Actually, here at box Turtle Bulletin we do not often make accusations of “hate”. Some folks oppose equality for their gay neighbors for reasons that do no include animus or hate.

However, though we don’t make the accusation much, we don’t find it difficult at all to recognize a comment based in ignorace, hatred, and fear when we see one.

In case you haven’t noticed, gay marriage is winning in this country. See you in 10 years when Prop 8 will just be another shamed smudge on U.S. legal history.

It’s funny how you hate when we point the finger and you and call you names but you love to say anyone who supports traditional marriage automatically hates all gay people and is a murderous evil heathen. Real nice.

They call us “homosexuals”, not gay or lesbian, which are the words we (or most of us) choose to be referred to as. If they really respected us, they would call us by what we call ourselves.

Calling us “homosexuals” is akin to calling an African American a “negro” or “nigra”.

They know it is offensive to us because it dehumanizes and debases us to a cold, sterile fact of our sexual orientation; one they believe is a choice despite evidence to the contrary.

You have imagined threats that do not exist, accused gay people of motives that they do not possess, and adopted a martyrdom that is not deserved.

No gay person is seeking to impact your life in any way. But you seek to harm gay people specifically because they are gay (or, as you put it, because you do not “condone or accept” their “behavior”).

You are anti-gay.

Admit it.

When you have the opportunity to either leave gay folk alone or to choose to make their lives more difficult, you choose to intrude on gay folks and take away rights. That is, by definition, anti-gay.

And this anti-gay attitude which you so proudly display is based on nothing other that dislike and distrust and a bit of dredged up fear.

You accuse Ben of being a bigot. Which makes me wonder: Do you know what “bigotry” is, Kim? Are you familiar with what the term means?

It’s exactly the attitude and behavior you came here displaying.

if as a Gay man you really want to live and let live. then why do you care to rewrite History, to rewrite marriage, why do you care to have prop 8 fail if it wont changfe anything?

If you really can argue that nothing will happen from it then why do you want it to pass.

you gain no more marrital rights, and no less if it passes?

why are homosexuals so tirelessly wanting to take a heterosexual word and make it into a hetero/homo word.

why dont you leave the dictionary how it has been for 1000′s of year and make a new term to describe your union.

and you can not argue that it would not affect me and my kids negatively if prop 8 fails.

dr’s are being sued for upholding their religious beliefs. For centuries homosexual behavior have not been acceptable . . .I am not even going to argue the tolerance side. any decent human being thinks human are humans and shoudl be trated civilly. I am not againts homosexuals. I am for prop 8 because I am for religious freedom. which it the basis for the founding of our country.

I am free to my religious beliefs that homosexual behavior is not ok. You are free to disagree. But you are not free to constitutionally define that it is ok.

you are not ok to take a moral, sexual orientation to school, rewrite text books and make my religious beliefs null and void.

You are so willing to call people bigots when they do not condone or accept your behavior. Really who is the bigot. I tolerant, I do not care what you do in your home. But do not force my religious beliefs to change.

You asked several questions. Over time, I may be able to answer some of them.

Regarding my absence, I simply forgot that I had posted here and only found all your replies this last weekend. Certainly you have served up some food for thought.

Regarding the “real issue” and my motivations: in my original posting I said “If you believe in God, *and* if you believe that God established the definition of marriage, you will probably find yourself supporting proposition 8.”

This actually reflects my own motivation, but it hardly ever “works” as a starting point for a discussion between two people of differing religions (or no religion).

I smiled when you thought I might be an open-minded person. I try to be. I am a pompous jerk some of the time, but I do try to see all points of view (sometimes to a fault).

Boo, you guessed right. See my reply to JasonD where I tried to be a little more clear.

Ouch. Guilty as charged. Stupid comment on my part. I read it now and wonder “what was I thinking?” I can only offer the lame excuse that I posted this on the eve of Sept. 11 and I must have had the Iraq war “diversion” from Afghanistan on my brain.