Everybody's Gay: LGBTQA Support Thread

[Chloemew]

Sailor Moon might potentially be coming over for a month around November time, since apparently the plane tickets are cheaper around that time! If everything goes to plan though that then means I have to tell my mum and stepdad about her and

...uhhhh

Like it's not so much the fact we're both girls but the fact I'm in yet another long-distance relationship (which they were kinda iffy about in the past), and this time I'm not with some boy who lives 2 and a half hours away, I'm with a girl who lives on the other side of the ocean. Granted I was 17 back then and now I'm almost 24 and not a stupid teenager, but I still have no idea when or how I should tell them about Meg. I honestly feel like they wouldn't have a huge issue with me being bi but at the same time I'm not sure? I distinctly remember a time where we couldn't find any non-busy pubs to go to while in Nottingham so we went to a LGBTQA one and my mum said that "normal people could go there too" and like... I don't even know, I know my mum loves me and she probably didn't realise what she was saying and now I'm getting upset fucking hell

And then I'd have to put up with my stepdad asking me tons of questions about her and asking what we're planning on doing about it all and I know I won't be able to give full answers because we still haven't quite worked everything out and he'll be like "well why not???????????"

I just wish I could be confident they'd be chill about it like my dad and stepmum are

[Otherwise]

I already got to see someone who I was actually pretty good friends with post a photo that calls Caitlyn Jenner a science project.

To be fair calling surgery that extensive - cosmetic and otherwise - a science project probably isn't immediately incorrect. It was probably a hell of a job to do, and go through.

[Wiffle]

That...no. You do not refer to people as science projects. You call them people because they are freaking people. Transitioning isn't cosmetic anyway. I don't get where anyone got the idea that it's ok to talk about a human being like this.

[Otherwise]

I'd be rather surprised if there weren't any procedures of a cosmetic nature, being affiliated with the Kardashians and all that.

I was referring to the process, not the person. Maybe I was mistaken in thinking it's something of a medical marvel to change someone's appearance so much that people refer to the result as a stunning woman.

[Wiffle]

Even if you're amazed with advances of modern medicine that allow for successful transitions for transgender people that does not make a person a science project. It's completely dehumanizing. That's why it's a huge problem that they said that.

[Exeres]

I was referring to the process, not the person.

[Wiffle]

Yes I read that. I believe I said that it's not the issue I had. The image that was posted called Caitlyn Jenner, a person, a science project. There's nothing right about that.

[Otherwise]

And I'm trying to point out that you might be taking it a little too bodaciously.

Might. I don't know the intent behind the post. Don't think it's worth getting worked up over that much over a possible misinterpretation though.

[Wiffle]

Not much is open to misinterpretation when it says "That science project Bruce Jennner is" (using the wrong name even, so yeah screw that). There is no acceptable reason to say that about a human being.

[[Citation Needed]]

Hey now, enough of the transphobic discussion bringing everyone down. How about a light-hearted comic?
http://imgur.com/a/nAmYM
After reading through it, you have to reread it and look carefully for the subtle things you missed.

A trial in New Jersey this week will determine whether telling gay people that they can become straight constitutes consumer fraud. The ruling might mean the end of so-called “conversion therapies” for good.

[Wiffle]

A trial in New Jersey this week will determine whether telling gay people that they can become straight constitutes consumer fraud. The ruling might mean the end of so-called “conversion therapies” for good.

YES!

[SaintCrazy]

Thank god, those conversion "therapies" are basically just sexual and emotional abuse.

What mainstream experts agree on, though, is that homosexuality is perfectly normal. (Indeed, a New Jersey Superior Court judge has already granted the SPLC one victory, ruling that it is fraudulent to say that homosexuality is a disorder.)

Plus, it looks like there's a bit of a legal precedent, which is nice to have considering that we don't have much scientific evidence on how sexual preferences work (we do have some evidence, which will probably come up in the case, but we haven't figured out a solid theory for how orientation works yet).

We DO have plenty of evidence that those "therapies" don't fuckin work, that's for sure.

[Alkarii]

I'd read in an old issue of Penthouse Forum (or was it Variations?) about a study where they scanned the brains of straight men and gay men. They found a physiological difference between the gay men and the straight men. Unfortunately, I read this more than ten years ago, so I can't remember who did the study.

I later read on Wiki (about homosexuality in animals) that someone did a study where they kept breeding rats, letting a population grow, but staying in the same cage. After a certain point, some of the rats were observed engaging in sexual activity with other rats of the same sex.

Putting these two things together, and noticing how no mammal the size of a human or larger lives in the concentrations we do, I've been wondering if there's some kind of biological mechanism involved. Sex between humans (usually) helps form an emotional bond, so the individuals will stay together, working together for survival. It may be easier for nature to make you gay than it is to remove your sex drive, though that doesn't mean it can't happen, since there are people who are asexual.

So... I completely forgot where I was going with this.

[SaintCrazy]

There's evidence for a number of different mechanisms for homosexuality, including genetic and environmental factors. Based on the fact that we haven't figured out how The Gay happens, it's probably a complex mix of factors.

In terms of an evolutionary argument, it's possible that a handful of genes exist that individually enhance our fitness (ability to reproduce and carry on said genes). However, when combined together just right, along with certain environmental factors, changes in the brain, or who knows what, the person could end up not being heterosexual.

I really am interested in seeing more studies in the future on how this might happen though, just because there's so much about sexuality that we don't know. The only thing that we seem to know for sure is that variations from "normal" sexual behaviors happen in nature all the time, not just in humans.

[TheStranger]

I read once that one factor of homosexuality might be having a lot of older siblings, but I have no idea if thats true or not.