Homosexuality, is it a choice?

I find most topics about LGBT issues end up eventually discussing choice vs. being born this way. I figured a separate topic for that debate might help keep other threads on topic.

So is it a choice or not and why do you think so?


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One has no choice in the matter. Attraction is not something you can mull over in your brain when you're 8 years old or 4 or 15 or whenever you first feel your heart beating faster when you see somebody you're attracted to. You have no idea what sex even is but you are attracted to them . Is it a man? Is it a woman? Maybe it's both.. it's about chemistry and that's that...

 

I am gay. I cannot recall not knowing something was out of synch between what I was supposed to feel towards boys, and what I did feel about some of them. I was always more curious about their bodies, than any girls and more attracted to what interested me. My memory of this goes back to when I was four, and that is about when human long term memory typically begins. Maybe it was in my formula, or maybe it was about the books my mom read to me, or maybe it was my brothers that induced it by sharing my room. Studies do not find those as correlations with orientation. I think it likely precedes any of that stuff. In the end, I don't care all that much. I am not a victim of my orientation. My culture is a victim of its own limitations and stereotypes. I am accountable for my personal sexual conduct regardless of how I got to like male bodies more than female ones. My culture and community is likewise accountable for how it treats me.

 

Homosexuality is a choice. That choice was made around two years of age. You chose to gravitate towards one gender. This was the stance of science for decades. Political correctness, and a well intentioned plea for a protected group made us change our position.

This choice becomes hard wired, the longer we dwell in that state. Our memory of being two is limited at best. That homosexuality is a choice, makes NO DIFFERENCE, as the fourteenth amendment says, equal treatment under the law.

The drive to make homosexuality a protected group, I FEEL, is counterproductive to mainstreaming homosexuality. For this reason, I oppose making homosexuality inborn for political purposes. We should fight discrimination on constitutional grounds provided. They are all we need.

 

I think that even framing that way is moot. It shouldn't matter if it was by choice or not. If you love a person, then that's all that should matter.

 

Why would anyone choose to be gay?

 

I don't really find it that important. I am gay, why, I don't know, I fail to see why it matters.

I like what btthegreat said. I'm not a victim of my sexuality.

 

It is not a binary answer. It is both a choice and genetic. Very similar to alcoholism, drug addiction, sports ability, intelligence....etc. Attraction is probably mostly genetic but sexuality operates on a spectrum. The answer is not yes or no

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I also agree with this. Choice is irrelevant in terms of rights

 

Its a peculiar stance here. Are you saying it was a 'choice' to gravitate at two, before it became hard-wired in the decade that followed or is it still a choice at twelve and 25, and 61 to unwire ourselves and change our wiring?

I oppose imposing the politics on the science too. I just don't see why that choice to gravitate before you are out of diapers that you describe, is not more likely the impact of a 'gravitational pull' that precedes the diaper. Not a lot of two year old behavior is the result of choices in any real sense. If there is consistency in the choice and a strong prevalence for one choice over another, so much so that the wiring has occasion to get strongly attached, that suggests something, a magnetic pull if you will, is behind the consistency.

We absolutely agree that wherever the science trail leads, the political trail must lead to equal treatment under the law. If you can't 'make' homosexuality inborn for politicial purposes, and you can't, it is illogical to oppose' making it' inborn for political purposes.

 

This is a great post, and captures what I've felt about myself. I feel like the confusion centers around sexuality vs. sex. One describes you as a person and the other is an action. I do not recall making a conscious choice to be attracted to girls, nor do I believe you can choose what attracts you. I did however choose to enter a physical and emotional relationship with another woman.

When we have the choice vs. birth argument with people could it be we just aren't talking about the exact same thing?


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You and I are. The problem gets more complicated when 1. People confuse their views/ impressions, with actual science. 2. People confuse their agendas, with either their views/ impressions, or actual science, and 3. People do not account for ignorance and stupidity as well as ignorance and bigotry. A lot of folks cannot grasp that whatever process happens in the minority orientation process, is going to be the same as their own process. Theirs is natural and chosen by God before they are born. Ours is unnatural and chosen by illness or moral turpitude. Never underestimate the power of willful ignorance to perpetuate itself

 

Same reason anyone would "choose" to be a drug addict, a compusive hand-washer, a kleptomaniac, or a practitioner of any other self-destructive activity.

 

That is extremely idiotic and offensive. Try to grasp this:

Now, before we go on, I want to be clear about something. While this excellent piece is directed at Christians, everything said here applies equally to anyone who ignorantly claims that homosexuality is a choice. I continue with selected excerpts

Consider this:

Is something beginning to dawn on you? I hope so, but if not, here is more:

It just gets better! Anyone who can’t relate to this and see how stupid it is to claim that homosexuality is a choice is a hopeless empty shell of a human being

 

If you have a penis and you happen to like people with penises (or is it penes? :s), it's a choice insofar as liking people with e.g. green eyes is a choice. I don't think there's any reason to view attraction to certain genitalia as somehow different from attraction to any other physical attribute.

And if we're talking about gender here, not sex, the same applies: attraction to someone who identifies with masculine gender roles is like attraction to someone with a certain disposition: finding shyness cute, for instance, or preferring to have relationships with systematic thinkers. It's quite straightforward at this point. Where it gets difficult is determining how far any sort of attraction is a choice; I would argue that it isn't, but I'm a hard determinist, aaand...we're off topic.

 

natures way of saying there are too many frickin' people on the planet, so lets slow down the birth rate.

 

I really liked that statement too. I'm not a victim of my sexuality... now. That wasn't always true though. I would imagine most gay people have had periods of their life where they were a victim of their sexuality. Perhaps it was self inflicted, or coming from an external source but I think it can be a source of pain for most gay people until they move beyond recognition, fear and shame to understanding peace and satisfaction.


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From empirical studies, they found that this gravitation occurred then. I'm sure Piaget has lots to say as well. This gravitation grows. This would appear to almost everyone to be forever, as two is cloudy. I cant remember that far back. So, it doesn't matter, but about two. I remember the earnest search for the gay gene. And I said then, that there would be a shift, to inborn gayness.

 

I am curious to know what behaviors they watched and interpreted, to determine that a specific two year old was showing signs of gravitating towards homosexuality or heterosexuality. Its not like they could ask or show pictures of porn and wait for the flag to rise!

 

Homosexuality, is it a choice?

Just as much as heterosexuality is.

 

Yeah it's a bit rough from time to time

 

From what I remember, they had both sexes interact, and watched facial expressions, and engagement. They say it is clear.

And finally, to make gay not a choice, makes you a victim to your orientation. Sexual orientation is not autonomic.

 

Can you find a link. Its sounding like a total reach to me. First, whether a genetic predisposition creates victimhood is not relevant to the science . That is your agenda, you just shoved in. . Second it is patently untrue. I am not a 'victim' to my blood type, melanin level , gender, penis size, or my fingerprint, or my eye color either.

 

These studies are not INTERNET friendly, or are slow to be.

As for my add, about victimhood, how else to explain sexual orientation of convenience, or desperation? Prison? Turning all the desirable women in Cuba into prostitutes during our OCCUPATION. Thereby making the men desperate for companionship?


Question, did you CHOOSE to have sex the last time you did? Or did you not choose. We have no choice in being sexual beings, but still choose to exercise it.

 

Agreed. Our sexuality is not a choice, but our sexual actions are. They are two different things. I think if conservative anti gay people would speak out against gay sex they would receive a different reaction from the left. Instead they say things like "homosexuality is an abomination" which is horribly offensive. If someone thinks the kind of sex I have is weird, gross or wrong that is their prerogative. But to think my entire sexual identity which I did not choose is wrong, gross or weird is a different thing entirely.



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It's a choice because there's no evidence for it to be genetic.