College Conservative

:D

Yes. Unless the statement that "life starts at conception" is actually the truth. It's not annoying to ask people to follow the truth. Especially when they themselves know it's true, as is the case here.

What could have more truth about a gay person's gayness? You don't have to follow it - you don't even have to accept it. A person will be gay to their heart's content whether you believe in it or not.

There actually is a real difference between "life and death" issues, and "social circumstance" issues. (I'm not just making that up to win an argument, or promote a platform.) That's why I think the comparison is slightly misleading.

What could be more life and death than a person's gayness? It's definitely their life - in fact, when you've found the person you truly love, you could even say that it's your WHOLE life. If children get involved, it affects their life too. And if you live in the many, many places where being gay is still socially dangerous, the risk of death very much gets involved.

Something doesn't become less important of an issue just because you're not involved. So I stand by my comparison.

If that is the case, the same goes with religious beliefs. Part of millions of people's religious beliefs is that marriage was created by God for one man and one woman. One's religion can be considered their whole life. There are many places in the world where it is dangerous to have certain religious views, like Christianity, where imprisonment and death take place on a regular basis. But yet my religious views become less important of an issue just because a gay person does not share them. So your comparison only stands for one side, not all sides.

The church and the government are supposed to be separate. Your religious beliefs should not overshadow someone elses rights. If you want to base laws on the bible then you gotta use the whole bible. No tattoos, no cutting your hair, no make up, stone people to death for being adulterers, don't let women touch anything while they have a period, and lets get some laws on the books for the proper way to sacrifice your sheep.Most biblical laws make no sense. The ten commandments make sense. The words of Christ make sense. The rest is NONsense.

Why cant i give you more than one upvote, WHY?!!?!

I upvoted this comment of yours because I like your use of "spin," but when it comes to the reality of the issues I agree with what d2renterprise wrote below.

As a Christian, I think most of us believe gays have rights. Jesus was on earth to pay the penalty for all of us, people have the ability to accept him, or not. Jesus fulfilled the law because no one can live up to it. It's about grace & mercy. There were a lot of good points made in the above arguments. Please don't try to tell me that Christians aren't also discriminated against in this country or that gays aren't. I have been plenty discriminated against. I believe we all react to being treated badly. I have more respect for gay people who feel they have no choice than I do for Christians who (wantonly) have multiple divorces. After the Supreme Court decision about gay marriage I did not hear even one word about it in my (not liberal, but bible believing) church. My last word is that we need to defend the choice of a fetus, defend our right to religion, and not persecute gay people.

I have upvoted this but mostly because of the perspective it might give some people. I sincerely hope there aren't any idiots left in the civilised world who think gays are not human.

I wish I knew who made this meme :)

Nice!! :D

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Let me just say this. Gays had every right (before the government legalized same sex marriage) to get married. A gay man could have married a woman, and a gay woman could have married a man. This was never illegal. Also the government allowed for same sex couples to join together through civil unions, and could receive the same legal rights as a married couple by filing some paperwork. So the easiest thing that could have been done was to change the rights given in civil unions instead of changing marriage. And before any tries to tell me that a gay person marrying someone of the opposite sex is not the same because someone of the opposite sex is not exactly who they would choose to marry, think about this. If I stated that I choose to marry Selena Gomez and my human rights are being violated because since we have never met I am not allowed to marry her, does that mean I don't have the right to get married because I can't marry the person I choose (Selena Gomez)? Or if a 40 year old and a 14 year old were to fall in love, should they be allowed to get married because love has no boundaries?

You are missing the point. The benefits and responsibilities of marriage is involved either directly or indirectly in literally thousands of individual pieces of legislation of all levels. To expand the law to equalize the rights of civil unions to the rights of marriage would have taken FOR EVER - and every step of the way, there'd be someone trying to say "well, THIS is the part where we should turn around and stop, because where does it end?" It would be exhausting, it would cost tax payer money out the wazoo, and ultimately, same-sex couples wouldn't get the rights for their families that they desperately need.

Or, we could just mature as a society, and realize that "marriage" is just a word, and like many words can have and has had multiple meanings. It has a spiritual definition, it has a cultural definition, and it has a legal definition. Same-sex couples just want the legal definition, because then they can get on with their lives and be with their families without worrying what happens to them with inheritance laws, child custody, taxation, employment benefits, insurance coverage - all that stuff, that is an inseparable from spending the rest of your life with someone.

But what you fail to understand is that this is the only time in history where the "rights" gained for one individual has impacted in a negative way the rights of another individual. Religious individuals and organizations are now being forced to change their religious practices in order to keep from getting sued. Marriage is not just a word, it is a religious practice. The government gave certain rights to married couples because the can see that when a man and woman join together, you get a reproductive society, and there are many other benefits to a society that can do this. Marriage was never created by the government, otherwise the government would have never created civil unions.

And you also missed the point that it was never illegal for gay people to get married. You also have failed to see the other negative impacts that this has on society. Shorty after the legalization took place, child molesters wanted their acts to be considered normal instead of a criminal act based off of the same arguments the LGBT community used with love having no boundaries. There was also a man suing to make it legal for him to have more than one wife. All of this was predicted by those of us who still believe in the sanctity of marriage being between one man, one woman, and God, but people like you said it would never happen. You also said churches would be protected, but that is not the case either. So answer this, why should I lose my rights just for someone else to gain theirs?

Child molesters and polygamists are going to discover very quickly that we have already had those fights: children and animals cannot legally give consent, and the rights of polygamists were very clearly and very narrowly defined when Utah joined the union. (I assume we're talking about the USA - I don't know what the situation is elsewhere.) The historical rulings will stand with very little contest. Their cases will go down in history as non-issues - just as gay rights' activists predicted that they would. I personally never said that these cases would never happen - I said that these cases would never be taken seriously in court, and I still say that.

As to your other point, where you believe this to be a case of one group's rights against another and you can't have both rights coexisting with each other - well, honestly, that's what happens when the rights you claim intentionally curtail the rights of people who just want to live their lives. There are many Christian churches that are not only fine with same-sex marriage but are even happy to perform the service; you won't hear them complain about any infringements of their rights. If your right is to deny rights to other people, that's going to end up in court. Take it up with them.

And you really need to stop saying that gay people were free to marry people they did not love. That's not a solution to anybody's problem.

Here is an argument they can use, easily. Age of consent in many states is 16. Right now, someone at the age of 16 can get married with parental consent. It wouldn't take much to change that to not needing parental consent and lower the age to say 14 or even 12. If a 12 year old can make the conscious decision to have sex and get pregnant, why should they be considered not able to give legal consent in other areas of their life? If love has no boundaries between sexes, then why should it with age?

Have you not seen what has happened to many churches that have been forced to accept same sex marriage? And yes I do mean forced. Many churches individually do not choose what they accept and reject, but is based off of regional organizations. In the midwest, after the Methodist church decided to allow same sex marriages to take place, many pastors have resigned, and many people left the church. This is all a result of the government legalizing something and the "church" trying to protect themselves from non-discrimination laws. By them having to do this, this is a direct violation of the purpose behind the separation of church and state, which was to keep the GOVERNMENT from telling the CHURCH what they are allowed to believe and practice. The original intent was not to keep the church out of the government like people like you want to believe. So although the "churches", or mainly the regional organizations they are apart of, have accepted same-sex marriage, that doesn't mean the individuals within the church do feel their rights haven't been infringed upon.

And I never said that it was a solution for gay people to marry who they don't love, I was merely stating the FACT that they had the legal right to get married, regardless if it was someone they didn't love. Like I stated before, if this was all about "rights", then there was another way this could all have been accomplished without infringing on the rights of other individuals. Would it have been easy, maybe not. However it still would have allowed one group to gain certain rights without infringing on the rights of others. The fact is that this had nothing to do with rights, but everything to do with forcing the LGBT viewpoints onto others. I should have every right to refuse business to anyone, regardless of my reason why, and not get sued over it. Why should my personal and religious rights be compromised for someone else's "right" to marry?

Because its a friggin child that's why!! And polygamy....the bible talks about men having many wives, as long as everyone involved in a marriage is an adult so what?

You need to do a little more research about the bible. The men only had 1 wife, but could have multiple concubines, or mistresses. Concubines had nothing to do with religion but with the culture of those people. Just because something is mentioned in the bible, that doesn't make it a part of religion, but insight into what the culture was like.

The first name that I can think of is Abraham. He had more than one wife. Also adultery was a sin but mistresses okay?? This is what I'm talking about. The bible hypocrisies itself. I'm Christian and I follow Christ. Immorality is causing harm to others. It's our responsibility to love others and not pass judgement. I bring racial segregation into this because people used biblical verses to discredit black people as humans just as they are for people who are gay.

Once again you are confused. Abraham only had one wife. The others that you are thinking about were known as concubines. There is a difference, and it is a strictly cultural thing, not religious. As you fail to understand, not everything in the bible is telling us what our religious beliefs are, but also information of what the culture was like. You need to learn to not confuse the ways of the culture with the beliefs of religion.

Which bible verses actually are used to discredit black people?

Do you not know the difference between loving the sinner and not the sin? Obviously not since you don't seem to understand why religious people were wanting to stop same sex marriage from becoming legal. It wasn't about trying to hurt someone, but to protect their religious views. Marriage is a religious act that the government decided to give certain privileges to because of the benefits families have for society. Marriage was not created by the government, which is why the government created civil unions.

This is a small, very small amount of information about how biblical words were twisted to support racism. From a blog called Strange Fruit. Googling the bible and racism can take you to supremacist pagesOne of the most popular biblical stories is also the one most often used to justify white racial superiority. After he disembarked from his 40-day cruise, Noah went a little wild in his celebrations, resulting in a bit of indecent exposure whilst passed out on the floor. Noah's son, Ham, walked in on him and saw the display. Rather than covering Noah, Ham went and blabbed all about it. When Noah recovered from his bender, he was not pleased with Ham and so he cursed Ham's son: “Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be to his brothers” (Genesis 9:25). Eventually the Canaanites did indeed become slaves to the Jews, so end of story, right? Nah...

Some claim that people with dark skin descended from Ham, while white folks came from Japheth and Asians came from Shem. Ham's name is thought to translate to 'black /dark,' and his descendants populated North-East Africa (Cush's descendants populated Sudan, Mizraim to Egypt, Phut to Libya, while Canaan's folks went to Israel). Again, the claim here is that both the skin, the curse, and the seedy disposition are heritable.

If you want to flip through your own bible to double check. Here are a list of polygamist bible verses from WikipediaOld Testament
The Torah includes a few specific regulations on the practice of polygamy,[2] such as Exodus 21:10: "If he take another wife for himself; her food, her clothing, and her duty of marriage, shall he not diminish".[3] Deuteronomy 21:15–17, states that a man must award the inheritance due to a first-born son to the son who was actually born first, even if he hates that son's mother and likes another wife more;[4] and Deuteronomy 17:17 states that the king shall not have too many wives.[5] The king's behavior is condemned by Prophet Samuel in 1 Samuel 8. (The understanding of the Jewish perspective on co-wives may also be derived from the Hebrew word for co-wife found in the Tanakh, "???" [Tza'rah], which forms the same root as the Yiddush word, "????" [Tzoo'rus], meaning "trouble".) The Torah may distinguishes concubines and "sub-standard" wives with the prefix "to" (lit. "took to wives").[6] Despite these nuances to the biblical perspective on polygamy, many important figures had more than one wife, such as in the instances of Esau (Gen 26:34; 28:6-9),[3] Moses (Ex 2:21;Num 12:1),[3] Jacob (Gen 29:15-28),[3] Elkanah (1 Samuel 1:1-8),[3] David (1 Samuel 25:39-44; 2 Samuel 3:2-5; 5:13-16),[3] and Solomon (1 Kings 11:1-3).[3]

Multiple marriage was considered a realistic alternative in the case of famine, widowhood, or female infertility.[7] The practice of levirate marriage obligated a man whose brother has left a widow without heir to marry her.[Deut 25:5–10]

You are misinterpreting Exodus 21:10. The woman they are referring to was not a wife to begin with. The woman they are referring to was someone that was given to someone else as payment for redemption. She then could become either the person's wife or the wife of his son. If neither one choose her to be their wife, then they are required to either give her the protection that a wife would receive or set her free.
Exodus 21:10 is giving them a rule to follow if they choose to have more than one "wife" (which would be one wife and one or more concubines), and when dividing the inheritance in how they are suppose to, and not take favor to one who is not the first born.
And I would think that condemning the king's behavior in 1 Samuel 8 would mean that it is not an accepted religious practice. So once again, IT IS PART OF THE CULTURE, NOT PART OF THE RELIGION. LEARN THE DIFFERENCE.

There are Muslim extremists trying to take the strictest aspects of their religion and enforce them as laws. How can we as Christians take the strictest parts of the bible and try to enfoce them as laws and not be considered religious extremists too.

Christianity is true, Islam isn't.

By trying to not legalize same sex marriage, what is the punishment Christians were going to give same sex couples? Death? No. Imprisonment? No. In fact all they were doing was trying to keep their religious practice that the government only made benefits for. Religious people were not trying to keep same sex couples apart or make it illegal for them to be together, as they could still be together through civil unions, and if this was all about rights, they could have changed the rights given through civil unions instead. But instead the LGBT community had to force their beliefs onto a religious practice because they felt they were being denied something. So what would make one a religious extremist by wanting to keep their religious practices?

The word "marriage" has been translated over and over from its original form. The fight for marriage equality was due on a federal level. Because you have some states not acknowledging civil unions or allowing them.

Not every church or Christian is against it. That's why. I'm Christian and I'm not against it. Did you miss the part where I said churches should have the choice of performing ceremonies or not? They should be separate from the government. They do mot pay taxes. The government should stay out of religion and religion should stay out if government.

How can you keep religion out of the government when one's religion is a part of their life? Most decisions make throughout the day is based off of their personal and religious beliefs. So when one's religion is part of their life, how can you keep them from using their religious views for the decisions they make at work or in the government? Homosexuals don't stop being gay during certain parts of the day, so why should a Christian turn off their beliefs during certain parts of the day just to be able to please other people?

Still you have not answered the question of why not change civil unions which were created by the government instead of changing the religious practice of marriage.

Like the time black people were allowed to use the same water fountains as whites? Churches should be able to do what they want. If they dont want to allow anything "gay" whatever...separation of church and state, they dont pay taxes....businesses however it's a different story. You shouldn't be able to discriminate.

Why should my personal rights that involve religious beliefs stop during certain times of the day just to please other people? If a gay person is gay 24/7, then I should be able to practice my religion 24/7 as well. Being gay is as much a part of their life as being a Christian is part of mine. And although churches don't pay taxes, they are still a public building, which means they are required to allow legal activities to take place there, which would include same sex marriage. So the separation of church and state has now become invalid because the government is telling the church what they are allowed to practice or risk getting sued for discrimination.

The point I was making about no other group losing their rights while another gained theirs, answer this. Did white people become slaves to blacks after slavery was abolished? Did men lose their right to vote in order to allow women to vote? Let me answer that for you, NO! But yet that is not the case here. Churches and religious people are losing their religious rights because homosexuals think they need to force their beliefs onto others.

There is a BIG difference between two consenting adults getting married and an old perv marrying a child.

If a 14 year old can consent to having sex with a 16 year old, then why not a 20 year old, or 30, or 40 or 60?

Because its two children. Until you are 18 you are not legally an adult.

What happens at 18 that makes someone an adult? I know many 14 to 16 year olds that are more mature than some 30 year olds. Just because the government says they are an adult, does that really make them an adult?

The law defines them as an adult. Your parents are no longer legally responsible for you. I'm not trying to put you in a bad place, but you keep taking about teens being able to consent. Everyone knows people who don't act their age.

So if it is only a law that defines them as an adult, then the law can easily be changed to lower the age for what makes someone an adult. It wouldn't surprise me one bit if those who are attracted to teens and think there isn't a problem with being in a relationship with them try to get that changed. You might say it will never hold up, but just give it a few years, maybe less. Society is removing all moral values that were once based off of religion to make themselves feel better about what they do.

Are you serious??If you think that many adults are pervs that they could come out and protest and spend money making that happen than yes. I don't know any gay or straight that is okay with kids and adults having sex with each other. People don't even want teenagers having sex with each other. There is a difference between molesters and gays. It's disgusting that you would equate the two as even close to being similar.

I never stated they were the same or similar. I am stating that just as homosexuals did 40 years ago with changing their status from being a mental disease to being natural, others will do and are doing the same thing. I have also only been stating that the same arguments homosexuals have been using for years will be and are being used by these other people, because if it worked for one group, why not work for them? You really need to learn how to interpret what is said better as you clearly do not understand anything I have stated or anything that is stated in the Bible.

You would be very suprised of all the things that were considered "mental disorders " forty years ago. Medical and mental health history is full of oddities. I would like to think that we have evolved as a society.

We are evolving into a society that views religion as being a mental illness. This is why society is changing morality in a negative way. So if I would be surprised what was considered a "mental disorder" 40 years ago, what is to say that you won't be surprised of what won't be considered a "mental disorder" 40 years from now?

The reason it isnt the same is because childbirth at a young age can be dangerous for both the mother and child

That, and you learn responsability as you grow, most people wouldnt be ready for marriage at a younger age.

And once more, explain one negative side effect of gay marriage

And childbirth can be dangerous for a mother and child after a certain age. So should there be laws to regulate the oldest someone can get married?

Most people are not ready to get married before the age of 25, but they are legal to do so at 18. So should they change the age of an adult to 25, which means changing the smoking and drinking ages as well?

And you can go and read all my previous comments, including my last one towards you on the negative side effects of gay marriage.

When women get older, they get to a point of not even being able to have kids, basically nature's way of saying no.

As for the age of 25 thing, i have no arguement, i beleive you to be right on that point.

But for your final point, like i said, Gay marriage hasnt destoyed churches in other countries, so why do you think it will be different here, also the fact that you can choose to follow a religeon, homosexuality isnt a choice, because you cant magically make yourself aroused at whatever you want

When women get older, it doesn't get impossible for them to have children, just harder. And once girls start hitting the age they have their period, they are capable of having children. On both sides of the scale it can be dangerous for either to have children. So if your argument is that a 14 year old shouldn't get married based on that, then it is no different then when people were trying to say that same sex couples shouldn't get married because they can't produce offspring. Once again, the same argument can be used for the perverted view point of have a relationship with someone under the age of 18 as what was used for homosexuality, which is the point I have been making this whole time.

You don't know that same sex marriage has not been effecting churches in other countries, but it is already proving to hurt churches within our own country. People are walking away from churches that are accepting same sex marriage, harming their beliefs. If this is not having a negative effect on the church, then what is it doing?

Jesus Christ, arguing with you is similar to a brick wall! Cant you just see that homosexuals just want to be in a legally binded relationship?! Not religiously binded, legally, i say again, just so it gets through your thick skull, LEGALLY not RELIGIOUSLY. Frankly, i dont think gays give any shits about your churches, gays are not hurting anyone, but clearly, because you are just blinded by your wretched book, we should just do all as the bible says. Shut down all the tatoos parlors, stop wearing mixed fabrics, let our hair grow to our ankles. You are the kind of person who gives Christians a bad name. The seperation of church and state exists for good reason, because if america is the "Land of the free" then why dont you beleive in freedom of sexuality?

First off, if they only wanted to be in a legally binded relationship, then CHANGE CIVIL UNIONS WHICH WERE CREATED BY THE GOVERNMENT AS LEGALLY BINDING RELATIONSHIPS. There is nothing religious about civil unions, but there has been about marriage, because if marriage was created by the government they would not have needed to create civil unions. What about this do you not understand?

The separation of church and state was not put into place to keep the church out of the government, but to keep the government out of the church. Time for you to go back and study up on your history.

And how exactly does gay marriage hurt you?

Whether or not something "hurts" others is not the only test of whether something is right or wrong.

Then the argument about being gay hurting society or gay marriage hurting society is also invalid.

Re-read the comment. It says "is not the ONLY test", which means it is just one of many different ways to determine if it is right or wrong. So it doesn't make the argument invalid about homosexuality's ability to hurt society or same sex marriage hurting society.

Well lets see here. I have already stated it multiple times in different ways, but lets be more direct. I can't practice my religious beliefs 24/7 without risking discriminating someone and getting sued over it. It is taking a religious practice that I still believe to be sacred, regardless of the number of divorces that have taken place, and is changing every meaning behind it. It has been changing multiple churches religious practices when it comes to marriage, and I can only pray that my religious organization never changes their practice in order to conform to what society believes to be right. So does none of this sound like it infringes on my personal rights?

This is the biggest flame war I've ever seen 0.0

So, im sure every church in Australia, the UK and Canada has fallen into complete anarchy over the full legalization of a gay marriage

You do realise that marriage isnt just a Christian thing, because if it was, Muslims, Atheists, etc wouldnt be able to get married, but im pretty sure that they do

Australia is mostly atheists, so there are not many churches there. In an article written in 2006, between the years of 1991 and 2006, over 1,000 churches closed their doors. So with that already taken place, the division same sex marriage has between people will destroy even more churches. There are already churches in America that are suffering from the legalization due to people leaving, pastors resigning, and many other things taken place because the "organizations" for the regional areas have told the churches to start allowing same sex marriage to take place. So instead of me trying to prove that churches are going to fall because of same sex marriage, how about you prove that it won't effect them at all.

I NEVER stated that marriage was just a Christian thing, but a religious practice. Religious practice is not limited to only Christians. You need to stop twisting my words.

What's destroying churches is their people being self righteous hypocrites.

You're not listening. Ask anyone who has turned their back on religion, God, or Christ. It's people that go around judging, finger pointing, being hateful who have given faith a bad name. It's all these self righteous politicians who preach the gospel and then get caught being sinners just like everyone else. It's people like Westbouro Baptist Church protesting gay funerals screaming about Hell....protesting funerals..how mean and hateful is that? ......Then some people just can't wrap their heads around the concept of a supreme all knowing being. There has always been people who doubt the existence of God so that's nothing new.

No what is destroying churches is society telling people it is ok to do whatever you want and not expect any consequences in return. The majority of the people in the church admit and accept the fact that we all sin, but know that they are also suppose to turn from their sin. This isn't being a hypocrite just because they point out what is a sin. It is called holding people accountable for their actions.