Quote:
Originally Posted by FuglyStick
But doesn't that ambiguity lend itself to the argument fundamentalists make that homosexuals can be "cured?" If it's possible for you to be, say, 10 percent heterosexual, isn't it just a matter of conditioning for you to become 100 percent heterosexual? Isn't it saying that every heterosexual has the potential to be gay, and every homosexual has the potential to be straight? And doesn't that support the fundamentalists' assertions that single parent families, cross dressing at a young age, sexual abuse and cross gender play, among a litany of others, are the "causes" of homosexuality? And doesn't that open the door for them to assert that there is no such thing as homosexuality--that without a catalyst to "cause" homosexuality, it ceases to exist?
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That's all a cognitive leap. There's no basis for it.
Saying that someone is (to use your example) 10% homosexual speaks nothing as to why that person would be that way. It offers no constrictions on how sexuality is expressed. Indeed, it does quite the opposite; the sexual continuum theory suggests that there's absolutely nothing wrong with a straight man being attracted to another man, or a gay man to a woman.
Using numbers or percentages to express such a thing is cumbersome at best. Regardless, imagine the hypothetical 10% homosexual man. This is a man who is primarily attracted to women, and who probably identifies as heterosexual. However, this man occasionally feels attracted sexually to other men. If we assume the 10% figure refers to the ratio of potential mates, then for every 9 women he is attracted to he'll meet one man who invokes a similar response.
It quickly breaks down and the clumsiness of the metaphor becomes apparent. Even so, I think it serves the purpose. Whether or not this man chooses to act on those impulses (probably not), they're still there. Depending on his upbringing he may even think them shameful and wrong, but that's not going to make them go away.
Sexual continuum is simply a rejection of cookie-cutter labels in favour of a more realistic model that accounts for individual variations. There's no more or less to it than that.