Sorry for the DP, but it was too late to edit my first post. I wanted to add a response to
@Kitsune. You mentioned something that is kind of off topic and I know some people feel the same way as you about this and it made me think some things. You said,
And I couldn't help but think of all the kids who have same sex parents who are in the schools where you think their families should not be portrayed as healthy, happy or desirable. I have a 5 year old niece and one of her best friends, May, has two moms. Why shouldn't May's family be portrayed as normal and desirable, just as my niece's family is which has a mom and a dad? If you think May's parents should have their choices respected and protected, which it sounds like you do, then their children should not be made to feel like her and her moms are different or less desirable than anyone else. And what kind of a lesson is it to be teaching kids, that my niece should feel like she is better than May because she's got two moms and my niece has a mom and a dad?
There are also millions of kids who hurt themselves because they are bullied at school for being queer. These kids do not choose to be gay and they do not deserve to be made into outsiders. Schools should simply accept and reflect back to their community that the kids who attend them come from families of all kinds of make up - blended, gay, etc, and kids themselves are going to be gay or straight or whatever. Schools should be teaching kids some book learning, some social and communications skills, maybe even how to be thoughtful and think for themselves, not telling them what is right or wrong with different kinds of families and sexual orientations.
If we don't have any say in a gay couple's decision to get married and have kids, because it's their right to do so if they wish, then how can we then turn around and say that schools should not portray those families as healthy? Why on earth would you want to make these children feel like their families are not healthy or desirable or that they themselves are not healthy or desirable? It just breaks my heart to think that people would put their values above the well being of little kids and teenagers and allow kids to be put in a position where they are made to feel that they and their families are not healthy or equal to others.
Even though it is off-topic let's play a simulation game. Let's pretend like we, you and I, each get to create a society from the ground up. You can make the rules (or laws), the attitudes, the cultural norms, and so on and so on of the society you are creating. And I can do the same with mine. And the goal is to have a society that can survive the longest and compete against the societies of the other players. How would each of our societies fare?
I don't know what you would choose to do with yours, but I think from the things I have read you say I believe there is a fair chance that you would lean towards a pretty egalitarian society with a lot of social freedom and laxitude. Maybe I am mistaken I don't really know, but in my society what I would do is try to strike a balance between individual freedoms, and social cohesion. It isn't that hard to do if you are willing to sacrifice the privileges of a few in order to guarantee that the society won't break down in the long run. In order to do this we need to try to curb or cull attitudes that are damaging to society and promote those that make society stronger.
And how do we choose which things to promote, which things to allow, and which things to curb? How do we identify the attitudes that are risky or a potential threat to society? Some of them are obvious, you should promote a healthy diet and you cannot allow people to go around killing others, for example because that would make it really hard for people to live together in peace. So that one has to go. But what about attitudes that seem innocuous because they don't hurt other individuals and yet pose a risk to society at large? Are there any attitudes like this and how do we identify them?
I think there is a spectrum, of course, but a good exercise is to take an attitude and ask yourself
what would happen if every single person engages on it? so... let's try it with something silly.. what would happen if everyone gets a buzzcut? People would be uglier, but society survives, so getting a buzzcut is something we can allow. What would happen if everyone gives a little bit of what they make to charity? Society would be better, we would have more shelters for the poor, the elderly, and the disadvantaged. So charity is an attitude we should promote. What about being gay? What would happen if every person in society woke up gay one morning? What would happen is nobody would have children and society would collapse in less than a generation. So homosexuality is something to curb. What about incest? What would happen if everyone married their sibling or their parents? That one would also be a shitshow, we would have children but a lot of genetic issues and not too much cooperation between families, so it would take a few generations for complete breakdown, but eventually that is where society would be headed. So incest while slower than homosexuality is a also something we need to curb.
How do we curb these attitudes? The first thing is not to pretend like they are healthy. These aren't healthy attitudes, and precisely because homosexual kids tend to be bullied and homosexual adults can't form families and always have a myriad of mental health problems linked to their sexual orientation, homosexuality is not a desirable trait. Nobody really knows for sure whether or not people are born gay, there isn't a consensus, and in my opinion if people are born gay, not
every gay person is born that way. Some people are confused through their adolescence and end up identifying as gay because it is the path they took and it became natural and normal for them. If sexuality is a "fluid" thing, doesn't it make more sense to try and push people to be straight? Why present impressionable kids with the idea that there are 75 different sexual orientations and everything is just equally good when it isn't? Why make them second guess their natural instincts? Why not let them figure shit out on their own? A lot of people get bullied for defying social norms and social cues, it happens to everyone who is different from the mainstream. Are we going to make every kid try 100 pairs of glasses just so that the shortsighted kids won't feel left out? Or tell them that having perfect eye-sight is "just as good" as suffering from eye problems? Makes no sense.
So if I had to create a society of my own I would let everyone choose their own sexuality but the absurd concept of gay marriage would be out of the question and I wouldn't let them adopt children. If they want marriage and children they would need to marry someone from the opposite sex like everyone else. They would be able to live together as a couple, practice their sexuality privately, and be protected from any sort of prosecution or attacks from others, but it would be forbidden to portray homosexuality openly in pop culture, the subject would be explained in stark terms in sex ed classes, and it wouldn't be something to celebrate. Same as incest.
