h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Natural is always a dodgy word in a discussion like this one, because it gets confused with things like moral or "the ordained order of things" (NB scare quotes). At its broadest a predilection for animals or children is "natural" because it falls within the possible range of human behaviours. A person with such predilections would be incapable of concluding this was wrong if they had not been told so, or seen similar behaviour in others condemned, *or* could not derive it from general principles that had been approved or disapproved of, or... in short if they had had no usable moral education in relating to other people/sentient entities.

Noggin

Mycroft, we were discussing the rights of homosexuals, not of paedophiles or of people who want to have sex with animals. You are not staying on topic and I feel you are only trying to be provocative without actually contributing to the debate in order to . . . what? If you had a real interest in the topic I think you would be discussing the topic. Please excuse me if I am wrong in this, but it is how I see it.

az

Not so many decades ago, the general opinion of homosexuality in this country was on a par with the outrage that surrounds paedophilia these days. This comparison is irrelevant though, as pre-pubescent children aren't able to give informed consent to sex, whereas homosexual adults presumbably know what they are doing.

Hi Noggin,

I agree with you that it is difficult to ascertain whether someone has *really* been 'cured' of their homosexuality. Indeed, it is difficult to measure sexuality at all, given that the subject could be lying about anything.

The people cited in the article were all either very anti-gay or very anti-anti-gay, with the probable exception of Spitzer, who was described as if he was approaching it from an academic standpoint. This is of course going to bias their stated opinions.

I did a quick Google search for '"Robert Spitzer" "Archives of Sexual Behavior"' and although I couldn't find a link to the actual study there are several critiques of it from both sides. Quite interesting reading.

hi milch,

Yes, the general argument when people try to equate paedophilia and bestiality with homosexuality is precisely what you mentioned - the consent of the other being involved.

Sorry if I was a bit short with you earlier - just didn't understand where you were trying to go with the fetish thing. Anyhow, it's very late and I must get some sleep.

hasta mañana,

azzzzzz

All these studies show that is if you really don't like your sexuality you can surpress the sexual fantaisies - if you try really hard you can even sleep with someone else. This isn't really surprising after all people manage to be celibate through choice.

Look at the results.

The amount of sex reduces - yes if you try hard not to have sex, and stop actively looking for it then you can not have sex.

They get married, yes the form close friendship with a woman (as many gay men do) and have some sort of sex with her. But very few of them have sexual fantaises about women other than the one that they are married to.

The amount of fantasies reduce - yes if you try really hard you can stop yourself mastubating and having any fantasy.

Their are a small minority of people who are basically bisexual, but choose to be gay and I suppose that they can change.

And yes their are some people who's sexuality changes when they fall in love with someone.

If you belive that being Gay is Ok then it's ok to be gay whether or not you choose to be gay, if you believe that it's wrong to be gay then its wrong whether or not its a choice.

Can we reguard it as a mental illness? If you think a mental illness as something that you can't get out of your mind and causes your problems in life then yes, but that's not how most people think of a mental illness.

But I was brought up not to eat meat, I've thought about it deeply and I don't think that eating meat is wrong. I have tried eating meat but I just can't get the image of a cute ickle animale being evilly murdered out of my head.

I find it embarrasing that when I got out for a meal I have to ask people to prepare something different. It's boring going to resturants and only having a choice of one or two dishes - yes I'd like to be able to eat meat - but is being vegetarian a mental illness?

Still got a bit of backlog to work through, but this caught my eye, from Creachy...

'now before i get the backlash of being accused of being homophobic, can i just point out i am neither anti nor pro-gay. having never experienced homosexuality myself i cannot judge.'

Do people really think like this, that they have to experience both sides before being able to 'judge'? I guess you cannot say then whether you are sexist or not, or racist or not, or any other phobia or hate/fear based prejudice.

Because you feel you have to be able to experience both sides before you can say anything pro or anti. Thats impossible in life, and thats a very high fence you are sitting on.

i have good balance

Z,

Since vegetarianism is learned behaviour then I don't think it could be considered a mental illness. Most people aren't brought up to be homosexuals. I sometimes wonder how many totally heterosexual people there would be if we weren't brought up in societies where heterosexuality was the accepted norm.

az

Really Creachy, have you ever experienced torture? If not then by your own rules you cannot judge whether torture is wrong or right. You are going to need good balance sitting on that ridiculous fence.

It's like, a doctor doesn't need to have had a disease or injury to be able to treat it?

quite right Kaz. i have not experienced torture so therefore will not judge it

though i think you are taking it a bit extreme here. perhaps next time you should just say 'i think you are completely wrong, therefore you are an idiot.' it's a lot quicker and far more to the point.

now if you are quite finished nit picking perhaps we can get back to the objective stance i was initially taking which is, and always has been, that this study can help those that 'want' to be helped.
i have not once passed judgement on homosexuality, please remember that.

My thoughts.

Scientifically speaking (in a Judeo-Christian society that is ), homosexuality is a bit of an oddity. As humans, we are told that we are designed to reproduce, live within the guidelines of heterosexual sex, get a job, get a mortgage, worship gods, watch TV, go down the pub.

A lot of people do that.

But then, a lot of scientists are also religious. Science is never the be all and end all, and especially when it comes to human behaviour, it rarely fills in the gaps for us, merely theorising what our motivations are for doing certain things.

When it comes to the Bible, being gay is dysfunctional. Christianity is homophobic (regardless of whether you want to tack the word "fundamentalist" onto the front) - it promotes marriage, conformity to society and gods word, and anything outside the norm is rejected and either must be changed or killed. Gay people cannot marry in a Christian sense - that is, to reproduce their genes in a safe manner. Therefore it's not a desired trait of a Christian - just read the Bible and look at how many pages are devoted to the ideal of marriage. Marriage = children.

BUT. Not everyone is Christian. And less and less people are subscribing to the original ideals of Christianity when it comes to marriage and children. Not everyone chooses that option any more.

I think scientific research into what makes people gay is incredibly important. When I was studying human behaviour and gender as part of my psychology course, I was shown a case study of a man in Germany who was studying the construction of the brain. He theorised that gay men had a certain part of their brain (the part that controlled sexual instinct) that was more similar to women than their fellow gender. Unfortunately, this video was tarnished by the fact that my (very straight) course tutor switched it off and decided to rant about how offensive this was - that (despite the fact that this was scientific research) it implied that being gay was something that could be changed at will.

I personally, would like to know whether I am psychologically straight (that is, the experiences with the girl-across-the-road made me want to do her) or behaviourally straight (that is, I was meant to be a gross leerer of both women and men).

I know from my psychology studies that humans are not driven by the desire to reproduce when it comes to having sex - if that was the case, we wouldn't bother, and contraception wouldn't exist. I know that we have sex for pleasure. I also know that regardless of any scientific research, I will never perceive myself to be an oddity of society because I want to have sex with most people regardless of gender. And that religion in Western society is continually being seen as less of a community thing, more of a personal thing.

So I can't be worried about the study. That's bigotry for you. That's Christianity for you. FACT - don't disagree with me, mkay? Mkay. It's not going to stop people having sex, not now, not ever. It's certainly not going to stop the gay civil rights process.

Remember - people can always move out of the Bible belt. I have never been capable of being brainwashed. I grew up in a Christian repressed atmosphere, and I came out Satanist and bisexual. If someone is truly something, they can certainly fake it to the world. They can get married, they can have kids. They can die in a "heterosexual" role, but they will always, always be gay on the inside.

The only true problem I have with this article, is that a) the guy is letting his religious values conflict with his research (bias is a big part of Psychology ethics) and b) he's only dealing with people who probably have religious pressure on them (be it internal or external). Most people who "turn" back to being straight are usually under pressure that doesn't involve them making their own decisions for themselves - that is, they are affected by the desire to not divorce themselves from their religion (or go to hell), their family, or from society as a whole. All in all, it doesn't look like a steady study, and it's results may be rejected as sound science.

But then, I rarely listen to psychological/scientific studies after taking the psychology course. For one study that pops up now, there will no doubt be another tomorrow that disagrees.

*can't be bothered to preview/edit*

I haven't read the whole backlog so i might be repeating someone elses statement, anyway

I always got the impression that somewhere is a switch in the brain that basically decides whether you are sexually attracted to men or sexually attracted to women, this is fixed in the womb and cannot be be switched back (though i'm not sure what happens with bisexuals, maybe in their case the switch isn't fixed .)
The group described in the article's claim that they can 'cure' homosexuality is rubbish. all they are doing is repressing that person's sexuallity to a riduculously high levels, this is bound to lead to increased agression which will spill out onto their families.

I think the sadest thing about the article is that their are families who are so homophobic that they force their children to be treated by these quacks.

I hope I haven't offended anyone with this post.

I haven't read the particular article which quotes the paper, but I have just read Spitzer (2003)'s paper 'Can Sexual Orientation Change?' - and it's not a great paper - that being said, it's not bad.

The author himself was initially skeptical that such therapy would work, yet after the questionnaire based experiment, he reviewed his opinion.

There is no control group, nor is the experiement blinded - indeed, by the author's own admission - he conducted the telephone interviews himself, so there could be some degree of bias in the report. The subjects are also self-reporting, with subjective criteria.

That said - the sample size is large - n=200. However, the sample was self-selecting - having learnt of the study through ex-gay religous ministeries: so there may have been outlying social factors within the subjects' particular social stratas which see such sexual orientation as a 'bad thing'.

A lot of letters to the editor regarding the 'cure' appear to have misinterpreted the purpose of this paper. The title is 'Can sexual orientation change?' not 'A cure for homosexuality' - it is an investigation into whether the sexuality of an individual can be modified at all - in other words, can one be 'heterosexual' then be 'homosexual', then 'bisexual'? Is it something that can be modified, much like the other psychological issue which can be altered with psycholocial therapies: phobias?.

In which case, one could extrapolate - can those with 'homophobia' change their behaviour in a similar vein to those who have 'arachophobia'?

It's not a great paper - but it acknowledges this in the discussion of results at the end.

Hope this clears a few things up.

Stay ,
WD

Now *there's* an idea! A cure for homophobia!

az

<>

Well, not a very practical solution, I don't think. And these beliefs are now much further spread than in just the bible belt. And Bush&co are doing their best to make sure the Christian right becomes stronger and stronger. What is happening is more subtle than brainwashing.

az

yes, and with that research it may be possible. i have already said to someone myself that they probably are able to turn it around and use the therapy to turn a Heterosexual into a Homosexual. but does that make it alright to use now?

actually, that's a good question. If the resulting finished product of the Therapy was able to be reversed, would anyone argue about a Heterosexual wanting to change into a Homosexual? Or would that be just another example of external pressure on the applicant? and would they still be a Heterosexual on the inside?
would anyone be up in arms if a group of therapists came to your local church/mosque/cynagogue etc, and held conferences on doing just that?

Az, it always feels that way when Republicans are in power. There has always been a strong Christian voting majority when it comes to Presidential elections. That, alongside the general voter apathy, is how Bush got elected. It's not that there are more of them, or they are stronger, they just seem more apparent sometimes than they really are. As far as I can tell, there are more people willing to ditch their Ralph Nader vote to get Kerry in than Down-South Christians wanting to take over America (not that they could anyway - the state being separate from the church, alongside the existance of Congress makes Bush weaker than you think).

creachy - If people are able to give their consent, and have gone through a whole bunch of pyschological counselling sessions (much like pre-op transsexuals are required to), then I personally would have no problem with people using whatever method works to be whatever sexuality they liked to be.

I wish sometimes that I could be more attracted to men than I am. Or, conversely, more appreciative of women than I am. Everyone wants to improve themselves.

I mean, forgawdssakes, it's only sex.