posted
Icarus: thanks for the reply. My apologies if what you've read of my posts weren't more clear. That's a sad thought.
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posted
I still think using "blacks" and not "black people" while issuing lots of "white people" and "white folks" is inappropriate when writing for public consumption.
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quote: Black people can write, direct, and star in any kind of movie and make a lot of money for the studio.
quote: When black people know they're the majority of the audience, they don't follow all those white-people rules about prim audience behavior.
quote: It's like going to church. In African-American culture, most folks don't think that church is about sitting silently while the preacher edifies them and the choir sings. [By implication, "folks" in an African-American church would be black folks, no?]
quote: The thing to remember is, that's how black people feel all the time when they are out in the white-dominated world.
quote: Frankly, I wish everybody watched movies the way black people do.
I'm not saying you're definitely wrong, alluvion, but a cursory examination of this last column doesn't seem to bear you out.
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posted
My trouble is, hatrack drives me nuts. I guess some people just weren't made for internet forums.
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One reason to post short posts is to get away from the rhythm of demogoguery. If the "truth" you have to tell relies on the rhythm of your text rather than the content of your words, you're being charismatic, not truthful.
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posted
"One reason to post short posts is to get away from the rhythm of demogoguery. If the "truth" you have to tell relies on the rhythm of your text rather than the content of your words, you're being charismatic, not truthful. "
In response to what I think you mean, I happen to think nearly the opposite is true, order and rhythym is everything to truth, and words and sentences switched around will have a different meaning.
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posted
It's funny that Card's books tend to draw people that are opposed to his personal viewpoints. You just get a feeling reading his novels that his is open minded and compassionate and....well, liberal. Obviously that part isn't true.(the liberal part, he may be compassionate, i don't know.) I just try really hard to ignore all I hear about his political views so as not to lessen my joy at reading his beautiful stories.
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posted
I think I see the problem here...people are equating everything they like about Card with "goodness and intelligence" and everything they dislike about Card with "evil and stupid"...and thus they get all upset when they try to reconcile it.
Whatever happened to the viewpoint that it's possible to have vastly different opinions for reasons that have nothing to do with the intelligence and morality of the person? That is possible. In fact, it happens all the time.
I get the feeling a lot of people won't be satisfied until Card screams out "Being a conservative and being a devout Mormon is WRONG!"
Because they equate being such things with "evil and stupid". It's the ONLY WAY THEY CAN IMAGINE someone having those viewpoints.
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posted
I'll give an example from my own life: Most of my best friends in the entire world right now are gay. Many of them in commited same-gender relationships.
But it's not "despite despite native hostility" that I'm friends with them. It's not something seperate and/or in opposition to my religious beliefs.
It's because of the things my Mother, Church Leader, and Teachers (all Mormon!) taught me about having love and compassion for ALL those around me that I'm able to be friends with them.
And believe me, the question of how to treat people who identify themselves as homosexual did come up, many times. And always the answer was to treat them with the same love and friendship I would want to be treated with.
My gay friends know about the Church's position on same gender marriage. What they get though (and many online don't seem to get) is that it's a position not based on hatred, but on sincere belief that such is a divine law. That to encourage others to violate such a law would (to a Mormon) be the most hateful, spiteful thing in the world.
I'm starting to understand Card's anger in his recent essays, really I am.
It's frustrating to continually be told the view point MUST have it's origin in hatred, even when it doesn't.
To say nothing of being told that one's compassion is DESPITE following the gospel, even though it's the gospel that taught one's self that compassion.
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quote: But it's not "despite despite native hostility" that I'm friends with them. It's not something seperate and/or in opposition to my religious beliefs.
And when OSC apologizes for that whole "playing house" crack a few months back, I'll buy this excuse. But I don't believe he'd accuse a couple of his homosexual friends of "playing house" in a long-term committed relationship to their faces. I don't think you'd accuse any of your homosexual friends of the same thing, either. It's not something that someone says to friends. It's not even something that someone thinks about friends.
It's the sort of remark that someone makes when someone has forgotten the humanity of the people of whom he's speaking. In that essay, Card was very definitely treating 'em like varelse, not utlanning. I believe that this was a temporary lapse, and that he let the demagoguery get away from him -- in a very Grego-like fashion, mind you -- but I still consider it a bad sign.
------
BTW, Puffy, I'd like to think that you'd be a compassionate person without the gospel, too.
posted
As the Mormon definition of marriage is "between a man and a woman", changing that definition to include "between any two people of any sex" IS destruction of an important institution. Read the LDS Proclamation on the Family (you should be able to find it easily on the lds.org website). So again, Card isn't a "biggit", just someone who is defending what he believes to be important.
While he may be right or wrong (I would say right, of course), the question should be about his correctness, not about his motives.
Too often today, people who don't have PC opinions are silenced by claims that they are "hateful" or that the listeners are "offended". All this is a clumsy and churlish attempt to censor dissent and avoid a reasonable discussion of the issues.
My PC opinion? I trust Intel more than AMD.
Posts: 561 | Registered: Feb 2005
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posted
Heh, amusingly enough, this topic is about racism, not homosexuality. And sorry, but homosexuality isn't a race.
Considering that one of the biggest reasons that Card has stated that he moved to the South was for the multiracial environment, I would say that whatever he is, he's certainly not racist.
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Puffy, I think you have a valid point, but it was an obvious one. If I believe something is wrong there is a reason for it. (ie, it's "stupid" or "evil" or something else.) Orson must also believe that things are "stupid" or "evil" or "against God" or he wouldn't speak out against them. Like I said before, his political or personal views are not my concern, I just ignore them and enjoy the novels. Thanks, Nik
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I'm inclined to think along the same lines as TD, above (briefly). I would like to imagine that empathy is inborn, and that hatred is learned.
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posted
Porter, if you disagree that one is capable of thinking that two friends who love each other dearly, live together, and have openly committed their lives to each other are "playing house," I have to ask: why are these people your friends? Clearly you do not understand their feelings, or are otherwise so skeptical of their stated motivations that you find your position towards them to be adversarial. Where does friendship fit in?
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posted
It is possible to disagree strongly with the life choices of somebody and still be their friend. It is possible to still love them, even though you think their choices are destructive to themselves and a mockery of what you hold sacred.
It's hard to do sometimes, because we are all fallible mortals, but it is still possible. I believe it is a good thing, too.
posted
Porter, I don't think that's Tom's question.
I think what Tom is saying is you can believe that their life choices are immoral and contrary to your religious beliefs, but that does not necessitate believing that their stated intentions are dishonest or ridiculing them.
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posted
The ridiculing part doesn't enter into what I said. Tom said that there are some things that you don't even think about friends.
As for disbelieving their stated intentions -- I also don't think this has direct bearing on what I said. My friends believe X about their actions, possibly sincerely. I could believe that X isn't really true, no matter how much they want it to be, and that Y is true instead.
I was mostly taking exception to Tom's statement that there are certain things you don't even think, if you are really a friend.
posted
Maybe it depends on how deviant or sinful you think homosexuality is. Adultery is a sin, but it is not considered by most people to be as bad as murder or rape. I can be friends with an adulterer, but not a murderer.
[ March 14, 2005, 11:08 AM: Message edited by: Beren One Hand ]
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posted
Okay, Porter. I can see having an unkind thought about somebody you consider a friend. Point taken, I guess.
Beren, I think there's something to that, thought I personally would have trouble being friends with an adulterer as well. I could be friends with a promiscuous person who is not deceiving anybody, but not someone who cheats on a spouse. In fact, I have an acquaintance who is in an unhappy marriage and is always playing around with other guys--I don't know that she has taken it beyond that. But I have lost an immense amount of respect for her because of her flirting, and I no longer feel comfortable around her.
(And I don't mean harmless flirting, either. I mean basically hitting on people and encouraging them to reciprocate. Getting men she doesn't know to buy her drinks at a bar, not wearing her ring, etc.)
posted
Oh, I don't think Theresa's a troll. I think she's just extremely young and very, very prejudiced.
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posted
Well, I saw Mr. Card at a book signing in DC. He went on about how much he loves Queen Latifah....
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