Is homosexuality a natural thing?

From what I gathered, they simply explain why homosexuality isn't natural, not why it would be harmful. Gay sex, mostly referring to anal, isn't harmful if you do it right - and my original statement that love between two human beings is natural, still stands. I don't particularly like it when people are observed as slaves of the nature, as we're very complicated beings.

What I'd most like to know, is that what's the goal of this conversation? So what if you can prove that homosexuality isn't natural? Are you saying that everyone should just stop being gay because it doesn't make sense? I don't mean to offend, just curious.

You are literally shooting your own argument in the foot with your second statement, not to mention the fact it doesn't stand on it's own anyways. And no, people who may have some sort of slight prejudice and those who are fanatics and filled with hate are not the same, and someone who may not agree morally with homosexuality in no way legitimizes the actions of hateful fanatics.

Stupid opinions do not kill people, fanatical hate does. I suggest you take a long look at your own posts and what you are saying.

Why would it even matter?

science education is a good thing

That doesn't just explain why it's unnatural but also explains why it's a menace or can be a menace for nature. There's no outcome of homosexuality. Just sex and be done with it. Let's posit if half of the world population were to be homos. We will face a serious crisis of under-population which could never be solved. It's not love. At least, not natural. It's artificial. And if it's potentially a menace for our society and the nature as a whole, then we have to compromise this artificial love for something that is more natural and more widely accepted, both by the society and the nature.

We're not slaves of nature. We can change it to our will. But again, we humans are limited in what we can do. In everything, we have limits. For some things, we have to consider what the nature demands because if we ignore the nature, it'll be us who'll be affected.

I don't know. I intended it to just be a simple discussion over the internet. If it change someone's mind, then it's up to him. If not, then who cares? it's a simple debate over the internet that may or may not be fruitful. I'm not saying everyone should stop being gay. Instead, I'm saying everyone should consider this. Why gays are not good for our society and how they can prevent people from being gay. Because it is in our control. Environment and the upbringing of the child is what makes one a gay. Naturally, there are no genes in us forcing us to be gay neither we're born to be gay.

100 years from now, somebody is going to look at the history books and say: hey look, back then people hated people because they were gay--what a bunch of morons they were back in the day.

You can't...that's the whole part about it being natural. Regardless of your opinion of it on being moral/ethical or not, you can't stop people from being gay. You can attempt to stop them from expressing their sexuality, but that usually requires oppression and, well, punishment and violence.

Personally, I am not willing to oppress and punish people for doing something that harms no one and doesn't affect me at all.

Of course we cannot change the gays that are right now, gays. Because sexual behavior tends to get addictive and it's hard to leave addiction. Violence, oppression is not a way. So just leave them the way they are.

My point here is, what can we do to prevent any more gays. We can give our children a better upbringing atmosphere free of any kind of sexual frustration that might lead to homosexuality. It's all about the future which is in our hands. What's done is already done. Change what you can.

This topic is so retrograde. It it weren't natural it wouldn't occur in nature "naturally", but it does. More to the point there's absolutely no reason to doubt someone who tells you it isn't a choice, if being gay was a choice why would anyone do it when it comes with all sorts of harassment? They wouldn't.

At this point asking such a question just seems kinda dumb, a shady way of justifying discrimination wrapped in a question that is for all intents and purposes answered, and (more importantly) one that doesn't need to be asked in the first place.

Edit: I can't seem to find the post where someone was talking about why gays don't use contraceptives as much (was it edited out?) but my answer to that is simple: Most people use contraceptives to prevent unwanted pregnancies, something gay couples don't have to worry about. They make the mistake of having unprotected sex with unchecked partners by assuming (as far too many people do) that "it won't happen to them".

You keep saying genes aren't responsible. You're incorrect. They are partially responsible. Once again, as I explained earlier, see diathesis-stress model: something like homosexuality occurs due to the confluence of both environment AND genes, and some people ARE more genetically prone to homosexuality than others.

There is no statistical, scientific, or historical evidence to show that rises in homosexual behavior have led to any decline in society. If you want to continue with the line of thought which posits that homosexuality is bad for society, please produce some evidence to support this viewpoint.

You say that most homosexual sex doesn't lead to anything, that it's just sex for sex's sake; but then the majority of heterosexual sex in the Western world is just sex for sex's sake as well. Should we outlaw sex that isn't for the purpose of conception? Should contraceptives be outlawed so we ensure conception? Or what do you mean? Because as it stands now, that line of thought is also fallacious.

Lastly, you state that love between two homosexual partners is artificial or unnatural; this is completely unfounded. Technically, on a neurological level, the chemical catalyst for what we call "love" is exactly the same in homosexuals as it is in heterosexuals. In other words, homosexual love and heterosexual love are experienced the same way by human consciousness, and therefore there is nothing
"artificial" about it if it happens to be experienced in a person of a homosexual persuasion.

You have yet to prove any point whatsoever in this argument.

I understand that you're looking at this from a biological point of view, but what I'm saying that this isn't all there is to it. Not to us, not to life. If life was simply about survival and multiplying, how boring that would be? We come here to do our thing and then die and the end. What a fruitful life. You can't think about everything with logic only.

And well currently there's more than enough of us here already so at the moment a few homosexuals don't really hurt at all.

No matter how you present this, your message sounds like "being gay is a choice" to me. For people who raise children, your argument could be something to think about, but not really for others.

@i_return: it's natural for me and not you or anyone else on this planet call tell me any different.

/facepalm

I was trying to come up with a way to answer this nicely...but honestly what you said was really ignorant.

That partial responsibility of genes is in every deed we commit. Theft, murder, depression and all kinds of emotional tendencies and other behaviors are somewhat integrated in our genes. But then it's up to the environment to bring the stimulus. Everyone has a genetic tendency to go berserk, now if one goes berserk will you blame the society or the genes? Being more genetically prone or not won't matter when you erase the whole idea from the roots. And it can be erased.

Of course there isn't any. Because homosexuality has always been in the minority. If there was one society where homos were the majority, I could give you an example. But luckily there's none.

I seriously despise the way West perceives sex as a whole so I'll just say, don't bring the West in here. But even then, that kind of sex is casual. One not intended to be fruitful. But heterosexual behavior will at some point, reproduce. Will it not? but homos cannot and never will be able to. This is what I mean. One thing that can NEVER bring anything, is not something that we should support.

When the idea or the nature itself of homosexuality is artificial, then how can you that their love is natural? it's just like masturbating and having real sex. Both stimulate the same thing but are different. A lot different.

Wow. I'm done with this.

So are you saying sex without the possibility to have children is why it's wrong?

Dear diary,

Today I learned that animals are not part of nature.

No, that's not how it works. Please look up diathesis-stress model. It is a high validity psychological construct which applies to psychological conditions. Under this theory, while there is a certain degree of choice, once a person already feels homosexual desires, choosing to totally repress and disregard those feelings will actually lead to psychological problems which could be very destructive to the individual in question and the people around them. It is much healthier for persons who feel homosexual desires to act on those desires in a safe and healthy environment rather than repress them. This is proven by years of psychological research.

If homosexuals are in the minority, then their practices as a minority group are necessarily protected under U.S. law, especially since their actions do not harm anyone. You can not tell homosexuals not to engage in homosexual behaviors with other consenting homosexuals. It is against the law, and beyond that there is no ethical basis for limiting the freedoms of a group when their actions cause no harm to society.

Once again, not all heterosexual sex leads to procreation. There are plenty of individuals who NEVER produce offspring at any point in their life. That does not mean they should be outlawed from sex.

And your despise of the Western sexual culture is anachronistic insofar that the sexual revolution of the West has been correlated with healthier expression of individuals' sexuality (as proven by years of psychological research: namely, sexual repression is unhealthy) and subsequent returns on a multitude of social issues, such as gender equality. So while your perspective on sexuality is archaic, your appraisal of homosexual sex as producing nothing of good is also tentative at best: homosexual sex may yield in the individuals involved a healthier baseline psychological state of being and potentially higher forms of psychological functioning as recorded in individuals who are in the throes of "love". Therefore, homosexual love and sex is not without product, and this is totally excluding any consideration of homosexual partners who provide much needed warm and loving homes for orphan children who otherwise might be thrown into the cycle of inadequate foster care. There is worth which arises from the love and subsequent partnership of many homosexual individuals, and this worth is beneficial to society at large!

Inevitably, you have failed to provide a clear definition for "natural" to use as a construct for appreciating homosexuality. Thereby any labeling of homosexuality as artificial is baseless as you have failed to prove how it is unnatural to begin with. And masturbation is as "natural" as it gets: fetuses in the womb have been observed masturbating in multiple scientific studies. Likewise, young children and other animal species have been observed engaging in masturbation. So that comparison doesn't really make sense. Masturbation is JUST as natural as sex.

pretty obvious to me that it is biological in origin. thousands of different animal species engage in it for one reason or the other.

i feel pretty lucky to not have been born gay to be honest. (no offense to gay people but it seems like a burden to me)

if it's not biological in origin then the religious are right and gay sex is like lays potato chips. once you start you can't stop because it is so amazingly better than regular sex.

you might think the religious would stop advertising how great the gay sex is but they just won't shut up about how it is so incredibly good that people would rather have gay sex than basic human rights or to not be murdered over it.

the world is strange to me.

the people hate the gay sex but bust their asses advertising how awesome it is.

A guy can't impregnate another guy and a girl can't impregnate another girl is that natural? Homosexual behavior has also been observed in animals. So I'm really divided on the issue I have no idea.

Yes.

I admire your optimism but providing certain religions persist over the next century its highly doubtful.

It's as natural as any other mental illness.

You're an idiot.

Some animals eat or just kill their young if they are born with problems or there is not enough food to go around. Using animal behavior I don't think is a good arguement for human actions.

@BronxBomber: 149 years ago, Americans said the same thing about black guys being hated on the basis of their skin color. But untill this day, the black are still being hated for that. You know what I'm trying to say?

The entire psychological community disagrees with you on this, as scientific research and cultural awareness led to the removal of homosexuality from the DSM-IV, and subsequently led to the declassification of homosexuality as a mental illness.

So in short, no, it's not "as natural as any other mental illness", because it's not a mental illness at all.

@JyePhye: What scientific research, exactly and obviously, declassifies homosexuallity as a mental disorder ? What is your resources? And more importantly, what is it classified as, if not a mental disorder?

@AutoPilotOn: Yeah.See I believe some animals feed on their own excrement, does it mean it's natural for humans to do so?! :P

I see a lot of people here confusing the terms unnatural and uncommon.

@elkoldo: from http://www.aglp.org/gap/1_history/#declassification

"The American Psychiatric Association (APA) removed homosexuality from its official Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) in 1973. This decision occurred in the context of momentous cultural changes brought on by the social protest movements of the 1950s to the 1970s: beginning with the African-American civil rights movement, then evolving on to the women's and gay rights movements.

Just as influential in the APA's decision were the research studies on homosexuality of the 1940's and 1950's. Alfred Kinsey's and colleagues' study on male and female sexuality marked the beginning of a cultural shift away from the view of homosexuality as pathology and toward viewing it as a normal variant of human sexuality. Kinsey had criticized scientists' tendency to represent homosexuals and heterosexuals as "inherently different types of individuals." Therefore, he introduced a 0 to 6 scale to classify sexual behavior or fantasy from "exclusively heterosexual" to "exclusively homosexual" (the "Kinsey Scale"). The "Kinsey Reports" found that 37% of males and 13% of females had at least some overt homosexual experience to the point of orgasm; furthermore, 10% of males were more or less exclusively homosexual and 8% of males were exclusively homosexual for at least three years between the ages of 16 and 55. This is where the frequently quoted "10%" figure comes from. 2-6% of women reported more or less exclusively homosexual experience or response. A more modest 4% of males and 1-3% of females had been exclusively homosexual after the onset of adolescence until the time of the interview."

"Males do not represent two discrete populations, heterosexual and homosexual. The world is not to be divided into sheep and goats. It is a fundamental of taxonomy that nature rarely deals with discrete categories... The living world is a continuum in each and every one of its aspects." (Kinsey, et al. 1948 Sexual Behavior in the Human Male(1948), p. 639).

So what does this all mean? Essentially that you can't draw a hard line between those who are homosexual and heterosexual; sexuality is a spectrum; homosexuality can not be classified as some sort of clearly identifiable psychological disorder, as homosexuality is an inherent function of all sexuality which the human conscious and subconscious explores at some point in every individual. In contrast, a person who is schizophrenic presents distinct behaviors which clearly classify them as differing from the regular population; homosexuality is nowhere near so clear, as all humans can exhibit behaviors at some point identifiable as homosexual in some way. Homosexuality is simply classified as a part of the vast spectrum of human sexuality at large.

It being natural isn't relevant to anything except maybe the idiots who argue that it's unnatural and should be shunned

Hey bran

Lock this thread

Look at his opening paragraph in the OP and the mention of flamebait:

"Been a long time since my last thread. And as usual, this one's gonna be a good flamebait as well thread promoting a healthy discussion and debate. "

Of course it's natural. Much like heterosexuality is natural.

The answer to this is the reason I even opened this thread...so far (and it's possible that it's there somewhere and I missed it) I haven't seen it.

I'm always curious why stuff that happens between 2 (or more) consenting adults and that harms nobody (or nobody else, for the people who think of it as harming the ones who take part in it) seems to be so many people's concern...

@gazaali: The nature argument is pointless. I only see it come up as a response to people who are against homosexuality using the "it's against nature" argument. The things you mentioned like disorders and murder and incest happen in nature and are natural. So something being natural doesn't make it justifiable or unjustifiable. So yes, you are correct in saying that accepting that these things you listed as natural makes the issue of naturalness a pointless topic of discussion when it comes to the issue of homosexuality and people's moral acceptance or denial.

Why it's a moral issue is beyond me

I can't believe I missed this gem of a thread.

I think the more important issue is: what's the problem with a person choosing to have consensual sex with another person who happens to be of the same sex? The topic of whether or not homosexuality is *natural* is completely irrelevant because unnatural does not mean bad. I feel like when people ask these questions, they misunderstand what natural is. The house that I live in was constructed by man. Its unnatural. That does not make the house bad though. It provides me shelter and a safe place to sleep. By saying that unnatural things are bad you are saying that anything caused or made by us humans is bad as well. (Examples: video games... and even the internet which we are using to communicate!) I know that the topic specifically asks if its natural or not, but I refuse to answer that question because it is ignorant and irrelevant.

I will, however, poke a few holes in your argument. You say that gay people run the risk of STDs after having sex? So do straight people. Oh, and did you know women can die during childbirth?

It's funny that you say that on a video gaming forum. If you are going to use the argument that homosexuality is of no use to society (and society, in itself, is an artificial but not bad, thing.) then at least stop being a hypocrite and don't play video games. Oh, don't drink beer either. Don't eat sweets. The list goes on and on and on. Oh, and btw... heterosexual people have sex all the time in a way that prevents conception. Let's add that to the list too!

We've made a lot of progress in the last 50 years. I think another 100 years will show greater acceptance.

Well, we've moved past "colored" entrances and water fountains, and the separate but equal mindsets. I think we've done well when it comes from what it used to be to the present.

To the people saying that the word natural is a pointless invention, that makes no sense at all! Just because a toaster is made up of millions of naturally occurring particles doesn't make it natural. Humans developed these things, albeit from nature, but at the end of the day, they are simply applications of nature. It's not like you can pull toasters out of thin air, nor go searching for one in the Amazon and expect to find them growing on trees. In the same way, homosexuality is probably unnatural. There are hermphadites in the animal kingdom that reproduce via "sex" with other hermphadites, which is certainly strange, so I guess anything is possible. But it's more than likely homosexuality in humans is a product of society, and the growing complexities it presents to human interaction.

@Okaymum: I think what they meant with the "natural" word/discussion being pointless is that even if you establish that it is/isn't natural there's nothing you can do with that knowledge. So you've made up your mind that it is or isn't natural, now what? How did your life improve?

Does it exist in our universe? Yes, hence it is natural.

Okay, I understand now. But even with that line of thought, there's limitless practical uses in determining whether or not something is natural or not, otherwise, there would be no such use for the word, let alone this thread! I could get into it for a millennium, but I see no use in that. The fact is the word, or, rather, the meaning of the word, is crucial to understanding matter/life in general, if there even is anything to be understood.

@Okaymum: Agreed; I was referring specifically to the use of "natural" in this particular discussion, not the word in general (as long as it is being used for its intended purpose and not to define "common" or usual") =)

They were born that way.. so yeah.

Shit analogy is shit. Toasters are purely man made constructs. If man were to disappear to tmw there would still be homosexuality in nature across a plethora of species. Secondly, hermaphroditsm is completely different than homosexuality. A hermaphrodite is a creature with both sexual organs associated with the male/female (or has the ability to switch between them). Homosexuality revolves around attraction which is derived from brain chemistry, hermaphrodites are classified due to their anatomy. And there is nothing strange with hermaphrodites with respect to nature, its extremely fucking common.

Its posts like these that make me embarrassed FOR you.

Who cares? Like, seriously, does it even matter? We do so many things that aren't natural anyway, sitting at a computer, staring at a monitor isn't natural. And at this point in time people are just doing most things for pleasure. Why are you so fixated on other people's lives, OP?