A week of LGBTQ acceptance education in a middle school. Really?

They can live their lives without being bothered. They can having loving, committed relationships that are even legally recognized. They cannot however be married in the righteous sense of the word. Many who don't think the first ones are enough want to force others to have to participate in things they don't consider right. Like the cake places that have been shut down for not wanting to make gay wedding cakes. It wasn't that they didn't want to make cakes for gays, just not the wedding cake for a ceremony they didn't believe right. How is that right? And I get tired of the comparison of homosexuality to race. It isn't anywhere near the same thing and the gays didn't go trough anything near what blacks did. And no, people that are against gay marriage and other things gay aren't being bad people in the same way at all, that's just your feelings about it.

townsend said:

It shouldn't be divisive though. The "agenda" that LGBT folks have is just being allowed to do live their lives without anyone bothering them. They want to marry who they want, and not be discriminated against. That shouldn't be divisive, the people who are polarized against it are being bad people, in the same way that the people who were against divisive issues like interracial marriage were bad people.

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Because some disagree they are bad people? What happened to right to personal beliefs. There are some things I disagree with but I do not mistreat or misaligned the individual. I think I have as much right to disagree as they do to make choices. Your methodology of someone being bad who has a different opinion is a form of elitism.

Cowboysrock55 said:

Eh, I feel like kids were always pretty ruthless. Social media maybe changed the platform to do it on but kids have always been mean to each other. I can remember some pretty nasty stuff kids did to each other back when I was in grade school. I think as a society we are just more sensitive to these issues then we were 20 years ago. It used to be if you were getting bullied someone would just tell you to toughen up. Now we have week long course in schools for sensitivity training.

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This is true but with social media that cruelty is amplified and shared with man more people.

Add in the comments and the piling on and it's much worse than a couple of kids messing with you after school.

townsend said:

It shouldn't be divisive though. The "agenda" that LGBT folks have is just being allowed to do live their lives without anyone bothering them. They want to marry who they want, and not be discriminated against. That shouldn't be divisive, the people who are polarized against it are being bad people, in the same way that the people who were against divisive issues like interracial marriage were bad people.

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Live and let live is a lie though. Government interference into the right of religious people to express their own opinions or decide who they do business with has meant that we have laws forcing society to act like they are normal, when in fact they aren't. They can live their lives without anyone bothering them and there are perfectly fine laws to protect that.

Forcing small businesses to bake wedding cakes espousing their messages crosses a line however, and that is the point where we have reached a society; tolerance is no longer tolerance but forced acceptance. That is the current backlash you see.... All due to the government's overreaching into the realm of forced acceptance.

mschmidt64 said:

Live and let live is a lie though. Government interference into the right of religious people to express their own opinions or decide who they do business with has meant that we have laws forcing society to act like they are normal, when in fact they aren't. They can live their lives without anyone bothering them and there are perfectly fine laws to protect that.

Forcing small businesses to bake wedding cakes espousing their messages crosses a line however, and that is the point where we have reached a society; tolerance is no longer tolerance but forced acceptance. That is the current backlash you see.... All due to the government's overreaching into the realm of forced acceptance.

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Absolutely true and if one doesn't conform to this agenda then they become outlaws and undesirables to the system which is simply a form of substitution of persecution.

And there is a 100% difference between outright, blanket refusal of service and specific, personalized service that carries implication of promotion of a certain political or religious message. If a bakery tells a gay couple "We don't serve your kind here" and orders them out of line and won't let them buy a donut in the morning, that is one thing. It's completely another to say "We bake wedding cakes for straight couples but not gay couples," or "We cater straight weddings but not gay weddings."

Those transactions carry more than a simple exchange of payment for service or product. Catering or baking specific orders to convey a message (such as congratulations over a same sex marriage) carries with it an element of support of the message. This should be protected by the first amendment freedom of speech and freedom of assembly -- you shouldn't need a "Religious freedom" act -- you should already be protected from government action on that ground.

Frankly this is how it should be... A Jewish bakery shouldn't have to bake a KKK cake, or if you want to take it into the realm of protected classes, a Catholic bakery should be able to say no to a Muslim cake if they want to. They shouldn't be able to kick Muslims out of their line for regular purchases but the personalized aspect of a specific contract for services should be rejectable by the business operator.

mschmidt64 said:

Forcing small businesses to bake wedding cakes espousing their messages crosses a line however, and that is the point where we have reached a society; tolerance is no longer tolerance but forced acceptance. That is the current backlash you see.... All due to the government's overreaching into the realm of forced acceptance.

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I'm not for forcing small businesses to bake cakes, but let's call a spade a spade. This is not a typical event. It's an irregular occurance that gets played up because it can let the people who have been bullying gays, feel like they're the ones being bullied.

Like seriously, one incident out of maybe 1000 of discrimination like this, can we say that the people who were discriminated against were at fault. Mostly it's just bigotry, mostly it's people who have decided that some shit that they have no reason to oppose, other than some instructions given to wandering Jews, taken out of context, is bad and they feel threatened by it, and THAT is why there's such a backlash, because people who were taught all their lives that gays and transsexuals were sub-human, have to behave like they aren't now.

Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of people who join the backlash, because of this BS narrative of poor helpless bakers, but they've just been manipulated into taking up for "their side". Just like how there's people who get outraged by the "war on Christmas" and other nonsense that champions of the over dog feel threatened by.

townsend said:

champions of the over dog feel threatened by.

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Oh good grief. Terms like this make you sound like just as much of a biased dickhead as the people you're trying to champion against.

I don't know any of these supposed gay haters who treat gays like they are subhuman but I do know plenty of honest Christians who would have a problem catering to a gay marriage event due to their honestly held religious convictions. I can only speak to my own experience, but to that end, it's 0% actual hatred and bigotry and 100% honest religious belief.

Frankly what I'm not seeing is all the unconscionable bigotry that I hear is so widespread. I think THAT is what is the rarity. But maybe I just live in a bubble of moderate middle class conservatives, even though these are the very same people I've been told are extreme on this issue.

townsend said:

I'm not for forcing small businesses to bake cakes, but let's call a spade a spade. This is not a typical event. It's an irregular occurance that gets played up because it can let the people who have been bullying gays, feel like they're the ones being bullied.

Like seriously, one incident out of maybe 1000 of discrimination like this, can we say that the people who were discriminated against were at fault. Mostly it's just bigotry, mostly it's people who have decided that some shit that they have no reason to oppose, other than some instructions given to wandering Jews, taken out of context, is bad and they feel threatened by it, and THAT is why there's such a backlash, because people who were taught all their lives that gays and transsexuals were sub-human, have to behave like they aren't now.

Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of people who join the backlash, because of this BS narrative of poor helpless bakers, but they've just been manipulated into taking up for "their side". Just like how there's people who get outraged by the "war on Christmas" and other nonsense that champions of the over dog feel threatened by.

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Your last line is very telling as to what you think of people who celebrate religious datees such as Christmas. Their beliefs are nonsense to you. You can of course hold to that opinion but that depiction is offensive to some as well.

L.T. Fan said:

Your last line is very telling as to what you think of people who celebrate religious datees such as Christmas. Their beliefs are nonsense to you. You can of course hold to that opinion but that depiction is offensive to some as well.

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I don't believe all Christian beliefs are nonsense. But I do believe most if not all dogmatic interpretation of scripture are the demonstration of a man's particular non-inspired preferences. Which is why people on discriminating against the sinners who do the "sins" aren't tempted by.

If I don't wanna fuck men, but I love shellfish, you know which parts of Leviticus I'll want enforced.

mschmidt64 said:

I don't know any of these supposed gay haters who treat gays like they are subhuman but I do know plenty of honest Christians who would have a problem catering to a gay marriage event due to their honestly held religious convictions. I can only speak to my own experience, but to that end, it's 0% actual hatred and bigotry and 100% honest religious belief.

Frankly what I'm not seeing is all the unconscionable bigotry that I hear is so widespread. I think THAT is what is the rarity. But maybe I just live in a bubble of moderate middle class conservatives, even though these are the very same people I've been told are extreme on this issue.

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Here's the thing. Most bigotry isn't personal, very rarely is someone such a shit that they'll hate someone to their face. That's why the "love the sinner, hate the sin" form of discrimination is so popular, it allows you to be friendly while protecting bigotry.
The question is whether you think less of an individual for belonging to that group. If you distrust that group as a whole (I.E. Their gay agenda). How you'd react if a loved one turned out to be one.
The problem is that we have hit another impasse between religion and social progress (as we did when interracial marriage got popular).
Now if the idea is that a Christian baker can refuse to make a gay wedding cake, or a gay baker can refuse to make a Christian wedding cake, I support both. But that's not the level of discrimination we're actually seeing. Right now in places like North Carolina and Mississippi, people are fighting for the right to not be fired for being gay.

Cowboysrock55 said:

Oh good grief. Terms like this make you sound like just as much of a biased dickhead as the people you're trying to champion against.

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If the shoe fits...

The most popular, most powerful religion in the country is fighting for the right to discriminate a group of people who have not been allowed to marry, serve in the military, or even exist until very recently. People who've enjoyed all of the basic rights that LGBT have had to fight tooth and nail for, are playing the victim.

townsend said:

I don't believe all Christian beliefs are nonsense. But I do believe most if not all dogmatic interpretation of scripture are the demonstration of a man's particular non-inspired preferences. Which is why people on discriminating against the sinners who do the "sins" aren't tempted by.

If I don't wanna fuck men, but I love shellfish, you know which parts of Leviticus I'll want enforced.

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Your examples shellfish are old testiment Levitical law for orthodox Jews who still practice it and aren't strict Christian beliefs. The area of gay practices are incorporated however, in some of the Pauline epistles which are Christian beliefs for practice.

L.T. Fan said:

Your examples shellfish are old testiment Levitical law for orthodox Jews who still practice it and aren't strict Christian beliefs. The area of gay practices are incorporated however, in some of the Pauline epistles which are Christian beliefs for practice.

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Fair point. I suppose I should have mentioned that women should keep their heads covered, and men can't have long hair.

townsend said:

Fair point. I suppose I should have mentioned that women should keep their heads covered, and men can't have long hair.

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Where is that from?

L.T. Fan said:

Where is that from?

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Corinthians, chapter 11, I believe.

townsend said:

If the shoe fits...

The most popular, most powerful religion in the country is fighting for the right to discriminate a group of people who have not been allowed to marry, serve in the military, or even exist until very recently. People who've enjoyed all of the basic rights that LGBT have had to fight tooth and nail for, are playing the victim.

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Yeah, so it's ok to be a bigot when it comes to a persons religion, just not sexual orientation or gender. If it looks like a bigot and smells like a bigot, it may just be another bigot.

Just because you belong to a group of people that you classify as an "under dog" doesn't mean you can't be just as big of a bigot or just as offensive when dealing with a group you term as an "over dog." Intolerance goes both ways. Your self loathing is so over the top some times.

townsend said:

Fair point. I suppose I should have mentioned that women should keep their heads covered, and men can't have long hair.

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Or the adultery, fornication or divorce stuff.

Cowboysrock55 said:

Yeah, so it's ok to be a bigot when it comes to a persons religion, just not sexual orientation or gender. If it looks like a bigot and smells like a bigot, it may just be another bigot.

Just because you belong to a group of people that you classify as an "under dog" doesn't mean you can't be just as big of a bigot or just as offensive when dealing with a group you term as an "over dog." Intolerance goes both ways. Your self loathing is so over the top some times.

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I agree that you can be a bigot from any camp, a bully from any side, and that discrimination against Christians, whites, men, or the rich, is no more justified than any other kind of discrimination.

What I'm arguing against is the right of bigots to limit other people's rights. If I am pro alcohol, I am not discriminating against prohibitionists, if I'm anti segregation, I'm not discriminating against the segregationist. It may seem that way to the oppressors losing their right to oppress, but gay rights is about limiting oppression.. But to some oppressors it feels like a loss of rights.

In the fairytale of the innocent Christian baker, I'd side with the baker. But in the real world the kind of legislation being minted is meant to preserve the rights of bigots to be bigots, not for innocent Christians to unoffensively practice their religion.