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ORIGINAL: rulemylife Examples?

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"Democrats, Republicans, or independents -- marriage is a religious institution, and government should define it to be between a man and a woman," Naugle told The Advocate, which he mistook for a legal publication when he returned the magazine's call for comment on his opposition to marriage equality.
 
Naugle held a press conference Tuesday with a group of Democrats, including pastors and local activists, who agree with social conservatives leading the charge for Amendment 2. He mentioned that key blocs in the Democratic Party, such as Latinos, African-Americans, and Catholics, are showing support for the amendment.
 
"We also know that a majority of black Democrats are supporting this -- like 60% -- based on religious reasons," he said. He also said Latinos, many of whom in the state are Catholic, will be an important group of voters to pass the amendment.

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ORIGINAL: SpinnerofTales

I have to ask a question that has long been bothering me. How can anyone who is in the d/s world to the point of being on this board support the conservative agenda. Financial policy aside, it seems these people are dedicated to our eradication. Does anyone think that a group vocally against reproductive rights, gay rights, free speech rights in the matter of pornography are going to at all support the rights of "whip swinging perverts" like us?

[...]

I ask again, how can anyone who identifies themselves as part of the d/s community support the conservative social agenda?

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ORIGINAL: Elisabella



The simple answer to your question is that "reproductive rights", gay rights, and free speech rights in the matter of pornography all have absolutely NOTHING to do with D/s.


I really do wonder why you think the D/s community should be so closed minded that only people with certain political views should be welcome?

Bella

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ORIGINAL: SpinnerofTales

First, I never said that gay bashing is a conservative phenomenon. What I DID say is that gay bashing is a large and important problem and part of the answer to that problem is to educate people that gays are not a threat, not a sick or dangerous group and that not only is violence against gays unnecessary but no more to be tolerated than racial violence. If there is any doubt that action is needed, I need only to think from an official statement issued by Archdioceses of New York in which the cardinal said "While we do not condone violence against homosexuals, it should be understandable that their lifestyle can cause disgust and lead to such violence from moral people".

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ORIGINAL: SpinnerofTales

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ORIGINAL: Elisabella



The simple answer to your question is that "reproductive rights", gay rights, and free speech rights in the matter of pornography all have absolutely NOTHING to do with D/s.


I really do wonder why you think the D/s community should be so closed minded that only people with certain political views should be welcome?

Bella

Once again, I never said there need be any rank and fill party line someone needs to be part of the d/s community. What I did say was that I take a different view of enlightened self interest than you do. For example, I am in favor of political equality between the genders, but would certainly not support a political agenda that had as part of it that men should be kept in pens and treated like cattle (I know some male subs would disagree but that's just me). Likewise, as someone born Jewish, although now a proud and avowed athiest, I would not support a candidate who's agenda, spoken or unspoken, was to make this a country where only Christians had a say.

Now your answer is very clear and I understand it. Since it's easy for you to hide, it's not a big deal if what you do is viewed as something that should be legislated out of existance. Since you do not ideantify with others in the sexual freedom movement, you are unconcerned with the sexual freedom policies of the conservative right as general. Because you can take off your collar and pretend you're just a "good, traditional woman" you can avoid things like child custody problems, the threat of criminalization of your sexual behaviour (hey, why should anyone have the right to whip someone who wants that whipping) or other unpleasant ramifications that can be done.

So...thanks for the explanation and good luck with that.

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ORIGINAL: Elisabella
The simple answer to your question is that "reproductive rights", gay rights, and free speech rights in the matter of pornography all have absolutely NOTHING to do with D/s...

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ORIGINAL: SpinnerofTales

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ORIGINAL: Elisabella



The simple answer to your question is that "reproductive rights", gay rights, and free speech rights in the matter of pornography all have absolutely NOTHING to do with D/s.


I really do wonder why you think the D/s community should be so closed minded that only people with certain political views should be welcome?

Bella

Once again, I never said there need be any rank and fill party line someone needs to be part of the d/s community. What I did say was that I take a different view of enlightened self interest than you do. ( translation = I am smarter then you  deal with that)
For example, I am in favor of political equality between the genders, (I guess nancy pelosi is not an example of women getting ahead in politice, or fienstien or boxer ).but would certainly not support a political agenda that had as part of it that men should be kept in pens and treated like cattle (I know some male subs would disagree but that's just me). Likewise, as someone born Jewish, although now a proud and avowed athiest, I would not support a candidate who's agenda, spoken or unspoken, was to make this a country where only Christians had a say.

Now your answer is very clear and I understand it. Since it's easy for you to hide, it's not a big deal if what you do is viewed as something that should be legislated out of existance. Since you do not ideantify with others in the sexual freedom ( ROFLMAO! Paleese ) movement, you are unconcerned with the sexual freedom policies of the conservative right as general. Because you can take off your collar and pretend you're just a "good, traditional woman" you can avoid things like child custody problems, the threat of criminalization of your sexual behaviour (hey, why should anyone have the right to whip someone who wants that whipping) or other unpleasant ramifications that can be done.

So...thanks for the explanation and good luck with that.

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One thing I need clarification about - what specifically do you think people are going to "legislate out of existence"?

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ORIGINAL: SpinnerofTales

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One thing I need clarification about - what specifically do you think people are going to "legislate out of existence"?

Bella,

I didn't just shoot back a reply because I wanted to give your question and your points a bit of thought. I am going to answer your question....and then I am going to ask you one, and I would really like it if you gave it a bit of serious thought before replying.

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What am I afraid of in terms of being legislated out of existence? Well, let's see...I'm worried about organizations like TES, Black Rose and the NLA being put out of business, either by direct legislation or by repeated police harassment (see the history of gay gathering places before Stonewall).....I am worried that when the anti-porn moralists "clean up" the stuff they find filthy, books like The Story of O, The Sleeping Beauty Trilogy, even the Gorean books (which I find literarily questionable at the least) will be in the same category as the playboy magazines they want to strip from the magazine racks in the name of decency. I worry about clubs and play spaces being raided and shut down on public indecency statutes. I worry about educational and community materials like The Loving Dominant or Promythius (The TES magazine) being classified either as pornography or an incitement to spousal abuse and controlled in that manner. I worry about the fact that at this very moment, Sadism and Maschocism is defined by the psychiactric professoin as a mental disorder (and if you can't think of a lot of pretty scary ways THAT could be used in all sorts of cases, you sleep easier than I)....I worry about the police using the statutes designed to protect battered women to press charges of assault against those involved in consensaul s&m activities and all the uses that could have for those with less than good faith. In short, I can see a lot to worry about.

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You may say that I'm paranoid, if you like, but let me point out something to you. I am (oh god, the shame) a cigarette smoker. I have seen, in a very short span, the government decide that that isn't a very good thing. Suddenly, I am not allowed to smoke in restaurants, moviehouses, hallways, offices and the tax on these cigarettes are higher than the price the manufacturers are charging for the product itself. Now, you may say this is a good thing or a bad thing, depending on your view of smoking and smokers...but it IS a fine example of what the government can do when they decide that they are going to make life rough for people engaged in disaprooved but legal behaviour. Things can happen. Things can happen fast. And it is a hell of a lot harder to change things back than it is to keep it from happening in the first place.

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And now that I have answered your question, let me ask you mine.

You say that it is an acceptable choice for gay people simply to deny their sexual and affectional prefrence if they want to fit in. That it is no different than, in your own words, your Master not walking you around on a leash at the mall. So let me ask you to do this....sit down and look at your partner.....and have him look at you...and imagine for five minutes what your life would be like if you were subject to physical danger, systematic discrimination, and second class citizen status if anyone found out that you and he were not just platonic buddies and roomates. Think of all the ways that you two, that any happy couple, shows that they are a couple, completely outside of the realm of public displays of sexual frenzy, and imagine that you have to hide every one of them in order not to bring a variety of rather unpleasant circumstances down upon you.

How would you feel about it? And would you find that anywhere near as easy as just not being walked on a leash in the mall?

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I don't see what theoretically outlawing heterosexual relationships has to do with the topic any more than I see what abortion and homosexuality have to do with D/s.

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ORIGINAL: Elisabella

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Since you obviously are considering your answers rather than just spouting vitrol as many do, I'd like to continue this line of thought.

To me, while while homoxexual rights, pornography and d/s are different things (the abortion question is a matter in another category), they all share a common thread. They are practiced by people who are, in their practice, falling outside what is perceived and, by some including the religious right and, as you mentioned, the radical femininsts, as falling outside of the mainstream of "healthy" sexuality. Therfore, just as blacks, Hispanics and Asians are very different groups, with a number of different concerns, racial discrimination is a common problem they deal with. The supression of one of those groups is a threat to all of those groups. Again, we are on far safer ground when we say "We will not tolerate discrimination" rather than "We will only discriminate against X" as X is always a changable quantity.

As for why I view the conservatives as more dangerous than the liberal radical feminists is that, for better or worse, the conservative political structure has aligned with themselves intimatly with the evangelical religious right wing. The evangelical religious right wing is very unlikely to either adopt a live and let live philosophy or to decide they have bigger fish to fry (for example as radical feminists might in deciding that equal pay for equal rights is more important than a general moral clean up campaign). Not only does the religious right view the supression of "perversion" as a god given mandate and responsilility, it is the sizzle that sells their steak.

The undeniable fact is that the religious right (who does proudly proclaim a "decency" agenda has a great deal more power when it comes to policy decisons than the radical feministas who have made an unintentional common cause with them. And, given the anti-porn feminist's actual power over the progressive wing (insert liberal if you like), I view them much in the same light as I view the white supremacist arm of the conservative party (which likewise exists but is more a blemish than a feature).

And that, in short, is why I find the conservative social ideology as a far more clear and present danger than I do the liberal feminist social ideology, although both are equally repellent.

One last thought....if this should change. If the anti-porn, anti-sexual freedom left wingers appear to be on the road to becomming a major policy shaper of the liberal agenda, I would, as a liberal, stand and fight to stop them. If conservatives did the same, perhaps I would not have had to ask my initial question in the first place.

And that said, I think you..it is a pleasure to discuss matters with someone who's words have thought behind them rather than just a knee jerk condemnation of anything with which they disagree.

[Moyers'] part in Lyndon Johnson and J. Edgar Hoover's bugging of Martin Luther King's private life, the leaks to the press and diplomatic corps, the surveillance of civil rights groups at the 1964 Democratic Convention, and his request for damaging information from Hoover on members of the Goldwater campaign suggest he was not only a good soldier but a gleeful retainer feeding the appetites of Lyndon Johnson.