I am not convinced that there is any active promotion of homosexuality in society. I know that a lot of people feel that there is, but I don't see it. A lot of the disagreement is actually whether people believe that homosexuality is a genetic trait or a learned sexual preference. I can't see any conceivable way that I could ever become gay, nor do I believe that it is possible to convert people one way or the other. People are just born gay, so no amount of promotion is going to make any difference, in my opinion. Repression of homosexuality results in people leading miserable lives. Live and let live, I say.
Campness, on the other hand, I have never understood. Why some gay men feel the need to exaggerate and affect an unnatural 'flamboyance' is beyond me.
What worries me more is the promotion of the idea that under-age sex is completely normal and healthy. And that is being actively promoted through magazines, music, the soaps, schools and so on. My school was single sex up to the sixth form and sex was never entartained as a possibility, let alone a normal thing to do.
Children are being robbed of their innocence younger and younger; they now feel inadequate if they aren't sexually active at 16. Television has abandoned the watershed completely, and the video ratings system is a joke. I am certainly not a prude, but I wish that we could just let children be children.
As for Islam, I can't say that I have a strong feeling either way. What really matters is how people behave. Religion is just an excuse, not the cause, in my opinion. Violent people will be violent, desperate people will take desperate actions, idiots will be idiots; religion merely gives it some rational justification in their mind.
I think that we should also draw a big distinction between Islamic Fundamentalism and the more normal Islamic religion practiced by the vast majority of Muslims. 99% of muslims are completely normal people, with many just adhering to their religion because it is what their society or culture expects.
Islamic Fundamentalism is a cult, just like any other cult, that indoctrinates the vulnerable. Some people can be made to believe, and do, anything if they are manipulated carefully. It is a dangerous cult that needs to be eradicated, but not at the expense of victimising innocent muslims.
We don't claim that Christianity is an evil social disease just because the IRA pretends to be a catholic organisation. Islamic terrorists are not so very different from the IRA. First and foremost they are terrorists, and they do not represent Islam or muslims.
As you say, Islam isn't the nice religion that it is often made out to be, but then nor is Christianity if the Bible is taken literally. I can understand why some people try to defend it though; they are trying to counter the strong negative coverage that it receives from the media. The truth always lies somewhere in the middle.
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