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What's the general consensus on sexuality being a choice?

submitted by SexualityCritical from self.GenderCritical

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[–]censorshipment 27 insightful - 5 fun27 insightful - 4 fun28 insightful - 5 fun -  (5 children)

Sexuality i.e. sexual orientation isn't a choice.

Sexual desire i.e. lust isn't a choice.

Sexual activity is a choice (where people have bodily autonomy).

[–]SexualityCritical[S] 1 insightful - 2 fun1 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 2 fun -  (4 children)

If this is true, the implication would be that asexuality is impossible for most people, that genes compel a person to experience sexual lust. This would, likewise, mean that someone's desires are divorced from ideology, that they have no beliefs about a certain sexualised thing/person, but rather that something biological automatically causes them to feel a certain way. If choice isn't involved in such experiences, sensual or internally artistic, it would mean that someone is frequently being psychologically attacked, that they feel the way they do due to their genetics compelling them to, even if they don't like it whatsoever. If they do like it, however, that can only be because of ideology. If someone doesn't like sexuality, their experiences of it must be truly horrific. Or, is it the case that they're not actually experiencing sexuality, or 'sexual arousal,' but, rather, their genitals are moving in accordance with a certain, specific, OCD fixing arrangement of things, which causes blood to be pumped to such genitals? The same reason any genital movement occurs in non-sexual scenarios.

[–]MarkTwainiac 6 insightful - 1 fun6 insightful - 0 fun7 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

If this is true, the implication would be that asexuality is impossible for most people, that genes compel a person to experience sexual lust.

The amount and kind of sexual desire humans experience varies widely from individual to individual, usually varies quite a lot within the lifespan of each individual, and varies too amongst persons of different sexes, life experiences, health histories and so on. It's quite common for girls & women to experience markedly different levels of sexual desire at different points in the menstrual cycle as well as during pregnancy, after childbirth and when breastfeeding/rearing young children.

In general, there have always been people who from puberty on are heavily inclined to horniness, and those who never feel horny at all. Ascetic traditions and roles for those who are asexual and celibate have always existed in pretty much all cultures.

I don't think you understand how genes and gene expression work.

[–]SexualityCritical[S] 1 insightful - 2 fun1 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 2 fun -  (2 children)

I'm saying that no genes exist which create sexuality. I'm saying people come to be sexual, based upon the social construct that is sexualness, through social engineering, through the various environments which shape and structure them to be the type of person that they are.

[–][deleted] 5 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 0 fun6 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

I'm saying that no genes exist which create sexuality.

Most everything living on this planet reproduces sexually, and those lesser creatures don't have social constructions.

[–]SexualityCritical[S] 1 insightful - 2 fun1 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

I'm not saying sexual reproduction doesn't exist. But, you see, people in this very thread stated, correctly, that sexuality isn't defined by sexual intercourse, but rather by arousal and attraction. Clearly, if sexuality was sex, sexuality would be a choice, since people choose which sex to be with erotically.