Does anyone like the Iona Institute?

CFlat

This might be slightly off topic but I was working in the Portarlington/Monasterevin area this morning and the amount of 'No' posters compared to the 'Yes' posters was astonishing. At a guess I'd say it the 'Yes' posters were out numbered 10/1. They are also very colourful and eye catching.

The Sinn Feins posters are like something out of the 1970s that someone found and put 'Tá' and 'Yes' on and they were the only 'Yes' posters I saw. They also only had one colour. Clearly Aengus O Snodaigh didn't liberate enough ink cartridges from the Oirechtas store room.

Anyway, the 'Yes' side need to up their game re posters certainly in the area I 've passed through. I don't think I'd be influenced by a poster but clearly some people are.

K4t

haveringchick wrote: »

Equating them with ISIS is just pathetic and funny and ironic in a sad kind of way.

Even funnier considering it was a poster defending Iona who first mentioned Isis in this thread.

Snickers Man wrote: »

Ah now here. That's taking it a bit far.

Indeed, they're far more of a threat than the Westboro Baptist Church will ever be.

Lollipops23

Snickers Man wrote: »

Ah now here. That's taking it a bit far.

Not at all. They're bigoted and want the country to come around to their hateful way of thinking.

K4t

K4t wrote: »

Even funnier considering it was a poster defending Iona who first mentioned Isis in this thread.

Indeed, they're far more of a threat than the Westboro Baptist Church will ever be.

how are they a threat to Irish society I am curious about that as I said not a fan of them but really they are a threat to Irish society!!!! get a grip.. they are a small very conservative lobby group given far more consideration that their support would warrant.

There are hundreds of issue that are for more of a danger to Irish society that the Iona crowed.

K4t

mariaalice wrote: »

how are they a threat to iris society I am curious about that as I said not a fan of them but really they are a threat to Irish society!!!! get a grip.. they are a small very conservative lobby group given far more consideration that there support would warrant.

There are hundreds of issue that are for more of a danger to Irish society that the Iona crowed.

Any religious fundamentalist group is a threat to Irish society; Iona is a threat considering the amount of funding it receives from here and abroad, as well as the amount of air time it is afforded by our state and private broadcasting services, which is hugely disproportionate to as you say a "small lobby group". As mentioned earlier, David Quinn and Breda O'Brien both write for the two leading broadsheets. Of course they are not the biggest threat to Irish society, but they are a threat. The worst thing you can do is ignore these people, though even that is difficult to achieve. I have a firm grip thanks. Any other questions?

PopePalpatine

conorhal wrote: »

In fairness most other synonyms for liberal come up with ****s

If that's the case (rather than you just spewing bile), I'd hate to see the synonyms for "conservative".

SpaceTime

CFlat wrote: »

This might be slightly off topic but I was working in the Portarlington/Monasterevin area this morning and the amount of 'No' posters compared to the 'Yes' posters was astonishing. At a guess I'd say it the 'Yes' posters were out numbered 10/1. They are also very colourful and eye catching.

The Sinn Feins posters are like something out of the 1970s that someone found and put 'Tá' and 'Yes' on and they were the only 'Yes' posters I saw. They also only had one colour. Clearly Aengus O Snodaigh didn't liberate enough ink cartridges from the Oirechtas store room.

Anyway, the 'Yes' side need to up their game re posters certainly in the area I 've passed through. I don't think I'd be influenced by a poster but clearly some people are.

There are mostly Yes posters up around here and they're very colourful.

I agree though the SF poster looks like it the template for a very, very dull school book cover or something.

PopePalpatine

On my way to work there's a fair few Sinn Féin posters with "Votáil Tá/Vote Yes" along with one of their local councillors. I just feel that's quite a bit opportunistic.

Menas

PopePalpatine wrote: »

On my way to work there's a fair few Sinn Féin posters with "Votáil Tá/Vote Yes" along with one of their local councillors. I just feel that's quite a bit opportunistic.

It is, but as a yes supporter I am happier to see the sf posters than those offensive no posters with the family on them.

Ozymandius2011

Wexford town probably has more yes than no posters at moment. Unusually the yes ones appeared first.

I think if it's lost, the lack of urgency will have been partly to blame but only in the last week of April.

K4t

Ozymandius2011 wrote: »

Wexford town probably has more yes than no posters at moment. Unusually the yes ones appeared first.

I think if it's lost, the lack of urgency will have been partly to blame but only in the last week of April.

Wexford folk don't suffer fools gladly in my experience. Only drunken ones..

BuilderPlumber

K4t wrote: »

Any religious fundamentalist group is a threat to Irish society; Iona is a threat considering the amount of funding it receives from here and abroad, as well as the amount of air time it is afforded by our state and private broadcasting services, which is hugely disproportionate to as you say a "small lobby group". As mentioned earlier, David Quinn and Breda O'Brien both write for the two leading broadsheets. Of course they are not the biggest threat to Irish society, but they are a threat. The worst thing you can do is ignore these people, though even that is difficult to achieve. I have a firm grip thanks. Any other questions?

I agree. The likes of Iona are laying down the framework for others, be it here but more than likely elsewhere, to put into practice. Remember this from the 1970s as I previously pointed out:

http://www.iranchamber.com/history/rkhomeini/books/velayat_faqeeh.pdf

This thing was probably written across decades in Saudi Arabia by an unnamed source, sold to an Iranian priest and then put into practice to create a Shiite version of Saudi Arabia. This document is well argued and touches on what irks the people (banks, imperialism, corruption, etc.) and then makes cases for outlawing alcohol, stoning women, and going soft on heroin among other things!!! This document is moderate compared to what it lead to and the state it helped to found is moderate compared to the ones that came after it.

Iona could well lead to the Catholic version of Islamism in perhaps Africa or even in rural Ireland. If someone can link Catholicism with world problems like Velayat Faqeeh does Islam and world problems, then there is a true danger of a Catholic Republic forming.

BuilderPlumber

Not a NSA agent wrote: »

This is probably a better comparison than ISIS. While they want you to live by the catholic version of sharia law they aren't killing anyone. They're just loud assholes who wish to force everyone to follow their ideology.

Yet. But either did this:

http://www.iranchamber.com/history/rkhomeini/books/velayat_faqeeh.pdf

A Saudi Arabian written and influenced document an Iranian priest endorsed and then sold out his country and its entire culture for money and to rule his country as a Saudi-style monarch. This lead to much much worse regimes forming down the years and emboldened Fascism in Islamic countries eventually resulting in al Qaeda, 9/11, Taliban, al Shabaab, Boko Haram and ISIS/ISIL.

What if we got some fanatic Catholic state with loads of cash to do the same? Iona-style organisation writes up a similar thesis and then sells it to some country on the verge of regime change and with corruption problems. Could fanatic Catholicism be sold as a solution to Ireland's problems of unemployment, job insecurity, inequality, poor treatment of employees, the poor treatment professional bodies give students (eg. ACCA and CIMA) by failing them deliberately to make money, drugs, crime, insincere politicians, etc, etc. Well, that's what Saudi Arabia's clever fascist exporters were able to do. And indeed Hitler.

SpaceTime

While I agree you have a point, I think IONA is a remnant of another era rather than a framework for a new era of extreme catholicism.

Ireland did become a quasi-fascist theocracy for a while. It had all sorts of worrying things going on:

*Censorship - both official and unofficial.
*Private religious organisations exercising inappropriate powers.
*Almost total merger of church and state.
*Confusion between civil law and religious traditions/law.
*Attempt to merge the notion of national identity with religious identity - i.e. creating "Holy Catholic Ireland" instead of just "the Republic of Ireland".
*Extrajudicial punishment tolerated for breech of religious laws - Magdalene laundries.
*Use of state resources to coerce : odd combinations of social services, health services, 'care' institutions etc.
*Politicians declaring their loyalty to a religion as more important than their loyalty to the nation : John A Costello

"I have no hesitation in saying that we, as a Government, representing a people, the overwhelming majority of whom are of the one faith, who have a special position in the Constitution, when we are given advice or warnings by the authoritative people in the Catholic Church, on matters strictly confined to faith and morals, so long as I am here—and I am sure I speak for my colleagues—will give to their directions, given within that scope—and I have no doubt that they do not desire in the slightest to go one fraction of an inch outside the sphere of faith and morals—our complete obedience and allegiance." ... "I am an Irishman second, I am a Catholic first, and I accept without qualification in all respects the teaching of the hierarchy and the church to which I belong.

*Banning of contraception and over-regulation until the 1990s.
*No divorce until 1995
*Abortion laws that are so restrictive they are bordering on insanity. (Still largely unchanged)

....

Let's not get too teary eyed about our past. Whether we're comfortable about it or not, Ireland was a very strange country. Its quite normal and increasingly progressive now, but we come from a place that was shockingly conservative and very theocratic.

IONA and other organisations are really a ghost from that past rather than a template for any future.

K4t

SpaceTime wrote: »

IONA and other organisations are really a ghost from that past rather than a template for any future.

Yet they will exert a huge influence over the future. Their opposition to same-sex marriage and their tactics of spreading misinformation, especially relating to children, is merely a rehearsal for them in the lead up to the big one i.e. abortion. Iona aren't a massive danger, but they will cause a massive delay in this country progressing as it could and should. C'est la vie.

SpaceTime

K4t wrote: »

Yet they will exert a huge influence over the future. Their opposition to same-sex marriage and their tactics of spreading misinformation, especially relating to children, is merely a rehearsal for them in the lead up to the big one i.e. abortion. Iona aren't a massive danger, but they will cause a massive delay in this country progressing as it could and should. C'est la vie.

Well, it's up to the rest of us to argue past those things.

I don't think the Irish population is inherently that conservative as much as they were repressed and afraid to stick their head above the parapet for a long time.
Those who did try to challenge in the past tended to get squished by the establishment and I would suspect many of our most interesting people left for the "new world".

You have to remember there were several threads of influences leading up to independence here. Different factions all wanted independence, but not for the same reasons.

You'd republicans who saw it in a French / American revolutionary way which was all about enlightenment and freedom. They were quickly sidelined after independence.
Women's groups who were all about progressing women's freedoms (totally sidelined after independence).
Gaelic revivalists - Sort of survived.
Catholics who felt they had been opressed under the British and wanted to set up a Catholic state.

We ended up with a sort of weird befuddled identity that combined a notion that republicanism was just "not England", rather than a grand ideal about democracy and government by the people, over the people and for the people.
That was combined with a bit of gaelic revivalism to 'build the nation' and then the big chunk was the extremely conservative types who wanted to build a model Catholic state and were prepared to do that through social engineering type approaches.

That's basically what happened Ireland.

The wheels began to fall off in the 1970s and people woke up. So, maybe we're finally heading more towards a genuine republic after all these years?

To me, this vote is as much about showing that we are really moving into a new era where we can finally bury that rather grim period of Irish history and actually look towards a genuinely socially inclusive, open, democratic, republic with some real values and understanding of what that word means.

If you ever get a chance, compare the French and Irish Constitutions in English. Shocking difference! One's a republic, the other I'm not quite sure it even knows what it is.

The very first turning point was in 1972 when we removed the "special position" of the Catholic Church in the constitution.

That was voted in favour of by a landslide 84% yes!

BuilderPlumber

K4t wrote: »

Yet they will exert a huge influence over the future. Their opposition to same-sex marriage and their tactics of spreading misinformation, especially relating to children, is merely a rehearsal for them in the lead up to the big one i.e. abortion. Iona aren't a massive danger, but they will cause a massive delay in this country progressing as it could and should. C'est la vie.

Things may be consigned to the past but may come back again in the future. Certainly, fascist 'Islam' has received a revival and once was totally unheard of in moderate Muslim countries like Iran and Afghanistan ... until bloody Saudi Arabia started funding poisonous fascist organisations.

Even Christian/Catholic countries have gone from less to more religious societies too. Poland is a major example. Only for Pope John Paul, Poland would probably have become more like its neighbours such as Czech Republic (a mix of atheist and moderate religion) when it came to religion rather than the most Catholic country in Europe.

kidneyfan

No

BuilderPlumber wrote: »

Things may be consigned to the past but may come back again in the future. Certainly, fascist 'Islam' has received a revival and once was totally unheard of in moderate Muslim countries like Iran and Afghanistan ... until bloody Saudi Arabia started funding poisonous fascist organisations.

Did Saudi Arabia fund the Ayatollah Khomeini (how Macchiavellian if true).

Nodin

K4t wrote: »

Wexford folk don't suffer fools gladly in my experience. Only drunken ones..

Does that mean a wexford man will only suffer a fool if he's drunk? Or suffer a drunken fool?

BuilderPlumber

kidneyfan wrote: »

Did Saudi Arabia fund the Ayatollah Khomeini (how Macchiavellian if true).

Saudi Arabia's main mission was to spread its very hardline, fascist, intolerant and indeed racist form of 'Islam' across the Middle East and beyond. In the 1960s and 1970s, Iran was the direct opposite of what Saudi Arabia stood for and Saudi Arabia did ALL it could to 'Islamise' and 'Arabise' Iran. The terms in commas mean that these terms as applied to Saudi Arabia's views.

Khomeini we all know did not have much time nor respect for Saudi Arabia when he assumed power. But before he assumed power, Khomeini's main goal was to topple the Pahlavi Shah. Along the way, he even resided in Ba'athist Iraq under Saddam's poorly in health predecessor (Saddam was second in command officially but was defacto in command). Khomeini used both Iraq and Saudi Arabia as a source of help (both were then rivals of the Shah: Saddam's regime was a similar secular entity to the Shah's Iran whereas Saudi Arabia was a theocratic absolute monarchy).

It is clear that Khomeini and his legacy became more a symbol in the newly created Islamic Republic, which fused elements of Saudi Arabia's theocratic monarchy with existing Iranian nationalism. Iran was 'Arabised' and 'Islamised' in Saudi terms and became the Shia version of Saudi Arabia. However, fascist 'Islamism' was set on fire by the other events of the time (most notably, the Afghan wars and later Iraq) thus leaving Iran's brand a moderate form of Islamism by comparison. This was not lost on Iran, whose Islamic Republic is far from ideal but still preferable to the conditions in the war ravaged Arab states, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia itself and others. The good the Islamic Republic did like creating a welfare state and distributing certain wealth cancelled out some of the bad things as did turning a blind eye often to things.

But as for Khomeini? He still remains a symbol but the clever guys who used him as symbol in the 1980s are now the leaders of Iran present and recent. Namely, Khamenei and Rafsanjani. But Khomeini when alive spoke out against 'stone age' practices done in his regime's name, interfering into people's home lives and even told initially those who took over the US embassy to get out. Khomeini's family never profited out of the regime and are among its main opponents to this day. Perhaps, Khomeini was more in love with Iran than Saudi Arabia and foreign versions of 'Islam' than we are lead to believe?

SpaceTime

BuilderPlumber wrote: »

Things may be consigned to the past but may come back again in the future. Certainly, fascist 'Islam' has received a revival and once was totally unheard of in moderate Muslim countries like Iran and Afghanistan ... until bloody Saudi Arabia started funding poisonous fascist organisations.

Even Christian/Catholic countries have gone from less to more religious societies too. Poland is a major example. Only for Pope John Paul, Poland would probably have become more like its neighbours such as Czech Republic (a mix of atheist and moderate religion) when it came to religion rather than the most Catholic country in Europe.

Eastern Europe also has a post communist religious revival though. That's very clearly what's been going on in Russia.

Ireland probably went through that phase too because of official oppression of Catholicism in the past and even though that stopped after Catholic emancipation there were still very strongly negative attitudes from the UK establishment in the late 19th and early 20th century.

There was an element of rebellion about being ultra religious.

Unfortunately it's a bit like the abused becoming the abuser. The oppressed church structures ran wild once they did gain power and began to oppress aspects of society they didn't like, ignoring democracy and freedom and just grabbing inappropriate power all over the place.

Things only began to become balanced in the 1970s and really I think we're only hitting normality in the 21st century.

kidneyfan

No

Very interesting thank you.

BuilderPlumber wrote: »

Saudi Arabia's main mission was to spread its very hardline, fascist, intolerant and indeed racist form of 'Islam' across the Middle East and beyond. In the 1960s and 1970s, Iran was the direct opposite of what Saudi Arabia stood for and Saudi Arabia did ALL it could to 'Islamise' and 'Arabise' Iran. The terms in commas mean that these terms as applied to Saudi Arabia's views.

Khomeini we all know did not have much time nor respect for Saudi Arabia when he assumed power. But before he assumed power, Khomeini's main goal was to topple the Pahlavi Shah. Along the way, he even resided in Ba'athist Iraq under Saddam's poorly in health predecessor (Saddam was second in command officially but was defacto in command). Khomeini used both Iraq and Saudi Arabia as a source of help (both were then rivals of the Shah: Saddam's regime was a similar secular entity to the Shah's Iran whereas Saudi Arabia was a theocratic absolute monarchy).

It is clear that Khomeini and his legacy became more a symbol in the newly created Islamic Republic, which fused elements of Saudi Arabia's theocratic monarchy with existing Iranian nationalism. Iran was 'Arabised' and 'Islamised' in Saudi terms and became the Shia version of Saudi Arabia. However, fascist 'Islamism' was set on fire by the other events of the time (most notably, the Afghan wars and later Iraq) thus leaving Iran's brand a moderate form of Islamism by comparison. This was not lost on Iran, whose Islamic Republic is far from ideal but still preferable to the conditions in the war ravaged Arab states, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia itself and others. The good the Islamic Republic did like creating a welfare state and distributing certain wealth cancelled out some of the bad things as did turning a blind eye often to things.

But as for Khomeini? He still remains a symbol but the clever guys who used him as symbol in the 1980s are now the leaders of Iran present and recent. Namely, Khamenei and Rafsanjani. But Khomeini when alive spoke out against 'stone age' practices done in his regime's name, interfering into people's home lives and even told initially those who took over the US embassy to get out. Khomeini's family never profited out of the regime and are among its main opponents to this day. Perhaps, Khomeini was more in love with Iran than Saudi Arabia and foreign versions of 'Islam' than we are lead to believe?

floggg

Ozymandius2011 wrote: »

Wexford town probably has more yes than no posters at moment. Unusually the yes ones appeared first.

I think if it's lost, the lack of urgency will have been partly to blame but only in the last week of April.

It seems allowing the No side a head start has worked in the Yes side's favour.

The No posters angered a lot of people and hardened their support. It also encouraged a lot of donations to Yes Equality.

Fuseman

No

Any person who knows anything about family, know that if at all possible, the best place for a child to be raised is by its own biological mother and father. I have gay friends and they respect my opinion even on this.

There should be provisions to make sure that Civil partnerships get as much cover from our laws but it should not be called Marriage and should not be in Article 41 of the constitution which is about the Family.

Another point, by allowing SSM you will be denying the right of a child to know its biological father/mother through surrogacy. If you are buying cattle these days you have to fill in details of the bull and cow from which the cattle came from for traceability reasons. Imagine this will not be the case for children if SSM is passed ! :eek:

PopePalpatine

IIRC a baby produced with the help of surrogacy will still have the biological parents written on their birth cert, so there goes your fearmongering about "traceability".

Fuseman

Fuseman wrote: »

Any person who knows anything about family, know that if at all possible, the best place for a child to be raised is by its own biological mother and father. I have gay friends and they respect my opinion even on this.

There should be provisions to make sure that Civil partnerships get as much cover from our laws but it should not be called Marriage and should not be in Article 41 of the constitution which is about the Family.

Another point, by allowing SSM you will be denying the right of a child to know its biological father/mother through surrogacy. If you are buying cattle these days you have to fill in details of the bull and cow from which the cattle came from for traceability reasons. Imagine this will not be the case for children if SSM is passed ! :eek:

One again its not about children or the right to have children, its about marriage are people who are married but don't have children not married in you eyes, because you seem to believe that marriage is only about having children.

Nodin

Fuseman wrote: »

Any person who knows anything about family, know that if at all possible, the best place for a child to be raised is by its own biological mother and father. I have gay friends and they respect my opinion even on this.

Not sure what this has to do with the Iona institute. Or the marriage referendum, as it doesn't propose legalising child snatching by childless gay couples.

Fuseman wrote: »

There should be provisions to make sure that Civil partnerships get as much cover from our laws but it should not be called Marriage and should not be in Article 41 of the constitution which is about the Family.

A pointless exercise.

Fuseman wrote: »

Another point, by allowing SSM you will be denying the right of a child to know its biological father/mother through surrogacy. .........

The vast majority of cases of surrogacy are for childless heterosexual couples, so again, SSM has nothing to do with it whatsoever.

galljga1

PopePalpatine wrote: »

IIRC a baby produced with the help of surrogacy will still have the biological parents written on their birth cert, so there goes your fearmongering about "traceability".

Yeah, if you use the double tagging system, that should be that one sorted. I'm sure Mullinahone co-op should have no problem producing cute little tags for babies.

Fuseman

No

PopePalpatine wrote: »

IIRC a baby produced with the help of surrogacy will still have the biological parents written on their birth cert, so there goes your fearmongering about "traceability".

and what about the privacy of sperm donors? With Surrogacy the sperm could come from another country

El_Duderino 09

Fuseman wrote: »

Any person who knows anything about family, know that if at all possible, the best place for a child to be raised is by its own biological mother and father. I have gay friends and they respect my opinion even on this.

There should be provisions to make sure that Civil partnerships get as much cover from our laws but it should not be called Marriage and should not be in Article 41 of the constitution which is about the Family.

Another point, by allowing SSM you will be denying the right of a child to know its biological father/mother through surrogacy. If you are buying cattle these days you have to fill in details of the bull and cow from which the cattle came from for traceability reasons. Imagine this will not be the case for children if SSM is passed ! :eek:

I heard David Quinn himself has adopted children. Adoption denies children the ability to be raised by their biological parents. Does David Quinn have a family in your view? How would gay adoption differ from straight adoption?

Also, are you opposed to straight surrogacy in the same way as gay surrogacy?

PopePalpatine

Fuseman wrote: »

and what about the privacy of sperm donors? With Surrogacy the sperm could come from another country

I'd imagine that sperm donors don't want much to do with their biological kids...it could end up like that crappy Vince Vaughn movie where he's fathered dozens of them! :pac:

ArtyM

Fuseman wrote: »

If you are buying cattle these days you have to fill in details of the bull and cow from which the cattle came from for traceability reasons. Imagine this will not be the case for children if SSM is passed !

Wow.
Seriously.
Wow.

Fuseman

No

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

I heard David Quinn himself has adopted children. Adoption denies children the ability to be raised by their biological parents. How would gay adoption differ from straight adoption?

Also, are you opposed to straight surrogacy in the same way as gay surrogacy?

These days adoption is a choice by which the birth mother can give up her child. As an adoptive father myself, we learned during the adoption process that the best place for a child to be brought up if at all possible is with their natural parents. You also learn that for the adopted children, you should never deny them the right to know their biological parents. Our Son already knows about his "Tummy Mummy"

So if DQ has adopted children, I am sure he has every right to express his opinion on this.

El_Duderino 09

PopePalpatine wrote: »

IIRC a baby produced with the help of surrogacy will still have the biological parents written on their birth cert, so there goes your fearmongering about "traceability".

Seriously is there anyone who doesn't get the distinction between selling livestock for milking, breeding and meat vs carrying a child for people who can't have their own?

El_Duderino 09

Fuseman wrote: »

These days adoption is a choice by which the birth mother can give up her child. As an adoptive father myself, we learned during the adoption process that the best place for a child to be brought up if at all possible is with their natural parents. You also learn that for the adopted children, you should never deny them the right to know their biological parents. Our Son already knows about his "Tummy Mummy"

So if DQ has adopted children, I am sure he has every right to express his opinion on this.

And your opinion is that adoption should be banned?

I'm confused. If adoption is ok for hetero couples and not for gay couples, then knowing the biological parents isn't the issue. Couldn't a gay couple tell the adopted child about 'tummy mummy' exactly as you did? What's the difference between you adopting and a gay couple adopting?

Are you offering sub standard parenting because you're not the biological parent?

SparkySpitfire

klark_kent wrote: »

thats the exact point , a lot of people believe that a child is better being raised by a male - female couple , regardless of whether the child is adopted or not

But the thing is, kids all over the country are now being raised by single mothers and fathers (regardless of sexuality, hence nothing to do with this referendum) and they're fine?

I'm one of those (grown-up) children and it's absolutely insulting that I am in any way worse off or deficient because of my upbringing. What you believe or don't believe is irrelevant. The fact is it's already happening and the results aren't apocalyptic or society-destroying.

El_Duderino 09

klark_kent wrote: »

well the setting for a child is quite different if they are adopted by a gay couple so i suspect that might be viewed as a significant difference

Different yes. All families are different. Some are demonstrably better than others. We don't prevent families unless substantial demonstrable harm is occurring. Do you think gays will necessarily cause demonstrable harm?

We allow children to be raised by a single parent so we know you don't need 2 genders to raise a child. What's the difference with 2 parents of the same gender?

El_Duderino 09

klark_kent wrote: »

thats the exact point , a lot of people believe that a child is better being raised by a male - female couple , regardless of whether the child is adopted or not

Is that your opinion?

efb

Fuseman wrote: »

These days adoption is a choice by which the birth mother can give up her child. As an adoptive father myself, we learned during the adoption process that the best place for a child to be brought up if at all possible is with their natural parents. You also learn that for the adopted children, you should never deny them the right to know their biological parents. Our Son already knows about his "Tummy Mummy"

So if DQ has adopted children, I am sure he has every right to express his opinion on this.

Would gay couples not be in the same situation???

SparkySpitfire

klark_kent wrote: »

i didnt say they were , im saying that one of the core beliefs of the NO side is that a child is better off being raised by a male - female couple

wasnt referring to single parents families

And I'm saying that belief has no basis in fact.

So it's grand if they're raised by a single mom but not two moms? Is that what you're suggesting?

El_Duderino 09

SparkySpitfire wrote: »

And I'm saying that belief has no basis in fact.

So it's grand if they're raised by a single mom but not two moms? Is that what you're suggesting?

This is the really annoying nub of it. Fuseman is trying to say its ok for hetero adoption but not gay adoption. Why bother with all the rigmarole of talking about children being raised by parents of both genders (by a single parent) and being raised by their biological parents (by a parent who adopted children)? Why don't they just say they don't like homosexuality and be done with it?

El Weirdo

Fuseman wrote: »

Any person who knows anything about family, know that if at all possible, the best place for a child to be raised is by its own biological mother and father. I have gay friends and they respect my opinion even on this.

You do realise that even if your "gay friends" do actually respect your opinion, that doesn't make the opinion any less wrong?

Diemos

Why isn't there a "hell no" option?

Tigger

Diemos wrote: »

Why isn't there a "hell no" option?

Because Sherlock or defimation or MCD or daft.ie or just coz Terry said

P_1

Fuseman wrote: »

Any person who knows anything about family, know that if at all possible, the best place for a child to be raised is by its own biological mother and father. I have gay friends and they respect my opinion even on this.

There should be provisions to make sure that Civil partnerships get as much cover from our laws but it should not be called Marriage and should not be in Article 41 of the constitution which is about the Family.

Another point, by allowing SSM you will be denying the right of a child to know its biological father/mother through surrogacy. If you are buying cattle these days you have to fill in details of the bull and cow from which the cattle came from for traceability reasons. Imagine this will not be the case for children if SSM is passed ! :eek:

I'm adopted and let me tell you that your opinion is so wide off the mark it it was a kick into Hill 16 would have landed somewhere in the Hogan Stand. I defy you to tell my parents that they didn't provide the best environment for me growing up. As for having the right to know your biological parents, don't make me laugh.

I swindled the NSA

Lolek Ltd T/A The Iona Institute

So are they :
1) A charity
2) An Institute or
3) A lobby group

Legally they cannot be all of the above

BuilderPlumber

I swindled the NSA wrote: »

So are they :
1) A charity
2) An Institute or
3) A lobby group

Legally they cannot be all of the above

It is all of the above. It is not the only organisation either than manages to be all of the above either!!

The worst aspect though of these organisations is how they plant their representatives in the media. The bloomin' Sindo being the worst. To me, it seems that the unthinkable has happened: an unholy (forgive the pun!) alliance of radical rightwing fascist and borderline fascist Catholics, other religious and atheists have formed and are crowding out voices of moderation everywhere. While they seem worlds apart religiously, the views of Ian O'Doherty, Mark Humprys, Ali Selim, John Waters, Ruth Dudley Edwards and David Quinn are often indistinguishable from each other on many issues. Many here bar Selim share a fanatic desire to support the Iraq war and US neo-conservativism for example. Rags like the Sindo facilitate these and allow such people to become pals. Fascist/rightwing hardliners are fascist hardliners whether Catholic, other religious or atheist and ALL have enough in common to work together it seems.

shroom007

I swindled the NSA wrote: »

So are they :
1) A charity
2) An Institute or
3) A lobby group

Legally they cannot be all of the above

The Iona Institute " A great bunch of lads"

222233

After this no, I think they are a group of homophobic people living in the past

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JUL-mn0pmks

Fuseman

No

All I am saying is that the best place to raise a child in an ideal situation is with its biological parents. Gay adoption is not allowed in Ireland. If the gay couple want to adopt they have to apply as a single application.