…At which point, we can chalk it up to the law of unintended consequences.
Asks nishi, in Darleen’s earlier thread on same sex marriage and the church
Tell me why homosexuals differ from african americans, or even from women who are now protected under anti-discrimination laws.
Well, the quick answer is that they are not. Gays are, in fact, protected under anti-discrimination laws. But until it is determined that homosexuality is a condition of birth and not of preference, gays occupy a different sphere in terms of biological determinism, and so occupy a different sphere in terms of legal protection, as well. Preferences aren’t determined, and therefore need not be treated as such.
The real interesting question for me is, what will happen if and when science determines that homosexuality is predisposed, and the gene combination / chemical configuration that predicts for it can be screened for? Would people be within their “rights” (akin to abortion rights, say) either to abort the fetus as defective, or pay for genetic alteration?
Of course, this all comes down to what society decides is the “norm,” and whether or not — as a way to challenge the very concept of a norm — enough people are willing, given options, to bring homosexual children into the world in a social climate where their numbers will almost certainly dwindle (I think an interesting analogy here might be with the deaf culture, the most strident of whom have taken to demonizing cochlear implants, and even created a sliding scale of deaf “authenticity”), all of which raises interesting questions about the kind of evolving culture nishi has long depicted as nearly deterministic in and of itself.
Nishi has argued here quite frequently, for instance, that eugenics is already at play with respect to “designer babies”, and in one respect , she has a point: some people do seek out mates purely on the basis of their genetic makeup; but where nishi missteps is that this is not at all the norm these days, and in fact the very anti-discrimination laws she professes to champion has turned such clinical calculation with respect to mating choices into the exception rather than the rule, with the majority of people using other metrics to decide upon a mate (does s/he make me laugh; do we share the same taste in movies, etc.) — another example of cultural evolution that nishi seems unable to shoehorn into her arguments without feeling a twinge of doubt.
So my question is, wouldn’t it be ironic if the very thing that gives homosexuality “rights†in nishi’s figuration — this idea that homosexuality, like sex and “race” / color, is biologically determined — is the thing that leads, ultimately, to its eradication?
This is, of course, a hypothetical question, and is meant to spark (additional) conversation. Even if such screening is only workable, under some hypotheses, at the age of 2-3, gene therapy may be a way to make that particular objection to the suggestion of eradication moot.
an interesting twist, in the scenario where homosexuality is determined in utero, and abortion is the screening procedure, is that the pro-LIFE! will protect the right of the fetus to be born gay, just like protecting the right of the fetus to be born Downs or acromegalic.
Man , your web hit count must be going through the roof with the string of hot potato topics you’ve chosen recently.. I like it.
also, in population genetics terms, we are already seeing assortative mating of samesex couples, like in your piece about fatherhood and lesbians in GB.
it is unlikely that samesex couples would change the sexual orientation of their offspring to hetero….they might even seek to change it to reflect their own orientation!
;)
Jeff, we are entering the Age of Designer Eugenics.
You can yell HITLER! and run off and bury your heads in the moral sand of judeoxian ethics, or you can open intelligent, realistic, and pragmatic discussions on it and try to colonize the higher ground before the proggs get there.
Interesting point, nishi, but I prefigured it by bringing up gene therapy. No need to abort if the “defective” — or, depending on your point of view, “undesirable” — genes can be modified after birth.
Also true — and this is why I introduced as analogous the militant deaf culture.
But the bottom line is, once it is determined that living as a homosexual is, by dint of science, a choice, the dynamic could change altogether, and the effect could be to make people less accepting of the choice.
This is the cultural evolution you talk about, and I am having this conversation on your terms.
If I’ve learned anything from movies, it’s that nature cannot be constrained, gayness will find a way. That and Republicans are evil, but that is a topic for another day.
Comment 4 just wrecked another irony meter. Be back later.
Actually, Ouroboros, these kinds of threads get good discussions going, but they don’t do much for my hit count. Most people don’t want to discuss. They just want quick soundbites, oftentimes framed around a bit of snark. They are topical. I tend not to be — at least, not in the way they are accustomed.
Thanks Jeff for asking a question I’ve been wanting to hear the answer to. Of course, the converse can be true as well. Could/Should homosexual couples who want a child, have one designed to be homosexual should a genetic basis for such be found?
PT
I have a gay son. I am okay with it if he is but I would be a liar if I said that I wouldn’t prefer he was heterosexual. The young man is so un-obviously gay, however, it is at times hard for me to believe that he hasn’t made a choice.
Rights ( at least those currently recognized at law) to end a pregnancy are predicated, at present, on a pregnant person’s right to stop being pregnant, and circumscribed in race-gender neutral ways.
The constitution demands of the 14th amendment as they apply to race do not not prohibit using birth control based on sex of your partner, or selecting a mate based on race, etc.
Since no such argument can apply to race or sex now, anti-race, anti-sex dicrimination law could hardly be translated into the rights you suggest for “likely to be homosexual” babies, unless there is a complete reinterpretation of existing law or new law that extends such prohibition against discrimination.
I doubt women would opt in droves to end such pregnancies anyway, even if the outcome was certain.
A theory proposed by researchers in recent science news, suggests a likely mechanism for transfer of traits that create male homosexual individuals ( not so for lesbians) are genes that give a maternal carrier of the traits a fecundity advantage that makes up for the loss in male offspring who receive the traits and have a lower rate of reproduction. (There is some evidence for male homosexuality being carried by the female line, and also evidence that these women are on average more fecund than other women. ) If so, women would probably not opt to abort females carrying the traits. A homosexual child may fall short of a parent’s “ideal” child, but I would not predict women terminating pregnancies as they do with, say trisomy 21. There is no increased rate of intrauterine demise putting a pregnant person at higher than average risk, as in Trisomy 21. There may be quirks or eccentric traits, but there is no severe disability, and possibly many advantageous associated traits. I can’t see male homosexuality being “wiped out” by this means.
“…Preferences aren’t determined…”
Isn’t there an odd duck (decidedly out of context) philosophical reading of this phrase under Dennett’s compatiblism wherein preferences (freewilling) are determined (LaPlace’s Demon)?
This is the cultural evolution you talk about, and I am having this conversation on your terms.
well, im grateful, Master. ;)
but i think u should seize the engines of linguistic production on this and colonize the high ground before the progs get there to lock you out.
i gtg to work, damn two awesome threads.
have fun.
;)
#2, #8:
As someone who watches the pw sitemeter with some regularity, I’ll back JG on the general point (which is, btw, why I do what I do here the way I do it). Indeed, there often is not much correlation between comment count and traffic, either. That being said, I have long thought that the ‘sphere favors the quick hit over in-depth academic discussion. This is partially inherent in the way people read the ‘net. It is in part the lack of academic grounding of the average reader (and I do not say that as a snark — I have said to JG before that he might get more traffic if his substance was the same, but explained as he would explain it to the person on the adjacent bar stool). I note that the “whitey” post got Insta-lanched, and I suspect the Sly & the Family Stone frame helped.
But until it is determined that homosexuality is a condition of birth and not of preference, gays occupy a different sphere in terms of biological determinism, and so occupy a different sphere in terms of legal protection, as well.
But biological determinism isn’t what defines the sphere of legal protection. Pedophiles and serial killers wouldn’t be legally even if it could be proved, in some or all cases, that their conduct was dictated by a disposition fixed before birth. Arguing that “I was born this way” (or “I was forced to before this way”) isn’t an excuse. The inability to control acting on one’s urges might make a difference as far as the remedy imposed, i.e., the sane go to prison and the insane to a mental institution. But “not being able to help it” doesn’t make what one does legal, whether the inability arose at birth or afterwards.
Re: #8 & #14 Well regardless of the traffic issue your selection of topics has been especially exciting and has provided some good meat to grapple over..
This is off topic but walking around town lately I’ve been getting the distinct impression that I’m surrounded by alien beings from another world, here to make this world their world… You can see it in their furtive glances and smell it in the air of moral superiority that surrounds them.Then again, this IS Seattle and the Progs are everywhere and I have been watching a lot of my new “The Invaders” collection DVD ( A Quinn Martin Production – 1967)
#10: I’d be interested to know what “obviously un-gay” is. Doesn’t like musicals? Has no sense of fashion? Can’t coordinate his accessories? Drives a truck?
Sheesh; the fear and loathing of the different in here burns.
While it would be ironic, it would just be one more page for the book of ‘unintended consequences’.
This is a book progressives are unable to read anyway. Tree in forest, no one hears. Down memory hole. Real unfact, double negative bad.
#18:
Bobby,
Nice sweeping generalization based on a single comment. No loathing coming from you at all.
As for that comment, you would have to ask the father what he knows about his son. But I would bet that without the distance the ‘net affords, you would not casually suggest the man — whom I do not recognize as a regular commenter here — loathes his own son. Or maybe you are that much of a jackass.
Uhm, what’s a nishi?
See you’re not in California. It’s really pathetic. Poor gay peoples all trying to figure out a good excuse to use to explain to their moms why they’re not married yet. Bunch of mostly premature mid-life crises all over, and many relationships are being stressed and destroyed cause one or the other just isn’t ready. You’re supposed to take this seriously and go to coffee and nod understandingly. Tip: don’t bring up MSRA. This is unrelated and not helpful.
Oh now you’ve done it.
Confused,
nishi is a frequent commenter (she’s #1 in this thread). And she’s confused also, though maybe not in the same way.
Bobby, you just aren’t paying attention. First you twisted what the man said. He said “un-obviously gay”, not “obviously un-gay”. If it isn’t obvious to you, the former means nothing in his observable actions or demeanor announces obviously to the observer that he is gay. The latter means he is demonstrating traits that assert his non-gayness.
If you aren’t from another solar system, you know that it is sometimes, if not always, quite possible to determine if a person is gay by their words, actions, deeds, mannerisms, predilictions, etc. Yet the phrase you twisted it into is something else. Obviously un-gay. As if there were some traits that gays never exhibit. You seem determined to projecy that ridiculous viewpoint on Palmetto Tiger. No doubt because it’s easier to kick a straw man than a real one, and you get to fuss about all the fearing and the hating if you change what he said.
I never said it was. In fact, I said gays were already covered by anti-discrimination law by virtue of being people. The question I was answering is how are they different from blacks and women in a particular regard. And my answer was there is no preference involved in those cases. If it happens that homosexuality is ultimately tied to preference, which it very well could be if science turns it explicitly into a choice (much as deafness is moving in that direction), then the laws would be more likely to look upon homosexuality as preference, and so have grounds to limit the “rights” associated with it.
But you make a good point: if we tie the rights of homosexuals to something innate and biologically determined, how do we justify not doing the same to pedophiles, should they, too, prove to have a biologically determined predilection?
Remember, I’m trying to play devil’s advocate a lot here. I’m just not saying where, exactly, because I’m interested in the debate from all directions, and I don’t want my personal opinions interfering.
Sarah —
I accounted for your concern by noting in the original post that gene therapy after birth would address nishi’s abortion argument. I don’t think many women would abort based on a “gay gene” — but I can certainly see families opting for gene therapy after birth.
If you aren’t from another solar system, you know that it is sometimes, if not always, quite possible to determine if a person is gay by their words, actions, deeds, mannerisms, predilictions, etc.
Not to mention, “gayface.” <—– which may be NSFW.
Off to go workout. Because I’m buff and comfortable with my sexuality.
Back later to respond to…whatever needs responding to, I guess.
I suppose by the time we discover some sort of gene therapy for gayness (personally, I think there is probably a myriad of factors that contribute to a person being homosexual – my cousin was a lesbian for a while, but it apparently wore off) – administration/treatment will be prohibited, at least so much ad treatment in childhood. Circumcision, cochlear implants … similar arguments will be made that it isn’t for a parent to impose things such as hearing, genital mutilation, or heterosexuality upon a child.
And, I imagine (especially given how far we’ve gone toward full acceptance and celebration of homosexuality) few individuals of legal age will desire to change the very thing upon which many of them have defined themselves.
I would look forward, though, to the conversations and debates if/when pre-birth testing is able to determine gayness. Homosexuals (and their cries of genocide) versus feminist.
But, I’m sick that way.
…this is not eugenic. This is classically, Darwinianly selective.
Eugenics preceded the knowledge of genes; the appearance of the latter in selective criteria doesn’t transform those selections into the former. Conversely, we used to not know that fat people are often genetically stuck being fat, but individual preferences for apparent fitness didn’t become “eugenics” once we figured that out.
Selective criteria can be socialized in a crypto-eugenic way. Offers to fuck the President because he pretends to hold an opinion that women have recently been re-conditioned to regard as a sign of unthreatening sexual confidence don’t come from nowhere, for example.
But nothing any breeding individual does is eugenics. Eugenics makes Zombie Darwin angry, because sexual selective power is forcibly removed from selectors, distorting, to its inevitable detriment, the randomness that drives natural selection. “Designer babies” make him bored.
Saying somebody is “un-gay” is equal to “fear and loathing”? Sheesh, the stupidity of that comment burns.
Has anyone got knowledge how many offspring male homosexuals have in the aggregate? How many female homosexuals have?
Is same sex attraction presumed to automatically eliminate the apparently otherwise universal drive for grandchildren, who in turn have grandchildren?
I’ve known quite a few male homosexuals who’ve married, had grandchildren and whose grandchildren may be supposed to want grandchildren of their own. I do not know how widespread this phenomenon is, not in our own society, let alone in less tolerant societies. I have not personally observed this same phenomenon with female homosexuals, but I can imagine it may be present outside my experience.
How to account for this under the present hypothesis?
Thinking on a different particular in the lead post, once we posit ‘gene-therapy’ to ‘remove’ gayness, aren’t we also positing ‘gene-therapy’ to implant it?
Good question, Sdferr. I’d say only the few artificially inseminated never-dicked dykes because upon successfully mating persons should be classified as a hetero-behaving breeders and thusly disqualified from pure homo status.
Q. WHAT IS A NAZI?
A. ANYONE WINNING A DEBATE WITH A SO CALLED “PROGRESSIVE”.
THE MANTRA OF THE MARXIS LEFT: “WHY DEBATE WHEN WE CAN AVOID IT BY CALLING OUR OPPONENTS RACIST, SEXIST, HOMOPHOBE, XENOPHOBE?” WHen the debate is kept to the facts the left always loses. Can you blame them for cheating?
WIth any hope, between the fact that most abortions are given to “liberals” and the hope of altering genes, we can eradicate the self destructive auto-immune disease known as “liberalism”.
With the “free love” addiction to abortion the “liberals will keep bleeding” while the Christers keep breeding. It’s just a matter of time.
Uhm, what’s a nishi?
A female Heffalump Devil.
Of course it is. But it is from this model that eugenics was formulated. Nishi is talking of designer babies. I simply referred to a way in which people already engage in such behavior that she believes should be formulated into, you know, a program.
Is it merely a linguistic exercise, Thor? Or is it possible to get a handle on questions Nishi assures us are on the immediate horizon, if not here already?
do seek out mates purely on the basis of their genetic makeup
But after all the mating, the makeup comes off. Sometimes it never goes back on. Like heels or stockings.
K, maybe once in a while at a wedding, or some fancy dinner. But then the feet hurt and she’s tired and has her face washed and is dead to the world by the time you’ve got the dog back in, dishwasher started, coffee on the timer and a cup of water for the three-year-old. Well, at least you get to watch Sportscenter with the sound down low.
Now that I think of it, those gays, they take care of themselves pretty good, right? I mean, they do on TV…..
Well nishi is lost in her own smart thoughts, mostly, though she’s been quite coherent of late.
It’s linguistic because there’s the truth, namely that persons self-identify self-referentially – forgive me, simply stated I mean that people get to say who they are – and in doing such they can disown certain of their behavior, like hetero-fucking, yet still claim themselves as homo with protected status under civil rights statutes. Therefore actual sexual activity is subordinate to self-identifying to group, which makes the whole mess a word game if you ask me.
Not to be, what’s the word in this word game?, ah yes, blithe about it Thor but would you say that in general, everything is a word game? Or no?
If the courts bought that excuse I wouldn’t have to pay parking tickets.
But theoretically, mostly.
The hypotheticals posed about post-brith gene therapy, say at age 2-3 are interesting as thought experiments, but would seem to be somewhat unlikely to arise in reality, if evidence leaning towards pre-birth brain and phenotype changes in male homosexuality continues to be supported. Perhaps the only “gene therapy” that might work would involve treating the mother, and the benefit to be had might be at the expense of other risks or detriments.
I operate from the assumption that male homosexuality has a strong genetic or congenital component. If there is out of many factors one or two that could be altered, such as protection of susceptable mothers from stressors changine the uterine environment, or treatment or prevention of of infection… I can’t think there would be much outcry against that.
ONe caveat – male homosexuality and female homosexuality do not seem to have the same mechanisms. So what applies to male homosexuality might have little to do with lesbians.
I can do the mental gymnastics to get from male homosexual to male heterosexual and vice versa, but have a hard time with male heterosexual to female homosexual or male homosexual to female homosexual, nevermind male homosexual to female heterosexual and male heterosexual to female heterosexual. Sheesh, this is taxing and we haven’t begun to come to grips with the bi-sexual permutations.
#31 and #38:
That is the problem with matoko’s self-proclaimed title of eugenicist. She refuses to acknowledge that it is a selective breeding program from the late-nineteenth early-twentieth century. It has nothing to do with genetic engineering as is known today, or individual people selecting who they will have children with. Eugenics removed all choice from the equation by agitating for the state to determine who will have children with whom. Genetic repair has nothing to do with eugenics, genetic enhancement has only the slightest to do with eugenics, as eugenics was merely cattle-breeding as applied to humans. Eugenics had nothing to do with medicine, other than using medicine to sterilize people deemed unfit to breed. Eugenics was a program that wanted the state to determine, who should be allowed to have children with whom and then enforce that determination. By claiming to be a eugenicist she is an advocate for state control over that part of a person’s life.
Genetic repair or enhancement has nothing to do with eugenics; it is merely enforced breeding.
By refusing to acknowledge what eugenics actually is she continues her patten as a griefer.
Eugenics is merely enforced breeding – should have been clearer there.
To blather on: using ‘eugenics’ to describe what matoko proposes is similar to using ‘galley’ to describe a destroyer; while both are self-propelled warships, the similarities cease pretty quickly. Misuse of a technical term that matoko should well know is a technical term (with a precise description – see technical term) is again, evidence of her dishonesty in debate. She chooses a term and changes the meaning of it to suit her. While that does hone my thoughts and positions (thanks also to the other commenters here), it is not an honest debating style.
If folks have a right to an abortion, it is predicated on the idea that a fetus is not a person, right?
And these discrimination things accrue to people based, in some measure, on their status as a person.
So, it is completely legal to discriminate in utero, right?
So, there would be no problem with reassigning the race of a baby in utero?
I thought all it took to reassign a female heterosexual to a female homosexual was five Coors Lights and a disposable camera.
Yes, as Sarah reminds us, unlike, say, Twinks Gone Wild, lesbian porn has mysterious crossover appeal to the heterosexual male audience. Distinctions duly noted, and then there’s female twins, another odd phenomema of heightened hetero-male attraction. Twin lesbian hitchhikers, yet another peculiarity, for twin homo-male hitchhikers will always be seen as road rash bonus points for an altogether different reason than female twins to the eyes of a well adjusted hetero male.
Ok, I am way unclear on stuff here.
It’s generally, the government can’t make laws preventing discrimination on the basis of preference, but they can make laws preventing discrimination on the basis of something congenital.
Is this correct?
#51 – thor
It isn’t a mystery – there’re chicks!
That’s all the guy-brain needs.
#52 – BRD: If I got your question right –
Government can make laws against actions. Desires, not so much. (Well they can make laws against desires, but enforcing them is hard; laws against actions are easier.)
I believe I have linked this one before, but since the subject has come up, I will give this argument a link again.
http://www.davidszondy.com/future/man/odd_john.htm
One of the reasons that I’m still single is that I have an uncanny knack for being attracted to closet cases. Four and counting. What that says about me I don’t want to know.
Anyway.
For men, same-sex attraction is not a choice, at least not in the way you choose to be a smoker. The gay men I’ve known well did their dead-level best to fight their feelings and “play it straight,” but they were fighting a losing battle. Try as they might, they couldn’t choose NOT to be attracted to men instead of women.
I should know: I was the one they tried to not be gay with. (Again, I don’t want to know what that says about me.)
I mean, come on, guys. You started being curious about girl parts from a very young age (we develop our sexual identity at around three), and given the choice between a hot chick and a hot dude, there was no question that you’d take the chick.
For whatever reason, gay men don’t see themselves as “real men,” so for them, men ARE the opposite sex. And there are suggestions that lesbians reject their femininity because they despise the vulnerability that it represents. Sexual abuse is often a factor in same-sex attraction.
However, I don’t know where same-sex attraction originates in males. It is entirely possible that there are different reasons in different degrees for different individuals, some of the causes being organic, some environmental, and who knows what else. Having or lacking a particular gene doesn’t seem to be entirely determinative, given that there’s a mechanism to determine which genes express themselves and which don’t.
That’s how you can have identical twins and one is autistic. The realm of what we don’t know is getting larger by the day.
As for the comparison to the militant deaf culture, I find that very apt. The militant deaf refuse to admit that something is missing; many gays don’t see their bonding handicap as a problem either. But of course, sociopaths wouldn’t volunteer for a conscience transplant even if such a thing were offered, so “they don’t mind” isn’t the best criteria for whether something is wrong with someone.
Maybe we can take it a step further and mandate that everyone abnormal get fixed. Wouldn’t that be a brave new world?
And this one.
http://www.davidszondy.com/future/man/eugenics.htm
What matoko always fails to address is what is the responsibility of one man to another. “Am I my brother’s keeper?” We could theoretically, create genetic supermen, but what does that mean for the relation between people? Social Darwinism and historical eugenics already shows us that people who just think they are superior can use that to justify exterminating other people. What guarantees are there that such a belief won’t arise again?
Putting aside judeo-xtian ethics, what protection is there from this happening again if matoko gets her way? She has provided none, and therefore she is a proto-genocidist. Her program leads to tyranny, and then elimination – the cold record of history says so, and she never can refute that, nor does she try.
Again, not an honest debater is she.
Um, dude, people have always sought out mates on the basis of their genetic makeup. Everyone who intentionally dates ugly fat girls (and boys) raise your hands!
See?
“…it’s generally,the government can’t make laws preventing discrimination on the basis of preference, but they can make laws preventing discrimination on the basis of something congenital.”
BRD, no. I”m not sure if Jeff made this a postulate for his hypotheticals or not, but it isn’t the case in law.
and then there’s female twins, another odd phenomema of heightened hetero-male attraction
You know, that one has never really worked for me. I’m not repelled by it, but given my druthers I’d be more of variety pack/Baskin Robbins kind of guy.
That’s attractiveness, Swen; not what the eugenicists were aiming at. The pretty dumb girl vs. the smart ugly girl. Which do you think the eugenist considered more ‘fit’?
dicentra: “Try as they might, they couldn’t choose NOT to be attracted to men instead of women.I should know: I was the one they tried to not be gay with. (Again, I don’t want to know what that says about me.)
Hahahaha! I married a young bisexual woman. After 10 years and three kids she left me for another woman.. not even a hot lipstick lesbian either.. and has lived a full on lesbian lifestyle since.. I’m not sure what that says about me either.. but I prefer not to think I drove her to lesbianism but rather that I turned her straight for 10 years..
One of those ‘glass half full’ perspectives.
If they get rid of gay peoples who is gonna work at Nielsen?
Here is Cochran’s hypothesis:
ty Aldo. ;)
greg’s hypothesis is that a pathogen destroys the specialized neurons that say, correspond to production of some neurohormone that operates on neural tissue growth and differentiation.
resulting in Aldo’s brainscan results–
the reason lotsa geneticists and molecular biologists think this is plausible is the Red Queen Theory, technical delineation in the immortal Dr. Hamilton’s vol II of the Narrow Roads of Geneland:the evolution of sex, and Matt Ridley’s The Red Queen for layppl.
the current competitive theory is “sexual antagonism”, delineated here.
please note, that both methods could be operating simultaneously on homosapiens sapiens, they are by no means mututally exclusive.
If the technologies that Jeff postulates come to pass, I believe that it would be difficult to keep them under wraps for very long even if they are deemed illegal.
Parents are like gravity to their children’s water. They will try to pick the path of least resistance for them as they mature. Homosexuality is, in the minds of most, a more difficult lifestyle. It is also more dangerous. The vast majority of parents would steer their children away from homosexuality if they could even if it meant personal danger (like committing an illegal act) for the parents.
eugenics defn:
Eugenics is the self-direction of human evolution.
now, like all science eugenics can be used for good or for ill.
because we have free will right?
but there is nothing intrinsically evil about eugenics, just as there is nothing intrinsically evil about science and technology.
We are entering the Age of Designer Eugenics.
We already have free market eugenics, like ivy league co-eds selling their oocytes for 5k a pop, and jodie fosters search for a 160IQ sperm donor.
Well Bobby if you can get down from your high horse and allow me to talk about the son I know and awkwardly explain my point which is that whatever the truth is in this debate sometimes it is difficult for me to think “correctly” because of yes, how did you put it, beer and teething. Maybe I was born this way. Anyway ol’ pal, my statement contained perhaps a wee bit of irony you in your superior position somehow overlooked. First time for everything boyo!
yup berger.
like Stephen Hawkins says,
and because parents love their children, they will want every advantage they can afford.
consider: by the time we have the capability to re-engineer sexual orientation, we will also have the capability to in crease IQ and comeliness.
it may be a matter of financial choice.
What are the moral distinctions between the various forms of perversity? I’m not trying to be provocative for its own sake. I’m simply curious. If there is a moral distinction between two men who fuck each other in the mouth and one man who fucks a goat(or one of his grandparents)?
What is that distinction?
…and because parents love their children, they will want every advantage they can afford.
I actually saved some money by marrying a woman with very nice teeth. 6 out of 7 kids did not need braces. This left more money for buying into a community with good schools. And better prospective mates for my children. It’s worked so far – my grandchildren are all bright and beautiful. Just because I put a higher value on teeth than boobs!
Grandchildren having grandchildren (eventually) is the presumed object. Does homosexuality in fact get in the way of this object? This is yet to be proved and cannot safely be assumed. This is a murky topic without good data to look at. Census 2000 has 33% samesex female households (pop. 329K couples) reporting at least 1 child, 22% samesex male households (pop. 336K couples). The same census estimates perhaps six times as many homosexuals in population as a whole if singles were to be counted (extrapolated estimate 4.3MIL adult individuals), but can’t be sure because the questions enabling an answer weren’t asked.
Where’d you get that definition, nishi? Here’s 8 definitions of eugenics and that isn’t one of them. None of them mention self-direction at all. And you’ll note that American Heritage plays the Hitler card.
Is that a reference from elsewhere, or is it something you just proclaimed?
Is that a reference from elsewhere, or is it something you just proclaimed?
Wait. Is that one of them redundant questions I’ve heard about?
If there is a moral distinction between two men who fuck each other in the mouth and one man who fucks a goat(or one of his grandparents)?
If there’s one to be made it accrues in favor of the human being partner, because there is the potential for more than narcissitic or imaginary emotional and intellectual, connection and attachment, society and companionship etc. Not that there necessarily will be, but that there can be. It’s a value judgement, but I’d say sleeping with a grandparent is creepier, because it is more likely with the gay partners that
a: there is consensual sexual activity
b: no chance of reproducing. (A grandparent/grandchild cross is likely to be disruptive to existing family bonds and family cohesion, and no chance of concentration of deleterious genes)
c: there probably less disparity in age and power of the participants and there is far less likely for one to have been entrusted with supervision of the other’s intellectual and moral development. I’m sure there’s more to it, but that’s off the top of my head.
Hmmm. Is it a girl goat or a boy goat?
That’s really irrelevant as well. Just because you’re born a certain way does not somehow mean that you are then protected and should be allowed to engage in that manner. Being born a psychopath does not give you free reign to act upon those murderous urges. You cannot simply abandon morality because someone is genetically predisposed to an activity or desire.
In any case you cannot make blanket statements about the topic. Some absolutely choose to act out homosexual urges, some appear to have been born with the innate desire for the same gender. What’s at stake here is if it’s wrong because then none of the other arguments matter at all.
And SarahW, the only reason you feel the grandpa thing is creepier is because you’ve been so programmed by a relentless tsunami of PC propaganda about homosexuals that you’ve become somewhat numbed to what would come naturally. People still go “ick” when confronted with homosexual activity despite this effort, but it has been lessened from what you started out with as a child.
Sigh, that was me :( Forgot to fix the name field from my weak attempt at humor earlier.
” And there are suggestions that lesbians reject their femininity because they despise the vulnerability that it represents.”
And here I was thinking it was just because most of them are ugly.
To be fair though, we should be more politically correct. I believe the proper phrase is “Women in comfortable shoes”.
If there’s one to be made it accrues in favor of the human being partner, because there is the potential for more than narcissitic or imaginary emotional and intellectual, connection and attachment, society and companionship etc. Not that there necessarily will be, but that there can be. It’s a value judgement, but I’d say sleeping with a grandparent is creepier, because it is more likely with the gay partners that
a: there is consensual sexual activity
b: no chance of reproducing. (A grandparent/grandchild cross is likely to be disruptive to existing family bonds and family cohesion, and no chance of concentration of deleterious genes)
c: there probably less disparity in age and power of the participants and there is far less likely for one to have been entrusted with supervision of the other’s intellectual and moral development. I’m sure there’s more to it, but that’s off the top of my head.
Sara W
None of the things you mention amount to moral distinctions unless there is some (arbitrarily)higher standard to which you adhere.
If I get that “forever” kinda feeling when I look at my goat while you get the same sort of tingle looking at your sister, who is to call one perverse and the other sanctum?
Ask Stavros Milos, he’s in love with a sheep. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tzr5Cubph9Y
The popularity of the “it must be genetics” meme/Leftist mindfuck of heterosexuals arises from the implication that if homosexuality is biologically determined, we heterosexuals must be “born that way” and “totally not gay.” It is turning the aversion to homosexuality inside-out for political and propagandistic reasons. If you talk to homosexuals off the record, or spend any time around Bryn Mawr College, you will find that the dirty little secret of the homosexual political movement is that very few homosexuals are and have been exclusively homosexual, but this information is suppressed because it contradicts the “born that way” narrative that is necessary in the short term to win political propaganda battles – thus, for example, the California Supreme Court implicitly accepted this narrative in order to arrive at the determination that homosexuals are a suspect minority class. This also accounts for the marginalization of “bisexuals” from the hard core gay rights establishment. “Born that way” will be discarded when no longer needed – a lie useful in cramming homosexuality into the language of civil rights, nothing more.
If one revisits history, one will find that outside of the Abrahamic traditions, homosexuality was a somewhat widespread recreational exercise, engaged by men who were married or were to be married, and especially in the Near East. The homosexual identity is a very recent phenomenon pushed by those Gramschi and Marcuse types, and pretty much a-historical. Thus, homosexuality is and has been a matter that is not predetermined even if there is no element of active choice as in the way one choses ice cream. There is a matrix, with cultural open-ness to homosexual behavior on one axis and the peculiar libidinousness for homosexual sex of the individual temperament on the other axis. In ancient Babylon, one man might simply have gone along with homosexual sexual contact as recreation without much reflection as to the moral aspect of the matter as expressed by the Abrahamic traditions; in Victorian Britain, the same man would have been repulsed at the suggestion, having a minimal desire for such contact. However, in similar circumstances, another man of differing temperment may have been unable to suppress his libido in Victorian Britain.
Also, as this is one of Jeff’s favorite subjects, one should examine the history of psychiatry and psychotherapy in regards to homosexual behavior, and the absence of any current research by the mental health disciplines into the phenomenon. An absolutely chilling example of an absolute victory of Leftist totalitarianism.
Um, dude, people have always sought out mates on the basis of their genetic makeup.
I like women who like me. Is that genetically based?
Alec,
I would modulate your conclusions somewhat, based on this post by Muslihoon, a Mormon convert from Islam.
He observes how male-on-male sex is common in the Muslim world and has been for millennia, just as you say. He remarks:
My response:
There is a difference between a man going at it with anther male and falling in love with another male. The former can be nothing more than the desire to scratch an itch, whereas the latter is a psychological need for completion.
But of course, our moronic culture refuses to discuss the matter sanely. BECAUSE OF TEH HOMOFUBBIA.
Thoratlas, I didn’t pose that question at all. Ccoffer did, and I failed to put his excerpted post in quotes.
Hf – trick question. It is a stuffed goat.
“If I get that “forever†kinda feeling when I look at my goat while you get the same sort of tingle looking at your sister, who is to call one perverse and the other sanctum?”
I’d say they both are. But if there is a moral distinction to be drawn, it would accrue to the human pairing, for at least there is a chance of more than narcissistic, imaginary feelings for a person. Not that there are, but there may be. With a goat, the feelings must be imaginary or narcissistic projection.
Both are perverse, that is.
pablo, your definitions all associate eugenics with political movements.
the word eugenics was coined by Darwin’s cousin, Francis Galton (the father of twin studies), from the greek roots for “good” and “production”.
it simply means self-directed evolution to evolutionary biologists, sociobiologists, singulitarians and transhumanists.
the “scient” types.
it has come to mean something else to the general public by becoming convolved with unsavory totalitarian political movements.
Senator, I didn’t say I found homosexual sexual behaviour especially wholesome.
Just that one seems more likely, in general terms, to be associated with certain ills the other is not.
It doesn’t make the other a net good.
SarahW i think you are talking about something called the “wisdom of repugnance” or the “yuck-factor”.
Master, i think u read ramez naams boot, More Than Human?
Ramez Naam’s book, More than Human.
it simply means self-directed evolution
So what does self-directed evolution mean? Seriously, I haven’t a clue.
“He observes how male-on-male sex is common in the Muslim world and has been for millennia, just as you say.”
Yes, this I know – in Iraq, it is not uncommon to see men whom you understand to be “more than friends.” But, you see, the “look the other way” subculture in (mostly) Arab Muslim cultures allows for this expression – in other words, within the framework of what is “acceptable” homosexuality, it is a widespread phenomenon. A young man will be the “receiver,” and it is excused until he grows his first beard hairs, then it is expected that he will line up “over center” with another hairless boy/adolescent.
“There is a difference between a man going at it with anther male and falling in love with another male.”
Maybe so for Sailors, Inmates, and Cowboys. But many argue that “romantic love” is a very recent phenomenon. (I don’t buy this totally – they seem to conflate freedom in chosing a spouse with the ability to love a spouse) And for the Greeks in the Classical period, male relationships commonly had a strong element of intellectual compatability and admiration of the male lover’s attainment of virtue. Those relationships did have the faux-sexually dimorphic attributes of homosexual relationships that we perceive as common today (in fact, because of the intellectual aspect, they were in some ways superior to male/female relationships), but they were more than mutual masturbation.
I simply think that expressions of sexuality are very much a matter of what the culture permits – which is why the agenda pushed through the Courts is so pernicious – we are essentially being told that we have no right to a culture by people who do not have the authority to do so.
Alex, there are statistically significant functional and morphological differences between homosexual and heterosexual brains.
How do you account for that?
/sigh
B Moes im too tired to think straight.
ill have to address your question tomorrow.
nite
Cool, and I am totally serious, I have no idea what you mean by that term.
“Master, i think u read ramez naams boot, More Than Human?”
Is it too much of an inconvenience for you to write in legible English? I have studied Classical Greek, Latin, Gaelic, Russian, and a few others, but I simply cannot develop an eye for whatever it is that you are trying to do here. I’d like to be able to at least comprehend what you write before disagreeing with it.
Jeff!
Micah Tillman argues here that gay rights are tied to women’s rights by virtue of our decision to support suffrage by removing sex as a factor of citizenship. All genetic/biological determinism aside, two adults of the same sex should have the right to enter into the same household forming contracts as is afforded different sex couples by virtue of the fact that they are American adults.
Although gay civil rights has no connection to black civil rights, gays are on a parallel trajectory since we as a nation used to use race as a factor in determining citizenship.
yours/
peter.
Alex, there are statistically significant functional and morphological differences between homosexual and heterosexual brains.
Are those brains scanned at birth? No, they’re scanned in adulthood, after the environment, choices, and whatever else alters the brain’s function. At this point, they cannot tell the difference between the chicken and the egg.
The idea that the brain is a static entity, unchanged by our behavior, is old and untrue. So the brain scans are interesting and might point to something, or they might not.
And by citizenship I mean scope of civil rights.
=p=
“Alex, [sic] there are statistically significant functional and morphological differences between homosexual and heterosexual brains.
How do you account for that?”
I account for that as above by stating that there is no “homosexual” or “heterosexual” brain. Your premise rises and falls on the definition of “homosexual.”
Is it one who has had a single homosexual experience? More homosexual experiences than heterosexual experiences? Exclusive homosexual experiences? A “bottom?” One who self-identifies for political purposes as “homosexual?”
Perhaps in our culture, if a man is effeminite, he is “expected” or “suspected” of being a homosexual, and self-fulfills the role by engaging in homosexual sexual behavior. Perhaps being classically “flaming” is a result of a traumatic experience or failure to differntiate an identity from that of the mother.
What your brain volume studies do not measure is the volume of the brain hemispheres at all stages of physical development of the individual. You do not allow for the possibility that a psychological event that triggers “gay-ness,” and developing as a “gay” over the course of decades affects the volume of the brain hemispheres. Perhaps biology (in the case of brain hemisphere volumes and functionality) is not the cause, but the result of maintaining a gay identity (one that apes characteristics of the opposite sex). Is it wholly beyond the scope of reason that a boy who spends his days reading Sweet Valley High novels and picking pastels – rather than playing football and reading Treasure Island – develops verbal attributes like those of heterosexual women?
Alex, there are statistically significant [differences]. How do you account for that?
How do you account for the fact that you don’t understand the difference between “statistically significant” and “meaningful”, despite allegedly having a graduate degree in the subject?
Hint: the concept you’re grasping for (in your usual semiliterate manner) is called “effect size”.
“All genetic/biological determinism aside, two adults of the same sex should have the right to enter into the same household forming contracts as is afforded different sex couples by virtue of the fact that they are American adults.”
Summary: If we’s American, two American dudes can marry one another.
I suppose that actually engaging the substantive debate denied you the status of “American,” huh?
Also, contracts with one another or with third parties as a single entity?
Peter:
The argument has merit as an argument for rights, but people who oppose same-sex marriage usually don’t object on the basis of rights. They — we — are concerned about what effect it will have on society.
No civilization in the history of the world has enshrined same-sex marriage as the functional or moral equivalent of hetero marriage. As shown above, dude-on-dude action can be socially acceptable, but it has never been considered an acceptable variation thereon.
The prohibition against interracial marriage is a historical aberration, resulting from the extreme difference in social status between masters and slaves. The Spaniards were as racist as anyone, but they encouraged racial commingling to “elevate” the poor benighted brown people.
but it has never been considered an acceptable variation thereon.
Correction: But same-sex marriage has never been considered an acceptable variation on marriage, unlike polygyny, which is an effective reproductive strategy, among other things.
“The prohibition against interracial marriage is a historical aberration, resulting from the extreme difference in social status between masters and slaves. The Spaniards were as racist as anyone, but they encouraged racial commingling to “elevate†the poor benighted brown people.”
Yes – race wasn’t as significant a matter until relatively recently. IIRC, there were four black/mulatto Popes. Also, there are interracial marriages referred to in the Old Testament, without comment to the effect that those marriages were of a different class.
If you talk to homosexuals off the record, or spend any time around Bryn Mawr College, you will find that the dirty little secret of the homosexual political movement is that very few homosexuals are and have been exclusively homosexual, but this information is suppressed because it contradicts the “born that way†narrative that is necessary in the short term to win political propaganda battles
I’m convinced that homosexuality is rooted in biology, not personal preference. (Nishi has linked me up to some interesting science that reinforces this intuition, some of which she included in her comment up thread). It is only very recently that open homosexuality has become socially tolerated, and that tolerance does not extend far outside of the most cosmopolitan places. Homosexuals have been subject to rejection from their families, social ostracization and opprobium, criminal charges, and even death in some places. Knowing that, I would expect most homosexuals to go through a psychological denial stage which would compel them to attempt to lead a heterosexual life. This would account for your finding that “very few homosexuals are and have been exclusively homosexual.”
Also, it seems apparent to me that human sexuality is not sharply divided between homosexuality and heterosexuality, but ranges on a continuum from exteme heterosexuality to extreme homosexuality, with some androgynous or bi-sexual people in the middle. Again, I believe that this predisposition is biological.
#18 Sheesh; the fear and loathing of the different in here burns.
That burning you smell must be coming from your opium pipe. A subject like this will always draw in random cranks who have an obsession, but the regular PW commentariat is as tolerant as any group of people you will find anywhere. In fact, I’m guessing that gays and lesbians are very well-represented among the PW community, unlike, say, Jews at DKos.
Dan Collins refused to use air freshener after he farted and the last remaining fags on PW left in a tizzy complaining of Robert’s Rules of decorum.
I’d sure hate to to see that scene repeated. PW wouldn’t be the same without you and KK.
“it is unlikely that samesex couples would change the sexual orientation of their offspring to hetero….they might even seek to change it to reflect their own orientation!”
Samesex couples can have offspring? How does that happen?
syn,
Sience is astounding, those smart guys are always finding new stuff. For instance I used to think that there was no way to get pregnant through anal sex, and then I met a lawyer. (Cowboys fan/New Yorker/American Idol contestant/etc…)
science, that is.
Early yet.
Get it peer reviewed and published!
Aldo – people often choose things (obesity, for example, or – back in the day – the goth kids) for which they are picked on, so I don’t think that just because people are rejected by their family or schoolbuddies mean that they didn’t choose to be gay.
Of course, “choice” can be a complicated thing.
Besides, my nephew tells me that being gay is “cool” now. He’s in high school.
“It is only very recently that open homosexuality has become socially tolerated, and that tolerance does not extend far outside of the most cosmopolitan places.”
No – outside of the Abrahamic cultures, the practice was widespread as recreation, or in some ancient cultures, a form of worship (male prostitutes in the temple). Far too practiced, at those times and in those cultures – compared with today – to be attributed to biology. Are 80% of Greek men latently biologically “gay?”
“Aldo – people often choose things (obesity, for example, or – back in the day – the goth kids) for which they are picked on, so I don’t think that just because people are rejected by their family or schoolbuddies mean that they didn’t choose to be gay.”
Add to that list the choice of a religion different than that of the parents – sometimes punishable by death – yet it happened, and happens, all the time. Same thing with choice of politics or a political party, which could lead to a child’s alienation, ridicule, and rejection. Hell, the better part of the baby-boomer generation went far out of their way to be rejected by their families . . .
AleC (pardon)
What your brain volume studies do not measure is the volume of the brain hemispheres at all stages of physical development of the individual. You do not allow for the possibility that a psychological event that triggers “gay-ness,†and developing as a “gay†over the course of decades affects the volume of the brain hemispheres. Perhaps biology (in the case of brain hemisphere volumes and functionality) is not the cause, but the result of maintaining a gay identity (one that apes characteristics of the opposite sex). Is it wholly beyond the scope of reason that a boy who spends his days reading Sweet Valley High novels and picking pastels – rather than playing football and reading Treasure Island – develops verbal attributes like those of heterosexual women?
dur!
yes that is impossible. homosapiens sapiens nervous tissue growth and differentiation stops around age 7.
syn–
Samesex couples can have offspring? How does that happen?
adoption, in vitro, host womb, egg donation, and coming soon to a neighborhood near you!…ovum recombination.
my nephew tells me that being gay is “cool†now.
the proper term is “bi-curious”.
#104 i can only state that the differences are statistically significant, i do not know if they are “meaningful”. that would be up to researcher and the peer-review process.
AleC, perhaps you could read the study you are attemptin to criticise.
layppl version
my nephew tells me that being gay is “cool†now.
the proper term is “bi-curiousâ€Â.
Erm, no … full “gay” peeps are cool. Supposedly. I imagine, as how things go, in reality it’s just the attractive male and/or female gays that are cool.
My 17 y/o nephew is all for gay rights, etc. Gay acceptance is trendy. And, he lives in a pretty conservative neighborhood – Grosse Pointe.
B Moes
there are different types of eugenics.
hopefully i have adequately explained Free Market Eugenics here.
Another variant is totalitarian eugenics, the idea that the citizen, including their reproductive potential, physical body, and DNA is the property of the state. this the popularized meaning of eugenics, and the term has become so corrupted that the true meaning is probably unrecoverable.
Now biotech is just a subset of nanotech…you do believe that we are becoming successful nanotechnicians, don’t you? in biotech we stack carbon-based molecules..in nanotech we stack non-carbon-based molecules.
we are coming into the age of designer eugenics, where we will be able to improve homosapiens sapiens by editing our DNA.
the selfish genes code for three things…..reproduction, survial, and death.
why death? because a species cannot evolve without individual death.
that is why there are no immortal species.
so biological anti-senescense, like de Grey promotes, is one of the major research topics for designer eugenics.
AlecL
No – outside of the Abrahamic cultures, the practice was widespread as recreation, or in some ancient cultures, a form of worship (male prostitutes in the temple). Far too practiced, at those times and in those cultures – compared with today – to be attributed to biology. Are 80% of Greek men latently biologically “gay?â€Â
Indeed. The modern definition of “homosexual” would be unrecognizable in ancient Greece or Rome. Sexual practices were about defining one’s social position. For a male citizen, proper objects of lust were women, slaves and young boys. Pedastry was accepted and celebrated.
It should be noted, too, that even in such cultures, same-sex marriage was unknown. Marriage was a family contract and concerned things like property, inheritance and the legitimizing of children.
What Judaism brought to the stage was an ethical monotheistic religion that channeled male sexuality (which in and of itself can be expressed over a wide range … men seem to have a great capacity to sexualize/fetishize any number of objects) into monogamy with women.
erm, sure carin, the beautiful are always cool.
but my cousins and their cohort (douglas county colorado, highest median house price in the country) endorse the whole bi-curious model.
not quite as yucky as full blown homosexuality with that “poop stabbing” yah know.
i can only state that the differences are statistically significant, i do not know if they are “meaningfulâ€Â. that would be up to researcher and the peer-review process.</I.
Translation: “I tried to bullshit everyone with some jargon and got caught at it.”
I have the full text of the article in front of me right now. It’s the usual mishmash of cookbook stats and ass-covering that gets published all too often nowadays.
1) As expected, no effect size is discussed. Thus, totally meaningless.
2) They found a correlation. Say it with me, GURRRRRRRRLLJEEENIUS: “Correlation is not _______”.
Closing my italic tag. Sorry about that.
SBP, its PNAS.
take it up with them.
SBP, its PNAS.
You’re the one who advanced it in support of your thesis, GURRRRRRRRLLJEEENIUS. I’m taking it up with you.
Let me guess: you never read the actual study. An overblown summary was printed in one of those popsci rags that you feed on.
again, i am talking about libertarian eugenics i guess. we discover how to do anti-senescense treatments, the individual decides if they want them or perhaps if they can afford them.
pablo, your definitions all associate eugenics with political movements.
Those are not “my” definitions. Those are THE definitions, as described by 8 dictionaries, which is where we keep THE definitions.
That’s not what Galton said when he coined it. “The investigation of human eugenics, that is, of the conditions under which men of a high type are produced.” [Galton, “Human Faculty,” 1883] Nothing at all about self-direction.
Please cite something authoritative that supports your position, or I’ll assume that you just made it up as you usually do.
But that is not the couple having offspring. That is, at most, one person having a child with no biological input from the other. And people who adopt are not having offspring, the child is not their offspring. You call your self a scientist, and you can’t figure that out?
Dear God, you’re hysterical, lolscientist. But since I’m in the mood for some coherent crazee, I think I’ll go hang with The Colonel.
SPB, i read it, and i’ve read other studies. the difference in brain morpholgy and function as correlated with sexual orientation has been studied quite extensively, probably since the advent of fMRI.
Aldo chose this study, and im analyzing it in the context of cochran’s gay germ theory and zimmer’s Parasite Rex and the Red Queen Theory of sexual evolution.
you are welcome to criticize.
that is how science works.
Re: 110 Hey Aldo. Perhaps you agree that it is somewhat strange or even ironic that while I accept and support my children’s decisions, a position that to me, says tolerance, it’s not enough for those whose agenda will accept no less than everyone embracing their politics.
I suppose everyone needs an excuse these days. No one’s actually responsible for anything they do. I’m a victim of my genes!
wow pablo….adopted children aren’t “real” children?
thats harsh. ;)
there are four paths of heredity. genetic, epigentic, symbolic and behavioral.
adopted children inherient symbolic and behavioral traits from their adoptive parents.
hetero couples use host wombs, in-vitro, and donated eggs too.
are those children not their biological offspring?
BTW, only one of THE definitions makes any reference to or implication of any political movement whatsoever. No such association exists in any way shape or form in 7 others, and the one that does mention the Nazis does so in a note, not in it’s definition of the word. Said note makes it awfully clear that eugenics is not self directed, as the Nazis were not seeking volunteers. Is nishi illiterate or full of shit or both? You make the call!
No, that’s not what I said, you idiot. They are not the offspring of their adoptive parents.
pablo, that is myelinization of existing neurons.
it is neither increase on humber of neurons or in appreaciable brain volume.
So, increase on humber stops around 7? Oglooby!
ducktrapper
It is nature, not society, that our greatest opressor.
–Camille Paglia
you can make men equal under the Law, but you cannot make them equal under the genes.
yet. ;)
ifference in brain morpholgy and function as correlated with sexual orientation has been studied quite extensively
I’ll bet money that there’s a strong correlation between sexual orientation and the mean number of Barry Manilow albums owned.
That means what, exactly?
Two words: “jack” and “shit”.
if i might redirect you on topic, pablo, splitting hairs on the definition of eugenics is rather counter-productive.
i can call it designer evolution if you prefer.
Oh, and GURRRRLJEENIUS: I don’t really need a lecture from a semiliterate psychotic on “how science works”.
Hey, has nishi stopped lying yet?
No?
OK.
that is fine SBP, you are certainly entitled to your opinion.
so, pablo, if two men have a baby with one donating sperm, and using a donated or purchased oocyte, invitro fertilization, and a host womb, isn’t that their biological offspring?
isnt that standard reproductive therapy for heterocouple with fertility problems?
It’s one of theirs, not both. Why am I even answering such an idiotic question to someone who claims to be a biologist of sorts? How could you possibly need such obvious information explained to you?
Not splitting hairs. Your definition of the word does not resemble any that i can find. I am absolutely right and supported by every reference material that has been put on the table. You are wrong and your only support is your own assertion. Nope, not splitting hairs at all.
that is fine SBP, you are certainly entitled to your opinion.
It’s my “opinion” that correlation and causation aren’t the same thing?
Whatever you say, GURRRRRRLJEEENIUS.
If the egg comes from the mother of the non-sperm donating male member of the pair-bond, you could say they have a .75 biological offspring, I suppose. If the egg comes from the sister of the same male member, you’re down to .625, no? If from an aunt, smaller percentage still, etc. through the potential permutations of near relatives. Otherwise, one of them has a biological offspring, the other does not.
so, pablo, if two men have a baby with one donating sperm, and using a donated or purchased oocyte, invitro fertilization, and a host womb, isn’t that their biological offspring?
Sdferr, Pablo, then a hetero couple using exactly the same reproductive therapy would also be only “part parent” right?
Comment by Sdferr on 6/20 @ 8:39 am #
If the egg comes from the mother of the non-sperm donating male member of the pair-bond, you could say they have a .75 biological offspring, I suppose. If the egg comes from the sister of the same male member, you’re down to .625, no? If from an aunt, smaller percentage still, etc. through the potential permutations of near relatives. Otherwise, one of them has a biological offspring, the other does not.
That must be the symbolic heredity variety. What bullshit?
/shrug, be right.
i will say designer evolution from here on.
;)
one question tho…is Free Market Eugenics self-directed?
hahaha
SBP, i am speculating, a thought experiment if you will, about the interlationships of cochrans gaygerm theory, the PNAS study, the Red Queen theory of sexual evolution and Carl Zimmers work on parasitology.
i am thinking about how these things might work together to support a biological basis for sexual orientation.
Sdferr, Pablo, then a hetero couple using exactly the same reproductive therapy would also be only “part parent†right?
Oh, I thought you were talking about the scientific aspect, not the legal?
Time for the nishidiot okie-dokie!
I don’t think there is anything especially symbolic about sharing part of my genome with my half-sister. My father and her father were two different men. My mother and her mother was the same person.
What nishi intends by including ‘symbolic’ in her list of hereditary items, I do not know. I could guess, but what would be the point of that?
“…be only ‘part parent’ right?…
Wrong. Try part biological parent.
lulz…..i gtg go to work.
have a nice day, proteins.
;)
…i am speculating, a thought experiment if you will…
Really? Speculating? It’s funny(sort of), that after all your comments, that’s the first time you mentioned you were specualting.
And you think that will catch on? You know nothing about humanity. Partners aren’t, on a wide scale, going to tell each other that they’d rather have someone else’s kids because the partner isn’t quite up to snuff. Unless, of course, not being up to snuff means the partner is incapable of providing the means of recreation.
Would you have a baby with your lover’s sperm and another woman’s egg because you both think hers are better than yours?
Reproduction, not recreation. And yes, a wicked Freudian slip.
means of recreation
You mean, like golf clubs, footballs, movie tickets? Sorry, couldn’t resist.
Teh Players Must Seize the Means of Recreation! And that includes you, Condom. And you too, HappyBunny.
SBP, i am speculating,
No, you were bloviating.
Two entirely different things, GURRRRLJEEENIUS.
If “gayness” is a matter biology and not preference, and science determines it can be altered, then it becomes a matter of preference anyway, simply after the fact.
And in some scenarios it’s the parents’ preference rather than the individual’s.
FWIW, Sociology says that “normal” is a greater than 20% occurance within the population.
Recreation, like LUGs in college. Lesbian Until Graduation.
If “gayness†is a matter biology and not preference, and science determines it can be altered, then it becomes a matter of preference anyway, simply after the fact.
That was Jeff’s original premise of the post.
RTO trainer —
That was precisely my point. If it is determined that homosexuality is biologically determined, the proof would have to be in identifying the determinant factors in the biology. Which, to follow this out to its logical extreme, would mean that, ultimately, were science to pursue it (and that’s another question entirely: I imagine at that point the gay rights groups, like the militant deaf groups before them, would become nishi’s BIOLUDDITES), parents and, depending on the age of “the cause,” children themselves, would have the choice to either embrace the biological anomaly (used to suggest that the default and preferred evolutionary course is heterosexual desire for means of procreation), or to “correct” it.
Which means, ultimately, that this desire to privilege the determinism thesis could be the very thing that leads to actual choice, rather than the hypothetical battle now between those who think homosexuality is innate and biological, and those who think it a preference. And at that point, I suspect “correction” would win out — though doubtless there’d be people who embraced their anomalous biology, just as there are deaf people who embrace their deafness, because it provides them with a distinct identity.
But at that point, I don’t think society would be under as much pressure to treat homosexuals as a protected class for the purposes of civil rights, particularly if we can say that they have simply refused “treatment” to correct what is a biological anomaly.
I’m not saying this is my position necessarily, understand. But that has been the gist of this discussion for me.
Oh, and to Christopher Taylor —
I addressed you concerns in one of the earlier comments.
B Moes
there are different types of eugenics.
hopefully i have adequately explained Free Market Eugenics here.
Another variant is totalitarian eugenics, the idea that the citizen, including their reproductive potential, physical body, and DNA is the property of the state. this the popularized meaning of eugenics, and the term has become so corrupted that the true meaning is probably unrecoverable.
That is real nice, nishi, but I asked you to explain what you meant by self-directed eugenics.
Interesting that although homosexual practice has existed for millenia, self-identification as homosexual, and the practice of homosexuality as a lifestyle is a fairly recent development.
At least in the realm of theory, I tend to believe that sexual behaviour, particularly that outside of ‘traditional’ man-woman wedlock was made a taboo thing by Western culture, and as a result, those who wished to indulge in other practices were essentially cast out of society, and found a niche in the “gay” subculture. Currently, because of the rigidity of sexual identity definitions, people who would otherwise be “generally” heterosexual, but occasionally practice homosexual sex, are shoehorned into identifying as either “gay” or “straight” exclusively. Certainly labels exist (bisexual, pansexual, etc.) but those who identify under those labels are generally alienated by those on BOTH ends of the spectrum.
So, in a nutshell, do I beleive in an existence of a “gay gene”? Nope. I do believe that it’s a choice, albeit subconscious, that’s the result of much pressure from both mainstream and counterculture sides.
dammit.
Oops. Aldo beat me to it.
And it is on that premise that I’d like to conversation to proceed.
When I have time after breakfast, I’ll turn my last comment into a follow-up post, so those interested can continue this conversation.
Meanwhile, my ears are burning, which means — in addition to my being called a “racist” for my “whitey” posts (my racism is akin to that of Sly and the Family Stone’s, only most of them can’t be racist, given that they’re black, so that’s kinda cool for them and sucks for me) — there are doubtless lefty sites out there noting my HOMOPHOBIA.
From which I don’t suffer, incidentally. I have long stated I support civil unions, and that I simply don’t accept a new kind of contract being shoehorned into an existing, and clearly defined, type of male/female contract.
that this desire to privilege the determinism thesis could be the very thing that leads to actual choice,
in theory that is fine, but in practice at that point parents may simply choose to expend their fundage on more cost viable enhancements like IQ or beauty.
also, correcting sexual orientation would be the same as correcting race or gender.
unless of course you are applying judeoxian ethics to judge that homosexuality is somehow “wrong”, and should be corrected. ;)
after Aldo and i read “A Partisan Century”, i would like to read Citizen Cyborg, which has excellent discussions of these issues.
Darleen, you said,
“What Judaism brought to the stage was an ethical monotheistic religion that channeled male sexuality…into monogamy with women.”
Um, no, that’s not quite right. Judaism, while condemning homosexuality, didn’t establish, condone, or practice monogamy. The Roman rule of the Jews established monogamy. That’s a pretty basic fact in Judeo-Christian history.
[…] of interesting discussion in yesterday’s post on the (still debatable) cause or causes of homosexuality, but much of it has gotten away from the […]
As promised, the follow up is here. Oh, and it turns out I was correct about how lefties might react to these kinds of posts.
Once again, the “failed academic” thing shows up — all in an effort to silence those who’d try to have an open discussion.
Which is why when I heard we’d be having an open discussion on race, I just kind of smirked a bit, knowing that the most adamant activists on the left would never, ever allow such a thing.
First of all, this is not about me. I’m simply raising the questions because I’m interested in the debate.
What you should concern yourself with, nishi, is how much judeo christian ethics underpins the fabric of our society, and how THAT would influence whether or not people see homosexuality as either wrong or, less inflammatory, undesirable for one reason or another.
I’m not making value judgments (those who photoshop me humping a stuffed animal, on the other hand…). What I’m doing is trying to get a nice discussion going. And for that, I need to be excoriated.
Such are the wages of progressivism.
after Aldo and i read “A Partisan Centuryâ€Â, i would like to read Citizen Cyborg, which has excellent discussions of these issues.
I’ll get it this weekend.
Which is why when I heard we’d be having an open discussion on race, I just kind of smirked a bit, knowing that the most adamant activists on the left would never, ever allow such a thing.
sure they would. In fact they demanded a discussion, right after they succeeded at re-defining racism as a concept that only applies to white males.
Which is called begging the question.
At any rate, you are all invited to join the new thread. And to visit the sites of my detractors, who have once again attacked me for being a stay at home father and a “failed academic.”
If only I’d had them in one of my seminars. I could have perhaps saved them from turning into such impotent pricks.
So….who are these people who decide one day to be heterosexual? I never had that inner conversation. Not ever. I am interested to talk to the folks who say that sexual preference is a choice (one that they, apparently, made).
I would posit that if you had some moment where it was a toss-up whether you were gonna go for the beaver or the boner and you had to make a lifestyle choice…well…sit down and let’s chat about that.
Lisa – I know of 2 married couples where a husband and a wife ended the marriage in order to switch teams. I also know a formerly gay dude married to a scorching hot lady. So, it appears that their tastes can evolve.
Lisa, I believe there’s a term, bisexual, for people who choose on a case-by-case basis. I imagine they may also seek encounters in which they don’t even have to choose.
If they’re women, and want to have three-ways with a straight couple, they can be very popular with straight guys. With straight guys’ straight girlfriends, maybe not so much.
Lisa: You do not seem to understand the definition of ‘choice’. Yes, in some instances ‘choice’ can mean an initial ‘undefined’ state, and you then move into a defined state. A simple example is when you play chess and have to decide who is white and who is black.
Another definition of choice would be that of the switch; there is an initial ‘default’ state, and you flip-flop that state. You hope that switches come with an ‘off’ as default. Similar to your choice whether to get a passport or not; the default is ‘no’ but you pays your money and you gets your passport.
My way of looking at it is that the ‘default’ is heterosexuality, or at least hetero-leaning. Because while I consider myself to be extremely heterosexual, there are circumstances where I won’t mind dipping my wick in the strange, so to speak. Hence, we say it is a choice; if your ‘default’ for some reason has been misconfigured, it should be reconfigured properly. Similarly, if you flip a proper configuration to a misconfiguration, then you should understand that it is a choice. YMMV.
McGehee: Damn straight! Pun intended ;) Some katoeys, holy schmoly! And, of course, hot bi-gals.