ThomasRoss
- 679 comments
- 847 likes given
- 623 likes received
Bio not provided
A&F's sales have slipped over the past two years. I think the douchey "cool-kid" message they've been sending out over the past nearly fifteen years has finally gone a little stale. Perhaps there's hope for mankind after all.
@OnoI found this article I think you would like Ono. It's about Jesus Himself not being a Genesis literalist.
@ibealionIn reply to KatieLaurenB you said "I recommend that you find out what "love" means according to the Bible." That's good advice! For everyone! Here is how I interpret love:
John 13:34-35 “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
My interpretation of this passage is that it is the world who defines love. How else would the world ever know a Christian by their love? By using the Chistian's definition? I doubt it.
Are Christians known for their love? if you ask random people to list some words and short phrases describing Christianity, the #1 volunteered answer at over 90% inclusion is "anti-gay". Oops!
Keep working on that being known for your love thing. The rest of us still don't really believe you, yet.
@ibealion@DavidStevens The Bible is infallible, ibealion? That would mean everything in it MUST all be true. There are over 75 places in the Bible where the earth is described as flat, fixed, or at the center of the universe. Therefore Copernicus, Galileo, Columbus...they were all WRONG about the earth being a round little dirtball that spins around an unremarkable star, Right?
@ibealion @Dmack89 @timqz1 @DavidStevens ibealion, you're taking Pascal's Bet. The Joel Olsteen million ways to God interpretation of scripture is plenty good, and much less problematic than the whole, "we're Baptists, Mother Theresa was part of that ancient cult, Catholicism. Therefore she's in Hell." idea. Or Gandhi, for that matter.
@ibealion By the way, I have read the Bible, done some study of my own and came to a different conclusion than you about homosexual expression being any more or less of a sin than heterosexual expression. I even wrote about it, in three parts. If that sounds long, don't worry. The three put together are fewer than 5,000 words. It would take you 15 minutes to plow through the lot of them.
http://evolequals.com/2012/08/04/the-homosexuality-question-answered-not-a-sin-2/
http://evolequals.com/2012/08/11/the-homosexuality-question-part-ii-jesus-did-say-something/
@Tiffani@ibealionThank you for those quotes Tiffani! I am especially struck by "Love does no harm to a neighbor." It seems like an important part of the definition of love! It goes nicely with the quote I last put up in these comments, John 13:34-35 “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” That also defines love...on the viewpoint of the outsider!
True Christian love is visible AS LOVE to the non-Christian. And yes, sometimes people who are so, so Mr-Rogers-good come off as some sort of a creeper, and they might even be hated for that by the same outsider. But their words and actions are still seen as loving. And their love does no harm. An extremely large study of LGBT suicide attempts in pro and anti-LGBT households surveyed about 20,000 Oregonian High School Juniors over the course of a year and found a shocking discovery: ALL kids had higher suicide attempts in the anti-LGBT households. The ones who identified as gay had 25% more attempts. But the straight kids had 8% more attempts. This goes right to that part of the Sermon on the Mount about doctrine, when Jesus talks about good fruits and bad fruits, and doctrine that bears bad fruit is false and is to be thrown into the fire.
@ibealion@ThomasRossJohn 13:34-35: “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
@ibealion@ThomasRossibealion, if you weren't trying to evangelize to me, a loyal follower of the comments on this page just about since it went up, then who? You need to actually develop a relationship with the people you evangelize in order for it to be effective. For the most stunningly perfect life of a really effective Christian evangelist, I recommend you look to Mr. Rogers.
http://mentalfloss.com/article/16416/15-reasons-mister-rogers-was-best-neighbor-ever
@ibealion @Ono @DavidStevens No ibealion, your comments haven't angered me. You haven't developed the kind of relationship with me where I would consider your words important enough to get angry about. It sounds very much like you need to re-read your New Testament. All your concern seems to be about the gay issue, when Jesus is not on-record condemning it even once! Meanwhile, your concern for the poor gets short shrift, something Jesus spoke about over three hundred times!
In short, your theology is warped.
I like that quote a whole lot, but it's not Plato. It is attributed in multiple sources to Ian MacLaren, a.k.a. Reverend John Watson, who originated the line sometime just before the turn-of-the-century. And it's morphed. "Kind" was originally "pitiful", as in "filled with pity".
This quibble is presented for educational and entertainment purposes, not to rip on FileasPhogg or anything trollish like that.
http://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/06/29/be-kind/
Sarah, why don't you tell that to the world's zoos, where we've been noticing gay penguin pairs raising borrowed and abandoned eggs for the past 20 years or so? If "natural" means that it is found in nature, then homosexuality is QUITE natural, being described in over 1500 animal species spread across major branches of evolution from vertebrates to insects. For 500 of those species, homosexuality in their species is well-documented.
Homophobia, on the other hand, is only found in us. There are no instances documented of animals sensing another animal's gayness and persecuting them over it.
So, what is unnatural here, is homophobia, not homosexuality.
B, I am so sorry that happened to you. That is the very worst thing that happens in society, that the victim of raped gets blamed. For their intoxication. For their clothing. For their beauty. For whatever. I bet you would have been kind of okay with your rapist getting off scot-free, even with his attitude, if your friends and the people you thought you could trust had taken your side. The betrayal hurts the worst, doesn't it?
@ChristineMiller It's nice to see someone taking an interest in the Greek origin word 'arsenokoites', used twice in the Bible in the context of two out of the three New Testament "clobber verses" against LGBT's, and nowhere else. From my initial research, I learned that it could mean "male sluts", but later learned that the term was more frequently used for male prostitutes. If Paul or Timothy had more clearly wanted to cast out gay people from the kingdom of heaven, they would have either used the term 'kinaidos' if they were going full-greek, and 'racha' if they were trying to address the Jews. They did not. And with all of the bisexuality going on around them in the cultures surrounding Judea, they could hardly have missed it.
@pgnbri Big? You mean, like you are heavy-set? It's true that there is a lot of size-ism out there. But it's also true that there are "chubby-chasers" of all sexes, and all orientations out there. Just because they are not the norm, doesn't mean they aren't findable.
Or did you mean the "other" kind of big? My first BF was that kind of big, and believe me, it was tough to deal with! But when you're in love you somehow manage to love whatever they've got, even if it's a bit more than you'd like! :-)
@AlecPlayer OMG. Your post just killed me, because that was the reason I attempted suicide at 15. I've come to realize over time that the overwhelming cause of suicide is a death of hope. In my case, I was abused at my Dad's house and at school, and had a difficult relationship with my siblings. I honestly thought that the only person in the world who truly loved me was my Mother (whom I wasn't living with at the time), but even she only loved me out of some sort of genetic imperative. My death of hope was the thought that I was first maybe, then probably, then certainly, really, truly, completely, and eternally, unlovable. That I was a good kid when you first met me, but sooner or later...something...came out, and that was that.
That is not true, as I have proved over and over since that dark day 28 years ago. Not for me, not for you, not for anyone. You are worthy of love, and, SO much more than that, you ARE LOVABLE!!
And BTW, men have had to live with that mofo Brad Pitt for a looong while now, so we are perhaps a little more "over" the whole competition idea. We know each of us is not the best at anything in particular. We either we got a 'thing' you like, or we don't. Brad...<sigh>...hate you! call me!
@Sunnyseattle I would say that there is an exception that proves the rule. There ARE people out there that literally see the love of their life as the only thing that "hits them", sexually. They are rare, and you either are that person, or you aren't. Or, you might be a person like my little brother, who once confided in me that his ex-girlfriend could make him...we'll say "finish" here in this polite conversation space...in about 30 seconds if she wanted to, but he'd mostly given up on one-night stands because he couldn't "finish" at all. Some really are wired that way.
@HeidiMurphy @ThomasRoss If that did not work, then you will be getting this new response in your emails. Scan your email for an unfollow button or piece of hypertext somewhere. I think there is one.
@StoneyS I am interested to hear, if you would share what your particular issues are, about dating a bi guy.
One of the big reasons I am interested, is that you yourself seems to have presumed, about bi guys, in the same sort of way you have decried heidi, for presuming insecurity amongst all of those who would not date a bi guy. You see, "bi" covers a LOT of territory! There are bi guys (and girls) who are transitioning to gay, bi-straight and bi-gays, who are really just straights or gays who have a history of gettin' a l'il freaky, and honest-to-goodness bisexuals who are both equally attracted and equally capable of loving either sex. Do you really feel like every single one of those permutations of "bi" isn't right for you? Do you REALLY want to throw out the guy who used to "mess around" with his best friend during adolescence, is honestly pretty much straight, AND honest enough to admit he liked what happened with his friend? That sounds like a pretty stand-up kind of guy, if you ask me! What's wrong with him?