A person who denies the very essence of themselves in order to conform to what their family and society expect of them is the one who is harming themselves. I am not advocating a state of anarchy where everyone does what they like with no thought about the consequences. But I see it as a very positive thing that homosexuality is becoming more acceptable in mainstream society, something that no longer has to be a dirty or shameful secret. It's not that long ago that homosexuality was considered a mental illness. You're not going to stamp it out of people by telling them they're going to hell or they're fundamentally flawed.

My belief is that a tribe wants to perpetuate itself and keep itself strong. A few thousand years ago in the Middle East I imagine there would have been a strong incentive in those societies for people to marry and habe many children in order to achieve this. A homosexual is not so likely to marry and have children are they, so they would not have been fulfilling what probably was seen as a vital role at the time. Things have rather changed since then don't you think? Is someone now not fulfilling an obligation to society because they are not marrying and having children?

I don't believe homosexuality is wrong "because God said so." I believe this ancient society wrote rules for themselves and incorporated them into their religion in order to ensure that people followed them. The "God said so, it's in the Bible" arument is only going to work with other Christians.

I quite agree with what Pwcca has said here about circumcision. I take rather more issue with comparing homosexuality to poisoning people with mercury -- hmm, pretty extreme, I think most people would agree.

Linda.