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| Human Sexuality; ...Is pretty crazy, right? | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Jun 24 2012, 04:24 PM (599 Views) | |
| Yanmato | Jun 24 2012, 04:24 PM Post #1 |
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I'll flip you. I'll flip you for real.
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One of the more insidious aspects of heteronormativity is the mindset that heterosexuality is the "default" orientation. It's the "normal" sexuality. When one examines deviations from this established baseline, the subject is seen as having a particular trait. "Is attracted to own gender" is a trait, where "Is not" is the normal non-trait. The problem being that this sets heteronormative thinkers up for some strongly-built misconceptions. Whether it's judged as negative, positive, or neutral, "I am attracted to gender X" becomes an abnormal trait. The state of being attracted to that gender becomes a quality that defines that person. The thinker becomes aware of every member of that gender the subject knows. "They're attracted to those people," muses the thinker. This is what leads to the guy who feels uncomfortable sitting next to the gay man when a het woman provokes no response. This is what leads to the thought that gay bars are perpetual alcohol-fueled orgies because what's a lesbian going to do but have sex with other women? That's what they do, right? Heterosexuality gets no such confusion because it's not a trait at all. It's the default, normal state. In some ways, a heterosexual is seen as not even having an "orientation." And this divide between states that have no real fundamental differences among them means that while one sexuality is seen as nothing more than a quality the person possesses- one that defines little other than who they sleep with on the off-chance that they sleep with someone- another is seen as something akin to a fetish or a fixation. "You have a trait that is sexual in nature. You are a sex freak." This doesn't carry over the the heterosexual, of course. Remember, the heterosexual has no trait. In reality these traits mean little other than that a person is capable of being attracted to members of a certain group. If one is "attracted to women," this doesn't automatically mean one is filled with lust at the sight of any female that comes into their field of vision- that's the case whether the individual is a het man or is themselves a woman, no difference. And of course one understands this is true for normative sexuality. But normative sexuality is effectively invisible, so heteronormative thinkers generally don't think of truths of their own orientation and apply them to others. The terminology is somewhat misleading in this idea as well. "One is attracted to such-and-such" isn't quite as accurate as "One possesses the capacity to be attracted to such-and-such." Along with this I was thinking of Stalks's suggestion quite a while ago, that bisexuality is the human default and that restrictions (biological, psychological, and social) are pasted over that basic sexuality. And I have a new model by which to look at human sexuality. One that hopefully solves these issues or at least blunts them. To begin with, under this model heterosexuality is not the "default" from which one examines others. There's going to be a "default" from which all other things are seen as deviations- from which all differences are seen as "traits" while adherences are "non-traits-" that's just human nature. So consider pansexuality the default. I certainly don't think it's the most common state for humans to find themselves in, but it seems like a reasonable zero-line. Rather than naming someone's orientation by category, one possesses each of these traits, each of these sexual out-groups. And one would define oneself by acknowledging each of their traits separately. Each group one is not attracted to would be referred to by having a 'barrier' against that group. As in, "Thanks bro, but I have a barrier against other dudes." "Heterosexual" sounds like a package deal. All the not-attracteds that come with it must go together, or so the old model would have you believe. But that's just not the case. And it encourages heteronormative thinkers to lump everything not falling into that category together. Under the new model the originally "normative" individual now has several traits rather than a single un-trait. A barrier against their own sex. A barrier against minors. A barrier against animals. A barrier against relatives. Each of these traits is a separate quality that colors the individual's sexuality independently and none of them have anything to do with one another. Take one away and the rest don't suddenly evaporate. Under the old model, some people still believe otherwise. Every category of orientation under the old model is really a whole cocktail of separate unrelated traits. A better model should recognize each trait separately to more accurately measure and understand orientation. In addition, these barriers would exist on multiple levels. There's the guy who just isn't attracted to men and the guy who just won't ever say out loud that he's attracted to men. These are different from one another and both are different from the openly gay guy. I imagine three levels of barrier, any one of which could apply to any given group: Level 1: The individual cannot feel attracted to anyone in the given group. Level 2: The individual cannot acknowledge any feeling of attraction to anyone in the given group. Level 3: The individual will not act on any feeling of attraction to anyone in the given group. Only one of these three levels of barrier can exist for a certain group at a time. If one has a level 2 barrier, for example, that can only be because one doesn't have a level 1 barrier against the same group, and the notion of a level 3 barrier is moot. There's not much one can do about one's own level 1 barriers and having or not having any given one isn't inherently good or bad. And level 3 barriers aren't automatically harmful. In fact, maintaining certain level 3 barriers is seen as a good thing, and failing to build them can put you in jail for certain groups. Arguably with good reason, depending. But I suspect all level 2 barriers are inherently unhealthy. One can have barriers against certain activities as well as certain groups. Everyone has a few kinks they just do not want to ever try. I'd also put attraction toward things not capable of returning affection on their own (like the previously mentioned lamp, or in a more common but probably squickier case, corpses) in the act category rather than the group category. People in groups interact with one another; it's a two-way street between you and the person you do or do not have a barrier against. Acts are something one individual does or two or more people do together. You can have barriers around the act but the act can't have barriers back; that's the key difference between the two categories. And barriers against acts can live on any of the three levels, just like barriers against groups. So under this model, possessing the capacity to feel attracted to someone or something is not the trait. It's the "default." This means others thinking under the model are less likely to automatically view it as a fixation. But while that's probably true, humans are still able to fixate. One can possess a fixation just like one can possess a barrier. And that fixation can be toward a group or an act. It can vary in intensity. It just can't be toward the same thing one has a barrier toward- at least not a level 1 or 2 barrier. Fixations, just like barriers, are variations from the default, where having no barriers OR fixations is the "normal" condition. So does this make sense? Does it sound good? What are the flaws in this way of thinking? Does your own orientation look different under this model of measurement than the original categorical model? Does it feel more or less accurate? TL;DR: The opt-in model of measuring sexuality is dumb. Use an opt-out model instead. |
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| Celery Stalks | Jun 26 2012, 01:54 PM Post #11 |
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Just watch, I'm going to make Bell my wife!
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WATCH YOUR PRIVILEGE, HETERONORMATIVE THINKER |
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| VampyreGurl55555 | Jun 26 2012, 09:47 PM Post #12 |
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treating the absence of sexual attraction as a trait instead of the presence of sexual attraction as one is a really neat idea and it would be great to see how a civilization would run with something like that in their society. I wonder if it's too much different from what we have now though. If a man made an offer to another man, and he was a heteronormative thinker, he'd probably say "I'm not gay", or "I don't swing that way", or something to that effect, which is essentially the same as "Thanks bro, but i have a barrier against other dudes." |
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| Yanmato | Jun 27 2012, 11:53 AM Post #13 |
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I'll flip you. I'll flip you for real.
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In the former, the het man is saying "No thank you, you have a quality not compatible with me." The gay man is the special one. He's the one at fault. In the latter, the het man is saying "No thank you, I have a quality not compatible with this proposal." The one rejecting the overture is the one who has the trait. The one rejecting the relationship is the one taking the credit/blame for its nonexistence, rather than the other party being at fault for opening his mouth in the first place. |
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| Celery Stalks | Jun 27 2012, 12:46 PM Post #14 |
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Just watch, I'm going to make Bell my wife!
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This is multiple levels of stupid.
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| Yanmato | Jun 27 2012, 06:32 PM Post #15 |
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I'll flip you. I'll flip you for real.
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ELABORATE. |
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| Celery Stalks | Jun 27 2012, 08:46 PM Post #16 |
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Just watch, I'm going to make Bell my wife!
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It is ridiculous to believe that anyone is at fault when party A likes party B but party B does not like party A back. It seems to imply that either party A or party B can do something to fix the issue. It's really just the way things are. If you propose to a person, and they refuse your proposal, is it their fault that they don't like you? Is it your fault that you like them? Neither accusation makes much sense. Another point I wanted to make is that it is unreasonable to set any defaults for sexuality. You can use positive phrasing or negative phrasing to try to describe your own sexuality better but no default should be assumed. It would be absurd to assume everyone is attracted to everyone else, it would be equally absurd to assume that everyone is attracted to nobody. Few people can describe their sexuality with breadth, and words like "gay" or phrases like "not attracted to men" are just simple rules one can openly admit exist for them, so that they may avoid the annoyance of certain people hitting on them that they know they won't be attracted to. In fact, saying "I'm not gay" and "I can't be attracted to men" are practically the same thing and you are just trying to argue implications that I don't think exist or are incredibly subtle. The point of making the fact that you're not gay clear is not to put the other person down for being gay, it is generally to ease the pain of rejection ("He's not gay, so perhaps I'm still an attractive candidate to gays.") When taking default stances you aren't supposed to make positive assertions. The problem is that it is practically a positive assertion to say somebody likes men and somebody doesn't like men. We do not know enough about human sexuality (psychology) to decide were defaults reside. I will say one final thing: there is too much emphasis is put on the Gay=>Straight spectrum of sexuality; sexuality is something much bigger than that. In today's society people probably feel coerced into liking men, liking women, liking both, or liking neither, as if sexuality were so simple. Edited by Celery Stalks, Jun 27 2012, 08:48 PM.
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| Yanmato | Jun 27 2012, 09:24 PM Post #17 |
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I'll flip you. I'll flip you for real.
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I'm not assigning blame or claiming the scenario is in any way a failure or a calamity. Nor am I saying topics as complex as human sexuality should ideally be described by variations from an arbitrary default. I'm saying these are rules and conditions that people, by nature of being people, are going to apply to what they see and measure around them. It's not a universal human compulsion, so maybe you in particular aren't going to do it. But it is human nature. A majority of people are going to naturally follow certain patterns of thought, and rather than stubbornly trying (and failing) to make them stop thinking wrong, one is going to get more progress by offering a direction people can take those thought patterns that doesn't lead to complications like xenophobia or the imposition of inadequate categorizations regarding human emotion. The fact that one party is "to blame" whenever anything happens (good, bad, or neutral) is one of those natural thought patterns. So is the notion that in any variation of conditions one condition is going to be "the regular kind," from which all other conditions will be seen as variations. No matter what you do, most people are going to take these rules, sensible as they may or not be, and apply them to everything they judge, interpret, and analyze in the world. The variations may seem subtle to you when they're laid out for you to consciously examine, but this sort of subtle inductive reasoning is what drives people to the nigh-absurd levels of hatred you see every day. So no. I realize that in reality there isn't a single human state that is "the normal" making all others abnormal. I know "Wanna go out?"/"Nope." is not a scenario that even needs assignment of responsibility, let alone one that has a reasonable place to put it. But not many other people are going to take the time to realize that. So we need to be aware of how these rules will interact with the schema we teach each other to think with when we're teaching them. It's simply not a reasonable option to just ignore them. And I hate spectrum-based sexuality too, Stalks. Makes me wonder what thread you're reading that has somebody advocating it. |
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| Nameless | Jun 27 2012, 09:57 PM Post #18 |
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Our Great and Humble Zombie Overlord
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Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't most children "wired" to not be sexually attracted to anything before puberty? Shouldn't that be taken into account when determining a sexual "default"? |
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| Celery Stalks | Jun 27 2012, 10:01 PM Post #19 |
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Just watch, I'm going to make Bell my wife!
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Why is it wrong for someone to say they aren't gay or that they don't like men? It is a simple fact. If you've ever played the children's board game "Guess Who?" or the game "20 Questions" you'd know that generally when people narrow down the amount of possible answers they do so by asking questions with the closest 50/50 split. Conveniently someone's sex has around 50% chance of being male and around 50% chance of being female when they are born, therefor if you don't like one sex and someone of that sex wants to "get to know you better" the first reason for rejecting them that you're going to give is that you're not sexually attracted to that sex. People generally expect explanations (when a person is a child it is common for them to respond to many things with "Why?"), so when an explanation is obvious people often give it, unless it is offensive ("I don't like you because you're fat.") But generally people aren't offended because you said they were "a man" or "a woman", therefor "I'm not attracted to men" isn't offensive to anyone.
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| Nameless | Jun 27 2012, 10:24 PM Post #20 |
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Our Great and Humble Zombie Overlord
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Being asked out by a gay man is offensive to a homophobe. :P |
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