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PaperclipPerfector  10mo ago (text post)   34883 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 9, 2024

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Awesome, thanks! Some things you said that I'd like to explore further:

"Love your neighbor" does not extend to "normalize your neighbor's erotic proclivities at the cost of broader society" or "you must erase the distinction between things."

So, you believe that normalizing non-hetero relationships is a detriment to society? How do you reconcile that with non-hetero people who are in happy, healthy relationships?

Christians have traditionally believed that marriage is permanent bond between a man and woman for the purpose of forming a household and raising children, where the duties of the man and woman are asymmetrical. For a man to "marry" another man is a contradiction in terms, the same as when your boss tells you, "I want you to think of me as your friend, not your boss."

I understand what you mean. I try to keep my private life separate from my work life, too. Although, I have a second job at the church I attend, and my pastor is of course, my boss, but he's also my friend. I play in a DnD campaign with a bunch of other church friends, and he's the DM. Would your suggestion to me be that I break the friendship off because he's technically also my boss?

Furthermore, the male-female union is a core building block of civilization and therefore deserves special recognition by the state and by the church. It deserves to be considered normative.

It certainly has been that way throughout the course of history. However, along with that, we've historically treated women separately from men and for along time, women had fewer rights than men. We have also marginalized people of different races, religions, and sexual orientations. Sexuality aside, we've also oriented our social policies to strongly benefit married people over single people. All of this has been "normal" for thousands of years. How does this fit into your definition of loving your neighbor? Also, would you agree that what is "normative", even within the context of Christianity, is fluid and varies over time?

There is furthermore the argument that homoerotic behavior is a vice, a sin. And if we love our neighbor, we want to save them from sin. Sin ultimately makes us less happy.

I agree, there's an argument to be made. But that's just it -- an argument, a position, an opinion, a perspective. You believe non-hetero relationships are sinful, I do not. We both think our own opinions are the truth. There are many people who agree with either of us, and there are those who are not religious that pay no mind to the doctrine of sin. What does sin matter to them? Should we force our views onto them, or lovingly allow them to make their own informed choice on what works best, even if we don't agree?

I do think though, that forgoing sexual promiscuity and other sexual vices that a straight person has tempted by has made me more happy.

Do you think that a majority of non-hetero people are more sexually promiscuous than hetero people? I identify as asexual, so maybe I don't have the best perspective on this, either.

So, you believe that normalizing non-hetero relationships is a detriment to society? How do you reconcile that with non-hetero people who are in happy, healthy relationships?

There are many good things that are happy and beneficial that do not deserve special recognition by the church or the state. There are many vices that should be discouraged by the church and state, even though some people will practice said vice and seem to be happy in practicing it.

my boss, but he's also my friend. I play in a DnD campaign with a bunch of other church friends, and he's the DM. Would your suggestion to me be that I break the friendship off because he's technically also my boss?

It's not a perfect analogy, I was just making a point about language. The "boss" relationship is inherently different than the "friend" relationship, different relationships deserve different words. It's not a perfect analogy because one can be a boss and a friend, maybe I'll think of a better analogy.

It certainly has been that way throughout the course of history. However, along with that, we've historically treated women separately from men and for along time, women had fewer rights than men. ... How does this fit into your definition of loving your neighbor?

Christianity (until recent progressive Christianity) has always recognized the basic human reality that men and women are different, have different strengths and weaknesses, are complementary, and therefore have different spheres of responsibility, different rights and duties. It's hard to remember this now that as Americans we are so long removed from existential war, but the state is primary an agent of violent force, that is the state is an organization of men who use violence to protect their land and women from other organized violent men, and as such of course governance rights of the state are going to be of men. "Loving your neighbor" is an entirely different question than whether person should have say, "a vote", (ie decision-making power over the apparatus of violence).

There are many people who agree with either of us, and there are those who are not religious that pay no mind to the doctrine of sin.

Everyone believes in sin, secular people just have different words for it. A vice or a personal sin, is something that feels good but is ultimately bad for the person doing it, you don't need religion to understand the concept, it's just without religion you have to reinvent and throw out all the work done on helping people effectively deal with vices.

But specifically you asked how a "Christian" who loves their neighbor could not want to support their neighbor in X. Well if the Christian loves their neighbor, and their religion teaches X is a sin, that means that X is ultimately bad for that person, therefore if they actually loved their neighbor they would want to discourage their neighbor from doing X.

We have also marginalized people of different races, religions, and sexual orientations.

Apples, oranges, cheese and carburetors. These are entirely unlike phenomena and must be analyzed separately

Do you think that a majority of non-hetero people are more sexually promiscuous than hetero people?

I think that gay men are, yes. I'd recommend reading "And the Band Played On" by Randy Shilts. Lesbian women are different phenomenon.

There are many good things that are happy and beneficial that do not deserve special recognition by the church or the state. There are many vices that should be discouraged by the church and state, even though some people will practice said vice and seem to be happy in practicing it.

I agree with this. The apostle Paul even said, "not everything is beneficial." Though, I suspect that you believe that non-hetero relationships fall into the "vice" category.

It's not a perfect analogy, I was just making a point about language. The "boss" relationship is inherently different than the "friend" relationship, different relationships deserve different words. It's not a perfect analogy because one can be a boss and a friend, maybe I'll think of a better analogy.

That's fair.

Everyone believes in sin, secular people just have different words for it. A vice or a personal sin, is something that feels good but is ultimately bad for the person doing it, you don't need religion to understand the concept, it's just without religion you have to reinvent and throw out all the work done on helping people effectively deal with vices.

I would put it more generally, that everyone believes that there are things we do that hurt others or hurt others and/or the larger society. How is a healthy non-hetero relationship something that fits that definition?

Apples, oranges, cheese and carburetors. These are entirely unlike phenomena and must be analyzed separately

I find it interesting you use the bolded word to describe those things, because truthfully, they are concepts that humankind has made up to describe things. Paul famously said, "There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus." It would appear to me that the walls we use to divide each other are are not needed in God's Kingdom. Jesus even said that of marriage -- "For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven." (Matthew 22:30)

How is a healthy non-hetero relationship something that fits that definition?

To put it bluntly, the problem is not a loving (caritas) relationship between two men or two women, which is all fine and good, the problem is using each other as mutual masturbation aids or sticking dicks up each others poopy holes. I would suggest that doing so is like eating that potato chip or masturbating to porn. It feels good in the moment, but ultimately leaves you empty and just wanting more stimulation/titillation while building a habit of mind that ultimately makes a person unsatisfied and less happy than they would be if the relationship was affectionate but not erotic.

I mean, I don't like any of those things because I'm asexual, but even if I wasn't, I wouldn't take such a hard-line stance against such things. I don't understand the fixation that conservative Christians have with sex acts that aren't PIV. I just don't get it. If you don't like them, don't partake in them, but don't try and make someone else's life miserable just because you ascribe to those beliefs.

What's you understanding of the role of the homosexual community (and also the hard drug community, similar arguments applied) in the emergence and spread of the AIDS pandemic? Wikipedia lists 42 million dead, among them something like half of the pre-AIDS male homosexuals in America.

Very little, to be honest.

Mm.

Suppose we have the following two statements:

"There's nothing wrong with these acts or the communities that celebrate engaging in them."

"These communities were ground-zero for a plague that has to date killed an amount of people roughly equivalent to a world war, and the acts they engaged in and their celebration of those acts resulted in a highly disproportionate amount of what we know term super-spreading, particularly in the early stages of that pandemic."

Are these statements compatible?

Would you consider conservatives dangerous, due to their behavior in spreading the Covid plague?

Have you considered that part of why AIDS was so dangerous, was because we didn't really have the concept of "AIDS" back then?

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