Conservative (Neo-Cons which are really fake conservatives) booklist

the idea of two women having sex doesn't make me sad. The only two things I can imagine two guys doing to each other seem kind of disgusting to me. But to each his own.

 

I think Rev. Clifton's views are a good case for not labeling people liberal-conservative. It's just not that simple, we all have different experiences that shape our opinions and often just don't line up with the dogma line.

 

Amen to that Khan!

 

It's interesting to me that we pass laws against prostitution, and call it shameful and demeaning, and while I agree, I also have to wonder about the morality of both men and women that marry for money.

Quite frankly, if you pay a hooker $500 for sex, that is a far cry from a man or woman standing in front of a church and swearing they will love each other until death, when they only thing they love is the size of the person's bank account.

What about a person who dates another and engages in sexual activity because they take them to dinner, or they buy them exspensive gifts? I suppose we could ask when is prostitution considered prostitution?

All of them are wrong from a moral standpoint IMO, but in a free society a person should be able to make a choice to what they do with their sex life, and what takes place behind closed doors, and quite frankly I do not think the local, state, or federal government should have any right to interfere with two people having consentual sexual intercourse regardless if they are being compensated for those sexual activities.

 

Why do you think marriage for money is immoral? Marriage is about committment, not romantic love. Marriage exists to meet societal needs, not merely to sanction the undoubted pleasures of intimacy.

Marriage is traditionally much more concerned with the protection of women and children than it is with "love".

Prostitution offers no protection whatever for the natural and even today to some extent inevitable consequences of sexual intercourse, that is, the care and raising of children.

There is surely nothing wrong or unnatural in a woman freely selecting a mate who is better positioned to protect and provide for her children; men who cannot or will not do so are usually thought of as "losers".

 

Thanks Mr. Engineer for clarifying your bigotry and hatred for me.

Even though you may not have been the original author of the posting, your regurgitation of it shows you condone it.

Political jokes are fine, even when they poke fun of elected officials, but some sensitivity and tact are called for.

Negroes I met while yachting; that certainly misses the mark on all counts.

You could be better than that and still witty, but you chose not to be. That really reveals a lot about you. Thanks for showing your true colors.

 

I don't think that there is necessarily anything wrong with a woman considering a guy's ability and willingness to provide financial protection for her and her children as one of the factors in her marriage choice. However, when someone (male or female) makes a choice of a marriage partner based solely on the fact that the prospective partner just happens to be rich, then such a person is selling herself/himself no less than the individual plying her/his trade down in the red light district.

 

Exactly.

 

Traditionally, when men held all of the economic power and women had nothing, it made sense to select husbands for one's daughters based on the son-in-law's economic ability. However, when marriages are reduced to mere economic transactions, the party with less economic power was essentially placed in a potentially abusive situation without the economic ability to escape. Now if there is love involved in the situation, then the party with the greater economic wherewithal might be less likely to press his/her advantage.

 

Not necessarily so.
Marriage provides a woman with one (presumably, hopefully) sexual partner and a known (putative, social) father for her children. In exchange for her vow to forsake all others, the woman becomes entitled to the man's economic resources for the support of her and the children.
Prostitution provides a woman with many sexual partners and, though the children may have sperm fathers, they have no social father. However, because the woman is getting money from the men for whom she performs sexual favors, the children are still provided for economically.

 

I don't suggest that marriage is a strictly economic proposition. It isn't now and I kind of doubt that it ever was as a general rule.

However, "romantic love" as the sole or even primary reason to marry is neither an ancient tradition nor a particularly wise practice. Take a look around!

Why do you suppose that more than half of all marriages end in divorce and the majority of those IIRC in the first YEAR? Romantic love as a matter of biology has a limited shelf life folks. There are far better predictors of marital success than THAT and one of them is financial stability.

Having said all of this, I must, in the interests of honesty, admit that I haven't a CLUE what women seek in men. I do know from my law practice that a woman will often put up with a great deal from her husband including violence against herself (but usually NOT against her children), adultery (so long as it is discreet enough to be plausibly deniable such that her outward dignity can be preserved), alcohol and drug abuse (to an AMAZING extent), and horrible combinations of the above.

BUT the ONE THING in my experience that will impel a woman to up and leave is cronic unemployment of the wilful sort.

 

Nosborne: There is a reason why these women tolerate abuse, adultery, alcoholism, etc., on the part of their husbands: simple economic (and psychological) inability to escape.

I am manic-depressive and have been for seventeen years. In addition to indivual therapy with a series of psychiatrists, psychologists, and counselors, I have also been in group therapy for two years. All of my current fellow group members are women, most of whom are trapped in abusive relationships. I also rode the bus system for nine out of the fifteen years that I lived in Seattle, as a result of which I had the opportunity to strike up conversations with a good many cute single moms.

What I can tell you is this: abuse begins with control. If an abusive spouse/significant other: (a) refuses to allow her/him to work or allows her/him to work only if she/he makes not too much above minimum wage; (b) refuses to allow her/him to contact friends/relatives, and punishes her/him for so doing; and (c) reminds her/him that no man/woman will ever want her/him for a significant other, then that person has established sufficient control in order to abuse the you know what out of his wife/girlfriend or her husband/boyfriend.

 

Inability to escape for perceived (or possibly real) economic reasons?

That makes perfect sense and agrees with my own experience. And once the conomic situation is impossible anyway, there's nothing to keep them around.

Except, of course, murder. Well over 80% of murders arise in domestic violence situations where the killer is well known to the victim.

Brrr. What an awful subject.

 

Yup.

 

Speaking of which, TH, why ARE they often so damned cute? I don't get it. I have never understood it, unless the "protect me/my children" charactoristics also define the "abuser".

 

Or perhaps the abuser is cold blooded enough to select only cute victims. I helped prosecute a rapist like that once.

 

It has often been noted that beauty (and cuteness) in women are measures of a woman's sexual desirability to men. Since the cute ones would be more likely to be able to get a man, it would follow that the cute ones would be more likely to become moms in the first place. Thus, there would also be more cute single moms. Not sure whether abusers have any desire to "protect" women and children.

 

I think there are many nice guys who accept the female's ideology of "love me, love my child." But, in the case of the abuser taking a cute single mom, it may be that he thinks that her status as a single mom might make it more difficult for her to escape (as opposed to if she had only herself to support).

 

Tisk, tisk, Jimmy. Surely you are aware that gun control is an evil communist plot. If law-abiding people don't have guns, they are much easier victims for criminals and oppressive governments.