First Darwin and then Homos? Never!

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Rogan Josh


I never said he does. I pointed out that he claimed one thing and used this 'study' to (presumably unintentionally) prove the opposite.



So now you are claiming that they are really still gay but just in denial. What unbelievable arrogance and bigotry!

Hey, maybe we are all gay, and just in denial

Obviously, you are ignorant about how societal pressures can affect individuals to make decisions. The heterosexist pressure of conformity has pressured a number of gay men to marry someone of the opposite gender. I have come across, and talked with a number of older men who came of age in earlier decades who have married, and then later got a divorce because they are gay.

One of the first people one comes out to, is to himself.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Rogan Josh


I never claimed that bisexuality was a phase - I claimed that bi people had phases of prefering one gender. Stop lieing please.

It's hard to argue with someone who is blantantly dishonest.

Here is from your earlier post -- "Bi people go through phases."

Care to explain?

[Rogan Josh]

Originally posted by MrFun
Obviously, you are ignorant about how societal pressures can affect individuals to make decisions. The heterosexist pressure of conformity has pressured a number of gay men to marry someone of the opposite gender. I have come across, and talked with a number of older men who came of age in earlier decades who have married, and then later got a divorce because they are gay.

That is completely different and not at all relevant. The people we are taling about were gay and have become straight - not the other way round.

How dare you presume to tell someone what to think? Never have I said that being attracted to members of the same sex was wrong, but here you are claiming that these men are wrong to be attracted to members of the opposite sex! Unbelievable!

Here is from your earlier post -- "Bi people go through phases."

Care to explain?

How many times do I have to explain this!?

"Bi people go throught phases" is not equal to "Being bi is a phase".
duh!

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Rogan Josh


So, by your own admission, 'gays' can be 'converted' to being straight.

You really need to figure out what you want to say

Oh lord, how could you miss the point here so obviously? The study was relating to actions, and when you have 95% of those studied still engaging in homosexual acts, that shows the "therapy" to be a failure. Those who don't commit acts say their sexual urges don't go away, they just supress them. Can you cite any studies of people being "cured" of their sexual orientation? Could you be converted to being attracted to men sexually over women if you tried hard enough?

And bisexuals don't turn off their attraction to a particular gender on a whim! I know plenty of bisexuals, and this a categorically stupid claim! That's like claiming that when a man dates a blonde, he suddenly loses all attraction to redheads.

[Kontiki]

Originally posted by Rogan Josh


I suppose it depends on the individual, but generally they do not chase everything that moves. They find someone attractive and date them for a while, then split up and might date someone of a different gender. They are not (usually) some sort of sex crazed demons who need to have sex with both sexes at once!

So do you chase every female that moves? Are you a sex crazed demon that needs to have sex with females constantly?

Or perhaps, once upon a time, you found someone attractive and dated them for a while. Then, after you broke up, you dated someone else. When you were dating someone, did you all of a sudden never find another female attractive at all, but as soon as you broke up, you magically could find other people attractive?

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Rogan Josh
I suppose it depends on the individual, but generally they do not chase everything that moves. They find someone attractive and date them for a while, then split up and might date someone of a different gender. They are not (usually) some sort of sex crazed demons who need to have sex with both sexes at once!

Are you distorting arguments just to be belligerent or what? I speak-a slowly:

Bi's do not "turn off" their attraction to one gender any more than someone turn's off their attraction to other people when their dating someone. Just because a bisexual is dating a woman at some point doesn't mean he isn't still attracted to men at the same time! This is just getting ludicrous.

[Kontiki]

Crosspost.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Rogan Josh

That is completely different and not at all relevant. The people we are taling about were gay and have become straight - not the other way round.

How dare you presume to tell someone what to think? Never have I said that being attracted to members of the same sex was wrong, but here you are claiming that these men are wrong to be attracted to members of the opposite sex! Unbelievable!

How many times do I have to explain this!?

"Bi people go throught phases" is not equal to "Being bi is a phase".
duh!

First, I brought up closeted gays who marry someone of the opposite gender to show that one cannot change one's sexual orienation -- which is definitely relevant to this thread's discussion.

Second, I think it's completely fair to assume that if one denies part of what they are, they complicate their own life that much more.

Third, I do not see how you can distinguish "phase" from "going through phases."

[Starchild]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Go talk to starchild. Genes do not determine behaviour.

You know what I found today? Twas reading through a science news site and found this delightful article about a study done by the University of Chicago showing a link between brain metabolism and sexuality.

http://www-news.uchicago.edu/releases/03/031112.differential-brain-activation.shtml

To summarise:

The research team theorized that hypothalamic differences may reflect biological differences between men with strong sexual orientation differences. In order to determine whether such differences might exist, they gave the men doses of Prozac, a drug that selectively inhibits the reuptake of serotonin in the brain. At another time point, the researchers also administered a placebo to the men. Neither the researchers nor the subjects were aware of which substance they were given.

They were tested 90 minutes after having received the drug or the placebo. The subjects were also administered radioactive glucose, which provides a marker for a Positron Emission Tomography (PET) brain scan to determine where in the brain the drug acted to inhibit the reuptake of serotonin. The heterosexual men had a much stronger response in the hypothalamus to the Prozac than did the homosexual men, a finding that suggested that men with strong sexual preferences have differences in the ways in which the neurotransmitter serotonin works in their brains.

“The remarkably strong association seen in this study between hypothalamic physiology and sexual orientation underlines the promise of functional brain imaging for elucidating the neuroanatomy and neurophysiology underlying human sexual behavior and functioning,” said Heino F. L. Meyer-Bahlburg, professor of clinical psychology at Columbia University.

And I found this one interesting as it deals not with humans but with sheep, showing that homosexuality is not only rooted in biology but found in animals as well as people.

http://www.ohsu.edu/news/2004/030504sheep.html

PORTLAND, Ore. - Researchers in the Oregon Health & Science University School of Medicine have confirmed that a male sheep's preference for same-sex partners has biological underpinnings.

A study published in the February issue of the journal Endocrinology demonstrates that not only are certain groups of cells different between genders in a part of the sheep brain controlling sexual behavior, but brain anatomy and hormone production may determine whether adult rams prefer other rams over ewes.

"This particular study, along with others, strongly suggests that sexual preference is biologically determined in animals, and possibly in humans," said the study's lead author, Charles E. Roselli, Ph.D., professor of physiology and pharmacology in the OHSU School of Medicine. "The hope is that the study of these brain differences will provide clues to the processes involved in the development of heterosexual, as well as homosexual behavior."

The results lend credence to previous studies in humans that described anatomical differences between the brains of heterosexual men and homosexual men, as well as sexually unique versions of the same cluster of brain cells in males and females.

"Same-sex attraction is widespread across many different species." said Roselli, whose laboratory collaborated with the Department of Animal Sciences at Oregon State University and the USDA Agricultural Research Service's U.S. Sheep Experiment Station in Dubois, Idaho.

Kay Larkin, Ph.D., an OHSU electron microscopist who performed laboratory analysis for the study, said scientists now have a marker that points to whether a ram may prefer other rams over ewes.

"There's a difference in the brain that is correlated with sexual partner preference rather than gender of the animal you're looking at," she said.

About 8 percent of domestic rams display preferences for other males as sexual partners. Scientists don't believe it's related to dominance or flock hierarchy; rather their typical motor pattern for intercourse is merely directed at rams instead of ewes.

"They're one of the few species that have been systematically studied, so we're able to do very careful and controlled experiments on sheep," Roselli said. "We used rams that had consistently shown exclusive sexual preference for other rams when they were given a choice between rams and ewes."

The study examined 27 adult, 4-year-old sheep of mixed Western breeds reared at the U.S. Sheep Experiment Station. They included eight male sheep exhibiting a female mate preference - female-oriented rams - nine male-oriented rams and 10 ewes.

OHSU researchers discovered an irregularly shaped, densely packed cluster of nerve cells in the hypothalamus of the sheep brain, which they named the ovine sexually dimorphic nucleus or oSDN because it is a different size in rams than in ewes. The hypothalamus is the part of the brain that regulates sex hormone secretion, blood pressure, body temperature, water balance, and food intake, while it also plays a role in regulating complex behaviors, such as sexual behavior.

The oSDN in rams that preferred females was "significantly" larger and contained more neurons than in male-oriented rams and ewes. In addition, the oSDN of the female-oriented rams expressed higher levels of aromatase, a substance that converts testosterone to estradiol so that the androgen hormone can facilitate typical male sexual behaviors. Aromatase expression was no different between male-oriented rams and ewes.

The study was the first to demonstrate an association between natural variations in sexual partner preferences and brain structure in nonhuman animals.

The Endocrinology study is part of a five-year, OHSU-led effort funded through 2008 by the National Center for Research Resources, a component of the National Institutes of Health. Scientists will work to further characterize the rams' behavior and study when during development these differences arise. "We do have some evidence that the nucleus is sexually dimorphic in late gestation," Roselli said.

They would also like to know whether sexual preferences can be altered by manipulating the prenatal hormone environment, for instance by using drugs to prevent the actions of androgen in the fetal sheep brain.

In collaboration with geneticists at UCLA, Roselli has begun to study possible differences in gene expression between brains of male-oriented and female-oriented rams.

And wherever you look, more correlations between genes, biology, and sexuality pop up. Left-handedness, womb hormone levels, finger length, inner ear structure. Genes don't determine behaviour? There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Ben, than dreamt of by your philosophy.

[Boris Godunov]

Nice, Starchild

I was a bit flabbergasted by BK's BAM in that regard, too. Genes are hugely important in determining behavior. If they weren't, we wouldn't have such a thing as "instinct," now would we?

[MrFun]

We love ya, Starchild.

[Starchild]

The problem is with the whole nature v nurture debate is that fact that it's a lot subtler than that. It's a fairly fine balancing act. Your genes may say "be 6'1" but if you don't get enough calcium you'll never grow beyond 5'0. Your environment may say "be straight" but your genes tell you to dance the pink polka.

[Gibsie]

Originally posted by Starchild


You know what I found today? Twas reading through a science news site and found this delightful article about a study done by the University of Chicago showing a link between brain metabolism and sexuality.

Nowhere in there does it show that people are incapable of choosing their brain metabolism. You need to prove that gays can't change their brain metabolism. Yes, the gays choose how their brain works just like they choose their sexuality. It's so obvious (I read it in the Bible).

[Boris Godunov]

And your belief in the Bible is obviously a protected right because it's an unchangeable quality, like being black.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Rogan Josh

What unbelievable arrogance and bigotry!

Sorry, could you just confirm that you are the poster who characterised gay men (although not I imagine, lesbians) as arsef*ckers?



'bigotry'- an unreasoning adherence to a creed or view.


Even blindfolded in the dark, I think I could determine between the bigots and non-bigots in this thread.