Was there a fact in any of that? One small scintilla of real-word evidence?

She should be prevented, by law from using the world “science.”

Someone needs to suggest to the poor thing that she google this:

“Scientific Testable Assertion”

Feh… Probably wouldn’t do any good…

So, basically, the only good gay person is a dead, sorry, rightwing gay person.

What the fuck private social security accounts have to do with discrimination in survivor benefits I don’t know. You can already save in a private account for your retirement if you don’t want discrimination, Star. If the government had gone ahead with the privatisation your beloved president was pushing, we’d still have discrimination in social security survivor benefits. Similarly, unless the government writes equality into the law creating Health Savings Accounts, they’ll still discriminate, you idiot. There isn’t going to be some magical gay friendly health savings or social security account in the private sector that does what it likes but also gets government tax breaks.

She blinded me with Science.

I’m forever amused by the fact that the “Homosexuality is a choice” crowd are too dense to realize that they are implicitly insisting that they get as sexually aroused by their own gender as by the opposite. One can only surmise that they are, in fact, closeted homosexuals themselves. I know heterosexuality is nowhere near a “choice” for me. I don’t know how any genuine heterosexual could think it was.

Philosophers don’t argue that “nothing can be proved�; they say one cannot prove a negative. This is why, during formal debate, the burden of proof is always on the claimant.

Take Star Parker, for example: If she claims gay marriage will destroy the US, she has to offer some proof to back that assertion. It isn’t her detractors’ job to prove she’s full of shit, no matter how easy that is to do.

People change religions, so we shouldn’t have religious freedom.

Shouldn’t she also have to prove that there are “without question” ex-gays? Come to that, shouldn’t she have to prove that she will never become gay?

Though, really, I’d like to see her at least swear to the last one. I’d hate to run into her in a bar.

Programming Note: As I write, the brilliant Ms. Parker is currently appearing on BookTV on CSPAN 2!

Viewer discretion is advised….

Somebody needs to tell this guy about Karl Popper and falsifiability.

Falsifiability states that even if your spoon zooms off and converts Ms. Parker to a lesbian, the majority of evidence concludes that the law of gravity ist still valid.

However, if we find one morning, while someone is eating their bowl of cheerios, that their spoon jumps out of their hand and flies up to the ceiling, we kiss goodbye to our law of gravity.

Is anyone else struck by the overwhelming urge to rent the apartment above Ms. Parker’s and make use of a very large and powerful magnet?

I’m forever amused by the fact that the “Homosexuality is a choice� crowd are too dense to realize that they are implicitly insisting that they get as sexually aroused by their own gender as by the opposite. One can only surmise that they are, in fact, closeted homosexuals themselves. I know heterosexuality is nowhere near a “choice� for me. I don’t know how any genuine heterosexual could think it was.

I chose heterosexuality after my first encounter with Dr. Jellyfinger when they thought I had appendicitis when I was like 8.

I have to confess that I never quite have understood the line that homosexuality is not a choice, because clearly for some people, it is. Prisoners, for example, and Anne Heche. So, while I do believe there are people on the margins who are born with an unshakeable sexual preference, I think most people can make a choice. And the point is, it doesn’t matter. People should be allowed to love who they love. This one of the far too many areas where conservatives have framed the argument.

They should fight for private health care accounts and getting corporations out of the benefits providing business and so they could stop complaining about discrimination in benefits toward gay couples.

So because gays are denied benefits they should lobby for everyone not to have benefits. So, um, her argument is that those people who choose to be gay should behave like a bunch of pricks because they are treated unequally. Do I have it right?

So, while I do believe there are people on the margins who are born with an unshakeable sexual preference, I think most people can make a choice.

Without discussing your particular sexual preference, can you honestly say that you could just decide one day to change it? What would be the factors that would or could cause you to make such a choice?

I think it’s the other way around: there may be people at the margins who make a choice, but for most people, the brain is wired in a certain way from the beginning.

(Your examples do not convince me, by the way. Prisoners who have sex with other men reportedly do not consider themselves homosexuals; there is a power relationship there that has nothing to do with sexual preference and everything to do with dominance and hierarchy. As for Anne Heche, being confused and erratic is not necessarily the same as making a choice to change orientations.)

Um…do they have coed prisons where you live, Aquagirl?
As for Anne Heche, I think she was just following orders from the Aliens. Or she’s um, BISEXUAL. Ever heard of ’em before?

Well, who people choose to actually have sex with is a choice. And, yes, even if you’re gay gay gay you can wake up tomorrow and choose to sleep with people of the opposite sex forever more.
It doesn’t make you less gay. It just makes you, um, kinda miserable.

As a more-or-less bisexual, I know my mom was delighted whenever I found a boyfriend, because, hey, that means I’m straight now, right? (And when I found two boyfriends who were themselves also bisexual, hoo boy. I think she still has that facial tic.)

But sleeping with either a man or a woman doesn’t make me anything other than what I am, and I’m probably never going to wake up and *not be attracted to* men or women.

The whole ex-gay thing annoys me, because it falls into the old You Are What You Eat argument, which dictates, taken to its logical extremes, that you are only gay or straight when you are actually engaged in sex, and that there’s no such thing as, for example, a horny fourteen year old straight male virgin (He’s really just Schrodinger’s Libido, waiting to see if someone will open the closet or not).

You don’t stop being gay or straight when you stop sleeping with people of one gender or another. You stop being gay or straight when you stop being *attracted to* one gender or another.

You pretty much summed it up there, D. Sidhe, but I wanted to add that some people (myself included) consider sexual orientation to be kind of a sliding scale, rather than a duality. A lot of people (especially straight people) think there is gay and straight. Some people will allow for bisexuals, but seem to think that that means they are equally attracted to *everyone*, which would be kind of distracting, if you think about it. I personally believe that sexuality is more of a continuum . . . you can be extremely gay and like only your own gender, or extremely hetero and like only the opposite. However, most people probably aren’t at the extremes. I personally am bisexual, but I more often date men. Still, this doesn’t make it a choice. You can’t suddenly decide to move to the other side without really screwing up your life and your psyche. “Choosing” your sexuality is really just self-deception, imho.

I’m with you on the sliding scale thing. I’m a bit more attracted to women than to men, but mostly attracted to personalities. Combined with various other complications, I tend to describe myself as “more or less lesbian” and in general refer to all my partners as “partners” without commenting on gender. (Plus, my current partner enforces even demographic anonymity on the internets.) But whatever I am, it’s what I’ve always been, and it doesn’t change no matter who I’m dating.

Just for fun, can I mention that as far as I’m concerned, refusing to date someone based on their gender is like refusing to date someone based on their race or religion?

“More or less lesbian” – awesome. When people ask me if I’m gay, I usually reply glibly, “Only on the good days.”

This idiot was interviewed by TDS and was too stupid to realize she was being mocked.
How can she be taken seriously after that?

To clarify my earlier comment, I agree with D. Sidhe that one’s sexual partners are a choice, but I believe one’s sexuality — which dictates the population from which one is willing to select partners — is not. And obviously, no matter what your innate sexuality, your sexual behavior — your choices of partner, for example — can be, and generally will be, influenced by external factors.

I dunno, I’d totally make out with a guy, but I wouldn’t have sex with one. What does that make me?

Anyway, Hysterical Woman put it best, I think. The reverse is, of course, An insane murderer didn’t have the choice not to murder, therefore we shouldn’t do anything to protect society from him.

Whether something is a choice or not has nothing to do with whether it’s prohibited or not.

Well, I was oversimplifying to make a point (ridiculing the subject of the post) but I, too, would agree that it appears there’s a sliding scale. My own take on it, though, is that most people are well towards the margins of the scale. Of course, I can’t read minds, so that might just reflect the fact that I’m on one end of the scale. What I find bizzare about the “It’s a choice” idiots is the notion that anyone can reach adulthood without enough awareness to realize that we’re all wired a little differently.

shorter Star Parker: if no one has retirement or health benefits, we will have equality. Gays are hypocrites for not fighting for equality.

ahem. my theory. which a theory by me. star parker.

yes, go ahead.

yes. my theory. ahem cough cough ahem. this theory, a theory by me, star parker, p.a.r.k.e.r., ahem, is a theory, ahem, cough cough, a theory…

yes, please go on.

mm, yes. ahem. is a theory by me, star parker, concerning homosexuality.

and that theory is!!!!!!!!!?

me, that theory, by me, star parker, is a theory which says that homosexuality is when two people of the same sex have sexual relations. with each other.

that’s my version. the rest should know that a brontosauras is skinny on both ends, and large in the middle.

I’d comment on this, but unfortunately I have been forbidden from commenting on Star Parker by s.z. of World O’ Crap and Bill S, because I stupidly confused her with Star Jones of the View. D’oh! Maybe I should just hold fire as a rule, unless there’s a picture of the wingnut in question so as there’s no chance of confusion on my part*.

*Discounting, of course, the “doughy, middle-aged white dude” factor.

And when I say the “doughy, middle-aged white dudeâ€? factor, I am, of course talking about the wingnut-o’-teh-day, not about myself. Just to keep things clear. Ahem.