#He can make plays with laws of genetic but God forbid a woman as a righful queen that isn't written as a shrewd bitch lmao

[aangopologist]

GRRM only knows three type of women: "willful", "shrewd" and "sweet" (read meek)

[bonefall]

with your HRT herb post, and you having talked about hitting some cats with the Woman Beam, would you make any of them trans women? or trans guys, so they could still be toms but also have kits (if they want to ofc ofc) to help with the genetics??

I will! But so far there are only 3 trans cats. I'm looking to trans more of them as they come up though.

Especially transfemmes. Transmascs are a lot easier to 'make' because WC has a male-skewed gender ratio already and cats who can have kittens without a sire are extremely useful genetically.

There are two* transwomen so far; Hazeltail and Volestar*. Redtail is a transman.

Hazeltail

Hazeltail is getting saved. Mousewhisker and Minnowtail are going to have a half-clan relationship; so depending on how ASC goes, Mouse is either going to die back in TBC while opposing the imposter OR leave for RiverClan if Minnowtail gets canonical kits. Hazeltail will be taking on his ThunderClan appearances from then on, whatever happens.

And if the Erins get wise and give Mouse some kids for genetic diversity, that will mean for my redux, Hazeltail and the lucky girl will be lesbians.

Hazel will also be following my herb guide; she's on Wolf's Foot and/or Hops, still working out what her suppliments look like specifically though! (I also want to play with the fact that Wolf's Foot is a multiuse herb and possibly imply that time she 'almost' died of greencough was because she gave up her herbs to save a clanmate. I may also change Jayfeather's magical StarClan save from Poppyfrost to Hazeltail...)

Volestar... maybe.

Volestar/Volepelt meanwhile... I've been waffling on it for a while. Representation is extremely important to me, but I can see Volestar EXTREMELY clearly in my head. I'm afraid if I make her canonically trans instead of cis, she might harken a stereotype.

She's HUGE, in personality and in size. One of the biggest in RiverClan. She looks like an otter with a heart to match, and plays an important supporting role in Darkstar's Commandment. Darkstar is rational and politically savvy; and Volepelt is uncompromising and assertive.

Volepelt is an early proponent of the law to protect kittens, her being loud and argumentative is what eventually gets her the deputyship role. She's picked BECAUSE Darkstar knows she will fight to uphold this law when she's gone. So... I don't want to change her personality at all

And... I don't see her taking transition herbs either. I would really just like her to be a non-dysphoric transwoman who's really happy with who she is, but I'm not transfemme and I also don't want to invoke a hurtful image for my followers, or god forbid, summon the Disc Horse.

So TL;DR I really want Volestar to be transfemme. She may end up as a cis woman though. Literally nothing about her personality or appearance would change either way.

Redtail

Was trans, and mates with Runningwind. They had two litters together, with only one kit from each surviving to adulthood (Longtail and Sandstorm).

He took nettle root and rosemary; I imagine pine pollen is mostly used by ShadowClan and WindClan, as they have easier access to Scots Pine trees.

As a side note, I also have a personal headcanon that Rowanclaw is a transman and his kits were from a stint with a rogue; Tawnypelt jumped in to claim them as hers and it PISSED Tigerclaw off in Hell. I won't be using it for the rewrite because it conflicts with an important scene for my planned Hawkfrost redemption arc.

Hmm... t4t tawny/rowan though... I am Looking.

[lastsonlost]

GOD DON’T MAKE ME HAVE TO DEFEND TAYLOR SWIFT

San Francisco — The ACLU of Northern California today sent a letter to Taylor Swift and her attorney refuting their meritless legal defamation threats against a local blogger.

On Sep. 5, PopFront editor Meghan Herning wrote a post titled “Swiftly to the alt-right: Taylor subtly gets the lower case kkk in formation.” The post is a mix of political speech and critical commentary, and discusses the resurgence of white supremacy and the fact that some white supremacists have embraced Swift. It also provides a critical interpretation of some of Swift’s music, lyrics, and videos. The post ends by calling on Swift to personally denounce white supremacy, saying “silence in the face of injustice means support for the oppressor.”

On Oct. 25, Herning received an intimidating letter from Swift and her attorney labeling the blog post as defamatory and demanding that she issue a retraction, remove the story from all media sources, and cease and desist. The letter threatened a lawsuit.

“This is a completely unsupported attempt to suppress constitutionally protected speech,” said ACLU of Northern California attorney Michael Risher.

The letter went on to say that it should serve as an “unequivocal denouncement by Ms. Swift of white supremacy and the alt-right.” But that denunciation would only be known by Herning because the letter also attempts to use copyright law to forbid her from making it public.

“Intimidation tactics like these are unacceptable,” said ACLU attorney Matt Cagle. “Not in her wildest dreams can Ms. Swift use copyright law to suppress this exposure of a threat to constitutionally protected speech.”

Herning contacted the ACLU after receiving the letter from Swift's attorney, and ACLU lawyers determined the legal claims were unsupported. The blog post is opinion protected by the First Amendment.

“The press should not be bullied by high-paid lawyers or frightened into submission by legal jargon,” said Herning. “These scare tactics may have worked for Taylor in the past, but I am not backing down.”

The ACLU has requested a response from Swift and her attorney by Nov. 13 confirming that they will not pursue a lawsuit.

THIS IS THE ORIGINAL POP FRONT ARTICLE RIGHT HERE

Swiftly to the alt-right: Taylor Swift subtly gets the lower case “kkk” in formation with “Look What You Made me Do”

An anti–Marxist Mixtape review.

A little over a decade after her musical debut, Taylor Swift has made a career out of being portrayed as a good girl unjustly wronged. Her song catalog is stocked with tunes about how innocent she is, and how men seem to wrong her. But the most notable moment of the Taylor-as-an-innocent-victim narrative may have come when Kanye West interrupted her Best Female Video acceptance speech at the 2009 Video Music Awards to drunkenly ramble about how Beyoncé should have won.

Kanye upstaging Taylor in that moment not only gave that narrative merit in a lot of people’s eyes, it also looked like the personification of many a long-standing white fear: a black man taking away a white woman’s power. And Taylor has been playing off that narrative ever since, while America has embraced the notion of white victimhood — despite the reality. Kanye West is still hated for that moment, and the media has documented further fights between Taylor Swift and other pop stars such as Katy Perry, Calvin Harris, and Kim Kardashian. There is no shortage of media details about these “feuds”, whatever their purpose may be.

On the other hand, the idea that Taylor Swift is an icon of white supremacist, nationalists, and other fringe groups, seems to finally be getting mainstream attention. But the dog whistles to white supremacy in the lyrics of her latest single are not the first time that some have connected the (subtle) dots. A white supremacist blogger from neo-Nazi site The Daily Stormerwas quoted in a Broadly article in May 2016 as saying, “it is also an established fact that Taylor Swift is secretly a Nazi and is simply waiting for the time when Donald Trump makes it safe for her to come out and announce her Aryan agenda to the world.” What “facts” the blogger is pointing to are unclear (and likely invented); still, his statement exemplifies how neo-Nazis and white supremacists look to her as their pop icon.

And it is fitting: in the past few months, white supremacist trolls have jumped off line and onto the streets. Charlottesville was a coming out story for white supremacists and nationalists, a chance to show who they were and what they want — or really who they didn’t want in “their” country. But the brazen white supremacists on the streets are not the only ones who have bought into the current form of white supremacy. There is still a contingent of the country that agrees with the president and his response to the tragedy of Charlottesville. For all Trump’s tomfoolery and cavorting with white nationalism, his approval rating has stayed steady: almost 40% of the country thinks he is doing a good job. Perhaps this is an affirmation of the racist policies and climate that this administration has capitalized on and intensified, because racism and white supremacy have always existed in America — and the president alone cannot take credit for the movement.

The American eugenics movement  — a pseudo-science theory that the human race would be improved by controlled breeding to increase the occurrence of desirable heritable characteristics that favor the white or anglo race — was alive and well long before Hitler came to power. In fact, the American Eugenics movement actually inspired Hitler. During the Progressive Era of the late 19th and early 20th century, eugenics was considered a method of preserving and improving the dominant groups (a.k.a. “white” groups — a shifting political label) in the population. These early ideas paved the way for racist and nativist reactions to emigration from Europe rather than scientific genetics. Meaning, as the Italian, Irish, and other immigrants poured into the country, eugenics was used as the basis for keeping those groups out. [Source]

The American eugenics movements received extensive funding from various corporate foundations including the Carnegie Institution, Rockefeller Foundation, and the Harriman railroad fortune. Eugenics was championed by Ivy League scholars, Congressmen, and Presidents alike. One of the major campaigns emergent from the Eugenics movement was the restriction of immigration and scapegoating of immigrants, similar to what we see today. Another was the systematic sterilization of the poor and disabled. By 1910, eugenics had become so popular that even women’s suffragists groups were lobbying for eugenics legal reforms. Prominent birth control advocate and Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger advocated for controlling birth rates among poor people, people of color, and the disabled.

Eugenics was popular among those who wanted the US to stay out of World War II, and until the US was attacked at Pearl Harbor, they were successful. Eugenics only fell out of favor because of the Nazi defeat in that war. Yet America never quite defeated the eugenics-based racial hatred in our country and culture, which is why it is no surprise that today the alt-right is echoing the cries of eugenicists. Indeed, signs with slogans like “defend the European race” are not new; the support of Trump for “extreme vetting” is just another form of advocacy for segregation.

Indeed, we often forget that there were many Americans who thought we entered the wrong side of the war. The Nazis received myriad support from the American business community and wealthy, WASP-y Americans, who seemed to see common cause. And while prior to the U.S. entering World War II, American support for the Nazis was never explicitly stated, the silence and refusal to help in the face of racial atrocities said everything. The racialized politics of the era lived on in America through segregation in housing (e.g. redlining), banking, xenophobic immigration policies, reactionaries against the civil rights movement, the Reagan era, the War on Drugs, etc.

Taylor’s lyrics in “Look What You Made Me Do” seem to play to the same subtle, quiet white support of a racial hierarchy. Many on the alt-right see the song as part of a “re-awakening,” in line with Trump’s rise. At one point in the accompanying music video, Taylor lords over an army of models from a podium, akin to what Hitler had in Nazis Germany. The similarities are uncanny and unsettling.

Aziz Ansari has aptly referred to the quiet support of white supremacy as “the lower case kkk”: that is, the quiet racial hatred that has played a role in the social, cultural, legal, and political history of America, and not just the “backwards” south as some may think. Quiet racism only needs subtle encouragement, and it seems that “look what you made me do” fits the criteria perfectly. The song “Look What you made Me Do” evidently speaks to the lower case kkk; and they have embraced it.

The day the song came out, Breitbart jumped on the lyrics on Twitter:  “I rose up from the dead, I do it all the time,” a line that they interpreted as racism and racial hatred rising from the dead. Those tired old beliefs about protecting the white race have found new racists to carry the torch (literally) and their beliefs into the 21st century. Breitbart and their loyal followers are central to the movement to be proud of being a racist, white supremacist and have the audacity to equate that with patriotism. And for liberal Bay Area natives like myself, who grew up with a healthy dose of 90’s era “racism is dead” propaganda, it feels like racism has risen from its grave with the stamina of a White Walker. While society at large seemed to reject racism as an abstract concept, the internet provided an “underground” space for racists to congregate without fear of retribution until Donald Trump encouraged them to come out in the open.

Taylor’s are lyrics that connect with whites that are concerned with what they see as the white dispossession of power. Breitbart highlighted another lyric on Twitter, the line, “but I got smarter, I got harder in the nick of time. Honey, I rose up from the dead, I do it all the time.” The lyrics were paired with the image of a story about a loophole for buying AR-15s. And the lyrics speak to even more than just unnecessary gun glorification but also to the white people who have been closeted racists for years.

Later in the song, there is another telling line: “I don’t like your kingdom keys. They once belonged to me. You asked me for a place to sleep. Locked me out and threw a feast (what?).” These lyrics are the most explicit in speaking to white anger and affirming white supremacy. The lyrics speak to the white people resentful of any non-white person having a position of power and privilege. Think of Barack  Obama: the fears of white dispossession of power were actualized in his success, which was a huge factor in the appeal of candidate Trump. He is a patriarchal, rich white man that embodied the anger and white supremacist ideology.

From the White House to the streets, chants like, “ you will not replace us” and call and responses like “whose streets” “our streets” were yelled by white men carrying torches in the night in Charlottesville a few short weeks ago are reminiscent of Swift’s lyrics. “I don’t like your kingdom keys, they once belonged to me,” is another way of saying, I will not be replaced and anger over white dispossession of power.

The lyrics validate those who feel that have been wronged, e.g. white people angry about a black president. The chant, “our streets” is similar to saying “you locked me out and threw a feast.” It is about feeling displaced, feeling wronged.  

In other words, these lyrics became the voice of the lower case kkk, and Taylor’s sweet, victim image is the perfect vehicle and metaphor for white supremacists’ perceived victimization. With the song at the top of the charts, it makes one wonder: how large is the lower case kkk? How much are people paying attention to the lyrics of the song? It is clear that Breitbart has embraced the song as being a white supremacist anthem, so why wouldn’t Trump’s base — and other white Americans that believe they deserve their white privilege — embrace it as well? And considering Taylor’s fan base is mostly young girls, does the song also serve as indoctrination into white supremacy?

It is hard to believe that Taylor had no idea that the lyrics of her latest single read like a defense of white privilege and white anger — specifically, white people who feel that they are being left behind as other races and groups start to receive dignity and legally recognized rights. “We will not be replaced” and “I don’t like your kingdom keys” are not different in tone or message. Both are saying that whites feel threatened and don’t want to share their privilege. And there is no way to know for sure if Taylor is a Trump supporter or identifies with the white nationalist message, but her silence has not gone unnoticed.

“Quiet racism only needs subtle encouragement, and it seems that ‘look what you made me do’ fits the criteria perfectly.”

Swift is not one for politics. She did not endorse Hillary Clinton until November 8th, 2016 on the eve of the election. She has stayed away from race conversations directly, but her music has been interpreted as racially offensive before. Her song “Shake it Off” has come under fire many times [salon]. The song has long been considered an insult to black America, yet it debuted at the top of the charts and is one of Swift’s biggest hits. It is clear her message of being white, pretty, and consequence-free is one that many in America have embraced. And like the quiet support that Trump received to the surprise of polls, Democrats, and the world, Taylor is giving support to the white nationalist movements through lyrics that speak to their anger, entitlement, and selfishness.

When Katy Perry, Lady Gaga, and Beyonce openly campaigned for Hillary Clinton, Taylor’s political silence appeared to be a rejection of her peers’ support of the inclusive Democrat platform. And when one of the most popular female artists in the world declines to join the many in her field in voicing for progressive politics, it could well be construed as her lending support to the voices rising against embracing diversity and inclusion emblematic of Trump supporters. Further, the single attacks other pop stars in the same way that the alt-right has attacked the “liberal” media. Taylor’s song identifies with the oppressed conservative trope, and the song is indeed their anthem.

Taylor Swift was called “Nazi barbie” by Camille Paglia, who stated that Swift is “a silly, regressive public image of white 50’s America.” That seems to fit nicely with the imagery of the alt-right. Her lyrics are like an affirmation for everything the alt-right has been feeling for years: oppressed, afraid to come out, and made to look like a fool. And now that they feel empowered, it befits the movement to have a white, blonde, conservative pop star that has no doubt been “bullied” by people of color in the media, singing their feelings out loud. And with a president that openly addresses hate groups and justifies racial hatred, this is not a time for neutrality.

And while pop musicians are not respected world leaders, they have a huge audience and their music often reflects their values. So Taylor’s silence is not innocent, it is calculated. And if that is not true, she needs to state her beliefs out loud for the world — no matter what fan base she might lose, because in America 2017, silence in the face of injustice means support for the oppressor.

AS MUCH AS I WOULD LOVE TO SEE KARMA COME TAYLOR SWIFT’S AWAY THIS IS BULLSHIT.

[and-then-there-were-n0ne]

Calm explanations aside, many people panic when they hear of such possibilities. They are happy to follow the advice of their smartphones or to take whatever drug the doctor prescribes, but when they hear of upgraded superhumans, they say: ‘I hope I will be dead before that happens.’ A friend once told me that what she fears most about growing old is becoming irrelevant, turning into a nostalgic old woman who cannot understand the world around her, or contribute much to it. This is what we fear collectively, as a species, when we hear of superhumans. We sense that in such a world, our identity, our dreams and even our fears will be irrelevant, and we will have nothing more to contribute. Whatever you are today – be it a devout Hindu cricket player or an aspiring lesbian journalist – in an upgraded world you will feel like a Neanderthal hunter in Wall Street. You won’t belong.

The Neanderthals didn’t have to worry about the Nasdaq, since they were shielded from it by tens of thousands of years. Nowadays, however, our world of meaning might collapse within decades. You cannot count on death to save you from becoming completely irrelevant. Even if gods don’t walk our streets by 2100, the attempt to upgrade Homo sapiens is likely to change the world beyond recognition in this century. Scientific research and technological developments are moving at a far faster rate than most of us can grasp.

If you speak with the experts, many of them will tell you that we are still very far away from genetically engineered babies or human-level artificial intelligence. But most experts think on a timescale of academic grants and college jobs. Hence, ‘very far away’ may mean twenty years, and ‘never’ may denote no more than fifty.

I still remember the day I first came across the Internet. It was back in 1993, when I was in high school. I went with a couple of buddies to visit our friend Ido (who is now a computer scientist). We wanted to play table tennis. Ido was already a huge computer fan, and before opening the ping-pong table he insisted on showing us the latest wonder. He connected the phone cable to his computer and pressed some keys. For a minute all we could hear were squeaks, shrieks and buzzes, and then silence. It didn’t succeed. We mumbled and grumbled, but Ido tried again. And again. And again. At last he gave a whoop and announced that he had managed to connect his computer to the central computer at the nearby university. ‘And what’s there, on the central computer?’ we asked. ‘Well,’ he admitted, ‘there’s nothing there yet. But you could put all kinds of things there.’ ‘Like what?’ we questioned. ‘I don’t know,’ he said, ‘all kinds of things.’ It didn’t sound very promising. We went to play ping-pong, and for the following weeks enjoyed a new pastime, making fun of Ido’s ridiculous idea. That was less than twenty-five years ago (at the time of writing). Who knows what will come to pass twenty-five years from now?

That’s why more and more individuals, organisations, corporations and governments are taking very seriously the quest for immortality, happiness and godlike powers. Insurance companies, pension funds, health systems and finance ministries are already aghast at the jump in life expectancy. People are living much longer than expected, and there is not enough money to pay for their pensions and medical treatment. As seventy threatens to become the new forty, experts are calling to raise the retirement age, and to restructure the entire job market.

When people realise how fast we are rushing towards the great unknown, and that they cannot count even on death to shield them from it, their reaction is to hope that somebody will hit the brakes and slow us down. But we cannot hit the brakes, for several reasons.

Firstly, nobody knows where the brakes are. While some experts are familiar with developments in one field, such as artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, big data or genetics, no one is an expert on everything. No one is therefore capable of connecting all the dots and seeing the full picture. Different fields influence one another in such intricate ways that even the best minds cannot fathom how breakthroughs in artificial intelligence might impact nanotechnology, or vice versa. Nobody can absorb all the latest scientific discoveries, nobody can predict how the global economy will look in ten years, and nobody has a clue where we are heading in such a rush. Since no one understands the system any more, no one can stop it.

Secondly, if we somehow succeed in hitting the brakes, our economy will collapse, along with our society. As explained in a later chapter, the modern economy needs constant and indefinite growth in order to survive. If growth ever stops, the economy won’t settle down to some cosy equilibrium; it will fall to pieces. An economy built on everlasting growth needs endless projects – just like the quests for immortality, bliss and divinity.

Well, if we need limitless projects, why not settle for bliss and immortality, and at least put aside the frightening quest for superhuman powers? Because it is inextricable from the other two. When you develop bionic legs that enable paraplegics to walk again, you can also use the same technology to upgrade healthy people. When you discover how to stop memory loss among older people, the same treatments might enhance the memory of the young.

No clear line separates healing from upgrading. Medicine almost always begins by saving people from falling below the norm, but the same tools and know-how can then be used to surpass the norm. Viagra began life as a treatment for blood-pressure problems. To the surprise and delight of Pfizer, it transpired that Viagra can also cure impotence. It enabled millions of men to regain normal sexual abilities; but soon enough men who had no impotence problems in the first place began using the same pill to surpass the norm, and acquire sexual powers they never had before.

What happens to particular drugs can also happen to entire fields of medicine. Modern plastic surgery was born in the First World War, when Harold Gillies began treating facial injuries in the Aldershot military hospital. When the war was over, surgeons discovered that the same techniques could also turn perfectly healthy but ugly noses into more beautiful specimens. Though plastic surgery continued to help the sick and wounded, it devoted increasing attention to upgrading the healthy. Nowadays plastic surgeons make millions in private clinics whose explicit and sole aim is to upgrade the healthy and beautify the wealthy.

The same might happen with genetic engineering. If a billionaire openly stated that he intended to engineer super-smart offspring, imagine the public outcry. But it won’t happen like that. We are more likely to slide down a slippery slope. It begins with parents whose genetic profile puts their children at high risk of deadly genetic diseases. So they perform in vitro fertilisation, and test the DNA of the fertilised egg. If everything is in order, all well and good. But if the DNA test discovers the dreaded mutations – the embryo is destroyed. […] Following selection and replacement, the next potential step is amendment. Once it becomes possible to amend deadly genes, […] you can just rewrite the code and turn a dangerous mutant gene into its benign version. Then we might start using the same mechanism to fix not just lethal genes, but also those responsible for less deadly illnesses, for autism, for stupidity and for obesity.

[…] And even if you don’t want that for your child – what if the neighbours are doing it for theirs? Would you have your child lag behind? And if the government forbids all citizens from engineering their babies, what if the North Koreans are doing it and producing amazing geniuses, artists and athletes that far outperform ours? And like that, in baby steps, we are on our way to a genetic child catalogue.

Healing is the initial justification for every upgrade. Find some professors experimenting in genetic engineering or brain–computer interfaces, and ask them why they are engaged in such research. In all likelihood they would reply that they are doing it to cure disease. ‘With the help of genetic engineering,’ they would explain, ‘we could defeat cancer. And if we could connect brains and computers directly, we could cure schizophrenia.’ Maybe, but it will surely not end there. When we successfully connect brains and computers, will we use this technology only to cure schizophrenia? If anybody really believes this, then they may know a great deal about brains and computers, but far less about the human psyche and human society.

[…] Of course, humans can and do limit their use of new technologies. Thus the eugenics movement fell from favour after the Second World War, and though trade in human organs is now both possible and potentially very lucrative, it has so far remained a peripheral activity. Designer babies may one day become as technologically feasible as murdering people to harvest their organs – yet remain as peripheral.

Just as we have escaped the clutches of Chekhov’s Law in warfare, we can also escape them in other fields of action. Some guns appear on stage without ever being fired. This is why it is so vital to think about humanity’s new agenda. Precisely because we have some choice regarding the use of new technologies, we had better understand what is happening and make up our minds about it before it makes up our minds for us.

-  Yuval Noah Harari, Can Someone Please Hit the Brakes? in Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow

[alwayschocolateface-blog]

10 reasons beeing gay is wrong

1.  It Is Not Marriage

Calling something marriage does not make it marriage. Marriage has always been a covenant between a man and a woman which is by its nature ordered toward the procreation and education of children and the unity and wellbeing of the spouses.

The promoters of same-sex “marriage” propose something entirely different. They propose the union between two men or two women. This denies the self-evident biological, physiological, and psychological differences between men and women which find their complementarity in marriage. It also denies the specific primary purpose of marriage: the perpetuation of the human race and the raising of children.

Two entirely different things cannot be considered the same thing.

2. It Violates Natural Law

Marriage is not just any relationship between human beings. It is a relationship rooted in human nature and thus governed by natural law.

Natural law’s most elementary precept is that “good is to be done and pursued, and evil is to be avoided.” By his natural reason, man can perceive what is morally good or bad for him. Thus, he can know the end or purpose of each of his acts and how it is morally wrong to transform the means that help him accomplish an act into the act’s purpose.

Any situation which institutionalizes the circumvention of the purpose of the sexual act violates natural law and the objective norm of morality.

Being rooted in human nature, natural law is universal and immutable. It applies to the entire human race, equally. It commands and forbids consistently, everywhere and always. Saint Paul taught in the Epistle to the Romans that the natural law is inscribed on the heart of every man. (Rom. 2:14-15)

3. It Always Denies a Child Either a Father or a Mother

It is in the child’s best interests that he be raised under the influence of his natural father and mother. This rule is confirmed by the evident difficulties faced by the many children who are orphans or are raised by a single parent, a relative, or a foster parent.

The unfortunate situation of these children will be the norm for all children of a same-sex “marriage.” A child of a same-sex “marriage” will always be deprived of either his natural mother or father. He will necessarily be raised by one party who has no blood relationship with him. He will always be deprived of either a mother or a father role model.

Same-sex “marriage” ignores a child’s best interests.

4. It Validates and Promotes the Homosexual Lifestyle

In the name of the “family,” same-sex “marriage” serves to validate not only such unions but the whole homosexual lifestyle in all its bisexual and transgender variants.

Civil laws are structuring principles of man's life in society. As such, they play a very important and sometimes decisive role in influencing patterns of thought and behavior. They externally shape the life of society, but also profoundly modify everyone’s perception and evaluation of forms of behavior.

Legal recognition of same-sex “marriage” would necessarily obscure certain basic moral values, devalue traditional marriage, and weaken public morality.

5. It Turns a Moral Wrong into a Civil Right

Homosexual activists argue that same-sex “marriage” is a civil rights issue similar to the struggle for racial equality in the 1960s.

This is false.

First of all, sexual behavior and race are essentially different realities. A man and a woman wanting to marry may be different in their characteristics: one may be black, the other white; one rich, the other poor; or one tall, the other short. None of these differences are insurmountable obstacles to marriage. The two individuals are still man and woman, and thus the requirements of nature are respected.

Same-sex “marriage” opposes nature. Two individuals of the same sex, regardless of their race, wealth, stature, erudition or fame, will never be able to marry because of an insurmountable biological impossibility.

Secondly, inherited and unchangeable racial traits cannot be compared with non-genetic and changeable behavior. There is simply no analogy between the interracial marriage of a man and a woman and the “marriage” between two individuals of the same sex.

6. It Does Not Create a Family but a Naturally Sterile Union

Traditional marriage is usually so fecund that those who would frustrate its end must do violence to nature to prevent the birth of children by using contraception. It naturally tends to create families.

On the contrary, same-sex “marriage” is intrinsically sterile. If the “spouses” want a child, they must circumvent nature by costly and artificial means or employ surrogates. The natural tendency of such a union is not to create families.Therefore, we cannot call a same-sex union marriage and give it the benefits of true marriage.

7. It Defeats the State’s Purpose of Benefiting Marriage

One of the main reasons why the State bestows numerous benefits on marriage is that by its very nature and design, marriage provides the normal conditions for a stable, affectionate, and moral atmosphere that is beneficial to the upbringing of children—all fruit of the mutual affection of the parents. This aids in perpetuating the nation and strengthening society, an evident interest of the State.

Homosexual “marriage” does not provide such conditions. Its primary purpose, objectively speaking, is the personal gratification of two individuals whose union is sterile by nature. It is not entitled, therefore, to the protection the State extends to true marriage.

8. It Imposes Its Acceptance on All Society

By legalizing same-sex “marriage,” the State becomes its official and active promoter. The State calls on public officials to officiate at the new civil ceremony, orders public schools to teach its acceptability to children, and punishes any state employee who expresses disapproval.

In the private sphere, objecting parents will see their children exposed more than ever to this new “morality,” businesses offering wedding services will be forced to provide them for same-sex unions, and rental property owners will have to agree to accept same-sex couples as tenants.

In every situation where marriage affects society, the State will expect Christians and all people of good will to betray their consciences by condoning, through silence or act, an attack on the natural order and Christian morality.

9. It Is the Cutting Edge of the Sexual Revolution

In the 1960s, society was pressured to accept all kinds of immoral sexual relationships between men and women. Today we are seeing a new sexual revolution where society is being asked to accept sodomy and same-sex “marriage.”

If homosexual “marriage” is universally accepted as the present step in sexual “freedom,” what logical arguments can be used to stop the next steps of incest, pedophilia, bestiality, and other forms of unnatural behavior? Indeed, radical elements of certain “avant garde” subcultures are already advocating such aberrations.

The railroading of same-sex “marriage” on the American people makes increasingly clear what homosexual activist Paul Varnell wrote in the Chicago Free Press: "The gay movement, whether we acknowledge it or not, is not a civil rights movement, not even a sexual liberation movement, but a moral revolution aimed at changing people's view of homosexuality."

10. It Offends God

This is the most important reason. Whenever one violates the natural moral order established by God, one sins and offends God. Same-sex “marriage” does just this. Accordingly, anyone who professes to love God must be opposed to it.

Marriage is not the creature of any State. Rather, it was established by God in Paradise for our first parents, Adam and Eve. As we read in the Book of Genesis: “God created man in His image; in the Divine image he created him; male and female He created them. God blessed them, saying: ‘Be fertile and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it.’” (Gen. 1:28-29)

The same was taught by Our Savior Jesus Christ: “From the beginning of the creation, God made them male and female. For this cause a man shall leave his father and mother; and shall cleave to his wife.” (Mark 10:6-7).

Genesis also teaches how God punished Sodom and Gomorrah for the sin of homosexuality: “The Lord rained down sulphurous fire upon Sodom and Gomorrah. He overthrew those cities and the whole Plain, together with the inhabitants of the cities and the produce of the soil.” (Gen. 19:24-25)