🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <emmc2.2285$961....@server1.news.adelphia.net>, 
tabmok99....@damnspaz.com says...
> > Because the whole idea behind a right to life is that it is a right.  The
> > right to life is fundamentally just a right to choose.  The right to choose
> > your own destiny.  Unborn babies (and indeed most babies till 3 months or so)
> > don't even have a sense of self, so they therefore cannot be capable of
> > choosing their own destiny.  If you kill someone who has no sense of self,
> > their right to choose hasn't been violated, because they didn't have one in
> > the first place.
> 
> No one wants to die.  And to you know how gruesome the abortion process is?

I know the details of the process but I would not use the word "gruesome" 
to describe it. I hope you have not offended any readers who have been 
through this with your off-hand remark.

> > > > Being gay is a sexual preference.  It's hard-wired, it's quite likely
> > > > genetic.
> > > Possibly it's genetic.
> > 
> > Well i can remember the details exactly, because it doesn't really interest
> > me, but i do know that scientists are pretty sure that they've isolated a
> > certain gene which always appears in homosexuals, but they haven't found out
> > what the precise identifier is on that gene which makes a person homosexual. 
> > The biological lingo in there is probably wrong, but that's the gist of it.
> 
> They only reached that conclusion cuz they wanted to.  
So did we only discover what makes a person's eyes blue because we 
*wanted* to? 

> The evidence was set up 
> for them to get the desired conclusion.  
Sorry you must have mis-posted, should this not be in alt.conspiracy-
theory :P

Who *set up* the evidence? Are you suggesting a bunch of homosexual guys 
created a human DNA pattern and impregnated all gay men with it just so 
the scientists could find out it was genetic. And oh yeah they abducted 
all us straight men and made sure we did not have this gene to make the 
results more accurate. :P

> Sounds like something you said about 
> psychologists a long time ago, hmm?
I think I missed that, care to expand? :)

> > > More likely, it's caused by some incident that happens
> > > during childhood.
> > 
> > That's what the Christian church wants you to believe...
> 
> Maybe it is caused by genes sometimes, maybe a hormone imbalance, or a 
> horrible childhood incident, or any combination.  I think it's different in 
> each case.  
And you base this evidence on?

> Supposing though that it was caused by nature rather than nurture - does that 
> legitamize it?  If they found out that most killers and rapists have a 
> defective gene, would that make it right?  Would it be OK for them to do as 
> they do?

There are a number of "illnesses" passed on genetically. Obesity is one 
such example. Should we outlaw obesity because some people have a fucked 
up gene? It does not hurt anyone. How about disability? Some disabilities 
are caused by genetic defects. Should we outlaw this?

There are theories that rape and murder may have some genetic links. Our 
society demands that we do not condone rape and murder since it involves 
the loss of life and freedom of a number of individuals. It creates 
victims who have no choice in the issue. The majority of people will also 
find rape and murder abhorrent. 

Homosexuals do not demand we all become gay. They do not demand that we 
try it. They just want to do whatever it is they do and not be 
ostracised. As do obese people, disabled people, ethnic minority groups, 
disadvantaged people. Why can you not live and let live?

> > > > Being sad in general can be a mental disorder - hard-wired and quite
> >  likely
> > > > genetic.  Being sad about specific things is a choice.
> > > Feelings aren't choices.  That's like saying the starving Ethiopian kids are
> > > choosing to be hungry.
> > 
> > They feel hungry because their body is not getting enough glucose so it's
> > automatically sending a message to the brain to feel hungry.  You can't
> > change that - it's biological.  Sadness about death is not biological.  If it
> > were biological, as soon as someone died - even if you didn't know they had
> > died - the chemical reaction for sadness would take place in the brain.  But
> > in order to feel sad about someone's death you first have to know about it,
> > therefore it is not a biological/physical reaction - it's a psychological
> > one.
> 
> OK, that was a bad example.  But still, emotions are not decisions - the 
> choice is how you react to them.  No one, no matter how they try, can control 
> their emotions.
Actually you can control your emotions. How often do you suppress anger 
or personal suffering in the company of others? It is also possible to 
change your state of mind from a depressive one to a more happy one. All 
of this is control of emotion. Have you never lied? This is a great 
example of emotion control. Without it the lie is obvious!

> > > > From an ethical point of view it is better not to eat meat because we
> > > > shouldn't have the right to just kill animals the way we do.  There are in
> > > > fact no positive arguments for eating meat other than "i like it".  Eating
> > > > meat is even less defensible than taking drugs.
> > > But you were just defending guns with hunting animals as a prime example.
> > 
> > I didn't say hunting was okay, i said some people do it as recreation.  Ie
> > their purpose is recreation, not killing.  That killing is a side-effect is
> > irrelevant in the context in which i mentioned it.  But if you want to look
> > at it in the greater picture, then yes, hunting is bad.  And people really
> > should only be using guns as recreation by shooting targets and clay pigeons.
> 
> Well, sometimes they need to thin out their numbers.  I guess it's acceptable 
> then too.

Culling of animals is very often the defence a hunter will use. 
Personally I do not see how whales and baby seals require culling. Most 
hunting is for fun pure and simple. It is a cruel sport and in the 
unlikely event that culling was deemed necessary, there are more humane 
ways to cull animals than to hunt them.

> > > > Says who?  Maybe when Adam ate the first apple he got really high, but
> >  then
> > > > it became such a staple food that humankind have built up a resistance to
> > > > it.
> > > Human kind didn't all come from Adam and Eve.  That was just a myth that was
> > > used to explain things to epople in the olden days.
> > 
> > You know what i mean.
> 
> OK, maybe apples do make some animals hallucinate.  That doesn't mean it's bad 
> for our kind.  Just like saccharin (sp?) in gum will give rats cancer.  It 
> doesn't mean chewing gum will hurt our kind.  We have a different genetic 
> structure than rats, what's OK for one species isn't necessarily OK for 
> another.  And illicit drug abuse (to be specific for Mark) isn't ok for
> anyone in our species.
					 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^  
<grin>

> > > > Remember we talked about this on agmk a few months ago.  But the feeling
> >  of
> > > > having sexual power over someone would be greatly reduced if everyone
> >  walked
> > > > round naked and sex was simply a matter of saying "you feel like some? 
> >  yup?
> > > > *thrust thrust*  thanks, i'll seeya".
> > > Maybe, but we're not animals, we're people.
> > 
> > We are animals.  Humankind is an animal species, as opposed to a plant
> > species.
> 
> OK, technically we are - but we're better.  We're at the top of the food 
> chain.  We have the responsibility to act better, and even if we don't live up 
> to that responsibilty it's still there.

This "responsibility" is just another example of human arrogance. We 
claim to be "better" than other animals. 

Amongst our great achievements are the wiping out of a number of other 
animal species purely for sport or to adorn our fragile bodies or our 
homes with their dead skin. We did not even have the respect to hunt the 
animal for food and use it's then useless carcass for furnishing, we just 
killed it and took what we wanted. 

Or how about the mass destruction of parts of the world both through war 
and for raw materials. We have cut down so much rain forest and created 
many other imbalances in the atmosphere thet we are changing the very 
nature of the planet. Our research into nuclear reactions is still having 
long term side effects. 

So far I see no responsibility and nothing that says we are "better". No, 
wait a minute we are better ... at fucking up.

> > > > where non-Christians would be burnt at the stake,
> > > Don't know which country you're talking about.
> > 
> > Howsabout the whole of Europe during the Dark Ages?  What about the Crusades
> > during the Middle Ages where thousands of Arabs were killed because they
> > didn't believe in the Christian God?  What about witch hunting (which was
> > just an excuse to kill anyone who wasn't Christian)?
> 
> God didn't say to do that - the people chose to.  Those people wanted to kill 
Ob boy. All this murder was carried out in God's name and was often based 
on the very passages you have been quoting. Please read below...

> non Christians, not God.  God in fact said to do the opposite (Thou shalt not 
> do murder)

So how are we supposed to carry out his will with regard homosexuals!

I quote from a previous message ...

"If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of
them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death;"
                                                         ^^^^^^^^^^^^

Please, define murder and then define the killing of a homosexual in the 
above quote and explain the difference. I see none. 

Interestingly it seems very similar to "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to 
live" (Did I get that right? :) ) Yet you claim that the witch hunts were 
instigated by the people and not the God that spoke those very words.

-- 
Mark