But of course! Mothers are responsible for everything in the universe!
Remember how "overbearing" mothers used to be what "caused" men to be gay? Argh..
these are some of the same people who think that creationism should be taught as science, so my bet is that a little scientific evidence on another point won't budge the core beliefs of some.
your second thought is a scary one, though. the womb police aren't much troubled by someone else losing bodily privacy and autonomy for the sake of protecting the religious beliefs held by others.
I think the idea that sexual orientation is inborn sounds politically seductive but it gets us in more trouble. I, personnally, try to avoid it (not just because I think it isn't true).
There are things that are protected by the American constitution that are very clearly choices. Religion, for example. So the fact that someone chooses their sexual orientation should not, in and of itself, be an argument to discriminate.
The fact is, folks should not be imposing their lifestyle (a very particular view of marriage and family) on others in a 'free' society. Period. And they should not be discriminating against people on the grounds of who they choose to live with or have sex with or whatever.
And those patriarchal bastards will blame almost anything on mothers/women whether it comes by biology or not.
The nature/nurture argument with regard to sexual orientation is a double-edged sword. The argument goes, if it's a choice, then it's not subject to protection and equality. If it's not a choice, then it must be an abnormality of genetics and hormones.
There's no winning for sexual "others" with either position.
I'm with the previous commentor. Choice has been protected historically and should continue to be so and we need to broaden those protections. I believe the right to self-determination is implicit in the US constitution.
yeah...i'm similarly unconvinced that "nature" is a good stand for our community. as someone with a fluid orientation, i'm much more inclined to talk about the choice of affirming my sexual idenity than where it came from.
Interesting. I was thinking that "natural" would be more acceptable in the same way that depression has been somewhat destigmatized over the past generation. It used to be seen largely as a sign of weak character or depravity, but now that there are known biological factors, there's less judgment attached to it.
The NYT did a piece recently on a biological basis for addiction and possible drug therapy, and one of the things they talked about was the hope among researchers that addictive tendencies would incur less judgment and stigma once a genetic cause or factor is pinpointed. I was thinking that evidence for the inherence of orientation might open the eyes of some anti-gay people.
That said, I can see how politically a biological basis might not carry much weight with homophobes. I guess a better frame of reference might be that about 50% of all pregnancies abort naturally, but that doesn't render medical abortion acceptable in the eyes of anti-choicers.
And you're absolutely right, Jove, it shouldn't matter because our freedoms are supposed to be protected by law. Funny how easy it is to lose sight of that anymore.
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