Did Mod cause the collapse of evcforum?

At the time, I tried to read NJ's comments in different ways. Taken in context of individual posts that he made this comment in, then yes one could argue that he was only musing about moral relativism. But since he kept bringing it up and kept asking what the moral difference was between homosexuality and rape, I really saw no other interpretation except that he was baiting.We're not idiots. I know the moral difference between homosexuality and rape. You know the moral difference between homosexuality and rape. And I'm pretty darn shure NJ knew the moral difference between homosexuality and rape. Yet, he kept bringing this very topic up and asked the same question across half a dozen thread. The only interpretation that made sense for his behavior was either baiting or snide.Without looking up the threads themselves, I even remember the first time berberry lost patience. NJ made the usual "if we allow homosexuals to get married, then what's to prevent people from marrying kids and dogs?" argument. Berberry replied with "we're not kids or dogs, you twit" or some other name calling. Berberry got a warning for that. So, apparently, it was ok to compare berberry to kids and dogs with a thin veil of moral relativism, it was not ok to call NJ a twit or some other name.After that saw NJ's explanation that he was talking about moral relativism rather than comparing gay people to dogs, I stood back and watched. Then NJ went ahead and made the same comparason in half a dozen other threads in the name of moral relativism. It became apparent pretty fast that he was either making thinly veiled snide comments or he was baiting.Take it how you will.

Oh, please, NJ was not an idiot. If anything, he was very intelligent. Don't expect me to believe he honestly did not understand the moral difference between homosexuality and rape. If he did it once, then I'd let it go. If he did it twice, I'd begin to suspect. He did it dozens of times in half a dozen threads. If he wasn't comparing Ber to kids and dogs, why did he keep bringing it up and use it as an example? Yes, we did know. He was an intelligent person. I believe he was intelligent enough to know the moral difference between homosexuality and rape.In the first half a dozen times he brought it up, we really did try to explain to him the difference between homosexuality and rape. But after explaining it to him half a dozen times by each of us, it became clear that he was either an idiot (which he was not) or he kept bringing it up across half a dozen threads dozens of times to make a thinly veiled snide argument.What's the difference between catholics and pedophiles again?

Hyrogoyphx writes: ​ I am mystified that you could even draw that inference. He clarified like 9,000 times. What his argument consisted of was if you allow for gay marriage, what moral imperative would preclude beastiality or any other "sexual sin?"

And we clarified to him like 10,000 times that gay marriage and rape weren't two comparable things. And please, I believe he was smarter than trying to really use the slippery slope argument.

That's a long way off from saying that homosexuals are also zoophiles. I don't see how anyone can draw that inference.

What's the difference between catholics and pedophiles? If we allow catholics to pray openly, what's to prevent pedophiles from kidnapping your children?That's what's comparable with his slippery slope argument, which we know he wasn't idiotic enough to make.

I don't think he was "gay-bating," but even supposing he was, so what? Quite honestly if you were all too dumb not to take the bait, then he won that little social experiment, don't you think?

We didn't take the bait. We just became frustrated after explaining to him like 10,000 times why homosexuality and rape weren't comparable and that there's no slippery slope from allowing gay marriage to allowing pedophilia.Like I said, I don't believe he was idiotic enough to not know the difference. Mod ain't gay. He's bi, which is a totally different animal, one that researchers have proven to not exist... just j/k. For the record, I never wanted anyone to get banned. I even repeatedly requested Admin to give a blanket amnesty to everyone, including some of the craziest crackpots we've ever seen. I don't want to see anyone banned. Edited by Taz, : No reason given.Edited by Taz, : No reason given.

He never outright said that homos and rape are morally equivilent just like I've never said that being catholic and pedophile is morally equivilent.Now, what's the difference between catholic and pedophilia? There were at least two dozen of us responding to him on the matter. Don't tell me not one of us explained to him the moral difference between the two. I've repeatedly requested Percy to wave his magic wand and resurrect all our dearly departed, even the ones who were on crack. I don't want to see anyone banned.

While I was gone to work, you guys added 5 more pages to this thread. Have fun arguing about a dead subject. I knew I shouldn't have gotten involve.

Hyroglyphx writes: ​ I mean, didn't anyone wonder why someone who was allegedly not here for the old days had such a vested interest in defending someone he never met?!?!?!

No, because I didn't even notice you until this thread. I've been too busy with my life to notice anything not bleedingly obvious on the forum.I'm just a little dumbfounded that someone like you could really stop being christian.And being a skeptik, I still have my doubts that you're actually nem jug.Edit.How did you rack up thirteen hundred posts without any noticing your ip? Or did you move?Edited by Taz, : No reason given.

No, not we. If you recall, I answered this question to you many times. As long as they don't hurt anyone, I say go for it. Personally, I see a lot of genetic problems if they decide to breed, but every time I bring up the breeding issue I get shunned by my peers for wanting to put people in concentration camps (even though I just want to educate people about the option of not reproducing if you ain't got what it takes in your genes).Try again. No, it doesn't.I have also pointed out many times that I'm not a moral relativist by any stretch of imagination. Here is why you insist on there being a problem. No offense, but you're still taking the creationist approach to solving moral problems.In science, we sometimes have to accept that we just ain't got all the answers yet. We may even have to admit that there are some questions we may never know the answer to. This doesn't mean that science is wrong.With morality, we really have to accept that sometimes we ain't morally and philosophically sophisticated enough to answer EVERY question any twisted mind can conjure up.In short, this is what living your life is about. You continue to ponder at these scientific and moral questions.As far as moral absolutes go, I don't think we have all of it down yet, not by any stretch of imagination.

Hyro, you and mod are sleeping together aren't you? I knew this would happen one day.And could you tell your boyfriend to rid himself of the sideburns?Edited by Taz, : No reason given.

They're illegal because people want to get involve in other people's personal business, like prop 8. Yes, you are taking the creationist approach.One of the sure signs of creationist attitude is the need to explain everything. Any scientist will tell you "I don't know" if they run into something that they can't explain. This ain't so for creationists. They refuse to admit that there are gaps in our knowledge.The reason you think there are paradoxes in our moral framework is because you absolutely must have an answer for every moral question out there.I'm a moral absolutist and I will freely admit that there are moral questions we are not sophisticated enough to answer just like there are scientific questions we are not advance enough to answer. I guess we'll have to agree to disagree, in this thread at least. I really don't see the need for moral relativism or any conflict at all. But we already know that there are moral absolutes that nobody can argue against. For instance, genocide is wrong by any standard. Even sociopaths think it's wrong. Even the nazi bastards thought it was wrong. Even people in biblical times thought it was wrong. That's why after the Israelites murdered everyone in the city of Jericho, all the soldiers involved had to stay outside the camp to cleanse themselves of the evil.I would argue that moral absolutes do exist. The only reason they appear not to exist is because people tend to over complicate things with philosophical bullshit and fortune cookie language. This is why in the past I had raised objections many times to Holmes' arguments. He should really sleep with people like Nietzsche and Kant. I don't believe for a minute that any sane mind could understand what the hell their arguments truly are.

Actually, there was a purpose behind it. Early civilizations probably noticed the high rates of birth defects in cases of inbreeding. It's like the thou shalt not eat shellfish thing in Leviticus. Because there were high concentrations of lead, ancient people probably noticed something was wrong with people who ate too much shellfish.You see, ancient people were really good with rules of thumb. What started as just a few simple cases could turn into a social taboo.**********************
Added by edit.Case in point. We today still don't like the idea of our dogs drinking from stagnant water. There's really nothing wrong with it if it's clean. But because of those mother fucking ginea worms, it became culturally disgusting to drink stagnant water.
************************* Because the culture and religions that happened to become dominant on Earth happened to be monogamous. Again, I find nothing wrong with polygamy or polyandry.Edited by Taz, : No reason given.

No, that is the cause for such laws to come about. People want to interfere with other people's personal lives, so they come up with bullshit excuses like protect the sanctity of marriage. That's how these laws came about. No, you don't understand. Yes, science wants to explain everything, but not at the cost of sacrificing integrity and truth.You will find that scientists really have no problem saying "I don't know". Good luck getting that sentence out of a creationist. Which is the same as referring to absolute terms to define what is not yet defined. It's like falling back to axioms (or idioms) to define a bigger picture.Like I said, not every moral question can be answered, and you should accept that. We can try to answer them, but the fact that we can't answer some at this moment in time doesn't mean there isn't an absolute answer to be found later on. And since we have already found quite a few absolutes, it stands to reason that we should be able to find more. And that is exactly what I did not say.I did not say that those are absolutes because people universally agreed they are absolutes. Read below. I take the approach to moral absolutes like the methods scientists use to approach theories and laws. The Newtonian model of gravity isn't accurate to a certain extent because consensus says so. It's accurate to a certain extent on its own merit.Even if tomorrow all scientists decide to proclaim that they all universally agree to adopt the Aristotelian model of motion of the universe doesn't mean things naturally move in circles.But the fact that the consensus among scientists tells us that the Newtonian model is extremely accurate and that it got us to the moon is a very big indicator that the model is accurate.Moral absolutes work in a similar way. Just because the consensus tells us something is a moral absolute doesn't make it so. However, it is a very big indicator for it to be so. Um, he didn't feel morally righteous when he committed those acts. And just because people know right from wrong doesn't mean they will always do right. Now, you're talking about cultural values, which most of the time are morally neutral. Again, I've found that you have trouble understanding the concept of moral neutrality because you are still taking the creationist approach to morality. And please don't be offended.Cultural values are often times (or rather most of the time) are morally neutral. There is nothing wrong with wearing a head scarf. It's not right either. It's just morally neutral.And there is nothing wrong with being a terrorist. And it's not right either. It's morally neutral. Now, what one decides to act as a terrorist is another question.I know that it is a common belief that Middle Eastern people view Islamic terrorists as heroes. And let us suppose for a moment that this is true. Now, here comes the tricky part, so please bear with me.We view them as evil because they kill civilians who are nothing more than bystanders. They bomb schools full of children. They bomb buses full of religious pilgrims.Many Middle Eastern people view them as heroes not because they kill innocent people but because of what they claim to defend against. You might not like to hear this, but we're not the most popular country in the world. Just by siding with Israel alone puts us way up there on their to-do list. This combines with the fact that we have entire armies occupying just about every part of the Middle East.So, when you're saying one's hero is another's villain, you're comparing apples to oranges.Ask those people who cheer for Hezbollah in American universities. You will find that they don't approve of the killing and genocidal proclamations of the organization. They cheer for them because of other aspects. They seem relative to you because you're refusing to see the acts from different perspectives.The beheaded people are innocent in our eyes because we value freedom and individuality. They regard those people as guilty and worthy of death because they don't value freedom and the fact that those people were christian alone warranted beheading.Cultural values are morally neutral. But what people choose to act upon them can be viewed both ways. But in it all, and you even mentioned this, murder is viewed wrong in certain circumstances. Why? Because it's a moral absolute. And both we and they have a very clear distinction between murder and execution. Based on our cultural values (which are mostly morally neutral), we view the beheadings as murder. Based on their cultural values (which are mostly morally neutral), they view the beheadings as just executions. I'm sorry, how does the first sentence make sense?Absolutes of anything are hard to put our fingers on. Universal constants are absolutes and they can stand on their own merit. And because they are absolutes, people tend to stumble onto them often enough to have a consensus.Even if tomorrow a wind called amnesia sweeps the Earth and we all forget everything we have learned in the last 6,000 years, eventually we'd still discover things like pi, the hydrogen atom, and the quadratic formula all over again. And this stands true for a moral absolute like murder.Again, I must emphasize that the quadratic formula isn't an absolute because the consensus says so. But consensus does help us in determining it's absoluticity (this word is copyrighted by moi). Same with moral absolutes. Just because consensus says murder is wrong doesn't mean it's an absolute. But because it is an absolute, people have stumbled upon it often enough that we can all agree it's wrong.Just because the bible says pi = 3 doesn't mean consensus is wrong, just like just because some sociopath says murder is right doesn't mean the consensus is wrong.

Ok, one more reply before I get banned for bringing this thread totally off the road and into the twilight zone. Perhaps, but let's hold off on trying to answer this question for a while... like a few hundred million years. You're still not understanding what I'm saying.Not everything has to be assigned a moral value. A woman showing skin is morally neutral. Heck, a naked woman walking down the street is morally neutral.What we (society) defines as wrong based on cultural value is a different matter. The act of showing skin is morally neutral. But what it affects based on cultural value is open for interpretation. I would even go as far as argue that whether we define showing of skin as right or wrong has nothing to do with morals at all and just cultural value.Again, not everything has to be assigned a moral value. Showing skin is neither right nor wrong. It falls under the culture label. See? You're describing terrorism based on your cultural value, which of course would ultimately lead to the conclusion of it being morally repugnant.It's like describing abortion doctors as baby killers. Or better yet. The other day, I was talking to a tea party member, and she kept insisting on describing us tax paying citizens as "slaves" and Obama as a "gangster".If you decide to describe these acts in such a term, of course it becomes morally repugnant.But people in the Middle East don't describe it as blowing innocent people up. They describe it as fighting imperialism to defend their culture and way of life, which they are right by the way.If you sit down and talk about killing innocent people without ever mentioning the situation in the Middle East, they will agree with you that it's wrong. That's how they see what's happening to Iraqi innocent bystanders by the American Army. But if you were to simply talk about guerrilla warfare in your own country against an imperialistic super power that just invaded your country, of course both of you will agree that it's right to do so.Simply by calling them terrorists, you're not being fair to describing who these people are. You're not willing to see these things from their perspective. And if you were to talk from the same angle of perspective, you will agree, which again proves an absolute somewhere in there.Which is why when I said terrorism is morally neutral, I mean just that. Which goes back to confidence and how much we have of it in a certain group. I remember spending entire threads talking to you about this.

Because people tend to follow the rule of thumb rather than know the real reason behind the taboo.Case in point. In Southeast Asia, people generally think warm is good and cold is bad. We know that too high of a fever will cause mechanical problems in the human body. So, we try to cool down the body of kids whose fever is running out of control. But in Southeast Asia, it is a common practice for people to cover those kids up even more, which by our standard is pretty darn stupid.The point is the reason these people over there do it is because they follow the rule of thumb of hot is good and cold is bad. They refuse to think beyond that.Incest has taken the same path. People in the past noticed horrendous birth defects in cases of incest, so they made up this rule of thumb of incest is bad. And what do you do when you're uneducated? You follow rules of thumb without thinking about it.

Not only is it illegal in every state in the US, there are Ida codes in every department I know for incidents involving incest. If you don't know what Ida codes are, ask NJ. He should know.

You mean socially repugnant.I don't know if you're still paying attention to what I'd been saying, but this is something that I need you to understand for you to even begin understand all my points earlier. Don't confuse societal rules and morality. Incest and necrophilia on their own merits are morally neutral, just like walking naked down the street and oral sex. But we, as social creatures, have made up social rules to distinct ourselves from other social groups.Edited by Taz, : No reason given.