Concerning privacy of bedrooms and whether that applies to this thread topic:
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<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt2" style="border:1px inset"> Originally Posted by Pragmatic_Liberal
No, clearly it's not what's going on here, but the second sentence was a false syllogism, because it was precisely that kind of activity that came to public attention in Lawrence v. Texas. It was brought to public attention by a contest between gays standing up for their rights and bigots trying to oppress them.
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Surely you aren't saying that I got wind of this app and the controversy surrounding it from Lawrence v. Texas? What bearing do you think that case had on Exodus International and their quest to help folks manage unwanted sexual attractions?
Concerning the mission of EI:
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<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt2" style="border:1px inset"> That's one way of couching it. Since you suggest viewing things from your perspective below, I'll do the same here, to make an attempt at shared understanding. This organization is providing an ap premised on the assumption that homosexuality is something to be fixed (or cured, addressed, or remedied, or pick-your-adjective). This belief was arguably once a valid theory (and I stress the arguably), but it has been thoroughly discredited. Not only do we see homosexuality in nature, but we've seen the suicides caused by the application of homosexuality 'cures'. The belief originates from religious convinction, which has a demonstrably poor track record when it comes to describing reality, and not from any credible science. </td></tr></tbody></table>
This is a mistake that many others on this thread have also made - the mistake of disregarding the important fact of audience. EI's services are not intended for every homosexual - not even most homosexuals - but rather for those that find the homosexual desires to be a burden they don't want to bear. It is for people with unwanted same-sex attraction. Take from that perspective, "fixing" makes perfect sense.
Usually when we are dealing with behaviors that we don't like, we talk of therapy. Many people like to smoke, and the ones who seek to quit do not, in doing so, criticize those who don't want to quit. Alcoholics do not, in seeking to stay sober, demonize the one who falls off the wagon.
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<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt2" style="border:1px inset"> Worse, it is an ideologically-based attack on gay identity. </td></tr></tbody></table>
Not when the target audience is people with unwanted attractions. It has nothing whatever to do with others who identify themselves as gay.
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<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt2" style="border:1px inset"> Let's instead take an ap designed to cure straightness. </td></tr></tbody></table>
Are you sure that that doesn't exist? Are there gay advocacy apps? There seem to be an awful lot of homosexual activist groups that want to "cure" me of my notion that homosexuality is a sin.
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<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt2" style="border:1px inset"> It isn't an attack on their beliefs, it's an attack on who they are, </td></tr></tbody></table>
No it isn't. My heterosexual activities help to define my marriage, but they do not - they cannot define me personally. After all I was who I am before I became sexually active, and I am quite certain that my identity would not change if I were rendered incapable of continuing sexual activity (or my husband were). If sexual activity defines who we are, then either that activity is not private, or no one knows me but my husband :shut:
You see, EI proposes to help the person manage/diminish unwanted sexual attraction so that they need not act on that unwanted attraction. They aim to help the person control their behavior by managing their emotions and take charge of their emotions by choosing their behavior. Again, where's the harm?
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<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt2" style="border:1px inset"> When that organization promotes intolerance, opposition to it is born not of intolerance, but of respect. </td></tr></tbody></table>
What is this then? Is this intolerance?
<center><table style="border-collapse: collapse" bgcolor="#ffffff" border="1" cellpadding="10" width="90%"><tbody><tr><td>Exodus International affirms that gay-identified individuals and those who struggle with same-sex attraction are persons for whom Jesus Christ died and loves equally. Therefore, we strongly oppose bullying, name calling and acts of aggression against any individual or group of individuals for any reason. These actions have no place in our society and we must, instead, affirm behavior that validates the personal worth and dignity God bestows upon every human being.</td></tr></tbody></table></center>
Then they have been misled about EI and the app. It has nothing to do with homosexuals who are happy in their lifestyle. The app simply isn't for them.
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<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt2" style="border:1px inset"> The claim implicit in its existence is an affront to gay personhood. </td></tr></tbody></table>
Wow. Now that is telling.
You know there are women who hate me just because I have six kids and I home school. They think that my lifestyle is an affront to their lifestyle. They think that my choices are a judgment of theirs. Nothing could be further from the truth. I didn't consider these women or their choices when I made my own.
There are people who choose to manage their unwanted sexual attractions. These people know that they aren't the only ones in the world who make this choice. They want to provide what help they can to others like themselves. It has nothing whatever to do with anyone else.
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<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt2" style="border:1px inset"> Help to do what, then? According to the organizations website, "Exodus has challenged those who respond to homosexuals with ignorance and fear, and those who uphold homosexuality as a valid orientation." Again, they want to invalidate - their words - homosexuality as a way of life, regarding it instead as a disease, or as "one of many conditions that beset fallen humanity". This is intolerance, plain and simple. </td></tr></tbody></table>
Again with the audience problem. This is directed to Christians, churches, and church leaders. Homosexual living is not compatible with Christianity, so in that context, it is not a valid orientation. It is meaningless in any other context than that of Judeo-Christian morality, but within that context, it makes sense.
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<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt2" style="border:1px inset"> Though the parallels to 'cooties' and the religious view of gayness as a disease are interesting, and perhaps worth exploring. </td></tr></tbody></table>
All sin may be seen as a disease, but that is not the perspective given on EI's web site. They call it a disorder. I would call it sin. And it is meaningless to explore outside the context of Christian morality.
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<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt2" style="border:1px inset"> I didn't see anyone saying you couldn't think whatever you like. </td></tr></tbody></table>
I was giving you my perspective of the issue in general. Perhaps it doesn't belong here in this thread. I have been told by homosexuals and homosexual supporters that I shouldn't be allowed to think the things I think. Really. I was totally blindsided by that.
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<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt2" style="border:1px inset"> I'll have to beg your pardon for the generalization, but the right in this country seem to have a quixotic view of rights. They seem to think that they should always protect them, rather than being enforced even-handedly. Thus, if you criticize someone, you're exercising your First Amendment rights. If they criticize you, though, instead of them exercising THEIR First Amendment rights, they're instead trying to deny you yours. </td></tr></tbody></table>
That's funny. I experience it exactly in the opposite. :think:
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<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt2" style="border:1px inset"> As for free exercise of religion, we don't let satanists do human sacrifices, because it impinges on the rights of others. While this is hardly on the level of murder, the belief that homosexuality is not a legitimate identity, when put into practice, ALSO impinges on the rights of others </td></tr></tbody></table>
Um. Do you realize that you have just equated murder and belief? I know that you tried to avoid it by sticking in "when put into practice" but that was lame. I mean, what is belief without acting on the belief? It's nothing but hot air.
-Right to marry? No one's been denied the dubious right to marry. What has happened is that people who desire to unite with someone of the same gender have demanded to have a license for that union. But there's the rub. The issuance of licenses is the sole right and responsibility of the individual states. They routinely deny such licenses for incest and polygamy, as well as for such things as young age. Notice that in the case of incest and same-sex couples it is couples and not individuals who are being denied. So it isn't because they have same-sex or same-family attraction that they are denied, it is because the couple is not one condoned by the citizens of that state. So it isn't the homosexuality (same-sex attraction), but rather the union to which they object
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<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt2" style="border:1px inset"> As for yanking the ap, that doesn't bear one way or another on any of our rights </td></tr></tbody></table>
I never claimed it did. I said that it shows the bigotry of those who would sign a petition to yank it.
The rights I was talking about were in the vein of showing you my perspective as a harassed Christian.
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<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt2" style="border:1px inset"> You're free to believe what you like, but you can only turn that belief into action where it does not impinge unduly on the rights of others. Here, your belief is extremely intolerant of gays, and is meeting justified opposition in the public sector. </td></tr></tbody></table>
Here where? The app someway impinges on someone's rights? How so? And how are any of my claims personally "extremely intolerant" of anyone?
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<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td class="alt2" style="border:1px inset"> Would they be in that plight if so many people weren't telling them how horrible they were for having those desires? </td></tr></tbody></table>
That is a discussion for another thread, but I find it rich that anyone's opinion would have any bearing at all on the homosexual actions of a homosexual. I'm not seeing any evidence of it. Plus, Christianity does not teach that anyone is more horrible than any one else - sinners are all sinners and therefore separated from God. Wretched, to be sure, but not beyond redemption. Plus, it isn't the desires that make them sinners - it is entertaining those desires and eventually acting upon them that makes them sinners. Just like wanting to kill your child's murderer isn't sin, but planning and then acting out that plan is. Plus, it is more the ignorance of homosexuals concerning what Christianity does and does not teach that torments them more than Christians and their actions.
nicholsmom just tears them up. I would not be surprised to find in her the hall of fame next year.:first: