If you scorn homosexuals because of the greater health risk, due to their behavior, then you're surely an advocate of banning smoking, and sin taxes on "junk" foods.

Right ?

Yes, I do support banning drugs and cigarettes. Food seems necessary, but a sensibly crafted tax on junk food would be a good idea.

Hate speech! Hate speech! Somebody call the police and arrest this guy!

Oh, sorry, I thought he was speaking up here.

The obvious consequences of unchecked homosexual behavior flies in the face of the unrestrained libertarianism championed by some on this blog. Facts are stubborn things as the level the STD's within the "Gay Community" testify.

High cholesteral and alcoholism or tobacco related illnesses are genetic predispositions that can be controlled through personal discipline and self-awareness although many are unaffected by junk food or tobacco.The libertarian position on homosexuality is that it should not be controlled but rather acted upon and even encouraged by those so inclined. To equate junk food or tobacco with unrestrained homosexual behavior is silly while dangerous since it trivializes truly dangerous and self-destructive behavior.

No one wishes to marginalize or denigrate homosexuals only the unrestrained behavior advocated by the libertine wing of libertarian philosophy. It is a cliche but libertarians seem oblivious to the simple fact that freedom is not free while ordered liberty stands on a distinct moral foundation which has little in common with modern relativism.

OJ:

Whether the behavior is natural is completely unrelated to the diseases that result. Your statement is pure non-sequitor.

Tom:

What do you mean by unchecked homosexual behavior? Is it any different than unchecked heterosexual behavior? Maybe unchecked sexual behavior, no matter its orientation, is the problem.

Which makes one wonder how homosexual marriage could possibly be a bad thing.

OJ:

Smokers pay more in per-pack taxes than their habit-induced medical costs. On top of that, they die earlier, easing the burden on Social Security. Why is it you want to ban smoking?

JEFF:

So you believe that species could evolve in such a manner that a natural behavior would be so obviously a disease vector and one for so many rare diseases. Ah, the infinite plasticity of Guinnian Darwinism....

And I want them to stop smoking for the same reason I want men to stop cavorting in each others' anuses--I'd rather they live and be healthy.

I thought unchecked sexual behavior was a problem - unwanted pregnancies, STD's, and emotional trauma are all caused by it. I don't think conservatives (and I personally am a centrist Democrat) would object to Jeff's assertion that unchecked sexual promiscuity is a problem.

However, there are many social restrictions in the heterosexual community that restrain that activity, if not always successfully. The important thing is that there is such a thing as healthy heterosexual sexual relationships, even if opinions vary as to what that may be.

Orrin's point (I believe) is that homosexual sexual activity is inherently unhealthy for numerous reasons regardless if politically correct commentators choose to ignore that evidence.

I don't see how gay marriage would miraculously change gay sexual behavior. Even in premarital sex, the primary behavior pattern for heterosexuals is monogamy (even if serial monogamy.) Not so for homosexuals who are in general more promiscuous.

Of course, there are heterosexuals who are extremely promiscuous, just as there are gays who prefer committed relationships. But in general, the above is true. Allowing gay marriage is unlikely to turn promiscuous homosexuals into monogamous partners, nor will a legal stature change the health risks of anal penetration.

Legal marriage exists because the govt recognizes the benefits of marriage to society - specifially the economic benefits when a man and woman have and raise a child. People get married for other reasons as well, but historically the economic case trumps, thus the appeal of arranged marriages. Only in the prosperous modern West have other considerations come to the forefront. Since homosexual sex lacks the procreative function, its benefit to society is nil.

When we were engaged, my fiancee did all the blood tests in our state for VD. I have to say that the doctor's and Orrin's notions of health consequences of sex are laughably naive.

Harry:

It has nothing to do with sex--it's to do with having contact with feces.

Tom C:

Yes, equating tobacco with homosexual behavior IS silly, because tobacco use kills far, far more people annually.

Additionally, gays generally don't affect the health of others, whereas second-hand smoke does.
Research on non-smokers who work in smoking environments, such as bars, shows that blood concentrations of nicotine can be as high as two-thirds that of smokers.

OJ:

No. I believe that words have meaning.

If something occurs through natural processes, it is natural, no matter its knock-on effects. That is why your statement is a pure non-sequitor.

For instance, cleft palate--a non-genetic birth defect--leads to all kinds of awful knock-on effects. Are you going to tell me that, therefore, it is unnatural?

All mammals start life based on the female phenotypical template. The XY mammals go through a complex series of hormone mediated transformations too become male. Along with substantially different bodies, statistically normal XY males have brains that are just as irremediably different from their XX counterparts (some on the left have failed to take this on board, and you have rightfully skewered them for that).

In order for you to conclude homosexuality must be unnatural--in the strict meaning of the word, unfiltered through your revulsion--then you must also conclude that the transformation of the female brain to male is deterministic and binary.

Even though practically nothing, other than death, in nature is deterministic.

And then you would be confronted with the existence of XY females. And at least substantial numbers of homosexuals with identical ring and index finger lengths, just like women, and just unlike heterosexual men. And post-mortems showing female-like brain structures.

For an evolutionist, or anyone who understands the difference between genotype and phenotype, this is just part of the territory. All processes have defect rates.

For a religionist, though, insisting on treating the outcome of a natural process as a moral choice requires ignoring mountains of material evidence to the contrary.

OJ seems to feel his preferences are a sound basis for governmental coercion.

Yet he insists, without a hint of irony, he is not a statist.

Wow, who knew cleft palate was acquired via anal sex? Those are some powerful sphincter muscles.

Michael:

Both are deadly and volitional. It's hardly surprising that cigarettes are more popular than anal sex, but the unpopularity of the act offers additional reason to think it unhealthy.

OJ:

Would you mind explaining how my post got you anywhere near your conclusion?

oj:

I don't argue that anal sex is as healthy as vaginal sex.

I'm merely saying that the additional health risk can't be used to justify discrimination against gays, unless all other voluntary health risks are similarly scorned.

Michael:

Exactly. And that line of reasoning leads straight to an intrusive nanny state.

Jeff-

The diference is women.

Jeff:

You support the idea of the State stopping people from discriminating. I think it none of the State's business. Who's intrusive?

Jeff:

We were discussing unusual diseases based on aberrant behavior when suddenly you switched to a birth defect.

OJ:

YOU asserted by implication that the consequences made homsexuality unnatural, thereby abusing the meaning of the word unnatural.

By example, I pointed out that perfectly natural things--cleft palate--can have very unpleasant circumstances, thereby highlighting your non-sequitor.

Argument by analogy, don't you know. I think the first several paras in that previous post make it crystal clear that's what I was doing.

I'm not sure how I said the State should stop people discriminating, although I am in general agreement that the State should not, itself, discriminate on any basis other than merit. Regardless, you are going to get to a nanny state far faster than I.

So riding a bike is "natural" because humans do it? Man, your system is even more closed than I'd realized. There is nothing that could ever disprove any aspect of your beliefs.

I question the original statement that homosexuals suffer STDs (or any other medical problems) at a greater rate than heterosexuals, if each group is assessed on the same level of promiscuity.

That was not my experience 30-some years ago, nor is it my impression now, though I don't have the same access to data that I had then.

All of us have some contact with feces.

All of us have some contact with automoblies, but even if it seems like a neat new experience, we don't drive them into bridge abutments.