----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, April 12, 2002 12:09
AM
Subject: Re: Cause of homosexuality? (was
Women, men and stress)
Hello everyone,
There was a study of Penquins in
Antarctica. Penquins stay together for life and often walk long
distances together to find their nests. In the study they found
one pair of Gay Penquins. Upon following them to their nest they
also discovered that the cave where they made their nest was the cleanest of
all of the caves in this definitely overpopulated area. According
to current heterosexual myth it is reported that they planned to open a hair
salon.
PETE said: However,
Some of the
ancilliary traits often associated with homosexuality in males
make them
less than ideal candidates for warriors,
In Gestalt therapy as well as in Native
religions there is a process that is based upon exploration through role
reversal. For example, if someone is considered an "animal" by
another person and is judged based upon that prejudice then in order to judge
the judgment it is important to discover the intent of the person doing the
judging. One way is to look at the actions through the filter of
role reversal. Simply call the judge the repugnant term, animal,
savage, homosexual, whatever and call the judged the human being and see
how the judgment reads or feels. For example it is
interesting to explore the irrational fear of heterosexual men around Gays as
to being raped or at least being ogled in the shower. Maybe,
since this is an activity that is considered normal for healthy
heterosexual men with women, the role reversal is that they don't like
Gays considering them in the same manner or at least considering the
possibility that they might be treated the way they (the heterosexual men)
treat women. Can you imagine how a short delicate woman
feels around a big muscular "possible rapist?" All of
the stereotypes of Gay behavior in the military is nothing like the people
that I knew when I was in the military. They were just as
macho and no more smoozy (soft eyed) than the people that I knew who
frequented the most macho brothels around. In short, most of the
stereo types are pretty adolescent as is what is supposed to constitute a
proper heterosexual. If you want to create a vicious
stereotype in a macho movie, make the villain a really competent martial
arts Gay guy.
As for over population, you can check the
archives, I made this case sometime ago so obviously I think there is a lot
that has to do with what the specie's needs at the time. I believe
the same is true with left handed babies who have initially a more solid
inclination for music. But I suspect that the process of
free will and hard work gets beyond that quickly. As for
whether Gays have a biological basis which I hear you saying, I suspect that
the biological inclination to be Gay is the same as being
Straight. I don't believe this should be any more or less
interesting than studies of what makes the difference between boy and girl
children. Unfortunately all of this is, like girls in certain countries
(who are aborted), an all too easy political issue for the bigots of the
world. That is why I tried to treat it with a light touch in both
of my last posts. But you guys are really serious
dudes.
Keith said: As to homosexuals being in the
vanguard of the creative movement, I'm not
> so sure. A full-scale
statistical analysis (assuming one could make an
> objective choice of
creative people) would have to be done on this
> question. What I'm more
sure about is that creative people need plenty of
> time to gestate
ideas so, without families to care for, homosexuals would
> seem to have
an advantage.
Are there more Blacks in
sports? In the end, there is a very powerful network of Gay
Creative people in the Arts and other Creative
Industries. Even when the oppression was almost total, they
were, like Jews, unbelievably creative. Even with AIDS
destroying a whole generation, the rebound has been phenomenol. I
can't believe that the same is not true in the UK. This is where I
work and I am well aware of the situation. They are an
encredible resource to whatever society they happen to belong
to. Just imagine how many blank walls there would be in the
world if all of the works of Gay artists were suddenly to
disappear.
You are right, as I teasingly wrote two
posts ago, that their family situation makes it easier for them to work 18
hour days with a partner in the same profession. The
traditional Western family structure is at odds with the business of the
Arts as well as other Creative endeavors. It is not only
composers who must work in schools to survive but theoretical physicists and
economists as well. In all of these endeavors success
demands quality and quality demands that the value must be in the project and
not in the profit if you are to succeed. In
the Creative endeavors the failure rate is greater than the "four
common failures" the market analysts like to quote before the fifth big
success in regular business.
In the Creative endeavors, if the issue is
primarily profit then the failure rate, even for businesses like Sony,
resembles the Internet.com companies in the last market.
Entertainment companies were the original virtual companies and anyone
familiar with entertainment companies would never have been fooled by the dot
com's hokum. I wasn't. As for the Gays all you
have to do is look at the figures and compare their per capita to the rest of
the population. Unfortunately heterosexuals looking at
Gays is a little like Moslems looking at Jews. You would think
that there were a billion Jews in the world and that they were all named
Sharon, to listen to the fear of the average Arabic man on the
street. Actually there are fewer Jews to all of the Moslems
than there are Native Americans to the population of the US.
I am not threatened by the Gays and I both teach
them and some have been my Masters. Am I Gay or do I
have those stress tendencies. No. Am I afraid or have
I been approached yes and I said no. Just as some
women have through the years said no to me as well. I don't have
to assault a woman because I see her naked anymore than the Gays in the
showers in the Army have to treat me with disrespect if they are attracted to
me. Some Gays give it up and become heterosexual.
Some heterosexuals like Leonard Bernstein give that up as
well. Some Gays are narcissists, a comparable
number of Heterosexuals are narcissists as well. Some Gays
are pedophiles. Some heterosexuals are pedophiles as
well.
In point of fact, I consider any talented
group of people who care deeply about their work and give significantly to the
cultures where they live as gifts to the society rather than considering the %
of sick folks in every population as damning the population.
So, because of the political issues involved I
choose to consider all of these issues lightly or
bluntly. Women have been oppressed throughout Western male
history. So have homosexuals and to a large degree
certain minorities like the Jews and Gypsies. There is a time
when being "objective" about certain issues can not be objective at
all. In fact the distance required by objectivity
itself can destroy empathy and make people into objects that can then be
treated badly. I am against any group being treated as sick,
disfunctional or a function of a biological problem or disaster that then
kicks the "medical model" into use and ends up in abuse. I
know enough history to know that history treats such things very badly
and I would prefer a better heritage for my descendants than my behaving in
such a fashion.
I'm not accusing anyone of such but
considering the "scientific" studies that ended up "Sticking it"
to Indian people in the last century and that I have seen at
times considered as "givens" on internet lists, even today, I think we
have to always make our intentions very clear about some
things. Today's "givens" when it comes to human
groups are often tomorrow's attrocities. That is the reason
I stepped back from the comments on the Dene people even though my adopted
father was 1/8th Apache and grew up at White River Apache
Reservation. He was always good with money as was
Geronimo. I think also that we have to remember that
statements being made by groups who are under serious stress from huge
external groups often say things that they wouldn't say given another
situation. You need to consider the context for what they say as
much as the specific. Taking aim at the specific often misses the
point as I may have done in the Gay discussion.
In point of fact, I'm not sure just why it came
up at this time except for Keith's comment about Gays and school
curriculums. In point of fact also, the Catholic
population of the world is 1.8 billion people on the planet but on my little
reservation there were NO Catholics and if you had written a school text that
excused them and explained Priestly celebacy they would have taken offense and
aimed their derision at that as much as the Gays have taken it in the
schools. They were 100% Masons and they all were sure that
every Catholic was split in loyalty with most of it going to the
Pope. What was the bad guy yesterday is tomorrow's neighbor and
you have to get along with your neighbors.
So you might consider what it is that makes
Heterosexuals. All of the books explain it but what if it is just
as common for a % of the world to be Homosexuals as it is for there
to be heterosexual men and women? My culture has
always assumed a certain number of Gay people in the population and has even
considered a common role for them. We also considered and consider
women to be equal to men in everyday life but that gender has tendencies
that make most "move" one way or other. We observe this in all of
life as well. Even the Blue Bass that is hermafroditic needs a
partner to stimulate the egg laying and to fertilize those
eggs. Theoretically one could do it all but the dance wouldn't
happen without the other and without the dance there would be no eggs.
We have a sacred government where each of us
assume the stereotype and conventions of our rolls in human and Cherokee
nature. Men work essentially strategically while women work
tactically. Women own the property but men use the
property. Cooperation is necessary or nothing is done.
Nothing is done unless both agree. There is no conquest here only
cooperation and agreement to use one's gifts for the good of the family and
community. If you break that contract you are not welcome in the sacred
community since examining that contract is the purpose of that community in
the first place.
But in regular life you must fill in the blank
spaces that are framed by stereotype and convention, with the uniqueness of
your own vision that is given by the Great Mystery of the
Universe. We can call it anything but the one
place where we split with the classical humanist is in the sense of
consciousness in everything including the Great Mystery. We take
an agnostic stand when it comes to the form this all takes. We believe
that all of existance can only be described in metaphor since today's truths
are tomorrow's folllies. But we do believe that all of life
is essentially balanced, symetrical and purposeful in that sense.
But it is a Great Mystery which we will study all of our life as a species and
will only know partially even when we are through. So before I go
further about the Gay issue I must be sure of the purpose and intent of
such a study and whether it means to go further than the simple
Stereotype Frame and convention or style of the culture being looked
at.
I believe in your good will but this did make me
quesy. I've lost friends over the middle east
recently. And I have worked through the homosexual issue from the
time that I met and became friends with Gay people. I am
convinced that attitudes to Gays are like the old stories about sex and
masturbation neither of which ever made me crazy in spite of all of the
authorities both published and in power who swore that they would.
Yours in the spirit of fun as we paddle up
stream.
Ray Evans Harrell
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Thursday, April 11, 2002 4:50
PM
Subject: Re: Cause of homosexuality? (was Women,
men and stress)
> Hi Ray,
>
> At 13:21 11/04/02 -0400,
> (REH)
> >I don't know Pete. It sounds a little like herding
porcupines to me.
>
> Apart from agreeing with what Pete wrote I
don't think I have anything to
> add -- save to comment on his final
paragraph:
>
> (PV)
> >> I didn't notice it mentioned
here (may have missed it), but one of
> >> the types of stress
which affected the rats, if I recall, was
> >> overpopulation.
Some researchers then of course proposed that the
> >> purpose of
the whole mechanism was to limit population levels.
> >> I believe
the (darwinian) selectability of such a mechanism was then
> >>
hotly debated, and I don't recall the outcome.
>
> This was
indeed the reason why Reg Morrison mentioned the research into
>
homosexuality because his book is mainly about overpopulation and
other
> limits to economic growth. Another hormonal factor which limits
human
> population growth (or used to, in bygone hunter-gathering eras)
is that
> while a mother is suckling her baby (so long as it's very
regular and
> frequent) her hormones prevent further conception. In the
agricultural era,
> when mothers were needed at peak times in the fields
to sow and harvest
> (probably leaving her baby with grandparents at
home), then they would
> easily have become fertile again (apparently
only a short pause in suckling
> is necessary for the normal hormones to
re-assert themselves) -- thus one
> of the reasons for very large
families in agrarian regions. A great deal of
> this research used to be
done at Edinburgh University but I have no
> references to this.
>
> As to homosexuals being in the vanguard of the creative movement, I'm
not
> so sure. A full-scale statistical analysis (assuming one could
make an
> objective choice of creative people) would have to be done on
this
> question. What I'm more sure about is that creative people need
plenty of
> time to gestate ideas so, without families to care for,
homosexuals would
> seem to have an advantage.
>
>
Keith
>
__________________________________________________________
> "Writers
used to write because they had something to say; now they write in
>
order to discover if they have something to say." John D. Barrow
>
_________________________________________________
> Keith Hudson, Bath,
England; e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> _________________________________________________
>
