Gay marriage in Australia

[Jokodo]

Okay, that's an answer, which apparently contradicts one of your previous answers, when you said:

I'm not sure whether I or someone else managed to convince you at least a little bit, but let me ask you:

Scenario 1: If an orphaned baby boy was available for adoption and there were 2 single persons applying for adoption rights. One of the persons was a straight man. The other person was a gay man. All factors regarding income and accommodation and career background and criminal checks were the same for each person, as well as other tests.

Scenario 2: If an orphaned girl boy was available for adoption and there were 2 single persons applying for adoption rights. One of the persons was a straight man. The other person was a gay man. All factors regarding income and accommodation and career background and criminal checks were the same for each person, as well as other tests.

Which are the preferences, if any, and why?

(Or do you still support an outright ban in the case of gay men, but not straight men? In that case, why? )

Both interesting scenarios Angra.

I would have to pick the straight fella over the gay fella for the baby boy, obviously

For the baby girl, I would probably still pick the straight fella, but I can see arguments the other way since the straight fella could be a wrong-un.

I just think when it comes to children's upbringing it should be a heterosexual one if possible because that gives the child the more evolutionarily natural environment.

If you're about giving children an "evolutionarily natural environment", first thing you need to advocate for is abandoning the nuclear family as a household unit, not preserving (an abstract ideal of) it. The huge majority of human infants have grown up in households or bands comprising multiple adult males males and females and their offspring. The second most common arrangement in the ethnographic record seems to be one where there's a men's house and a women's house, with the kids growing up in the women's house initially, with little contact to the men, and the boys being transferred into the men's house around 10 years old.

If "evolutionarily correct" were a meaningful concept, mum and dad with their kids in a house in the suburbs would be about as incorrect as it gets.

By your logic, wrt adoptions, we should strictly give preference to people living a communal lifestyle. Whether the people are homosexual, or heterosexual, or both, shouldn't matter because, according to you, people can be expected to keep their sexuality to themselves, with the result that the kids will never even know who's doing whom.

 

[Sajara]

Well that sounds pretty strange to me and I also work with a lot of ex-military, but in an office environment.

What 'but?' I'm in a cubicle farm.
And it may be strange to you, sure.
It may be completely unlike your office.
But that's the point. You're trying to apply your personal anecdotes as the produce of evolution and wired into the entire species.
It doesn't work that way, there are oodles of exceptions to every rule you try to come up with and they don't matter a damn, anyway.

Discussing sex features frequently in corporate HR guides on behaviour that is not acceptable in an office environment and I would agree with those sentiments.

Fine.
Agree or disagree.

Just stop pretending that YOUR views and experiences matter a hill of beans to anyone else in the world and/or should be the basis of legislation.

There's always one person in every office where everyone grows quiet when they come around. I have a hunch that his office is just like your office Keith...

 

[Keith&Co.]

There's always one person in every office where everyone grows quiet when they come around. I have a hunch that his office is just like your office Keith...

 

[Keith&Co.]

Sexuality is a private business.

Ever watch the TV show, Bones?
One episode, they had a character from Japan who practiced a lifestyle devoid of sexuality. This person dressed and cut their hair to hide his/her gender and avoided self-identifying as male or female. They belonged to a culture that tried to downplay the importance of gender and sex in their day to day interpersonal relationships.

Drove.
The Americans.
Insane.

They dealt with it as a subplot in the manner the show usually does, but it does make you think.

We don't know how to deal with that sort of thing. Our language CAN be gender neutral, but it is very difficult to refer to people as 'it' without sounding like you're giving offense. We have to work hard to find gender-neutral figures of speech rather than him or her, he or she, bastard or bitch.

If we found such a person in the men's room, we wouldn't know whether we should be offended or if we need to not make any sort of eye contact AT ALL.

And at the end of a long day with a dark parking lot, do you offer to walk them to their car, or ask THEM to walk YOU to safety?

Is it a skirt or a kilt? A shirt or a blouse? A moustache or something we don't talk about? Do you compliment them on the loudness of a fart or pretend that you heard nothing?

Sex is a big, big part of our daily lives. Even if we're not comparing penis lengths or cup sizes, you just can't get away from it.

 

[Sajara]

Advertisements are often not 'obliquely' sexual at all...they are full-on sexual. Some are better than others. Careful to watch these as they are NSFW.

NSFW:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/23/sex-sells-ads-should-have-thought-twice_n_4653226.html

- - - Updated - - -

Sexuality is a private business.

Ever watch the TV show, Bones?
One episode, they had a character from Japan who practiced a lifestyle devoid of sexuality. This person dressed and cut their hair to hide his/her gender and avoided self-identifying as male or female. They belonged to a culture that tried to downplay the importance of gender and sex in their day to day interpersonal relationships.

Drove.
The Americans.
Insane.

They dealt with it as a subplot in the manner the show usually does, but it does make you think.

We don't know how to deal with that sort of thing. Our language CAN be gender neutral, but it is very difficult to refer to people as 'it' without sounding like you're giving offense. We have to work hard to find gender-neutral figures of speech rather than him or her, he or she, bastard or bitch.

If we found such a person in the men's room, we wouldn't know whether we should be offended or if we need to not make any sort of eye contact AT ALL.

And at the end of a long day with a dark parking lot, do you offer to walk them to their car, or ask THEM to walk YOU to safety?

Sex is a big, big part of our daily lives. Even if we're not comparing penis lengths or cup sizes, you just can't get away from it.

I believe the proper pronoun is 'Ze' if I remember correctly.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Careful to watch these as they are NSFW.

Do they have the Flake bar commercial?
When I was stationed in Scotland, they had one of a woman in a canoe going under a waterfall and fellating a Flake bar... That was sexier than the entire Showgirls movie.

 

[Jarhyn]

That whole 'more natural evolutionary environment' tripe has never set well with me.

Darwinistic concerns are, as far as I have been able to surmise, the absolute worst principles to give service in the discussion. Of human ethics. In a Darwinian ethical model rape and murder are ethical. In fact in a pure Darwinian context they are GOOD behaviors. As is having as much incest as you can get away with. Dying is not evil within a pure Darwinian context, and longevity is oftentimes actually unethical from a Darwinian point of view.

You want to have a more natural (Darwinian) evolutionary environment? One husband. Many wives. Kill all the males you see banging any of your wives until you get old enough for the others to kill you instead! Oh, and eat every kid that doesn't smell like you, and chase off the rest once they hit puberty!

If these don't sound very human, humane, or ethical among humans, you win a cookie! Because they aren't. Because humans get a pass on that disgusting, barbaric, inefficient and horribly flawed evolutionary model thanks to language and intelligence and I honestly want to kick anyone who romanticizes that evil, disgusting filth so hard in the nuts that their boner for Darwinian evolutionary ethics is fulfilled with a Darwin AWARD.

 

[DrZoidberg]

That whole 'more natural evolutionary environment' tripe has never set well with me.

Darwinistic concerns are, as far as I have been able to surmise, the absolute worst principles to give service in the discussion. Of human ethics. In a Darwinian ethical model rape and murder are ethical. In fact in a pure Darwinian context they are GOOD behaviors. As is having as much incest as you can get away with. Dying is not evil within a pure Darwinian context, and longevity is oftentimes actually unethical from a Darwinian point of view.

You want to have a more natural (Darwinian) evolutionary environment? One husband. Many wives. Kill all the males you see banging any of your wives until you get old enough for the others to kill you instead! Oh, and eat every kid that doesn't smell like you, and chase off the rest once they hit puberty!

If these don't sound very human, humane, or ethical among humans, you win a cookie! Because they aren't. Because humans get a pass on that disgusting, barbaric, inefficient and horribly flawed evolutionary model thanks to language and intelligence and I honestly want to kick anyone who romanticizes that evil, disgusting filth so hard in the nuts that their boner for Darwinian evolutionary ethics is fulfilled with a Darwin AWARD.

In my house the word "natural" has always been a pejorative for this very reason.

 

[mojorising]

By your logic, wrt adoptions, we should strictly give preference to people living a communal lifestyle. Whether the people are homosexual, or heterosexual, or both, shouldn't matter because, according to you, people can be expected to keep their sexuality to themselves, with the result that the kids will never even know who's doing whom.

I don't think this is a realistic picture of the tribal life of our ancestors. I think pair-bonding was still practised even during times of pre-history but I will have to research this a bit more.

It seems strange that it is such a fundamental part of our modern lives if pair-bonding was not practised before modern culture evolved.

If pair-bonding was not happening in prehistoric times and it was just the most sexually vigorous male individuals who took advantage of the females in the tribe then it seems strange that the sexual jealousy evolved as such a powerful emotion in men.

Men get very jealous over sexual access to their female since a rival could impregnate her and he could end up paying the cost of raising the child. Women get jealous over emotional infidelity where their meat-hunter might start to provide food to a rival female.

 

[mojorising]

Do they have the Flake bar commercial?
When I was stationed in Scotland, they had one of a woman in a canoe going under a waterfall and fellating a Flake bar... That was sexier than the entire Showgirls movie.

I remember that Flake bar commercial. Yes of course adverts are full of sexual innuendo but the more risque ones usually become newsworthy since they begin to infringe upon our naturally prickly reaction to sex since it is such an emotive subject for perfectly natural reasons.

 

[mojorising]

In a Darwinian ethical model rape and murder are ethical. In fact in a pure Darwinian context they are GOOD behaviors.

A totally different argument of course (I think I saw that there is already a thread on this?) but, no it does not make it morally good, just because it is a (n occasionally) successful strategy. Morality does not equate with evolutionary success.

Morality often involves putting others considerations before your own which will often get in the way of your own success (unless other people see your selfless actions and your status rises in their eyes which could be a Darwinian explanation of morality).

 

[Keith&Co.]

By your logic, wrt adoptions, we should strictly give preference to people living a communal lifestyle. Whether the people are homosexual, or heterosexual, or both, shouldn't matter because, according to you, people can be expected to keep their sexuality to themselves, with the result that the kids will never even know who's doing whom.

I don't think this is a realistic picture of the tribal life of our ancestors. I think pair-bonding was still practised even during times of pre-history but I will have to research this a bit more.

Do you have any actual evidence to base this belief on or is it like all the rest of your claims?

It seems strange that it is such a fundamental part of our modern lives if pair-bonding was not practised before modern culture evolved.

Not so strange if 'marriage' is more of a method of property control, though. If the concept of individual holdings came first, then marriage would have followed as a means of determining who got what from whose death.

If pair-bonding was not happening in prehistoric times and it was just the most sexually vigorous male individuals who took advantage of the females in the tribe then it seems strange that the sexual jealousy evolved as such a powerful emotion in men.

Men are territorial about their property.

Men get very jealous over sexual access to their female since a rival could impregnate her and he could end up paying the cost of raising the child.

Wait, since when? Do you think we've had alimony and child support laws for tens of thousands of years? Long enough to be an evolved response?

- - - Updated - - -

Do they have the Flake bar commercial?
When I was stationed in Scotland, they had one of a woman in a canoe going under a waterfall and fellating a Flake bar... That was sexier than the entire Showgirls movie.

I remember that Flake bar commercial. Yes of course adverts are full of sexual innuendo but the more risque ones usually become newsworthy since they begin to infringe upon our naturally prickly reaction to sex since it is such an emotive subject for perfectly natural reasons.

Please either lay off the fictional science talk or provide some evidence that our 'prickly reaction' to sex is naturally sourced, not socially taught.

 

[mojorising]

Do you have any actual evidence to base this belief on or is it like all the rest of your claims?

Keith, your primary response to much of my opinion is to ask for evidence. These are just opinions based on reasoned reflection. In my opinion they are quite plausible but if you disagree, instead of simply asking for evidence you could offer reasoned counter-opinion.

Not so strange if 'marriage' is more of a method of property control, though. If the concept of individual holdings came first, then marriage would have followed as a means of determining who got what from whose death.

Yes marriage as property ownership is a good point. I think there is more to it than this though as women are not evolved as dumb objects but have an approximately equivalent level of rational intelligence to men so they were probably empowered actors with some degree of choice in the tribal scenario and and not passive objects.

 

[bilby]

By your logic, wrt adoptions, we should strictly give preference to people living a communal lifestyle. Whether the people are homosexual, or heterosexual, or both, shouldn't matter because, according to you, people can be expected to keep their sexuality to themselves, with the result that the kids will never even know who's doing whom.

I don't think this is a realistic picture of the tribal life of our ancestors. I think pair-bonding was still practised even during times of pre-history but I will have to research this a bit more.

It seems strange that it is such a fundamental part of our modern lives if pair-bonding was not practised before modern culture evolved.

If pair-bonding was not happening in prehistoric times and it was just the most sexually vigorous male individuals who took advantage of the females in the tribe then it seems strange that the sexual jealousy evolved as such a powerful emotion in men.

Men get very jealous over sexual access to their female since a rival could impregnate her and he could end up paying the cost of raising the child. Women get jealous over emotional infidelity where their meat-hunter might start to provide food to a rival female.

Never mind our ancestors. Partible paternity is common in parts of South America today.

Your simplistic world-view is at odds with reality.

 

[mojorising]

Please either lay off the fictional science talk or provide some evidence that our 'prickly reaction' to sex is naturally sourced, not socially taught.

You think the prickliness with which sex is treated as a subject by humans is just some kind of socially learned awkwardness?

I disagree. I think sex is an inherently prickly subject because it is a high stakes game involving the determining of whose genes will be mixed with whose to form the next generation. In animals with advanced mental capacity such as humans, the parents and family get involved in decisions so it becomes a high stakes game with a lot to win or lose which is why it is highly emotive for humans. I think this is evolved as part of human emotional response system.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Keith, your primary response to much of my opinion is to ask for evidence.

Well, of course. YOu make bold assertions about threats to the family and the history off marriage traditions and why gay marriage is bad.
If there were some objective reason to think that any of these claims were worth a shit, then it might have some application to the rest of us in facing up to this threat to society you think you've identified.

These are just opinions based on reasoned reflection.

I have a bit of a problem with 'reasoned' in that statement. I doubt that you've 'reasoned' your way to flat out inventing history and science and other claims you assert.

In my opinion they are quite plausible but if you disagree, instead of simply asking for evidence you could offer reasoned counter-opinion.

Well, well written science fiction is plausible. That doesn't mean we should start building a spaceship to meet the coming fleet of space aliens. And i really don't have a need to counter something you just made up out of thin air with on objective reason to think it applies to other human beings.
I just ask for some reason at all to think that your biology fanfiction applies.

Not so strange if 'marriage' is more of a method of property control, though. If the concept of individual holdings came first, then marriage would have followed as a means of determining who got what from whose death.

Yes marriage as property ownership is a good point. I think there is more to it than this though as women are not evolved as dumb objects but have an approximately equivalent level of rational intelligence to men so they were probably empowered actors with some degree of choice in the tribal scenario and and not passive objects.

Why would you think that their having a choice would be something that evolved? That's a social issue. Culture decided that women deserved the chance to have a choice, or cultures decided they didn't.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Please either lay off the fictional science talk or provide some evidence that our 'prickly reaction' to sex is naturally sourced, not socially taught.

You think the prickliness with which sex is treated as a subject by humans is just some kind of socially learned awkwardness?

Yes, i do. Comes from having lived within more than a few cultures, and they didn't all practice the same awkwardness towards the same subjects. Join a new culture, learn different taboos and different practices.
And different swear words. It's all about who you associate with.

I disagree.

Big surprise.
But that, of itself, has no bearing at all on the discussion.
unless you can point to some of this evolutionary reading you claim, that supports it.

I think sex is an inherently prickly subject because it is a high stakes game involving the determining of whose genes will be mixed with whose to form the next generation. In animals with advanced mental capacity such as humans, the parents and family get involved in decisions so it becomes a high stakes game with a lot to win or lose which is why it is highly emotive for humans. I think this is evolved as part of human emotional response system.

and again, you leverage your personal anecdotes and try to use it as a baseline for the entire species.
You need to get out more.

 

[bilby]

Please either lay off the fictional science talk or provide some evidence that our 'prickly reaction' to sex is naturally sourced, not socially taught.

You think the prickliness with which sex is treated as a subject by humans is just some kind of socially learned awkwardness?

I disagree. I think sex is an inherently prickly subject because it is a high stakes game involving the determining of whose genes will be mixed with whose to form the next generation. In animals with advanced mental capacity such as humans, the parents and family get involved in decisions so it becomes a high stakes game with a lot to win or lose which is why it is highly emotive for humans. I think this is evolved as part of human emotional response system.

Sex is a powerful motivator. In the west, the Catholic Church realised this a long time ago, and has been using it to motivate people to give money to the Catholic Church ever since.

It works like this:

The Pope decrees that sex is prohibited by God, except in certain very restricted situations.
People like sex, so they have sex in situations other than those demanded by the Pope.
The priests get everyone together on a Sunday, and tell them how bad they are if they have had unauthorised sex.
The people feel guilty, and put money in the collection plate as a bribe to avoid Hell.

It's an excellent racket, using psychological manipulation to get money out of people. It has been going for so long, that even the perpetrators don't realise that it is a pure scam - people start to believe the bullshit. When the west went exploring, between the 15th and 19th centuries, they discovered loads of people who had never heard of the pope, who were doing sexy things without guilt, shame, or donations to the church; They immediately labelled these people as 'savages', so that they didn't have to face the fact that they had been hoodwinked for centuries. After sex, not admitting that you were wrong is one of the most powerful motivators for humans.

The reason that people speak out against the Flake commercials is that they have been thoroughly brainwashed into the belief that enjoying sex is shameful; This is great for the churches, because it means that their adherents unknowingly police any attempt to infringe on their turf.

The few remaining humans who have not been corrupted by the church still practice sexual behaviours that you seem to think are unnatural. But the history is clear - the unnatural thing is the church induced shame at sexual behaviours that fall outside the very strict rules imposed with the purpose of ensuring that most people cannot obey them.

Setting very strict rules - so strict that everybody will break them - is an ancient and honourable technique for dictatorship. Once everyone is a sinner (or a criminal), the powers that be can do as they please - arresting and executing anyone who upsets them. It worked for the Catholics in the middle ages; it worked for Stalin in the Soviet era; it's working for the Islamic mullahs in Afghanistan and Syria today.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

I don't think this is a realistic picture of the tribal life of our ancestors. I think pair-bonding was still practised even during times of pre-history but I will have to research this a bit more.

It seems strange that it is such a fundamental part of our modern lives if pair-bonding was not practised before modern culture evolved.

If pair-bonding was not happening in prehistoric times and it was just the most sexually vigorous male individuals who took advantage of the females in the tribe then it seems strange that the sexual jealousy evolved as such a powerful emotion in men.

Men get very jealous over sexual access to their female since a rival could impregnate her and he could end up paying the cost of raising the child. Women get jealous over emotional infidelity where their meat-hunter might start to provide food to a rival female.

Sexual jealousy would not be surprising in that case (though I'm not suggesting it was).
For example, we can see that in elephant seals, gorillas, or baboons, dominant males tend to get pretty angry if a female sneakily has sex with another other male. On the other hand, the males that sneakily have sex with some females do not usually get particularly jealous if the dominant male too has sex with the female they had sex. But then again, if a man has sex with a woman in an [allegedly] committed relationship with another man, the latter usually does not get particularly jealous, either.
So, it seems to me that the male that is overtly having sex with a female often gets jealous if she has sex with some other male - at least, if he can afford to.

But that is not to say that there is no evolved pair bonding. You haven't made a good case assuming that there is, though, but the main issue is that even if you did, that would not seem to provide any substantial support for the courses of action you advocate.
For example, if humans have a pair bonding adaptation, that may or may not be originally a sexual one - maybe the sexual adaptation only co-opted a general pair-bonding adaptation used in alliances. That same pair bonding can work in gay people as well. Alternatively, even if sexual pair bonding between males and females is a human adaptation, and even if also attraction towards one's own sex exclusively (or not exclusively) is a malfunctioning of human sexual instinct (which you don't know is the case), that does not entail that gay people cannot use the same sexual pair bonding adaptation when bonding with each other.
You might say "but we're not sure", but you need to make a number of assumptions when you really don't know, and the limitations of parenting rights plus the refusal to use the name "marriage" is not justified on account of that - I wish we could discuss this in greater detail, but given that you're responding to a zillion posters and your replies to me are very short, no in depth discussions between us are likely to happen.

That aside, in order to make the debates more managable and focused, I would still strongly recommend separating the different arguments, especially the semantic argument from the argument regarding adoptions, and debating them one at a time.

Granted, the issue of adoption may come up in a debate about marriage, but it's an independent one, and it could be discussed beforehand.Incidentally, gay couples already can adopt in parts of Australia, and in others they came become foster carers, so even if they don't adopt, they're rearing children anyway. Even if there is no same-sex marriage, the rights of gay couples on the matter are expanding, even if somewhat slowly. More here.

 

[Jarhyn]

In reality, the only ethical thing is to use the most probabilistically beneficial survival strategy, as pertains to your unit of evolutionary data. Anything else is unethical and foolish. This might, in some limited hybrid systems of evolution include limited extents of peer cooperation, but encouraging any model which cleaves to biological parent systems is principally darwi istic and focused not on the idea producer or idea discerner, but on the selfish GENE which has no bearing on the individual. It is from the distinctly human perspective a-ethical at best and unethical at worst. So it is to be wholly disregarded in any discussion of what is right for people. Instead we should be asking what model leads to the best intellectual development of a child, and there are many good arguments that this insists that all parents should be desirous and invested toward the existence and nurturing of children.

Since gay people can ONLY have children that they actively seek with intent, this biases them drastically towards behavior that develops their child rather than contributes toward their neglect, irrespective of biological relationships.