6 ms·

To me the biggest thing driving acceptance of gay people is the realization that being gay is not a choice, but rather something you are born with. In a recent

by 300bps 13y ago

To me the biggest thing driving acceptance of gay people is the realization that being gay is not a choice, but rather something you are born with. In a recent poll by Pew last month, 41% of the country now believes people are born gay. 8% believe it is the result of upbringing and 42% believe it is a choice. Source: http://www.people-press.org/files/legacy-pdf/06-06-13%20LGBT%20General%20Public%20Release.pdf http://www.people-press.org/files/legacy-pdf/06-06-13%20LGBT... To those that believe it's a choice, the natural question is, "When did you choose to be straight?" For me, I knew I was attracted to the opposite sex as early as 5 or 6. I didn't make a choice. Nobody makes a choice. You're attracted to who you're attracted to. If anyone says that is not the case, ask them at what age they chose their sexual orientation. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S14VRjVDPcs http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S14VRjVDPcs

pubb 13y ago
Give this clip about 5 minutes, it's a pretty good explanation of sexual orientation. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCNgknc7Qv8&t=45m52s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCNgknc7Qv8&t=45m52s The entire series of lectures is excellent if you thought this was insightful.
parsnips 13y ago
So what do you think about pre-natal testing for gay gene?
- 300bps 13y ago
  >So what do you think about pre-natal testing for gay gene? First I have to say that I'm unaware of a "gay gene". It may exist, it may not. There are plenty of mechanisms that could lead to being born gay without a gay gene. As one possibility, refer to: >Temperature-dependent sex determination (TSD) is a type of environmental sex determination in which the temperatures experienced during embryonic development determine the sex of the offspring.[1] It is most prevalent and common among amniote vertebrates that are classified under the reptile class, Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temperature-dependent_sex_determination http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temperature-dependent_sex_deter... Sure, this doesn't pertain to humans but it would not be surprising to me that other non-gene influencers might cause someone to be gay before birth. Having gotten that out of the way, I would be against any kind of testing for anything but the most critical gene defects. Anyone that thinks we should test for all gene defects should check out www.23andme.com. You'll discover (like I did) that the average person has several gene defects that can shorten their life and be passed on to their offspring. Trying to breed these out of humans would mean most people alive today wouldn't be alive today.
  - gizmo686 13y ago
    If Hitler hadn't killed 11 million people, most people alive today wouldn't be. Returning to the original point. The question about pre-natal gene testing does not seem to be about actually doing it routinely. Suppose that we devised a genetic test that can determine if a fertilized egg will grow into a gay adult if brought to maturity. If such a test works, it would mean that ones genes carries sufficient information to deterimine if one is gay. Wheater or not we actually use this on a given person does not change the fact that their genes are still sufficient.
  - lovemenot 13y ago
    Which brings us almost right back to Turing's research on morphogenesis: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chemical_Basis_of_Morphogenesis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chemical_Basis_of_Morphogen...
damoncali 13y ago
I agree with you, but I think the line of thought is more along the lines of "you are born straight and you choose to be gay, and the obvious badness of that choice makes you a deviant". That requires a different counter - and it's not going to be an intellectual one. It was once not uncommon for big thinkers to believe that animals can't suffer. They had lots of intellectual justifications for that. But people who have a dog know they can. To most of us it seems silly to suggest they cannot. But it's easy to fall for the nonsense if you don't ever spend time with animals. As more people know people that they know are gay (they've always known gay people), they will just see how obvious it is that it's a choice. I think this is a viral effect, put loosely. The more acceptance there is, the more acceptance there will be. And a tipping point, if you can pick a precise time, I believe happened earlier this year (at least in the US).
- damoncali 13y ago
  Oops. can't edit- in case it's not obvious - that should be 'obvious that it's not a choice'.
obviouslygreen 13y ago
I think considering the question of "is it a choice?" relevant is almost as bad as believing homosexuality is somehow wrong either way. Why should it matter? Was I born a programmer or did I choose to become one? I was born physically (to satisfy the gender-sensitive) male. I was born human. I was born with blue eyes. Beyond the physically obvious, if you're OK with persecuting people for a choice that does not affect you (e.g. "that guy is a blue-eyed human, and that's fine, but he CHOSE to be a PROGRAMMER, and that's just wrong!"), then you are making things worse. "It's not a choice" doesn't make it more or less right or wrong. It's how people are. The failure to accept that (or at least ignore and tolerate it) is the problem, and it will not be answered by "well it's genetic." [edit: Full disclosure: This post was made while listening to Queen, but I didn't CHOOSE to do that, the restaurant did that to me; please judge appropriately.]
- gizmo686 13y ago
  I never chose to become a programmer, but I am not going to argue that I was born that way. During my development, through environmental factors that no one was specifically controlling to make me a programmer, I naturally grew into being a programmer with no one ever making that choice.
- babarock 13y ago
  Yes, a thousand times yes. Whether it's a choice or not should be irrelevant. However, used as it is in the modern political context of "gay harassment issues", I believe we're actually doing a great disservice to the gay community by using "they didn't have the choice" as an excuse. Maybe it's just me, but every time someone argues that we should accept gay people because they didn't have a choice, I can't stop myself thinking: "So if they had a choice, would it be okay to harass them? Would it be okay to ask them to change?". The problem is not that gay people can't _change_. The problem is that it's f*cking wrong to ask them to change. Even if they could _change_ (whatever people mean by that), it's absolutely nonsensical to ask them to. As a society, we ask murderers to change, criminals, people generally harmful to others. But gays? Since when is it okay to criticize the choice of someone that affects nobody but this someone? I like pizza. If that bothers anyone, should I just say: "There's nothing I can do about it, I was born this way?"
bostonpete 13y ago
While I would agree that sexual preference is not a choice, I think people are sometimes too eager to make the connection that because something's not a choice, it must be genetic or there from birth. Many people have odd sexual fetishes (ranging from mildly odd to somewhat terrifying). Most would probably agree those fetishes aren't choices, but I've never heard the argument made that those sources of sexual arousal are somehow innate. Given the prevalence of identical twins where only one is gay, it seems clear that, at the very least, sexual orientation is determined by a variety of factors. I'm not sure what is the point of conducting a poll that asks people off the street which they think is the dominant factor...
gizmo686 13y ago
The question of weather or not one is born gay has not yet been completely resolved. There is not a 100% concordance rate between identical twins, indicating that it is not completely genetic; however, the concordance rate is greater than between non-identical twins. What probably happens is that, like almost all animal (including human) behaviors, there is genetic components, but environmental factors play a huge part. The question of weather or not being gay is a choice is a significantly different question, as we do not choice are upbringing. If I recall research I did about a year ago, starting at about 7 (again, I am going off of memory, but I am pretty confident the age is far prebusenent), researchers have found significant corralations between behavior and the eventual sexual orientation of the child. The other problem with using the 'not a choice' argument is that it (ought to be) completely irrelevant. People can argue that sociopaths, pedophiles, ETC are not a choice. This does not mean we allow their actions, because we still believe they are harmful. The reason that homosexuality stopped being considered a disease was that there was no correlation found between homosexuality and negative symptoms. Irrespective of if one made a choice, was born gay, or became gay through some other mechanism is irrelevent, because being gay is not a problem.
- 300bps 13y ago
  >The question of weather or not one is born gay has not yet been completely resolved. There is not a 100% concordance rate between identical twins, indicating that it is not completely genetic Being born gay doesn't necessarily mean it's genetic. As I stated in another comment, there are species that determine sex by the temperature experienced during embryonic development. If a pre-birth factor like temperature can control the sex of a lizard then it stands to reason that other pre-birth environmental factors could cause someone to be gay or straight in humans. Or it could be genes... as you said, nobody knows. But I am convinced that almost all (if not all) gay people are just gay; they don't choose to be gay at some point in their life. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temperature-dependent_sex_determination http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temperature-dependent_sex_deter... As for it "ought to be irrelevant" - of course it should be irrelevant. But it's not. Turing was sterilized for participating in deviant sexual intercourse which strongly implies the society of the day accused of him of choosing to be the way he was.
akavi 13y ago
I really can't summon the slightest hint of a reason why it even matters whether it's a choice. I can barely grasp the fact that there are people who even friggin' care.
- SimHacker 13y ago
  Thinking sexual preference is a choice (and especially being sure of it, and deeply invested in that belief, in spite of the testimony of openly gay people and scientists) is an obvious symptom of homophobic self loathing repressed homosexuality.
ars 13y ago
"When did you choose to be straight?" That's a pretty disingenuous question because if someone answers you "I was 10, I thought about it, and decided I prefer the opposite gender because that way I can have children." You'll probably tell him "Oh, you're Bisexual." So it's not a real question. No matter which way they answer you, you'll construe it in your favor.
- nitrogen 13y ago
  So it's not a real question. No matter which way they answer you, you'll construe it in your favor. The phrase "in your favor" seems to suggest an adversarial stance where none is necessary. Besides, the point of a rhetorical question is to make a statement, regardless of the answer. Receiving the hypothetical answer you gave as an example serves to demonstrate that there is a spectrum of orientation on multiple axes, ranging from knew for sure and had first crush in preschool, to no interest in either gender and everything in between.
mikeash 13y ago
Given how often homophobes end up being closet homosexuals, I think the question of "When did you choose to be straight?" is extremely pertinent. It's likely that they did choose to (try to be) straight, and think everyone else does the same. It is interesting how much of the anti-gay rhetoric basically boils down to homosexuality being the more attractive option, but one which we must refuse (and outlaw) for the good of humanity.
- sp332 13y ago
  If you believe in sexual self-determination (that each person has the right to decide what happens to their body), then how can you say people do not choose to be gay?
  - mikeash 13y ago
    There are really two different concepts here, that of who you're inherently attracted to, and that of who you actually try to sleep with. The latter is a choice, but evidence appears to be that the former is not. The phrase "is gay" generally refers to the former, although obviously it can be hard to determine if a person is really good at hiding it.
    - sp332 13y ago
      But who you're attracted to changes, sometimes quickly. And even in general, it's not like most straight guys are attracted to all women, just as a trivial example. How many women would they have to be attracted to before they're straight? If they like one guy is that enough to count as being bi or gay? I don't think it makes any sense to define "straight" or "gay" in those terms. Edit: Specifically, it makes no sense to me that people are "born" being attracted to a certain group of people.
      - stdbrouw 13y ago
        Facts don't stop being facts because they sound weird.
      - 13y ago
roguecoder 13y ago
It is a choice for bisexual people, though, and it doesn't make their same-sex relationships any less valid. I think the driving force is actual growing gender equality. There is no longer the assumption that "husband" and "wife" are inherently different roles, nor that women are the property of men. When relationships are presumed to be between equals, it no longer matters whether society can easily sort one half of the relationship from the other.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
tommorris 13y ago
> To me the biggest thing driving acceptance of gay people is the realization that being gay is not a choice, but rather something you are born with. I'm not sure that it is the case that sudden realisation of the etiology of sexual orientation is the cause of increasing tolerance. I think it is far more likely that acceptance and tolerance has come from the fact that lots of people have come out (and partly because of pop culture). Wind back to Turing's time and nobody knew that they knew a gay person. Gay people were kept in the shadows of society, and myths, rumours and slanders spread with no check on them. Now, precisely because so many people have come out, when I tell someone I'm gay, they don't immediately think "well, he must be some kind of sick, child abusing, creepy pervert who does unspeakable things in the bedroom". Reasonable people will simply conclude "okay, he likes dudes" because it fits with their experience of other gay people. The malicious stereotypes fail to live up to reality. In Britain, the official statistics say that 1 in 16 people are lesbian, gay or bi. Most people know more than 16 people, therefore most people know an LGB person. When the vast majority of them don't turn out to be immoral creepy sex abusing pervert freaks, it becomes rather more difficult for crazy people to keep the stereotypes going.

by 300bps 13y ago

pubb 13y ago

Give this clip about 5 minutes, it's a pretty good explanation of sexual orientation. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCNgknc7Qv8&t=45m52s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCNgknc7Qv8&t=45m52s The entire series of lectures is excellent if you thought this was insightful.

parsnips 13y ago

So what do you think about pre-natal testing for gay gene?

300bps 13y ago
>So what do you think about pre-natal testing for gay gene? First I have to say that I'm unaware of a "gay gene". It may exist, it may not. There are plenty of mechanisms that could lead to being born gay without a gay gene. As one possibility, refer to: >Temperature-dependent sex determination (TSD) is a type of environmental sex determination in which the temperatures experienced during embryonic development determine the sex of the offspring.[1] It is most prevalent and common among amniote vertebrates that are classified under the reptile class, Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temperature-dependent_sex_determination http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temperature-dependent_sex_deter... Sure, this doesn't pertain to humans but it would not be surprising to me that other non-gene influencers might cause someone to be gay before birth. Having gotten that out of the way, I would be against any kind of testing for anything but the most critical gene defects. Anyone that thinks we should test for all gene defects should check out www.23andme.com. You'll discover (like I did) that the average person has several gene defects that can shorten their life and be passed on to their offspring. Trying to breed these out of humans would mean most people alive today wouldn't be alive today.
- gizmo686 13y ago
  If Hitler hadn't killed 11 million people, most people alive today wouldn't be. Returning to the original point. The question about pre-natal gene testing does not seem to be about actually doing it routinely. Suppose that we devised a genetic test that can determine if a fertilized egg will grow into a gay adult if brought to maturity. If such a test works, it would mean that ones genes carries sufficient information to deterimine if one is gay. Wheater or not we actually use this on a given person does not change the fact that their genes are still sufficient.
- lovemenot 13y ago
  Which brings us almost right back to Turing's research on morphogenesis: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chemical_Basis_of_Morphogenesis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chemical_Basis_of_Morphogen...

damoncali 13y ago

I agree with you, but I think the line of thought is more along the lines of "you are born straight and you choose to be gay, and the obvious badness of that choice makes you a deviant". That requires a different counter - and it's not going to be an intellectual one. It was once not uncommon for big thinkers to believe that animals can't suffer. They had lots of intellectual justifications for that. But people who have a dog know they can. To most of us it seems silly to suggest they cannot. But it's easy to fall for the nonsense if you don't ever spend time with animals. As more people know people that they know are gay (they've always known gay people), they will just see how obvious it is that it's a choice. I think this is a viral effect, put loosely. The more acceptance there is, the more acceptance there will be. And a tipping point, if you can pick a precise time, I believe happened earlier this year (at least in the US).

damoncali 13y ago
Oops. can't edit- in case it's not obvious - that should be 'obvious that it's not a choice'.

obviouslygreen 13y ago

I think considering the question of "is it a choice?" relevant is almost as bad as believing homosexuality is somehow wrong either way. Why should it matter? Was I born a programmer or did I choose to become one? I was born physically (to satisfy the gender-sensitive) male. I was born human. I was born with blue eyes. Beyond the physically obvious, if you're OK with persecuting people for a choice that does not affect you (e.g. "that guy is a blue-eyed human, and that's fine, but he CHOSE to be a PROGRAMMER, and that's just wrong!"), then you are making things worse. "It's not a choice" doesn't make it more or less right or wrong. It's how people are. The failure to accept that (or at least ignore and tolerate it) is the problem, and it will not be answered by "well it's genetic." [edit: Full disclosure: This post was made while listening to Queen, but I didn't CHOOSE to do that, the restaurant did that to me; please judge appropriately.]

gizmo686 13y ago
I never chose to become a programmer, but I am not going to argue that I was born that way. During my development, through environmental factors that no one was specifically controlling to make me a programmer, I naturally grew into being a programmer with no one ever making that choice.
babarock 13y ago
Yes, a thousand times yes. Whether it's a choice or not should be irrelevant. However, used as it is in the modern political context of "gay harassment issues", I believe we're actually doing a great disservice to the gay community by using "they didn't have the choice" as an excuse. Maybe it's just me, but every time someone argues that we should accept gay people because they didn't have a choice, I can't stop myself thinking: "So if they had a choice, would it be okay to harass them? Would it be okay to ask them to change?". The problem is not that gay people can't _change_. The problem is that it's f*cking wrong to ask them to change. Even if they could _change_ (whatever people mean by that), it's absolutely nonsensical to ask them to. As a society, we ask murderers to change, criminals, people generally harmful to others. But gays? Since when is it okay to criticize the choice of someone that affects nobody but this someone? I like pizza. If that bothers anyone, should I just say: "There's nothing I can do about it, I was born this way?"

bostonpete 13y ago

While I would agree that sexual preference is not a choice, I think people are sometimes too eager to make the connection that because something's not a choice, it must be genetic or there from birth. Many people have odd sexual fetishes (ranging from mildly odd to somewhat terrifying). Most would probably agree those fetishes aren't choices, but I've never heard the argument made that those sources of sexual arousal are somehow innate. Given the prevalence of identical twins where only one is gay, it seems clear that, at the very least, sexual orientation is determined by a variety of factors. I'm not sure what is the point of conducting a poll that asks people off the street which they think is the dominant factor...

gizmo686 13y ago

The question of weather or not one is born gay has not yet been completely resolved. There is not a 100% concordance rate between identical twins, indicating that it is not completely genetic; however, the concordance rate is greater than between non-identical twins. What probably happens is that, like almost all animal (including human) behaviors, there is genetic components, but environmental factors play a huge part. The question of weather or not being gay is a choice is a significantly different question, as we do not choice are upbringing. If I recall research I did about a year ago, starting at about 7 (again, I am going off of memory, but I am pretty confident the age is far prebusenent), researchers have found significant corralations between behavior and the eventual sexual orientation of the child. The other problem with using the 'not a choice' argument is that it (ought to be) completely irrelevant. People can argue that sociopaths, pedophiles, ETC are not a choice. This does not mean we allow their actions, because we still believe they are harmful. The reason that homosexuality stopped being considered a disease was that there was no correlation found between homosexuality and negative symptoms. Irrespective of if one made a choice, was born gay, or became gay through some other mechanism is irrelevent, because being gay is not a problem.

300bps 13y ago
>The question of weather or not one is born gay has not yet been completely resolved. There is not a 100% concordance rate between identical twins, indicating that it is not completely genetic Being born gay doesn't necessarily mean it's genetic. As I stated in another comment, there are species that determine sex by the temperature experienced during embryonic development. If a pre-birth factor like temperature can control the sex of a lizard then it stands to reason that other pre-birth environmental factors could cause someone to be gay or straight in humans. Or it could be genes... as you said, nobody knows. But I am convinced that almost all (if not all) gay people are just gay; they don't choose to be gay at some point in their life. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temperature-dependent_sex_determination http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temperature-dependent_sex_deter... As for it "ought to be irrelevant" - of course it should be irrelevant. But it's not. Turing was sterilized for participating in deviant sexual intercourse which strongly implies the society of the day accused of him of choosing to be the way he was.

akavi 13y ago

I really can't summon the slightest hint of a reason why it even matters whether it's a choice. I can barely grasp the fact that there are people who even friggin' care.

SimHacker 13y ago
Thinking sexual preference is a choice (and especially being sure of it, and deeply invested in that belief, in spite of the testimony of openly gay people and scientists) is an obvious symptom of homophobic self loathing repressed homosexuality.

ars 13y ago

"When did you choose to be straight?" That's a pretty disingenuous question because if someone answers you "I was 10, I thought about it, and decided I prefer the opposite gender because that way I can have children." You'll probably tell him "Oh, you're Bisexual." So it's not a real question. No matter which way they answer you, you'll construe it in your favor.

nitrogen 13y ago
So it's not a real question. No matter which way they answer you, you'll construe it in your favor. The phrase "in your favor" seems to suggest an adversarial stance where none is necessary. Besides, the point of a rhetorical question is to make a statement, regardless of the answer. Receiving the hypothetical answer you gave as an example serves to demonstrate that there is a spectrum of orientation on multiple axes, ranging from knew for sure and had first crush in preschool, to no interest in either gender and everything in between.

mikeash 13y ago

Given how often homophobes end up being closet homosexuals, I think the question of "When did you choose to be straight?" is extremely pertinent. It's likely that they did choose to (try to be) straight, and think everyone else does the same. It is interesting how much of the anti-gay rhetoric basically boils down to homosexuality being the more attractive option, but one which we must refuse (and outlaw) for the good of humanity.

sp332 13y ago
If you believe in sexual self-determination (that each person has the right to decide what happens to their body), then how can you say people do not choose to be gay?
- mikeash 13y ago
  There are really two different concepts here, that of who you're inherently attracted to, and that of who you actually try to sleep with. The latter is a choice, but evidence appears to be that the former is not. The phrase "is gay" generally refers to the former, although obviously it can be hard to determine if a person is really good at hiding it.
  - sp332 13y ago
    But who you're attracted to changes, sometimes quickly. And even in general, it's not like most straight guys are attracted to all women, just as a trivial example. How many women would they have to be attracted to before they're straight? If they like one guy is that enough to count as being bi or gay? I don't think it makes any sense to define "straight" or "gay" in those terms. Edit: Specifically, it makes no sense to me that people are "born" being attracted to a certain group of people.
    - stdbrouw 13y ago
      Facts don't stop being facts because they sound weird.
    - 13y ago

roguecoder 13y ago

It is a choice for bisexual people, though, and it doesn't make their same-sex relationships any less valid. I think the driving force is actual growing gender equality. There is no longer the assumption that "husband" and "wife" are inherently different roles, nor that women are the property of men. When relationships are presumed to be between equals, it no longer matters whether society can easily sort one half of the relationship from the other.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

tommorris 13y ago

> To me the biggest thing driving acceptance of gay people is the realization that being gay is not a choice, but rather something you are born with. I'm not sure that it is the case that sudden realisation of the etiology of sexual orientation is the cause of increasing tolerance. I think it is far more likely that acceptance and tolerance has come from the fact that lots of people have come out (and partly because of pop culture). Wind back to Turing's time and nobody knew that they knew a gay person. Gay people were kept in the shadows of society, and myths, rumours and slanders spread with no check on them. Now, precisely because so many people have come out, when I tell someone I'm gay, they don't immediately think "well, he must be some kind of sick, child abusing, creepy pervert who does unspeakable things in the bedroom". Reasonable people will simply conclude "okay, he likes dudes" because it fits with their experience of other gay people. The malicious stereotypes fail to live up to reality. In Britain, the official statistics say that 1 in 16 people are lesbian, gay or bi. Most people know more than 16 people, therefore most people know an LGB person. When the vast majority of them don't turn out to be immoral creepy sex abusing pervert freaks, it becomes rather more difficult for crazy people to keep the stereotypes going.