Ben Carson: Prisons prove being gay is a choice

originally posted by: NavyDoc
Want to have community property? Put it in writing.
Want to have hospital visitation rights or medial power of attorney? Put it in writing.
Want to have rights of inheritance? Put it in writing.

But can't you see that's exactly what's happened already through extending marriage to same sex couples?
In fact, what has happened has been easier to achieve than it would be otherwise.

Instead of the constant arguing over contracts individually written, there is now a basic contract with the potential for a prenup. This covers all, rather than individuals creating their own contracts which then might be argued against.

Lets be honest here, if the government abandoned recognizing marriage and instead moved to responding to millions of different contracts, everything in government relating to how people are recognized as being in a partnership would slow to a crawl.

Instead of having someone in an gov office looking at a form and basing an opinion on that legally recognized contract, you would probably have to hire another thousand legal professionals to go through each individual contract to see if it complies and the couple qualifies for whatever it is.

This makes no sense, when the system is already in place to be able to look at a screen and say "these two people are married and this is their contract, they are entitled to this".

Instead, under the system you suggest, it would be more like "are these two people married? It depends on which state, and whether this is written correctly, and whether someone can find a clause in this paragraph, and whether the moon was full, and whether the ceremony was on a Wednesday, according to Buddhist practice and conducted by..."

Why go through all that trouble, expense, confusion, when marriage is not owned by any religion anyway and can continue to be used by the state?

Again, I like your belief in the assertion of individuality, but it just doesn't make practical sense.

a reply to: tothetenthpower

How sad to see how people are becoming stupider and dumber this days, even popular people that some look at as possible leaders.

What a joke, it seems that in this days and times in modern days stupidity is very common.

originally posted by: Anaana
a reply to: tothetenthpower

Good golly! I can accept that a man can choose to have sex with another man, but that is not the same as sexual orientation. And either way, prison is not a 'normal' environment in which to study behaviour, it is a good environment to study deviancy perhaps, even sexual deviancy. I do know at least one woman who thought she was gay, went to work in a prison and met the 'right' guy there. Swears she's straight as a die now

So, I suppose I could conclude, if I was to be totally narrow minded about it, that prison turns you into a raging heterosexual.

Love the Sterling Archer avie

I've got a good study for behavior people should try out, since you brought it up sort of, it helped trigger old memory. After reading about the thread, and thinking about it, I realized that I observed such behavior earlier in my life.

You see, when I was about 7 years old or so (give or take) I had a rabbit. The rabbit was a male. After awhile, I asked my dad if I could get another rabbit to accompany the rabbit I already had. I suppose I just wanted my rabbit to have a buddy around. So he agreed, and we got another rabbit. The second rabbit, was also a male. I think my father wanted it to male if memory serves me right. That way we wouldn't have to worry about having a bunch of babies all over the place. Over time, I noticed that my rabbits ended up humping at each other. And rather frequently. It wasn't all that rare of an occurrence really. Which is a rather odd sight to see considering I was only a boy. At the time I never really saw anything like that before. It kind of puzzled me. Maybe I was naive enough to think they were playing or something. Although I think I basically knew what was going on.

The situation was basically the same as the premise of the thread. I had two rabbits, who were male, who NEVER were in contact with female rabbits. Both of them were confined to the same cage most of the time. I would let them out and scurry around my house, on my porch, and even outside from time to time. Though they resided mainly in the cage together. It's hard to say if they both on the off chance prefered the same sex, or if they did it because there wasn't any other options for them in their whole lives. I would assume it would be the second option.

So, I've got a little bit of an experiment challenge for anybody willing. Here's what I want you to do:

1. Obtain two animals of the same sex. (preferably small animals that can be put into a cage together. Something like a rabbit, rat, guinea pig, etc. Males would work out much better.)

2. DO NOT let them around any females of the same species. Leave them with only themselves.

3. Study what they do, particularly their sexual behavior. Videotaping for future review would be a good idea if you're not able to be around that much.

4. If they do not do anything sexually together after at least a couple months, or even if they do, get another animal of the same species and gender, and put it with the other two animals. Continue to observe them after the 3rd has arrived. I'd say do that for about another month or so.

5. If nothing still happens, or even if something did happen, this time, get a female animal of that species, and see what happens this time around. Take note of the relations between each of the animals to see if they only orient themselves to the female, or to each other still, or both. This would be the crucial stage of the experiment.

6. Repeat the experiment. Or even try a different animal altogether and see what happens.

I would be rather curious to see what the data would be on that. Has anyone experienced anything similar? Or at least heard of some kind of study like this that had already been conducted? If so I'd like to see the findings/story behind it.

a reply to: Honcho

I have always believed it was a choice. Its not MY choice, but I have no issues with someone who has made that choice.

It is ether a choice or a condition. If it is a condition then it based on a physical issue and could be treated like any other condition. If it is a choice then it is based on a personnel issue and not on a physical issue.

For many years the gay society railed against the efforts of people trying to figure out a medical way of "fixing" the issue saying there is nothing medically wrong that needed "fixing". Now the cry has flipped and and it "I was born this way" which implies a physical essence that could be changed.

can't have it both ways.

Personally I stand more behind someone that says 'I choose to do as I do". I may not agree with the choice, but as long as its not hurting me or mine that is up to the person.

originally posted by: Metallicus
Why do inmates often choose to participate in homosexuality in prison? Are you saying it doesn't happen?

Same reason priests molest kids, dudes are going to get sexual gratification with a giraffe if it's the only thing they have access too. Sad, #ing sad, but true. It doesn't mean that this would happen if females where there too. Ignorant #.

a reply to: dr1234

So you are saying it is a choice?

Also to OP I am still awaiting a reply to my previous question...

originally posted by: mOjOm
Ummm....ya, and does it require another person or can you do it by yourself???

Just for curiosity sake of course.....

And now, I'm curious, too... WHY would anyone do that to become gay?

How do women become gay? What do they rub?

originally posted by: Lysergic
a reply to: tothetenthpower

How do these fools get past the filters?

I ask that in all seriousness.

When you read this thread and consider that ATS is somewhat representative of the larger population, you can see that many agree with him and support him in his views... No need for a filter.

originally posted by: Rocker2013

originally posted by: NavyDoc
Want to have community property? Put it in writing.
Want to have hospital visitation rights or medial power of attorney? Put it in writing.
Want to have rights of inheritance? Put it in writing.

But can't you see that's exactly what's happened already through extending marriage to same sex couples?
In fact, what has happened has been easier to achieve than it would be otherwise.

Instead of the constant arguing over contracts individually written, there is now a basic contract with the potential for a prenup. This covers all, rather than individuals creating their own contracts which then might be argued against.

Lets be honest here, if the government abandoned recognizing marriage and instead moved to responding to millions of different contracts, everything in government relating to how people are recognized as being in a partnership would slow to a crawl.

Instead of having someone in an gov office looking at a form and basing an opinion on that legally recognized contract, you would probably have to hire another thousand legal professionals to go through each individual contract to see if it complies and the couple qualifies for whatever it is.

This makes no sense, when the system is already in place to be able to look at a screen and say "these two people are married and this is their contract, they are entitled to this".

Instead, under the system you suggest, it would be more like "are these two people married? It depends on which state, and whether this is written correctly, and whether someone can find a clause in this paragraph, and whether the moon was full, and whether the ceremony was on a Wednesday, according to Buddhist practice and conducted by..."

Why go through all that trouble, expense, confusion, when marriage is not owned by any religion anyway and can continue to be used by the state?

Again, I like your belief in the assertion of individuality, but it just doesn't make practical sense.

But the government does not have to verify the validity of every single contract. The state would only come in if there was a dispute, as it does already with divorce.

There are millions of millions of employment contracts written every year and the government only gets involved with a minority of these when issues arise and this is done in the civil court system.

a reply to: tothetenthpower

lmao!


If he keeps making statements like this he will absolute become the next president.

My philosophy these days is that a candidate has to make up as much BS, as they can, and if they our BS their competition then they become president.

Anyone disagree?

originally posted by: NavyDoc
But the government does not have to verify the validity of every single contract. The state would only come in if there was a dispute, as it does already with divorce.

The state only gets involved in divorce because they were involved in the marriage contract.

If the government isn't involved with making the contract, they're not going to be involved when there's a dispute. Example: If two same-sex people make a contract that they have hospital visitation and one gets seriously ill and is hospitalized, the other brings their contract to the hospital and the hospital says, "I'm sorry, this contract is not valid in this state", then you have to get the government involved (and I'm sure they'll get right on this), get a court date for three months in the future, by which time, your mate has died and you didn't get to stay with him or say goodbye, make any decisions or have ANY power whatsoever, not to mention that you have to spend a good deal of money to get it into the court system.

Are you suggesting that that's a viable alternative to marriage? Why not just let them get married? What's it going to hurt?

There are millions of millions of employment contracts written every year and the government only gets involved with a minority of these when issues arise and this is done in the civil court system.

We loaned a "friend" a LOT of money once, wrote up a personal contract and never saw him again. Our money is gone and there's not a damn thing we can do about it, unless we want to spend more money than we loaned to track him down.

originally posted by: NavyDoc
But the government does not have to verify the validity of every single contract. The state would only come in if there was a dispute, as it does already with divorce.

There are millions of millions of employment contracts written every year and the government only gets involved with a minority of these when issues arise and this is done in the civil court system.

That's not true though. If it were then I agree with your opinion.
The state uses the contract of marriage for all kinds of things, from employee benefits to hospital visitation to adoption.

That's what the entire debate has been about for decades. The state regularly makes judgments on what the partnership is entitled to based on that marriage contract. It's not only used in personal disputes between people.

If we say that a same-sex couple can form a contract recognizing them as married, an employer or a state can then say that this marriage is not recognized under federal laws or protections, and then just not recognize it. Having anything less than a federal recognition of marriage would lead to massive discrimination not only against LGBT people, but toward anyone someone with power doesn't like.

What would there be to stop a local employer from rejecting spousal benefits for an interracial couple? If there is no specific recognition of what marriage is, anyone could then simply claim that it doesn't meet their imagined requirements.

We know that this would happen, Republicans and Christian groups have proven that this would happen through their endless attempts to attack the rights of others to marry.

What is happening now in the US is the right way to go in my opinion, the federal government has to recognize a definition of marriage in order to administer to those partnerships, and anything other than what is happening with extending existing marriage to same-sex couples would simply not do the same thing.

originally posted by: dismanrc
For many years the gay society railed against the efforts of people trying to figure out a medical way of "fixing" the issue saying there is nothing medically wrong that needed "fixing". Now the cry has flipped and and it "I was born this way" which implies a physical essence that could be changed.

can't have it both ways.

A physical essence that could be changed?
You mean like changing the color of your skin?

You seem to think that both of your statements above cannot live together, that they are opposites.
Obviously this mentality is blatantly false, I can say categorically that nothing needs to be changed, and state categorically that I was born this way.

The argument is against both positions. No one else has the right to claim that I can be "changed" (and especially not an adult inflicting that psychologically damaging view on children with Christian quackery), and no one else has the right to claim that I was not born this way, as a form of attacking who I am or what I am "allowed" to do when my life impacts no one else.

originally posted by: Annee
Oops!

Ben seems to be backtracking.

A few of the points he made on his Facebook statement and my thoughts on them:

Source

In a recent interview on CNN, I realized that my choice of language does not reflect fully my heart on gay issues.

I don't believe him here. I'm not sure what "does not reflect fully my heart on gay issues" means, but I'll give him the benefit of the doubt. I wish he had either stood by his opinion or explained WHY he feels the way he does. Now, I just think he caved under pressure, and apologized for political interests. Does he mean that he thinks prisoners prove that homosexuality is a choice, but he's sorry he spoke his mind? He didn't say he was wrong about his precious statement... It's a political apology. Which ain't worth much, IMO.

...up until this point there have been no definitive studies that people are born into a specific sexuality.

He's right that it hasn't been proven one way or another definitively. I don't really have a problem with him thinking homosexuality is a choice. It's his opinion and he's entitled to is, just as I am entitled to mine.

I also think that marriage is a religious institution. Religious marriage is an oath before God and congregation. Religious marriage must only be governed by the church.

I actually agree with him that "religious marriage" is an oath before God and must only be governed by the church, but "religious marriage" is a subset of marriage, which is a secular institution, not a religious institution.

Some of the Facebook comments are pretty funny.

originally posted by: NavyDoc

originally posted by: Rocker2013

originally posted by: NavyDoc
Want to have community property? Put it in writing.
Want to have hospital visitation rights or medial power of attorney? Put it in writing.
Want to have rights of inheritance? Put it in writing.

But can't you see that's exactly what's happened already through extending marriage to same sex couples?
In fact, what has happened has been easier to achieve than it would be otherwise.

Instead of the constant arguing over contracts individually written, there is now a basic contract with the potential for a prenup. This covers all, rather than individuals creating their own contracts which then might be argued against.

Lets be honest here, if the government abandoned recognizing marriage and instead moved to responding to millions of different contracts, everything in government relating to how people are recognized as being in a partnership would slow to a crawl.

Instead of having someone in an gov office looking at a form and basing an opinion on that legally recognized contract, you would probably have to hire another thousand legal professionals to go through each individual contract to see if it complies and the couple qualifies for whatever it is.

This makes no sense, when the system is already in place to be able to look at a screen and say "these two people are married and this is their contract, they are entitled to this".

Instead, under the system you suggest, it would be more like "are these two people married? It depends on which state, and whether this is written correctly, and whether someone can find a clause in this paragraph, and whether the moon was full, and whether the ceremony was on a Wednesday, according to Buddhist practice and conducted by..."

Why go through all that trouble, expense, confusion, when marriage is not owned by any religion anyway and can continue to be used by the state?

Again, I like your belief in the assertion of individuality, but it just doesn't make practical sense.

But the government does not have to verify the validity of every single contract. The state would only come in if there was a dispute, as it does already with divorce.

There are millions of millions of employment contracts written every year and the government only gets involved with a minority of these when issues arise and this is done in the civil court system.

You seem to base your thinking on being an honorable person.

I get that that is something you highly value, as do I.

If everyone was like us, all we'd need is a "gentleman's" agreement.

That's idealistic and unrealistic in today's world.

a reply to: tothetenthpower

ok, now show me the science were it says that being homosexual is not a choice...also, show me the science that shows how choosing to be homosexual is impossible... cause i'm pretty sure it is... you people think that just cause it could be a choice means it shouldn't be respected? you all talk about "science" but all i see are a bunch of people laughing...really, this community is retarded. Being gay could possibly be a choice, and that should be OK too.... idiots.

originally posted by: NavyDoc
But that would make it a choice then? If your only option (not only, masturbation has been invented for a long time, LOL) is to choose to engage in homosexual behavior, wouldn't that indicate that, at least in some cases, homosexual behavior is a choice?

You're making a very common error, here.

A homosexual action/behaviour is not the same as being homosexual. Homosexuality is an attraction to people of the same sex, whereas a homosexual act would be intercourse (or similar) with someone of the same sex. You don't have to be gay to have sex with another person of your sex.
As has been stated, in prison a lot of the "homosexuality" is actually just a symptom of some other issue going on there, whether that's rape, power plays, trying to stay safe etc. In male prisons, the absence of females inevitably leads to a situations where people are assigned (usually forcefully) a female role and made to go along with it. It doesn't mean they're gay, or even bisexual. It means that they're adaptable, and can see the road to lasting however many years they're going to be in there means they're going to have to go along with it. Better to be thought of gay, than strangled or shivved in the showers, right?

Think of it this way: if I'm hungry and have no meat in the house, I might have a salad. That's a vegetarian action, but it by no means indicates that I'm a vegetarian.
Correlation does not imply causation.

If choosing your sexuality is just a choice then why don't all these Gays going through the so called "corrective therapy" just choose to be straight???

Not only that but they all seem to still fight against it and usually fall right back to being gay after a while anyway so what happened??? Did they just forget about choosing to be straight one day out of habit??? Why is it so hard and require therapy when you can apparently just choose not to be gay any time ya want???

a reply to: nomdeterreur

Did you choose to be straight? Or did you, as you grew up, realise that the opposite sex is an amazingly beautiful and terrifying thing?
If you had the choice, would you willingly choose to possibly disappoint your parents, have your family and friends turn their back on you, be treated like a second class citizen, have people jeer at you in the street when you and your partner of the same sex hold hands on the way to the shops?

Of course you wouldn't. Homosexuals have about as much say in their sexuality as they do about how their genes express themselves. Telling them they're lifestyle is a choice is incredibly offensive to the thousands of young teenagers who take their own lives because they're made to feel that they're the problem, when in fact they're beautiful and perfect and have done nothing wrong!

originally posted by: nomdeterreur
ok, now show me the science were it says that being homosexual is not a choice...also, show me the science that shows how choosing to be homosexual is impossible...

The OP didn't make either of those claims... why should he show scientific proof of a claim he hasn't made?