Judge Roy Moore vs Chris Cuomo on States Rights, the Constitution, and Marriage

[William Tell]

I found this very much worth watching.

[TommyJeff]

No state can invent the definition of marriage?!?
Where is the federal power to define marriage??? I can't find it in my pocket constitution.

[Sonny Tufts]

No state can invent the definition of marriage?!?
Where is the federal power to define marriage??? I can't find it in my pocket constitution.

It's not that the federal government is defining marriage so much as it's the 14th Amendment preventing the States from violating the Equal Protection Clause by making unsupportable distinctions in saying who can get married.

[mrsat_98]

No state can invent the definition of marriage?!?
Where is the federal power to define marriage??? I can't find it in my pocket constitution.

When it comes to benefits and gov employees they can not discriminate.

[TommyJeff]

..... in saying who can get married.

Because the federal government has defined marriage. Which they never should have done. Had they not, there would be no discrimination.

[TommyJeff]

When it comes to benefits and gov employees they can not discriminate.

If the fed never defined marriage there would be no discrimination or violation of amendments - the problem is because the fed, wrongfully, defined marriage.

[jmdrake]

It's not that the federal government is defining marriage so much as it's the 14th Amendment preventing the States from violating the Equal Protection Clause by making unsupportable distinctions in saying who can get married.

Right. Let's let brothers and sisters marry, father and daughters or mothers and sons marry, multiple people marry, and any other configuration anybody can come up with. The idea that somehow gays are some special case is laughable.

[jmdrake]

Wow! Listening to Judge Moore. He just kicked butt regarding Dred Scott quoting the dissenting judge as stating that the horrible Dred Scott decision was a result of abandoning strict interpretation of the constitution. See 6:30 in.

And for the record, I don't know why the SCOTUS doesn't just rule on this issue and get it over with one way or the other.

[William Tell]

Wow! Listening to Judge Moore. He just kicked butt regarding Dred Scott quoting the dissenting judge as stating that the horrible Dred Scott decision was a result of abandoning strict interpretation of the constitution. See 6:30 in.

Yep! He did a great job! We need more like like him.

[Southron]

It's not that the federal government is defining marriage so much as it's the 14th Amendment preventing the States from violating the Equal Protection Clause by making unsupportable distinctions in saying who can get married.

The key word is unsupportable.
In other words, at the whim of whatever federal judge is in power.

[osan]

I found this very much worth watching.

Wow... the interviewer did not make even the most weakly respectable effort to appear impartial or professional.

I like this judge - he kicked that nutless phag's sack into his mostly-empty cranium.

What an unprofessional and pathetically transparent little "man". Honorless and without any art whatsoever. No wonder CNN has less than zero credibility.

ETA: I am embarrassed to admit that this punk annoyed me enough to want to knock a couple of his teeth out. "The satellite window went out." Yeah, but by what cause? $#@!.

So it is interesting that the good judge finally got the smarmy little $#@! to admit he would have accepted Dred and Plessy as the law of the land. "Vee ver only follovink ohduz..." God how I hope there are enough good Americans remaining to put the likes of this punk on the ends of several million ropes. And yes, I mean that very literally. A lifetime of this creeping filth has left me in a decidedly uncharitable timbre. At some point, the rebalancing of the scales must happen no matter how ugly the means.

[Sonny Tufts]

The key word is unsupportable.
In other words, at the whim of whatever federal judge is in power.

No State has yet to offer a cogent reason for banning gay marriage.

[Sonny Tufts]

Right. Let's let brothers and sisters marry, father and daughters or mothers and sons marry, multiple people marry, and any other configuration anybody can come up with. The idea that somehow gays are some special case is laughable.

We've heard this slippery slope argument before when it was made to uphold anti-miscegenation laws. It didn't work then and it doesn't work now.

If the State desires to preserve the purity of the African blood by prohibiting intermarriage between whites and blacks, we know of no power on earth to prevent such legislation. It is a matter of purely domestic concern. The 14th amendment to the Constitution of the United States ... has no such scope as seems to have been accorded it by the circuit court. ... All of one's rights as a citizen of the United States will be found guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States. If any provision of that instrument confers upon a citizen the right to marry any one who is willing to wed him, our attention has not been called to it. If such be one of the rights attached to American citizenship all our marriage acts forbidding intermarriage between persons within certain degrees of consanguinity are void ... State v. Jackson, 80 Mo. 175 (1883)

The underlying factors that constitute justification for laws against miscegenation closely parallel those which sustain the validity of prohibitions against incest and incestuous marriages. Dissenting opinion in Perez v. Sharp, 32 Cal.2d 711, 198 P.2d 17 (1948), which overturned California’s anti-miscegenation law.

It is clear from the most recent available evidence on the psycho-sociological aspect of this question that intermarried families are subjected to much greater pressures and problems then [sic] those of the intermarried and that the state’s prohibition of interracial marriage for this reason stands on the same footing as the prohibition of polygamous marriage, or incestuous marriage or the prescription of minimum ages at which people may marry and the preventing of the marriage of people who are mentally incompetent. Brief for the State of Virginia in Loving v. Virginia

[samforpaul]

Thank you God for Roy Moore.

[Stratovarious]

This Chris is a jack### right off the bat ...."I appreciate you taking the OPPORTUNITY...?

Really , what a great way to welcome a guest .... with an insult.

[William Tell]

Roy Moore is a jack### right off the bat ...."I appreciate you taking the OPPORTUNITY...?

Really , what a great way to welcome a guest .... with an insult.

Chris Cuomo is the host, Roy is the guest. Chris was the one who said that. Yeah, Chris is nasty.

[Stratovarious]

Chris Cuomo is the host, Roy is the guest. Chris was the one who said that. Yeah, Chris is nasty.

ha , yea I just caught that....ooops.

[Stratovarious]

jmdrake[/URL];5784692]Right. Let's let brothers and sisters marry, father and daughters or mothers and sons marry, multiple people marry, and any other configuration anybody can come up with. The idea that somehow gays are some special case is laughable.

I can't get past the opening insult from who ever this arrogant ##### Roy thing thinks he is.

The question I have is , why aren't these people screaming and yelling to support the kind of unions you mentioned ? And Polygamy , why aren't they
marching the streets in support of that and some of the combinations you mentioned.
I guess that comes later. :-)

[jmdrake]

We've heard this slippery slope argument before when it was made to uphold anti-miscegenation laws. It didn't work then and it doesn't work now.

Hello. Do you actually have a cohent intelligent argument as to why if we allow same sex marriage we shouldn't allow adult incest, polygamy, polyamory or any other arrangement of consenting adults? Because it seems that you don't.

[TommyJeff]

Hello. Do you actually have a cohent intelligent argument as to why if we allow same sex marriage we shouldn't allow adult incest, polygamy, polyamory or any other arrangement of consenting adults? Because it seems that you don't.

I am not sure if you are taking this position or simply asking a question. But I will ask (to you or anyone), does the government have the right to outlaw polygamy or the like? Why can't people do as they choose (so long as they are adults) with Their own body and well being? Why must the govt even define marriage? What's the point other than to give special privileges and to promote "all knowing" govt ideals of marriage between 1 man and 1 woman as the end all be all

[Sonny Tufts]

Hello. Do you actually have a cohent intelligent argument as to why if we allow same sex marriage we shouldn't allow adult incest, polygamy, polyamory or any other arrangement of consenting adults? Because it seems that you don't.

Do you have an intelligent argument why monogamous gay marriage should not be allowed? It seems you don't. Because that is the issue, not the other kinds of relationships.

[staerker]

Do you have an intelligent argument why monogamous gay marriage should not be allowed? It seems you don't. Because that is the issue, not the other kinds of relationships.

Poor soul, you're still looking to the almighty State for approval? It will stab you in the back once you turn around.

[jmdrake]

Do you have an intelligent argument why monogamous gay marriage should not be allowed? It seems you don't. Because that is the issue, not the other kinds of relationships.

The point I've made throughout this thread, that you seem afraid to directly address, is that if monogamous gay marriage should be allowed then there is absolutely no reason that polyamory or polygamy or adult incest shouldn't be allowed. And frankly, gay marriage already is allowed in all 50 states. It just doesn't come with the extra "goodies" that have been awarded heterosexual marriage. Prior to Loving v. Virginia you could be arrested for being in an interracial marriage. Today you can be arrested for being in a polygamous marriage or a polyamorous marriage or an adult incest marriage. In fact in some states any of those things are felonies. I don't give a crap if two dudes get married. But to pretend, as you are, that such an arrangement is somehow more "wholesome" than three people getting marriage or a father marrying his 18 year old daughter is retarded.

/thread

[jmdrake]

I am not sure if you are taking this position or simply asking a question. But I will ask (to you or anyone), does the government have the right to outlaw polygamy or the like? Why can't people do as they choose (so long as they are adults) with Their own body and well being? Why must the govt even define marriage? What's the point other than to give special privileges and to promote "all knowing" govt ideals of marriage between 1 man and 1 woman as the end all be all

The government should be totally out of the marriage business. I personally know people in a virtual polygamous relationship, but if they were to go before a preach and have a wedding ceremony, even without applying for a license from the state, they could be arrested. The gay marriage movement wants to pretend either that this situation doesn't exist, or that a man marrying two women is somehow worse than two women or two men marrying. Only 18% of Americans support polygamy while 58% support gay marriage. So spare be the BS that this is all about "marriage equality" and "freedom." It's no more about equality and freedom than NAFTA and the TPP are about free trade.

[jmdrake]

Poor soul, you're still looking to the almighty State for approval? It will stab you in the back once you turn around.

^This

[osan]

Do you have an intelligent argument why monogamous gay marriage should not be allowed? It seems you don't. Because that is the issue, not the other kinds of relationships.

I see that you are suffering from a common misapprehension. Throughout its existence, the term "marriage" has always referred to the union of a man and a woman, whether monogamously or otherwise. Many emperors and many African cultures held with the practice of polygamous marriage. IIRC, there have even been cultures, albeit vanishingly few, where women took on more than one husband. Until just so very recently, "marriage" has not included homosexual unions.

Words are important. If you realized how important, you would understand that words such as this must remain constant in their meanings. If they do not, endless trouble arises. Examples of this trouble are abundant and often revolve around current understandings of given words, vis-à-vis their meanings from ages past. Religious understandings have gone to deep Hell as the result of the semantic shift of words, not to mention their casually dismissive attitudes that have lead to all manner of dangerously careless misuse of those words even in a very narrow time slice.

To alter the meaning of a word is to destroy our ability to understand history. This is a fact against which one cannot effectively argue. I have had this discussion with people and have utterly destroyed them without the need to even be awake, it is that cut and clear... like shooting fish in a barrel. Language, being the single most important thing we ever learn, should be held with commensurate reverence, respect, and care. Sadly, we ignorantly and foolishly take language for granted, rarely becoming proficient in its use and fain applying our skills, such as they may be, with little skill. By this means do we diminish ourselves, our forebears, and damn our posterity in likewise.

To alter the definition of "marriage" to include homosexuals is to doom us to misunderstanding of aspects of the old world, for in but a generation or two when ***** marriage becomes indistinguishable from the traditional form, there will be a subtle but profound psychological shift in the perception of history. Some may argue that thsi is a good thing. I say it is catastrophic, because from these slight parallax shifts there may result earth-moving side-effects, what many refer to as "unintended consequences".

I am wholly against "gay marriage" as an expansion of the legal maxim of "marriage". It stands to bleed into non-legal use, especially the vernacular, and that will alter the fundamental consciousness of people in ways that cannot be rationally deemed as good by anyone save those with the expressed intent of causing such deviance of thought and perception from a validly and anciently established order.

Forgetting the issue of whether the "state" should have anything to do with marriage, beyond the just enforcement of contract disputes between parties, I am in favor of allowing ***** to pair-up in terms precisely equivalent to "marriage", but using a different name. "Civil union" was one of the terms offered up a while back and it is as good as any, yet the *****s railed against this. There is a subtle psychological point at issue here that perhaps many people do not recognize, lingering just beneath the surface. It is that of "normalcy" and perhaps more importantly, "acceptability". The ***** are, consciously or otherwise, trying to force acceptability of ***** unions by expropriating the tradtional term, "marriage" and forcing the new usage upon the rest. This is a reprehensible act that, IMO, is rightly resisted. So insecure are these people in the propriety of what they do, yet so deeply avaricious is their drive to force everyone to "accept" them, that they are now engaged in this frenzied push to place the rest in a legalistic arm-bar by "stealing" the traditionalist term "marriage" and making it their own.

Were these people secure in the knowledge that what they do is just and within the bounds of their prerogative, they would have no problem with another term. Stealing "marriage" is their way of plastering a false veneer of "normal" upon that which is clearly not. What these pathetic sad-sacks do not realize is that being "abnormal" in this way is no big deal insofar as their prerogative is concerned. They stand well within it when they choose ***** over normal, and I have absolutely no problem with that at all.

The problem for me, however, is that not only are they demanding to be accepted as "normal", they also demand to be praised for what they choose. To this I take singular exception and will smack the living crap out of anyone who attempts to force such a thing upon me. The truly frightening thing about these people is their mindless frenzy where non-acceptance is encountered. During the Stonewall anniversary way back 20 years or so ago, some smarmy little twerp in a speedo, a self-advertising member of ***** Nation attempted to hump my leg. I told him to stop. He advanced. I told him to stop again. No joy. I them told him that I would break parts of his body if he so much as touched me. This got people's attention. Many stopped dead in their tracks. I make a rapid exit from the area in order not to get my ass beaten - possibly to death - by a bunch of ***** with "burn the witch" radiating from their eyes. It was a brief moment, but the apprehension I experienced has never left my memory.

Make no mistake about it, the gay marriage deal runs far more deeply than the mere legalities. There is an entire psych battle being waged and, IMO, freedom is losing badly.

[Sonny Tufts]

To alter the meaning of a word is to destroy our ability to understand history. This is a fact against which one cannot effectively argue.

If that were true we could never understand Shakespeare, for whom certain words had different meanings than they have today. We don't seem to have any trouble in understanding texts that are even older, although the meanings of words have changed in the interim.

Language changes constantly. "Husband" originally meant a house owner. "Assassin" meant a hashish-eater. "Awful" meant wonder-inspiring. "Fun" meant to cheat or hoax. "Bully" meant a good person, or a darling. "Nice" meant foolish or silly. How has the change in these and other words impeded our understanding of history?

I am wholly against "gay marriage" as an expansion of the legal maxim of "marriage". It stands to bleed into non-legal use, especially the vernacular, and that will alter the fundamental consciousness of people in ways that cannot be rationally deemed as good by anyone save those with the expressed intent of causing such deviance of thought and perception from a validly and anciently established order.

You mean that mindless prejudice against gays might disappear? And you think that's a bad thing because irrational bigotry is a valid social order?

The ***** are, consciously or otherwise, trying to force acceptability of ***** unions by expropriating the tradtional term, "marriage" and forcing the new usage upon the rest. This is a reprehensible act that, IMO, is rightly resisted. So insecure are these people in the propriety of what they do, yet so deeply avaricious is their drive to force everyone to "accept" them, that they are now engaged in this frenzied push to place the rest in a legalistic arm-bar by "stealing" the traditionalist term "marriage" and making it their own.

Given your visceral loathing of gays (your rhetoric betrays you), I can see why you would find it unacceptable to treat them the same as straights when it comes to a legally-recognized union.

Stealing "marriage" is their way of plastering a false veneer of "normal" upon that which is clearly not.

It's more normal than you would like to think.

They stand well within it when they choose ***** over normal, and I have absolutely no problem with that at all.

What proof do you have that they choose to be gay? Can you positively rule out a genetic factor?

The problem for me, however, is that not only are they demanding to be accepted as "normal", they also demand to be praised for what they choose. To this I take singular exception and will smack the living crap out of anyone who attempts to force such a thing upon me.

The fact that you got all bent out of shape by some guy who hit on you indicates that you're the one who's insecure and who has to express how macho you were.

Make no mistake about it, the gay marriage deal runs far more deeply than the mere legalities. There is an entire psych battle being waged and, IMO, freedom is losing badly.

You have a very strange and warped concept of freedom. Apparently yours is nowhere near "live and let live".

[Peace&Freedom]

Language changes constantly. "Husband" originally meant a house owner. "Assassin" meant a hashish-eater. "Awful" meant wonder-inspiring. "Fun" meant to cheat or hoax. "Bully" meant a good person, or a darling. "Nice" meant foolish or silly. How has the change in these and other words impeded our understanding of history?

Speaking of language, the above post is a clinic lesson in flipping words around to turn an avoidance of making a case into a demand that the other side do so.

You mean that mindless prejudice against gays might disappear? And you think that's a bad thing because irrational bigotry is a valid social order?

What is your basis for defining rejection of sexual immorality as mindless prejudice or irrational hatred?

Given your visceral loathing of gays (your rhetoric betrays you), I can see why you would find it unacceptable to treat them the same as straights when it comes to a legally-recognized union.

Cultural judgments of behavior are a separate matter from legal recognition. It is legal to attend a place of worship, and it is legal to attend a strip joint. Which has higher social respect, and is treated better, regardless of law?

It's more normal than you would like to think.

It not a matter of his thinking it. Homosexuality has been understood to be abnormal for thousand of years, across most populations and civilizations. The other side must state the merits for calling it normal, not just declare it.

What proof do you have that they choose to be gay? Can you positively rule out a genetic factor?

Rule out a genetic factor? As in, prove a negative? The burden is on the advocate to positively prove there is a genetic or morphological basis for the claim that homosexuality is inborn. And beyond that, to show (if that could be proven) that there is a group right to have gay marriages protected by law, compared to heterosexual marriage, incestuous marriages, polygamous marriages, etc.

The fact that you got all bent out of shape by some guy who hit on you indicates that you're the one who's insecure and who has to express how macho you were.

Perhaps he was commenting about not enjoying the government being used to impose a false legitimacy for gay marriage, or other social left values on him. His talk about hitting was over the issue, your talk was about attacking a person.

You have a very strange and warped concept of freedom. Apparently yours is nowhere near "live and let live".

The history of civilization is neither strange nor warped. Freedom, to a person with a historic view of the matter, involves respecting the Author of liberty. Freedom to a Christian Libertarian means supporting the maximum liberty of man under God's law. Not apart from that law. A whole lot of people who believe so, absolutely will not be allowed to "live and let live" in a land that pushes the social left view upon them through law.


P.S.: Note that Tufts' response to this (a few posts ahead) was not to positively make his case, but to continue to ask questions framed so as to demand that the other side prove a negative. I decline to do that, and just note my observation about his rhetorical tactics were re-confirmed.

[osan]

If that were true we could never understand Shakespeare, for whom certain words had different meanings than they have today. We don't seem to have any trouble in understanding texts that are even older, although the meanings of words have changed in the interim.

Excuse me, but that is bull$#@!. Most people, I would bet well above 95% in America, would have a terrible time parsing Shakespearian sentences. I consider my language skills to be fair to middling, which is to say, far and away superior to that of the average man whose skills are all but nonexistent, and even I still have some trouble with certain passages. Moreover, I have noticed in myself and have suspected it in others that many of Shakespeare's expressions offer only a general sense of their fuller and more detailed meanings. I know what he is saying and often get a sense of the profundity of his precise meaning. Nevertheless, I am pretty certain that there are subtleties that I am missing.

Language changes constantly.

Not all language changes constantly, but more importantly it is not change that matters so much as the sort of change.

"Assassin" meant a hashish-eater.

It is actually the plural form of "hashish user", but its actual applicable meaning is precisely that which it is today. The hashishiyyin were a Muslim sect who would, well... asssassinate rivals after consuming hashish. The relevant meaning was that of assassins. The eating/using hashish part was just the device for uniquely identifying and distinguishing them from others. Therefore, the fundamental and "inner" meaning of the term has, in fact, not changed a bit since the 13th or 14th century.

"Awful" meant wonder-inspiring.

That is correct, and the current vernacular usage is not right. Now, taking that example and reading a text from, oh, say the Victorian period where the author describes an "awful sight", is would be very easy for the reader to conclude that the vision was of necessity terrible, when in fact it may have been something very different.

I used to design programming languages and write compilers - taught compiler construction - and one of the cardinal rules is that keywords never alter their meanings. There is strong reason for this - the machine is stupid and if you tell it the wrong thing by using a keyword incorrectly, the machine will DO the wrong thing. In the military, certain organizations have developed very specific communications languages such that miscommunication becomes a very difficult thing.

"Fun" meant to cheat or hoax

.

That was originally the VERB form of the word, not the noun.

"Bully" meant a good person, or a darling.

That is right. Teddy Roosevelt is often portrayed as saying "bully" when he was pleased with something. And with this you once again make my point. Bully derived from the Dutch "boel" - "lover". Through the 17c it morphed into a "good man" and then one who is essentially a loudmouth, and finally to one who picks on the weak. So if I have no knowledge of the etymological origins of the word and read a book from 1470 and it tells of the bully whom "he held in the highest esteem", I might be lead to infer that this guy was mentally impaired in some significant manner, to be in love with an abuser.

"Nice" meant foolish or silly. How has the change in these and other words impeded our understanding of history?

I cannot, off the top of my head, say how those particular words may have altered our understanding of historical texts. I can, however, say that such alterations have indeed caused endless trouble for many people. The understanding of religious texts is a prime example. I knew a man who nearly became my father in law. He had been an ordained Jesuit and an enormously erudite man, specializing in ancient languages including Aramaic, Hebrew, Latin, and Greek. His PhD thesis was a new translation and analysis of the New Testament wherein he demonstrated the manifold problems of determining the proper semantic content of the various passages. This was the man who first taught me to appreciate language and demonstrated to me how delicate the semantics of words and sentences can be.

You mean that mindless prejudice against gays might disappear? And you think that's a bad thing because irrational bigotry is a valid social order?

Those are YOUR words, not mine. Perhaps this is a reflection of your own positions. It has absolutely nothing to do with mine. But if an individual chooses to be bigoted, that is his business and nobody holds any authority to force him to think/feel otherwise.

Given your visceral loathing of gays (your rhetoric betrays you), I can see why you would find it unacceptable to treat them the same as straights when it comes to a legally-recognized union.

You don't know $#@! about me, pal. I don't even loathe people such as yourself who make assumptions based on an apparent lack of analytic skill and very bad transactional habits. To wit: had your habits been up to snuff, you would have asked whether I loathe ***** prior to making your weakly founded accusations.

If you want to dance, for God's sake learn how before getting on the floor.

It's more normal than you would like to think.

Since you have no idea what I think, but base your opinion on a very superficial parse of my expressions, I'd have to say you're talking our your other end.

What proof do you have that they choose to be gay? Can you positively rule out a genetic factor?

Firstly, I have several ***** friends some of whom I have known more than 40 years. I've had dozens of ***** acquaintances. Many say they "knew" by the time they were in 6th grade that they had no interest in girls, but a very substantial proportion - just guessing here @ ca. 20-25% - told me in no uncertain terms that they chose to be gay or were directed to that lifestyle by third parties.

All that aside, they still choose to be gay, just as I chose to be straight. I could VERY easily have chosen the ***** lifestyle. I grew up in a place where rape and physical beatings were a daily reality for children. I've watched kids only a year or two younger than myself curled up in fetal balls in a corner, twitching after being gang-raped by other students and even teachers. I had all the opportunity in the world to go full-***** and it would have been easy for me in terms of environmental support. But I had no interest in it and CHOSE to be what I am as the matter of nature. I assume that gay people do the same, but it is still a choice. They can and often DO choose to lead the straight lifestyle, even today. They might be miserable in it - I cannot speak for them - but they most definitely can make that choice. So yeah, it is most definitely a choice. We are men, not amoebae. We think and act pursuant to those thoughts; we do not merely react to stimuli in deterministic ways.

The fact that you got all bent out of shape by some guy who hit on you indicates that you're the one who's insecure and who has to express how macho you were.

If that is what you took from what I wrote, then you have a terrible problem with reading comprehension. I've been "hit on" by more men than you could shake your foreshortened stick at and on many occasions I have been so very flattered by it. In fact, several of my wife's colleagues are in love with me. The instance in question, first of all, was not one of being hit on. It was one of a complete stranger in a speedo attempting to hump my bare leg (it was August and I was in shorts) and I was not interested. I politely told him to stop and he refused to respect my wishes. I told him once again and he still advanced upon me. That was when I became more forceful. If you think he had the right to rub his uninvited weenie on my knee, then you lack all credibility. I simply asserted my right to travel unmolested by a stranger who, like a dog in the mood, decided mine was as good a post to hump as any. That you took anything else away from what I wrote shows you have a problem of some sort.

You have a very strange and warped concept of freedom. Apparently yours is nowhere near "live and let live".

And you appear to have a terrible comprehension deficit. You have my sympathy and that is no sarcasm.

[osan]

Speaking of language, the above post is a clinic lesson in flipping words around to turn an avoidance of making a case into a demand that the other side do so.

Nice catch. I'd not seen it in a way I could articulate. Very good.

What is your basis for defining rejection of sexual immorality as mindless prejudice or irrational hatred?

I don't even go so far as to call it immoral - it is just abnormal... and THAT is OK. This goes right back to the original point I made about the importance of words not losing their original meanings. "Normal" in the common usage dates from the very beginning of the 16th century, meaning "common" or "typical". Homosexuality, even in this age of gay manufacture, is not at all common or typical in the broader population. Were it, say, 40% I would say otherwise. But <10% I would not call "normal". But here "normal" has morphed into "acceptable" with a very specific sideband implication of "healthy" or "morally upright". THAT is the problem the ***** have with being labeled "abnormal" - it is taken as a clinical assessment of disease, and that is the fault of the straight "community" whose medical "experts" deemed it a sickness, rather than just an odd mutation of habit, the reward of which was bad enough in terms of the propagation of specific blood lines. But no, their fear of "it" drove them to connote it as "sick" and therefore to be stamped out like smallpox. Now we suffer the backlash of that stupidity with the liberal douchebags forcing the ***** upon our children in subtle ways such that those who would have grown up straight now choose the gay. I take exception to that bit. I had a student named Rayon Brown - black kid and as flaming as anyone you have ever seen. He was a really cool kid and we got along famously. I had no problem with his orientation because it was ever so obvious that he was wired that way. But I see lots of kids now choosing to be ***** because of what they are taught in the schools - I've even had a few tell me this, so it is not my imagination. A couple of my daughter's friends were on that side of the fence and they told me they felt they'd been pushed to it by what they learned in school. This was in Vancouver, WA, just for information's sake, a VERY conservative community. So much so, I am really surprised this $#@! flew there, but there it was.

Cultural judgments of behavior are a separate matter from legal recognition.

That is a really important distinction to know and understand. Kudos.

Homosexuality has been understood to be abnormal for thousand of years, across most populations and civilizations. The other side must state the merits for calling it normal, not just declare it.

Places like Japan in the old days regarded ***** as abnormal, yet such people were not to my knowledge warred upon. They had something of a different view of sexuality from the West. No warring, but it was still not looked upon as normal. This whole "normal" issue really should be addressed and corrected so people can get their undies unbunched. This nonsense is helping nobody.

Perhaps he was commenting about not enjoying the government being used to impose a false legitimacy for gay marriage, or other social left values on him.

That is essentially correct. That he seemed so eager to paint me a... dare I say it... "homophobe" seems to say more about him than myself... but what the hell do I know?