http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100312/ap_on_re_us/us_lesbian_prom_date

Leum @ #30
Libby, sci-fi may not be uncharacteristic of hardcore Christians (CS Lewis wrote some, and Left Behind arguably qualifies), but Ender's Game and Speaker for the Dead are. They're some of the most pro-tolerance, pro-acceptance books I've ever read. I have trouble imagining how the man who wrote them could even be related to the man who writes Card's blog.

"Ender's Game" was recommended to me some years back. Somehow, I never liked the book. Could not put my finger on why, except I could not get my head around adults allowing/encouraging this poor perfect misused boy to kill people, and even set him up for it. Not to mention his psychopathic older brother who somehow morphs into a great world leader.

Then I stumbled across a reference to Ender's Heresy - - When bad people do bad things, it is terrible, and to be deplored, but when good people do bad things, it is fine, and to be admired. There was also a reference to this review/commentary on the book - - Creating the Innocent Killer: Ender's Game, Intention, and Morality by John Kessel. (Caution, a long read, but worth it.)

Please read that, and then tell me if you still see pro-tolerance and pro-acceptance. What I see is a carefully crafted story, Intelligently Designed (pun intended) to lead the reader down some very dodgy moral bunny trails into the bucklebrush. I have read none of the other books in the series, nor will I.

I did not know he was a Mormon when I read the book. I may be wrong, but I can see some of the LDS afterlife fantasy "becoming like Gods ruling other Planets" in it as well.

For more fun stuff from Orson Scott Card, see his apologetic for The Book of Mormon.

As SF authors go, he ranks right up there with L. Ron Hubbard, IMHO.

Just stop navel-gazing at your own country, and look at the rest of the ex-Christian world. Religious decline is multi-faceted. First of all, literalism gives way to moderation. Public evangelicalism gives way to privacy, and support for secularism. Theism gives way to deism, though most people are unaware of this, or can even define these terms ("use The Force, Luke"). Religious belief gives way to agnostic atheism, which only becomes unapologetic atheism when it passes a criticial tipping point. This tipping point has already been passed in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the UK, and most of Europe. In these nations, religious people are openly mocked in social settings. The USA is the only advanced nation where the tipping point has not yet been reached, IMO.

Other than in the US, people are criticised if they talk too much about their religion, not too little. Politicians risk electoral failure if they talk about their religion (ie Stockwell Day in Canada). The US is the only nation where the opposite is true. When the US passes the tipping point, current evangelicals will not gain more power, or conduct more outrageous activities. They will be exposed as being a minority with nowhere to hide, and most will do exactly what Christians in the rest of the "west" have already done; become more private and more moderate about their religion.

There's some BS about them not being as good parents as straight people (a child needs a male and female role model), but until they require parenting tests to marry we can safely ignore that argument.

The reason I think gay marriage is opposed is homophobia which in turn is based on a flawed understanding of sexual orientation. Specifically, it seems to me that many people don't see orientation of heterosexual, homosexual, paraphilia, and (not technically orientation, but typically included) transgender and cisgender* identity. Instead, they have a straight/perverted dichotomy which makes no distinction between the homosexual cigendered man; the heterosexual transgendered woman; the bisexual intersexed person; and pedophiles, child molesters**, and rapists. The fact that there is a significant difference between people who engage is consensual sex and people who do not care about consent doesn't register; they see the desire to have consensual "perverted" sex as more or less indistinguishable from the desire to have sex with an unwilling person.

*biological sex matches gender identity

**not necessarily the same as pedophiles

I know I've got a lot of tomes back home - Purpose-Driven Life for example - that are just screaming to be used for my next barbecue, especially since I fear they might corrupt the sensibilities of my younger siblings.

/snark