201. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #169879 by AllanW on April 27, 2008 at 3:09 am

Re; comment 169877 Steve Zara.

That's the clearest explanation of Rapture motivation I've read. Thanks.

202. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169868 by AllanW on April 27, 2008 at 2:25 am

ZekeCDN; I'm happy to acknowledge the situation as you outlined completely. And it just adds weight to your later comment (which I equally agree with) that the best route forward is to ensure we spend time and effort making sure these support mechanisms are in place where they may be deficient at the moment that help vulnerable individuals cope. Not unnecessarily restricting everybodies ability to express themselves even if this means supporting their right to express repugnant ideas.

203. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169856 by AllanW on April 27, 2008 at 1:39 am

Good morning everyone.

Interesting points by ImagineAll. School as a place of happiness and safety? No; learning and preparation for the real world.

'Either allow them both or don't allow both of them- the double standard is ridiculous' I agree; what are the rules and how do we enforce them? At the moment there is a double standard and that's what I'm examining. Bonzai states that schools currently have rules that 'allow no freedom of expression'. That may be so but should it be so?

Max D;
'Shoule someone be allowed to make a case for exterminating people whose ring and middle fingers are the same length (a sure sign they are werewolves)? I think they should. Because I think people carrying out the actions are the ones responsible.
I admit to not really finding this very emotionally satisfying and more than mildly disturbing.' I agree; disturbing but rational and consistent? Only disturbing if we follow a gut reaction based upon our own tender and worthwhile feelings but ultimately defeating and damaging to our growth as a society? Bonzai states that it is currently a crime but the question before us is not that it is but should it be?

I welcome ZekeCDN's contribution (hailed by many as useful and insightful). Let's examine it without for a second decrying its validity and sincerity.

I'm paraphrasing here; 'Victims of other abuse are more used to it. They have experience in dealing with it. Gay kids are unsure if they will be supported. So they should be treated differently when exposed to abuse.' His next contribution was, for me, right on the money; 'Only the same old cure-all we have for every other kind of ignorance and bigotry: education and time.' Absolutely; consciousness-raising allied with Max D's next point of exposure, illustrated by a great personal example.

Dr Benway gives another facet to the double standard idea in relation to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Teratornis dragged us somewhat away from the limited contemplation of homophobic bullying and back to the more basic question at hand;

'In both cases, it looks to me like the victims haven't learned to get over their hypersensitivity to mere symbols. Verbal bullying is not the same as physical bullying, because verbal bullying requires the full cooperation of the victim to be effective. We can certainly blame the victim of verbal bullying for feeling insulted, because feeling insulted is a choice.' Exactly my point, my friend, thanks. Followed by;

'The real tragedy in our schools is not that some kids are wearing slogans on their shirts, but that we don't teach kids how to handle insults. We don't even teach kids the fact that learning how to handle insults is possible. An insult is nothing more than a knock at the door. It's up to the hearer to decide whether to invite the insult in, and entertain it. We need to teach all children to handle insults, by giving them the same kind of training given to police officers and (some) professional athletes. Cops and pro athletes must learn to keep cool heads in confrontations with angry folks who are highly skilled at using words to manipulate another person's emotional state. The trick is to remain consciously aware of our emotional responses to things, and to practice by exposing ourselves to progressively more heinous insults, until we can evaluate anything people say with clinical detachment.'

Right on the mark again; by framing rules that encourage victim mentalities and refraining from introducing an environment at formative ages that develops these skills we perpetuate ignorance, learning and deny the possibility of reaching more of our potential. So tell me again why many here support restrictions to free speech?

Cartomancer suggests in comment 169770 that people, especially teenagers cannot control the results of their emotions at the moment and so shouldn't be expected to. I'm sad that he seems to imply that humans cannot improve themselves either individually or in aggregate.

Teratornis again hits the bulls eye; 'Before we try to legislate away everybody else's right to hate, we might start by excising our own hatred first.' I would only add that the legislative process is not a decision that needs to be addressed but has already been made. He reiterates the points I made earlier and he supports;

'We expect the religious to tolerate all the offensive things we say to them. Do we also reserve the right to be crybabies ourselves? Are we just as self-absorbed and self-unaware as Orwell's pigs? Do we want to be more equal than everyone else? I don't think anyone, whether religious or not, has a high opinion of blatant hypocrisy, so why don't we show the world the right way to deal with insults'.

And;

'In contrast, choosing to be upset by mere symbols is entirely a personal choice. Most people seem too stupid to figure this out on their own, particularly when they are young and most strongly controlled by their emotional brains, so let's give them the training they need to figure it out.'

The rest of comment 169779 is a more detailed explication of the ramifications of these points and is really useful.

Having read the posts so far, where am I on this? I still find no convincing argument for any restriction on free speech. I'm even swaying towards disagreement that schools should have the restrictions they currently have as I disagree with the premise that schools should be a closeted, safe-haven. I certainly see no reason (and think on the contrary) that current hate laws are as irrational and destructive as blasphemy laws are so should be repealed given a concentrated effort to teach people effective ways of dealing with adversarial conflicts. I am, of course, still open to be convinced back to my former position of supporting restrictions on free speech based on my personal tendencies to provide support for oppressed minorities but it had better be good :)

204. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169708 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 4:08 pm

Bedtime for me; see you tomorrow.

205. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #169704 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 3:59 pm

Hi Melissajoy1234.

I know your post was directed at RD but I'd like to comment if I may?

You seem like a nice lady and the responses so far have been nice and polite so I'll just reiterate a few points they made and add a couple of my own.

You call yourself ignorant but I'm sure you're being a little harsh there. Read a few books written by RD or on science in general and I'm sure you'd enjoy them.

As for God's response should RD ever meet him at the end of his life; well, that's the crux isn't it? How are you so sure that he will? Atheists don't believe that his existence has been shown to be remotely likely so far so go about there lives on the basis that all we have is this one life so we'd better make the best of it. Why do you think he exists?

Most people here don't look to argue for the sake of it either; we want to discuss things that we feel are important but do it in a way that stresses the factual evidence not just our feelings; in that regard, believing that RD is searching (and failing) to find peace in his life so far is a statement that should be backed-up by something more substantial than 'I think it'. Would you care to discuss it a little more?

206. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169686 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 2:52 pm

Comment #169684 by lostpoet

'One idea -- I try to feel solidarity with people rather than causes. Supporting people who feel humiliated and are in pain is always right. And "might" isn't even needed.'
Can't disagree with this point. My perspective in this discussion is that 'causes' is the term for a group of individuals facing the same kind of problem that causes their hurt. I don't think we have a difference of opinion here.

207. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169682 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 2:39 pm

Comment #169678 by lostpoet

'Consciousness-raising becomes particularly powerful when we stand-up with the "target" and refuse to let them be intimidated, wouldn't you agree?' Yes I would; there is power in facing adversaries (whether physical or intellectual) with numbers in many cases. Standing alongside people to show solidarity is effective and I've done it (as you have) many times and in many different causes.

But I would just add that 'might does not equate to right'. I'd always want to be showing this solidarity with a cause that I have thought through and the weaknesses and strengths have been tested and found solid. That's what I'm doing here.

I can't disagree with your last point that emotionally I oppose people who cause hurt to others but I'm trying to come to an understanding of not just my individual position but to an understanding of what might be the most effective manner for society to regulate itself with regard to these issues. I remain unconvinced so far that my personal tendencies on this issue are anywhere near to being justified more widely.

208. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169677 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 2:26 pm

Comment #169658 by Sargeist

'If both I and the Beatles *want* to cause people to kill their parents, but only one of us has the power, does that mean only those with the power are to be held accountable?'

Good example; I advanced the view that any speech should be free, even (to pick up on a point by Mphil that touches on your example) the 'Go kill x' variety. Why? Because they are words not deeds. Anybody who performed the deed should be held by society to account not the transmitter.

If the legislation were formed this way then a number of results might be forthcoming such as the scale and type of publicly-voiced opinions would be more forthright; the necessity for people to recognise that they need to discriminate the sources and content of information they receive would be made more obvious; the necessity to actually think about issues would be more obvious; the ability to function in society would require a depth and width of engagement that does not exist now. I submit that most of these results would be beneficial to society as a whole.

209. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169676 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 2:18 pm

Comment #169656 by prettygoodformonkeys

'AllanW - explain "dissonance", and I'll try to answer your many questions. Otherwise, no.'

Please yourself.

210. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169674 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 2:15 pm

Comment #169645 by lostpoet

'They simply have these experiences.' Ok maybe there is no mileage in looking at how the brain processes these different stimuli.

'I think we can and should do better' than 'sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt me' you mean? I'm not sure that this old saw doesn't contain a lot of what I'm getting at here. So the 'should' part of the phrase above is aimed at convincing people to be less hateful and more respectful of differences? A noble aim and one I'd subscribe to in a heartbeat once anyone shows me that legislation (don't forget we have blasphemy and hate crime legislation on our books in the UK) is better at changing behaviour in a thoughtless bully than a combination of consciousness-raising and steadfast refusal by the target to be intimidated.

Your final paragraph is a restatement of the problem; it is disrespectful behaviour but whether it is premeditated or not in my view only tells us more about the sender than the target. Even in this example of the jerk at school does it not provide a terrific justification that more information is better than less in these things? It tells us about the jerk and his opinions. It may tell us something about his family and upbringing. It certainly underscores the free speech issue. It tells the people around him and the school what his reaction to the Day of Silence is. And the downside is what? Gay schoolmates react how? I'm not being facetious here but exactly how much mental torture is this inflicting? I can think of many circumstances (such as those Max D has experience of) that would be a lot more intimidating; being cornered by a bunch of jocks, surrounded and shouted at, hectored. Having a bunch of people follow you across the quad loudly shouting out slogans and epithets directed solely at you. That's not to say that there might be some hurt generated by his wearing the t-shirt but my contention is that this is mainly within the ability of the receiver to affect; water off a duck's back or suicidal thoughts? I know which end of that spectrum would be a reasonable reaction and which would be self-defeating and damaging. And that's the nub; the reaction is individual to the receiver so how can clumsy legislation remedy those effects?

211. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169648 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 1:26 pm

Comment #169638 by phil rimmer

'Sorry, I tend to think in slogans, which is no help to anyone.' No apology necessary; I tend to write in shorthand that I understand completely but which leaves others asking questions; it's why I put a smiley at the end of my post :).

I'm glad that you put 'excuse' in commas as for me it reflects the case that many times the abusive bullying is as thoughtless (and devoid of genuinely-held hatred) as not. I thought Sargeists point about the word 'gay' being used in British schools was appropriate here; it is used in almost an asexual manner here not as a sexual pejorative in my experience. The effective solution is a combination of consciousness-raising and non-physical resistance by the target to the abuse rather than trying to legislate it away.

Your point that bullying that is sanctioned by a majority of society is of much greater significance is well made but of greater significance to whom? The minority it is aimed at? Other societies that do not share that particular viewpoint?

212. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169644 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 1:17 pm

Comment #169637 by prettygoodformonkeys

'The point is that allowing adolescent gay bashing is much more serious than the navel-gazing, middle class angst you and PBUM seem to be equating it'. This is almost Steve's point from earlier that I disagreed with; he made the point that it is more widespread and you say it's more serious (I'll ignore the pejorative adjectives). My point is that you need to justify why homophobia is more serious than racism, sexism, ageism etc.

'You make some good points within that area'. Thanks :) but which ones!

'it diminishes the importance of the problem to lump it in with, for instance, "being skinny".' Here I'm going to take a contrary position (as I have all along; this is an exploratory conversation not a policy document as far as I'm concerned). I don't have the figures to hand (and it's not a numbers game anyway) but you need to justify why the scale of hurt, damage and loss of self-confidence associated with anorexic and body-image problems is any less serious for those who undoubtedly suffer abuse about this characteristic of their personality than people who suffer homophobic abuse. Is it intent (as was mentioned in an earlier post? Is it to do with systematic rather than isolated abuse?

213. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169636 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 12:48 pm

Sargeist;

A minefield is right! After a shaky start I think we're starting to dig into it a little more, as uncomfortable as it may be. But I'd absolutely agree with you that this site is the place to have this kind of discussion as the posters will tend to be the more thoughtful and reflective ones around rather than knee-jerk reaction-mongers :)

Any socially constructed idea should be able to withstand a lot more than the gentle examination we are giving this topic if it is to justify it's place, in my opinion.

214. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169633 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 12:39 pm

Hi phil rimmer;

A bigger problem for whom and why? And what is a hateful society? :)

215. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169632 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 12:34 pm

Peacebeuponme;

Ok so the differentiator is best phrased as; 'It's unnacceptable bullying if it occurs systematically not as isolated, occasional abuse'. Yes?

216. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169630 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 12:31 pm

Thanks Steve; I agree that any abusive comments about things that could change about a person may be different to any comments about a person about characteristics that cannot change. So is that a useful definition of what should be classed as acceptable abuse or not? 'It's unnacceptable abuse and should be subject to legal penalties if it refers to characteristics that cannot be changed about a person'?

217. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169627 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 12:27 pm

Peacebeuponme;

I entirely agree that any experience like this can be horrible for the target, no question about that.

I'm just interested in digging-out the social rules that distinguish between abuse that is acceptable and abuse that is not and is legislated against. For you that may lie in the motivation for the abuse; hatred or just being obnoxious as part of an in-group/out-group behaviour.

The other interesting thing for me is that most of the argument seems to be made about the effect it has on the target rather than the intention of the transmitter and there I think there are problems (as I've posted earlier).

218. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169616 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 12:12 pm

Peacebeuponme; why is it different? Can you explain how it differs to racism, sexism, homophobia?

219. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169613 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 12:06 pm

Steve,

I understand your questions of Sargeist (I guess they are trying to compare levels of suffering and differentiate his from other people's) but for me that misses the point. The argument for proscribing some forms of written and verbal ideas has been made because it causes hurt, distress and/or humiliation (again we're not talking about physical abuse here). And plainly this did for Sargeist and does still for a great many others. The onus is surely on the proscribers to justify the distinctions they want to make between the groups of the abused in order to sanction some bullying behaviour and not sanction others and exempt it by calling it free speech or teasing or just plain rough and tumble. This is exactly one of the consequences I was highlighting earlier as a direct result of using this thinking to formulate rules.

Am I making this any clearer?

220. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169604 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 11:50 am

Thanks for that, Sargeist; you make my point exactly.

221. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169595 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 11:36 am

Comment #169582 by prettygoodformonkeys

Yeh, thanks for that contribution.

Care to point out where anyone here is not defending same-sex attraction or the fact that we as humans are part of the animal kingdom?

BTW 'they', 'forbidden', 'helplessly', 'these people'; may just be careless phrasing but if not your dissonance is showing.

222. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169571 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 10:17 am

Comment #169552 by lostpoet

'I wrote a reply earlier, but don't see it here yet.' It's a bugger that; sometimes you lose whole posts because of some timing issue (I'm not techie enough to diagnose this problem :)). For any response longer than a few quick sentences I've adopted the habit of constructing my replies in a word processing programme and then pasting it into the box when complete. This method has at least the virtues of making me think a little more before replying, being able to spell-check it and of being able to preview it before posting.

'People control whether they experience emotional pain, humiliation and suffering as much as they control whether they experience physical pain and anguish in response to an assault.' Interesting; I can see that the electrical stimulation of pain-receptors can be analogous to the electrical signals passed to the brain from speech and sight organs so there could well be a likeness in that way. However I'd need to have it spelled out to me more fully that the way the brain processes these two inputs is very similar before accepting that idea. I have nowhere near enough understanding of this science to even venture a guess either way but I'd be willing to listen if you have anything that can provide guidance?

'I also suspect that children, generally speaking, are less skilled at controlling what they psychologically and physically experience in response to an assault.' I'd be tempted to agree with this point just from my layman's understanding of the sophistication of mental models and ways of coping with the world that are acquired by most people throughout the growing and maturing process. Yet while being swayed by this view it raises problems; do we therefore build rules (blasphemy laws, hate laws etc) that penalise proponents of any ideas that affect those who lack (and it's a 'lack' because we accept that they are possible to construct or learn) the ability to be uninjured by the spoken or written word? Does this include (and if not why not?) the impulse to condemn any form of dialogue or writing which points out difference (because the damage we are talking about normally relates to a persons feelings of inclusion as opposed to exclusion from societal groupings)? I'm sure you would be able to find people who have been badly marked and hurt by being singled out for being left-handed or ginger-haired; I'm sure as children they have been terribly wounded to be labelled as different for these characteristics that are just as uncontrollable by them as being a girl, gay or Iranian (to give just some examples of many characteristics you could name). Again, my point is solely concerned with non-physical aggression; does society want to legislate in this area at the risk of causing injustices and possibly widespread effects when a more positive effect could be achieved by using these instances and examples to teach more robust and healthy alternative strategies?

'I believe that we should side with those being disparaged much more often than those doing the disparaging.' I wholeheartedly agree with you and my sympathies lie fully in that direction. Yet just as greenhouse-grown, force-fed and protected tomatoes reach maturity successfully but taste as interesting as water and naturally-grown tomatoes ripen more slowly and face a more uncertain and less successful route to maturity, once there they taste far more of tomato. A silly example only meant to throw out an idea that as much as we try to control all of the environmental variables that affect populations of people (from an altruistic and generous impulse that I share) should we not accept that this route could eventually be fruitless and that there are alternatives to consider?

223. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169522 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 8:27 am

Re; comment #169517 Steve Zara

1. Maybe so :)

2. I was assuming that; many thanks for putting me right.

3. Just an amendment; 'I assumed you were saying that the victim is responsible for all THEIR reactions, emotional and otherwise to bullying.'
And yes, I was floating that idea (certainly no stronger than that).

4. I'm being hassled to go to B and Q for taps so will be back a little later.

224. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169515 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 8:15 am

Steve Zara;

'I wasn't offended. I was just a bit puzzled as to why you made the point.'

Thanks :)

As I said earlier, I was registering my disagreement with the 'seriousness' part of your comment not the fact of it. While I acknowledge the links you shared (and have read others as well over the years that reinforce that prevalence of homophobic bullying in schools) I nevertheless have formed the view that there are more severe forms of bullying and oppression being practiced in the UK. That's all.

I'd hate for our discussion to founder on this point as I would really enjoy your thoughts on the meat of the other posts on this thread.

225. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169504 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 8:04 am

lostpoet;

Many thanks for the thoughtful post. I understand the point about these words causing pain, humiliation etc as they can but as we were discussing earlier is this not in the control of the receiver of the message not the transmitter?

And I understand the nature of the message being intolerant ('Be something your not rather than something I don't like') but again do you see how this standard of intolerance is vastly more reflective upon the sayer rather than any group that it is targetting?

226. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169500 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 7:58 am

Mitchell Gilks;

You manage at least to have read and understood the point; 'The closest possible thing I saw him argue is that it was more prominent than other forms of bullying, and thus perhaps deserves more attention.'
Exactly. Steve attempted to support his assertion by linking to a survey conducted at the request of Stonewall, surveying 1145 pupils in schools and reported in brief by the BBC. I then attempted to quickly raise a number of sections of society who I felt might suffer from a more severe kind of bullying and intimidation that would counter the statement 'more prominent than other forms of bullying'.

The point of mentioning that homophobia might be an issue close to Steve's heart and therefore assume a more prominent place in his view of the world is not irrelevant or even a low blow as firstly it is not a disparaging comment in any way (not in my intention or estimation anyway) and secondly I felt it relevant as it is one form of stereotyping that has analogies to religiosity/irreligiosity while not being completely similar (the idea that religion is a choice is not similar).

Quite on topic;

'Personally, I think you should justify your horrible assertion, or apologize. Of course you're free to be a dick.'

Personally I think that Steve should make it clear to me if I've offended him and I'll readily apologise but as for you, well, you can make any assinine statements you wish and I'll just make my judgements of your character accordingly but will refrain from knee-jerk reactions; there is enough of that kind of unthinking arse-gravy on here already.

227. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169488 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 7:34 am

MitchellGilks and Steve;

Maybe I was not clear. My point was not that you were making a point as a homosexual but your words were that bullying against homosexuals was more serious than any other form of bullying. Only that. It was the 'seriousness' part of that sentence I was highlighting not the homophobia reference.

228. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169484 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 7:30 am

Well, let's take your example, Peacebeuponme. It's not a hypothetical example.

If you're in the shoes of the person on the end of the name-calling, how could this go? I'll assume that the 'everyone' at the school doing the calling is white (but it might be interesting to develop the case without this assumption). I'll equally assume for the moment that the calling does not degenerate into any form of physical abuse (an assumption that can likewise be dropped and developed later).

I think there are circumstances in which you can demonstrate that this would not cause you profound distress and could indeed reinforce your confidence and sense of self-worth. For instance, you come from a family that has given you a strong sense of your history and ethnicity. It has instilled in you a calm and assured strength of self. In addition you entered the school knowing that this name-calling may well occur and have prepared yourself with a series of verbal retorts that demonstrate your sense of humour and, while recognising your physical colour difference, demonstrating that you feel it is a sad reflection on the person doing the calling rather than it having any impact on you.

How does this play out? There will be a distribution of reactions to your plainly not being intimidated and your responses reflecting back upon the callers. Many will drop the issue in short oredr and use it as the basis for friendship. Many will drop the issue (stop the calling) and revert back to treating you as if you were the same as them (whether in their frioendship group or not) and some will remain bigotted and not change their mind. This group will increasingly become marginalised by the others in the school society as they recognise the bigottry for what it is (the others have seen that it does not affect you for themselves and have come to the conclusion that it says more about the bigots than it does about you).

Contrast this with a heavy-handed and no doubt clunkily implemented set of rules by the school which, in all probability, will actually cause more resentment across a wider group of the school society.

229. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169475 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 7:11 am

Gymnopedie;

No-one here fails to make the connection. It can be seen as 'bullying' in tone. I'm certainly saying that the circumstances of this event are ones that I would characterise as well within free speech parameters and individuals seeing the t-shirt should examine their own reactions to it not seek to prevent the message being transmitted. As others have said, it says far more about the person making the message than those it may be targetting.

230. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169474 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 7:04 am

Steve;

Thanks for agreeing on the responsibility for physical reactions being with the individual concerned.

'I assumed you meant that the victim was responsible if they felt bullied or upset.' Do you know, to some extent I am. I'm feeling my way through this point so bear with me; there are many people who do not let abuse, disparaging comments or criticism affect their sense of self. I'm sure you'd agree with that. We have all met someone like that. I'm not saying that they ignore it (although I'm sure some people do and they wouldn't let these kinds of comments or writing affect them either) but rather that they hear or read the words, distance themselves from the gut-reaction and reflect upon it. Is this not a commendable trait? On the other hand many people feel a drop in self-confidence as a result of what they perceive to be harsh verbal or written treatment of themselves (again here we're not talking about physical intimidation or abuse, that we have agreed is abhorrent). Now why would it be the responsibility of the transmitter of abuse to work out exactly how the receiver is affected by the words?

That's the nub of my query; if you build societal rules based upon a requirement to assess how it would mentally and emotionally affect someone else (and by legislating passing a penalty onto them for failing to do this well enough) then aren't you just building a system that is designed to fail? Yet if you build it from an assumption that people are demonstrably capable of not taking offense (or losing self-confidence) then you, in some way, encourage the strengthening or prevalence of this trait in the whole body of society, surely?

As you can see. this is not exactly my area of expertise and I'd welcome any comments :)

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Comment #169467 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 6:46 am

'If you counter what you consider to be offensive words by resorting to violent reaction then you deserve to lose the argument'

is a far better sentence and exactly what my intention was, Peacebeuponme. Thanks for that. I agree.

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Comment #169465 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 6:44 am

Steve;

Any other group of the same size that have suffered as much? This isn't a numbers game, Steve. Just off the top of my head I'll point you towards the female victims of arranged marriages who have died or been physically assaulted in this country. Or the thousands of ex-servicemen and women who suffer physical hardship with little or no assistance after government service in which they participated in radiological or germ warfare testing. Or the many mainstream Muslin families who suffer physical violence as a result of their ethnicity. Or the many victims of household abuse (both men and women) some of whom are killed as a result.

Whats' so weird about the responsibility for any reaction being the victims' own? The responsibility for their own actions I mean. The responsibility for the deluded, insensitive, bigotted abuse is, of course, with the transmitter.

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Comment #169461 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 6:36 am

Peacbeuponme;

I'm not linking stupidity and violence so closely; read the posts in question. It was a comment intended to show the corollary of a point Steve made about wit and intelligence.

You can like or not any comment I make but I suggest you make sure you've read it carefully in order not to tilt at the wrong windmill. Show me where I dismiss uneducated people as thugs, please.

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Comment #169456 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 6:22 am

Interesting analogy; aspects of the human psyche as disease ('Bullying is bad for any individual, but as with diseases,)

Your point that I disagreed with was that bullying of homosexuals is more prevalent than any other form of bullying (you reinforce the point in your post above ('we deal first with that which is most widespread.').

Speaking from our position in the UK I'd need to be convinced of that assertion.

Back on the point in question; 'Which is why we have to work to limit verbal abuse.' Please explain why we have to do this? And why you distinguish between verbal and written abuse? Because if your argument revolves around the 'well it causes people to react violently' or 'makes people react to the offense' or 'makes people feel worse about themselves' then I'm afraid you have a weak argument as I'm pretty sure that all of those consequences are entirely within the control of the receiver of the message not the transmitter, mate.

235. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169453 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 6:09 am

'Verbal bullying is a serious matter, especially when it comes to homosexuality. '

Dead wrong; you are speaking from your own personal cause here, Steve. There is no more seriousness involved in homophobic people (I'm NOT supporting them) than in racist, sexist, ageist or any other criteria you could mention. For someone in society it is intensely personal and damaging.

236. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169452 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 6:07 am

'Unless you have wit and speed of thinking you deserve to suffer? '

Let me put the other side of that coin; if your stupid and unthinking it's ok to react physically to verbal abuse?

237. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169445 by AllanW on April 26, 2008 at 5:54 am

I'm sorry Albedo but I cannot accept your idea of hate crime and incitement. You seem to be confusing slogans on some media (whether it be cotton or in print) with actions that cause harm.

It is solely within the control of the reader of the words (in whatever medium) to be offended and to take action as a result. As a point of view, mine lies squarely on the side of individual responsibility; if you cannot control your actions (stress on actions) as a result of what someone says or writes then you are in the wrong.

If you cannot use your intelligence to counter what you consider to be offensive words with equally devastating counter-arguments without resorting to violent reaction then you deserve to lose the argument (read this as 'fail to get society to accept your point of view').

I agree that society is the arbiter of these issues but feel that at the moment the line is drawn irrationaly on the side of people who fail to take responsibility for their own conduct and want others to accept the argument that 'I only did it because I was provoked'. This is lame and irrational behaviour and should not be supported in my opinion.

Grow up, in other words. Your view smacks to me of the taste of kindergarten where fragile souls need protection from bullies. There are, of course, bullies in this world but the sooner we all develop a little thicker skin then the less tension on both sides of an argument will accrue as a benefit. Encourage people to take an active but non-violent reaction without resorting to legislation or violence. There are plenty of options of how to deal with these issues without making blanket, innappropriate and restrictive rules.

You will, of course, not make the mistake of reading into what I've said here that I condone any sort of physical bullying of any kind, I'm sure.

Time to grow up everyone and be a little more robust not wilting. Some actions and activities need to be restricted for all of our good but speech or writing is not one of them.

238. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #168683 by AllanW on April 25, 2008 at 9:32 am

Scroll back on this thread a few pages (and the one with TheTruthID's drivel on it);

I counted them out in exactly this way a few nights ago hence why I refuse to add to the troll-feeding.

239. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #168677 by AllanW on April 25, 2008 at 9:28 am

Free speech rights require protection even for the bigots. In other words, to be free to espouse your own viewpoints you need to support the rights of others to espouse theirs. You don't have to agree with them and some free speech will generate responses that are entirely unwelcome; lap it up, that's the real world. And a school absolutely is required to be a haven for these kinds of ideas to be expressed in not to be sheltered from IMO.

If I weren't so podgy around the middle I'd be wearing a home-made t-shirt with the slogan;

'Please don't be offended, it's not just YOUR god I don't believe in ..'

240. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #168442 by AllanW on April 25, 2008 at 6:39 am

He's a kid at school. He represents no-one but himself. He has no responsible position or legislative function to uphold. I support his right to wear the slogan t-shirt.

It makes it easier for the other kids to spot who the christian bigot in the crowd is.

241. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #168323 by AllanW on April 25, 2008 at 2:39 am

Interesting views on Dave(TX); I remain sceptical as well because of the poor writing and the open fallacies but I'll wait for his response to my query, I guess. I think the other thing that raised the hairs on the back of my neck was the (TX) portion of his username; now I freely admit that this may look like a sweeping generalisation but I'm rapidly coming to the conclusion where American higher education awards are concerned that you have to dig quite deeply to ascertain whether it is an award from a body with any value or not as the recipient can be unaware of how deficient their award may be seen to be in circles outside their state or country.

242. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #168302 by AllanW on April 25, 2008 at 1:03 am

Dear Dave(TX); which college are you a physics prof at, please?

243. Open Letter to a victim of Ben Stein's lying propaganda

Comment #168293 by AllanW on April 25, 2008 at 12:03 am

Re; comment #168277 The TruthID
'Wow. I've been gone for hours and when I come back you still are talking about me. Boy, what an impact I've made. Some of you starting to second guess your beliefs?'

Don't flatter yourself; most people have been staying off this thread so as not to feed your trollish behaviour. The impact you have made is to reveal yourself as a monstrous ignoramus.

We are, however, rueful; not because anything you have dribbled has led us to question our viewpoints but to reflect upon the fact that there are still so many wilfully ignorant people such as yourself in the world and we have so much work left to do to change that situation.

244. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #167490 by AllanW on April 24, 2008 at 5:23 am

Bugger me! Twenty minutes later and the sun pops out. Nice work Geoff :)

245. Open Letter to a victim of Ben Stein's lying propaganda

Comment #167474 by AllanW on April 24, 2008 at 4:56 am

Myself and a group of fifty or so friends from around Europe (and one in Japan :)) set-up this kind of facility in minutes. You need a host website that can cope with the volume of traffic, purchase or lease the software for (if memory serves) £10 per month, each user loads a small (about 2mb) program and away you go (given that you have a headset and microphone that is :)).

We co-ordinate 40 person conversations on topics and create simultaneous threads for smaller groups and others not involved in the main action. We host around sixty simultaneous connections atm. The conversation mode we use is 'voice-activated mute' so that you can only hear one person speaking at a time.

246. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #167466 by AllanW on April 24, 2008 at 4:44 am

Entirely agree debbyo; well said.

And Geoff, send some of the sunshine over here, please :)

247. Open Letter to a victim of Ben Stein's lying propaganda

Comment #167464 by AllanW on April 24, 2008 at 4:41 am

Yep, agree Steve that Skype is an alternative. Just that my experience is that Ventrilo is a better quality of connection, software and ease of use (for example; you could host thread-specific fora on there that people can just click into and out of). And it is configurable to allow voice-activated muting (so we can't all speak at once) as well as other hosting options. Sorry but I don't know how good Skype is at those kinds of things.

248. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #167454 by AllanW on April 24, 2008 at 4:18 am

Talking of cricket ...

Not a lot happening so far as I look out of the window at Old Trafford (it's been raining all morning); maybe they'll begin after lunch.

249. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #167442 by AllanW on April 24, 2008 at 3:49 am

Re; comment #167432 Philip1978

'Mornin' Saviour; slept well?

250. Open Letter to a victim of Ben Stein's lying propaganda

Comment #167433 by AllanW on April 24, 2008 at 3:27 am

I agree that anything should be associated with this site but am still unclear as to what objective we are pursuing. If it is a place of calm, tranquil enjoyment of our atheism in the company of others then I'm not particularly interested. I also agree that segregating posters by their professed allegiance is not only open to question but fraught with administrative danger; I would be against any proposal that introduced these facilities.

On a positive note however, I would be interested in a facility that offered the hosting of a ventrilo server to enable voice contact. This might afford us the chance to co-ordinate response postings to creationist trolls to avoid unnecessary duplication and deliver cogent replies and would, of course, be password protected. I've seen this work in other circumstances very well as a tool to declutter postings.