Welcome and thanks for sharing, I am very edified by your openness. I hope that you will stick around.

The first social norm that you should be aware of is the frenzy of coherence, perhaps you can already detect this theme? It is objectively rational that everything should fit snuggly into a category, and we do not question the motivation or urgency behind categorisation – because there is none.

The second is that it is normative to talk about sexual identity as something that cannot explain sexual behaviour and conversely, evidence of sexual behaviour cannot be used as an indicator of sexual identity. That appears to be the logic applied to your history.

Pursuant to points one and two: If some aspect of your capacity for sexual attraction was mutable, that would only create dangerous incoherence. Any mutability suggests that Religiously Mediated Change might secretly be gaining credibility (even when it isn’t).

It could be then that bisexuality becomes a catch-all category for anyone who cannot produce normative homosexuality to a satisfactory standard.

The third, is that while EA has “virtually” the entire life sciences behind him, we virtually have to take his word for it. EA is loathe to reference an idea, but I do accept that it may be that those journals are in German.

They are a good bunch. My personal interests are about understanding people who are different to me, Queer theory, and how our use of identity regulates pleasure and knowledge and conformity.

In regards to the mutability of sexuality, take a look at this commentary.

I’m on your side more than on 80% of the relevant topics.

Didn’t one of your religious leaders say something about that?

Well… not exactly. That was Ronald Reagan.

I don’t see anything inherently prejudicial against bisexuals in my statement – one either is capable of sexual attraction to both men and women or one is not. If not, then one is not bisexual. If so, then one’s sexuality is not changed by throwing away one partner and taking another of the other sex. One has been true to oneself.

Dan, the rules of this blog don’t permit us to discuss a limited number of topics here. This is one of them. We can’t have an open discussion about this because it invariably causes intervention by the blog moderators and hard feelings all around. You’ll have to either accept or reject that I also stand 100% behind the right of bisexuals to enjoy full human status and full civil rights, just as I do for the gays, lesbians, transgender and intersexed.

That said I disagree strongly with your assertion that sexuality is immutable, unless you mean something different than (what I think) the common understanding is. However the subtleties involved in sexuality how it interacts with attraction do not lend themselves to useful discussion with bigots whose argument is ‘you can just stop being gay if you really wanted to, so by being gay you are deliberately insulting me and god’. Thus I understand why it is desireable to argue that for the purpose of legal arguments relating to discrimination.

Also, and correct me if I’m misinterpreting you, you seem hostile to bisexuals. Would you mind explaining why, given that bisexuals are intrinsically self-motivated to support marriage and legal equity?

Oh, and speaking of which – being a liberal doesn’t mean I don’t understand economics. You conservatives have done an awful job on the economy – or do you think we’ve forgotten?

some of us aren’t Democrats/liberals because we are economic conservatives e.g. we believe in capitalism, free enterprise and individual liberty. That fiscal conservatism has been unfortunately wedded to social conservatism does not make me any less in favor of full human rights for everybody. I’m just not willing to join a political party I disagree with on just about every other issue just for that one thing. I’m not a single-issue voter.