Another Minor Irritation
Apr. 9th, 2004 05:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
omorkaHave I ranted about this on here before? I apologize if I have.
Why does our culture draw the lines on sexuality where it does? Depending on who's talking, there are either two or three categories:
- People who fuck (or desire to fuck) people of the other gender
- People who fuck (or desire to fuck) people of the same gender
- (optional) People who fuck (or desire to fuck) people of both genders
A very few people, having observed the behavior of people in the first two categories, break it down into four or five categories:
- Males who fuck (or desire to fuck) females
- Males who fuck (or desire to fuck) males
- Females who fuck (or desire to fuck) males
- Females who fuck (or desire to fuck) females
- (optional) People of either gender who fuck (or desire to fuck) people of both genders
Now, question #1: why do all bisexuals, if we get recognized at all, get lumped into a single category? Is the behavior of bi men really indistinguishable from the behavior of bi women?
Both of these methods of categorization are relatively recent. For most of what we will loosely call "Western Civilization" (roughly 800 CE through 1850 CE), the categorization scheme was:
- People who fucked people of the other gender to whom they were legally married only with the intent of generating children
- People who didn't fuck anyone at all
- Sinners (people who fucked people of the other gender in a semi-recognized non-marriage transaction that could potentially generate children, either as man and mistress or as john and whore)
- Perverts (everyone else)
This, at least, has a certain logic to it in that it doesn't arbitrarily assign you to a category based on your gender. Other cultures, including ancient Greece and some South American countries, use:
- People who want to penetrate others during sex, but don't want to be penetrated
- People who want to be penetrated during sex, but don't want to penetrate others
- People who don't want to have any sex at all (very small category)
- Perverts (everyone else)
This makes a lot more sense to me than any of the previous categories, being based on what you want to do rather than the gender of the fucker and the fuckee, although I'm still unhappy about being assigned to the catch-all category, which is always stigmatized. Note that some people who are in the stigmatized categories of "gays" and "lesbians" in the modern Western model fall easily into the two "normal" categories in this schematic, although some don't. However, given that the two normal categories are usually labeled as "man" and "woman," it does assign some people in those categories to the "wrong" gender for their genitalia. Question #2: why do we tend to want categories that are gender-based at all?
None of these methods of categorization seem to be particularly logical to those of us whose attractions are not based on the beloved's gender or equipment. I'm a genetic woman with a mostly female somatic form (although I do have a couple of slightly masculinized features) whose primary turn-ons are (1) intellect (that is, intelligence expressed in an academic manner) and (2) creativity and/or an appreciation and support thereof. It has nothing to do with what's between their legs (although more men than women are likely to exhibit their intelligence in that manner) or with what I want to do with them (I'm fairly flexible in that regard). None of the usual methods of categorization are built to handle me. Neither are they built to handle a genetic and somatic male whose turn-ons are leather and redheads, and who wants to be whipped and tied up - his desires aren't about gender or penetration, either.
The people who do research on sexual orientation tend to revert to the most simple version - people are hetero or homo, no other categories, no exceptions. They also tend to be focused on deterministic explanations, mostly genetic. This is obviously silly, as there exist gays and lesbians who have heterosexual identical twins; even if genes are a strong part of the explanation, they're clearly not the only part. Worse, though, they seem to be not open at all to explanations that don't focus on very simplistic differences. If, for example, your hypothalamus has a certain portion that's this size, you're supposed to want to fuck men, and if it's any bigger, you're supposed to want to fuck women. He even had this perfect opportunity to even work bisexuals in - if you're between this size and this size, you could go either way or both - and he chose not to touch us with the proverbial ten-foot pole, much less a dissection scalpel. So, question #3: why is no one doing research on bisexuality or non-category aspects of sexuality? Wouldn't it be at least as interesting to, for instance, research what makes a person a top/bottom/Dom/sub?
Part of the issue with us bisexuals, sapiosexuals, pansexuals, omnisexuals, and othersexuals is that we seem to have a choice about our sexuality - at the very least, we can choose to express our sexuality in ways that are externally not obviously different from the heterosexual norm. That is, we can retreat into "heterosexual privilege" when we need to, like a mixed-race person who can pass for white. While that's true in a limited sense, we all have the option of retreating into "celibate privilege" if it's necessary for survival - but it crushes us to do so. Everyone has the option of choice, which is one reason I'm leery of the argument "But we can't help it!" as an argument for gay and lesbian civil rights. That only protects us from persecution based on desire - after all, an alcoholic has a genetic predisposition, too, but they are still held responsible if they drive under the influence. As they could choose not to drive, so a gay or lesbian could choose not to fuck. We have to find a better justification for treating us like human beings, and naturalizing all sorts of desire seems to be a more obvious one. After all, everyone except the straightest and most vanilla has some sort of kink. The best course seems to be to honor that kink, and see a preference for men as no different from a preference for blondes, or people with long legs, or pierced nipples, or professors of literature.
--
Edward Stein addresses a number of these issues in The Mismeasure of Desire, although his primary focus is on whether "homosexuals" or "gays and lesbians" are philosophically valid universal categories and whether it makes sense to try and measure them scientifically. (His answers are "probably not" and "not without major revision of the research paradigm," although there are a couple of places where he seems to be remarkably unsympathetic to the information that has been collected already.) It's a very dry book, but his arguments are impeccable, especially where he points out that proving a genetic basis for homosexuality does not, in any real sense, mean anything useful for gay rights and in fact may be harmful (by giving expectant parents the option of aborting children who carry the "gay gene," for instance). If anyone has a chance, I do recommend picking it up.
Why does our culture draw the lines on sexuality where it does? Depending on who's talking, there are either two or three categories:
- People who fuck (or desire to fuck) people of the other gender
- People who fuck (or desire to fuck) people of the same gender
- (optional) People who fuck (or desire to fuck) people of both genders
A very few people, having observed the behavior of people in the first two categories, break it down into four or five categories:
- Males who fuck (or desire to fuck) females
- Males who fuck (or desire to fuck) males
- Females who fuck (or desire to fuck) males
- Females who fuck (or desire to fuck) females
- (optional) People of either gender who fuck (or desire to fuck) people of both genders
Now, question #1: why do all bisexuals, if we get recognized at all, get lumped into a single category? Is the behavior of bi men really indistinguishable from the behavior of bi women?
Both of these methods of categorization are relatively recent. For most of what we will loosely call "Western Civilization" (roughly 800 CE through 1850 CE), the categorization scheme was:
- People who fucked people of the other gender to whom they were legally married only with the intent of generating children
- People who didn't fuck anyone at all
- Sinners (people who fucked people of the other gender in a semi-recognized non-marriage transaction that could potentially generate children, either as man and mistress or as john and whore)
- Perverts (everyone else)
This, at least, has a certain logic to it in that it doesn't arbitrarily assign you to a category based on your gender. Other cultures, including ancient Greece and some South American countries, use:
- People who want to penetrate others during sex, but don't want to be penetrated
- People who want to be penetrated during sex, but don't want to penetrate others
- People who don't want to have any sex at all (very small category)
- Perverts (everyone else)
This makes a lot more sense to me than any of the previous categories, being based on what you want to do rather than the gender of the fucker and the fuckee, although I'm still unhappy about being assigned to the catch-all category, which is always stigmatized. Note that some people who are in the stigmatized categories of "gays" and "lesbians" in the modern Western model fall easily into the two "normal" categories in this schematic, although some don't. However, given that the two normal categories are usually labeled as "man" and "woman," it does assign some people in those categories to the "wrong" gender for their genitalia. Question #2: why do we tend to want categories that are gender-based at all?
None of these methods of categorization seem to be particularly logical to those of us whose attractions are not based on the beloved's gender or equipment. I'm a genetic woman with a mostly female somatic form (although I do have a couple of slightly masculinized features) whose primary turn-ons are (1) intellect (that is, intelligence expressed in an academic manner) and (2) creativity and/or an appreciation and support thereof. It has nothing to do with what's between their legs (although more men than women are likely to exhibit their intelligence in that manner) or with what I want to do with them (I'm fairly flexible in that regard). None of the usual methods of categorization are built to handle me. Neither are they built to handle a genetic and somatic male whose turn-ons are leather and redheads, and who wants to be whipped and tied up - his desires aren't about gender or penetration, either.
The people who do research on sexual orientation tend to revert to the most simple version - people are hetero or homo, no other categories, no exceptions. They also tend to be focused on deterministic explanations, mostly genetic. This is obviously silly, as there exist gays and lesbians who have heterosexual identical twins; even if genes are a strong part of the explanation, they're clearly not the only part. Worse, though, they seem to be not open at all to explanations that don't focus on very simplistic differences. If, for example, your hypothalamus has a certain portion that's this size, you're supposed to want to fuck men, and if it's any bigger, you're supposed to want to fuck women. He even had this perfect opportunity to even work bisexuals in - if you're between this size and this size, you could go either way or both - and he chose not to touch us with the proverbial ten-foot pole, much less a dissection scalpel. So, question #3: why is no one doing research on bisexuality or non-category aspects of sexuality? Wouldn't it be at least as interesting to, for instance, research what makes a person a top/bottom/Dom/sub?
Part of the issue with us bisexuals, sapiosexuals, pansexuals, omnisexuals, and othersexuals is that we seem to have a choice about our sexuality - at the very least, we can choose to express our sexuality in ways that are externally not obviously different from the heterosexual norm. That is, we can retreat into "heterosexual privilege" when we need to, like a mixed-race person who can pass for white. While that's true in a limited sense, we all have the option of retreating into "celibate privilege" if it's necessary for survival - but it crushes us to do so. Everyone has the option of choice, which is one reason I'm leery of the argument "But we can't help it!" as an argument for gay and lesbian civil rights. That only protects us from persecution based on desire - after all, an alcoholic has a genetic predisposition, too, but they are still held responsible if they drive under the influence. As they could choose not to drive, so a gay or lesbian could choose not to fuck. We have to find a better justification for treating us like human beings, and naturalizing all sorts of desire seems to be a more obvious one. After all, everyone except the straightest and most vanilla has some sort of kink. The best course seems to be to honor that kink, and see a preference for men as no different from a preference for blondes, or people with long legs, or pierced nipples, or professors of literature.
--
Edward Stein addresses a number of these issues in The Mismeasure of Desire, although his primary focus is on whether "homosexuals" or "gays and lesbians" are philosophically valid universal categories and whether it makes sense to try and measure them scientifically. (His answers are "probably not" and "not without major revision of the research paradigm," although there are a couple of places where he seems to be remarkably unsympathetic to the information that has been collected already.) It's a very dry book, but his arguments are impeccable, especially where he points out that proving a genetic basis for homosexuality does not, in any real sense, mean anything useful for gay rights and in fact may be harmful (by giving expectant parents the option of aborting children who carry the "gay gene," for instance). If anyone has a chance, I do recommend picking it up.
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no subject
Date: 2004-04-09 04:56 pm (UTC)I'm not so sure that whether or not homosexuality is genetic matters much at all. Part of having gay rights that aren't just on paper would be having parents who don't care if their kid is gay or not. And if parents are aborting children based on their genes, then we have much larger problems to deal with...
no subject
Date: 2004-04-10 10:22 am (UTC)Part of my being techy about this is that I think there are a lot of Kinsey 1's and Kinsey 5's out there who act as if they were Kinsey 0's and 6's because of the stigma placed on bisexuality - that is, I think the criterion is not a "must have" for more people than will admit it. (No, I'm not one of those bis who thinks that everyone is really bisexual, but I do think there are a lot more of us out there than will admit it - we do have two closets to come out of.)
There are already some parents who abort due to genetic factors in the fetus. Right now, the tests that are available are mostly for things like double-recessive genetic diseases or trisomy-21, but they do exist. The idea that anything that had a genetic cause could be selectively aborted isn't new. Fortunately, the people who are most opposed to homosexuality/bisexuality are the people who are also most against abortion, so we may be spared that particular spectre, but I wonder if one revulsion might be enough to overcome another . . .
no subject
Date: 2004-04-10 12:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-04-10 03:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-04-10 05:43 pm (UTC)Surely you know it doesn't work the other other way - straight men lust after lesbians in porn all the time. (And see Chasing Amy for a non-porn mainstream media example.) And most lesbians I know have a sob story about the time they fell in love with a straight female friend.
Desire doesn't have to be requited to count, or once again we're back to only counting behavior, in which case virgins and celibates don't have an orientation. That seems ridiculous to me.
no subject
Date: 2004-04-10 06:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-04-10 07:01 pm (UTC)Those aren't very straight things to do!
Date: 2004-04-11 01:31 am (UTC)One of my big pet peeves is that, as a straight man, I'm supposed to have less dress sense than a gay man. Gay men are supposed to be more cultured, and understand color, music, dance, etc. better than me. As a highly artistic straight male I find these steeotypes hurtfull, and I try to reclaim many of these traits when I can.
The only way I can think of to 'act straight' is to have sex with a woman, then have trouble performing because you are thinking about men and it turns you off. Would THAT work as a definition?
no subject
Date: 2004-04-10 12:55 pm (UTC)The reason gender gets a different category is because it's an easy and (mostly) accurate way to classify a huge majority of the population(remember, descriptive, not predictive). I'd wager that for most people things like leather are a lower order requirement. People who absolutely must see leather to get turned on(bovosexuality?) are more rare.
I find the Kinsey Scale to be somewhat arbitrary. According to this:
http://www.lgbtcampus.org/resources/training/kinsey_scale.html
Kinsey's research was based on volunteers and...prisoners! So with statistics like "60% of all males have had a homosexual experience by the age of 16", you'll forgive me if I'm a bit distrustful of the whole thing. What's a "homosexual experience"? Or a "homosexual fantasy"? If people are self-defining stuff like this, than the scale becomes completely subjective and loses any validity whatsoever. A homophobe might consider having a dream about another man to be a "fantasy", and thus rate higher than they should. If there are objective definitions for these terms(devised in the 1950s, of course), then what are they?
I think the idea of the scale is good, but actually trying to put numbers on it(or, heaven forbid, decimal points) is IMHO going to far without a really good theoretical and statistical grounding to back it up. So you'll have to be more specific about what you mean by a "Kinsey 1 who acts like a 0".
Good point on the abortion issue, but I fear what happens when it becomes possible to selectively modify your children's genes. Designer babies, anyone?
Then again, maybe the legions of identical blond haired/blue eyed/low self-esteem having cheerleaders will revolt and destroy the technology in the chaos.
no subject
Date: 2004-04-10 01:24 pm (UTC)I do have to wonder how one would get a handle on someone's sexual fantasies/desires without them being self-defined. Yes, it's subjective, but sexuality itself is subjective, isn't it? If you only count behavior, I'm heterosexual, and you don't have a sexuality yet at all! What I mean by "a Kinsey 1 who acts like a 0" is someone who would enjoy sex-play with a member of the same sex, and might even occasionally fall in love with one, but who chooses not to express that portion of his/her sexuality because of the social stigma involved. I haven't the slightest idea how to make that "objective," but it's pretty obvious that such people exist, isn't it?
What's the point of a descriptor of one's sexuality that isn't predictive? And the whole reason I'm leery of gender-based descriptors is that I think our ideas about gender are pretty fucked up to begin with. In particular, I think the standard views of gender aren't a good descriptor for a much larger portion of the population than most people are willing to admit. Saying "Omorka is female" is likely to give someone the wrong idea about me for almost as many things as it is to give them the right idea. (Then again, so is "Omorka is married," but I'm trying not keep that out of this rant as much as possible.)
I also think fetishists of various sorts (leather fetishists being only the ones that sprang to mind) are more common than you do, but given the issues about surveys we already brought up, there's probably not much point in arguing about that.
If you have a good practical idea for a "really good theoretical and statistical grounding," I'm sure there are dozens of doctoral students in gender studies and/or human sexuality who need a dissertation . . . we could sure use a few such studies. (Part of the point of Stein's book is that almost none of the current research on human sexuality has anything close.)
The Gattaca idea frightens me, too, but so does the idea of putting legal restraints on it - anything the looks like restricting anyone's reproductive rights is a bad idea given the current political climate. The only think I can think of to curb it is to make it socially unacceptable - "You specifically selected for slim children with blue eyes? Oooh, how tacky! What if pleasantly plump with green eyes is the hot thing in twenty years? How are you going to explain it to them?" Dunno if that will work, but it seems better than the identical cheerleader scenario . . .
no subject
Date: 2004-04-09 08:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-04-10 10:24 am (UTC)You coming to Beltane? (Oops. That sounded like a come-on, didn't it? Not my intent, sorry.) I don't even know where you are these days . . .
no subject
Date: 2004-04-10 10:33 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-04-10 11:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-04-11 06:08 pm (UTC)