Free Discussion

dare de-vil wrote:

Yeah I live in mass too and provincetown is one of the most well known gay communities in the US.

In America it depends on where u live whether its safe or unsafe. We get a bad rep because of the rural south, which is full of the fat, racist, homophobic pricks that people focus on when they badmouth us. The north is good, as r the big cities like San Francisco, LA, Boston, Seattle, NYC, Miami, Washington DC...

Why Florida and California don't allow gay marriage ill never know, those r the gayest states

Florida suxs. Thats why. But CA is awesome but they also have a strong conservative population. Overall the US is conservative by comparison to other countries.

I don't know if I agree with that. There are a shitload of countries out there that have homosexuality as illegal. There's a list on Wikipedia somewhere that has a chart of all countries and their laws on gays. Just search lgbt rights by country

Ecii wrote:

dare de-vil wrote:

Yeah I live in mass too and provincetown is one of the most well known gay communities in the US.

In America it depends on where u live whether its safe or unsafe. We get a bad rep because of the rural south, which is full of the fat, racist, homophobic pricks that people focus on when they badmouth us. The north is good, as r the big cities like San Francisco, LA, Boston, Seattle, NYC, Miami, Washington DC...

Why Florida and California don't allow gay marriage ill never know, those r the gayest states

Florida suxs. Thats why. But CA is awesome but they also have a strong conservative population. Overall the US is conservative by comparison to other WESTERN countries.

There, I fixed it for ya

i expected FL to be a gay friendly place coz its so casual and everything. and i also wanted to go to school there if i ever decide to study in america.

painservedcold wrote:

Ecii wrote:

Florida suxs. Thats why. But CA is awesome but they also have a strong conservative population. Overall the US is conservative by comparison to other WESTERN countries.

There, I fixed it for ya

Thank you. I'm glad you knew what I meant.

Since we're on the topic of gay marriage now, two days ago (wednesday) was the closing arguments for the trial to rule proposition 8 in California as unconstitutional. I didn't catch very much of the arguments, but apparently the anti-gay side babbled incoherantly and didn't actually provide a legally acceptable basis for their claim, while the pro-equality side was able to answer all of the judge's queries.

The ruling is expected sometime this lifetime, though it is a guarantee that it will be appealed to the US Supreme Court. No idea how it will go down once it gets there, but I tend to think that even conservative judges like Scalia won't be able to accept horseshit as viable logic.
Sorry, but saying that gay marriage is bad for procreation and then saying that infertile couples are good for procreating in the same breath doesn't cut it.

Religion as a whole doesn't make a lot of sense, and unfortunately for sane people marriage started out as a religious concept and the two are still deeply connected, in ceremony if not in ideal, which means a lot of nutters give themselves license to dictate the terms of other peoples' relationships.

Sabazius wrote:

Religion as a whole doesn't make a lot of sense, and unfortunately for sane people marriage started out as a religious concept and the two are still deeply connected, in ceremony if not in ideal, which means a lot of nutters give themselves license to dictate the terms of other peoples' relationships.

In another venue I would discuss this in more detail, but for now I'll just settle for a sparknotes version of why religion isn't acceptable in this case.

discrimination is being caused and cannot be justified under the judicial principle of rational basis, which is basically to say that in order to do something discriminatory like this, the voters of california needed to have some concrete reason based in LOGIC or perceived logic to work with. The provided excuse/reason was that allowing same sex marriages prevents the state from 'channelling' people towards marriages in which procreation will occur, which is one of the goals of the state. The intervenor-defender could not, unfortunately, explain why non-fertile heterosexual couples would not be subject to the same kind of marriage ban, since a non-procreative couple by definition is not physically able to procreate, and whereas a gay couple can procreate through in vitro fertilization.
Back to religion, my point is that according to my understanding of US and california law, religious belief does not meet the benchmark set for rational basis, and thus is not a legally valid argument for aiding and abetting unconstitutional discrimination. This is, of course, without having to get involved with first amendment rights regarding freedom of religion and the separation of church and state, but those are valid reasons why Judge Walker won't go there.
re: marriage starting as a religious concept; while this is true that many people primarily identify marriage by its religious ceremony, legally married couples will likely remember the decidedly less romantic part of marriage, in which they had to apply for a marriage license and fill out paperwork to make themselves legally wed. Proposition 8 also cannot use reverse-discrimination towards religious institutions as a rational basis for creating the bans, as religious institutions in all five states that have approved gay marriage went out of their way to ensure that religious organizations would NOT have to perform a ceremony if such a thing was against their religious tenets. This did not impact the states from allowing civil marriage licenses to be produced for the same sex couples in question. Specifically, we can look at Massachusetts as an example, where gay marriage has been in existance since 2005 and where there are protections for religious groups in their statutes permitting gay marriage. In the five years that there has been gay marriage in MA, there has not been a single documented case of discrimination towards religious organizations, providing evidence that discrimination based on religion is not a rational basis for pre-emptive discrimination as created by proposition 8.

Any questions?

I'd just like to point out that my statements before were in no way validatory of the status quo, merely descriptive of it

Sabazius wrote:

I'd just like to point out that my statements before were in no way validatory of the status quo, merely descriptive of it

I know they weren't validatory Alex. I also know you don't hold those beliefs as your own. My treatise was meant to describe why that described view was legally unsound and to show that there is a glimmer of victory on the horizon for equality.
Besides, you KNOW what happens when I get to talking politics, I absolutely blame you for giving me that opening

http://www.details.com/culture-trends/critical-eye/201006/gay-exorcism

Discuss.

neat

painservedcold wrote:

http://www.details.com/culture-trends/critical-eye/201006/gay-exorcism

Discuss.

Wrong.

Moving on to Alabama...

Ecii wrote:

painservedcold wrote:

http://www.details.com/culture-trends/critical-eye/201006/gay-exorcism

Discuss.

Wrong.

Moving on to Alabama...

OMG I LOVED THAT AD. I can almost not believe that this guy was a serious candidate for political office.

Ecii wrote:

painservedcold wrote:

http://www.details.com/culture-trends/critical-eye/201006/gay-exorcism

Discuss.

Wrong.

Moving on to Alabama...

Sense. This video makes none.
I'm not sure he even presented an argument in that, just spoke in a soft voice and used lots of emotive words while he walked toward the camera at an odd angle.

ok, maybe i'm wrong or something, or just not catching the concept of you guys, but i see no prob with what this guy is asking. sorry, but in the united states, the primary language is english, all the street signs & traffic items are english, so why shouldn't it the test be in english. i personally believe that our states should give more than just one time writtem & driving exams. we have old people driving around here that shouldn't be driving. they take the test when they were 16 yo & now at 70 or 80 yo, they're still driving. how are we suppose to kow if they can still drive safely? what, just from an eye exam & answering a few verbal questions? i don't think so. laws change, cars change. we need to be continuously checked & rechecked, like every 8 years or something. it's just silly! sorry if i'm not agreed by others. just my view.

codypaul214 wrote:

ok, maybe i'm wrong or something, or just not catching the concept of you guys, but i see no prob with what this guy is asking. sorry, but in the united states, the primary language is english, all the street signs & traffic items are english, so why shouldn't it the test be in english. i personally believe that our states should give more than just one time writtem & driving exams. we have old people driving around here that shouldn't be driving. they take the test when they were 16 yo & now at 70 or 80 yo, they're still driving. how are we suppose to kow if they can still drive safely? what, just from an eye exam & answering a few verbal questions? i don't think so. laws change, cars change. we need to be continuously checked & rechecked, like every 8 years or something. it's just silly! sorry if i'm not agreed by others. just my view.

The concern I have is not that there is testing being done, that's simply good judgment on his behalf. Its the language requirements that are being imposed on people. Like it or not, people from other countries with other languages do immigrate to America. While it makes sense to get people to speak a single language, its just not acceptable to impose language barriers on people who need to be able to drive.

yes, its true that such a restriction should not be made but for me have 12 languages is not practical. about 5 should do it. but then, that is also like saying you have to do it in english, you have no choice. oh well.

I think learning English is very important to living in America.
However when filling out a forum I would like it to be in my native language so I understand everything 100%. I speak French well but I would not want to take my drivers test in it if I can take it in English.

Ecii wrote:

I think learning English is very important to living in America.
However when filling out a forum I would like it to be in my native language so I understand everything 100%. I speak French well but I would not want to take my drivers test in it if I can take it in English.

^-- this.
Quoted for fucking truth, this is exactly how it should be goin on.

Im smarter than I let on

LOL. You're a college student, course you're a smartie

although i'm new here & don't want to offend if i say something wrong, but i'm sorry. it's not my problem if you come from another country & need to learn the english language. you came to America. no one made you. it's not my fault that your prior country doesn't have english as their primary language. i was born in america & like that person, i didn't have a choice on what language i wanted as my primary language. my past relatives came from europe somewhere & their main language was something else. but in order to make it over here, they needed to learn the lands language. i'm not saying they need to forget their native language, they just need to learn the primary language of the land that "they are making a choice to come live or DRIVE in". we're a free country, omfg, how laxed do we need to make it for these people?

ok after reading my post i just sent, i will add something more. again, sorry, but i look at it this way. i wouldn't go over to japan or another country & expect them to start posting dual signage & have all forms of paper in both their native language & mine. i know some countries do that, and props to them, but that's the countries choice, not my demand. if 1 million americans moved to china i seriously don't see them changing over to dual signage. that country has already publicly been outspoken in saying people from other countries need to learn their language or prepare to be lost. and to think, america buys 78.1% of their mass-production, but they're not catering to us which i don't expect them too. i'm just saying, learn the native language or stay in your own country. obviously you're already making a huge choice to move away from your native land of birth, so follow up with making an additional choice & learn our language & speak our language when you go into a free-choice mcdonald's or send your children to our american funded public schools or something like that. i know america is known as a "huge melting pot of the world", but that doesn't mean that we then suppose to literally melt all crap & life styles into it & expected to cater & live that way. i shouldn't be forced to add salt to my corn pops cereal just because juan smith prefers it on all his food. thank you!

True that Cody