Ooooo, that’s a good one! Way to go Hunter.

And on and on and on.

The problem in dealing with Vogt’s “arguments” and those of the other anti-gay voices is that when you look at them closely, in the words of Gertrude Stein, there’s no there there: they’re the same old catch phrases and buzzwords, pretty much free of substance, and depending on the audience, masked by rhetoric that sounds reasonable; they rely heavily on insinuation (Tony Perkins and the “child molesters” mantra) and rhetorical tricks. When challenged, they change the subject. And of course, they rail about the “emotional tone” — Vogt’s comment about Rob’s “smug, condescending tone” just says to me that he has no substantive response, and is “simply” another guise of the “hateful rhetoric from the left” response.

Rob — Keep up the good work — I no longer have the energy to dissect these characters, and I’m glad you’re doing it.

A lot of these arguments boil down to nothing more than an argument from tradition, the weakest of all possible arguments. It’s as if there is not room for anything new in the world, even if perhaps it isn’t so new? It’s as if Vogt finds it impossible to believe that we could maybe be better informed, more compassionate, more educated, less prejudiced, more tolerant, more understanding, less confused, less stupid and far more enlightened than our remote ancestors?

Impossible. There is no such thing as progress. It’s a liberal myth.

As for the rest of it. It’s one thing to believe that homosexuality is a sin. Absolutely your right as a Christian. I have no real problem with it, other than that I think it’s stupid, absuive, wrongheaded and a misapplication of mistranslated Scripture. But hey! Your belief, your life.

It’s quite another thing when you then take up time inventing all kinds of stories about me to tell yourself, when these stories have no actual basis in fact, logic, or experience. And really– have NO BASIS WHATSOEVER IN THE SCRIPTURE THAT YOU’RE QUOTING ME. When you do make up the crap, that is what makes you a prejudiced person. You don’t know me, or anything about me. You only know what you told yourself about me, and can’t be bothered to correct it.

And its quite another thing entirely when you use the crap you made up to justify harming me, making my life as difficult, expensive, unpleasant, and dangerous as possible, foment political campaigns to do this, insist that god hates me, convince other people to harm me and tell lies about me, disadvantage me, vilify me, criminalize me, and label me as a threat to marriage, family, children, faith, liberty, god, holiness, and western civilization itself– such as it is.

And all to no benefit for yourself, just the satisfaction that you have confirmed an ancient, durable, vicious prejudice. Unless of course you’re politically connected, in which case you can also make a lot of money at it.

That’s what makes you a prejudiced bigot.

The older I get the more I believe that Satan has a much higher sense of human decency and moral values than God.

And how did Hell come into being? Did Satan create it as a gift to God because he knew that God wanted a horrible place to send people who commit behavioral infractions and/or thought-crimes? Did God outsource Hell’s creation to Satan? And if so, why? In any event it seems that Satan must be working under a maintenance contract for God to assure that the hellfire continues to burn properly, and that it’s size is continually expanded to accommodate the exponentially growing number of people that God sends there.

Hell represents quite an interesting symbiotic relationship between God and Satan. If God stopped sending people there, I imagine that Satan would just close it down and demolish it.

You trained in philosophy or logic by any chance?