Coming Out Strong

I’ve put off writing about the HRC/Logo debates from last week but I think it’s time to add my two cents. I just read an editorial by Jonathan Capehart, one of the panelists for the event. He focuses on a response New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson gave when Melissa Etheridge asked him if he thought homosexuality is a choice or if it is biological. It’s a pretty good editorial, but I think we need to go a little deeper.

Let me set the scene. I was watching the debates with around 300 other lgbt and allied folk from Minneapolis/St. Paul at the HRC and OutFront Minnesota sponsored location, a local lesbian restaurant/bar. The place was packed and by the middle of the debates, everyone was getting a little punchy from the huge crowd, not being able to flag down a server, and from hearing exactly what we were expecting from the candidates. When Etheridge asked that question, I rolled my eyes (”what a softball”), but then had to gasp when Richardson completely whiffed it, “it’s a choice.” The entire crowd had the same reaction Capehart described having, “Oh, no, he didn’t!” The poor guy then proceeded to grab a shovel to try to dig himself out of the hole. Richardson had committed numero uno faux pas for anyone trying to show the lgbt community how lgbt friendly they are. Etheridge, aghast, thought he had misunderstood the question and so she repeated it, which is when the shovel came out. As far as most in the lgbt community are concerned, he might as well have said he thinks the sky is green, up is down, and the US occupation of Iraq is going just swell.

While I have no intention of standing up for Richardson’s remark, I’d like to register an unpopular opinion. Is homosexuality a choice or biological? I, personally couldn’t care less and I’m rather offended by the question. Scientifically speaking, there seem to be a number of factors that affect human sexuality for all of us, gay and non-gay but I am tired of this question and the assumptions it is based on. Just to get a little perspective, let’s hear that question again, worded in a slightly different way: Is heterosexuality a choice or is it biological?

The conclusion we (queer and non) must make from this question is that if it’s a choice, one choice is better than another and that if we could choose, we really should choose to be heterosexual and gender conforming. Another related assumption is that if it is biological, that conclusion gives us helpful information as to whether “it” is “okay.” Lots of things are biological, various diseases and conditions are biological, hair color is biological, eye color and skin tone are biological, and even left and right handedness is biological.

This is just one of the many rainbow herrings that show up whenever straight people start debating the lives and loves of lgbt people, but the even bigger problem here is that the lgbt community has completely colluded on this one. Do we really accept the premise of this question? I don’t and I think we need to have a new litmus test if we are going to bother with those. I’m not willing to concede to faulty and irrational arguments and assumptions from anti-gay people and we need to make sure we aren’t propagating our own. We must be able to critique ourselves and make sure we can live with our assumptions and conclusions. We can do better than this and we must.

So I propose a challenge and a question for you because I want to see some discussion (I feel like I’ve been shouting in an empty room for the last few posts).

• Tell us about one of your favorite rainbow herrings and then deconstruct it for us. If you’d rather, you can just present it and we’ll all deconstruct it together.
• Should there a line in the sand (or litmus test) for allies and friends? If yes, what is it? If no, why not?

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 15th, 2007 at 3:02 pm and is filed under language, discrimination, politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.