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> you aren't cursed for having those desires, but for acting upon them

That sounds exactly as repressive and hateful that other major religion, as well as historical laws which punished homosexual acts in many western countries. You have highlighted the difference between our desires and our behavior, but you seem to deliberately avoid acknowledging that straight people are permitted an institution in which their desires can be met within constraints, but gay people are not.

"You're invited to participate in our faith so long as you scrupulously act like someone else for your whole life" sounds a lot like an unvitation.

Islam pretty much is a framework for how you deal with God and for how your life here and hereafter will be according to that relationship. That's all it is.

You also acknowledge that even straight people have constraints in Islam, i.e. no sleeping around etc, why not also argue that it's somehow terrible that straight people have to repress their desire to fornicate?

"You're invited to participate in our faith so long as you turn your focus away from your base desires and towards God and the hereafter"

You're insinuating that you're being targeted or singled out whereas Islam "blanket-bans" entire categories of what are considered regressive behaviours such as overeating, you're not being targeted here, so can you stop with the victim complex please? Islam is as against environmental destruction, abuse of animals or overeating as much as it is against what it sees as wrongful sexual desire. What I feel like is being missed for the trees here is that the "holisticness" of Islam. It's against what it sees as destructive behavior, without prejudicing or singling out any specific group. Look at the higher purpose here.

I've said your description sounds "exactly as repressive and hateful" as another major religion and the laws of many western states until relatively recently. You're insinuating that Islam is being targeted or singled out whereas I will blanket label as homophobic any regime which masquerades as being even-handed because they generously permit queer people to pretend to be straight, so can you stop with the victim complex please?

Liberal humanism is against what it sees as destructive and oppressive behavior, without prejudicing or singling out any specific group. Look at the higher purpose here.

You've buried the lede that the core framework does see homosexual behavior as "wrongful sexual desire", "regressive behaviour".

You can accept that or not, but it's disingenuous to equate asking gays never to have sexual or romantic relationships, to asking non-gay people just to curb excess.

That's not an equal imposition, it feels like self-equivocating ad-hominem to read "you're not being targeted here, so can you stop with the victim complex please?"

If you agree that it's better for gay people to never experience intimacy, please just say so, without labelling the concern (that gay people may feel less invited) as ridiculous

Someone who has a thirst for illicit relationship with women must also refrain from doing so.

Forbidding a person from lusting anyone other than spouse whether they like it or not is no different than forbidding a person from having gay desires. And no amount of self identification can label that inhumane.

Under your axioms, it may be equivalent, but I think they're mistaken.

Orientation is not a choice, and is orthogonal to identification.

I believe that same-sex relationships can be as profoundly fulfilling, enriching, and pro-social as heterosexual relationships.

That marrying a straight woman with a gay man is profoundly unfulfilling for both.

And that denying a class of people something so profound, freely enjoyed by everyone else, and which does not harm anyone else, can indeed be seen as inhumane.

You say orientation isn't a choice even though bisexuals at least establish it as their free choice for relationship. Fine. Even if you correctly claim that some people may have an immutable orientation, why would you in your brilliant and far reaching wisdom think it would be inhumane for the same person to be celibate from that orientation? And further think it is inhumane for the person to engage in a relationship of another orientation?

I don't believe for a second any person has this immutable orientation, straight or gay. And likewise, I don't believe it is inhumane for a person to avoid a relationship that is illegitimate. Trying to argue otherwise is like arguing the color blue can also be seen as red.

I am not bisexual, but tried to be. The choice wasn't available.

Have you felt strong attraction for both sexes? If not, have you tried to?

If you tried to feel attraction but could not, you might need help on understanding what attraction is. Until you do, you won't know what love and harm is.

You feel attraction for both sexes, but choose to ignore one?

You choose to behave.

We are here. We do not harm each other. We do not harm other people. I believe God wills it. Peace, Nas.

> In Islam you're not hated or judged for what you call your true feelings. You are however instructed to gain mastery over those feelings and make them subordinate to you rather than the other way around

To me, that sounds like a very fancy way of saying : repress your feelings and who you are to conform to an arbitrary set of rules written by one dude hundreds years ago.

Enlighten me on how are you supposed to act/feel to “gain mastery over your feeling” when said feeling is “as a male; I want to spend the rest of my life sharing experiences with this other male, intimate and not intimate, without endangering anyone else” ?

Repress your feelings of desire for your neighbor’s wife. Do not act on those feelings. Stay away from anything that could even slightly make you sinful or think of sinful desires.

This is a form of discipline and mastery of desires. Enlighten me how this is not what a faith built on God’s word should be commanding on any individual?

> Repress your feelings of desire for your neighbor’s wife. Do not act on those feelings. Stay away from anything that could even slightly make you sinful or think of sinful desires.

Why should you repress those feelings ? Unless they don't hurt you or hurt others; I see absolutely no reason to hide them or not act on them. What makes them "sinful" is you deciding they are sinful according to some made up rules you read in a book.

> Enlighten me how this is not what a faith built on God’s word should be commanding on any individual?

  - Rule nb 1: Avoid harming yourself as much as you can.
  - Rule nb 2: Avoid harming others as much as you can.

And very importantly :

  - Rule nb 3: Let others be.

You obviously do not believe in self control. I don't know in which culture eyeing your neighbor's wife is OK.

So you are saying they are invited as long as they are willing to endure people trying to change them?

No I didn't say that at all, and that's a petulant response honestly. Re-read my comment. I said Islam instructs people to make their feelings subordinate to them rather than the other way around. The other replies to the GP were not so different from what I'm saying. You're hardly required to state your sexual orientation each time you pray, if that's the sort of line of reasoning you're taking here.

Perhaps I misunderstood you? What did you mean with

> instead you are seen as a blank slate and whatever actions you do impact your life here and the life hereafter

I assumed you meant that people will be welcomed because they are a blank slate that can be written upon by those seeking to influence them.

I read it as you are your own blank slate to write on as you choose

Lol, Blank slate does not mean for others to write on you. Blank slate means for you to be free of your own tendencies and not be beholden to your desires. And able to write your own Character.

That's actually kind of the point.

He never mentioned change.

(in reply to the post you just sent) I can't actually reply to comments that far down, I guess that's a HN quirk I didn't notice all this time until just now but yeah I also just covered that in a reply to someone else https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35657964

>you are seen as a blank slate

To me, this is just another angle of what the parent comment was talking about. We are not blank slates. We have millions of years of evolutionary instinct and genetics/epigenetics built into us AND we have everything we are fed (literally and figuratively) affecting us before we even get a chance to start thinking about 'who' or 'what' we are.

The blank slate line of thinking is what conservatives in the US implicitly (or explicitly) use to make the claim that being gay is a choice. It seems that it's just another way to justify punishing people for things that may be beyond their control, because if we are blank slates, then everything about you is your own fault.

Obviously there are aspects about ourselves that we can change, but the blank slate ideal is a dangerous slope to slide down.

>You are however instructed to gain mastery over those feelings and make them subordinate to you rather than the other way around

Genuine question: How is this different from saying "it's not bad to be gay, it's just bad to not repress your feelings and never act on them", as is a common (paraphrased) refrain among those who are anti-lgbt?

To clarify, a blank state in your relationship with God. Like, you aren't judged for being a certain sexual way until you actually act on it (or choose to not act on it).

> Genuine question: How is this different from saying "it's not bad to be gay, it's just bad to not repress your feelings and never act on them", as is a common (paraphrased) refrain among those who are anti-lgbt

I'll admit it's probably not hugely different though to my understanding Islam's purpose is more about guiding a person to have a relationship with God rather than being anti-anything, and about doing what is within one's ability to move towards that goal. Like I said in a different reply it's not like you are being singled out for hatred or anything like that, the purpose is for everyone to get themselves right with God.

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