Tantz Aerine
This quote has been bothering me for a while, and I am sorry for going back to it, but I need it cleared up :) What do you mean, my opinions defend homosexuality?

Well you said that even if homosexuality is a choice, it's a valid one right? And made for reasons that are okay?

I'm basically saying that you're not saying "being gay is a choice and you can choose not to be!"

Argh I dun make sense.

As for PQing you to be analyzed, I encouraged you to give us examples for the sake of argument, but I'm pretty apathetic about why, I, personally, am gay. But out of curiousity I'll PQ you after I respond here.

RobertTidwell

ZeroVX

RobertTidwell

Weird Al is Jewish? News to me.

And no, I really couldn't tell that that other guy was Jewish. He just looked like an English guy.

What was I supposed to be looking for?

I hope that first line was a joke.

Neil Gaimans facial features are more relaxed than some jewish people because his family tree has been mixed more liberally than most jewish people, I believe. The shape and position of the eyes, the shape of the nose, his hair. They all hav very typical jewish qualities about them.

Compare neils face to als, then to alan moores.

No, it wasn't a joke. I seriously didn't know that.

I usually don't make conclusions about people the first time I see them.

in most of his songs he talks about being jewish, and in UHF he makes tons of jokes about it.

I will start my post with my reply to Robert. Now, please try to listen carefully, because it has started to become a little tiring to have to teach you all the time about what science and the scientific truth is, and then having you go off and make HUGE erroneous assumptions mixed with a good dose of disjointed thinking. I am willing to discuss for as long as you like, but I am not willing to have to reply to things that are simply not logically founded- or disprove the same assumptions again and again. Let me show you.

RobertTidwell
All studies are faulty because you can never test everybody, only portions of people.

There is a difference between the term 'faulty' and the term 'representative'. A study is meant to show trends, trajectories, general rules about things. It is not meant to be taken as some sort of prophetic truth about each and every person. If the study is conducted with all the rules and precautions that it should be conducted (you should go to university to know about those rules), and then repeated (the term is 'replicated') accodingly in different populations and different points in time and always yields the same results, then this study is representative and reflecting a certain pattern of behavior. How the study will be interpreted is the next stage, which should be done with due support. Therefore: NOT ALL STUDIES ARE FAULTY (or 'flawed', as is the correct term). Faulty are only those studies that are not conducted properly. If you want to really be objective about what you believe and what you tell other people, then you should get educated on how to tell the two apart and refrain from stating an opinion when you can't.

However, for a person who believes all studies are faulty and therefore none (including those that seek to prove that homosexuality is biologically based) are reflecting the truth of the matter, you sure do struggle dreadfully to support something you have no support for. ;)

'You'
Also people lie on tests. AND if you make a test about homosexuality between siblings more people who have homosexual siblings will sign up than those with straight families. Plus what about closeted gays who take the tests and lie?

Well, if you ever study research, you will see that all researchers that respect themselves take all of the above for granted, and therefore design studies that do not rely on what people say but on what people do, and also devise ways to make sure that their sample (that means the people they examine) include both those who are willing to sign up and those who are not. How this is done? It's called a 'research design'.

Numbers do lie. Numbers lie ALL the time. You can do two different studies and get completely different results just based on location, social class, gender, religion, race, etc.

Numbers and statistics lie IF YOU LET THEM. As I stated above, if you know where to look, if you know the language of these numbers, you will be able to tell which study is 'lying' and which is not. Or if they both are. That's what being a scientist means.

Your body decides who you are attracted to, your mind decides how you deal with that attraction.

Your mind decides who you are attracted to. NOT your body. Your body may concur or not, but your mind is the one making all the clicks. You are attracted to the one you think attracts you. There was a great case study of a man who was sitting in a train seat and this beautiful, gorgeous woman came and sat next to him. Needless to say, he was immediately attracted to her, but he was too shy to initiate conversation or acknowledge her or the like. Anyway, during the train ride, he dozed off, and at some point his leg muscles relaxed and his knee softly swung to the right, where the woman was sitting and touched her. The man immediately was aroused at that touch. He opened his eyes and was about to sit up, when he realised that while he'd been dozing, the woman had left an another man was sitting next to him, whose knee he had touched with his knee. He immediately lost all attraction and arousal. Now, why did I tell this story? Because it shows beautifully how by touching another man he was aroused because his mind believed the other man to be a charming woman. It was not because his body was attracted to the other man's. If attraction was determined by biology, then this would have been impossible to occur. These instances of misinterpretation of stimuli happen all the time, and it is also what happens to homosexuals when they are convinced early in their life that this is who they are. It is a fallacy that is then further encouraged by other stimuli. It is NOT biological.

But it is proof that our minds do not control everything we do. Right? One person might experience something and learn a positive lesson from it while another might learn a negative lesson from it. Neither of those cancer people become attracted to obesse people, even though they were obsessed with slender people their whole lives, right? If you work with just psychology then yes, its a huge involvement, but when you mix biology into it...

This is incoherent and I can't follow it. It does not follow a logical pattern. I gave you an example of how two people respond to a different stimulus in their life, thus demonstrating how the same stimulus may push a man towards homosexuality and fail to do the same for another on a subconscious level. How is it not proof that the mind controls the way you interpret things? And what is all this about cancer people being attracted to the obese or not??

And psychology primarily works with biology. The standard modus operandi is to scratch off any chance for biological reasons for a phenomenon, then move on to the social. Psychology and biology go hand in hand, but those who are psychologists are taught where to attribute things based on proof- not hearsay, not flawed studies and not what is the easy thing to believe. YOu are not making sense in this last quote (not logical sense, anyway) and I get the feeling you just want to keep this argument going for the sake of the argument.

Does surviving a plane wreck make you suddenly not allergic to chocolate?

What are you seeking to prove with this? Yes, there have been instances where a plane wreck has cured people of many things. There is also this really famous study about a man with terminal brain cancer. He had tumours the size of nuts in his brain. There was no cure for him and he was expected to die in 2-3 months maximum. Then this doctor presented him with a sugar pellet in the form of an obscure pill, and told him this was a hush-hush super drug that would cure his cancer if he took it. The man believed this to be true, and started to take the pellets according to the 'prescription'. In one week or so, the tumour was gone. Utterly, completely gone. There are x-rays to prove this. It does not stop there, though. The man was released from hospital and went every month or so for a check up. After about 6-7 months where he had been 100% healthy, this other doctor told him that the cure he had taken (he had not been taking it ever since the tumour was gone) was just sugar. The man was devastated, and believed everything was faulty, including the assurance that he was tumour-free. In a couple of days, the tumours were back.

The hospital could not cure him, and so they did it once more with him- they gave him a different treatment (which consisted of coloured water) and told him this was a sure cure. The tumours were gone again within two weeks (or so). However, after a few years of healthy living, the man realised again (through some other unethical guy telling him so) that he had been given a placebo yet again. The tumours were back the next day, and he died within the week.

Now I ask you, aside for the criminal non-ethical treatment of this man, who controlled the tumour? His body or his mind? Let me also tell you that the same effect, called 'placebo effect' where your mind is convinced that you are getting treatment, has been demonstrated in several other people. When you mix the mind and the body (not 'psychology and biology, that's silly), then the mind wins. Therefore: Homosexuality is something you choose to be. How this is done, at what level of consciousness and what it denotes is another matter. However let me tell you that from very early in psychology up until now, homosexuality is associated with high levels of unconscious fear.

(Please don't tell me 'I am not afraid of anything' or 'my brother is afraid of nothing, in fact he's a dare devil' or something to that trajectory. I am talking about deep set fear about things that have never been brought to the conscious to be addressed- therefore there is only emotional reactivity and not cognitive one to the particular issue. )

Errrn! Wrong answer! Accepting it does have a lot to do with it. The more a socioty opresses a people, those people will try to hide who they are. Those people will be afraid to be honest in such tests. Also, the people doing the tests will look at them a certain way. You can't be nuetral if you think homosexuality is wrong. The only way to know the truth about homosexuality is if we stopped hating gay people.

You are mixing concepts again. If you are a true scientist and not a quack with a diploma, it won't matter if you like it or not. If you accept it or not. If you decide to study it, you will be objective and face the music. Otherwise, you just don't study it. About the people lying as subjects and interpreting wrong as researchers, I have already answered there are safeguards. I cannot give you the full course in research methods and statistics- I think I have shown and told enough.

Hating something is worlds apart with thinking something wrong or, to put it in the non-value judgement term, 'erroneous'. Yes, gay people should not be hated just like NO person should be hated. Hatred is a social vice that should be fought and not promoted. Hatred is what blinds people, along with greed and desire for control over others.

What also blinds poeple and makes them unable to be neutral is the need to prove something no matter what. Which happens a lot with regards to homosexuality and other issues. Many times the need to evade guilt or the need to 'let things be' instead of putting in the gruelling work needed to make things right (on any issue) is stronger than the need for truth. This is also a fact of psychology to which many (scientists and not) fall. The question is if you can get up from that trap and move on.

Not believing something is right/natural/okay to do does not mean you do not want to look at it objectively. If that were the case, nothing would have been done by humanity to make things better- from the discovery of antibiotics (nobody things the disease is right/natural/okay) to the emergence of better social systems where fewer and fewer are oppressed, people have made these inroads because they were not afraid to look at a problem/issue in the face and do something about it. Hatred was not part of the equation- and do not confuse it with intense dislike or rage (in the case of the social systems). Hate is a desire for thoughtless destruction. Rage is just anger that can be put to constructive use.

Unfortunately, hate is easier, because there's no demand to fix anything.

Also, you can't mark my comment as wrong unless you prove it in a logical and coherent way as I have been doing. However the way you phrased it gives me the impression you believe we are in some sort of contest to prove who's right. This is not a contest. There are no losing parties. Please don't bring it down to that.

Look at your example from WW2. People hid their religions and ethnic backgrounds to escape persecution. Do you think that if hitler put up a huge campaign asking for jewish people to come and get their blood tested that many would?

Of course not. Still, despite their hiding and running, Hitler did find a whole lot of them, didn't he? He also had experiments conducted on them of many types, from medical to social. A few million people is a pretty massive sample of the Jewish. Was their refusal to reveal themselves prevent him from getting what he wanted?

There is a huge difference between those two quotes. You even said later that you DIDN'T say specific, predictable events, even though you had. There is a world of difference in 'These things make you gay." and "Sometimes we see paterns in the lives of gay people and believe this may be the cause."

You are trying to twist my words out of context here. There is no difference between the two quotes. What do you mean by 'things'? A 'thing' as I understand it, is a concrete situation or an object. What I mean by 'event' is the mathematical concept of a particular situation which may occur in several superficially different contexts (with different variables) yet still be the same 'event' with the same 'outcome'. A 'pattern' consists of 'events'.

Do you understand now how everything I said is consistent? If you need concepts/terms/ideas to be defined, please state so. It is something we should have done initially, but we can always do it now.

'Robert
How can you see ethnic traits?

People of different ethnicities and nationalities tend to have different physical features. You can see people who look Greek. You can see people who look Armenian.

Even though I am not armenian, I've learned to tell armenians apart. I can even tell, after talking to an armenian, if they grew up in a muslim country, russia, armenia, or the US. Not by them stating it either. I've just picked up on different inflections of the voice, the way they dress and such. That isnt a phenomon. I cant tell mexicans apart from other hispanics though. I'm mexican and the only people I can seperate are Brazilians because they dont speak spanish. ha.

I did specifically say before they speak, and not dressed in the particular way/ manner usually expected of them.

And here's another thing for you: I have several straight friends who can tell who is homosexual (not the Divas, as you called them) in pretty much the same way you described your brother does. All of these friends of mine are psychologists who have at some time or another focused on the issue. They can even understand a closeted gay person.

How do you explain that, if it not a social, taught phenomenon?

Still I am not sure if you could tell an Armenian or a Greek apart when that Armenian or Greek wanted to merge with the other community. Greeks in diaspora did it all the time because they did not want to be discriminated against by the local population. They did it successfully. I am not talking though, about picking up inflections in the voice or dress code. I am saying to understand it by just having the person sit in a chair writing math and paying no attention whatsoever to you.

Jewish people can also pick out converted Jewish people, not only those who have specific characteristics, as you said. How would you explain that?

As for the example of WWII, I did not of course mean jewish people who had been living in the same community and knew who was who. I am talking about a Jewish person who was not from, say, Germany, but had defected to the Nazis, and still managed to pick out the German Jews he had never met in his life.

I would not think of bringing proof which has such a blaring confounding variable as that.

reidavidson

Tantz Aerine
This quote has been bothering me for a while, and I am sorry for going back to it, but I need it cleared up :) What do you mean, my opinions defend homosexuality?

Well you said that even if homosexuality is a choice, it's a valid one right? And made for reasons that are okay?

I'm basically saying that you're not saying "being gay is a choice and you can choose not to be!"

Argh I dun make sense.

When did I do that?? I did say that 'being gay is a choice' and I am saying that if someone knows how and where to look without causing a psychological disaster, that 'you can choose not to be'. It's just hard to achieve 'choosing not to be' because of all the things that divert people from the objectivity of the matter.

A valid choice is not a right choice necessarily. A valid choice means that it is an existing choice. Of course it is existing!

As for PQing you to be analyzed, I encouraged you to give us examples for the sake of argument, but I'm pretty apathetic about why, I, personally, am gay. But out of curiousity I'll PQ you after I respond here.

I am not one to do anything 'for the sake of the argument'. That is a waste of energy and space because what you are saying is 'I'm not going to take you into account, but I'm going to let you have your say'. I'm not interested in that. The only reason I am doing this is because Robert professed a desire to learn/acquire more viewpoints. If he had had a different attitude, I wouldn't have bothered.

Also, PQing me saying 'now what' is not quite what I had in mind. And I am not a councillor. I am an education specialist and a researcher. I would not be qualified to do all that you apparently imagine.

If you are apathetic about why you are gay, then I am curious to know why you are paying so much attention to this thread? It shouldn't matter to you either way.

It's stupid to suggest that what you find attractive/appealing is in your DNA, you don't have an inherited love of a certain type of music, so why would you have an inherited love of the same sex? Tantz is right in saying that it's a choice, if subconcious choice, but nowhere has Tantz implied that it's wrong and shouldn't be respected, which is what has I'm guessing is what has reidavidson asking questions, as the good old line "being gay is a choice" is the usual religious asshole way of saying "stop being gay right now".
However, back on topic: regardless of sexuality, comics that boil down to lots of sex generally don't get much respect from me.

For the sake of objectivity, please let me review my position and philosophy on all issues including what I have been saying here concerning homosexuality:

I have kept my posts free of value judgements- I have not said or implied homosexuality is right just as I have not bothered to call it wrong; that could not be condusive to anything. In the same note, I also will not lose respect for or in any way shun a person who is gay; that would be unfair to do and an unnecessary waste of human potential.

I am not a fanatic and I despise and condemn anyone selling hate for any one group to other groups.

I am a researcher and a scientist as well as an author, so I am educated, trained and decided to call things what I see, test and objectively evaluate them to be. Nothing more, nothing less :)

Thats pretty much what I said you said :O

I know, spacer :) Thanks. The reason I said it again was not to correct you, but to be certain there won't be any misinterpretations. ;)

More on the topic of "genre that people hate you for", the other day I had someone flame me for my manga because they thought it was stupid 1. since it was a Japanese style and there is not a drop of Japanese blood in me and 2. because they thought I only did it because it "suposedly" is the popular thing now. Oh, and another time, someone who's parents are for the "only buy stuff made in the US" thing(I do not know if it is because of the war or what) was telling my off about making "japanese crap". I thought it was the funniest thing in the world and walked away laughing. (I can only imagine the look that must have been on his face.)lol

spacer
It's stupid to suggest that what you find attractive/appealing is in your DNA, you don't have an inherited love of a certain type of music, so why would you have an inherited love of the same sex? Tantz is right in saying that it's a choice, if subconcious choice, but nowhere has Tantz implied that it's wrong and shouldn't be respected, which is what has I'm guessing is what has reidavidson asking questions, as the good old line "being gay is a choice" is the usual religious asshole way of saying "stop being gay right now".
However, back on topic: regardless of sexuality, comics that boil down to lots of sex generally don't get much respect from me.

That would be a good analogy if it werent for the fact that music has nothing to do with how your body reacts to other chemicals(in this case, another body.)

Like it ir not, but it isnt a choice. You dont first chose to be either straight or gay, if that were the case and if it were so predictable, then wouldn't the conversation have ended when she posted WHAT MAKES PEOPLE GAY?

No. Even psychologists who have been researching homosexuality for years don't agree on what "makes a person" into one sexuality or another because NONE of the research agrees.

Why doesn't it? As I've said, its easy for people to lie. And I'm sorry but you can't test someones sexual attraction by what a person DOES.

Gay men have sex with women. Gay women have sex with me. Straight men and women have sex with other men and women. you can CHOSE to act how ever you want. Your mind and previous experiences in life help you decide on what actions to take, but trust me, you can not PICK who the fuck you are attracted to.

Also, nobody said it was a hereditary gene. It isn't as if gay people have gay babies. We don't know the biological factor that can help make someone attracted to the same gender but we do know that our bodies react to chemical stimuli. The brain reacts specifically to chemicals that are introduced to it and when you kiss certain people you get certain chemical reactions.

Here's a better analogy for you.

Does your brain tell your stomach that your hungry? No. Your stomach does its thing and when there is nothing for it to process it sends signals up to the brain. Your body can influence your psychology. Your body knows more about it than you do. Sorry, charlie.

Anyway, I'm effectively ending this because Tantz has lost her god damn mind.

Tantz Aerine
being homosexual has very specific, very valid and very predictable social reasons.

Tantz Aerine
Ha ha! I never said it was predictable. I never said it was easy to find the key stimulus before sexuality crystallizes. All I said was that in retrospect this behavior can be analyzed on a pure social/psychological basis without the explanation of biology.

You can't even keep your own thoughts straight.

I've asked several times for you to give some examples of what "makes a person gay" and you refuse. You've not posted a single shred of evidence to support your claims. You've gone back and forth between "THIS IS RIGHT" and "This is what my school of thought currently believes." You talk about scientific method but you, since you claim to be a psychologist should know better than any of us, that SCIENCE is about questions. Its about never assuming that you know something. It's about investigating until there is absolutely NO QUESTION. Not about ruling ideas out.

I've heard your claims and they all sound rather uninformed. "Greeks can spot greeks when they go to a resteraunt." is in no way the same as being able to pick up who is attracted to who.

I can't walk into a room and say, "Oh, tim over there loves to fuck black girls, same as me."

Your mind is a powerful tool in shaping who you are, but on a deep level it can only do so much. Your body has natural instincts which kick in before your mind does. There is so much to learn about biology - and psychology too, don't get me wrong - that we've barely even begun to understand ourselves.

Lastly, Tantz dear, by accepting people who are gay you are saying that it is OK. It means you are accepting the behavious. Flat out. Its hard to seem like you disapprove of something someone has "chosen" to be their lifestyle if you can hang out with them and help them explore their so called "choices".

Anyway, I'm done here because as I've said, you've lost your mind. You refuse to listen to anybodys claims except the ones fed to you by your education which I've already told you can be and often is biased towards a certain thought. You've gone back and forth on your own words and this isn't interesting anymore. You clearly don't know what the hell your talking about.

Oh, and sorry for coming off like an asshole, I don't mean it. I'm just lousy at picking words that don't seem angry.

Oh my Robert. I didn't expect that lashing out from you- or maybe, in retrospect, it's to be expected since with what I am saying I am aggravating you. And why wouldn't I be? If you started to consider that your brother's environment had anything to do with his being gay, certainly the way you approached the matter would have a wider range of emotions that are not easy to handle than it does now.


Twisting my words out of context is not proof that I am incoherent. Yes, there are predictable variables. Yes, there are specific events that can push a person to become gay. And no, they are not always easy to spot before they occur while they are pretty easy to infer in restrospect. That CAN'T be predictable by laymen such as yourself. They can't be predictable by other scientists who don't know where to look. That does NOT mean they are not predictable.

You are free to believe that I am not consistent to what I am saying, but that is simply not true.

No. Even psychologists who have been researching homosexuality for years don't agree on what "makes a person" into one sexuality or another because NONE of the research agrees.

If you truly believe that, I don't see why you refuse to take into consideration as a possibility what I have been supporting.

Also I don't see why you don't grasp this chance to learn to be able to sort which study to take seriously and which to discard as trash.

Also, nobody said it was a hereditary gene. It isn't as if gay people have gay babies. We don't know the biological factor that can help make someone attracted to the same gender but we do know that our bodies react to chemical stimuli. The brain reacts specifically to chemicals that are introduced to it and when you kiss certain people you get certain chemical reactions.

Now you are taking a step back, for which I am happy. You did state a very valid point- this is certainly correct that gay people do not have gay babies and straight people may have gay offspring after a few years. And while your body does react to chemical stimuli you have yet to prove or support adequately that such is the case in causing homosexuality. So far all the evidence you brought forth was regarding genes and other comorbid genetic factors.

See? We're getting places.

Does your brain tell your stomach that your hungry? No. Your stomach does its thing and when there is nothing for it to process it sends signals up to the brain. Your body can influence your psychology. Your body knows more about it than you do. Sorry, charlie.

You can convince your body that it's always hungry or that it is not hungry enough to warrant food. It's called an eating disorder. What I mean is that the brain can bypass the needs of the body or translate them into an entirely different behavior that what the body would desire. Of course there is a body-oriented desire for sexual activity. The mind is what determines how this desire for sexual activity will be expressed.

Oh, and, you may not know how to pick words that don't sound angry, but saying 'sorry charlie' and other such sarcastic remarks show that you are actually angry and out of arguments and therefore you resort to simply calling me names :) That's fine; it's a normal psychological reaction ;)

Lastly, Tantz dear, by accepting people who are gay you are saying that it is OK. It means you are accepting the behavious. Flat out. Its hard to seem like you disapprove of something someone has "chosen" to be their lifestyle if you can hang out with them and help them explore their so called "choices".

I accept people who are gay because they are people. The same as I could accept a person with cancer or a person with Down's syndrome (to make a genetically induced condition analogy ;) ). It does not mean I accept that homosexuality is right. However I do believe strongly in free will and as long as the gay person does not hurt me or infringe on my own personal boundaries like any other person might, then what they choose to be is their own business.

It is obvious how little experience you have of psychologists and psychology in general when you say this. Psychology is ALL ABOUT letting people choose by themselves, and helping them ONLY IF THEY WISH IT, because frankly you can't help someone who does not want to be helped. And of course you help a person explore how and why they make a choice, any choice; then you have granted them the power to be able to say whether they actually want what they are doing or if they would rather change it. That's the way psychology works. If you have trouble wrapping your mind around that, it is because you rely so much on hearsay. You can always, however, open a psychology textbook on 'the psychological method' to see and learn what I mean and what I do :)

You refuse to listen to anybodys claims except the ones fed to you by your education which I've already told you can be and often is biased towards a certain thought.

I have been listening. I have been open and analytical. What your problem is, is that I have not been accepting your claim based on what so-called evidence you put forth. I am sorry, but I am not going to accept anything that has no clear and sound basis. I will, however, listen to it carefully and take all the time needed to analyze it, as I have been doing all these days. Believe me, I did have other things to do than sitting down to write essays to you to show you where the thought process was being led astray by those publications.

While the above quote has merit, I am rather disappointed that you don't follow what you preach. You have been clinging to a few popular mantras which were fed to you and refuse to look to any of the evidence I gave you- you did not answer the questions I posed to you and you completely ignored any evidence I presented to support my own point- or you addressed it at a tangent without any sort of relevance on the point I was making.

Now, instead of arguing, you rant and call me all sorts of names without actually having been enough evidence on the matter- and because I sense that you have run out of arguments to support the conviction you are not willing to temper with anything else you may hear (let alone look at it with a critical eye), you terminate what you, in essence, initiated. In fact, Robert, the one who sounds biased, enraged and perhaps even fanatic about something he cannot prove with hard evidence is you.

RobertTidwell
That would be a good analogy if it werent for the fact that music has nothing to do with how your body reacts to other chemicals(in this case, another body.)

Like it ir not, but it isnt a choice. You dont first chose to be either straight or gay, if that were the case and if it were so predictable, then wouldn't the conversation have ended when she posted WHAT MAKES PEOPLE GAY?

It's the same in the way that you don't decide to like certain music, you just hear it and think hey that's pretty cool. Likewise you see a man or woman and depending on what you like you see them and think hey they're pretty hot. Also, which chemicals are these :|?

RobertTidwell
Anyway, I'm done here because as I've said, you've lost your mind. You refuse to listen to anybodys claims except the ones fed to you by your education which I've already told you can be and often is biased towards a certain thought. You've gone back and forth on your own words and this isn't interesting anymore. You clearly don't know what the hell your talking about.

What's the issue here? The point you're arguing over is trivial at best. Either being gay is a subconcious choice, a choice that the individual didn't sit down and think "oh hey, lets be gay from now on", but still a choice, and thus should be respected, or it's not a choice and then it should STILL be respected. Who cares WHY people are gay, personal choices (if they ARE choices) that don't harm anyone are noone elses business but that persons.
Tantz is right, you're getting pretty fucking manic about this.

spacer

RobertTidwell
That would be a good analogy if it werent for the fact that music has nothing to do with how your body reacts to other chemicals(in this case, another body.)

Like it ir not, but it isnt a choice. You dont first chose to be either straight or gay, if that were the case and if it were so predictable, then wouldn't the conversation have ended when she posted WHAT MAKES PEOPLE GAY?

It's the same in the way that you don't decide to like certain music, you just hear it and think hey that's pretty cool. Likewise you see a man or woman and depending on what you like you see them and think hey they're pretty hot. Also, which chemicals are these :|?

RobertTidwell
Anyway, I'm done here because as I've said, you've lost your mind. You refuse to listen to anybodys claims except the ones fed to you by your education which I've already told you can be and often is biased towards a certain thought. You've gone back and forth on your own words and this isn't interesting anymore. You clearly don't know what the hell your talking about.

What's the issue here? The point you're arguing over is trivial at best. Either being gay is a subconcious choice, a choice that the individual didn't sit down and think "oh hey, lets be gay from now on", but still a choice, and thus should be respected, or it's not a choice and then it should STILL be respected. Who cares WHY people are gay, personal choices (if they ARE choices) that don't harm anyone are noone elses business but that persons.
Tantz is right, you're getting pretty fucking manic about this.

You do decide what music you like. As a child you get used to certain sounds and when you are around 12 or 13, most people begin to look for their own music. You chose which bands to look into by their name, clothing, what magazines say, radio exposure.

When I hit 16 a friend of mine gave me a tape of ICP. I had never heard any music like it before. I am obsessed with extremes and with diversity so I investigated it. I researched what they were doing and that was when they became my favorite band. Not when I heard the first song.

What makes me mad about tantz is her condesention. I've been perfectly okay with the way she thinks but she just "regards things as trash" that she doesnt already agree with. SHe isnt interested in learning. She has yet to come out and say exactly what she believes is a "preditable social reason" and has gone back and forth on her own words. Its like trying to talk to a christian about the mythology of the bible. I won't do it. I've offered research that I found interesting and she a.) assumed that I didn't know the difference between transgender and hermaphrodites. b.) assumed the studies were insufficiant because I did not know the percentages they dealt with. c.) wrong because they didnt agree with her preconcieved notion. I get enough of the insults at work.

Anyway, there are chemical reactions every time you expose yourself to someone. Your mind is nothing but constant chemical reactions. I dont know the science as well as I'd like, but in short, everything you do changes the way your brain works. Kissing the right person, for instance, can make you insanely happy. Eating chocolate can make you feel like your in love.

You can become addicted to the chemical reaction that some people create inside of you. I've been.

Tantz Aerine
Oh my Robert. I didn't expect that lashing out from you- or maybe, in retrospect, it's to be expected since with what I am saying I am aggravating you. And why wouldn't I be? If you started to consider that your brother's environment had anything to do with his being gay, certainly the way you approached the matter would have a wider range of emotions that are not easy to handle than it does now.


Twisting my words out of context is not proof that I am incoherent. Yes, there are predictable variables. Yes, there are specific events that can push a person to become gay. And no, they are not always easy to spot before they occur while they are pretty easy to infer in restrospect. That CAN'T be predictable by laymen such as yourself. They can't be predictable by other scientists who don't know where to look. That does NOT mean they are not predictable.

You are free to believe that I am not consistent to what I am saying, but that is simply not true.

No. Even psychologists who have been researching homosexuality for years don't agree on what "makes a person" into one sexuality or another because NONE of the research agrees.

If you truly believe that, I don't see why you refuse to take into consideration as a possibility what I have been supporting.

you should see the emails to my best friend: "You fucking fat bitch, where the hell are you?" is how I say, "havent heard from you in a while, whats up?"

Also I don't see why you don't grasp this chance to learn to be able to sort which study to take seriously and which to discard as trash.

Also, nobody said it was a hereditary gene. It isn't as if gay people have gay babies. We don't know the biological factor that can help make someone attracted to the same gender but we do know that our bodies react to chemical stimuli. The brain reacts specifically to chemicals that are introduced to it and when you kiss certain people you get certain chemical reactions.

Now you are taking a step back, for which I am happy. You did state a very valid point- this is certainly correct that gay people do not have gay babies and straight people may have gay offspring after a few years. And while your body does react to chemical stimuli you have yet to prove or support adequately that such is the case in causing homosexuality. So far all the evidence you brought forth was regarding genes and other comorbid genetic factors.

See? We're getting places.

Does your brain tell your stomach that your hungry? No. Your stomach does its thing and when there is nothing for it to process it sends signals up to the brain. Your body can influence your psychology. Your body knows more about it than you do. Sorry, charlie.

You can convince your body that it's always hungry or that it is not hungry enough to warrant food. It's called an eating disorder. What I mean is that the brain can bypass the needs of the body or translate them into an entirely different behavior that what the body would desire. Of course there is a body-oriented desire for sexual activity. The mind is what determines how this desire for sexual activity will be expressed.

Oh, and, you may not know how to pick words that don't sound angry, but saying 'sorry charlie' and other such sarcastic remarks show that you are actually angry and out of arguments and therefore you resort to simply calling me names :) That's fine; it's a normal psychological reaction ;)

Lastly, Tantz dear, by accepting people who are gay you are saying that it is OK. It means you are accepting the behavious. Flat out. Its hard to seem like you disapprove of something someone has "chosen" to be their lifestyle if you can hang out with them and help them explore their so called "choices".

I accept people who are gay because they are people. The same as I could accept a person with cancer or a person with Down's syndrome (to make a genetically induced condition analogy ;) ). It does not mean I accept that homosexuality is right. However I do believe strongly in free will and as long as the gay person does not hurt me or infringe on my own personal boundaries like any other person might, then what they choose to be is their own business.

It is obvious how little experience you have of psychologists and psychology in general when you say this. Psychology is ALL ABOUT letting people choose by themselves, and helping them ONLY IF THEY WISH IT, because frankly you can't help someone who does not want to be helped. And of course you help a person explore how and why they make a choice, any choice; then you have granted them the power to be able to say whether they actually want what they are doing or if they would rather change it. That's the way psychology works. If you have trouble wrapping your mind around that, it is because you rely so much on hearsay. You can always, however, open a psychology textbook on 'the psychological method' to see and learn what I mean and what I do :)

You refuse to listen to anybodys claims except the ones fed to you by your education which I've already told you can be and often is biased towards a certain thought.

I have been listening. I have been open and analytical. What your problem is, is that I have not been accepting your claim based on what so-called evidence you put forth. I am sorry, but I am not going to accept anything that has no clear and sound basis. I will, however, listen to it carefully and take all the time needed to analyze it, as I have been doing all these days. Believe me, I did have other things to do than sitting down to write essays to you to show you where the thought process was being led astray by those publications.

While the above quote has merit, I am rather disappointed that you don't follow what you preach. You have been clinging to a few popular mantras which were fed to you and refuse to look to any of the evidence I gave you- you did not answer the questions I posed to you and you completely ignored any evidence I presented to support my own point- or you addressed it at a tangent without any sort of relevance on the point I was making.

Now, instead of arguing, you rant and call me all sorts of names without actually having been enough evidence on the matter- and because I sense that you have run out of arguments to support the conviction you are not willing to temper with anything else you may hear (let alone look at it with a critical eye), you terminate what you, in essence, initiated. In fact, Robert, the one who sounds biased, enraged and perhaps even fanatic about something he cannot prove with hard evidence is you.

blahblahblah you keep saying I've shown insufficiant evidence but unlike you, I've posted SOME evidence.

you've yet to post a single reference, a single quote, a single statistic. You've constantly gone on about how everybody but you is wrong with out even exploring the ideas given. You've insulted me several times, and thus are no longer interesting.

For the record I did not twist any of your words. Those are your quotes. You can go back and look at the entire block of text. You say one thing and then another to try and cover yourself. Then you go back in fear of looking like you are wrong. You go back and ammend your thoughts and rearrange them so they don't seem as incoherent.

Do people with genetic disorders chose to have them? You imply as much. I like also how you refer to the fact that you do not accept homosexuality but you are still okay to love a homosexual person. I don't accept racism. I think its wrong. I think bigotry is the first and most disgusting thing on the planet. I can't just "accept" some racist ass mother fucker talking to me. I wont, either. I went for 3 months at work with out talking, with out saying a single word, to the woman who sat next to me because her husband was a skinhead.

I do not accept people who beat, rape, or mistreat women. I've stopped being friends with many guys who cheat on their girlfriends. who spread diseases because they dont care about their partners health. I and some friends beat the crap out of someone who beat the crap out of his girl.

You can "accept" these things if you like, my point though is that by accepting a person you are accepting of all the things they do. Even if you think it is wrong on some level, by approving of the person you approve of their actions.

Anyway, I cuss a lot and use sarcasm cuz I grew up listening to hip hop. Not because I'm mad. Its part of my personality.

Robert
What makes me mad about tantz is her condesention. I've been perfectly okay with the way she thinks but she just "regards things as trash" that she doesnt already agree with. SHe isnt interested in learning. She has yet to come out and say exactly what she believes is a "preditable social reason" and has gone back and forth on her own words. Its like trying to talk to a christian about the mythology of the bible. I won't do it. I've offered research that I found interesting and she a.) assumed that I didn't know the difference between transgender and hermaphrodites. b.) assumed the studies were insufficiant because I did not know the percentages they dealt with. c.) wrong because they didnt agree with her preconcieved notion. I get enough of the insults at work.

Condenscention? I never quite addressed you as a 'puny mortal with insignificant views', not did I? Correct me if I'm wrong, but that's what condenscention is. Instead I have taken the time to discuss with you and been very careful about how I phrased things, unlike how you have been doing.

I didn't a.) assume you didn't necessarily know the difference between transgendered and hermaphrodite people, but because the particular example seemed rather unusual, I had to explore the possibility. (I said 'you must mean hermaphrodites. That means I thought it as a possibility, not a certainty.)

b.) I didn't assume the studies were insignificant because you didn't know the percentages they dealt with. I either said 'they need to be explored further before accepted as evidence' or discarded them as invalid (or trash) because of the flaws in their research designs that showed even through your secondary presentation of them. That's the way the scientific method works, sorry.

c.) Obviously you overgeneralise here. I didn't assume your were wrong. I merely told you that with what you were telling me, you were not making a convincing case. If you are getting insults at work, I am sorry for you, but maybe you are getting them because you may be sneering at people that get on your nerves because they don't conform to what you want them to believe. If I wanted to characterise you Robert, I would have found much more accurate adjectives for you than 'wrong'.


Also, you may have skim read my posts, but I did say that I am not posting the reasons because they may upset people reading them. I did also say that many of these reasons are associated with intense, yet unconscious/subconscious, fear.

I am interested in learning. I am also interested in evidence. If I don't get sufficient evidence, I don't buy what is being sold to me. And that's the way everyone should handle data. If what I have said hasn't convinced you, Robert, that's absolutely fine. I never was out to convince you. I never was out to enforce my scientific views on the subject and I couldn't care less what you think about homosexuality. I repeat, you were the one who specifically asked me to say why I thought what I thought. You didn't make it clear that what you were really after was a debate in which, should you not win, you will rant and say your debating opponent is all sorts of things that are unfounded. Also, since you spoke of your work environment, make it a point not to have this behavior there, because people may be tempted to take it up with you with much more serious things than a forum post. That's a friendly advice you are free to discard ;)

For the record I did not twist any of your words. Those are your quotes. You can go back and look at the entire block of text. You say one thing and then another to try and cover yourself. Then you go back in fear of looking like you are wrong. You go back and ammend your thoughts and rearrange them so they don't seem as incoherent.

This is completely wrong. I have already explained TWICE how the two statements do not oppose each other. YOu yet fail to address that quote. I don't have any fear of looking wrong. That's part of the scietific process and nobody can be right all the time. But I will evaluate whether I am right or wrong based on EVIDENCE. Not on the disgruntled misaccusations of someone I don't know.

If you are unable to connect the dots on your own and need someone to connect them for you, that is hardly 'to ammend' anything. That is simply taking you by the hand to explain what to me, as a psychologist, is easily inferred.

Do people with genetic disorders chose to have them? You imply as much.

You would have really liked me to have implied that, don't you? ;) I did not. I gave an example of accepting a person who is in some way disfunctional without thinking that the genetic disfunction is something I should consider 'okay' and I should not research to help the person get over it if possible. I never did say that the person with a genetic disorder chose to have it.

This is what 'twisting someone's words around' is, Robert. ;)

like also how you refer to the fact that you do not accept homosexuality but you are still okay to love a homosexual person. I don't accept racism. I think its wrong. I think bigotry is the first and most disgusting thing on the planet. I can't just "accept" some racist ass mother fucker talking to me. I wont, either. I went for 3 months at work with out talking, with out saying a single word, to the woman who sat next to me because her husband was a skinhead.

Once more you sadly failed to see that I made a very specific statement about that: I said 'as long as that gay person does not hurt me or infringe on my limits like any other person, then what he/she does with his own body is his own business'. Racism involves trying to hurt/manipulate/belittle/otherwise demean other people, and therefore is unacceptable as well as a phenomenon to be researched.

While you are commendable in shunning a racist person, you are not commendable for mixing up the two starkly different cases and contexts.

Anyway, I cuss a lot and use sarcasm cuz I grew up listening to hip hop. Not because I'm mad. Its part of my personality.

Well, you should work on that, because the more you do it, the more you demonstrate how you have lost control of the discussion and the less people will listen to you.

Also, in previous posts you had not been speaking in this manner; only when you feel you can't convince me/win the argument/ succeed in whatever way you think you should succeed in this did you begin to demonstrate this behavior. Therefore, it sounds far more possible to interpret this as a reaction to your feeling of helplessness to assert your point constructively. :)

unlike you, I've posted SOME evidence.

you've yet to post a single reference, a single quote, a single statistic. You've constantly gone on about how everybody but you is wrong with out even exploring the ideas given. You've insulted me several times, and thus are no longer interesting.

'Insult' involves attacking you personally. Please tell me just how I did that to you. Unless of course, by 'insult' you mean 'demonstrating how my viewpoint requires much more evidence of a different quality if I am to prove it to be correct or to be taken into consideration.' This, however, is not 'to insult' you. This is 'to display the scientific process' to you.

The evidence you have posted is lacking, insufficent, waylaid or posted on popular sites with questionable credence as well as being lacking, insufficient and/or wailaid. It doesn't make you look better.

I haven't posted references/quotes/statistics because I simply didn't bother to take the time to look them up and post them here. The reason why that is, is that I was never interested in convincing you- you were the one who asked for my viewpoint and my evaluations on the information you presented, so I did just that. You are the one feeling threatened and in need to prove a point. You can find these statistics, and you can always open the books of the theories of personality by Freud, Jung, Adler as well as Skinner's expose on how he could behaviorally raise any baby to become anything- from a criminal, to a doctor, to a homosexual.

I did say these names. It's up to you to look it up. Like I said, you are the one on fire ;) I have done my studies, I have done my own theses, I have procured evidence when the need arose. I won't go spending twice the time I've already spent replying to your posts by digging through my textbooks to appease you.

In any case, check this out- your quotes:

You
Anyway, I cuss a lot and use sarcasm cuz I grew up listening to hip hop. Not because I'm mad. Its part of my personality.

and

You
What makes me mad about tantz ...

Therefore, the above presents more evidence backing up this quote of mine of this current post:

Also, in previous posts you had not been speaking in this manner; only when you feel you can't convince me/win the argument/ succeed in whatever way you think you should succeed in this did you begin to demonstrate this behavior. Therefore, it sounds far more possible to interpret this as a reaction to your feeling of helplessness to assert your point constructively. :)


I will agree, however, that you have reached just about the limit of what you can consider at this point in time. When you mature a little more or when you do realise who is interested in insulting you and who is interested in simply being objective and neutral, you can perhaps find someone who will take the time to discuss with you.

wow ... there is a lot of writing 0_o...

anyways... i have nothing against BL... i read a few,

http://www.kiki-kay.com/kiki/news.php

There is also one with vampires (which i actually haven't read in a while... now i want to go find it again)

so i have nothing against them its just the fan girls and there are a lot of crappy ones.

I remember when i was younger i used to hate them so bad though... mainly because i was dating a girl who was obsessed with them. Sense ive been away from her ive grown to more accept them, i wont go buy a comic because it has them in them, but i also don't run away.

i thought this was about a genre in comic...please stay on topic or start another topic in debate and discuss section

YOu're right sub :)

Must means might?

How the fuck does that work? Also i wasnt saying you did accept racist people and shit. I was using that as an example.

I think its funny the words you use. You "accept" people with a terminal illness the same way you "accept" a person who is doing something you might think is wrong?

Again, I didnt twist your words. You may not have used them the way you intended but it looks like bullshit from here.

You dont need to post the reasons, some research would be nice though!

You've implied that your education is somehow more significant than anything else. You act as if you are above answering specific questions.

When I said you made me mad, I miss spoke. Mad is kind of a catch all phrase for different emotions that involve some level of anger. I'm not as fucking crazy as I come off, I just swear a lot and use scarcasm, but your personality is very annoying and frustrating and I'd much rather it werent.

Also I get yelled at by customers before I even answer my phone, so its nothing that I'm doing to them. they're just fucking bitter, old ass, worthless souls.

robert:
stop now.
or continue this discussion through PQ

I only read the first post.
Don't have the attention span to read the rest.
I think this genre has it's ups and downs. I think it's easier to get readers because it's a specialized interest. People can read an action comic anywhere and everywhere but Boy's love is just a little harder to find. (That however is changing because I feel the amount of bl comics is rapidly increasing. ^_^ I remember back in the day when there was only one yaoi webcomic that I was aware of.)

I've only received a few negative comments myself. Honestly though I get more flak for drawing in the "manga" style than anything else.


But I just feel that the Boys Love genre will always be harder to integrate into a site like this than other genres mainly because it's impossible to appeal to everyone and some people have really strong views about it (however close minded they may be). And when it's thrown into the mix with a bunch of other genres people are gonna complain when they stumble upon something they don't want to see.


I suggest we make a DD geared for boys love

Like DrunkenGaySexDuck.com

hmm I wonder if that domain is taken

Hijuda
And the "die in a fire" comment was mainly directed at the fangirls who write BL for the sake of having effeminate men getting boned in the ass. The worst of the bunch are those that make gay Naruto or Inuyasha or whatever the crap is popular stories. Sasuke and Naruto would never get

WOW - That sounds kind of painful! Whose making these kind of comics in DD??? Good Lord!

I'm getting a nice education from many of the authorities on the genre and have been picking up some great ideas on manga all together. But I'm with Hijuda on this one...(Like this is a CIVIL WAR) - It's a comic but by all means, don't make the boy love all about JUST BOY LOVE. Have a PLOT...a SUB PLOT...make it mean something.

I'm just having a hard time wrapping my mind around a bunch of girls (ladies) drawing comics like this because they like watching effeminate men...do each other. That's gotta be a minority...

Loved your retort Darth Mongoose:

Darth Mongoose
Oh I see, so I was wrong all these years thinking the solution was making interesting, complex female characters the readers can relate to! The REAL solution is to make male characters who look and act like women! How did I never realise that!?

Seriously though. Girls creating male characters who are pretty and sweet and like to cuddle and talk is JUST AS BAD as guys making female characters who have huge boobs and walk around in their underwear. It's gratuitous fantasy.

Give 'em hell! You made a GREAT point!

actually its not a minority... chances are if its a girl who likes anime... they read yoai... go to any anime convention and ask... (My GF is the only exception i have seen so far to this)

DemonSaintDante
actually its not a minority... chances are if its a girl who likes anime... they read yoai... go to any anime convention and ask... (My GF is the only exception i have seen so far to this)

None of my friends like yaoi, and they are all ladies and lovers of all kinds of anime. (How many paychecks we've spent on DVDs...)

Maybe they are only the "majority" at anime conventions?

DemonSaintDante
actually its not a minority... chances are if its a girl who likes anime... they read yoai... go to any anime convention and ask... (My GF is the only exception i have seen so far to this)

Erm, what? I'm a girl who likes anime, and not yaoi. In fact, a good portion of the girls I know don't really like it. Maybe it has something to do with age? =p

subcultured
robert:
stop now.
or continue this discussion through PQ

Thread is about boy love comics.

conversation is about how to appropriately write boys who love each other: normal people who happen to be gay because their biology says their gay v. people who experienced some traumatic event that made them choose to be gay.

It's relevant to the subject of thread.

Maybe its the age... most girls i know are between 16-19... i just know yoai is one of the big sellers at conventions... Just goes to show i need to get out of my small little state 0_o...

DemonSaintDante
Maybe its the age... most girls i know are between 16-19... i just know yoai is one of the big sellers at conventions... Just goes to show i need to get out of my small little state 0_o...

I just asked my ex, who works in a book store and reads a lot of manga, shes 21, she says she doesnt like the comics with boys having sex with each other.