Students Walk Out On Dan Savage Criticizing The Bible

Is there anything that Dan said that is incorrect or untrue?
or would you rather have hurt feelings because your book has been shown to be nonsense?

While I agree that you should be a little careful when addressing a captive audience, I don’t think that he stepped over the line with this. I don’t think that he threw any ‘venom’ or ‘bile’ at them. Are you saying that what he said about the bible was untrue? I think that very few people see your comment for anything other than it was – Avoiding the argument, while trying to claim the moral high ground. In short the same thing these kids were doing, and it is an act of pure cowardice.

Savage curses a lot, whether he’s talking about the bullshit in the Bible, or what he had for lunch yesterday. I’m pretty sure anybody who came to see a lecture by Dan Savage was expecting that, so the cursing is NOT THE FUCKING ISSUE, and anyone who thinks it is can just sit the fuck down.

If you object to the cursing, then you are a naive prude. (“Prude” because who the fuck cares about a few four-letter words, and “naive” because this is what a Dan Savage lecture looks like, get over it) If you object to the content, then either you are a homophobic violently-misogynist slavery apologist — or else you are one of those people who is so deep in denial that they can look at a sentence like “If a man lay with another man as with a woman, then fucking kill his ass, yo” and come up with some twisted interpretation that makes that phrase LGBTQ-friendly. I hope you are part of the latter group, because at least they are generally nice people, even if a bit misguided.

Where are you going with this Alex? Are you honestly trying to suggest that gay kids aren’t harassed by people using the Bible as their justification? I’ll assume that you aren’t making that argument – if you are in fact making that argument, you are deluded and there really isn’t anything else to be said.

So, assuming that you aren’t making that case, how do you propose that someone should go about changing people’s bullying of gays? If they are doing it because they are good little christians, and the Bible tells them to do so, the only way you can get them to change is by pointing out that the Bible is wrong. Oh yes Alex, the Bible is a steaming pile of bullshit, and people need to hear that it’s OK to ignore anything obnoxious in that book.

Also, the tone trolls lost when those kids got up and walked out. That was a lack of respect, and getting called pansy-assed in return is fair play as far as I’m concerned. If you want respect you have to show respect.

The first time I tried to view the video, I got an error, so I read alexmartin’s tirade before I saw it. I was thinking Savage must have used the most obscene, offensive language possible, and threatened the students leaving with violence. What he actually did was say “bullshit” a few times and “pansy-ass” once, the latter in the only comment he made about the students leaving. that’s what alexamrtin was whining about? Srsly? I see he cannot find anything in Savage’s speech that was in any way inaccurate, and his accusation of “bullying” is so ludicrous I really started to wonder about his sanity. But in fact, I guess he just wants to divert attention from the frequent use of that disgusting monument to ignorance and bigotry, the Bible, to justify the only too real, vicious homophobic bullying that has led a number of American school students to kill themselves even within the last year.

He seemed to get a bit off topic but, sure, I’ll gladly applaud his conduct. He didn’t do any of th things you accuse him of and pointed out something that should be obvious; we cannot take the Bible’s moral pronouncement on people as absolute or infallible.

If you and your children take issue with that, give up your worldly positions, become hermits and spread the word of your lord. Hell do anything as long we don’t have to deal with you.

You have to apply empathy here, and imagine yourself in the position of Christians who happen to think that homosexuality is wrong but that aren’t interested in beating homosexuals up or bullying them. If you do, you get this:

Wait … I came here to listen to thoughts on bullying, and what I’m getting is this yahoo ranting about things in the Bible with arguments that I’ve already heard and with arguments that are really simplistic, lumping me in with people who want to kill homosexuals, or beat them up, or bully them? Why am I listening to this jerk? I’m outta here.

You have to apply empathy here, and imagine yourself in the position of Christians who happen to think that homosexuality is wrong but that aren’t interested in beating homosexuals up or bullying them.

People who are opposed to violence against gays shouldn’t have a problem with hearing the parts of the Bible that call for violence against gays being called “bullshit”.
Thinking homosexuality is wrong is bigoted and irrational. They do not deserve special consideration for holding that view.

Dan Savage was exactly right. The students who flounced were being cowardly.

Forbidden Snowflake,

And if Savage had targeted that directly, there wouldn’t be a problem. It’d even be on topic. But he didn’t. His big examples are all about cases where religions have stopped considering something wrong, and he seems focused on arguing that point, and not that bullying based on that would be wrong. And if he wanted to argue against the violence point, there are a ton of examples in the NT that he could have used to make that same point without causing the reaction he got.

(You can start with the case of the adulterous woman, and move on from there to the Golden Rule.)

Verbose stoic,
If Lori isn’t saying that, I will. I don’t care in the slightest about the feelings of people who base their morals or their identity on a collections of millenia-old fairy tales. However strongly they may believe, their beliefs have no basis in fact, and I am under no obligation to respect the beliefs or those who hold them. If you wish to convince me that there is a moral element to homosexuality, you must prove that there is some potential harm intrinsic to homosexual behavior specifically, a contention for which there is no evidence. Therefore, your religious claims or beliefs regarding the moral status of homosexuality are invalid, and deserving of nothing but mockery.

T’is Himself,

Congratulations on quoting my defense of a moderate position and then trying to argue that I’m defending an extreme position on this issue. Well done! It’s sadly not rare enough for commenters to directly quote that which refutes their own arguments and questions, but you managed to do it with an expletive-ridden rant that is devoid of any rational or argumentative content.

Let me rephrase that in a way that you might understand it: Until you learn to fucking read comments and address what I actually fucking said, you can take your rant and shove it up your arse.

Does my adding in the expletives help you understand where actual calm, reasoned discussion would fail? I do so like to ensure that everyone is talked to at their own level.

Lori,

Their beliefs are causing irreparable harm to others, therefore I consider those beliefs immoral. I have yet to see a valid reason for considering homosexuality immoral so until I do I will continue to disrespect those beliefs.

The point, though, was that they are just as convinced of that about your beliefs, and the beliefs about homosexuality. Thus, they feel precisely as justified in disrespect those beliefs as you do. At that point, all you have are groups of people disrespecting each other for no other reason than they disagree with each other, and history has shown, I think, that whenever that happens no good ever comes of it.

I don’t want them to be tolerant, I want them to stop being bigots.

But you call them bigots because you think them wrong. They don’t consider themselves bigots because they don’t think they’re wrong. While that’s being settled, wouldn’t you at least prefer tolerance over the alternative, which is open hate, disrespect, and bullying?

Where do you think those child bullies learned their behavior? Oh yeah, all those “non-bullying” adult role models in their lives. They are just as guilty and I have no respect for them.

So, you think that a parent who consistently taught the message that homosexuality is wrong but that homosexuals were not to be bullied, beaten up, or killed for being that and that differing belief systems are to be tolerated would produce child bullies over homosexuality? I find that hard to believe.

Or how about parents who think it wrong but never talk about it? Are they causing the problem, too, by making it utterly irrelevant in their children’s lives?

Bullying is a serious problem with long-term and potentially lifelong effects. As a victim of bullying myself I can’t emphasize enough how psychologically damaging it has the potential to be. I can do nothing less than fight for the end of the bigotry that leads to it.

The disagreement here — that you have not yet argued for, as far as I can tell — is that you think that holding these beliefs leads strongly to bullying, and I deny this. Even from my own experience, bullies will bully and use whatever they have available to do so, even just physical strength. In the meantime, this focus on “bigotry” picks fights you don’t need to pick and makes enemies out of those who would ally with you, and risks you becoming the bully. None of these are likely to help eliminate bullying.

Congratulations on quoting my defense of a moderate position

There is no moderate position when the question is “do this group deserve the abuse it gets”. The answer is either “No” or some degree of yes. Compromising on the dignity of a minority group is not moral nor “moderate”. It’s basically saying “they are not important enough for me to care about”.

Ing,

There is no moderate position when the question is “do this group deserve the abuse it gets”.

And I was defending the group of people who while they might think that homosexuality is morally wrong, would answer that question nevertheless with a resounding “No”. So, then, what was your point?

Dan,

You’re also dealing with a group, Verbose Stoic, who engage in behaviors and make statements which they think are “speaking truth with love” but which constitute and contribute to a great deal of the abuse gay students experience. Their attempts at love are often themselves abusive. They do not grasp this.

So, I think we can presume here that we are talking about a group — again, the one I’m interested in defending — that are unintentionally doing this. So here are the possible cases:

1) They are expressing their own beliefs in a reasonable and non-abusive manner, but some people take that as support for their unreasonable and abusive actions. Well, we can argue over how much responsibility people in that case have for what other people do with their statements, but the solution to this is to point this out reasonably and let them do the reasonable thing and say, vocally, “No, my position does not justify that”, and thus become allies against the unreasonable ones.

2) Their expressions of their beliefs are in fact abusive, but they don’t see it that way. Again, the answer is to simply and reasonably point out the perspective that they are missing, at which point many will be shocked at what they are doing and stop.

3) Their expressions of their beliefs are not abusive, but those they aim it at think it abusive because they interpret it as meaning something it does not and that it reflects an intention it does not. The problem here is with the interpreters, not the speakers, and so it must be made clear what the intent is and the interpreters must be open to accepting that and avoid still interpreting it in line with their own biases.

The biggest debates, then, will come when trying to decide whether 2) or 3) is the case, as it deals with wildly differing perspectives and with people — on both sides — who are likely to be emotional and defensive over those accusations.

“Friction” has resulted?

When “Friction” includes wild conspiracy theories about how homosexuals are going to turn your children gay, that homosexuals have an agenda to destroy heterosexual marriage, that homosexuals are trying to destroy the family, that homosexuals are trying to criminalize Christianity, then what you call “friction” is nothing more than irrational fear and hatred.

Second part:
*
When he writes in favor of torture, before weaseling out when he realizes that he may have reached a threshold and caused the disgust of his own readership, he displays behind the thin veneer of pseudo-reasoning his sadism and utter absence of fortitude.
*
I know something by experience: fascist apologists do not, never gave, and will never give a shit about victims of oppression. When it comes to Harris, he is not smart enough, not cunning enough, not talented enough a wordsmith to hide the repulsive rich-white-upper-class-supremacism which motivates him: he tries, and he fails, again, and again, and again, and again, so do those who try to use the very same useless broken rhetorical tricks or try to hide behind the torments of stoned and mutilated women for whom they feel nothing, and for fuck sake how many time will I have to say that playing dumb to disguise one’s own moral failings never works?

You know Dan Savage personally? Oh wait…NO! Your making a rash judgement about him and me. So are you a tool? Should I be allowed to make the same rash decision?