Other posters noted the apparent hypocrisy of condemning homosexuality while endorsing (implicitly or explicity) adultrey or fornication (pre-marital sex among adults). I agree with them.
I was pointing out that there are 2 ays to go with that:
Either lower the [biblical] standards for the homosexuals because heteros aren’t following the rules themselves, or;
Raise the [biblical] standards for the heterosexuals and hold them accountable to the same bible that they use to condemn homosexuals.
Burdens are not distrubted equally. But that’s another thread.
Interesting point. There are some (perhaps not the majority) who would see the broad acceptance of heterosexual fornication as a sure sign of severely declining moral values. They may likely see the push to legitimize homosexuality as part of that same process.
To the extent the heterosexual community has accepted fornication quite openly, and adultrey implicitly it is hypocritical to make the homosexual a scapegoat. (This assumes of course that all 3 —fornication, adultrey and homosexual behavior---- are biblically prohibited)
My view is that they are. However my feeling is that we should not be seeking the lowest common denominator. Rather, the heteros should be held to the same [boblical] standard.
If homosexuality is a choice, could those who hold this view gives us the details of how this choice comes about, what are the exact psychological mechanisms that come into play for this choice to occur? Is there any scientific evidence to prove this?
Please note, this isn’t directed specifically at faithfool, but rather at those who hold the view that homosexuality is a choice. Faithfool simply expressed it first in this thread.
Just to clarify unless (or if) my post came across as muddled as they typically do, I no longer believe that homosexuality IS a choice. I 100% believe that we are all born with our orientations, including straights, gays and bisexuals.
The view I previously expressed is what my old church and former religious people I know thought. Also, these were my beliefs before I took a reasoned look at the evidence out there and changed them.
Sorry if I caused any confusion.
::: faithfool hangs her head in sadness and realizes she could’ve never taught :::
No need to apologize, Faithfool! I had read what you wrote at the beginning of your OP and realized those were no longer your views. You just expressed the issue first in this thread and that was what I why I quoted you. No harm done, I hope?
Just ask a man on the “pro-choice” side, “So, are you telling me that you could choose to achieve and maintain an erection and have sex to orgasm with another man?” It’s fun to watch their reactions.
Back to the OP’s question: if you’re bisexual, then you do have a choice. I can bring to mind someone I know who has had both homosexual and heterosexual relations. Said someone ended up choosing one (I’m not saying which).
I think the underlying point is not that homosexuals choose to be homosexuals as such, but that they choose to engage in homosexual activity. There is little argument on this point, I trust. I am not born a criminal, I make a choice to continue to engage in only lawful behavior (actually, I don’t, but whatever). (I choose the criminal comparison only because, WRT people who severely frown upon homosexual activity, it is appropriate, not because I think homosexuals are “like” criminals. Thanks for not overreacting to this analogy.)
Who cares if it is a choice or not. Most freedoms we have available to us involve choice. I do not retain freedom of speech if my only choice is to speak highly of the president, for example. Similarly, even taking an individualist approach to the second amendment, no one is required to own a gun, they choose to exercize that right. Choice is a red herring in most debates about homosexuality and rights.
raindog, you’re right. I have no idea if the man is an alcoholic today; I don’t even have any idea if he’s alive today. He vanished out of my life some 7 or 8 years ago, and I haven’t heard from him since. Considering last time I heard from him, we were engaged, at least as far as I knew, there is a trace of bitterness. On the other hand, I have learned quite a bit about alcoholism and alcoholics while being treated for clinical depression. I have been exposed to the school that says if you have one drink or get drunk once you’re an alcoholic.
Look, to me, drinking alcohol is a choice, as is drinking it to the point where it affects “activities of everyday life” to use a phrase I’ve heard quite a bit in recovery circles. As I said, a long time ago, I had the choice, and even the desire, to seek oblivion at the bottle of white wine. I chose not to. Some years after that, when I was hospitalized with severe clinical depression, I found out the hard way that it’s far easier to get treatment for alcoholism than it is for clinical depression, and there are far fewer support groups. Ironically, it would have been cheaper and easier for me to get the treatment I needed if I had chosen to drink that first bottle of wine.
This is a somewhat touchy subject for me, so perhaps I’d better back off now.
CJ
I know a little about both depression and alcoholism. It is fairly present in my family, and both my parents are were (are) alcoholics as well as a couple brothers. I didn’t mean to be presumptuous.
Can I get any more takers? To rephrase the OP questions,
If you are a heterosexual, do you remember having chosen to be one?
I think this is a question specifically in the realm of logic - is it possible to have two mutually exclusive cases of human nature, two states, two ways of being, whatever they are, and have one of them be a choice and the other one not be a choice but rather predetermined without choice?
Bit of a red herring, no? Has anyone anywhere ever succeeded in identifying and explaining the “exact psychological mechanisms” for any volitional act?
Exactly how and when did you decide to become a doctor, and specifically, an orthopedist? Explain why you jumped out of the way of those stampeding horses. Tell me exactly how you got those four tattoos and two ear piercings but decided against the fifth tattoo and the tongue-splitting. Why are you a Calvinist? Give me the exact thought process behind why you didn’t call it “Treebird” instead, that would have been an even more bitching song title!
He doesn’t have an exact chronology and neurological pathology for these decisions? Then they weren’t volitional at all! We were unavoidably destined, from the beginning of time, to bask in the melodious tones of “Freebird,” and nothing else.
Actually, I don’t think that is the OP’s question. If you’re bi, you have a wider choice of partners than if you’re not, but the question is, do people choose to be bi in the first place?
The rephrased question above seems to be asking if homosexuality is like tattooing. We’re all naturally born without tattoos. But if a person is exposed to the idea of tattooing, s/he might choose to become tattooed. So, are we all naturally born hetero, but somehow along the way some of us choose to become gay?
I think it’s clear that sexual attraction isn’t something we think about and decide on. However, I don’t think that there are “two mutually exclusive” options, and it’s pretty clear that people’s tendencies and behaviors can change over a lifetime.
The question I posed in a previous post is smart-assed, but serious in a way, too. For those who think non-straight orientation is chosen, can you honestly say that you could pick a population you’re not attracted to (same sex, kids, people you hate) and successfully copulate with them? I doubt it.
Homosexuality exists in every human society, and always has, despite often being reviled and persecuted. That’s pretty strong evidence that it’s not any more a “choice” than left-handedness.
I’ll respond to your second one first. The problem with your phrasing is that it sort of seems to stack the deck against the “choice” crowd by positing “exclusive cases of human nature,” or “states” or modes of being. On the other hand, much of the religious doctrine I’ve heard focuses on “sinful” actions. I’m not going to get into the whole argument over whether there’s a distinction between “being a homosexual” and “indulging in homosexual acts or catering to an urge to do so,” except to note that the concept of some free-floating “homosexual state of being,” divorced from any acts or thoughts in furtherance thereof, strikes me as somewhat more congenial to a pro-homosexual-rights position than to the more conservative view. The conservative says: “It’s simple, just don’t put your unit in any of the following orifices, and we’re cool.” Some conservatives may, with real sincerity, believe that as long as the conduct is averted, the negative consequences of the “sin” are largely averted, and any theoretical “orientation” toward the conduct is of modest concern. The homosexual says “You’re trying to tell me how to be and I can’t control that!” which is almost incontrovertible, not because people don’t have free will, but because no one can really tell what another person “is” or “truly feels.”
Putting aside the problems I have understanding any existential “state of being” divorced from the acts and choices that are associated therewith (from being a homosexual, to being a Republican, to being a skateboarder), and assuming that “homosexual” and “not homosexual” are binary, volitional states (in the same trivial sense that “tattooed” and “un-tattooed” could fairly be said to be) . . . then I can say I “chose” heterosexuality (at least to the same extent I “chose” to skip getting a tatoo). That is, I didn’t take the available actions that would have put me into the category of homosexuals (or tattoo-sporters, or Libertarians), but did take the ones that led people to call me a heterosexual based on my actions. I was reasonably aware of the sexual options out there, I evaluated them (from my limited knowledge at the time), and decided to cultivate some and not others. Later in life, the interests I chose to cultivate morphed a bit, and in this phase, too, I was making conscious choices that have significantly changed the profile (but not, so far, the sex) of my dream date, and the things I’d like to do with/to said dream date.
To my mind, the conservative point of view has nothing to do with discussing “sin”.
As far as I’m concerned, the conservative says: “Put your unit wherever you want, pal… it’s none of my business. And it’s none of your business where I put mine. And if your idea of sin isn’t the same as mine, that’s your lot to deal with.”
It is possible to be gay and celibate. If I were celibate, I’d still be straight. I would still “lust in my heart” after women, not men.
Sexual orientation and attraction are fundamental to human psychology. To tell people that they’re sinful if they’re attracted to the same sex is indeed trying to tell them how they can “be”. And to tell people, well, that’s fine, just don’t have sex… that’s an enormous violation of their rights.
I covered this in my first post, but I will restate.
There could, hypothetically, be both a default state and an alternate state that people could enter by choice. No one would initially choose to be in the default state, they’d just be born that way. However, if the possibility of the alternate state were one open to everyone, then everyone (or at least everyone aware of the possibility) would have to reject it in order to remain in the default state. There wouldn’t be an initial choice about the default state, but a choice would have to be made in order to stay that way.
Attempt at Helpful Analogy: Let’s say you’re a natural redhead. You had no choice in this matter, it’s simple genetics. You were born that way. But thanks to the massive modern hair product industry, you have the option of “unnaturally” changing your haircolor to almost any shade you like. Assuming there’s no lack of access or funds that would prevent you from dying your hair, you can freely choose to change your natural haircolor or freely choose to keep it. Of course, you would have to be aware that it’s possible to dye hair in the first place.
This leads us to another possible reason for suppressing homosexuality: if people aren’t aware of this “choice”, they won’t choose it. Nevermind that gay people throughout history have somehow managed to figure things out even if their culture did its best to keep homosexuals in the closet.
This, quite frankly, is bullshit. People were gay fifty years ago. They were having sex, getting high and and into all kinds of mischief. People cheated on their spouses, visited opium dens, etc.
The idea that somehow we’re more sinful nowadays than we were in the past is wrong, wrong, wrong.
The only difference is, perhaps, we’re hearing about it more, with the growing mass media.
I don’t know if I agree with you, at least not if you’re saying that the statistical incidence of “aberrant” behaviors was the same (I don’t have a cite either, as yet). My impression has been that there were always some people doing the same types of things (though I don’t know if, say, bukkake or fisting or latex fetishes were known as such), but that they were not necessarily numerically as prevalent as they now are, because they bore a stigma or had barriers to entry (so to speak). Whether they were as numerically prevalent or not, these subcultures of “sin” (I’ll leave it in quotes because we’ll never agree on what, if anything, really is sinful) shared in common the fact that they were, in most cases, confined to particular settings or milieus, with boundaries in between those milieus and the “straight” civilian world. For everything from foul language to drug use or homosexuality, you could show that it existed, but for the people who didn’t choose to enter the subcultures in which these phenomena took place, the phenomena didn’t necessarily touch their lives to a significant degree. Now it’s difficult to be immersed in the popular culture without routinely having to confront all of them. Maybe this is “better” and “more open,” but I sense that a lot of the discomfort with our new modern world comes not from the existence of formally-taboo subjects or conduct, but from the dissolving of the boundaries that used to make it possible to avoid having to see to much of it. Homosexuality is only one of (but is high among) the now-overt phenomena that are, indeed, alarming some of the horses.
side, “So, are you telling me that you could choose to achieve and maintain an erection and have sex to orgasm with another man?” It’s fun to watch their reactions.