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More than twenty years ago, the American Psychiatric Association removed "homosexuality" from its list of mental disorders, stating that "homosexuality per se implies no impairment in judgment, stability, reliability, or general social or vocational capabilities."

As a person who will likely choose not to have a child, but to adopt, I'd like to ask why you consider that selfish.

A disorder implies that it is in some way harmful to the person. The only thing harmful about my sexuality is social in nature, much like most of the reasons why peoples opinions on how sexuality is formed.

I believe what Wench was trying to say a bit ago, is the reason homosexuality is psychologically, and the accent is on that word, a disease is that they aren't psychologically attracted to someone who would, if the situation were correct, be able to reproduce with them. I don't consider myself a homophobe, however I do agree on the point that evolution/survival of the species would prefer heterosexuality over homosexuality, and so it doesn't make sense for a mentally well and healthy person to be homosexual.

I don't see how other disorders are harmful except in a social way. It doesn't physically harm me to be learning disabled, it doesn't physically harm me to be dyslexic. However, it does impare my social ability by keeping me from keeping up with my peers. That's all.

EDIT: Er, maybe I should say "physically attracted" as it's a biological thing we are talking about.

The point is that naturally one should be driven to continue the race. It's the urge that matters. It's just natural for a race to desire to continue itself. If you don't feel like having children, if the idea never enters your head that it'd be nice to have kids whether you take care of them or not... I'd say that's a psychological disorder as well.

And just because it hasnt been weeded out doesn't mean it's favored. Idiocy hasn't been gotten rid of yet.

To say that "if you weren't meant to be" infers that you believe in a God you picks specifically who goes into the world, based on how perfectly natural they are. If that were so, we'd all be exactly the same.

As it is, there are plenty of strange compulsions. Some people have the urge to kill other people for no real readson. I wouldn't say that's natural, but they exist anyways.

I'm not saying you're a bad person if you're gay. I'm not saying you shouldn't be able to live your life that way, or that it's a horrible way for you to be. I'm just saying that it seems like a psychological disorder to me.

I was going to continue the debate myself when I got back from D's but I see that I've been sufficiently covered. I'll back out for now unless I'm needed. whee

Okay, sorry I didn't respond to this earlier, but here goes.



Wanting to have children from a relationship where there are two members of the same sex isn't confusion at all. It's a natural, human urge to want to nurture a child into adulthood-- Just because you are same sex oriented doesn't change that. Wanting to have sexual relationships with the same gender isn't confusion either, because It's not something to *be* confused about. Sexual attraction is something that can't be mixed up, or confused, because it's something that happens to us, whether we realize it or not.



Okay, as you said: Love IS irrational. It's an emotion that sometimes doesn't make sense, but it does exist because we're human beings, and we love. It doesn't matter who the person is that we fall in love with-- It's usually about the person him/herself.



I actually meant strange compulsions as a passing thing: Strange compulsions, that are based on material things like looks, and that aren't really focusing on the person involved, don't turn into relationships. Homosexuality is simply the fact that you are attracted to a different type of person. Someone of the same sex as you. It's not something that's different from any other sexual proclivities of heterosexual nature, except that gay people can't reproduce. But reproduction is not what a relationship is about-- It's not expected of us to have children in our relationships, it's a choice we can make or not make, like many things in life.



I think perhaps you misunderstood what I meant about intimacy. By saying that intimacy is what constitutes a relationship, I meant all types of initmacy, not purely of the sexual nature. People, any two people, can have an intimate connection. It can be over a book that you both liked and hated in the same breath, It can be over the fact that you both understand each other so well. Emotional intimacy is more of what I was getting at. Some sort of psychological connection that draws you to this person. The word intimate does sometimes have sexual connotation, but I've seen many straight males have very intimate connections with their other straight male friends. They are so well in tune with each other, they know each others likes and dislikes, they know what to say when the other person is sad. The little things like that define true intimacy to me-- Sex comes in later.



You're right-- It is only opinion that we love who we think we love. However, so many people these days persue homosexual relationships, transexual relationships, and indeed, heterosexual relationships, that it can't possible be argued that we were only meant to love the member of the opposite sex. Sure, from a biological standpoint, it would seem that men and women fit together, but emotions come into play. Sexuality isn't black and white. Like everything else in the world, it's different colors in between. Are you really convinced that it's better to persue a relationship with the opposite sex than to persue any other type of relationship? Not everyone is satisfied with these simple gender guidelines. To define something as complex as human sexuality by the analogy of man:woman, woman:man is a ludicrous idea to me.

And don't worry, I'm not taking offense to any of this. I like to debate this kind of thing, in fact. I could go on forever.

To throw in some stuff from my side here. (Not everything, as that would take too long plus I'm having fun just reading the debate.)

The difference between that analogy and being gay is that you say you're MORE attracted to outgoing girls than to shy reclusive girls. Not that you aren't attracted to the latter, you even acknowledge that you could be attracted to and form a relationship with a shy girl.

If this is the analogy you want to you than okay, but it would not be usable speaking about someone who was gay, that would be bisexual. A gay male is NOT attracted to females. Like you are not attracted to males (Or at least I assume you're not.) they feel the same about females. In a short explaination without technical words and such, this is because is essence they have a "female" brain. It was explained to me, but I don't remember the nooks and crannies, but the "female" brain was the gist of it.

If you believe in God and that he created all of us, then isn't it a fair assumption to make that he made gay people the way that they are for a reason?


Not confused. They're acting exactly how they're supposed to. Maybe not by your beliefs but by the way their brains are made and wired. If you believe that God had everything to do with that, than they're acting just the way that God intended them to act.

Ahhh.

That's refreshing.