[QUOTE=matt_mcl]
I think we should be clear on something. There’s a difference between having once identified as gay and no longer identifying so for whatever reason and being ex-gay, i.e. having gone through some sort of “therapy,” usually religious, to supposedly intentionally alter your sexual orientation.
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I’m sorry, I didn’t realize “ex-gay” had any kind of specific meaning to it.
[QUOTE=Fish]
I, personally, have never seen any evidence of anybody claiming to be an ex-gay except as a prelude to gay-bashing. I am therefore understandably skeptical of their sincerity.
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That’s pretty much what I’m getting at here.
[QUOTE=Fish]
I find it hard to accept, from what I know of human biology, that sexual attraction can flip back and forth as if on a switch, that one day a person can be attracted to women, and the next day, boom, attracted to men.
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While I agree with you that labels are generally useless, I do know of at least one person I can absolutely vouch for as having been, for a time, attracted to women and now attracted to men exclusively - me. I had a summer of women attraction, and had three female lovers (and a great time) and was sexually excited by and attracted to them. It’s now three years later, we’re all still friends, and there’s no spark there, no hint of even that lingering ember I usually feel for exes, and I’ve not felt sexual attraction for another woman since.
Weird, I know. But there it is.
I generally label myself “mostly straight” or “80% hetero” or something similar. This is because I’m enough of an agnostic to remain open to the possibility of attraction developing to another woman sometime in the future. But if you were to pin me down to one of two labels, right now I’d choose heterosexual, and that summer I’d have chosen homosexual.
And this might devolve into hijackland, but I really wonder why the term “bisexual” is so frowned upon. It seems like it’s rarely used in scientific circles, and when used in real life, I get a lot of :rolleyes: and a general feeling that the self-proclaimed bisexual is simply an indiscriminate slut.
Of course, I’m not standing on soap boxes screeching at people on *either *side of the issue. I’ve never participated in a parade or claimed to represent “the gay lifestyle”. I was, in fact, married to a man but not having sex with him during my “gay phase”, and later had a child with him. And I’m not entirely convinced that I’ll never be attracted to a woman again, but I just don’t know. So am I an “ex-gay” according to the unstated definitions of the OP?
I’m certainly “pro-gay”, in that I think it just shouldn’t be an issue; I’m pro-gay marriage and adoption and equal rights.
It seems (not stated as fact but as perception) that those who call themselves “ex gay” always get outed later as still having homosexual relationships. Donnie McClurkin is just the latest.
Matt makes an important point. “Ex-gay” doesn’t mean that you used to have more same-sex attraction, but nowadays you have more opposite sex attraction.
It’s a term associated exclusively with religious programs that are supposed to cure people of the disease of homosexuality. And people do go through these programs and they do come out claiming not to be gay any more. But are they really not gay? Well, what does it mean in the first place, to be gay?
If the criteria for being an ex-gay is to be someone who used to have same-sex sex, but nowadays doesn’t any more, then there are plenty of ex-gays. But in my opinion, not having sex with men doesn’t mean you’re not gay, I mean, even Liberace didn’t have sex with men during the time he was actually on stage performing, he was still gay when he was on stage wasn’t he? You can be a virgin and be gay, if the word “gay” has any meaning it doesn’t mean that you customarily have sex with members of the same sex, it means you WANT to.
Well, that’s a more interesting question. If someone tells you they used to want to have sex with men, but no longer do, what does that mean? Let’s put it this way. My Grandmother is 90, and she hasn’t had a man in her life for the last 30 years. Is she still straight? It seems to me that it’s possible to become asexual…it happens all the time that as people get older or have certain organs removed or they just give up that they pretty much lose all sexual desire. If you’re gay and you lose all interest in sex, does that make you ex-gay?
[QUOTE=Nava]
“Moral” comes from the latin “more”: custom. Literally, moral means “that which is customary”. By this ethimological definition, morals change with time and location; by this definition, “moral” and “good” are not necessarily the same things
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But “morality” is generally invoked as though it were indeed a set of rules determining right from wrong and which applies to every member of society. As society has become more modernistic and multicultural–and free–custom has become too weak and relativistic to be the basis for rules or standards of behavior. Society needs such a set of rules–that is, as you say, distinct from the legal code–but how can you condemn a person’s actions without knowing everything about their cultural background and degree of liberalism–or for that matter, sexual orientation?
Relax. I don’t cite God as evidence, but rather I keep that area open to speculation while pre-empting any dimissal of my work as atheistic or “secular humanist”. It’s a rhetorical balancing act.
[QUOTE=WhyNot]
And this might devolve into hijackland, but I really wonder why the term “bisexual” is so frowned upon. It seems like it’s rarely used in scientific circles, and when used in real life, I get a lot of :rolleyes: and a general feeling that the self-proclaimed bisexual is simply an indiscriminate slut.
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Not a hijack. The scientific implications of bisexuality vis-a-vis “conversions” is one thing I want to see discussed, the thread title notwithstanding.
[QUOTE=Lemur866]
“Ex-gay” doesn’t mean that you used to have more same-sex attraction, but nowadays you have more opposite sex attraction.
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Uh, that’s pretty much how I would define it.
Indeed. Although the other side of homosexuality is an aversion to opposite-sex relations, so how that plays out is part of the issue at hand.
[QUOTE=elucidator]
You’re talking math, I’m talking monkeys. I very much doubt that you can think of any sexual perversion, inversion, or diversion that has not been tried, or even practiced on a consistent basis.
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Cutting yourself in half at the waist so as to be able to give yourself oral sex.
Regardless, “sure, there must be, there’s lots of people out there” seems like a pretty vacuous way to answer a straightforward question.
I don’t think “aversion” is quite the best word, more like “indifference”, if the testimony of our bent brethren and sistren is accurate. Clumsy as well, when one considers an entirely normal het male might view the prospect of sex with Rosanne Barr with the same level of “aversion” as the prospect of sex with another guy, the Revulse-o-meter needle swings all the way over to “EEeeww!”.
[QUOTE=sqweels]
Uh, that’s pretty much how I would define it.
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Well, it would make sense to use it that way, except the term has been approprated for other uses. Like, “pro-life”. If you use “pro-life” to mean something other than antiabortion, you’re going to confuse people.
“Ex-gay” is pretty much exclusively used by religious “therapy” that aims to cure someone of homosexuality. I’ve never heard someone say “I’m an ex-gay…I used to have sex with men exclusively, but then I pretty much stopped wanting cock and now only have sex with women”. No, it’s always someone who undergoes religious counseling, someone who believes homosexuality is a sin who wants to free themselves of same-sex attraction. Not someone who just stopped wanting cock one day.
Mostly people who have claimed to become ex-gays are deluding themselves. They’re still gay, they’ve just managed to stop having sex with men. And there are plenty of ex-ex-gays. Is it just me, or does it seem counterproductive to send a bunch of guys with secret shameful gay urges to a camp out in the woods somewhere? I mean, lots of ex-ex-gays have described how they were getting counseled to love pussy in the name of Jesus during the day, while smoking pole all night.
[QUOTE=Nava]
We dedicated a whole month of my Philosophy class to what is “morality”…
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And it seems that you’ve missed the point…
The original meaning of the word “moral” has no bearing at all on a modern discussion of morality. The original meaning of the word “virtuous” meant something close to “successful”. But so what?
I’ve looked in several online dictionaries and most listed many definitions for moral, but I didn’t see any with anything like “that which is customary”.
[QUOTE=WhyNot]
While I agree with you that labels are generally useless, I do know of at least one person I can absolutely vouch for as having been, for a time, attracted to women and now attracted to men exclusively - me
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Fascinating. Whether we admit it or not, most human behavior can be attributed to delicate chemical balances within us. I had read somewhere (no cite, sorry) that women were attracted to different types of men at different stages of their monthly cycle — to the wild and dangerous ones when they were most fertile, and to the reliable and stolid ones for the rest of the duration. I hadn’t ever heard of someone in your situation — at least not that I’d be inclined to trust — but I suppose it’s possible in theory to attribute it to a quirk of body chemistry. Under the right circumstances, I suppose it could happen.
The question then becomes how to distinguish between Ex-Gay™, the brainwashed product of a political message who may or may not be sincere, and ex-gay, the person simply following his body’s demands.
[QUOTE=Lemur866]
I mean, lots of ex-ex-gays have described how they were getting counseled to love pussy in the name of Jesus during the day, while smoking pole all night.
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I’m going to have to, uh, borrow this mental image for a little while.
dash
[QUOTE=elucidator]
I don’t think “aversion” is quite the best word, more like “indifference”, if the testimony of our bent brethren and sistren is accurate.
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What he said. I’m not *averse *to the prospect of straight sex. To me it’s like Finland: I’m sure it’s a perfectly nice place but I’ve got no particular desire to go there.
[QUOTE=matt_mcl]
I’m going to have to, uh, borrow this mental image for a little while.
dash
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You’d think there’d be a huge amount of ex-gay-ministry themed gay porn, you know? Along with the wrestling coaches and drill seargeants and prison guards and priests and cowboys.
[QUOTE=elucidator]
Seems to me that such sexuality is more fixed in men than women, there is more flexibility in women. Painting with a very broad brush, in the widest possible terms and without the slightest pretense to authority: many women are entirely comfortable with a shifting sexuality, men are not, when a woman says she’s “bi-sexual”, she means she is bi-sexual, when a man says it, he means he’s “queer as a blue horse”.
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Miller and I would like you to please put down the broad brush and back away.