I NEVER called you a liar.
By saying that homosexuality is a choice, you are calling me a liar when I assert the FACT that homosexuality is not a choice, for I never chose it.
Ah ha! As I somewhat suspected, I think there’s a bit of a language confusion here. It appears from this thread that New Iskander isn’t a native english speaker. I think the following terms are being bandied about with variously different meanings attached to them. New Iskander, please correct me if these aren’t a point of confusion, I don’t want to paint you the wrong color here. I believe you are interchanging the terms “homosex” and “homosexuality” - the first meaning the actual act of homosexual sex, the second meaning the orientation of homosexuality.
I truly hope that clears some of this thread up. It’s starting to get ugly.
I think you’re wrong. I sure don’t remember choosing to be straight, and I think we can see how at least a couple of gay posters feel about the issue. Dipshit.
No, I don’t think you get it.
Who does it hurt when he states a fact? I think it helps somewhat. When people like you say that it’s a choice, bigots have an easier time saying that gay people are choosing to sin and should be punished for it.
What freedoms did he usurp? He’s not talking about passing any laws. It’s the OTHER guy who wants to ban same-sex marriage. Why aren’t you posting about him, nimrod?
In America this is only partially true. As Kerry said immediately after the comment you’ve stupidly pitted him over, at the present time in this country couples who gay are denied certain abilities that married couples have. Hospital visitation rights, for example, and there are issues with ownership of property. In at least some states, gay couples are not allowed to adopt children. Did you know any of this before you started spouting off? The entire same-sex marriage issue, for a lot of people, comes down to the fact that people should not be denied rights based on their sexuality. Kerry argued in that debate that gay couples should have the same rights as same-sex couples (although he argued at the same time that marriage is between a man and a woman). And you’re pitting him for it because either you have no idea what you’re talking about, don’t know anything about the science of the subject, or both.
You’re just making shit up now. Why the hell would anyone have to legally declare their sexuality? What has anyone said that would make you think this is a possibility?
A lot of homophobic idiots have said so, but nobody with an ounce of common sense as far as I know.
I agree. That’s why gay and straight couples should have the same rights. Which is what John Kerry was saying.
You’re too late by (I think) a few hundred years. The biology is a fact, and your reaction to someone stating the obvious just because you don’t like it is idiotic.
I distinctly remember having homoerotic fantasies. They left me perplexed and I never acted upon them. My theory is that all people do a lot of playing in their imagination before settling down on a certain sexual routine. Some people, probably the least repressed, carry out their experiments in real life.
I knew it. I was talking about Sex and you thought it was about Marriage.
And look who didn’t answer my very simple questions.
Whether to fuck or not is a choice.
Precisely whom to fuck is a choice.
To a large degree, precisely whom one is interested in fucking is a choice.
Whether or not one is primarily interested in fucking men in general, or in women in general, or either in various amounts, is not a choice.
There’ve been quite a few contributions on another thread from women who have slept with both men and women. Some of these women are married. Others have thought about sleeping with another woman but haven’t yet done so.
I don’t know how you can be so dogmatic about characterising such individuals as not choosing their particular interests. There seems to be at least an element of conscious choice in their experimentation. I can’t see how you can say unequivocally that they behave the way they do because they were fixed that way at or before birth.
Perhaps they could contribute their opinions here.
If, as a couple of the studies mentioned early in the thread indicate, sexuality is determined by a number of genes on the X chromosome, then female sexuality is going to be an entire order of magnitude more complicated than male sexuality.
That accords with my thinking and experience, spectrum - the second part of your sentence, at any rate.
You said “Right now, one can raise a family and have same sex partner.” Marriage is a sidebar to that, and I was not talking about marriage. If you have a same-sex partner, you do not have all the same rights that a straight couple (married or not) has. Get it yet? [Who am I kidding?]
It’s not a belief or dogma, it’s a fact. People do not choose their sexuality.
I believe you said you were married, so did you choose to be attracted to women, Roger? When exactly did you make this choice?
Look, sexuality is an inbuilt thing. You and I are attracted to women, and we didn’t have any choice in the matter. Gay guys are attracted to men, and they didn’t choose to be, either. What’s so hard to understand?
Atticus, I was talking specifically about women who fantasise about or go to bed (occasionally) with other women. There appears to be the possibility of an element of choice here.
I don’t think he was saying that, necessarily. I took him to mean that the range of options one might have is selected for you.
For some men and women, the unconciously available options may be male partners AND female partners. For some, like me, while I might choose to experiment with another guy, I don’t have the option of being attracted to one. It just doesn’t happen.
Hey, I’m not denying that some people are bisexual. In that case, they could choose who to go to bed with, I suppose. Don’t know for sure, don’t know any bisexual people. But once again, they haven’t chosen their sexuality.
People do not choose their sexuality, agree or disagree?
Human sexuality is a complex and largely unknown thing. It’s possible that within each individual is the possibility for the whole range of sexual activity across the continuum, and that the behaviour we exhibit through our lives reflects the (changing) combination of all the various factors, genetic, biological, parental influence, other environmental, social and cultural. And to that, yes, I think one might add an element of selection, or choice. Certain elements may be much more influential for certain people, effectively ruling out any but one outcome; again, in certain people, the influence of elements may be greater at certain times.
This may explain why some people, women, in particular, have periods during which they are homosexual and other periods during which they are heterosexual. Or why others, or indeed the same individuals at different times, have sexual relationships with both men and women for periods at a time.
I think our sexuality may be considerably more nuanced than some people think, and not an invariant, monolithic construct. An element of determination should not, I feel, be ruled out.
We covered this already. The people you speak of are bisexual by nature. This is not their choice. They may choose to have sex with different people at different times - they do not become homosexual or heterosexual at different times!
Leaving aside bisexuals since this seems to be a source of confusion, let the proposition be that homosexuals and heterosexuals do not choose their sexuality. Yes or no?
Atticus, I’ve already addressed that question in the part of my previous response that you don’t quote.
I know many gay men who have, at some point in their lives, been attracted to a woman.
I know many straight men who have, at some point in their lives, been attracted to a man.
Same with women.
That doesn’t change the fundamental fact of their basic homosexual or heterosexual orientation.
Sure, it can be argued (with some success) that we are all essentially bisexual, tending along a spectrum of sexuality. But I there’s no substantive evidence suggesting that we can move along that spectrum to any great degree. And the vast majority of anecdotal evidence suggests quite the opposite.
Dogmatic? Nah. It’s the real world, babe.
Maybe so. Still, why would some strive to define themselves one way or another? Whence this desire to conform to a certain label? Whatever we do in bedroom, we all are Human Beings first. I find politicians describing people by their sexual orientation very disturbing. As a matter of principle, I wouldn’t like to be identified as ‘straight’ in public, for example. I don’t think of myself as ‘straight’. Being ‘straight’ doesn’t even begin to define me, I think. Sure, I have a wife and have fathered children. No, I don’t have a boyfriend. Why? I dunno, just don’t feel like it, I suppose. No, I don’t get intimate with goats. Why? Well, I don’t keep goats. Why? I dunno, just don’t feel like it, I suppose… Why don’t you go fuck yourselves, Senators?