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Re: Homophobia

Postby hreru » 2015-03-29, 11:18

Okay, I guess I talk too much about things I know little of. I didn't mean to let myself get involved into any lengthy discussion originally.

If you could take me as someone who can't look at things this way. For me it is and will be a matter of two individuals respecting, or not, each other.

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Re: Homophobia

Postby linguoboy » 2015-03-29, 14:29

hreru wrote:If you could take me as someone who can't look at things this way. For me it is and will be a matter of two individuals respecting, or not, each other.
But what is that "respect" based in? I don't think you can "respect" someone without understanding something about their background, and being part of a marginalised group is generally a very important component of that.

There's a weird contradiction underlying this discussion. Both hreru and Yserenhart have vociferously defended making assumptions based on the underlying norms of the majority culture. Yet when I suggest that they should also be willing to make certain assumptions about members of marginalised groups based on commonalities in their experiences, suddenly everyone's an individual and "respect" looks the same for everybody.

You know what's a very common experience among marginalised groups? Not being believed when we try to talk about our experiences. On the one hand, Yserenhart states its our responsibility to do this in order to educate the majority. And then when I do, he (and hreru in turn) openly questions the validity of them. Think about how you would respond to that sort of reinforcement.
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Re: Homophobia

Postby Yserenhart » 2015-03-29, 21:47

linguoboy wrote:There's a weird contradiction underlying this discussion. Both hreru and Yserenhart have vociferously defended making assumptions based on the underlying norms of the majority culture. Yet when I suggest that they should also be willing to make certain assumptions about members of marginalised groups based on commonalities in their experiences, suddenly everyone's an individual and "respect" looks the same for everybody.

You know what's a very common experience among marginalised groups? Not being believed when we try to talk about our experiences. On the one hand, Yserenhart states its our responsibility to do this in order to educate the majority. And then when I do, he (and hreru in turn) openly questions the validity of them. Think about how you would respond to that sort of reinforcement.

I feel I should clarify my position here, as I didn't express myself clearly enough to convey what I actually meant.

I am very much willing to make assumptions about members of marginalised groups; as long as that assumption is significantly (greater than ~70-75% chance of being correct) statistically more likely to be correct; or if going with that assumption is less likely to be harmful than not. My comments about being an individual were in the context of things like micro-aggresions; in which it can very much be an individual thing as to what's a problem, and what's not; and in which there is a lack of information accessible in the same way as information about things that are more obvious a problem (e.g. violence or being denied marriage/adoption rights). Which is why I also state that it is the individual's responsibility to educate others, because noöne else can properly speak for you on things that may affect you differently than it would others.

I wasn't actually questioning the validity of your experiences, nor denying that they were harmful to you (and could be to others too), I was questioning if it was a problem of being LGBT, or from a different source (and in one of your later posts you at least partially agreed it could be more than just heteronormativity). I believe that the best way to achieve a solution to such a problem is to examine the causes to see if it could be coming from something other than what it might seem at first; the solution may often be different if the problem affects multiple groups than if it affects only one group.

It also seems that a lot of people (if not everyone) is assuming that I'm straight and identify as male; I don't actually recall giving any indication as to either of those. It also seems that there's an assumption that I don't understand what it's like to be a marginalised individual; this is very much an incorrect assumption, part of the reason I left (and don't ever intend to return to) my country of birth was to escape the discrimination I faced.
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Re: Homophobia

Postby linguoboy » 2015-03-30, 1:22

Yserenhart wrote:I wasn't actually questioning the validity of your experiences, nor denying that they were harmful to you (and could be to others too), I was questioning if it was a problem of being LGBT, or from a different source (and in one of your later posts you at least partially agreed it could be more than just heteronormativity).
In case you've forgotten, here's what you wrote:
Yserenhart wrote:I will admit that I'm a bit doubtful that all of the discrimination shared here on UL that's attributed to heteronormativity is actually because of it. For example, part of linguoboy's testimony about the staff in hospital, and it being assumed that his husband was his father[.]
[My emphasis.] So you quite clearly stated that you were questioning more than just this single instance. How much more? I'm not a mindreader, so I have absolutely know way of knowing.

I think you and I may have different understandings of how intersectionality works. Because everyone in our society has a gender identity as well as a sexual orientation, heteronormativity never operates in isolation. The effects are always mediated by perceptions of the target's perceived gender (and age, and race, and class, and national origin, etc.). Thus the causes are never either-or, they're always both-and. It's a combination of heterosexism and sexism and ageism and racism and classism that causes an individual to see two men of the same race and class but different ages together and assume a blood relationship rather than a romantic one. Any solution based on finding the one true source of the misidentification is going to be, at best, a partial solution. (Which is why I recommend an approach than involves making as few assumptions about the parties involved as possible.)

Yserenhart wrote:It also seems that a lot of people (if not everyone) is assuming that I'm straight and identify as male; I don't actually recall giving any indication as to either of those. It also seems that there's an assumption that I don't understand what it's like to be a marginalised individual; this is very much an incorrect assumption, part of the reason I left (and don't ever intend to return to) my country of birth was to escape the discrimination I faced.
The only one of those assumptions I believe I'm guilty of making is assumption of masculine gender identity. I don't remember my basis for this, but it goes back at least as far as our previous conversation and perhaps much earlier. Moreover, I'm only doing so because the grammar of English requires it. In any case, give me your preferences in terms of pronoun reference[*] and I will abide by them. If my remarks about the experience of marginalised groups seemed to exclude you, it's because I was addressing an audience which I believed no longer included you.

[*] Which, it strikes me now, would be a more useful category to have in a user's profile than "gender".
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Re: Homophobia

Postby hreru » 2015-03-31, 8:00

linguoboy wrote:But what is that "respect" based in?
I'm afraid I can't explain it better than I did but I'll try. I mean, let's say, generalised respect, that is accepting the other one who might be even very different from me, as another human being. I can go on from that if I get to know them better. I will probably do mistakes on the way. At the same time I have to be careful about them not hurting or misusing me, there always might be lying, emotional blackmailing, open aggression or some such. What I've learned I will use the next time on similar occasion, mostly subconsciously I suppose. But everyone is different, a new person will mean a new beginning for me; it's funny how some people laugh at what others consider an offence and vice versa. And I'll be repeating this over and over and learning how to be a human among people. For my whole life.

I didn't doubt the facts but the interpretation. I've filtered your hospital story through my understanding based on how I feel about things, and I know I react internally unnecessarily strongly at other people's remarks even if they're meant well. I didn't say it was your case, I offered it as an alternative. How else can one understand other people's emotions than using one's own as a model?

Understanding people with experience different from yours is a process that might take days and months and years, or be never accomplished. You can't say "we know better" and expect people to take it just like that. Of course you know better, you live it. But the other one has to "live it" with you, to have a similar experience, to have something to build on, and to be willing and able to make connections between what they know and what you tell them. That's how I see it, but I'm quite an emotional person, others might get to it different way perhaps.

I'd add I consider the basic generalised respect tolerance, the understanding acceptance.

You know my opinions and think it too little, and you're giving me microaggression and discrimination. But similarly someone else might think me too liberal and give me mental illness or necessity to keep the essential role of traditional family. I just think that the way through individual people is the safest however slow it might be.

In other words, if you happened to be around and wanted to stop by for a tea you'd be welcome. But don't expect me to take everything you say about your life for granted, I simply might understand it differently because my life is different.

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Re: Homophobia

Postby linguoboy » 2015-03-31, 14:50

hreru wrote:I didn't say it was your case, I offered it as an alternative.
And what made you think I had failed to consider that alternative? Why would you assume I hadn't asked myself the question, "What's behind this? Is this really heterosexism or is there something else going on?" about a dozen times before coming to the conclusions I did? Is that not something you do?

As I say above (and this is addressed to everybody), give us minorities the benefit of the doubt when we speak to you about the discrimination we face. We have more experience with it than you do.

hreru wrote:In other words, if you happened to be around and wanted to stop by for a tea you'd be welcome. But don't expect me to take everything you say about your life for granted, I simply might understand it differently because my life is different.
Fair enough. But, by the same token, don't expect me to be accepting of having my experiences trivialised and discounted. I'm coming off of a whole lifetime of defending myself against that sort of reception. It really would be nice if the rest of the world evolved to the point where I could stop.

That said, I do appreciate your (and Yserenhart's) willingness to explain your positions and I think I understand a bit better where each of you is coming from now.
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Re: Homophobia

Postby Koko » 2015-04-02, 5:18

Something brought to mind by something Vijay said: there's a high number of many video game villains being non-hetero. The only controversy: against gays. Lesbianism is totally okay to be in video games made for children (don't take this as it seems), but take out the gays!

If you're going to make an action against homosexuality (and bi and trans; as there were various villains identifying as either too), why allow the lesbians (and related scenes to remain unchanged?

There was even one gay villain who… wait for it… had a mental illness. People as a whole are despicable creatures, so much so one is hardly sorry for us.

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Re: Homophobia

Postby vijayjohn » 2015-04-21, 18:50

Last night and today, I was watching a few YouTube videos on Indian attitudes towards homosexuality. Today, I found this video. I think some of the opinions expressed here really are positive, but others are clearly negative while still others may sound more positive to a non-Indian than they really are:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6HgC8jK3fhw
And last night, I also found two very different videos in Malayalam, both from TV interviews in Kerala. One is a short interview where four Malayalee trans people talk about their experiences with discrimination:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5kU0tvcavM
The other features this guy who is apparently a doctor (specifically a sexologist and psychologist. Isn't that scary?). I haven't seen this whole video yet, but towards the beginning, when the host asks him whether homosexuality is a disease(!), he's like it's not a disease, nooooooooo. It's just what happens when kids don't have a strong father figure at home! (Repeat :roll: as desired). And this guy comes from my parents' hometown. Actually, he may even have been a student of my grandma, who would have definitely been at least as homophobic as him :oops: :para:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6sbYiiN5GY
I should try to translate both of these into English. I think it could be really interesting. (BTW, these are some of the first few results you get on YouTube if you search for "Kerala homosexuality" without quotes).

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Re: Homophobia

Postby Tenebrarum » 2015-04-21, 19:06

Welcome to Vietnam.
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Re: Homophobia

Postby hreru » 2015-05-16, 19:28

linguoboy wrote:And what made you think I had failed to consider that alternative? Why would you assume I hadn't asked myself the question, "What's behind this? Is this really heterosexism or is there something else going on?" about a dozen times before coming to the conclusions I did? Is that not something you do?

There are several reasons. First, no-one is able to judge motives of other people's behaviour on a sensibly objective level under all circumstances. I sometimes misjudge heavily, other times I don't care at all, especially when in stress. I don't believe you're immune towards that.

Then, when someone tells me about a bad experience with someone else I naturally think of how I'd feel at their place (both of them) as well as what might make the other one behave this way and if it's not only a misunderstanding. Can you tell me why I shouldn't do it with minorities? Am I supposed to make an exception for they know better and just take over their point of view mechanically? Where would be there any value in that?

And finally, what I'm after are the other one's intentions - have they wanted to insult or to ridicule me? You say this is not so important for you. I find it difficult to understand then what it is that you take into consideration. Is the main criterion a sign indicating you're not fully accepted? If it's so, I think it's a mistake. Homosexuality will hardly be fully accepted by everyone; and apart from people who simply hate it there are those who disapprove of it but tolerate it and in my opinion that's only a good thing. What could perhaps be done is creating such an athmosphere in which any criticism is considered bad so nobody will dare to say it aloud but they will think the bad things the more; but that's not what you want, or do you?

It's never occured to me there should be anything wrong about homosexuality. I can't see why marriage or adoption should be unaccessable to gays. At the same time I think it is less natural and normal than heterosexuality. I don't mean it negatively, more like stating a fact, I said I understand these words differently. Say, I don't have children and I'm not going to have any, and I definitely think that is less natural and normal compared to women who do have children.

I admit I'm biased towards Roma people. I'm well aware social seclusion and poverty is a killing combination, I know part of my bias is irrational, I never call them names and I dislike it strongly when other people do; still I am biased. I'm not going to give reasons, it doesn't belong here, but what I dislike the most is that some use their discrimination as a weapon. I was accused of racism exactly because I treated them like everyone else instead of better than the others. And please don't tell me that they know better, I want to have the right to judge my own deeds.

I guess me having described my approach made me fall into the category of "racists who claim they're no racist because they have some Jews for friends". But in my opinion being biased against a group of people and still treating them individually is a positive thing. It's good, when you have issues with Jews, to learn to know some of them better and make friends with them.

I don't buy the "we know better" arguement. I'm no way questioning your lifelong first-hand experience and it seems self-evident to me it makes your point of view well-founded, and as long as you mean it this way I agree fully. But once you're indicating the length and personal character of this experience makes your evaluation of given situation unchallenged and I'm only allowed to listen to your point of view without a possibility of forming my own opinion, you're attacking my identity and taking rights away from me. What's wrong about discussion? There are two sides involved, those who feel discriminated and those who are accused of discrimination. As if there were only two possibilites; to shut up and listen or to ignore and marginalise. What about listening with interest and thinking about it seriously, with the possibility indeed you come to a different conclusion that than the speaker? I think I've listened enough during my life.

I recal having heard by a Roma woman years ago people showed contempt to her even by simple things like leaving a pavement she's walking on to make her aware they didn't want to have anything in common with her. Some time after that I had this nagging feeling every time I needed to cross the road that I had to look around me first if there's none of them around, in which case I'd have needed to go on and cross the road later to avoid showing disrespect, to let them feel comfortable and safe and welcome. I knew it was nonsense but still, I did it and it took me some time to get rid of it. This is exactly why I dislike the concept of microaggression: it tries to make me feel guilty of something I've never meant to do. Physically handicapped people are fed up with being helped in situations in which they don't need any help. Abstaining alcoholics complain about being offered a drink even after repeated refusal. Once I read a conversation with two pedophiles who were very aware of how they could hurt children and swore they would never molest a child, on the contrary they used their understanding of children to help them, they're more like big brothers to them. Parents of autistic children have to face complaints about their children misbehaving. But, helping is generally considered a good thing, offering a drink common hospitality, people are afraid for their children, and when a ten-year old comes to you in a restaurant and takes your meal off you you'll be at least surprised. Shall I feel guilty in advance for the mistakes I do towards these people? Or shall I get me a list of not-to-dos before approaching anyone? I refuse the theory of microaggression completely. I know I hurt other people while being unaware of that, so what?, I'm being hurt by other people when they're unaware just as well. That's life. I can't read their mind, they can't read mine, so many things get wrong, but many can be explained later. I rely on other people's good will, and they can rely on mine.

In my 20 or so I considered racism and discrimination generally a clear example of fight between good and evil (and looking back to my original question here, I'd have looked at what the Swedish singer said negatively in my 20). I changed my opinion slowly. Human is a weird mixture or good and bad sides, and unless I know otherwise I tend to see other people's behaviour positively. Plus I think if terms the type of homophobia are so broad that they include both murder commited of hatred on one side and acceptance mixed with slight hesitant disapproval on the other they're pretty close to useless. Moreover, among minorities, or people discriminated against, there are nasty bastards just as among majority.

If my attempts to listen to everyone's woes with both sympathy and critical thinking make me a part of oppressive majority that likes to be in power, to use Lauren's words, then sorry, I'm going to go on oppressing you. I won't like it if I'm considered homophobe, racist, sexist, ageist and so on but relying on my own conscience and judgement is more important to me than how I'm categorised.

linguoboy wrote:Fair enough. But, by the same token, don't expect me to be accepting of having my experiences trivialised and discounted.

Fair enough for me, and thanks for the appreciation of my willingness to explain :) (and I hope you haven't changed your mind after this post. :ohwell: ) Well I don't take is as trivialising, but since you do ... don't you think you've done the same to me? "Teasing is indeed bad, but you know, I've been teased too, and it could have been even worse if the reason was homosexuality." For me that was a fundamental formative experience, you don't know how intensive it was and what it did to me, and you think you're entitled to compare it to what you've been through and to suppose it was not any worse. Well I think you are - you see it your own way based on information I've given and on your own experience - it's normal and deeply human to do so in my opinion; but I wonder how you can think you are entitled to do so, you criticise me for doing that to you. I understand you wouldn't have dared to report being bullied for being gay, but you know, if I had been bullied for being lesbian the same way I was for different reasons I could and would have reported that. Trivialising again?

Sorry I repeat myself, I know I've already written how I see it. But I'm not good with words and I felt misunderstood during most of the debate, so tried once again. This post has not all been aimed at you, linguoboy, it's what had been mulled over in my mind for over a month almost every day since I last wrote here, and if it seems to you I react on something you've never told it's true, it's sometimes more of a general reaction to the previous conversation as a whole. This time it wasn't written in anger or panic like my deleted post or some that followed, I let it get sorted in my head and I'm confident it describes well how I see things. I'll stick to what I wrote and I'm not going to be sorry for my opinions.

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Re: Homophobia

Postby TeneReef » 2015-05-17, 1:03

update

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Re: Homophobia

Postby mōdgethanc » 2015-05-17, 7:23

The other features this guy who is apparently a doctor (specifically a sexologist and psychologist. Isn't that scary?). I haven't seen this whole video yet, but towards the beginning, when the host asks him whether homosexuality is a disease(!), he's like it's not a disease, nooooooooo. It's just what happens when kids don't have a strong father figure at home!
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Re: Homophobia

Postby Prowler » 2015-05-17, 13:38

UK that high in comparison to The Netherlands and Norway? Surprising.

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Re: Homophobia

Postby md0 » 2015-05-17, 14:37

The rainbow index is strictly representing the legal situation (stuff like, no requirements to update gender field on ID or clear anti-discrimination clause in the constitution).
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Re: Homophobia

Postby linguoboy » 2015-05-17, 14:56

meidei wrote:The rainbow index is strictly representing the legal situation (stuff like, no requirements to update gender field on ID or clear anti-discrimination clause in the constitution).

Yeah, I thought that was immediately obvious from how much better Croatia scores than Italy. Legal protections don't mean much if they aren't actually enforced.
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Re: Homophobia

Postby md0 » 2015-05-17, 15:20

And also explains sudden spikes like eg Malta from last year to this one. A series of LGBT related bills was passed last year.
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Re: Homophobia

Postby Lur » 2015-05-17, 16:13

Spain looks so green for how shitty it actually is about this.
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Re: Homophobia

Postby TeneReef » 2015-05-17, 19:08

linguoboy wrote:
meidei wrote:The rainbow index is strictly representing the legal situation (stuff like, no requirements to update gender field on ID or clear anti-discrimination clause in the constitution).

Yeah, I thought that was immediately obvious from how much better Croatia scores than Italy. Legal protections don't mean much if they aren't actually enforced.

well, gay rights in Croatia are more respected than in Italy
and that's a good thing

there are no laws regarding same-sex partnerships in Italy whatsoever.
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Re: Homophobia

Postby linguoboy » 2015-05-18, 15:19

hreru wrote:And finally, what I'm after are the other one's intentions - have they wanted to insult or to ridicule me? You say this is not so important for you. I find it difficult to understand then what it is that you take into consideration. Is the main criterion a sign indicating you're not fully accepted? If it's so, I think it's a mistake. Homosexuality will hardly be fully accepted by everyone; and apart from people who simply hate it there are those who disapprove of it but tolerate it and in my opinion that's only a good thing. What could perhaps be done is creating such an athmosphere in which any criticism is considered bad so nobody will dare to say it aloud but they will think the bad things the more; but that's not what you want, or do you?

I've explained quite clearly what I want: full acceptance. I don't see any convincing reason why this should be impossible. Isn't lefthandedness fully accepted in our society? In my parents' generation, lefties were still forced to write righthanded. But nowadays we accept that a certain percentage of the population is lefthanded and accommodate them. Not always well, mind you, but it's not considered "unnatural" or "abnormal", just an ordinary human variation like green eyes or attached earlobes.

Actions matter more than intentions because they affect others concretely. Furthermore, actions are knowable in a way that intentions can never be. You can tell me your reasons for doing or not doing something, but I have no way of knowing if you are telling the truth. On some level you can't be sure you're telling the truth, because, in addition to being prey to wide variety of cognitive biases, humans are masters of post-hoc rationalisation.

I don't know how many times I've seen this acted out in real life when someone says something clearly racist and friends defend them by saying "they don't have a racist bone in their body". Their logic is: racists are bad people, my friend isn't a bad person, therefore my friend cannot be racist. So any racist thing they do has to be explained away somehow--"they didn't mean it", "they were misunderstood", "they were joking", "you're being too sensitive", etc. etc. All this applies even moreso to one's own behaviour. I don't think most prejudiced people see themselves as prejudiced, and this is how prejudice is perpetuated throughout our society in spite of the fact that everyone is nominally against it.

hreru wrote:It's never occured to me there should be anything wrong about homosexuality. I can't see why marriage or adoption should be unaccessable to gays. At the same time I think it is less natural and normal than heterosexuality. I don't mean it negatively, more like stating a fact, I said I understand these words differently. Say, I don't have children and I'm not going to have any, and I definitely think that is less natural and normal compared to women who do have children.

I don't agree, and increasingly US society is changing its views in this area as well. Nearly one in five women nowadays is childfree by choice. (That's twice the incidence of lefthanders!) Among college-educated people, it's considered a normal life choice, and increasingly a positive one (given concerns about overpopulation and resource exhaustion).

hreru wrote:But in my opinion being biased against a group of people and still treating them individually is a positive thing. It's good, when you have issues with Jews, to learn to know some of them better and make friends with them.

No one is disagreeing that this is a good thing. But one thing you learn when you get to know Jews well (and I've had a lot of Jewish friends) is that they all share common experiences due to their Jewishness and you can't hope to understand their individual experiences without understanding the larger context they occur in. And this is the same for any group, majority or minority. But it takes more effort to understand the minority experience because (a) you're more likely not to share it and (b) you're less likely to be exposed to it secondhand (e.g. through friends and acquaintances, in education, in the media).

If you want to understand me, that involves understanding how my experiences have been shaped by the fact that I'm gay. That doesn't mean every gay person (or even every gay man, or every educated White middle-class gay man in the USA etc.) has had the same experiences, but there are definitely commonalities there which can't be ignored. By the same token, of course, knowing something about your background helps me to understand and interpret your experiences as well. Without that understanding, there's no chance of communicating across the gap that separates your personality from mine.
"Richmond is a real scholar; Owen just learns languages because he can't bear not to know what other people are saying."--Margaret Lattimore on her two sons

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hreru
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Re: Homophobia

Postby hreru » 2015-05-27, 11:45

linguoboy wrote:I don't agree, and increasingly US society is changing its views in this area as well. Nearly one in five women nowadays is childfree by choice. (That's twice the incidence of lefthanders!) Among college-educated people, it's considered a normal life choice, and increasingly a positive one (given concerns about overpopulation and resource exhaustion).

And I don't disagree with you in this, apart from the use of normal and natural. What if I said it this way? Reproduction is one of essencial features of living organisms and sexuality serves as a mechanism that should ensure it. Being attracted to the same sex rather than to the opposite one hampers this mechanism and weakens probability of sucessful reproduction, and in this way it might be considered unnatural. Saying this I don't claim that reproduction is the only goal of sex life (or even he only goal of life as such), nor that an individual's life without descendants has been wasted, and of course no way that homosexuals can't have children. Similarly, maternity is an important part of a woman's life, women are biologically set to bear children. Those who don't have any have missed an opportunity to experience a very significant aspect of female's role, and from this point of view it might be called unnatural. That doesn't automatically mean inferior, or bad. Unnatural doesn't equal morally wrong, or doomed to oblivion! After all, civilisation goes in many ways against nature. Stealing is natural, killing is natural, and I bet you'll find more species that steal and kill than those which practice homosexual relations. While we're at using animals as a model, rejecting individuals whose behaviour doesn't comply with set majority standards is a common feature among social animals. Just as being suspicious towards foreigners not belonging to your own community.

As for meaning of normal, let me quote myself from the very beginning of the conversation:
To me homosexuality is both normal as in "belonging to a spectre of accepted behaviour" and abnormal, meaning "deviating from prevailing norm".


Natural and normal are tricky words, of course indicating lack of normality and nature is commonly used to express negative assessment but it might be used neutrally as well, and in these specific reproduction-related cases I really see no problem in understanding these words neutrally. I myself call things/people not normal also in a positive way, in pure admiration for their originality but I don't think it's usual to do this. Family issue, I guess, I inherited it from my daddy. :)

linguoboy wrote:I've explained quite clearly what I want: full acceptance. I don't see any convincing reason why this should be impossible.

Because you want too much. What does your full acceptance cover, how far does it go? For example, I was pretty shocked by a post by Lauren. It was her opening the "Share your art" thread, and I thought, telling I'm going to learn to draw and showing my first attempts of an absolute beginner?, why I'd never ... is this even possible? :shock: :lol: A not-to-do in my world. If I thought something similar about her being a transwoman (correct me if I'm wrong here) it would be transphobia, it would be oh so bad and I would be expected to be ashamed of it, while me thinking it's weird to publish the very first drawing experiment would have been but a funny episode if I'd written my opinion. At least I think nobody would be telling me I don't accept her artistic expression fully and it makes me the bad one. :para: But both the "it's weird" attitudes are based on the same principle, and might be of the same low intensity - as far as it doesn't involve considering the other one a second-class person it's okay to me. By the way, Lauren, I found your way of expressing your surprise over me being a woman rather painful. The kind of "she's a she, now really, with these opinions, hahaha" - quite a critical remark over my gender, written in third person in my presence. All these are examples of low scale unacceptance/offence/conflicts that happen everyday to everyone just because people are different, and are unavoidable (and it happens especially when people don't know each other sufficiently). Yet I'm told it's inadmissible to behave in this way to certain groups of people because it's discrimination, and because their full acceptance is necessary.

I don't doubt cognitive biases and rationalisation have their say in my judging intentions of the others or of myself, or in the other one's explanation of their deeds to me. Still the intentions are so much important. He hit me (action) sound very different from He hit me by accident (action and intention, or the lack of it here actually :) ).

I'm not sure I want to understand you. That is, in one particular point that's, however, crucial to me. (And it's this reason why I write here.) I always feel unwell when meeting an attitude I'd call "let's bring equality to the earth". Reading this passage in your reply to Yserenhart makes me feel uneasy, somewhat afraid even:
The effects are always mediated by perceptions of the target's perceived gender (and age, and race, and class, and national origin, etc.). Thus the causes are never either-or, they're always both-and. It's a combination of heterosexism and sexism and ageism and racism and classism that causes an individual to see two men of the same race and class but different ages together and assume a blood relationship rather than a romantic one...(Which is why I recommend an approach than involves making as few assumptions about the parties involved as possible.)

Leaving out the original point of your words now, I focus on how easily perception of age might be considered ageism, perception of race racism and so on ... as few assumptions as possible ... for me this is a vision of a very cruel and cold world, a world in which crossing a road without having checked for Roma presence makes you an insensitive beast, so nobody allows not to check. All prejudices labelled, described and removed from society, we're all equal, we're all the same. I'm exaggerating now indeed but I don't know how to put it better. Dealing with other people different from yourself is complicated but necessary, it's what makes you human. Differences are good, prejudices are normal, what's important is how you process them.

linguoboy wrote:
hreru wrote:But in my opinion being biased against a group of people and still treating them individually is a positive thing. It's good, when you have issues with Jews, to learn to know some of them better and make friends with them.

No one is disagreeing that this is a good thing.

Even if you keep being biased after that? Still prejudiced, still a racist? Personal contact and rational approach are good but they don't grant the alarm signal inside you will be weeded away. From what you say I understand that in your opinion that still makes one racist, just like only tolerance towards homosexuals, as opposed to full acceptance, makes one homophobic.
Apart from that I agree with the two last paragraphs.


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