Last Sunday I attended the second Speak Out forum. And guess what? For three hours liberals and conservatives poured out deeply felt concerns to each other, and no riots ensued. Well, it did get tense a few times. There were several sharp exchanges. But most of the 65 or so participants were civil and patient with each other. I came away from the meeting exhausted yet optimistic.

Much of my optimism stems from seeing so many people willing to set aside self-acknowledged prejudices and give the person from the other side of the culture war a fair hearing. People listened. They tried to understand. Two world views were in conflict, yet a truce was called and peace talks were conducted.

Not that we resolved our differences. We'll never resolve all our differences. We begin from fundamentally different understandings about who we are and how we got here, and those different understandings yield different opinions and different lives. But at least we were making progress. Most of us were.

It was then at the forum, and it still is, my sincere belief that we are all in the same boat as far as God's judgment is concerned. We're all sinners. God loves us equally even though we are always missing the mark. In that frame of mind I looked across the room and tried to see a person rather than a "they."

We had problems with labels ---- not with name-calling or derogatory terms. We had problems with the words "traditional" and "conservative" and "Christian." Some liberals didn't like conservatives using those words to describe themselves. "Traditional" can have bad or good connotations. "Christian" has a diversity of meanings. But alas, we have to call the cultural conservatives something. Let's just call them cultural conservatives, or simply conservatives, and recognize that not everyone is happy with that label.

Probably the idea that was batted around the most at the forum was the conservative point that a person and a person's actions are two distinct things, and that a person can respect another person but still object on principle to that person's behavior or lifestyle ---- especially if that lifestyle carries with it serious public health and emotional risks.

If a person, straight or gay, is involved in a compulsive behavior, we can generally separate in our mind the person from the behavior. But homosexuality is often conflated to merge the person and the desire or behavior, so that if someone disputes the behavior or consequences of that behavior it is seen as disputing the person.

The liberal view, to counter the "love the sinner, hate the sin" argument, was that sexual orientation is so much a part of a person, so deeply ingrained in the psyche, that it becomes a key aspect of that person's identity. And if you don't like the sexual orientation then you don't like the person.

Other issues that surfaced included the conflict between gays and the Boy Scouts of America. Do the Boy Scouts have the right to determine its private organization's leadership, or by discriminating against gays as leaders, are the Boy Scouts violating others' civil rights?

One theme stressed repeatedly was, "What's wrong with love?" If two people of the same sex love each other, then shouldn't others butt out?

Yes and no. Yes, because we should live and let live (a view held by most conservatives who favor less government). No, because we're not taking about private committed adult relationships. We're talking about a faction in the gay community that aggressively seeks to change public policy regarding marriage, school curriculum and private organizations (see Boy Scouts above).

What struck me as remarkable about the forum was that one side of the room, the liberals, often emphasized personal experience in making their case. They brought a lot of emotion to the table. They talked of hardships brought on by the stigma society has placed on homosexuality ---- rightly or wrongly. Listening to their accounts, I could not help but be moved.

Conservatives tended to emphasize abstract ideas. That is not to say that the liberals were not capable of rational argument or that conservatives were incapable of compassion. But the two sides approached matters differently. One might say that personal experience and deep emotions make more real sense than any abstract idea. That said, I am withholding judgment on whether emotion and personal experience trumps abstract ideas, or vice-versa.

Yet one of the most compelling stories told at the forum came from a cultural conservative who shared her story about a friend of hers who was once gay but now is not. The friend struggled with his sexuality for years and felt outcast in the straight world. He found acceptance in the gay community. Later, with motivation and faith in God, he changed his sexual orientation (he has been married for five years now). But the change was seen as a betrayal to his gay friends and he found he was an outcast once more.

Both sides in the controversy over homosexuality are capable of making others feel like outcasts. Forums such as those at Palomar College help to break the ice and allow participants to see each other as people. I tip my hat to Associate Professor Michael Mufson, who has been directing the Speak Out series at Palomar College. I plan to attend the third forum May 14.

Mark Thornhill is the North County Times editorial cartoonist.

4/28/02