Can depopulate world
I am not condemning or condoning it; I just don't think I could wake up every morning looking at a bearded, fuzzy face in bed with me. A beautiful, smooth-faced person looks a lot better.
But God did say he loved all of his children. He just isn't happy with some of their ways, like we are with our own children.
But the good point of same-sex marriage is it will start depopulating the world until women evolve into being able to conceive from other women and men from other men. This I would like to live long enough to see.
All the government would have to do is make it a crime to be artificially inseminated, and that would stop the same-sex women from having children until they evolved. Then, since the world has lost its morality and anything goes, the women who are thinking of having an abortion could instead sell or auction their unborn child to a same-sex couple to make them a family. That would stop abortion, but might take a little longer to depopulate the world.
Now see, that wasn't hard to solve two problems, was it?
D.E. HUNTER
Benton
Save the record shops
When I buy music, I like to have a physical CD, not a file on a computer or phone. This makes it difficult to get new music added to my collection, because there are so few individually owned record shops in Arkansas.
Stores like Wal-Mart sell CDs and most people I know buy them from these supercenters, but these stores are bad options for people like me. Their selections are limited, usually only stocked with the latest pop, country, or hip-hop albums. Wal-Mart has an even bigger problem: It censors swearing on albums and apparently refuses to carry albums that it deems problematic. Best Buy is a little better about this since it has a bigger selection.
To make matters worse, the individually owned music shops that are left in Arkansas are struggling to stay afloat. The owner of Been Around Records told me that the shop has had less and less sales now that buying music over the Internet has really taken off. I worry that soon there won't be any music shops in the near future due to chain stores and online shopping.
People should be aware of the record stores that are still open in Arkansas and try to buy their music from them. It would break many people's hearts if all record shops were to close down.
CLAYTON CALDWELL
Little Rock
Man versus machine
I wouldn't mind so much driving to ATMs if they worked. Several times I stop at ATMs to get cash or to make a deposit. On more than one occasion I've received the message that the ATM is not working!
So I trust a real, live human being at the other side of the microphone. I also can request my balance on the back of my receipt that you cannot get with ATMs. Please keep drive-through banks open.
MELBA SHARP
Little Rock
Compromise needed
Have folks put on blinders to fuel the controversy over Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis' refusal to issue same-sex marriage licenses?
She refuses to perform some legal duties of her elected position because she says the duties cause her to violate her religious principles. Her opponents want her fired or jailed because she refuses to perform these duties and won't resign.
When she sought this position, the job did not conflict with her religious principles prohibiting same-sex marriage. She and her supporters campaigned and invested time and money to win her election to the office. Now that she has been elected, her duties have been changed after the fact in a way that would have disqualified her from seeking election in the first place.
I think requiring her to violate her religious beliefs because her duties changed might seem fair to her opposition, but that is not fair to her. Nor is it fair to expect her to forfeit her pay and resign the office for which she was previously qualified and elected. And it is not fair to the county, nor her opposition, for her to disregard the law.
So why not agree to a no-win compromise where she is paid for the remainder of her elected term but gives up her position, which would also cost her any expectation of future re-election?
I believe neither she nor the county nor the citizens anticipated this predicament, but they all would gain and lose by this compromise.
L. RANDOLPH MANO
Little Rock
Misunderstood him
Bradley Gitz in "The Poverty Doctrine" lumps Pope Francis with socialists and implies that he is against capitalism.
The Catholic Church has never advocated socialism. In fact, popes have consistently spoken against it. Pope Francis has also spoken out against unbridled capitalism which ignores the needs of the poor.
In one line of the Gitz piece he states, "The mistake in all this is, of course, two-fold ... second, to allow the inequalities and broader imperfections that invariably continue to exist under capitalism because they are intrinsic to human nature itself ..." (a sentence that rivals St. Paul for writing style, by the way).
I believe the key to Gitz's misunderstanding of the pope and his message is in this sentence. The pope is speaking as a pastor, a shepherd, and appealing to a nature (redeemed) that is higher than our base human nature.
Were we all to listen to Pope Francis' call, we could go a long way to solving poverty using the principle of subsidiarity, also taught by the Catholic Church.
SHARON K. VANDER ZYL
Cherokee Village
Editorial on 10/12/2015