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Forget Cricket Talk about anything [within Board Rules, of course :) ]

 
 
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Old February 8, 2008, 07:10 PM
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shaad shaad is offline
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Join Date: February 5, 2004
Location: Bethesda, MD, USA
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Quote:
Originally Posted by goru
First off, I'm not sure if the mods/admins have a problem with discussing this topic with minors around, so I'd suggest keeping it "clean" (although, I myself don't have a problem with bringing anything into the discussion).

So, what are your views on homosexuality? Do you believe homosexuals are "unnatural" people? Do you think they are likely to go to "hell"? Do you believe that a man cannot fall in love with a man and a woman cannot fall in love with a woman? And if you do believe that such love is possible, then why do you feel it's different from man-woman love? Are your views based on rational reasoning and/or religious beliefs? If rational reasoning (i.e. not because "God told me so", however if God has provided you with rational reasons, we can discuss them), please do state what they are.
Interesting post, goru. I'll approach it from several perspectives.

First, in my personal code of ethics, consensual acts between two or more sane adults that do not cause harm to others are prefectly fine with me. And since being "disgusting" or "obscene" to some forum members here doesn't really strike me as acts causing harm, I have no problems with homosexuality. Mind you, it's not really my cup of tea, but then eating "shutki maach" isn't my cup of tea either, and I don't go around labelling the latter as "unnatural".

Second, some posters would like to suggest that homosexual or bisexual behaviour is not innate, but learned, and therefore the issue of choice enters into it. I think it is more accurate to say that sexual orientation is a result of complex interactions between environmental, cognitive/psychological and biological factors. Evidence for biological components include:
  • Twin studies in humans, where genetically identical monozygotic twins are both more likely to be gay if one is, than fraternal (non-genetically identical) twins. There are some criticisms of these studies (ascertainment bias), but the trend seems real.
  • Correlation between fraternal birth order and sexual orientation. The fraternal birth order effect is the strongest known predictor of sexual orientation; crudely, each older brother increases a man's chances of being gay.
  • The gene fruitless in Drosophila, different versions of which can lead to male-to-female courtship, male-to-male courtship, extremely aggressive male-to-female courtship, etc.
  • The gene TRPC2 in mice, a knockout of which results in both male and female mice becoming bisexual.

Third, some posters have also tried to hint that choice is always involved, since some gay men have had children and are thus capable of coupling with women. Orpheus has already responded to this, but I think it's important to emphasize his point again. The phenotypes of many genetic traits, particularly in the arena of behaviour, are not always of the all-or-nothing category; most exhibit normal or gaussian distribution, i.e. there will be some homosexual/bisexual males capable of coupling with females, just as there will be some who cannot. In addition, I don't wish to sound unnecessarily crude here, but anyone armed with say, a probe and a firm understanding of biology/anatomy could make any male, straight or gay, ejaculate in the presence of another male human, a donkey, or a blank canvas. There would be no choice involved; but would the fact the he is "capable" of ejaculating in the presence of another male make him gay? If not, then the converse argument, as presented above, also does not fly.

Fourth, it has been suggested that homosexuality is somehow contradictory to evolution since the latter involves the passing on of genes. There are several reasons why such an argument is invalid.
  • It assumes that homosexuality is an all-or-nothing phenotype. But, as we have discussed earlier, sexual orientation appears to show a normal distribution. In addition, it's not as if every new homosexual is born with a new mutation that provided him with the relevant versions of the genes. In almost all cases these genes were carried, presumably in heterozygous form, by their parents. But, even if one assumes an ideal scenario for it to become eliminated from the population, one in which homosexuality is due to only one recessive gene (as mentioned by Orpheus, it's likely to be multifactorial, i.e. involve multiple genes), is 100% penetrant (i.e. all who are homozygous for it are homosexual; obviously untrue, as twin studies have shown), and results in no homosexual male ever coupling with a female (again, false, as has been discussed), one finds when one does the math that it would take eons for it to completely disappear (al Furqaan, you might like the math involved; PM me if interested). As an aside, it's also the same reason why ethnic cleansing of any form is unlikely to ever work.
  • It assumes that the genes associated with sexual orientation control only sexual orientation, and no other traits (the genes I mentioned affecting sexual orientation in Drosophila and mice are involved in other functions; completely eliminating the fruitless gene, for instance, results in a dead fly). An interesting analogy is the version of the gene that brings about sickle cell anaemia in humans. It's an illness-causing gene, yet it persists with fairly high distribution among the population in Africa because it confers resistance to malaria. If some of the other traits associated with the genes regulating sexual orientation provided some positive selection, then homosexuality would continue to persist in the human population.
  • It assumes there is no kin selection. Kin selection is used to describe evolutionary strategies that favour the reproductive success of an individual's relatives, even at a cost to its own survival or reproduction, e.g. one penguin leading a predator like a sea leopard away from the rest of its brood. Yes, the individual itself might not survive, but its genes, shared by its relatives, continue to be passed on. So, if some of the other traits associated with the genes involved allowed the homosexual individual to improve the reproductive success of his relatives, then these genes too would have been postively selected.

Finally, just as a corollary, there appears to be a suggestion that heterosexual sex is "natural" because it can result in procreation. However, procreation is not the reason on most of the occasions that we indulge in sexual intercourse; not to put it too crudely, recreation is. If that is the case, what is "unnatural" about homosexuals indulging in the same activity for recreation?
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Last edited by shaad; February 8, 2008 at 07:17 PM..
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