Is homosexuality a choice?

[_Paul Kemp]

1. The brain sciences have "turned up" precisely nothing regarding the "causes" of homosexuality...
Its all so convenient, really.

Nonsense. There is no more of a "cause" for homosexuality than there is a "cause" for heterosexuality.
You must have missed the article from the OP... http://www.newscientist.com/channel/sex ... news_rss20

Just admit that the only reason why you oppose homosexuality is because your church tells you to. (The same church that does all those awesome things I mentioned earlier)

The Heavenly Father you refer to is simply a myth. So you rant and rave and sound like an ignorant redneck because of a myth you bought into at some point and refuse to think critically about. Does that about sum things up?

[_Mister Scratch]

Finally, I advise you to bait him into admitting that there is no good reason to prohibit homosexuality,

I know of no movement abroad that proposes the prohibition of homosexuality, whatever that might entail.

Abroad? Why look abroad when we can mind anti-homosexuality movements right here at home---movements such as the LDS Church. And you know perfectly well what "prohibition of homosexuality" would "entail": no homosexual sex, no homosexual marriage, and, ideally, a Constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.

For "Droopy" and his ilk, it is all a matter of nitpicking the details, which, in the end, he shouldn't care about, since Heavenly Father said so, end of story. I daresay that his focus on the minutia is evidence that he doesn't want to confront the truth about his position, which is that it is based purely in faith and metaphysics, rather than real, empirical evidence and logic.

Faith in the rightness of homosexual behavior and its culture is as much metaphysical as any other form of "faith" (not understood in an a strictly LDS sense, obviously). Science, again, has nothing to say regarding the origins of homosexuality as to its "cause" any more than it has much to say about the origins of musical or mechanical aptitudes, or why one person gravitates to one religion, one to another, or one leans to the left or to the right politically.

Scatch, likes the namesake of his screen name, and like so many others who follow him, is really afraid of free agency. The rage for genetic determinism has a long pedigree, and is simply the most recent manifestation of the perennial effort to deligitimize the concept of choice and place much of our behavior outside the boundaries of individual volition.

So, am I therefore to assume that you support the right of gays to marry, and to have sex? Or do you agree with the Church's stance, which is to force gays to "choose" celibacy?

[_Droopy]

Here are some links to analysis regarding the issues at hand here. Let's see how many on the pro-homosexual side here engage them substantively.


http://www.narth.com/docs/nothardwired.html

http://www.narth.com/docs/detect.html

http://www.narth.com/docs/essentialist.html

http://www.narth.com/docs/bornway.html

As to both past and present attitudes within the "Gay" subculture regarding the origins of homoerotic feelings, I here post a large compendium of quotations from homosexual activists and leaders that should provide a little wake up for those who whose entire understanding of this issue has been formed within the protective womb of the mainstream media, and who otherwise don't do much serious reading, either in the traditional sense or online. The quotes can be found at a rather interesting website:

http://www.queerbychoice.com/

If you are a committed, ideologically pure liberal, this is either going to drive you absolutely ga ga, or you're going to have to reorient your belief system to take this into account.

The link page at this site should create cognitive dissonance among the leftists here on an apocayliptic level, not the least for the reason that much of the criticism here is from the traditional and postmodern Left.

http://www.queerbychoice.com/gaygenelinks.html

For those of you here who are constitutionally incapable of stepping beyond the safe cubicle of political correctness, a few of the most pertinent will be listed below:

http://web.archive.org/web/20040105072257/
staffweb.lib.uiowa.edu/ktonella/oob/features/Biology.htm

http://bad.eserver.org/issues/1994/14/sartelle.html

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline ... ining.html

http://www.gene-watch.org/educational/g ... uality.pdf

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m ... i_68273927

http://www.symposion.com/ijt/gilbert/sterling.htm

http://www.rslevinson.com/gaylesissues/ ... 990719.htm

And this is of particular interest:

http://www.berkeley.edu/news/media/rele ... 2_97b.html

http://www.zmag.org/zmag/viewArticle/13019

http://www.endhomophobia.org/BeyondGay.htm


Well, let this suffice for the present. The social constructivist theory of homosexuality is alive, well, and has a long history among homosexual activists, academics, and theorists, but you won't here anything about it in the pop mainstream media.

Indeed, the entire academic ideology of Queer Theory is predicated on the existence of fluid and shifting "sexualities", and poses a direct challenge to the either/or genetic argument.

[Guest]

Nonsense. There is no more of a "cause" for homosexuality than there is a "cause" for heterosexuality.
You must have missed the article from the OP... http://www.newscientist.com/channel/sex ... ay-brains-
structured-like-those-of-the-opposite-sex.html?feedId=online-news_rss20

I've already shown that this study provides no such evidence as is claimed in the mainstream media reports on the subject. Go back and read my initial links to critiques of the study, or quite while your ahead.

Just admit that the only reason why you oppose homosexuality is because your church tells you to. (The same church that does all those awesome things I mentioned earlier)

My reasons are a matter of principled theological, philosophical, and psychological beliefs and concepts that are not about to be changed by shallow left wing moral grandstanding.

The Heavenly Father you refer to is simply a myth. So you rant and rave and sound like an ignorant redneck because of a myth you bought into at some point and refuse to think critically about. Does that about sum things up?

This forum is the place for you Kemp. Intellectually facile, educationally shallow, and entranced by your own emotional commitment, you have a place at the table here in perpetuity.

[_Droopy]

Also, please go back (or would a mod do it?), and break up that long hyperlink, so the previous pages are readable.

[_Droopy]

What is determined and beyond human control cannot be judged. It cannot be critiqued or analyzed, and no discriminations or judgments can be made, in an ethical or moral context.

Actually, I think one can make a good case that that which is indeterministic cannot be judged, critiqued or analyzed. I think that which is determined is easier to judge and punish. Maybe you cannot help but to do action X, however I also cannot help but to judge you for doing action X. It's a self-defeating defense in my opinion.

In the universe you have just apparently constructed, in which all perceptions and behaviors are determined and beyond conscious alteration, your argument would have force. In a world, however, in which free will exists in a dynamic relationship with biologically determined biases, predispositions, and variables, this argument is invertebrate.

[_Droopy]

I said:

I know of no movement abroad that proposes the prohibition of homosexuality, whatever that might entail.

Scratch then adds:

Abroad? Why look abroad when we can mind anti-homosexuality movements right here at home---movements such as the LDS Church. And you know perfectly well what "prohibition of homosexuality" would "entail": no homosexual sex, no homosexual marriage, and, ideally, a Constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.

This kind of amphibolous interpretation is hilarious both for its Marxian (Groucho) linguistic bedlam as well as the way in which it indicates Scratch's limited grasp of the English language. Actually, his usage is quite good, but his (her) range is limited.

So, am I therefore to assume that you support the right of gays to marry, and to have sex? Or do you agree with the Church's stance, which is to force gays to "choose" celibacy?

I support neither, because there is no "right" for heterosexuals or homosexuals to engage in either. There is no doctrine or policy in the Church that "forces" homosexuals to be celibate. They are free to have sex and get married, as per there preferences.

[_asbestosman]

For those of you here who are constitutionally incapable of stepping beyond the safe cubicle of political correctness, a few of the most pertinent will be listed below:

http://web.archive.org/web/20040105072257/
staffweb.lib.uiowa.edu/ktonella/oob/features/Biology.htm

From the above website:

They would be special rights for fundamentalists
The reason fundamentalists think homosexuals can change to heterosexuality is that they know people can force themselves to adapt to circumstances which they do not find particularly pleasurable. And so they resent the assertion by homosexuals that they must do what feels right; for fundamentalists, this is giving homosexuals special rights which they themselves do not have--doing what feels good or right for themselves is not something they do, after all. So there are millions of heterosexual women for whom sex does not feel right; they would prefer not to have it and only cuddle, but they do not follow their feelings and abstain from sex--they continue to have sex without liking it much or without getting that "special feeling' that they would like. This explains the romance novels which so many heterosexual housewives indulge themselves in--it is what they are lacking in their own lives. They dream of it, and yet console themselves that it is an impossibility and so settle for their husband.

I find that comical and likely untrue. The whole thing sounds more like speculation than research.

For the sake of argument, let's say you're correct and that homosexual feelings are a choice, or that they change over time or whatever. Fine. Now how does that change whether we should make their relationships the same as heterosexual relationships in the eyes of the government? Really, this whole choice / not a choice thing seems irrelevant. I'm not gonna give kleptomaniacs a special status even if their problem has a genetic origin.

[_asbestosman]

In the universe you have just apparently constructed, in which all perceptions and behaviors are determined and beyond conscious alteration, your argument would have force. In a world, however, in which free will exists in a dynamic relationship with biologically determined biases, predispositions, and variables, this argument is invertebrate.

Then in a universe where determinism mixes with human volition, we can still judge people according to the exercise of their volition and lock away those who are either incapable of exercising volition and are therefore dangerous, or exercise volition in a such a manner that they are dangerous or criminal.

[_asbestosman]

This kind of amphibolous interpretation is hilarious both for its Marxian (Groucho) linguistic bedlam as well as the way in which it indicates Scratch's limited grasp of the English language. Actually, his usage is quite good, but his (her) range is limited.

So, am I therefore to assume that you support the right of gays to marry, and to have sex? Or do you agree with the Church's stance, which is to force gays to "choose" celibacy?

I support neither, because there is no "right" for heterosexuals or homosexuals to engage in either. There is no doctrine or policy in the Church that "forces" homosexuals to be celibate. They are free to have sex and get married, as per there preferences.

(bold mine)

*Snicker* (The proper word is "their", not "there")

Anyhow, they are free to have sex and get married with the opposite sex. They are in some sense "free" to try so with the same sex but not without church disciplinary action. But if the church had it's way, they would not be free to marry anyone of the same sex. For some, that basically amounts to forced celibacy if they have no interest in the opposite sex. I'm quite certain you know that's what Scratch was talking about.