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Behavior and prejudice

Discussion in 'BBS Hangout: Debate & Discussion' started by WildSweet&Cool, Oct 11, 2007.

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  1. kokopuffs

    kokopuffs Member

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    I thought it would be clear that "the argument" was the main argument pertaining to this thread, yes the one we're posting in. The one about whether it is bigotry to be afraid to expose our children to homosexuals, and tangentially whether it is bigotry to deny homosexuals the "right" to adopt.

    I'm also glad that you felt that a pithy quote could sum up years of mindless bowing and scraping to talking points. It's pretty obvious you didn't read any of my post so I won't bother to respond to the rest of yours.

    I'm not saying homosexuals aren't targets of hate groups. I'm saying that comparing it to the manifest destiny-style racism that existed in the colonial-post colonial period is ridiculous and really shows how out-of-touch with reality some people are. I mean, when I think about it it's just galling to think of some middle-class American equating himself with the suffering of blacks.
     
  2. MR. MEOWGI

    MR. MEOWGI Contributing Member

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    Especially American middle-class gay black people.
     
  3. LScolaDominates

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    I don't think anybody is equating the level of suffering endured by African-Americans to that of gay Americans. However, there is a definite similarity in some aspects of how both groups were dehumanized and margainalized to the point where acts of violence and oppression were justified against them.

    Discrimination in all forms leads to oppression of the target group, and discrimination itself leads to the acceptance of oppression itself. You may not be the victim now, but as long as you don't fight against discrimination, you can bet that one day you will be.
     
  4. kokopuffs

    kokopuffs Member

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    Exactly. Now let me ask you, what do you think was a bigger challenge to their middle-class americandom, the fact that they were black or the fact that they were gay?
     
  5. MR. MEOWGI

    MR. MEOWGI Contributing Member

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    Why don't we ask the openly gay rich black athletes?
     
  6. kokopuffs

    kokopuffs Member

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    No rational person could justify equating the levels of suffering. And yes, I accept that there are similarities amongst any bigoted anti-<x>-group movements you care to point out. That's just how hate works. However by throwing themselves under the "civil rights movement" banner what gay rights people have done is equated themselves with the suffering of black people. I reject that completely.

    I also don't agree with discrimination inevitably leading to oppression, although I have to think about that.
     
  7. kokopuffs

    kokopuffs Member

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    Yes, why don't we? I'll let you be the first to ask.
     
  8. MR. MEOWGI

    MR. MEOWGI Contributing Member

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    Name one and I will.
     
  9. kokopuffs

    kokopuffs Member

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    Let's go with a recent out-er... John Amaechi (sp?).
     
  10. MR. MEOWGI

    MR. MEOWGI Contributing Member

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    What would his career have been if he was openly gay from the start? Would he even of had one? There has never been an active openly gay NBA player etc. It's not a civil rights issue? The National Black Justice Coalition disagrees. http://www.nbjcoalition.org/
     
  11. LScolaDominates

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    No, they haven't equated their suffering with anything. Their situation is unique and demands unique treatment. You are the one doing the equating here, not them. Civil rights aren't only for black people. That's the whole point.
     
  12. Refman

    Refman Contributing Member

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    I never said that it did. I just want to know how we decide who is universally right and who is universally wrong. It is easy for me to take a nornative subject and say "I believe this way, therefore I am right." That doesn't necessarily make it so.

    I view this the same way I view censorship. How do we decide who can look at all the stuff the rest of us supposedly cannot handle? It's the same thing...in this case, how do we decide who the moral arbiter is?
     
  13. kokopuffs

    kokopuffs Member

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    We can play what-if games all day and not get anywhere. I specifically asked you to ask John Amaechi whether he faced more challenges from his race than his sexual orientation. So far all you've provided is a link to an interest group's website and speculation. If you did actually ask him or find an interview in which the question is asked/answered, and he said "by far being gay was a bigger challenge than being black" then I would accept it. However, in absence of proof all we have are your opinions.

    I'm not doing the equating. You're blind if you don't think that gay rights activists have labeled themselves under the civil-rights-movement banner for that specific reason. Civil rights aren't just for black people? Wow, ok. Way to ignore the fact that the term "civil rights movement" is heavily connotated with the black civil rights movement and, to a lesser extent, the women's civil rights movement. Both groups of which suffered a great deal of oppression. Does the concept of civil rights apply to all people? Sure. Does using the term "civil rights movement" to describe oneself convey a strong sense of equality to the others? You betcha.
     
  14. LScolaDominates

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    Gay rights activists aren't a ubiquitous group with a hidden agenda. They want what everybody wants--to be treated equally. Civil rights is part of equality, and it would be even if blacks were never slaves on this continent. I didn't ignore anything. Suffering is suffering, and nobody will ever convince me that one person's suffering is any more significant than any other's. Somehow, you seem to be implying that civil rights are exclusive to blacks and women, which is absurd.
     
  15. thadeus

    thadeus Contributing Member

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    There is no universal right. 'Right' is historically-mediated, it changes over time - and WS&C is currently on the 'wrong' end of a change towards not being outwardly bigoted towards gay dudes. He's using the 'birds and bees' avoidance thing as an excuse. There was a time when his perspective was 'right' and no one would have disagreed with it - but now, it's just right wing.

    Who is the moral arbiter here? I'd argue there isn't one. I'm certainly not telling him how to raise his daughter - but I am telling him that his behavior is bigoted (trying to avoid the word 'prejudiced' because that implies a neutrality - one can be prejudiced against buying a certain kind of car, but one can't be bigoted towards that car). And, it is.

    Not "approving of their lifestyle" is definitely a moral judgment on its own. It's not a case of who holds moral authority (because it's rare that anyone can claim that), but a question of whether the change that's in progress is for the better - and I argue that it's good for a group that has been the subject of derision, isolation, and outright violence for the majority of recorded history for a change towards acceptance to take place, and that the same change doesn't actually hurt anyone who isn't gay.

    WS&C is portraying the birthday party as something that is potentially harmful to his daughter, but then why isn't a birthday party for a child with straight parents equally harmful? It could easily lead to the same circumstances. What about people kissing on TV? It's an irrational argument he's making - the real crux of the matter is that he is bigotted towards gay people, and doesn't want to do anything that would suggest to his daughter that it is okay to feel otherwise.
     
  16. Refman

    Refman Contributing Member

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    Of course, I don't see gays being forced to sit on the back of the bus, going to different colleges than others, or having their demonstrations interrupted by the cops turning fire hoses on them.

    What we have been talking about isn't even close to the same thing.
     
  17. geeimsobored

    geeimsobored Contributing Member

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    Why does this even matter?
     
  18. LScolaDominates

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    OK... and last time I checked my calendar, it didn't say "1965", so I guess that means gay people can't claim that their cause has anything to do with civil rights. :rolleyes:

    If my sarcasm offends you, I'll be more direct: WHAT IS YOUR POINT?
     
  19. Desert Scar

    Desert Scar Contributing Member

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    I think this shows more about your ignorance about the history of atrocities to people because they are gay. The history of Blacks, Indigenous, Jews and Gay persons in Western societies in different time and different places have major commonalities. Just because some gays could get away with being underground (as did some Jews during the inquisition and the Holocost) doesn't make those atrocities of those less lucky any less real. On top of it today it isn't socially acceptable to be openly racist, sexist, hatred of other religions, etc, but homophobia isn't quite there in America--it is one of the issues of the time, Sharpton and Scott King seem to graps this.

    Thank you.

    Hell, if I wanted to say who got and still gets the rawest deal, I'd go with Native Americans, those of which survived at all. Civil rights don't apply to them? Tell that to the folks who took over Alcatraz or children taken from their homes to be placed in Americanization boarding schools. This is very bad and devisive slope to go on--who got worse. Civil rights apply to all systematically oppressed groups, and gays persons certainly are one group, and it is one of the debates of today where people are more open about their bigotry. What has happened and continues to happen to gay persons very much falls under the rubric of bigotry based on race, ethnicty, culture, religion and sexism--the broad connection to civil rights and its general priciples I belive are totally the appropriate place for gay rights/activism.

    And lets not pretend our governmental/societal/media indifference at best and hatred/compassionless response to the AIDS crisis in America wasn't mostly do to the fact its 1st publizied victims were gay. That underlying bigotry lost thousands of US lives (way overrepresented in gay men), maybe ultimately millions worldwide (more heterosexuals), of lives by delaying the modern science going in full throttle at this wicked tough disease. And if you read on quite a few politicans and preachers at the time AIDS coverage was at its new height they were getting pretty close to saying just burn them for bringing this on to society (of course in realty it started in Africa among hetersexuals primarily and had been expanding for some time without diagnosis, but that wasn't as good of story). Gay rights and gay issues are not just peanuts in the larger scheme of oppression in recent American history, and go well beyond a few Matt Shepard cases.
     
    #359 Desert Scar, Oct 16, 2007
    Last edited: Oct 16, 2007
  20. ico4498

    ico4498 Member
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    this is precisely why i'm uncomfortable with the gay/black analogy. its not that i'm unaware of the validity of the comparison ... i'm just queasy about the inevitable "greatest victim" debate it invites.

    entire peoples are extinct as a direct result of colonial ambition. in Jamaica, the native peoples, Arawaks, ceased to be less than a century after Columbus "discovered" them. they're not an anomaly in history.

    the issue of prejudice and discrimination have common themes across dissimilar groups. perhaps the "greatest victim" debate has a place in academia ... my history just yells that hating on folks, whose difference victimizes none, is wrong. that doesn't require an analogy.
     

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