I posted this in Great Debates, because it’s bound to turn into one.
Some evangelical Christians believe that everybody is born heterosexual, and that homosexuality is a lifestyle someone adopts, rather than a sexual preference that’s hardwired since birth.
Yes, I believe in a “gay gene.” However, I’ve heard passing references to cases where otherwise straight men and women have “converted” to homosexuality, because it’s seen as trendy in some circles. For instance …
Bisexuality among many high school and college-aged women. No, they don’t turn into diesel dykes, but supposedly lipstick lesbianism is seen as cool among a certain crowd.
Men looking to advance in careers or workplaces that are dominated by gay men, such as fashion, the theatrical arts, waiting tables in high-end West Coast restaurants, and so on.
The folks who jump on the “trend of the day,” seeing that homosexuality is getting more press, the majority positive from mainstream media.
Google searches, of course, are useless, unless I want links to porn sites. So, is this reality … have any folks who are hardwired for heterosexuality adopted a gay lifestyle because it was cool, much in the same way that white suburban kids become gangsta’ wannabes?
Well, since there is no test for who is “hardwired” for what sexuality, I think your question is empirically unanswerable. I don’t doubt that persons whose natural sexual inclination is heterosexuality have convinced themselves they are homosexual - the human mind is infinite in its quirks. But I don’t think it is possible to tell which persons changed sexual orientation because it was “cool” to do so, or whatever other reason, from those who came out of the closet to themselves at a late date.
While it’s conceivable that someone at a 2 or 3 on the scale going from a self-identification as straight to one as gay, a 1 would be unlikely to do so, and for a 0 it would be unthinkable.
Personal ancedote time: While I am gay, I have, in the past, slept with women. Not my thing, but it was good friendly fun. I’ve also known a guy who was gay, but who married his business partner, who was a woman. So you could say that he was born homosexual, and that heterosexuality was a lifestyle he adopted. Or you could just come to terms with human sexuality as a continuum, and not just a black-and-white issue.
But there was an episode of 20/20 that featured several women who “discovered” that they were lesbians. They were all women who had been married for years, some of them with children in their late teens, and who all claimed never to have been sexually attracted to women when they were younger. Personally I was a bit skeptical about their claims but what do I know? After all Anne Hesche (sp?) didn’t discover her homoseuxality until she met Ellen.
Actually, I know a woman who ‘converted’ at age 35. She’d never had a lesbian relationship, and had been married to her husband (whom I also know) for 10+ years. This does indeed happen.
I agree with MrVisible. Individuals in that 2-3 range could change their lifestyle as convenient without really compromising their sexual well being.
As an exclusively heterosexual male, I would never swing in the other direction, but if I could choose my sexuality…then I’d be a perfectly balanced bisexual. I mean, whoa, that would double the number of fish in the sea .
MGibson:
IMO, This can partly be explained by the fact that some people have homosexual tendencies deep down until they are somehow awakened, or some folks are homosexuals (or just have tendencies) who live in denial about it until arriving at acceptance.
I have known some of these women. Not in the Biblical sense, though – I’ve rarely heard of one of these types actually having sex with a woman. Their supposed bisexuality generally consists of saying “I’m bisexual!” and maybe getting really drunk and giving their best friend a peck on the lips while their boyfriends cheer. Not a “conversion” any way you slice it.
Mr. Visible summarizes it all really well. I’ll only add that wherever you are on the famous Kinsey Scale the two things that counts is love and lust. It’s so hard to tell those apart that they are almost inseparable, but yet….
I’ve ‘always’ known that I was attracted to men as well as women. Yet it took until I was 25 years old to act on that emotion, not that I didn’t have the opportunity and the desire before that, it was simply the first time I fell in love with a guy and that it happened that it worked out in a situation when I was ‘available.’ In both male and female relations I tend to be pretty monogamous. Some other people are more likely to be promiscuous or they are more definitive about their sexuality.
Most people just don’t seem to think that much about it post puberty. I sure didn’t… as I said it was obvious. However society imposes roles on us and it’s really hard to own up to same-sex attraction, even to yourself, but even more so to others. This cuts both ways…. My parents met my only long time boyfriend. They never said a word about it, and I didn’t either. To this day I am ‘officially’ hetero in their eyes. It took a lot of soul searching to be able to answer my sexual orientation the correct way, even if I knew in my heart already.
Maybe that explains the latecomers.
As to the OP I would answer that maybe you sometimes realize it later than average, but you never really ‘convert.’ Many people try out same-sex sex and just don’t get off on it; others try opposite-sex sex and just don’t feel right about it. Whichever way it feels natural, or doesn’t – I believe there is no way of forcing it, or ‘converting.’
Did it ever occur to anyone that human sexuality is fluid and of infinite degrees, as opposed to black and white? It is both possible to be a “a little gay” as it is to suddenly realize at some point that you are, indeed, attracted to someone of the same sex.
As we can only “measure” sexual orientation by action and/or verbal communication, and not by actually knowing precisely what is going on inside a person’s brain, it is impossible to tell, IMHO.
Oh, hell, yes! I’ve known any number of women who were cozened into believing that is was impossible for a woman to be feminist and heterosexual as well. Hence, any number of women adopted homosexual behavior for political reasons rather than for sexual reasons. If that sounds creepy, believe me, it was.
To this day I have yet to hear a gay man declare that he became homosexual as a revolutionary act. For this I commend them.
Oh, come now. Isn’t the ‘latent’ theory fully exploded by now?
Why is it so impossible to imagine that someone can, over say, a couple of decades, change from 0=hetero to 4=mostly gay?
From 20 through 40 I’ve changed a great deal; I’m hetero and married and comfortable and close to changeless in some ways, but, yes, I can actually imagine myself in another alternate universe being in a less stable situation and considering alternatives should they come up. Would this make me ‘latent’ for all of my 40 years of life, or someone who evolved, as people often do?
Is a ‘Republican’ someone that was just a latent conservative when they were young and foolish? Is a Democrat someone that was a latent Reaganite? Please.
Or is the ‘latent’ tag a way of conveniently explaining away someone who (to put a homophobic tag on it) ‘turned to the dark side’?
In other words, an external observer can look at this person changing, tag them as ‘latent’ (they’ve always been that way – they were in denial!), and therefore it could never happen to them! How comforting – this person has always been different, and they finally discovered it. They’re definitely not like me!!
I think “a little gay” is somewhat apt, and could explain alot of this. For people other than Kinsey 0’s and 6’s, there must be some situation in which the alternative is attractive. In those people, it is most likely an individual attraction. An otherwise straight man attracted to a particular man, an otherwise straight woman attracted to a particular woman, an otherwise gay man attracted to a particular woman, etc. IMHO, sexuality is social, and social interactions occur between individuals, not groups.
This is all just conjecture on my part, but seemingly sound conjecture. Possibly the “converts” are Kinsey 1’s and 5’s who just finally met the extreme exception that breaks their conduct pattern.
I find the kinsey scale deeply flawed in concept; we are creatures made up of more than a single driving parameter; there are different kinds of attraction and desire, some of them are deeply rooted and others are more malleable to our own wills.
The only way I can think of to try to explain this is analogy (go easy on me, please):
Some people are allergic to peanuts, other people deeply dislike them, others have simply never seen a peanut.
Some of these people are going to find themselves able and willing to eat peanuts, others aren’t.
As I said, I don’t believe the things that drive us are as simple as a single factor like the ability/desire to eat peanuts as above, but extend it out widthways to include the variables for everything from coconuts to sunflower seeds and the question “do you eat nuts?” becomes one that can’t be answered easily or expressed with a single index.
I’m not sure about this. Changing someone’s sexual preference is apparently a real bitch. Consider all the work that goes into ‘curing’ pedophiles and like.
As a 100% hard wired pouf I can tell you that from personal experience I’ve been a pouf since birth. The handle that so many Pouf haters hand on is that I did not pop out at birth with a swishy waddle and am immediate attraction to the obstetrician which they claim as proof that I learned this behaviour. Studies have shown that Environment does influence sexual behaviour, but the studies tend to show that in oppressive environments Homosexuals are oppressed and less likely to be open and fulfilled sexually. In open environments the opposite it true! The same holds true for the way Women are treated and see themselves – and it even holds true for Raving Fundamentalist Christians too – They are not born that way they just learn aberrant behaviour. Take twin fundamentalist Christians and separate at birth. Leave one with their natural Fundamentalist Parents and put the other with a family of aboriginals in Australia – leave to cook for 15 years and open the oven to find an nice happy well adjusted child that has to be condemned for not turning out just like Mommy and Daddy!
Hatred and racism are learned as all too many Fundamentalist Christians know! What I find so odd is their use of a poorly translated history to back up their hate crime! What I really laugh at is when I have seen the sons and daughters of these oh so devout folks come out queer – so how do they explain this learning thing and who did they get the lessons from…… the local Minister by any chance?
As for folks being trendily G.A.Y. that is more to do with open society and social acceptance rather than what some call fashion. I do know some folks who have tried it out to see what it’s like and they decided it was not their “Thang”… but these folks only tasting fruit! Societies that lack rules on food allow folks to explore international cuisine – but it is the innate inquisitiveness of folks that makes them taste it.
I have asked straight folks why they had sex with members of the same sex. They always say the same thing — to see what it was like. No Big Deal! The Folks I know who ONLY ever sleep with same sex partners are just as straight forward about it.
There is a massive difference between a learned response and an innate response – and for me Sexual orientation has been clearly innate – it’s just that when I was three, due to certain social norms in which I was raised, I did not know that I was to be Called a Pouf – I just was one!
Female sexuality is, IMO, different than male sexuality.
I do not know whether this is biology, or that women are conditioned by our culture to find other women sexy.
I have known political lesbians as well as women who have had a long lesbian stage but eventually end up married to a man. They have all taken their gay identity (or bisexual identity) very seriously at the time.
I’ve never heard of a polititcal gay man. Nor of a predominately straight man who has a serious “gay stage”
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