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Maryland Gay Marriage Bill sent back to cmte. Shelved for this year at least.

mac said:
1 and 4 are certainly morailty. As to 5, they are obeying a laws that are based on societal morality...in all societies that currently exist, that morality is heavily influenced by religion.
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Having given it more thought: fear alone proves that morality is not necessary to maintain law and order. Morality/religion influenced our creation of law, but the main reason we need law, courts and prison is to protect ourselves from each other by 1) Having a place separate criminals from society. 2) Motivating the rest of us not to commit crimes. Even my argument on contributing to society is, in part, based on the fear of that ability to be taken away. If morality was the motivation for us not killing, stealing and so on, then we wouldn't need law. Law operates on the basis that fear of punishment (and fear of losing a job, fear of ruining your life and fear of very practical things) will motivate people not to act.

I still stand by my other provisions, nonetheless, since they also motivate people to obey the law without morality.
 
Big Tom said:
So your saying that its normal to be gay? Not in the real world.
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Same old claims. Same old lack of an explanation or reasons for why you believe what you believe. Still no definition of "normal." When you gonna wake up son?
 
Big Tom said:
So your saying that its normal to be gay? Not in the real world.
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I have no idea how these types of idiotic opinions don't get someone either banned or infracted. There are homosexual people on this board, and what this person is doing is not only insulting and disrespecting everything about them, but the fact that they can do it all repeatedly in every thread about gay marriage, gay adoption, or anything else regarding homosexuality is just plain stupid. I somehow doubt that we would extend the same courtesy to those idiots who maintain that African Americans, Jewish people, or any other ethnic group are 'wrong' or 'abnormal'. So why do we tolerate this blatant hatred?

I could understand if they were debating on the causes of sexuality where both sides can engage in reasonable debate. Or maybe even a respectful discussion of how to stop kids from bullying other children who happen to be homosexual. These twits can't even manage that, because they do nothing but piss and moan about homosexuality being wrong, abnormal, or some other stupid nonsense that is nothing but disrespect and belittlement.

It's hate speech - nothing more.
 
CaptainCourtesy said:
As long as you also have no negative connotation to deviant, I would agree.

So, based on this definition of deviant, do you think that we should legislate any restrictions on lefthandedness of being Jewish in the US?
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No.

......
 
mac said:
No.

......
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You know, it is deviant to be Christian in some countries?

I don't really see the point of using the word "deviant" with all its negative connotations unless your intent is to communicate a negative connotation.
 
theplaydrive said:
moral    

1. of, pertaining to, or concerned with the principles or rules of right conduct or the distinction between right and wrong; ethical: moral attitudes.
2. expressing or conveying truths or counsel as to right conduct, as a speaker or a literary work; moralizing: a moral novel.
3. founded on the fundamental principles of right conduct rather than on legalities, enactment, or custom: moral obligations.
4. capable of conforming to the rules of right conduct: a moral being.
5. conforming to the rules of right conduct ( opposed to immoral): a moral man.

None of my points have anything to do with right conduct, right/wrong or good/bad. 'Right' is not the issue because right isn't intrinsic to anything I've talked about.

#1 is not morality. It becomes morality when you attach meanings of good/bad, right/wrong to them. With pure empathy, you aren't controlling your behavior because you feel it's right or wrong, good or bad, you're controlling your behavior because you don't want to cause pain since you know what pain feels like. That knowledge is enough. For example, if you insult someone, see the pain on their face and you feel empathy for them, you may want to hug them or apologize because you feel the weight of their emotion, not because of morality. This is what I mean by empathy. It has nothing to do with what's good or bad.

Another example, I won't steal because I know that stealing will hurt the person I'm stealing from as evidenced by the pain/anger I feel imagining it/empathizing. Once you decide that this makes not stealing right is when it becomes moral. Other than that it's just a guide.

edit: you can develop a system of morality based on empathy, but empathy and acting on empathy do not necessitate morality

#4 is not morality either. The desire to contribute to society because it's a good or right thing to do is morality. The desire to contribute to society because you want to have an impact is not (i.e. it's cool to see how my actions can change things). There is nothing moral about this.

#5 I said society no longer needs morality and religion to maintain law and order. I never argued that those laws were not based on morality (in fact, I agreed that they were). Atheists show that religion is not required to obey the law or to have a desire to obey it.

In my opinion, fear of the law is enough to maintain it for most people (most people don't want to go to jail for many practical reasons) and that's definitely not moral.
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You can define morality any way you like, the simple truth is that it is a code of conduct. Following laws, treating people a certain way because it's the right thing to do, this is morality.

Atheists don't prove aanything. They still live within society and follow societies morality. Societies morality is greatly influenced.
 
CriticalThought said:
You know, it is deviant to be Christian in some countries?

I don't really see the point of using the word "deviant" with all its negative connotations unless your intent is to communicate a negative connotation.
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I didn't use the word deviant. What happened here is that CC asked me if I thought being Jewish and Left handed in America was deviant and I said yes, so long as you take away any negative connotation of the word. In your blind hatred of anyone that disagrees with you, you jump to blame me for the use of the word deviant.

Is this what you call open minded?
 
mac said:
You can define morality any way you like, the simple truth is that it is a code of conduct. Following laws, treating people a certain way because it's the right thing to do, this is morality.

Atheists don't prove aanything. They still live within society and follow societies morality. Societies morality is greatly influenced.
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Do you think it's possible to have a society where a majority of the population is atheist, and still possess a common morality?
 
mac said:
You can define morality any way you like, the simple truth is that it is a code of conduct. Following laws, treating people a certain way because it's the right thing to do, this is morality.

Atheists don't prove aanything. They still live within society and follow societies morality. Societies morality is greatly influenced.
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That's the point. It's not about doing 'the right thing'. But still, that doesn't address the fact that people are more motivated by fear of the law than morality...which is why we consider deterrence a factor in forming punishments. People bypass their morals in life everyday, even on this board. People personally attack each other, throw things, judge, condemn people, etc., etc. but most of us don't break the law (or least in any damaging way to get thrown in jail).

I'm not even going to argue about atheists because anyone can just make assumptions about that.
 
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theplaydrive said:
Having given it more thought: fear alone proves that morality is not necessary to maintain law and order. Morality/religion influenced our creation of law, but the main reason we need law, courts and prison is to protect ourselves from each other by 1) Having a place separate criminals from society. 2) Motivating the rest of us not to commit crimes. Even my argument on contributing to society is, in part, based on the fear of that ability to be taken away. If morality was the motivation for us not killing, stealing and so on, then we wouldn't need law. Law operates on the basis that fear of punishment (and fear of losing a job, fear of ruining your life and fear of very practical things) will motivate people not to act.

I still stand by my other provisions, nonetheless, since they also motivate people to obey the law without morality.
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If it is fear alone you are relying on to maintain order and discipline, then you will surely end in revolution. A very cursory examination of human history will show you that.
 
StillBallin75 said:
Do you think it's possible to have a society where a majority of the population is atheist, and still possess a common morality?
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Absolutely. It may even be that common morality allows rape, murder, and vigilante justice or other things we are currently opposed to. the point is, there is no truly atheistic society to experiment on to find out how it works. There never has been.
 
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mac said:
I didn't use the word deviant. What happened here is that CC asked me if I thought being Jewish and Left handed in America was deviant and I said yes, so long as you take away any negative connotation of the word. In your blind hatred of anyone that disagrees with you, you jump to blame me for the use of the word deviant.

Is this what you call open minded?
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:roll: I don't do hatred.
 
mac said:
You've been showing me a fair amount of it for some time. I'd say you do.
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How do you show hatred over an internet forum? Show me where I have been showing you hatred.
 
mac said:
Absolutely. It may even be that common morality allows rape, murder, and vigilante justice or other things we are currently opposed to. the point is, there is no truly atheistic society to experiment on to find out how it works. There never has been.
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It seems more likely that there would be very little differences, depending on the background of the people forming the society of course.

Religion hasn't really played much into ethics for the past hundred years or so, most of the time it has been struggling to catch up and reinvent itself to be more in line with acceptable common morality.
 
mac said:
If it is fear alone you are relying on to maintain order and discipline, then you will surely end in revolution. A very cursory examination of human history will show you that.
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I completely disagree. First, most people are motivated by fear. Second, it's not the type of fear that causes revolutions; it's not the fear of some horrible tyrannical government that works against the will of people. In the words of Machievelli, 'a prince ought to inspire fear in such a way that, if he does not win love, he avoids hatred'. There is a difference between a government being hated by its citizens and being feared by them. It's fear that human beings don't mind having because "if I'm afraid to kill someone, then other people are afraid to kill me."

We are able to recognize the practicality of law to civilization. It's not something causes revolution.

People go against their morality all of the time, obviously and in public. The trick is they only go against the parts that aren't punishable by law; fear and recognition of the requirement of law are what maintain it.
 
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It's too bad they couldn't pass that bill. It's the right thing to do. And we as a nation just need to accept this and move on. There are so many other things we need to be paying attention to. Seriously.
 
theplaydrive said:
I completely disagree.
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What society has survived that did so? Imperial Russia? France? Rome?

First, most people are motivated by fear. Second, it's not the type of fear that causes revolutions; it's not the fear of some horrible tyrannical government that works against the will of people. In the words of Machievelli, 'a prince ought to inspire fear in such a way that, if he does not win love, he avoids hatred'. There is a difference between a government being hated by its citizens and being feared by them. It's fear that human beings don't mind having because "if I'm afraid to kill someone, then other people are afraid to kill me."

We are able to recognize the practicality of law to civilization. It's not something causes revolution.

People go against their morality all of the time, obviously and in public. The trick is they only go against the parts that aren't punishable by law; fear and recognition of the requirement of law are what maintain it.
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I'm really rather amazed that you are attempting to push a government that relies on fear to rule. How is it that you think that is even possible in a Democracy?
 
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