Homosexuality

The paper written by Kennedy and Davis, which was called The Reproduction of Butch-Fem Roles: A Social Constructionist Approach, provides further evidence that the history of sexuality is young and

In his article, “The Invention of Sexuality”, Weeks argued that sexuality is a product of society and is shaped by

The word “gay” has gone through drastic changes. Traditionally, it was a positive term that meant to be “happily excited” or “jolly” (Merriam Webster, “Gay”). It was used regularly to express one’s feelings about life. Today, it has a far different meaning. Now people use the word gay to label homosexuals, those with feminine qualities, or those who do something thought to be outside of the norm for their gender. “Being gay” went from expressing someone’s happiness to describing his sexual preference. The definition of gay has changed so much that its original meaning has become archaic and lost to the times.

He contradicted the argument that homosexual behaviour is related to genetic, hormonal or biological disorder. To abolish these views, the author mentions that ‘no school of medicine, medical journal or professional organization has ever recognized such claims (p. 2) - at least at the time he wrote the article in 1994.

In “The Myth of Homosexuality” by Christine Downing, there is the discussion of homosexuality and its meaning over the years. Downing begins the article by stating how a myth has classified women-on-women and men-on-men relationships to fall under the same term of homosexuality, but there is much deeper understanding to it than that. The classification under one word has caused a lot of shaping concerning how they are viewed or how they view themselves. In order to look past the surface of what defines the myth, Downing states that we must start with the culture’s myth and it’s origin.

Homosexuality is defined or characterized as attraction towards the same gender either male or female. It came from the Greek language, where “homo” means the same or similar, hence referring to the attraction between two beings of the same sex. Homosexuality is also referred as a clinical term. Most male homosexuals generally prefer to be called "gay men" and most homosexual women generally prefer to be called "lesbians." Homosexuality is one of the three main categories of sexual orientation, alongside bisexual and heterosexual. The longstanding consensus of the behavioral and social sciences and the health and mental health professions is that homosexuality is an example of normal and positive variation in human sexual

He argues that psychologists as early as Freud have determined the importance of a person’s sexual identity in defining a person’s psychological make-up and then points out that it is impossible for a reader to divorce their sexuality from a reading of any text, that a reader brings to a text the entirety of his experiences and identity and therefore, he brings his sexual identity to the reading of a text also. I use the male pronoun at this point in this paper because the author of the article examined the homosexual male reader, which is separate from either the heterosexual identity and also separate from a lesbian identity because "the homosexual male, in spite of his ‘difference’ is still a biological man, and very importantly, he is a socially constructed man, with all that this implies for phallocentrism and patriarchy" (73). Therefore, it can be seen, a reader can neither divorce their sexual identity nor their gender identity from a reading of a text; in fact, because these factors play a major role in a reader’s psychological make-up, they also play a major role in a

Is the need for acceptance of one’s sexuality as important as other issues like poverty, unemployment, global warming, natural disasters and proper health solutions for Ebola, Lyme that put our survival itself at risk? When meditating on this question, let us also analyse our own sexual fabric. We set the standards of our own yardsticks to measure a sexual identity as valid/ invalid, normal/ abnormal, natural/ unnatural, acceptable/ unacceptable, moral/ immoral and finally good/ bad.

What I found most significant about this reading was the idea and meaning of sexuality between both men and women. When I think of the term sexuality, I simply just think about sex. Who I have sex with and what I like during sex. From the reading, I felt like social reforms, scientists and physicians were implying that sexuality was meant for procreation and anything that prevents procreation is an abomination to sexuality. It was stated, “The conservative social reforms mounted a political battle against anything and everything that facilitated non-procreative sexual behavior, including prostitution, homosexuality, masturbation, abortion and birth control” (Bem,1993, p.82). How can you relate sexuality

Throughout history, definitions of sexuality within a culture are created and then changed time after time. During these changes, we have seen the impact and power one individual or group can have over others. In the Late Nineteenth Century into the Early Twentieth Century, we see multiple groups of people and or authorities taking control over the idea of sex and how they believe society is being impacted by sex. At this point in time, society had groups of people who believed they had the power to control how society as whole viewed and acted upon sex. Those particular groups and ideas changed many lives and the overall definition of sexuality within that culture.

The reading that I chose is Homosexuality because it is an argument that many like to have, yet they can never give a good reason for it. One of my aunts is a lesbian and she recently lost her partner of 15 years. It was very hard for her to lose someone that she had loved and been with for so many years. What was even harder for her is trying to get her a service in the catholic church. The catholic church has been known for being Anti-gay, so when she went to talk to them about giving her a service she felt the need to lie about their relationship. She told them that she was just a close friend of hers, and this really bothered me for some reason. She just lost someone who she loved dearly and was a big part of her life, but she still felt like she had to lie about it in order for them to give her a decent memorial. How awful is that? What gives these religions to look down upon everyday people? I am not saying that the church would have automatically ban her from the church and deny her services, but her knowing how strict these religious churches are made her feel that way.

Other studies conducted suggest that homosexuality might be base on difference in the brain structure of homosexual and heterosexual males. In 1991, Simon LeVay, a researcher at salks institute for biological studies in San Diego, found that an area of the brain called INAH-3 was larger in heterosexual men as in homosexual men [6]. INAH-3 is a small cell cluster in the hypothalamus that is involve regulating male sex behavior. LeVay’s finding provided clues that prove that sexual attraction to some extent might be biological. Other studies following levay’s study suggest that homosexuality might be base on genetic. It is believe that “gay gene” is passed from mother tho son.

Opposition to gay marriage has increased since the summer and a narrow majority of Americans also oppose allowing gays and lesbians to enter legal agreements that fall short of marriage. Moreover, despite the overall rise in tolerance toward gays since the 1980s, many Americans remain highly critical of homosexuals ­ and religious belief is a major factor in these attitudes.

even though sexuality can be considered universal, the sexual behaviors affiliated with it offer different attitudes in various communities. Sexuality is aligned to sexual attraction where individuals can identify themselves with a broad range of sexuality that is bisexual, gay or being lesbian. Sexuality can change over time in a person depending on the circumstances surrounding him or her. It may be affected by the social circle and emotional imbalances that may occur in an individual. Interestingly there exists sexual inequality among many societies in the world. As observed, many societies encourage men to have multiple sex partners but forbid it in women. Moreover, pre-marital sex is promoted in men, but women are flaunted if they participate in pre-marital sex. Across the globe, Western Europe has embraced certain norms in sexuality such as homosexuality whereas African society embraces a negative attitude towards the same.

Upon entering this course, my understanding of human sexuality was decent; I was aware of certain aspects of sexuality such as being straight, gay, lesbian, queer, transgender, etc. Nevertheless, I did not realize how expansive sexuality is; it never occurred to me that sexual health, prostitution, marriage, rape, sex trafficking, divorce, families, etc., all fell under the umbrella of human sexuality. Books and essays such as Renee Hill’s Walk Together and David Shneer’s “Out of School” showcased the multiple facets of human sexuality and how terms like queer are not directly related to homosexuality. While sexuality and homosexuality are linked, frequently, people mistake them as being synonymous; before entering this class, I was searching for a definition of sexuality, and often in the thesaurus section of dictionary websites homosexuality and or sexual orientation was considered a synonym of sexuality. Formerly, I too would have agreed they were the same, however, after taking this course, I concluded that homosexuality is just one topic in the broad discussion of sexuality. My understanding of sexuality now is that it