Whoa, I go away for a while and all this happens? Clearly, I need to be around more often. The absence of my Loving Lesbian Vibes must be affecting people badly.
Ahem. Right, right. Gotta be serious.
Zubz313: More than anything else, I have to criticize your misrepresentation of AIDS. Giving people the wrong idea about AIDS is dangerous and irresponsible, and will only serve to increase the rate of HIV infection. AIDS can spread through unprotected penetrative sex of any kind, be it heterosexual or homosexual. If anything, the sheer scope of the international AIDS crisis should make it clear that it isn't just a "gay" disease.
AIDS is a human tragedy. It affects all of us. Misrepresentation and poor education is part of the reason it's become such a crisis. Please, don't make things worse by turning a medical issue into a moral one! Morality has nothing to do with it. AIDS victims are not evil or perverse, anymore than victims of SARS are evil or perverse. When it comes to AIDS, any sexual practice is safe as long as people take precautions such as condoms etc. Being gay or straight is completely irrelevant.
Speaking of sexual practices... Anal sex is
not an exclusively gay act. Heterosexual couples also enjoy sodomy. Lesbian couples do, too. (Fisting, toys, rimming, strap-ons... Er, I should stop now.) Anal sex is enjoyable as long as it's performed with care. Once again, being straight or gay is completely irrelevant.
In fact, I have to challenge Zubz313's statement that he was addicted to porn. Dude, have you seriously watched a lot of porn? If you had, you'd have seen plenty of straight people having anal sex.
When it comes to Zubz313's religious arguments, I'm afraid I have no response to make. I'm agnostic and I have no real understanding of common religious views about homosexuality. Since I haven't studied the Bible or other religious texts, I can't defend or attack Zubz313's ideas about God.
What I can say, however, is that I'm glad to be myself. I neither know nor care what any divine entity thinks of me. I'm happy the way I am, the way I was made -- whether it was nature that made me a lesbian, or whether it was God.
Zubz313 also argued that sex wasn't a necessity, because a person who doesn't have sex won't die. When I said that sex was a necessity, I meant it. Not that a human being deprived of sex will die -- of course not! But that a human being deprived of sex will be unhappy. After all, we don't need music to stay alive, either. We don't need games, or laughter, or companionship. A lone person surviving in the wilderness can still scrounge together a living.
But companionship, humor, music and sex
are necessities, in the sense that they all contribute to a person's sense of well-being. Sex is a physical need, but also a psychological one. It's fine if someone who has enjoyed sex decides to give it up for personal reasons -- but to demand that other people also give it up? That's going a little too far!
That was sex in general I just commented on; now let's talk about homosexuality.
Whether homosexuality is natural or not is a silly concern. What is "natural" and what is "unnatural"? Other species are also known to indulge in homosexual acts, so homosexuality certainly isn't a human invention. What about computers? Vaccinations? Surgery? Should we stop manufacturing machines and medications, because these things are "unnatural"?
In my view, absolutely anything that happens in the universe is natural, by virtue of the fact that it
happens. The moment it happens, it becomes a part of nature. As a result, there is nothing in the entire world that is unnatural.
Pretty simple, huh?
Morality should have nothing to do with naturality or normality. After all, morality itself is a fiction, and one that each individual composes in his or her own way. I have my own moral system, and you have yours. Both these systems are fictional ideas that we willingly believe in. According to my system, certain actions are "wrong" -- in your system, other actions are wrong.
In my system, causing deliberate harm is a sin, as is interfering with another person's freedom, so long as that person's free actions do not deliberately harm others. By "harm" I mean any action that is invasive and that causes physical or emotional pain. Non-invasive actions, such as expressing one's opinions in a democratic forum, are not sinful. Invasive actions -- such as insulting someone personally, or breaking into their homes, or stealing from their bank accounts, or killing them, or raping them, or stopping them from fair political participation --
these are sins.
In my system, loving someone is not a sin. Nor is having consensual sex with someone, whether or not I love them, and whether or not they are of the same gender.
Zubz313's moral system is in direct opposition to mine when it comes to this particular issue, but hey, them's the breaks.
To freely express our moral beliefs is a great privilege, but in the end, it is unlikely that we will convince each other to put our self-made fictions aside and adopt other people's.
That's why I'll stop my discussion here. It's gotten way off-topic, anyway!
Last edited by pearlesque at 6:08 am, Jun 26 2007________________
"They sicken of the calm, who knew the storm." - Dorothy Parker.
yup... and that middle picture of the other link 