Yeah… no. Just because Ethan is secure in being gay, doesn’t mean it can’t still hurt to hear someone imply that being gay is a mistake and thus HE is considered a mistake. Particularly when its coming from the people who normally bring you great joy.
I totally agree – as much as people can be as secure about their sexuality as they want, mean is still mean and it can definitely hurt. Plus the fact that this whole discussion is so close to Ethan’s heart, even I cringed in sympathy.
A person who is comfortable and secure in their sexuality has no obligation to laugh at homophobic and heterosexist jokes. There are gay jokes and then there are heterosexist gay jokes.
Turns out hell ain’t for you after all. The Father was all for it, but The Son reminded him about that whole ‘new covenant’ thing, so the vote came down to the Holy Ghost and it turns out The Holy Ghost has a pretty good sense of humor.
In the Mad magazine parody of the original Battlestar Galactica, Lucifer set off Baltar’s Gaydar and Baltar asked “you robots are all AC/DC, aren’t you?”
Meanwhile, I had an idea for a storyline: somebody has been converting Amber’s Autumn e-novel series into a My Little Pony fanfic, which is bringing Amber attention from all the Bronies.
some please clarify for me, because I could be wrong.. but doesn’t the whole glitch thing mean that he would have been born that way rather than it being a personal choice? how is that insulting?
From a biological standpoint, a variation which largely precludes the possibility of passing one one’s genes to the next generation would probably be seen as a maladaptation.
From a HUMAN standpoint, the idea that there’s something “wrong” with a homosexual is just awful.
Actually, it may not be quite as black and white as that. If you look at animals, chimps and bonobos in particular, sex is used to form and nurture social bonds, just as grooming is. That is, it helps keep the whole cohesive and working. In that sense, same-gender sex serves an important function for the community, even if it doesn’t lead to offspring.
I disagree Doom. There are a number of species, bees for example, where having an infertile, neutered, etc. variation is good for the species. These “neuters” (for lack of a better term), are in place to help care for the group without distraction. Because they can’t reproduce, they can’t choose to promote their own offspring over others, so the best way to promote the species is to take care of those who can reproduce and the resulting offspring.
This sort of variation can be thought of as a type of altruism. We see somewhat similar behaviors in higher ordered social groups. For example: if one individual puts themselves at risk for the rest of the social group, s/he is reducing his/her chance of reproducing and passing on his/her genes; however, s/he is protecting the other offspring of the group, thereby allowing the group (and probably some relatives that share his/her genes), to thrive.
1) Kin selection
2) Other stuff we don’t understand yet
Homosexuality is too common in in too many animals from humans to insects for this to be maladaptive. Indeed, it would seem that in many cases it is not even neutral, but rather adaptive for a certain percent of a population to be homosexual.
IIRC, the mean mammalian rate of homosexuality is approximately 7%. The reasons for the genetics of homosexuality to be useful to a species are numerous.
1) Reducing the conflict around mating season – many species do not mate with a single female
2) Automatic check to avoid overpopulation – homosexuality seems to become more prevalent when there are many older siblings of the same sex, so it would appear that it’s a built-in population control mechanism
3) Surrogates & Kinship – being able to function to step-in as an elder if parents are killed or serving to build/maintain community function.
These are just SOME of the possible reasons, but there is a clear biological reason for why homosexuality does not automatically ween itself out of the gene pool – it’s detrimental to the individual passing on genes, but beneficial to the community at large in other less tangible ways.
there are actually a whole list of animals that sometimes mate in same-gender pairs. there are various reasons for this, but it seems that homosexuality is neither exclusively human or an ‘evolutionary deadend’….
Studies have been done in Italy where women with homosexual brothers are compared to women with heterosexual brothers in terms of number of offspring. It ended up that women with gay brothers have more children than the women with heterosexual brothers. Some theories say that it’s due to hormonal mixes and levels and the proposed hypothesis was that homosexual men are actually good for the species, because it means their sisters (if they have any) will make more babies.
This would also explain how homosexuality /isn’t/ bred out of the gene pool, since it’s more probable that the sisters would carry some of the genetic material for homosexuality and therefore be more likely to give birth to homosexual babies.
Furthermore, the more babies she has, the more likely they will be homosexual!
It seems like nature is kind of bending over backwards to keep homosexuality in the gene pool.
Not something that would logically happen if homosexuality were a “dead end” or not useful to survival.
This conversation makes me happier than I can say.
Case in point: My nephew is going to be way more spoiled by his lesbian aunt than he would be if I had kids of my own to take care of. My sibling’s offspring are going to benefit from my homosexuality.
The reproduction argument is a red herring. Gay people can, have, and will continue to reproduce biologically. Back in the day you got married to someone of the opposite gender if your parents forced you to. Now, there are a lot of technologies that make it possible for gays to have their own biological children. The difference is that we don’t do it by accident when we’re drunk nearly as much.
I’m a lesbian. I can very easily go to a Sperm bank, pay money, and get gametes that allow me to have a biological child. I’m gay not infertile.
Neither of your examples prove that being gay doesn’t pull you out of the gene pool from an evolutionary standpoint. They just show that society had a way of pulling gays back in (evolution applied long before the rules of society) and now there is an option that allows lesbians back in by choice. Humans quit following evolutionary law a long time ago and this is just another example. As crass as it sounds, forcing gays to marry and reproduce “may” have had a benefit from an evolutionary standpoint, but artificial insemination bypasses the whole topic.
I’m not saying that the other evolutionary reasons for there being rainbows in the gene pool aren’t valid, just that forced marriage and artificial insemination don’t pass muster.
Yes, and some people are wrong. The set of people who believe homosexuality is a flaw is wholly a member of the set of people who are wrong. It’s also wholly a member of the set of people who are bigots, which itself is wholly a member of the set of people who are wrong. So you’ve got a couple levels of suck there to work with.
The results from a glitch are unreliable. If the unintended consequences were desireable then a programmer should write it up as a feature and implement it correctly. All glitches should be removed from a body of work so that they do not pollute the intended functionality of an application. Any true programmer would know that.
A glitch, particularly in electronics and computer programing, is a problem that often results in a program or system not working the way it should and said glitches thus need to be fixed.
Calling homosexuality a “glitch’ is not saying “they’re born that way”. Its saying “there is something wrong that needs to be fixed so it will work properly”.
Also remember that it LITERALLY used to be classified as a mental disorder in the DSM and was placed among things like schizophrenia until very recently in history, so it could and did get you thrown into a mental hospital. That’s one reason the “glitch” analogy is so wince-worthy.
Unfortunately the DSM is heavily influenced by societal pressures at the time instead of being based strictly on clinical medicine. Dr Drew was complaining about it the other day because apparently the next revision is going to exempt doctor prescribed medications from the definition of addiction, so you can’t be an addict as long as you’re getting your fix from a doctor. Apparently they’ve never seen House
I’ve always thought the whole “born gay” argument was insulting, like it’s taking the choice away from people. Just depends on a person’s point of view I suppose.
Except that it isn’t a choice. The argument that it is a choice is insulting, both to homosexuals and heterosexuals, because it implies you have control over something you don’t, and never will. Because really, if it was a choice, why would anyone ever choose to be gay? Why would they purposefully choose to be ostracized from society, denied the same rights that everyone else has and be persecuted? To imply it’s ever a choice is to essentially accuse homosexuals that everything bad that happens to them is their own fault.
Not to mention that it just plain doesn’t make sense. You don’t choose what you like. If you see a movie, and you think it’s awesome, you didn’t choose to like that movie, it just hit all the right spots in your brain to make you enjoy it. If you eat a food that you hate, you can’t just say ‘I’m gonna choose to like this’, and all of a sudden it tastes great. That’s not how things work.
Except I personally know people who were attracted to one gender and then slowly became attracted to the other. It seems to me that sometimes it IS a choice, and sometimes it is a matter of birth. At least one couple I know described themselves as ‘heterosexual until I fell in love’. So I have to disagree, sometimes its nature, sometimes its nurture, sometimes its something less definable than either of those.
Then again, I find the question itself entirely irrelevant. Is it a choice or is it a matter of birth? Why is that important to the discussion? Does it somehow change the idea that you should have the freedom to be with whomever you choose (assuming a consenting adult relationship, of course), regardless of who that is? Don’t think so.
“Heterosexual until I fell in love.” So they inwardly didn’t consider the possiblity that they were gay until someone happened to make them question it.
There’s more than just gay too, which no one ever remembers. People can be bi, and it’s not one extreme or the other. There’s all sorts of shades in-between.
I’m pansexual. I can like pretty much anyone. I’m mainly attracted to males, though on occasion a woman will have me turn my head.
And don’t even get me started when it comes to androgynous people and people outside the gender binary. :p
There are so many factors for me when it comes to attraction.
I didn’t choose to be pansexual, because for the longest time I thought I was a gay male. When I started having gender identity issues, I started noticing that I DID like more than just males, I just never noticed because I was too busy thinking one thing and not being open.
“Except I personally know people who were attracted to one gender and then slowly became attracted to the other.”
Except that that in no way implies choice. What that implies is change. Because people aren’t static, they will change overtime. You’re right in that it is more than just nature, nurture plays a role as well. But nurture is still something that tends to be beyond your control, as that’s the effect that other people and your environment have on your development.
Go up and ask those people who slowly became attracted to another gender if that’s what they chose, or if it’s just something that happened overtime, because I can practically guarantee you they’re not going to say it the former.
But people CAN choose. You make it sound like being gay is a diese or something. Some people simply want to be gay, so they are. There’s not some invisible hand guiding your penis around. I know people who were once straight then decided one day that they enjoy their best friend’s company better than members of the opposit gender.
If we’re using the movies metaphor, you might enjoy action movies a lot until you see the right drama and realize you like that too. So next time you choose to go see a drama instead of an action movie.
They can CHOOSE to ignore the attraction they feel. They can CHOOSE to date people they don’t actually feel attracted towards. What they can’t choose is who you feel attracted to.
Age 19
Prior to that I would have considered myself bi, or at least open for debate.
People can and do choose, but personally I think it only works out when the person tends that way anyway. I was much more attracted to women, and I went with it. Not that it should matter to anybody else, but for me I’m glad that I did.
So… I direct you to my reply to Taekwondogirl right above your post. It’s not the same thing, but it follows the same lines. I didn’t choose to be attracted to women or androgynous people, but I am.
There’s a difference between changing/choosing and broadening your horizons and/or experimenting.
Choosing to go see a drama is not like realizing that you also like women.
Realizing that you also like dramas is like realizing that you also like women; choosing to go see a drama is like choosing to go on a date with a woman. You did include that part.
Oh, OH, I see how it is. Well, in that case, how about you choose to be gay, right now. Why don’t you go look at a picture of a naked man, and then CHOOSE to get a boner because of it. Because I can guarantee you that that is not how this works.
Your attempt to use my own metaphor against me fails as well. I can choose to watch a drama instead of an action movie, but whether I’ll enjoy it is beyond my control. Likewise, I can choose to go and have sex with another man, but that in and of itself would not make me a homosexual. There’s more factors to it than just that.
But if it were a choice, the action movie lover would have said beforehand, ‘okay, starting today I’m going to like dramas too,’ and then went and watched a drama because all of a sudden they made the choice to like dramas.
It doesn’t happen like that. You don’t consciously choose what you like and dislike. Sure, there’s cases of ‘acquired taste’ such as in food, where one exposes oneself to something until one gains a tolerance for it, but still, actually liking whatever it is has no connection to the choice. The repeated exposure is necessary to train the involuntary reactions into a new pattern.
I have to say that as a pansexual, I hate the “but it’s not a choice!” argument that so much of the LGBT community depends on. Because while I recognize that there are plenty of people who are only attracted to one gender and nothing will change that, there are also plenty of us who are attracted to two. (Or, more specifically in the case of people like me, more! Or don’t really find that gender effects who we’re attracted to at all!) I could choose to exclusively pursue partners who are fully male in both body and mind. For me, that would be roughly equivalent to deciding to only date people within my own religion, or only people within a certain socioeconomic bracket, or only people who share my interest in dungeons and dragons. Maybe I’d be eliminating some potentially very compatible partners, but everyone does that, whether they do so consciously or not. But I see no reason why I should make that choice, and I resent the religious and political right’s attempt to make that choice for me.
And, for that matter, in the case of monosexual people (both hetero and homo), the argument that it isn’t a choice is potentially damaging anyway, because, well… that can be taken as implying that if (for example, since we’re here at Shortpacked! anyway) Ethan had chosen to be gay, it’s possible that he made the wrong choice. Saying “I didn’t choose this,” while very true, is also very defensive. And I believe that if we’re ever going to get equality of all sexualities, we need to stop defending and start owning our identities.
You can choose to date only men, or women, or whatever, but you can’t choose who you’re attracted to. For example, even if I chose to only date women, I’d still be attracted to my male best friend, and if I chose to date only men, I’d still have the hots for his sister.
Very true – you can’t just wish away an attraction to one gender. However, people choose not to act on other attractions all the time – because they feel they need to focus on something else in their lives at the moment, because they or the object of their affection are already committed to a closed relationship, because they’ve made an overture already and been refused… there are plenty of good, responsible reasons not to just jump everyone you think is hot. “Because they’re the wrong gender” should not be lumped in with them.
And there is a very vocal section of the opposition who claim that everyone has some degree of same-sex attraction and that the only right and moral way to respond is to repress the shit out of it – they’re the ones who usually get the “it’s not a choice” line thrown at them. Telling them it isn’t a choice side-steps the issue – the issue is that it isn’t a wrong choice. Choosing to have a relationship with someone of the same (or a similar) gender is not the same as choosing to have a relationship with someone without their existing partner’s knowledge and approval.
Whether you choose to act upon attraction is irrelevant, the part that determines whether you’re homosexual or not is the existence of the attraction in the first place, which you admit can’t be controlled. Likewise, there are more options than just two, heterosexual and homosexual are not the only possibilities, and people who are 100% one or the other are very rare, as most people do fall somewhere in between.
The problem with the opposition is that most of them are religious, and thus their reasoning and arguments stem from a magic book, and an inanimate object can’t be argued with. If it’s a choice, then it’s the wrong choice, so says the magic book, and you won’t convince them otherwise. The ‘its’ not a choice’ line is simply the most effective weapon against them, the argument that their perfect, almighty God would purposefully make someone like this calls into question whether their book is actually the most reliable source of information for everything in the world. Mind you, these are the same people who will continue to deny the truth even when it’s presented to them as scientific fact, so it’s hardly a perfect argument, but it’s still the best there is. At the very least it works against the ones who aren’t completely retarded.
Furthermore, by claiming it’s not a choice (because it isn’t), it allows for more easily drawn comparisons between discrimination against sexual orientation and previous civil rights movements, such as racial and gender discrimination, which would allow for using previous civil rights movements as precedents in any legal battle that may be required to acquire equality.
Again, restating the original point, you admit yourself that the attraction can not be controlled, only whether you act upon it, but the attraction is what determines your sexual orientation, and whether you act upon that is irrelevant. Trying to say that it’s a choice would be fine in a perfect world where everyone would clearly understand that there’s nothing wrong with it (even if it would still be an incorrect statement), but in the imperfect world we live in, saying something like that is tantamount to admitting guilt, and that will only cause harm and delay change.
I’m exhausted, and I’ve completely lost track of my train of thought, which I’m not entirely certain I had in the first place, I’m going to sleep. >.<
Just to clarify, Gizen, not all people who are against gay/lesbian are religious. In my community, from my personal experiences, the Atheist community is the most anti-gay.
@G.S. Mercs,
I know that not all of the opposition to homosexuality comes from the religious right (hence my usage of the word most), however, the majority of them are, simply because the only argument against homosexuality that’s even remotely valid is because it goes against their religion, and even that’s a very poor argument.
The fact that the majority of the people opposing it that you’ve met are atheists is just… well, downright weird to me. That you’ve seen so many atheist anti-gays is strange enough, but, seriously what reasoning could they possibly have, aside from possibly admitting blatant fear of people who are different on their part.
Now I’m gonna be wondering about this all night. o.O
@Gizen Fair enough. Oddly enough, when I ask them about it, the first thing they do is start telling me how I’m a horrible person for being a Christian, so I cannot provide an answer as to why they are anti-gay.
Best guess I can think is they might see it as anti-evolutionary?
I think having my experience discounted for a politically popular (well, not as much politically popular anymore) idea that gave the majority a pat on the back for allegedly make the “right choice” because of their innate nature is offensive.
Before that it was city that was full of sinners and homosexuals and it got flipped over and sunk. And do I offend anybody that warrants people calling me an asshole?
Yes, the Dead Sea was created when the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were punished for homosexuality. Also, Paul Bunyan created the Grand Canyon when he dragged his axe.
(Of course, you never said you were Christian and there are other faiths that include that scripture, but please excuse my kneejerk reaction against people using faith–oftentimes /my/ faith– as an excuse for hate.)
Laura, considering he’s referencing Christian “literature” it’s probably safe to assume he’s Christian.
It is NOT Christian to hate and it’s NOT Christian to judge. I was under the impression with the tale that it wasn’t simply being homosexual that caused the destruction in that tale but full out hedonism and raping angels.
Taekwondogirl, while the story of Sodom and Gomorrah is part of the Christian canon (calling it literature is a bit off, and Willis, nothing but respect for you, man, but it’s kind of harsh calling it something written by a “bronze age tribesman.” Can’t we all just be nicel?), it’s part of the Old Testament, which means it’s also part of the Jewish canon. Possibly the Islamic as well (there’s a lot of overlap, naturally, and the Koran does acknowledge the events in both the Torah and the Bible, but in a different light in some cases). Then there’s also the more recent spin-off religions like LDS, though that one I honestly couldn’t say how much of their history they take from ol’ St. James.
Yes, because I don’t feel like typing in all the other shit and I was in a hurry, I used “me@me.com” If you think I’m actually scared of hate mail than I’m just insulted.
And yeah, you’re entitled to your opinion, it doesn’t mean you have to sit there telling him that his beliefs are tall tales just because you don’t believe in the same thing, that, as I’ve stated, is bigoted
No, hating people for being gay is biggoted as well, I never said it wasn’t, that would just be stupid of me.
But it’s clear that he’s sorry for his comments, and the fact that even AFTER he apologized he’s still being attacked and being told that his beliefs are myths is just wrong. And I’m not even going to get into the issues of you (being the person who represents your site) publicly treating one of your, clearly loyal (I say loyal because where most religious people I know have stopped reading this comic because of the amounts of homosexuality, he decided to stay with it because he enjoys the content), readers in this way, it’s really made me see you in a new light.
He said he was sorry if he offended anybody for saying he hates gay people, not that he’s sorry for hating gay people. If that’s an apology to you, then, wow.
If I punch you in your face and say I’m sorry if my punching your face hurt you, that’s not an apology for punching you in your face. That’s just being a dick.
The only reason why he’s not 100% gone now (I can ban folks reeeeall easily) is that I just don’t think he KNOWS he’s being a dick, or knows WHY people think he’s being a dick. I probably would have said similar things when I was 17. But if this were some other page deep in the archives, I probably would have banned or deleted the comment out-right. I don’t especially appreciate hate speech in my website’s comments. But this is the subject of the day/weekend, so I’ve been more lenient.
But if calling out a reader who says hateful things on my website makes me a bad host, then, okay, I guess I’ll just have to be a bad friggin’ host.
I never said that he said that he’s sorry for hating gay people, that’s part of who he is and I WOULDN’T expect him to apologize for that, no matter how mad people get for it. I said he apologized for his statement, and when I read “If I offend anyone, I’m sorry.” that’s what it sounds like to me, sure his follow up may not have been the best, but it’s clear that all he was trying to do was make a joke and it exploded in his face.
Also, you’re comparison is just silly. Yeah, you’re going to hurt somebody if you punch them, no shit, you can’t apologize for something like a punch hurting. But with a joke it’s different, he thought you guys would take it better than you did, and when he saw how offended you got he apologized for it. Have you never said something that offended somebody because you misjudged the situation and thought they’d find it humorous?
Someone needs to do their Bibilical homework. Oh by all means assume it was Homosexuality based on some suspect translations and interpretations at best.
Nevermind the the other passages that state the crimes of Sodom much more plainly and don’t mention Homosexuality at all. For example:
Jeremiah 23:14; Ezekiel 16:49–50; Matthew 10:14–15; 2 Peter 2:6–8
And don’t try to point at “know them” passage with the angels, based on how it is used the majority of the time it literally means know. This statement becomes clearer when you realise Lot was considered an outsider, who then invited strangers into the city. So it’s just as likely they wanted to know who these strangers are.
Then even after that you want to go the sex route. It’s called gang rape, pretty sure that’s a sin. Then your point fails further when you realise, no Homosexual acts ocurred in said story. Just the possibility of a threat of one.
So yeah, if you can’t even be bothered doing your homework, not to mention allowing a dodgy story like this one affect your attitude towards a group of people, you’re asking for it honestly.
Right, I’m pretty sure it was more that there was RAPE happening (or being threatened to visitors) than a matter of which gender was raping which gender.
Nicely argued.
Sadly, the bible (along with other religious texts) its often used merely to back up our preexisting beliefs – whether they be good or bad ones. Its not enough for us to have the belief ourselves, we look to have it backed up by a higher source – and that basicly means confirmation bias when reading religious quotes.(normaly which you have heard others saying).
It is rare indeed for someone to read over the bible and truely decide what is right or wrong based on it – in all cases they have probably made up their mind already. (and, to be sure, this isnt always a bad thing).
In the case of homosexuality, the inate belief that many have that its wrong probably comes from the ¨ickey factor¨ as a straight male I find it very unpleasent to think about homosexual acts. The trick is, anyone sensible, should realize that feeling does not corispond to it being ¨wrong¨ or ¨harmfall¨ (or contagious…) in any way.
I can’t believe any of you (nobody in specific) even take this back to the scripture and try to pin it on another ‘actual’ wrongful act of humanity. That is basically still exactly the same as pinning the reason on homosexuality (which is quite possibly neolithical in origin), because it blames the actions of humans for a common natural disaster. Doesn’t anyone here just consider the actual probable geology? What the hell do you need to look at ridiculously ignorant scripture for to find the cause in morality? Just because it is an old tale does not make it accurate, divine nor wise. Quite the contrary. Say people did turn into pillars of salt, let’s see where that happened as well.
Anyone considered this concept called vulcanoes? Pyroclastic flows? People turning into salt pillars and ash from above doesn’t make anyone think of a certain Vesuvius eruption reported on by Plinius (who was a Roman and educated, yet said the eruption was harmless so he took a bath and died)? Could that be it? A certain arabian peninsula being bordered by fault lines as continental plates collide meaning possible vulcanic activity?
Why the hell would you ever try to pin a natural disaster on the actions of people, or a whimsical god, if you can easily explain it by being in the wrong place at the wrong time?
No clearly, the Japanese tsunamis are retaliation for Pearl Harbour and the Indian Ocean tsunami is for not being islamic enough, or was it not being christian enough or having terrorists in the country, right? Because that is the level of thought used here, for ANY of the “reasons”. Pick random bad things and turn a disaster into a scare story about morality. No way it could be a natural phenomenon reported on and interpreted wrong (quite probably with a social agenda) by and for ignorant, uneducated people who declared it ‘(divine) fact’.
People should not just read it themselves, but try to read through the moral / social values being promoted and try to see what the actual events were.
Or does any of you believe in Hercules’ creation story of the Rock of Gibraltar as well? Or is that too Greek to be a reliable source?
No, we’re trying to disassemble the argument of why someone hates homosexuals and point out that their reasoning is based on a lie or a misconception. Some of us can be Christian while still acknowledging the complete and utter bullcrap of some parts of the Bible… or the people who claim to understand it.
Actually Han, I don’t believe a word of that book. I’m positive it would have happened even if the city was a paragon of good morals. We also have to account for who’s writing the story down, could be they just didn’t like Sodom much and it was an easy target since it was gone. Sodom could have easily been a very lovely city, people have been known to lie.
As Linkara said we’re just dissasembling the argument to someone who genuinely believes it was caused by bad people and showing how iffy Bible scripture is. The only way you can argue with them is by pointing out their superfluous interpretations, which most of the time isn’t even their own.
I’m right there with you on it being a natural disater that just happened.
Your forgetting that the two cities were not being punished for their sexual preferences but for the open Malice that greeted the visiters of the cities.
“full of sinners and homosexuals”
Not that you actually got that from any kind of scripture, historical document, or, y’know, ANYTHING AT ALL, but at least you’re acknowledging that they’re two different things with no relation to each other.
And, seriously, you make sweeping horrible comments about massive groups of innocent people without cause or provocation, but you’re upset because people are attacking you individually, objectively, and in reaction to something evil you’ve done?
Hypocrite. Jesus likes those, right?
The part of my Bible where Jesus complains about hypocrites and people who abuse their religious texts to hurt people are obviously typos; it’s obviously supposed to say “queers”.
You hate gays because of your religion… Seriously? >Shakes head< That has to be one of the saddest thing I have ever heard. Religion doesn't give anyone the right to hate. In fact, most religions I've studied dissuade people hatred because of the fact it leads away from the righteous paths that they try and teach. Anyone who can declare their hatred without any sense of regret, but instead pride… I pity them.
Yes, I’ve heard of the Dead Sea and Sodom. Have you ever heard of : Jeremiah 23:13,14 and Ezekiel 16:48-50?
My favorite things to ask people who bring up Sodom are the following: Would God, who is good, have been cool with the situation if the angels had been women? Isn’t rape of guests, rape period? Can the historical context of raping men as an act of dominance be really ignored? Can you be intellectually honest and compare gang rape, especially in its historical context, to a selfless exclusive romantic relationship between two consenting adults?
I did not mean hate as in try to kill someone hate. It’s more like the feeling you get when you’re stuck in traffic. Besides, I know a couple of them and at first I’m a bit freaked out but I looked past their sexual orientation and accept them for who they are.
Do you really like gay people for who they are? I worked with a guy who talks like you- he didn’t know I was gay until he asked. He talked a lot about gay people before that, and talked about how he wasn’t homophobic, but then always added homophobic beliefs he held. He didn’t really like me for who I am despite what he said.
Personally, as a gay person, I don’t care that much if you like me or not, I’m more interested in: will you vote to hurt my family? Will you be one of the people who costs me thousands of dollars a year in extra taxes and a lot of extra anxiety about how my wishes and requests will be ignored in an emergency?
If you’re not, any debate between us can be friendly and academic in nature. If you are – the claim that you “like” me is worth less than a three dollars bill.
What is a crime is that religion is invaded by tomism forgeting the humanist and existencialist brands of theology. Also is a crime to say you undersand the scriptures without reading hebrew, greek and arameo. Another crime is trying to profes a relgion that bases its belifs in fundational text writen in xvii century (the “instructions” for reading the bible, catholic church has one fom 105 years ago). And your final crime is hypocresy, profesing love but at the same time hating homsexuals. Freedom of expresion? Ha! Should I give that to Nazis and frat-boys too? (hint: they are not too smart) talk all you want, we will tolerate you, but we will NOT respect you
Well… As a member of a fraternity, Gerardo, I would in fact very much like to keep my Freedom of Expression. We’re not all drunken gay-bashers. In fact, when I joined the current president was gay.
Yeah, there are some bad frats out there, but lumping us in with Nazis? When you’re trying to promote tolerance and acceptance, it’s not a particularly smooth move to blindly bash on “safe” targets like that.
Why is natural order better? Survival of the fittest is natural, but its hardly cilivilised.
Not that homosexuality is nesscerly unnatural anyway. Its counter to individualy gene spreeding – but then, so is self-sacrifice humans sometimes do to save others, and we hardly say thats wrong do we?
The way we came to be…though evolution,design, or a hybred, allows for these things, so who are we to say they are unnatural? and even if they are, why is unnatural universaly seen as wrong?
Birth control has had a bigger impact on the number of babies born than the existence of gay people. Interestingly enough, food stability has also brought the birthrate down, humans are a bit weird in that the less you feed us, the more we seem to reproduce.
There are (Better scientists can correct me on the exact number if they wish.) about 700 species in the animal kingdom that exhibit homosexual behavior.
There is only one that exhibits homophobia. Who’s being unnatural now?
Gay happens in nature. So does Bi. Look up the Kinsey Scale. Trying to make everyone straight is unnatural. Not that it matters; argument from nature is a fallacy. It’s just that your hatred is so affecting your reasoning abilities that you can’t even make a fallacy right. It’s a fallacy within a fallacy. Cue Inception horn.
Actually, I don’t hate the characters at all. In a hate scale of 1-10, 10 being the thing I hate the most that is whining emos, homosexuals in general are 2 as in minor annoyance.
This is a big part of why I don’t go to cons. Bigotry from certain segments of fandom is dispiriting enough online. Encountering it up close, with others visibly and audibly cheering it on, is something I can do without all together, thanks.
Indeed. I started following Tennapel on Twitter a while back. This was roughly during the 2008 election season. I very quickly had to drop him like a hot potato. It was rather disheartening to learn that the guy who made Earthworm Jim and Neverhood and Sockbaby was so… so fucking stupid.
Well, a cursory look through his twitter feed found references to the “Liberal agenda” and he may have referred to Barack Obama as “Generalissimo” (not sure on that one at all, seemed to be in reference to the Weiner fiasco)
BTW, Weiner Fiasco is my Village People cover band.
Mussolini was Il Duce (the Duke)…Franco was, in fact, called Generalissimo – but he was actually a general, so it’s a valid title, not really a nickname (aside from the fact he was frequently called that even in English).
TenNapel is just… he’s hell-bent on offending people. He’s got a comic called Ratfist and he- in the middle of a sequence- spent a panel to attack furries.
In a webcomic about a person who’s an anthropomorphic rat. He’s a twit.
in the middle of a sequence- spent a panel to attack furries.
In a webcomic about a person who’s an anthropomorphic rat. He’s a twit.
Sounds more like a troll than a twit. Not that the two categories don’t have a significant overlap, of course.
(Weirdly, this is insanely common, actually. Not necessarily in the comic itself, but people who draw comics with anthro characters going on rants about furries. Sometimes it seems more common to draw anthro comics if you hate them than if you like them. :p)
You see, Doug Tennapel has studied the teachings of this Middle Eastern philosopher named Jesus of Nazareth. A great deal of what Jesus taught was adapted from Judaism, an ancient religion that, among other things, obsesses over inheritance, property rights, and family succession.
In short, Homosexuality was punished (by death!) because, without a woman “changing hands”, how would you know which family got some of the other family’s stuff?
Anyway, after Jesus was himself punished-by-death for breaking from Judaism, his disciples dedicated themselves to spreading his message. A cult was formed, worshipping Jesus as God himself (or “Christ”), which, especially after catching on in the empires of Europe, eventually transformed into one of the dominating religious faiths in the present day.
However, in large parts of the “Christian” faith, the prohibition on homosexuality is still in effect. in Catholicism, for example, homosexual acts, like all extra-marital sex acts, are punishable by eternal damnation(!). Many in the gay community therefore hold all Christians in suspicion and contempt.
So, what did Doug Tennapel do? He blogs. And he defends his arguments. As an artist and a Christian, this causes him to be as reviled on the internet as Sarah Palin covered in 3D glasses.
Yes, he blogs and defends his arguments. He also defends them incredibly poorly and compares same-sex marriage to women pooping in the men’s room (or some such).
Apparently he deleted the comments, but the quote in question has him reponding to someone asking what issue he has with two men in love marrying:
“The same argument I have against letting a man take a dump in the ladies room. And office appropriate for one sex isn’t automatically appropriate for another, no matter how much a man loves taking a dump in the ladies room.”
[Googles "Christ"... Google says to ask Wikipedia...]
Oh. Says here that Christ means “anointed one” or “messiah”, and not “God”. Woops.
My point is, I’ve just read Doug TenNapel being called… let’s see… “backwards”, “a twit”, and “so fucking stupid”, in the middle of a discussion about casual prejudice, because those posters don’t believe a conservative is worthy of the respect they themselves are indignant isn’t being shown to an imaginary robot.
I agreed with you until the ‘imaginary robot’ thing. That’s a straw man. Nobody’s up in arms about the robot, they’re offended by insinuations, intentional or otherwise, regarding the nature of homosexuality itself.
… But “I have friends who are” Republican and “I like them as people” j/k I think a lot of the political policies of the Republican Part are bad for various reasons. Most of the anti-conservative things I say are, anti-idiotic individuals, not anti-conservative thought. There’s a difference between saying Sarah Palin doesn’t know history, and all Republicans are ignorant about basic historical facts taught in elementary school.
OK, now lets move past the anti Republican thing and focus on the sheer amount of hatred towards Christians on this board (not from “R” specifically). Christians don’t deserve it any more than gays do. I’m starting to get a little embarrassed for listening to a “tolerant” group that keeps bashing a group that MOSTLY wants to follow a good and tolerant message. Willis’ comments about tribesmen and a comparison to a Paul Bunyon fable are a pretty good example.
Shit people, I’m atheist and I’m starting to get offended. What the hell are you people doing?
No they’re calling him a twit cause he’s a homophobe. If conservative and homophobe are synonyms for you then that’s all on you.
The only person who mentioned conservatives, even in passing, were the first poster, who modified the term as “backwards cultural conservatives.” No one calling him a twit or stupid mentions anything except his homophobia.
Yes, because all conservatives are horrible, intolerant racist bastards, just like all liberals are tree-hugging, ineffective, overly-idealistic hippies, dontchaknow. *rolls his eyes* As a conservative that can still enjoy Colbert and Stewart alongside Limbaugh and Hannity (for the entertainment value), and has actually some lesbian friends I outright support, I hate this stereotype.
You’re welcome to be a conservative. I frankly don’t care what your political affiliations are. But please, speaking as a member of the queer community, don’t use your kindness to your friends as a show of your good faith. Say you support homosexual rights or something. We’re people, not merely badges that you can collect and show off so that everyone can see how ‘accepting’ you are.
I ment accept sorry it’s just that I’m bi so hearing comments that look down on a persons gender preferences is a real sore spot for me like the kind of sore that if you don’t tend to it gets infected and just makes you feel worse. Well comments like that are the infection of my sore.
well yeah but maybe it’s my complete indifference to who’s putting their dicks in what, but a show about giant robots seems a silly place to even have the issue come up. “hey look, they’re giant metal humans with giant metal human issues” gets old.
Isn’t that statistically improbable? There are plenty of motives, apart from the hiding of a secret, for joking and being unsensitive. This is all fiction, of course, but if it were real, I’m sure most of them would be laughing just because of the discourtesy, meanwhile being gay-friendly.
Everybody’s a little racist; and homophobic, for that matter. (God, I love that musical. xD ).
A lot of people probably just laughed because they were already in a laughing and clapping mood, they were just laughing and clapping at joke A, and he told joke B, and sometimes it’s hard to instantly switch mindsets.
I find it incredibly easy to stop laughing and clapping when you say something sickeningly offensive no matter how trite the immediately preceding statement was.
It’s been proved that one is VERY fond of laughing once the “laugh mood” is on. Most comedians start their speeches with “How about a little clapping for the DJ/the guy who came before me/the barman?”, because a capping audience is an audience prone to “laugh mood”.
The same joke in different mood creates different responses.
Moreover, it’s also been proved that people laugh when they feel awkward or uncomfortable as well.
As long as the joke was not “SO-OFFENSIVE-I-KNOW-WANT-TO-KILL-HIM”, even people who disliked the joke probably laughed.
If you’re trying to tell me that people don’t do this in general, fine. If otherwise, please don’t tell me how wrong I am when I talk about about how I personally react to things when you don’t know the first thing about me.
Maybe I misread your phrase, but as far as I understood it, it was something like:
“I can easily stop laughing and clapping any time, therefore it’s something easy and everyone can do it.”
I just wanted to point out I disagreed, no need to take it personal. XD
Dude, you called me wrong when I was talking about myself and how I personally react in a certain situation. I took it personal because that is the textbook fucking definition of personal.
But it wasn’t, and you just failed to clarify that you were acting on an assumption on your part about what I was saying.
You aren’t wrong about your personal experience. You are wrong to use your anecdotal evidence to argue a statistical point. People in general show this behavior even if you do not.
I was there, and I can say most of us were just still giggling over the fact someone had the gall to ask if he was gay, and that they were even answering instead of shooing them out. They answered it pretty quickly and all were talking over each other, so even though I remember them making the comment about “glitches” it wasn’t until after the panel that I actually had the time to think about the implications and go “Wait what.” I think that goes for most people there. Personally I’m extremely supportive of LGBT rights, but was still laughing at their comments because as you said, you can’t instantly switch gears.
I really didn’t get the impression they meant to say what they did, and I hope they make a comment about it to set things straight, since otherwise the show has had a lot of little moments that seem a lot more liberal than most kid’s programs. Male characters hug and Miko referred to Wheeljack as Bulkhead’s “boyfriend” without anyone going through the motions to assure the audience they’re straight, and KO does act in ways that make you think he might be gay, but it’s never the butt of jokes, it’s just his personality, and that makes him appealing.
I love the musical too, but that song is such bullshit. It misunderstands what racism actually is and seems to allow for “reverse racism” which is utter bullshit.
These characters accept that they’re wrong, and therefore that it’s okay.
The problem is that this is portrayed as right. They’re definitely characters who could say something stupid and be wrong, but that doesn’t seem to be what they’re going for.
In some countries, we apply some sort of “positive discrimination”, which I think is what you are talking about when you say “reverse racism”. In my country, the norm focuses on women rights. It is unjust, but it can help to change society, so it can be seen like a temporal measure.
… This has nothing to do with the strip at all, sorry. ^__^U
Positive discrimination is a double edged sword, while it can provide a ‘foot in the door’ to positions previously unavalible fto individuals from certain groups, those same people acchievements & reps are ‘tainted’ by being the recipient of said positive discrimination.
How is that supposed to work? I mean, nobody assumes all racists secretly want to be ::insert race here::. Most homophobes are straight people who honestly believe homosexuals to be evil amoral deviants.
Sorry, but that whole mindset drives me nuts. It’s like claiming the only people making problems for homosexuals are other homosexuals in denial.
Because homosexuality is an invisible trait, meaning that people are capable of lying about it (to themselves and others).
People who are absolutely obsessed with gay sex, who argue that everybody experiences attractions to members of the same sex but moral people don’t act on it and look I have a spouse of the opposite sex–they seem a little gay, sometimes.
That doesn’t mean that it applies to all anti-gay villains, of course.
Can that trope die in a fire already? Jelli covers it pretty well. Homophobia is a STRAIGHT problem, and any homophobic homosexuals are that way because of what STRAIGHT society has imposed on them. For every homophobic homosexual, there are at least ten homophobic heterosexuals.
I’ve never understood the logic behind this argument, and isn’t it a little strange/hypocritical to mocking homophobes by insisting that they’re just gay?
No, the general rule is that “casual” anti-gay people- ie people who don’t like homosexuality but don’t do anything about it other than vote against their rights and occasionally bash it- are usually just straight assholes. It’s the people who dedicate their lives to eradicating the homosexual menace that are self-loathing closet cases.
In other words, the probability of being a closet homosexual is proportional to how much energy you put into opposing homosexuality.
You don’t have to be intentionally setting out to offend people to say something offensive. It was a stupid thing for the panelist to say, but the stupidity reveals some scary thinking about homosexuality. Is that hard?
Oh, it was totally a foot-in-the-mouth kind of thing, and definitely cringe-worthy. I’m not sure it implies homophobia or hating homosexuals or anything, though. Certainly, there’s indication that the speaker has bad self-monitoring or alternately no clear idea of when the line is crossed.
But language is a really clumsy vehicle for expressing thought – benefit of the doubt might be a prudent course of action. And pointing.
If someone carelessly drove over you in a car, the fact that they did not ~intend~ to drive over you does not take away from the fact that you were hit by a car.
If someone stole your wallet and you then couldn’t afford the cab fare to the hospital to be with a loved one on their death bed, the fact that they didn’t ~intend~ to do so doesn’t make grandma willing to wait a little longer whilst you walked.
The fact that someone said something homophobic, like, that they were flawed at birth, and they didn’t ~intend~ to? DOES NOT STOP IT FROM BEING HOMOPHOBIC.
Intent usually matters, though. Carelessly hitting someone with a car implies stupidity, not road rage. Your simile actually bears out the whole possibly-not-homophobic-just-stupid reasoning here.
The stealing a wallet is mean to begin with, though, and takes considerably more effort than saying something stupid.
Knowing everyone will say something stupid (from your own P.O.V. at least) sometime makes every relationship you’ll have in life. Knowing you will say something stupid yourself helps accepting that noone is perfect.
Knowing everyone will say something stupid (from your own P.O.V. at least) sometime makes every relationship you’ll have in life _easier_. Knowing you will say something stupid yourself helps accepting that noone is perfect.
… Need to be more careful about checking what I’ve written in the future.
You’re right, it does matter. Which is why if someone says “Oh god I’m sorry, I had no idea” afterwards that CAN be a mitigating factor. It doesn’t stop something homophobic from being homophobic.
Look at the definitions. If you want to scoff the fact I’m using wikipedia, grab a dictionary and look up its local version. Homophobia requires an aversion to the non-hetero, or antipathy, or prejudice. It DOES NOT require intent.
Do you also believe that if someone said “I’m not racist but all black people are thieves” and believed it, that they were not racist?
I’m fond of the pathenogenic species of whiptail lizards where female/female mating behaviour isn’t just existent…it’s the usual way of doing things, and actually has reproductive impact!
Argh…closed the tab, then when I came back to make that post, I hit the wrong reply link…that was supposed to connect to the post where it’s germane. >_<
No, thats not true at all.
Homophobia is a belief, or rather, a fear.
Anyone can say something that causeś offense to that group without being homophobic….I cant see that in this case easily, but its certainly possible.
To state that everything people say stems from their beliefs is just wrong. Mistakes, slips of the tough…or even just ignorance…can play parts.
For example, maybe he thought gays really are a genetic mistake – which makes him wrong (at least,according to most current research) – but doesnt nesscerily make him scared of homosexuals or even that he thinks it needs to be ¨corrected¨. (after all, evolutionary we have all benifited from ´mistakes´ or ´mutations´…they arnt always a bad thing.
Theres many levels of wrongness possible here, all we can state with absolyte certainity is that it was a stupid comment that caused offence.
Homophobia is not JUST about fear. Do you have a different definition to the two resources I linked to back up your explanation?
But anyway, using your logic it might not mean that the person in question is homophobic, sure I’ll give you that, though I don’t personally think this is any slip of the, err, tough. But can you acknowledge that the statement itself is homophobic, regardless of what the person wanted it to be?
The term Homophobia has always bothered me, it implies that the sufferer has an irrational fear they cannot help but experience, thus potentially offering an excuse for any bigot to explain away their hatred.
We don’t use the phobia aspect for discrimination against race, creeds, sexes or colours, so why use it for sexual orientation?
It should also mean “fear of the same”, since “homo-” is Greek for “same” (it also happens to be a Latin word that means “man” as in “homo sapiens”, but that’s unrelated to both the word “homosexual” and how fears are named). Whether that means monotony or conformity, that seems like something that it makes sense to be afraid of.
It’s also very specific. Prejudice against homosexuals instead of prejudice based on orientation. So it’s different from racism or sexism.
It’s just a bad word. I have no idea how it became the popular term for anti-gay prejudice.
You know what I hate about homophobia? It’s the fact that no one knows what the word actually means. It more accurately describes someone that can’t handle a steady job or a consistent menu than someone that hates homosexuals, let alone those who didn’t think before speaking.
We don’t automatically call people who make thoughtlessly racist comments xenophobic. We don’t call people who thoughtlessly make things difficult for left handed people sinestrophobic.
You know what *I* hate about homophobia? That it oppresses people, makes them feel worthless, unnatural, inhuman, sinful, a mistake, a glitch. That they hear it from their employers, their teachers, their leaders, their church, their friends, their family, random people in the street, the media that they enjoy and the people behind it. That people are raped as a means of ‘fixing’ them. That people are murdered.
People not knowing what a word means is bad, but keep it in context.
We do, however, call people who make thoughtless racist comments “racist”.
“Homophobia” is a terrible word. I agree with that. It shouldn’t have become the common word for “prejudice against gay people”–but that IS what it means.
It maybe a bit on the narrow side but it does have a catchy sound to it as gayist rhymes with racist.
Queerist might work but it doesn’t roll off the tongue as well as gayist does.
Hetro has been known as straight while all the other orientations as often refered to as bent so possibly antibentitist could work…
In short, my ideas for popularising new terminology like gayist, queerist or antibentitist could take off if the right people or characters use them, who knows.
Now I’m imagining a scene where a new Transformer walks in and one of those already present has the five-tone buzz-crunch from the general area of their crotch.
Everyone else stares. The new arrival raises a metal eyebrow. The one who… reacted, blushes.
Maybe I am not seeing much television lately, but as far as I know mexican television is not a bastion of acceptance… Esteban Arce hasn’t been fired yet http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Smrakb5ZHlk last time I checked and the guy tends to find new lows not only in homophobia but in general stupidity -.- People like him get a huge backlash, but they don’t really fired for being offensive.
I’m too G1 to know who Knockout is, but if substituted for Tracks I’d get the joke and feel just as bad for Ethan. Then again some writers have made the Decepticons more than 2 dimensional bad guys. Who knows maybe Megatron is a non discriminatory despot bot.
Megatron strikes me as the kind of guy who doesn’t care what his troops do in their spare time as long as they’re getting the job done. Flirting with the other guys is probably one of the least harmful eccentricities a Decepticon has ever shown.
I like being a glitch then that means I have more personality than the thousands of non glitchy drones. Us glitches are like that one toy of someones favorite show being recalled because of a defect which then causes collectors to want us because then we become rare and more valuable than our still on the shelf counterparts.
Outside of the Marvel US comics (cos Marvel UK brought in Arcee), Transformers have always had genders that are exactly like ours and never really explained why. Knock Out’s the second gay Decepticon in canon too, but the first to not be “AHAHAHA HE’S GAY FOR THE LEADER THAT’S HILARIOUS!!!”.
The mainline IDW comics are the same way…mostly. Some of them bring in the whole gender thing accidentally by using characters like Elita-One, but theoretically, Arcee’s the only female Cybertronian in the IDW universe, and she was deliberately created, like the one in Marvel continuity. (Though through different methods…though both stories are problematic in various ways.)
But, yeah…most canons have two genders (though there’s rather a gender imbalance) and generally imply romantic feelings – though they may be played down.
It’s one perfectly natural and spontaneous reaction to an awkward, shocking statement that catches people off guard in a relaxed moment. Not ideal, and I’m pretty sure some of the laughers were pretty horrified at their reactions once the statement sunk in.
I’ll agree as far as the laughter. Laughter is a natural spontaneous response to anything the brain can’t logically process, so it could just as easily be “Did he seriously just say that in 2011 america?” as “LOL gay robots!” Applause, however, requires an extra effort and I’m pretty sure is a fair indicator of approval and/or agreement.
On the other hand, given the various TF shows’ frequent display of conservative values re: gender roles and stereotypes, I’m not all that surprised… I mean, each ‘bot has a personality gimmick: Tough, coward, extremely lyoal, a bit dumb… or female. Slightly better nowadays, perhaps, than in the G1 days, but still…
I think the real problem is that it is a cultural undertone. I haven’t seen the latest show or really listened to the creators but honestly there is so much unconscious social stigma on this issue people will just say this kinda stuff without realizing what it really means. It’s a whole other social thing to confront but people can joke around then just speak off key without knowing.
Honestly so many transformers are “glitched” with gimmicky personalities I’d swear that the Allspark just has more off days then it does on.
I suppose the creators COULD be jerks too, just feel maybe this could be explained later or whatever rather then calling them all the new racists.
*holds up a protest sign that says “It’s Not a Glitch – It’s a Feature!”*
Given that there aren’t too many female Transformers, you’d think homosexuality would be the norm. Then Arcee and the other fembots could complain that all of the good AND bad ones are either gay or one with the Allspark.
So I dont see the problem. A Glitch by definition is an Irregularity in a system.
Homosexuality is a deviation from the norm and as such is an irregularity.
Therefore the explanation offered was apt.
Anyone offended by the use of the term glitch is only offended because they refuse to accept that homosexuals are different. The fact is they are, We are all different in our own way and the Glitches that make our personalities different from the homogeneous mass of “clones” that exist in the modern world are what we should be proud of and embrace. Nobody should know that better then the Geek/Otaku/Gamer/Cosplayer subcultures. I am different and proud of my glitches.
You don’t see the problematic implications of conflating homosexuality with a “glitch”? There’s more to words than what’s in the dictionary. Fucking connotation, how does it work?
Thank you for putting that into words. It’s a bit frustrating watching everyone read negative meanings into what might have simply been a poor choice of words. (I say poor because the words have offended a lot of people.)
My friends and family are people I love for their differences, and for those things that make them unique. My wife’s glitches are what make her who she is, and I love her for them. Yes, I can see how people could take the answerer’s words and read homophobia or other meanings into them…but couldn’t he also mean that he’s “unique”, and think that “glitch” was a cute way to use a transformer-esque word? It’s not like the guy’s a professional politician that should be expected to choose his words carefully. Maybe people are reading meaning into his words that wasn’t there.
People are offended because “glitch” is what people say to mean an unintended fault. It does not mean “unique”, so why would you assume that’s what the speaker meant to say?
No. Glitch Does not mean “quirk” or “unique special feature” sorry, it just doesn’t mean that. A glitch means an error. A. Mistake. Something that’s wrong with the system.
None of those connotations are acceptable in this context.
Yes it was clearly meant as a thoughtless joke, but that doesn’t make it even the tiniest bit less hurtful or offensive.
I’m pretty sure that if someone started joking around with a bunch of people about your wife’s “glitches” saying “There must have been something wrong with her when she was born.” then you would get upset. Just saying.
There is no such thing as a neutral glitch. It simply does not mean “different.” It means “flawed,” much like your disingenuous and facetious attempt to whitewash what the panelist actually meant by what they said.
actually the problem still exists as you are calling heterosexuality the norm, meaning that homosexuality is a deviation from the way things should be or the original design. Even if it isn’t seen as a flaw you are still putting heterosexuality first.
? Kid targeted material is often ultra conservative, this easily fits into the norm. Seen any gay GI Joes (out GI Joes thank you, not fanon ones) or Pokemon trainers or animated superheroes (don’t believe Northstar’s ever been in a cartoon) or wacky animal mascots (again, RD is fanon).
My god… I don’t remember ever feeling so offended. I mean its bad enough hearing jerks like hyper-conservatives and religious zealots insult homosexuals, but when you hear the creators of one of your childhood icons call being gay (and thus members of their own fandom) “GLITCHES” of all things…
And what’s worse is the people who applauded that. I’d have loudly started “BOOING” if I’d been there, if not going up to the microphone and demanding an apology from them for calling me “glitched”.
Gender has nothing to do with gentailia. Gender is mental. Transformers have no Sex ( in the anatomical sense). They 100% DO have Gender and they always have in pretty much every continuity.
Really? I always though that they lacked gender identities until the concept was introduced to the Autobots by the humans that they hang around with. And there’s no way a Decepticon would allow us puny humans to affect their culture.
Nope. “Male” does NOT = Gender Neutral. There have been genders in Tfs since the begining (1984) And there have been two genders Male and Female for as long as there have been dinosaurs or cunstruction vehicles (1985).
As far as their psychology is concerned (which is where gender rests) TFs have always basically been portrayed as big metal humans in armor, everywhere and always. This goes right down to gender concepts and rolls. They are “he’s” and “she’s” and romance between them has also been around and decently common (for a boys toy line) since 1985 as well.
I always felt that gender wasn;t introduced into Transformers until “The Search for Alpha Trion”. IMO the “male” Autobots weren’t male until the writers came up with female ones. Until the writers came up with the need for gender distinctions, there weren’t any. Of course, in story, the female Autobots must have “existed” prior to their introduction story, but to me before then there were no “male” or “female” TFs – just Transformers.
IMO the concept of gender is superfluous for a fictional race that reproduces through Allspark/Matrix infusion (or budding in G2), but on occasion it’s used well. Mostly in Beast Wars.
Referring to a person as an “it” in English is generally considered rude.
It’s not uncommon for genderless/sexless fictional characters to have “he” or “she” applied to them for politeness, even if it’s not completely accurate.
The thing is, for male Transformers the term I*S* 100% accurate. They have male voices, male attitudes, interactions and personalities, male psychologys and, heck, very largely male appearances. They are he’s and brothers and guys and act like it. The TF males are as strongly male as the females a female, they’re not and have never been ungendered using the pronouns for convienence, even before the females appeared in 1985.
That’s merely because English has failed to adapt to the existence of genderless sentients. I doubt that “it” could maintain such a stigma if we ever did develop strong AI since eventually there would be a person who would be offended at having their asexuality belittled and swept under the rug.
Bramble – Singular they actually has at least as long a pedigree as the singular you – and used by no less esteemed an author as Shakespeare, even. It’s simply an accident of usage that caused the singular forms (thou and thee) to mostly die out*, whereas the other singular forms of the third person remained. (Specifically, the singular they being used much as it is now, whereas the singular you being used as a mark of respect, coupled with increasing the number of people supposed to be worthy of that respect.)
* Still used in some fossilized phrases, and certain dialects.
I think most people would accept “male” as shorthand for something along the lines of “a gender defined predominately by masculine traits and a desire to fulfill a masculine role in social and societal interactions,” though.
The Autobots from the very beginning had male voices, used the male pronoun, and overwhelmingly tended to be stereotypically masculine in body shape (surprisingly so given the blockiness of their original designs). Claiming they only became male after female autobots were introduced is at best ignorant and at worst extremely disingenuous.
Ouch! That would be on the list of things someone probably thought would be funny or cute to say but actually turned out to be needlessly rude. Nothing quite like feeling hated by your peers!
I fail to see the glitch in Knockout’s personality. He’s got style, he’s got class, he’s got smarts. Besides Soundwave (of whom I am a perennial fanboy), my favorite Prime Decepticon is Knockout.
Is it bad that after reading your post, all I could think about was “He’s got style! He’s got flair! He was there! That’s how he became the Nanny!”
…I’ve been watching too much TVLand lately…
Being fair, we don’t know if this was a writer or a voice artist or someone else involved in the show. Just that they were on the panel. Unless you were there or know something we don’t?
I skipped the Prime panels, so I never heard this first hand. I did hear the “don’t ask don’t tell” line with respect to Knockout. I thought it was a cute, non-answer. Bit of a giggle, like when official Hasbro acknowledges what the fan boy and girl think.
I’d not heard about the “a glitch in the all-spark” until this cartoon. And I’m not happy about that line. On a lot of levels it just feels like the Hasbro rep, egged on by the applause to the first riff, decided to keep going. And as usually happens when things keep going, that person ended up with egg on their face. But it’s usually in off-the-cuff comments that we see people’s true beliefs and prejudices. And you would think that official Hasbro would do better to ensure they didn’t touch off firestorms like this, particularly when you could tell this question was coming a mile away.
Cut to the chase. First answer seemed like a well-prepared duck. Second one seemed like deer caught in headlights kind of answer. Intentionally or not, it was pretty hurtful and undeserving. But just as undeserving were the apparent laughs and cheers. The speaker should have been booed and called out on the issue.
To be completely honest, I wouldn’t have caught the connotation until later. I’m an engineer and we use the word “glitch” for everything from a brief malfunction to the reaction on our friend’s face when we make a particularly good (and usually innapropriate) joke. I associate it with an unexpected result or surprise as much as I do for a flaw.
In my experience, off-the-cuff comments are a really bad way to judge people’s beliefs and prejudices. It really depends on the person. Some are pretty much the same for a quick or a slow response, others can say some pretty stupid things without originally intending to.
And, let’s be fair, witty people are in the minority.
HAD there been booing, he’d probably backtracked pretty fast – but that would probably been just as bad a measure.
In short – yeah, it was a really, really bad comment, but it tells us very little about the person uttering it.
On the one positive note, it might give us a pretty cool shirt.
It doesn’t matter how the individual would react, the crowd dynamic likely would not have been that different unless everyone who has posted dissension in these was there AND displacing several of the people who were clapping AND did loudly protest at the time. Only a few people have posted this but it is true, people laugh when they are uncomfortable for whatever reason, this is part of how a lot of standup comedians work.
And after this terrible glitch comment, people will STILL yell at Michael Bay about the twins and forget that there’s offensive stuff like that in the cartoons as well.
This was a singular comment, that until this webcomic was only available to the specific attendees of a specific panel. Michael Bay’s movies are available to millions to view in cinemas, on DVD, or via download if it comes to that. Also, this comment happened last week and Bay’s been churning out films for years. Also, I’m pretty sure people are capable of multitasking and being angry or offended by more than one thing at one time.
Do you really want that to happen? Doesn’t that just make this stupid thing much bigger than it should be?
Dumb questions like that are just a small example of why I’ve become exhausted with all of the irony, parody, and humor regarding Transformers and other cartoons/toys I enjoy.
I agree, though possibly for different reasons. Making a big thing out of it will just give homophobes and like ammunition and a possible martyrdom status. Like so: “You can’t even crack an innocent joke anymore!11!”
And then it grows and expands like a cancer, because the noisy idiots get to control the debate rather than the much larger, somewhat reasonable populace.
It’s a stupid answer, and the guy who said it might be an idiot, or not. If you know the guy/girl personally and want them to rethink this, talk to him/her one-on-one, get it sorted out. Calling them out in public, well, it usually means they’re going on the defensive. And, well, that usually doesn’t work.
But they *said* it in public. And not in their capacity as a private citizen (as it were) but as someone connected with the Transformers franchise. Putting them on the defensive? They got to be on the attack and get a free pass for it already, and that’s not right.
Yes, I do, and no, it doesn’t, any more than some racist joke is making something bigger than it is. Making people — as we see with Ethan — feel like crap is never cool, and they should be called out on it. Being silent about it just makes it easier for people to get away with that kind of thing.
You do realize that no one outside of those who attended that panel knew about this, before this comic strip, right? Heck, I didn’t even know who Knockout was, since I don’t watch Transformers: Prime.
I’m all about the toys, so even if I was able to go to BotCon, I wouldn’t hang around for these panel discussions, especially for a cartoon I don’t like.
Gay is not a malfunction, not a choice, and definitely not a glitch!!!!
As if being a Transformers fan who is also gay isn’t hard enough as it is, they have to bash us too??? The only bashing that belongs in Transformers is kitbashing!!!!
Am I the only one who has a problem with the person who asked the question in the first place too? It’s a fictional character why should it matter what orientation they are? I really doubt the creators expected someone to ask if a fictional robot is homosexual and paniced to think of an answer. It was a bad answer but still.
The fact that the vast majority of Transformers are “male” makes Knockout’s hobby as an “automobile enthusiast” seem more than a little homosexual. In his first episode he all but wolf-whistled at Optimus Prime’s, uh, rims.
You could also interpret it from his fixation on his own appearance, but that was also G1 Sunstreaker’s schtick and nobody asks if he’s gay. Knockout is a little bit Fabulous, but not as bad as G1 Tracks.
Actually, no. I probably would’ve made A Scene. Because FUCK that shit. If my Union Boss, Redneck Mountain, Kentucky Ol’ Boy father in law can give me a hug and call me son, these fuckers got no excuse.
What is the exact meaning of glitch, cause I dont think thats bad. Extrictly in Biology a male who likes males or a female that likes females, suposing the race is not hermafrodite, is an ANOMALY meaning out of normal/standard behavior.
PD: If you find that biology is not politicaly correct… bite me.
“… suposing the race is not hermafrodite, is an ANOMALY meaning out of normal/standard behavior.”
Variance and mutation is a fairly standard and important aspect of species survival and evolution. For something to be truly anomalous, it would have to be much more of rarity than homosexuality.
Evolution and mutation are two diferent things, look dont bend the subject. Just because something is an anomaly or “not normal” it doesnt mean It is bad, and I cant figure it out how being gay is evolution, even if we consider the demografc regulation of the species It will still not fit in the category of evolution.
Im all about gay rights, but dont get hippie on me. I remember one girl who saiid to me “i dont consider myself bi, gay or straight” and a lot more of crap she tought It was philosophy (if philosophy starts and ends with Platon). Most of the cheap philosophy comes from feminism and queer theory, everything is down to sex (wich Freud alredy said more than a century ago). Is not rare that some people close their eyes and ears in front of everything that seems politically incorrect.
Forget the cheap philosophy, just look at all that cheap science you’re spouting. Mutation is integral to the process of evolution.
Anyway, as has been pointed out multiple times thus far, a glitch is not simply something out of the ordinary. It is something broken; a mistake; something that needs to be fixed. But hey, you keep raging against the political correctness machine, mate. Thoughtlessness must be defended!
Never thought of Knockout as gay, just an elegant flair to his speech and hobby but not more than that. Reminds me that this is the same franchise that Transmutate came out of.
There’s no such thing as a heterosexual transformer, though – unless transformers somehow started reproducing with two sexes. I might not be up-to-date in that case.
Now, “male gender” transformers, naturally, are the norm. But they all have personality quirks in some way or another. I wouldn’t classify any of them as “glitches”.
David no don’t even bother. These are the same kind of people who think the words CRAZY and INSANE are offensive. Or the people who think Pinkie Pie and Derpy are ablest propaganda. Look up TRIGGER WARNING some time.
I’m sorry internet I’m not gonna treat you like a big baby just so you won’t cry.
Yes, I’m totally all those things you just said! I’m one of ‘these people’! And yet again people are acting like they know all this stuff about me without knowing the first thing about me!
Is your head up your own ass because that’s where you keep your crystal fucking ball?
No, I think lame is appropriate. I can’t be offended by something that has nothing to do with me. I certainly wouldn’t want hear such nonsense after paying about $1,000 for the con set, hotel room, etc.
There are gay jokes that could have been made that didn’t imply that being gay was a “glitch”. For example, they could have said, “I don’t know about that, but Knockout does have a secret desire to reformat as a Mazda Miata.” Keep the jokes light.
You can’t be offended by something that’s not targeted against you, specifically?
Of course you can. You can defend other people.
And you don’t want to hear the “nonsense” of people standing up for themselves when you’ve paid for a ticket, but you think it’s okay for those people to actually *pay for* bigoted comments directed at them?
When it comes to homosexuality in nature – some studies I heard about suggest that there’s an increased chance for some offspring to be homosexual (later children?). The regularity suggests to me that it might be something which offers an advantage somehow. In other words, homosexuality offers some advantage for offspring (possibly their siblings’?)
Of course, genetics is tricksy and I’m not a biologist, so…
Still, pretty neat. It’s not a bug, it’s a feature.
I’m pretty sure I saw a study at some point suggesting that men with multiple older brothers are more likely to be gay – something about the mother’s body adjusting over time with multiple pregnancies, so that later sons get more female hormones in utero. Which, considering kin selection, it would make a kind of sense to limit the number of siblings reproducing – too many cousins, and you’ve basically got the same genetic source competing against itself all over the place.
There are also studies showing that children carried in seriously stressful times, (think, pretty much anywhere in Europe during early 40′s), are more likely to be homosexual, with the main supposition (from the ancillary data) being the hormones that keep a body stressed/on edge for long periods of time somewhat affect the child in utero. (I don’t recall if there did any studies on lesbianism, as most were on male homosexuality- further supposition is stressors long term indicate continuous danger, i.e., threat to survival- larger amounts of women (in the next generation) are needed to make more humans long term. But since physiological gender is determined by spermatic chromosones, the woman’s body can only affect development after that establishing fact)
I seem to remember when gays took pride in being ‘bent’ and ‘queer’ and ‘different’ and having an ‘alternative’ sexuality. I was cool with them then.
When it changed into this “you will call us normal or else” business, I became homophobic.
Seriously what is offensive about being glitched? We’re all screwed up in some way.
And this is the biggest problem. All I ever said was “different” (or synonyms thereof) but you immediately assume different = bad. That’s the REAL intolerance.
If a black person gets offended for being called colored, and insists they do NOT have more pigment than everyone else, they’re insane.. and that does happen, so yes. (also, what? how does minority even factor in?)
I’m also jealous of gays for getting butthurt and rights and stuff when nudists and the hirsute are still treated badly.. and those -are- normal.
No, I’m pretty sure the real intolerance is saying you don’t like the homosexuals (who are still in the minority) insisting that they be considered normal.
And if a black person feels insulted because they were referred to with a slur of some sort, it’s not because they think they’re actually white (and implying that ‘everyone else’ has Caucasian skin/light coloring seems pretty freaking offensive too). It is because that minorities, be they racial, religious, sexual, or alternative lifestyles, have historically been treated VERY badly by the majority and such phrasings are a throwback to even worse treatment. It’s a sign that the thinking behind those terms and other, worse forms of discrimination, is alive and well even if it’s no longer legal in more overt forms.
I remember very clearly on a bus one time an old black man in the seat in front of me turns around and tells me “Hey girl. You know what you are? A Snow Girl. That’s what we call little white girls like you.”
He wasn’t doing it to point out I was white, or to make conversation. I know because I’ve encountered him before, also while doing nothing but minding my own business. I don’t think I deserved being called a bitch by him those times either, but if you think him calling me a “snow girl” wasn’t any less hurtful because my skin is, in fact, “white” then I don’t know what to tell you.
You are using a VERY mathematical definition of “different”.
Different: it implies not being the same, the same as “strange”, “weird” or “abnormal”.
None of those words implies “badness”, “need to be fixed” or “need to be normalized”.
While all that is true, you’ll have a really hard trying to convince people of that (believe, I’ve tried and failed), so I’d suggest you just give up.
Umm Nerdatcomputer, English might not be your thing. Strange, weird, and abnormal ALL have bad connotations. They’re not as powerful as straight up insults, but let’s practice for a second.
Nerdatcomputer is a strange person. He has weird interests. He is abnormal and it’s hard to relate to him. Did you feel complemented or included by these sentences or did a strong negative intent come through?
From a very “mathematical” point of view, the usage of those words have no connotation whatsoever.
On the other hand, there are words that have a “bad connotation” in their root; like “evil”, “bad” or “broken”.
I’m aware that the “mathematical definition” does rarely apply to normal life.
It’s not the same to call someone “atypical” than to call him/her “a freak”; even when those two words seem to have the same meaning.
But:
If you make the warning that “you use [X] word with no bad connotation whatsoever”, people shouldn’t get angry when you use it.
I often recur to the [x] word (I don’t know synonyms and don’t want to waste time looking for them), and warn people that I don’t use them with any bad connotation. They ALWAYS get mad at me. -__-
Please learn some synonyms or you will continue to get that reaction for obvious reasons. Language is not math and has never been. If you didn’t know whether black, African-American, or colored was the best, and decided to use “the N word” because, hey they’re all referring to the same thing, you’d justifiably be insulted, or at least shunned by most people.
Not that “negative words” can’t be reclaimed by the targeted group, but that’s not your place to help them out as an outsider to that group.
Many people think being different is wrong, like you. Also they claim everyone is the same. Then they claim for diversity or something like that. Is a train of thought that privilege the term “politically” over the term “correct”, the fact something is correct and politically correct is nothing but a coincidence. Many pseudo leftist and liberals have being leading this “politically correct” thought.
Your comentary can be analized like the denial of difference in pro of equality that at the same time labels wrong to the simple mention of diference. Its all simple formal logic. And thats why I dont like the sistematic and trivial “gay rigths” arguments, but the general public seems to like better the “hippie” discourse. I dont care if at least gives gay people ceirtain dignity
“What? You mean those uppity queers weren’t just acting like they were in on our jokes, they did it to get their foot in the door towards actual acceptance and tolerance? And now they want to be treated like PEOPLE?!”
God damn I hate semantics. It’s like those people who think an excuse is always a bad thing.
Queer and bent and basically every other word for gay just means ‘deviating from the usual’ that is the very definition of a glitch. You know what comes to mind when you say glitches? Combos in fighting games, noclipping, memory overwrite errors leading to infinite items. It doesn’t need to be negative. I loves me some freaks, they’re the best people on earth, and if someone’s born with gills or extra teeth or a horn or something, awesome. Use them and enjoy your underwater lifestyle and amazing powers, but -humans are still not supposed to be like that- People used to understand that.. Hell the word gay just means ‘has a whole lot of sex’
Except “glitch” does, in fact, have a definite negative meaning. That’s not even connotation or semantics, it’s IN THE DICTIONARY DEFINITION. When a game has a glitch, even if it leads to having 99 Master Balls, it means that something in the code is BROKEN AND WRONG.
And science is of the current opinion that something goes wrong in the uterus to cause gaiety. (I’m sure that theory, like all of them, will change in a week) I don’t like it, and if it started going away because we stopped putting birth control hormones in the water or something, I’d be pleased, but it’s CLEARLY a glitch in the “man-woman” system. It’s up to you to make it a Missingno glitch or an M-block glitch. I’m not familiar with this character but I’m pretty sure people are enjoying his antics, so whatever made him that way is good if you enjoy it. Stop trying to act like gay is just this normal part of nature and get the rod out of your ass.
We never had this with the polyamorous people or the S+M people or any other perverted group, they were just doing what felt right to them and ignoring the morality of it because if it feels good it must be okay.. and people who have a different idea of what people are supposed to be like do not have to accept it as normal or face intolerance of our intolerance.
Except, as has been noted numerous times in other comments, there are many studies showing homosexual tendencies all over the place in nature.
And bonus points for assuming that the S&M crowd are all totally amoral for doing what they enjoy.
I’m a little tempted to ask how the communities that engage in relationship models which inherently require more trust and open communication than monogamous or vanilla relationships are inherently “ignoring the morality of it,” but I’m afraid your answer might break my brain.
At a guess? All S&M couples and the like OBVIOUSLY exist in IRL exactly the same way they do in the most stereotypical pornos, ignoring things like consent, safety, and respect in the name of getting their rocks off.*
You really make me worry about humanity, if you can’t see how hateful and cruel your comments are. Being gay is, yes, different from being straight. Well done. But being gay is *not* actually against the natural order of things; as other commentators have pointed out, it is found in nature and recognised in many early cultures.
Repeatedly calling gay people ‘glitches’ or implying that they are asking too much to be accepted, or that they are on-par with ‘perverts’ or ‘freaks’ is homophic, bigoted, mean and makes you sound, frankly, stupid. And I really have to ask: who is this ‘we’ that never had ‘this’ with ‘the poly/s&m people’? This sentence is wrong in about a billion ways.
Also, being gay simply does not mean ‘has a whole lot of sex’. That phrase has the same connotations as the word ‘colored’ that you previously stated should not offend black people: it is laced with the kind of prejudice that has typically been used by ‘normal people’ to put down, oppress and hurt those seen as ‘glitched’. Not to mention, I’m gay and my sex life is amazingly poor.
And that’s all I have time for. I have to be at work at like 7am tomorrow, so goodnight.
I don’t like to get in the middle of discussions, but as a matter of facts, I believe he is not really homophobic.
From what I read (I could be wrong), he doesn’t seem to have ANYTHING against homosexuals, and even recognize they should be allowed to live together. That alone is enough to be clear of the “being homophobic” charge.
All he is trying to do is impose his theory that homosexuality is not really normal. One should never forget that the word “normal” implies “following a norm”, and therefore it all depends on which “norm” you are talking about.
But what’s even MORE important, he says that being normal (according to the definition above) is not “better” or “worse”; so that means he is not really homophobic.
“but -humans are still not supposed to be like that- People used to understand that.. Hell the word gay just means ‘has a whole lot of sex’”
and
“I don’t like it, and if it started going away because we stopped putting birth control hormones in the water or something, I’d be pleased”
That’s pretty fucking homophobic to me. Incredibly insulting and making others feel like shit? Definitely horrible bigotry, even dressed up as complaining and putting forth a ‘theory’.
I’m going to assume you missed the part where he said that homosexuals were a ‘perverted group’ that ‘ignored morality’. Oh, and ‘Stop trying to act like gay is just this normal part of nature and get the rod out of your ass’.
Because it’s either that or you are a terrible person.
“God damn I hate semantics. It’s like those people who think an excuse is always a bad thing.”
Yeah, that’s pretty much exactly the opposite of what I actually said. I pointed out a huge difference in meaning.
Oh, and I’m a 24 year-old gay virgin who’s had one boyfriend ever, so no, it doesn’t just mean “has a lot of sex”.
Look, I’m a 21-year-old who cheerfully identifies as queer (albeit mostly because outside of the LGBT community, an awful lot of people’s eyes start to glaze over when confronted with terms like “pansexuality” and “fluid sexuality” and “non-standard gender identification,” and as much as I like educating people about the issues sometimes it’s best not to derail the entire conversation to explain that no, I’m neither gay nor straight, and I’m not really bi, either). And I take offense at saying I’m “glitched,” because, get this, different and defective are not the same. I have plenty of “glitches,” mental and physical: high cholesterol, nigh-inability to conduct business over the telephone because of anxiety, quite a bit overweight, obsessive need to tell people off in comment threads of webcomics… but the fact that I sometimes want to get it on with someone with girlparts is not one of them. It does not hurt anyone or keep me from functioning in society, except so far as people who weren’t invited to the girlparts party anyway want to make trouble over it.
I think coldfusion is rigth but his semantics and logic are a little twisted, instead of glitch that denotes “faulty” the right word would be ANOMALY, as my sister who studies Medicine told me once people sometimes are confused by the meaning of the word and the connotation. Is easy to get tangled in lenguage.
Pd: I like people that is aware of their sexuality instead of the metafisical ones that says they are some kind of “spiritual” being that only loves the esence… Bunch of neoplato hippi crap
Hey, did I say I’m exclusively attracted to people with OMG BEAUTIFUL SOULS or something? Just because “gender” isn’t on my internal checklist for partners doesn’t mean I’m not attracted to people’s physical attributes – or even that I’m not attracted to attributes usually found in certain genders or sexes. Male and female bodies are awesome. I just don’t have any particular preference for one over the other, or any preference for clear over ambiguous gender presentation. I have a couple of definite physical “types” I’m attracted to regardless of gender.
Just because my sexuality boils down to “people are sexy” rather than “boys and/or girls are sexy” doesn’t mean I’m not “aware” of my sexuality.
(And I do believe that what you’re dismissing as “metaphysical” and “spiritual” does have to figure into it at some point, or otherwise you might as well just go out and buy yourself a realdoll.)
Last comment of the night.
Morality and Ethics are is a Convention of rules made by man more or less arbitrary. So gay cant be good or bad but simply “be”, cause “being” somethimg cant be wrong. Even when you are “being bad” that means an act, being gay dont involve an act.
Meh, obviously you were going for the simplest possible definition, but you know that one is terribly flawed I hope. Example: someone is attacking you and you punch that person’s face and knock them unconscious. The only person you’ve helped is yourself and you’ve “caused harm” to an other, but I strongly disagree the act was immoral. Other examples: getting a job for yourself which of course automatically makes every other applicant NOT get the job and thus continue to be unemployed, buying the last __ available at a store, getting on a lifeboat picked by lottery when there isn’t enough space for everybody, etc etc. Just because it causes harm to somebody doesn’t mean it’s immoral. But of course you knew that…
So Ethan rails about dramatic hypersensitivity only to be dramatically hypersensitive about something that hits close to home for him. Oh no, the people who make that robot toy/game/comic/cartoon property you like are thinking off spec from how you think they ought to think. They must be evil and stupid and what’s wrong with the world. Ethan has so much to teach them all.
You can tell all that from him looking momentarily sad after hearing a somewhat insulting comment?
Wow, you’re good. My own ability to look at a comic strip panel and immediately know exactly what is going through the fictional character’s head pales in comparison to yours.
This gift must be studied! I shall write a paper on the topic to see if we can receive grants. Working title: “Extrasensory Perception as it Relates to the Discernment of Underlying Motivations of Fictional Characters Responding to Emotional Stimuli in Works of Comic Drama”
On second thought, that’s too clunky. Let’s just call it “Dramatic Hypersensitivity”.
Oh, hypersensitivity is defined as “feeling insulted when someone deliberately insults you”? Strange, that’s not what my dictionary has, I must need an updated version. Or you’re a jerk. One of those for sure.
Freedom of speech is a bitch isn’t it? People can be jerks, its just how people are. Yeah it was an offensive joke, but its still a joke, and even bigots and jerks have the right to make jokes. Its not a hate speech, its not some movement to deny anyone rights, its an offensive joke.
I was wondering when freedom of speech was going to be trotted out. Yeah they have a right to say that. We have a right to say that it was a shitty thing to say.
I’m gonna go on a bit of a rant here because why not? We got a discussion going about gender and sexuality here.
The whole thing with sex and sexuality is just made out to be so significant, and I can’t say it ever has seemed to be so for me. Heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, pansexual, unspoken is the assumption that we are inherently sex driven beings. Everyone out there clearly must want sex. Quite frankly this seems off to me. It’s not like I’m not into women because I’m into dudes, they both just seem equally unappealing to me. A few times a year I’ll spot someone who I wouldn’t mind boning if I was offered, but honestly, I don’t see myself as ever going to seek out sex.
So what? Why’s it gotta be so important? Someone wants to fuck x and someone else wants to fuck y, and it’s actually important enough that people build these policies around it. People oppress over it, hate over it, love, build, and destroy over it. I see them defining themselves as someone who prefers x or y. I see them fighting over x like rabid hyenas, appearing to wither and become dispirited after an extended amount of time without y.
Whether gay, straight or what have you they all seem to treat it with such importance, and to expect you to treat it with similar importance. I’m not on some dry streak here, I’m just not on the market. It’s not a big deal. There’s legitimate oppression and hate going on here, and we need to get on top of that. I got my priorities straight here. When that’s taken care of though. Once we’ve managed to successfully create an environment of tolerance regardless of who you’re boning, I hope the next thing we reevaluate why it is we expect everyone to be boning in the first place. Every day I go out there and talk like I’m interested in sex because that’s just what you do, and I have no fucking idea if anyone else is just going through the motions for the sake of convenience or if it’s just genuinely the all encompassing drive in everyone that people make it out to be.
Don’t think I’m trying to put you on the spot, but do you identify as asexual? I do, and I see this kind of argument from them (and usually only them) all the time. Asexuals seem to be one of the only groups who frequently question the assumption of rabid sex drive.
That said, the reason why it’s so important here is because regardless of how much group x does or doesn’t want to screw group y, it’s still horrifically offensive to call anyone glitched based on their orientation. Especially considering all the persecution that gay people have had to go through in the past.
I also hope that someday we’ll advance far enough that we won’t need to use sex and sexuality as the social status indicator it is right now. But the whole discussion seems out of place in a debate like this.
I’d never heard of Asexual before. Didn’t know there was a word for that.
Obviously the comment made was offensive. Whatever your sexual orientation there shouldn’t be anything wrong with it. I didn’t mean to argue in favor of him. I just had some stuff on my mind and with 400+ comments discussing gender and sexuality issues I thought it wouldn’t be a huge deal if I chipped in. I apologize for my mistake.
Obviously “Nah, I’m good thanks” is just as valid a preference as “Dudes plz”, “Chicks plz”, or “Both plz”. Unless someone deliberately mocks you for being a “loser virgin” or whatever, I don’t see how you’re being targeted though. It’s like this… assume you don’t like the sport (American) football. During football season, nobody is picking on you by talking about football all the time. You might find it slightly boring, but not everything is about you (good or bad).
I think I ought to point out that some of us who are against discrimination — including (gasp!!) some of us who are gay themselves — are also fans of that “magic book” of stories from the bronze age. It’s not all “religious people on one side and non-religious people on the other” by any means. Religion in general of course could be a whole other HUGE array of threads, but I wanted to say that since people are bringing it up.
Obviously, the question of how to sort out things like the New Testament’s “love your neighbor,” “love your enemies and turn the other cheek,” “don’t judge other people,” “help those who are poor and downtrodden and abused” and so on and so on with some passages in the Old Testament (which has far more, by the way, on matters relating to the abuse of the poor by the powerful than it does about sex at all!) is still an issue to be explored, but again I wanted to point out that not all of us Christians — including gay Christians like myself (gasp!) — think the same way about things.
Because one gay guy uses the word fag means it’s okay for everyone else to do so and that all connotations and offense that it carries for others suddenly vanish?
It should be pointed out that this whole ugliness stems from a long time staple of fandoms: Questioning something that is completely innocent in a comic book or cartoon.
For example, “Can Mr. Fantastic stretch every part of his body?”
Of course, in Transformers we’ve long had stupid questions about Tracks being gay. The voice actor himself explained that the voiced he used was a “Harvard lockjaw” accent, a sort of snooty, upper-class, New England sort of thing.
The problem is that adults in any fandom come up with these dumb questions. One asks such a question at BotCon and gets a strange answer and suddenly it’s the worst thing to ever happen.
Umm no, even if the question was dumb (and it doesn’t seem particularly dumb) that doesn’t automatically disqualify the answer from being offensive. Example: if some weirdo asked if Pinkie Pie was a cannibal during a MLP FIM panel, that would be a bizarre question. If the panelist said, “Yes, but only of black furred ponies because they’re so athletic,” would that insanely stupid response be something we should shrug off because either: 1) it was meant as a joke or 2) the question was dumb? I would say strongly no.
In the case of this question, there’s 10 million ways to go about answering this that aren’t offensive at all. Here’s a couple for free:
-The first joke and then move on
-We didn’t really think about it, so I don’t know
-I’m not sure, we’ve never asked him
-No (if it’s important that he’s straight for some later storyline, very doubtful in this case)
-Yes (risky for the conserva-fans, but if it’s the case, it’s the case)
etc
Somebody has already linked the “Intent is fucking magic” post, so go ahead and ctrl + find that if you desire. “Without true malice” is both just your opinion (you have no way to back it up) and irrelevant (if someone says something that hurts another person, does it make it better if they were too dumb to know it would?). It’s not a “high horse” to say that an insulting comment is insulting. Why do you feel it’s important to defend stupidity?
I just think that too much is being made of this. Plus, talking about it here accomplishes nothing. If someone who was at the BotCon panel felt insulted, they should have said something then. And really, why does what a writer of a crappy Transformers cartoon matter? Does his joke suddenly make it true that being gay is a ‘glitch’? What does this whole thing matter so much to everyone?
Step 1) Recognize that you not caring about something is not the same as that thing being unimportant. Step 2) Don’t enter an argument that you don’t find important in the first place ESPECIALLY NOT to say “You guys are overreacting, I, the arbiter of importance, have clearly marked this as irrelevant, please pay attention!” Step 3) In order to gain some empathy, please imagine if you went to a fan gathering of your favorite thing (sports, video games, TV, quilting, whatever floats your boat) and the organizers who you respect in a general fashion for their contribution to that thing you like said “This basic trait of MikeK’s that he didn’t choose and can’t change at will is bad, amirite?!” and all your fellow fans laughed and clapped. Do you feel like a welcomed part of the group?
Step 4) When talking about something like, say, gay bashing, go against your gut instinct to linking youtube videos that create strawman arguments about offensive slurs to gay people in the name of humour lest people think you’re human garbage.
I have a couple of things to clear up. First of, I am a Muslim and in the Koran, no angel got raped. The people at the city wanted to because they thought they were visitors. Second of all, to everyone and I mean everyone, I’m sorry. I’m sorry for the hate comment and I’m sorry for the other comment following it, I’m sorry for being a bigot and for the record, I tolerate homosexuals. I don’t love them, I tolerate them. Third, to R, no I will not vote to hurt you and your family or anyone’s family or ignore anyone in any emergency because even if the person in question have a different sexual orientation, he or she is still human and I will help them any way I can.
Again, I would like to give my sincerest apologies to everyone about my comment and to anyone who is a homosexual, if you are hurt by the comment in any shape or form, I’m sorry.
I’ve read through the archive of this comic for the past week. I enjoyed every up and down, twist and turn. I especially enjoyed reading the comments section. I’ve found most of the comments humorous, and some extremely dull. I’ve enjoyed my time here, but I’m afraid it is at an end.
See, I’m one of those religious dolts who believes in a scrap of parchment that was written by some crazy old guy a long time ago. At least, that’s what people seem to think. And while I believe the act of homosexuality is a sin, I do not condemn anyone else because we’ve all sinned. I’m not going to recite text, because I do not wish to start a conversation that I cannot finish in person.
Which brings me to the issue here, where individuals prefer to argue back and forth behind the safety glass of a laptop/desktop computer. Though apologies have been made, it is only human nature for foolishness like this to happen again. I say foolishness because words without fruitful actions are just that–foolish. Few people stand up when the real spotlight is on them.
In any case, I’ve come to bid farewell to this community. It was fun while it lasted, but I’m a bigot that can’t stand in the presence of people who prefer to be lambs rather than lions. I’m also intolerant of the intolerant (I suppose I’ll work on it). So, Sir Willis, it has been a pleasure. I doubt you will miss me, I’m but a drop in the bucket of viewers. Good bye.
It would seem anything I might have to say on the issue has already been said in some way, shape, or form, and adding my two cents into this would be staggeringly redundant…
I dream of the day when posts about sexuality, as opposed to sexual activity, won’t generate over 500 comments. Until then, I suppose its good we’re talking about it.
Loved the comic Willis. As a gay nerd, might I say your consideration is ever appreciated.
Um
is Ethan not secure enough with his sexuality to laugh about it? thats like a black guy not liking racist jokes…. wait, what?
He seemed fine till they got the glitch part. That’s where it went too far for me too.
Even “I” stared at the screen dumbified by that, wow.
Yeah, I gotta admit, that was pretty deep into Cringe Inducing territory.
Yeah, I’m a Southern Baptist minister, and I think that’s going too far.
Yeah, I’m not gay and even I was offended by that.
It’s because it hits too close to home when it comes to the idea that something’s “wrong” with gay people, which gay people hear ALL THE TIME.
ALL. THE. FUCKING. TIME.
And it gets bloody old, really fast.
I would imagine it wasn’t exactly refreshing the first time.
Yeah… no. Just because Ethan is secure in being gay, doesn’t mean it can’t still hurt to hear someone imply that being gay is a mistake and thus HE is considered a mistake. Particularly when its coming from the people who normally bring you great joy.
I totally agree – as much as people can be as secure about their sexuality as they want, mean is still mean and it can definitely hurt. Plus the fact that this whole discussion is so close to Ethan’s heart, even I cringed in sympathy.
A person who is comfortable and secure in their sexuality has no obligation to laugh at homophobic and heterosexist jokes. There are gay jokes and then there are heterosexist gay jokes.
Aww. That wasn’t very nice.
Jesus fucking Christ.
Rule 34 says there’s plenty of porn of Jesus and Christ fucking
So He’s fucking Himself then? Kinky.
Father/Son/Holy Ghost OT3?
….I’m so going to Hell. I probably was before, but this is another nail in the coffin.
Nah, that’s only after you write Jesus/Judas.
Personally I’d love to see a fanfic that goes in to what really happened between Jesus and Satan during that forty days in the desert.
Years ago I came across a yaoi doujinshi that was Satan/Jesus.
That makes me think finding fanfic shouldn’t be that hard.
That isn’t canon?
now it’ll be the special hell.
Would that be the one reserved for child molesters and people who talk at the theater?
Yes!
Turns out hell ain’t for you after all. The Father was all for it, but The Son reminded him about that whole ‘new covenant’ thing, so the vote came down to the Holy Ghost and it turns out The Holy Ghost has a pretty good sense of humor.
Wow.
What…
What does that even mean?!
Double Rainbow.
A gay one.
Wow. I often forget how backwards parts of fandom are.
Fandom?
That was one of the TF:Prime panelists that answered.
The question itself is pretty par for the course for a large convention, given Knockout’s character.
And here I was hoping today’s strip was an exaggeration. Sadness.
In the Mad magazine parody of the original Battlestar Galactica, Lucifer set off Baltar’s Gaydar and Baltar asked “you robots are all AC/DC, aren’t you?”
Meanwhile, I had an idea for a storyline: somebody has been converting Amber’s Autumn e-novel series into a My Little Pony fanfic, which is bringing Amber attention from all the Bronies.
You Shook Me All Night Long!
Good lord. A GLITCH?! That’s just rude man…
some please clarify for me, because I could be wrong.. but doesn’t the whole glitch thing mean that he would have been born that way rather than it being a personal choice? how is that insulting?
Because being non-hetero is a difference and not a disorder or “glitch”
Glitch is insulting because it implies being broken or not working correctly.
Because the implication is that homosexuality is a flaw. “Glitch” is pretty much computer-speak for “problem that needs to be fixed”.
Like a cat?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Turing#Conviction_for_indecency
Sad face.
Sad face, indeed.
Unexpected Answer is unexpected indeed!
WHOA!
A sad fate for a brilliant man.
To some people homosexuality is a flaw.
To most people bigotry is a flaw.
‘Some people’ sure can be bigoted fucks, can’t they.
and bigotry can be viewed as a flaw, or over zealous religious fanatics
Guess there was a glitch in the matrix the day their personality file was loaded, huh?
From a biological standpoint, a variation which largely precludes the possibility of passing one one’s genes to the next generation would probably be seen as a maladaptation.
From a HUMAN standpoint, the idea that there’s something “wrong” with a homosexual is just awful.
Actually, it may not be quite as black and white as that. If you look at animals, chimps and bonobos in particular, sex is used to form and nurture social bonds, just as grooming is. That is, it helps keep the whole cohesive and working. In that sense, same-gender sex serves an important function for the community, even if it doesn’t lead to offspring.
I disagree Doom. There are a number of species, bees for example, where having an infertile, neutered, etc. variation is good for the species. These “neuters” (for lack of a better term), are in place to help care for the group without distraction. Because they can’t reproduce, they can’t choose to promote their own offspring over others, so the best way to promote the species is to take care of those who can reproduce and the resulting offspring.
This sort of variation can be thought of as a type of altruism. We see somewhat similar behaviors in higher ordered social groups. For example: if one individual puts themselves at risk for the rest of the social group, s/he is reducing his/her chance of reproducing and passing on his/her genes; however, s/he is protecting the other offspring of the group, thereby allowing the group (and probably some relatives that share his/her genes), to thrive.
Tada! Biology is fun!
1) Kin selection
2) Other stuff we don’t understand yet
Homosexuality is too common in in too many animals from humans to insects for this to be maladaptive. Indeed, it would seem that in many cases it is not even neutral, but rather adaptive for a certain percent of a population to be homosexual.
IIRC, the mean mammalian rate of homosexuality is approximately 7%. The reasons for the genetics of homosexuality to be useful to a species are numerous.
1) Reducing the conflict around mating season – many species do not mate with a single female
2) Automatic check to avoid overpopulation – homosexuality seems to become more prevalent when there are many older siblings of the same sex, so it would appear that it’s a built-in population control mechanism
3) Surrogates & Kinship – being able to function to step-in as an elder if parents are killed or serving to build/maintain community function.
These are just SOME of the possible reasons, but there is a clear biological reason for why homosexuality does not automatically ween itself out of the gene pool – it’s detrimental to the individual passing on genes, but beneficial to the community at large in other less tangible ways.
That sounds really interesting.
(Biological reasons why the 7% of population is gay)
Don’t have a page that talks about that theory? =3
there are actually a whole list of animals that sometimes mate in same-gender pairs. there are various reasons for this, but it seems that homosexuality is neither exclusively human or an ‘evolutionary deadend’….
Studies have been done in Italy where women with homosexual brothers are compared to women with heterosexual brothers in terms of number of offspring. It ended up that women with gay brothers have more children than the women with heterosexual brothers. Some theories say that it’s due to hormonal mixes and levels and the proposed hypothesis was that homosexual men are actually good for the species, because it means their sisters (if they have any) will make more babies.
This would also explain how homosexuality /isn’t/ bred out of the gene pool, since it’s more probable that the sisters would carry some of the genetic material for homosexuality and therefore be more likely to give birth to homosexual babies.
Furthermore, the more babies she has, the more likely they will be homosexual!
It seems like nature is kind of bending over backwards to keep homosexuality in the gene pool.
Not something that would logically happen if homosexuality were a “dead end” or not useful to survival.
This conversation makes me happier than I can say.
Case in point: My nephew is going to be way more spoiled by his lesbian aunt than he would be if I had kids of my own to take care of. My sibling’s offspring are going to benefit from my homosexuality.
The reproduction argument is a red herring. Gay people can, have, and will continue to reproduce biologically. Back in the day you got married to someone of the opposite gender if your parents forced you to. Now, there are a lot of technologies that make it possible for gays to have their own biological children. The difference is that we don’t do it by accident when we’re drunk nearly as much.
I’m a lesbian. I can very easily go to a Sperm bank, pay money, and get gametes that allow me to have a biological child. I’m gay not infertile.
Neither of your examples prove that being gay doesn’t pull you out of the gene pool from an evolutionary standpoint. They just show that society had a way of pulling gays back in (evolution applied long before the rules of society) and now there is an option that allows lesbians back in by choice. Humans quit following evolutionary law a long time ago and this is just another example. As crass as it sounds, forcing gays to marry and reproduce “may” have had a benefit from an evolutionary standpoint, but artificial insemination bypasses the whole topic.
I’m not saying that the other evolutionary reasons for there being rainbows in the gene pool aren’t valid, just that forced marriage and artificial insemination don’t pass muster.
Yes, and some people are wrong. The set of people who believe homosexuality is a flaw is wholly a member of the set of people who are wrong. It’s also wholly a member of the set of people who are bigots, which itself is wholly a member of the set of people who are wrong. So you’ve got a couple levels of suck there to work with.
In computer terms, glitches dont need fixed. They are unintended features. Ask any true programmer and they will tell you this!
The results from a glitch are unreliable. If the unintended consequences were desireable then a programmer should write it up as a feature and implement it correctly. All glitches should be removed from a body of work so that they do not pollute the intended functionality of an application. Any true programmer would know that.
That’s bugs. Glitches are transient one-in-a-billion oddities that it probably isn’t worth looking into.
A glitch, particularly in electronics and computer programing, is a problem that often results in a program or system not working the way it should and said glitches thus need to be fixed.
Calling homosexuality a “glitch’ is not saying “they’re born that way”. Its saying “there is something wrong that needs to be fixed so it will work properly”.
That’s a damn big insult to the gay community.
Also remember that it LITERALLY used to be classified as a mental disorder in the DSM and was placed among things like schizophrenia until very recently in history, so it could and did get you thrown into a mental hospital. That’s one reason the “glitch” analogy is so wince-worthy.
Unfortunately the DSM is heavily influenced by societal pressures at the time instead of being based strictly on clinical medicine. Dr Drew was complaining about it the other day because apparently the next revision is going to exempt doctor prescribed medications from the definition of addiction, so you can’t be an addict as long as you’re getting your fix from a doctor. Apparently they’ve never seen House
If someone called your way of life a “glitch” would you be happy about it?
Or if EVERYONE called your life a glitch.
I’ve always thought the whole “born gay” argument was insulting, like it’s taking the choice away from people. Just depends on a person’s point of view I suppose.
Except that it isn’t a choice. The argument that it is a choice is insulting, both to homosexuals and heterosexuals, because it implies you have control over something you don’t, and never will. Because really, if it was a choice, why would anyone ever choose to be gay? Why would they purposefully choose to be ostracized from society, denied the same rights that everyone else has and be persecuted? To imply it’s ever a choice is to essentially accuse homosexuals that everything bad that happens to them is their own fault.
Not to mention that it just plain doesn’t make sense. You don’t choose what you like. If you see a movie, and you think it’s awesome, you didn’t choose to like that movie, it just hit all the right spots in your brain to make you enjoy it. If you eat a food that you hate, you can’t just say ‘I’m gonna choose to like this’, and all of a sudden it tastes great. That’s not how things work.
Except I personally know people who were attracted to one gender and then slowly became attracted to the other. It seems to me that sometimes it IS a choice, and sometimes it is a matter of birth. At least one couple I know described themselves as ‘heterosexual until I fell in love’. So I have to disagree, sometimes its nature, sometimes its nurture, sometimes its something less definable than either of those.
Then again, I find the question itself entirely irrelevant. Is it a choice or is it a matter of birth? Why is that important to the discussion? Does it somehow change the idea that you should have the freedom to be with whomever you choose (assuming a consenting adult relationship, of course), regardless of who that is? Don’t think so.
“Heterosexual until I fell in love.” So they inwardly didn’t consider the possiblity that they were gay until someone happened to make them question it.
There’s more than just gay too, which no one ever remembers. People can be bi, and it’s not one extreme or the other. There’s all sorts of shades in-between.
I’m pansexual. I can like pretty much anyone. I’m mainly attracted to males, though on occasion a woman will have me turn my head.
And don’t even get me started when it comes to androgynous people and people outside the gender binary. :p
There are so many factors for me when it comes to attraction.
I didn’t choose to be pansexual, because for the longest time I thought I was a gay male. When I started having gender identity issues, I started noticing that I DID like more than just males, I just never noticed because I was too busy thinking one thing and not being open.
“Except I personally know people who were attracted to one gender and then slowly became attracted to the other.”
Except that that in no way implies choice. What that implies is change. Because people aren’t static, they will change overtime. You’re right in that it is more than just nature, nurture plays a role as well. But nurture is still something that tends to be beyond your control, as that’s the effect that other people and your environment have on your development.
Go up and ask those people who slowly became attracted to another gender if that’s what they chose, or if it’s just something that happened overtime, because I can practically guarantee you they’re not going to say it the former.
But people CAN choose. You make it sound like being gay is a diese or something. Some people simply want to be gay, so they are. There’s not some invisible hand guiding your penis around. I know people who were once straight then decided one day that they enjoy their best friend’s company better than members of the opposit gender.
If we’re using the movies metaphor, you might enjoy action movies a lot until you see the right drama and realize you like that too. So next time you choose to go see a drama instead of an action movie.
They can CHOOSE to ignore the attraction they feel. They can CHOOSE to date people they don’t actually feel attracted towards. What they can’t choose is who you feel attracted to.
So when did you choose to be straight?
Age 19
Prior to that I would have considered myself bi, or at least open for debate.
People can and do choose, but personally I think it only works out when the person tends that way anyway. I was much more attracted to women, and I went with it. Not that it should matter to anybody else, but for me I’m glad that I did.
So… I direct you to my reply to Taekwondogirl right above your post. It’s not the same thing, but it follows the same lines. I didn’t choose to be attracted to women or androgynous people, but I am.
There’s a difference between changing/choosing and broadening your horizons and/or experimenting.
Your metaphor is mixed up.
Choosing to go see a drama is not like realizing that you also like women.
Realizing that you also like dramas is like realizing that you also like women; choosing to go see a drama is like choosing to go on a date with a woman. You did include that part.
Oh, OH, I see how it is. Well, in that case, how about you choose to be gay, right now. Why don’t you go look at a picture of a naked man, and then CHOOSE to get a boner because of it. Because I can guarantee you that that is not how this works.
Your attempt to use my own metaphor against me fails as well. I can choose to watch a drama instead of an action movie, but whether I’ll enjoy it is beyond my control. Likewise, I can choose to go and have sex with another man, but that in and of itself would not make me a homosexual. There’s more factors to it than just that.
But if it were a choice, the action movie lover would have said beforehand, ‘okay, starting today I’m going to like dramas too,’ and then went and watched a drama because all of a sudden they made the choice to like dramas.
It doesn’t happen like that. You don’t consciously choose what you like and dislike. Sure, there’s cases of ‘acquired taste’ such as in food, where one exposes oneself to something until one gains a tolerance for it, but still, actually liking whatever it is has no connection to the choice. The repeated exposure is necessary to train the involuntary reactions into a new pattern.
I have to say that as a pansexual, I hate the “but it’s not a choice!” argument that so much of the LGBT community depends on. Because while I recognize that there are plenty of people who are only attracted to one gender and nothing will change that, there are also plenty of us who are attracted to two. (Or, more specifically in the case of people like me, more! Or don’t really find that gender effects who we’re attracted to at all!) I could choose to exclusively pursue partners who are fully male in both body and mind. For me, that would be roughly equivalent to deciding to only date people within my own religion, or only people within a certain socioeconomic bracket, or only people who share my interest in dungeons and dragons. Maybe I’d be eliminating some potentially very compatible partners, but everyone does that, whether they do so consciously or not. But I see no reason why I should make that choice, and I resent the religious and political right’s attempt to make that choice for me.
And, for that matter, in the case of monosexual people (both hetero and homo), the argument that it isn’t a choice is potentially damaging anyway, because, well… that can be taken as implying that if (for example, since we’re here at Shortpacked! anyway) Ethan had chosen to be gay, it’s possible that he made the wrong choice. Saying “I didn’t choose this,” while very true, is also very defensive. And I believe that if we’re ever going to get equality of all sexualities, we need to stop defending and start owning our identities.
You can choose to date only men, or women, or whatever, but you can’t choose who you’re attracted to. For example, even if I chose to only date women, I’d still be attracted to my male best friend, and if I chose to date only men, I’d still have the hots for his sister.
Very true – you can’t just wish away an attraction to one gender. However, people choose not to act on other attractions all the time – because they feel they need to focus on something else in their lives at the moment, because they or the object of their affection are already committed to a closed relationship, because they’ve made an overture already and been refused… there are plenty of good, responsible reasons not to just jump everyone you think is hot. “Because they’re the wrong gender” should not be lumped in with them.
And there is a very vocal section of the opposition who claim that everyone has some degree of same-sex attraction and that the only right and moral way to respond is to repress the shit out of it – they’re the ones who usually get the “it’s not a choice” line thrown at them. Telling them it isn’t a choice side-steps the issue – the issue is that it isn’t a wrong choice. Choosing to have a relationship with someone of the same (or a similar) gender is not the same as choosing to have a relationship with someone without their existing partner’s knowledge and approval.
Whether you choose to act upon attraction is irrelevant, the part that determines whether you’re homosexual or not is the existence of the attraction in the first place, which you admit can’t be controlled. Likewise, there are more options than just two, heterosexual and homosexual are not the only possibilities, and people who are 100% one or the other are very rare, as most people do fall somewhere in between.
The problem with the opposition is that most of them are religious, and thus their reasoning and arguments stem from a magic book, and an inanimate object can’t be argued with. If it’s a choice, then it’s the wrong choice, so says the magic book, and you won’t convince them otherwise. The ‘its’ not a choice’ line is simply the most effective weapon against them, the argument that their perfect, almighty God would purposefully make someone like this calls into question whether their book is actually the most reliable source of information for everything in the world. Mind you, these are the same people who will continue to deny the truth even when it’s presented to them as scientific fact, so it’s hardly a perfect argument, but it’s still the best there is. At the very least it works against the ones who aren’t completely retarded.
Furthermore, by claiming it’s not a choice (because it isn’t), it allows for more easily drawn comparisons between discrimination against sexual orientation and previous civil rights movements, such as racial and gender discrimination, which would allow for using previous civil rights movements as precedents in any legal battle that may be required to acquire equality.
Again, restating the original point, you admit yourself that the attraction can not be controlled, only whether you act upon it, but the attraction is what determines your sexual orientation, and whether you act upon that is irrelevant. Trying to say that it’s a choice would be fine in a perfect world where everyone would clearly understand that there’s nothing wrong with it (even if it would still be an incorrect statement), but in the imperfect world we live in, saying something like that is tantamount to admitting guilt, and that will only cause harm and delay change.
I’m exhausted, and I’ve completely lost track of my train of thought, which I’m not entirely certain I had in the first place, I’m going to sleep. >.<
Just to clarify, Gizen, not all people who are against gay/lesbian are religious. In my community, from my personal experiences, the Atheist community is the most anti-gay.
@G.S. Mercs,
I know that not all of the opposition to homosexuality comes from the religious right (hence my usage of the word most), however, the majority of them are, simply because the only argument against homosexuality that’s even remotely valid is because it goes against their religion, and even that’s a very poor argument.
The fact that the majority of the people opposing it that you’ve met are atheists is just… well, downright weird to me. That you’ve seen so many atheist anti-gays is strange enough, but, seriously what reasoning could they possibly have, aside from possibly admitting blatant fear of people who are different on their part.
Now I’m gonna be wondering about this all night. o.O
@Gizen Fair enough. Oddly enough, when I ask them about it, the first thing they do is start telling me how I’m a horrible person for being a Christian, so I cannot provide an answer as to why they are anti-gay.
Best guess I can think is they might see it as anti-evolutionary?
I think having my experience discounted for a politically popular (well, not as much politically popular anymore) idea that gave the majority a pat on the back for allegedly make the “right choice” because of their innate nature is offensive.
Maybe its referring to Bobs Guardian keytool from ReBoot, and that tool interfaced with the spark?
Damn, I don’t like homosexuals and even I don’t go around insulting them.
…*head explodey*
Agreed, that was bad.
Haha, holy shit.
What.
I must confess surprise. “Shortpacked! Is Totally Gay” is less a book title than it is a mission statement.
[NerdRage Intensity="meh"]You’re right not to insult them, but that was still a fail-at-life comment. [/NerdRage].
I have a perfectly good reason why I hate them and it involves religion. Ever heard of the Dead Sea?
“I have a perfectly good reason why I hate them and it involves religion. Ever heard of the Dead Sea?”
Yes. It’s the deepest hypersaline lake in the world that borders Jordan. WHAT ABOUT IT, ASSHOLE?
Before that it was city that was full of sinners and homosexuals and it got flipped over and sunk. And do I offend anybody that warrants people calling me an asshole?
Yes, the Dead Sea was created when the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were punished for homosexuality. Also, Paul Bunyan created the Grand Canyon when he dragged his axe.
If I offend anyone, I’m sorry. Even though I said hate them that those not mean I can’t tolerate them.
Ah, yes. Hate being such a Christian value.
(Of course, you never said you were Christian and there are other faiths that include that scripture, but please excuse my kneejerk reaction against people using faith–oftentimes /my/ faith– as an excuse for hate.)
I just wish you would realize you are hating a group of harmless people because of a tall tale written by Bronze Age tribemen.
Laura, considering he’s referencing Christian “literature” it’s probably safe to assume he’s Christian.
It is NOT Christian to hate and it’s NOT Christian to judge. I was under the impression with the tale that it wasn’t simply being homosexual that caused the destruction in that tale but full out hedonism and raping angels.
Taekwondogirl, while the story of Sodom and Gomorrah is part of the Christian canon (calling it literature is a bit off, and Willis, nothing but respect for you, man, but it’s kind of harsh calling it something written by a “bronze age tribesman.” Can’t we all just be nicel?), it’s part of the Old Testament, which means it’s also part of the Jewish canon. Possibly the Islamic as well (there’s a lot of overlap, naturally, and the Koran does acknowledge the events in both the Torah and the Bible, but in a different light in some cases). Then there’s also the more recent spin-off religions like LDS, though that one I honestly couldn’t say how much of their history they take from ol’ St. James.
The More You Know *shooting star*
Right, but the lesson taken away from it depends on the interpretation. Also, there was a reason why I put literature in quotes. :p
Yes, because I don’t feel like typing in all the other shit and I was in a hurry, I used “me@me.com” If you think I’m actually scared of hate mail than I’m just insulted.
And yeah, you’re entitled to your opinion, it doesn’t mean you have to sit there telling him that his beliefs are tall tales just because you don’t believe in the same thing, that, as I’ve stated, is bigoted
All right, let’s sort this out, then.
Hating a group of people because of a 3000-year-old story involving angels and a woman turning into salt: not bigoted
Saying the story probably didn’t happen and their hatred is unsupported: bigoted
Woo, we’re learning!
No, hating people for being gay is biggoted as well, I never said it wasn’t, that would just be stupid of me.
But it’s clear that he’s sorry for his comments, and the fact that even AFTER he apologized he’s still being attacked and being told that his beliefs are myths is just wrong. And I’m not even going to get into the issues of you (being the person who represents your site) publicly treating one of your, clearly loyal (I say loyal because where most religious people I know have stopped reading this comic because of the amounts of homosexuality, he decided to stay with it because he enjoys the content), readers in this way, it’s really made me see you in a new light.
He said he was sorry if he offended anybody for saying he hates gay people, not that he’s sorry for hating gay people. If that’s an apology to you, then, wow.
If I punch you in your face and say I’m sorry if my punching your face hurt you, that’s not an apology for punching you in your face. That’s just being a dick.
The only reason why he’s not 100% gone now (I can ban folks reeeeall easily) is that I just don’t think he KNOWS he’s being a dick, or knows WHY people think he’s being a dick. I probably would have said similar things when I was 17. But if this were some other page deep in the archives, I probably would have banned or deleted the comment out-right. I don’t especially appreciate hate speech in my website’s comments. But this is the subject of the day/weekend, so I’ve been more lenient.
But if calling out a reader who says hateful things on my website makes me a bad host, then, okay, I guess I’ll just have to be a bad friggin’ host.
I never said that he said that he’s sorry for hating gay people, that’s part of who he is and I WOULDN’T expect him to apologize for that, no matter how mad people get for it. I said he apologized for his statement, and when I read “If I offend anyone, I’m sorry.” that’s what it sounds like to me, sure his follow up may not have been the best, but it’s clear that all he was trying to do was make a joke and it exploded in his face.
Also, you’re comparison is just silly. Yeah, you’re going to hurt somebody if you punch them, no shit, you can’t apologize for something like a punch hurting. But with a joke it’s different, he thought you guys would take it better than you did, and when he saw how offended you got he apologized for it. Have you never said something that offended somebody because you misjudged the situation and thought they’d find it humorous?
See, now you’re just apologizing FOR him. I’d rather hear it from Aizat, not Me@Me.com.
I love you so much right now that it is physically painful.
Um. That’s over-simplifying and misinterpreting a LOT by leaving out the context.
Someone needs to do their Bibilical homework. Oh by all means assume it was Homosexuality based on some suspect translations and interpretations at best.
Nevermind the the other passages that state the crimes of Sodom much more plainly and don’t mention Homosexuality at all. For example:
Jeremiah 23:14; Ezekiel 16:49–50; Matthew 10:14–15; 2 Peter 2:6–8
And don’t try to point at “know them” passage with the angels, based on how it is used the majority of the time it literally means know. This statement becomes clearer when you realise Lot was considered an outsider, who then invited strangers into the city. So it’s just as likely they wanted to know who these strangers are.
Then even after that you want to go the sex route. It’s called gang rape, pretty sure that’s a sin. Then your point fails further when you realise, no Homosexual acts ocurred in said story. Just the possibility of a threat of one.
So yeah, if you can’t even be bothered doing your homework, not to mention allowing a dodgy story like this one affect your attitude towards a group of people, you’re asking for it honestly.
Don’t take your preacher’s word for it, read.
Right, I’m pretty sure it was more that there was RAPE happening (or being threatened to visitors) than a matter of which gender was raping which gender.
Nicely argued.
Sadly, the bible (along with other religious texts) its often used merely to back up our preexisting beliefs – whether they be good or bad ones. Its not enough for us to have the belief ourselves, we look to have it backed up by a higher source – and that basicly means confirmation bias when reading religious quotes.(normaly which you have heard others saying).
It is rare indeed for someone to read over the bible and truely decide what is right or wrong based on it – in all cases they have probably made up their mind already. (and, to be sure, this isnt always a bad thing).
In the case of homosexuality, the inate belief that many have that its wrong probably comes from the ¨ickey factor¨ as a straight male I find it very unpleasent to think about homosexual acts. The trick is, anyone sensible, should realize that feeling does not corispond to it being ¨wrong¨ or ¨harmfall¨ (or contagious…) in any way.
I can’t believe any of you (nobody in specific) even take this back to the scripture and try to pin it on another ‘actual’ wrongful act of humanity. That is basically still exactly the same as pinning the reason on homosexuality (which is quite possibly neolithical in origin), because it blames the actions of humans for a common natural disaster. Doesn’t anyone here just consider the actual probable geology? What the hell do you need to look at ridiculously ignorant scripture for to find the cause in morality? Just because it is an old tale does not make it accurate, divine nor wise. Quite the contrary. Say people did turn into pillars of salt, let’s see where that happened as well.
Anyone considered this concept called vulcanoes? Pyroclastic flows? People turning into salt pillars and ash from above doesn’t make anyone think of a certain Vesuvius eruption reported on by Plinius (who was a Roman and educated, yet said the eruption was harmless so he took a bath and died)? Could that be it? A certain arabian peninsula being bordered by fault lines as continental plates collide meaning possible vulcanic activity?
Why the hell would you ever try to pin a natural disaster on the actions of people, or a whimsical god, if you can easily explain it by being in the wrong place at the wrong time?
No clearly, the Japanese tsunamis are retaliation for Pearl Harbour and the Indian Ocean tsunami is for not being islamic enough, or was it not being christian enough or having terrorists in the country, right? Because that is the level of thought used here, for ANY of the “reasons”. Pick random bad things and turn a disaster into a scare story about morality. No way it could be a natural phenomenon reported on and interpreted wrong (quite probably with a social agenda) by and for ignorant, uneducated people who declared it ‘(divine) fact’.
People should not just read it themselves, but try to read through the moral / social values being promoted and try to see what the actual events were.
Or does any of you believe in Hercules’ creation story of the Rock of Gibraltar as well? Or is that too Greek to be a reliable source?
No, we’re trying to disassemble the argument of why someone hates homosexuals and point out that their reasoning is based on a lie or a misconception. Some of us can be Christian while still acknowledging the complete and utter bullcrap of some parts of the Bible… or the people who claim to understand it.
Actually Han, I don’t believe a word of that book. I’m positive it would have happened even if the city was a paragon of good morals. We also have to account for who’s writing the story down, could be they just didn’t like Sodom much and it was an easy target since it was gone. Sodom could have easily been a very lovely city, people have been known to lie.
As Linkara said we’re just dissasembling the argument to someone who genuinely believes it was caused by bad people and showing how iffy Bible scripture is. The only way you can argue with them is by pointing out their superfluous interpretations, which most of the time isn’t even their own.
I’m right there with you on it being a natural disater that just happened.
Your forgetting that the two cities were not being punished for their sexual preferences but for the open Malice that greeted the visiters of the cities.
..are you saying homosexuals are so fat they sunk it?
“full of sinners and homosexuals”
Not that you actually got that from any kind of scripture, historical document, or, y’know, ANYTHING AT ALL, but at least you’re acknowledging that they’re two different things with no relation to each other.
And, seriously, you make sweeping horrible comments about massive groups of innocent people without cause or provocation, but you’re upset because people are attacking you individually, objectively, and in reaction to something evil you’ve done?
Hypocrite. Jesus likes those, right?
The part of my Bible where Jesus complains about hypocrites and people who abuse their religious texts to hurt people are obviously typos; it’s obviously supposed to say “queers”.
You hate gays because of your religion… Seriously? >Shakes head< That has to be one of the saddest thing I have ever heard. Religion doesn't give anyone the right to hate. In fact, most religions I've studied dissuade people hatred because of the fact it leads away from the righteous paths that they try and teach. Anyone who can declare their hatred without any sense of regret, but instead pride… I pity them.
Yes, I’ve heard of the Dead Sea and Sodom. Have you ever heard of : Jeremiah 23:13,14 and Ezekiel 16:48-50?
My favorite things to ask people who bring up Sodom are the following: Would God, who is good, have been cool with the situation if the angels had been women? Isn’t rape of guests, rape period? Can the historical context of raping men as an act of dominance be really ignored? Can you be intellectually honest and compare gang rape, especially in its historical context, to a selfless exclusive romantic relationship between two consenting adults?
I’m not even homosexual and I’ll insult you. Bigoted asshole.
Whoa, just relax. I’m not a bigot. I’m just a guy who would like some natural order restored in this world. Is that a crime?
Not a crime to want that, but that line of thinking does lead to a lot of hate crimes.
It’s also not a crime to call a bigot a bigot. Bigot.
I did not mean hate as in try to kill someone hate. It’s more like the feeling you get when you’re stuck in traffic. Besides, I know a couple of them and at first I’m a bit freaked out but I looked past their sexual orientation and accept them for who they are.
But you still hate them. While “accepting” them. Got it.
It’s not a crime. It just kinda makes you a dick.
Do you really like gay people for who they are? I worked with a guy who talks like you- he didn’t know I was gay until he asked. He talked a lot about gay people before that, and talked about how he wasn’t homophobic, but then always added homophobic beliefs he held. He didn’t really like me for who I am despite what he said.
Personally, as a gay person, I don’t care that much if you like me or not, I’m more interested in: will you vote to hurt my family? Will you be one of the people who costs me thousands of dollars a year in extra taxes and a lot of extra anxiety about how my wishes and requests will be ignored in an emergency?
If you’re not, any debate between us can be friendly and academic in nature. If you are – the claim that you “like” me is worth less than a three dollars bill.
What is a crime is that religion is invaded by tomism forgeting the humanist and existencialist brands of theology. Also is a crime to say you undersand the scriptures without reading hebrew, greek and arameo. Another crime is trying to profes a relgion that bases its belifs in fundational text writen in xvii century (the “instructions” for reading the bible, catholic church has one fom 105 years ago). And your final crime is hypocresy, profesing love but at the same time hating homsexuals. Freedom of expresion? Ha! Should I give that to Nazis and frat-boys too? (hint: they are not too smart) talk all you want, we will tolerate you, but we will NOT respect you
Well… As a member of a fraternity, Gerardo, I would in fact very much like to keep my Freedom of Expression. We’re not all drunken gay-bashers. In fact, when I joined the current president was gay.
Yeah, there are some bad frats out there, but lumping us in with Nazis? When you’re trying to promote tolerance and acceptance, it’s not a particularly smooth move to blindly bash on “safe” targets like that.
Why is natural order better? Survival of the fittest is natural, but its hardly cilivilised.
Not that homosexuality is nesscerly unnatural anyway. Its counter to individualy gene spreeding – but then, so is self-sacrifice humans sometimes do to save others, and we hardly say thats wrong do we?
The way we came to be…though evolution,design, or a hybred, allows for these things, so who are we to say they are unnatural? and even if they are, why is unnatural universaly seen as wrong?
Birth control has had a bigger impact on the number of babies born than the existence of gay people. Interestingly enough, food stability has also brought the birthrate down, humans are a bit weird in that the less you feed us, the more we seem to reproduce.
There are (Better scientists can correct me on the exact number if they wish.) about 700 species in the animal kingdom that exhibit homosexual behavior.
There is only one that exhibits homophobia. Who’s being unnatural now?
Gay happens in nature. So does Bi. Look up the Kinsey Scale. Trying to make everyone straight is unnatural. Not that it matters; argument from nature is a fallacy. It’s just that your hatred is so affecting your reasoning abilities that you can’t even make a fallacy right. It’s a fallacy within a fallacy. Cue Inception horn.
This is funny, if it was ironic. If not, less funny.
Way to comment on a commit where most of the main characters are gay or have had gay sex. You don’t have to be here you know.
*comic
silly typo, sorry
Actually, I don’t hate the characters at all. In a hate scale of 1-10, 10 being the thing I hate the most that is whining emos, homosexuals in general are 2 as in minor annoyance.
Handily enough, a 2 on that scale also encompasses trolls on a popular forum’s comment section. So that’s also what you are. To the world.
This is a big part of why I don’t go to cons. Bigotry from certain segments of fandom is dispiriting enough online. Encountering it up close, with others visibly and audibly cheering it on, is something I can do without all together, thanks.
It’d be bad enough, if it was just the fandom…when the creators have a dumbass response like that one… >_<
I agree…. I probably would have left the room in tears if I heard the creators of a show I loved say that or something similiar.
Not only would my view on the individual be shattered , it would ruin the series for me.
I don’t watch transformers that much though so this doesn’t bother me as I’m sure it bothers Ethen
Will this result in a Broken Pedestal for Ethan and if it does, would it affect his love/interest in Transformers?
And people wonder why I get touchy about shit.
You touch what now?
Now now, don’t judge other people’s kinks.
How’d the answerer manage to leave, what with his foot in his mouth and all?
Eh, sometimes people that work on shows you love can be backwards cultural conservatives.
Doug Tennapel, anyone?
Indeed. I started following Tennapel on Twitter a while back. This was roughly during the 2008 election season. I very quickly had to drop him like a hot potato. It was rather disheartening to learn that the guy who made Earthworm Jim and Neverhood and Sockbaby was so… so fucking stupid.
What did Tennapel say/do…I’m sort of familiar with his work, but not with his person.
Well, a cursory look through his twitter feed found references to the “Liberal agenda” and he may have referred to Barack Obama as “Generalissimo” (not sure on that one at all, seemed to be in reference to the Weiner fiasco)
BTW, Weiner Fiasco is my Village People cover band.
Generalissimo is Italian for “the big general”.
It was the nickname of Franco, Italian’s dictator during WWII.
Benito Mussolini. Franco was dictator of Spain. Please forgive my pedantry.
Mussolini was Il Duce (the Duke)…Franco was, in fact, called Generalissimo – but he was actually a general, so it’s a valid title, not really a nickname (aside from the fact he was frequently called that even in English).
TenNapel is just… he’s hell-bent on offending people. He’s got a comic called Ratfist and he- in the middle of a sequence- spent a panel to attack furries.
In a webcomic about a person who’s an anthropomorphic rat. He’s a twit.
Sounds more like a troll than a twit. Not that the two categories don’t have a significant overlap, of course.
(Weirdly, this is insanely common, actually. Not necessarily in the comic itself, but people who draw comics with anthro characters going on rants about furries. Sometimes it seems more common to draw anthro comics if you hate them than if you like them. :p)
You see, Doug Tennapel has studied the teachings of this Middle Eastern philosopher named Jesus of Nazareth. A great deal of what Jesus taught was adapted from Judaism, an ancient religion that, among other things, obsesses over inheritance, property rights, and family succession.
In short, Homosexuality was punished (by death!) because, without a woman “changing hands”, how would you know which family got some of the other family’s stuff?
Anyway, after Jesus was himself punished-by-death for breaking from Judaism, his disciples dedicated themselves to spreading his message. A cult was formed, worshipping Jesus as God himself (or “Christ”), which, especially after catching on in the empires of Europe, eventually transformed into one of the dominating religious faiths in the present day.
However, in large parts of the “Christian” faith, the prohibition on homosexuality is still in effect. in Catholicism, for example, homosexual acts, like all extra-marital sex acts, are punishable by eternal damnation(!). Many in the gay community therefore hold all Christians in suspicion and contempt.
So, what did Doug Tennapel do? He blogs. And he defends his arguments. As an artist and a Christian, this causes him to be as reviled on the internet as Sarah Palin covered in 3D glasses.
Yes, he blogs and defends his arguments. He also defends them incredibly poorly and compares same-sex marriage to women pooping in the men’s room (or some such).
What is your point?
Women pooping in the men’s room? That’s a new one…
Apparently he deleted the comments, but the quote in question has him reponding to someone asking what issue he has with two men in love marrying:
“The same argument I have against letting a man take a dump in the ladies room. And office appropriate for one sex isn’t automatically appropriate for another, no matter how much a man loves taking a dump in the ladies room.”
huh… Well that was a terrible comparison on his part.
my only comment on this is that if I’m remembering it right the term christ originally just meant you got your ass nailed to a cross by the Romans.
It comes from the greek christos, “annointed,” actually. A direct tranlation of “messiah.”
[Googles "Christ"... Google says to ask Wikipedia...]
Oh. Says here that Christ means “anointed one” or “messiah”, and not “God”. Woops.
My point is, I’ve just read Doug TenNapel being called… let’s see… “backwards”, “a twit”, and “so fucking stupid”, in the middle of a discussion about casual prejudice, because those posters don’t believe a conservative is worthy of the respect they themselves are indignant isn’t being shown to an imaginary robot.
I agreed with you until the ‘imaginary robot’ thing. That’s a straw man. Nobody’s up in arms about the robot, they’re offended by insinuations, intentional or otherwise, regarding the nature of homosexuality itself.
… But “I have friends who are” Republican and “I like them as people”
j/k I think a lot of the political policies of the Republican Part are bad for various reasons. Most of the anti-conservative things I say are, anti-idiotic individuals, not anti-conservative thought. There’s a difference between saying Sarah Palin doesn’t know history, and all Republicans are ignorant about basic historical facts taught in elementary school.
OK, now lets move past the anti Republican thing and focus on the sheer amount of hatred towards Christians on this board (not from “R” specifically). Christians don’t deserve it any more than gays do. I’m starting to get a little embarrassed for listening to a “tolerant” group that keeps bashing a group that MOSTLY wants to follow a good and tolerant message. Willis’ comments about tribesmen and a comparison to a Paul Bunyon fable are a pretty good example.
Shit people, I’m atheist and I’m starting to get offended. What the hell are you people doing?
No they’re calling him a twit cause he’s a homophobe. If conservative and homophobe are synonyms for you then that’s all on you.
The only person who mentioned conservatives, even in passing, were the first poster, who modified the term as “backwards cultural conservatives.” No one calling him a twit or stupid mentions anything except his homophobia.
Yes, because all conservatives are horrible, intolerant racist bastards, just like all liberals are tree-hugging, ineffective, overly-idealistic hippies, dontchaknow. *rolls his eyes* As a conservative that can still enjoy Colbert and Stewart alongside Limbaugh and Hannity (for the entertainment value), and has actually some lesbian friends I outright support, I hate this stereotype.
You’re welcome to be a conservative. I frankly don’t care what your political affiliations are. But please, speaking as a member of the queer community, don’t use your kindness to your friends as a show of your good faith. Say you support homosexual rights or something. We’re people, not merely badges that you can collect and show off so that everyone can see how ‘accepting’ you are.
You are not badges!? D=
Oh men, that means I can no longer show my gay-friends-badges collection.
I will have to look something else to brag about. ;___;
I hear if you get all eight, you can challenge the Elite Four.
In Sexymon, you don’t fight the Elite Four. You fight the Elite Foursome.
But is it POSSIBLE, for a man, to love, another MAN?
(Repeat forty five times. ‘Entertainment value’ my ass.)
Those who cannot except a person for who they are does not have the mental capacity to be considered a modern evolved human.
Yes, from time to time, we must all be excepted for who we are. Truly, we are all exceptional, in our own exceptional ways.
I sure hope that’s a typo.
I agree with your point, but I just have to do this.
*accept not except
*do not does
I ment accept sorry it’s just that I’m bi so hearing comments that look down on a persons gender preferences is a real sore spot for me like the kind of sore that if you don’t tend to it gets infected and just makes you feel worse. Well comments like that are the infection of my sore.
I’m glad I left for all the Q&As
Aww Ethan needs a hug
Hell I need a hug after that it gave me a sad
Aww :C I’ll hug you!
-hugs- :c
Woo! Captain America live-in!
Woo! Captain America love-in!
I totally agree! I imagine this was a totally horrible experience for him.
*hugs* all around.
Personally I’ve always kinda considered robots having either gender or a preference of any kind thereof kinda glitchy anyway…
This is true, but it’s clear that this particular case was aimed at homosexuality, not robosexuality.
well yeah but maybe it’s my complete indifference to who’s putting their dicks in what, but a show about giant robots seems a silly place to even have the issue come up. “hey look, they’re giant metal humans with giant metal human issues” gets old.
Um… wow. Yeah, just… just wow. I’m alone in the room and that answer STILL managed to somehow create awkward silence.
See, Transformers: Prime is bad in a variety of ways.
Wow. Well then.
SPECIAL INTEREST GROUP OFFENDED MODE
[X] ACTIVE
[_] INACTIVE
You mean minority group. Right?
holy crap wow.
You just know Optimus Prime’s a homophobe, anyway.
Well, Optimus IS Jewish…
I guarantee you that most of the losers dissing, laughing and clapping were self-loathing closet cases. Simply pathetic.
Isn’t that statistically improbable? There are plenty of motives, apart from the hiding of a secret, for joking and being unsensitive. This is all fiction, of course, but if it were real, I’m sure most of them would be laughing just because of the discourtesy, meanwhile being gay-friendly.
Everybody’s a little racist; and homophobic, for that matter. (God, I love that musical. xD ).
A lot of people probably just laughed because they were already in a laughing and clapping mood, they were just laughing and clapping at joke A, and he told joke B, and sometimes it’s hard to instantly switch mindsets.
I find it incredibly easy to stop laughing and clapping when you say something sickeningly offensive no matter how trite the immediately preceding statement was.
Sometimes it takes a litle bit for an offensive comment to sink in.
You are wrong about this. By a country mile.
It’s been proved that one is VERY fond of laughing once the “laugh mood” is on. Most comedians start their speeches with “How about a little clapping for the DJ/the guy who came before me/the barman?”, because a capping audience is an audience prone to “laugh mood”.
The same joke in different mood creates different responses.
Moreover, it’s also been proved that people laugh when they feel awkward or uncomfortable as well.
As long as the joke was not “SO-OFFENSIVE-I-KNOW-WANT-TO-KILL-HIM”, even people who disliked the joke probably laughed.
If you’re trying to tell me that people don’t do this in general, fine. If otherwise, please don’t tell me how wrong I am when I talk about about how I personally react to things when you don’t know the first thing about me.
Why do you get offended so easily? XD
Maybe I misread your phrase, but as far as I understood it, it was something like:
“I can easily stop laughing and clapping any time, therefore it’s something easy and everyone can do it.”
I just wanted to point out I disagreed, no need to take it personal. XD
Dude, you called me wrong when I was talking about myself and how I personally react in a certain situation. I took it personal because that is the textbook fucking definition of personal.
But it wasn’t, and you just failed to clarify that you were acting on an assumption on your part about what I was saying.
You aren’t wrong about your personal experience. You are wrong to use your anecdotal evidence to argue a statistical point. People in general show this behavior even if you do not.
I was there, and I can say most of us were just still giggling over the fact someone had the gall to ask if he was gay, and that they were even answering instead of shooing them out. They answered it pretty quickly and all were talking over each other, so even though I remember them making the comment about “glitches” it wasn’t until after the panel that I actually had the time to think about the implications and go “Wait what.” I think that goes for most people there. Personally I’m extremely supportive of LGBT rights, but was still laughing at their comments because as you said, you can’t instantly switch gears.
I really didn’t get the impression they meant to say what they did, and I hope they make a comment about it to set things straight, since otherwise the show has had a lot of little moments that seem a lot more liberal than most kid’s programs. Male characters hug and Miko referred to Wheeljack as Bulkhead’s “boyfriend” without anyone going through the motions to assure the audience they’re straight, and KO does act in ways that make you think he might be gay, but it’s never the butt of jokes, it’s just his personality, and that makes him appealing.
I love the musical too, but that song is such bullshit. It misunderstands what racism actually is and seems to allow for “reverse racism” which is utter bullshit.
Their argument is okay, but their conclusion is incredibly bad.
“Everyone has racist thoughts, so instead of dealing with it let’s do it on purpose more, because that makes it okay!”
Most people will use any ammunation they can grab hold of to justify their beliefs.
A person’s willingness to accept that any of their beliefs are wrong and be willing to change it is an all too UNCOMMON thing.
These characters accept that they’re wrong, and therefore that it’s okay.
The problem is that this is portrayed as right. They’re definitely characters who could say something stupid and be wrong, but that doesn’t seem to be what they’re going for.
In some countries, we apply some sort of “positive discrimination”, which I think is what you are talking about when you say “reverse racism”. In my country, the norm focuses on women rights. It is unjust, but it can help to change society, so it can be seen like a temporal measure.
… This has nothing to do with the strip at all, sorry. ^__^U
Positive discrimination is a double edged sword, while it can provide a ‘foot in the door’ to positions previously unavalible fto individuals from certain groups, those same people acchievements & reps are ‘tainted’ by being the recipient of said positive discrimination.
How is that supposed to work? I mean, nobody assumes all racists secretly want to be ::insert race here::. Most homophobes are straight people who honestly believe homosexuals to be evil amoral deviants.
Sorry, but that whole mindset drives me nuts. It’s like claiming the only people making problems for homosexuals are other homosexuals in denial.
Because homosexuality is an invisible trait, meaning that people are capable of lying about it (to themselves and others).
People who are absolutely obsessed with gay sex, who argue that everybody experiences attractions to members of the same sex but moral people don’t act on it and look I have a spouse of the opposite sex–they seem a little gay, sometimes.
That doesn’t mean that it applies to all anti-gay villains, of course.
See also Ex-Gays.
Can that trope die in a fire already? Jelli covers it pretty well. Homophobia is a STRAIGHT problem, and any homophobic homosexuals are that way because of what STRAIGHT society has imposed on them. For every homophobic homosexual, there are at least ten homophobic heterosexuals.
I’ve never understood the logic behind this argument, and isn’t it a little strange/hypocritical to mocking homophobes by insisting that they’re just gay?
It’s the hypocrisy that is being mocked.
No, the general rule is that “casual” anti-gay people- ie people who don’t like homosexuality but don’t do anything about it other than vote against their rights and occasionally bash it- are usually just straight assholes. It’s the people who dedicate their lives to eradicating the homosexual menace that are self-loathing closet cases.
In other words, the probability of being a closet homosexual is proportional to how much energy you put into opposing homosexuality.
…whoa. Did that actually…happen? I sort of want to give all the Ethans in the audience a hug.
I am not a glitch. :C
“…whoa. Did that actually…happen? I sort of want to give all the Ethans in the audience a hug.”
I feel the exact same way. Couldn’t have said it better myself.
Seems Willis is gunning for a GLAAD award…
…and you know what? I wouldn’t mind. Because this gay geek TOTALLY GETS this comic.
Do they give out awards for webcomics? If so, Willis definitely should have it, if I understand the purpose behind their awards.
I concur – Shortpacked! has done amazing things to better represent gay geeks. And this strip really takes the cake.
How can any Autobot or Decepticon have a sexual orientation? They don’t reproduce sexually… do they?
When a Manbot and a Fembot love each other so much…….
And to think that all this time, I thought they were all autosexuals.
But…they can’t get in bed with Urmomtron. Or, if they can…WHAT DO THEY USE AFTER THE NICKEL?!
DAMMIT, WILLIS, WHAT DO THEY DO?!
They use chrome?
nah, Firefox – it has more plugins ans attachements they can use….
Wait… self sexuals, so transformers reproduce through masturbation?
They masturbate into the Spark and that’s how baby Transformers are made.
A GLITCH is the Tranformer equivient of a FAP.
And somewhere on the internet this visual is being drawn and posted…
You gotta love Rule 36… ^_^
Or are they Deceptisexuals?
I can’t believe it’s taken this long for the subject of autoeroticism to arise.
You can go ask Tramp. I’m sure he’ll give you a disturbingly meticulously researched all of text on how babby Transformer is formed.
They don’t, yet canon shows Transformers with genders and orientations. So logically the Transformers invented both just for fun.
Or picked them up while dealing with organic species.
It’s not a glitch, it’s a feature.
Also, if this actually happened, please don’t tell me. I like my little world of delusions where people are accepting and nice.
There are a few comments further down you probably shouldn’t read then…
Don’t assume malice when stupidity is still an option. Still not good.
Hanlon’s Razor!
I’m not assuming malice. Homophobia is still homophobia, it doesn’t need intent to magically make it so.
So… You don’t need to be afraid of homosexuals in order to be a homophobe? Or did I get that wrong?
I’m more of a proponent of unintentionally stupid in this case – but it’s hard to tell from a single statement.
You don’t have to be intentionally setting out to offend people to say something offensive. It was a stupid thing for the panelist to say, but the stupidity reveals some scary thinking about homosexuality. Is that hard?
Oh, it was totally a foot-in-the-mouth kind of thing, and definitely cringe-worthy. I’m not sure it implies homophobia or hating homosexuals or anything, though. Certainly, there’s indication that the speaker has bad self-monitoring or alternately no clear idea of when the line is crossed.
But language is a really clumsy vehicle for expressing thought – benefit of the doubt might be a prudent course of action. And pointing.
If someone carelessly drove over you in a car, the fact that they did not ~intend~ to drive over you does not take away from the fact that you were hit by a car.
If someone stole your wallet and you then couldn’t afford the cab fare to the hospital to be with a loved one on their death bed, the fact that they didn’t ~intend~ to do so doesn’t make grandma willing to wait a little longer whilst you walked.
The fact that someone said something homophobic, like, that they were flawed at birth, and they didn’t ~intend~ to? DOES NOT STOP IT FROM BEING HOMOPHOBIC.
Aren’t you being a little bit extreme?
Comparing an “offensive comment” with a “hit a run”?
Sounds far fetched to me. XD
All and all, while the comment was most unfortunate , it’s still only a comment.
It was an homophobic comment, but who knows?
You should try not to over-react about this.
Two things don’t have to be on the same scale to be compared.
The statement also has the potential to harm a lot more people than a hit-and-run driver, so that’s different!
But only one aspect was being compared–the similar one.
Intent usually matters, though. Carelessly hitting someone with a car implies stupidity, not road rage. Your simile actually bears out the whole possibly-not-homophobic-just-stupid reasoning here.
The stealing a wallet is mean to begin with, though, and takes considerably more effort than saying something stupid.
Knowing everyone will say something stupid (from your own P.O.V. at least) sometime makes every relationship you’ll have in life. Knowing you will say something stupid yourself helps accepting that noone is perfect.
Knowing everyone will say something stupid (from your own P.O.V. at least) sometime makes every relationship you’ll have in life _easier_. Knowing you will say something stupid yourself helps accepting that noone is perfect.
… Need to be more careful about checking what I’ve written in the future.
You’re right, it does matter. Which is why if someone says “Oh god I’m sorry, I had no idea” afterwards that CAN be a mitigating factor. It doesn’t stop something homophobic from being homophobic.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homophobia
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/homophobia
Look at the definitions. If you want to scoff the fact I’m using wikipedia, grab a dictionary and look up its local version. Homophobia requires an aversion to the non-hetero, or antipathy, or prejudice. It DOES NOT require intent.
Do you also believe that if someone said “I’m not racist but all black people are thieves” and believed it, that they were not racist?
I’m fond of the pathenogenic species of whiptail lizards where female/female mating behaviour isn’t just existent…it’s the usual way of doing things, and actually has reproductive impact!
Argh…closed the tab, then when I came back to make that post, I hit the wrong reply link…that was supposed to connect to the post where it’s germane. >_<
No, thats not true at all.
Homophobia is a belief, or rather, a fear.
Anyone can say something that causeś offense to that group without being homophobic….I cant see that in this case easily, but its certainly possible.
To state that everything people say stems from their beliefs is just wrong. Mistakes, slips of the tough…or even just ignorance…can play parts.
For example, maybe he thought gays really are a genetic mistake – which makes him wrong (at least,according to most current research) – but doesnt nesscerily make him scared of homosexuals or even that he thinks it needs to be ¨corrected¨. (after all, evolutionary we have all benifited from ´mistakes´ or ´mutations´…they arnt always a bad thing.
Theres many levels of wrongness possible here, all we can state with absolyte certainity is that it was a stupid comment that caused offence.
Homophobia is not JUST about fear. Do you have a different definition to the two resources I linked to back up your explanation?
But anyway, using your logic it might not mean that the person in question is homophobic, sure I’ll give you that, though I don’t personally think this is any slip of the, err, tough. But can you acknowledge that the statement itself is homophobic, regardless of what the person wanted it to be?
The term Homophobia has always bothered me, it implies that the sufferer has an irrational fear they cannot help but experience, thus potentially offering an excuse for any bigot to explain away their hatred.
We don’t use the phobia aspect for discrimination against race, creeds, sexes or colours, so why use it for sexual orientation?
I think “xenophobia” applies to fear and hatred of someone based on their race or culture.
I almost forgot about that term but it has been a long time since I heard that one being used.
It should also mean “fear of the same”, since “homo-” is Greek for “same” (it also happens to be a Latin word that means “man” as in “homo sapiens”, but that’s unrelated to both the word “homosexual” and how fears are named). Whether that means monotony or conformity, that seems like something that it makes sense to be afraid of.
It’s also very specific. Prejudice against homosexuals instead of prejudice based on orientation. So it’s different from racism or sexism.
It’s just a bad word. I have no idea how it became the popular term for anti-gay prejudice.
You know what I hate about homophobia? It’s the fact that no one knows what the word actually means. It more accurately describes someone that can’t handle a steady job or a consistent menu than someone that hates homosexuals, let alone those who didn’t think before speaking.
We don’t automatically call people who make thoughtlessly racist comments xenophobic. We don’t call people who thoughtlessly make things difficult for left handed people sinestrophobic.
It’s bad, but keep it in context.
You know what *I* hate about homophobia? That it oppresses people, makes them feel worthless, unnatural, inhuman, sinful, a mistake, a glitch. That they hear it from their employers, their teachers, their leaders, their church, their friends, their family, random people in the street, the media that they enjoy and the people behind it. That people are raped as a means of ‘fixing’ them. That people are murdered.
People not knowing what a word means is bad, but keep it in context.
We do, however, call people who make thoughtless racist comments “racist”.
“Homophobia” is a terrible word. I agree with that. It shouldn’t have become the common word for “prejudice against gay people”–but that IS what it means.
Gayist perhaps?
I’d prefer something that *wasn’t* specifically gay, myself.
Like racism or sexism apply to prejudice against any/all races or sexes.
But I’m not the boss of the language.
“Sexualitist?” Yeah I’m not good at language either, I just go with what I’ve got.
It maybe a bit on the narrow side but it does have a catchy sound to it as gayist rhymes with racist.
Queerist might work but it doesn’t roll off the tongue as well as gayist does.
Hetro has been known as straight while all the other orientations as often refered to as bent so possibly antibentitist could work…
In short, my ideas for popularising new terminology like gayist, queerist or antibentitist could take off if the right people or characters use them, who knows.
Your unstated premise that these are mutually exclusive conditions is false.
If anything, they’re complimentary.
That latter comment really cross the line.
And no it was not a glitch. He was the dream Decepticon the Allspark always wanted.
And I’m sure Ethan was not the only one in the room (fictional or otherwise) who felt like they got punched in the gut there. Hugs for everyone!
Aww, his expression breaks my heart
ROBOTS DON’T HAVE GENITALS
And?
Don’cha know? Gender and sexual identity is COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY tied to physical sex.
And cars don’t have hands and feet. Robo-junk is there, it’s just… genitals in disguise!
Now I’m imagining a scene where a new Transformer walks in and one of those already present has the five-tone buzz-crunch from the general area of their crotch.
Everyone else stares. The new arrival raises a metal eyebrow. The one who… reacted, blushes.
John Turturro would like to have a word with you…
They fire you for that in Mexico if you say it on television. A “glitch”, I’m not gay but that’s pretty insulting.
Maybe I am not seeing much television lately, but as far as I know mexican television is not a bastion of acceptance… Esteban Arce hasn’t been fired yet http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Smrakb5ZHlk last time I checked and the guy tends to find new lows not only in homophobia but in general stupidity -.- People like him get a huge backlash, but they don’t really fired for being offensive.
He IS STILL WORKING?!!! thanks for the info, I really thought they would fire him, but yeah, he does get huge backlash from the public.
I’m too G1 to know who Knockout is, but if substituted for Tracks I’d get the joke and feel just as bad for Ethan. Then again some writers have made the Decepticons more than 2 dimensional bad guys. Who knows maybe Megatron is a non discriminatory despot bot.
Megatron strikes me as the kind of guy who doesn’t care what his troops do in their spare time as long as they’re getting the job done. Flirting with the other guys is probably one of the least harmful eccentricities a Decepticon has ever shown.
The fact that he put up with Starscream so long is proof of that.
I like being a glitch then that means I have more personality than the thousands of non glitchy drones. Us glitches are like that one toy of someones favorite show being recalled because of a defect which then causes collectors to want us because then we become rare and more valuable than our still on the shelf counterparts.
And those who cannot appreciate us for our so called “glitches” must suffer my Wrath! Hahahahahahaha!
I’m not super familiar with Transformers, so do they even have a gender? They’re robots. Feel free to correct me.
Outside of the Marvel US comics (cos Marvel UK brought in Arcee), Transformers have always had genders that are exactly like ours and never really explained why. Knock Out’s the second gay Decepticon in canon too, but the first to not be “AHAHAHA HE’S GAY FOR THE LEADER THAT’S HILARIOUS!!!”.
The mainline IDW comics are the same way…mostly. Some of them bring in the whole gender thing accidentally by using characters like Elita-One, but theoretically, Arcee’s the only female Cybertronian in the IDW universe, and she was deliberately created, like the one in Marvel continuity. (Though through different methods…though both stories are problematic in various ways.)
But, yeah…most canons have two genders (though there’s rather a gender imbalance) and generally imply romantic feelings – though they may be played down.
the first being Starscream?
Oh wait, that’s just fanon.
I believe he means this dude:
http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Tidal_Wave_(Armada)
(Look at the end of the “Energon cartoon” section)
:3 I always knew there was a reason I liked Tidal Wave.
Would it be better or worse from a LGBT pov if the joke continued: The Allspark made him FR but he always felt he should be FF?
(mentioning scooters would go back to gay-bashing)
Now that is sad…
For me, the saddest part is that it followed up with LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE.
It’s one perfectly natural and spontaneous reaction to an awkward, shocking statement that catches people off guard in a relaxed moment. Not ideal, and I’m pretty sure some of the laughers were pretty horrified at their reactions once the statement sunk in.
I’ll agree as far as the laughter. Laughter is a natural spontaneous response to anything the brain can’t logically process, so it could just as easily be “Did he seriously just say that in 2011 america?” as “LOL gay robots!” Applause, however, requires an extra effort and I’m pretty sure is a fair indicator of approval and/or agreement.
EXACTLY. Thank you.
To be fair, we are talking about a robot that feints when he gets excited. Perhaps people with epilepsy should be offended too.
Surely people who fence, too?
I see what you did there.
CLEVER. <3
You joke, but gay epileptic Transformers fans are LIVID.
All 4 of them.
On the other hand, given the various TF shows’ frequent display of conservative values re: gender roles and stereotypes, I’m not all that surprised… I mean, each ‘bot has a personality gimmick: Tough, coward, extremely lyoal, a bit dumb… or female. Slightly better nowadays, perhaps, than in the G1 days, but still…
Its hard to say one way or another?
I think the real problem is that it is a cultural undertone. I haven’t seen the latest show or really listened to the creators but honestly there is so much unconscious social stigma on this issue people will just say this kinda stuff without realizing what it really means. It’s a whole other social thing to confront but people can joke around then just speak off key without knowing.
Honestly so many transformers are “glitched” with gimmicky personalities I’d swear that the Allspark just has more off days then it does on.
I suppose the creators COULD be jerks too, just feel maybe this could be explained later or whatever rather then calling them all the new racists.
http://genderbitch.wordpress.com/2010/01/23/intent-its-fucking-magic/
I love that post.
I know that feel bro.
I love that possible homosexuality is a glitch, but being a paranoid nutcase or making sculptures out of dead bodies is presumably “normal”
Oh god. I felt that very last panel in my chest man.
*holds up a protest sign that says “It’s Not a Glitch – It’s a Feature!”*
Given that there aren’t too many female Transformers, you’d think homosexuality would be the norm. Then Arcee and the other fembots could complain that all of the good AND bad ones are either gay or one with the Allspark.
So I dont see the problem. A Glitch by definition is an Irregularity in a system.
Homosexuality is a deviation from the norm and as such is an irregularity.
Therefore the explanation offered was apt.
Anyone offended by the use of the term glitch is only offended because they refuse to accept that homosexuals are different. The fact is they are, We are all different in our own way and the Glitches that make our personalities different from the homogeneous mass of “clones” that exist in the modern world are what we should be proud of and embrace. Nobody should know that better then the Geek/Otaku/Gamer/Cosplayer subcultures. I am different and proud of my glitches.
You don’t see the problematic implications of conflating homosexuality with a “glitch”? There’s more to words than what’s in the dictionary. Fucking connotation, how does it work?
Thank you for putting that into words. It’s a bit frustrating watching everyone read negative meanings into what might have simply been a poor choice of words. (I say poor because the words have offended a lot of people.)
My friends and family are people I love for their differences, and for those things that make them unique. My wife’s glitches are what make her who she is, and I love her for them. Yes, I can see how people could take the answerer’s words and read homophobia or other meanings into them…but couldn’t he also mean that he’s “unique”, and think that “glitch” was a cute way to use a transformer-esque word? It’s not like the guy’s a professional politician that should be expected to choose his words carefully. Maybe people are reading meaning into his words that wasn’t there.
People are offended because “glitch” is what people say to mean an unintended fault. It does not mean “unique”, so why would you assume that’s what the speaker meant to say?
No. Glitch Does not mean “quirk” or “unique special feature” sorry, it just doesn’t mean that. A glitch means an error. A. Mistake. Something that’s wrong with the system.
None of those connotations are acceptable in this context.
Yes it was clearly meant as a thoughtless joke, but that doesn’t make it even the tiniest bit less hurtful or offensive.
I’m pretty sure that if someone started joking around with a bunch of people about your wife’s “glitches” saying “There must have been something wrong with her when she was born.” then you would get upset. Just saying.
A glitch is a problem in software. And he called homosexuality a “glitch” Implying it’s a problem.
While I’m sure he simply meant it as a joke, it still hurts…
Just one problem: That’s not actually what “glitch” means.
Glitch means broken. Guess what? “Gay people are broken” isn’t something we’ve never heard before.
There is no such thing as a neutral glitch. It simply does not mean “different.” It means “flawed,” much like your disingenuous and facetious attempt to whitewash what the panelist actually meant by what they said.
actually the problem still exists as you are calling heterosexuality the norm, meaning that homosexuality is a deviation from the way things should be or the original design. Even if it isn’t seen as a flaw you are still putting heterosexuality first.
I think “the norm” here is used to mean “typical”.
Poor Ethan! I want to hug him.
Out of people who make something aimed at kids no less! Ugh.
? Kid targeted material is often ultra conservative, this easily fits into the norm. Seen any gay GI Joes (out GI Joes thank you, not fanon ones) or Pokemon trainers or animated superheroes (don’t believe Northstar’s ever been in a cartoon) or wacky animal mascots (again, RD is fanon).
Good GOD This comic makes me want to hug Ethan! Bad comment, peeps!
My god… I don’t remember ever feeling so offended. I mean its bad enough hearing jerks like hyper-conservatives and religious zealots insult homosexuals, but when you hear the creators of one of your childhood icons call being gay (and thus members of their own fandom) “GLITCHES” of all things…
And what’s worse is the people who applauded that. I’d have loudly started “BOOING” if I’d been there, if not going up to the microphone and demanding an apology from them for calling me “glitched”.
Seriously? Did they seriously say that? Way to be jerks!
That was offensive. Some of us have trouble accepting who we are as it is… I’d've been Ethan in that situation.
How could a Transformer be gay? They have no genitalia, which means no gender, which means there is no reference point to define orientation by.
And that would have been a proper answer.
Gender has nothing to do with gentailia. Gender is mental. Transformers have no Sex ( in the anatomical sense). They 100% DO have Gender and they always have in pretty much every continuity.
Really? I always though that they lacked gender identities until the concept was introduced to the Autobots by the humans that they hang around with. And there’s no way a Decepticon would allow us puny humans to affect their culture.
Nope. “Male” does NOT = Gender Neutral. There have been genders in Tfs since the begining (1984) And there have been two genders Male and Female for as long as there have been dinosaurs or cunstruction vehicles (1985).
As far as their psychology is concerned (which is where gender rests) TFs have always basically been portrayed as big metal humans in armor, everywhere and always. This goes right down to gender concepts and rolls. They are “he’s” and “she’s” and romance between them has also been around and decently common (for a boys toy line) since 1985 as well.
I always felt that gender wasn;t introduced into Transformers until “The Search for Alpha Trion”. IMO the “male” Autobots weren’t male until the writers came up with female ones. Until the writers came up with the need for gender distinctions, there weren’t any. Of course, in story, the female Autobots must have “existed” prior to their introduction story, but to me before then there were no “male” or “female” TFs – just Transformers.
IMO the concept of gender is superfluous for a fictional race that reproduces through Allspark/Matrix infusion (or budding in G2), but on occasion it’s used well. Mostly in Beast Wars.
Hate to break it to you, sunshine, but MALE IS STILL A GENDER. If there was no gender they’d have all been ‘it’s rather than ‘he’s.
Referring to a person as an “it” in English is generally considered rude.
It’s not uncommon for genderless/sexless fictional characters to have “he” or “she” applied to them for politeness, even if it’s not completely accurate.
The thing is, for male Transformers the term I*S* 100% accurate. They have male voices, male attitudes, interactions and personalities, male psychologys and, heck, very largely male appearances. They are he’s and brothers and guys and act like it. The TF males are as strongly male as the females a female, they’re not and have never been ungendered using the pronouns for convienence, even before the females appeared in 1985.
That’s merely because English has failed to adapt to the existence of genderless sentients. I doubt that “it” could maintain such a stigma if we ever did develop strong AI since eventually there would be a person who would be offended at having their asexuality belittled and swept under the rug.
You mean “they”. “It” implies nonsentience.
“They” implies plural a lot more than “it” implies anything.
“It puts the lotion on its skin.”
No, “it” carries a heavy dose of depersonalizing implication.
Pat, I’d say that if English can deal with the singular “you,” it can deal with the singular “they” – linguistic drift. It happens.
Bramble – Singular they actually has at least as long a pedigree as the singular you – and used by no less esteemed an author as Shakespeare, even. It’s simply an accident of usage that caused the singular forms (thou and thee) to mostly die out*, whereas the other singular forms of the third person remained. (Specifically, the singular they being used much as it is now, whereas the singular you being used as a mark of respect, coupled with increasing the number of people supposed to be worthy of that respect.)
* Still used in some fossilized phrases, and certain dialects.
Male is a sex. Masculine is a gender.
I think most people would accept “male” as shorthand for something along the lines of “a gender defined predominately by masculine traits and a desire to fulfill a masculine role in social and societal interactions,” though.
Uh, no.
The Autobots from the very beginning had male voices, used the male pronoun, and overwhelmingly tended to be stereotypically masculine in body shape (surprisingly so given the blockiness of their original designs). Claiming they only became male after female autobots were introduced is at best ignorant and at worst extremely disingenuous.
Ouch! That would be on the list of things someone probably thought would be funny or cute to say but actually turned out to be needlessly rude. Nothing quite like feeling hated by your peers!
Mr. Willis sir!
Make a T-shirt. An appropriate image and the phrase “I am not a glitch in the Allspark!”
I would wear that so hard to the con next year. Also every other con. Maybe a rainbow merged Autobot/Decepticon symbol?
Second.
Oh, hey. One of the few good things that Prime had going negated by the creators. Why do I keep watching that show again?
Awwww! Ethan, would you like a hug? D:
Shit, man, I actually cried.
I fail to see the glitch in Knockout’s personality. He’s got style, he’s got class, he’s got smarts. Besides Soundwave (of whom I am a perennial fanboy), my favorite Prime Decepticon is Knockout.
Is it bad that after reading your post, all I could think about was “He’s got style! He’s got flair! He was there! That’s how he became the Nanny!”
…I’ve been watching too much TVLand lately…
Is it possible for this show get worse?
It is, the writers manage to be idiots even outside of the job.
Don’t be silly.
…Any chance you’d like to explain this?
It just goes to show that geeks can be insensitive and bigoted as well.
This really isn’t news.
Definitely not news. Ever play any online multiplayer video games?
Welcome to the internet! You must be new here.
Poor Ethan.
Cheezus. I like Prime and all, but my respect for the writers just dropped by metric-buttocks loads.
Being fair, we don’t know if this was a writer or a voice artist or someone else involved in the show. Just that they were on the panel. Unless you were there or know something we don’t?
Well, you get my drift.
If I recall correctly, it was that The Hub guy that said that particular phrase, Mike Fogel or something.
It was the writer panel, not the VA one, so yeah. I didn’t catch who exactly said it, but everyone up there was writing staff.
I skipped the Prime panels, so I never heard this first hand. I did hear the “don’t ask don’t tell” line with respect to Knockout. I thought it was a cute, non-answer. Bit of a giggle, like when official Hasbro acknowledges what the fan boy and girl think.
I’d not heard about the “a glitch in the all-spark” until this cartoon. And I’m not happy about that line. On a lot of levels it just feels like the Hasbro rep, egged on by the applause to the first riff, decided to keep going. And as usually happens when things keep going, that person ended up with egg on their face. But it’s usually in off-the-cuff comments that we see people’s true beliefs and prejudices. And you would think that official Hasbro would do better to ensure they didn’t touch off firestorms like this, particularly when you could tell this question was coming a mile away.
Cut to the chase. First answer seemed like a well-prepared duck. Second one seemed like deer caught in headlights kind of answer. Intentionally or not, it was pretty hurtful and undeserving. But just as undeserving were the apparent laughs and cheers. The speaker should have been booed and called out on the issue.
I could not agree more.
Seconded.
Pretty much what I said in a comment above. It all depends on “the mood” of the speech.
Apparently, “the mood” of the talk was really great, and the comment was not “mood-breaking” enough to change that.
I’m in favour of gay rights, and yet I don’t think I would have booed.
I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have clapped, but I wouldn’t have booed either.
To be completely honest, I wouldn’t have caught the connotation until later. I’m an engineer and we use the word “glitch” for everything from a brief malfunction to the reaction on our friend’s face when we make a particularly good (and usually innapropriate) joke. I associate it with an unexpected result or surprise as much as I do for a flaw.
In my experience, off-the-cuff comments are a really bad way to judge people’s beliefs and prejudices. It really depends on the person. Some are pretty much the same for a quick or a slow response, others can say some pretty stupid things without originally intending to.
And, let’s be fair, witty people are in the minority.
HAD there been booing, he’d probably backtracked pretty fast – but that would probably been just as bad a measure.
In short – yeah, it was a really, really bad comment, but it tells us very little about the person uttering it.
On the one positive note, it might give us a pretty cool shirt.
This is one of those, “If I were there,” moments.
It’s a safe bet that if you were there, things would have gone exactly as they did. I know Dave Willis was there and offended, and it still happened.
Unless you’ve got some insight to this person in particular, please stop telling them you know how they’d react.
It doesn’t matter how the individual would react, the crowd dynamic likely would not have been that different unless everyone who has posted dissension in these was there AND displacing several of the people who were clapping AND did loudly protest at the time. Only a few people have posted this but it is true, people laugh when they are uncomfortable for whatever reason, this is part of how a lot of standup comedians work.
That is fine. There is a difference between this and telling people that they totally wouldn’t have done what they said they would.
If I was there when it happened, I would most likely not have considered the Glitch as a bad thing unti the Fridge Logic trope kicks in.
Oh, come on! I don’t care if I haven’t seen Prime yet that was a low blow.
I cringed when he said that. I like the vague near-confirmation! But c’mon, guys.
Yes.
Let’s just hope that when they said that, there was a glitch in that person’s brain.
And after this terrible glitch comment, people will STILL yell at Michael Bay about the twins and forget that there’s offensive stuff like that in the cartoons as well.
This was a singular comment, that until this webcomic was only available to the specific attendees of a specific panel. Michael Bay’s movies are available to millions to view in cinemas, on DVD, or via download if it comes to that. Also, this comment happened last week and Bay’s been churning out films for years. Also, I’m pretty sure people are capable of multitasking and being angry or offended by more than one thing at one time.
What’s your point?
I hope they eventually have to face what they’ve said and apologize to all of the LGBT fans they’ve insulted.
Do you really want that to happen? Doesn’t that just make this stupid thing much bigger than it should be?
Dumb questions like that are just a small example of why I’ve become exhausted with all of the irony, parody, and humor regarding Transformers and other cartoons/toys I enjoy.
I agree, though possibly for different reasons. Making a big thing out of it will just give homophobes and like ammunition and a possible martyrdom status. Like so: “You can’t even crack an innocent joke anymore!11!”
And then it grows and expands like a cancer, because the noisy idiots get to control the debate rather than the much larger, somewhat reasonable populace.
It’s a stupid answer, and the guy who said it might be an idiot, or not. If you know the guy/girl personally and want them to rethink this, talk to him/her one-on-one, get it sorted out. Calling them out in public, well, it usually means they’re going on the defensive. And, well, that usually doesn’t work.
But they *said* it in public. And not in their capacity as a private citizen (as it were) but as someone connected with the Transformers franchise. Putting them on the defensive? They got to be on the attack and get a free pass for it already, and that’s not right.
People defending themselves against attack puts the attacker on the defensive?
Now my head hurts.
Yes, I do, and no, it doesn’t, any more than some racist joke is making something bigger than it is. Making people — as we see with Ethan — feel like crap is never cool, and they should be called out on it. Being silent about it just makes it easier for people to get away with that kind of thing.
You do realize that no one outside of those who attended that panel knew about this, before this comic strip, right? Heck, I didn’t even know who Knockout was, since I don’t watch Transformers: Prime.
I’m all about the toys, so even if I was able to go to BotCon, I wouldn’t hang around for these panel discussions, especially for a cartoon I don’t like.
Not sure what you’re getting at here. Are you saying it’s okay to oppress minorities if it’s not something *you* are interested in?
“No not malfunction! number 5 is alive!”
Gay is not a malfunction, not a choice, and definitely not a glitch!!!!
As if being a Transformers fan who is also gay isn’t hard enough as it is, they have to bash us too??? The only bashing that belongs in Transformers is kitbashing!!!!
-hugs Ethan-
And here I thought transformers would fuck anything with a tailpipe.
Am I the only one who has a problem with the person who asked the question in the first place too? It’s a fictional character why should it matter what orientation they are? I really doubt the creators expected someone to ask if a fictional robot is homosexual and paniced to think of an answer. It was a bad answer but still.
I wish more gay people existed in fiction in roles where it doesn’t matter.
I s’pose, though, it depends on*why* this person thought he might be gay…
The fact that the vast majority of Transformers are “male” makes Knockout’s hobby as an “automobile enthusiast” seem more than a little homosexual. In his first episode he all but wolf-whistled at Optimus Prime’s, uh, rims.
You could also interpret it from his fixation on his own appearance, but that was also G1 Sunstreaker’s schtick and nobody asks if he’s gay. Knockout is a little bit Fabulous, but not as bad as G1 Tracks.
“In his first episode he all but wolf-whistled at Optimus Prime’s, uh, rims.”
He DID wolf-whistle. Check it (It’s in the first 12 seconds): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOhsviaZOZk
Fangirls ship him with other dudes. They want there to be gay characters.
To be fair, (some) fangirls ship most fictional attractive male characters with other fictional attractive male characters.
….Wow. I’m with Ethan.
Actually, no. I probably would’ve made A Scene. Because FUCK that shit. If my Union Boss, Redneck Mountain, Kentucky Ol’ Boy father in law can give me a hug and call me son, these fuckers got no excuse.
What is the exact meaning of glitch, cause I dont think thats bad. Extrictly in Biology a male who likes males or a female that likes females, suposing the race is not hermafrodite, is an ANOMALY meaning out of normal/standard behavior.
PD: If you find that biology is not politicaly correct… bite me.
“… suposing the race is not hermafrodite, is an ANOMALY meaning out of normal/standard behavior.”
Variance and mutation is a fairly standard and important aspect of species survival and evolution. For something to be truly anomalous, it would have to be much more of rarity than homosexuality.
So biology is actually very PC. Funny that.
This sort of response almost makes the headdesky comments worth it. Just saying.
This is a good response and you should feel good for saying it.
Evolution and mutation are two diferent things, look dont bend the subject. Just because something is an anomaly or “not normal” it doesnt mean It is bad, and I cant figure it out how being gay is evolution, even if we consider the demografc regulation of the species It will still not fit in the category of evolution.
Im all about gay rights, but dont get hippie on me. I remember one girl who saiid to me “i dont consider myself bi, gay or straight” and a lot more of crap she tought It was philosophy (if philosophy starts and ends with Platon). Most of the cheap philosophy comes from feminism and queer theory, everything is down to sex (wich Freud alredy said more than a century ago). Is not rare that some people close their eyes and ears in front of everything that seems politically incorrect.
Forget the cheap philosophy, just look at all that cheap science you’re spouting. Mutation is integral to the process of evolution.
Anyway, as has been pointed out multiple times thus far, a glitch is not simply something out of the ordinary. It is something broken; a mistake; something that needs to be fixed. But hey, you keep raging against the political correctness machine, mate. Thoughtlessness must be defended!
Never thought of Knockout as gay, just an elegant flair to his speech and hobby but not more than that. Reminds me that this is the same franchise that Transmutate came out of.
If he was designed to be hetero, and isn’t, then yeah, it’s a glitch. Don’t see how this is a big deal.
There’s no such thing as a heterosexual transformer, though – unless transformers somehow started reproducing with two sexes. I might not be up-to-date in that case.
Now, “male gender” transformers, naturally, are the norm. But they all have personality quirks in some way or another. I wouldn’t classify any of them as “glitches”.
Although, I think a man who shouts “Powelinx” during anal should have a better sense of humor about his sexuality.
DEHUMANIZING COMMENTS ARE ~SO FUNNY~
You should probably go back and read the entire strip, and not skip panel 2 this time.
I have read the strip. I just don’t want to live in a world where so many are conditioned to react negatively to lame joke.
Can you please not say lame when you mean bad or pathetic?
“Bad”? You mean the word that came from “bædling,” which meant “effeminate man, hermaphrodite, pederast”?
Folks are gonna be hardpressed to find a word that expresses negativity that didn’t used to be a slur.
HEY LOOK IT’S MY FIRST COMMENT ON THIS PAGE, AT LAST.
Almost as if you were avoiding the whole affair like a smart person would do. Oh well!
Your retort on the word bad is interesting. If you had a link for me to do my own research I’d be most grateful, sir.
Google got me this: http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=bad
David no don’t even bother. These are the same kind of people who think the words CRAZY and INSANE are offensive. Or the people who think Pinkie Pie and Derpy are ablest propaganda. Look up TRIGGER WARNING some time.
I’m sorry internet I’m not gonna treat you like a big baby just so you won’t cry.
Yes, I’m totally all those things you just said! I’m one of ‘these people’! And yet again people are acting like they know all this stuff about me without knowing the first thing about me!
Is your head up your own ass because that’s where you keep your crystal fucking ball?
Changed the name as someone already had Emily apparently.
What is wrong with trigger warnings? It’s for folks who have gone through horrible things, and don’t want to have a PTSD attack.
I’ll tell you right know what’s wrong with trigger warnings is that most people have no idea what the hell you mean by “trigger warnings”.
I’m still not entirely clear on it.
No, I think lame is appropriate. I can’t be offended by something that has nothing to do with me. I certainly wouldn’t want hear such nonsense after paying about $1,000 for the con set, hotel room, etc.
There are gay jokes that could have been made that didn’t imply that being gay was a “glitch”. For example, they could have said, “I don’t know about that, but Knockout does have a secret desire to reformat as a Mazda Miata.” Keep the jokes light.
You can’t be offended by something that’s not targeted against you, specifically?
Of course you can. You can defend other people.
And you don’t want to hear the “nonsense” of people standing up for themselves when you’ve paid for a ticket, but you think it’s okay for those people to actually *pay for* bigoted comments directed at them?
When it comes to homosexuality in nature – some studies I heard about suggest that there’s an increased chance for some offspring to be homosexual (later children?). The regularity suggests to me that it might be something which offers an advantage somehow. In other words, homosexuality offers some advantage for offspring (possibly their siblings’?)
Of course, genetics is tricksy and I’m not a biologist, so…
Still, pretty neat. It’s not a bug, it’s a feature.
I’m pretty sure I saw a study at some point suggesting that men with multiple older brothers are more likely to be gay – something about the mother’s body adjusting over time with multiple pregnancies, so that later sons get more female hormones in utero. Which, considering kin selection, it would make a kind of sense to limit the number of siblings reproducing – too many cousins, and you’ve basically got the same genetic source competing against itself all over the place.
There are also studies showing that children carried in seriously stressful times, (think, pretty much anywhere in Europe during early 40′s), are more likely to be homosexual, with the main supposition (from the ancillary data) being the hormones that keep a body stressed/on edge for long periods of time somewhat affect the child in utero. (I don’t recall if there did any studies on lesbianism, as most were on male homosexuality- further supposition is stressors long term indicate continuous danger, i.e., threat to survival- larger amounts of women (in the next generation) are needed to make more humans long term. But since physiological gender is determined by spermatic chromosones, the woman’s body can only affect development after that establishing fact)
It was a while back
I seem to remember when gays took pride in being ‘bent’ and ‘queer’ and ‘different’ and having an ‘alternative’ sexuality. I was cool with them then.
When it changed into this “you will call us normal or else” business, I became homophobic.
Seriously what is offensive about being glitched? We’re all screwed up in some way.
So… you’re fine with minorities as long as they identify as having something inherently wrong with them.
Okay.
And this is the biggest problem. All I ever said was “different” (or synonyms thereof) but you immediately assume different = bad. That’s the REAL intolerance.
If a black person gets offended for being called colored, and insists they do NOT have more pigment than everyone else, they’re insane.. and that does happen, so yes. (also, what? how does minority even factor in?)
I’m also jealous of gays for getting butthurt and rights and stuff when nudists and the hirsute are still treated badly.. and those -are- normal.
I’d like to know what rights you think gay people have that those groups don’t…
I’d also like to know how you think that gay people aren’t IN those groups.
Oh, and you didn’t actually only say “‘different’ (or synonyms thereof)”, you also said “glitched”. Which DOES, in fact =bad.
No, I’m pretty sure the real intolerance is saying you don’t like the homosexuals (who are still in the minority) insisting that they be considered normal.
And if a black person feels insulted because they were referred to with a slur of some sort, it’s not because they think they’re actually white (and implying that ‘everyone else’ has Caucasian skin/light coloring seems pretty freaking offensive too). It is because that minorities, be they racial, religious, sexual, or alternative lifestyles, have historically been treated VERY badly by the majority and such phrasings are a throwback to even worse treatment. It’s a sign that the thinking behind those terms and other, worse forms of discrimination, is alive and well even if it’s no longer legal in more overt forms.
I remember very clearly on a bus one time an old black man in the seat in front of me turns around and tells me “Hey girl. You know what you are? A Snow Girl. That’s what we call little white girls like you.”
He wasn’t doing it to point out I was white, or to make conversation. I know because I’ve encountered him before, also while doing nothing but minding my own business. I don’t think I deserved being called a bitch by him those times either, but if you think him calling me a “snow girl” wasn’t any less hurtful because my skin is, in fact, “white” then I don’t know what to tell you.
You are using a VERY mathematical definition of “different”.
Different: it implies not being the same, the same as “strange”, “weird” or “abnormal”.
None of those words implies “badness”, “need to be fixed” or “need to be normalized”.
While all that is true, you’ll have a really hard trying to convince people of that (believe, I’ve tried and failed), so I’d suggest you just give up.
Umm Nerdatcomputer, English might not be your thing. Strange, weird, and abnormal ALL have bad connotations. They’re not as powerful as straight up insults, but let’s practice for a second.
Nerdatcomputer is a strange person. He has weird interests. He is abnormal and it’s hard to relate to him. Did you feel complemented or included by these sentences or did a strong negative intent come through?
English is not my thing, that’s for sure. =P
But try to read my previous post again.
From a very “mathematical” point of view, the usage of those words have no connotation whatsoever.
On the other hand, there are words that have a “bad connotation” in their root; like “evil”, “bad” or “broken”.
I’m aware that the “mathematical definition” does rarely apply to normal life.
It’s not the same to call someone “atypical” than to call him/her “a freak”; even when those two words seem to have the same meaning.
But:
If you make the warning that “you use [X] word with no bad connotation whatsoever”, people shouldn’t get angry when you use it.
I often recur to the [x] word (I don’t know synonyms and don’t want to waste time looking for them), and warn people that I don’t use them with any bad connotation. They ALWAYS get mad at me. -__-
Please learn some synonyms or you will continue to get that reaction for obvious reasons. Language is not math and has never been. If you didn’t know whether black, African-American, or colored was the best, and decided to use “the N word” because, hey they’re all referring to the same thing, you’d justifiably be insulted, or at least shunned by most people.
Not that “negative words” can’t be reclaimed by the targeted group, but that’s not your place to help them out as an outsider to that group.
Many people think being different is wrong, like you. Also they claim everyone is the same. Then they claim for diversity or something like that. Is a train of thought that privilege the term “politically” over the term “correct”, the fact something is correct and politically correct is nothing but a coincidence. Many pseudo leftist and liberals have being leading this “politically correct” thought.
Your comentary can be analized like the denial of difference in pro of equality that at the same time labels wrong to the simple mention of diference. Its all simple formal logic. And thats why I dont like the sistematic and trivial “gay rigths” arguments, but the general public seems to like better the “hippie” discourse. I dont care if at least gives gay people ceirtain dignity
“What? You mean those uppity queers weren’t just acting like they were in on our jokes, they did it to get their foot in the door towards actual acceptance and tolerance? And now they want to be treated like PEOPLE?!”
Different? Obviously.
Broken? No, although many gay youths think so for some reason that nobody has been able to figure out.[/sarcasm]
The distinction between “queer” and “glitch” seems highly significant to me.
God damn I hate semantics. It’s like those people who think an excuse is always a bad thing.
Queer and bent and basically every other word for gay just means ‘deviating from the usual’ that is the very definition of a glitch. You know what comes to mind when you say glitches? Combos in fighting games, noclipping, memory overwrite errors leading to infinite items. It doesn’t need to be negative. I loves me some freaks, they’re the best people on earth, and if someone’s born with gills or extra teeth or a horn or something, awesome. Use them and enjoy your underwater lifestyle and amazing powers, but -humans are still not supposed to be like that- People used to understand that.. Hell the word gay just means ‘has a whole lot of sex’
Except “glitch” does, in fact, have a definite negative meaning. That’s not even connotation or semantics, it’s IN THE DICTIONARY DEFINITION. When a game has a glitch, even if it leads to having 99 Master Balls, it means that something in the code is BROKEN AND WRONG.
tl;dr – backpedal moar, plz
And science is of the current opinion that something goes wrong in the uterus to cause gaiety. (I’m sure that theory, like all of them, will change in a week) I don’t like it, and if it started going away because we stopped putting birth control hormones in the water or something, I’d be pleased, but it’s CLEARLY a glitch in the “man-woman” system. It’s up to you to make it a Missingno glitch or an M-block glitch. I’m not familiar with this character but I’m pretty sure people are enjoying his antics, so whatever made him that way is good if you enjoy it. Stop trying to act like gay is just this normal part of nature and get the rod out of your ass.
We never had this with the polyamorous people or the S+M people or any other perverted group, they were just doing what felt right to them and ignoring the morality of it because if it feels good it must be okay.. and people who have a different idea of what people are supposed to be like do not have to accept it as normal or face intolerance of our intolerance.
Except, as has been noted numerous times in other comments, there are many studies showing homosexual tendencies all over the place in nature.
And bonus points for assuming that the S&M crowd are all totally amoral for doing what they enjoy.
Please, keep digging.
Here are all the species that have homosexuality in them: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homosexual_behavior_in_animals
The number of species that have homophobia in them? 1.
Which one is not normal again?
I’m a little tempted to ask how the communities that engage in relationship models which inherently require more trust and open communication than monogamous or vanilla relationships are inherently “ignoring the morality of it,” but I’m afraid your answer might break my brain.
Yeah, pretty much this.
At a guess? All S&M couples and the like OBVIOUSLY exist in IRL exactly the same way they do in the most stereotypical pornos, ignoring things like consent, safety, and respect in the name of getting their rocks off.*
*(Sarcasm mode, if it wasn’t obvious.)
You really make me worry about humanity, if you can’t see how hateful and cruel your comments are. Being gay is, yes, different from being straight. Well done. But being gay is *not* actually against the natural order of things; as other commentators have pointed out, it is found in nature and recognised in many early cultures.
Repeatedly calling gay people ‘glitches’ or implying that they are asking too much to be accepted, or that they are on-par with ‘perverts’ or ‘freaks’ is homophic, bigoted, mean and makes you sound, frankly, stupid. And I really have to ask: who is this ‘we’ that never had ‘this’ with ‘the poly/s&m people’? This sentence is wrong in about a billion ways.
Also, being gay simply does not mean ‘has a whole lot of sex’. That phrase has the same connotations as the word ‘colored’ that you previously stated should not offend black people: it is laced with the kind of prejudice that has typically been used by ‘normal people’ to put down, oppress and hurt those seen as ‘glitched’. Not to mention, I’m gay and my sex life is amazingly poor.
And that’s all I have time for. I have to be at work at like 7am tomorrow, so goodnight.
¨ or that they are on-par with ‘perverts’ or ‘freaks’ is homophic¨
I hate to nit-pick, but surely theres nothing wrong with being a freak either?
Look up heteronormative and then we’ll talk.
Right, I’m heteronormative. I like that a lot better than ‘homophobic’ anyway.
Uh, you’re both, sunshine.
I don’t like to get in the middle of discussions, but as a matter of facts, I believe he is not really homophobic.
From what I read (I could be wrong), he doesn’t seem to have ANYTHING against homosexuals, and even recognize they should be allowed to live together. That alone is enough to be clear of the “being homophobic” charge.
All he is trying to do is impose his theory that homosexuality is not really normal. One should never forget that the word “normal” implies “following a norm”, and therefore it all depends on which “norm” you are talking about.
But what’s even MORE important, he says that being normal (according to the definition above) is not “better” or “worse”; so that means he is not really homophobic.
And yet…
“but -humans are still not supposed to be like that- People used to understand that.. Hell the word gay just means ‘has a whole lot of sex’”
and
“I don’t like it, and if it started going away because we stopped putting birth control hormones in the water or something, I’d be pleased”
That’s pretty fucking homophobic to me. Incredibly insulting and making others feel like shit? Definitely horrible bigotry, even dressed up as complaining and putting forth a ‘theory’.
I’m going to assume you missed the part where he said that homosexuals were a ‘perverted group’ that ‘ignored morality’. Oh, and ‘Stop trying to act like gay is just this normal part of nature and get the rod out of your ass’.
Because it’s either that or you are a terrible person.
For some reason I can not reply to you guys (is it possible to block someone?), so I’m just replaying to myself….
I said “I could be wrong”, which seems to be the case.
I did miss all of that. =P
Oh wait, I never said “I could be wrong” …
Well: “I could have been wrong” and I was wrong.
How could I miss all of that? @___@
“I was wrong”: three of the hardest words in the English language to say, but usually worth it. Salud, man.
“God damn I hate semantics. It’s like those people who think an excuse is always a bad thing.”
Yeah, that’s pretty much exactly the opposite of what I actually said. I pointed out a huge difference in meaning.
Oh, and I’m a 24 year-old gay virgin who’s had one boyfriend ever, so no, it doesn’t just mean “has a lot of sex”.
Look, I’m a 21-year-old who cheerfully identifies as queer (albeit mostly because outside of the LGBT community, an awful lot of people’s eyes start to glaze over when confronted with terms like “pansexuality” and “fluid sexuality” and “non-standard gender identification,” and as much as I like educating people about the issues sometimes it’s best not to derail the entire conversation to explain that no, I’m neither gay nor straight, and I’m not really bi, either). And I take offense at saying I’m “glitched,” because, get this, different and defective are not the same. I have plenty of “glitches,” mental and physical: high cholesterol, nigh-inability to conduct business over the telephone because of anxiety, quite a bit overweight, obsessive need to tell people off in comment threads of webcomics… but the fact that I sometimes want to get it on with someone with girlparts is not one of them. It does not hurt anyone or keep me from functioning in society, except so far as people who weren’t invited to the girlparts party anyway want to make trouble over it.
I think coldfusion is rigth but his semantics and logic are a little twisted, instead of glitch that denotes “faulty” the right word would be ANOMALY, as my sister who studies Medicine told me once people sometimes are confused by the meaning of the word and the connotation. Is easy to get tangled in lenguage.
Pd: I like people that is aware of their sexuality instead of the metafisical ones that says they are some kind of “spiritual” being that only loves the esence… Bunch of neoplato hippi crap
Hey, did I say I’m exclusively attracted to people with OMG BEAUTIFUL SOULS or something? Just because “gender” isn’t on my internal checklist for partners doesn’t mean I’m not attracted to people’s physical attributes – or even that I’m not attracted to attributes usually found in certain genders or sexes. Male and female bodies are awesome. I just don’t have any particular preference for one over the other, or any preference for clear over ambiguous gender presentation. I have a couple of definite physical “types” I’m attracted to regardless of gender.
Just because my sexuality boils down to “people are sexy” rather than “boys and/or girls are sexy” doesn’t mean I’m not “aware” of my sexuality.
(And I do believe that what you’re dismissing as “metaphysical” and “spiritual” does have to figure into it at some point, or otherwise you might as well just go out and buy yourself a realdoll.)
<3
Seriously, this comment hurts the back of my hand…
Good on you for doing this comic about it, pretty good job bringing home how jacked up remarks like that are in such an understated way.
hahaha nice. *claps for transformers dude*
I really hope you’re a troll.
Pretty safe bet. Regardless of if he’s sincere or not.
No, Transformers:Prime panel, your MOM is a glitch.
And I wouldn’t do her, not for every nickel on Earth.
Last comment of the night.
Morality and Ethics are is a Convention of rules made by man more or less arbitrary. So gay cant be good or bad but simply “be”, cause “being” somethimg cant be wrong. Even when you are “being bad” that means an act, being gay dont involve an act.
Yes it does, it’s called Powerlinx. :p
That’s having sex, not being. Big difference.
But I’d argue that morality can be pretty easily defined: Help others? Moral. Harm others? Immoral. Doesn’t affect others? Neutral.
Meh, obviously you were going for the simplest possible definition, but you know that one is terribly flawed I hope. Example: someone is attacking you and you punch that person’s face and knock them unconscious. The only person you’ve helped is yourself and you’ve “caused harm” to an other, but I strongly disagree the act was immoral. Other examples: getting a job for yourself which of course automatically makes every other applicant NOT get the job and thus continue to be unemployed, buying the last __ available at a store, getting on a lifeboat picked by lottery when there isn’t enough space for everybody, etc etc. Just because it causes harm to somebody doesn’t mean it’s immoral. But of course you knew that…
So Ethan rails about dramatic hypersensitivity only to be dramatically hypersensitive about something that hits close to home for him. Oh no, the people who make that robot toy/game/comic/cartoon property you like are thinking off spec from how you think they ought to think. They must be evil and stupid and what’s wrong with the world. Ethan has so much to teach them all.
You can tell all that from him looking momentarily sad after hearing a somewhat insulting comment?
Wow, you’re good. My own ability to look at a comic strip panel and immediately know exactly what is going through the fictional character’s head pales in comparison to yours.
This gift must be studied! I shall write a paper on the topic to see if we can receive grants. Working title: “Extrasensory Perception as it Relates to the Discernment of Underlying Motivations of Fictional Characters Responding to Emotional Stimuli in Works of Comic Drama”
On second thought, that’s too clunky. Let’s just call it “Dramatic Hypersensitivity”.
You are my new hero.
Oh, hypersensitivity is defined as “feeling insulted when someone deliberately insults you”? Strange, that’s not what my dictionary has, I must need an updated version. Or you’re a jerk. One of those for sure.
Freedom of speech is a bitch isn’t it? People can be jerks, its just how people are. Yeah it was an offensive joke, but its still a joke, and even bigots and jerks have the right to make jokes. Its not a hate speech, its not some movement to deny anyone rights, its an offensive joke.
err..no one is saying he should be arrested or anything.
It’s true, he has the right to say it, and he probably didn’t mean to offend anybody anyway.
However if he hasn’t apologized for it yet then he should, that’s not cool.
I was wondering when freedom of speech was going to be trotted out. Yeah they have a right to say that. We have a right to say that it was a shitty thing to say.
What. Is. Your. Point.
was going to be trotted out
I think you meant to say “trolled out”.
“Congress shall pass no law…” Yadda yadda blah blah blah.
Hmmm. Nope, don’t see anything in here about freedom from consequences of your speech or about how everybody else has to pretend you didn’t say it.
Holy Shit On A Stick, over 400 comments.
Tranformers and homosexuality: two topics that Shortpacked fans can talk about all day.
So I have noticed.
Given how weird Transformer gender/form/sexuality typically is maybe having any set preference is a glitch?
I’m gonna go on a bit of a rant here because why not? We got a discussion going about gender and sexuality here.
The whole thing with sex and sexuality is just made out to be so significant, and I can’t say it ever has seemed to be so for me. Heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, pansexual, unspoken is the assumption that we are inherently sex driven beings. Everyone out there clearly must want sex. Quite frankly this seems off to me. It’s not like I’m not into women because I’m into dudes, they both just seem equally unappealing to me. A few times a year I’ll spot someone who I wouldn’t mind boning if I was offered, but honestly, I don’t see myself as ever going to seek out sex.
So what? Why’s it gotta be so important? Someone wants to fuck x and someone else wants to fuck y, and it’s actually important enough that people build these policies around it. People oppress over it, hate over it, love, build, and destroy over it. I see them defining themselves as someone who prefers x or y. I see them fighting over x like rabid hyenas, appearing to wither and become dispirited after an extended amount of time without y.
Whether gay, straight or what have you they all seem to treat it with such importance, and to expect you to treat it with similar importance. I’m not on some dry streak here, I’m just not on the market. It’s not a big deal. There’s legitimate oppression and hate going on here, and we need to get on top of that. I got my priorities straight here. When that’s taken care of though. Once we’ve managed to successfully create an environment of tolerance regardless of who you’re boning, I hope the next thing we reevaluate why it is we expect everyone to be boning in the first place. Every day I go out there and talk like I’m interested in sex because that’s just what you do, and I have no fucking idea if anyone else is just going through the motions for the sake of convenience or if it’s just genuinely the all encompassing drive in everyone that people make it out to be.
Don’t think I’m trying to put you on the spot, but do you identify as asexual? I do, and I see this kind of argument from them (and usually only them) all the time. Asexuals seem to be one of the only groups who frequently question the assumption of rabid sex drive.
That said, the reason why it’s so important here is because regardless of how much group x does or doesn’t want to screw group y, it’s still horrifically offensive to call anyone glitched based on their orientation. Especially considering all the persecution that gay people have had to go through in the past.
I also hope that someday we’ll advance far enough that we won’t need to use sex and sexuality as the social status indicator it is right now. But the whole discussion seems out of place in a debate like this.
I’d never heard of Asexual before. Didn’t know there was a word for that.
Obviously the comment made was offensive. Whatever your sexual orientation there shouldn’t be anything wrong with it. I didn’t mean to argue in favor of him. I just had some stuff on my mind and with 400+ comments discussing gender and sexuality issues I thought it wouldn’t be a huge deal if I chipped in. I apologize for my mistake.
Obviously “Nah, I’m good thanks” is just as valid a preference as “Dudes plz”, “Chicks plz”, or “Both plz”. Unless someone deliberately mocks you for being a “loser virgin” or whatever, I don’t see how you’re being targeted though. It’s like this… assume you don’t like the sport (American) football. During football season, nobody is picking on you by talking about football all the time. You might find it slightly boring, but not everything is about you (good or bad).
I think I ought to point out that some of us who are against discrimination — including (gasp!!) some of us who are gay themselves — are also fans of that “magic book” of stories from the bronze age. It’s not all “religious people on one side and non-religious people on the other” by any means. Religion in general of course could be a whole other HUGE array of threads, but I wanted to say that since people are bringing it up.
Obviously, the question of how to sort out things like the New Testament’s “love your neighbor,” “love your enemies and turn the other cheek,” “don’t judge other people,” “help those who are poor and downtrodden and abused” and so on and so on with some passages in the Old Testament (which has far more, by the way, on matters relating to the abuse of the poor by the powerful than it does about sex at all!) is still an issue to be explored, but again I wanted to point out that not all of us Christians — including gay Christians like myself (gasp!) — think the same way about things.
I think we need some healing from Kids in the Hall’s Scott Thompson.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42fyiFuwkE0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxMrWSTlvgg&feature=related
…what the hell.
For the uncultured who know not of Kids in the Hall, Scott Thompson is gay.
Because one gay guy uses the word fag means it’s okay for everyone else to do so and that all connotations and offense that it carries for others suddenly vanish?
It should be pointed out that this whole ugliness stems from a long time staple of fandoms: Questioning something that is completely innocent in a comic book or cartoon.
For example, “Can Mr. Fantastic stretch every part of his body?”
Of course, in Transformers we’ve long had stupid questions about Tracks being gay. The voice actor himself explained that the voiced he used was a “Harvard lockjaw” accent, a sort of snooty, upper-class, New England sort of thing.
The problem is that adults in any fandom come up with these dumb questions. One asks such a question at BotCon and gets a strange answer and suddenly it’s the worst thing to ever happen.
Umm no, even if the question was dumb (and it doesn’t seem particularly dumb) that doesn’t automatically disqualify the answer from being offensive. Example: if some weirdo asked if Pinkie Pie was a cannibal during a MLP FIM panel, that would be a bizarre question. If the panelist said, “Yes, but only of black furred ponies because they’re so athletic,” would that insanely stupid response be something we should shrug off because either: 1) it was meant as a joke or 2) the question was dumb? I would say strongly no.
In the case of this question, there’s 10 million ways to go about answering this that aren’t offensive at all. Here’s a couple for free:
-The first joke and then move on
-We didn’t really think about it, so I don’t know
-I’m not sure, we’ve never asked him
-No (if it’s important that he’s straight for some later storyline, very doubtful in this case)
-Yes (risky for the conserva-fans, but if it’s the case, it’s the case)
etc
That’s pretty much what I said earlier, but there are so many people on high horses that it got lost in their comments.
There are nicer ways to answer that question, even nicer gay jokes that don’t insult gay people.
That writer just gave a bad answer, but one without any true malice and far too much is being made about.
Somebody has already linked the “Intent is fucking magic” post, so go ahead and ctrl + find that if you desire. “Without true malice” is both just your opinion (you have no way to back it up) and irrelevant (if someone says something that hurts another person, does it make it better if they were too dumb to know it would?). It’s not a “high horse” to say that an insulting comment is insulting. Why do you feel it’s important to defend stupidity?
I just think that too much is being made of this. Plus, talking about it here accomplishes nothing. If someone who was at the BotCon panel felt insulted, they should have said something then. And really, why does what a writer of a crappy Transformers cartoon matter? Does his joke suddenly make it true that being gay is a ‘glitch’? What does this whole thing matter so much to everyone?
Step 1) Recognize that you not caring about something is not the same as that thing being unimportant. Step 2) Don’t enter an argument that you don’t find important in the first place ESPECIALLY NOT to say “You guys are overreacting, I, the arbiter of importance, have clearly marked this as irrelevant, please pay attention!” Step 3) In order to gain some empathy, please imagine if you went to a fan gathering of your favorite thing (sports, video games, TV, quilting, whatever floats your boat) and the organizers who you respect in a general fashion for their contribution to that thing you like said “This basic trait of MikeK’s that he didn’t choose and can’t change at will is bad, amirite?!” and all your fellow fans laughed and clapped. Do you feel like a welcomed part of the group?
Step 4) When talking about something like, say, gay bashing, go against your gut instinct to linking youtube videos that create strawman arguments about offensive slurs to gay people in the name of humour lest people think you’re human garbage.
I merely felt that some levity was in order. Those sketches are good and succinct.
Someone actually got that part of the panel on film, BTW. Just in case anyone wants to see it for themselves:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFFOXNnRhVA
I have a couple of things to clear up. First of, I am a Muslim and in the Koran, no angel got raped. The people at the city wanted to because they thought they were visitors. Second of all, to everyone and I mean everyone, I’m sorry. I’m sorry for the hate comment and I’m sorry for the other comment following it, I’m sorry for being a bigot and for the record, I tolerate homosexuals. I don’t love them, I tolerate them. Third, to R, no I will not vote to hurt you and your family or anyone’s family or ignore anyone in any emergency because even if the person in question have a different sexual orientation, he or she is still human and I will help them any way I can.
Again, I would like to give my sincerest apologies to everyone about my comment and to anyone who is a homosexual, if you are hurt by the comment in any shape or form, I’m sorry.
I thank you as well.
That’s a response I can live with, but I can’t speak for everybody else. Thank you from me, at least.
that’s the apology I was waiting for.
Jesus Christ, this is a lot of comments.
Or even an alot of comments…
I’ve read through the archive of this comic for the past week. I enjoyed every up and down, twist and turn. I especially enjoyed reading the comments section. I’ve found most of the comments humorous, and some extremely dull. I’ve enjoyed my time here, but I’m afraid it is at an end.
See, I’m one of those religious dolts who believes in a scrap of parchment that was written by some crazy old guy a long time ago. At least, that’s what people seem to think. And while I believe the act of homosexuality is a sin, I do not condemn anyone else because we’ve all sinned. I’m not going to recite text, because I do not wish to start a conversation that I cannot finish in person.
Which brings me to the issue here, where individuals prefer to argue back and forth behind the safety glass of a laptop/desktop computer. Though apologies have been made, it is only human nature for foolishness like this to happen again. I say foolishness because words without fruitful actions are just that–foolish. Few people stand up when the real spotlight is on them.
In any case, I’ve come to bid farewell to this community. It was fun while it lasted, but I’m a bigot that can’t stand in the presence of people who prefer to be lambs rather than lions. I’m also intolerant of the intolerant (I suppose I’ll work on it). So, Sir Willis, it has been a pleasure. I doubt you will miss me, I’m but a drop in the bucket of viewers. Good bye.
Good comic about a stupid (and offensive – though likely unintentionally offensive) off-hand comment.
And wow, >500 comments. Just wow.
Wow, 500+ comments, huh?
It would seem anything I might have to say on the issue has already been said in some way, shape, or form, and adding my two cents into this would be staggeringly redundant…
…huh…
WELP
Cocks and pussies, everyone. They sure are grand.
I dream of the day when posts about sexuality, as opposed to sexual activity, won’t generate over 500 comments. Until then, I suppose its good we’re talking about it.
Loved the comic Willis. As a gay nerd, might I say your consideration is ever appreciated.
That was rude, and I am surprised Ethan has not tried to knock that dude out yet.
Well, remember that comic time is not real time. For Ethan, no time has passed yet since panel four.