I’d say the big problem with the genetic mistake argument is that it might well be seen less as “something to be lived with” and more “problem that needs to be fixed”. Not really an argument to how true it is, but unforunate implications.
But if it is a choice, then gay isn’t something you be, it’s something you do; and there’s no such thing as “gay people.” They wouldn’t exist as a special group with a particular identity: they’re just people who choose to engage in a particular behavior or lifestyle, like pickpockets or motorcycle riders or plumbers or Civil War reenactors.
Just to address the “gayness hinders reproduction argument”, consider the nature of humans. We’re a social species that forms family groups. Say you have three kids, two straight, one gay. Well the two straight kids reproduce but the gay one doesn’t. Bad for reproduction you might say, but you’d be wrong. Humans are K reproductive strategists. Instead of focusing on having a lot of offspring who will mostly die we focusing on investing resources into the success of a few offspring.
What this means is the nieces and nephews of the gay caveman have an extra half parent to share in the hunting. Also since the gay caveman had no kids to teach survival skills to he can focus on his relative’s kids. This makes them better educated, and better survivors. They’re more likely to survive, and be properly nourished, into adulthood.
Thus families that carry a genetic chance of gayness are more likely to survive. Gay, while obviously detrimental to the individual organism’s chances to reproduce, isn’t detrimental to the entire population of carriers of the gene and is infact positive for them.
The fact that sexual orientation cannot be chosen or changed is not an ideological position, or an “argument,” it’s a hard fact. The reason to contest the assertion that it’s a “choice” is the same as for contesting an assertion that the earth is flat – it’s just fighting ignorance.
It seems to be a fact that homosexuality is a choice—for some. I see sexual preference as existing on a continuum. Some people are 100% heterosexual, some are 100% homosexual, some are any place in between. Take a person who is fully bisexual. Let’s say they are equally attracted to both sexes. And have dated and had meaningful relationships with both…then that person has an option (assuming a preference for monogamy) to live his life either as a homosexual or a heterosexual.
But I think this whole topic is a moot one. While I do believe that some people choose homosexuality, the discussion has to include those who are hard-wired to be. And it is difficult to see how someone can dispute the existence of that group. I’m not going to be sexually attracted to a male, no matter what. And I’ve definitely met people for whom heterosexuality was, I think, similarly out of bounds.
**Elucidator, **excellent post. (Equally as unfunny as your usual contributions, but at least this time the lack of a snicker was intentional. ;)) Seriously, excellent points, well made.
So, is the neuterness of a worker bee a genetic error? If there is a gene (or genes) for homosexuality, and it has survived this long, then there must be some reproductive advantage for it. It seems to be too prevalent to be a chance mutation that keeps dying out. I can think of lots of reasons why a certain percentage of homosexual men would be advantageous in a population - more hands to provide food, while not reducing the genetic diversity of the population. But they’d just be stories until we can find more evidence.
Only if you define sexuality by acts. I’m a bisexual with a (current) preference for women, but I have no more control over falling for a woman than I do a man, and were I in a monogamous relationship it wouldn’t mean i’d no longer find the other gender sexually attractive - just as we wouldn’t call you no longer heterosexual if you decided to be chaste, or say you were only sexually attracted to redheads if you were in a monogamous relationship with one.
Sexual behavior is a choice.
Sexual attraction is not a choice.
The overarching aim of homosexual activism is for homosexuality to be accepted as “normal”. This is why only “marriage”, and not any other differently described form of union (albeit with the same legal rights), is acceptable to activists.
Establishing homosexuality as an inherent biological tendency places it pretty much on the same footing as heterosexuality and prima facie lends it the aspect of “normality”.
This achievement is a potent weapon to wield against opponents of homosexual rights: they can be stigmatized and condemned as irrational bigots who ignore the “facts” out of fear or hatred - THEY are the “abnormal” ones.
Nothing like beating straight guys up with a fallacy, is there?
Which is why I said “live his life”, and not, “be”.
I saw that, but I consider my thoughts, emotions, and (probably) voiced comments to be as much a part of my life as what I actually do is. It would be impossible for me to remove my sexuality from the way I live my life, even if I were chaste. Were I dating a person, I would still be living my life as a bisexual and not as a monosexual.
Humans are a social species. You can’t look at the effect a trait has on one member of a social species and say “X trait keeps this member of the species from reproducing, therefore X is a negative trait”. If you look at it that way, you can’t explain sterile worker bees, or why in a wolf pack usually only the alpha wolves reproduce, or the same sort of thing in other social animals.
Sexual orientation is defined by attraction, not action. A bisexual woman who chooses to a monogomous relationship with a man is still bisexual.
A bisexual man who chooses to express his sexuality with another man is not “choosing” the attraction itself, only choosing to act upon it. It’s the attraction that people don’t choose and can’t change, even if those in the middle of the Kinsey scale choose to express exclusively on one side or the other.
So, it is impossible that scientists are beginning to think this because that is what the evidence says? Or do you think some gay activist went and converted a penguin to the gay lifestyle?
This straight guy doesn’t feel the least bit beat up by anyone getting equal rights. I feel much more “beat up” by people I know being denied the right I have to establish a legally binding relationship.
Do you feel diminished by the prospect of SSM? Why?
Not true. That is the method. just ask any woman who says her biological clock is ticking. Ask people who feel a drive to have kids . And then ask if sex was what it was all about.
Can you articulate how the idea of homosexuality being “normal” (I assume we’re not talking about statistical normality here) is a fallacy? And may I say that characterizing gay rights activism as “beating up straight guys”, even as a metaphor, is pretty offensive (given the prevalence of gaybashing as opposed to the almost nonexistent concept of “beating up straight guys”) and completely inaccurate.
For the simplest example of why it’s a crucial component, see the (currently 2-page) thread on why black people overwhelmingly are against same-sex marriage.
In that community, people who belong to a group once themselves denied basic rights believe that gay people should be denied those same basic rights … They do not see this as hypocritical… because teh gays *chose *to be that way. [head explodes]
The argument that homosexuality is not a choice but something inherent carries no weight anyway with fundamentalist anti-gays. They would simply say that’s unfortunate for you, as it is unfortunate for those born with pedophile, bestial, or necrophiliac desires. Such perverted urges are to be resisted.
You can’t win arguments with these people, it’s pointless even trying. Fortunately they’re in the minority. At least I hope they are!
You’re new around here, kid, so let me tip you off. That “beat with a fallacy” contains elements of a toxic straight line, it could easily be used as the set off point for a truly wretched array of puns.
You gotta watch your step around here, some of these people have neither scruple nor taste when it comes to such things. The stats tell you how many members, how many currently on line, but they don’t say anything about how many currently under indictment.
Oh, and welcome aBoard, me hearty! Rrrrrr! Rrrrrr!
I’m not aware of any such thing as “homosexual activism.” but the overarching goal of gay rights is equal rights. No one cares if you “accept it as normal.”