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In this episode, we discuss gayness.
Participants: Yassine, TracingWoodgrains, Sultan, Shakesneer.
Links:
Ezra Klein Interviews Dan Savage (New York Times)
Stonewall: A Butch Too Far (An Historian Goes to the Movies)
Mattachine Society (Wikipedia)
3 Differences Between the Terms 'Gay' and 'Queer' (Everyday Feminism)
Exploring HIV Transmission Rates (Healthline)
Boys Beware (PBS)
Recorded 2023-02-02 | Uploaded 2023-02-28
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Notes -
A fascinating episode, and worth listening to. It taught me much. Thank you all for your honesty; I understand my dead uncle, a bisexual creative more at home in bustling New York than in quaint Albuquerque, a lot better now. (He died of AIDS in the 80’s.)
Regarding the ideas surrounding “conversion therapy” and “born this way” in general, not specifically gayness or sexuality:
I’ve successfully used the Fourth Step (of the famous Twelve Step recovery method) to process and resolve a great number of my hurts, habits, and hang-ups. It is the only successful method I’ve found for editing my own subconscious, and it has allowed me to eliminate many of my self-destructive and otherwise unwanted behaviors in my pursuit of being a better me.
Having seen how malleable my own psyche is, and how changeable my understanding of myself is from epiphany to epiphany, I find myself frustrated at people who don’t even try to resolve their own shit before it hurts other people. I believe “born this way” in general is a lie our emotions tell us to cope with not having a theory of mind which can describe where emotions come from or how they function.
Emotions are the least consistent part of man, and the most removed from reality of all man’s components. All emotions (pathological or not, positive or not) insist they are eternal and uncreated, true and perfectly valid, up until the very moment they’re resolved and burst like a bubble, with little left to show they were ever there.
Isn't that merely indicative of their strength? 'We have always been at war with Eastasia' is not a statement weak governments produce. The fleeting yet totalitising nature of our emotions shows both their immediately unyielding face, and also the purpose that such a front, quite unknown to their host in the moment, is designed for.
The closest parallel I can think of is the confidence trickstering of credit instruments, best illustrated by old fashioned gold-backed systems: "Of course we have enough gold for you, sir." Being able to put a the maximum possible energy into effect by agitating a pre-existing body with the minimum of initial impetus—that's what emotions are, and they do their job very well, however unpleasant being their vessel is.
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