cossie
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On fire! |
Location: Exiled in North East Engl...
Registered: July 2003
Messages: 1699
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I see a lot of 'debate' on this issue across the wide and varied spectrum of gay message boards. It's taken me a long time to be sure, but I finally accepted that I was gay when I realised that whenever I saw an attractive person of initially indeterminate sex I was disappointed if they turned out to be female. Until then, I regarded myself as bi - and, like Tim, I have enjoyed, and still enjoy, a long and happy marriage and a super family.
I'm firmly in the 'conditioning' camp. The full story is much to long to tell here, but I grew up with caring but elderly parents in a rural setting with few peer-playmates of either sex. I can't claim perfect recall, but as an only child of a family which not only didn't do naked but as near as dammit acted as if naked didn't exist, I had an insatiable curiosity about the human body from a very early age. I think this pre-conditioned me to be something of a voyeur, and I suppose in a way I still am (nice gallery, Tim!) but it certainly made me a randy little bugger. My first overtly sexual experience (of the 'doctors and patients' variety) occurred when I was six. It was heterosexual, and was followed by many other adventures of that ilk over the next six years. At twelve, at a time when there were no near-contemporary girls in our community, I had my first relationship with a boy. I loved it, though it was still a pretty innocent touchy-feely affair. I know HOW it started (and one day I will bare all!) but I've never fully convinced myself as to WHY it started. Certainly for the next sixteen years I had a series of relationships spread pretty indiscriminately between the sexes, though biased towards males, and I still see little intrinsic difference between such relationships.
It probably sounds a bit twee, but physical attraction hits me between the eyes well before my brain analyses gender.
So what, I hear you say. Well, it seems to me that I had a pretty good grounding in hetero relationships and if I'd never stumbled into a gay relationship I'd never have missed it. But I did, and eventually it became clear to me that this was my preference. I therefore postulate the theory that most of us have, to a greater or lesser degree, the capacity to be gay, but in many of us the trigger is never pulled. (Good visual image, don't you think!) I suspect that the earlier in life the trigger is tweaked, the more positive the response will be. Thus Marc finds himself with a gay orientation from his earliest recollections, but who knows what apparently trivial incident may have pushed him in that direction? Nigel validly draws attention to his own situation, which does, I'm sure, ring a bell with many of us who have suffered much less than he; I know that I have had a few sexual experiences which revolted me at the time but which developed a peculiar kind of fascination in retrospect.
I have rambled enough (for now!) but I concur one hundred per cent with Tim's view on the protection of kids; I am,I suppose, a paedophile (English spelling!) insofar as I love looking at boys - especially naked boys - but the proposition that sexual relationships at that age with 'loving' adults are harmless is absolute bullshit.
I am not ashamed to be gay; my gay relationships have taught me a great deal, and have developed the characteristics of kindness, sympathy, consideration, understanding and - above all - love, which I hope and certainly try to exhibit in abundance. But we must not hide behind the fiction that we cannot harm kids because they are pre-programmed one way or another. Too many gays are insular and selfish - witness the reaction to the recent legal action by the Scout Association of America. For heaven's sake, stand back, be realistic, and ask yourselves what the hell else the Scout Association could reasonably do! Let's live our lives as we wish to live them, but without ever losing sight of our responsibility to those younger and potentially more impressionable that ourselves.
(PS- Tim - I've waxed loquacious because I usually can't penetrate to your new board! Please check the 'Beautiful Thing' thread on the old board for another relevant message.)
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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