Santorum to kids of gay parents: You'd be better off with a dad in jail

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

Will homosexuals and heterosexuals at some point silently agree that things worked a lot better for both sides when open homosexuals stuck to San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York?

Fair or not, and I certainly have no problem with homosexuals or homosexuality unlike most folks I know, homosexuals will never be embraced by society at large to the degree they fantasize about. Unfortunately, they will always be treated as second-class except where they are heavily concentrated. The best they could have ever hoped for was having their own mecca in San Francisco. AIDS kind of prevented that, I guess.

....wow

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

Will blacks and whites at some point silently agree that things worked a lot better for both sides when negroes stuck to the ghetto?

Seriously.

When did the ghetto become equivalent to San Franscisco, Los Angeles, and New York? Those cities have nice qualities.

Seriously, trying to make the differences between heterosexuals/heterosexuality and homosexuals/homosexuality into something akin to racial differences is never going to work. It's just not. If you don't believe me, go ask the vast majority of African-American Democrats.

You mean the ones who think homosexuality is a choice?

No, I mean the ones who do not care whether or not it is a choice, but see it as undesirable trait in their offspring by virtue of its incompatibility with the survival of their offspring. After all, when you get right down to it most heterosexuals have one basic desire: survival. This includes, of course, survival of their offspring. Biologically, they are never going to really accept something that threatens the survival of their offspring whether it be in the near or distant future.

I truly hope this is an act...

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

Will blacks and whites at some point silently agree that things worked a lot better for both sides when negroes stuck to the ghetto?

Seriously.

When did the ghetto become equivalent to San Franscisco, Los Angeles, and New York? Those cities have nice qualities.

Seriously, trying to make the differences between heterosexuals/heterosexuality and homosexuals/homosexuality into something akin to racial differences is never going to work. It's just not. If you don't believe me, go ask the vast majority of African-American Democrats.

You mean the ones who think homosexuality is a choice?

No, I mean the ones who do not care whether or not it is a choice, but see it as undesirable trait in their offspring by virtue of its incompatibility with the survival of their offspring. After all, when you get right down to it most heterosexuals have one basic desire: survival. This includes, of course, survival of their offspring. Biologically, they are never going to really accept something that threatens the survival of their offspring whether it be in the near or distant future.

So... homosexuality is bad for the survival of children... how, exactly?

Because children need to learn how to ostracise and bully weaker and different children to survive!!! It's about SURVIVAL PEOPLE!!!

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

I assume that Politico is an evolutionary biologist, a psychologist and a parent?

Getting back to the original point, I am saying this: Santorum speaks openly what most heterosexuals are thinking privately. I do not fall into that category. But I am not naive either and I am sorry if that makes some of you uncomfortable.

What com-plete and utter twaddle.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

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You seriously didn't read every response did you?

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Lewis_%28U.S._politician%29

Okay, if you want to get technical about it.

But you need to name a black democrat who was beaten and abused, whose name starts with D... duh!

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

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John Lewis - editorial October 2003...

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

What else are they going to do, vote Republican?

DING! winner!

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

What else are they going to do, vote Republican?

DING! winner!

Not vote at all would be the obvious answer.

That's practical.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

Politico made it clear the prejudice he is describing is not his own view and he does have a point... most people my age and even my kids age especially her ein the South are very disturbed by homosexuality. Pointing out a prejudice does not make someone themselves prejudiced

Now... here we have a nugget in here.

Equally, most people my age around here don't care about homosexuality... it's situational. And considering the tremendous shift in support of LGBT rights, it's fair to say that that shift will continue.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

Living in a society which has gone pretty far in tolerance I can say that it obviously isn't generally true that homosexuals can't be accepted in society. Sweden decriminalized homosexuality at about the same time as the US but today has gay marriage and being bigoted against gays is certainly more controversial than being gay.

Sweden didn't decriminalize homosexuality until 2003?

Weird, I must have been mixing this up with something else. I could have sworn both Sweden and the US made this move in the early 70s (like a lot of social legislation) but apparently this was not the case with either country. Apologies and all that.

The main point remains unchanged though - bigotry can disappear rather quickly.

I believe the US Academy of Medicine (or whatever it is) stopped referring to homosexuality as a mental disorder in the early 1970s...

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

Politico made it clear the prejudice he is describing is not his own view and he does have a point... most people my age and even my kids age especially her ein the South are very disturbed by homosexuality. Pointing out a prejudice does not make someone themselves prejudiced

You're in your late sixties, right? May I ask how old your kids are?

I think it's fair to be talking more about people your grandkids' age (if you have any), since they're the people who are undergoing the most shift and ending up with something like 70-75% acceptance of homosexuality and support for gay marriage.

I'm not as familiar with the South as you (obviously, since you live there), but I do have some familiarity with the greater Birmingham, Alabama area and from what I've seen the worst most people in their teens and twenties get these days is somewhat squeamish, and there are actually some settings--not many yet, to be sure, but some, and relatively easy to find if one tries--in the rural South, places like that one R+25 Congressional district or whatever the number is, where it's possible to be openly gay, which nobody would have expected even ten years ago.

Kids are all in 30s

I do not know anyone who would discriminate against a gay person... they are just disturbed or as you said "squeamish" Even 20 years ago, one of my project managers was gay- and this is in construction. He was a great man and great employee who sadly died  not long ago.  No one had a problem with him- he commanded respect of those he supervised. But there wer ejokes behind his back

There is a difference between someone finding homosexuality abnormal and someone who discriminates against homosexuals... the latter is unacceptable and the former is pretty common, that is what Politico was saying

Thanks, Clarence.

I would add that I, too, know some pretty homophobic people, but I still do not think they would ever discriminate against a homosexual (i.e., not hire/serve them or fire them simply because they are homosexual). This is why it particularly irks me when gay rights activists compare what gays go through with segregation. It is over-the-top and, really, a bit disrespectful. I can see why there is serious backlash among African-Americans.

You realise that's not why there's tensions between the LGBT community and the African American community, politically don't you?

As usual, Poli, you've taken a point about the existence of homophobic people... which is fact, some people will never deal with the idea, and given the number of wonderful homosexual people I know, that's their loss, but then extended it to an absurd degree. Just because there are homophobic people doesn't mean that efforts to reduce that (which have most certainly worked) should be stopped.

There has been a radical shift in the treatment and acceptance of homosexuality and homosexuals, it's beyond self-evident... and because there remains homophobia (albeit at reducing levels) that somehow negates that?

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

Politico made it clear the prejudice he is describing is not his own view and he does have a point... most people my age and even my kids age especially her ein the South are very disturbed by homosexuality. Pointing out a prejudice does not make someone themselves prejudiced

You're in your late sixties, right? May I ask how old your kids are?

I think it's fair to be talking more about people your grandkids' age (if you have any), since they're the people who are undergoing the most shift and ending up with something like 70-75% acceptance of homosexuality and support for gay marriage.

I'm not as familiar with the South as you (obviously, since you live there), but I do have some familiarity with the greater Birmingham, Alabama area and from what I've seen the worst most people in their teens and twenties get these days is somewhat squeamish, and there are actually some settings--not many yet, to be sure, but some, and relatively easy to find if one tries--in the rural South, places like that one R+25 Congressional district or whatever the number is, where it's possible to be openly gay, which nobody would have expected even ten years ago.

Kids are all in 30s

I do not know anyone who would discriminate against a gay person... they are just disturbed or as you said "squeamish" Even 20 years ago, one of my project managers was gay- and this is in construction. He was a great man and great employee who sadly died  not long ago.  No one had a problem with him- he commanded respect of those he supervised. But there wer ejokes behind his back

There is a difference between someone finding homosexuality abnormal and someone who discriminates against homosexuals... the latter is unacceptable and the former is pretty common, that is what Politico was saying

Thanks, Clarence.

I would add that I, too, know some pretty homophobic people, but I still do not think they would ever discriminate against a homosexual (i.e., not hire/serve them or fire them simply because they are homosexual). This is why it particularly irks me when gay rights activists compare what gays go through with segregation. It is over-the-top and, really, a bit disrespectful. I can see why there is serious backlash among African-Americans.

You realise that's not why there's tensions between the LGBT community and the African American community, politically don't you?

As usual, Poli, you've taken a point about the existence of homophobic people... which is fact, some people will never deal with the idea, and given the number of wonderful homosexual people I know, that's their loss, but then extended it to an absurd degree. Just because there are homophobic people doesn't mean that efforts to reduce that (which have most certainly worked) should be stopped.

There has been a radical shift in the treatment and acceptance of homosexuality and homosexuals, it's beyond self-evident... and because there remains homophobia (albeit at reducing levels) that somehow negates that?

There has always been adequate treatment and acceptance of most homosexuals, albeit not ones who talk about their proclivities. That is beyond self-evident. There is NOT acceptance of homosexuality nor will there ever be. Homosexuals deep down inside recognize this, and it is the root of their continued dissatisfaction with the way things are. Ultimately, they will never really be satisfied because homosexuality will never been accepted in the mainstream the way that one prefers Pepsi over Coke. It will always been seen by heterosexuals as "abnormal", for lack of a better word, in the sense that it is an unfavorable characteristic from a biological standpoint.

I could restart this... but it's not worth your time or mine...

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

Politico, you overstate the connection between genetic fitness and parental assessment of a gay child.  Trying to impute psychological behavior from some sort of scientist's-eye view of reproducibility is a significant error in your argument.  Fitness is merely a selective mechanism - if you were saying that people who a militantly anti-gay were more likely to produce offspring, and that was borne out by facts, and therefore gay-haters are selected for, you'd have a point.  But this "straights hate gays because of genetics" thing is pretty retarded on its face.  Put bluntly, people do not, in fact, think with their d**ks (DNA delivery systems).

Look, if you or anybody on here really needs concrete proof about what I am talking about then go do a simple study where you interview parents of newborns in hospitals. Ask the parents one question with a promise of complete confidentiality/anonymity (and some sort of incentive for taking the time to participate in the study, of course): "Do you hope your newborn is homosexual?"

Personally, I think such a study would be a complete waste of time because I guarantee you will not get a single person answering in the affirmative.

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Yeah, that's a whole other can of worms. Who the heck has any idea what the cause of homosexuality is?

OK... this is just bad from a statistical position...

There is a BIG, HUGE, MASSIVE difference between wanting your child to be gay and dealing with the fact that they are.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

Politico, you overstate the connection between genetic fitness and parental assessment of a gay child.  Trying to impute psychological behavior from some sort of scientist's-eye view of reproducibility is a significant error in your argument.  Fitness is merely a selective mechanism - if you were saying that people who a militantly anti-gay were more likely to produce offspring, and that was borne out by facts, and therefore gay-haters are selected for, you'd have a point.  But this "straights hate gays because of genetics" thing is pretty retarded on its face.  Put bluntly, people do not, in fact, think with their d**ks (DNA delivery systems).

Look, if you or anybody on here really needs concrete proof about what I am talking about then go do a simple study where you interview parents of newborns in hospitals. Ask the parents one question with a promise of complete confidentiality/anonymity (and some sort of incentive for taking the time to participate in the study, of course): "Do you hope your newborn is homosexual?"

Personally, I think such a study would be a complete waste of time because I guarantee you will not get a single person answering in the affirmative.

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Yeah, that's a whole other can of worms. Who the heck has any idea what the cause of homosexuality is?

OK... this is just bad from a statistical position...

There is a BIG, HUGE, MASSIVE difference between wanting your child to be gay and dealing with the fact that they are.

Did you miss my other posts?

No, but I think you've missed the overarching and fundamental differences.

You're saying that parents will never really accept their children's homosexuality... what I, and most others are saying is that a) that's utter rubbish and b) walking around asking parents if they 'hope' their child is gay, has nothing to do with acceptance.