BS: 'Gay marriage' question

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: KB in Iowa
Date: 15 Feb 13 - 01:27 PM

Oops, four years, not three. April 3, 2009 is when it was legalized.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: KB in Iowa
Date: 15 Feb 13 - 01:26 PM

On April 3rd it will be three years since same-sex marriage was legalized in Iowa.

The world has yet to crumble around us. Except for the friends and families of those who have entered into a same-sex marriage, along with the couples themselves, I daresay things have not really changed at all.

One small exception perhaps. An Iowa City jewelry store has been running TV ads for some new software they have. Seems it allows you to customize your engaement ring on the spot. One of the two versions I have seen shows a woman purchasing the ring and then at the end has a picture of her and her partner. I like it.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,Musket sans cookie
Date: 15 Feb 13 - 11:46 AM

Woof! Woof!
Ok boy, I shall interpret for Goofus. Have a gravy bone and go and lick your balls.

Goofus.   How many women do you want to monitor till you prove your point? The good professor says there are a few billion to choose from so eventually you may find enough to confuse idiots with but you'll still be wrong.

Mainly, it appears, because your comments are subjective and pander to bigotry.   The other odious creatures have recognised they are on a hiding to nothing and have done the decent thing and stopped posting.

The good professor is fed up of reading your crap too. Which, being a greyhound with nothing better to do all day is saying something.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 15 Feb 13 - 11:42 AM

As it happens, I have a very good friend a lady in her late sixties, who popped out five little'uns in seven years with hardly a hiccup, and is so placid and calm that "Pot" takes her for relaxation.

She happens to have:-
One Gay daughter
Three straight sons
One gay son

And a nicer bunch you couldn't hope to meet.

D'ye hear that thump and a dull roar in the background?

It's the sound of a hypothesis, which was presented as fact, crashing and burning.

That's the way science works old chum, one exception and it's back to the old drawing board.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 15 Feb 13 - 11:31 AM

DonT: "Your pseudo scientific analysis falls flat on its face if even one happy, placid woman goes through a non stressful pregnancy and birth, and her child is Gay"

Well, of course you have monitored such a woman??..or are you speaking hypothetically?...or do you even know who or what you're talking about?

Firth is still doing 'research'...

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 15 Feb 13 - 07:33 AM

Your pseudo scientific analysis falls flat on its face if even one happy, placid woman goes through a non stressful pregnancy and birth, and her child is Gay.

Only the most arrogant, up-his-own-arse charlatan would have the Hutzpah to advance that as a fact.

And just to prove I tried, and for the third time.

Apart from your well known distaste for their existence, please explain what you see as the essential difference between an infertile heterosexual couple adopting a child and rearing it in a safe and caring environment, and a homosexual couple doing the exact same thing?

We know you object! So tell us why.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 15 Feb 13 - 07:19 AM

""There Does seem to be a correlation as to stresses, anxieties, depression, resentments etc. etc, on the genes..or more accurately, the 'markers', and quite probably properties.""

And you base your argued certainly about Gays and consequently your attitude to allowing them to be what they are on that "probably"?

Do you sell snake oil as well, or turn lead into gold?

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 15 Feb 13 - 02:35 AM

frogprince: "He discounts findings of a much higher correlation with identified genetic markers."

Not at all...genetic markers can be subject to alterations, caused by the aforementioned things in the article. A more apt study would be to somehow 'monitor' the stress levels,(or other influences to genes in general, such as drugs or alcohol, et al)...There Does seem to be a correlation as to stresses, anxieties, depression, resentments etc. etc, on the genes..or more accurately, the 'markers', and quite probably properties. Remember, the mother and child are processing the SAME fluctuations, of the SAME 'energy'(if you will), chemical balances or imbalances(if you will)...and the cells set up the receptors, to 'crave' whatever 'substance' or 'gratification' it has been 'accustomed' to.

The is a good segment on 'receptors' in the video "What the bleep Do We Know?" (I posted the link for TIA a while back..I could re-post it, if you may be interested). It's easy to understand, in the video.

Don, Once again, you're 'off the track'...and hopefully not trying to drag people with you....You are missing, ENTIRELY the bigger point....but more on that, later....so the more serious stuff related to the thread doesn't get high-jacked, AGAIN....OK?

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: frogprince
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 09:10 PM

The article does allege that a substantial study found a "modest but significant" correlation between first trimester stress and orientation. Saying for consideration that it is a valid finding:

That finding would not even begin to support gfs. He discounts findings of a much higher correlation with identified genetic markers.
To take a theoretical stab in the dark, there could be those who would be at a balancing point because of genetic factors (or other biological factors not yet understood) who are tipped on over to homosexual orientation by the stress factor.

But gfs never backs away from "choice, choice, choice"; so all the stress factor, or any other biological factor, could do, would be to produce an individual who is prone to make the bad choice of a homosexual lifestyle . I won't hold my breath waiting for evidence for that to come together.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 08:33 PM

""....AND....

GfS""

So a minority of Gays don't like arseholes like you patronising them, which means what exactly, in the overall framework.

If just one Gay couple wish to make the genuine lifelong commitment of getting properly married, what the hell do you think gives you and other bigots the right to deny them?

And I'm still waiting for an answer (a sensible one might be beyond your capabilities) to the question you, claiming to have missed it, requested that I repeat for your benefit.

(See my post of 14th Feb 06.30 AM), which you also seem to have missed, avoided, ignored or otherwise failed to answer.

Quelle surprise!

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 08:20 PM

""Oh, and as per aforementioned, in the 'prop 8' thread...
why you are being misinformed!!!..........

Now guess what 'results' they come up with...and for why!""

Relevance to causes of gender oriaentation if any, WITH EVIDENCE if you have any??

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 08:15 PM

""In "Magical Beginnings, Enchanted Lives," Dr. Deepak Chopra clearly explains what pregnancy research is showing, "When a pregnant mother is anxious, stressed, or in a fearful state, the stress hormones released into her bloodstream cross through the placenta to the baby. Hundreds of studies have confirmed that chemicals released by the pregnant mother's body are transported into the womb and affect the unborn baby."

Negative thoughts are often the root cause of a fear-based stress response. Deepak Chopra states, "Stress activates the unborn child's endocrine system and influences fetal brain development. Children born to mothers who had intensely stressful pregnancies are more likely to have behavioral problems later in life." Thomas Verny says, "Studies show that mothers under extreme and constant stress are more likely to have babies who are premature, lower than average in weight, hyperactive, irritable, and colicky." Cell biologist and neuroscientist Bruce Lipton, Ph.D. writes, "When passing through the placenta, the hormones of a mother experiencing chronic stress will profoundly alter the distribution of blood flow in her fetus and change the character of her developing child's physiology.""

SO? That article makes one single reference to a comment by Lipton that the mother's stress levels can affect the genetic make up of her child, without presenting any evidence for such, and you extrapolate the one thing the article fails to mention at any point,...HOMOSEXUALITY.

Brilliant!! Except, where's the smoking gun????

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don Firth
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 04:47 PM

It's not about bureaucrats trying to gain control of the health system, or "political diagnoses!"

It's a human rights issue, and that transcends politics.

Goofball, why does this issue get so far up your nose? The world is changing and becoming a more civilized place. More and more states all the time are legalizing same-sex marriage, and it is in the process of being passed in both France and England. When people see that, as a result, civilization does not collapse and the world is NOT destroyed, it will become an accepted thing. In the same way as interracial marriage.

There will, of course, be those such as yourself who will weep, wail, and gnash their teeth, but they will go the way of the Neanderthal.

I'm not trying to change your mind. I know it's locked in concrete. But I'm just warning you of what's to come.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 04:44 PM

....AND....

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 04:40 PM

Oh, and as per aforementioned, in the 'prop 8' thread...
why you are being misinformed!!!..........

Now guess what 'results' they come up with...and for why!

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 04:17 PM

Not just rats, Bucko....

as to Musket's, do you think that damage could be sustained to the gene?

To KB, not exactly predetermined in all cases...but not genetic as the misplaced ideologues would want it to be, to equate it with the civil rights issues of the 60's.. That's why I posted, that those who WANT help should be able to get it...The ideologues have determined that it can't be given help, so they want to deny them. Just read any number of Firth's post regarding it. That''s what you get when wannabe bureaucrats try to gain control of the health system...political diagnoses!!..WRONG!!!!!

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: frogprince
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 03:54 PM

I could hardly imagine anyone denying that major stress during pregnancy is unhealthy for the development of the child. And a signiicant prenatal influence on sexual orientation is by all means worth considering as part of the entire picture. But identifying a modest but significant factor is no where near the same thing as finding a primary factor in a majority of cases. gfs has personally admitted knowing the identified genetic markers which have been shown to correlate much more significantly with orientation. It's good to know that gfs would never let an agenda bias his interpretation of evidence.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don Firth
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 03:34 PM

Pregnant rats under stress.

And this is supposed to be a great solace to those same-sex oriented folks currently extant? What do you do for them (even if this bit of research on rats has any relevance whatsoever)? Blame their mother for being uptight? What woman ISN'T a bit uptight when she's pregnant?

Goofball, you are still making the short-sighted blunder of thinking that romantic relationships, which logically lead to marriage, are all about the crotch, and have nothing to do with the thoughts, shared personal values, and the emotions of the parties involved.

B. F. Skinner, eminent research psychologist and behaviorist, use to derive his theories about human behavior by watching and documenting pigeons pecking different colored buttons in hopes that a peanut would slide down the chute.

I'm inspired!!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,Musket sans cookie
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 02:31 PM

Hey Goofus!

The good professor wants to pick you up on another point. Don't you boy?

Woof! Woof!

Sorry, everybody else. I've given up trying.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: KB in Iowa
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 01:53 PM

The article you just posted seems to indicate that sexual orientation is not a choice but is instead predetermined. Is that what you meant to do?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 01:23 PM

I put this link up...but you'd have to log in to get to it, so I cut and pasted the article....Interested??????????????...not that our resident 'ideologue/activists' give a shit!:

The effects of prenatal stress, and of prenatal alcohol and nicotine exposure, on human sexual orientation.
Physiol Behav. 2001; 74(1-2):213-26 (ISSN: 0031-9384)

Ellis L; Cole-Harding S
Minot State University, 58707, Minot, ND, USA. [e-mail]

BACKGROUND: Studies of rats have shown that mothers who are subjected to stress during pregnancy are more likely than mothers who are not stressed during pregnancy to have male offspring who exhibit female-typical sexual receptivity postures (lordosis) in the presence of other males following the onset of puberty. More recent animal experiments have indicated that prenatal exposure to alcohol affects the sexual preferences of male offspring in ways that are similar to the effects of prenatal stress. Research with human subjects have thus far yielded inconsistent findings regarding the effects of prenatal stress on male sexual orientation, and no research has yet addressed the possible involvement of prenatal exposure to alcohol or other widely used recreational drugs, such as nicotine. PURPOSE: The present study was undertaken to determine if prenatal stress could be one of the causes of variations in sexual orientation in humans, both singularly and in conjunction with prenatal exposure to alcohol and nicotine. METHODS: Over 7500 offspring and their mothers provided information regarding the offspring's sexual orientation and the mother's stressful experiences and use of alcohol and nicotine during pregnancy. RESULTS: Findings indicate that prenatal stress has a modest but significant effect on the sexual orientation of male offspring, particularly when the stress occurred during the first trimester of pregnancy. Regarding prenatal exposure to alcohol, no evidence was found to suggest that it impacted offspring sexual orientation of either males or females. Prenatal nicotine exposure, however, appears to significantly increase the probability of lesbianism among female offspring, especially if the exposure occurred in the first trimester along with prenatal stress in the second trimester. CONCLUSION: The present study is consistent with animal models suggesting that prenatal stress disrupts the typical sex hormonal milieu within which male fetal brains are sexed, thereby feminizing/demasculinizing the male's sexual orientation. However, little support was found for similar effects of prenatal alcohol exposure. In the case of prenatal nicotine, this study is the first to suggest that this drug has masculinizing/defeminizing effects on the sexual orientation of female offspring.

Now, TIA, as I posted before, some empathy and compassion MAY cause you to understand the situation you described earlier. You WILL NOT get accurate info from the ideologues...just how to exploit a MEDICAL/psychological disorder!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Regards!

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 01:11 PM

Here, I've posted about this before...the other stuff is just wishful thinking for the ideologues!

Try this!

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don Firth
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 12:43 PM

Exactly so, Penny!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 11:23 AM

It was????

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,TIA
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 09:53 AM

Thanks Penny. Well put.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Penny S.
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 09:47 AM

I see that the idea of survival has reared its head, as if we survive in couples with offspring, all by ourselves. This very morning I was hearing it explained that humanity developed (though this will not convince the anti-Steve arguers) when the climate pressure of a developing glacial made it imperative for groups to come together and cooperate. We survive as groups.

And even the survivalist types with their bunkers and long term storage depend on others to produce the materials for those bunkers and stores. Most modern people would have no chance of survival, even with those stores and guns once the raw materials run out.

Who knows where to find useful and accessible minerals that have not been worked out? Who can deliver a baby trapped in the birth canal? Who knows where to find safe natural medicines? If society collapsed, you'd have a better chance with the Yanomami than in Oregon.

The point of this tangent being, that because we survive as groups, with division of labour, having couples not open to procreation does not make a group less likely to survive. Having non-fertile uncles and aunties may even improve the chances. It works with naked mole rats, meerkats, wolves, and other social beasties. They tend to go in for group hugging more than we allow, so the necessity for some sort of physical contact which same sex marriage enables doesn't arise.

I cannot understand why so many people of the hetero persuasion somehow think that their own marriages are diminished if other people call their bonding by the same name. It's as if it were a quantum phenomenon, with an electron here influencing the spin of another over there. Without the maths behind it.

By the way, if anyone were to keep the word wedlock, it should be the traditionalists. They're the ones with the locked up concepts.

Penny

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 06:40 AM

""Why are you bringing homosexuals into it...?""....from GfS

Duhh! You claim to be able to read and comprehend, and you have to ask why homosexuals feature in a thread on Gay Marriage??

Stunning!

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 06:30 AM

""Tell me what is the difference between an infertile heterosexual couple adopting a child, and a Gay couple (male or female) doing the same, other than your distaste for the latter?""

That's the question!

Your answer?

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 14 Feb 13 - 02:08 AM

Oh, you just want me to tap dance on your face in high heels!

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don Firth
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 10:53 PM

You can't even follow your own argument, Goofball!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 10:33 PM

Is there a point, somewhere in there??

Everything I posted was true....unlike yourself...the rest were just questions...that you all went into a tailspin over.

Moral of the story: Maybe political posturing has nothing to do with the truth...just politics.

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don Firth
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 09:25 PM

Jeez!! Even Fred Astaire couldn't tap dance like that!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 09:17 PM

Why are you bringing homosexuals into it...?I was talking about survival, the OTHER natural instinct of healthy living beings...human or not...you guys are already making up excuses.
Amos was on it....!

TIA: "How's that drive for survival workin' out for ya?."

Actually fantastic........not only did the cardiologist remark that my recovery was 'miraculous', he is using my music in his practice in healing therapy....and has spread 5 hospitals in Colorado, Idaho, Texas, not to mention therapists, and another group of masseuse.(True story).

So I guess OK....

Don T, What question was that? I only saw one, but I thought it was more than adequately answered...unless it was another one.

So did you all enjoy the 'True or False'....and It was posted WITHOUT 'commentary!

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,TIA
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 08:59 PM

If individual survival and procreation is such an important drive, perhaps GfS, the learned Counselor, can explain to us the origin of altruism.

Wait, I got it... It is a perfect syllogism:

Gays have more important goals than procreation.
Altruistic heroes, when sacrificing for the good of the group, value certain goals above procreation.
Therefore Gays are heroes.

Checkmate :)

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: gnu
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 08:51 PM

Don... he has to ignore your question because he cannot answer it with an intelligent response that makes any sense.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don Firth
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 08:47 PM

I see no difference.

The howl usually raised by the anti-gays is their claim that gays only want to adopt children so they can molest them. But among the gay couples I know who have adopted children this is simply not the case. The children are certainly well cared for and cherished. And I know of at least two children, adopted from a Chinese orphanage, who are having and will continue to have a far better life than they would have had if they had not been adopted.

With many heterosexual married couples, children just happen, and, in far too many cases, are not necessarily wanted, or come along at inconvenient times.   This can lead to all kinds of domestic difficulties.

But with a same-sex couple, obviously the child is wanted.

That, despite its unconventionality, is far preferable to being an unwanted or inconvenient child.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,TIA
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 08:40 PM

My kids are so much more accomplished musically, academically, socially, morally, ecumenically (Jack Sparrow joke), and in all other ways than GfS, that all of the blather means nothing. Nothing.

And they and their friends and lovers are the future. GfS is the sad, doomed past. Sorry about that. How's that drive for survival workin' out for ya?.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 08:18 PM

I a couple of questions for the posters to this thread.

Does anyone other than GfS believe that it will benefit a child more to live with neglectful, irresponsible heterosexual parents, who are resentful of the burden, than with a Gay couple who actually want the child, and offer a loving and caring home?

Does anyone else care to answer the question I asked GfS in my last post, which he chose to ignore?

""Tell me what is the difference between an infertile heterosexual couple adopting a child, and a Gay couple (male or female) doing the same, other than your distaste for the latter?""

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Amos
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 06:22 PM

First of all, there is some merit to the question about the urge for survival. It does certainly seem to inform what most organisms and most species are trying to do. They spend an awful lot of time "getting and spending" in order to be able to wake up the next day. But there are many instances (some described above) where survival does not mean the individual, but emphasizes the future existence of the species or the family. So the calculation has to be broadened to include wide-spectrum survival (meaning individuals, families, groups, and species, interalia). I think it goes without saying that in any given situation, and for any given viewpoint, the importance of the different facets of survival will vary. If a man sacrifices himself by throwing himself over a grenade, and thereby saves the lives of four of his fellows, he has committed a survival act in the broad sense, even at severe personal cost.

Secondly, it is pretty clear that when confusion, oppression, trauma, and loss mount up beyond the ability of the individual to cope, (at least in humans) he or she can be pushed into an inverted state of mind whereby destruction makes sense and survival becomes an ugly illusion used to fool the weak-minded. This state of mind generates all kinds of colorful crimes and clever acts which add up to destructiveness on the facets of survival. THis doesn't change (in my opinion) the fact that survival is a core drive.

Gay people, however, or usually not exercising a choice about gayness. It could be argued they should reproduce anyway, but that doesn't work very well. The fact that they do not does not mean they are contra-survival in general; it merely means they are focusing on other facets of survival. Fabric, for example! Or building networks. Or organizations which add aesthetics to the culture. One of the reasons we sing, after all, is because of a sense that it improves things in some way.

A

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: frogprince
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 06:09 PM

Hmmm...I'm not quite sure where I'm going with this myself, but I'm going to mess around with it...I could care less if this is "drift" from where this thread has been going.

gfs constantly comes back to the concept that it is going against nature (I think he might also say against the will of God) to not. have a priority to reproduce.

Musket has just suggested that compassion and equality have a secular basis. There are suggestions that compassion, at least, may have roots down to the biological, tied to the survival of the species aspect.

But there is little or no evident impulse to equality in nature, unless in such terms as equality of worker bees among themselves, under the dominance of their superiors. No such thing as equality in a wolf pack or herd of mustangs.

So: is it going against nature, and nature's God, to promote equality of all mankind? Are we wrong, perhaps, to discount the validity of the divine right of kings?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Kenny B (inactive)
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 05:59 PM

How about " Im my own Granpa" by two very nice chappies Homer and Jethro
I apologise in advance about introducing MUSIC into this controversial subject but we've had eveything else so far, so why not?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don Firth
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 05:06 PM

"Question: is there any evidence whatever to suggest that any other animals are aware of any connection between sexual activity and pregnancy?"

No evidence that I am aware of. I tend to doubt that any animals really make the connection. Since such a relatively long period of time takes place between mating and birth, I doubt that it occurs to an animal that there is a cause-and-effect relationship between the two.

Anecdote:

The heavily pregnant Mrs. Yeokum makes her annual eight mile trek down the mountain to the settlement infirmary to deliver her nineteenth child. The nineteenth time she has made this journey since she was married at the age of fourteen.

It was an easy delivery as usual, she being a healthy, robust, and still relatively young woman. As the doctor wrapped her newborn baby in a blanket and gently handed him to her, he said, "Well, Mrs. Yeokum, I guess we'll be seeing you again next year, eh?"

She responded, "Nope!"

"Oh?" said the doctor, "Aren't you planning to have any more children?"

"Nope!" she said. "We found out what was doin' it!"

Don Firth

P. S. There might be a folk song in there somewhere.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: frogprince
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 04:25 PM

Question: is there any evidence whatever to suggest that any other animals are aware of any connection between sexual activity and pregnancy?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don Firth
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 04:03 PM

No normal person wants to die. But there are situations in which most, if not all, living creatures are willing to sacrifice themselves for the good of others or for the good of the species.

The male black widow spider fertilizes the female, and then she eats him (hence "black widow"). And there are a number of insect species where this kind of thing is part of the mating ritual. This perpetuates the species.

The whole of history—and today's newspapers—carry stories of people who have died to save another person, or who have been willing to die for a principle, be it patriotism, a religious belief, or what they consider to be some higher good.

But then, you can't really expect a person who has no principles to understand that.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: frogprince
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 03:37 PM

It's a terrible thing to contemplate: people who have no real will to reproduce, passing that on to their children, generation after generation, until they outnumber those who have the will to reproduce, and the human population ages and dies....

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 03:06 PM

Look it up.
....(not to be confused with 'the ability')....

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 02:39 PM

The "will" to survive, huh?

"Will"???

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 01:59 PM

Don T,: "A false premise, and from a false premise anything follows.

The will to survive is an innate part of all animal life..true or false?

FALSE!"

BZZZZZZZZZZ

Don...someone should have taught you about the birds and the bees...

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 12:38 PM

""True or false......All living things on the planet share two common instincts..the will to survive and reproduce.""

A false premise, and from a false premise anything follows.

The will to survive is an innate part of all animal life..true or false?

FALSE!

Most animals have that innate and overriding urge, but not all. Particularly, but not solely, in the insect world there are groups whose job it is to give their lives when it is appropriate to do so, and even among humans a mother may willingly give her life in defence of her child.

The will to reproduce is an innate part of all animal life..true or false?

FALSE!

Mammals which live in groups very often live their whole lives focussed on the survival and rearing of one alpha pair's offspring. They give up their chance of reproduction, perhaps not willingly, but without too much concern, and there are many heterosexual human couples who decide against reproduction for a multitude of reasons other than inability.

The rest of your post is arrant nonsense, given that your basic premise is fatally flawed.

Tell me what is the difference between an infertile heterosexual couple adopting a child, and a Gay couple (male or female) doing the same, other than your distaste for the latter?

BTW, I can apparently read and comprehend well enough to take you on, and what I write is at least comprehensible to others who can read.

And the fact that you deny something carries no weight unless we trust you. Ask around and see whether that is the case.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay marriage' question
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 12:18 PM

""It appears that compassion and equality are secular traits after all. Funny that. .""

Which is absolutely obvious really, if you look at it without the unidirectional filters of all the religions which have claimed and still do claim ownership of morals and ethics.

IMHO, knowledge of right and wrong preceded all religions and possibly preceded Homo Sapiens.

After all, morals and ethics are largely an expession of the need for an individual to moderate his behaviour for the benefit of the community, and even apes have a rudimentary concept of acceptable and unacceptable actions.

Early hominids must have co-operated to hunt for food and it's not to much of a jump to suspect that family and tribal groups had some vague, maybe even subconscious, golden rule which predisposed them toward empathy, if not love, for their immediate kin.

Don T.