posted
I would think that such a brilliant communicator could get his point across without derision. I think that a good communicator also would be persuasive, if possible.
I am forced to conclude that he wanted to inspire vitriol from the Lalos of the world. He as much as said so.
And I don't get that. I just don't get WHY, if he has the worl'd fastest car, does he aim for the mud puddles directly in front of the bus stop.
I would see that essay as an example of a great communicator losing his edge, maybe, but not at the height of his powers.
I don't mean to be offensive or insulting by saying that. It's just the way I see it. Posts: 9293 | Registered: Aug 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
Oh, yeah, sorry to edit the post on you, kat I realized after I wrote it that, although I was springboarding off a statement you made, most of my post was actually directed, in a diffuse manner, to a lot of other people, and I didn't want you to feel like I was trying to argue something with you, when we agree Posts: 1907 | Registered: Feb 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
DB, That's somewhat different, in that the governing bodies of events like marathons have no constitutions/bylaws that is equivalent to the "equal protection" clauses in most state (and our federal) constitutions.
quote: And I don't get that. I just don't get WHY, if he has the worl'd fastest car, does he aim for the mud puddles directly in front of the bus stop.
quote:I never will understand this hidden "agenda" business. Really, people! Conservatives aren't out to Destroy the Environment, Pagans aren't out to Subvert our Children, and Homosexuals aren't out to Twist our Morality. People are just trying to live their lives, and their priorities don't necessarily follow yours. It doesn't mean that they hate you because you choose a different Prime Directive and Modus Operandi.
((Jenny))
I liked that.
I don't really know that I have anything extremely insightful to add to this discussion (and my brain is fried from sitting here and reading it all)....but I will add that Geoff has really impressed me, and I think KarlEd deserves a medal...and a marraige license.
....I wish there was a way to solve this without hurting people so deeply.
[ February 24, 2004, 05:36 PM: Message edited by: Kasie H ]
Posts: 1784 | Registered: Jun 2001
| IP: Logged |
1) The MA Constitutional Convention brought some national attention to it.
2) There were a couple of Conservative groups that were going to sue to block any attempts; I'm not sure if this was the case, but from what I've read/heard, there was pressure being applied by conservative groups.
posted
In roman times, the bride's hair was parted with a spear. In China, brides are decked in red. The celebration of marriage as the victory of Love is a fairly recent development in civilization. I dunno. Maybe in his next essay Card will unroll a plan to do away with courtship and romance altogether and go back to the grandmas arranging everything.
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
This thread makes me sad. Ornery and Hatrack have very different styles as we all know. So far no one at Ornery seems nearly as riled up about this as we are. However, here at Hatrack after banging our heads against a brick wall for probably a year, it appeared we were starting to come to a collective consensus, like the Quakers. Or at the least we were a lot closer to understanding each other, and being able to walk a mile in the other person's shoes. Even while not comprimising our most deeply held beliefs.
I was wishing it could be a model for society as a whole. Obviously OSC doesn't actually read hatrack that often, otherwise he would have been able to observe the long slow road of progress we have been making in getting along with each other. While not becoming "Politically Correct" we have been all trying (though not always suceeding) at avoiding exactly such wanton non fact based statments as were made in this article.
OSC is only human I guess, but like Celia, my respect for him has dropped several notches. I thought he was above publically writing Demosthenes drivel and rhetoric. (Or if he was writing it, he should have been writing it under a pseudonymn.)
quote: Maybe in his next essay Card will unroll a plan to do away with courtship and romance altogether and go back to the grandmas arranging everything.
But if this idea was instituted, I have a feeling there'd be 100% more marriage in MY life.
Posts: 4816 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Right, Bok, but the backlash has whipped the other way. If Bush's call for an amendment is more than symbolic, anyway. I think it's more of a wake up call for the states to address these issues.
Edit to say: Bush and most conservatives including myself did not feel an amendment was necessary until these events unfolded.
posted
whoops, sorry celia. Actually this entire thing brought to mind that discussion we had in the car on the liquor run with Happy Camper. OSC made some sort of religious generalization that both you and HC took some umbrage too, because you are both (if I recall correctly) agnostics (or is one of you an atheist?) and didn't feel the way he said you *should* feel at all. I think you said at the time that it lowered your respect of him, though you were basically viewing it as a live and let live situation.
This peice definitely lacked sensitivity and ordinary politness and good manners.
posted
Olivet, in this particular debate, it is not possible to even address certain subjects without treading a very fine line. Either you stick precisely to a well-defined, non-offensive opinion, or you hurt someone's feelings. We cannot make a rational or informed decision on this matter without hearing all sides, and it seriously impairs the process when one side elicits such anger simply by stating an uncomfortable idea.
EDIT: Whoops, I stepped away from my computer before actually hitting "Post", and the world has moved on without me Feel free to ignore this one.
[ February 24, 2004, 05:59 PM: Message edited by: A Rat Named Dog ]
Posts: 1907 | Registered: Feb 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
Yeah, I wish I could remember what he said at that signing. Whatever it was was less of a charisma issue and more of a "that doesn't make any sense" issue.
Posts: 3956 | Registered: Jun 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
Though I would also like to commend how you have handled yourself in this discussion. IMO, what we need are more people willing to be reasonable far more than people willing to do what it takes.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
Banna, you would not believe the mental acrobatics I go through trying not to be offensive when bringing up my own concerns. It's kind of unfair that people on the pro-gay-marriage side of the argument are only arguing against people that it's okay to insult Notice I never got this much sympathy when John L insulted my religion.
[ February 24, 2004, 06:05 PM: Message edited by: A Rat Named Dog ]
Posts: 1907 | Registered: Feb 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
My respect has grown for him immensely. He felt what he felt, wrote what he wanted to write, and sticks by it.
In a very very public way, he has taken a spectacularly unpopular view, written it out in clear concise, terms that cannot be mistaken and doesn't give a rat's [patootie] what the rest of you or anyone else think.
If that's not deserving of respect, then I'm not sure I care what you people think IS deserving of respect.
quote: If that's not deserving of respect, then I'm not sure I give a flying shit what you people think IS deserving of respect.
I don't respect it when people put their opinions out there specifically to hurt people. If he felt he was doing it as a strike back to the people who called him bigoted, I'm ashamed that he felt he had to descend to that level..
Posts: 4816 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
I think it CAN be done without "playing dress-up" analogies, etc. , but I'll never know if OSC can do it because he apparently didn't want to attempt it.
Posts: 9293 | Registered: Aug 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
Good point, Dag. but it is the minority in the press. And that seems problematic to me.
I'm not comfortable with the idea that politeness makes everything okay. But maybe that's because I wasn't raised with very good manners. Broken home and whatnot.
odouls, s^^t is offensive to me. See, there is cloaking nastiness in politeness, and there's plain crudeness. Neither is the road not taken.
quote: Why did the gay marriage "civil disobedience" mobilize on Valentine's Day/President's day? It seems a very ill timed decision on their part.
On which holiday will the nation's autosexuals and non-sexuals chose to mount THEIR protest? Or will they continue to subsidize the nation by paying an unfair burden of taxes and insurance premiums? Whom will they leave their estate and benefits to when they die?
Posts: 2655 | Registered: Feb 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
So, at what point are we going to start debating Card's rightness/wrongness instead of his offensiveness/bravery?
Posts: 1907 | Registered: Feb 2000
| IP: Logged |
quote: Notice I never got any sympathy from John L or anyone else after he insulted my religion.
This has been such a fast moving thread I must have missed it.
There was an essay OSC wrote once that had some incredibly dumb statements in it. It was on a much more trivial issue, and I don't think even Geoff tried to defend it. It was pretty darn poorly written if nothing else. He resorted to rhetoric then, without the normal calm reasoned discourse that we have come to expect from him even when we disagree.
I took the stance at the time that even a great author has down days, and occasionally wakes up on the wrong side of the bed. The problem is that the inferences and rhetoric in that case were not as blatantly, intentionally hurtful to others as they *appear* to be in this case.
To look at it from a different perspective. How can this peice of rhetoric possibly be viewed as a Making? It seems a whole lot more like Unmaking to me. It is using a "knack" to put "muscles" on an argument, rather than taking the long hard labor to flesh out an argument honestly.
Though posting it on Hatrack, where it would be more hurtful, instead of leaving it at Ornery was also possibly Unmaking.
AJ
(and of course this thread is moving so fast it ended up way down from where it entirely made sense)
posted
Well, I read his essay two days ago. At the time, I did wonder how we know that children raised by gays are worse off (though I tend to think it would be tough for a kid of the opposite gender). Since there haven't been that many. I mean, the worst off kids seem to be the children of celebrities.
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:This has been such a fast moving thread I must have missed it.
Different thread, same subject. He basically said that if you disagree with homosexual marriage for religious reasons, then your god can "kiss his patootie". I thought that was a pretty offensive and childish dismissal of some very well-thought-out religious viewpoints, and it hurt to the degree that I wrote a pretty uncharacteristic vitriolic reply. Didn't get nearly the sympathy for it, though Posts: 1907 | Registered: Feb 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
So Geoff, what do you think of my Making/Unmaking point?
I don't buy the "you have to break a few eggs to make an omlet" approach in this case, becuase those eggs have already been broken in the past and I don't see an omlet materializing anywhere in society except a glimmer of one on hatrack that now appears to have been effectively destroyed.
quote: Ryuko, for heaven's sake, he didn't write it for the express purpose of hurting people.
Maybe not, but it's been implied in this thread that the only reason he wrote such inflammatory and out-of-context points is because he was expressly trying to strike back at the people who have called him bigoted for being opposed to gay marriage.
As for whether he's wrong... He is allowed to have whatever opinion he wishes. I don't agree with him. But I am violently opposed to the way he wrote this essay. I was actually reminded of Jack Chick in reading it, which makes me really really sad.
Posts: 4816 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Geoff, well, I've been trying to steer the argument to the particulars OSC puts in his op-ed. No one has really taken me to task yet. Why don't you give it a try?
For the record, I think the SJC satisfactorily (not "correctly", since there are multiple interpretations I think) interpretted the amendment in the MA Constitution, and correctly ruled against the current statutes. I think their subsequent clarification in January was a more troublesome, particularly if you want to leave any chance for compromise, but they did cite previous unsuccessful attempts of "separate but equal".
In all of this, they have not made a law. They HAVE, however, asked that the MA legislature passes legislation that does bring the current statutes back into coherency with the state constitution.
posted
Not everything is a making or an unmaking. when Alvin killed the slavecatcher he didn't use a knack. Just anger and his fists. But on reflections, I think OSC believes the redefinition to be an unmaking.
ack, end of the page. I kept refreshing like a numbskull.
quote: Maybe not, but it's been implied in this thread that the only reason he wrote such inflammatory and out-of-context points is because he was expressly trying to strike back at the people who have called him bigoted for being opposed to gay marriage
He didnt write this thread. You cant be ashamed of OSC for what is implied in a thread about what he wrote. Lots of things are implied in lots fo threads. Doesnt make them true.
Posts: 2532 | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged |
quote: Oh crap, now odouls is on his side. He MUST be wrong
Just to be clear, I'm not making any distinction as to whether or not I agree or disagree with his opinion on gay marriage or his opinion of courts' actions with the issue. I am only stating my greater sense of respect for him as a result of his putting his opinion out in the open to be scrutinized by whiners, crybabies, fanatics, psychos, heterosexuals, homosexuals, judges, sci fi fans, supporters, republicans, democrats, jatraqueros, ornery americans, emos, 4th graders and 4th grade emo assholes like me alike.
(I certainly do not want to taint his opinions by lending my support to them. That's the kiss of death around here. )
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Dont Know]](graemlins/dontknow.gif)
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
I realized after I wrote it that, although I was springboarding off a statement you made, most of my post was actually directed, in a diffuse manner, to a lot of other people, and I didn't want you to feel like I was trying to argue something with you, when we agree ![[Hail]](graemlins/hail.gif)
![[Frown]](frown.gif)
![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
)
