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Author Topic: OSC writing Superman
Rakeesh
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Yes to the last? And/or yes to the similarities between the two?
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Aris Katsaris
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quote:
"NOM, of which Card is a member, has attempted boycotts of businesses due to their support of SSM."
I wasn't aware of this but I just googled it up and you're right (http://www.christianpost.com/news/nom-launches-boycott-of-starbucks-over-same-sex-marriage-stance-72006/).

Boycotting OSC just became significantly more proper, as reciprocity (tit-for-tat) is another obvious Schelling point. Argument in response to argument, boycott in response to boycott, violence in response to violence.

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Parkour
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So Orson Scott Card supports boycotts of businesses which don't tow the line, but to boycott him for that is bullying.
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Synesthesia
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This seems to be a can dish it out but can't take it situation. It's just, he's saying gay folks are destroying society and marriage and practically wiping their behinds on American apple pie and we're just supposed to do nothing?
Dude, people like me would still be on the back of the bus if folks didn't go, wait a minute, this whole segregation thing is kind of wrong. I'm sorry, but what else can we do? He's saying that I'd be a terrible marriage destroying person for marrying a dame and I kind of think he's wrong about that.
This doesn't mean I think he should be forced to renounce Mormonism or marry a man even though I dislike various aspects of Mormonism and the history of it but there's a thing called freedom of religion and a concept called, I'm sorry, but someone is going to RESPOND to you pushing them and it will keep going on and on.

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stilesbn
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quote:
Originally posted by Parkour:
So Orson Scott Card supports boycotts of businesses which don't tow the line, but to boycott him for that is bullying.

You'd have a point if he didn't think that it was wrong for Orson Scott Card to support boycotts of businesses which don't tow the line.
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Scott R
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Yes, it is wrong to boycott businesses for their political stance, where the stance is not part of their business. So, it's okay to boycott Walmart because of their unfair business practices; it is okay to boycott a bookstore that carries mainly LGBT literature; it is okay to boycott Christian bookstores.

It is NOT okay to boycott Starbucks for supporting SSM. It is not okay to boycott a business because it is owned by, or hires, people whose opinion you disagree with. (GENERALLY-- I'm sure someone is going to come out and say something farcical like, "YEAH? WHAT IF IT'S OWNED BY HITLER?")

I'm honestly less invested in the question of businesses, though, because it doesn't hit my freedom of expression buttons.

:shrug:

quote:
So Orson Scott Card supports boycotts of businesses which don't tow the line, but to boycott him for that is bullying.
You ascribe to the middle-school model of communication? "He called me a dweeb, so I called him a twerp?" "She pulled my hair, so I poked her in the eye?"

Tell me where the adult table is. [Big Grin]

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scifibum
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quote:
It is NOT okay to boycott Starbucks for supporting SSM
This surprises me, since before this you said you don't begrudge anyone their boycott, and seemed more worried about taking it beyond boycott and trying specifically to get someone fired.

A boycott is about trying to coerce a business to stop doing something harmful, or maybe sometimes start doing something desirable. It's not normally about getting someone fired, or "disenfranchising" an artist. If you think the business is causing harm, then trying to influence it to do something else must be okay if you aren't causing as much harm. (Of course these things are very subjective.)

Getting someone fired from a business because of their political views takes the issue beyond the ordinary, justifiable kind of boycott. The extra layer between the entity being coerced and the behavior at issue is crucial.

Edited to clarify what I expressed very poorly the first time around.

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Rakeesh
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quote:
I'm honestly less invested in the question of businesses, though, because it doesn't hit my freedom of expression buttons.
Well I mean the two matters *are* related, and on the same grounds if not scale. If one boycotts a business because as you say of their political stance of supporting SSM, then that is their political stance that is being opposed-it's just that the pressure being applied is on their business. They're not fighting the idea with ideas, they're fighting to defund the idea.

Likewise on Card's level. He has been a not inconsiderable voice in opposition to SSM. Attempting to see to it that his prestige and name recognition, not to mention his earnings, are inhibited to dwindle the support for the idea of opposition to SSM...well, it seems like if one is a violation of freedom of expression, so to is the other. So I suppose the question is, why does one trigger your freedom of expression button more than the other?

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Samprimary
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quote:
Originally posted by scifibum:
Getting someone fired from a business because of their political views takes the issue beyond the ordinary, justifiable kind of boycott.

So, do you think this is categorically true? 'cause if so my answer is kind of "yeah right"

Like, this is tricky and requires clarification. If I boycott the Superman comic — like, I say I am not purchasing the comic and want nobody else to purchase the Superman comic and we start a boycott, is this an ordinary, justifiable kind of boycott? Or does it already categorically cross into the territory of an "unjustifiable" boycott somehow.

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Samprimary
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also where the hell are we on this.

is the comic even going to happen or what

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BlackBlade
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quote:
Originally posted by Samprimary:
also where the hell are we on this.

is the comic even going to happen or what

The way that article was written really pisses me off.
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Stone_Wolf_
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In what way?
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BlackBlade
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quote:
story written by noted homophobe — sorry, “gay marriage opponent” — Orson Scott Card
Ah ha ah ha ha. See it's funny because he pretended like when we write articles we can have Freudian slips too! Also, lets make the word homophobe meaningless except as a word to describe anybody who isn't ok with same-sex marriage. Yep, they are all doing it out of an irrational fear of homosexuality.

quote:
The now non-homophobic Adventures of Superman no. 1 will be launched digitally on April 29
Couldn't end the article without dropping the word one last time, just so we *know* the article writer is definitely standing up for gay rights in his article. He's got your back, unless you happen to disagree with him on this, in which case you are one of those homophobes.

edit: Also, as others noted in the comments. The article is not controversial, the author is apparently. But hey, I'm sure the comic was going to be all about Superman breaking up a secret Mormon general authority gay-sex ring.

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Synesthesia
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quote:
Originally posted by Scott R:
[QB] Yes, it is wrong to boycott businesses for their political stance, where the stance is not part of their business. So, it's okay to boycott Walmart because of their unfair business practices; it is okay to boycott a bookstore that carries mainly LGBT literature; it is okay to boycott Christian bookstores.

It is NOT okay to boycott Starbucks for supporting SSM. It is not okay to boycott a business because it is owned by, or hires, people whose opinion you disagree with. (GENERALLY-- I'm sure someone is going to come out and say something farcical like, "YEAH? WHAT IF IT'S OWNED BY HITLER?")

I'm honestly less invested in the question of businesses, though, because it doesn't hit my freedom of expression buttons.

:shrug:

Your position isn't making sense to me. OSC wrote about overthrowing the government if gay marriage is allowed. How do you expect people to respond to this?
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Samprimary
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quote:
Ah ha ah ha ha. See it's funny because he pretended like when we write articles we can have Freudian slips too! Also, lets make the word homophobe meaningless except as a word to describe anybody who isn't ok with same-sex marriage. Yep, they are all doing it out of an irrational fear of homosexuality.
This would be a good thing to charge the writer of the article with, except the writer of the article obviously wasn't just using OSC's opposition to gay marriage as the sole input with which to label OSC a homophobe. You are inferring that, sorry.

I mean seriously I would get the frustration, except you are levying a narrowing charge. We are talking about a person who has a harrowingly homophobic history in his political articles and acts, is literally a director of the national organization of marriage, said that we need to keep homosexual laws on the books because gays "cannot be permitted to remain as acceptable, equal citizens within that society" and then later said that good real-married folk have to rise up and take down a government that lets gays marry.

So one of the reasons you are pissed off about the article is because you are assuming that the writer's definition of homophobia is "a word to describe anybody who isn't ok with same-sex marriage"

when you can't say that's what they are doing, especially with card's long history of saying and doing a boatload of things that people are reasonably going to interpret as homophobic. Which are, in fact, referenced.

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Samprimary
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quote:
Originally posted by Synesthesia:

Your position isn't making sense to me. OSC wrote about overthrowing the government if gay marriage is allowed. How do you expect people to respond to this?

well hey technically an anti-gay overthrow of the government isn't a boycott so there's no need to be as concerned about it, right
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Synesthesia
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I reckon he has the freedom to overthrow the entire government if gays are allowed to marry legally on a federal level. It's just overthrowing the entire government.
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BlackBlade
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quote:
Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:
Ah ha ah ha ha. See it's funny because he pretended like when we write articles we can have Freudian slips too! Also, lets make the word homophobe meaningless except as a word to describe anybody who isn't ok with same-sex marriage. Yep, they are all doing it out of an irrational fear of homosexuality.
This would be a good thing to charge the writer of the article with, except the writer of the article obviously wasn't just using OSC's opposition to gay marriage as the sole input with which to label OSC a homophobe. You are inferring that, sorry.

I mean seriously I would get the frustration, except you are levying a narrowing charge. We are talking about a person who has a harrowingly homophobic history in his political articles and acts, is literally a director of the national organization of marriage, said that we need to keep homosexual laws on the books because gays "cannot be permitted to remain as acceptable, equal citizens within that society" and then later said that good real-married folk have to rise up and take down a government that lets gays marry.

So one of the reasons you are pissed off about the article is because you are assuming that the writer's definition of homophobia is "a word to describe anybody who isn't ok with same-sex marriage"

when you can't say that's what they are doing, especially with card's long history of saying and doing a boatload of things that people are reasonably going to interpret as homophobic. Which are, in fact, referenced.

I cannot think of one thing (no exaggeration) one thing Mr. Card has done that I would accept as being indicative of homophobia.

We have to stop using the word phobia as a synonym for "against something".

I have heard people on this board laugh at Mormonism many times. Nobody has dropped the word "Momonophobes" to describe them. Were same-sex marriage advocates who gathered at the LA temple to protest Prop 8 afraid of Mormonism? Is the Edmunds Tucker act an example of institutionalized Mormonophobia?

Homophobia is being misused, you can hedge all you want that homosexuals are being abused more than the other way around, but time and time again I've refused to countenance that. I can't back any cause where my allies are acting in a shameful manner.

I managed to identify homophobia in myself, and I can clearly see it in others often times. But Mr. Card's very aggressive and passionate opposition against homosexuality cannot be conflated with homophobia. For heaven's sake, the man is one of the most introspective people in the history of the written word, and while it's easy to point out that he does not like homosexuality, or approves of it, the idea that he harbors an irrational fear of it, and it leads him to act in the way he does strains credulity.

Put another way, who is somebody who is an opponent of same-sex marriage you would *not* call a homophobe?

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Rakeesh
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Given some of the things he's advocated to deter or inhibit public acceptance of homosexuality, speaking for myself I wouldn't so quickly set aside the term 'irrational fear.'

As for the Wired article itself, yeah, it was a tedious bit of choir preaching, and lived up entirely to the expectations it fostered within the first paragraph. Shoddy writing and shoddy argument. For both reasons and especially because of its attempt to oppose a political belief by basically calling it mean and stupid, I'm not a fan of the article.

All of that said, though, and without condoning it, I have a difficult time mustering up much sympathy for Card on this matter. It's not as though all of this outrage and insult and hysteria just abruptly got thrown at him. For a long, long time, years before gay rights was holding out much hope for equality other than 'wait for the young to get older', Card has been writing essays and columns very, very similar to that Wired article.

I'm not a fan of that style of attack, but Card's been rolling around in the dirt for decades now. My sympathy for him on this is pretty abstract.

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BlackBlade
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Rakeesh: You may not realize it, but I see people who might otherwise feel different harden their stance again homosexuality precisely because they see that homosexuals are becoming a PC protected minority, while Mormonism is still laughed and scorned. Millions flood to see The Book of Mormon Musical, and laugh at the silly Mormons, make fun of them perpetually for being polygamists once upon a time, hate them for denying blacks the priesthood for so long, and rail against them for supporting measures designed to stop homosexuals from being married in identical terms as heterosexuals.

This, and then these Mormons come to church and hear, "The world will hate you because you love me." and "The people in the great and spacious building (a metaphor for the non-believers) pointed their fingers and mocked those who partook of the fruit (those in the church). The world is playing to the script in the scriptures (no pun intended) almost perfectly, so why shouldn't they hold fast, rather than release their grip? Nobody wants to approve of them anyway, they are just those stupid Mormons who believe in their phoney baloney Joe Smith and his imaginary gold plates. Oh, and EL OH EL they wear magic underwear.

I am intensely sorry for the mis-steps my church has made regarding homosexuality. I think it's a blot on our history, just like denying black's the priesthood. But I have no illusions that if those things had never happened, that somehow Mormonism would be respected or that it would suddenly stop being fashionable to make fun of them. We have been made fun of, and persecuted literally since the church was restored by Joseph Smith. There's a reason we ended up in Utah, and it wasn't because we liked eating sego lilies and living in mud huts.

I have a lot of respect for trying to use proper language including using phrases that adhere to what the people they are describing are comfortable with (You could call this PC). Yet it sickens me to see people use the term homophobe without any sort of respect for what that word implies. It's being used to shut down discourse, to shut down the meaningful exchange of ideas.

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Stone_Wolf_
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I think part of the problem here is definitions. Here is what wiki has to say on the matter:

quote:
Homophobia encompasses a range of negative attitudes and feelings toward homosexuality or people who are identified or perceived as being lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender (LGBT). It can be expressed as antipathy, contempt, prejudice, aversion, or hatred, and may be based on irrational fear.
Now, if this writer was trying to clinically diagnose OSC as suffering acute homophobia, I would agree with you BB. But unfortunately, the language has moved away from the scientific use of the word that you are defending.

That OSC does not have an actual fear of gays does not mean that by the common usage of the term he is not a homophobe. I'm afraid being a queer quashing crusader of Christianity (I would have said Mormonism, but it didn't flow) puts him head and shoulders into that category. And if he doesn't like it, he shouldn't call for the overthrow of the U.S. government, or declare that SSM is the end of democracy, or that gays need to be made an example of and not allowed to be a part of our society.

I know you have tremendous respect for the man, and are yourself a proponent of civil rights for gays, but unfortunately (for those who would love to hold him in high esteem and honor, like myself), the world sees his active campaign against SSM is...well, evil. And I am forced to agree.

The man was my personal hero for the middle third of my life. No longer. If he merely approached this topic with the benevolent heart of a true believer who wanted nothing more then to help those who's souls his beliefs put in danger of damnation and not actively pressuring society to create an prosecuted underclass, then I could not feel as I do.

But let's be honest here. He is trying to alienate gays, he puts real effort into it. And as such deserves the title bigot and homophobe.

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BlackBlade
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Stone_Wolf:
quote:
Homophobia encompasses a range of negative attitudes and feelings toward homosexuality or people who are identified or perceived as being lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender (LGBT). It can be expressed as antipathy, contempt, prejudice, aversion, or hatred, and may be based on irrational fear.
I cannot get behind that definition of homophobia. It makes homophobia something unique and apart from pretty much every other word that has the suffix -phobia.
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Synesthesia
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Phobia means discomfort and being freaked out by something too. Like gum freaks me out. Wads of it, the sound of it. UGH. Chiclephobia is the word for fear of gum. It doesn't make me run screaming, but it's SO GROSS.

But it's kind of pathological to think that more rights for gays will equal collapse, everyone becoming gay, no one ever, ever marrying heterosexually. Folks are not pushing to ban gay temples, or ban missionaries, or ban Mormons from marrying and practicing their religion, but folks like OSC do not even seem to want gays to have civil unions, at least NOM doesn't want them to and what is up with that?

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BlackBlade
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I'm not advocating for Mr. Card's views in this matter or for NOM Synesthesia.
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Destineer
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The point about humor is a little weird. There's only a very small PC subculture in which you can't make fun of gay people. Gay jokes are an entire industry of their own for comedians. And gay people, by and large, are very good-natured about being the butt of jokes.
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Samprimary
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quote:
while it's easy to point out that he does not like homosexuality, or approves of it, the idea that he harbors an irrational fear of it ...
yeah he's written hundreds of words detailing how gay marriage literally imperils civilization. That the government allowing gay marriage means you are to turn against the government, because of the peril to the Reproductive Order. I don't know what else I can tell you except "you have just described an idea which does not strain credulity."
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BlackBlade
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quote:
Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:
while it's easy to point out that he does not like homosexuality, or approves of it, the idea that he harbors an irrational fear of it ...
yeah he's written hundreds of words detailing how gay marriage literally imperils civilization. That the government allowing gay marriage means you are to turn against the government, because of the peril to the Reproductive Order. I don't know what else I can tell you except "you have just described an idea which does not strain credulity."
Then his conclusions are bad ones, not homophobic ones. I mean, I hate to use Hitler but he was an anti-semite, not a jewaphobe (yes I made that word up).
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Mucus
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quote:
Originally posted by BlackBlade:
... they see that homosexuals are becoming a PC protected minority, while Mormonism is still laughed and scorned.

Yeah, I remember the time that openly gay guy almost got elected President while the Mormon stood no chance at all. Oh wait, the other thing.

I know you're trying to relate the thoughts that other people in your Church are feeling, but this Christian persecution thing you've (as a a group) presumably inherited from other Christians is just terribly unconvincing, especially in America of all places.

Edit to add: The even weirder bit in my view is that the actual persecution of Mormons back in the past was largely done by a pre-dominantly conservative by our standards Christian country. The people that have the most solid grounds to mock and laugh at Mormonism today are not Christian and typically aren't conservative.

If you're right and Mormons are striking back at being oppressed, they're basically standing with the people that actually oppressed them against people that didn't even really have a place in America at the time.

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scifibum
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quote:
Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:
Originally posted by scifibum:
Getting someone fired from a business because of their political views takes the issue beyond the ordinary, justifiable kind of boycott.

So, do you think this is categorically true? 'cause if so my answer is kind of "yeah right"

Like, this is tricky and requires clarification. If I boycott the Superman comic — like, I say I am not purchasing the comic and want nobody else to purchase the Superman comic and we start a boycott, is this an ordinary, justifiable kind of boycott? Or does it already categorically cross into the territory of an "unjustifiable" boycott somehow.

What's the goal of your boycott? Is the economic pressure directed at that goal or not?

If I boycott Starbucks because of their political lobbying or donations, hopefully I *tell* them and my boycott may have the result I want.

If I boycott Starbucks because they employed someone I don't like, that's just silly, because employing someone I don't like isn't something that it makes sense for me to protest. What harm does that do? Allowing jerks to make a living? Yeah, I'm in favor of allowing jerks to make a living.

I do think that if you're going to use economic coercion tactics in response to harmful political positions, you need to direct them directly. Not at a secondary or tertiary level.

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BlackBlade
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quote:
Originally posted by Mucus:
quote:
Originally posted by BlackBlade:
... they see that homosexuals are becoming a PC protected minority, while Mormonism is still laughed and scorned.

Yeah, I remember the time that openly gay guy almost got elected President while the Mormon stood no chance at all. Oh wait, the other thing.


Oh yeah, Mormons have a *long* rich history of being elected president. Let's not remember that four years ago it was precisely Romney's Mormoness that lost him the Republican nomination to McCain. And look at the field he won the nomination over this time around? Easily the worst crop of sordid crazy fools I've ever seen. Yay for him beating out the Idiot League. I'm sure after he was nominated nobody said anything about whether the country was ready for a Mormon president, or whether Romney would consult with church leadership during his administration. Nope.

Look I'm not trying (but I may be inadvertently doing this) to build a Mormons have it worse than homosexuals argument. I'm trying to point out that one form of bigotry is becoming (rightfully) increasingly frowned on. While the other has existed since the beginning and nobody stands up for them. Like seriously when a Jew wrote an editorial about how he found The Book of Mormon movie distasteful, and were it about Jews or Muslims people wouldn't be nearly so giddy about it, he got shouted down.

Nobody mentions that Matt Stone and Trey Parker already had a movie about Mormon missionaries starring in pornos years ago, or that one of their most talked about episodes of South Park is called "Meet the Mormons" and it eviscerates the Mormon church. Nobody is going to call them Mormonophobes.

Look, there are plenty of homophobes out there, and calling them out is fine. But there are people who don't support same-sex marriage who are not homophobic, and they don't deserve to have their livelihoods destroyed, or be disrespected. They need to be reasoned with and helped to change their minds. Mr. Card may not somebody who can be persuaded, but so what? There are atheists here who aren't going to become members of my faith, they might even donate money to groups that try to promote that belief system, I don't lose sleep over it, and I don't expend my outrage because of it. I don't support what NOM is doing, and frankly I'm kinda embarrassed that the president of the university I graduated from is the member who left and Mr. Card replaced. But I've never met the man, I don't know what goes into his decisions, his father is an apostle I have a lot of respect for.

I can't give this thread the attention it deserves, I'm already spending time I should spend elsewhere trying to write these posts. But I don't want to live in a society, where somebody like Mr. Card is exiled and cannot work in his field, not because he has no ability or his work itself lacks merit, but because he believes and is vocal about his beliefs, and supports organizations that attempt to make that belief reality. If it can happen to him in this way, with this justification, it can happen to others. We don't need that principle in our society.

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Darth_Mauve
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The big difference--Mormon's try to make homosexuals change their ways. Homosexuals as a whole, don't care what religion you are.
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Scott R
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quote:
Originally posted by Darth_Mauve:
The big difference--Mormon's try to make homosexuals change their ways.

Let's be realistic-- Mormons want to change the whole world, not just gay people.
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Rakeesh
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BlackBlade,

This conversation reminds me again at how you're somewhat stuck in the middle in these sorts of conversations. I can appreciate somewhat what that's like, and wanted to take a moment to say that it was noticed in case it didn't seem that way.

Anyway, on to the argument;) I've never had any patience with the victimization claim made by Christians in the US, since it seems that 9/10 times what is actually being decried is a gradual shift in prestige and loss of default-respect as though this were some sort of attack. With respect to Mormons, I would be a little less impatient with such claims, because to those of us outside the Christianity club, Mormonism isn't really stranger just newer. Mucus seems to have the right of it to me-Mormons as a group, so far as they can be characterized as such, seem to have made common cause with the people (conservative Christians) who were the ones driving old persecution. But for those who do feel that homosexuals are more respected than Mormons, I'd just love to hear about the last time a Mormon was hitched to a truck and dragged to death, or when the last time a bunch of Mormon kids were denied the right to form a club in school, so on and so forth.

I will agree, though, that in terms of trends prejudice and mockery of homosexuals is becoming less acceptable more than the same against Mormons-but the thing is, it's radically different groups doing it. Most people don't have the foggiest idea about what Mormons actually *are*, really, except maybe 'Utah Christians' or something...unless they are active Christians themselves. Us secular types will complain and criticize about Prop 8 and blacks in the priesthood, that's certainly true, but we're deeply critical of Christians on a variety of things anyway. We're not the ones taking about cults and false Christians and secret ceremonies and so on. For the really virulent stuff (which is, thankfully, confined to speech), you have to look much closer to home.

Perhaps one of the reasons those of us on the outside of the whole faith camp don't appreciate as much as perhaps we should this prejudice and bigotry is, well, hey. We're insulted in quite a few of the same ways, and have been for generations.

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MattP
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quote:
Yes, it is wrong to boycott businesses for their political stance, where the stance is not part of their business.
When a business takes a political stance, it is part of their business. Their ability to take the stance, support that stance tangibly, and advocate for that stance to others is directly influenced by their success as a business. It's entirely appropriate to decide to stop supporting that business as a customer and to advocate for others to do the same if you disagree with their stance and don't wish to support it.
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Parkour
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quote:
Originally posted by scifibum:
quote:
Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:
Originally posted by scifibum:
Getting someone fired from a business because of their political views takes the issue beyond the ordinary, justifiable kind of boycott.

So, do you think this is categorically true? 'cause if so my answer is kind of "yeah right"

Like, this is tricky and requires clarification. If I boycott the Superman comic — like, I say I am not purchasing the comic and want nobody else to purchase the Superman comic and we start a boycott, is this an ordinary, justifiable kind of boycott? Or does it already categorically cross into the territory of an "unjustifiable" boycott somehow.

What's the goal of your boycott? Is the economic pressure directed at that goal or not?
Of course it is. That's the point of boycotts, after all. We wish to show our nonsupport, as consumers, for a specific thing. In this case, let's say the boycott is "show your nonsupport of dc hiring a director of the national organization of marriage" - is that justifiable, or categorically unjustifiable?
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BlackBlade
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Rakeesh: I appreciate that. It does suck being in the middle a bit, where your own faith thinks your on the road to apostasy, and liberals think you're crazy.

quote:
Mucus seems to have the right of it to me-Mormons as a group, so far as they can be characterized as such, seem to have made common cause with the people (conservative Christians) who were the ones driving old persecution.
There are a lot of reasons why it appears Mormons are conservative. But in reality, they are not. Most Mormons don't even live in the continental US, you could not describe them as conservatives. It's not a feature of the religion that lends itself to conservatism, rather people who are conservatives like liberals look at the religion, find intersections that fit their biases and beliefs, and go from there.

When I read my scriptures, I see confirmation for what I believe in regards to same-sex marriage and a great many topics all over the place. I'm just as guilty to a degree.

As for Mormon persecution look deeper, it's there. I've been persecuted for being a Mormon. A man in one of my wards from Afghanistan had men looking to kill him as part of a fatwa that had been declared against him. As a missionary I had anti-mormons interrupt us while we were talking to people on the street and try to start fights with us. A man assaulted me once (though he was mentally ill) because I was a Mormon. There were signs on the streets in Taiwan that warned people to stay away from Mormons. My father was denied a job because he was LDS. But no, I cannot claim that in the US a person was dragged by a truck until he was dead because he was LDS. But I wouldn't put it past some people, given the right circumstances, to do that sort of thing to a Mormon. How hard is it to shoot a man?

But it's human nature to want to get out from being bullied, and throw your weight around. It's a sad lesson, but often a fringe group that gains acceptance in the mainstream turns right around and finds other groups to persecute.

Homosexuals aren't trying to force their way into a Mormon temple. But who remembers Chic-Fil-A being told by a Chicago government official they couldn't open a location because of the beliefs of their CEO? Who remembers a Mormon trying to write a Superman comic and being told that because he is trying to stop same-sex marriage, he can't work for DC comics?

If the shoe was on the other foot, we wouldn't applaud that state of affairs because we agree with same-sex marriage. If comic book stores said they weren't holding Superman on shelves not because Mr. Card was a supporter of same-sex marriage, but because he supports GLAAD, and they lobby for political recognition of same-sex marriage, and hey sometimes they discuss which constituencies they could get a foothold in secret memos, we wouldn't get behind it. NOM isn't supporting Nigerian Christian extremists. They aren't violently attacking homosexuals either. So comparisons to groups like the KKK are ludicrous.

And I am clearly too angry at this topic, because here again I am posting.

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steven
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If OSC had the writing history of James Dobson (or perhaps Tim Lahaye...I can't think of a comparably famous conservative-Christian-fiction writer), this wouldn't be as big a deal with his core readership.
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Rakeesh
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quote:
Homosexuals aren't trying to force their way into a Mormon temple. But who remembers Chic-Fil-A being told by a Chicago government official they couldn't open a location because of the beliefs of their CEO? Who remembers a Mormon trying to write a Superman comic and being told that because he is trying to stop same-sex marriage, he can't work for DC comics?
Just to point out, what I also remember is that in the case of CFA, some of the strongest critics of opponents of SSM were also loudest in opposition to such behavior by the government. In other words, it didn't go unchallenged. As for the would-be DC writer, well I will say to me that's a slightly different case. I still think it's wrong, but this particular writer has supported-in voice and otherwise-very, very similar methods. I can still disapprove of a particular method without feeling very bad if at all for one who is attacked with his own tactics.
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BlackBlade
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quote:
Just to point out, what I also remember is that in the case of CFA, some of the strongest critics of opponents of SSM were also loudest in opposition to such behavior by the government
And in this Superman scenario some gay people who said they think this is a bad idea, but I haven't heard anybody prominent pull a John Adams and say, "No way, not on my watch." Honestly DCs handling of the situation thus far has impressed me. But I still think we may be inches from them letting Mr. Card go.

As for tit-for-tat, I've never subscribed to it.

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Stone_Wolf_
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quote:
I can still disapprove of a particular method without feeling very bad if at all for one who is attacked with his own tactics.
Yup.
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Samprimary
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quote:
Originally posted by BlackBlade:
quote:
Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:
while it's easy to point out that he does not like homosexuality, or approves of it, the idea that he harbors an irrational fear of it ...
yeah he's written hundreds of words detailing how gay marriage literally imperils civilization. That the government allowing gay marriage means you are to turn against the government, because of the peril to the Reproductive Order. I don't know what else I can tell you except "you have just described an idea which does not strain credulity."
Then his conclusions are bad ones, not homophobic ones. I mean, I hate to use Hitler but he was an anti-semite, not a jewaphobe (yes I made that word up).
Again, I don't know what to tell you. If hitler had said "...the personification of the devil as the symbol of all evil assumes the living shape of the Homosexual." and "the discovery of the Homosexual virus is one of the greatest revolutions that has taken place in the world. The battle in which we are engaged today is of the same sort as the battle waged, during the last century, by Pasteur and Koch. How many diseases have their origin in the Homosexual virus! ... We shall regain our health only be eliminating the Homosexual"

we sure as hell would be calling hitler a homophobe for it.

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Jeff C.
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Samp, are those quotes from OSC?
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Anthonie
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The quotes are from Hitler, if we replace "homosexual" with "Jewish/Jew".
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BlackBlade
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quote:
Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:
Originally posted by BlackBlade:
quote:
Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:
while it's easy to point out that he does not like homosexuality, or approves of it, the idea that he harbors an irrational fear of it ...
yeah he's written hundreds of words detailing how gay marriage literally imperils civilization. That the government allowing gay marriage means you are to turn against the government, because of the peril to the Reproductive Order. I don't know what else I can tell you except "you have just described an idea which does not strain credulity."
Then his conclusions are bad ones, not homophobic ones. I mean, I hate to use Hitler but he was an anti-semite, not a jewaphobe (yes I made that word up).
Again, I don't know what to tell you. If hitler had said "...the personification of the devil as the symbol of all evil assumes the living shape of the Homosexual." and "the discovery of the Homosexual virus is one of the greatest revolutions that has taken place in the world. The battle in which we are engaged today is of the same sort as the battle waged, during the last century, by Pasteur and Koch. How many diseases have their origin in the Homosexual virus! ... We shall regain our health only be eliminating the Homosexual"

we sure as hell would be calling hitler a homophobe for it.

Then, again, that's a problem with the word homophobe. Why don't we say Hitler had a fear of Jews? Because he didn't. He knew exactly what he was doing with his abuse of the Jews. They were a stepping stone he could use. The idea that he was irrationally afraid of them, and so he put them all in ghettos and extermination camps is not something I've heard any historian argue.
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jebus202
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LOL
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Rakeesh
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Is there a reason it would be all one or the other? Aren't human motives, even outside Godwins, rather more complicated than that?
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Synesthesia
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Phobia doesn't just mean fear.
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Stone_Wolf_
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For the record:

quote:
Judeophobia- Fear of Jews.
http://phobialist.com/

Oh, and WHY THE HOLOCAUST - Hitler's Darwinistic Messianic Genocide By Jan Horník does say that Hitler was a Judeophobe.

I could look more up...but I'd rather not. Ew.

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Ginol_Enam
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quote:
Originally posted by BlackBlade:
Who remembers a Mormon trying to write a Superman comic and being told that because he is trying to stop same-sex marriage, he can't work for DC comics?
[/QB]

Except for this website, I really haven't seen OSC's Mormonism referenced regarding this Superman story. I'm not even sure how many people realize he is a Mormon. The anger about this story, from the OSC's opponents anyway, seems pretty focused on his "anti-homosexual" stance. Obviously, the LDS church is a large part of who OSC is and certainly an influence on his opinion here, but I don't see it being under attack at any point in connection to this Superman gig. Personally, I think your insistence to shoehorn his Mormonism is rings a little false, BB.
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BlackBlade
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quote:
Originally posted by Synesthesia:
Phobia doesn't just mean fear.

Yes it does. It's roots are literally grounded in fear. The fact people are trying to use it to mean not liking something is precisely what I am arguing against.

---------

quote:
Except for this website, I really haven't seen OSC's Mormonism referenced regarding this Superman story.
Where did I make the accusation this was all being done because of Mr. Card's Mormonism?
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