Christian Group has bank account removed due to "unacceptable views"

And maybe a thread about why the state should even be in the business of sanctioning some marriages and not others.

I would like to be involved in that. i believe that there are many benefits to such a life style, but i also aknowledge that the spirit can be willing, but the flesh is weak!

The real question is whether abstinence-based programs are primarily intended to promote abstinence for its own sake or to reduce teenage pregnancy and the transmission STDs.On the latter criterion the evidence suggests that it is a failure and that a broader approach (perhaps best summed up as "be good, but if you can't be good, be careful") is more effective.I suspect that most of the supporters of abstinence-based programs really have the first view in mind, even if they say otherwise.

Hello, you. How's it going?I'd be interested in seeing new thread(s) discussing abstinence and gay marriage. I'd join in the discussion here, but its almost totally off topic.

Getting nasty personal again I see. Sigh. Can't just stick to the argument can you. In fact can't even FOLLOW the argument. Actually, mentioning the dangers is trying to warn people, which isn't exactly an act of hatred, but that's OK, kill the messenger, I understand that's what you have to do. The point, you silly frog, was that like holmes I too have to repeat arguments over and over because the same old stuff keeps getting said by my opponents on MANY subjects, not any particular subject. See, that's how it reads in CONTEXT. Get it?

This is the Coffee House, for casual chitchat I've always thought, not debate. There are plenty of sites that discuss a general epidemic of STDs and other social ills as a result of all the Liberationisms, but finding statistics that answer yours point for point is going to take a while. And I'm busy elsewhere too. Hang tight.

Gay marriage is simply one of many topics we seem to have landed in here, not in itself a cause of any of the statistics under discussion. The point about gay marriage is that the very idea destroys the meaning of marriage. There is not one single reason for gays to be married, it's all cosmetic, all psychological. It accomplishes nothing for the society except the final destruction of the meaning of marriage in the public mind, and what it would accomplish for gays legally can be done in other ways quite easily and leave marriage alone for what it has always been intended for. But I see the handwriting on the wall. It's going to happen no matter what the sane people think.I didn't bring up abstinence education. Somebody here brought it up as not stopping kids from having sex anyway-- well, duh, if you keep saying "they're going to have sex anyway," then of course they will, but a strong anti-acting-out attitude on the part of the whole society, parents, teachers, TV, would go a long way to ending it. The problem is nobody's really against it. They think it's a "right" or a "liberty" -- gad, it's even HEALTHY, good for the sperm yet. Again, it's going to happen no matter what the sane people think.That is a problem in the public schools and my position is that Christians at least, and anybody who really cares about keeping their children from the sexual libertarian influence of today's society should simply get out of the public schools altogether and away from a lot of other sources of such influence. Let them teach whatever they want to teach. It's going to be a disaster but there's no stopping them. It's going to happen no matter what the sane people think.

The state has a definite interest in supporting stable hetero two-parent families for the sake of its own stability, and has no interest whatever in supporting gay marriage.

No, I at least don't say otherwise. I don't know much about abstinence-based programs, how they approach the problem, I'll have to read up on them, but it seems to me that yes, an abstinence focus should definitely be to promote abstinence for its own sake.It IS incidentally the answer to the obvious diagnosis that the problems of teenage pregnancy and STDs are the result of NON-abstinence, but the idea overall is that pre-marital abstinence is simply a good thing for people and for society in general. Absolutely.The reason it is a failure, if it truly is, is that there are mixed messages in the culture today, some egging them on while the abstinence programs are a pretty weak alternative in such an atmosphere."Be careful" isn't working either however. Condoms don't solve all the problems and even when encouraged aren't often used.

It's not a question of "working" or "not working", it is a question of which works better. And it seems that programs that include accurate infromation on precautionary measures are more effective at preventing STDs and teenage pregnancy even if there is some dilution of the pro-abstinance message.

I disagree with your stance that gay marriage will be the ruin of society. How can publicly recognising the validity of a couple's love de-value marriage. What devalues marriage is more the celebrity practice of getting married for a month,6 months, a year, and making this appear normal. Marriage should be re-established as a long term option to be carefully considered.

You'd know all about that, wouldn't you? I think you'd find it a lot easier to take the moral high ground if you didn't drag every single thread into the gutter with your own disgusting personal slanders. The point is that the reason we repeat our arguments - yes, to both you and Holmes, sometimes - is that you fail to actually address them. With Holmes I'm fairly certain that he's making genuine misreadings. With you it's obviously that you're unable to gather any significant rebuttal to the arguments put to you. Hence, your constant ad hominem attacks.

Yes, exactly. What de-values marriage is the access to easy, quick, and accepted divorce and re-marriage that religious conservatives insist be avaliable to men.

I gave you several reasons. How about you address them?

How does a homosexual marriage affect a heterosexual marriage?

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion