# OK. Can we agree that it isn't a "lifestyle choice" now? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [December 30, 2006, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053 "2006-12-30T01:13:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/1 "2006-12-30T01:13:11Z")
Another evangelical minister bites the dust. Any chance he’s going to get his parishoners to realize that homosexuality is not a “lifestyle choice”? I doubt it… > [@](#): > > [Second Colorado evangelical resigns over gay sex](http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20061213/ts_nm/evangelical_scandal_gay_dc_2) > > …Barnes told his congregation in a videotaped message on Sunday he had “struggled with homosexuality since he was five years old.” Five years old. You don’t “choose” your sexuality at 5 years old, folks! Come on people… The evidence is right there before your eyes!! ---
**Author:** ![Valgard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/7feea3/32.png) [@Valgard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Valgard)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/2 "2006-12-30T01:17:44Z")
Oh I can just see the reaction: “ANOTHER person who consciously made a Bad Moral Decision at age 5! We’d better redouble our efforts to clamp down on them!” ---
**Author:** ![xenophon41](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xenophon41/32/253_2.png) [@xenophon41](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xenophon41)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/3 "2006-12-30T01:23:17Z")
I wish having the evidence hit home like that were all it took, **John** , but I don’t reckon more than a few of those parishioners will have their minds -or hearts- changed by this. I think even if they accept that homosexuality isn’t a choice, they’ll still think “homosexual behavior” can and should be avoided by the righteous. Until we see practicing evangelical leaders come out of the closet _without_ apology for their “sins”, nothing will change. (And wouldn’t it be refreshing to see one of these guys come out on Sunday morning and say “I’ve been your shepherd for 20 years, I’m so grateful and proud of all of you, and now please meet my life-partner Bill.”) ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/4 "2006-12-30T01:24:16Z")
I blame fluoridated water. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/5 "2006-12-30T01:25:31Z")
Just to be the Advocate of the Other Guy for a moment: “Struggling” with something from a young age doesn’t mean it’s not a trial or test set up by God. God (in their paradigm) made some people with no legs, and some with no brains (obvious examples seem to be coming out of the woodwork these days!) and some with high libidos and ugly faces who can’t convince anyone to marry them, and some who are gay and can’t marry the person they’d like to. In all of these cases, these are tests of faith. Those who can’t follow God’s rules, despite the hurdles He’s set up for them, don’t win the game. God’s rules include loving him even if he made you without legs, not having sex outside of marriage, and not marrying if you’re a homosexual. If you can’t follow the rules and still have faith in God, you lose. I personally think it’s stupid as all get out, but I see the logic in their system. It’s a large part of why I don’t follow their system. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/6 "2006-12-30T01:26:18Z")
[QUOTE=silenus] I blame fluoridated water. [/QUOTE] Turns out it wasn’t the _Communists_ who wanted our precious bodily fluids, after all. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/7 "2006-12-30T01:26:20Z")
My personal opinion is that sexuality is not a lifestyle choice. I also don’t think that it matters if it is or not. I’ve heard people say that it’s a “lifestyle choice” and that it’s “unnatural.” Let’s agree for the sake of argument that it’s both. Why the fuck should you, I, Pat Robertson or the U.S. Government give two shits if someone wants to be unnatural in their own home? Who is being harmed? I feel sorry for Rev. Barnes. Nothing in the article says that he said anything about lifestyle choices though he was anti-gay marriage. The poor guy felt that he had to “struggle” against something that shouldn’t matter. Founding a 2000+ member evangelical church is some serious overcompensation. Hopefully he will accept who he is. ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/8 "2006-12-30T01:28:25Z")
No doubt it was the influence of the liberal children’s shows on liberal public television that made this 5-year-old make this choice. ---
**Author:** ![Random](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/57b2e6/32.png) [@Random](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Random)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/9 "2006-12-30T01:40:11Z")
[QUOTE=Revtim] No doubt it was the influence of the liberal children’s shows on liberal public television that made this 5-year-old make this choice. [/QUOTE] Bert and Ernie have much to answer for. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/10 "2006-12-30T01:43:43Z")
[QUOTE=Revtim] No doubt it was the influence of the liberal children’s shows on liberal public television that made this 5-year-old make this choice. [/QUOTE] Since the preacher was five years old in 1957, and PBS isn’t quite that old, that one won’t fly. Back to fluoride. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![The\_King\_of\_Soup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a87d85/32.png) [@The\_King\_of\_Soup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_King_of_Soup)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/11 "2006-12-30T01:50:20Z")
Well said, **John Mace** : one’s sexuality is _not_ a lifestyle choice, and it’s not an issue of morality or mental health or fashion, either. You are absolutely right about that, and it couldn’t have been said better. But anyone who thinks his (Barnes’s) parishoners are going to suddenly drop the prejudices they’ve been cultivating for decades, probably with his loud encouragement, needs to read more carefully: by claiming that “he has struggled with homosexuality since he was five years old,” he is not making the issue more human and accessible; he’s just reinforcing the idea that homosexuality is some kind of birth defect, an aberration that his congregants can reassure themselves won’t happen to truly good people. It would be healthy and clarifying for a formally gay-bashing clergyman to admit he was _wrong_, not merely to continue to pander to his flock’s bigotry by saying that he has _sinned_. That merely knocks down one figurehead without touching the foundation of sand on which the next one is sure to be built. It would be nice if this kind of hypocrisy actually worked _against_ its premises, but in this case every half-renunciation seems merely to feed the lies. Each new example of “sin” serves not to educate the faithful that the acts they deplore are normal, but rather to frighten them with a new bogey ever increasing in size. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/12 "2006-12-30T01:51:21Z")
You get to choose what you want to eat, you get to choose what you like to wear. You don’t get to choose what makes you horny. ---
**Author:** ![JustAnotherGeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/58f4c7/32.png) [@JustAnotherGeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JustAnotherGeek)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/13 "2006-12-30T01:57:06Z")
I think this is the interesting part: > [@Same Article](#): > > Barnes was confronted by an associate pastor of the church who received an anonymous phone call from a person who heard someone was threatening to go public with the names of Barnes and other evangelical leaders who engaged in homosexual behavior, Ames said. 1st: How many levels of hearsay are in that statement? I lost count. (It’s doesn’t make it any less true, boy, talk about foafoafoaf) 2nd: Should we be expecting a spate of admissions in the near future? Or a tell-all book / movie / tv show? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9fc348/32.png) [@The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Flying_Dutchman)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/14 "2006-12-30T02:00:32Z")
[QUOTE=samclem] Since the preacher was five years old in 1957, and PBS isn’t quite that old, that one won’t fly. Back to fluoride. 🙂 [/QUOTE] Well I’ve been masturbating since at least 1954 before our water was flouridated. ---
**Author:** ![NJ\_Kef\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b487fb/32.png) [@NJ\_Kef\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NJ_Kef_1)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 2:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/15 "2006-12-30T02:03:53Z")
On the other hand, if a straight guy says succumbing to homosexual encounters is a choice, maybe he is telling us more about himself than we are ready to acknowledge. Maybe some straight boys actually see this as a decision. They are men too. “Damn, I’m horny! Aiiight, yah, suck my dick! Oh, yahhh, that feels good. Yahhh, suck it like dat!” ---
**Author:** ![Sevastopol](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cdc98d/32.png) [@Sevastopol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sevastopol)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/16 "2006-12-30T02:04:15Z")
[QUOTE=John Mace] Another evangelical minister bites the dust. Any chance he’s going to get his parishoners to realize that homosexuality is not a “lifestyle choice”? I doubt it… Five years old. You don’t “choose” your sexuality at 5 years old, folks! Come on people… **The evidence** is right there before your eyes!! _(my emphasis)_ [/QUOTE] You lose them right there. ---
**Author:** ![Annie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/858c86/32.png) [@Annie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/17 "2006-12-30T02:13:39Z")
[Deny, deny, deny…](http://images.cafepress.com/product/85741754v11_240x240_Front.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/18 "2006-12-30T02:21:45Z")
[QUOTE=The King of Soup] Well said, **John Mace** : one’s sexuality is _not_ a lifestyle choice, and it’s not an issue of morality or mental health or fashion, either. You are absolutely right about that, and it couldn’t have been said better. But anyone who thinks his (Barnes’s) parishoners are going to suddenly drop the prejudices they’ve been cultivating for decades, probably with his loud encouragement, needs to read more carefully: by claiming that “he has struggled with homosexuality since he was five years old,” he is not making the issue more human and accessible; he’s just reinforcing the idea that homosexuality is some kind of birth defect, an aberration that his congregants can reassure themselves won’t happen to truly good people. [/QUOTE] I don’t think the parishoners are going to change (hence the “I doubit it” in the OP), which is why I openned this up in the Pit instead of GD. Sorry if that wasn’t clear. And there wouldn’t be any real debate on this MB anyway-- are there even 3 regular posters in GD who think homosexuality is “lifestyle choice”? I don’t think so… there haven’t been for awhile anyway. ---
**Author:** ![auntie\_em](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@auntie\_em](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/auntie_em)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/19 "2006-12-30T02:24:35Z")
[QUOTE=Random] Bert and Ernie have much to answer for. [/QUOTE] I blame _Free To Be You And Me._ I mean, isn’t it obvious? ---
**Author:** ![Biggirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/biggirl/32/3294_2.png) [@Biggirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biggirl)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053/20 "2006-12-30T02:37:35Z")
[QUOTE=auntie em] I blame _Free To Be You And Me._ I mean, isn’t it obvious? [/QUOTE] Or the fundamentalist version called Be Ashamed of Yourself and Hide. It starred J Edgar Hoover and Roy Cohn. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-can-we-agree-that-it-isnt-a-lifestyle-choice-now/386053.md?page=2)