Quote:
Originally Posted by smc
"Gay" expresses sexual orientation, as is "heterosexual" or "bisexual" and other such terms. Ones sexual orientation has nothing whatsoever to do with "romantic involvement." For example, if former U.S. Senator Larry Craig is romantically involved with his wife, but also has sex with men with whom he has no romantic involvement, it does not make calling him gay or bisexual incorrect.
You are entitled, as is everyone, to define your own sexual orientation. You are not entitled to change established, accepted definition of words and terms to suit your personal interests.
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Hah! So this is where all the interesting people went.
Anyway, your point is well made but there is a problem. Since Kinsey has appeared already, he's a good illustration. His research into human sexuality was based upon a strictly binary interpretation of gender--masculine or feminine. Clearly, Kinsey's work is the best (only) large-scale study we have, but the fact is that the rise in the apparent numbers of transgendered people, and the concomitant rise in numbers of people attracted to them, questions the binary interpretation of gender.
In fact there is as much of a range of gender expression as there is of attraction (cf Roughgarden, Evolution's Rainbow). This does not negate Kinsey but it does pose problems with interpretation thereof. The term 'homosexual' only came to mean 'manly men attracted to other manly men' in the 1970s, but we know, for example from the London 'molly-houses' of the 18th C as well as many many other examples that same-sex attraction where the individuals do not play the same gender role, is in fact much older and could be stated to be the norm. Furthermore these examples--and there are many--clearly reflect a range of gender expression that had been going on for a long time, but has been suppressed and conflated with sexual attraction, something I question.
This is absolutely not to suggest that transwomen are not women--they are. However in some ways their position is actually more clear than that of men who are attracted to them, largely because, at least until very recently, there was no term describing them other than pejoratives. Now I would describe myself as heterosexual but transattracted; I see transwomen as women but I recognise that I do have a specific attraction to them because of their transgender status. I venture to suggest this might apply to other men in my position. Clearly there are also men who are homosexual but transattracted, and bisexual but transattracted.
IMO transattraction is a valid expression of sexual desire; words like 'chaser' and 'admirer' are clearly derogatory to such men, and we need to rid ourselves of them, just as we need to rid ourselves of terms like 'tranny' or 'shemale'.
What this also means is that words like 'gay' 'straight' and 'bisexual' really do need to be revisited in the light of this phenomenon. We might discover that transattraction is indeed another, discrete, sexual preference (which is my hunch). But there is simply no research on this. Furthermore, Kinsey shows us that there is no black and white; his seven categories (someone said 6 but they forgot 0 I think) are still valid. However we should, biological variation applied, find that the same is true for transattraction; that there is a scale from 0-6 (say) going from fully cis-attracted to fully transattracted. Furthermore this must necessarily relate to the conventional understanding of sexual attraction, for how else would we explain a ciswoman who is attracted to transwomen, or a cisman who is attracted to transmen? (And these examples do really exist.)
So while I agree with your general proposition, that we cannot just make up or manipulate terms to suit ourselves, we do have a problem if the understood meanings of these terms do not adequately describe reality.