Does A New Scientific Report on Gender Identity Support the Church?

[thesometimesaint]

20 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

Both eating and sex are powerful human urges.

And furthermore, one is necessary to personal survival, while the other is not.

Sex is not necessary for personal survival. Further as long as heterosexuality remains at it predominate level species survival will continue.

[mfbukowski]

18 minutes ago, thesometimesaint said:

If you are not interested in the medical definition. Then why insert your opinion? It's about as useful as being uninterested in lung cancer and claiming that lungs don't exist.

I made my living counseling people, and was good at it. Can I talk you into becoming a homosexual?

Are you actually reading anything, or just making random irrelevant points for fun?

Edited August 26, 2016 by mfbukowski

[rockpond]

11 minutes ago, mfbukowski said:

That's nice.CS Lewis:

http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/139095-if-anyone-says-that-sex-in-itself-is-bad-christianity

Good dodge.

[Scott Lloyd]

4 minutes ago, thesometimesaint said:

Sex is not necessary for personal survival. Further as long as heterosexuality remains at it predominate level species survival will continue.

I meant that eating is necessary for personal survival. (Really, I thought this was self-evident from my post.)

 

[rockpond]

8 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

Well, that's just it. They can only speak for themselves.

That's all anyone can do as pertaining to this matter.

But the prevailing social narrative is that it's not possible for anyone to change.

A few years before she died, I learned that one of my favorite pop singers of the '60s, Leslie Gore ("It's My Party, and I'll Cry If I Want To"), was a lesbian who had lived with her partner for many years.

I found an online interview in which she was asked if anyone knew her sexual orientation during the heyday of her career, when she was in her teens. She responded that if they did, "they knew it before I knew it," because she was not aware of it until she was in her 20s.

Now, unless she was altogether asexual during her teenage years, which I highly doubt, here is one individual who did change her sexual orientation after puberty.

I wonder how many there are who are like her in that respect.

There could be many like her.  It doesn't change the reality for those who can't change or didn't make a conscious choice about their orientation.

Side note:  That Leslie Gore didn't recognize her sexual orientation prior to her 20's doesn't mean that she was ever heterosexual either.

 

[mfbukowski]

8 minutes ago, CMZ said:

I see that this thread is veering away from the gender identity topic and towards the sexual orientation topic, which to me are, indeed, very different topics.

Since I am getting ready for work and can't type all my thoughts on the matter now I will just refer to a time I was listening to Love Line on KROQ and a male listener called in saying that he had been molested by his uncle when he was maybe around 12 and that ever since then he's felt attracted to males. Dr. Drew told him, "When your uncle did that to you he changed the wiring in your brain to make you attracted to males and that change is permanent and the best thing you can do now is to learn to accept it." Sooooo..... someone else can choose to engage in actions that unalterably change your sexual orientation but you can't do anything to change it back?

And, I do think some may have something about their physical makeup that gives them something like homosexual urges, but I also think that the world builds some concrete sort of construct around that to make them seem bigger and more permanent and unalterable than they really are. And the further away an individual gets from understanding and adhering to Gospel principles the bigger and more out of control those feelings will seem (no, I'm not saying that strict gospel adherence will necessarily remove all such feelings, but quite often in these discussions I see people putting temporary mortal feelings ahead of eternal gospel principles as though their sexual orientation is the most powerful force in the universe).

I agree

I have met people who have had that experience.  Your first sexual experience can be very powerful in patterning your preferences ever after.

[CMZ]

1 minute ago, rockpond said:

There could be many like her.  It doesn't change the reality for those who can't change or didn't make a conscious choice about their orientation.

 

So sexual orientation is a conscious choice.

 

[guerreiro9]

2 hours ago, rockpond said:

We've described to you how we understand sexual orientation.  You then wrote:  "I can't even get a consistent explanation for what sexual orientation means."  Obviously as you converse with different people you'll get different understandings.  If you want a "consistent explanation", I'd suggest going to a scholarly source.

I would prefer people don't use it at all if it doesn't have consistent meaning.  Until then I'll have to continue to ask.

2 hours ago, rockpond said:

Dessert preferences and sexual orientation are really not comparable.

Why?  In what ways do you find the comparison invalid?

2 hours ago, rockpond said:

Impossible = not able to be done.

I referred to people not being able to do something.  Sure doesn't seem like a logical fallacy.

So if I am not able to lose the extra 20 pounds I've been meaning to drop that makes it impossible?

2 hours ago, rockpond said:

Okay... so you are a male married to a woman.  Toward the top of this page you said that you do "not identify [yourself] sexually in any way".  So, when did you date men?

So if someone who self identifies as gay never dates men does that change their "orientation"?

-guerreiro9

[Scott Lloyd]

19 minutes ago, rockpond said:

There could be many like her.  It doesn't change the reality for those who can't change or didn't make a conscious choice about their orientation.

Side note:  That Leslie Gore didn't recognize her sexual orientation prior to her 20's doesn't mean that she was ever heterosexual either.

 

A teenager steeped in the glamor of fame, fortune and early success in entertainment not being interested in sex at all? I should think that unlikely.

Furthermore, young love (the heterosexual kind) is the theme that pervades all of her early hits, including "Judy's Turn To Cry," "She's a Fool," "That's the Way Boys Are," "You Don't Own Me," "Sunshine, Lollipops and Rainbows," "California Nights," and on and on.

By the way, I misspelled her first name. It's Lesley.

 

Edited August 26, 2016 by Scott Lloyd

[guerreiro9]

1 hour ago, bcuzbcuz said:

You are married....but.....(by your own definition) "a human male who does not identify (himself) sexually in any way"!!!!!!. Have you told your wife? You are neither attracted nor unattracted to her.

I understand now why you do not grasp what people mean when talking about sexual orientation.

 

My attractions and desires have changed substantially since I first met my wife.  I now consider many things attractive that I did not previously and vice-versa.  I expect my attractions to continue to change as a I pass through life experiences.

So what do identify as sexually?.... Me

-guerreiro9

[rockpond]

12 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

A teenager steeped in the glamor of fame, fortune and early success in entertainment not being interested in sex at all? I should think that unlikely.

Furthermore, young love (the heterosexual kind) is the theme that pervades all of her early hits, including "Judy's Turn To Cry," "She's a Fool," "That's the Way Boys Are," "You Don't Own Me," "Sunshine, Lollipops and Rainbows," "California Nights," and on and on.

By the way, I misspelled her first name. It's Lesley.

 

Who said that she wasn't interested in sex?  That may or may not be connected to recognizing/understanding her sexual orientation.

[rockpond]

18 minutes ago, guerreiro9 said:

I would prefer people don't use it at all if it doesn't have consistent meaning.  Until then I'll have to continue to ask.

Why?  In what ways do you find the comparison invalid?

So if I am not able to lose the extra 20 pounds I've been meaning to drop that makes it impossible?

So if someone who self identifies as gay never dates men does that change their "orientation"?

-guerreiro9

All evidence points to you not really wanting to understand.  I'm out.

[thesometimesaint]

37 minutes ago, mfbukowski said:

Are you actually reading anything, or just making random irrelevant points for fun?

Do I really need to quote guerreiro9?

[ALarson]

16 minutes ago, rockpond said:

Who said that she wasn't interested in sex?  That may or may not be connected to recognizing/understanding her sexual orientation.

Here's what Gore stated about this:

Quote

 

At Sarah Lawrence College, Gore took courses in literature and drama, enjoying every minute of it: "I was a good student and I enjoyed school," Gore later said of her experience at the school. "The campus was kind of like a haven for me. A beautiful school and an excellent philosophy. They treat women like human beings, and they were doing that back then. It felt really good to ... feel good being a woman, and Sarah Lawrence had a lot to do with helping me feel that way."

Discovering her Sexual Orientation

It was also at Sarah Lawrence that Gore realized that she was a lesbian. Before college, she later explained, she simply had never had the time to examine her true feelings. "I had boyfriends," she said. "I was scheduled to get married ... All of that was part of the agenda at the time ... Part of the problem that I had ... was being out in the public. It was hard to even explore it. I wasn't even left that opportunity. When I talk to some of my gay women friends now who might just be a little bit older than me, they would come in from [Long] Island or New Jersey, and they would put on their black Levis and black jackets and run to the bars. I wasn't quite able to do that."

Though Gore did not come out as gay until after the heyday of her fame had passed, she says she never concealed it from the people who were close to her: "I just tried to live as normally as humanly possible. But as truthfully as humanly possible."

http://www.biography.com/people/lesley-gore-16606845#discovering-her-sexual-orientation

 

 

Edited August 26, 2016 by ALarson

[rockpond]

2 minutes ago, ALarson said:

Here's what Gore stated about this:

 

Thanks.  Sounds like she was attempting to live as a heterosexual before realizing that she was gay.

[Scott Lloyd]

2 hours ago, rockpond said:

Thanks.  Sounds like she was attempting to live as a heterosexual before realizing that she was gay.

Or, just as likely, was socialized into it by cultural influences. Kind of like the woman in the article I cited earlier who in high school was into being the "hot," sexy girl but voluntarily changed her sexual orientation after becoming steeped in feminist ideology and politics. Gore did become a rather strident activist for feminism and other liberal causes such as the pro-choice movement.

 

Edited August 26, 2016 by Scott Lloyd

[rockpond]

9 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

Or, just as likely, was socialized into it by cultural influences. Kind of like the woman in the article I cited earlier who in high school was into being the "hot," sexy girl but voluntarily changed her sexual orientation after becoming steeped in feminist ideology and politics. Gore did become a rather strident activism for feminism and other liberal causes such as the pro-choice movement.

 

I know many feminists who are heterosexual.

[ALarson]

29 minutes ago, rockpond said:

Thanks.  Sounds like she was attempting to live as a heterosexual before realizing that she was gay.

I agree.  I think it was very difficult back then (and even now) for those in the public eye to come out as being gay.  Look at all the past movie stars who hid it because of how they worried it would ruin their careers, etc.  

One certainly cannot always tell someone's sexual orientation by the subject of their songs or type of music they performed, IMO

Edited August 26, 2016 by ALarson

[Gray]

An early reaction to the "metastudy" (from the comments some readers hesitate to call it that due to the relatively small selection of studies reviewed and no criteria given for how studies were selected):

 

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/warrenthrockmorton/2016/08/23/the-new-atlantis-study-on-sexual-orientation-and-gender-identity-thats-not-a-study/

 

Quote

 Their review of sexual orientation is not up to date (A major omission is that it neglects to cite our recent magnum opus on this topic: http://psi.sagepub.com/content/17/2/45.full.pdf+htmlf). The idea that sexual orientation is fluid has some plausibility for women, but not for men.

Quote

As I reviewed the sexual orientations sections, I agree with Bailey. I especially agree that readers should read this major review of research on sexual orientation published earlier this year. Mayer and McHugh’s paper is missing any serious discussion of epigenetics, they overlook the new genetic linkage paper involving gay brothers, as well as work on “gay rams.” The TNA authors minimize the neural differences between gays and straights, calling them “minor differences in brain structures.” How do these authors know what differences are minor and which are not? In fact, the differences in symmetry and brain activity are quite provocative and have not been accounted for by any environmental theory. Of course, we need more research with larger sample sizes but Mayer and McHugh just shrug these studies off as inconsequential.

Regarding sexual abuse, the authors review several studies which demonstrate higher rates of sexual abuse among GLB people as opposed to heterosexuals. For the most part, they report the relevant details but they failed to catch the mistakes in the Tomeo study and report it incorrectly (see this post for the problems with using Tomeo). Even though some who are touting the study miss this, the authors provide caution for those wanting to see homosexuality as the result of sexual abuse:

 

 

Quote

The New Atlantis describes itself as a “Journal of Technology and Society.” However, the article did not receive peer review and it shows. Lawrence Mayer, the first author, is not well known in sexuality research circles but the second author is. Paul McHugh is retired from Johns Hopkins and was responsible for discontinuing the sex reassignment program there. He also was an advisor to the Repressed Memory Foundation in the 1990s.

Quickly, the National Organization for Marriage touted the paper as “Groundbreaking New Research.” Even calling the paper a new study isn’t accurate, there are no new studies in the paper. A bunch of old ones are missing as well.

 

[Scott Lloyd]

10 minutes ago, rockpond said:

I know many feminists who are heterosexual.

I never denied that there are such. Probably most are heterosexual, given that the heterosexuals are overwhelmingly predominant in the population as a whole.

 

[Scott Lloyd]

12 minutes ago, ALarson said:

I agree.  I think it was very difficult back then (and even now) for those in the public eye to come out as being gay.  Look at all the past movie stars who hid it because of how they worried it would ruin their careers, etc.  

One certainly cannot always tell someone's sexual orientation by the subject of their songs or type of music they performed, IMO

It sounds as though being lesbian never even occurred to her until she went to college.

[ALarson]

25 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

Or, just as likely, was socialized into it by cultural influences.

 

You believe that Lesley Gore was "socialized" into becoming gay? 

Considering the music she was encouraged to perform, I'd think she would have done just the opposite.

 

Edited August 26, 2016 by ALarson

[ALarson]

3 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

It sounds as though being lesbian never even occurred to her until she went to college.

I don't read her words as stating that at all.

[Scott Lloyd]

1 hour ago, ALarson said:

You believe that Lesley Gore was "socialized" into becoming gay? 

I said I believe it is possible.

Do you insist that it's impossible? What about the "hot" female quoted in the article I cited who chose lesbianism after high school when she got into the feminist ideology?

Quote

Considering the music she was encouraged to perform, I'd think she would have done just the opposite.

Her string of hits came mainly while she was in high school.

Her lesbianism did not emerge, by her own account, until after she entered an all-women's college where she was encouraged to feel good about being a woman and where, I'm guessing, she encountered feminism.

I can think of only one of her hits, "California Nights," that came along during that period.

A lot of young people, especially in show business, changed greatly from the late 1960s on, the period when the sexual revolution occurred and the counter-culture got into full swing.

Edited August 26, 2016 by Scott Lloyd

[rockpond]

4 minutes ago, ALarson said:

You believe that Lesley Gore was "socialized" into becoming gay? 

Considering the music she was encouraged to perform, I'd think she would have done just the opposite.

 

If socialization is a significant determining factor in sexual orientation, you'd think we'd have very few gays or lesbians among active LDS members.