02-24-2017, 06:47 AM
(02-10-2017, 07:50 PM)speakeasy Wrote: The good news is minority groups such as black Americans, members of the LGBT community, all women, and the physically and mentally challenged have had their rights recognized by acts of law in most developed countries, and especially in the USA. The bad news is it has caused great upheaval in our society as we try to adjust to this new age.
(02-23-2017, 09:19 PM)izzy Wrote: I think it is good news overall, but I am skeptical of the advancements made for the LGBT. Note the word is skeptical. As you indicated above, my skepticism (rather than firm opinion) is in regard to the culture that makes up our society, and the level of permissiveness, also, in the generic sense when one groups rights advancement seems to be infringing on the free exercise of other people's rights, i.e. a baker who does not want to bake a cake for a LGBT couple(or other analogies).
I am going to make two more comments, not to provoke a response or a debate but to serve as qualifiers to my statement of skepticism.
#1) My brother is HIV positive, had AIDS and had his viral load backed off, so now he is just considered POZ(if anyone wants to here some disturbing commentary about that feel free to e-mail e privately, as it is bone chilling). So it is not with a bit of understanding that I frame references to LGBT.
#2) He readily acknowledges that they recent (last three decades) societal acceptance of alternative lifestyles, and the various expression of that is what lead to his situation.
So in closing on this, what I am trying to say that my skepticism around the advancement of rights for all groups may come at level of generalized societal cost.
As regrettable as it is to know your brother is dealing with the effects of HIV, it is also providing medical science with ways to control or combat a contemporary virus. There will be others not associated with the gay lifestyle which may benefit from these advances. It's part of the face of the future which will march relentlessly on until it becomes the present. But consider how much more difficult it will be to make room in our world-views for this next few generations who will be required to accept changes that will come at a much faster pace - commensurate with the velocity of scientific discovery and human enlightenment.
I acknowledge the painful reality of threats to a societal establishment we all need in order to function with civility and sanity. That's the price we're going to pay. But to me our entire recorded history (including archaeological evidence) has been survival by overcoming obstacles, I feel our species will adapt.
(02-23-2017, 09:19 PM)izzy Wrote: It is interesting you came up with three generations. For cultural anthropologists (or at least when I was in school) it was taught that the appropriate pace for moving a taboo to an acceptable mores is three generations. It had been studied in culture after culture, to determine the pace that often lead to decline.
The U.S. had an almost episodic period a few decades back, when AIDs first emerged. Had homosexuality and bisexuality had the same level of acceptance level it has today, the damage to the general society could have been devastating on both financial terms and in terms of family structure. Fortunately the taboo mechanism was in tack enough to stigmatize the behavior in such a manner that it likely prevented widespread dissemination into the greater heterosexual community.
You can also see this effect in the migration of tattoo culture in the U.S. The generalized taboo in the business community probably kept enough of a check on what might have been wide dissemination of the practice that sanitation and health standards were able to get ahead of the sea adoption from a health standpoint in the majority of communities. A community like mine was less fortunate, and health related problems proliferated which caused the County to cajole the municipality to effectively ban the establishment of any new tattoo parlors and called for the long term elimination of all of them systematically. This artistic expression has been stifled in a community that may have benefited economically from it economically as a result.
Your position supports the fear that contemporary thought toward people and practices will pave the way to societal decline - and it's a fair assessment. However, I'm seeing it as the evolution of humankind toward a better understanding of the rights of all life. Only time will tell, I guess.
izzy- Wrote: I’ll just make a few comments. If Renard is to believed, most of the crime in Portland was wesen related. Nick was supposedly an effective cop before he became Grimm, implying he was effective against wesen without knowing they were wesen. Using the standard, lawful, and non-life taking measures that are the collection of procedures that make up civil law enforcement, Nick was able to effectively discharge the duties of his job. Enter Nick the Grimm and suddenly Miranda rights, search and seizure protocol is discarded, and murder, framing individuals for crimes they did not commit are in. Once again, before becoming a Grimm Nick is effective as a LEO, after Grimm, Nick turns his back on the very foundation of law that is the Rosetta Stone of our society.
Moreover, I think someone could make the case that it was Nick’s emergence as Grimm that provided the impetus for BC rising so prominently in Portland...
The laws of humans do not apply with justice to most wesen crimes on Grimm. So the Wesen Council was the authority charged with enforcing Wesen law. The two simply do not, almost without exception, cross boundaries in their application. So I can't agree with your position on this subject. Human society is a separate and equal one from Wesen society. In order for it to apply fairly, Kehriseites would have to acknowledge the existence of Wesen. Nick applies Wesen justice when it is needed and Kehrseite justice when appropriate, imo. But he's no moral pillar to be used as a model for good behavior, just a flawed but well-intentioned good guy, to this fan.
In my view, he is in no way responsible for the rise of BC.
"The only thing that will redeem mankind is cooperation." Bertrand Russell - printed on a beer mat in "Shaun of The Dead".