Some people call them unnatural, sinners, weirdos, normal people, etc.
What does this add to your argument? Just curious. It's very off-subject in comparison to the rest of it.
The fact of the matter is that there is no way to tell why a person is a homosexual. If we are born homosexual are we not born murderers? If the environment so drastically influences me am I still on a clean slate for my life since the environment shaped me this way and I am not at fault?
Not everything has to do with genetics or 'environmental factors'. What about free will. Can someone not choose to be gay later on in life?
I guess I probably mis-worded what I said about the whole weirdo thing. I was trying to state something else but whatever that wasn't the point.
If someone gets sexually aroused by the same sex you are a homosexual. Meaning that if they try to get aroused by the opposite sex but can't, they were born that way. He/She is incapable of changing his/her sexual orientation. They don't have a choice as to which gender arouses them.
The same can be said about a person who is heterosexual.
For example if I could be with a woman or a man, I would almost automatically be with the woman. Why? Because I am naturally attracted to woman and I can't bring myself to be sexually attracted to a man. I can't just choose to like a man because I naturally like women. I can't one day decide that I sexually like men or romantically love another man. Even if there were strong environmental factors, I would never truley like/love a member of the same sex because I like women.
When scientists look or study homosexuality, they tend to look at genetics because genetics are the sure way to understand the many complexities of the human body and mind. The enviornment can be a factor, but the environment is always changing. One can say that a kid born in an abusive house hold will grow up to be depressed or be an abusive father, but that isn't neccesarily always the case. Even if a non-gay man is influenced by his environment to be gay, if he wasn't originally gay to begin with he probably will not be able to bring himself to engage romantically/sexually with the opposite sex. Same thing applies for a gay man. Even ex-gay ministries do not change a person's sexual orientation, just his/her sexual conduct.
AGAIN I AM NOT SAYING THAT FREE WILL ETC. CANNOT BE THE REASON. Like I said before, I'm just trying to clear up my beliefs. The subject of homosexuality is still being researched to this day and until a definitive answer is here, being born gay is the belief I'll probably stand by until I'm proven wrong.
Edited by tim on 08/15/2012 14:46:46
Are you saying, Mator, that you have to have sex with someone of the same sex to be considered a homosexual? And, by that logic, you have to have sex with someone of the opposite sex to be considered a heterosexual? If you stay a virgin your whole life, despite your best efforts, can you not be considered heterosexual or are you still asexual? I'm a virgin, does that mean I can't call myself straight?
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Are you saying, Mator, that you have to have sex with someone of the same sex to be considered a homosexual? And, by that logic, you have to have sex with someone of the opposite sex to be considered a heterosexual? If you stay a virgin your whole life, despite your best efforts, can you not be considered heterosexual or are you still asexual? I'm a virgin, does that mean I can't call myself straight?
I think there's a fine line between all of these things. I think sexuality should be defined by sex. You can still say you're attracted to a certain type of person, but until you engage in sexual acts you can't call yourself heterosexual, homosexual, or bisexual.
Even if you're still a virgin you can still say you're attracted to members of the opposite sex, but you cannot make a clear statement about your sexuality. However, this is all rather off-topic and irrelevant.
@Tim:
The fact of the matter is people can and do change, Tim. Regardless of what genetics or whatever says the fact is people do change their sexuality. Sexuality is as much a psychological thing as it is a biological one. Therefore, to insist on it being unchangeable is silly, foolish, and downright incorrect. People change psychologically, so saying someone "is incapable of changing his/her sexual orientation" is false.
But generally that's true, I'd say. Do you have accounts or something of people changing their sexuality at will?
my signature broke, here is a fox snek:
Are you saying, Mator, that you have to have sex with someone of the same sex to be considered a homosexual? And, by that logic, you have to have sex with someone of the opposite sex to be considered a heterosexual? If you stay a virgin your whole life, despite your best efforts, can you not be considered heterosexual or are you still asexual? I'm a virgin, does that mean I can't call myself straight?
I think there's a fine line between all of these things. I think sexuality should be defined by sex. You can still say you're attracted to a certain type of person, but until you engage in sexual acts you can't call yourself heterosexual, homosexual, or bisexual.
Even if you're still a virgin you can still say you're attracted to members of the opposite sex, but you cannot make a clear statement about your sexuality. However, this is all rather off-topic and irrelevant.
@Tim:
The fact of the matter is people can and do change, Tim. Regardless of what genetics or whatever says the fact is people do change their sexuality. Sexuality is as much a psychological thing as it is a biological one. Therefore, to insist on it being unchangeable is silly, foolish, and downright incorrect. People change psychologically, so saying someone "is incapable of changing his/her sexual orientation" is false.
I'll repeat what I said before in my last post:
AGAIN I AM NOT SAYING THAT FREE WILL ETC. CANNOT BE THE REASON. Like I said before, I'm just trying to clear up my beliefs. The subject of homosexuality is still being researched to this day and until a definitive answer is here, being born gay is the belief I'll probably stand by until I'm proven wrong.
There isn't anything out there yet to confirm whether side is right so for now I'd like to keep it at you're not wrong and I'm not wrong. There are many theories as to why someone is homosexual Mator, I'm just trying to state the reasons why I believe that one is born gay.
The Hat of Love wrote:
But generally that's true, I'd say. Do you have accounts or something of people changing their sexuality at will?
Yes. I've heard several such accounts. Some people don't go about their entire lives with a single sexual orientation, it most definitely, undoubtedly, 100% confirmed, can and does change in certain situations. This is why I'm pressing Tim so hard on this, clearly he hasn't been out around people with different sexual orientations than himself if he truly thinks sexual orientation never changes.
The Hat of Love wrote:
But generally that's true, I'd say. Do you have accounts or something of people changing their sexuality at will?
Yes. I've heard several such accounts. Some people don't go about their entire lives with a single sexual orientation, it most definitely, undoubtedly, 100% confirmed, can and does change in certain situations. This is why I'm pressing Tim so hard on this, clearly he hasn't been out around people with different sexual orientations than himself if he truly thinks sexual orientation never changes.
To imply that I am a social recluse who "hasn't been out around people with different sexual orientation than himself" offends me greatly.
Do you think that I would be speaking on this thread if I didn't know at least 1 homosexual person in my life? Do you?
Let me tell you a story,
I had a friend named Josh who was gay. We had been buddies for 5 years until one day he took his own life out of the shame and guilt he felt from his environment. Everybody in his "family", even his own father called him a faggot and that certainly didn't change his outlook on his sexual orientation. He told me before he died that he always knew he was gay. That there wasn't a doubt in his mind and he simply wasn't attracted to the opposite sex. I myself used to think it could be a choice, but he told me otherwise. He said to me that he simply cannot stop being gay and that he didn't chose to be gay when he was younger, he just for some reason liked men. He couldn't help himself. Even when he was being bullied by his family and home environment, he couldn't change his ways to like a woman. One of my best friends took his own life that day because of the things around him that would keep making fun of his sexual orientation and telling him to change something that is completely natural and irreversible to him. There was no "certain situation" or "environmental factor" to change him.
That's it. One of the main reasons why I believe someone is born gay is because of my best pal Josh. Call it "bias" or personal experience or whatever, the environment he lived in took his life and because of that I can't take it as one of the reasons why one is gay. It didn't make him straight, it made him die.
I'm done with this argument. If you wish to keep calling me out on points that I believe in fine by me. Like I said, homosexuality is still a mystery and until it's solved no one can be correct.
Edited by tim on 08/16/2012 13:12:50
The Hat of Love wrote:
But generally that's true, I'd say. Do you have accounts or something of people changing their sexuality at will?
Yes. I've heard several such accounts. Some people don't go about their entire lives with a single sexual orientation, it most definitely, undoubtedly, 100% confirmed, can and does change in certain situations. This is why I'm pressing Tim so hard on this, clearly he hasn't been out around people with different sexual orientations than himself if he truly thinks sexual orientation never changes.
To imply that I am a social recluse who "hasn't been out around people with different sexual orientation than himself" offends me greatly.
Do you think that I would be speaking on this thread if I didn't know at least 1 homosexual person in my life? Do you?
Let me tell you a story,
I had a friend named Josh who was gay. We had been buddies for 5 years until one day he took his own life out of the shame and guilt he felt from his environment. Everybody in his "family", even his own father called him a faggot and that certainly didn't change his outlook on his sexual orientation. He told me before he died that he always knew he was gay. That there wasn't a doubt in his mind and he simply wasn't attracted to the opposite sex. I myself used to think it could be a choice, but he told me otherwise. He said to me that he simply cannot stop being gay and that he didn't chose to be gay when he was younger, he just for some reason liked men. He couldn't help himself. Even when he was being bullied by his family and home environment, he couldn't change his ways to like a woman. One of my best friends took his own life that day because of the things around him that would keep making fun of his sexual orientation and telling him to change something that is completely natural and irreversible to him. There was no "certain situation" or "environmental factor" to change him.
That's it. One of the main reasons why I believe someone is born gay is because of my best pal Josh. Call it "bias" or personal experience or whatever, the environment he lived in took his life and because of that I can't take it as one of the reasons why one is gay. It didn't make him straight, it made him die.
I'm done with this argument. If you wish to keep calling me out on points that I believe in fine by me. Like I said, homosexuality is still a mystery and until it's solved no one can be correct.
I never called you a social recluse.
My argument is not that someone can change their sexual orientation at will. My argument is that sexual orientations can change.
He may have "known" for however long he did that he was attracted to men, but that does not necessarily imply he was born being gay and would have to be gay his entire life. It is quite possible for his sexual orientation to change, just as it is possible for a person who is heterosexual to become homosexual or bisexual.
He didn't have to change his ways, the people around them had to change theirs. Also, direct pressure by bullying often has the opposite affect than what was intended. It's still possible that he could have changed, probably not by will alone, but instead by some other sort of experience later in life which would influence him to feel attracted to women.
My mom has an interesting analogy.
If you're trapped on an island with only one other person of the opposite or the same sex you will eventually, after a certain period of time, engage in sexual interactions with them because human beings are sexual creatures.
I myself don't fully agree with this statement, I think some people who have extremely deep-rooted and strong feelings regarding sexual orientations other than their own might commit suicide before such a thing could happen. But that's not really relevant to the point being made.
Again, there could have been a situation later on which could lead him to change his sexual orientation. Just because the bullying and pressure from his environment didn't lead him to change doesn't mean it was unchangeable. Regardless of this, however, the bullying and pressure from his environment was wrong, and should not have been present in the first place. I am in no way saying it would be good for him to have changed his sexual orientation or anything else. I'm fine with turning this entire situation around and putting a heterosexual in a similar situation. For in that case as well I would tell you that there still is a possible turn of events in which the person would change their sexuality.
A bullying/pressuring environment is unlikely to change an attribute in a person if that attribute is of considerable significance to them. The bullying/pressuring environment is more likely to put the person on the defensive, leading them to go to whatever measures they feel are necessary to preserve their own character. This is true with a few minor exceptions.
Homosexuality is only as much a mystery as you make it out to be. It's a psychological bias to satisfy a biological need just as heterosexuality is a psychological bias to satisfy a biological need. With this understanding it becomes clear that such a bias is not unchangeable. It can also be made clear from history that hatred or prejudice based on a person's physical/mental traits is wrong. Thus acceptance of people regardless of their sexuality is something that everyone who can claim to be educated must strive for.
Homosexuality is natural. Rape is natural. So is murder, eating, drinking, walking, talking, having sex, curiosity, emotion and heterosexuality. What's your point? By your logic, everything humans do is condemnable.
Clearly, being part of human nature is not a good way of deciding of deciding what is right and what is wrong. We have to go by other factors such as 'does this have any negative effects?' Homosexuality's negative effects (if they're even considerable), I think you'll agree, are less than rape's.
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The Hat of Love wrote:
We have to go by other factors such as 'does this have any negative effects?'
Firstly, would you really have killed half the population if you knew there was no God? Cos I know plenty of atheists and none of us have gone on murderous rampages recently. I covered this in the God debate - most people have morals which we have evolved to have for the benefit of ourselves and our species.
You're talking like natural automatically means good. This can be disproved using murder as an example: natural things can be bad.
Instead of deciding rights and wrongs by how 'natural' they are, we decide whether things are right and wrong generally by how much harm/good they do. Murder and rape, I'm sure you'll agree, do quite a lot of harm. Homosexuality does no harm. Allowing homosexuals to be homosexual without prejudice and without people calling them unnatural probably does quite a bit of good, too.
Edited by The Hat of Love on 10/15/2012 14:10:43
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Some people just like killing people because it is interesting. I think death is interesting, and I would kill someone just to see what happens to their body after (like lab mice), not that I like killing, but I like to experiment.
But morals and stuff like that is something we grow up to have from learning from other humans. So morals is not in our DNA or anything like that.
And natural does mean good. Cocaine isn't natural, look what it does. Marijuana is look how many people died from it. Weird right? Oh no, becuase God made it. Same way as the cocaine plant God made, but it was made to chew only, because it is NATURAL.
A rationalizing being DOES NOT kill another rationalizing being. An animal kills another because it's in their DNA.
"we decide whether things are right and wrong generally by how much harm/good they do"
That just sounded like the government. And no further explanation needed, unless asked if you didn't get why it sounded like a government.
ZA BrickSquad wrote: A rationalizing being DOES NOT kill another rationalizing being. An animal kills another because it's in their DNA.
"we decide whether things are right and wrong generally by how much harm/good they do"
That just sounded like the government. And no further explanation needed, unless asked if you didn't get why it sounded like a government.
I don't think you can dismiss this point of view.
It's the basis of utilitarianism, founded by the philosopher Jeremy Bentham, and I think that John Stuart Mill's adaptation of Bentham's core ideas provide a concrete and believable basis for morality.
It can be summarised as "the greatest happiness for the greatest number" - and can be extended to take into account the rights of individual by roughly quantifying happiness / grief.
If you think that morals only come from God, you seriously need to reconsider. Get to know some athiests, and I doubt they'll kill you. (In fact, many deaths are from people killing others due to conflict in religion!)
Edited by ninja on 10/15/2012 14:45:27
It's the basis of utilitarianism, founded by the philosopher Jeremy Bentham, and I think that John Stuart Mill's adaptation of Bentham's core ideas provide a concrete and believable basis for morality.
It can be summarised as "the greatest happiness for the greatest number" - and can be extended to take into account the rights of individual by roughly quantifying happiness / grief.
Ninja please rephrase what you said, it was hard to understand D= Just the first line threw me off lol.
If you think that morals only come from God, you seriously need to reconsider. Get to know some athiests, and I doubt they'll kill you. (In fact, many deaths are from people killing others due to conflict in religion!)
I never said morals only come from God, that just sounds incredibly ignorant lol. Ninja, most of my smoking buddies the past 2 weeks have been mostly atheists, and we talk about life a lot sharing each other's opinion and viewpoints.
And yes you are right with the about the killings, but it's cuz of most religions out there, the extremists. And also humans acting like "God". Perfect example: Adolf Hitler, he thinks he was doing something good for God... His mom was Catholic and his dad was Christian. If he never stopped going to church, he would of learned that the handicapped, Jews, and others he killed are human like him and would of never killed them all.
It's the basis of utilitarianism, founded by the philosopher Jeremy Bentham, and I think that John Stuart Mill's adaptation of Bentham's core ideas provide a concrete and believable basis for morality.
It can be summarised as "the greatest happiness for the greatest number" - and can be extended to take into account the rights of individual by roughly quantifying happiness / grief.
Ninja please rephrase what you said, it was hard to understand D= Just the first line threw me off lol.
If you think that morals only come from God, you seriously need to reconsider. Get to know some athiests, and I doubt they'll kill you. (In fact, many deaths are from people killing others due to conflict in religion!)
I never said morals only come from God, that just sounds incredibly ignorant lol. Ninja, most of my smoking buddies the past 2 weeks have been mostly atheists, and we talk about life a lot sharing each other's opinion and viewpoints.
And yes you are right with the about the killings, but it's cuz of most religions out there, the extremists. And also humans acting like "God". Perfect example: Adolf Hitler, he thinks he was doing something good for God... His mom was Catholic and his dad was Christian. If he never stopped going to church, he would of learned that the handicapped, Jews, and others he killed are human like him and would of never killed them all.
Utilitarianism is the name of a moral philosophy - the basic essence of it is often summed up as "the greatest happiness for the greatest number". My point was that it describes an effective way of qualifying actions as right or wrong - based on reason, not blindly following orders from someone else, be it God or the government.
I'm not an expert in the subject, but feel free to 'Google' it if you want to know more.
I assumed you thought morals were solely God / Christian based from your "If I knew there was no God, I would have killed half the population of the United States by the first week. Get where I'm going?" statement. Perhaps I simply didn't get where you were going.
nat·u·ral/g2;naCHərəl/
Adjective:
Existing in or caused by nature; not made or caused by humankind.
Nope, doesn't say anything about goodness.
And you can rationalise murder. Look at the mafia.
Yes thank you: not made or caused by humankind.
I know we can rationalize murder. Murder is also business if many of you didn't know. Some people just kill for money. Why does money have more value than humans? Because we humans make it so.
So Hat, you are telling me it's okay if I rape and kill a little girl?
