I can’t answer to the gay part but I had crushes with sexual overtones with Linda Carter and Barbi Benton when I was 4 or so. People thought that I might be a little fem for having a whole collection if Wonder Woman dollars and clothes to go with them but it was just the opposite. I could dress and undress those dolls to my hearts content. I also starting seeking out soft-core porn which was really hard to find when I got get it.
I even had sexual dreams about several woman even though they were all rather confused and often dirtier than the real thing would be. The girls in my kindergarten did nothing for me but I had a very strong eye on one teacher as well to the point in which I would flub up anything I needed to say to her.
Does anyone else have those experiences? I can easily imagine someone realizing that they always really liked men from a very young age.
Hmm, not to doubt your memories, but do you have photos and several close relatives that also confirm your memories? And aren’t you a Pysche graduate (PhD?), don’t they teach you in beginning psychology about how unreliable memory is?
I am intrigued by the existence of a DC Comics economy. How does the exchange work? Will Marvel Money® work on a 1 to 1 ratio? 'Cause I still got some Spideybucks in my wallet…
Seriously, don’t you think you’re generalizing a little too much from your experiences? I have no doubt that there are asexual five-year-olds running around. But I know I was playing doctor around that age, and I know I wasn’t alone. Kids masterbate at that age (maybe not to orgasm, but they know the power of the “touch”) and are interested in other kids’ genitalia. I also know that crushes don’t always have to be physical, or at least in the “let’s get naked” way. When I was in grammar school, kids were branching out into couples as early as the first grade. I think they were more “make-believe” relationships than anything else, but it indicates that not all boys at that age think girls have cooties (or vice versa). Some players and playettes start young.
(I don’t know about you, but I remember a lot from the time I was five. Memories of my fourth year are vague, but I have rich mental pictures of my life as a snaggle-toothed kindegartener.)
It may be that the Reverand exaggerated when he said the “struggle” began at five. Maybe he began having homosexual feelings at five, but that doesn’t mean he was 1) aware he was having them at the time and 2) aware that these feelings were supposedly bad and shameful. I can’t imagine a five-year-old being indoctrinated with “GAY BAD!!!” in Sunday School class. They usually save that shit until you’re a teenager. So maybe the actual internal conflict started later in life, but he can trace the genesis of his homosexuality to his five-year-old self. Sounds reasonable to me.
Just to play devil’s advocate here there is a consistent and non-hypocritical position that can be carved out here.
Homosexuality is not a choice. It’s inbred and therefore not a sin.
Marriage is meant to occur between man/woman pair bonds.
Sexual activity outside of the bonds of marriage is a sin.
Homosexual sexual activity, since it cannot occur within marriage bonds is, by definition, sinful.
Those born homosexual are still capable of salvation/grace/what-have-you provided they avoid sexual activities outside of marriage just like all straight non-married persons
I wouldn’t agree with someone who makes this argument but I don’t think I could label them hypocrite.
It’s common to hear queer people saying “I’ve always felt different”. I know I did. I remember that it was always part of my worldview that there was something about me that didn’t “fit in”.
Memories aren’t just collections of facts like colours, places, and dates. If someone reaches back as far as they can in their mind and says that they have always carried a feeling with them, I believe them.
I was terribly, horribly in looooove with Matt Bennett in kindergarten. Truly, madly, deeply in love. I knew I wanted to kiss him and hold his hand and make him smile, because when he was happy it made me feel good, and I liked him in some strange way that I didn’t fully understand, but felt like Mommy and Daddy’s “like”. When I’d think about him at home, I got a physical arousal response and would masturbate (yes, witnessed by my mother on at least one embarrassing occasion!)
Now that I’m older, I can assure you that it was just as much “love” as what I felt at 10, or 15 or 25. There is simply no evolutionary advantage I can think of to creating kids without romantic feelings, and lots of advantage in evolving to have sexual feelings even before procreation is possible, for social bonding and relationship practice(not to mention pregnancy early and often).
Anyone who says (all) kids are asexual at age 5 hasn’t been around or studied many kids, and has probably been reading too many Victorian novels of cherubic youngsters with coal dust on their cheeks.
I’d google up some cites, but frankly I’m not sure how to google for information on children’s sexual development without getting a whole bunch of disgusting kiddy diddler sites.
These weren’t just memories and they were obvious and confirmed by everyone to this day. There was a lot of memorary baggage invested in what was goig on within the family when it was going on . I was absessed with dark haired, blue-eyed girlfriends
I did go to psyche gradute school but this is a branch of memory that continues to this day.
If it isn’t, then I have the perfect excuse for committing adultery: I couldn’t help it!
In the case of Mr. Barnes, I’m guessing that had he grown up in a place/environment where homosexuality was not taboo, he would never have “struggled” with it at all. A 5-year-old is not even physiologically capable of having sex, so at most we can say he was curious about what types of sex his own gender could engage in. That doesn’t make him “gay,” it makes him curious, in the way that many children are. (Read The Hite Report9s) On Male/Female Sexuality, if you don’t believe me.) Personally, I can’t fathom how someone who marries and has children, yet also has sex half as often with his/her own gender is somehow gay. At most, they are bisexual. There are still places in the world where people like this are simply considered normal, and not gays trapped in the closet.
Personally, I’m equally annoyed by intolerance for natural sexual experimentation AND people who claim homosexuality is “inborn.” Both groups are saying rational adults have no choice in what they do with their own bodies. How fair is that? And do we accept such reasoning in any other sphere of society?
What amazes me is not teh gay, or even the five years old business… it’s that someone who KNOWS he likes men sexually chooses to becomes a fire-and-brimestone preacher that has to rail against men who like other men sexually.
Admittedly this doesn’t (so far) appear to have been a cause of Barnes’ – as opposed to Haggard, who apparently railed frequently about it – but still, “evangelical leader,” is a job description that seems to not leave much wriggle room one how you treat men sucking cock, and I wonder what torturous mental gymnastics he went through knowing he liked what he was in some wise condemning.
What does this mean? A 5 year old is certainly capable of getting and maintaining an erection, or of being vaginally penetrated. You do know that the youngest verified mother on record is a 5.5 year old girl, right?
Although I’m on the record with a strong “I don’t give a rat’s ass if it’s inborn, learned, or studied like a midterm, whatever consenting adults do to each other is fine with me!” I think there’s even some disservice done by repeatedly insisting that homosexuality is inborn. But SEXUALITY certainly is present in very, very early childhood - you just don’t see it through the diaper that your toddler is busily rubbing on to climax.
Sorry, that went off prematurely. I have always had an extremely strong attraction for hot females with dark hair and blue eyes. I used to connive about watching Fantasy Island at age 5 to see if Barbi Benton would be a regular guest and Wonder Woman was untouchable for reasons that adults refused to believe.
People that interrupted those 5 year old fetishes were dealt with harshly such as my uncle that broke my Wonder Woman overhead light cover in my bedroom and had to try and find a new one right away. He didn’t understand why it was such a big deal.
The trend continued until this day even though I didn’t realize what was happening. All significant girlfriends and now my wife looked like Linda Carter or Vivien Leigh.
That started very early and affected my life. The early dreams were extremely sexual but I didn’t really understand the concept of the vagina when I was 4 or 5 so my dreams led me to create some things that would be fetish and disgust me now. It was 100% real. I was the 6 year old kid that really loved a tight early 1980’s style sweater on a woman on an cold day.
Did many other males have these urges staring at a very early age
I’m well aware of the 5-year-old mother story, and I’m also aware that it’s considered a freak of nature. (And just who was the father, I wonder?) I’m not going to get hung up on this red herring. If 5-year-olds are capable of having sexual intercourse with each other (not just getting the occasional erection masturbating) then I guess Jack and Jill better not hang out alone together, huh? :rolleyes:
It doesn’t really matter when the average person becomes capable of informed consent and fully aware sexual activity. What matters is that Mr. Barnes’ curiosity about his own sexuality and that of other males at age five did not make him gay. Many, if not most, straight men have similar thoughts to his at some time or another. (I refer back to the books I mentioned in my last post.) How someone is at age five doesn’t prove anything, and saying that it’s “evidence” that a man’s sexuality is pre-determined is about as rational as saying someone is pre-destined to be a criminal, a drunk, or a millionaire.
That is, sorry, I thought you were agreeing with **Epimetheus **that 5 year olds are asexual when you said “A 5-year-old is not even physiologically capable of having sex,”.
But it seems, upon further review, that you do believe 5 year olds are sexual, just not *generally *having intercourse, which I agree with. But it’s because of psychological and social barriers, not physical ones.
(My brother had full penetration sex with me, a 2 year old, when he was 5, so I KNOW this is physically possible! Our parents caught us, so it was indeed verified by an adult, and is not simply errant memory.)
Same here. And even at five years old, a kid raised in the atmosphere the dear reverend most likely knew would already have some vague sense that the things he was feeling weren’t right.
Five-year-olds can engage in sexual activities. They can get hard-ons and they also stimulate genitalia, their own and others. They can orgasm, they can penetrate. Can they go spladunking exactly like a grown man can? No. But they can certainly have sex.
The five-year-old pastor may have had an idle curiosity. He may have had an innocent crush. Or he could have had hot horny sex with his best friend. All of these options are possible. I don’t know why people are so intent on disbelieving the guy on this minor point. I would think he alone would be the best judge of when he started feeling a certain way.
If the pastor had made his feelings known to his wife and to the world, then I think it would be safe to conclude the guy is bisexual. But because his sexuality has been shrouded in secrecy and deceit, and he lives in a society where homosexuality is still taboo, it makes just as much sense–if not more–to conclude he’s a closeted gay.
For Rev. Barnes, he did make a lifestyle choice. He chose to live as a heterosexual male, with wife and kids. And maybe he is bisexual. But to his following and to the community he belongs to, that’s a distinction without a difference.
I kinda agree with this. I think it is true that for SOME individuals, gender preference is immutable and purely innate from birth. But for others, the roots of gender preference lie in the middle of the biological-environmental spectrum, and we unconsciously or consciously “choose” who we want to be with. If we lived in a society where homosexuality was 100% acceptable, I’m betting much more than 10% of us would be gay. I think there are many closeted individuals in our midst now, but I also think there are many of us who have “chosen” heterosexuality because we are creatures of a pro-heterosexuality environment. We are perfectly comfortable in our preference, but given a different environment we would also be perfectly comfortable as a homosexual. In that way, most of us are bisexual. I think sexuality is way too complicated for us to conclude what is and isn’t a “choice”.
Whether your sexual orientation is actually “inborn” or not isn’t really the issue. I don’t think any of us here have a problem with people who want to experiment, but most of us just aren’t attracted to one of the two sexes-- whether it’s our own or the opposite sex.
Sure, having gay sex can be a lifestyle choice, but **being **gay isn’t. And I think we can safely say that some people simply are gay, period. We may all be bisexual to some degree, but most of us seem to reside at one extreme or the other.
Struggling with sin at age five seems right, we ALL have sinful tendencies, it’s part of where we live, and that allows us free will, and our ultimate decision (from my understanding). And yes the evidence is right before our eyes sinful tendencies are present in everyone’s life.
