Homosexuality is a choice

[gumboot]

I'm not sure that word means what you think it means?

No, it doesn't. Thank you for the correction.

*palatable.

As for second hi-light. No need to mention the Elephant Man, when one only need imagine the hideous Ron Jeremy (later in his career.)

They call him The Hedgehog. Nothing with him in it, past 1975, could be a turn-on.

One of the reasons I have never, ever, understood the attraction of porn (aside from the way it usually makes sex look kind of gross) is the prevalence of incredibly ugly men whose only attribute seems to be a large penis (see my earlier remark about straight porn actually being gay).

Just sayin'. By your measure, I'm about 60/40 straight to gay.

I suspect most of us are actually probably more gay than we think (or are willing to admit). I reckon any straight male who likes hardcore straight pornography has to be at least 30% gay. (Yes, I did make that number up).

 

[Alan]

I don't think a man would need to be turned off by a man in order to be straight. Couldn't he just be neutral to the man?

 

[Skeptic]

One thing that struck me is, if you were 100% straight male (let's just pretend to assign numerical value for a moment) you surely wouldn't be able to stand watching a straight sex scene in, say, a movie, right? Despite the delight of watching a naked goddess rolling about in pleasure, you would be so totally turned off by seeing a naked male that it wouldn't work.

This gets something very simple wrong: straight men aren't turned off by seeing naked men. They are indifferent to seeing naked men. Not the same thing.

A turn-off would be if the woman in the movie was, for instance, your sister. I would say most men would certainly not want to watch such a sex scene -- however hot she is to others.

 

[Silly Green Monkey]

Really? Have you 'tried' everything? Men? Boys? Androgynous? Effeminate? Cross-dressers? Shemales?

Is this what you require for you to be able to determine your own sexuality? If someone says they are gay, do you disbelieve them unless they have tried every flavor of the opposite sex??

No? But i guess i was expecting more from someone who boldly claims that he has "no attractions to males whatsoever".

By 'tried' i meant anything from thinking up fantasies to looking at erotic photos and everything in between.

Do I need to look at all seven billion people on the planet before anyone will accept that I don't feel sexual attraction to any of them?

 

[Aitch]

I suspect most of us are actually probably more gay than we think (or are willing to admit). I reckon any straight male who likes hardcore straight pornography has to be at least 30% gay. (Yes, I did make that number up).

That brings to mind Frank Harris's remark to the Duc de Richelieu:

No, my dear Duke, I know nothing about the joys of homosexuality. You must speak to my friend Oscar about that... And yet, if Shakespeare had asked me I would have had to submit.

 

[JFrankA]

This gets something very simple wrong: straight men aren't turned off by seeing naked men. They are indifferent to seeing naked men. Not the same thing.

A turn-off would be if the woman in the movie was, for instance, your sister. I would say most men would certainly not want to watch such a sex scene -- however hot she is to others.

Very true, but the point Gumboot was making, is that for the reason he said and even because of what you said, a "Homosexual - Heterosexual" scale just doesn't make sense.

 

[Arcade22]

One only need peruse the galleries of a fetish pornography website (I don't recommend it unless you're into that sort of thing) to see how vastly sexual preference can vary, even within the broad confines of "I like women" or "I like men".

Recent posters seem to have nailed the idea that sexuality isn't a simple black and white, or even gray-scale issue.

One thing that struck me is, if you were 100% straight male (let's just pretend to assign numerical value for a moment) you surely wouldn't be able to stand watching a straight sex scene in, say, a movie, right? Despite the delight of watching a naked goddess rolling about in pleasure, you would be so totally turned off by seeing a naked male that it wouldn't work.

What if you were 95% straight and 5% gay? Maybe then you wouldn't be quite so bothered by the naked guy, and could enjoy the scene, as long as you didn't see any full frontal male nudity, or something.

By the time you get to 50/50% maybe you get as much delight from watching the guy as the girl. But then as you tip the other way, the opposite happens. By the time you're 95% gay and 5% straight you're loving the guy, but the naked girl's just palpable.

Finally, at 100% gay, you can't watch a straight sex scene, because the image of a naked woman rolling about is such a turn-off.

Given that films would only have gay sex scenes if most people were at the extreme ends of the scale, clearly most of us are somewhere closer to the middle. So basically, everyone's a little gay. (I've often thought that anyone who's really into straight porn must be quite gay, since it mostly seems to consist of intense closeups of penises!)

The same sort of sliding scale could be applied to a plethora of different characteristics, such as age. Start with a 10 year old boy and an 60 year old woman doing the horizontal dance together. Who's into that? No thanks. Two 35 year olds? I can handle that.

Then again with general attractiveness. I don't know about anyone else, but I think I'd actually prefer a sex scene with two averagely attractive people than, say, Natalie Portman and the Elephant Man.

You could make up sliding scales like this forever, using different opposing characteristics of sexual attractiveness.

Then how 'gay' is someone who finds feminine features attractive but couldn't care if it's a guy or a girl? Is that being just as 'bisexual' as finding both masculine guys and 'normal' women attractive, but not 'feminine' guys?

Example: Feminine guy and masculine guy

 

[charles brough]

Being heterosexual, I had no idea the position of society was bringing such misery on the homosexual element in society, so aptly stated in some of the posts in this very long thread. Being an atheist and knowing the science involved in all this, I have long been amazed at the ignorant statements made people of the church about it being unnatural and able to be changed.

In my posts, I often point out that homosexuality is common in other animals as well and that it serves a vital function to group survival. The staid academic community is reluctant to deal with that fact however because it wants to avoid conflict with the faithful. So, let me sum up, what I, a heterosexual atheist, have found out:

We evolved as small (hunting-gathering) group primates. In small group animals, the alpha males uniformly practice a kind of brutal competition for dominance. In the sexual-preference scale, the alphas are the heterosexuals. If all the males underwent this brutal competition, the group, including our groups which we call "societies," would be in perpetual chaos. Of course, our democratic secular system finds it necessary to play down/ignore this alpha trait. After all, the system cannot claim domination is natural if we aim for a democratic society! No man is "supposed" to dominate.

So, social scientists are not effectively coming to the defense of gayness nor do they want to antagonise the faithful.

Nevertheless, studies show that the male majority is to some extent bisexual. Only the most dominant Alphas have no erotic response to the same sex, but most men are totally unaware of this. As example, the individual might might not realize that in watching a Flaminco dance, he is more fascinated with the male dancer than with the female. The totally homosexuals are only a small minority.

What has happened is that society had to adopt patriarchal/monogamous ideas or ideology in order to build organized society. I explain why and how in "The Next Civilization," but the point is that it was necessary and has enabled us to build civilization and keep advancing. The problem is that monogamy requries a strictly heterosexual, alpha, patriarchal "culture" diametrically opposite of a "gay culture." It is a system that had to be ideologically imposed in order to work. Thus, it has make victims of the homsexul segment.

How it workes is that it provides a culture or public opinion that forces or encourages all the bisexuals into the marital system. In that way, it can control the stream-of-sexual-encounters characteristic of gay culture and at the same to support the male domiance, Alpha ways enough to organize males into a heirarchy of dominance known as "government."

Now, with the marital system breaking down, society is becoming destabilized and the whole civilization thrown into decline. Polls show that over half the people already believe it is in decline even without remembering all the long list of social problems that were in the news in earler decades.

In response, the church seeks to regress society back to the old faith to correct the problems. That, however, is not going to happen. It is not as though the patriarchal/monogamous sytem has to be so brutal with homosexuality. A p/m system could (and I think, will) be eventually establish that can preserve a patriarchal culture and marital system in a contracted agreement between the two to cultures or ways of life.

 

[Darat]

...snip...

One thing that struck me is, if you were 100% straight male (let's just pretend to assign numerical value for a moment) you surely wouldn't be able to stand watching a straight sex scene in, say, a movie, right? Despite the delight of watching a naked goddess rolling about in pleasure, you would be so totally turned off by seeing a naked male that it wouldn't work.

...snip...

I think you have a false dichotomy in that there section.

I would say not being turned on by something is not the same as being turned off by something. Whilst a heterosexual male may not be turned on by seeing a male in a porn film I don't see why they would be turned off?

Given what a lot of porn consists of and typical male group behaviour I really don't think the "100% heterosexual" male would be turned off by seeing other men engaging in sex, whether with other men or women. He would either be turned on or not turned on.

 

[Aepervius]

Really? Have you 'tried' everything? Men? Boys? Androgynous? Effeminate? Cross-dressers? Shemales?

Since when you do have to try every sex stuff to know you are not attracted to it ?

DId you have sex with a poney ? With a pig ? With a corpse ? With the corpse of a poney ? Did you trxy asphixy sex ? Did you try young teenager (assuming a legal one 14 year old) ? Did you try sex with children (hey illegal, but maybe you like it) ? Did you try sex with a vaccum cleaner ? With a shoe ? With a muppet ? Maybe you know you missed that kick with having sex with an apple pie. Hey how about sado maso ?

"you need to try the other type of sex to know if you like it" is one of the stupidiest argument I ever heard.

 

[Aepervius]

No? But i guess i was expecting more from someone who boldly claims that he has "no attractions to males whatsoever".

Why not ? I have no attraction whatsoever to children or vaccuum cleaner or poney either. I do not need to try it, the idea already disgust me. Other people might like it , and so far as legal , if that is their thing , that's their sex life.

 

[Aepervius]

One thing that struck me is, if you were 100% straight male (let's just pretend to assign numerical value for a moment) you surely wouldn't be able to stand watching a straight sex scene in, say, a movie, right? Despite the delight of watching a naked goddess rolling about in pleasure, you would be so totally turned off by seeing a naked male that it wouldn't work.

That is why some of us only watch lesbian porn. Ho hum.

I agree that the sexual scale are not black and white but a rainbow of color going from light to dark, probably a multidimensional space seeing how spread it is.

What I always wondered is where the gaussian actually is. Is it really centered on 50/50 ? I don't think so otherwise there would probably much more bi.

I have the feeling there are actually two half gaussian , One with a high peak around the 0% gay, anotehr one with a smaller peak around the 100% gay, and the long trail meeting in the middle.


Like this :

XX
    X 
      X 
        X               
        X        XX
          X     X 
            XXX
0% gay              100% gay

I keep hearing "everybody has a little gay in them" but I get the feeling that in reality most people are not "in the middle" but at those extrem. The minority being in the middle.

 

[Aepervius]

Very true, but the point Gumboot was making, is that for the reason he said and even because of what you said, a "Homosexual - Heterosexual" scale just doesn't make sense.

Perhaps. But what sort of scale would you use then ? Straight/non straight (but not forcefully gay at 0% straight?).

So you could be 17% straight, 1.3% homosexual, 13% shoe fetishist 11% asphixionist 2% pedophile 19% sado 7% maso (does not come to 100%) ?

 

[Taarkin]

I don't think a man would need to be turned off by a man in order to be straight. Couldn't he just be neutral to the man?

Nope, if you don't instantly gouge your eyes out upon seeing a dude's butt you're a flamer.
http://youtu.be/-PyGmfRzeSE

 

[JFrankA]

Perhaps. But what sort of scale would you use then ? Straight/non straight (but not forcefully gay at 0% straight?).

So you could be 17% straight, 1.3% homosexual, 13% shoe fetishist 11% asphixionist 2% pedophile 19% sado 7% maso (does not come to 100%) ?

There can't be a scale at all. There's a basic sexual attraction, and all the other stuff. The basic sexual attraction is what people call themselves, (homosexual, bisexual, heterosexual) and cannot change. But circumstances, emotions, peer pressure, intelligent reasons, etc, etc, can make some act like it seems like they aren't what they say their basic sexual attraction is.

Again, taste in food is the only analogy I can think of.

 

[Cainkane1]

i sure as hell never choose to be queer.
it was the way i was born.

Straights need to ask themselves when they chose to be straight. I mean were they scratching their head and asking themselves hmmm do I want to be gay or straight? Oh I know. I'll go with the majority and be attracted to the opposite sex.

 

[ThunderChunky]

Being heterosexual, I had no idea the position of society was bringing such misery on the homosexual element in society, so aptly stated in some of the posts in this very long thread. Being an atheist and knowing the science involved in all this, I have long been amazed at the ignorant statements made people of the church about it being unnatural and able to be changed.

<snip>

In response, the church seeks to regress society back to the old faith to correct the problems. That, however, is not going to happen. It is not as though the patriarchal/monogamous sytem has to be so brutal with homosexuality. A p/m system could (and I think, will) be eventually establish that can preserve a patriarchal culture and marital system in a contracted agreement between the two to cultures or ways of life.

Sounds like a lot of unsubstantiated BS.

 

[Jono]

I don't think a man would need to be turned off by a man in order to be straight. Couldn't he just be neutral to the man?

Neutrality is kind of a turn-off though in itself.

 

[ZirconBlue]

That's just it. I don't think it's simple depends on circumstance. It's a mixture.

On this point, we're in violent agreement. The scale is a useful model, IMO, of our default or general position, but only with the understanding that other factors can alter our position on the scale.

Look, I compare what gets a person aroused is like what kind of food a person likes. For example, I hate tomatoes. Can't stand the taste by itself. I pick them off a sandwich if someone puts sliced tomatoes on a sandwich.

But - crush them and make them into a sauce and put them on a pizza or pasta. Okay, I like it that way. So even though I like tomatoes as part of a sauce, I can't stand them alone.

The basic desire is attraction to tomatoes isn't there, but in a certain circumstance, yes.

So, you're on the far "don't like" end of the tomato scale, but, under certain circumstances, your dot moves to the "like" end. (Although, I'd suggest for this example that "raw tomato" and "cooked tomato" should not even be on the same scale.)

On the flip side, peanut butter is the world's most perfect food. I love peanut butter more than any other food I can think of -- except on bananas. Or tomatoes. Or mixed with honey (bleh). Or.... you get the point.

The basic attraction to peanut butter is strong, but given certain circumstances - no way!

So, your general position is on the absolute "like" end of the peanut butter scale. But, in certain situations you could slide further down the scale. Even all the way to the very opposite end in some cases.

Similarly, you could be highly attracted to women in general, and be at the far end of that scale, but in some situations you can find yourself not attracted, or even repelled, by a particular woman and the particular circumstances you deal with her in.

 

[Marcus]

There is an implication in some of these posts that there can't really be such a thing as a 100% heterosexual male, that given the right situation, any male could find himself persuaded to be attracted to another male.

It's a textbook example of projection, frankly. Just because some men are ambivalent, or 5% gay, or whatever you want to call it, doesn't mean that they all are.

If I see porn, I am not turned on by the male involved, I identify with him, I imagine what it would be like to be him. The porn wouldn't be as good without his involvement. Without the woman, however, the whole thing would be completely useless.