Sexual Orientation is not a Choice

[TracerBullet]

FTFY

you only show your own ignorance here

 

[genuineoriginal]

the actual study (it failed it's peer review BTW)

So you are claiming that the homophiles that were selected for the peer review did not like what the study reported?

That is to be expected, homophiles hate the truth.

 

[genuineoriginal]

I only show my own ignorance here

FTFY

 

[TracerBullet]

FTFY

Translation: I don't like the fact that my false claims were shown to be false so i will do things like this to draw attention away from my own false witness

 

[PureX]

You're right. But over time, I do shape my own habits and tastes.

You can't always choose to want or not want something. This seems to be based on the body.

But you can always choose what you want to want.

That isn't really the issue. The issue is upon what are those "choices" being based? You seem to be asserting that they are based on free will, because you label them "choices". But we don't really have any way of knowing that for sure. As many of our determinations are based on sub-conscious programming, either genetic or circumstantial. And is it accurate to call a pre-programmed determination a "choice" at all?

This is based in the soul. What informs these choices? Reason - and by extension values and morals that you've chosen to accept.

Actually, no. Most of our decisions/chices are not made based on conscious reason. Most of them are being made based on sub-conscious habits and intuitions created by mechanisms and conditions that we are not even aware of.

You choose what bodily urges you want to encourage and discourage in yourself.

Sometimes, but often we aren't even aware of our genetic proclivities.

You choose even what thoughts to allow to persist in your mind, and what thoughts to shoo away.

Sometimes, but mostly not. Most of the time we think without thinking about what we thinking. It's 'automatic' brain chatter going on in our minds completely unconsidered. And much of it determines our behavior equally automatically and unconsidered.

You cultivate your thought patterns and behavior patterns.

It's possible, but it takes diligent self-evaluation and a lot of time and persistence.

And over time, you shape your habits, and ultimately - your wants.

Most people don't shape their habits, they are shaped by them.

 

[genuineoriginal]

_____
Homosexuals Admit “Sexual Orientation” Can and Does Change
. . .
Trudy Ring, writer for the homosexual magazine The Advocate openly admits the flawed nature of the central argument that homosexual activists have used to insist on special treatment based on their mutable erotic desires and volitional erotic activity—something which other groups similarly constituted do not enjoy:

For years, much of the case for LGBT rights has been based on the argument that sexual orientation is fixed and immutable…..

But an increasing body of social science research posits that a sizable number of people experience some degree of fluidity in their sexual and romantic attractions: being drawn to the same gender at one point in their life, the opposite gender at another.​

. . .
_____​

 

[Lon]

Actually, no. Most of our decisions/chices are not made based on conscious reason. Most of them are being made based on sub-conscious habits and intuitions created by mechanisms and conditions that we are not even aware of.

The whole nurture vs nature debate will go on long after this, but you are waaaaay overstated on the nature portion.

I'd debate both of the above, who debate each other, because both have the individuals in question as passive rather than active in decision making: one acts that way because they were 'trained' and the other because it is in their genes.

Both are high-brow impractical because *we still put people in jail for their own actions regardless of either nature or nurture (*it isn't just me that believes we are accountable whether nature and/or nurture is blamed).

 

[glassjester]

That isn't really the issue. The issue is upon what are those "choices" being based? You seem to be asserting that they are based on free will, because you label them "choices". But we don't really have any way of knowing that for sure. As many of our determinations are based on sub-conscious programming, either genetic or circumstantial.

Free will is a bit of an all-or-nothing deal. If we aren't free on the micro-scale (thoughts, singular behaviors), then we aren't free on the macro-scale (thought patterns, habits).

Why do you believe you can't choose what thoughts to persist in, and what behaviors to enact?

Actually, no. Most of our decisions/chices are not made based on conscious reason. Most of them are being made based on sub-conscious habits and intuitions created by mechanisms and conditions that we are not even aware of.

In this view, does free will exist at all?

Sometimes, but often we aren't even aware of our genetic proclivities.

Sometimes we choose what urges to encourage or discourage? How can that be a 'sometimes' thing?

Sometimes, but mostly not. Most of the time we think without thinking about what we thinking.

Maybe you do. But that's your choice.

It's possible, but it takes diligent self-evaluation and a lot of time and persistence.

Isn't that our duty as humans?

Most people don't shape their habits, they are shaped by them.

So it's possible to not live this way, yes? In that case, what's a better way to live? To consciously shape your habits based on what kind of person you want to be, or to allow habits to form based on whatever happens when you're not paying attention to yourself?

 

[TracerBullet]

_____
Homosexuals Admit “Sexual Orientation” Can and Does Change
. . .
Trudy Ring, writer for the homosexual magazine The Advocate openly admits the flawed nature of the central argument that homosexual activists have used to insist on special treatment based on their mutable erotic desires and volitional erotic activity—something which other groups similarly constituted do not enjoy:

For years, much of the case for LGBT rights has been based on the argument that sexual orientation is fixed and immutable…..

But an increasing body of social science research posits that a sizable number of people experience some degree of fluidity in their sexual and romantic attractions: being drawn to the same gender at one point in their life, the opposite gender at another.​

. . .
_____​

That is nice...except she is talking about bisexuality.

"The idea that not everyone is exclusively attracted to one gender, or equally and consistently attracted to both, isn’t exactly new. Groundbreaking sexuality researcher Alfred Kinsey and his colleagues developed the Kinsey Scale in 1948, placing sexuality on a continuum of 0 to 6, “exclusively heterosexual” to “exclusively homosexual.”"

 

[Arthur Brain]

Sexual orientation is not a choice (that's the title of the thread).

I didn't choose to be heterosexual. No one did. There's no such thing.

But my choices over time shaped by taste in partners.

Based on reason and moral beliefs, people ought to gradually whittle down their partner preference to one person or zero people.


This I did. That one person is my wife.


If they base the partner-selection process on desires rather than reason, they will never make a righteous choice - they are becoming slaves to sin - no matter the gender of the partner.

Look, I identify as heterosexual (or substitute any other label) as I am exclusively attracted to the opposite sex. That was not a choice on my part. There wasn't any conscious decision making process involved whereby I woke up one day and thought "I am only going to be attracted to women". It's just the way it is.

I've never chosen to fall in love by the same token or "choose" to find peanuts (except dry roasted) unpalatable. I can choose to act on all sorts of impulses but there are many things in life where choice simply isn't involved at all - and attraction is one of them.

You may as well say that someone with a peanut allergy can choose to eat nuts and not suffer the repercussions for all the sense you're making. It's just ridiculous.

 

[Arthur Brain]

Sexual preferences are not hard wired and can be changed.

Speak for yourself. Just because you think people can "train" themselves to fall in love with paper clips and the like doesn't make it true by a long shot.

 

[Sancocho]

That's all fine and dandy but does absolutely nothing to address orientation at puberty.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17195103

 

[Sancocho]

thousands of studies on the topic have passed through their rigorous peer reviews.


a thesis review is not the same as the peer review of a scientific article

and what of the dozens of studies done replicating this and all coming to the same conclusion?

so evidence isn't evidence if you don't want to believe it

Please tell me your qualifications in the area of scientific research at the graduate level.

 

[TracerBullet]

Please tell me your qualifications in the area of scientific research at the graduate level.

and what of the dozens of studies done replicating this and all coming to the same conclusion?

 

[bybee]

Barf?

LOL!

 

[glassjester]

Or rather, only an incredibly obtuse person would fail to see the relationship between choosing to covet your neighbor's wife and choosing to covet your neighbor.

This really gets at the heart of the issue.

Believing that you have an innate "orientation" makes people think that there's a type of person (rather than one person) that they should always covet.


If I say I am "heterosexual," that means I desire sexual intimacy with women in general. That's a lot of people to harbor attractions to! Here, it's worth considering the blurry line between "having sexual desire toward" and "coveting."

Is there any real difference?



My dismissal of the very idea of sexual orientation stems from two principles:
1. Choosing to marry should not be motivated by bodily desire.
2. We ought not encourage in ourselves sexual desires outside of marriage.


Whereas proclaiming allegiance to any of the recently-invented "orientations" implies (and necessitates) sexual desire for a large group of people that you're not married to.

 

[glassjester]

You may as well say that someone with a peanut allergy can choose to eat nuts and not suffer the repercussions for all the sense you're making. It's just ridiculous.

No. I might as well say that your partner preferences (not just the choice of a particular partner, but your preferences) are under your control as much as your musical preferences.

Do people have physiological responses to music they like? Yes.
But these preferences are still fundamentally autogenic, and subject to the will.

 

[bybee]

No. I might as well say that your partner preferences (not just the choice of a particular partner, but your preferences) are under your control as much as your musical preferences.

Do people have physiological responses to music they like? Yes.
But these preferences are still fundamentally autogenic, and subject to the will.

Have you read Viktor Frankl? It is our attitude that is either controlled by our will or not. It is in control of one's attitude towards the "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune" that determination of what kind of person one shall be and become resides.

 

[glassjester]

Have you read Viktor Frankl? It is our attitude that is either controlled by our will or not. It is in control of one's attitude towards the "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune" that determination of what kind of person one shall be and become resides.

I have not. But I would go so far as to say that this:

"It is our attitude that is either controlled by our will or not."

Is a choice.



And to take Hamlet's soliloquy a step further: To be, or not to be - that is the only question.

 

[glassjester]

Which is no different than:

Romans 6:16 - Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness?

Or this:

"You're gonna have to serve somebody." - Bob Dylan