In the long run this won't matter, any more than it did for state laws against interracial marriage.

Fining people for a practice in greater and greater amounts over time can only be seen as what it is, unless you agree with it and want to ignore it with a wink and a knowing nod. My reference to Saudi Arabia stands for itself, so I'll just paste and perhaps you'll actually read it this time:

Even if this ends up being real, does anyone actually believe she wrote it? I would find it far easier to believe they paid a reasonably talented ghost writer to sound like Snooki.

Looking at, say, voters, I'd imagine for every person who would react positively to ads featuring gay people there are three that would react negatively, and six that would have no positive or negative reaction. Among the latter five are those who would have positive reactions to other things.

Alas, we have nations in which those are illegal sins in the modern world. They would say the attitudes among those who do not adhere to them create societies in which all suffer. They'd say their religious laws are what separate them from nations of vice like the U.S.

The harm in the former case isn't caused by smoking, it's caused by smoking in your presence. You obviously aren't harmed if I leave your presence to smoke just as you won't be harmed if I am not drunk in your presence. Being drunk, in terms of the law, means my judgement and abilities are impaired, and that I am a…

I find your use of "disincentivising" a little facetious. There's no incentive being removed, our drinking wasn't previously subsidized, a pre-assessed fine has simply been added. Adding a disincentive is just a way of forcing people to stop making a perceived bad choice, so the difference is nil. If you can't…

Again, no. If you are in a room with me and I light a cigarette, the proximate cause of your inhaling toxic fumes is my choice to smoke in your presence, no different than someone choosing to be on the same road with you when they are drunk.

I didn't miss the distinction, I think you just missed how vague and subjective it is in any circumstance. Someone whose family was killed by a drunk driver would debate with you the directness of the harm. Someone who was given a sexually transmitted disease would consider the harm direct.

You could make the same argument for any "sin". Transmission of disease, unplanned pregnancy, inadequate redistribution of wealth back into society, not working hard enough to economically benefit society, blah, blah, blah. How can we trust people to have 'safe sex' when we can't trust them to drink responsibly, or…

Does government even have the right to stop people from making bad choices? Arguments can be formed to excuse moralistic imposition as if it were totally objective with ease, we see it constantly as religious groups try harder and harder to impose their ideals on secular government. Now gluttonousness and drunkeness…

Characteristics be damned, with a name like that it should be the go-to choice for the creation of chainmail bikinis.

Times change. Watching British victorian period pieces on tv, I'm getting used to hearing that someone is on "queer street" when they're almost broke, but I wouldn't say try to use it now.

Yeah mom, that's ectoplasm, I swear...

Wasn't "The Sign of the Bloody Taint" a Nancy Drew mystery? I could be wrong...

I've questioned facelifts, breast implants, and other forms of surgery that cover the normal progression of body aging here, and evidently that's not feminist cool, so I will just quietly nod and hope no one sees me...

"...when their route home from a field trip took them past a gaggle (a herd? a swarm? an escargatoire?)"

I dunno, there's a difference between being politically biased and, like, blathering on about how someone you differ with politically picks their nose all the time while actually picking your nose yourself. That's not being political, it just betrays a sad lack of self-awareness.

Most of the fashion shown in pics on Jezebel is ugly and expensive... oh wait, Anne Romney, I get it, nm.

lolz... it doesn't take this many words to say "Because it is on HBO."