The Homosexual Agenda

[Rocinante]

It would be helpful to post factual information as opposed to opinions. Opinions do not lead to the truth. Opinions create two separate warring parties.

For those who do not like getting the Catholic Answer here, it’s not just the posters writing but what the Church teaches. This teaching is constant and has not changed.

Some in our society wake up one day and say, The time has come for this or that to change. According to who? The clock or calendar? No, people propose things that people either agree or disagree with. That’s what happens. There is no calendar marked “this year, we start promoting gay marriage.” I suggest everyone wake up to the fact that things change only because people change them, or not.

people of course do and should continue to change social institutions through the democratic process for the simple reason that over the past several decades we have continued to learn about what changes to social institutions will best serve us just as we have learned how to better do just about everything else–to better serve ourselves with better tvs and phones and cures for diseases more efficient charitable organizations and research teaching us not to beat our children, etc. if our knowledge about economics, biology, medicine, mathematics, and everything else improves over time, why wouldn’t our knowledge of what sorts of social institutions best serve mankind?

i’m at a loss to see how “it’s always been that way” is any sort of argument towards “it ought to always be that way in the future.” if there is a better way–a way of better taking into account the needs of more and more of us–we ought to do it regardless of what was done in the past.

rocinante

 

[FidesSpesCarita]

Star Trek:
Spock son of Sarek of Vulcan and Amanda of Earth.

Babylon 5
Captain John Sheridan of Earthforce married Ambassador Delenn of the Minbari.

So, Amanda and John are both the xenos?

Xeno- is a prefix based on the Greek word “Xenos”, meaning stranger. In biology, it is often used to designate species-difference

So yes to Spocks parents and yes to John Sheridan.

 

[LCMS_No_More]

Xeno- is a prefix based on the Greek word “Xenos”, meaning stranger. In biology, it is often used to designate species-difference

So yes to Spocks parents and yes to John Sheridan.

Oh, I get the meaning of the word. I just never heard of a sexual orientation where one would be sexually attracted to extraterrestrials. Personally, I don’t think that Klingons, Narn or Asgard are at all attractive, but I’d give Delenn or Saavik a second look.

(Yes, I’m a sci-fi geek)

 

[edwest2]

people of course do and should continue to change social institutions through the democratic process for the simple reason that over the past several decades we have continued to learn about what changes to social institutions will best serve us just as we have learned how to better do just about everything else–to better serve ourselves with better tvs and phones and cures for diseases more efficient charitable organizations and research teaching us not to beat our children, etc. if our knowledge about economics, biology, medicine, mathematics, and everything else improves over time, why wouldn’t our knowledge of what sorts of social institutions best serve mankind?

i’m at a loss to see how “it’s always been that way” is any sort of argument towards “it ought to always be that way in the future.” if there is a better way–a way of better taking into account the needs of more and more of us–we ought to do it regardless of what was done in the past.

rocinante

Human beings have not changed over the last 2,000 years. It doesn’t matter if we have cell phones or computers or cars. Babies stll take about nine months to develop and other purely human needs have been identified millenia ago.

I watched the “better way” being marketed over the last 40 years. It has led to a cultural facade that values women less. They have become things, not people. The media has grown increasingly dysfunctional, presenting irrational behavior as entertainment.

There is such a thing as the wisdom of the ages. There are great works of literature out there that have examined the human condition in minute detail.

I suggest we all ignore the changes in hair styles, dress and the design of our cars to realize one thing: the fundamental human being has not changed for thousands of years. That’s why we can watch a Greek play written thousands of years ago and get it.

In the area of science and technology - nothing changes over time. All that happens is we stand on the shoulders of the creative men that have gone before us and perhaps add to their work. Every new scientific advance does not sweep away the past as if it never existed. Washing machines, today, are essentially the same as those made in the 1950s. Sure, the outer styling is different and the controls are electronic but there are only X number of ways to wash clothes. People entering the field of electrical engineering have still got to know the basics dating back to Faraday.

Public schools have seen the worst evils of the experimentalists. Bussing kids to achieve racial equality achieved nothing. Go to Detroit, it’s the most segregated city in the country.
Or “self-esteem.” Someone convinced a school board to give all the kids on a little league team trophies, the winners and the losers. The fictional premise? The self-esteem of children is so fragile that it must be protected. Baloney. Kids fall, they get a spanking. They need to be taught, sometimes by making a mistake, that they can learn from their mistakes and failures, so they grow up to be functional adults. Just because some guy has to write a paper to earn his Ph.D. doen’t give him the ability to reorder something that already works as it should.

What’s next? Square tires on cars? Sure, let’s give it a try.

There is no human need that exists today that has not existed before. If you want to do efficient charity work then consider giving a dollar to the person holding the cardboard sign outside. Not a penny will go to ‘administrative costs.’

I think people need to realize that there are things that actually work and require zero changes. Some years ago, I met a man in a hospital who was 100 years old. I asked him how he would compare life today to when he was 20 years old. His reply: “Everything’s about the same. It all just happens faster.”

God bless,
Ed

 

[John21652]

Human beings have not changed over the last 2,000 years. It doesn’t matter if we have cell phones or computers or cars. Babies stll take about nine months to develop and other purely human needs have been identified millenia ago.

I watched the “better way” being marketed over the last 40 years. It has led to a cultural facade that values women less. They have become things, not people. The media has grown increasingly dysfunctional, presenting irrational behavior as entertainment.

There is such a thing as the wisdom of the ages. There are great works of literature out there that have examined the human condition in minute detail.

I suggest we all ignore the changes in hair styles, dress and the design of our cars to realize one thing: the fundamental human being has not changed for thousands of years. That’s why we can watch a Greek play written thousands of years ago and get it.

In the area of science and technology - nothing changes over time. All that happens is we stand on the shoulders of the creative men that have gone before us and perhaps add to their work. Every new scientific advance does not sweep away the past as if it never existed. Washing machines, today, are essentially the same as those made in the 1950s. Sure, the outer styling is different and the controls are electronic but there are only X number of ways to wash clothes. People entering the field of electrical engineering have still got to know the basics dating back to Faraday.

Public schools have seen the worst evils of the experimentalists. Bussing kids to achieve racial equality achieved nothing. Go to Detroit, it’s the most segregated city in the country.
Or “self-esteem.” Someone convinced a school board to give all the kids on a little league team trophies, the winners and the losers. The fictional premise? The self-esteem of children is so fragile that it must be protected. Baloney. Kids fall, they get a spanking. They need to be taught, sometimes by making a mistake, that they can learn from their mistakes and failures, so they grow up to be functional adults. Just because some guy has to write a paper to earn his Ph.D. doen’t give him the ability to reorder something that already works as it should.

What’s next? Square tires on cars? Sure, let’s give it a try.

There is no human need that exists today that has not existed before. If you want to do efficient charity work then consider giving a dollar to the person holding the cardboard sign outside. Not a penny will go to ‘administrative costs.’

I think people need to realize that there are things that actually work and require zero changes. Some years ago, I met a man in a hospital who was 100 years old. I asked him how he would compare life today to when he was 20 years old. His reply: “Everything’s about the same. It all just happens faster.”

God bless,
Ed

Well said!

 

[larkin31]

You specifically wrote “Human reason does not exist outside of the human mind. It does not exist objectively.” Now you backpeddle and try and tell us you didn’t say the mind cannot make observations and claims towards the objective end of the spectrum.
Despite an earlier denial of the existence of objective reasoning, you now suggest there is actually a “spectrum” of human knowledge and understanding, with “objectivity” at one end. Well, which is it? Objective reasoning doesn’t exist, or it does exist?
Or will continue with this obfuscation?

“reasoning” is not “objective,” meaning that it does not exist outside the mind. Can reasoning be reliable and convey reliable meaning toward the objective end of the spectrum? Sure. Can it fail miserably and distort and deceive. Sure. But it is a brain function, not something that one will bump into in the dark–it itself has no objective existence.

I did not enter into a lengthy rant about you. I went into a lengthy rebuttal of your thinking, of what you wrote. Your illogicalities are becoming evident and you are being precious about it.

Really? This is about me, too.

In the first quoted paragraph, you wrote *"… there is no persuasive evidence of a thing that we term “Natural Law” beyond our thought and discourse." In my last post, I pointed out that the human mind needs to interact with its environment so it can have fodder for reasoningabout the environment with which it interacts. In an earlier post you wrote There is no “evidence” of any **empirical *kind of any such idea. The *idea exists, surely. But as *objective fact, no. None. Zilch. None whatsoever. If you have some, please provide…The natural world, the environment with which our minds interacts, provides the empirical evidence that you say does not exist. Taking the empirical evidence, we use our reasonsing to objectively discern certainty and universality in that environment. You have concede that we do this and you have conceded that we interact with a physical world. Therefore you cannot deny that the universality which can be objectively discerned, through reason, can be called the Natural Law, or whatever else we so choose to call it. It represents a defined certainty about the nature of things.

Which “universality” do you mean? Simply pick one, and I will respond. As far as I am concerned, and until you demonstrate otherwise, even “universality” is only a construction of the human mind and does not exist outside it or human discourse.

To prove to yourself that things do really, really , really do exist outside your thinking, turn off the lights in your house, shut your eyes and walk from one end of the house to the other while thinking about,say, the TV

This is, of course, a terrible example of objective existence. Besides, I am still waiting to “bump” into “Natural Law.” I very very likely will bump into some tables, but I will not ever bump into “Natural Law.”

Now tell me how it feels when you bump into the table.However, with the lights on, your eyes open and a good look around the house, your mind can objectively measure a safe passage from one end of the house to the other, because of the predictability of your environment. Now go outside into the big wide world and do the same thing. Include all the animals and plants and even human nature into your interactions, into your reasoning and I gaurantee you will discern certain attributes of things that are certain, universal and ordered. Welcome to a “Discovery of the Natural Law- 101”.

I do not doubt at all that the world of our senses is fairly predictable. Gravity is indeed very very universal in its application. And is one of our recognized Physical Laws. Gravity is objectively real, but “Physical Law” is not–it is only a human idea in discourse.

 

[InSearchofGrace]

Human beings have not changed over the last 2,000 years. …

God bless,
Ed

Ed, as always, your posts inspire.

As related to the OP, mankind has had some of its members turn to homosexuality since ancient times, against the law of nature. The natural law, written in the hearts of men, may be debunked by certain posters here, but it is there.

The change towards good is that homosexuals have a strong voice now, at least in this country and in this culture of ours. They ARE free and HAVE equal rights.

But the march towards gay marriage and beyond is unholy. The blessing that homosexual activists seek from society, that the homosexual lifestyle is beneficial and should be promoted, is against what God intended for man.

It is not a surprise that those who deny or question the existence of God find the need to re-invent morals and contrive a different meaning to “nature”.

. . . . . .

 

[larkin31]

Moreover, that one form occurs in nature less often than another form, or that it is a sterile form, or a dysfunctional or problematic form, has no bearing on whether that form is “natural” or not nor whether it conforms to a “law” or not nor whether it is “moral” or not.

 

[edwest2]

So, do we go to the Fifth Century B.C. and declare: “Man is the measure of all things.”?

Right now, today, homosexuals can do whatever they want. The issue of “marriage” is the only recent point of contention. Sodomy laws were overturned, privacy existed, but now it’s on the ballot. That’s part of the issue. The other issue shows that marriage and privacy are not the whole story. Once legalized, it leads to automatic State sponsored indoctrination in public schools. Little kids are getting to read King and King.

So, if an Italian community gets its first Mexican immigrants, kids in schools will be mandated to study not only Mexican culture but their sexual attitudes as well?

I’ve worked with gay people. I worked in a hospital that did “sexual reassignment” surgery. I have no irrational fear of any of the above. One employee went from woman to man.

Moral behavior requires a standard.

morallaw.org/blog/?p=31

I am still proud of America’s Judeo-Christian Heritage, which was described as such by the Federal government in the 1960s.

God bless,
Ed

 

[PetersKeys]

Out of curiosity, is it the fact that YOUR tax money (your emphasis) is going to support these people or their immoral actions that landed them in a place of need?

why should my tax money have to support immorality? when these young girls give birth to their illegitimate children and goto the government for help to fix up the mess for them. And the fact is many of these same girls were the same ones who were yelling things like “intolerance” and “bigot” when people tried to defend the dignity of marriage. Should people who support a wrong cause(like the devaluing of marriage) be compensated when that wrong cause they support eventually gets them in trouble? And considering feminists have de-valued motherhood and chivarly so horribly, many of these young women with children know nothing about how to take care of their own children and what to do. So in turn my tax money has to go to them. and if so, why from tax paying citizens. I don’t like my tax money doing to pro abortionists and people who don’t respect and have any regard for marriage…

 

[John21652]

“reasoning” is not “objective,” meaning that it does not exist outside the mind. Can reasoning be reliable and convey reliable meaning toward the objective end of the spectrum? Sure. Can it fail miserably and distort and deceive. Sure. But it is a brain function, not something that one will bump into in the dark–it itself has no objective existence.

At best I can describe you as disengenuous. You are consistently obtuse! According to you, rationality is just a construct and exists only in the mind. That is a roundabout way of stating a firm belief in subjective reasoning as the foundation for belief. In other words, you are saying there is no basis for beleiving anything, unless it suits. Well, from all your posts we can see that is the case!! You forget that all psychological reflection takes place in the course of transactions with one’s environment, that is, with an objective reality. You actually furnish us with proof of his a little later in this post! According to Marxist ideology, there is no objectivity in human reasoning. Your denial of Rationality is a Marxist tool. It drives much of the progressive agenda, which is what the homosexual agenda is a part of. And it is at this point that the progressive agenda is at odds with Catholicism , for One aspect of Catholic moral teaching that distinguishes it from most other moral systems, whether liberal Protestant or secular humanist, is its emphasis on the objectivity of moral principles. Read it and learn.

Which “universality” do you mean? Simply pick one, and I will respond. As far as I am concerned, and until you demonstrate otherwise, even “universality” is only a construction of the human mind and does not exist outside it or human discourse.

Pick one?! You named one below, yet here refuse to acknowledge the existence of universality. Your illogicality is on display. You are obviously not reading the posts properly, if at all. Possibly you have a cognitive problem. Universality has been raised in earlier posts and you consistently deny the issue.

This is, of course, a terrible example of objective existence. Besides, I am still waiting to “bump” into “Natural Law.” I very very likely will bump into some tables, but I will not ever bump into “Natural Law.”

Now you are being fascetious and displaying your illogical mindset. You have again avoided the argument and in the process proving how closed your mind is.

I do not doubt at all that the world of our senses is fairly predictable.

This contradicts your notion that there is no such thing as an objectively discernible external reality.

Gravity is indeed very very universal in its application. And is one of our recognized Physical Laws. Gravity is objectively real, but “Physical Law” is not–it is only a human idea in discourse.

Gravity is one of our recognized Physical Laws. Gravity is real, but Physical Law is not!! Here in in this one paragraph is the entire essence of your illogical arguments against Natural Law. You say Gravity is a Physical Law and is objective, but Physical Laws are not. You are saying Gravity is both objective and not objective all in the one breath! To put it into a proper logical context, Gravity, being an objective reality, cannot belong in a class of objects which are not objective, but according to you they can be and are!! Too funny. You also recognise the concept of universality, yet in all your earlier posts you have gone to great lengths to prove otherwise. If Universality is a subjective human mental construct and nothing more, as you suggest, because they can’t be objectively identified, then gravity cannot be objectively identified either, yet you admit it is!

Like I said in an earlier post, the Natural Law has a habit of burying its underakers.

 

[larkin31]

. If Universality is a subjective human mental construct and nothing more, as you suggest, because they can’t be objectively identified, then gravity cannot be objectively identified either, yet you admit it is!

Like I said in an earlier post, the Natural Law has a habit of burying its underakers.

Do you understand the difference between an material object and an idea?

 

[St_Francis]

Do you understand the difference between an material object and an idea?

Larkin,
It seems to me that when you were talking about objective reality you were really talking about material reality. An idea has objective reality but not material reality. A table has material and objective reality.

 

[Rocinante]

Human beings have not changed over the last 2,000 years. It doesn’t matter if we have cell phones or computers or cars. Babies stll take about nine months to develop and other purely human needs have been identified millenia ago.

i’m surprised you haven’t noticed that human society has changed in the past 2000 years as have all social institutions. and changed for the better at that. for example, we no longer think there ought to be an institution called slavery. we think that people should have the right to participate in government even if they happen to be female or black. we now think that people ought not be forced to participate in a state sponsored religion. we no longer believe that men ought to have multiple wives like the kings and wealthy men of the bible did. we don’t think the institution of marriage should include child brides married off to old men. we no longer think of women as the property of their husbands. we no longer think that blacks and whites ought to be forbidden to marry one another. we no longer think that children ought to be forced to marry whoever their parents want them to marry. we now believe that political power ought to be shared equally among the people rather than the people being ruled by the priests and the royalty. we no longer think that marriage ought to be political unions among the royalty of different nations. we no longer think there ought to be a social institution called royalty and rather believe in social equality. we no longer believe that a woman who is physically abused by her husband ought to remain with her husband. we no longer believe that parents and teachers ought to beat children. we now believe that the best government and the best religion result from keeping these two institutions distinct rather than having a state sponsored religion or government persecution of religions it doesn’t like.

from this perspective the good old days you lament losing weren’t all that good. and the changes to improve social institutions in the ways demonstrated above are all for the better. given that social institutions including marriage have changed in many ways in the past for the better, there is no reason to think that they cannot be further improved.

note how many of these changes listed above are changes in the institution of marriage. note also that we didn’t learn how to improve our social institutions in these ways by becoming more adherent to the dictates of religion but by recognizing where religions had it wrong in the past. the “wisdom of the ages” you cite didn’t get slavery right or the fact that we ought not beat our children with rods or have polygamous marriages. that doesn’t mean that it got everything wrong, but it is obvious that there is room for improvement on the old wisdom.

rocinante

 

[John21652]

i’m surprised you haven’t noticed that human society has changed in the past 2000 years as have all social institutions. and changed for the better at that. for example, we no longer think there ought to be an institution called slavery. we think that people should have the right to participate in government even if they happen to be female or black. we now think that people ought not be forced to participate in a state sponsored religion. we no longer believe that men ought to have multiple wives like the kings and wealthy men of the bible did. we don’t think the institution of marriage should include child brides married off to old men. we no longer think of women as the property of their husbands. we no longer think that blacks and whites ought to be forbidden to marry one another. we no longer think that children ought to be forced to marry whoever their parents want them to marry. we now believe that political power ought to be shared equally among the people rather than the people being ruled by the priests and the royalty. we no longer think that marriage ought to be political unions among the royalty of different nations. we no longer think there ought to be a social institution called royalty and rather believe in social equality. we no longer believe that a woman who is physically abused by her husband ought to remain with her husband. we no longer believe that parents and teachers ought to beat children. we now believe that the best government and the best religion result from keeping these two institutions distinct rather than having a state sponsored religion or government persecution of religions it doesn’t like.

from this perspective the good old days you lament losing weren’t all that good. and the changes to improve social institutions in the ways demonstrated above are all for the better. given that social institutions including marriage have changed in many ways in the past for the better, there is no reason to think that they cannot be further improved.

note how many of these changes listed above are changes in the institution of marriage. note also that we didn’t learn how to improve our social institutions in these ways by becoming more adherent to the dictates of religion but by recognizing where religions had it wrong in the past. the “wisdom of the ages” you cite didn’t get slavery right or the fact that we ought not beat our children with rods or have polygamous marriages. that doesn’t mean that it got everything wrong, but it is obvious that there is room for improvement on the old wisdom.

rocinante

ed began his post by writing about “Human beings”, but you changed the subject in your response to “human institutions”. Therefore, in relation to Ed’s post, your answer is totally irrelevant. You changed the subject of the response so you could make a great big, progressive political and moral statement, which is so easy to see through. Many of the points you make are subject to debate. In the context of a whole society, it is very, very debatable whether or not society has “improved” as your response suggests, particularly when one takes notice of issues such as the breakdown of the family, marriage failure rates, child delinquincy, etc, etc,. I will, however, take up one point in particular. Slavery. The “wisdom of the ages” did in fact get it right with slavery. If you doubt that then go and study Lord Chief Justice Mansfield’s decision in the Sommersett Case -

The state of slavery is of such a nature, that it is incapable of being introduced on any reasons, moral or political; but only positive law, which preserves its force long after the reasons, occasion, and time itself from whence it was created, is erased from memory: it’s so odious, that nothing can be suffered to support it, but positive law.

It took a Chief Justice to enunciate the 'wisdom of the ages" to overturn what had come to be accepted practice and it took a civilm war in the US to tear down positivist laws which had been enacted to suit the relativist inclinations of certain people.

Much of the societal change you seem to so warmly welcome is nothing but the re-introduction of relativistic positive law designed to suit the inclinations of certain people.

 

[Rocinante]

ed began his post by writing about “Human beings”, but you changed the subject in your response to “human institutions”. Therefore, in relation to Ed’s post, your answer is totally irrelevant. You changed the subject of the response so you could make a great big, progressive political and moral statement, which is so easy to see through.

john, i didn’t change the subject. the issue here is the institution of marriage. i said,

“people of course do and should continue to change social institutions through the democratic process for the simple reason that over the past several decades we have continued to learn about what changes to social institutions will best serve us just as we have learned how to better do just about everything else…”

Ed’s response to my statement was to say that human institutions need not change since humans have not changed in the past 2000 years. i don’t suppose he would like to roll back the clock on the changes in social institutions that i listed. would you?

Many of the points you make are subject to debate. In the context of a whole society, it is very, very debatable whether or not society has “improved” as your response suggests, particularly when one takes notice of issues such as the breakdown of the family, marriage failure rates, child delinquincy, etc, etc,. I will, however, take up one point in particular. Slavery. The “wisdom of the ages” did in fact get it right with slavery. If you doubt that then go and study Lord Chief Justice Mansfield’s decision in the Sommersett Case -

It took a Chief Justice to enunciate the 'wisdom of the ages" to overturn what had come to be accepted practice and it took a civilm war in the US to tear down positivist laws which had been enacted to suit the relativist inclinations of certain people.

you are missing the point. slavery was a social institution. the authors of the bible did not even see fit to condemn it, rather we are told answers to moral questions about how badly slaves can be beaten (so that they do not die for at least one day) and that slaves ought to be obedient to their masters.

slavery was accepted practice at one time, and that social institution was changed for the better. it is accepted practice that marriage is between a man and a woman and not two men or two women. that accepted social practice though not nearly so horrendous as slavery can and should also change.

Much of the societal change you seem to so warmly welcome is nothing but the re-introduction of relativistic positive law designed to suit the inclinations of certain people.

really? which of the changes in social institutions i listed would you like to changed back to what they were in the past?

arranged political marriages?
child brides?
polygamy?
prohibition against interracial marriage?
divine right of kings?
state sponsored religion?
women as the property of men?
limiting political participation to wealthy white men?

which of these changes are not actually good for humanity but rather merely evidence of “relativistic positive law designed to suit the inclinations of certain people”? if ed is right then since people have not changed in the past 2000 years then none of these changes in social institutions could possibly have been needed or beneficial.

rocinante

 

[edwest2]

Most of the things you list represent abuses by the priviledged few. And the rest represent a completely undetailed example of the circumstances of certain time periods. Yes, when one country captured another, the enemy was often put to work. Germans captured in Europe ended up on farms and other settings in the United States during World War II. Japanese Americans were interned in camps over the real fear that they would transmit important information to relatives back home. Reading Japanese is a lot more difficult than reading German.

What has the nobility in the United States done to you lately? Oh they don’t wear robes anymore, but Wall Street just brought the entire world to its knees. They took away the homes of the peasants because they manipulated the peasants’ assets.

The Homosexual Agenda is a social engineering experiment - nothing more.

God bless,
Ed

 

[edwest2]

i’m surprised you haven’t noticed that human society has changed in the past 2000 years as have all social institutions. and changed for the better at that. for example, we no longer think there ought to be an institution called slavery. we think that people should have the right to participate in government even if they happen to be female or black. we now think that people ought not be forced to participate in a state sponsored religion. we no longer believe that men ought to have multiple wives like the kings and wealthy men of the bible did. we don’t think the institution of marriage should include child brides married off to old men. we no longer think of women as the property of their husbands. we no longer think that blacks and whites ought to be forbidden to marry one another. we no longer think that children ought to be forced to marry whoever their parents want them to marry. we now believe that political power ought to be shared equally among the people rather than the people being ruled by the priests and the royalty. we no longer think that marriage ought to be political unions among the royalty of different nations. we no longer think there ought to be a social institution called royalty and rather believe in social equality. we no longer believe that a woman who is physically abused by her husband ought to remain with her husband. we no longer believe that parents and teachers ought to beat children. we now believe that the best government and the best religion result from keeping these two institutions distinct rather than having a state sponsored religion or government persecution of religions it doesn’t like.

from this perspective the good old days you lament losing weren’t all that good. and the changes to improve social institutions in the ways demonstrated above are all for the better. given that social institutions including marriage have changed in many ways in the past for the better, there is no reason to think that they cannot be further improved.

note how many of these changes listed above are changes in the institution of marriage. note also that we didn’t learn how to improve our social institutions in these ways by becoming more adherent to the dictates of religion but by recognizing where religions had it wrong in the past. the “wisdom of the ages” you cite didn’t get slavery right or the fact that we ought not beat our children with rods or have polygamous marriages. that doesn’t mean that it got everything wrong, but it is obvious that there is room for improvement on the old wisdom.

rocinante

You know what? Catholics have been lied to over the past 40 years by Hippie liberals and Marxists.

1960 Birth Control Pill
1968 Sexual Revolution. Note - it’s all about SEX, not love. And this battle got us:
1973 Abort your baby. Go ahead. It’s your body. And the man is where? The consensual relationship meant nothing?
1978 “Sisters! Throw off the chains of your oppression!” Men - all men - are the enemy. Good old Marxist class warfare. Demonize all men. Those patriarchal institutions are holding women down.

And the lie is still repeated today by the sons and daughters of those same people. “In the 1950s, women were barefoot and pregnant.” They were also chained to the kitchen stove if you wait to hear the long version of that story.

I was born in the mid - 1950s. The average number of kids in my neighborhood was TWO, that’s T W O. Not 10. Not the propaganda you hear today. Last night, an idiot called American housewives from the 1950s idiots. My mother could do carpentry, she mixed cement, painted the house, and did other “manly” things without a second thought. She worked in a warehouse, an assembly line environment and did other odd jobs as she could. And she looked great in a dress.

Today, the descendants of people with Che Guevara posters want daily revolution. Abolish the old order! Why? They are tired of it, they claim. Yeah, just like the Beats of the 1950s who got out their list of things to protest because that was their “job.” Did they actually believe in something? You don’t have to. Just pick up that protest sign and start yelling slogans.

In the 1980s. No-Fault Divorce. Isn’t that great!? It’s nobody’s fault anymore. And what about the kids and the in-laws? Families torn apart.

Anarchy for anarchists is what I’m mostly seeing today. I’ll have no part of it.

God bless,
Ed

 

[larkin31]

Larkin,
It seems to me that when you were talking about objective reality you were really talking about material reality. An idea has objective reality but not material reality. A table has material and objective reality.

Exactly. But I would add, and have added already several times, that an idea has objective reality only in human discourse (various forms of human discourse are possible.)

But yes, what you write is what I mean, with this one important qualification. So thank you for the assistance in clarification.

 

[John21652]

john, i didn’t change the subject. the issue here is the institution of marriage. i said,

Marriage is but one ‘human institution’. You mentioned several more and included a few customs which are not really ‘institutions’.

“people of course do and should continue to change social institutions through the democratic process for the simple reason that over the past several decades we have continued to learn about what changes to social institutions will best serve us just as we have learned how to better do just about everything else…”

Just who is “we”? . Take the institution of marriage. Divorce rates in the US and in my own country, Australia, have gone through the roof. The family unit has been trashed and the ones paying the price are the kids. In Australia in 1975, the concept of “no fault divorce” was recognised by an Act of Parliament. It is now being recognised that the concept of no fault divorce is wrong and has caused untold hurt, harm and fragmentation of our society. Yet people like you will dare try tell the world that such change is beneficial?!

Ed’s response to my statement was to say that human institutions need not change since humans have not changed in the past 2000 years. i don’t suppose he would like to roll back the clock on the changes in social institutions that i listed. would you?

There is a vast difference between change for the sake of change and constructive change. Many of the changes wrought by the left wing progressive agenda have wrought destruction on society.

you are missing the point. slavery was a social institution. …

If you study your history a little more, you will see that Slavery was only an ‘institution’ for a very brief period and was 'instituted by positive laws made in the early American colonies after first settlement. Before the positive laws were instituted slavery was carried out by a few because there was no stated law against it. Slavery was an abberation in American and English affairs. A Virginia Act of 1662 declared that *“all children born in this country shall be held bond or free only according to the condition of the mother,” *thus establishing the rule in all the slaveholding areas of British America. Slavery was never the norm before this. Slavery was institutionalised through positive law, which came from local and parochial standards and conventions and vested interests. It was not universal. No such positivist law existed in England either. Slavery was eventually abolished because of Natural Law arguments which overcame the positivist law. A prime example is an argument America’s own Thomas Jefferson used in a 1770 case(Howell v Nethrland) Justice Mansfield stated the Natural Law and the US states fought to make it universally accepted. Go back through history even further and you will see that slavery was sporadic and did not last long in any given society.

it is accepted practice that marriage is between a man and a woman and not two men or two women. that accepted social practice though not nearly so horrendous as slavery can and should also change.

So you want to trash millenia of accepted human behaviour and normalise what is clearly abnormal? Why? So gays can have 'equal rights"? They want to be “equally regarded” even though their behaviour is anomolous and disordered. What other disorder do you wish to sanction in the name of “equality”. Tell me this, how can sex between a man and a woman ever be considered on a par as sex between a man and a man" Do you really think the two are equal?

really? which of the changes in social institutions i listed would you like to changed back to what they were in the past?

• arranged political marriages?

Going on the number of botched marriages and the inability of people to discern properly, this may not be a bad idea!!

• divine right of kings?

This was definently an abberation. The idea only lasted a few hundred years and again normalcy overcame it. The US Declaration of Independence enshrined the Natural Law doctrine of self evident rights well and truly.

• women as the property of men?

The **Married Women’s Property Act 1870 **in England restored women to the Natural Law position they once enjoyed. If you doubt that, go look up Boedicia and her ilk, Joan of Arc and the female Abbesses of Europe and England. Even Ancient Egypt treated women as equal to men under the Law. Unfortunately, you have let your head be filled with the Marxist idea that women have always been downtrodden and oppressed, when in actual fact, for much of history, the reverse has been true.

• .,mlimiting political participation to wealthy white men?

Yeah, you’re right on this one. An absolute abberation indeed. I’d take out the word “white”.!!

which of these changes are not actually good for humanity but rather merely evidence of “relativistic positive law designed to suit the inclinations of certain people”? if ed is right then since people have not changed in the past 2000 years then none of these changes in social institutions could possibly have been needed or beneficial.

You still don’t see that the changes wrought have undone what most people viewed as ‘good’. It has not been change so much as dismantling and the result is a fractured society. Most of the so called “institutions” you have mentioned here are in fact aberations of human history and have been against Natural Law. However, fixing is different to destroying and introducing an extreme liberalism is as wrong as the wrongs you seek to rectify.