Tony? Really?
The TERMS homosexuality/heterosexuality/bisexuality/asexuality are constructs - because they're terms society has created over a long period of time to describe biology.
Sexuality is not just the desire to ... stroke one's genitals, it's a method to build and sustain relationships, to continue your genetic line etc etc...
But a) the use or non-use of terms, and the implications they carry, absolutely do have a tangible effect on people (note my "civil unions" example upthread), and b) it's beyond silly to deny that society and culture has an impact on what people find sexually desirable, and how sexuality is practiced.
Nobody is arguing that biology plays no role- that's a strawman. But to say that society and culture plays no role? Just take a look at the relative prevalence of pubic hair in pornos of the 1970s and today, and tell me with a straight face that sexuality and gender isn't at least a little bit socially constructed. You can't.
Note: this is not to pick on you specifically, but is more to push back generally against the people who are basically denying that anything besides biology matters.
Respectfully... how the hell did you get to there from what I wrote?
My view is very clear... the biology is the most important innate element here. Without the biological drive and attraction to someone of the same gender, the social construct doesn't have anything to hang off. The framing of that biological attraction into categories is a construct, which is what I wrote before. Same-sex attraction exists in our species, as it does in many others... of course we can look to Ancient Greece or Rome where the sexuality spectrum was decidedly blurred and say human sexuality seems more codified now. But again, that's not about the biology, that's about the social framing for that sexual expression. Even then, open expressions of outright homosexuality were not exactly welcomed in Greece or Rome - we're actually in a society where one can (generally) fully express one's innate biological sexuality - therefore there's not as much need to blur or quantify non-straight sexual activities as anything other than what it is.
So of course society has an impact, but that does not change the innate biology that drives the desire to be or act in a certain way. So if you're in a society where homosexual activity is frowned upon (or punished), then it is likely you will not act on it. That doesn't change your actual sexuality, it just changes how you are PERCEIVED in your society.
Tony, you're actually wrong, sexual bonding has been recognised in a number of species apart from our own, a number of bird species, crocodiles, pigs, hyenas and closer to home, chimps.
I've also done gender classes and they do a terrible disservice to the study of gender and sexuality because there is some kind of inherent mental block to acknowledging that people are different... different doesn't mean better or worse, weaker or strong, important or not important, but different.
I find this idea that sexuality is purely about getting something hard and then sticking it into something - getting off and leaving... is actually a little disturbing.
