What is offensive language?

[R.D. Silverman]

Originally Posted by CRGreathouse

I'm not sure why you quoted me; I'm agreeing with you there.

.

I was responding to something that you had quoted from someone else's
post. I did not see that prior post; the poster is on my ignore list.

[CRGreathouse]

Originally Posted by R.D. Silverman

The issue is not, e.g. latin-square design but rather WHICH TOPICS
are relevant. What is the sample space of possible items to be included
in statistical comparisons? I see no way to define this.

The most common way is to find widely-accepted collections compiled for other purposes and find numbers of each member. There are others as well.

My apologies for not having the time to delve into this further at the moment.

[CRGreathouse]

Originally Posted by R.D. Silverman

I was responding to something that you had quoted from someone else's
post. I did not see that prior post; the poster is on my ignore list.

Ah, I see. Thanks for the clarification.

[davieddy]

Originally Posted by Brian-E

I grew up in Britain and felt rejected there from a very early age because I was gay. The rejection came largely through a strong Christian tradition which was much more prevalent then (the 1970's) than it is in Britain now. I could stand it no longer in my twenties and moved to The Netherlands where the Christian religion, while almost as ubiquitous as in Britain, was not dominant to the extent that people imposed their ideas of morality on everyone else. I renounced my British nationality as soon as was possible and these days I have almost nothing to do with the country where I was born.

I say this to illustrate that the phenomenon which we see in the "red states" of the US today has (or at least had) parallels elsewhere too. But the hold that the worst fringes of religion enjoy can weaken and become irrelevant as seems to be happening now in Britain and also elsewhere in Europe. The Netherlands was a forerunner in this process, but other countries have since caught up. Is the USA showing any signs of going that way too?

Great and frank post (as usual) Brian.
Before resorting to PM or a meeting, a few questions/anecdotes
come to mind.

When (~1960) were you born/bred and where?
When/how did you determine you were gay?
Are you aware of the "60s revolution"?
After I divorced in 1992 (and before internet porn:) I
travelled to Amsterdam several times.
I found the Dutch people I met to be liberal-minded,
intelligent, humorous, fluent in English etc. :
when I suggested to a Dutchman that this was a national
trait, quite different from the average Brit, he assured me
that I would find equally ignorant/bigoted people in the
Netherlands if I strayed off the beaten tourist track.
Where in the Netherlands did you find respite?
Have you been to Brighton?

I had a favourite porn shop in the red light district, where
the proprietor would regularly give me a cup of coffee while I
sought out a suitable "dirty" video. On leaving satisfied, I
thanked him for the free coffee:
"The video was free. That was the most expensive coffee you've ever had".

I usually stayed at the Hotel Van der Velder on Damstraat.
Delightful family ran/(run?) it. They must have sussed the
(main) purpose of my visit, but noone mentioned it, and we
enjoyed many an enjoyable breakfast conversation, notably
the classical music they piped, another great feature of your
adopted country.

David



on the train,

[Zeta-Flux]

Originally Posted by R.D. Silverman

I was responding to something that you had quoted from someone else's
post. I did not see that prior post; the poster is on my ignore list.

I wish I had know I was being ignored before I spent all that time. Oh well...

-----------

CRGreathouse,

To be honest, it hadn't occurred to me before your post that Silverman was being hyperbolic too. Perhaps because I just don't see a few percentage points difference in "high school drop out rates" creating a distinction between states being led by the educated and those not. (Nor, frankly, do I think such statistics fairly represent how educated people are with respect to social issues.) But thanks for helping me understand.

[Uncwilly]

Originally Posted by R.D. Silverman

In 1972 Congress finally approved sending an Equal Rights Amendment to the states for approval. It does not take a crystal ball to guess which states did not aprove it:

[science_man_88]

Originally Posted by Zeta-Flux

I wish I had know I was being ignored before I spent all that time. Oh well...

-----------

CRGreathouse,

To be honest, it hadn't occurred to me before your post that Silverman was being hyperbolic too. Perhaps because I just don't see a few percentage points difference in "high school drop out rates" creating a distinction between states being led by the educated and those not. (Nor, frankly, do I think such statistics fairly represent how educated people are with respect to social issues.) But thanks for helping me understand.

okay lets say a 90% with 75% of the course finished -> 67.5% of the course material absorbed compared to a possible 100% I'd say that's lower education.

[Brian-E]

Originally Posted by Zeta-Flux

The United States is a very large country. There are places where a gay man would feel extremely comfortable, and other places where he would be subjected to ridicule.

But for the most part, Americans pride themselves on being tolerant of others. But it isn't the kind of tolerances where they will lay down and let you walk all over them. They try to be fair. We also have a tradition of free speech, and that can sometimes be uncomfortable. A majority of Americans are religious, and we also have a tradition of religious tolerance. That means that you will see prayers at sporting events. This can be uncomfortable for those opposed to all things religious in a secular setting. But, for the most part, you won't see anyone cram religion down another person's throat. So, for example, *most* people would be extremely outraged if, say, a gay person was bullied, even though a majority of Americans are against gay marriage.

You might know that I'm Mormon, and spent two years in Alabama and Mississippi knocking on doors teaching others about my church. Mormonism is viewed by some protestants as a cult. As you can imagine, there were a few uncomfortable experiences I had. But for the most part, people are ok (even in those scary :-p red states) with others sharing their beliefs. If you have any questions on any aspects of that experience, feel free to ask.

I guess there is a full range of tolerance-levels amongst religious people - and amongst non-religious people too. Your characterization of the US as broadly religiously tolerant is encouraging, though it surely hides unpleasant intolerant excesses. I wonder whether you would distance yourself from the recent sermon by Mormon second-in-command Boyd K. Packer preaching that same-sex attraction is "impure and unnatural". I don't think you would go so far as to embrace the views of this Mormon group which advocates opening marriage to same sex couples - unless you've changed your view since the discussions on this forum a couple of years ago. Anyway, even amongst the Mormons there is clearly a wide range of tolerance, and this will undoubtedly be true too of other Christians, people with other religions, and people with no religion.

----

Originally Posted by davieddy

Great and frank post (as usual) Brian.
Before resorting to PM or a meeting, a few questions/anecdotes
come to mind.

[...]

David



on the train,

Thanks for your interest, David. I will PM you because I don't think my life story would interest others so much and it certainly isn't relevant to this thread.

[Zeta-Flux]

Originally Posted by science_man_88

okay lets say a 90% with 75% of the course finished -> 67.5% of the course material absorbed compared to a possible 100% I'd say that's lower education.

google brought me this: http://www.statemaster.com/graph/edu...ng-equivalency

The highest state is Alaska, a red state. Depending on how one defines red vs. blue, the top ten are pretty equally split, perhaps even favoring red.

The bottom few are all southern states, a significant majority of those being red. California is only 3 percentage points above those states.

In other words: they are pretty evenly distibuted.

But as I said, I don't know that this statistic measures social education. I imagine it is a complicated statistic, measuring, among other things: the effect of uneducated immigrants coming to the US, the effect of students in low population states choosing jobs not requiring education, etc...

I imagine there may be a religious effect. Some religions encourage education while others don't. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religio...d_intelligence

[Zeta-Flux]

Originally Posted by Brian-E

I guess there is a full range of tolerance-levels amongst religious people - and amongst non-religious people too. Your characterization of the US as broadly religiously tolerant is encouraging, though it surely hides unpleasant intolerant excesses.

Sure. With freedom comes the freedom to be a wacko. But, at least in my experience, they are in the significant minority. (Unless of course, you live in one of their little communities.)

I wonder whether you would distance yourself from the recent sermon by Mormon second-in-command Boyd K. Packer preaching that same-sex attraction is "impure and unnatural".

You might be surprised that that article does not represent accurately what he actually said. For example, his talk never refers to same sex attraction. He talks more broadly about overcoming temptations we have.

There was one specific sentence that bothered a few people I know--about how Heavenly Father wouldn't give us temptations we cannot overcome. Pres. Packer chose to change the wording in the published version. So I would recommend that more than the actual video (which you can find at lds.org if you like). The published talk is found at: Pres. Packer's talk

I don't think you would go so far as to embrace the views of this Mormon group which advocates opening marriage to same sex couples - unless you've changed your view since the discussions on this forum a couple of years ago. Anyway, even amongst the Mormons there is clearly a wide range of tolerance, and this will undoubtedly be true too of other Christians, people with other religions, and people with no religion.

Exactly. [My views have changed a little. For example, I realized that it is important to distinguish between reasons the government is involved with marriage vs. why individuals choose to make a marriage. I also realized that the argument that marriage is about promoting childrenbirth is wrong. Rather, it is about (from the government angle, not the personal one) getting those who will participate in sexual acts that *might* create children to channel those acts into an institution that is the best place for any children produced by the couple to be reared.]

[cheesehead]

Originally Posted by R.D. Silverman

Idaho
Kentucky
Missisippi
Alabama
Utah
Nebraska
Tennesee
Georgia
S. Dakota
Florida
LA
Missouri
Nevada
North Carolina
Oklahoma
S. Carolina
Arizona
Utah
Illinois (surprise!)
Virgina

Five of these initially approved, then rescinded.

The Supreme Court has ruled in the cases of other amendments that ratifications cannot be rescinded, so the ratifications in Idaho, Kentucky, Nebraska, South Dakota and Tennessee remain in effect.

The legislative margins in Florida and Illinois were just two votes in each case (i.e., changing two "nays" to "ayes" in each state would've ratified), and just one vote in Virginia. (In Virginia, oddly enough, not only a change of one "nay" to an "aye", but also either one additional "aye" or one additional "nay" with no other change would've led to ratification. In the last case, the additional "nay" (instead of the lone abstention) would've produced a tie that would've been broken in favor of ratification by the Lieutenant Governor presiding over the state senate, whereas the number of ayes by state senators was insufficient without the L.G.'s tie-breaking addition.)