Hoo boy.. Here we go.
What else are you not saying?
Satan, pedos,abnormals please do continue.

thoreau wrote:
These days even some parents don't seem to mind their children being sexually active at 13 or 14. It is not something that can be turned around instantly. Incidentally Tatchell has claimed that he and some friends were sexually active at school with adult men, and claims that it did him no harm. This is the person who is trying to get the age of consent lowered.

16 is fine tbh.
It won't stop teenagers messing but would people gripe about two 15yr olds? Completely different situation with a 40yr old and a 15yr old though.

grackus wrote:
Is it 'normal' for heterosexual people to have sex for pleasure?

grackus wrote: This is where I see things very differently. I find it farcical that the age of consent is 16 considering we know for a fact that virtually every single person that has ever lived has had sexual feelings, thoughts and desires well before this age. I know I’d cracked a fair few out by this age!

If you have hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of teenagers who have sexual desires, and you place them in the middle of a highly sexualised society then it’s pretty much a given that someone is going to have sex at some point!

The way the law stands currently if you don’t carry on at school then you are thrust into the adult world, into the ‘job market’ at the age of 16 (I realise this is changing soon). When I was at school, some people had barely turned 16 and they were already doing full-time jobs. So they were effectively told that they were to be treated like an adult, and have to compete with adults, but just weeks previously they were told that they couldn’t understand their own feelings and desires. Isn’t this a bit ridiculous?

I can entirely understand why parents might not want their children to enter into sexual relationships while they’re still at school and so forth; this is an entirely natural reaction. But the fact is that teenagers can, do and will do so; surely it would be better for the whole thing to be above board and openly discussed, and not viewed as some sort of salacious act?

Additionally, most teenage girls are attracted to older men. You could just say that most women are attracted to older men at least at some point in their lives. So you’re inevitably going to get a situation where a 15 year-old is attracted to someone older, I know for a fact that this happened when I was at school, which then opens up a whole new thorny issue.

For example, in the case of Jeremy Forrest:

www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/jailed-run...bducted-8669976.html

Obviously what he did was wrong and irresponsible. I think it’s fair to say he shouldn’t teach again! But certain newspapers were treating him as if he was a paedophile, when he’d in fact had what can reasonably be described as a consensual relationship with an adolescent that the law deemed slightly too young to be able to understand her own feelings. Her mum actually reported him to the police, and the girl (who was now 16, I believe) was devastated by this and very angry, and ultimately moved out of the family home.

This sort of situation is created by the furore which exists around paedophilia and sexual abuse, and of course it is a serious subject. But you have to create a reasonable definition of what this is, and not give in to the most tawdry and rabid tendencies of the public and gutter press. How can you seriously say to an intelligent 15 year-old lass, “you’re too young to understand your own feelings”? I can imagine how I would have responded at that time if someone had said that to me!

But effectively legally this person is treated as a child, and Forrest like a paedophile or child abuser, despite the fact that she was weeks away from being an adult by law, was fully sexually developed, and had clearly entered into an admittedly inappropriate consensual relationship with him.

I accept that if you’re going to have the current social and legal structure that you have to draw the line somewhere, but for me 16 is far too high because you’re criminalising a lot of entirely natural behaviour. Can you seriously say to 15 year-olds: “don’t have sexual feelings”? Of course not, the idea is ridiculous.

In large parts of Europe, I would suggest most of Europe, the age of consent is lower than 16 because of all of these issues:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ages_of_consent_in_Europe

You can read Miranda Sawyer – not a paedophile, I think it’s fair to say! – arguing for an age of consent of 12 here:

www.theguardian.com/education/2003/nov/02/schools.uk

For me, that is too low, but I certainly believe it should be 14 in line with most of Europe, and that we should generally take a less censorious and more open and healthy attitude to sex.

I also think that the implication that Peter Tatchell is a paedophile and not merely a sexual abuser, but someone who is attempting to change the law purely to make such sexual abuse socially acceptable is ludicrous and offensive.

Edit: let me mention as well that Britain has the highest teenage pregnancy rate in Europe, despite having one of the higher ages of consent:

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-28860/U...enage-pregnancy.html

But that it's been coming down steadily as society (slowly) becomes more liberal:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-17190185

You could argue that there are economic reasons for this too, and that would be valid, but surely more healthy attitudes to sex also play a part. So any arguments that if 14 year-olds are allowed to legally have sex then you're going to have a raft of unwanted pregnancies also fall completely flat.

unmasked wrote....
Are you sure that 'gay animals' are not simply animals that are confused and sexually frustrated IE dog tries to shag tree?

wake_up_bomb wrote:
I won't comment on this any more, since this thread was supposed to be about gays and Darwin, but I will say just one thing.

No-one is pretending that children do not have sexual feelings, some from a very early age. You don't have to act on them. You wouldn't let a 4 year old ride a motorbike just because they wanted to ride a motorbike. The reason why the age of consent is there is because our government of the time decided that people below the age of 16 were not yet mature enough to give their informed consent. Personally I am in agreement with that arbitrary figure. If a few 15 year olds get all sad because they are missing a year from a whole lifetime they can waste on pursuing sex so be it. At least that means that filthy perverts can be prosecuted for grooming and having sex with children.

Of course now that we live in a culture that is saturated with sexualised imagery aimed at children it is obvious that children are going to be acting on their sexual feelings earlier and earlier.

Everyone should expect more stories like the Jeremy Forrest one to crop up more and more, all painting the children that were abused as willing participants, even initiators, and the abusers as victims.

Anyway. Apologies to the OP for derailing his thread. I should have realised it would happen.

It might be the 100th Monkey effect.
The population of a land/culture may have a self organising system, this means when the population is given the impression of over population, even if over population as an illusion, it could be that that concept is a type of social engineering and even another face of counterculture.
We then get either depopulation or depopulation type behaviour. (I mean this in the nicest possible way)

I propose that the natural sexual state of a human is bisexual, this can be referenced by looking at historical accounts of ancient Greek and Roman cultures, somehow a division/diversity has been made since.
Perhaps we are all underneath a variety of bisexual with just a tilt of preference, and social engineering and conditioning has created sexual diversity from this.
Seems to me that bisexual is the natural way 'please yourselves' homosexual and hetrosexual are therefore both forms of discrimination.

I don't know enough to verify this or to discuss any details.
I can only guess that to isolate the 'gay gene' is to view it outwith it's relationship with the other genes in it's community, therefore it can't 'exist or not exist' but only exists more so in some individuals than others, I wonder how this gene looks in bisexual people.?

oioioi wrote:
Not if you're westboro Baptist lol

You know who keeps giving birth to these gay agenda types? Straight people!

andyh wrote:

Christ on a fucking bike...just when I thought I'd put the dif behind me.

From the pov of someone who happens to identify as a gayer, there really is nothing magical or sinister about it. As has already been pointed out, people are actually usually comfortable (probably for the first time in a very long time in the history of the human race) to identify themselves as 'gay' - hence the supposed "increase".

As little as sixty years ago, you could still have been 'gay', but be married (to the opposite sex) with children...just because it was easier. Thankfully, people are feeling the need to do that less and less.

As has also already been mentioned...a lot of this has to do with labels. It is unfortunate that we still live in a world where this is such a big issue. To my mind, sexuality can indeed be a fluid thing. I may be attracted to physical attributes generally associated with other men, but it doesn't mean I may never meet someone and fall in love, and that someone happens to be of the opposite gender.

It's not a new thing. It's not a result of some diabolical conditioning or agenda. It is not the result of anything in the water. For as long as there have been 'straight' people, there have and always will be 'gay' people. Some of it due to labels as mentioned above, but mostly just because that's how it always has been. The presence of gay people (whether they comprise 1.5% or 50% of the population), will NEVER stop those who wish to from procreating. To suggest this as a possible agenda is quite frankly idiotic.

To suggest that consenting sexual relations between adults has anything to do with child abuse is equally absurd...seriously, just stop a minute and think about the nonsense that you are spouting.

There may or may not be such a thing as 'gay' animals but again...wtf does this have to do with beastiality? Seriously?! We'll never know until they develop the capacity to communicate with us and express a preference themselves. Either way...I'm quite sure they do not make nearly as much of a huge deal of it as we seem to.

It really is as simple as that.

grackus wrote: What I would say to you is...go to Spain where the age of consent is 13, and you will find that there are no more padeophiles than in the UK. There has been no such highly publicised series of sexual abuse scandals at every level of society in Spain (of which I am aware) and we know for a fact that their level of teenage pregnancy is lower. Furthermore, Spain is an extremely family-oriented society, and I think you will find that, ironically, a Spanish 14 or 15 year-old is less likely to have had sex than their British counterpart.

That says to me that there is little or no link between the age of consent and sexual behaviour. I could not reasonably sit here and argue that a 15 year-old is not in the position to give informed consent. I don't see how anyone could argue that. A 15 year-old could make a decision that fucks their life up, but that could happen at 16 now!

I don't view either alcohol or recreational drugs as positive influences over society as a whole. Overall, I believe they are probably more negative than positive, although I could list positive benefits of several drugs including alcohol. But it’s quite obvious to me that we have to accept that people are going to take them whether we like it or not. It makes sense therefore to draft public policy addressing the reality rather than what we would like the situation to be (ie. possession is decriminalised).

By the same token, we have to accept that 15 year-olds are sexual beings, are sexually developed and are going to pursue sexual relationships. There is no point going around saying that all 15 year-olds should never have sex because we know for a fact that some of them definitely will, particularly in such a sexualised society.

In an ideal world, they’d all study their bollocks off twelve hours a day, abstain from alcohol, cigarettes, drugs and saturated fat, spend their spare time familiarising themselves with the classics, and never feel attracted to anyone until they’re financially secure. Life isn’t like that, so you can either address the reality or live in a fantasy world and simply create more problems.

I wonder what you think about this article abs.
I'm not saying it's my view but it's out there and from what I can gather it's not being presented by homophobic people but rather homosexual people, unless I have that wrong. (fair chance).

'' The X-Men movie series, based on the comic books of the same name, is well-known for its unusual cast of gifted mutants and for its extraordinary special effects. What is not as widely known about the X-Men is the fact that the movies, along with the comic books, draw many clear parallels between the mutants and the gay and lesbian community. It is an open secret that the most recent movie in the series, “X-Men First Class,” which serves as the prequel for the other films, is especially overt in presenting these parallels.
Zach Stenz, one of the First Class screenwriters, explained on a Facebook comment posted in June: “I helped write the movie, and can tell you the gay rights / post-holocaust Jewish-identity / civil rights allegory stuff was put in there on purpose. Joss Wheldon designed the whole ‘Cure’s storyline in the comic books specifically as a gay allegory, and Bryan Singer wove his own feelings of outsiderdom as a gay man into the movie series. The whole ‘Have you ever tried NOT being a mutant’ coming out scene in X2 [released in 2003] is even particularly subtle, while it is effective.”''

Here's the rest townhall.com/columnists/michaelbrown/201...men_movies/page/full

It's a weird analogy to make imo.

Blue_Tackler wrote:
I don't think I'm understanding, BT. I frequently don't, however...so don't feel too bad.

I get that some of the issues encountered by these characters, simply because of what they 'are', do parallel many of the instances of hatred, bigotry and misunderstanding that happen daily in the real world.

I don't think that the creators of the series were in any way implying that gay people are some kind of mutation. For a start, they'd be wrong as well as very stupid, and given the quality of their works, I'd credit them with a little more intelligence than that.

Ab's said
It's a bit like a reverse psychology thingy I guess Ab, I'm supposing that the X from the XMEN could relate to Xchromosome, or something and it's a bit of an intellectual play on peoples preconceptions so now the 'mutant' gene in this play is being replaced by 'mutant social concept'.
Where the 'mutant' is not really a genetic trait or illness but the perception of the general population driven by whatever, (the mutant generator)

In other words it's the perception that is mutated, not the genes.
That's about as far as I can go before I start talking complete shit, unless I already have.

Edit according to icemans 'mutation' it goes like this...
''Our favourite X-men Iceman was born in Long Island, New York to William Robert Drake and Madeline Beatrice Bass Drake. Bobby was like any other schoolboy growing up and leading a normal life. But things started to change when he hit puberty. That was when he started to discover his mutant ability to control ice.

When his parents found out about his mutant power, they told him to keep it a secret for fear of his life. Unfortunately, the secret was made known when he was out on a date with his girlfriend, Judy Harmon.

A group of local bullies starting assaulting them and in self defence, Bobby used his mutant power to encase his aggressor''
www.just-marvel-x-men.com/x-men-iceman.html

I imagine quite a lot of gay people would be able to relate to this ..... it's the discovery, the silence, the coming out, and the 'local bullies'.

I get the feeling that a lot more is said in the Xmen stories than first meets the eye, and this is actually imo a better way with dealing with issues about peoples sexuality than looking for that gene, I mean why, what is the intension ?
Are parents going to have a choice we want/don't want a gay one?

Ab Origine wrote:
Yeah, kind of wish I hadn't started it, but I did find the article in the OP very interesting.
.....Wonder how many posting actually read it before relaying their scripted opinions on the subject though

Appreciate your input Ab but I do take issue with your magical or sinister - you're right, it's not.

But (unless coming from a religious or very spiritual POV where our souls are somehow defined 'elsewhere') there is EITHER some kind of genetic influence, OR everyone's sexuality is taught in the same way as other behaviours: the age old Nature v Nurture debate.

Now, most people are agreed it's not a taught/learnt behaviour.
So, as with all gene-science stuff, as researchers get closer to narrowing down the causes or catalysts of whatever subject they're studying, what happens with this knowledge?

Further questions I guess are;
Why do we need to know (Why aren't these great minds being put to studying cancer, for example)? How will this information be used? Who is funding these studies?

I'm getting frustrated a bit because I can't find a way to succinctly put across what I mean
This was never a Gay: good or bad? thread!

Great minds are put to use by those who can afford to pay the most for them.
Those who can afford to pay the most obviously want them to work on specific tasks that will make yet more money because thats all they are concerned with.

A good example is stuff like ubiquitous computing and mind-computer interfacing.

andyh wrote:
I will look them up as I have no idea what either of those are andy, but thanks, as you have given me further thoughts to follow on this thread

Ubiquitous computing is stuff like IPv6 which enables many more ip addresses...specifically unique ones so that every device can be uniquely identified.

Brain-computer interfaces are the next step in transhumanism and its a very strong agenda tbh.

If you think this whole gay thing is touchy touchy just wait til you start reading up on this topic lol...it scares the shit out of me tbh.

Imagine a world where every single person can see/hear/taste/touch what someone else experiences at the same time globally...not only that but where you can communicate with them even with language differences, perhaps even read thoughts.

Then there's AI augmentation, brain-computer interfaces to expand intelligence/knowledge.

We're only a couple of decades away from it being mass produced IMHO. Yet despite this advanced tech, we have yet to cure cancer and we have yet to raise the living standards of a huge percentage of humans on this planet.