Republican Oklahoma County Commissioner makes Homophobic Comic Book ad

[Dan the Roman]

I find it interesting that this thread has gotten as long as it has. I also find it interesting but highly reassuring that it has broken down like it has, overwelmingly on the side of genetics, more because it shows an increased consensus in favor of acceptance.

Which is actually one of my problems with it. I say this as another one of those homosexuals, but the battle over nature vs. nurture is now inseparable from the issue of gay rights generally. Opponents of gay rights insist on nurture so they can argue that no concessions can be made while supporters of gay rights and individuals in the community embrace the nature argument because it removes any degree of control. I actually think that regardless of the science this is not a great internal approach because too much focus on determinism leads to fatalism, the idea that one has no control. This is one of the things that makes public health efforts so difficult among many young people in the gay community. The entire idenitity has become entrapped in a lack of control.

That said I definitely did not make a conscious choice as far as I could tell, and my interest was sort of gradual across the end of Middle School through High School. There may well have been something of a feedback loop along the way, and I would not rule out that you could have a situation in which someone questions their sexuality, experiments, gets a positive response and continues.

My own personal view is that attraction is different from enjoyment. It is perfectly possible that a man who is not gay could enjoy same-sex experiences in addition to heterosexual ones, and depending on nurture embark on a different course, but what defines being gay at least to me is not having any real attraction to the opposite sex, which effectively negates any aspect of choice. I think part of the problem opponents of gay rights have is that they are still asuming that Gays and lesbians are bisexuals who happen to have chosen to play the wrong-side of the field. This is clearly not the case, and the fact that some people who identify as gay may be bisexuals playing a particular side of the field does not negate the fact that the overwhelming majority of gays and lesbians that field is limited to abstention or the "wrong side."

Sorry for going on this late, I thought I would put my two-cents in.