Gay-to-straight therapy repudiated

[Larv]

Psychologists repudiate gay-to-straight therapy. If such therapy does not work, or if it does more harm than good, then I agree with the APA. Maybe the therapists should just leave the gays alone. There's enough business already from screwed-up heterosexuals to keep them going for a long time.

However, this leaves open the question: If gays are so naturally and durably gay then what is there about nature that allows them to flourish in a population? Are gays counterproductive to a population? Or are they beneficial contributors to it? Maybe the answer is part of the solution for attaining more dignified treatment of the gay community by the general public.

Maybe science is the way. Obviously, homosexuality is not uncommon down through the ages. But, being your normal, everyday, life-long heterosexual, it is very hard for me to understand why it persists, with the single exception that gay persistence can be explained using Wm. Hamilton's theory of kin selection.

"Hey," asks Joe the Plumber, "what has a gay done for me lately?" Well, if you're able to explain Hamilton's theory to him, maybe he'll come around. And to prove your point you could add that the APA decided that gay-to-straight therapy was bogus after all and doing more harm than good.

"You can take the boy out of Ohio," we used to say, "but you can't take Ohio out of the boy." That's true enough for me, and I haven't yet sought psychological therapy to remove it, but I probably should have.

[freeztar]

I had never even heard of such "therapy". How bizarre?!

It seems that some people are so uncomfortable that they can't help but to try to make everyone else more comfortable.

"Oh, you're gay? I can help you with that!"

[InfiniteNow]

Implicit in the suggestion that there is a therapy is the assumption that homosexuality is something to be cured... that there's something "wrong" with being gay. It's plainly stupid, and needs to be acknowledged as such.

As for persistence evolutionarily, there is the aforementioned issue of kin selection, whereby homoesexuality offers reproductive advantage in terms of caring for kin (much like the grandmother hypothesis). There is also the issue of human sexuality falling along a spectrum, as opposed to being divided into boolean "either/or" states. In some cases, the sex drive itself was selected for, not so much the mating partners genitals. Having a stronger sex drive or desire for sex is a more successful approach to spreading your genes into the future than merely selecting for attraction to opposite sex partners alone. The drive for sex itself is what gets selected, not the drive for opposite sex partners, and that selection of drive/desire somtimes results in a preference for same sex parnters.

Additionally, you have social hierarchy issues, whereby sex can be used to calm tensions and assuage group alphas. It's about dominance and submissiveness. We are, at our core, animals which exist in troops, and often tensions can cause members of that troop to be ostracized or killed. It may sound silly to some, but in these circumstances among angry primates sex can be used to save lives, remain a member of the pack, and ensure availability of resources and group protection... hence, same sex activity would be selected for (even though offspring are not created with same sex partners). Those who were unwilling to engage in same sex relations would have more often been killed or ostracized from the group, and hence reproduced less than those who were okay with same sex activities such as petting or rubbing or intercourse.

In a similar manner, sex can be used to barter... a form of trade... where you gain favors by having sex wtih others (as in bonobo monkey tribes). Basically, sex can be used as currency, and this currency can be spent beyond just opposite sex partners... and beyond the mere act of mating. Quid pro quo in its most basic form.

Evolutionarily, there are a great number of reasons that homosexuality is selected for. Above, I've named but a few.

[Moontanman]

Basically, sex can be used as currency, and this currency can be spent beyond just opposite sex partners...

Eeeewwww! Then again prison movies seem to work on that principle.....

[Larv]

I tried googling "straight-to-gay" therapy, but the Internet has nothing on it. Doesn't seem like there is much of a demand for it. Wonder why. You'd think the separate-but-equal rule would apply here, too. Doesn't it seem odd that sexual-orientation-reversal therapy is a one-way street? Why don't more straights want to be like gays? Where's the equality in that? There is something very lopsided in the American public's POV.

So much of all of this is about words, just words. Maybe we should abolish expressions like: “damn straight,” “straighten you out,” and “the straight and narrow.” Or maybe we should add equalizing expressions to our lexicon, like “damn kinky,” “queer you out,” and “the gay and narrow.”

[InfiniteNow]

Are you intentionally trying to look like a bigoted fool, or do you truly feel this way?

[sanctus]

Larv, there are no such gay-to-straight "therapies", the only thing one would learn there is to be an actor for the rest of the life, cheating yourself...
It is just like you do not decide to fall in love with that given person or attracted to that given person, it just happens or doesn't. And if it turns out you always feel attracted to people of the same sex, well then it is like that, you can deny it or not.

There is no surprise that there are no straight-to-gay "therapies", because the other ones exist just out of social pressure, i.e of a part of society wanting people to deny themselves, because they can't handle it. While if you are straight, but meet someone of the same sex and you are attracted to then, well, accept it or deny it :-). Many gay people at the beginnig have problems accepting it and there are consults, forums, etc. to help them coming to terms with themselves...if you want you can call them straight-to-gay therapies. Note that now I wrote therapy without " " because the latter are actually therapy because they help come to terms with oneself, while the "therapies" I wrote about before did exactly the contrary...

[Larv]

Originally Posted by InfiniteNow

Are you intentionally trying to look like a bigoted fool, or do you truly feel this way?

Are you intentionally trying to look like a humorless jerk? Lighten up little with your knee-jerk accusations of bigotry. Until we all can laugh about this sexual-orientation silliness, we’ll forever be in each other’s faces with accusations of bigotry.

If equality is what you demand, then please tell me why there is no therapy available anywhere to convert heterosexuals into homosexuals. Doesn’t this fact, in and of itself, prove that homosexuality and heterosexuality are very different things? Of course they are. Let’s face it: gays are gay because nature made them that way, and straights are straight because nature made them that way. Nature made dogs to be dogs and cats to be cats. So why can’t we just recognize that we are separate by the laws of nature but equal under the laws of nature.

Isn’t that really what the APA decided when it repudiated gay-to-straight therapy?

[freeztar]

I think you raise a valid point, Larv.

It's nonsensical to ask every cat to be a dog (or vice versa). Yet, they should be accorded the same privileges that every other pet has.

I don't think that is bigoted at all. Your post shows that you've thought about the issue in a logical manner and that you are still interested in thinking about the issue. I respect that.

I think Infinitenow used the "B" word because the joke you used was a bit distasteful. It didn't offend me and I saw behind the humor, but I could see why it might be called out in such a way. It's a shame when our meanings get lost in translation, but all you can do is try to clarify and move on.

[Boerseun]

Heck - that kinda reminds me of years ago, when left-handed kids had to attend special remedial classes to learn how to write "properly", i.e., with their right hands.

Shizaam... you writes lefts, you writes lefts, goddamnit.