I don't know what the worst sports fan base in the world is, but I know the Kentucky basketball fan base has to be one of them.

Nice to know there are some level-headed UK fans.

EISXUOIS wrote :

Vaporman87 wrote :


I don't really have a position on these religious freedom acts. I don't know why they're necessary if there is already a federal law on the books with similar language. But oh well. It all seems silly compared to the fact that unborn children can be murdered. I'll never understand that one. One day, much like slavery, we as a society will look back on all the death we allowed to happen to our children and wince in disgust. -end quote

I agree on both points. And I can stand by what I believe without running over someone but at the same time I won't stop saying things because someone gets offended..
-end quote

Oh boy...
I have known two women who had abortions and they both felt it was very traumatic for themselves. I don't have a problem with feeling bad for a life that could have been but a fetus is not a child yet. And no one knows if that life would have been a good one or a bad one but if ending a pregnancy that way is on the table, there is a big possibility that it would not have been good. Having children and having more people in this world contributes to consumerism which I feel runs counter to conservation. (Accidental alliteration!)

Now you can disagree with that but those are some reasons for it. Abortion is not a recreational activity. Nobody does it for fun or carelessness or pleasure. It's a serious medical procedure and if there has to be legislation about it (which I don't think), it should be created with more than the input of rich, old, white men basically as much opposite to the demographic as possible.

Now I do agree that the RFRA is pointless if we attribute good intentions to it. Although I do not. I like what  David Letterman said about it: "This is not the Indiana I remember. I lived there for 27 years and folks were folks and that's all there was to it. We all breathed the same air, we were all carbon-based life forms. And now this guy [Pence] throws a wrench into the monkey works...I'm sorry. This guy throws a monkey wrench into the works."

I don't think someone should stop whatever they say just because someone is offended. I like for people's feelings to be out in the open. Not a fan of the Lee Atwater method...but! If someone with a different view offends, whether it's by a boycott or insulting religion or having a "lifestyle", that has to be accepted as well! If a business is going to discriminate based on closely-held beliefs of the business owner, I think that's wrong but let's say it's acceptable. If a business owner is going to do that then they have no right to complain when people then discriminate against them because of it. No one gets to open the door and then lock it against others. I see a lot of talk on the pro-RFRA side about fairness and hypocrisy and it just blows my mind.

I do not believe that taking someone's money in exchange for goods and services should have anything to do with either party's lifestyle. That should not be allowed to be a consideration. It's not an endorsement. It's called minding one's own business. [EDIT: The pizza place that won't cater gay weddings (lol) has been given a $half mil in donations after their whining. Yes, the poor, persecuted xians...Just like Chick-Fil-A, they can moan about progressive pressure but they have P L E N T Y of support, let's make no bones about it]  I will appreciate if small government fans can avoid laws like this about people's private doings but it seems like a very vocal portion only want fewer laws when it benefits them and more laws when it comes to enforcing the behavior of people different from them.

As for political correctness I agree it goes too far occasionally, but things have been too far in the other direction for a very long time.

People are going to disagree in this country. It is too big and there is too much influence and freedom not to. That used to be OK. Lately this country is tearing itself apart over this and many other issues along the same lines, and I believe it is because some rich and powerful people are twisting language and instigating fights so they can become more rich and more powerful, while many people they con to bicker for their points writhe in quicksand. It is disgusting. That is something I do not like about this era.

I will not write any further in this discussion.

I try to keep my positions on things off the radar, especially here. But, If there is one thing I am not afraid to be vocal about, it is abortion. And I have good reason to be.

But first, with regard to RFRA, there needs to be some language that keeps the businesses that it applies to very limited. I mean, I have no problem selling propane to a gay person. I'm selling them a product that they use to keep warm. They are not asking me to participate in anything I don't agree with. They just want my product, and hey... that's cool. Money is money! But if I own a food service or photography studio, and I am asked to participate in a ritual that goes against my beliefs or values, that's a different beast. Yes, I'm still selling a product or service, but it involves being a part of something I am not comfortable with. If I were asked to come and photograph or cater a nudist colony's banquet, or Wiccan festival, I would also not feel comfortable doing that, and likely refuse my services to them. If I was asked to photograph the circumcision of a newborn (say, for a Jewish couple), I would also refuse them. So there needs to be some specific language in there to leave room for refusing service if it involves the business owner being required to take part in something they are not comfortable with... whether it is for religious reasons or just simply disturbing to them.

Abortion is an issue that has directly affected my family. My sister chose to have one secretly many years ago. Would she have been a fit mother? Nope. That I am CERTAIN of. But there are millions of couples out there who would have been. Which leads to another issue... adoption. Adoption in this country is a difficult and expensive process. It should NOT be. My wife and I have been down the adoption path, as you know. It cost us a great deal of time, money, and emotional turmoil. In the end, ours did not succeed. So many people out there just want to have a family, and choose not to because of the fact that adoption is so difficult and costly. Remove some of the barriers to adoption, and eliminate abortion, and you have made the lives of would be parents fulfilling, and the lives of children who would otherwise die in the womb actually possible for them. The inconvenience and labor of a pregnancy for the mother who would kill her child should be secondary to the life of the child and the family who would take them in and love them. But it is not. In adoption, everything is about the birth mother. What she needs supersedes all else. The would be mother and father are at her mercy. You can't just "pull out" of the adoption if she seems to be wasting your time and money. You must hope and pray she follows through. It is time the focus shifted from the mother of the unwanted child, to the child and the would be parents.

I often wonder what my deceased niece or nephew would have been like. The problem is that we have declared "Motherhood" as a proper defense for murder (Read this article thoroughly, and you will get some perspective on what I am saying), and accepted it as "okay" because it is a "health" issue that women should have the right to make. They did have the right to make the decision to be pregnant or not... when they chose to have sex. This, of course, leads to the defense of "rape, incest, and life of the mother". Rape... incest... these are despicable acts of disgusting people. So let's make it right with a murder? No. Give the child a chance. We can't know how the child will come to accept how he/she came to be. But at least give them a shot. Give them a chance to be something instead of killing them and throwing them in the trash like waste. "Life of the mother" is a different story, one that in this day and age is so rare that it's hardly worth mentioning. Even so, the mother's life must come first... especially if she already has children to care for.

We're content to tell ourselves this is a normal thing to do. Is abortion an easy choice to make? Nope. It can destroy a woman. It nearly destroyed my sister. For years her guilt led her to slicing her arms with a knife, "self-cutting" they call it, as a way to try and punish herself for what she had done. Alcohol, drugs, she did it all to escape her guilt. This is the way to handle unwanted pregnancy? This is what we have declared a possible "solution"? It's deplorable. It's murder. My sister murdered my niece/nephew. And she has carried that burden with her for two decades. Ask her now if she would do things differently. This "solution" is stupid. We are stupid people in this country. Why else would we have such inept people running it? And I mean all of them from all sides of the aisle. So few of them have any integrity or moral compass. Yet they are setting the standards for how we are to live. Stupid people governing stupid people. This is where we have arrived, after 200 years. We started with simple farmers and plantation owners who had more sense in a finger, than all of us combined in this entire country. And because we are here now, we have decided that "solutions" like abortion, while undesirable, are acceptable. No.

*steps off soap box*

Sorry. It's something I am passionate about.

I'm against the idea of abortion. It's baby murder! But people think otherwise.

thecrow174 wrote :

I'm against the idea of abortion. It's baby murder! But people think otherwise.
-end quote

My father is a Vietnam vet and when he got home hippies called him babykiller. Hippies who are now for killing babies via abortion..

Hackers.

In this day and age, you have to be very careful who you give personal info to. You probably shouldn't give personal info to anyone, because you never know if that someone could be watching your every move. And when your computer gets hacked, what do you do?

thecrow174 wrote :

Hackers.

In this day and age, you have to be very careful who you give personal info to. You probably shouldn't give personal info to anyone, because you never know if that someone could be watching your every move. And when your computer gets hacked, what do you do?
-end quote

Switch to Linux..

Is that what you did?

EISXUOIS wrote :

thecrow174 wrote :


Hackers.

In this day and age, you have to be very careful who you give personal info to. You probably shouldn't give personal info to anyone, because you never know if that someone could be watching your every move. And when your computer gets hacked, what do you do?
-end quote

Switch to Linux.. -end quote

This.