Mostly because of my personal experiences. In Belgium, as you both know no doubt, gay marriage has been legal for, hm, about seven years now, I believe, homophobia is frowned upon very heavily (except among Muslims, but okay, let's not go there), in short we're a pretty good country for gay rights. And in universities, I'm not aware of there being any real issues for gay students. But in the high schools? In my school - a Catholic school, yes, but over 60% of Flemish students goes to nominally Catholic schools, and the large majority of those schools wouldn't even dare to show the slightest indication of homophobia - there were exactly two students who came out while I was there. Two. They weren't bullied that I know of (though as I didn't know either one personally, who can say), but it's rather significant that the many others there must have been apparently didn't dare or weren't read to come out yet. Ironically, I get the impression that in many American schools there are far more students coming out.
And those suicide rates among gay teens being so much higher than those of their straight peers, that is the case here as well.
So, you know, one shouldn't exaggerate the importance of religious anti-gay bigotry in determining these statistics.
And those suicide rates among gay teens being so much higher than those of their straight peers, that is the case here as well.
So, you know, one shouldn't exaggerate the importance of religious anti-gay bigotry in determining these statistics.
This message last edited by Legolas on 13/10/2010 at 07:55:14 PM
Love the Sinner
13/10/2010 04:07:28 PM
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I have to think about that for a while.
13/10/2010 04:30:56 PM
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Suicide is significantly higher in young gay populations
13/10/2010 05:36:01 PM
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That is not what I think requires thought
13/10/2010 05:56:06 PM
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Nossy I ain't a mind reader, no matter how I try or how much I would do Jean Grey
13/10/2010 06:06:42 PM
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ok now show that it caused by what Christian beliefs *NM*
13/10/2010 06:50:32 PM
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I don't think it's the belief's themselves
14/10/2010 12:20:01 AM
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The churches who encourage people to bully gays should be condemned
14/10/2010 06:43:06 PM
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Ah, that Ghandi quote sure does get around. (which is funny, since he wasn't a Christian)
13/10/2010 05:07:42 PM
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I'm not sure that is true
13/10/2010 05:16:30 PM
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When's the last time you heard the quote attributed to anyone else?
13/10/2010 08:34:10 PM
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That many people don't know the correct origin doesn't change it though
13/10/2010 09:31:13 PM
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I think you are missing his point
13/10/2010 05:45:45 PM
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Question (and this one actually is asking for information )...
13/10/2010 06:42:17 PM
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I have seen gays be bullied before
13/10/2010 07:02:35 PM
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You just didn't listen to a thing I said *NM*
13/10/2010 07:09:29 PM
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why do you believe that? Because I don't agree with what you said?
13/10/2010 07:30:27 PM
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I said you aren't listening to a thing I said, for you didn't respond to anything that I wrote
13/10/2010 07:52:50 PM
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you are not interested in talking to anyone who doesn't agree with you
13/10/2010 09:01:03 PM
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I think there's truth in this as well.
13/10/2010 07:55:00 PM
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churches tend to refelect society as much if not more then they influence it
14/10/2010 07:15:35 PM
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Re: I think you are missing his point
13/10/2010 08:30:42 PM
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Re: I think you are missing his point
13/10/2010 09:55:52 PM
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Re: I think you are missing his point
14/10/2010 03:49:14 PM
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Actually you can very much debate whether homosexuality is a sin on a textual level
14/10/2010 05:49:22 PM
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Re: Actually you can very much debate whether homosexuality is a sin on a textual level
14/10/2010 08:52:24 PM
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Do you know greek or hebrew?
14/10/2010 08:57:32 PM
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I know a few words here and there, but not really. Do you?
14/10/2010 10:46:36 PM
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There's a good case on both sides (try Strong's Concordance, if you haven't, btw. )
15/10/2010 05:09:21 AM
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You're kind of sidestepping a large part of his point
13/10/2010 05:51:53 PM
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so should Christians abandon other religious conviction to stop bullying?
13/10/2010 07:39:54 PM
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Many good points there; I think I'll let you play Defender of the Faith for a bit.
14/10/2010 08:50:23 AM
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I think he is jackass that does not believe other's can have apoint of view
13/10/2010 06:48:12 PM
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That's right, bullying would go away if we didn't have Christians to make moral judgements on things
13/10/2010 08:11:27 PM
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I mostly agree
13/10/2010 08:19:00 PM
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most of the bullies I remember from school were not known for their regular church attendance
14/10/2010 07:24:06 PM
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Let me see if I can understand where we agree, it is hard to do with all the Sarcasm
13/10/2010 08:48:38 PM
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Meh. He's not entirely incorrect. But not all Christians are anti-gay.
13/10/2010 08:43:04 PM
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It is better to be a Tolkein than a Token
13/10/2010 08:52:09 PM
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If I were a Tolkien liberal Christian, wouldn't that make me an American Roman Catholic? *NM*
13/10/2010 09:18:57 PM
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Interesting
13/10/2010 08:56:46 PM
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His first three sentences were totally unecessary. The rest is conspiracy-laden nonsense.
14/10/2010 12:37:06 AM
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Re:
14/10/2010 03:06:36 AM
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I think Chora has dibs on that bumper sticker.
14/10/2010 09:35:02 AM
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Re:
14/10/2010 11:50:04 PM
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It's nothing at all like cultural relativism.
15/10/2010 01:16:10 AM
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I don't think there is any question...
14/10/2010 04:42:45 AM
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A lot of Christian doctrine states that people cannot know who is worthy of God and it's not up to
14/10/2010 05:41:19 AM
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I think he's reading a lot of things into that letter that aren't there.
14/10/2010 08:22:13 AM
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