Yeah yeah...heard that BS all before. If your rich yeah...other than that it's just BS.

Oh I didn't argue.  I just told her told her in no uncertain terms that I didn't give a toss...  and in no uncertain terms to get  the f**k out.

The fact that I shouted and swore at her... well she picked the wrong day to get up my nose.  Apart from the fact I had been informed of a death in the family that day [and she knew it] and the fact I was in pain and recovering from recent surgery [and she knew it], she started in on me when I was not the one who made the original comment.  To me that was like kicking the dog when you know it was the cat who shat in your slippers, so yeah, I took offense.

Sure I could have politely said: "Tell someone who cares, and now would you please leave.", but that wouldn't have given me the pleasure of blowing off some seriously built up steam after a seriously frustrating day.  

Hmmm, was probably the difference between sleeping that night or not.

This is a strange world we live in, indeed. One where minorities (and there is a reason why they are minorities) are dictating to majorities what to do and say. The goal of a minority is not to be tolerated, since it NEVER stops there, but to actually BECOME the majority. A bit like the Borg.

The problem therefore occurs when the majority forgets the real meaning of the word 'tolerance'.

Tolerance is a good thing. But being tolerant of something is NOT the same as accepting or embracing that very same thing. The same way that being open minded is a good thing but isn't the same as accepting everything we're told as true.

For someone to be open minded, that person has to have strong core values and opinions. Otherwise, he is just like a speck of dust, thrown to wherever the wind blows next. When you start accepting *everything* in the name of tolerance and an open mind, or in the name of 'freedom', regardless of the consequences, the only thing you end up with is utter chaos.

What is happening right now in our society is that, in the name of 'freedom', everything is becoming acceptable. Not tolerated, but accepted. There is a big difference between the two.

And wow to the voices of reason who point this out, they are accused of being assholes, chauvinistic pigs, racists, bigots, etc, just as the people who raise their voices against wars are accused of being unpatriotic.

You see, freedom has a terrible price, and that price is responsibility. The more freedom you have, the more responsible you must be.

And what is responsibility? Responsibility is trying to do what is best for you as an individual but also for society at large. If necessary, it's looking at the results of your actions after-the-fact and deciding if they are good or bad. Sometimes we do things with the best of intentions, but the results are bad. We all make mistakes, but the responsible person will recognize a mistake and double track. The non-responsible person will carry on regardless.

And the latter is what we are doing as a society these days. We are allowing our rules and core values to be broken down, one by one, in the name of 'freedom', and we don't care what the results to society as a whole are, provided we, as individuals, are not affected by them (big mistake, because, in the end, we all are). Well, guess what, a society without rules and values is not a society - it's chaos, it's everyone fending for himself.

For a society to be able to sustain itself and be healthy, a balance must be achieved and maintained. This means it must be open to change, no doubt, but must not become overly permissive either. There is a reason we have laws, after all. You can chose to break the law, but there is a price to pay. Break the law and you go to jail. We have a traffic code so people can drive their cars in the safest way possible. Break that code and you get a fine or go to jail.

So, the rules imposed on a society, as long as not overly restrictive, are a good thing. As individuals, we may or may not like them, but they are there for the well being of the whole. What is happening these days is that people think they can make their own rules and then IMPOSE them on the rest of society. And they are succeeding. The minorities dictating to the majority what to think and say, and damn the consequences.

@Jorge

Here's an anthem for all assholes... enjoy.

Look at how ridiculous this 'minorities dictating to the majorities what to do' business is getting to be:

Goodbye, mother and father! Now Parent 1 and Parent 2 appear on PC passport form

Last time I checked, it still took a *father* and a *mother* to conceive a child.

Next logical step is bestiality lovers demanding the right to be legally married to their pets. Sigh.

One crim to other crim....

"What are you in for?"

"Well, I practised Animal Husbandry but then I got caught...."

Bloody ridiculous, ain't it!  The people who come up with this crap are far more offensive than the discrimination  they're purportedly trying to stop/stamp out. 

Frankly, I'd wash their mouths out with carbolic soap until they lean to say mother and father, poofter and lezzo without gagging.  Shoot, I know plenty of gay males and females who refer to themselves that way.  Nope, they don't hide behind pretense or 'so-called' political correctness. 

I mean, how correct is Parent 1 and Parent 2, really?  Like didn't Mother AND [presumably] the [named] Father bump bellies to get the little sprog in the first place?  Could be that some, in this day and age of miraculous scientific breakthroughs, may question their parentage and want DNA testing done to eliminate alternative conception - Jake AND Jacob, Lizzy AND Leah - but for the most part I think we can safely assume it WAS mother AND father doing the horizontal dancing which led to rug rats.

Was obviously not a kiwi prison.

Mind you, it sure gives 'riding his ass' a whole new meaning, don't it?

Are you sure it's you and not everybody?

The article states that gay couples have to be the registered parents of any child they adopt. Keyword being adopt. Meaning some mother and or father waved their right to be seen as the mother or father. In some cases, the child while having a genetic father and mother, has been abandoned by both of them. I think having Parent 1 and Parent 2 is a small concession to make just so a child can be given a chance to grow in a loving environment. Think the child of a gay couple is going to be all messed up because they don't have a father and mother figure. Well let me tell you; there are a lot of people out there who grew up with a father and mother and still ended up being a fucked up individual, and often it's in no small part because of their father and mother. Myself included.

On a personal note, I forfeited the chance to have a child when I decided I needed to live my life as a woman, not a man. Some days I deal with it through gritted teeth and anger; other days I deal with it with tears streaming down my face. I wanted a child so badly, but considering how hard it is for gay people to be able to adopt, I couldn't see how any authority would allow me to do likewise. I guess it's for the best, because I wouldn't want my child to be made to feel different and ridiculed just because they happened to have a trans parent, or parents. Regardless of the fact that child would have been loved with all my heart.

I consider you an intelligent person, Jorge. But that is without a doubt, one of the most idiotic things I have ever heard. Marriage is an act performed by two consenting adults. Last time I checked, there is no possible way for an animal to give their consent to such a thing as marriage.

"What's that Billy, you've decided that you love Lassie and you want to marry him."

"Yes, dad."

And what do you say, Lassie"

"Bark, bark, bark"

"Well that settles it, we're going to have a marriage."

Seriously, you're comparing apples to rocks here, Jorge, and gay people are just as capable of seeing that as straight people.

Allow me to clarify a few things, just in case my first response is misinterpreted. The article Jorge linked to also states that "The decision follows the revelation last month that details of the holder’s sex could be erased from all passports to spare transgender people from embarrassment". I believe such action is wrong. The UK Passport Service provides me with the ability to change the gender listed on my passport once I have taken certain steps and changed the gender listed on my birth certificate. I've no issue with taking those steps, and doing things the correct way. As for the gender listed on my passport causing me embarrassment; hogwash. The only problem it's caused for me so far is being detained briefly while certain things are verified, oh, and the time when I had to catch a later flight from my stopover in Philadelphia because they took so long to verify things that I missed my connecting flight. It's actually quite funny to see the look on the customs guy's face when I speak to him in a female voice and then he looks at my passport and it says I'm male. Considering the security risks associated with flying these days, I think it would be a good idea to keep gender listed on UK passports.

I fail to see why anyone would have an issue with a simple rewording though. Your father and mother are otherwise known as your parents. So why the issue with listing them as Parent 1 and Parent 2? All it does is accommodate more people. It doesn't complicate things in my opinion. It's not making anyone's life harder than need be. That this rewording is something which has been demanded does not settle well with me. Decent people ask for something to happen. I don't demand anything, and I don't want any group that is supposed to be acting in my better interests to do otherwise. I fully understand why 'normal' people get peeved with gays when things are being demanded.

Likewise I could say that marriage is the act performed between a man and a woman for the creation of a family, not between two people of the same sex.

If you stretch the definition of the act to include marriage between people of the same sex, what do you think will stop the next generation from stretching it even further to include people and animals? I mean, why not?! 

I know it's a shocking and far fetched example, but it was used on purpose to prove a point: bestiality is still considered aberrant behavior these days, but then so was homosexuality a few years ago. Now homosexuality is so common, and so 'in your face', that it's considered normal. It's no longer simply tolerated, and the proof is that the gay lobby thinks they have the right to demand that passports state 'person 1' and 'person 2' instead of 'mother and father'.

For me, and I'm not American, the latter is as ridiculous as the demands of the Hispanics in the United States (?) for street signs in English *and* Spanish, and bilingual education programs in public schools! What the...? They're guests in another country - learn the local language! 

The question is, where will all this stretching of 'normal behavior' stop? Will it ever stop? What are the actual consequences?

The fact that animals are irrational is irrelevant, since bestiality lovers would once again use the 'tolerance' card like all the other minorities did before them, the 'live and let live' argument: 'what is it to you if x decides to marry their dog? It doesn't hurt you, and makes him or her happy.'

And so, if we once again fall for this argument to accommodate the wishes of yet another minority, we allow our perception of 'normal' - of right and wrong, if you wish - to be further distorted.

Please feel free to replace 'bestiality' in this example with anything else you personally find aberrant behavior, it's just an example.

Also please note that I am always an advocate for tolerance, which is the practice of permitting a thing of which one might disapprove. Tolerance, however - and once again - is not the same as going as far as to pass laws that deem such behaviors 'the norm'.

True in regards to World population but I think we should think of minorities on a localized level.

Great thread!

There was a cartoon in the paper years ago [about the time homosexuality became 'gay'] .....

"I'm all for decriminalizing homosexuality....just so long as they don't make it compulsory." ....