Why were the quotes off topic? We were discussing morality. I brought in some quotes supporting my point of view. Some founders of the this country, and some other thinkers.
Not only not off topic, but agreeing with my position; that is, that morality is absolute. If morality is whatever any individual speculates about, then society quickly becomes a dog eat dog, might makes right anarchy. Why? Because one person's morality is someone else's bestiality. And if those bestiophiles don't like that other people disapprove or even prevent their sexual flings (say, with MY dog, for instance), then if said bestiophile has more money or a position of authority, he will force his immorality on me.
As is happening, right now, via hate crimes/hate speech laws in other countries. And shaking the gates here.
So called "moral relativity" just means that some people want to call immorality morality. Just photo negative values. Not relative at all, that's just a smokescreen. And if someone objects that moral absolutes are religious based and therefore wrong/unconstitutional or whatever, every religion in the world has basically the same moral absolutes. They are indeed universal. And without promoting them, our once great country will become totalitarian in a couple of generations.
We've reached a point of some circularity, I think - you insist on calling homosexuality immoral, and I insist that it is not. I doubt there is any convincing on the horizon for either of us...
I say your quotes are off topic because you are ascribing a meaning to "morality" that I don't agree with - the discussion was about that meaning, and you can't argue a point using quotes that are based on the assumption that the point is true ("off-topic" may have been the wrong term, cicular may have been better).
In response to the problem raised in your second paragraph, I would suggest that our laws really shouldn't be based on morality at all (as I think I stated in another post). Precisely because morality is not absolute, and individuals (based on upbringing, cultural heritage, socialization, etc) do develop their own sense of morality. Despite that, many of us have very similar backgrounds and heritages, so we share a moral viewpoint which becomes the 'morals' of society at large. However, it seems better to me for our legal structure to be based on questions of cost/benefit to the functioning of our society, not on the moral opinions of a segment of society. For example, murder should be illegal not because it is immoral but because our society functions a lot better when we can go outside without (much) fear of being murdered. By this standard, people who don't consider murder immoral don't get a pass.