WITH THIS RING I THEE SODOMIZE

Chronicles Magazine ^ | April 2, 2002 | Thomas Fleming

[Protagoras]

There is indeed a connection. Alexander the Great was "gay", as am I. What's the significance of your moniker?

See? And where did it get him? He's dead!

In fact 100% of all the queers who lived back then are dead. There must be a connection.

PS. I'm not the real Thomas Jefferson, he is also room temp.

[A. Pole]

There is indeed a connection. Alexander the Great was "gay", as am I.

Do you like teenage boys like he did?

What's the significance of your moniker?

Nationality.

[FormerLib]

If the gerbil fits...

[FormerLib]

There is indeed a connection. Alexander the Great was "gay", as am I.

And yet another connection, they're both history.

[Clint N. Suhks]

Wow, two on one thread, way to go FR. The practice of perversion is and never will be a conservative ideal. ATG has been here before he was ATG and will return again. I wish him a speedy recovery from his disorder, I'll say a prayer for him.

[CubicleGuy]

Wow. What a telling commentary on the power of political correctness at FreeRepublic these days, that out of 108 posts to this thread, 28 of them were removed by the moderator. On the old "Quantum Leap" TV show, I think this was referred to as the "swiss cheese effect". Some things are remembered, others are lost to the memory hole, making life a lot more confused and confusing.

In short, over one-fourth of the thread had to be removed because of the fear of free speech by those in charge.

And we're supposed to believe that this site really is part of a free republic these days? The very name of the site itself has become a lie.

Pathetic. A nation which can no longer afford a free interchange of ideas without censorship or fear of offense can no longer afford freedom, it seems to me.

Catchy slogan, that "Free Republic". Too bad that's all it is.

[L.N. Smithee]

To me, what's "incredible" is that conservatives don't recognize the good sense of this argument. For the past ten years, the primary thrust of the gay movement has been in a conservative direction. Significant numbers of gays have turned away from the irresponsible sexual rebellion of the "gay liberation" days of the 70s and 80s, and seek to live in the suburbs as couples whose mutual commitment is recognized and honored.

There have always been gay couples who have had long, presumably monogamous relationships, but the gay culture that was stopped dead in its tracks in the late seventies/early eighties was more about excessive quantities of sex rather than relationships. Those "significant numbers" became "responsible" kicking and screaming -- I live in San Francisco, and I know all about it. There is no telling how much more decadent American society would have been if it were not for AIDS or some other deadly sexually-transmitted plague.

There's nothing I can do -- or would do -- to stop the government from "recognizing" the relationships of gays, but I will not give it the "honor" of viewing it as the equivalent of traditional (that is to say "normal") marriage, and there is nothing anyone can do about that.

If any other group showed a similar evolution, conservatives would be ecstatic.

Really? Can you give an example of "similar evolution[s]?"

But conservatives insist that gay couples, if they choose to live together, do so outside the bonds of matrimony. Because it's somehow important that gay couples be denied respectability.

Your disingenuousness drips from your words. Do you not recognize to whom you are speaking? Since when did conservatives "deny" respectability to something that has not -- until recently -- been viewed as respectable in American society? When in the past did conservatives say, "The big problem with homosexuality is that it forces its practicioners to live in sin?"

That attitude makes no sense in the current world where, like it or not, gay couples are visible. And since such visible couples are forced to remain unmarried, they can only stand for the proposition that marriage is irrelevant -- after all, if the guys down the street can live together without marriage for all these years, so can any kid and his girlfriend, right?

You've got it in reverse. The current acceptance of homosexuality wouldn't have been possible without the flouting of morals promoting marriage.

It all started with FDA approval of Enovid in the '60s, when the idea of sex without children emboldened American society to engage in sex for pleasure's sake, without unwanted pregnancy, commitment, and thus "forced" marriage. This in turn led to the sexual revolution and the so-called "new morality", a system in which matrimony was viewed as being an optional self-imposed restriction rather than the expression of a loving, lifelong commitment to fidelity. Homosexuality was tolerated in the open as just another way some chose to "do their own thing." No-fault divorce made dissolving a marriage as simple as leaving out the door and saying "I quit." When cohabitation in defiance of marriage ("it's just a piece of paper!") became acceptable, the idea took hold that women who were dismissed from long-term live-in relationships should be treated as divorcees and couples who lived together should have all the benefits of marriage. It became as easy to be married and divorced legally as not. Once heterosexual couples could be "married" without being actually wed, the natural progression was to ask why homosexuals couldn't be "married" since they did not have the provision of being wed.

"Any kid and his girlfriend" would have plenty of bad straight examples they could imitate before we even got to homosexuals. What heteros have done to crumble the institution of marriage made it possible for us to even be thinking about homos being a part of it, and letting committed persons of the same sex take vows will do nothing to reverse that damage.

Think how much stronger would be the message of support for marriage if conservatives applied their pro-marriage advocacy to everyone.

Absolute nonsense.

Marriage for people of the same sex is not as innocuous as you would like to believe. It would change the face of the nation as we know it, and call for the overhaul of all sorts of American institutions. Social conservatives would reject forcefully the idea of putting homosexuality on par with normal human relationships and what we now know as the nuclear family. There is no precedent for such a move for serious students of any major belief system, but there are those who claim to be of those beliefs who would just go along to get along or make a strike for "reform." Churches, governments, charities and their donors would be divided among those who wish to maintain tradition and those who would choose to reject it.

Nice try.

[Fethiye]

Thanks for your response to my post. Unfortunately, I don't have time to compose a worthy counter-reponse today or any time soon. But I do want to say that, even though you disagree with (almost) everything I wrote, I thank you -- seriously -- for thinking hard about it.

I know I'm a fish out of water on this site. And I know that most posters here will never think differently about homosexuality than they do now. That's their absolute right. (I know I'm not likely to change my own opinion on the subject!) But I post in the hopes that I can at least get people thinking. Because its not the anti-gay opinion that upsets and depresses me; it's the thoughtless comment that does it.

So thanks again.

[L.N. Smithee]

But I do want to say that, even though you disagree with (almost) everything I wrote, I thank you -- seriously -- for thinking hard about it...I post in the hopes that I can at least get people thinking. Because its not the anti-gay opinion that upsets and depresses me; it's the thoughtless comment that does it.

So thanks again.

No, thank you. I am currently being harassed by a thuggish Freeper who objected to my saying that it is stupid to use slurs while discussing current events regarding homosexuals. Your gracious comment is a welcome break.