Typical - Missoula (Great Falls, Bozeman: rentals, house, neighborhood)

[jenzebel]

Originally Posted by jimj

Isn't there better things to argue over? We all get that this paper is not the main paper for missoula, if I read it without ever knowing the town I would think it was one of those free throwaway papers just from the type of articles on the front page. There is no major paper that left wing, not even in the Kremlin west, the left coast home to communisim berzerkely.

Yes, joejoe takes shots at Missoula, but he also takes shots at cities in the flathead. His way of making people see both sides of towns not just thinking it's heaven on earth here and I think if he can stop one more person from moving here he would be happy.
That's fine, there are many who think like that but don't have the intestinal fortitude to say it, he does and I have to respect that.
Anyway, he's no troll just someone IMO that is tired of the influx of "pie in the sky lookie me I live in Montana,why isn't it more like xxx" crowds.

Yes JJMan has the courage to say what many others only think or say amongst friends.

We need more like him to speak up so that people think twice before they move here--too many come here already with unrealistic views and expectations.

[Rickers]

I didn't bother reading all of the replies and all I have to say is who cares ? That being said, being a son of a gay man who abandoned me, my mom and my two sister to live a very happy life with his boyfriend, I still don't give a flying rats patootie what people do, but I still don't have to be all PC and say it's fine. I think homo life is a sickness but so is a cold. Get over it or move if a gay couple darkens your towns doorstep. I live in Hot Springs, we have blind lesbian mayor. Hot Springs is like a gay extension of Missoula, or should I say "Pot Springs" ! I'll be moving soon , not to get away from people I don't like , but to take advantage of a differential in home values and to get out of a mobile home and get closer to a big river and into a nice cooler old house and still have enough cash to buy a newer rig.

[dangerousdan]

What's wrong with having more dogs than children?

[jimj]

I guess it would depend on what sired them wouldn't it?

[IdaClaire]

What a wonderful article about gays and lesbians in Missoula. I'm straight but I'm also a huge advocate for gay rights. This article makes me want to move back and bring all my gay and lesbian friends with me. Thanks for the advertisement for Missoula's tolerance! I'll be sure to pass the link along to my friends.

[dangerousdan]

Originally Posted by IdaClaire

What a wonderful article about gays and lesbians in Missoula. I'm straight but I'm also a huge advocate for gay rights. This article makes me want to move back and bring all my gay and lesbian friends with me. Thanks for the advertisement for Missoula's tolerance! I'll be sure to pass the link along to my friends.

I agree. Tolerance is a good thing.

[jimj]

JJM,
Public schools, what do you expect? As I have watched and been envolved in the schools with my son I have been painfully aware that morals, moral judgement in fact any type of conduct judgement is discouraged and they are told it's intolerant and that is bad. As near as I can tell if your neighbor wants to marry his donkey you are supposed to think "hey, what the heck it's his lifestyle" who am I to judge? Let's be tolerant of any and all behavior! I'm sorry, I was taught that you are allowed to judge peoples behavior and you are allowed to disagree. Don't take this to mean that I'm homophobic, I'm not, in fact I worked in downtown SF for a few years with an office that was very diverse and got along with most of the office.
I just don't want it stuck in my face just like I don't want straight couples pawing each other or making out in front of my (or anyone else's) child. What you do at home is your business but keep it at home. If your gay, fine but drop the swish, drop the lisp and keep your pawing at home it doesn't impress me in the least and doesn't endear you to anyone else. After talking with several gay co-workers their opinion was that if you acted like that you were a problem to them and that there was no need to act like a woman.

Boy this thread sure took a sharp left didn't it?

[Marka]

We discuss ideas here, not people. Refrain from ad hominem attacks or this will be yet another closed thread. Thank you.

[GiftShoppeGuy]

It's the "in your face" tactics that folks use that I don't care for much.

Gays would be fine I suppose, if they just went about their business and their lives.... but most here, that I've seen, are always making a point, or attempting to make a point of how gay they are....

Truth be told, gays don't deserve any more or less attention than most normal folks do.... anything beyond that is treated the same as if some 9 year old were begging for attention.

Gays aren't special by any stretch.. so there's no need to treat them any differently.

We speak of tolerance.... and this is fine too. The trouble with the word itself these days is that it gets used too often for all of the wrong reasons.... the word provides an "easy out" for anyone who might be upset because they might not be getting enough attention.

I can tolerate any good number of things. I can tolerate a gay person living just down the road, I can tolerate that she has a job and pays her taxes, and drives responsibly, and keeps her yard clean, and abides by our current laws..... I can accept the fact that she is indeed a human being with feelings and needs, and that she has a life, like we all do.

What I can't tolerate, is the neverending stream of propaganda that the gay community continues to generate.... it serves absolutely no usefull purpose, other than to appease the gay communities own inadequacies and insecurities about the kind of life they've chosen to live.
Propaganda that leads innocent folks to believe that Missoula might be a safe place for gays to live, when the truth of the matter is, that it is not.

Gay community leaders desparately needs martyrs in order to further their cause... sending gays to Missoula only serves to reinforce their agenda.... Live and let live only applies to us that may not subscribe to the lifestyle.... Gays don't have to live and let live, because if they did, the whole reason for their cause, regardless of how insidious it is, would disappear... and they certainly cannot allow that to happen.

The fact that we here might be conservative has absolutely nothing to do with tolerance. We here in Montana can tolerate more things than you from the outside could ever imagine.... Forcing us to accept certain perverse lifestyles, however, might be something altogether different...
Attempting to force folks to "accept" certain perverse ways of living, can, and does provoke certain reactions.... such as the cases presented in Missoula.
Sure, let the gays have their little parades or other activities of the like.... Certain other religions do the same thing..... these types of things only serve to make a closed community (the gay community) feel better about themselves. We here on the outside already feel better about ourselves, so there's no need for parades or other such silly what not's.

Human beings are free to pick and choose as they please, they have that God given right.... But they don't have the right to push their agenda down anyone elses throat... they don't have the right to be pushy and arrogant about their cause....

The fact that I've chosen to live the life that I do, doesn't make me any more or less intolerant of anything.... The fact that I might not accept the lifestyle of the gay community doesn't at all make me intolerant....
The fact that I might reject their politics, or their in your face marketing tactics, doesn't make me intolerant either...
The Catholic Church is here too, and I don't treat Catholics any different than I do Protestants... Just because I don't go to Catholic Church, doesn't make me intolerant of Catholics..... I may not agree with the Catholic Doctrine and I don't choose to live according to the Catholic Faith.... So am I a bigot because of that?... I think not. Catholics are just as free to pick and choose as I am..... So where does this presumed intolerance come into play?
The difference between the Catholics and the gays is that I don't have the Catholics trying to stuff some off the wall agenda down my throat.

The gay community might just have to come to terms with the fact that there are those in this world that will never accept the lifestyle, and they might have to start understanding that there is a huge difference between tolerating it and accepting it... There isn't anything at all wrong with not accepting certain perverse points of view. Some of the Catholic stuff is sort of "way out there" in my opinion.... just like some of the gay stuff is "way out there" too...

The Catholic Church would so prefer that abortion be illegal..... they went to the state house and lost the same way the gays lost on the issue of marriage. Yet we don't find the Catholic Church bemoaning their loss in the state house over and over again like some worn out broken record, but we do with the gays, and the issue of marriage. So gays lost the marriage issue in Montana... get over it already and move on.
If marriage is such a big deal, there are other states that are happy to oblige.

The boo's and the hisses that one gay politician might have experienced in our state house came more from the fact that that sort of lifestyle isn't "accepted". Nevermind the intolerance, because we can tolerate just about anything you want to throw at us. Missoula can be used as proof of that fact, in a very loose sense.
If Montana was so intolerant and bigoted, as gay leaders would have you believe, then you could bet your bottom bucko-bronson that there would be no gay politicians in the state..... But Montana does have gay politicians, so the argument of an intolerant Montana is rather moot.

The gay community can't get the laws they want passed here, because, though we can tolerate it, we don't "accept" the lifestyle. The last time "acceptance" was forced down anyone's throats, was when Hitler was in power.

The gay community can't ever win on the argument of acceptance, because they already know that they can't win on that premise.... all they are left with is the argument of tolerance. And based on that, we are all forced to having to listen to the same old redundant propaganda....

No one is ever going to get all of what they want, all of the time.
The Catholics aren't going to get it, the gays aren't going to get it, the jews aren't going to get it and so on and so forth.... This, in and of itself, is the beauty of this democracy we've fashioned for ourselves.
If I was a selfish, self absorbed individual, with a politically charged agenda, I could very easily cuss my state house for not passing some of the legislation I wanted... but I'm not.... so exactly how much more "tolerant" do I need to be?
I can accept the fact that we are never going to get all of what we ask for in the state house..... I respect and admire the job that our lawmakers do, even though they may not give me what I want, when I want it.... I would expect that since the gay community is all about "tolerance"...... that they actually practice some of it themselves with regard to our state house, and those of us that are tired of hearing the same old arguments, day in and day out.

[dangerousdan]

You assume the "in your face" gays represent all gays -- my personal experience suggests that this is a small vocal group and that most gays are just quietly trying to live their lives free of hate crime and discrimination. I think that people are entitled to their religion-based prejudices so long as they don't engage in unlawful discriminatory acts or violence. People can also be totally racist but it doesn't justify denying housing or jobs based on race or race-motivated crime.