fallout from "the gay bomb"

[metaphorge]

Inspired by the discussion here:
[Poll #1000850]
My thoughts: of course it is... with the use of extreme enough conditioning techniques, you can condition almost anyone into almost anything (note: this is not saying that it is necessarily easy or ethical to do so).

Making a statement such as "sexual orientation is not changeable" vastly oversimplifies the matrices of to whom and what and why we're attracted to an offensively cartoonish degree.

Just because something about a person can be altered does not mean that it should be.

I vehemently disagree with the tactic of defending equality for queer people on the grounds of "I was born this way, I can't help it." Why do we need to argue that we have justification to fuck whatever person in whatever way we choose as long as all parties are both consenting and qualified to give consent?

We don't need to apologize and we aren't broken. Our orientations don't have to be carved into our genes for us to get to be who we are. This is just the sort of essentialist thinking that is the root of almost all oppression.

I am not a victim of being queer.

Wow, OMFG, I made an LJ post with actual content.

Comments

[metaphorge.livejournal.com]

I also think (and this is a hunch, no actual hard data ti back this up) that it's more likely for someone's criteria for who they find attractive to broaden rather than narrow (see again the men in prison example).

[tenacious-snail.livejournal.com]

So, my own personal identity was bi from age 8 to 20, lesbian from 20 to 32, and bisexual from 32 to present (39). I think a number of things happened to make that change, and one of the things that happened is I moved to a place where the culture of "what it means to be male" or "what it means to be female" is much broader.

I don't know how much I stopped being attracted to men, for the time I wasn't attracted to them, so much as being Really Not Attracted to sexism. I've found other approaches to that that work better.

I'm queer. That is really more accurately who I am. Both me *and* the culture and community in which I live and love have changed. A bisexual queer identity *works* now in a way it couldn't have 20 years ago. And I continue to find queers of various genders attractive.

My attempt at a succinct post is failing, as I don't know how to explain queerness, sexism, sexual orientation, gender roles, essentialism, and ten other things that seem relevant all in one post.

[metaphorge.livejournal.com]

I'm queer. That is really more accurately who I am. Both me *and* the culture and community in which I live and love have changed. A bisexual queer identity *works* now in a way it couldn't have 20 years ago. And I continue to find queers of various genders attractive.

Amen. Gosh, when was the last time I was attracted to someone who was not queer? Wow, that's been awhile.

My attempt at a succinct post is failing, as I don't know how to explain queerness, sexism, sexual orientation, gender roles, essentialism, and ten other things that seem relevant all in one post.

I think you just did above.

[tenacious-snail.livejournal.com]

I'm both squee!yay! that you think I did, but also "*pout*, I could talk theory and praxis for hours and hours, why won't you play with me?"