Subj:  Re:What's Happening                   95-03-10 21:09:45 EST
From:  Joe Uhrig

>>Gay people don't have any similar unifying ideology.<<

I don't like specific unifying ideologies even within myself as I really like diversity of ideas and the freedom to explore them.  However my own personal credo in just about every battle I join is a quote from Jefferson:

Within that I have a lot of flexability.  If the fundamentalists want to gnash their teeth in fear in private, I think that's unfortunate, but their choice and I will respect their wishes.  However "respect for beliefs" ends with me when they by clinging to their old limitations attempt to limit me.  Under those circumstances I will attack those beliefs until they are no longer limiting me  and will feel no guilt in doing so.  Here is a quote dealing with the other side of the issue that someone shared with me over in the Astronomy forum.

"It is not a man's duty, as a matter of course, to devote himself to the eradication of any, even the most enormous wrong; he may still properly have other concerns to engage him; but it is his duty, at least, to wash his hands of it, and, if he gives it no thought longer, not to give it practically his support. If I devote myself to other pursuits and contemplations, I must first see, at least, that I do not pursue them sitting upon another man's shoulders. I must get off him first, that he may pursue his contemplations too."  (Thoreau; "The Relation of the Individual to the State", 1848,  later "Civil Disobedience".)

 



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