it's gay pride this week end in toronto :dancer1: :dancer1: :dancer1:

i'm about to start my day...should be a blast :)

tomorrow will be perfect. i can nurse my hangover all day with tennis.

cheers kids...

I would imainge that the Toronto Gay pride weekend would be a whole lot of fun :ok:

Is 'happy pride!" the common greeting for that now? :shrug:

Well, going by the Eastbourne thread, half of the Eastbourne tennis crowd would apparently have been celebrating that one had it been more, erm, "local".. :rolleyes:

Yeah, I keep seeing that term scattering around the net on US sites. Not really heard it before this year but hey, Happy Pride Viva! :D :yahoo: :yahoo: :B&B: :cheers:

Have a good one, I'm sure you will. ;)

Let us know what you get upto, never been to one myself.

That sig is frigging hialrious! roflmao

Happy pride everyone then! :ok:

HP - Happy Pride

*wonders what a poster of same initials would think*

:lmaao: :lmaao: :lmaao:

HP everyone

:D

Is that similar to the Mardis Gras?

It is yes, :D

Sounds fun, have a great time.

There was supposed to be a pride in Leicester this weekend (or gay shame as we call it in bpool :P ) but it was cancelled coz nobody ever goes. There was a beach party at a lesbian bar on saturday night to make up for it though :unsure: roflmao

there's always an apartment across the street from ours that lays out their 'gay shame' banner every pride week :D

watch out for sand in your vagina :P

:) But Montreal takes the cake for gay pride parades ...followed by san francisco.....

Hey..... montreal is the original sin city.... :)

Toronto isn't too bad at all... the other festivitiy being the caribbean festival ' carribana ' july ending august..abouts :)

Isn\'t Montreal the only place where same-sex marriage is legal?

No - try Belgium

I don't see the point of gay pride festivals etc etc.
Initially they were a way of saying to the world that gay people are here, and by making themselves visible and showing unrepentant celebration of their sexuality sent a clear message to the wider society-in other words they were a political statement dressed up as celebration-great!
I see the point of these celebrations in societies struggling to come to terms with homosexuality.
However the concept of pride in ones sexuality in a liberal society like ours that accepts homosexuality seems out of place, why should one have pride in ones sexuality? To be comfortable with ones sexuality seems fine, but why make a song and dance of it.
I, like most people enjoy my sexuality but pride is not appropriate way to describe it.
I've been to the Manchester Mardi Gras and most people i talked to there seemed to think the whole thing was a rip off (entrance fee was £10) in fact i was astonished by the amount of cynicism to the whole event. My best mate thought it was good place to get layed (although he never did) but that's not about pride it's about sex.....well maybe that is a good reason for them after all.

I sorta agree with you BT, and in other ways I don't. I'll have a read of the thread tomoorw and give you a reply as falling asleep at my desk at the mo and need bed..

Night All :wave:

i agree with BT. I would be happy to celebrate a 'person pride', as im proud to be a nice, honest, gorgeous, wonderful etc person :D roflmao
there is nothing to be proud of being gay, its just a part of who you are, you dont see straight people dressing up as straight stereotypes just to party. If im honest, gay pride is an excuse for a booze up and to find a lay, or at least thats how i view it, which is why we call it gay shame. Although i am going to manchester pride in august roflmao roflmao

Was there meant to be a gay pride in Leicester then Liam? For me personally I don't have anything against gay people, and I think they have a right to show what they are and let people know that they deserve respect too. I mean my beleifs and what I believe personally in myself I dont actually lets say, 'agree' with homosexuality, and I think its not really right but that doesen'tmean that I don't respect everyone and I certainly wouldn't look down on a gay person at all.

Liam I know you are gay and I'm fine with that :) I just always personally had the belief that man and woman were made for each other and thats the way it should be. But I suppose gay people would say to me "yes all straight people say that, only gay people would understand"

You're going to Manchester pride?! :yikes: :ok: My friend Jen is dragging me, my boyfriend and one of our other gay friends to Manchester pride this year :D

Andy
You say of homosexuality "its not really right' i would love to hear your rational for this statement, a sexual inclination is tantamount to a thought or feeling, how can ones natural predilections be either right or wrong?
The enactment of ones sexual desires are wrong if they are perpetrated upon a minor or done without consent, and i assume you are not suggesting homosexuality necessarily falls within either of these two categories, so i'ld be fascinated to hear an elaboration of your declaration.
Your belief that 'I just always personally had the belief that man and woman were made for each other and thats the way it should be'
while touching in a naive kind of way, has the same ring of intellectual coherence that a child might have in declaring 'the moon is made of cheese'.

roflmao we will have to meet for a pint, im going with my best mate Bobbles and his mum dad :cheers:

Hi BT,

Ok just to answer some of your questions... You talk about sexual inclination and how can it be right or wrong. Well I agree with you to some extent, I agree that you can't actually say that someones own decision on who they find attractive etc can be 'wrong' but what I was trying to say, is that I personally feel that a man and a man together in a sexual way is just not the way it was/is meant to be.

Now I know that comment is bound to cause a stir but like i said before, I would never look down on a gay or lesbian person and I also wouldn't say things like "thats disgusting that you are gay/lesbian" like you find some people do. So I don't think i'm being harsh on anyone here.

Ok now you probably want the reason why I see it this way. Well, It is just my personal feeling that a man SHOULD be with a woman and vice versa. At the end of the day, if the man wasn't made for the woman, or the woman made for the man, then why is it that when the two come together in love they can start a family of their own? A man and a man or a woman and a woman can't do that. Ok yes they can adopt but i'm talking the natural way here, if a man and a man or a woman and a woman were meant to be together then why is it the case that only a man and a woman together can make a family of their own?

I know it sounds silly, I understand that it does but it's just the way I see things. I mean I don't think we will ever know why some people are gay/lesbian when others are completely straight and would never find the same sex attractive in a sexual way. If someone could find that answer for me i'd be amazed because I don't think anyone can say 100% why that is the case.

My grandma reckons people are born gay, and I think that is probably true, why it happens that way? I don't know but many people have many different views and you can't really say anyones view is wrong.

Hope that answered some of your questions :) I'm sorry if I sound like i'm living in a dream world where everything is perfect, like you probably thought after I said about the man and woman being made for each other.

oh well kids...i had a fun day and so did a million other people :P

Andy,
It's far from certain whether homosexuality is innate or not, there's some evidence that it is, but the case is far from proven one way or the other.
That aside, let me assure you that homosexuality is not down to a 'decision on who they find attractive' whether socially or biologically determined homo and heterosexuality are part of who we are and not the result of a decision to opt for one or the other. We are made how we are, we do not choose in which direction our loins twitch-whether straight or gay.
As for a man and a women being 'made for each other' as you say, obviously biologically speaking nature has designed man and women thus, for the express purpose of reproduction and genetic transmission.
But as homosexuality is a constant within our species (although the exact figure often cited as 10% of men and 5 % of women is almost impossible to arrive at) and though the ultimate end of reproduction cannot be achieved by same sex couples naturally, the overwhelming majority of heterosexual sex is not intended for this purpose either. Sex is primarily, though not exclusively used by the human beings for enjoyment not for furthering the species. In that sense homo and heterosexual sex have the same purpose-pleasure!
In fact many early civilisations didn't recognise the male role within reproduction at all-the male act occurring nine months prior to birth, this may well account for the primacy of female deities within early civilisations-the infant seemed the sole result of the woman's body alone-Hera's changing status within ancient Greek civilisation is a good example of this.
The idea of the 'human tool' goes back to Aristotle and was incorporated into catholic thinking. The idea being that if we as human beings are designed by god with a purpose in mind, we cannot thwart gods purpose-so sex according to catholic teaching is not for pleasure but creating children, hence the lack of contraception even to this day (the analogy with Aristotle's tool is that a tool has a purpose that must be enacted or there is little point in it's being made that way)
Human beings whether straight or gay or not tools, we transcend our biology
and become much more than nature ever intended.

It's interesting that in ancient greece (i think) the male-male relationship was seen as the truly spiritual one - the one that actually meant something. The women were used for their procreation role and that's it, and the men often had sexual relationships with one another - hence all the stuff about Alexander being bisexual. It wasn't really unusual in those days (i'm gonna ignore all the implications this has for women's rights at the moment tho :P )

I agree with BT. I dont think about it too deeply but if we were all here to pro-create, then the Earth would be even far more over populated than it already is. Plus you get gay men who think they should be with a woman, and start families, and are miserable all their lives because they a living their life based on what others think they should

I hope everyone who went had a nice day :ok:

They had a discussion about it on Radio 1 the other day and generally most of the texts were supportive....

:bow: