Greetings folks, Now this is interesting...remember that during the same year (1974) of the debate I have provided in the link below, homosexuality was finally removed from the category of a disorder from the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). It is fascinating to see how consistent and logical LGBT arguments have been from the get-go, and how weak the arguments against "homosexual marriage" were then, and continue to be today. The best the opponents can come up with, without any scientific or rational basis, is "It is our opinion...", not to mention the fallacious argument that gay parents will promote homosexuality and raise gay kids (equally unsupported by any evidence whatsoever). This is good training for any of you who anticipate the kind of opposition that was shown in this debate: Should Marriage Between Homosexuals Be Permitted? - WGBH Open Vault
To play devil's advocate here, if these supposedly "weak" complaints have existed since the 1970s and there has been little progress toward gay marriage despite consistent LGBT argument, what does that say about those complaints? To me it says that people are attempting to create their own reality in which homosexuals not only do not exist but also have no feelings, but that's just me.
They haven't been seen as weak until very recently, when people actually look at them through an objective lens.
It's sad that it took 40 years for people to actually start understanding these arguments. But this is a blast from the past, and I wish PBS would still do shows like these. I'm watching the one about the death penalty, which are appropriately enough moderated by Mike Dukakis... [youtube]DF9gSyku-fc[/youtube]
While the APA removed it from the DSM, some other conditions could be aggravated by an orientation that is not heteronormative and a DSM diagnosis code would still be applied. This could be the function of innate wiring or it could be situational, meaning it was brought on by how someone was treated. This parallels the notions of endogenous and exogenous. Also, there is mention of the term "ego dystonic" in psychology which I don't believe has been shelved, although I've only seen it in the literature. While I don't have numbers, I'm almost sure that, proportionately, LGBT folks consume more mental health services than do heterosexuals. But, at the very least, the removal of sexual orientation by the APA from the DSM was a necessity. It was a scarlet letter that didn't need to be.
The arguments against same-sex marriage expressed here are consistent with so much of the debate that has recently raged in the UK (where same-sex marriage has only this year - 2014 - been legalised). They are based on the premise that any "elevation" of homosexuality will turn heterosexual people away from their sexuality and "turn them gay". It really is extraordinary to think that these (apparently) heterosexual people are so insecure in their sexuality that they believe it so vulnerable to change. They have a lot to learn from us gays. Thanks for sharing a fascinating piece of social history.
