distinguish races, and even then it is a highly superficial distinction.

And lastly, if people would stop getting involved in other people's business, activists would have less cause to stir up a fuss.

I think this thread has about run it's course, and nothing more can really come of this...

If for some reason Hoochman wants this reopened, he can come talk to me via PM.