Reply #107: Sorry, your reasoning is wrong. [View All]

[Lyric]

When people suffer in order to gain a "payoff", the payoff must be better than what they'd have gotten if they HADN'T suffered for it. To use your example of the suffering Christians--obviously, they believed that Heaven was better than Hell, so their choice was pretty easy.

However, being gay is not better, or more pleasurable, than being straight. In terms of sexual and romantic satisfaction, both experiences are pretty equal. If anything, being straight could be seen as a more positive experience because it's easier--it provides effortless comfort and stability in terms of social acceptance and identity, and precludes an enormous amount of stress, pain, frustration, fear, and grief.

But there is certainly nothing inherently superior about the experience of being gay. There is no pleasure or reward for being gay that is not also and equally available to people who are straight. So again--why choose to suffer when there is NO payoff? Christians had their belief in Heaven and their relief at avoiding hell to spur them into their choice. Gay people have nothing of the sort.

As for a gene that makes people willing to endure unnecessary pain, abuse, and trauma for no provable positive end...in other words, a gene that makes people completely irrational...well sure, I suppose it must exist. Goodness knows there are lots and lots of irrational people in the world who continually subject themselves (and others) to misery for no apparent reason. However, there's a much simpler term for that sort of thing. We call it "insanity".

:hi: