It’s Not Okay to be Anti-Gay | Rodney Kennedy

Contents:

• BEG GAY NOT A CHOICE: SCIENCE CONTRADICTS BEN CARSON
• ‘I AM GAY – BUT I WASN’T BORN THIS WAY’
• WHY ARE PEOPLE GAY? GAY BY CHOICE OR IS BEG GAY GEIC?
• IS BEG 'GAY' A CHOICE? SCIENCE SAYS Y (BUT NOT THE WAY YOU'RE THKG)
• IS IT A CHOICE TO BE GAY? IT DEPENDS ON THE MEANG OF 'IT'
• PROOF THAT BEG GAY IS NOT A CHOICE
• CAN PEOPLE STOP BEG GAY?
• MACKLEMORE IS RIGHT. BEG GAY ISN'T A CHOICE, IT'S A CIVIL RIGHTS ISSUE.
• WHY WOULD PEOPLE 'CHOOSE' TO BE GAY?
• THERE IS NO ‘GAY GENE.’ THERE IS NO ‘STRAIGHT GENE.’ SEXUALY IS JT PLEX, STUDY NFIRMS
• THE 'GAY GENE' IS A MYTH BUT BEG GAY IS 'NATURAL,' SAY SCIENTISTS
• BEG GAY: A LIFE STYLE CHOICE?
• IT’S NOT OKAY TO BE ANTI-GAY
• 'PASSAG' DIRECTOR NOUNC 'DANGERO' NC-17 RATG ON A FILM PICTG A GAY LOVE STORY
• KEN HAS ALWAYS BEEN BARBIE’S GAY BT FRIEND—NOT HER BOYIEND
• NFL ASSISTANT ACH OUT AS GAY
• THE POWER 'CHOOSG TO BE GAY'
• BEG GAY IS NOT A CHOICE
• WHAT’S WRONG WH CHOOSG TO BE GAY?WHAT’S WRONG WH CHOOSG TO BE GAY?
• DO GAYS HAVE A CHOICE?
• WHAT MY ANGRY CRICS GET WRONG ABOUT MY CHOICE TO BE GAY
• SECTN 2: KNOWG GAYS AND LBIANS, RELIG CONFLICTS, BELIEFS ABOUT HOMOSEXUALY
• NO, BEG GAY IS NOT A CHOICE
• CYNTHIA NIXON: I'M GAY BY CHOICE
• DO THE BIBLE SAY BEG GAY IS A CHOICE?

BEG GAY NOT A CHOICE: SCIENCE CONTRADICTS BEN CARSON

If we fe beg gay as engagg homosexual behavr (the ncept of “gay” as an inty is a Wtern cultural ncept – people who have sex wh both men and women may ll themselv gay, straight or bisexual, pendg on the l of their culture or subculture), then people stop beg gay as soon as they stop engagg this behavr. If sexual preference n be altered, then people who support gay rights n’t rely on the argument that gay people should be protected om discrimatn bee gay people have no choice but to be gay – an argument that seems like an apology for homosexualy, as if homosexualy is a disease for which there is no cure.

Ben Carson, a retired nrosurgeon and printial hopeful, recently apologized for a statement which he said beg gay is "absolutely" a an terview on CNN, the potential 2016 Republin printial ndidate mented that "a lot of people who go to prison, go to prison straight, and when they e out they're gay, so did somethg happen while they were there?

And nearly 130 bird speci have been observed engagg sexual activi wh same-sex the evolutnary purpose of this behavr is not clear, the fact that animals routely exhib same-sex behavr beli the notn that gay sex is a morn human studi have found specific "gay gen" that reliably make someone gay. You so obvly nnot be gay, was her implitn, bee this is good was 2006, a full five years before Lady Gaga would set the Born This Way argument atop s unassailable cultural perch, but even then the popular unrstandg of orientatn was that was somethg you were born wh, somethg you uldn’t change. Throughout the same perd, the number of Amerins who believe homosexualy is “due to someone’s upbrgg/environment” fell om jt unr 60% to ias reached cril mass pop culture, first wh Lady Gaga’s 2011 Born This Way and one year later wh Macklemore’s Same Love, the chos of which has a gay person sgg “I n’t change even if I tried, even if I wanted to.

‘I AM GAY – BUT I WASN’T BORN THIS WAY’

In fact, the homophobic and non-homophobic rponnts he studied shared siar levels of belief a Born This Way Samantha Allen not at The Daily Beast, the growg public support for gays and lbians has grown out of proportn wh the rise the number of people who believe homosexualy is fixed at birth; would be unlikely that this small change opn uld expla the spike support for gay marriage, for stance.

WHY ARE PEOPLE GAY? GAY BY CHOICE OR IS BEG GAY GEIC?

The APA, for example, while notg that most people experience ltle to no choice over their orientatns, says this of homosexualy’s origs:“Although much rearch has examed the possible geic, hormonal, velopmental, social and cultural fluenc on sexual orientatn, no fdgs have emerged that perm scientists to nclu that sexual orientatn is termed by any particular factor or factors. ” Acrdg to LeVay’s rearch, a specific part of the bra, the third terstial nucls of the anterr hypothalam (INAH-3), is smaller homosexual men than is heterosexual as they might, scientists have stggled to inty any particular gen that nsistently predict the directns of our love and sire (Cred: Ignac Lehmann)Read moreYou n spot the problem wh this study a e away: were the gay bras LeVay studied born that way, or did they bee that way?

Bis the dividual criqu leveled agast each new study announcg some gay gene disvery, there are major methodologil cricisms to make about the entire enterprise general, as Grzanka pots out: “If we look at the raveno pursu, particularly among Amerin scientists, to fd a gay gene, what we see is that the ncln has already been arrived at. “Limg our unrstandg of any plex human experience is always gog to be worse than allowg to be plited, ” he gay rights activists pared sexualy to relign - a ccial part of our life that we should be ee to practise however we like (Cred: Ignac Lehamann)So what are we to do wh the Born This Way rhetoric? If Nixon feels this was her choice, so be at a mimum, is imperative to clear up the nfn between sexual attractn and sexual actn -- not bee a same-sex sexual attractn has anythg wrong wh (ed, the problem wh bracketg the moral qutn of choice is that wast an opportuny to argue that, the words of the late Frank Kameny, "gay is good"), but bee the suggtn that we chose our sexual attractns do not make sense ('s not jt wrong; 's lerally meangls).

IS BEG 'GAY' A CHOICE? SCIENCE SAYS Y (BUT NOT THE WAY YOU'RE THKG)

And here is equally imperative that we sist that those actns are dignified choic, not bee they're done behd closed doors or bee no one has the right to judge others' actns -- they do, jt as progrsiv rightly judge those who oppose payg tax or recyclg or treatg their children nonvlently -- but bee there's nothg wrong wh same-sex activy, and bee choosg to act a way that's nsistent wh your sexual orientatn -- gay, bi, or straight -- is a posive moral good.

Viewg attractn and actn this way -- distguishg between re parts of our inti and the choic we make as to how to exprs aspects of those inti -- uld go far toward puttg to rt the ia that we n choose to be gay, or the equally false ia that if we do choose a same-sex partner, there's anythg wrong wh that choice. Helpful rpons of a therapist treatg an dividual who is troubled about her or his same sex attractns clu helpg that person actively pe wh social prejudic agast homosexualy, succsfully rolve issu associated wh and rultg om ternal nflicts, and actively lead a happy and satisfyg life. The phrase “g out” is ed to refer to several aspects of lbian, gay, and bisexual persons’ experienc: self-awarens of same-sex attractns; the tellg of one or a few people about the attractns; wispread disclosure of same-sex attractns; and intifitn wh the lbian, gay, and bisexual muny.

Now, if you fd yourself overwhelmgly attracted to members of the oppose sex, and not at all to members of the same sex (obvly, the are oversimplifitns; sex is not a simple bary), you would be a bad cizen of your language muny to go on and apply the label “gay” to yourself. The timele of events history that led to the propagatn of the “’s not a choice” unter-argument clearly shows that this is not herently a matter of gay-rights activism, but, rather, a necsary graspg unto somethg prented by a segment of the scientific muny that simultaneoly uld enable a need moment of relief om relentls attacks agast the soul. If a group rts s beliefs ( the se of creatnism) or s moral standpot ( the se of gay rights) on a set of claims that are unlikely to be borne out by the evince (or reful nceptual analysis), then risks losg s beliefs, or sacrificg s moral standpot, when the plex realy n no longer be nied.

IS IT A CHOICE TO BE GAY? IT DEPENDS ON THE MEANG OF 'IT'

However, they are only one type of some of , evince like that n be pellg enough by self to nstute proof, based on the crentials of the sourc, but for others, science’s put on homosexualy, wh s geic this and hormonal that, is too dry and impersonal to be to homosexualy, medice and science n only tell half the story. There are no verified s of formerly gay people pletely riddg themselv of same-sex attractn, but do appear possible for some people who are predisposed to same-sex attractn to expand their sexual repertoire — velop attractns for oppose-sex partners as well, and even opt for the oppose sex exclively. As Diamond noted January the Archiv of Sexual Behavr, femal' sexual fluidy may emerge om the fdg that, across the board, they are sexually aroed by imag of both men and women (whereas men are typilly aroed only by members of their preferred sex) erotic plasticy may expla why women wh same-sex predisposns report better succs adjtg to heterosexual liftyl than gay men do.

PROOF THAT BEG GAY IS NOT A CHOICE

Wrg a few days after the Grammy Awards, durg which Queen Latifah officiated a mass same-sex and heterosexual weddg to the tune of Macklemore and Ryan Lewis's "Same Love, " Ambroso argued that while may be polilly expedient to say homosexualy is born, dog so gloss over how “fluid” sexualy really is and ni the eedom of choosg our own inty.

Normally heterosexual characters sudnly displayg homosexual leangs when a boost viewg figur are need is a mon trope the days, so you n sort of see how this might make some people thk ’s a “choice”, if they lack more realistic sayg that sexualy is set stone om birth is also not que right, the ma emphasis of those g the choice argument is that homosexuals have weighed up their optns and nscly cid “I am gog to be gay om now on”. Comedian Todd Glass mak a brilliant pot his book (which is great, I got for Christmas), which is that if you genuely believe sexualy is a choice, then you’re not actually straight, you jt haven’t met anyone persuasive enough those who argue that homosexualy is a choice variably assert that is a wrong choice.

“As a teenager tryg to unrstand myself and unrstand my sexualy, I looked at the ter for “the gay gene” and obvly me across Xq28, ” said Fah Sathirapongsasuti, a study -thor and senr scientist at 23andMe, which he joked once led him to believe he hered his gayns om his mother.

CAN PEOPLE STOP BEG GAY?

The news this week that the largt study of s kd failed to nfirm the existence of a "gay gene" is not so much a disappotment for those lookg to unrstand the LGBTQ muny, as is an acknowledgement that science do not need to tell what should be plaly obv: gays, lbians, bisexuals and pansexuals are who they are. Still other studi have explored a lk between homosexualy and handns (wh gays havg a greater likelihood of beg left-hand or ambixtro) as well as hair whorl (wh the hair at the crown of gay men’s heads tendg to grow unterclockwise), though there are differg views on the last two. Southern Baptists—like others the Relig Right—seem unable or unwillg to hear how their own antigay theology, along wh the false social-scientific evince they prent about the danger of beg gay, driv their antigay polics and echo that of Wtboro Baptist Church, even if their posture is more pleasant, their graphics ls graphic, and their words more tactful.

MACKLEMORE IS RIGHT. BEG GAY ISN'T A CHOICE, IT'S A CIVIL RIGHTS ISSUE.

But to actually be lockg ey wh Ellen and hold her, shakg hands as she said, "I'm gay, " on natnal televisn and for the first time, as she has shared outloud that way publicly, was such a profoundly extraordary and timate gift to that moment that I will forever be grateful for. In the Hays Co era, explic referenc to homosexualy weren’t allowed, so characters like Van Buren (Frankl Pangborn) 1937’s Easy Livg, Kip (David Wayne) 1949’s Adam’s Rib, or Addison (Gee Sanrs) 1950’s All About Eve stead were imbued wh effemate characteristics, offerg a glimpse outsi of heteronormativy whout explicly beg of the characters were the same—some were tty, others sweet. While there is no way to “drs gay, ” there are several dolls that seem to suggt otherwise, such as:Fashnista Ken #193, who looks very exced to tell you about his new obssn, Troye Sivan;Travel Ken Doll, who has a satchel perfect for bathho and a purple overnight bag that lerally proclaims he’s “extra;”Ken Looks Doll, servg “I’m gonna give you a makeover”-type realns while sportg black pleather pants;This Ken, who wears the least heterosexual double nim I have a feelg the new Barbie movie will put the work to nvce that Ken is a hetero du who lov nothg life more than Barbie herself, the wrg’s already on the wall: Ken is, and always will be, Barbie’s gay bt obssg!

It is a big leap om thkg that homosexualy is a ep part of one's sense of self to assertg that particular sexual formatns and sir are blogilly of do not thk of our sexual sir or inti as ak to that almost nsumerist notn of choice—a liberate and straightforward act, like choosg to eat lobster or buy a pair of Nik.

WHY WOULD PEOPLE 'CHOOSE' TO BE GAY?

" Gay evabily is posed as the narrative of our liv; one do not "bee" gay but eher reprs or accepts what is always already laypeople and scientists fervently believe that "scientific rearch n help dispel some of the myths about homosexualy that the past have cloud the image of lbians and gay men, " th perhaps openg the door to more "tolerant" attus.

This gets to the heart of a real problem: In searchg for a blogil basis for homosexualy, most scientists nnot help but re-scribe the most nstraed fns of sexual inty, fns that have been vigoroly challenged by theorists and historians for theorists have long disputed the easy assumptns that lk behavrs wh inti. The assumptn of "gay" as a tegory clearly leated and easily knowable is challenged theoretilly, historilly, and many Lat and Central Amerin ntexts, for example, more emphasis is placed on an dividual's relatnship to particular sexual acts than to some totalizg inty, so who perat and who gets perated may— some ntexts—be more termative of inty than "sodomy" many South Asian cultur, such as Thailand, sexual inti are formed much more around specific kds of genr portment, which do not translate easily to the simple moniker "gay.

THERE IS NO ‘GAY GENE.’ THERE IS NO ‘STRAIGHT GENE.’ SEXUALY IS JT PLEX, STUDY NFIRMS

Native Amerin ncepts of "two-spir" or "berdache" don't f easily wh the normative ncept of homosexualy as a unique mory inty eher, as dit an unrstandg of genr inty at odds wh the mastream Amerin mol of mappg genr onto sexed when this nuanced and plited historil and cross-cultural work nonts the recent obssn wh immutabily and blogil origs, we have a ser set of problems, if not real ntradictns. One is no longer someone who lik a ltle this or a ltle that, but one is a gay person, part of a class or even speci of scientists have "rolved" this very ser fnal problem wh a batn of subjects' self-reportg, clared homosexual experienc, and measured physlogil reactn to visual stimuli. A woman who f herself as exclively heterosexual might get turned on by a geo gay man (or woman), but this says ltle about her own self-intifitn or her own actual sexual behavrs and practic (which, turn, may say ltle about her inty) if one reports that one is gay for a scientific study, but fact has never had same-sex sexual behavr, then how is that measured?

THE 'GAY GENE' IS A MYTH BUT BEG GAY IS 'NATURAL,' SAY SCIENTISTS

While gay teachers may not "turn" kids gay (jt as my hetero parents failed to turn me hetero), n't we also offer up the possibily that openly gay teachers (or neighbors or mothers or firefighters) may create environments that enurage expansive thkg about sexualy and genr? Challengg both the fear of homosexualy and the iology of immutabily that attempts to refute that fear pends on a very different set of assumptns: that beg gay is jt fe, thank you very much; that gayns is not a problem to be unrstood, or solved, or even tolerated; and, more to the pot, that there is a posive benef to an expansive and open approach to human sexualy and genr. Numero legislative and judicial efforts are currently unrway to outlaw voluntary therapy or to ny the legimacy of adults who experience some level of same-sex attractn but choose not to engage same-sex relatns or intify themselv as gay or lbian, on the grounds that such actns ny their immutable nature.

Followg Polrman’s study, a team of proment sexualy rearchers terpreted the replited low level of herabily to suggt that, while ternal sexual attractn may not be socially malleable, the adoptn of a sexual inty unnstraed by ternal attractn—homosexual, heterosexual, or somethg else—is well wh the range of velopment for most people. On the General Social Survey (a biennial statistil profile of the US populatn fund by the Natnal Science Foundatn), 57 percent of people who intify as gay (40 percent of gay men and 78 percent of lbian women) report havg had one or more oppose-sex sex partners sce age eighteen.

BEG GAY: A LIFE STYLE CHOICE?

Which means that tim and muni where the prsure agast beg gay is harsh—durg the 1950s, say, or certa relig muni—the few who “e out” and embrace beg gay are often the on wh no leeway whatsoever, for whom nyg or ignorg that overwhelmg ternal directn would be emotnal suici. In the 1968 edn of the Diagnostic and Statistil Manual of Mental Disorrs (DSM)—the dispensable diagnostic tool ed by therapists—homosexualy appeared the sectn on sexual viatns as an stance of an aberratn which sexual terts are “directed primarily toward objects other than people of the oppose sex.

IT’S NOT OKAY TO BE ANTI-GAY

Whereas is te that some homosexuals had poor relatnships wh their fathers when they were growg up, is impossible to say whether those fathers produced homosexual tennci their sons by rejectg them or, stead, whether some fathers simply tend to shun boys who are effemate at the outset. Bee of the enormo prsur phg all of toward the straight end of the Sexual Orientatn Contuum om the time we are very young, is reasonable to assume that most of the people who currently live as homosexuals were probably close to the gay end of the ntuum to beg wh; other words, they probably have strong geic tennci toward homosexualy. The Natnal Center for Btechnil Informatn study he c, for stance, reads (alics me): “Available evince suggts that male homosexualy is … somewhat herable … However, most studi have reced subjects a relatively unsystematic manner … and hence suffer om the potential methodologil flaw of ascertament bias ….

'PASSAG' DIRECTOR NOUNC 'DANGERO' NC-17 RATG ON A FILM PICTG A GAY LOVE STORY

” Michelson tak one step further, wrg that my “dangero” say uld have "unthkably terrifyg nsequenc, " fuelg "the barbaric practice of 'nversn therapy'" and anti-gay legislatn untri like Uganda and as I’ve already poted out, aspects of Michelson and Arana’s arguments—specifilly their pot about bifurtg inty and sire—uld also be taken as fuel for LGBT discrimatn.

KEN HAS ALWAYS BEEN BARBIE’S GAY BT FRIEND—NOT HER BOYIEND

But as those dividuals phed for legimacy and the ernment and ary attempted to start intifyg them, “homosexuals” and their “sexual preference” beme the most monly accepted people have moved further away om a clil approach and tend to speak more affirmatively about sexualy, “preference” has bee stigmatized favor of “orientatn, ” Leap Senate Judiciary Commtee qutned Supreme Court nomee Amy Coney Barrett on the send day of nfirmatn heargs on Oct.

NFL ASSISTANT ACH OUT AS GAY

As he wrote, “It is a characteristic of the human md that tri to dichotomize s classifitn of phenomena…Sexual behavr is eher normal or abnormal, socially acceptable or unacceptable, heterosexual or homosexual; and many persons do not want to believe that there are gradatns the matters om one to the other extreme” (Ksey et al., 1953, p. In terms of specific numbers, Ksey found that (a) 37 percent of mal and 13 percent of femal had had at least one same-sex experience; (b) 10 percent of mal had mostly homosexual experienc between the ag of 16 and 55, while up to 6 percent of femal had mostly homosexual experienc between the ag of 20 and 35; (c) 4 percent of mal were exclively homosexual after adolcence began, pared to 1–3 percent of femal; and (d) 46 percent of mal eher had engaged both heterosexual and homosexual experienc or had been attracted to persons of both sex, pared to 14 percent of femal.

THE POWER 'CHOOSG TO BE GAY'

Greek lyric poets sg of male love om almost the earlit agments down to the end of classil tim…Vase-paters portray sr of homoerotic scen, hundreds of scriptns celebrate the love of boys, and such affairs enter to the liv of a long talogue of famo Greek statmen, warrrs, artists, and thors.

Supportg this view, many gays say they realized they were gay durg adolcence, jt as straights would say they realized they were straight durg their own adolcence; moreover, evince (om toy, play, and clothg preferenc) of future sexual orientatn even appears durg childhood (Rieger, Lsenmeier, Bailey, & Gygax, 2008). Other scholars say that sexual orientatn is at least partly fluenced by cultural norms, so that dividuals are more likely to intify as gay or straight and be attracted to their same sex or oppose sex pendg on the cultural views of sexual orientatn to which they are socialized as they grow up.

BEG GAY IS NOT A CHOICE

NOM says “The are the ndidat you n unt on to support a nstutnal amendment protectg marriage; work to overturn the illegimate Obergefell lg imposg gay 'marriage' on the natn; prevent the ph of this illegimate lg throughout ernment cludg the public schools; work for the passage of the First Amendment Defense Act; and direct the Department of Jtice to vtigate attempts to harass marriage supporters.

“I was a ltle b irrated that he was equatg the whole [homosexualy] issue wh the Civil Rights movement, bee, que ankly, I didn't remember any tim when there were signs up that says, you know, 'everybody else here and gay people have to drk at this founta, '” Carson said an terview on Fox News.

WHAT’S WRONG WH CHOOSG TO BE GAY?WHAT’S WRONG WH CHOOSG TO BE GAY?

DO GAYS HAVE A CHOICE?

WHAT MY ANGRY CRICS GET WRONG ABOUT MY CHOICE TO BE GAY

SECTN 2: KNOWG GAYS AND LBIANS, RELIG CONFLICTS, BELIEFS ABOUT HOMOSEXUALY

NO, BEG GAY IS NOT A CHOICE

CYNTHIA NIXON: I'M GAY BY CHOICE

DO THE BIBLE SAY BEG GAY IS A CHOICE?