Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
Here's another variation on the infamous Miller-Jenkins case, published in the Worldnutdaily. The story is similar, though the facts are even worse for the religious right crowd. And you'll love the headline:
Another lesbian demands custody of Christian girl
Subtle, isn't it? Lesbians out there yanking children away from Christian parents! Except, predictably, the facts don't quite support that claim, even as stated by the worldnutdaily:
Lara Embry and her former lesbian partner, Kimberly Ryan, began a relationship while they lived in Seattle, Wash., and registered as domestic partners. Ryan had a daughter through artificial insemination on Feb. 21, 2000. A Washington court allowed Embry to adopt the baby and listed her as a second parent.The couple moved to Sarasota, Fla., in August of 2001. Embry conceived her own daughter through artificial insemination and gave birth on Oct. 2, 2001.
Both women and their daughters moved back to Seattle so Embry could finish her doctoral studies at the University of Washington. While they lived in Seattle, Ryan became listed as a second parent to Embry's child.
The lesbian couple returned to Sarasota in August 2002 and ended their relationship just two years later.
They informally rotated custody and visitation arrangements for two years following their break-up.
Ryan left her homosexual lifestyle, became a Christian and is engaged to marry a man. She grew concerned that the visits were not good for her 9-year-old daughter and discontinued the plans with Embry.
Embry demanded that a Florida court enforce the Washington adoption decree and allow her to continue visiting Ryan's daughter.
So they mutually agreed to be parents to each others' biological children and raised the children together. They even signed legal documents granting parental rights to one another. They lived as a family for 4 years this way and shared custody and visitation of the children for several years after that. And now one of them has found God, decided the other one is icky and wants to magically make all that history and their own declared legal intentions disappear. And to the nutballs at Liberty Counsel, this means a lesbian is trying to steal a child from a Christian.
Imagine for a moment that the situation was slightly different. Imagine for a moment that a woman marries a man who is incapable of impregnating her. They go through artificial insemination and have a child that is not biologically his, but he adopts the child legally and acts as a parent to that child, as she wants him to. Then they get divorced, and for 4 years after the divorce they share custody of the child just like any other couple would. Then the mother of the child suddenly becomes a lesbian and decides that men are icky and that she doesn't want her child exposed to him.
Do you suppose Liberty Counsel and the Worldnutdaily would be screaming bloody murder about how that lesbian was trying to steal that man's child away from him? Of course. But all the relevant facts are the same. In neither case did the jilted partner have biological parentage, but in both cases they acted as a parent precisely as the jilting partner wanted them to do and signed legal papers allowing them to do. Until they changed their mind.
This case is a no-brainer, far more clear even than the Miller-Jenkins case. The child in this case had at least 7 years of a parent/child relationship with Ryan, the still-lesbian mother. Removing that relationship just because her former partner has changed her religious views would be enormously damaging to the child.
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Comments
Sounds like a no-brainer indeed. I am interested in the lifestyle conversion from lesbian to xian. Coercion? Mental instability? Possibly the convertee is too erratic to have ANY children?
Posted by: MikeMa | March 20, 2009 9:50 AM
What about Embry's biological daughter? Is Ryan saying she never wants to see that little girl again, just as she doesn't want her own biological daughter to see Embry? There appears to be more than one child victim in this situation.
Posted by: JuliaL | March 20, 2009 10:00 AM
I fail to see how this is different from every other custody fight. As Ed states, there is really nothing to this, other than one parent happens to be gay.
Posted by: kehrsam | March 20, 2009 10:11 AM
I'm reminded of Dawkins's comment that it's silly to put the labels of religion on children, when these children are not old enough to choose to use those labels for themselves.
What would you think if you saw the headline, "Another Democrat seeks to gain custody of Republican girl"?
By the way, Ed, you missed the italics of "Another" in the WND article title. You can almost hear the exasperation that went into it.
Posted by: Adrienne | March 20, 2009 10:39 AM
Interesting, I did a Google News search for the story and found nothing but the WorldNut post and the post here.
I truly cannot fathom the idea that you would, or even could, cut a child off from an individual that they love and consider a parent. I also have to echo the question about the other daughter, is she cutting herself off from that girl?
I think we are going to see more and more of these domestic rights cases. Because some states recognize same sex partnerships and marriages while others have rather draconian anti-homosexual laws still on the books that are used to deny rights, protections, services, etc.
Posted by: dogmeatib | March 20, 2009 10:55 AM
MikeMa: it's also possible the woman isn't a lesbian, but bisexual (or somewhere in between), so at least the being with a man part could well work out for her.
Posted by: Patrick | March 20, 2009 11:14 AM
Glad to hear that you all are reading our press and that it bothers you enough to post. Evidently we are making a difference. Unfortunate that the most intelligent thing you can do is call us childish names isn't it.
The thing that should stick out and be obvious even to a gay person is that the stability of alternative lifestyle homes is not as great as what the gay/lesbian culture claims it to be. Legally being married does nothing to enhance this and divorce makes it even more complicated. Is it possible that perhaps the best place for the child is in a stable environment?
In response to Adreienne, Democrats do seek custody of Republican children by manipulation of government schools through the NEA and their liberal agenda. The saddest thing is they are funding this custody takeover with Republican tax payer dollars.
No doubt our children will all soon be marching down the streets in their new Young Socialists uniforms provided courtesy of Mr. Obama.
Posted by: bob | March 20, 2009 11:16 AM
One of the most interesting things to me about right-wing evangelical types is how binaristic, black-and-white their conceptualizations of the world are. This headline is Exhibit A: "Another lesbian demands custody of a Christian girl." Not only is the "lesbian" in this equation supposed to symbolize sheer, unadulterated evil while the "Christian" represents innocence and purity, but these two stock figures are completely incompatible. No "lesbian" could ever be "Christian," and vice versa. There are no shades of gray, apparently.
Posted by: Sadie Morrison | March 20, 2009 11:21 AM
Bob,
Since heterosexual families also seem to be pretty unstable,
where to you suggest we send all the kids?
Posted by: rnb | March 20, 2009 11:24 AM
I am too black and white and feel that all children should have a Christian home with a loving Mother and a Father. I don't beleive in divorce. How old fashioned and outdated. This would never do for the Lesbian community so I have no good ideas, on this. I guess the liberal courts should decide, after all, the children belong to the state anyways and the parents are merely guardians...
Posted by: bob | March 20, 2009 11:40 AM
Bob, you went out without your tinfoil hat! Bob!...Bob!!...Bob!!!
Posted by: NJ | March 20, 2009 11:44 AM
However, what's the divorce rate of heterosexual couples in the US again? 60%, isn't it?
So, should we ban heterosexual marriage because it's clearly unstable and damaging?
And do you have any statistics about the divorce rate amongst same-sex couples? If not, then you're trying to claim anecdotes as evidence of a larger trend, which any statistician will tell you is a ludicrous thing to do.
...You seem to have missed Adreienne's point entirely.There's no such thing as "Democrat child" or "Republican child"; just like there's no such thing as an "Astrophysicist child".
Religion and political ideology are things that you have to decide for yourself; you don't belong to a group simply because your parents are members of that group.
As such there is no such thing as a "Christian child", children are far too young to declare allegiance to any belief system.
...You are honestly claiming that schools are abducting children from parents and giving them to other parents due to political ideology? That doesn't even make sense.
Posted by: GDwarf | March 20, 2009 11:45 AM
Bob -
"Unfortunate that the most intelligent thing you can do is call us childish names isn't it[?]" Care to show any incidence on this thread where this is the case? (Questions end with question mark thus '?', by the way.)
"The thing that should stick out and be obvious even to a gay person is that the stability of alternative lifestyle homes is not as great as what the gay/lesbian culture claims it to be. Legally being married does nothing to enhance this and divorce makes it even more complicated." Any actual evidence for these claims? Please show properly referenced citations from credible publications.
"Is it possible that perhaps the best place for the child is in a stable environment?" Where did anyone suggest otherwise? Exact quotes please.
"In response to Adreienne, Democrats do seek custody of Republican children by manipulation of government schools through the NEA and their liberal agenda. The saddest thing is they are funding this custody takeover with Republican tax payer dollars*." And no doubt you have properly referenced evidence for this claim as well?
"No doubt our children will all soon be marching down the streets in their new Young Socialists uniforms provided courtesy of Mr. Obama." You make statements like this and wonder way no one takes the Religious Rightist Rump seriously. [shakes head] - DJ
*You don't get how it works do you? Your tax dollars go to the government, they decide where to spend it. If you don't like it? Vote them out. BTW Republicans aren't a majority so therefore the tax dollars are spending are those of DEMOCRATS, mostly.
Posted by: DingoJack | March 20, 2009 11:47 AM
What if, in the hypothetical situation you described with a straight couple, the mother didn't become a lesbian, but instead converted to a different religion? What if she was Muslim then converted to Christianity and wanted to keep her kid away from the Muslim dad? What if she were Christian and converted to Islam, and wanted to keep her kid away from the Christian father? Hmm, I wonder which way WND would spin those stories.
Posted by: catgirl | March 20, 2009 11:50 AM
The thing that should stick out and be obvious even to a gay person is that the stability of alternative lifestyle homes is not as great as what the gay/lesbian culture claims it to be.
The thing that should stick out in this case, is that this lesbian family was perfectly stable for years, and only became "unstable" when one partner became a "Christian" and started turning the familial arrangements into a power-struggle. Any comment on that, bob? If you "Christians" are so concerned about stable families, then what are you doing to keep this particular family stable?
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 20, 2009 11:51 AM
If I was a Christian, and if I had any say in this couple's decisions, I would have advised them to do what's best for their children: keep to their agreed-upon family arrangements (as in, keep their promises), keep on working hand-in-hand to lead and care for the children, and keep on providing an example of family cohesion and committment that the children can follow when they start their own families. Can anyone here, Christian or non-Christian, show me what's "un-Christian" about this course of action?
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 20, 2009 11:58 AM
Yeah, tell me about it. I'm even afraid I'll make typos here on account of my vision being blurred with tears. Those poor Republicans! When will the bigotry against them end?
Posted by: Sadie Morrison | March 20, 2009 11:59 AM
Bob:
Next time you claim something as idiotic as Obama being a socialist please take of your blinkers and do some actual research. He's so to the right of the political spectrum (of the capitalist democratic country I live in) that you'd almost need binoculars to see him if you stand at the center.
That said. This pair of parents seemed, for me, like the average USA family (living together/married for a few years, living apart/divorced) until one got converted into a fundamentalist christian.
Posted by: Who Cares | March 20, 2009 12:02 PM
GDwarf,
It's kinda hard to find a divorce rate statistic on something that isn't even legally recognized in most states, duh. You missed the point of my post. A reasonable judge will give custody to the home that is most stable as this is in the best interest of the child.
I did not miss Adrienne's point, I was responding to her comment with sarcasm which you evidently missed.
Children can however become Christians. Just like adults can become Republicans.
Schools are abducting the minds of children was my point with the NEA, not physical abduction and reassignment of parents.
I am proud of my tin hat!!
Posted by: bob | March 20, 2009 12:05 PM
What's the matter BS Bob? Cat got ya tongue? - :) DJ
Posted by: DingoJack | March 20, 2009 12:05 PM
bob: if you're really a christian, and if you really care about the stability of families and the welfare of children, then please address my points. Either that, or admit you don't really care enough to be worth debating.
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 20, 2009 12:07 PM
Patrick,
The complainant may be lesbian, bisexual or anything else. Whether being with a man will 'work out well' for her or not is irrelevant to my question and might be considered a fairly ignorant remark.
My concern is her inability to deal with her reality in a consistent way WRT the children. She was in a long-term committed relationship with a woman. Committed enough to sign legal papers allowing the adoption by her female partner. Changing her mind about her partner is just fine but changing her sexual orientation coupled with a religious conversion has the stink of religious coercion, not true belief. That kind of mental 'softness' cannot be a good thing for her or for the kids.
She might start believing right-wing nutjobs like bob have something useful to contribute to life rather than just existing as a waste of oxygen and a warning to others.
Posted by: MikeMa | March 20, 2009 12:09 PM
Sorry must have crossed the streams.
So there's no actual evidence then in suppport of your hyperbolic nonsense, therefore the standard old chestnut "I was not really serious." gets dragged out. No doubt the next fig leaf (so to speak) will be "I've been misquoted/taken out of context". - :P DJ
Posted by: DingoJack | March 20, 2009 12:14 PM
Well by all means, just go ahead and make things up about "stability" and anything else your little heart desires, then. In the absence of actual data, pure fabrication should do just fine.
Posted by: Troublesome Frog | March 20, 2009 12:16 PM
Umm, I think the "proud of my tin foil hat" line gave Bob away.
Posted by: Gretchen | March 20, 2009 12:17 PM
Sorry the last post of mine was aimed at ol' BS Bob. -DJ
Posted by: DingoJack | March 20, 2009 12:17 PM
Bob, who seems more 'stable' is this situation? The woman who is a lesbian, or the woman who was a lesbian, got artifically inseminated, switched her sexuality, changed her religion and wants to ban the woman who her 9 year old daughter grew up thinking was her mother from seeing the daughter?
Posted by: Ashley Moore | March 20, 2009 12:22 PM
I am too black and white and feel that all children should have a Christian home with a loving Mother and a Father.
So my wife and I, both non-Christian, need not apply, eh? Our happy, well adjusted daughter who graduated a couple of years ago and is attending college doesn't qualify, eh?
I don't beleive in divorce. How old fashioned and outdated.
What about divorce in abusive situations? We have family friends who listened to the advice of idiots like you, "oh no, divorce is never the answer." She stayed with her abusive husband for twenty years. The results? They ultimately got their divorce, but only after he had beaten their oldest child into a shell of a human being. The younger child ended up drug addicted and self loathing for the entire decade of their twenties. But he was a "good Christian."
This would never do for the Lesbian community so I have no good ideas, on this.
Do you even know any lesbians? The "lesbian community" is just like any other "community" in this country. They want the same protections and rights that you take for granted.
I guess the liberal courts should decide, after all, the children belong to the state anyways and the parents are merely guardians...
Amusing. If you actually knew anything about the legal precedent established by the courts you would realize how moronic your comment is.
Posted by: dogmeatib | March 20, 2009 12:26 PM
Ed, your last paragraph refers to Ryan as the still-lesbian mother, but the story says it's Embry. BTW I had a grad school colleague by that name, and she was gay too, so it might be her. She left the department in 1994 or so, so the timing is about right, but I forget where she went – could have been Washington. Very bright, and not one to take any BS from anyone. You go Lara!
Posted by: Dave M | March 20, 2009 12:30 PM
What's black and white and silver all over?
Bob wearing his shiny tinfoil hat, of course!
So children can become Christians, Bob? OK, tell me this: what if a nine-year old female child of two Evangelical Christian parents suddenly declared to her parents that she had converted to Islam? Would you start calling that child "a Muslim child"?
What if two Republican evangelical Christian parents had a nine-year old boy who declared one day that he was now a Socialist and an atheist? Would you take that child seriously? Would you refer to him as the "Socialist atheist child"?
Posted by: Adrienne | March 20, 2009 12:36 PM
Bob -
So do we forcefully convert the non-Christian parents or just seize their children? The reason WorldNutDaily gets linked to so much is because they constantly spout un-American, un-constitutional, and un-ethical ideas and act holier-than-thou about it. Your post is a perfect illustration.Posted by: Taz | March 20, 2009 12:43 PM
I forgot to add "dishonest".
Posted by: Taz | March 20, 2009 12:45 PM
BTW is there any evidence that the lesbian parent (Lara Embry) is not a Christian?
Just asking. -DJ
Posted by: DingoJack | March 20, 2009 12:54 PM
Re Bob
Hey, Mr. Bob and Mr. mroberts should get together. They could make not so beautiful music together.
Posted by: SLC | March 20, 2009 1:00 PM
Bob, multiple studies by numerous and diverse institutions over the past 40 years have consistently found that children raised in same-sex households typically do as well as children raised in heterosexual households. In the areas of academic achievement, self-esteem, gender identity, peer relationships, and emotional health there was no significant difference between the two family structures. In some studies children of same-sex families out performed hetero families in the area of family relationships. Still feeling confidant you know what's best for the children?
Here's a list of some of the organizations that conducted or evaluated the studies. They've all issued public statements endorsing same-sex family units for child rearing.
Here are a few of the more recent papers and journal articles that I'm talking about. So you can see for yourself.
That's where I'm coming from. What are you basing your opinion on?
Posted by: Abby Normal | March 20, 2009 1:01 PM
I'm relatively new to this blog, so I don't know if Bob is a regular or not. But he strikes me as a parody troll.
Posted by: Tommykey | March 20, 2009 1:14 PM
Either he's a parody troll, or he's one of those obnoxious idiots who makes an idiotic statement, gets called an idiot, then gets his self-pity on and starts screaming about how he's being dissed because he's a Christian. It's all part of a script a lot of these gung-ho born-agains follow: they were told they'd be called stupid, they were told it would be because they were Christian (and of course Christians are NEVER stupid, how can they be stupid when their Bible is the source of all truth?), and they were told that us evil secular city-slickers would never recognize the truth of anything they say. So when they're exposed as the clueless simpletons they've been told to be, they simply wear the contempt they earn as a badge of honor, declare victory, and get the hell out. I doubt we'll be hearing from bob again -- he's read all his lines, all the way to the end of his script. Wee'll just have to wait for the next simpleton to come in at the beginning of the same sctipt...
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 20, 2009 1:23 PM
Hey, uh, guys?
Bisexual people exist. (Hi.) Please stop assuming that being with a woman, then a man, indicates that you have some bizarre complex right there. I'm not denying it can, not in the face of the "Ex-Gays," but it's not valid assumption. It's something you need further evidence for.
It's insulting, and I know that you (most of you, at least) aren't trying to be.
Posted by: Nentuaby | March 20, 2009 1:23 PM
Tommy - Just between me & you, you're probably right. If ol' BS Bob's intention was to stir us up, he failed miserably.
Nothing I enjoy more than a knock-down, drag-out drubbing of trolls.
Born and bred in the brier patch, Bobbo! - :D DJ
Posted by: DingoJack | March 20, 2009 1:25 PM
(*&^^ it. I hate it when there's another bob out there posting such idiocy. Now I have to declare myself as NotBob, and our comments might get mixed.
Posted by: NotBob | March 20, 2009 1:26 PM
Nentuaby: I see no such assumption in the responses so far. We're not dissing a woman for being with a woman and then with a man; we're dissing her for adopting an intolerant religious doctrine, and, pursuant to said doctrine, trashing all of the family committments she had made with a woman, to the obvious detriment of at least one of her children. The issue is breaking one's committments and trying to tear a family apart, not bisexuality.
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 20, 2009 1:29 PM
Raging Bee: Obviously not everybody is making the assumption. There are several posts above about "suddenly switching her sexuality," however. I'm not claiming her sudden decision to exclude her former partner isn't wrong- I'm saying it's exactly and exclusively what's wrong.
Posted by: Nentuaby | March 20, 2009 1:32 PM
Nentuaby - It's the getting 'born-again', then suddenly discovering that they were heterosexual all along, that's the giveaway.
While it is possible that these were two completely coincidental events, the order is suspiciously akin to religious coercion sadly common in this kind of millau -DJ
Posted by: DingoJack | March 20, 2009 1:34 PM
RagingBee,
It appears as though you are one of a few here who likes to discuss something civil and not resort to anger and name calling. I missed your post about "the Christian thing to do".
Unfortunately when one finds that they are living in a sinful condition and become a gung-ho born-again radical right-wing nut job clueless simpletons idiot Christian and that they were not born a homosexual but became one due to social environs they realize that things must change. To stay in that situation is no more possible than for an alchoholic to take a job as a wine taster.
I am a Christian and truth be known my views are predominately libertarian. I think people have a right to live however they wish. Just don't coerce me to accept it or pay for it.
BTW, I did not respond earlier because I went too lunch at 12:00 which is what normal christian country folk do.
Posted by: bob | March 20, 2009 1:56 PM
Nentuaby,
If my posts are the ones making you unhappy, please accept my apologies. I am only concerned with the change in sexual preference as it relates to her religious 'persuasion'.
I have long ascribed to the idea that male and female genders are mixed and that we exist along a continuum not strictly at one end or the other. Many comfortably exist much nearer the middle. Good times all-round. ;=)
However, I believe our religious convert to be displaying a level of insecurity and a malleability that could lead her to allow many other things to change where her child is concerned to the detriment of the child.
Posted by: MikeMa | March 20, 2009 2:02 PM
Uh, yeah. Tell that to Ted Haggard.
Or any of the other outspoken ministers or gung-ho born-again radical right-wing nut job clueless simpletons idiot and most importantly, anti-gay Christian men caught having sex with other men after they supposedly found Jesus. There's been a few of them making the news over the past few years.
Posted by: Adrienne | March 20, 2009 2:07 PM
Uh Bob -
Raging Bee posted @1:23PM (must have been a looong lunch)
"Either he's a parody troll [That's you Bee is talking about], or he's one of those obnoxious idiots who makes an idiotic statement, gets called an idiot, then gets his self-pity on and starts screaming about how he's being dissed because he's a Christian. It's all part of a script a lot of these gung-ho born-agains follow.."
'Bobbo' & 'BS Bob' hurts your delicate little feelings, but calling you out for you are (and making a spot-on prediction of your future behaviour) merits: "It appears as though you are one of a few here who likes to discuss something civil and not resort to anger and name calling."
[shakes head in disbelief] Priceless! :D - DJ
PS A lot of posters (including your interlocutor) have asked perfectly civil questions, which you ignored. And WE are the RUDE ONES! HA!
Posted by: DingoJack | March 20, 2009 2:16 PM
To be fair dingo' I did call him an idiot ... *sob* I feel so EVIL!
I am a Christian and truth be known my views are predominately libertarian. I think people have a right to live however they wish. Just don't coerce me to accept it or pay for it.
Ahhh, so you're one of those ultra-right wing "libertarians" who wants to have the right to be discriminatory ... how is that different from a Republican again? Or are you just embarrassed to admit you worshiped Dubya?
Posted by: dogmeatib | March 20, 2009 2:20 PM
Posted by: Taz | March 20, 2009 2:30 PM
Dogmeatib - The naughty stair for you!
BS Bob first posted @ 11:18am, saying (in part)
"Unfortunate that the most intelligent thing you can do is call us childish names isn't it[?]"
Didn't realise the Bobbo is able to read minds, since (as pointed out) no-one had said anything like childish name-calling. I thought only god is omniscient!
Sorry Bobbo, hurt martyrdom doesn't cut it. Bring evidence, convince me. -DJ
Posted by: DingoJack | March 20, 2009 2:33 PM
Bob:
"Unfortunately when one finds that they ... were not born a homosexual but became one due to social environs..."
Right, evidently that happens a lot according to Christian zealots! :D
Tell me, Bob, what sort of 'social environs' would make you enjoy kissing another man?
Posted by: Gingerbaker | March 20, 2009 2:39 PM
Tell me, Bob, what sort of 'social environs' would make you enjoy kissing another man?
*chuckle*
I've always wondered about that one. I've been in many different "social environs," to top it off, I'm a liberal agnostic, so according to Bob I have no morals. I should be all hot and bothered about men but for some strange reason remain confidently heterosexual ... how does that work Bob? Latent Christianity?
Posted by: dogmeatib | March 20, 2009 2:47 PM
It appears as though you are one of a few here who likes to discuss something civil and not resort to anger and name calling.
So why are you not discussing what I said?
Unfortunately when one finds that they are living in a sinful condition...
"Sinful" as defined by what realiable source? A few minor passages in one religion's holy text with ZERO corroborating evidence and no bibliography? That's not much to rely on -- especially when we note that your definition of the word "sin" is vague to nonexistent, and makes no reference to actual harm done or predicted to actual people.
I am a Christian and truth be known my views are predominately libertarian.
Right -- you call yourself a "libertarian" but make ignorant judgements about other people's lives and circumstances, in which you have no valid stake and insufficient knowledge? And you demand that they be punished, not for harm done, but for choosing a path different from yours? And Ed and James wonder why I hold that label in such low esteem.
I think people have a right to live however they wish.
But you support someone else's attempt to break up a once-stable family, with no evidence of harmful or criminal action on anyone's part. You're a liar and a hypocrite; and both said behaviors are in violation of the Ten Commandments and Christ's teachings.
Just don't coerce me to accept it or pay for it.
In other words, don't "coerce" you to respect someone else's right to live as they wish, just as you live as you wish? Once again, you're being a hypocrite, by denying others a right you claim (undisputed) for yourself.
Also, no one here as asking you to pay for anything; we're asking you to mind your own business and stop making uninformed judgements of people and actions that don't concern you.
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 20, 2009 2:57 PM
Ah, but he wouldn't have to adopt the child in this situation. He is the presumptive father of any child his wife bears, so all he has to do is put his name on the birth certificate. This is yet another benefit of marriage that families like mine don't get. If my partner and I had been married, I'd have put my name on our son's birth certificate and put the $4k I spent on the second parent adoption in his college fund.
People like Ryan really piss me off. I'm assuming the second parent adoption laws in WA are similar to those in TX in that both parents must jointly petition the court to grant the adoption. If that's true, then Ryan must surely have understood the implications of the adoptions of her two children. I'd be curious about how she could reconcile any concept of morality (xian or otherwise) with walking away from her responsibilities to her children.
Posted by: Rational Jen | March 20, 2009 3:05 PM
Raging Bee said:
I'm pretty sure they have no need to wonder.
Posted by: Gretchen | March 20, 2009 3:07 PM
Patrick: It's also possible that she since changed or wasn't ever a lesbian to begin with.
Since we don't have direct access to what she's actually thinking and experiencing, it's impossible to know what's actually going on in her head.
People, as they say, are strange. People doing strange things, however, is not.
Posted by: Brother Dave Thompson | March 20, 2009 3:53 PM
Brother T - There's an old Yorkshire saying:
"There's nought as queer as folk" (translation: Nothing is stranger than people),
perhaps that was kind of what you were aiming for.
Posted by: DingoJack | March 20, 2009 4:00 PM
Totally off topic, but I was just reading another case about a transgendered Ohio woman who has been sentenced to jail for "exercising" her older husband to death. The article stated that she stood to inherit her husband's Military pension. So does that mean the law views transgendered marriages as the legal equivalent of naturally born same sex marriages? I'm just wondering because I assume people as enlightened as Bob, for example, might consider these relationships to be essentially homosexual in nature. But am I right in assuming the law does not? Do transgendered couples face the same struggle that gay couples face in recognizing the legality of their marriage, or do traditional marriage laws which define marriage "as between one man and one woman" still apply even if the woman came into this world as a man?
Posted by: H.H. | March 20, 2009 4:13 PM
Bob, perhaps you could explain why it is that the blue, Democratic party voting states pay more in federal taxes than the red, while the red, Republican voting states use more federal dollars than the blue?
Your gripe about stealing the minds of children by spending republican tax dollars doesn't quite make sense in light of this little detail (never mind that it is baloney in the first place).
Posted by: Robster, FCD | March 20, 2009 4:52 PM
H.H. I think you mean transsexual, rather than transgender. That is, the person was born with male parts and now has female parts, yes?
The legal status of transsexuals varies by state. However, Ohio is one of three states, along with Idaho and Tennessee, which absolutely refuses to let people change their sex. Some other states, like New Jersey allow it. Yet others will recognize it for some purposes but not for marriage, like Texas.
Federally it's mostly untested. In 2005 the a the DOJ, Board of Immigration Appeals ruled that for purposes of an immigration visa a sex change and marriage was sufficient to obtain a visa, provided the marriage took place in a state the recognizes it. So it looks like their content to leave it up to the states, at least so far.
Being that she is in Ohio, she's probably SOL. But if she married in a state that recognizes sex changes and moved there later, she may have a hope of getting the Federal benefits.
Posted by: Abby Normal | March 20, 2009 4:59 PM
H.H., In Texas, your birth gender is what is important. An FTM transsexual can only legally marry a man, while an MTF transsexual can only legally marry a female.
Posted by: Robster, FCD | March 20, 2009 5:01 PM
"Their content" should be "They're content," obviously.
Posted by: Abby Normal | March 20, 2009 5:02 PM
Thank you everyone who responded. Yes, I meant transsexual. It's not an issue I'm not very familiar with, but the more I thought about it, the more it raised some thorny questions. I see it's not an issue that's really been resolved. Interesting. Thanks for the info!
Posted by: H.H. | March 20, 2009 5:09 PM
The girl is not a "Christian girl," she is a child of Christian parents.
Posted by: Kristine | March 20, 2009 7:40 PM
Still waiting for Bob to respond to Abby Normal's post on what is backing up his premises.
Bob also stated:
Please provide us with peer-reviewed findings that discovered its "social environs" that cause homosexuality.
Here is one of many reports where the physical evidence shows that sexual identity origins is "by a combination of genetic, hormonal, and environmental influences" http://aappolicy.aappublications.org/cgi/reprint/pediatrics;113/6/1827.pdf
More physical evidence of genetic conditions for male homosexuality: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/reprint/261/5119/321
And more when doing a full genetic scan while attempting to validate the findings in the previous article by different scietists: http://mypage.iu.edu/~bmustans/Mustanski_etal_2005.pdf This genetic scan found that homosexuals shared similiar alleles at these distal regions different than heterosexuals: 8p12, 7q36 and 10q26.
And just to show how honest science actually is, this scan found less compelling evidence for the discovered allele mentioned in the previous article when genetic scanning equipment was more primitive. Though this effort discounted the importance of the allele in the previous article (it didn't discredit their work however), the last article's research scientists also discovered these three additional alleles with even stronger evidence for a genetic factor. That's how good science works, it doesn't hide behind past findings that don't look so good, it is constantly self-correcting.
Bob - you are at a science blog. Mere rhetoric that supports your arguments won't do well here, physical evidence to support your positions will.
Posted by: Michael Heath | March 20, 2009 8:57 PM
dogmeatib | March 20, 2009 2:47 PM
Perhaps you're an undercover agent of the Gay Agenda.
Homo-ray gun underneath your jacket and all ...
Posted by: llewelly | March 20, 2009 9:47 PM
Netuaby, I can see your point, but I don't think it's really warranted here. As a bisexual woman now living monogamously with a man, I didn't suddenly claim to be hetero. That would indeed be a sexuality switch. Relationship with woman, then man, sure, that happens ordinarily for many people. Being lesbian, then hetero, not so much!
Posted by: Cath the Canberra Cook | March 20, 2009 9:52 PM
If it weren't that you did not log a single fact to support your bigotry and the Christinistas get divorced more than any other group you might have been able to make a point. But instead, all you did was show your bigotry.
Posted by: Moses | March 20, 2009 10:49 PM
It's sad that a couple of lesbians having a domestic dispute over the custody of their children makes news like this, and the rest of the families going through similar each and every day in the US is completely ignored.
These children need both parents in their life, gay, lesbian or straight. There are plenty of federal studies that show these children that do not grow up in two parent families have higher suicide rates, higher teen pregnancy, lower test scores, and higher dropout rates.
Our courts are allowing parents to destroy children. Is it acceptable that society has become so abusive? Is the new term going to be Child Bashing?
Everyone that loves a child needs to stand up and say enough is enough. Children need and deserve both parents, and our courts need to make enforce that point.
Anything else is just abuse. In fact, the US Department of Justice Domestic Violence Web site states that one parent keeping another parent from accessing a child is domestic violence. Where is DV King Joseph Biden to enforce the DV rules for non-custodial parents?
Posted by: Joel Johnston | March 21, 2009 1:44 AM
Abby Normal and Michael Heath, PLEASE stop confusing poor Bob with facts.
He gets his statistics the same way he gets his theology and politics: the time-honored practice of Making Shit Up.
Giving him a dose of Reality-Based Facts just shorts out his tin-foil hat.
Posted by: Leigh Williams | March 21, 2009 1:54 AM
llewelly: I thought you were just happy to see me.
Posted by: wrpd | March 21, 2009 2:12 AM
What has the homophobic loonies stirred up is that they think it would be wrong for the court to recognise the relationship, The nasty little shits actually spell it out.
Posted by: Tony Sidaway | March 21, 2009 5:12 AM
And the other thing that makes this case very, very sad: this newly minted "born again Christian" seems to be ignoring her adopted daughter. There's no mention of the visitation rights being exercised by this concerned individual. It seems to be a case of one parent being so self-centered and thoughtless (not to mention irresponsible with her adopted daughter) she is willing to do something evil to get her way.
To hell with the law...apparently it doesn't count.
Posted by: Rjaye | March 21, 2009 6:57 AM
Rjaye,
The christian god always trumps the law and anything else. /snark
Of course most gods do and the hypocrisy that results is mind-boggling.
You are right in that both children are and will be hurt. The religious
dupingconversion process seems to require a lot of pain and stupidity be spread around.Posted by: MikeMa | March 21, 2009 7:30 AM
Bob:
You said:
"I don't beleive in divorce. How old fashioned and outdated."
So, you believe in GOD, with no evidence of his existence but you don't believe in divorce, for which there is plenty of evidence.
and, you also said:
"Unfortunate that the most intelligent thing you can do is call us childish names isn't it."
I know you want to hear it, Bob, so let me help you out.
You're a homophobic prick AND a fucking moron. Are you happy, now?
Posted by: democommie | March 21, 2009 9:07 AM
Bob - out there? Are we going to see evidence to support your positions as requested or are your positions mere prejudices shared by your religious community you have no interest in losing in spite of overwhelming and contradictory evidence?
Posted by: Michael Heath | March 21, 2009 11:21 AM
democommie:
Of all the luck! I just finished teaching logical fallacies this week and could have used such a textbook example of equivocation. (But rest assured, I shall keep it on hand for another time.)
Posted by: G. Broaddus | March 21, 2009 1:30 PM
Raging Bee, I'm honestly confused. You point out precisely the contradictions I, as a libertarian, would point out. Whatever the label, bob does not give evidence of really holding libertarian values. Yet you seem to want to insist that he is emblematic of the label, rather than those of us who don't like to direct others choices.
was excellent.This, however
Posted by: James Hanley | March 21, 2009 1:33 PM
Yet you seem to want to insist that he is emblematic of the label, rather than those of us who don't like to direct others choices.
I'm insisting that the "libertarian" label has been co-opted for too long by people like him, who call themselves "libertarian" but have no comprehension, let alone respect or support, for the rights or liberties of others. This bob guy isn't the first, he probably won't be the last, and he's only one of many I've been hearing from over a period of decades. Remember Ed's post about Ron Paul's loony-right-racist connections? People like that are not outliers in the "libertarian" movement; they're numerous enough, and vocal enough, to bring disgrace to the label and embarrassment to sensible people who really do care about liberty.
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 21, 2009 2:53 PM
Raging Bee - as a long time subscriber to Reason, the magazine for Libertarians, "Bob" is no true Scotsman. I never even see arguments by people like Bob published in a positive manner, instead they are justifiably derided for their ignorant, theocratic, fascist positions. I doubt Bob could even define libertarianism and how it differs from liberalism, classical liberalism, progressivism, and all the aspects and tribes of conservatism.
You do have a point when it comes to much of what comes out of Cato when it comes to economic issues. However that is a well known difference where those economic libertarians have flooded the Dems with votes as I noted in the study the other day as the GOP has become dominated by people like Bob. To top it off, uneducated voters like Bob tend to be populists who like to talk a libertarian economic gain but are actually strongly in support of liberal policyp platforms, like our current entitlement benefits which Reagan and Bush expanded.
I would argue that people like Bob claiming to be Libertarians is the exact same thing as Chuck Norris and Bill O'Reilly claiming they defend American's founding ideals and principles consistent with the aspirations of the framers. It's a rhetorical fallacy on their part where they attempt to put lipstick on their piggish faces - Tammy Faye style I might add.
Posted by: Michael Heath | March 21, 2009 3:18 PM
Raging Bee,
Our thoughts about folks like Bob are in perfect harmony. But, along with Michael Heath, I would like to insist that there are numerous libertarians who are unlike Bob. While I agree they are a disgrace to the name, their use of it does not mean they have successfully co-opted the label.
They are not true libertarians because they don't truly like liberty--they are just anti-government when it suits them. Michael Heath is spot on when he says they are actually populists (of the most unpleasant stripe).
Libertarianism is not wholly defined by people like that. And while I understand your argument that they are the ones having the most political influence, I don't wholly agree. Intellectual libertarians have had great influence both in the academic debates and in the real-world policy debates. For example, free trade, an emphasis on monetary policy, changes in welfare programs to make them less of an entitlement, prominent opposition to the violations of civil liberties in the wars on terror and drugs, developing arguments against the current restrictive policies on organ transplants, school vouchers, opposition to campus speech codes, etc. You may disapprove of some of these policies, which is all fair, but they are in fact real-world examples of where the libertarians whom you claim have been co-opted by the Bobs have in fact been very influential.
From Milton Friedman to Jonathan Rauch to Virginia Postrel to Tyler Cowen to Eugene Volokh to Tibor Machan to Robert Nozick to Wendy McElroy to James Bovard to John Baden and even on to Ed Brayton, there are publicly active libertarians who you continue to ignore. If they did not exist, if they did not help shape the public debate, and if they did not adopt the label libertarian, you might have a solid argument. However they do, they do, and they do--they are the libertarians.
Defining libertarians by people like Bob, or Ron Paul, is like defining liberal by people like Alec Baldwin.
Posted by: James Hanley | March 21, 2009 5:42 PM
Defining libertarians by people like Bob, or Ron Paul, is like defining liberal by people like Alec Baldwin. ...
or all
right wing nut jobsconservatives by people like Rush Limbaugh!Posted by: MikeMa | March 21, 2009 5:49 PM
James Hanley:
If what you say is true; does that mean that Libertarians aren't republicans that like to smoke dope and look at porn? If that's the case I ain't never gonna be Libertarian.
Posted by: democommie | March 21, 2009 5:50 PM
James, hypothetical question: if someone of your or Ed's strand of libertarianism ran for the Libertarian Party's nomination for President, would you get more support than Ron Paul or Bob Barr?
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 21, 2009 8:15 PM
Have "Lesbian visitation cases" become ubiquitous enough to be referred to "LVC's"?
Posted by: democommie | March 22, 2009 8:54 AM
Democommie,
No, no, no, you've got it all wrong. Libertarians are Democrats who like guns and low taxes.
Posted by: James Hanley | March 22, 2009 1:05 PM
I sometimes wonder if people like Bob call themselves libertarian simply because it's a seemingly more stylish label than "Republican" or "social conservative." I have known a few people who, like Bob, call themselves libertarian (and express topical disgust with the Republican party) and yet adhere to an ideology that is in no way, shape, or form "libertarian."
Posted by: Sadie Morrison | March 22, 2009 1:41 PM
Raging Bee,
Pointless question, pointedly ignored. I gave you evidence of influential libertarians, and you ask how many votes they could get? I sincerely don't think you're naive enough to think that influence is measured solely in electoral votes.
But what exactly is your point, anyway? You've admitted there are libertarians who aren't Ron Paul-like nutjobs. So what's left of your argument except the point where you and I agree--that Paul and his ilk are in fact nutjobs?
Are you claiming that people like Paul or "bob" ought to be considered the proper example of libertarianism? But what about all the examples I've given you?
Is your argument that they've "co-opted" the label "libertarian"? Then why is there a whole encyclopedia of libertarianism, in which Ron Paul gets minimal mention (1 page), and the index of which does not even have a listing for "gold standard"?
Or is your argument that you don't like libertarians in general, and it's a lot easier to try to tar them with the brush of the nutjobs than to actually deal with the real ideas of libertarian intellectuals?
Posted by: James Hanley | March 22, 2009 1:52 PM
James Hanley:
I played his "Welfare" game and won! It must be due to my OTJT (Off The Job Training).
Sadie Morrison:
Given a choice between "Libertarian" and "Bigoted Asswipe Moron" it's easy to see that they would pick the former.
Posted by: democommie | March 22, 2009 2:10 PM
I am too black and white and feel that all children should have a Christian home with a loving Mother and a Father.
Hey, Bob -
I'm a Jew. Should I be allowed to have children?
Posted by: Jeff Eyges | March 22, 2009 2:50 PM
Sadie stated:
As I stated in an earlier comment in this thread, social conservatives want to believe they are on the side of America's founding ideals, especially liberty, the exact opposite of their fascist positions. This how you get a guy like Sean Hannity, one of America's most influential haters of freedom, titling one of his books "Let Freedom Ring" as he diligently works to reduce the freedoms of women, gays, and everyone that doesn't support his theocratic fantasies.
As a regular reader here, I'm sure you've noticed the handful of social conservatives who Ed has linked to claiming that gays acheiving equal protections is somehow anti-freedom.
Given that I've found zero honest social conservatives where nearly of all of them also display some combination of being delusional or virulently ignorant, it's not surprising to see how effective they are in terms of lying even to themselves.
Posted by: Michael Heath | March 22, 2009 3:11 PM
Democommie,
??? I'm missing something. And I hate not being in on the joke!
Posted by: James Hanley | March 22, 2009 4:29 PM
James Hanley:
If you mean about the "Welfare" game? Apparently he does game design.
Posted by: democommie | March 22, 2009 7:55 PM
Pointless question, pointedly ignored.
The point of my question was that, while there may be a lot of "left-libertarians," "liberaltarians," "Braytonistas," or whatever you may want to call yourselves, they have not, so far, been able to keep the loonies, Republican poseurs, and Randroid asshats from controlling the "libertarian" message; just as all those decent and intelligent Republicans have been unable to keep their party, and their movement, from being hijacked by their own lunatic fringe. And what good is a movement with so many lunatic adherents, when we can't trust it to constructively engage with the real world? I'm sure you understood exactly what my point was when you chose to ignore it.
You know my standard of judgment makes sense, at least when it's applied to other movements: why did so many people vote for Obama? Not because the opposing party was 100% loony-right, but because it was infested with enough loony-rightists that the sensible progressive elements didn't have a chance of making a difference.
As a former Communist, I can understand the position you're in: Communism was full of really decent ideals, but its adherents had to spend decades on the defensive, washing their hands of all the insanity and atrocities committed in the name of those ideals, until most of them simply gave up and took up different ideologies. Given that experience, I have to ask this: if so many bad people keep on stealing (or buying) your ideas and using them to cover up or justify bad policies, and if so many utter lunatics seem inevitably attracted to those ideas (or at least the label), isn't it about time you started asking yourselves how good those ideas (or at least your presentation thereof) really are?
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 22, 2009 9:04 PM
James Hanley:
From my interpretation of Raging Bee's comment, it seems like she/he was asking how many votes a libertarian of your "type" would get in the Libertarian party.
Posted by: nightshadequeen | March 22, 2009 9:07 PM
nightshadequeen stated:
I don't think so.
This forum has already presented to Raging Bee statistically significant evidence that libertarians and Libertarians are far more supportive of Obama than they are of McCain, established even prior to McCain's nomination of Palin for VP, which would most likely push even more over to liberals rather than the social conservatives that now dominate the GOP.
I think the argument has now been transformed to the worthiness of libertarianism.
Posted by: Michael Heath | March 22, 2009 10:44 PM
Raging Bee,
An eloquent response (really, no sarcasm intended), but again I think you focus on the loonies and treat them as having more dominance than they really do. Apparently they're particularly noticeable to you, but to me they appear as odd abberations that aren't reflective of the libertarians I know, read, and talk to. And obviously, as Michael Heath has pointed out several times now, they're not reflective of that majority of libertarians who preferred Obama to McCain. I really do wish you wouldn't ignore that point.
Libertarianism rests on a distrust of the use of coercive power over others, finding it, at best morally problematic. As the basic feature of all government is its coercive power ("the state is that human community exercising a monopoly on the legitimate use of force over a given territory"--Max Weber), libertarians are naturally skeptical of government, even while recognizing its necessity. (Many things in life are necessary, but still dangerous in immoderate amounts, so this is not an oxymoronic statement.)
Many people are anti-government for non-principled reasons, or believe they're anti-government but really only mean they don't like the policies of the current government. Because libertarianism is the "anti-government" ideology, they glom onto it without really understanding it. Their failure to understand, generally a failure to actually read any libertarian theory, cannot logically suggest the ideas are flawed or that they are presented badly.
The same is true on the left, with anarchists. I've seen (and spoken to) many self-described anarchists who (a) have never read classic anarchist theorists and (b) who wanted to use both their own coercive power and the coercive power of the state to stop people from driving SUVs or forming corporations. That this violates the very meaning of anarchy (an arche = against power/authority) seems not to occur to them. Is their ignorance Kropotkin's fault? Does their ignorance have any bearing on the truth-value of Kropotkin's ideas?
Or take your own former belief in communism. Many people on the right judge communism by Stalin or Pol Pot. But did Stalin's actions really have any bearing on the truth-value of Marx's writings? Is Marx retroactively a moron because Pol Pot savagely killed 1/3 of Cambodia's population in three years?
Or in regards to conservatism, are Edmund Burke and Michael Oakeshott to be condemned because Rush Limbaugh also calls himself a conservative?
I understand your point about communism constantly having to try to prevent the loonies from taking over. I believe any unorthodox ideology faces that problem, but it doesn't mean the ideology itself is bad--it just means that people who feel disenfranchised from the political structure are desperate to find some kind of identity to justify their own alienation, and they'll grab whatever's convenient.
But as to whether they are as dominant as you say, I'd point you once again to Michael Heath's posts. If a majority of libertarians preferred Obama to McCain, then clearly a majority of libertarians are not a part of that loony crowd, and most libertarianis apparently are rather pragmatic. Pragmatists don't draw the kind of attention loonies do, so I dare say your assessment is, at least in part, a consequence of attention-bias.
Posted by: James Hanley | March 23, 2009 9:18 AM
nightshadequeen,
Keep in mind that libertarians tend to be skeptical of government. That being the case, what kind of libertarian would want to run for office? One who is driven, for whatever reason, to assume the reins of power that he allegedly despises. A libertarian of my stripe would never be that driven, and in electoral politics those who are driven--have the fire-in-the-belly--have an insuperable advantage over those who are not driven.
Raging Bee's question assumes electoral politics is driven by ideas. There's little evidence of that. I doubt anyone could convince me that Obama won the Democratic primary because his ideas were so superior to Clinton's.
That's not to say that ideas don't matter, but symbolic politics, charisma, and money each matter more. Politicians are far more likely to lose than to win because of ideas, which is why successful candidates so often drift to empty slogans like "It's morning in America," "It's the economy, stupid," "Compassionate conservatism" and "Change we can believe in."
Posted by: James Hanley | March 23, 2009 9:33 AM
...but again I think you focus on the loonies and treat them as having more dominance than they really do. Apparently they're particularly noticeable to you, but to me they appear as odd abberations that aren't reflective of the libertarians I know, read, and talk to.
That's what moderate Republicans say about their party. I'm sure most of the people who voted for McCain did so because they remembered him as a war-hero and a mostly sensible conservative, and didn't really pay that much attention to the loony right because their insanity just didn't affect them as much as it affects people like us. But if Mccain had been elected, would they have got the mostly-sensible conservative they remembered? The Republicans' recent track record strongly implies an answer of "Hell no!" That's my position WRT the libertarians.
And obviously, as Michael Heath has pointed out several times now, they're not reflective of that majority of libertarians who preferred Obama to McCain.
And why did they vote for a liberal who would surely have increased gummint regulation in nearly all policy areas whenever he could? Because their own movement and ideology couldn't offer a better realistic alternative. Their abandonment of their own party kinda proves my point, as does the desertion of Communism by so many of its adherents in the last century. The fact that so many Communists fount it sensible to vote for liberals or Socialists, rather than Stalinist tools, does not make Communism a more viable ideology.
Libertarianism rests on a distrust of the use of coercive power over others, finding it, at best morally problematic.
And here's where libertarianism gets off on the wrong foot at the start: we've long been aware that SOMEONE has to, and will, exercise coercive power over the rest of us; it's either decent folks trying to do the right thing, or gangsters, corporations, foreign occupiers, or whoever else can afford more firepower than us. Kvetching about "morally problematic" at this late date only rehashes a question that was, for the most part, settled long ago. And it is this apparent refusal to face reality that has attracted so many reactionaries and loons who have similar problems facing reality.
Many libertarians are so preoccupied with their "natural skepticism" of gummint that they fail to see the obvious: a strong state is necessary to uphold and enforce our individual rights, and weakening the state can easily make us less free, not more. Many of the loons and reactionaries who populate the libertarian movement are people who hate gummint because it forcibly denied them their right to oppress others.
Many people are anti-government for non-principled reasons, or believe they're anti-government but really only mean they don't like the policies of the current government. Because libertarianism is the "anti-government" ideology, they glom onto it without really understanding it. Their failure to understand, generally a failure to actually read any libertarian theory, cannot logically suggest the ideas are flawed or that they are presented badly.
Actually, it can. If your emphasis of certain points brings out the crazy, then that leads to serious questions about where your ideology, and the bulk of its adherents, would go if given freer reign. Again, the Communists had the same problem, particularly when people with jobs recoiled from bloodthirsty anti-business and anti-elite rhetoric. An ideology that attracts more loonies than sane people is bound to be interpreted, and applied, in an insane way.
Also, there is the question of WHY so many peopple call themselves "libertarians" without understanding, or caring, what the ideology really says. Was it not explained to them? Were they not liistening? Did they only hear the bits that suited their prejudices? Did libertarian "leaders" forego proper explanation in favor of pandering for a quick splash? (My guess is the latter: I remember libertarians making a big splash every March/April by raving about taxes and promising to make them go away.)
The same is true on the left, with anarchists. I've seen (and spoken to) many self-described anarchists who (a) have never read classic anarchist theorists and (b) who wanted to use both their own coercive power and the coercive power of the state to stop people from driving SUVs or forming corporations. That this violates the very meaning of anarchy (an arche = against power/authority) seems not to occur to them. Is their ignorance Kropotkin's fault? Does their ignorance have any bearing on the truth-value of Kropotkin's ideas?
To a certain extent, yes, it does, which is one reason so few people take anarchy seriously as an ideology or "system." If large numbers of people are seen misusing an ideology as an excuse to do large-scale evil, then the rest of us are bound to suspect that once the ideology is enshrined, the evil people using it as cover will be empowered to do what they want. This is why our Founders went to such great pains to ensure that their "majority rule" philosophy had so many checks and limits; and why they had to revise their pland and give their national government MORE coercive power in 1787. Again, the same is true of Communism, not to mention various organized religions and cults.
(Besides, your question carries a huge element of irresponsibility: you're implying that an ideology can be perfect and flawless, and if it goes wrong, it's the people's fault, not the ideology's. Politics is about taking responsibility, and if you can't take responsibility for the consequences of your ideology, and/or its presentation to the people, then your ideology is useless, at best, in the real world of imperfect people.)
What limits are libertarians placing on their anti-government philosophy to keep the crazies away? Not nearly enouogh, as their current condition clearly shows.
Keep in mind that libertarians tend to be skeptical of government. That being the case, what kind of libertarian would want to run for office? One who is driven, for whatever reason, to assume the reins of power that he allegedly despises. A libertarian of my stripe would never be that driven, and in electoral politics those who are driven--have the fire-in-the-belly--have an insuperable advantage over those who are not driven.
So what good is your ideology, if its sanest and most honest adherents aren't willing to take the reins of power and do what's necessary to keep the loonies in line? The Communists had exactly the same problem: the good and sensible Communists were all too high-minded to get their hands dirty with compromise and coercion. So guess who got to do the dirty work? (Remember that Lenin brought Stalin on to do what he knew had to be done, but didn't want to admit had to be done, to make his lame-ass "system" "work.")
And that brings us to another problem at the root of libertarianism: Politics is about using power to get the right things done; so what good is a political ideology that's squeamish about using political tools? With an ideology that conflicted, it's no wonder it attracts a conflicted "coalition" of conflicted people. And if we have a Constitutional government that at least tries to put state power in the hands of the people, then "skepticism of government" eventually translates to "skepticism" about democratic government, which then translates to refusal to accept the legitimately-expressed political will of the majority. Which is why so many anti-democratic and anti-Constitution scumbags find themselves attracted to your vague and obsolete skepticism.
When your house is burning down, is not the right time to keep on blithering about how skeptical you are about firefighters.
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 23, 2009 11:28 AM
Raging Bee stated:
Raging Bee - your argument against libertarianism and republicanism are both woefully out of date.
Moderate republicans and Republicans, like myself (the former), would never say such a thing; conservatives dominate the party both in number and in developing the party's platform planks. The last non-conservative who was able to run as a non-conservative was H.W. Bush, and he felt the need to put staunch conservative Dan Qualye on his ticket. Conservatives since then have taken control over the party, especially during the Bush years.
McCain identifies himself as a conservative; in fact all of the 2008 GOP Republican presidents claimed fealty to conservatism. The party never, ever, discusses republican values anymore, its all about your conservative creds. I asked a state congressional candidate who is an associate of mine and whose candidacy I was helping in one minor area, off-line, to describe the difference between the two and he was unable. He knew nothing about republicanism. The party has also lost a huge chunk of its members, almost all people like me that self-identify as moderates leaving almost nothing but conservatives. The New England states have hardly any Republican members of the House left.
I also think you are grossly unfair to the Libertarian party regarding its support of politicians with a chance to get elected given theirs' do not. Even inside a party one has to support candidates where your positions diverge, even with what's left of the almost ideologically pure Conservative, oops, I mean Republican party. While I am not a Libertarian, I've read their magazine for years. Its easy to understand why a Libertarian would support Obama and the Dems in 2008 relative to the performance of the GOP in 2008. That's also given the GOP's continued movement towards authoritarianism and in our personal lives and imperialism abroad in a manner far more obtrusive than what the Dems desire in other areas.
What we really need is more political parties with electoral opportunities, we'd then see libertarianism play a clearer and contributory role, though as James points out, their existence currently does improve public debate. That opportunity is not feasible no matter how good their message given the rules the two major parties have established that create barriers to entry which have proven impossibly high for all third party wannabees.
Posted by: Michael Heath | March 23, 2009 3:45 PM
You're hoping against hope that decent people get into power, apparently unaware that power attracts the worst people and repels the best. It's not that the best never seek it, but they do so reluctantly and so leave themselves at a competitive disadvantage to those who do want it.
You talk about being unrealistic, but you haven't recognized that basic fact of government.
Are you aware that in the 20th century more people died at the hands of their own government than died in in battle in all the wars that were fought--about 200 million people. And yet you say that speaking of power as morally problematic is starting on the wrong foot.
Regularly Ed posts about police beating, shooting, or framing innocent people, and you say power is not morally problematic.
If it was so easy as to just get the right people in power, perhaps we would already have figured out how to ensure that.
And you don't recognize that even in the hands of decent people, so much power can be harmful is used foolishly--not evilly, just unwisely. So we need to ensure that we have leaders who are both good and wise.
You accuse me of being unrealistic, but you're not willin to reconize what government really is and really does.
Finally, you misunderstand constitutionalism. You say it's to put power back into the hands of the people, and that we are to accept the will of the people. But constitutionalism is just as much about limiting the will of the people. When the democratically expressed will of the people is to oppress others' rights, then you can bet your sweet ass I'll refuse to accept it, because then it's not legitimate. You might try reading Madison's Federalist 10, before you start claiming that the will of the majority is necessarily legitimate.
When you figure out how we can create a strong government that doesn't abuse people, then come criticize me. But don't pretend that ignoring the atrocities of governments around the world is "realistic." You're living in a bubble that the victims of death sqauds and fascistic police don't have the luxury of enjoying.
Posted by: James Hanley | March 23, 2009 3:47 PM
You're hoping against hope that decent people get into power, apparently unaware that power attracts the worst people and repels the best.
No, I'm pointing out that a strong, legitimate, democratic state has a better chance of putting decent people in power, and keeping them honest, than any of the alternatives I mentioned. And once decent people get power -- any power -- they will be forced either to surrender, or to use their power as appropriate to enforce decent laws and protect the rights of civilians.
And once again, your statement above reinforces an attitude that is detrimental to any attempt to improve how a people are governed: by insisting that government, and people who seek the power of government, are ipso facto evil, you set low expectations of your government, to which that government will then be all to happy to live down. Low expectations give low results. Furthermore, by indiscriminately tarring government in general as evil, you give enemies of democracy one more excuse to deny the legitimacy of democratic governments, thus weakening democracy. This is what the Republicans do when they mindlessly insist that government is inherently not competent to do anything at all well, while doing everything they can to put incompetent people in charge of it. Instead of routinely insisting that our government is bad or incompetent, why not just get good and competent people elected?
Are you aware that in the 20th century more people died at the hands of their own government than died in in battle in all the wars that were fought--about 200 million people. And yet you say that speaking of power as morally problematic is starting on the wrong foot.
Yes, and I'm also aware that one of the most murderous of the offending regimes was destroyed by a powerful, stable, heavily-armed democratic regime, led by an elected politician named Franklin Roosevelt. I'm also aware that that regime then used its considerable power, and lots of its people's tax revenue, to create stable, prosperous republican regimes in place of said murderous regime. I'm also aware that people of the small-government, anti-interventionist persuasion OPPOSED both such interventions; and many libertarians today have made it clear that they, too, would have opposed liberal intervention in Europe had they been in power back then.
Regularly Ed posts about police beating, shooting, or framing innocent people, and you say power is not morally problematic.
Once again, you distort my position: I did not say "power is not morally problematic," I said we can't afford to burden good officials with vague general complaints when they're trying to right specific wrongs.
And how are we going to actually stop all that police brutality? By electing decent officials at all levels, and giving them our support as they use state power, and the legitimacy of law, to hold the offenders accountable.
And you don't recognize that even in the hands of decent people, so much power can be harmful is used foolishly--not evilly, just unwisely. So we need to ensure that we have leaders who are both good and wise.
Yes, that risk will always be present. But some such risk is simply not avoidable. If we keep our government weak because we're scared of our own elected officials, then other, even less trustworthy (and less accountable) people will have all the more leeway to do even more harm. The risks of a strong elected government -- maintaining full control of the military and security forces -- are far more acceptable than the risks of...whatever alternative is on offer. (What are the alternatives again? Libertarians seem kinda vague about this.)
When the democratically expressed will of the people is to oppress others' rights, then you can bet your sweet ass I'll refuse to accept it, because then it's not legitimate.
And how will we judge the legitimacy of our government's actions? By their adherence to the Constitution and all laws peoperly passed under it. If our government fails that test, then it will have to be altered or overthrown; but if it passes the test, then we will owe it our continued support. The Constitution is a binding contract between the people and our government, made because such binding agreemements are necessary to meet the people's basic needs. Either party needs a serious good reason to get out of its obligations under that contract.
Trashing the government when it passes bad laws is one thing; but if we manage to get the laws changed (by means of the established electoral and legislative procedures, of course), we will rightly expect the people to obey the new-and-improved laws, and the government to enforce them fairly and uniformly -- that is, after all, why we try to replace bad laws with good ones. Treating our own government as inherently evil won't do us much good then.
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 23, 2009 10:13 PM
Since a good third of this post has been about me, perhaps I should introduce myself.
I am a graduate of Liberty University
I did not care for either of the Bush's (they enacted more entitlement legislation than their Democratic predecessors)but you can't get much worse than Obama. BTW I did not support Ron Paul.
I support freedom both religious and financial
I do not believe in a nanny state
I am a Christian
I beleive in the legalization of all drugs
I belive prostitution should be legal
I favor the "Fair Tax"
I beleive the Republican Party looks very similar to the Democratic Party of the 1960's and the Democratic party looks very much like the Socialist Party.
I favor a government that allows individuals to spend the money they earn as they choose rather than seizing it and redistributing it.
I see no Constitutional provision for the government to provide education, housing, health-care or personal safety, or religious views.
What does this have to do with the topic at hand? I'm not sure other than people have accused me of believing all kinds of stuff that I don't and supporting people that I actually detest.
As to the topic at hand, I do not beleive in creating a subset of individuals and bestowing upon them special rights. This goes for gay/lesbians, disabled, minority etc.
One who practices homosexuality is merely a sexual deviant. They are no different than a those who practice bestiality, pedophilia, bigamy, or polygamy. (Notice I differentiate between "practicing" and an chance or experimental encounter)
A person who has been living in a homosexual or bi-sexual relationship and returns to a strictly heterosexual relationship is undeniable evidence evidence that homosexual behavior is not strictly genetic.
Can genetics predispose one to have tendencies towards this behavior? Certainly. Just as genetics can predispose somebody to have tendencies towards obesity, alcoholism or diabetes. This does not mean that they must succumb to the effects of these genetic tendencies, rather they must be extra vigilant and guard against them by behavior modification.
Additionally there are scientific arguments and disagreements to be found that show a cause end effect variance. If you follow the line of logic that says homosexuality is not a choice but rather a genetic causation, you would have to logically say that people born with this genetic code could be identified as homosexual at birth through a genetic test and this would be confirmed as they reach sexual maturity by repeatable results that all who exhibit those genetics become homosexuals and there are no heterosexuals amongst the group. This would be irrefutable scientific evidence. The point was made that this is a science blog and that science is about evidence and facts. The facts are that individuals make choices about their behaviors. As Humans we are governed by a conscience and not beholden to our primitive instincts. Obliging every urge without regard for a moral code of any sort is not civilized and has no place in our society.
I'm not a troll, I don't care to get in immature name calling.
I have a job so I don't spend every waking moment reading blogs and responding to every little comment. I only posted because I thought it was nice that Liberty was getting a little recognition here.
Posted by: bob | March 24, 2009 4:23 PM
Thanks for sharing, bob. I have a real job too, so I don't have time to explain in detail exactly how ignorant, bigoted, and just plain demonstrably wrong your "beliefs" are. Let's just say you're not making "Liberty" "University" look good as an institution of learning. I'll just deal with one example of your blind stupidity:
One who practices homosexuality is merely a sexual deviant. They are no different than a those who practice bestiality, pedophilia, bigamy, or polygamy. (Notice I differentiate between "practicing" and an chance or experimental encounter)
The difference, which you refuse to see, is that homosexuality between consenting adults does not in itself cause harm to innocent peopple; and pedophilia does. Sso does ploygamy, to the extent that -- like pedophilia -- it puts women in demeaning and grossly unequal relationships.
The only way you so-called Christians can pretend homosexuality is bad, is by falsely equating it with completely different activities. That should tell you something about the validity of your "beliefs." Oh, and don't you "Christians" have a commandment about bearing false witness against your neighbor? Read it again; there's no footnote saying "unless thy neighbor be gay."
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 24, 2009 4:44 PM
bob:
"I only posted because I thought it was nice that Liberty was getting a little recognition here."
Naziism got plenty of recognition at Nuremburg too, bob. It wasn't beneficial to their cause. Liberty U is good at turning out wankers like you--genuinely educated, critical thinkers, not so much.
Posted by: democommie | March 24, 2009 5:20 PM
I only posted because I thought it was nice that Liberty was getting a little recognition here.
Yeah, thanks to people like you (and Jerry Falwell, of course), we recognize that a degree from that laughably mis-named "school" isn't worth the paper it's printed on.
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 24, 2009 5:24 PM
I noticed Bob didn't support one of his premises with empirical evidence, merely spewing hate-filled, dishonest, invectives. I am glad to see him validate Liberty U. is involved since that corroborates my observation that the influence that entity has on perpetuating hatred and lies against people who do not subscribe to their hate-filled dogma.
I highly doubt we'll see Bob even attempt to confront the statistically significant evidence both Raging Bee and I presented earlier in this thread that shows Bob's assertions to be not only lies against gay people, but vicious ones at that. No surprise, I've never met one honest social conservative like Bob shows himself to be with his policy planks while falsely claiming to support libertarianism - especially his hatred of gay people and his dishonest characterization of both sexual identification and homosexual success at raising families.
Posted by: Michael Heath | March 24, 2009 6:01 PM
I'm not sure which is more grating.
The rightwinger saying I am a sexual deviant?
or
The leftwinger saying my wife is in a demeaning and grossly unequal relationship?
I'll give Bee the benefit of the doubt and mentally replace the broad term 'polygamy' with the more focused 'polygyny' and then replace 'polygyny' with 'that screwed up religious version of polygyny that cult leaders like to practice.'
Of course that begs the question. Does that make me the husband in demeaning and grossly unequal polyandrous relationship?
Posted by: Sean | March 24, 2009 7:05 PM
No it doesn't.
Still, I agree with most of your statement. I've never understood why people insist that polygamy must involve mistreating women or forced marriages with children, just because some religious sects that are famous for polygamy do that.
Posted by: Skemono | March 25, 2009 12:02 AM
Bob - You posted earlier "As to the topic at hand, I do not beleive in creating a subset of individuals and bestowing upon them special rights. This goes for gay/lesbians, disabled, minority etc." Can you show me the laws that prevent a heterosexual man (as I assume you are) from loving, marrying and raising children with any consenting, available, adult female you want? Perhaps LGBT's are simply asking for equal treatment under the law, like all other citizens of the US.
You also posted "If you follow the line of logic that says homosexuality is not a choice but rather a genetic causation, you would have to logically say that people born with this genetic code could be identified as homosexual at birth through a genetic test and this would be confirmed as they reach sexual maturity by repeatable results that all who exhibit those genetics become homosexuals and there are no heterosexuals amongst the group. This would be irrefutable scientific evidence." In fact identical twins have been shown to diverge from each other in terms of the outcomes of their genetics over time. Genetics is not destiny. Developmental, environmental and experiential inputs can change how the genetic code gets processed. If you had a identical twin brother, and you were exposed to huge steaming vats of 2,4,5 T (and he wasn't) it would be likely that you would develop cancers and he wouldn't. Genetics might make you (and you hypothetical brother) less prone to cancers, but it can't prevent it absolutely.
If a genetic marker (or markers) for homosexuality could be discovered (and there are some who are working on it), that would only correlate to the way such a gene is (or genes are) expressed. Some who had the gene would not feel sexually attracted to their own sex, and some would, depending on a range of factors. This in no way makes it 'a lifestyle choice'. If it were, one could ask the question the other way around, when did you 'choose' to be hetro? Probably other factors (genetics & inter-uterine environment seem make up the majority of a person's variability in personality) have shaped your sexuality in ways not accessible to your conscious mind. Thus it's not really ' a choice' since you (as a personality) don't get to choose how you feel*. -DJ
PS: Sorry about the rambling post. Another factor you haven't considered is that human behaviour (as in other animals) is never really an 'either/or' proposition, what of those who are intersex, either physically or psychologically? Do they have 'half a gene'?
Sexuality is a very complex business, that deserves more than 'black & white' answers.
*If homosexuality is a choice, is depression, schizophrenia, sociopathy a choice too? (of the difference between the former and the latter, is that the latter are self-destructive and/or destructive of others. Thus they are considered a problem needing to be controlled or managed).
Posted by: DingoJack | March 25, 2009 1:23 AM
Well, how kind of you to differentiate. I'm sure that makes gay and lesbian people feel ever so much better about being linked unjustly with pedophiles.
Also, why the fuck does it matter whether being gay or lesbian is a choice or not? Either way they are still people deserving of the same rights (not special rights) as every other citizen.
Unrelatedly, when will people give up the ridiculous discussion over whether a given trait is caused by one's genes or one's environment? "Nature vs. nurture" is a stupid debate. It's both for IPU's sake! Traits are a result of complex interactions between genes and genes, and genes and environment, all influencing each other.
Posted by: Mathew Wilder | March 25, 2009 1:51 AM
I see DingoJack beat me to the punch with a much more eloquent and in depth explanation of gene expression. Guess I took too long writing my not-so-long comment.
Posted by: Mathew Wilder | March 25, 2009 1:54 AM
Someone or rather once wrote: "Brevity is the soul of wit." - DJ
Posted by: DingoJack | March 25, 2009 2:07 AM
DingoJack:
Since the siren call of an mroberts comment on the top post woke me up at 3:00 AM I decided to look around and see where else his lack of housetraining had led him to befoul this blog. Anyhoo.
I think I know where the fuckedupmentalists get their idea that Teh GAY is a lifestyle choice. They get it from their clerical, legislative and broadcast personality champions. I mean if Teabag Teddy Haggard and a veritable (NON)GAY Shame Parade of individuals can turn their heterosexuality "on" in church and "off" at the Motel Hot Sheets; well then, everyone must be able to. All it takes is prayer--but you gotta do it a lot. If prayer is not constantly on your lips, GOD knows what might be. They say an idle mind is the "devil's workshop", I'm thinking it might be an idle mouth.
Posted by: democommie | March 25, 2009 3:38 AM
Demo - Isn't there some drug(s) to relieve the pain?
The number of Right-wing types* I've heard using the same talking-points (just with a toned-down religiosity) is quite startling. Is there a little known website 'Rightwing_Religious_Nutbaggery.com' that publishes this dreck? Same bogus arguments, logical clusterfucks and weird psychological tics. - DJ
*(and remember here even the most moderate right-winger is an extreme left-winger there)
Posted by: DingoJack | March 25, 2009 4:58 AM
DingoJack:
I'm pretty sure their drug of choice is their religion, the antidote is education which, apparently, hurts too much.
Posted by: democommie | March 25, 2009 7:03 AM
Dingo, yes I can show you cases where heterosexual males and females are prevented from engaging in loving, marital, child-raising activities.
Read this and then you can come back and act like you know something. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polygyny
Multiple wives or husbands is legal in many countries and considered the norm.
My beliefs about homosexuality as deviant behavior is not based on religious bias or unsubstantiated opinion.
In "The Deviance Process" by Edwin H.Pfuhl and Stuart Henry, 1993 it states "on the basis of such evidence (speaking of biological predisposition)it is contended that a homosexual orientation must be kept distinct from the homosexual role, which is a cultural element based on recognition of homosexual orientation (Whitam, 1977), the point here is that biology may explain sex orientation for some people. However, this does not mean that all homosexual acts are biologically determined, nor that all who adopt the gay lifestyle do so as a result of biological predisposition."
For those who do not understand the meaning of the word "Deviance" this book would be a good read. Deviance is usually explained and understood by most freshman students that take Psychology 101 or Sociology 101 at a good University or college. Since I went to Liberty I'm not sure how I learned that.
The views expressed on this board exhibit classic Neutralization Theory as present by Gresham Sykes and David Matza wherein those involved in a deviant behavior engage in a 5 stage process to make themselves feel better about their bahavior:
1.Denial of responsibility (I'm a homo because of gentics)
2.Denial of injury (Homosexualtiy hurts no-one so why shouldn't two consenting adults do what is "natural" to them"or "The difference, which you refuse to see, is that homosexuality between consenting adults does not in itself cause harm to innocent people" -Raging Bee
3.Denial of the victim ("I'm not defrauding anyone by humping them up the rectum as long as they consent")
4.Condemnation of the condemner (those who criticize homosexual behavior are homophobes, bigots, hypocrites, etc.)
5.Appeal to higher loyalties (We love each other, we are open minded about alternative lifestyles, we are being tolerant, etc.)
Sound familiar?
I am not a bigot, a homophobe or a gay hater. I just call things the way they are. If we give homosexuals the right to marry we must then logically give Muslims the right to marry four wives, Messianic Christians the right to marry many wives, sects of the LDS the right to marry multiple wives, etc. Or are you going to tell me that they are the deviants and LGBT's are not?
Please respond with a minimum of name calling and profanity as this too would be considered deviant behavior and is evidence not of ones intellectual prowess, but of the lack thereof.
Posted by: bob | March 25, 2009 5:48 PM
Bob, your obsession with the sex lives of others suggests dissatisfaction with your own. To remedy this, I recommend you go fuck yourself.
Posted by: phantomreader42 | March 25, 2009 6:00 PM
I expected this type of semi-intelligent response. If this is your overt way of hitting on me I must decline and say I am happily married in a monogamous heterosexual relationship.
Posted by: bob | March 25, 2009 6:14 PM
I expected a stupid response from you, bob. Don't flatter yourself, I'm not the least bit attracted to your bigoted ass. My fiance has an important sexual organ that you will never have: a brain. You can't even manage to read and comprehend two sentences!
Posted by: phantomreader42 | March 25, 2009 6:34 PM
Re Bob
The fact that bubble head Bob wasted 4 years of his life at a piece of shit phony college like Liberty Un. tells us all we need to know about him. Richard Dawkins said it best, when he was in Lynchburg speaking at Randolph Macon College. When confronted by an asshole like Mr. Bob Prof. Dawkins advised him to transfer to a real university.
Posted by: SLC | March 25, 2009 8:21 PM
Bob - Yes and homosexuals are fighting for the right to have multiple women. [rolls eyes] That is, I believe, called a fallacy of false equivalency, and we both know it. Try again.
What special rights are homosexuals asking for, that heterosexuals are being (or about to be) denied? What laws exist (or will exist) that will deny these rights?
Homosexuality might be taught as being 'deviant' at Liberty University, but in the real world it has not been considered 'deviant' for some years, merely as part of the continuum of human sexuality (and other animal's sexuality as well).
Now let's look at Sykes' & Matza's Neutralization Theory (1957). This theory was proposed to explain why juvenile delinquents behave the way they behave. However applying their theory to a situation that is beyond the cope of the original assumptions is not helpful.
Firstly, there is a growing body of evidence that homosexuality is a natural variance in many animals, pro baby controlled by both genetic and developmental cascades. Thus the first rationalisation is not applicable, homosexuals really can't control who they love (or heterosexuals for that matter), any more than someone with Trisomy 21, Klinefelter's syndrome, MS or Early Onset Parkinson's Disease (and many others) can help it. There is no "perpetrator" here and no "victim" either.
There is no denial of injury, since there is no injury to deny. The evidence (see Abby's post above) shows no evidence of increased harm to themselves or others, none.
Again since homosexuality is natural variance the "perpetrator/victim" mould doesn't really apply here. If the homosexual act is between consenting adults (and remember this is what we are talking about here), then, by definition, both agreed to the relationship, so no crime*.
"Condemnation of the condemner", doesn't apply in this case either, since "the condemners" is this case have shown themselves to be bigots (in the original Anglo-Saxon sense), liars and hypocrites (Hello Teddy) by their own behaviour and utterances. They condemn themselves.
As to the last point, what nonsense! Have you ever been in love before Bob? I bet you have! And admitting that you love someone is not in itself a crime, part of a crime nor justification of a crime (although it could be considered as a mitigating circumstance).
The model just doesn't fit, and this is because Sykes and Matza were not considering this kind of behaviour. Besides I think you'll find that the abnormal psychology has moved on since the the late '50s. -DJ
*"fraud" is a strange term to attach to anal sex. No fraud is usually involved, at least not in the legal sense. Perhaps the more erudite legal types can fill you in on that. Oh & BTW heterosexuals engage in anal sex too, & homosexuals don't always do so (think lesbians). It's not really germane to your arguement.
Posted by: DingoJack | March 26, 2009 12:23 AM
Bob, you said earlier,
I am too black and white and feel that all children should have a Christian home with a loving Mother and a Father.
I will ask you again, as you didn't respond the first time -
I am a Jew. Should I be allowed to have children? In case you're afflicted with the Judeophilia that seems to be making the rounds among evangelicals these days, I'll expand it - should Muslims be allowed to have kids? Buddhists?
Posted by: Jeff Eyges | March 26, 2009 8:09 AM
Dingo, unless you live in San Francisco or Key West you will have to show me your facts and statistics to prove that the gay lifestyle is not considered deviant in today's society. Do you have a credible citation for this?
I would offer California's Proposition 8 as empirical and democratic evidence that gay marriage is considered deviant and is unaccepted by California's citizens.
As to the issue of harm, bestowing the rights of marriage upon homosexuals causes harm to the institution of marriage. It is the equivalent of calling a lip-sync concert the legal equivalent of the real deal. Additionally, it will drive of the cost of health insurance, medicare, medicaid, and every other "benefit" or entitlements up for employers and tax payers.
Posted by: bob | March 26, 2009 8:44 AM
Jef Eyges, to brainless bigot bob:
Remember what Jerry Falwell said: "Almighty God does not hear the prayers of a Jew."
According to brainless bob's cult, you're not even a real person. God thinks...the Jews killed his son, and must be punished.
I'm sure brainless bob sees everyone outside his own cult as just another "deviant", fair game to murder at will. And I'm sure he is incapable of finding any moral problem with this. He's had all the humanity leeched out of him. That's what religious nuttery does to you, it turns you into a sick, pathetic, empty husk.
Posted by: phantomreader42 | March 26, 2009 8:45 AM
Jeff, I do not force my views on people unlike the homosexual agenda folks. If you are a practicing Jew I am sure you feel that the best situation for children is a Jewish home. I do not oppose that. Last I checked Jews were not considered deviant. I believe in freedom of religion provided it does not infringe upon another persons rights. As for various religions I would ask a few questions. Do they treat women in a respectful way or do they view them as property. Do they engage in militant activities or commit violence against others based soley upon religion. These are things that should be considered in our tolerance policies considering "religions"
Some radical religious fringe teachings (including Christian, ie. abortion clinic bombings, the Inquisition, etc.)do infringe on the rights of others and therefore need to be scrutinized. This is where Islamic leaders find themselves today in America.
Posted by: bob | March 26, 2009 9:40 AM
Actually, it was Bailey Smith, one of the first presidents of the Southern Baptist Convention after the fundies took over. As I recall, this statement was made at a prayer breakfast or some similar gathering at which Reagan was present, when he was running for the presidency. He didn't agree with Smith publicly, but was happy to have their support.
Falwell was approached for comment later on. He wouldn't affirm Smith's statement directly, but he indicated that he agreed.
Posted by: Jeff Eyges | March 26, 2009 9:42 AM
Jeff, I do not force my views on people unlike the homosexual agenda folks. If you are a practicing Jew I am sure you feel that the best situation for children is a Jewish home.
A) That isn't what you said above.
B) You didn't really answer the question. You're equivocating.
Posted by: Jeff Eyges | March 26, 2009 9:44 AM
Sean: point taken. Sorry, I was posting in a bit of haste. My point was that we have reason to discourage men from marrying multiple wives, because we observe (many times if not most of the time) that it puts the wives in positions of powerlessness, as well as depriving other men of potential wives.
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 26, 2009 9:47 AM
Bob's little psychological treatise reminds me of creationist's arguments. Assume the conclusion you want rather than going where the evidence leads you. Everything he said has the underlying assumption that homosexuality is wrong, period. He presents no evidence for that conclusion, he just assumes it. "Denial of injury" - but he gives no evidence there's any injury. "Denial of the victim" - but he gives no evidence there's any victim. (And "defrauding" - what the hell?) "Appeal to higher loyalties" - my irony meter just broke. Face it, bob, you can couch it in jargon all you want. But when it comes right down to it the only reasons people like you have for being so concerned about gay sex is:
1. it's icky
2. god hates it
Posted by: Taz | March 26, 2009 10:00 AM
Jeff, I'm not equivocating, I was perhaps unclear. If I was a judge determining where a child should be placed, I feel a loving Jewish home is a stable and worthy place and could in good conscience do so without hesitation. I could not however say that about a home that represents what is widely regarded as a deviant alternative lifestyle.
Posted by: bob | March 26, 2009 10:15 AM
If I was a judge determining where a child should be placed, I feel a loving Jewish home is a stable and worthy place and could in good conscience do so without hesitation. I could not however say that about a home that represents what is widely regarded as a deviant alternative lifestyle.
Would you say the same of a non-Judeo-Christian home?
Posted by: Jeff Eyges | March 26, 2009 10:18 AM
Posted by: Taz | March 26, 2009 10:25 AM
Bob, what measures would you use to prevent non-christians from having children? Forced sterilization? Forced abortions? Kidnapping? Murder?
This is a serious question, you say children should be raised by "christian" parents, so what do you mean to do to make sure non-christian parents can't raise children? Are you a eugenecist or a serial killer?
Posted by: phantomreader42 | March 26, 2009 10:27 AM
I am not a bigot, a homophobe or a gay hater. I just call things the way they are.
I've heard racists say exactly the same words. And no, you're not calling things as they are, you're calling them as you believe they are -- just like the aforementioned racists. And in both cases, the belief is observably wrong and contrary to facts and common sense. Facts which bigots like you ignore.
My beliefs about homosexuality as deviant behavior is not based on religious bias or unsubstantiated opinion.
Your continuing failure to substantiate your opinion proves that they are.
And what's all this rubbish about "the gay lifestyle?" Do all gays have one lifestyle, and all heteros another? Do you even know what the word "lifestyle" means? It's a completely separate concept from sexual orientation or tastes. Your continued misuse of this word shows how shabby your thinking is.
Last I checked Jews were not considered deviant.
Did you check with Martin Luther or John Hagee? Or the founder of that pathetic little madrassa of yours? (Thanks for the tip, phantomreader42.)
Oh, and let's note bo(o)b's choice of words here: "considered deviant." As in, "deviant" in some people's opinions. And as long as these opinions have no grounding in fact, reason, or common sense, such opinions have no validity, however widely they may be shared. Read the Constitution again, bob: our rights do not depend on majority approval.
Oh, and about that five-stage "process" bo(0)b mentioned: in the case of gays, those statements are all demonstrably true: they really can't choose who they desire (just as I can't choose who gives me the hots), there really are no victims (and bo(o)b has STILL not specified any victims), those who condemn them really are bigots and fools picking on harmless people when they should be solving real problems, and gays really do have much the same "higher loyalties" the rest of us have, such as patriotism, adherence to basic principles of common decency, spirituality and spiritual desires, adult responsibility, etc.
As to the issue of harm, bestowing the rights of marriage upon homosexuals causes harm to the institution of marriage.
Really? How, exactly, has gay marriage in Massachusetts "caused harm" to your marriage to your wife? If my grandparents had still been alive, how, exactly, would gay marriage have harmed their marriage of FIFTY-PLUS YEARS? Would the Queer Eye crew have crashed their fiftieth-anniversary bash? How does this "harm" work, exactly?
The answer is simple: it wouldn't have. Gay marriage doesn't harm any straight relationships between real people in the real world; it only harms the abstract "institution" in the fixed imaginations of people like bob.
It is the equivalent of calling a lip-sync concert the legal equivalent of the real deal.
Just because you, in your pinched little heart of hearts, don't consider gay marriage "real," does not make their desires or committments less real out here on Earth.
Additionally, it will drive of the cost of health insurance, medicare, medicaid, and every other "benefit" or entitlements up for employers and tax payers.
Ah yes, the vague, unspecified threat of financial ruin -- the standard fallback position when facts and reason aren't on your side.
Reading bob's last three sentences above, it occurs to me that the very same arguments could have been used to oppose interracial marriage, and quite probably were. And bob wonders why we call him a bigot.
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 26, 2009 10:45 AM
Dingo, unless you live in San Francisco or Key West you will have to show me your facts and statistics to prove that the gay lifestyle is not considered deviant in today's society. Do you have a credible citation for this?
Here we see bob admitting the gaping hole in his rationalizattion: SF and Key west are exempted from his demand for evidence because the evidence from those places won't support his opinion.
I would offer California's Proposition 8 as empirical and democratic evidence that gay marriage is considered deviant and is unaccepted by California's citizens.
And I would offer the narrow margin by which it passed, and the desperate dishonest tactics of its supporters, as "empirical and democratic evidence" that that opinion isn't as strongly held as bob wants us to think it is.
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 26, 2009 10:58 AM
Raging Bee:
Fifty years ago, brainless bigot bob would have been using those exact same arguments against interracial marriage. Two centuries ago, he would've used similar arguments in favor of slavery. In the Dark Ages, he would have used them to support witch hunts. Brainless bigot bob doesn't think. He just parrots what his cult tells him to. That's what they teach at Liberty.
Posted by: phantomreader42 | March 26, 2009 10:59 AM
Just to jump back to the libertarian discussion a bit; back in the day, James Hanley, you made the comment:
"In a well-functioning market, all costs are internalized into the company and there are no externalities. The dumping of waste into the Cuyahoga River was an example of an externality occuring because no one had a property right in the river. Well, the propery right was held by the government, and they did a noticeably poor job of protecting it compared to what a private owner would have."
This is just wack.
In this thread you say: "When you figure out how we can create a strong government that doesn't abuse people, then come criticize me. But don't pretend that ignoring the atrocities of governments around the world is "realistic." You're living in a bubble that the victims of death sqauds and fascistic police don't have the luxury of enjoying."
(Blackwater, anyone?)
So, my idiot's guide to libertarianism is "free market good - government bad."
Posted by: ildi | March 26, 2009 2:02 PM
It is very simple as to how gay marriage would affect the sanctity of bob's marriage. He must be in the closet. How else would one be able to explain how the ability of any other person being able to marry would affect themselves? Bob would find the ability to cement in law his love for his fellow man in marriage so tempting that he would leave his current marriage of convenience for what his heart truly desires.
Of course, that would be the logical reason, and people very rarely are logical...
Posted by: Robster, FCD | March 26, 2009 2:14 PM
Sigh***
Here we are, still conversing with bob as if he were in need of education instead of the bitchslap that a lying sack of shit such as him richly deserves. He's intellectually dishonet, cooks any genuine data into a KKKristian Stew of Stupid and makes the rest up from the whole cloth. What a fuckbag.
Posted by: democommie | March 26, 2009 2:16 PM
Robster: another logical reason, of course, is that his wife is in the closet; and if gay marriage were condoned, she'd dump him for a woman.
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 26, 2009 2:25 PM
ildi: thanks for pasting those quotes. "This is just wack" barely scratches the surface of the rank intellectual dishonesty of the arguments you pasted.
Well, the property right was held by the government, and they did a noticeably poor job of protecting it compared to what a private owner would have."
News flash: most of the land destroyed by mountaintop removal, or otherwise befouled by industrial waste, is privately owned, either by industrialists who profit from the destruction of the land, or by average homeowners and farmers who look to their elected government to do its job and are cruelly let down because their government is hobbled by an uncaring "libertarian" mindset that cares only for the concerns of the rich. When big businesses rape the land and displace innocent people by the thousands, the fake-libertarians dutifully step up and insist it's not the businesses' fault for raping the land, it's the government's fault for not stopping it. Then they dutifully advocate making government even weaker than it already was. This routine victim-bashing dates back to the Industrial Revolution.
So our idiot's guide to libertarianism is "pretend private businesses always do the right thing, then blame the victims when they don't."
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 26, 2009 2:40 PM
Raging Bee, I hadn't even considered that possibility. I know I would dump bob for a woman.
Posted by: Robster, FCD | March 26, 2009 2:44 PM
Wow, I thought it was over, but the forces of idiocy came out for another sortie. First Ildie
"In a well-functioning market, all costs are internalized into the company and there are no externalities. The dumping of waste into the Cuyahoga River was an example of an externality occuring because no one had a property right in the river. Well, the propery right was held by the government, and they did a noticeably poor job of protecting it compared to what a private owner would have."
.
This is just wack.
What an astounding monument to logical argumentation! But I noticed that you failed to refute any of the claims. Are you perhaps under the illusion that the Cuyahoga River actually was private property?
Thank you for making the argument in support of my position. In case you're the only American who doesn't realize it, Blackwater was under contract to the U.S. government, and the only reason they're not facing more charges for what they did was that they committed those acts as an agent of government. Blackwater is hardly a good argument in favor of government. Idiot's guide, indeed. The only remotely accurate statement you've made.And now Raging Bee, whose great rebuttals of bob (which I wholeheartedly agree with) are regrettably counterbalanced by his inexplicable failure to recognize how weak ildi's arguments are.
Dear little bee, who the fuck do you think gives them the permits to do such shit? It ain't the CATO institute, it's the government that is in the hands of the corporations. Look up James Bovard and Corporate Welfare, then maybe you'll have a remote chance of understanding tha libertarians oppose government giving such special privileges to industry and allowing them to harm others like this. Or, as before, you can chickenshit out and refuse to actually learn anything that challenges your preconceptions. Just keep yourself wrapped warmly in your moronic misunderstanding--just like fundamentalists, it feels so much safer than actually having to face truths. You're a fucking liar and you know it. Government favors the rich because they can afford to buy influence. Libertarians hate the buying of government influence. But, again, you want to persist in being a lying little chickenshit because you don't have the guts to actually learn the truth. Hey, you got something right. Emphasis on fake libertarian is right for once you dumb shit. We real libertarians criticize these fake libertarians for this shit, too, you dumb fuck, and it's about time you stopped being such a stupid shit and recognize it. Real libertarians don't say these things, and I'm glad you fucking admitted it, even if it was inadvertant.In a nutshell, Bee, fuck you. Or better yet, go fuck yourself. Take a long 2X4 studded with nails and fuck yourself in the ass with it.
But until you actually take the time to understand libertarianism, quit making your dumb as a post pronouncements about it. Stick to bashing the homophobes--a least on that one subject you're not a complete douche.
Posted by: James Hanley | March 26, 2009 5:10 PM
My, my, the hate sure comes out when you expose the flaws in one's ideology, don't they? I only have time for a brief response at this time, so here goes:
Blackwater is hardly a good argument in favor of government.
It's a VERY good argument in favor of greater government regulation of corporate activity -- which libertarians oppose.
...libertarians oppose government giving such special privileges to industry and allowing them to harm others like this.
You also oppose government regulations which, when sensibly written and rigorously enforced, would prevent industry from causing such harm to others. Which pretty much cancels out any benefit from denying special privileges to industries.
(And besides, you know as well as I do that many industries simply can't do business without certain "special privileges" granted by governments, such as rights-of-way, mineral rights, zoning-law changes, etc.)
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 26, 2009 5:42 PM
wawaweewa!
So, JH, you're saying that the Cuyahoga would have not been polluted if it had been privately-owned? wtf? Companies pollute privately-owned properties all the time. Maybe I'm just too much of an idiot to get what you mean by that first sentence: "In a well-functioning market, all costs are internalized into the company and there are no externalities." Maybe you can break that down for me using smaller words.
Also, I'm too stupid to see how that parses with this sentence I picked out of your diatribe to RB: "libertarians oppose government giving such special privileges to industry and allowing them to harm others like this". That's not an example of corporate welfare. Maybe those sentences are next to each other accidentally?
Ok, so in your worldview, existing pollution (or whatever harm industry causes) occurs because the rich buy influence with the government. But, if they didn't have governmental influence to buy in the forms of permits that allow, say, mountaintop removal, then they wouldn't do it, because...
ding! ding! ding! - In a well-functioning market, all costs are internalized into the company and there are no externalities.
Like I say, that's just wack. When you start on your libertarian rants, it eeriely reminds me of heddle...
Posted by: ildi | March 26, 2009 6:13 PM
1. An internalized cost is a cost that is paid by the producer. Salaries, electric bills, materials, etc, are usually internalized. Companies, being self-interested, would like to have others pay these costs. If the company can get a government to subsidize their labor costs, or their utility bills, that saves money for the company, making it more profitable.
This is rational behavior (which is not to say it's admirable). I remember when my wife and her siblings (plus spouses) took their parents out for dinner for their anniversary. Brother-in-law, thinking the check would be split evenly and being rational (which is not to say he's admirable), ordered the most expensive item on the menu, assuming others would bear part of the cost.
Making others bear the cost is called "externalizing" the cost.
2. One cost of production is dealing with the waste. Businesses like to avoid this cost, so if they can, they will dump the waste instead of treating or properly disposing of it.
Pollution is an externalized cost, or more simply, a "negative externality," because those who are affected by the pollution bear a cost.
3. If you or I owned the Cuyahoga River and they tried to dump it there, we would put a stop to it, because we would object to bearing the cost. We would take them to Court in defense of our property rights.
4. With rivers, nobody owns them. I am not arguing that rivers should be privatized, but just simply stating what is factually true. (But more on that in point 5.) Therefore, for years companies felt it was legitimate to externalize their waste costs by dumping their shit in the river. The costs were borne by all the public of Cleveland, but it was no private individual's private property, so no individual had legal standing to take them to court to prevent it.
Nor, let us note, did the government of Cleveland, the government of Ohio, or the U.S. government act to defend the public's property rights. They could have, but didn't. The U.S. government acted only after the Cuyahoga caught fire for the third time!
5. When I said, "if the Cuyahoga was private" you seemed to assume only the corporation could have owned it. A foolish assumption, but let us accept it for the moment. Indeed, if a polluting corporation owned the Cuyahoga, they might have polluted it anyway. But so what? If a corporation pollutes only its own property, it's not a matter of concern. It's an internalized cost, affecting the value of their property.
But, you might say, rivers are different. Yes, so if the corporation owned the Cuyahoga, polluted it, and let the polluted water flow into Lake Erie, they would then be externalizing their costs, imposing them on others. That would again be a breakdown of a well-functioning market, in which no externalities occur. (That well-functioning market, by the way, is hypothetical. That's why government is needed to protect property rights. If Raging Bee actually knew anything about libertarianism, he'd know that we don't want to eliminate government--we want it to play this role. But Raging Bee has a sad fear of learning.)
But let's revisit that assumption about ownership. Why would it have to be the corporation that would own it? In England, certain rivers have fishing rights that are held by private clubs (or so I've heard--it's at least a hypothetical possibility). If the fish are harmed, their property rights are harmed, so they have standing to sue.
A Cuyahoga Fishing Club that had fishing rights would have acted much more quickly to protect the Cuyahoga than the government would have. If you don't think that's true, the you're ignoring what you personally would do if you were one of the members of such a club.
Was that simple enough, ildi? Because I really don't like arguing with people who can't muster up a better argument than "that's whack." You're not even as bright as Raging Bee, it seems, who at least provides a real argument.
And, I'll say it for the third time, I'm still shaking my head in wonder that anyone could have been so deeply stupid as to think that Blackwater is a good argument for government, when they only exist because government will hire them and because government will protect them from the criminal charges they would face if they actually were operating as a private corporation--they charges the bastards should face--the charges every libertarian I know firmly believes they should face.
So until you learn something about what libertarianism is, instead of learning it from your Karl Marx comic books, just shut the fuck up about the topic, please.
Posted by: James Hanley | March 26, 2009 6:53 PM
Bee said regarding Blackwater
Uh Bee - Who is Blackwater working for? Who is paying for this ridiculously corrupt operation - Oh yeah that would be the US government. How does that prove Hanley wrong? More rules by goverment ain't gonna fix that mess. Fly away from this debate Bee, you're losing.
Posted by: Anna | March 26, 2009 7:09 PM
I'm speechless. You're actually arguing that government doing very bad things is an argument for even more government.
Logic, Bee. Learn it, live it, love it.
Posted by: James Hanley | March 26, 2009 7:16 PM
Thanks for recognizing that at last.
Posted by: James Hanley | March 26, 2009 9:33 PM
So many libertarians seem to think that the ideal "free" market either a) exists or b) has the potential to exist. The primary restriction preventing an ideal market, including removing negative externalization is the fact the there is not, has never been and will never be perfect information.
If there were perfect information, that hypothetical fishing club wouldn't sue the polluter, they would just send them a bill for the losses they incurred. Part of the benefit derived by the company polluting is that at worst they are managing to defer costs, at best they are eliminating them. If the pollution isn't discovered or people aren't paying for monitoring (remember no government intervention) the company externalizes the costs. If no single individual is harmed enough, or has enough money to pay the opportunity cost of an investigation to prove the source and the amount of damages, the company externalizes the costs. If worst case happens, the company has managed to avoid paying the opportunity cost associated with cleaning up after their wastes; those harmed had in effect given the offender a loan.
Posted by: Robert S. | March 26, 2009 10:49 PM
James, I actually disagree with your point about "you," which can be used in a non-specific manner, similar to using the indefinite pronoun "one" (e.g. "It's best to fess up when you make a mistake"). Your point about "they" is correct (it has no clear plural antecedent), but honestly, neither point is really too becoming. I understand that you probably get really irritated at having to explain libertarianism to people who assume that it is defined by the type of libertarian who has bumper stickers on their car like "9/11 was an inside job" (that's a personal example from a guy I worked with), but you shouldn't have to lower yourself to throwing out insults. That's one of the things that consistently disappoints me when these debates occur: I think you've generally got a good demeanor for handling debates (you make logical points, you can identify and admit logical points from your opponents, and you can admit your own mistakes, for starters), but when you resort to name-calling and insults like the above comment about a 2x4, that really lowers the bar of discourse. It doesn't make you wrong; it simply makes you look like a jerk.
(This is all meant to be constructive criticism, so please don't take it the wrong way.)
Posted by: G. Broaddus | March 26, 2009 11:21 PM
The existence of negative externalities, which would not exist in our Platonic form market, demonstrates a market failure. And it makes for a better explanation for why firms pollute than the simple moralistic arguent that "they're bad." Because moralizing does little to change anyone's behavior (e.g., "Just say no" doesn't stop kids from smoking pot), but recognizing that nobody acted to protect the Cuyahoga earlier because nobody had legally enforceable rights to do so does help us recognize how we can change behavior.
Excuse me? If I build a repair garage next to your house and dump the used motor oil over the fence on your property, are you simply going to send me a bill for losses? I would be very surprised if you would act that way.And if you merely sent me a bill, do you think I would pay it? If I was that disrespectful of your property rights, why do you think I would willingly pay up? So you would probably have to sue me.
And despite Raging Bee's continual (and continually inaccuate) suggestions that libertarians want to eliminate all government, libertarians actually tend to believe government has an important role to play in enforcing the rules of the common law. (Under common law principles, my dumping oil on your property, be it land or water, is trespass.)
So, please, folks, stop telling me what libertarians believe until you actually read the literature. You consistently get it wrong.
Posted by: James Hanley | March 27, 2009 7:36 AM
G. Broaddus,
I appreciate the comments. I especially appreciate your generosity in saying it only makes me "look" like a jerk.
And your understanding of the reasons for my irritation is right on target.
Posted by: James Hanley | March 27, 2009 7:43 AM
So, please, folks, stop telling me what libertarians believe until you actually read the literature. You consistently get it wrong.
We're telling you what people who call themselves libertarians have SAID they believe. If it's not what you believe, that's fine; but please stop pretending those libertarians don't exist or didn't say what we heard them say. You're not the only libertarian, and you've offered no credible evidence that you "represent" overall libertarian thought any more than Ron Paul, Bob Barr, or anyone else making exactly the same claim.
(And no, demanding that we "read the literature" doesn't cut it. Like I said to heddle, "the literature" doesn't necessarily represent what the rank and file believe. Once again, the Communists had exactly the same problem.)
And before you start another name-calling tirade, please also remember that I have spent the last few posts here responding -- sometimes at great length -- to YOUR attempts to clarify what libertarians believe. If I'm still as "ignorant" on that subject as you're now saying I am, a good part of the blame may lie with you.
Also, you're really not in a position to question my reasoning when a) you haven't responded to most of my substantive points above, and b) you have knowingly and blatantly misrepresented what I have said on numerous occasions. If you're trying to redeem libertarianism, you're not doing a very good job of it.
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 27, 2009 9:12 AM
*Ahem* - to get back to the point.
I love the tag-team sport of drubbing the troll. I go away for the day (life don't you know) and see what happens, Bobbo gets serially drubbed by several excellent posts!
Well Bobbo this is the way it works YOU made the extraordinary claim by equating crime and harm to homosexuality, YOU have produce evidence to back the claim up.
Pony up or fold. -DJ
PS BTW Who gets to decide what 'deviancy'* is? You, me, a judge, the crack-dealer on the corner? If 20% of women will be sexually assaulted or raped in their lifetime, then does that make those who weren't 'deviant'? Does it make those men who don't sexually assault or rape women deviant? If so, then I'm a deviant and proud of it.
Sometimes Bobbo standing out from the crowd is a cause for pride.
*'Deviant behaviour' is, presumably, that which differs from the unmeasurable mean behaviour by some significant (yet indefinable) amount.
Posted by: DingoJack | March 27, 2009 10:20 AM
'Deviant behaviour' is, presumably, that which differs from the unmeasurable mean behaviour by some significant (yet indefinable) amount.
"Deviant behaviour" is whatever makes baby Jesus cry.
Posted by: Jeff Eyges | March 27, 2009 12:13 PM
I'd have absolutely no problem with the hypothetical case outlined in the original post, and I doubt WorldNetDaily would either. They're strongly libertarian, and a component of that is support for strong biological parental rights. Blood is thicker than government issued paper.
Posted by: dweeb | March 27, 2009 12:26 PM
...and dweeb is thicker than both combined.
Posted by: Raging Bee | March 27, 2009 12:53 PM
dweeb - by density or viscosity? - DJ
Posted by: DingoJack | March 27, 2009 12:56 PM
Bullshit. You're either lying or you're incapable of recognizing when people are responding to your arguments. Redeem? Am I now the libertarian Jesus? I've said repeatedly that I don't care if you agree with libertarianism, so I'm hardly trying to redeem it. I'm just pointing out that you don't really now much about libertarianism, a point which you implicitly confirm by saying you don't actually need to read anything about it. A truism, yet you mean it as evidence. Again, learn logic. You take the fact that libertarians are not perfectly monolithic in their beliefs (another truism), and keep trepeating that truism as though it actually demonstrates something meaningful.And how do you know who is rank and file? Why am I not rank and file? I'm a complete unknown, not a "name" libertarian to whom people refer when explaining libertarianism. Come over to Positive Liberty for a while and read what the commentors write--they're certainly rank and file, as much as anyone is. But I'm quite confident you won't do so because you persistently demonstrate your shallowness by refusing to learn anything more about the subject you're debating.
I see, your ignorance is my fault. I repeatedly recommend libertarian sources for you to look at, you refuse to read them, and somehow it's my fault. And of course it wouldn't have anything to do with you having a mind that's shut tighter than a virgin's thighs, would it?Your style of argument sounds like a creationist talking about evolution. I'm not joking and I'm not just making a snide insult. Just like creationists you:
1) assert expertise in a subject about whch you're deeply ignorant,
2) refuse to educate yourself in it when someone points you to the relevant literature,
3) fail to comprehend any rebuttals of your points,
4) claim you're misunderstood/misinterpreted,
5) play the victim card.
I know you think pretty highly of yourself, but I deal with very highly educated people on a daily basis. I don't know a single one of them who would repeatedly say, "I don't need to read anything about that subject--I already know it all," unless it is their specific subject of study. When I have students who have read something in the newspapers and think they know it, so they don't have to read any of the assigned readings, I disabuse them of the notion. Only the worst students never figure it out. You never figure it out.
You revel in your exceptionally limited knowledge, and that's just pathetic.
Posted by: James Hanley | March 27, 2009 8:24 PM