Ex-male escort ... 'turns straight'

[Syne]

If you really think humans have no more say or complexity in their sex drive than animals, that's on you. That would make rape just as valid a form of copulation in humans as in animals.
…
I think it is pitiable, due to the correlated prevalence of substance abuse, depression, and suicide. But I similarly think a cancer diagnosis is pitiable due to its diminished life quality and mortality rate.

Valid? Pitiable?  

You’re comparing it to rape and cancer—an immoral act and a disease.

Wow, you REALLY need to learn how to read...or how to quit making intellectually dishonest straw man arguments.

"If you really think humans have no more say or complexity in their sex drive than animals" then that means YOU think rape is just as valid in humans. I don't, because I know humans are much more complex. You seem to keep insisting that animal sexual behaviors are the same in humans. Those behaviors necessarily include rape, and the only connection between that and human homosexuality is your assumption of similarity to animals. That's completely your doing, deary.

And where disease is caused by behavior, that behavior is wrong, like a smoker knowing the risk of cancer. Or do you think smokers have zero blame if they develop lung cancer? O_o

Homosexuality in animals is seen as controversial by social conservatives because it asserts the naturalness of homosexuality in humans, while others counter that it has no implications and is nonsensical to equate natural animal behaviors to morality. [source]

Again, you have yet to show that animals can have a homosexual orientation, while I have shown otherwise.

LeVay suggests that the same gene that promotes homosexual behaviour in male sheep could also make females more fertile, or increase their desire to mate. The female siblings of homosexual sheep could even produce more offspring than average. "If these genes are having such a beneficial effect in females, they outweigh the effect in males and then the gene is going to persist," says LeVay.

While male sheep do show lifelong homosexual preferences, this has only been seen in domesticated sheep. It's not clear whether the same thing happens in wild sheep, and if LeVay's explanation is right it probably doesn't. Domestic sheep have been carefully bred by farmers to produce females that reproduce as often as possible, which might have given rise to the homosexual males.

So LeVay and Vasey still say that humans are the only documented case of "true" homosexuality in wild animals. "It is not the case that you have lesbian bonobos or gay male bonobos," says Vasey. "What's been described is that many animals are happy to engage in sex with partners of either sex."
- http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20150206-...al-animals

Homosexual behavior is not the same as homosexual orientation. Quit intentionally equivocating or learn the difference already.

No one wants to be the object of your pity, Syne. They want acceptance. You don’t have to be a genius to understand that social acceptance is central to our lives. Rejection, in and of itself, can wreak havoc on, not only our mental health, but our physical health, as well.

No one wants cancer or depression or addiction or to be suicidal either.

No one has a right to be accepted. I'm sure even pedophiles want acceptance, but that in itself is no reason to accept their behavior. Or are you arguing otherwise? O_o

The “social stress” model proposes that stigma and discrimination directly cause the numerous mental health issues disproportionately found in the nonheterosexual population. The report identifies several shortcomings of the social stress model: Scientific evidence for the social stress model is limited, the parameters of social stress (what it is, what it means) are vaguely defined, and the model itself “does not put forth a complete explanation for the disparities” in mental health “between nonheterosexuals and heterosexuals.” In addition, the social stress model is unable to “explain the mental health problems of a particular patient.”
- https://www.osv.com/OSVNewsweekly/Articl...ldren.aspx


Most studies of minority stress are correlational.[3] While these studies have the advantage of using large, national datasets to establish links between minority status, stressors, and health, they cannot demonstrate causality. That is, most of the existing research cannot prove that prejudice causes stress, which causes poor health outcomes among minority individuals, because correlation does not imply causation.
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minority_s...imitations

Many victims of abuse have poor coping skills that would make them more susceptible to social stresses most people can readily cope with.

Now you're just lying.

No, I wasn’t lying. It wasn’t a jab, silly boy. It was an uppercut, and just so you know, that’s how you read—someone that struggles with their masculinity.

No, just your usual misandry rearing its ugly head again.

And I never said it was a "jab", I said it was a "gibe". Learn how to read...crack a dictionary.

Who knows, though? It looks like most people think that sexual orientation is supposed to be more stable in men.

I wouldn't doubt it. Sexual desire in men is very object oriented, whereas in women it is experience oriented. Objects don't change, but experiences can come from a wide variety of sources.

I disagree.

There’s a little thing called 'status' that might contribute to this. When a man takes a jab at another man, the terms are usually associated with our feminine nature because men are more valued in society. I think that this is why women are granted more freedom to act on their fluidity than men. It’s more socially acceptable.

If a jab from another man can harm your status, you don't have any to speak of, so it makes no difference.

Do you ever have any evidence for your speculations? No, just cherry-picking mine out of context, huh?

Women are more flexible because they've evolved to depend on social support.

When they're not mating, the females stay close together to sleep and groom, and defend each other from possible rivals. - http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20150206-...al-animals

[Secular Sanity]

Let’s have a little recap, shall we? You invoked an appeal to nature. I tried to the dodge it. And then you did your usual back pedaling routine by using that same old line of reasoning that’s been around for decades.

"Irrational animal behavior is not a yardstick to determine what morally acceptable behavior is for rational man."

"It seems obvious that this built-in need to keep reproducing would manifest itself in a powerful sex drive, one that might well spill over into mating while females are infertile, or same-sex mating. Victorian scientists saw animals having more offspring than seemed necessary: today we see animals having more sex than seems necessary."

Animal Homosexuality is a Myth

What seems obvious is that there isn’t a built-in need to reproduce and there never was. Nothing spilled over. All that "NATURE" needed was a sex drive, duh!

I'll see ya later, little guy.  

[Syne]

Let’s have a little recap, shall we?

Yes, let's.  

You invoked an appeal to nature.

I made zero value judgements there between nature and nurture (as there is obviously good nurturing and bad nature as well), and quite the contrary, I have repeatedly told you that your appeal to the nature of animal behavior doesn't make it good for humans just because it's natural. This is an obvious projection of your own repeated argument that only cites this fallacy.

I tried to the dodge it. And then you did your usual back pedaling routine by using that same old line of reasoning that’s been around for decades.

No, you tried to subsume nurture into your own appeal to nature: "And nurture is part of our nature."
And your argument against the nature/nurture dichotomy seems to just be an appeal to novelty, whereas you've made no real argument why that dichotomy doesn't exist or is an obsolete notion, even to the point of citing links with zero mention of nurturing.  

"Irrational animal behavior is not a yardstick to determine what morally acceptable behavior is for rational man."

"It seems obvious that this built-in need to keep reproducing would manifest itself in a powerful sex drive, one that might well spill over into mating while females are infertile, or same-sex mating. Victorian scientists saw animals having more offspring than seemed necessary: today we see animals having more sex than seems necessary."

Animal Homosexuality is a Myth

Wow, way to continue the obvious intellectual dishonesty. Here you sandwich a quote from my earlier source, http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20150206-...al-animals, inbetween a quote and its source...seemingly in an attempt to discredit my scientifically valid source by association (to what I can only assume would be a genetic fallacy...since you make no arguments against it).

How dishonest can you get?  

Not to mention that you don't even try refuting either.

What seems obvious is that there isn’t a built-in need to reproduce and there never was. Nothing spilled over. All that "NATURE" needed was a sex drive, duh!

What may seem obvious to you is completely subjective, since you utterly fail to support your argument in the least little way. You just proclaim it so, like a religious devotee.  

Evolution doesn't produce universal traits that don't serve survival and/or reproduction. So you're obviously completely ignorant of the science and only spouting whatever nonsense makes you feel good...which makes sense, seeing as you believe that the sex drive is only for pleasure.

Evolution by natural selection was first demonstrated by the observation that more offspring are often produced than can possibly survive. This is followed by three observable facts about living organisms: 1) traits vary among individuals with respect to their morphology, physiology and behaviour (phenotypic variation), 2) different traits confer different rates of survival and reproduction (differential fitness) and 3) traits can be passed from generation to generation (heritability of fitness).
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution

So you're a quasi-religious believer and a science denier. How can you live with that cognitive dissonance? O_o

[Secular Sanity]

So, whenever a man or an animal is banging it out, they’re thinking about impregnating someone? What are you, one of those stealthers?

Whatever, dude.  

[Syne]

So, whenever a man or an animal is banging it out, they’re thinking about impregnating someone? What are you, one of those stealthers?

Whatever, dude.  

Another lazy, dishonest straw man.

If you think animals are "thinking" anything, that may explain your anthropomorphizing. Like the desire for food as pleasure, instinctual drives need not be conscious ones (hence the name).

Too bad you haven't been able to refute any of the science you don't like. But true believers like you only need to make unsupported proclamations.

[Secular Sanity]

If you think animals are "thinking" anything, that may explain your anthropomorphizing. Like the desire for food as pleasure, instinctual drives need not be conscious ones (hence the name).

Exactly. Therefore, sexual preferences between two consenting adults, whatever that may be, cannot be consider unnatural or immoral. What you seem to be forgetting is that traits are passed down from both parents. And maybe that’s just your misogynistic tude rearing its ugly head again.

[confused2]

If you think animals are "thinking" anything, that may explain your anthropomorphizing.

I think Syne may be on to something here. The first response of any (most) animals to any sort of intruder is to try to kill it. We anthropomophise 'kill it' and call it 'bullying' or possibly one level above bullying we might say 'morally wrong' - with the same intent as any other animal - kill it.

[Syne]

If you think animals are "thinking" anything, that may explain your anthropomorphizing. Like the desire for food as pleasure, instinctual drives need not be conscious ones (hence the name).

Exactly. Therefore, sexual preferences between two consenting adults, whatever that may be, cannot be consider unnatural or immoral. What you seem to be forgetting is that traits are passed down from both parents. And maybe that’s just your misogynistic tude rearing its ugly head again.

Again, you're not making any argument. You just keep proclaiming things with religious fervor.
Saying "therefore, my point" is not an argument. It doesn't do a single thing to connect what I said with your assertion.

For example, let's take eating. It obviously serves a survival imperative, but you can doing it for pleasure too. You claiming that it cannot be unnatural or immoral would have to mean that you don't find even extreme gluttony a moral failing. Is essentially eating yourself to death natural and moral? If so, one has to wonder what, if anything, does count as a moral failing/unnatural to you. If nothing, any assertions of yours about what's natural or moral are completely meaningless.

And do you really believe that hunger is an instinctual drive divorced from survival? You believe that parents pass on a desire for specific pleasures instead of drives that promote basic survival? Or more to the point, you believe those desires for pleasure are encoded in our genetics? If so, wow. You're just choke full of anti-science bullshit.

---

If you think animals are "thinking" anything, that may explain your anthropomorphizing.

I think Syne may be on to something here. The first response of any (most) animals to any sort of intruder is to try to kill it. We anthropomophise 'kill it' and call it 'bullying' or possibly one level above bullying we might say 'morally wrong' - with the same intent as any other animal - kill it.

Yes, animal behavior has no moral component. Unless you believe humans are the same as animals and both either do or do not have morality. If animals do, why is no one trying to stop wild animals from murdering each other (animal police?), and if we don't, why is anyone trying to keep humans from murdering each other?

[Secular Sanity]

If you think animals are "thinking" anything, that may explain your anthropomorphizing.

Animals don't think?

I think Syne may be on to something here. The first response of any (most) animals to any sort of intruder is to try to kill it. We anthropomophise 'kill it' and call it 'bullying' or possibly one level above bullying we might say 'morally wrong' - with the same intent as any other animal - kill it.

There’s a joke in there somewhere. Something to do with an intruder jumping off the bed, a hot water bottle, and a stuffed sock, but you won’t be hearing it from me.  

And do you really believe that hunger is an instinctual drive divorced from survival? You believe that parents pass on a desire for specific pleasures instead of drives that promote basic survival? Or more to the point, you believe those desires for pleasure are encoded in our genetics? If so, wow. You're just choke full of anti-science bullshit.

We do have an innate desire to reproduce. It's not just desire for sex that keeps a species going. The desire for sex only helps ensure genetic diversity.

No...no, we don't. We don’t have an innate desire to have offspring. A desire for sex ensures a species survival. Lots of people never have children. My brother doesn’t have any children but some of his traits might be passed down through my children. Well, maybe not in my case. Speaking of which, I thought it only took a couple of weeks but it takes 6-8 weeks. Still waiting.  

Homosexuality is not a misfortune, Syne. The only unfortunate thing is your pity. It implies that you think that the very thing that brings them happiness is somehow incompatible with happiness. It makes no difference as to whether or not it is innate or acquired. The only thing that’s hurting people is homophobia. It’s a common theme among sufferers.

[Syne]

If you think animals are "thinking" anything, that may explain your anthropomorphizing.

Animals don't think?

Not on par with humans...hence the anthropomorphizing.

A Harvard scientist presents a new hypothesis on what defines the cognitive rift between humans and animals. He identifies four key differences in human thought that make it unique. Animals, for example, have "laser beam" intelligence, in which a specific solution is used to solve a specific problem. But these solutions cannot be applied to new situations or to solve different kinds of problem. In contrast, humans have "floodlight" cognition, allowing us to use thought processes in new ways and to apply the solution of one problem to another situation.
- https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20...102137.htm

IOW, they cannot abstract generalized things like morals or even the underlying motives for their actions...like a sexual orientation.  

And do you really believe that hunger is an instinctual drive divorced from survival? You believe that parents pass on a desire for specific pleasures instead of drives that promote basic survival? Or more to the point, you believe those desires for pleasure are encoded in our genetics? If so, wow. You're just choke full of anti-science bullshit.

We do have an innate desire to reproduce. It's not just desire for sex that keeps a species going. The desire for sex only helps ensure genetic diversity.

No...no, we don't. We don’t have an innate desire to have offspring. A desire for sex ensures a species survival. Lots of people never have children. My brother doesn’t have any children but some of his traits might be passed down through my children.

No, some of your parents' traits pass to your children. His traits wouldn't unless you've been engaging in incest. Basic biology, deary.

A person's conscious desire for offspring can certainly be mediated or even quashed by (bad) nurturing, but evolution didn't produce sexual desire as a drive unto itself.

Birds do it, bees do it, and we do it.

The birds, the bees, chimpanzees, humans – we all do it, but few people realise that sexual reproduction actually first evolved in creatures vastly different to ourselves.
...
Before sex evolved all reproduction was done asexually, which basically means by cell division – an organism literally splits in half to form two.
...
Asexual parents, in contrast, produce offspring that are basically carbon copies of themselves, which sounds like a better approach for a world in which we are told that our genes selfishly want to guarantee their survival.

So, bearing all this in mind, why should so many species take the long and winding route of sexual reproduction, when a straightforward path is available?
...
In 1886, German evolutionary biologist August Weismann proposed one such advantage.
...
Some of their offspring will carry a beneficial mix of good genes from both parents, meaning they will respond better to environmental stresses that would leave asexual species in grave danger. In fact, sex may even speed up the pace of evolution – an obvious advantage if the environmental conditions are changing rapidly too.

Ultimate proof of these benefits of sex comes from studies in which asexually-reproducing species have been coaxed into becoming sexually-reproducing ones. Primitive single-celled organisms usually do just fine with asexual reproduction, but if environmental stresses are high, they can turn into sexual species.
- http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20160704-...e-have-sex

Asexually-reproducing species can become sexually-reproducing due to environmental stresses, and the subsequent need to adapt faster, without any time to evolve a sexual desire at all.

If the sex drive had no basis in reproduction, we could not show evidence of sexual selection.


Are you saying sexual selection doesn't occur? O_o
Do you still insist that hunger has nothing to do with survival?  

Homosexuality is not a misfortune, Syne. The only unfortunate thing is your pity. It implies that you think that the very thing that brings them happiness is somehow incompatible with happiness. It makes no difference as to whether or not it is innate or acquired. The only thing that’s hurting people is homophobia. It’s a common theme among sufferers.

That very thing is highly correlated with addiction, depression, and suicide. There are many things that make people happy but are not healthy.

Even if we just accept your premise that homophobia is the only thing hurting them, that still means that it is unfortunate. But the social stress model has never been rigorously proven.

Compared to the general population, non-heterosexual and transgender subpopulations have higher rates of mental health problems such as anxiety, depression, and suicide, as well as behavioral and social problems such as substance abuse and intimate partner violence. The prevailing explanation in the scientific literature is the social stress model, which posits that social stressors — such as stigmatization and discrimination — faced by members of these subpopulations account for the disparity in mental health outcomes. Studies show that while social stressors do contribute to the increased risk of poor mental health outcomes for these populations, they likely do not account for the entire disparity.
- https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publicati...and-gender

How are higher rates of intimate partner violence caused by homophobia? O_o

Other factors, such as the elevated rates of sexual abuse victimization among the LGBT population discussed in Part One, may also account for some of these mental health disparities, as research has consistently shown that “survivors of childhood sexual abuse are significantly at risk of a wide range of medical, psychological, behavioral, and sexual disorders.”