falcongrrl

from (and written by) symposiarch:

This is the kind of discussion we get into when we insist on a notion of "orientation" vs "choice" as if there's a hard line between the two.

People have preferences. Some preferences are so strong that people suffer if they ignore them; some preferences are so weak that they're effectively full and random choices. What is a strong, immutable preference for one person is a "whatev" preference for someone else. Those preferences come from a combination of sources: Genetics, prenatal circumstances, things that happen as we grow up, random fusing of neurons this way or that.

Whether you like to have sex with men or women, or both, or neither, or two at once, or five at once, or dressed in bunny suits or like a nurse or while hanging from the ceiling or in a vat of green jello... those are all preferences.

Some are very strong, some are pretty weak, but I think to draw up two baskets and put the "very strong" ones in one basket and the "very weak" ones in the other leads to a bunch of pointless, and ultimately destructive, conversations about which preferences go in which basket.

At the end of the argument is a simple policy: It's between you and the people you're getting freaky with, and your spouses if you're getting freaky with someone else, but other than that, "orientation" and "choice," it's a distracting dichotomy. You like what you like, and you choose whether to do it or not so long as you're not hurting anyone in the process. And shame on anyone who tries to stop you.

(post here, but I quoted the whole thing)