Mississippi Senate Passes Religious Freedom Bill

[Gwazi Magnum]

a religious person is supposed to have a higher moral code to live by.

What a religious person has is a set moral code to live by that was determined 2000 years ago*.
Atheists are just as capable of having a moral code than a religious person, the difference is atheists get their moral codes from themselves and society.

*Assuming the Bible/Religion is where they get their morals off of. And the Religion is just a separate belief in their life, that doesn't play into their day to day life.

 

[ᴛᴏᴄᴋᴀ]

While other states are being assholes, my state is doing this

Pennsylvania governor signing orders for LGBT protections

This makes me so happy that I moved! I don't have to worry about my daughter being discriminated against, and from what she's told me about her school, she's actually accepted rather than being judged. As if I needed another reason to love this state!

 

[SacredWarrior]

While other states are being assholes, my state is doing this

Pennsylvania governor signing orders for LGBT protections

This makes me so happy that I moved! I don't have to worry about my daughter being discriminated against, and from what she's told me about her school, she's actually accepted rather than being judged. As if I needed another reason to love this state!

You should check out what my home state (Tennessee) is doing. You'll blow a gasket.

 

[ᴛᴏᴄᴋᴀ]

You should check out what my home state (Tennessee) is doing. You'll blow a gasket.

I saw something on HRC about it, but I couldn't read it. I'm so tired of hearing of all these stupid state creating these homophobic laws. They have nothing to do with religion. I'm sorry, but if you're going to refuse service to someone for being gay because of your religion you'd better not have a divorce behind your name, and you better be doing community service every chance you get. That's my take on it anyway.

 

[Sir Salty]

Personally, I think this violates the Constitution and I feel like religion shouldn't be above Constitutional law. Everyone is in right to be treated equal, fairly, and with impartial judgment.

 

[Brovo]

Personally, I think this violates the Constitution and I feel like religion shouldn't be above Constitutional law. Everyone is in right to be treated equal, fairly, and with impartial judgment.

Curious: Which part of the US Constitution do you think this violates?

 

[Grothnor]

Begin Rant.exe

Rantfile

Hello, I'm Grothnor and today we will be using the Christian Bible's own teachings, along with some historical context, to destroy the belief that what we call 'Homosexuality' is a sin.

Homosexuality as a sin is mentioned four times in the Christian Bible, Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13, 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 and Romans 1:26-28.

Leviticus is part of the Jewish Pentateuch (also known as the Torah), which are the first five books of the Christian Old Testament. These books are primarily used to describe the rules and laws that Jews had to obey, and there are far more than the Ten Commandments. The Pentateuch also includes 613 additional commandments that the Jews follow. The Jews also follow an a third set of laws which wasn't written down (though was once the Romans destroyed the Temple in Jerusalem and underwent a diaspora).

The early Christian Church distanced itself from following all these extra commandments: (the 613 and the Oral Tradition) due to disagreements concerning circumcision. Pretty much, some Jewish Christians said people had to become Jews (and get circumcised) before becoming Christians. The Apostles disagreed and a letter (Galatians) was sent to the offending church to sort out the mess.

Furthermore, one of the central-most beliefs of the Christian Church was that Jesus died for our sins to free us from the damning power of all the laws Judaism has. So anyone who cites Leviticus saying that 'teh gays is evilz' is a cherry-picking hypocrite who doesn't know how to Christian.

Now as for 1 Corinthians and Romans, we have to understand how things were done when these letters were written. Both letters were to congregations in Roman land, and during the Roman Empire, homosexuality was practiced very differently than it is now. By today's standards, homosexuality in the Roman Empire was often pedophilic and sometimes could be considered, if not literally, then symbolically, rape. Homosexuality back then was heavily tinged with a dominant vs submissive theme; it was only socially acceptable to be the dominant, as the submissive was looked down on as lacking manliness.

In short, it was pretty fucked up.

But the thing is, back then homosexuality WAS a sin. It was sex for gratification's sake, outside of wedlock and could never be part of a healthy, loving relationship so long as the dominance and control was so present. Modern homosexual relationships do not have any such universal negativity to them and can be just as loving and caring as any relationship.

In summary, what Paul is saying in 1 Corinthians and Romans ISN'T necessarily that homosexuality is a sin by its nature, simply by how it was practiced. In fact, as a modern homosexual relationship can meet all other criteria of a righteous Christian relationship, I would say that homosexuality is not sinful by its nature.

I would go even further to point out that anyone who claims homosexuals are sinful and proceeds to deny them rights, protest their 'sinful' ways or otherwise go out of their way to belittle them, either in public, private or even in the confines of their minds needs to learn how to LOVE THY NEIGHBOR, BITCH!

End Rant.exe
tl;dr Anyone who says that homosexuals are sinners need to go back to Sunday School.

 

[ᴛᴏᴄᴋᴀ]

Begin Rant.exe

Rantfile

Hello, I'm Grothnor and today we will be using the Christian Bible's own teachings, along with some historical context, to destroy the belief that what we call 'Homosexuality' is a sin.

Homosexuality as a sin is mentioned four times in the Christian Bible, Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13, 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 and Romans 1:26-28.

Leviticus is part of the Jewish Pentateuch (also known as the Torah), which are the first five books of the Christian Old Testament. These books are primarily used to describe the rules and laws that Jews had to obey, and there are far more than the Ten Commandments. The Pentateuch also includes 613 additional commandments that the Jews follow. The Jews also follow an a third set of laws which wasn't written down (though was once the Romans destroyed the Temple in Jerusalem and underwent a diaspora).

The early Christian Church distanced itself from following all these extra commandments: (the 613 and the Oral Tradition) due to disagreements concerning circumcision. Pretty much, some Jewish Christians said people had to become Jews (and get circumcised) before becoming Christians. The Apostles disagreed and a letter (Galatians) was sent to the offending church to sort out the mess.

Furthermore, one of the central-most beliefs of the Christian Church was that Jesus died for our sins to free us from the damning power of all the laws Judaism has. So anyone who cites Leviticus saying that 'teh gays is evilz' is a cherry-picking hypocrite who doesn't know how to Christian.

Now as for 1 Corinthians and Romans, we have to understand how things were done when these letters were written. Both letters were to congregations in Roman land, and during the Roman Empire, homosexuality was practiced very differently than it is now. By today's standards, homosexuality in the Roman Empire was often pedophilic and sometimes could be considered, if not literally, then symbolically, rape. Homosexuality back then was heavily tinged with a dominant vs submissive theme; it was only socially acceptable to be the dominant, as the submissive was looked down on as lacking manliness.

In short, it was pretty fucked up.

But the thing is, back then homosexuality WAS a sin. It was sex for gratification's sake, outside of wedlock and could never be part of a healthy, loving relationship so long as the dominance and control was so present. Modern homosexual relationships do not have any such universal negativity to them and can be just as loving and caring as any relationship.

In summary, what Paul is saying in 1 Corinthians and Romans ISN'T necessarily that homosexuality is a sin by its nature, simply by how it was practiced. In fact, as a modern homosexual relationship can meet all other criteria of a righteous Christian relationship, I would say that homosexuality is not sinful by its nature.

I would go even further to point out that anyone who claims homosexuals are sinful and proceeds to deny them rights, protest their 'sinful' ways or otherwise go out of their way to belittle them, either in public, private or even in the confines of their minds needs to learn how to LOVE THY NEIGHBOR, BITCH!

End Rant.exe
tl;dr Anyone who says that homosexuals are sinners need to go back to Sunday School.

We all know that the people (Repugnicants) are just using religion as a way to mask their homophobia. They're not fooling anyone (Although I'm pretty sure they think they are.).

Most religions follow the same ideals of not judging others and treating others the way you want to be treated. That doesn't mean you only treat people who are similar to you the way you want to be treated and fuck everyone else. It means you're supposed to treat everyone, regardless of your personal feelings about their lifestyle, the way you want others to treat you.

The Republican party is a fucking laughing stock with their 'beliefs'. If you don't have a dick you're not worth any sort of respect, and if you're not sticking it in a woman than you fall in the same category as one. I can't for the life of me understand why any woman would want to be a Republican, but I also can't understand why any woman would be Pro-life either. Just because you personally wouldn't get an abortion doesn't mean you have any right to tell another woman what to do with her reproductive organs!

Anyway, back to the topic!

I strongly believe that every single business who claims religious freedom when refusing service should have to prove that they practice that religion; notes from priests about the last time they went to confession, baptism certificates for all of their children....the whole freaking deal. If they want to use Religion, than they should have to prove they're a religious person and not just using it as an excuse.

 

[Brovo]

End Rant.exe

Warning: Sex parts on humans referenced, strictly in terms of history and biology though. You've been warned.

Quick note about homosexuality in ancient Rome: Roman Men who were possessed of the rights to Libertas and rulership over Familia were never permitted to be the lower half. It was socially unacceptable, period, because Roman men were expected to be the pinnacle of dominance. They could only take upon themselves those in the Infamia classes (slaves, prostitutes, entertainers, et cetera) who (with the exception of slaves obviously), while technically "free" by Roman laws, were second class citizens that often did not own property and had no legal say over their families. Thus, middle and upper class Roman men could boink lower class Roman men as the doms, and the Infamia had nothing to really lose in such a relationship, as they were already on the bottom rungs of society.

Basically, male on male wasn't just about the sex itself with dom vs sub, it was also entirely about social class. If an upper class male boinks a lower class male, neither person loses anything: The former retains their "Roman qualities" and the latter had nothing to lose to begin with. Under no other circumstances was this behaviour condoned or permitted, it was often compared to the Greeks, and used to dehumanize and make them inferior to the superior Roman culture.

In terms of Roman women boinking other women, early antiquity there wasn't much about it aside from "this is freakish." Later on during the late Republic era onward, they started to write about it more (or at least there are more surviving records), but they could only imagine such a relationship if one of the women in the pairing was "possessed of phallic vigor." IE: They possessed a dildo, or an especially enlarged clitoris, with which to use as a pseudo-penis. Yeah, they were as imaginative and weird as the Japanese are today.

As for everything else, completely agree. I just wanted to clarify the whole "Roman men boinking other men" thing, because it was more the Greeks that did the whole pedophilia thing. More specifically, the Spartan lifestyle of Agoge pretty much included it as core, because somehow, male, uhh... "Liquids", had magical properties by which to confer additional manliness to the, uh, younger receivers.

... It's fucking weird, okay? But in like, a completely delightful and obscene way.

Anywho...

Sorry I just fucking love ancient Rome it's a small obsession of mine.

 

[Grothnor]

Quick note about homosexuality in ancient Rome: Roman Men who were possessed of the rights to Libertas and rulership over Familia were never permitted to be the lower half. It was socially unacceptable, period, because Roman men were expected to be the pinnacle of dominance. They could only take upon themselves those in the Infamia classes (slaves, prostitutes, entertainers, et cetera) who (with the exception of slaves obviously), while technically "free" by Roman laws, were second class citizens that often did not own property and had no legal say over their families. Thus, middle and upper class Roman men could boink lower class Roman men as the doms, and the Infamia had nothing to really lose in such a relationship, as they were already on the bottom rungs of society.

Basically, male on male wasn't just about the sex itself with dom vs sub, it was also entirely about social class. If an upper class male boinks a lower class male, neither person loses anything: The former retains their "Roman qualities" and the latter had nothing to lose to begin with. Under no other circumstances was this behaviour condoned or permitted, it was often compared to the Greeks, and used to dehumanize and make them inferior to the superior Roman culture.

In terms of Roman women boinking other women, early antiquity there wasn't much about it aside from "this is freakish." Later on during the late Republic era onward, they started to write about it more (or at least there are more surviving records), but they could only imagine such a relationship if one of the women in the pairing was "possessed of phallic vigor." IE: They possessed a dildo, or an especially enlarged clitoris, with which to use as a pseudo-penis. Yeah, they were as imaginative and weird as the Japanese are today.

As for everything else, completely agree. I just wanted to clarify the whole "Roman men boinking other men" thing, because it was more the Greeks that did the whole pedophilia thing. More specifically, the Spartan lifestyle of Agoge pretty much included it as core, because somehow, male, uhh... "Liquids", had magical properties by which to confer additional manliness to the, uh, younger receivers.

... It's fucking weird, okay? But in like, a completely delightful and obscene way.

Yeah, I was trying to give a cut-down version of that, lest my rant get too long and I lose interest and never finish it.

 

[Sir Salty]

Curious: Which part of the US Constitution do you think this violates?

I think it breaks all kinds of rights. I think it's discrimination. I think it's treating people fairly unequally. I understand the Constitution was written by some religious people, what I meant to word is that I think it should be completely against the Constitution.

 

[Brovo]

I think it breaks all kinds of rights. I think it's discrimination. I think it's treating people fairly unequally. I understand the Constitution was written by some religious people, what I meant to word is that I think it should be completely against the Constitution.

That's the issue though. They're citing the religious freedoms clause from the first amendment of the Constitution as their reasoning for why this is okay.

 

[Sir Salty]

That's the issue though. They're citing the religious freedoms clause from the first amendment of the Constitution as their reasoning for why this is okay.

But it shouldn't be. That's my point.

The problem I have with the Consitution is that it has only been updated since 1992. That's still a fucking long ass time, for a 200 year document to dictate a life that is no longer the same as the founders who wrote the damn thing.

I don't think anyone's Beliefs religious or not should impact other people's lives.