Larry, I know I am coming down pretty hard on a couple of people here, but let me explain where I'm coming from:

A few years ago, a young openly gay man in Wyoming was picked up by a couple of guys in a bar, who took him out to a country road, tied him to a fence, then beat him and pistol-whipped him into unconsciousness. They left him tied to the fence, where he was discovered some 18 hours later by a passer-by who, at first, thought he was a scarecrow.

The good Samaritan took him to a nearby hospital, where it was determined that the bones in Matthew Shepard's face had been broken and that as a result of the beating, he had suffered severe brain damage. He died five days later.

There are people on these threads who claim that sexual orientation is a matter of choice, and people simply choose a "perverted life style," when scientific findings indicate that there are strong genetic components in matters of sexual orientation, and that being "gay" is not a matter of choice.

Hawking this kind of belief feeds the hatred and bigotry of people such as those who beat Matthew Shepard to death.

Claiming (as Akenaton does) that gay men are responsible for spreading the "plague of AIDS" around the world with his often spurious statistics also feeds this kind of bigotry and hatred. I've checked up on him, and he interprets statistics rather "creatively."   And GfS's insistence that sexual orientation is a matter of simple choice and that he, as a family counselor (!!) can "cure" "gayness" is rank quackery. I have also researched the nature of these so-called "cures" and have learned that they have not only been unsuccessful, they have often resulted in things high rates of depression in the subjects, and occasional suicide.

Misinformation of this kind feeds and encourages the hatred and bigotry of people like Matthew Shepard's murderers.

And condoning the actions of people like George Zimmerman, the self-appointed vigilante, who disobeyed police and accosted a black teenager who was merely walking home from running an errand at a nearby store, profiling him on the basis of his race and his hooded sweatshirt, and then murdering him—and then cheering his acquittal in an obviously spurious trial—in a community that has a long history of extreme racial prejudice once again condones bigotry and hatred.

Frankly, reading the posts of people who foster bigotry and hatred in this manner leaves me morally outraged, and it's pretty hard to show any respect for those given to this.

In fact, to show respect when what I really feel is disgust and contempt would be hypocritical.

And to say nothing at all would amount to tacit agreement.

Respectfully submitted,

Don Firth