In the main, I’m in agreement with Todderbob. I don’t believe that sexual orientation is determined by genes or pre-uterine environment or early childhood environment for a number of reasons. Those reasons being (1) I have known many people who successfully changed their sexual orientation. (2) Scientific studies confirm that many people have changed their sexual orientation. For example, Kinsey’s famous study on male sexuality concluded that a large percentage of men who are “exclusively homosexual” for part of their lives do not remain so for their entire lives. (3) It is an observation of mine that I can change my own preferences, and others have observed the same about themselves. As I’ve explained in other threads, I have, by my own free will, chosen to change my preferences on food and entertainment and other things. I’ve chosen to change my sexual turn-ons as well, and though I’ve always been exclusively heterosexual I’m sure I could change that if I wanted to. Of course it would not happen overnight, and no one believes that it would. Any deep-seated change in one’s personality takes time, effort, and commitment, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be done.
And I am also in full agreement that the issue of why anyone has a given sexual orientation is irrelevant to any political issue. The reason why so many people can’t be clear about this is because so much nanny-state intrusiveness is based on (false) beliefs about innate human desires. Since we supposedly are hard-wired to like alcohol or tobacco or fatty food, the argument goes, the government therefore must be involved in those things. If we’d just get back to believing in free will and respecting the rights or ordinary people to make their own choices, the debate would evaporate.
You’re confusing behavior with preference. Behavior is usually a matter of choice. I’m right handed, but I can make myself write (badly) with my left hand. I can make myself eat food I dislike, or refrain from eating food I do like. I can pass up the opportunity to have sex with someone I find attractive, and I could close my eyes and think of England to get through sex with someone I found wholly unattractive. None of this would change my preferences, though.
*What evidence do you need beyond people saying that they did not choose their sexual orientation?
None, I’m not making any claims beyond a lack of evidence for either side.
Why would the burden of proof lay on me, to prove that neither position is true, when I’m holding there’s not sufficient evidence? Are you saying you want me to gather a lack of evidence?
Well the AMA and the APA both reject the idea that sexual orientation is mutable, for instance, and the notion that it’s possible is plainly asinine if you give it any thought at all, but the more salient question is what is the proof that it CAN be changed? All of the attempted methodolgies and “therapies” for it have miserable failure rates. Why do so many gay teenagers kill themselves if they can just “choose” not to be gay?
Okay, can you provide some evidence to this effect? A publication from the AMA and APA?
While they’re not infallible, they are both very much experts in their respective fields. I’d be more inclined to agree with them, than you simply stating “it’s obvious, durrrr.”
Obviously not. There are many people, myself obviously included, who don’t hold that as an article of faith. I require evidence.
In much the same way I would require evidence if someone stated the Earth was flat, or the Earth was round, if I didn’t already have information on the subject.
Ahem, but that’s only relevant if I’m making the proposition that it can be changed. I’m not.
There’s also the possibility that it’s a choice that cannot be changed, although I find that extraordinarily unlikely. So, even if it is a choice, it’s not necessarily a choice that can be changed, and if that’s the case, then the discussion is purely academic, but still worth having.
So, because everything in the past has failed, it’s impossible?
I don’t think that people should be forced into “cures” for sexuality, but that doesn’t mean I think it’s impossible, simply because it hasn’t been successful yet.
I couldn’t tell you, although they don’t typically kill themselves because they’re gay, they kill themselves because they were abused.
Perhaps, maybe they weren’t aware they could change that factor, perhaps they (personally) couldn’t change it, perhaps a dozen other things. But that doesn’t invalidate the possibility of it being a choice, it only seeks the explanation that it isn’t a choice because of these things.
What I’m more looking for are objective, unbiased studies.
Please, show me the evidence. I asked for it already (in another thread). It’s not like you’ve shown it to me and I’ve flat out denied it, I’ve seen some evidence, but nothing conclusive, and certainly not “all” of it.
Please read the thread, we’ve already been over this.
Yes, I’m aware. This was touched on earlier in the thread.
And I am asking you what, aside from people’s own accounts of their preferences and life experience, would constitute sufficient evidence as to whether or not they chose their own sexual orientation. I’m having a hard time imagining what other form of evidence would even be possible. And I have to say that your dismissal of other people’s personal experiences strikes me as both arrogant and condescending. If I say I did not choose my sexual orientation, who are you to claim that I cannot know this? I’m in a much better position to know about what choices I’ve made than you are.
*No, and I don’t see how you could possibly get that interpretation from what I actually wrote.
Sorry, I misread, I thought you said “what evidence do you have,” not “what evidence do you need.”
My mistake.
Well, the evidence you propose, notably peoples own accounts, are anecdotal at best, and biased at worst. Not to mention the fact that I’ve heard evidence from both points of view.
Therefore, the evidence I’d need is something a bit more concrete. I don’t know exactly what evidence that would be, because I haven’t seen it yet… but presumably something like a gene, or a known environmental factor would sufficiently prove that it wasn’t a choice.
You think everybody, gay, straight and bi, who says they did not choose their sexual orienation is lying? Are you saying you can distinctly remember choosing your own? Personally, I did not choose my sexual orientation. My post is my cite.
Incidentally, your “hormone” theory of sexual orientation would still be an example of orientation not being a choice.
Do you think that everybody, gay, straight and bi who says that they did choose their sexuality is lying?
Personally, no, I don’t. However I also don’t believe people who say they’ve seen UFO’s. The human mind and memory are notoriously unreliable, and therefore entirely poor pieces of objective evidence.
Perhaps you should look into the definition of Anecdotal.
Good job reading the thread. Congrats. Go back and try one more time.
I’ll add that to the big pile of anecdotal evidence.
Incidentally, you still didn’t read the thread. In fact, the “hormone” theory (which, once again, is not my theory) would be a conditioning thing, not a genetic one.
Again, it’s pretty condescending to dismiss other people’s explanations of their own choices and preferences. If you have such a problem with this kind of evidence, maybe you should start asking different kinds of questions.
*You’ve heard evidence that the many people who say they did not choose their own sexual orientation are either mistaken or lying? I’d love to see this evidence for myself. If someone were to tell me that their sexual orientation was a conscious choice that they vividly remember making then I’d be willing to believe them, but I do not believe there is or even could be any evidence that would demonstrate that those who say they didn’t choose their sexual orientation are wrong. Who else could possibly know better?
*Well, if you don’t really know what evidence you want then it should be no surprise that none of the existing evidence is satisfactory. It also strikes me as odd to expect concrete evidence about a type of mental process (decision making), especially when this evidence would have to prove that the mental process in question DIDN’T occur.
As for your suggestions, there are very serious physical and mental disorders – things that affect people’s lives far more negatively than having an minority sexual orientation – that have no known genetic or environmental cause. Do you think these might be choices as well, or do you reserve your skepticism for sexual orientation? If so, why? It’s also rather simplistic to think that a single gene would be responsible for sexual orientation. Even something as seemingly straightforward as eye color is more complicated than that, there are at least three genes involved there.
I think that’s missing an important point though. Genetics only plays a part , even the most rabid nature over nurture beleiver will admit that genes aren’t the be all and end all. And even if they were, it shouldn’t matter (not that i’m saying you think they should, yours was just the easiest post to quote that illustrated what i’m arguing against)
Irrelevant, since not being genetic is not a synonym for being a choice. Exposure to hormones or some subconscious switch throwing itself still aren’t choices, genetic or not.
Haven’t you heard of old teachers forcing lefties to use their right-hands at school? The stories that always detail how unplesant and unhelpful such training was? Most people cannot pick their handedness, just as most cannot pick their sexuality.
I didn’t dismiss them. I pointed out that personal recollection is notoriously unreliable.
Different kinds of questions wouldn’t have necessarily gotten my point across. Or are you suggesting I stay away from this topic in general?
No, I’ve heard evidence from people claiming they’ve chosen and that they haven’t chosen their sexual orientation.
I think what you’re trying to say is that evidence should be there to change peoples minds… people don’t change their minds about things they hold as core beliefs, if anything, evidence to the contrary only reenforces those beliefs (see: Religion, prime example).
That’s an obvious nonsequiter. If I knew what evidence I wanted, I’d have it. I listed two possibilities for evidence that would convince me.
Uh, this doesn’t make much sense. If it’s a mental process, it’s a choice. On the other hand, if it’s not a mental process, it’s innate.
What I’m saying is, if it’s innate, there should be a, or a number of, quantifiable factors that go into it. Likewise, if it’s a choice, there should be a, or a number of, quantifiable factors that go into it.
However, since we’ve not found factors that point to either, I believe it’s premature to say that it is either.
I believe it’s possible that some of them are choices – like certain types of unexplained mental disorders where people essentially retreat into themselves after a trauma (although that trauma in itself is the typical explanation).
The fact that some of them have unknown genetic causes, but they do have definite genetic causes (certain diseases are genetic and definitely not environmental, even if we don’t know what causes them) indicates that they are at least genetic.
However, some diseases strike at seemingly random. Those might be genetic, although that seems unlikely, because there isn’t an increased incidence amongst family members, or they might be environmental, although that, too, seems unlikely due to a lack of other cases of the disease amongst those who share the environment.
The only possibilities left are A) choice, or B) genetic defect/difference.
B perfectly possible, but what of those cases of identical twins, where one contracts the illness and another doesn’t? Is it possible it’s A exclusively?
It seems unlikely, but possible. Since I’m not a believer in much of anything being purely random chance, that there are causes to pretty much everything, I believe that pretty much everything has a reasonable explanation.
What I’m saying is I don’t know that explanation, and until I do, I’m not going limit myself to the possibly mistaken assumption that I know things that I clearly do not.
I went into a somewhat lengthy and non-specific explanation just above.
So if it’s not a gene, why can’t it be multiple genes? Or multiple genes combined with certain environmental factors?