Please tell me I'm not crazy.

[princess_tutu]

So there's this guy that I've been arguing with. He is extremely anti-gay. Not to the point of violence, but to the point where he wants the entire LGBT community and their supporters to stop or leave the country so that he can raise his traditional Christian family. Oh, and homosexuality is a psychological disorder (on par with pedophilia) that

Comments

[mattymorgs]

Technically being homosexual can be considered an unnatural condition (physical or psychological) as it goes against the one of the very foundations of life: to reproduce. Thus, you have people who are unwilling to do so naturally. I'm not saying it is the most heart-moving reason behind it, but it is a true fact.

Frankly, if this is the case, he should be happy that gays aren't reproducing and are deciding to take themselves out of the gene pool if they are, indeed, suffering from a disorder.

That's about where my agreement (in any semblance) falls from him. I don't believe that they should have specific legislation for or against them just the same as any other group of people. In this world he can still raise kids as he sees fit. Besides, it would mean more for him to raise his kids in an environment of his design than by that of the government.

I think he knows what he wants but isn't going about it the right way. I just wish I had that amount of time to actively go out of my way to care about who puts what in whom. Unfortunately, I have to work and make a living for when I have my own kids to support and raise.

[new_wave_witch]

See, I disagree a little bit on your reproduction argument. Sure, our bits and pieces were created to make babies but I think that, in many ways, humans have evolved beyond instincual reproduction. With world population crowding everyone everywhere you go, there's no need to keep the species thriving. With advances in birth control, the purpose of sex has gone beyond reproduction. And also, you can't say that a person who has become sterile no longer has a purpose or is no longer natural. Plus, of course, I'll throw out the evidence of homosexuality in animal species in the wild, as many do. Perhaps homosexuality isn't so unnatural...

[lonelyheart267]

good points

[princess_tutu]

Defintely interesting points, Kaitlin. I hadn't thought about it that way. Thanks for the comments, everyone!

[mattymorgs]

Yes but those are only modern conveniences of the last fifty years. What about the billions that led up to this point? Things that are alive are meant to do two things: reproduce and die. Each purpose is being actively campaigned against by our modern society. Now I'm not saying that advances in medicine are a bad thing, just that as a species we sure seem to want to control things that are just meant to be. Being sterile for one does make you (in a way) unnatural. Or at least not viable. This is purely on a biological level mind you. You have bits. If the bits don't work, or you choose to employ your bits in ways they were not designed, you are not using what was given to you for the purpose they are there. Do you see what I am saying?

Just as well, monogomous homosexuality in "the wild" results in the two homosexuals dying off and not reproducing (or at least the one fervent one, to say little of any of its chosen mates), thus spreading into the gene pool anti-reproductive traits which will kill off the species or weaken it to be preyed upon by others.

While I certainly don't mind folks using birth control, and frankly if a guy wants to get some mud on the turtle it is none of my business, but I am simply stating that these two things are products of modern man-made convenience. Unless of course there is an orthotricyclin tree somewhere, but barring that if we were to go back in time a thousand years you'd see why both heterosexuality and fertility were so important to society as a whole.

So in today's world, like you said, I reckon we could stand to depopulate the planet some. But just because something can be done doesn't change the fact that it still isn't what was meant to be. If it weren't for the luxury of modern medicine and a large population, none of this would be an issue in a species trying to survive and become stronger. We are (locally, nationally, or globally) one disaster away from having our toys and conveniences and artificial lifestyles taken away from us. When that happens then what? Do we then become natural as we were unnatural before?

That's the question methinks. Or rather the fact that we have to face: in today's world we are not natural.

[froborr]

Actually, many social species have reproducing and non-reproducing members of the population. For example, most male chimps don't get to reproduce. They contribute to the survival of the group by helping defend their territory from rival chimp groups, hunting, etc., but they are prevented from reproducing by the dominant male.

In addition, every mammal with hands, and a few without (dolphins are very creative), practices masturbation.

Finally, you assume that things are "meant to be" a certain way, but that requires someone to mean; in other words, the world had to have been intentionally set up with specific purposes in mind. While this is certainly a possibility, even if we accept it as true, how can we know what that intent was? If everything else was designed to accomplish specific purposes, why not us? Finally, even if we accept that everything, ourselves included, was designed with a specific intent in mind, why does that necessarily mean we have to agree with that intent?

[mattymorgs]

Haha well I don't agree with a plane in which I am flying come crashing to the ground because it isn't flying any more but my disagreement doesn't change the natural order of gravity and the fact that I as a human wasn't meant to fly, anyway. So thus, when I take that risk, I am putting myself (and therefore my entire future - reproductive or otherwise) in jeopardy.

But it is all life form's ultimate purpose to reproduce. Just because someone masturbates doesn't violate the natural order of things, it is the ultimate destiny of life to pass on its genes at some point in its short life in a way as to create and raise its offspring in a beneficial way to the species.

The example with the chimps is a good one, but one that ultimately still goes to the point that those with superior, desireable genes survive and reproduce. The weaker chimps, while they may defend the group, do not have the option to create weak progeny. When one is placed in an absolute-survival environment, I hope you understand from where my point is coming.

But, since we have created an artificial world and society, since we defy nature at every possible point, we have the luxury to not "have" to do things that we were created (by gene or God) to do anyway. Once our artificial supports are gone, where will we be? Extinct? At the very least we'd be angry and inconvenienced as we actually have to do things now that were supposed to have been doing all the while. An example of that, let's say, would be a woman living in a Katrina flood zone who no longer has access to birth control pills. Since that convenience has been taken away by nature, she will either have to refrain from sex so she won't become pregnant or let nature take its course and risk pregnancy should she still have sex.

We are all (not just homosexuals) living artificially - unnaturally - though that lifestyle is simply one of the more visible and culturally abrasive ones than, say, having open heart surgery.

No harsh tones, just mere observation. I'm simply a thinker, nothing else. =)

[froborr]

I don't agree with a plane in which I am flying come crashing to the ground because it isn't flying any more but my disagreement doesn't change the natural order of gravity

Thank you for this example. If I might make an analogy, your argument is akin to saying that the law of gravity proves that the ultimate purpose of matter is to stay on the ground, and airplanes -- and birds! -- are therefore unnatural and wrong.

it is all life form's ultimate purpose to reproduce
Worker ants are sterile, but without them, the queens would starve. A species can only exist as long as some members reproduce in every generation, but that doesn't make it "unnatural" for some members not to.

those with superior, desireable genes survive and reproduce.
First of all, evolution is away from, not towards. It is not that some genes are "desirable" (again, you anthropomorphize by assuming the existance of some being able to desire) and the creatures which possess them survive. Rather, some features are maladaptive (to add an extra layer of complexity, the relationship between genes and features is rarely one to one), and individuals who possess them are less likely to reproduce, causing those features to be less common in future generations. The environment determines which features are maladaptive, and, if it changes, previously maladaptive, and therefore rare, features may suddenly become adaptive, and therefore common.

Our environment includes things like wheelchairs and hospitals, because we have put them there. As a result, features that would be maladaptive in an environment that lacked them are harmless here. This is actually a good thing from an evolutionary perspective, because it increases our genetic diversity and therefore our ability to adapt to new environments. For example, if our environment suddenly contained a very lethal new disease (which certainly happens often enough; witness AIDS, the 1918 flu epidemic, the Black Plague, etc) to which only people with Downs syndrome are immune, it'd be a very good thing for us that we kept them alive. That example might sound silly, but people with sickle cell anemia are immune to malaria, so it's certainly possible that an apparent disadvantage can, in the right environment, be an advantage.

Second, the primary threat to our survival as a species right now is that we are depleting our resources faster than they replenish. Fossil fuel is the worst example, as we're using it millions of times faster than it is made, but we are doing something similar with cropland, fresh water, ocean fish, and a number of other resources. From the point of view of species survival, it is good if a large percentage of the population doesn't reproduce -- just as it is good for ants that workers don't reproduce, because that division of labor allows the queens to produce more young and the workers to gather more food than would otherwise be the case. Obviously, I'm not suggesting that humans should live like ants, I'm just using them as an example of how a species can benefit from some individuals not reproducing.

we defy nature at every possible point
Every human population that has ever existed used some form of technology, whether stone axes or railroads. Technology predates humanity: australopithecines definitely used manufactured stone tools, probably fire, and possibly language. We evolved from tool-using ancestors, and it seems very likely that much of our evolution was to become better tool-users. Thus, it appears that using tools is a part of our nature.

Further, to "defy" something is to intentionally go against the will of that thing. This requires nature to have a will, and for us to know what that will is. Well, I have yet to see any evidence it has one, so I certainly don't have any way of knowing what its will is! How can I defy a will I don't know exists?

Finally, let us assume nature does have a will and somehow contrives to tell us what it is. That doesn't change the fact that I have a will of my own. I may indeed defy nature's will, if I believe it is morally right to do so.

Stupid comment length limit...

[froborr]

Once our artificial supports are gone
Why are you certain they will be? Rather, since all things end, why are you certain that we won't be gone before they are?

An example of that, let's say, would be a woman living in a Katrina flood zone who no longer has access to birth control pills. Since that convenience has been taken away by nature, she will either have to refrain from sex so she won't become pregnant or let nature take its course and risk pregnancy should she still have sex.
Certainly, the definition of adaptive behavior changes as the environment does, so the disappearance of birth control pills would necessitate a change in behavior for many people, just as the invention of birth control pills allowed a change in behavior in the 1960s. But what matters is the environment in which we live now, because there are an infinite number of hypothetical future environments and we cannot simultaneously prepare for all of them.

No harsh tones, just mere observation. I'm simply a thinker, nothing else. =)
Likewise.

[new_wave_witch]

But see, what I'm saying is that we've evolved beyond that form of "natural." Human beings have gotten to a point well beyond how we first appeared on this earth. We learned to make fire and cook food and our jaws evolved into a different shape. We learned to control reproduction and our sexual behaviors evolved to better suit our lifestyles and preferences.

Also, living things are meant to do more than just reproduce and die. There are amazing amounts of in-between in there, especially for humans. This is why, I think, these things are being campaigned against, if you can call it that, in our society: because we have evolved to a point where the in-between is more important than reproduction and death. These things get in the way of what we want to accomplish in our time spend on this earth, so we use our happy intelligence to control them.

But I've pretty much said the same thing I said before. Basically what I'm driving at is that who is to say whether these advances weren't meant to be, when we're so far from just cavemen bumping into each other and dropping calves? So if, according to me anyway, reproduction has evolved beyond necesity, then sexual pairings have evolved beyond reproductive purposes too. That's all I'm tryin' ta say.

P.S. mud...turtle... *weeps*

[mattymorgs]

Evolution is a natural process, however, and there is nothing natural about man-made products and concepts. We are the same human beings we were since the 1800s, the 800s, and several thousand years into the B.C. era. All of this "evolution" can be whisked away in the blink of a disasterous eye. Then what? All that we came to depend upon, all the emotions we have been spoiled to accept and crave are vanished like a fart in the wind. Then who survives? You can build a wall to shield a city from a jungle but eventually the jungle's gonna win. Are we ready to survive when it does? We certainly weren't when the inevitable (and quite repeatable) happened down south last hurricane season.

[new_wave_witch]

I'm not saying the products themselves are natural. Yes they're man-made. But I'm saying that are state as a humanity of being advanced is natural. Just like making fire, this is another skill we've learned.

[froborr]

Even before birth control, the purpose of sex went beyond reproduction. We use sex as an expression of affection, to establish dominance (sexual harrassment, rape), to relieve stress, for entertainment -- any of a thousand purposes. MOST human sex acts throughout history did not lead to offspring, so if that's the only thing sex is for, it's pretty badly designed.