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Selma,
I suspect that a society that doesn't encourage its
reproductive characteristics won't be around for very long.
Harry
I haven't been following this thread too carefully
but has anyone brought up the fact that all human beings are biologically both
male and female? All humans have both male and female hormones, and the Xs and
Ys don't always come out the way we think they're supposed to.
My position is that, if we lived in a society which
did not judge the issue, we would all be bisexual in varying
degrees.
Selma
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, October 24, 2003 5:48
PM
Subject: Re: [Futurework] More
hardwiring.
I wonder about all of this.
Mike Hollinshead told me sometime ago about the
British system of family where only the elders were allowed to marry and the
younger brothers and sisters became bachelors and spinsters with the job of
caring for the children of the first born. That way the family was
able to accrue status and capital but the younger siblings became human
sacrifices for the good of the family.
Then there is my British American slang word
dictionary. I sent one of the online lists to the Futurework over
the difference in the meaning of the word "Public Schools" which like
"liberal" and conservative mean the opposite in America and the
UK. There was also the interesting use of such terms as "arse" and
"fanny" which had some different meanings as well.
"Fanny" in British slang according to the
dictionary means vagina while in the US it means buttocks.
Now that causes some interesting thoughts when
thinking about what the word homosexual could mean. Is it possible
that we have been seeing differently because homosexual in England is what we
mean by heterosexual in the US?
The homosexuals in America are stereotypically
what you say but so are the heterosexuals. Since there are so many
more heterosexuals here, there are many more choruses and orchestras broken up
by them and heterosexuals even put up monuments saying that homosexuals are
damned and doomed to hellfire even though they were dragged to
death behind pickup trucks until the skin was no longer on their
bodies. I don't know any American homosexuals who have done the
reverse.
If our homosexuals had anywhere near the
same amount of aggression as the American heterosexual male then you
might have a point but our homosexuals are known as basically delicate,
artistic and sensitive, stereotypically.
They have as good a language as the Jews you admire, are highly
intelligent and are multi-cultural as well as being represented in the
complete racial and political spectrum. They are clannish in the
same way that Italians, Irish, Blacks, and the English are clannish as
well. They help each other in difficult situations since they are
usually the underdog. Just like the Russian artists now in the
US.
Well don't have much more time for
this. But I would suggest that 1. we have a problem of reverse
language or 2. that there is just a need to know you neighbor a little bit
better to strike a treaty from a place of equality and freedom and learn to
appreciate the gifts of each.
As for genetics. I can't see from my
experience, that it is not genetic. If I were to judge people by
who are the most artistic, sensitive, creative, intelligent, peaceful and
generally the most fun to be around then I would have chosen homosexuality as
would several of my other heterosexual friends. But, we were
not. We love women and we are the minority, in our sexuality,
when it comes to not liking aggression or preferring the passive mode in
literature. It also is bad business to air such
views. We don't have much sensibility for angry Gods who
must kill their sons in order to assuage their anger towards their creation
either. Our Gods don't do such things. To each his
own. But genetics will eventually point out whether those who have
abused and oppressed were just discriminate or were homicidal just as it has
with African Americans. I have great awe and fear for the
judgement of history. Art has taught me that.
Ray Evans Harrell
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, October 24, 2003 3:02
PM
Subject: RE: [Futurework] More
hardwiring.
Harry,
At 09:38 24/10/2003 -0700, you
wrote:
Keith,
I've
always thought that the lot of homosexuals is not so much gay as sad. Even
the name "gay" is a little sad.
Yes, I think so, too.
I think almost all of them are fairly sad when they are in their 60s from
those I know here -- one or two are very bitter. Some, like the ones Ed
mentioned, are supposed to live in warm loving partnerships but I think
these are very thin on the ground. The two couples I knew well round here,
one male and one female, have both broken up with a great deal of acrimony
after having lived together for many years in one cases and several years in
the other. Whenever the BBC have a TV documentary here on homosexuality they
almost invariably show a domestic scene of the same two men. They are both
in their early 60s, slightly dumpy, very smart and handsome, both with neat
toothbrush moustaches. The clip usually shows one of them playing the piano
with the other singing or, sometimes, tending the orchids in the
conservatory behind. I've seen this same clip at least three times and I
haven't seen a domestic scene of another male couple. I think the BBC must
only have this one in their library! I've seen plenty of lesbian couples
filmed in BBC documentaries. I don't believe there can be all that many male
relationships that persist for long. Although individual lesbians are
thinner on the ground than male homosexuals I think that there are probably
many more lesbian couples than males. I think the cultural aetiology of
lesbians and gays are quite different. In the case of one of the lesbian
couples I know, one of them actually showed my partner and I round their
house once and, to my great surprise, even their bedroom. This was
beautifully furnished with all sorts of silky drapes. I put my arm round her
waist and led her to the bed. All in fun, of course, and she took it in good
heart -- I was always ribbing her about her "marriage". But then,
sadly, they split. I met the one I'm talking about in an art shop in town
some months ago and she told me about the break-up -- the other had gone off
with another -- and cried, so I just hugged her for ages with all the other
customers in the shop swilling around, pretending not to take any notice. I
couldn't do that for a male gay. Mind you I've danced with an Indian man
quite intimately at a multi-cultural dance some years ago. Which reminds me
I now have the photo of you and I in warm embrace when you were here in
Bath. At least I have my arm round you. You are waving one of yours about as
though trying to escape. Your son is in the background looking on rather
quizzickly. There we are then. When I've worked out how to scan a colour
photo, or have asked a friend to help me (I'm a real computerphobe), I'll do
so and send it to you.
One grows orchids in
This is not
to say that individual homosexuals who are talented do not have a pretty
good life. Just that the majority seem to be trapped in the kind of
lifestyle that is required of them.
I get that
impression, too.
Prison behavior is
not homosexuality, but what I've called the "hole in the wall" behavior.
One that makes the best of a poor situation.
True. I
knew someone once who'd been in a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp and he told
me that when he was released at the end of the war the army took him and his
friends off to "recreation" for several weeks until he'd readjusted and was
then allowed back to his wife in England.
Keith
Harry.***********************************
Henry George School of
Social Science
of Los Angeles
Box 655 CA 91042
USA
Tel: 818 352-4141 : Fax: 818
353-2242
***********************************
From:
[EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] On
Behalf Of Keith Hudson
Sent: Thursday, October 23, 2003
11:32 PM
To: Ray Evans Harrell
Cc:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: [Futurework] More
hardwiring.
- Ray,
- A useful (and encouraging) news item you posted.
- Yes, the tide is turning and we're beginning to get some objective
research (and sense) into this business of homosexuality. In recent
decades, homosexuals have been very clever in branding those of us who
don't like to see rampant homosexuality around us as being "homophobic".
People like me don't fear homosexuality, except that we would rather
keep them from being too influential on our children or our
grandchildren at their critical puberty and adolescent stage of life
which could restrict their future experience of the wonderful joys of
the other sex and the procreation and raising of children. It would be
more accurate to call homosexuals "gynophobic" (sexually, that is). I am
no more anti-homosexual than I am anti-married couples who decide to
have no children (as is the case of one of my children) or only one
child. Both (as wide-spread phenomena these days in all so-called
"developed" countries) occur in many social mammals when they are
overpopulated, and are indicative of a highly-stressed society -- which,
at present, doesn't want to replenish itself.
- There have always been homosexuals -- but only in small numbers, not
in the large minority found today (even glorified) in developed
countries (10% or thereabouts?). Homosexuals are often delightful people
and creative, too. I know several such in the world of music, but I also
know other much older homosexuals who have lost their sexual vigour and
their looks and are now very lonely people -- some, quite bitter in
temperament (which, to my mind, is rather convincing evidence that they
made a bad mistake in their youth which deprived them of continuing
happiness in life).
- Let's call a spade a spade and call homosexuals unfortunates.
- Keith Hudson
- At 22:21 23/10/2003 -0400, you wrote:
- <<<<<
- SEXUAL IDENTITY HARD-WIRED BY GENETICS, STUDY SAYS
- LOS ANGELES (Reuters) Sexual identity is wired into the genes,
which discounts the concept that homosexuality and transgender sexuality
are a choice, California researchers reported on Monday.
- "Our findings may help answer an important question why do we
feel male or female?" Dr. Eric Vilain, a genetics professor at the
University of California, Los Angeles School of Medicine, said in a
statement. "Sexual identity is rooted in every person's biology
before birth and springs from a variation in our individual genome." His
team has identified 54 genes in mice that may explain why male and
female brains look and function differently.
- Since the 1970s, scientists have believed that estrogen and
testosterone were wholly responsible for sexually organizing the
brain. Recent evidence, however, indicates that hormones cannot
explain everything about the sexual differences between male and female
brains. Published in the latest edition of the journal Molecular Brain
Research, the UCLA discovery may also offer physicians an improved
tool for gender assignment of babies born with ambiguous genitalia. Mild
cases of malformed genitalia occur in 1 percent of all births -- about 3
million cases. More severe cases -- where doctors can't inform
parents whether they had a boy or girl -- occur in one in 3,000
births.
- "If physicians could predict the gender of newborns with ambiguous
genitalia at birth, we would make less mistakes in gender assignment,"
Vilain said. Using two genetic testing methods, the researchers compared
the production of genes in male and female brains in embryonic mice --
long before the animals developed sex organs. They found 54 genes
produced in different amounts in male and female mouse brains, prior to
hormonal influence. Eighteen of the genes were produced at higher
levels in the male brains; 36 were produced at higher levels in the
female brains.
- "We discovered that the male and female brains differed in many
measurable ways, including anatomy and function," Vilain said.For
example, the two hemispheres of the brain appeared more symmetrical in
females than in males. According to Vilain, the symmetry may
improve communication between both sides of the brain, leading to
enhanced verbal expressiveness in females. "This anatomical difference
may explain why women can sometimes articulate their feelings more
easily than men," he said.
- The scientists plan to conduct further studies to determine the
specific role for each of the 54 genes they identified. "Our findings
may explain why we feel male or female, regardless of our actual
anatomy," said Vilain. "These discoveries lend credence to the
idea that being transgender feeling that one has been born into
the body of the wrong sex is a state of mind.
- Reuters, October 20, 2003
- >>>>
- Keith Hudson, Bath, England, <www.evolutionary-economics.org>, <www.handlo.com>,
<www.property-portraits.co.uk>
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Keith Hudson,
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