Preface: this post isn't a reply to the conversation above: this is just a topic that has been lingering on my mind for a while and now seems like an apt time to bring it up.
The implication that human experiences cannot influence sexuality seems reductive. I'm sure we've all heard and, at one point, used the 'born this way' mantra in effort for equality; it acts as damage control to conservatives, as if something is innate to a human, it is immoral to attack them for it. But as our understanding of sexuality advances, it's not a stretch to say that this ideology is harmful to LGBTQ individuals. Now obviously, I don't want people interpreting this as sexuality being a willful choice we pick and choose, like clothes and such, but rather a malleable facet of human identity that can gradually alter over time. Psychologists and cognitive scientists have articulated this better than I can, but it's not unreasonable to say that important or traumatic events in one's life can, subconsciously, shape our sexual preferences. And this shouldn't be viewed as harmful to LGBTQ identities. Predictably, bigots will misconstrue this as sexuality being a choice or just as something to fit into their regressive narrative.
As for asexuality, it isn't a subject I can speak on anecdotally or even through readings/research. Naturally, talking about trauma and the influence it holds over sexuality is a slippery slope: on one hand, to make a blanket statement that negative experiences determine you as a person--sexuality or not--is not productive or insightful to anyone; on the other hand, it is not necessary for LGBTQ individuals to justify their sexuality through excessively making a point of how it is innate to them, and how the person's experiences are irrelevant to it, despite this claim not being wholly accurate. Dr. Lisa Diamond makes three succinct points on why 'born this way' isn't actually useful for us:
1. 'It is not scientifically accurate'
2. 'It is not legally necessary'
3. (most important point): 'It is actually unjust'
The third point resonates most pertinently to this discussion and to the queer community as a whole. A lot of gender-non-conforming and/or queer individuals offer stories from when they were a child about how they used to dress up as the opposite gender and use that as a tool to 'normalise' or act as damage control to how weird it is to be queer. I used to do this too, but eventually just stopped; you do not need to justify your identity to cisheterosexual people. Also, the desperation to fit into a fixed label of sexuality is too a product of heteronormativity. It's not unusual or abnormal for same-sex attracted people to develop opposite-sex attraction later in life, and this doesn't make them confused or 'traitors', likewise with heterosexuals developing an attraction to other genders doesn't make them an ashamed closeted person.
The implication that human experiences cannot influence sexuality seems reductive. I'm sure we've all heard and, at one point, used the 'born this way' mantra in effort for equality; it acts as damage control to conservatives, as if something is innate to a human, it is immoral to attack them for it. But as our understanding of sexuality advances, it's not a stretch to say that this ideology is harmful to LGBTQ individuals. Now obviously, I don't want people interpreting this as sexuality being a willful choice we pick and choose, like clothes and such, but rather a malleable facet of human identity that can gradually alter over time. Psychologists and cognitive scientists have articulated this better than I can, but it's not unreasonable to say that important or traumatic events in one's life can, subconsciously, shape our sexual preferences. And this shouldn't be viewed as harmful to LGBTQ identities. Predictably, bigots will misconstrue this as sexuality being a choice or just as something to fit into their regressive narrative.
As for asexuality, it isn't a subject I can speak on anecdotally or even through readings/research. Naturally, talking about trauma and the influence it holds over sexuality is a slippery slope: on one hand, to make a blanket statement that negative experiences determine you as a person--sexuality or not--is not productive or insightful to anyone; on the other hand, it is not necessary for LGBTQ individuals to justify their sexuality through excessively making a point of how it is innate to them, and how the person's experiences are irrelevant to it, despite this claim not being wholly accurate. Dr. Lisa Diamond makes three succinct points on why 'born this way' isn't actually useful for us:
1. 'It is not scientifically accurate'
2. 'It is not legally necessary'
3. (most important point): 'It is actually unjust'
The third point resonates most pertinently to this discussion and to the queer community as a whole. A lot of gender-non-conforming and/or queer individuals offer stories from when they were a child about how they used to dress up as the opposite gender and use that as a tool to 'normalise' or act as damage control to how weird it is to be queer. I used to do this too, but eventually just stopped; you do not need to justify your identity to cisheterosexual people. Also, the desperation to fit into a fixed label of sexuality is too a product of heteronormativity. It's not unusual or abnormal for same-sex attracted people to develop opposite-sex attraction later in life, and this doesn't make them confused or 'traitors', likewise with heterosexuals developing an attraction to other genders doesn't make them an ashamed closeted person.