Portrait, you know that we didn’t agree on Harry Potter, but what you’ve said here is absolutely true. Way too often people will try to de-humanize opponents so that people will sympathize with them against their opponent. It’s a cheap trick that’s played for nothing more than emotional leverage.Dear Friends,
To brand a man a ‘homophobe’ because he opposes homosexual deviancy on religious grounds, is not dissimilar to using the term ‘troll’ on the internet as an *ad hominem *strategy to discredit an opposing position by attacking the proponent. Both are instances of people flaunting their annoyance at opposing viewpoints (by which they have usually been thrown off balance) and trying to score cheap debaters points at the expense of their antagonist.
Invariably, calling a man a homophobe is an attempt to halt rational debate of an issue by shifting the focus to either one of the participants. In so doing they dismiss another man’s arguments based on some real or supposed attribute of the person. In this case, the supposed attribute is a fear of homosexuals. However, even if a man was afraid of homosexuals, that would in no wise diminsh his arguments one iota against their sinful aberrant conduct.
In any event the homophobia charge does not stand up to scrutiny. The vast majority of those who condemn homosexual deviancy are not fearful of homosexuals. Clearly one can disagree with something without necessarily fearing it, thus the attempt to close down reasoned discussion falls flat. It is an attempt to divert attention from the arguments against one’s position by focusing attention on the one who proposed the arguments, whilst trying to claim some moral high ground against him. This says more about the person using this abusive epithet than the one against whom thier abuse is directed.
Warmest good wishes,
Portrait
Logic is always nice to see here.Fear and love are not opposing emotions. One can have both love and fear for a person. With respect to your quote, as long as people are making strides to emulate Jesus’ teachings is that not enough? Fear is acceptable, acting out because of it is not.
Against the sin itself? Or against the person commiting the sin?I mean hatred
The fact that we ought to hate all sins doesnt mean we somehow should not hate homosexuality & the intense sadness & destruction it brings to those who commit homosexual sins. In fact If I love that person who is tempted to commit homosexual acts I will necessarily hate his/her sin, because that sin is destroying the person whom I love. The same principle applies to other sinsA couple observations:
Given human nature it’s rather difficult to hate the sin without some of that carrying over to our attitude toward the sinner.
Even granted that one hates the sin I think a large part of that is that there is a large disgust factor when it comes to homosexuality. Besides, it is easy to hate a sin which will never tempt most of us.
I’ve never met, nor seen on these forums anyone who hates adultery, divorce & remarriage or fornication with the same intensity that they reserve for gays. Why is that?
If straights hadn’t already destroyed traditional sexuality the “gay lib” movement could never have got off the ground.
With out ABC, premarital shacking up, no-fault divorce, acceptance of adultery, no one would even think the words “gay” and “marriage” together.
Maybe we should clean our own house instead of concentrating fire on others.