LGBTQ+ Rights and Religion

edited 5th Jun '18 9:16:05 PM by I-Teleported-Bread

I would say that being aplicable for the death penalty in some countries, still today, for something you don't choose, goes far beyond "opression". Now imagine how it was when it was uncacceptable in any region, always fearing for it to be revealed. So, yes, I will say with full conviction LGBT people are eternal victims of opression.

edited 3rd Feb '17 2:36:59 PM by Grafite

edited 5th Jun '18 9:18:56 PM by I-Teleported-Bread

People who otherwise find homosexuality and Transsexuals to be conflicting with their religious or moral views, but don't think it is also their rights to discriminate or make things worse of the LGBT+ is also the correct thing to do.

So, they either fall under the people who end up doing this:

Not in favor but also not making things worse

Not supporting people who are going to make things worse

Not actively giving help to them, but giving when they are asked to help

I think for some of them it's about being able to disconnect their personal religious beliefs and their political beliefs. Basically they don't think everyone should be forced to follow their religion or their religion's rules, so they support LGBT legal rights.

Though I'd be wary of anyone who uses the word "lifestyle", as the idea that being LGBT is a lfystyle is an incorrect and harmful one.

If they are offering political support, take it.

Frankly I don't think anyone who "disagrees" with our "lifestyle" can be a good person or worthy of any respect whatsoever regardless of religious justification. Can they say something's not strictly-speaking compatible with their religion (insofar as they personally understand it, and given that they oppose pressuring other members of their religion into feeling the same)? Fine. I'd be suspicious of them but there's not much that can be done about it.

Do religious people (often) think being LGBT is a lifestyle that can be chosen? Or is it more limited to "homosexuality is a sin" Christians?

edited 20th Mar '17 7:40:46 AM by hellomoto

Both seem prevalent, and there are plenty of priests and clergy of most faiths the world over ready and waiting with fire and brimstone speeches, usually centered around one or two passages in their religious texts while ignoring numerous others preaching love and acceptance.

Perhaps a more specific question?

Forgive me if this comparison is loaded in a way that gives unintended offense, but it's the best example I can come up with at short notice: take adultery. A believing Christian/theist/traditional moralist may well disapprove of adultery, and find it morally suspect (at the very least). At the same time, he may wholeheartedly oppose any laws that criminalize it, or that formally penalize or discriminate against adulterers.

It's a mixed bag. Many don't believe it's a choice in the slightest, or think it's a complicated parcel of nature/nurture that volition's not highly relevant to. It's kind of irrelevant, though, since many dispositions most people might agree are sinful aren't freely chosen, either. (I never chose to be arrogant and self-involved; I'm pretty much as God made me. Doesn't give me a blank check for it, though.)

I'm still wondering why people still oppose it given that has been almost 2 years and nothing bad that has happened has been because of gay marriage.

It's tough to say, depending on the individual. People may have various objections—some religious in nature, some not. But also, the acid test of a law isn't necessarily "will something that I consider bad happen if we institute/repeal it?"

edited 20th Mar '17 9:11:12 AM by Jhimmibhob

Yeah, it's based on what would be best for the collective good and if it is able to be implemented. But I'm still gonna laugh at all the people who said there would be "Consequences".

edited 5th Jun '18 9:19:15 PM by I-Teleported-Bread

Speaking as an LGBT person, it is not impossible, but my perspective of religion is already tainted due all the things that were done in the past in its name.

Nowadays, actually, in the environment I'm in, it's my irreligious colleagues that are the most bigoted and the christian ones who are the most tolerant, so change is happening already and I have nothing against most present day Christians.

edited 26th May '17 2:14:31 PM by Grafite

Discussion YOINK from US Politics:

I agree that Leviticus is a very poor source of law for Christians. However, 1 Corinthians 7, where St. Paul lays out his position on sex and marriage, doesn't really offer a lot of openings for gay marriage in context.

You guys' thoughts?

I mean Paul also calls strait sex within a marriage "sexual immorality", the man clearly had some hang up about sex (possibly being asexual himself) that he projected onto others.

Paul was offering his opinion and guidance to thouse who wanted it, however that does not make his advise the word of law.

I don't know a lot about the specifics of Christianity, so bear with me, but why should Christians heed the words of ordinary men and women, with all their faults and prejudices, just because they are an apostle/present in the Bible? Doesn't mean they were divinely inspired.

Unfortunately, I know the argument for that one: Saul got struck with divine revelation in the road to Damascus and took the name Paul. There were extenuating circumstances (he was already a serial cultist in danger from various forms of temple or Roman law... hence scampering to Damascus from, probably, Tarsus), but in dogma terms, Paul has a pass.

It's not a great one, though: that divine light was his conversion to Christianity and the revelation of Jesus. Nothing says Jesus told him sex was bad, woman are inferior and Peter has lost the plot trying to keep as close to Judaism as possible by insisting on conversion to Judaism before becoming Christian (including circumcision). That was very likely all Paul. I'd argue he had a point about the last bit: you don't attract Roman blokes by suggesting they undergo surgery, first.

I will always say this about Paul: he had great sales and marketing instincts.

edited 5th Jul '17 7:39:17 AM by Euodiachloris

Any church that permits divorce or any sort of relationship outside the context of marriage, or acknowledges the concept of consent, has lost the authority to use that passage against gay marriage. Your argument that something constitutes a religious violation doesn't hold whilst picking and choosing parts of the very same passage.

I'll still disagree even if you hold to things entirely, but at least it's more consistent (and not something to try debating).

The other thing is that we have no idea what the context is. Paul's letters were mostly replies to other letters, and he didn't really bother doing the "restate the question" thing. The question could have been broad enough to cover homosexual activity in general, or it could have been specific enough to be asking about the use of temple prostitutes or something along those lines. Because if what Paul was actually saying was "don't hire male prostitutes" (with the hiring of female prostitutes already considered wrong), it kind of ruins the argument against normal gay relationships.

The other thing is that the Greek standard for homosexual relationships (and relationships in general. The Greek philosophers had a pretty horrifying view on women) was...not healthy, to say the least. There was a whole mismatched power dynamic thing going on, and the, uh, "catcher", so to speak, was treated with disdain. It's perfectly possible to believe that the combination of the dynamic of the time with Paul's dislike of sex in general means that his objection doesn't actually apply to a healthy, balanced relationship or that his objection was to something specific about Corinth that didn't really happen anywhere else, because the Greek cities were actually pretty independent from each other, even under the Roman Empire.

And, honestly, Paul was probably some degree of asexual. The way he describes marriage indicates that he really didn't get the appeal. I mean, he says that people should get married if they can't handle being single. That's not a positive view of it.

And when it comes to the "divinely inspired" thing...don't use the argument about most of the bible being about normal people. There's something about scripture being "God-breathed" or however the different transltions put it, and the assumption is that means that everything in the Bible is divinely inspired. Apparently ignoring the fact that there are hundreds of translations into English, and they can't possibly all be the correct one.

edited 5th Jul '17 6:28:42 AM by Zendervai

" I wish that all of you were as I am. But each of you has your own gift from God; one has this gift, another has that."

Yeah, Paul definitely didn't have a sex drive. He's clearly lamenting that other people do here.

And if you want to play "stretch the interpretation", this phrasing doesn't help.

St. Paul's simply saying that, all other things being equal, chastity occupies a slightly higher spiritual plane than ordinary (though quite respectable) married life. This shouldn't be shocking in a faith that's always had its monasteries and convents. Nor is it unique—I'm pretty sure that Buddhist monks, certain Hindu holy men, etc., are also supposed to be celibate.

So though it's not to everyone's taste (to put it very mildly), a special regard for chastity doesn't seem like an uncommon thread in a religion, nor does it necessarily suggest a baked-in psychopathology.