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Cossie wrote:
>she caused enormous damage to the social fabric of my country.<
Mrs Thatcher was certainly blamed by her (vociferous) opponents for damaging the fabric of the country, but society's attitudes are down to the individuals in society, not to the person in charge. Her successors of whatever political persuasions have done nothing to improve the fabric of society since. Are they to blame too? Admittedly our present leader has talked a lot about improving it.
Hugs
Nigel
I dream of boys with big bulges in their trousers,
Never of girls with big bulges in their blouses.
…and look forward to meeting you in Cóito.
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Aussie
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Really getting into it |
Registered: August 2006
Messages: 475
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Women with beards are OK. It's only when they have a facelift and it pulls it up it to their chin that it gets distasteful.
Aussie
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Jedediah
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Likes it here |
Location: Made in NZ
Registered: March 2006
Messages: 170
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Eew. Eew. Eew! EEW!
Nasty Aussie! - go and sit in the corner.
cheers
E Te Atua tukuna mai ki au te Mauri tauki te tango i nga mea
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Aussie
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Really getting into it |
Registered: August 2006
Messages: 475
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Are you counting ewes again? Can't you sleep?
Aussie
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Wow, my head is spinning. As Richard Feynman said “What Do YOU Care What Other People think” I am not talking about those that are posting to this thread. I am talking about society as a whole, the studies of what ever. The point is we, those that can cross that artificial line that is the socially constructed bane of our existence; we are, whether by virtue of nurture or nature, we do exist.
Everything that has been said is all very interesting, Life is change we are not stone. I just don’t feel that I need anyone to define who and what I am. Beside if you guys have been reading about the new discoveries within the genome project you’ll find that it seems we are far more unique from one another than had been previously thought. This to me seems to make these silly templates we try to apply to groups all the more a moot point. I think we need to face the fact that any easy, not there ever where any, answers there may have been have gotten just a little bit less clear, Now comes the fun of discovery, a little less tethered by artificial constrants.
The question I have always asked is to what degree does or should our sexuality define us other than socially. To borrow a phrases from Bob Marley I think it should be of no more consequence than the color of our eyes, and can express its self with just as much variety.
Peace
[Updated on: Thu, 23 November 2006 17:01]
People will tell you where they've gone
They'll tell you where to go
But till you get there yourself you never really know
Where some have found their paradise
Other's just come to harm
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arich wrote:
> The question I have always asked is to what degree does or should our sexuality define us other than socially. To borrow a phrases from Bob Marley I think it should be of no more consequence than the color of our eyes, and can express its self with just as much variety.
"Does" and "should" are very different for me.
"Does": my sexuality has in fact pretty much defined most things about me. It has shaped my views on diversity and discrimination, and made a concern for all aspects of equalities (sex, ethnicity, orientation, age, religion, etc) a vital part of who I am. Being gay has also shaped my career: I have been determined never to work in any situation where I felt uncomfortable as an out gay man. Interestingly, it has not shaped my choice of friends, most of whom are straight.
"Should" this be so? Of course not: it's a sad reflection of society that for many of us who came out in the 1970s it became so as a matter of survival. And I'm afraid that I'm too old to change easily - in a sense, I've been scarred by growing up in a homophobic society. But things *are* changing - slowly, painfully, and more so in some places than others. Sexuality seems less defining for today's thirteen-year-olds (judging from my nephews circle of friends, anyway): perhaps in another generation sexual orientation will be able to take its place as "just another thing" about someone.
"The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. ... Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night devoid of stars." Martin Luther King
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Jedediah
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Likes it here |
Location: Made in NZ
Registered: March 2006
Messages: 170
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Sleep? What's that? (And i was very careful to spell Eew correctly)
What are you doing up anyway?
cheers
E Te Atua tukuna mai ki au te Mauri tauki te tango i nga mea
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Aussie
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Really getting into it |
Registered: August 2006
Messages: 475
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Going to work!
I wasn't sure if you could spell or not.
You were up pretty early too.
How did you find them?
Aussie
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As I thought about my question I came to sort of the same kind of conclusion, seems we are about the same age. One difference is I was out, not by choice, a bit earlier.
The bias of our personal experience we can not shed. I feel I have somehow that I have been able to minimize the effect to maybe a degree, but then some of the way it has shaped your attitudes and views are way beneficial, by comparison we do tend to be more, as you said, more accepting of diversity. I find it interesting in that we both tend to have mostly straight friends LOL as a matter of fact I only have one openly gay friend where I live, and that over a 4 year period of time.
And as for should, I guess I am lucky, I have not lived in so much fear, in my chosen fields of work it’s never been an issue, as I have never felt that I needed to even reveal my sexuality and since I’m not obvious gay, as I have said, that part of me becomes a point of awareness as people get to know me. My circle of friends has always tended toward the more alternative to prevailing societal view so to speak and that has been of great benefit to me.
Peace
People will tell you where they've gone
They'll tell you where to go
But till you get there yourself you never really know
Where some have found their paradise
Other's just come to harm
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cossie
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On fire! |
Location: Exiled in North East Engl...
Registered: July 2003
Messages: 1699
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... the times, they are a-changin'.
As regards the UK, we have become, in many respects, a pretty secular country. Unless we are driven into religious revival by Islamic extremists (and that possibility cannot be dismissed), we are on the verge of securing full legal protection, and - as NW has suggested - the present generation of schoolchildren doesn't appear to give a damn about gender preference. In fact, the same is largely true of the parents of that generation, so I'd confidently expect that in the space of one more generation - say 25 to 30 years - gender preference will have ceased to have any social relevance.
I doubt, however, whether so much progress is possible in the United States, where religious fundamentalism actively requires hate objects to create its power base.
Until the fundamentalists actually read their Bibles and stop making highly selective quotations - if Leviticus declares homosexuality an abomination, how can they choose to ignore the fact that eating shellfish is equally abominable, and that unruly sons should be stoned? - there is little hope of rational understanding.
The worrying thing is that the United States is the most powerful nation on earth, and the fundamentalist finger is dangerously close to the triggers of power.
For a' that an' a' that,
It's comin' yet for a' that,
That man tae man, the worrld o'er
Shall brithers be, for a' that.
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What happens over the next two years will be very telling. As for the fudi’s , I can’t wait to see forest of beams growing out of their heads when they gather together .
ooow watch where you point that beam. Get your beam off my junk. hahaha
People will tell you where they've gone
They'll tell you where to go
But till you get there yourself you never really know
Where some have found their paradise
Other's just come to harm
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Hey Saben I could complicate this even further from drawing on my own personal experiences.
I had always found myself liking to have friends (boys) who were young looking and also (when I was a young boy myself) small of stature like myself. Also since I was quite poor at athletic things I was interested in being with boys who were not very athletic either so I wouldn'd seem to be so inferior to them.
I know that when I was 9 or 10 (maybe a bit older) I was attracted to some girls but they had to be somewhat boyish looking and not be prominately femine acting or dressed. I liked a girl who was in a dress but also would appear unsophisticated and womanly acting. Also the less manly acting a boy, the more I was attracted to him.
As time went on I think I was turned from wanting to be with girls because I would be teased about it. Of course the more I was teased, the less I would try to be with any girls at school etc. I would cultivate friendships with other boys who I percieved were more like me.....gaydar?
Then more than a lot of you have done (if I have that correct?) I would find ways where I could sleep over with those other boys and see if they would be amenable to any kind of sexual fun. It was mostly one-sided with me being the active person and they would only have to remain passive and not have to let me think they were awake even. So it went on for years for me and also what was interesting is that I would never try to do anything with someone living close to me in my neighborhood. Well, it was easier to ask to sleep over if the other boy lived some distance away and it was also an excuse for us to be sleeping together. In those days we always would share a bed as most of us lived in fairly small houses.
Now what was very interesting to me was that when I finally found I was very attracted to one of the guys I knew on my ship that I was surprised at my reactions. This other guy fit my criteria as being slightly effeminate looking but not effeminate acting and looking young for his age. When we got to the point we were going to have a 69 I was totally turned off by the idea he would be doing something sexual to me.
So does that make me gay or straight but only confused about my attractions, or does it mean I am really bi and also would be attracted to the right girl? At the point in my life when I was 30 I was not at all attracted to guys my own age but still to younger guys in their teens. Yes, to guys who were young looking and somewhat effeminate in appearance such as the page boy type hair style like Prince Phillip had. But the more a guy looked like he was masculine, the less the attraction. As to girls, they were more attractive to me the less they looked like an older sophisticated woman.
Yeah it can be weird. 40 years after the Navy kicked me out for being gay I really wonder if I was. I am not attracted to guys. At least to noone much older than early 20's.
I can say one thing however, gay or not it is not a choice we make. So if I were born to be gay or became that way through nurture, it makes no real difference does it? It is a moot point as to the cause when the condition does not seem to be able to be changed no matter how hard you want it.
Ken
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cossie
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On fire! |
Location: Exiled in North East Engl...
Registered: July 2003
Messages: 1699
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... but, for my fourpenn'orth, you were (maybe) gay, and your friends were in denial. That's one of the sad things about the so-called moral majority; they regard themselves as superior because they didn't take the risks you were prepared to take.
In my view, you are morally superior to them all. "You followed your natural instincts, you didn't try to harm anyone." Though I hope you're with us for many years to come, it's hard to think of an epitaph morally superior to that.
Ken, I respect you.
For a' that an' a' that,
It's comin' yet for a' that,
That man tae man, the worrld o'er
Shall brithers be, for a' that.
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My humble thanks for that comment
Ken
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saben
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On fire! |
Registered: May 2003
Messages: 1537
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What you say makes me more inclined to feel that being "gay" isn't biological and isn't actually an innate part of someone. I honestly don't feel that attraction is based on genetics at all. I think it something mutable and quite choice based. Otherwise why is there such diversity amongst sexual orientation and why does 50% of the male population (according to some surveys) engage in male-male sex-play. Bisexuality, I think, is an innate characteristic that all humans have to varying degrees (maybe the degrees of variance are what defines "genetically gay"?)
I don't think being gay is really a conscious "choice" in the way that chosing a job or choosing what to wear is. But we can choose our sex partners based on our preference. And I think our preference is very much influenced by our past experiences and partners as much, if not more than genetics. Sexual preference is far more than just gender. Race preference, body-type preference, complextion preference, age preference, gender preference, some are more influencial than others, but I do think that all are just preferences and I don't think any are concrete. Gay and Straight don't exist any more than "daddy-lovers" and "asian-lovers" do. And definitely not as much as male and female do. That at least seems to be my inclination based on most people's experiences.
Look at this tree. I cannot make it blossom when it suits me nor make it bear fruit before its time [...] No matter what you do, that seed will grow to be a peach tree. You may wish for an apple or an orange, but you will get a peach.
Master Oogway
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