<Snipped quote by Dark Wind>

ARE YOU SAYING WE'RE NOT AT WAR WITH EURASIA????

*Gets trampled under the unstoppable force of newspeak*

@mdk Oh, it definitely is related to lobbyists, who are trying to pander to those who are discriminatory.

...when did I ever say I hate cisgender white men? The dumbasses who discriminate against them because they happen to be born into positions of privilege disgust me, it's not their fault, don't be the fuckin' discriminatory people you're fighting. Plus there are civil rights issues surrounding them, particularly men--men are raped and denied help (or even accused of liking it, or being the rapist!), denied custody, etc, and that's something I also want to bring awareness to. I'm not going to discriminate against you simply because you're not a minority, what kind of terrible logic is that??

that bit was supposed to be a joke about my own real actual ignorance on transgender bathroom issues. I straight up have NO FUCKING CLUE what's going on down there/in there/around there/about there/etc. there. None. None whatsoever. I DO NOT GET IT. Totally open about that. No jab was intended.

EDIT: also, I'm totally a minority, remember? I'm still counting myself ahead in the oppression olympics.

@mdk Oh. Sorry. I have issues with reading jokes literally sometimes. And basically, GOP lawmakers are pushing laws that would legally(?) make trans people have to use the restroom on their birth certificate. The idea is that it will prevent "men dressed as women" from peeping on women in the bathroom. Never mind the fact that a law like that isn't really enforceable and only spreads ignorance, and also the fact that it ignores trans men exist? It's just generally really shitty and a lot of trans people are suffering for it, heck, some cis people who look kinda trans are getting grief or even beaten up, it's fuckin' crazy.

Edit: lol no for real though I am so sorry at jumping at conclusions, I've had a lot of people actually try to use those types of statements seriously and...I'm not the best at all at seeing past sarcasm/jokes. I have really really high-functioning autism, but...I'm still autistic. >>

And basically, GOP lawmakers are pushing laws that would legally(?) make trans people have to use the restroom on their birth certificate.

Hadn't that been the rule all along?

Hadn't that been the rule all along?

A rule probably, but its unlikely it was written into actual law. If I'm wrong ,I will confess that I once used the mens when I was desperate. Take me to jail. Actually don't I don't wish to be deported at this late date.

@mdk Bathroom use was never legally enforced at all, trans people used bathrooms corresponding with their gender without incident for quite a while until this law craze popped up.

@The Harbinger of Ferocity

Perhaps the world will never be just. Perhaps hoping for universal rights and tolerance for everyone is a foolish notion that can never be attained.

So What? What if we can make the world 50% more just, 10%. What if all I can hope to achieve in the world is to make life better for one person. I'll take it. Just for who? I'll look for people suffering from injustice and start at the top of the list.

So what if there places in the world where people have it far worse than they do in the United States? In Africa they have forced genital mutilation, why are we wasting time on this whole woman's suffrage thing! It doesn't absolve us of the responsibility to act locally. We CAN have progress on multiple fronts, we must in fact. I don't live in Rwanda, or Chechnya or Iraq, I have to try to make what difference I can, where I can.

I hope that the world can be made better, and I'll work at it. I'd kinda like to leave the place better than I found it.

Now I agree in that we should all work to make the world a better place when we can, but you must also ask the question of when your 'better' is actually making it worse for others. Respect goes both ways and forced tolerance quickly morphs into oppression at its finest. Is making people, like religious folks who have strong beliefs that homosexual acts are bad, or simply people who believe in the traditional nuclear family of a mother and father as the best model of society, accept non-traditional relationships or genders as normal really a good thing?

Trying to force a certain set of moral codes on someone is an absolute recipe for disaster. As society knows, certain rules need to be put in place or society will fall apart, but anytime you go into moral territory that has little to do the basic functions of society you will find most people will not let you just tell them what you think is right or wrong. Is it ever right to force someone to do something they believe they should never do, like celebrate a homosexual wedding when they believe it is between a man and a woman only? Is that person who decided not to celebrate something they don't believe in a bad person, even though they would never think of harming a homosexual in the first place? Most of you would probably say no.

Prejudice and discrimination, of course they take place and on a wide variety of subject matters. When such things are seen, people should point it out, but that is so very different from people literally shoving the subject matter into some person's face and demanding they accept whatever it is or face the consequences, it has gone way too far. Let's say we have an evolutionary scientist who claims homosexual behavior will eventually die out so there is no reason to encourage the behavior in society? The scientist has a right to their opinion and should not be forced to write a retraction of any of their writings on the subject.

@The Harbinger of Ferocity
outandequal.org/2017-workplace-equali… This is already in draft, but in 28 states, one can be fired for being gay or trans.

South Dakota passed a law allowing foster and adoption agencies that receive state funding to reject LGBT parents in grounds of religious objection.

hrc.org/blog/100-anti-lgbtq-bills-int… Here's a neatly compiled list with sources and explanation~

The workplace one was a bit out of my depth so I'll skirt that one, but the law about adoption agencies hits very close to home. This is the common hot button topic, for does the government have the right to tell a religiously run organization what to do because they give funds to it? This is a seriously big issue for Catholic adoption agencies in particular who have had to wrestle with this one. These adoption agencies want the best for the kids which is why they decided to try and find as many nuclear family homes as possible, which statistically is the best environment for children. Add on to the fact that most Catholics believe homosexual behavior to be a sin and now you have the state forcing these religious groups to give up these children, they have been caring for, to someone they believe is not a good fit for the child, talk about a heart breaker.

I tried looking at those bills and found most of them dealing with gender identity politics, some with the above issue, and others I really could not figure out since they gave little to no information. Gender identity stuff is way too easily abused, such as a boy becoming a woman to win the women's wrestling championship in Texas. I think a lot of parents have the right to be worried about people using gender identity to their own ends as examples of such have already been popping up.

That being said...can we just keep laws out of the bathroom? Never needed them before so let's just stop...

---

Blast it everyone is too fast at posting, keep writing and more stuff pops up XD.

@IceHeart ...you're actually arguing that nuclear heterosexual families are the best environment for children. I'm guessing no amount of scientific evidence will convince you otherwise, but may I suggest if these religious organizations want to deny LGBT parents, they not take federal funding? And whether or not they believe the parents will be good for the child has nothing to do with whether or not they actually are.

Also, the Texas wrestling championship was a transgender boy who was forced to participate in the women's division because his school wouldn't let him wrestle with the boys. And I'm fairly certain one would not go through transition simply to win a wrestling competition--why would someone voluntarily cause gender dysphoria to themselves, ever?

Here's a study which combines 59 studies published by the APA, which provide rather conclusive evidence that homosexual parents are equilivant in parentage to heterosexuals.

If you'd like to tell a gay person why you think they aren't as good a parent as a straight person would be, go ahead! I'm all ears. You can say I'm baiting, if you want, but I'd very much like to hear your reasoning.

Also, tolerance of intolerance-how far are you willing to let that go? Should we not force any moral codes onto society? Was it bad to enforce nondiscrimination laws based on sex, race, religion? If not, then why is it bad to have them based on sexuality and gender? Where do you draw the line?

@NightinGem Historically the nuclear family is a tried and true construction that has served many civilizations throughout history and has been the backbone for many a society. Also what scientific evidence is there that a homosexual family is better for children? There is not enough evidence to prove that though there are certainly many, many studies that show single-parent homes to statistically be a lot worse off then two parent ones, so you really lost me on this supposed 'scientific evidence'.

As for the federal funding part, if they could keep running with federal funding part I do agree that would be for the best; however, it is still a very bad idea for the state to try and tell a religious run organization to do something that conflicts with their deeply held religious beliefs. The easiest way out is of course to just split from the government but depending on the situation that may not be an option if the adoption agency is to survive and continue to do good work.

Who would voluntarily do that? You underestimate the stupidity of humanity I am afraid...that said, that boy should never have been allowed to participate since his original biological gender gave him a clear advantage over the girls. It was like having a bunch of natural steriods pumped in that a natural born female would never have access to.

Looked at that study and it literally states, "In summary response to question 1 (‘‘How representative and culturally, ethnically, and economically diverse were the gay/lesbian households in the published literature behind the APA Brief?’’), we see that in addition to relying primarily on small, non-representative, convenience samples, many studies do not include any minority individuals or families. Further, comparison studies on children of gay fathers are almost non-existent in the 2005 Brief. By their own reports, social researchers examining same-sex parenting have repeatedly selected small, non-representative, homogeneous samples of privileged lesbian mothers to represent all same-sex parents. This pattern across three decades of research raises significant questions regarding lack of representativeness and diversity in the same-sex parenting studies."

Also hardly any of them had heterosexual nuclear family comparison groups so that is a problem as well.

So that doesn't really tell me much of anything due to how they were done.

@mdk Bathroom use was never legally enforced at all, trans people used bathrooms corresponding with their gender without incident for quite a while until this law craze popped up.

So with the new laws, they began the genital inspections at the bathroom stall?

let's spare the leading questions and skip to the point

Here's the actual history of bathroom access. Laws overwhelmingly trended progressive -- in 49 out of 50 states, the laws your talking about do not exist and never existed and never are going to exist. North Carolina is was the one and only state with a (short-lived)biological sex rule; three other states (including Mississippi, misleadingly labeled the same color as NC on CNN's very fake news infographic) allow the decision to be made at a local level. This is the 'law craze' you speak of.

Let's examine that again. Three states in the USA, out of 50, allow local governments and/or businesses to have their own policies. As these policies are entirely unenforceable, that is the moral equivalent of three states allowing people to express an opinion on a controversial matter.

What I am positing is not that NC was in the right. They weren't. I am not positing that 46 other states were in the right. They weren't. I'm saying that three states which said "Not my problem, you make up your own damn mind" are the only ones granting their citizens real actual freedom on this issue, and I commend them for that. Those are the states doing it right, and if I owned a business in one of those states (I don't), you could use whatever bathroom you wanted.

Except the handicap bathroom, because that's mine. Incidentally, disabled people who look non-disabled get grief/hassled/harassed all the time -- MORE OPPRESSION POINTS FOR ME WOOT I AM RUNNING AWAY WITH THIS CONTEST

edit: typo

@IceHeart ...did you not read the studies? At all? You know, the ones that basically prove that now that homosexual couples are being allowed to adopt, they basically function the same as heterosexual ones in terms of the wellbeing of the child?

Church and state should be separated, regardless. There is no place for religion in politics. And is an adoption agency depriving children of potential homes simply based on their own, biased, factually disproved personal beliefs truly good work?

Also, so does that mean we should discriminate against actual trans people because of that?

I must go to bed now. I dearly hope your sect of Seventh-Day Adventists aren't the terrifying cult-like people I've dealt with in my life.

Now I agree in that we should all work to make the world a better place when we can, but you must also ask the question of when your 'better' is actually making it worse for others. Respect goes both ways and forced tolerance quickly morphs into oppression at its finest. Is making people, like religious folks who have strong beliefs that homosexual acts are bad, or simply people who believe in the traditional nuclear family of a mother and father as the best model of society, accept non-traditional relationships or genders as normal really a good thing?

Although I see what you are driving at here I have to come down on the side of individual rights. A christian might personally believe that homosexuality is bad but the homosexual has the right to conduct their life as he or she see fit. If the boot was on the other foot and the homosexual thought Christianity should be outlawed, the Christian should likewise recieve the same protection. We don't have to like each other, but we should respect each others rights.

Is it ever right to force someone to do something they believe they should never do, like celebrate a homosexual wedding when they believe it is between a man and a woman only? Is that person who decided not to celebrate something they don't believe in a bad person, even though they would never think of harming a homosexual in the first place? Most of you would probably say no.

This is a complicated question. My gut says no people ought not be compelled in such a fashion. Why would you want a celebrant who thought what you were doing was wrong? Of course if they charge for the service, would we find it acceptable if they refused to marry Asians, or redheads or any other group?

Let's say we have an evolutionary scientist who claims homosexual behavior will eventually die out so there is no reason to encourage the behavior in society? The scientist has a right to their opinion and should not be forced to write a retraction of any of their writings on the subject.

All human behavior will eventually die out. Plenty of activities are of debatable evolutionary value. Evolution is how we got here, it shouldn't be a guide for our behavior, we ought to try to rise above our origins.

The workplace one was a bit out of my depth so I'll skirt that one, but the law about adoption agencies hits very close to home. This is the common hot button topic, for does the government have the right to tell a religiously run organization what to do because they give funds to it?

The government already writes all sorts of rules for businesses. For example you aren't allowed to discriminate on the basis of race. It doesn't seem to be a huge jump from there, to don't discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation.

In the case of not for profit religious organizations its a little murkier. Any time I see discrimination on the basis of sex I ask myself, would we be ok with this in the case of race?

Blast it everyone is too fast at posting, keep writing and more stuff pops up XD.

No kidding!

Historically the nuclear family is a tried and true construction that has served many civilizations throughout history and has been the backbone for many a society.

Been a while since anthropology class, but I'm pretty sure extended families are much more the norm throughout all of human history.

I wonder if my parents were gay if there would be more or less pressure for me to get married...

Things need to be kept in the closet more (in reference to *that* one gigantic issue, I mean people on both sides need to shut up about it all). It's less separation of church and state that's needed; more like separation of state and all things personal. It really would lead to less (w)itching in general. People should think before they speak and then maybe they wouldn't tick off so many sensitive snowflakes. Remember that old adage "if you don't have anything nice to say...."?

The world may tell you there are no simple answers. The world's a right....*restrains self, remembering above*

It's simple if you choose to view it simplistically.

I have to admit, I keep finding myself beat to my responses, but in all honesty I am not one to complain about that. A lively discussion is better than the reverberations of old ones held off to the side with the same audiences we are all familiar to. Especially so when their reaction is going to immediately nod and agree. It also is worthy to note that this topic, as charged as some opinions have been, is still open which is positive in its own light.

<Snipped quote by IceHeart>

Been a while since anthropology class, but I'm pretty sure extended families are much more the norm throughout all of human history.

You are quite right about extended families being the norm, I was hasty with my earlier words but even if they are extended they are still based on heterosexual relationships. Multi-generational households were/are indeed the norm, kinda forgot for a moment nuclear excluded the grandparents and such XD.

I don't believe in the evolutionary model myself as I find concrete evidence severely lacking, I was just using the example for debate. If anything I think humanity has essentially been breaking down genetically over the generations though our technology has helped us cope with that.

By no means am I advocating for homosexuality to be illegal, but homosexuals also have to accept the fact that religious people have rights as well, it is a two way street. Also race is a completely different issue, race is genetic, while homosexuality may or may not be genetic homosexual activity is up to the person.

By no means am I advocating for homosexuality to be illegal, but homosexuals also have to accept the fact that religious people have rights as well, it is a two way street. Also race is a completely different issue, race is genetic, while homosexuality may or may not be genetic homosexual activity is up to the person.

At the risk of opening up debate again I'll refer you back to the American Journal of Physical Anthropology and their excellent Race Reconciled issue.

Religious activity is also up to a person. Couldn't not a homosexual just as easily declare religious observance to be wrong and demand that religious believers have less rights? Religious people may feel they have some sort of moral high ground on the matter but they don't get to morally legislate on the matter. Don't invite them to your private Jesus club if you like, but in the public sphere we should all enjoy the same rights and the same respect.

I'm personally in favor of the free practice of religion and the free practice of your sexual identity. Crazy notions.

I don't believe in the evolutionary model myself as I find concrete evidence severely lacking

If you have an alternative framework you should call Nature and get it published. Overturning the fundamental theory of modern biology would make you a shoe in for that sweet sweet Nobel Prize money.

<Snipped quote by IceHeart>
Religious activity is also up to a person. Couldn't not a homosexual just as easily declare religious observance to be wrong and demand that religious believers have less rights? Religious people may feel they have some sort of moral high ground on the matter but they don't get to morally legislate on the matter. Don't invite them to your private Jesus club if you like, but in the public sphere we should all enjoy the same rights and the same respect.

I'm personally in favor of the free practice of religion and the free practice of your sexual identity. Crazy notions.

Don't know what kind of Jesus club you're talking about as Jesus wants to save everyone no matter who they are or what they've done. That being said he really wants people to choose him and wants them to stop self-destructive ways, but God did give free choice to man and that is something he will never take away. But I digress and many of you will obviously disagree with this sentiment...

You go on about how they have less rights but the current example is adoption. Adoption is not a right, many people have to work very hard to be considered to have adoption privileges. I know a wonderful heterosexual couple who were denied being able to adopt children because of their religion, so why were the kids they could have taken in given to homosexual couples instead? Criteria must be met and maybe that homosexual couple meets all the right criteria except for their homosexual relationship, but if these adoption agencies can refuse to give a heterosexual couple a kid because of their religion why can't Catholic agencies do the same with homosexuals? Can't have this kind of double standard floating around.