wolveraptor wrote:Lusankya wrote:I've never actually met an anti-gay fundie because I've led a sheltered life in some respects, but if/when I meet one, I'd like to ask them what they think of observations of homosexuality in animals.
Isn't it bisexuality that's observed in wild animals? As far as I know, only captive animals in non-normal environments develop complete homosexuality.
The breeding instinct is usually pretty strong in animals, but in people it's been dimmed back a bit and muddled with a lot of other psychological problems. However, my female bulldog will indeed hump other dogs. It's a dominance thing. Wolves often let only the top pair breed, and the top male lion is the only one who lets anyone breed. In this case they're not a good comparison because they only breed when the female is in heat, and only one. And in the case of wolves/dogs, so long as there is a strong dominant animal in charge, none of the other males suffer the sort of psychological distress humans get when denied nookie.
You'd need to look at animals that actually have sex for pleasure rather than to fulfill an instinct, such as dolphins, because they're a better example of the way the mind works in people. Anyway, I lot a lot of gay people who say it's not a choice whatsoever, and that they'd really rather they had the choice than to be forced by some accident of birth into being an artificial second class at best, and at worst a target for violence. Who would CHOOSE that?
It's obvious that engaging in sex acts with a variety of different subjects (women, men, people in furry suits, furniture...) has a lot of precedence without a biological need. A lot of this WOULD be choice. But there are people who have sex with their same gender who are not homosexuals, and this is an important distinction. Women who are lesbians are different than women who get drunk and kiss. My point about the Greeks was to show that, at one time in the past, there were a ton of other acceptable sexual 'choices' and people just had their preferences.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pederasty_ ... ent_Greece
Check out that link. Sex was, at one point, a lot more open than today. People today are confused in great part because they've had this artificial idea hammered into their head that sex is not just an impulse, but a divine mandate, and that any deviation in your aim is your fault. This is untrue. We assign the term 'deviant' to a variety of sexual practices we find unwholesome. It's really got nothing to do with the reality of the human sexual machine. We're treating human attraction like it's a light switch. It's obvious people are predisposed to their own favorite sort of mate, but that there's a lot of crap that's got nothing to do with breeding. Frankly, I don't know, I'm as vanilla plain as they come, so I just do my best to give people the benefit of the doubt. I know tons of people who are into all sorts of kinky shit and I'm fairly certain that's got nothing to do with breeding instincts.
Our main problem is, right now, that we see gender as something more concrete than it is. Social roles, hormones, child-rearing, group dynamics, and the old random predisposed factors have a lot to do with how you turn out. Fact of the matter is, even if it is a choice for some of them, it's their choice to make. If I live in America I can't tell racists they can't breed or raise children, despite the huge societal damage done by that kind of indoctrination, let alone making their children distasteful by all but similar racists. Wouldn't that be as deviant? Frankly, until they prove that gay people hurt anyone, I'm not gonna care. The whole 'gay lifestyle' seems to be about dressing prissy and speaking with a lisp. I don't see them picketing funerals, burning down churches, lynching people or anything else the 'well adjusted' members of society do. I'll let them win the biblical argument. It's still got no bearing on national policy.
