Late Blooming Lesbians

[Treffie]

More and more women are discovering after years of marriage to men, and having had children, that they are lesbians. Were they always – or is sexuality more fluid?

For Carren Strock, the revelation came when she was 44. She had met her husband – "a terrific guy, very sweet" – at high school when she was 16, had been married to him for 25 years, had two dearly loved children, and what she describes as a "white-picket-fence existence" in New York. Then, one day, sitting opposite her best friend, she realised: "Oh my God. I'm in love with this woman." The notion that she might be a lesbian had never occurred to her before. "If you'd asked me the previous year," she says, "I would have replied: 'I know exactly who and what I am – I am not a lesbian, nor could I ever be one.'"

From that moment Strock's understanding of her sexuality changed completely. She felt compelled to tell her friend, but her attraction wasn't reciprocated; at first she wasn't sure whether she had feelings for women in general, or just this one in particular. But she gradually came to realise, and accept, that she was a lesbian. She also started to realise that her experience wasn't unusual.

Strock decided to interview other married women who had fallen in love with women, "putting up fliers in theatres and bookstores. Women started contacting me from across the country – everyone knew someone who knew someone in this situation." The interviews became a book, Married Women Who Love Women, and when it came to writing the second edition, Strock turned to the internet for interviewees. "Within days," she says, "more women had contacted me than I could ever actually speak to."

Late-blooming lesbians – women who discover or declare same-sex feelings in their 30s and beyond – have attracted increasing attention over the last few years, partly due to the clutch of glamorous, high-profile women who have come out after heterosexual relationships. Cynthia Nixon, for instance, who plays Miranda in Sex and the City, was in a heterosexual relationship for 15 years, and had two children, before falling for her current partner, Christine Marinoni, in 2004. Last year, it was reported that the British singer Alison Goldfrapp, who is in her mid-40s, had started a relationship with film editor Lisa Gunning. The actor Portia de Rossi was married to a man before coming out and falling in love with the comedian and talkshow host, Ellen DeGeneres, whom she married in 2008. And then there's the British retail adviser and television star, Mary Portas, who was married to a man for 13 years, and had two children, before getting together with Melanie Rickey, the fashion-editor-at-large of Grazia magazine. At their civil partnership earlier this year the pair beamed for the cameras in beautiful, custom-made Antonio Berardi dresses.

The subject has now begun attracting academic attention. Next month at the American Psychological Association's annual convention in San Diego, a session entitled Sexual Fluidity and Late-Blooming Lesbians is due to showcase a range of research, including a study by Christan Moran, who decided to look at the lives of women who had experienced a same-sex attraction when they were over 30 and married to a man. Moran is a researcher at Southern Connecticut University, and her study was prompted in part by an anguished comment she found on an online message board for married lesbians, written by someone who styled herself "Crazy".

Cont'd (http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/jul/22/late-blooming-lesbians-women-sexuality)

[Psychonaut]

http://nicedeb.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/face-palm-300x300.jpg

[Moonbird]

Well I know two lesbian couples, one in Finland and one in Germany, all four women had been married to men before they declared themselves lesbians at 30+. So this change in sexual orientation doesn't just happen to famous actresses. From what I've understood from the ones I know they thought of themselves as heteros when they were young, whether this was wishful thinking on their part or reality I can't say.

When you look at history it seems like sexuality can be fluid, e.g. the men in Greece had homosexual relationships with other men when they were young, but when they got older they married a woman.

[Fortis in Arduis]

http://www.myartprints.co.uk/kunst/schule_von_fontainebleau/gabrielle_d_estrees.jpg

:)

The problem persists perhaps in the denial of bisexuality. These women were denying that side of themselves until suddenly it came to the fore and their interest in men was exhausted, and they no longer needed to have the family that they wanted before.

[The Ripper]

I have a hunch this phenomenon is related to that of older women suddenly discovering the amazingness of young African studs. :rolleyes:

[Fortis in Arduis]

I have hunch this phenomenon is related to that of older women suddenly discovering the amazingness of young African studs. :rolleyes:

Could it be related to the wider issue of cougarisation? ;)

[Tabiti]

More and more women are discovering after years of marriage to men, and having had children, that they are lesbians.
Not a surprise with all that modern family life and some husbands' behavior.

[Treffie]

Not a surprise with all that modern family life and some husbands' behavior.

I'm wondering if the phenomenon has something to do with the menopause?

[Eldritch]

I'm wondering if the phenomenon has something to do with the menopause?

Perhaps. I find the idea that these women could have managed to make it to early middle age while repressing their real sexual orientation so completely that not even they themselves were aware of it extremely improbable. So some kind of change has to have happened somewhere along the line.

How would you deal with this situation btw?


My 34-year-old sister—call her "Carrie"—came out to the family a week ago and is looking for us all to support the decisions she's making surrounding her coming out.

Background: My sister has been somewhat happily married for 14 years and has four children all under the age of 12. She wants to move her kids 3,000 miles away to be with the woman she has fallen in love with—call her "Louise." Louise is also married with kids. Both are stay-at-home moms. Carrie and Louise have met in person three times over three months. The first time was through a mothers' support group. The second time they met they got drunk and hooked up. About a month after this, they spent a long weekend together with their kids. They are now in love, speak on the phone several times a day, and have both told their husbands and families.

Louise has told Carrie that she won't move, as she wants her kids to be able to see their father on a regular basis and doesn't think she could win custody. She has asked my sister to move with her kids to be with her and her kids. My sister's husband wants to be able to see his children and plans to ask that she be required to stay in the state as part of their custody agreement. My sister is willing to fight this tooth and nail so that she can be with Louise. My sister has no money of her own.

My question is this: How do I support my sister but still make sure that she doesn't back herself into a legal and financial quagmire over a person she has met only three times?

Concerned Sister

[Tony]

I'm wondering if the phenomenon has something to do with the menopause?
Why do you ask her that?she's still so young...:dielaughing:

by the way it doesn't bother me particularly if a woman get lately aware of being attracted to her same sex , despite the drama title (more and more!as if there were an army of lesbians about to pop up from every house of ours ...) , regardless one's personal taste the worst thing is when a family breaks up.

[Eldritch]

Why do you ask her that?she's still so young...:dielaughing:

Actually, menopause can occur in women who are much younger than 44.

[Loddfafner]

There has been some research suggesting that sexual orientation is much more fluid for women than for men.

[Allenson]

What about us lesbians trapped in men's bodies, mmmm?

[RoyBatty]

I have a hunch this phenomenon is related to that of older women suddenly discovering the amazingness of young African studs. :rolleyes:

aka "Canadian Secretary Syndrome" :D :thumb001:

[Tony]

Actually, menopause can occur in women who are much younger than 44.
Rarely it can happens but she's still in her early 20s...:rolleyes:


There has been some research suggesting that sexual orientation is much more fluid for women than for men.
Right but last time I said somethin similar here Bridie answered me that a lot of girls pretend to be bi or lesbians because they know it's a turn on for many males...
ok it may be right , nonetheless fact remains that nowhere a guy would do that to another guy , no matter how exciting it might be for a woman.

[Eldritch]

Rarely it can happens but she's still in her early 20s...:rolleyes:


Öööh, are we talking about the same person here? The original articlee Kenny Boy posted said Strock "realised" she's a lesbian at the age of 44. :confused:

[RoyBatty]

ok it may be right , nonetheless fact remains that nowhere a guy would do that to another guy , no matter how exciting it might be for a woman.

The interesting point to note here is that it is NOT at all exciting for typical hetero women when guys start fooling around. In fact, they abhorr it.

Of course guys are quite different in this respect and the "two girls" fantasy is probably one of the most common ones.

[Tony]

Öööh, are we talking about the same person here? The original articlee Kenny Boy posted said Strock "realised" she's a lesbian at the age of 44. :confused:
but weren't we talkin about Tabiti?:D
Ken asked her the thing about menopausa and I asked him why he asked her that since she's so young that she's supposed to know very little if anything at all about it.


The interesting point to note here is that it is NOT at all exciting for typical hetero women when guys start fooling around. In fact, they abhorr it.

Yes you're right , almost every woman is pissed of by the sight two guys doing that and I say thanks God it is so. :D
I think there must be a sort of innate predisposition to do that and women , on the whole , seem to be more into that...

[Loki]

This article just had to be from the Guardian, though.

[Austin]

Disillusionment with the reality of married life to what they had envisioned from movies/TV/fantasies.

In modern society with all the mixed messages of supposed wisdom and liberation the naive/immature individuals that would have previously lasted will dissipate and divorce with only those who actually had a realistic perspective on what marriage entailed actually lasting.

[Moonbird]

Quote:
My 34-year-old sister—call her "Carrie"—came out to the family a week ago and is looking for us all to support the decisions she's making surrounding her coming out.

Background: My sister has been somewhat happily married for 14 years and has four children all under the age of 12. She wants to move her kids 3,000 miles away to be with the woman she has fallen in love with—call her "Louise." Louise is also married with kids. Both are stay-at-home moms. Carrie and Louise have met in person three times over three months. The first time was through a mothers' support group. The second time they met they got drunk and hooked up. About a month after this, they spent a long weekend together with their kids. They are now in love, speak on the phone several times a day, and have both told their husbands and families.

Louise has told Carrie that she won't move, as she wants her kids to be able to see their father on a regular basis and doesn't think she could win custody. She has asked my sister to move with her kids to be with her and her kids. My sister's husband wants to be able to see his children and plans to ask that she be required to stay in the state as part of their custody agreement. My sister is willing to fight this tooth and nail so that she can be with Louise. My sister has no money of her own.

My question is this: How do I support my sister but still make sure that she doesn't back herself into a legal and financial quagmire over a person she has met only three times?

Concerned Sister

Well to leave your husband for a person you only met three times seems a bit rush (putting it mildly) whether the other person then is from the other or the same gender. Especially since she furthermore is the mother of four children. I would say she should cool down at least for some months and think the whole thing over before she does something irreversibly.



I'm wondering if the phenomenon has something to do with the menopause?

Yeah, it's plausible it's something like the life crisis that happens to men in their forties when they start chasing 20 year old girls.:p

[Loki]

Well ... let's face it: a vagina is a wonderful thing. Even women know it.

[Moonbird]

Well ... let's face it: a vagina is a wonderful thing. Even women know it.

Lol I'm too young to have made that discovery. Anyway, I don't think I ever will either, I feel 100% hetero at the moment.;)

[Psychonaut]

I'm too young to have made that discovery.

http://knowyourmeme.com/i/3866/original/nfNeT7YvTozx0cv7ze3mplZpo1_500.gif

[Eldritch]

Well to leave your husband for a person you only met three times seems a bit rush (putting it mildly) whether the other person then is from the other or the same gender. Especially since she furthermore is the mother of four children. I would say she should cool down at least for some months and think the whole thing over before she does something irreversibly.


Yep. :rolleyes2:

Here's the original columnist's answer btw. (http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/SavageLove?oid=57011)

[Moonbird]

Yep. :rolleyes2:

Here's the original columnist's answer btw. (http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/SavageLove?oid=57011)

Maybe I should start givning answers in a column of my own.;) But this was indeed a pretty easy one to answer.

[Curtis24]

I'm not sure how flexible sexuality really is, barring extreme situations of isolation. To me, it seems inconceivable that I would wake up one day feeling homosexual, or gradually find myself developing homosexual feelings.

When people do change sexuality, my inclination is to believe that they were always just closeted from the beginning, and didn't actually change. But I do believe its possible that some people could be so repressed that they actually were gay and didn't know it(this seems more likely with women, being a man it seems inconceivable that a man would be that out of touch with what ever gave him erections).

And as Austin points out, I"m sure many of these cases are women becoming disillusioned with men/marriage.

[Aemma]

aka "Canadian Secretary Syndrome" :D :thumb001:

LOL! Crikey I had to look this up!


Sex tourism in full boom
In winter, a tourist woman’s fancy lustily turns to thoughts of sex.
By Ottawa Citizen January 8, 2007


MONTREAL -- In winter, a tourist woman’s fancy lustily turns to thoughts of sex.

By the thousands they descend on the Caribbean every year, women driven by one urge: to spend a week or two sleeping with local "beach boys" and paying them back in drinks, meals, gifts, and cash.

And it is Quebec women— with reputations as financially generous and uninhibited — who are among the best established in the island flesh trade.

Sex tourists, they’re called. Or as some prefer it, "romance travellers" looking for "love" and a little tenderness in the tropics.

This is the season — building to a travel peak in February and March — when business in Jamaica, Barbados and the Dominican Republic heats up.

Unlike most years, though, this winter’s parade comes with a heap of advance media publicity. In 2006, there was lots:

On the screen and DVD, two movies dealt with the subject: Vers le sud, a French film based on stories by Quebec author Dany Laferriere, starring Charlotte Rampling as a British sex-seeker in late-1970s Haiti; and Rent-a-Rasta, a 45-minute U.S. documentary about women who flock to Jamaica in search of the "big bamboo" and the young Rastafarians who cater to them.

On the stage, there was Sugar Mummies, a much-reviewed play in London’s Royal Court Theatre last August that starred Montreal-born Lynda Bellingham as a mid-life hedonist in Negril, the Jamaican sun resort.

On radio in December, female sex tourism was the topic of a long segment on the national CBC morning show, The Current.

And in print, there’s a provocative new autobiographical book called Romance on the Road, by Jeannette Belliveau, a Baltimore travel writer of Acadian origin who was a sex tourist herself.

All the coverage begged an essential question: Is sex tourism by women any better or worse than sex tourism by men?

Does it just represent a new twist on exploitation of the Third World poor — in other words, prostitution with the roles reversed, the woman paying the man? Or is it simply a case of women exercising their right to choose what to do with their bodies?[Interesting questions!]

There is no single correct answer, just points of view coloured by politics and morality. Scholars agree on one thing, though: female sex tourism is common enough and big enough to merit serious academic attention.

By some estimates, 600,000 Western women have engaged in travel sex sometime over the last 25 years — many of them as repeat customers, returning to the tropics every winter for some sun and some action.

"Seeing it in operation, it’s quite a phenomenon — there’s a whole system," said Kamala Kempadoo, a global sex-trade expert who teaches at York University in Toronto. Of Guyanese descent, she did field work on female sex tourism in Negril in 2000 and 2001.

"It’s not just women on the beach, it’s the nightlife. You go to a party and see couple after couple of older, quite substantial — I mean overweight — white women with very young, very lithe black men," Kempadoo said. [ROFL!!]

"It’s quite a curious thing."

The root of it isn’t just carnal. The women want a companion, too, someone to show them around, romance them, make them feel special and needed — something they don’t feel at home.

But the names the men and women are known by colloquially belie the true nature of the transaction, some research suggests: It’s sex for hire, where black men’s flesh is tied — at least temporarily — to white women’s pursestrings.

The men go by many monikers. In Jamaica and other former British colonies, they’re called rent-a-gents, rent-a-Rastas, rent-a-tutes, the Foreign Service. In the Dominican Republic, they’re sanky pankys (a play on ‘hanky panky’).

The tourist women get nicknames, too. British ones go by "Shirley Valentine" (from the 1989 hit movie of the same name, about a Liverpool housewife finding liberation in Greece). In Bermuda, they’re "longtails" or "yellowtails."

In Jamaica, the name depends on the woman’s colour: "Milk bottles" if they’re white, newly arrived and, to put it crudely, "in need of filling" (as one Negril man put it to British writer Julie Bindel in 2003).

If they’re black, the women are called Stellas (from the popular 1998 film How Stella Got Her Groove Back, about a black San Francisco stock broker on holiday in Jamaica).

Canadians have made it into the slang lexicon, too. In Barbados, female sex tourism has been dubbed "Canadian secretary syndrome."[:eek:]


In Martinique, locals refer to incoming flights of Air Canada as "Air Coucoune" — French for "Air Pussy."

Little wonder. Canadian women in search of sex have been coming to the Caribbean for years.[:eek:]

"You guys were the pioneers," said Belliveau, who sells her 410-page book through her publishing website.

"Pretty much the first group (of female sex tourists) in the Caribbean after the takeoff of jet travel (in the 60s) was French-Quebecois women in Barbados,"[OMGS, what would Frigga do?] Belliveau said. "They had a tremendously high reputation among the local beach boys. They were fun loving and generous and a real great time."

It’s still true, added Belliveau, 52, an ex-journalist and divorcee who spent much of her 20s and 30s travelling the world and — as she freely admits — having sex wherever she went. (She’s now remarried — to an African-American man.)

"Canadian women are mostly in Barbados now, which is somewhat upmarket; Jamaica is poorer," Belliveau said. "And the Dominican is slowly getting the reputation of having men that are very eager to be the world’s best lovers. In the French islands, the men are more suave and gallant and won’t accept payment."

More here. (http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/story.html?id=2bdb148d-66df-4f8a-918f-ffe59d617b90&k=17066)

EDIT: There's something to be said for leading a quiet and sheltered life! :D

[Aemma]

I'm not sure how flexible sexuality really is, barring extreme situations of isolation. To me, it seems inconceivable that I would wake up one day feeling homosexual, or gradually find myself developing homosexual feelings.

When people do change sexuality, my inclination is to believe that they were always just closeted from the beginning, and didn't actually change. But I do believe its possible that some people could be so repressed that they actually were gay and didn't know it(this seems more likely with women, being a man it seems inconceivable that a man would be that out of touch with what ever gave him erections).

And as Austin points out, I"m sure many of these cases are women becoming disillusioned with men/marriage.

Hmm really? I think general pop culture has shown that it's the other way around, really.

[Aemma]

Quote:
My 34-year-old sister—call her "Carrie"—came out to the family a week ago and is looking for us all to support the decisions she's making surrounding her coming out.

Background: My sister has been somewhat happily married for 14 years and has four children all under the age of 12. She wants to move her kids 3,000 miles away to be with the woman she has fallen in love with—call her "Louise." Louise is also married with kids. Both are stay-at-home moms. Carrie and Louise have met in person three times over three months. The first time was through a mothers' support group. The second time they met they got drunk and hooked up. About a month after this, they spent a long weekend together with their kids. They are now in love, speak on the phone several times a day, and have both told their husbands and families.

Louise has told Carrie that she won't move, as she wants her kids to be able to see their father on a regular basis and doesn't think she could win custody. She has asked my sister to move with her kids to be with her and her kids. My sister's husband wants to be able to see his children and plans to ask that she be required to stay in the state as part of their custody agreement. My sister is willing to fight this tooth and nail so that she can be with Louise. My sister has no money of her own.

My question is this: How do I support my sister but still make sure that she doesn't back herself into a legal and financial quagmire over a person she has met only three times?

Concerned Sister

Well to leave your husband for a person you only met three times seems a bit rush (putting it mildly) whether the other person then is from the other or the same gender. Especially since she furthermore is the mother of four children. I would say she should cool down at least for some months and think the whole thing over before she does something irreversibly.




Yeah, it's plausible it's something like the life crisis that happens to men in their forties when they start chasing 20 year old girls.:p

Totally agree!

[Svanhild]

I'm wondering if the phenomenon has something to do with the menopause?
I've discovered my liking for both genders when reaching puberty. In puberty gender-specific processes and sexual urgings begin to work and rise. During menopause they decrease a bit. Hence I can't imagine it has to do with the menopause on the basis to the fact that the menopause is often described as a low in sexual lust.

[Aemma]

I've discovered my liking for both genders when reaching puberty. In puberty gender-specific processes and sexual urgings begin to work and rise. During menopause they decrease a bit. Hence I can't imagine it has to do with the menopause on the basis to the fact that the menopause is often described as a low in sexual lust.

Not to put words into Treffie's mouth of course, but I took his comment to mean that perhaps menopause as the herald of a change in a woman's hormonal functioning might have some play here. It would make sense, much as what your comment about your own experience does: both puberty and menopause are times of hormonal fluctuations and might/may have an impact? I don't know.

[Treffie]

Is anyone else seeing a `SingleMuslim.com` advertisement banner here? :p

[Aemma]

Is anyone else seeing a `SingleMuslim.com` advertisement banner here? :p

LOL Nope not me! I see a Match.com Dating for Canada and some Puberty for Boys thing! LOL Go figure!

[Groenewolf]

Is anyone else seeing a `SingleMuslim.com` advertisement banner here? :p

Something to help with the symptoms of menopause:rolleyes2:.

[Curtis24]

Hmm really? I think general pop culture has shown that it's the other way around, really.

I only have my personal experience being a man to go on, plus there doesn't seem to be a late-blooming homosexual male syndrome. , what examples are you thinking of?

[Loki]

By the thousands they descend on the Caribbean every year, women driven by one urge: to spend a week or two sleeping with local "beach boys" and paying them back in drinks, meals, gifts, and cash.

And it is Quebec women— with reputations as financially generous and uninhibited — who are among the best established in the island flesh trade.

Sex tourists, they’re called. Or as some prefer it, "romance travellers" looking for "love" and a little tenderness in the tropics.


Here is my verdict: they go there for that, since they simply lack social skills and confidence to pull a good white man locally. Or perhaps too fat and ugly for that. So the result is the easy way out for them to satisfy their unattended sexual cravings.

By far the most decent English women here would rather meet a handsome white guy, but just don't know how to go about it.

[antonio]

Here is my verdict: they go there for that, since they simply lack social skills and confidence to pull a good white man locally. Or perhaps too fat and ugly for that. So the result is the easy way out for them to satisfy their unattended sexual cravings.

By far the most decent English women here would rather meet a handsome white guy, but just don't know how to go about it.


I think Loki exposed perfectly the hard true liying under it. :thumb001:

Ps. Heterosexual man have not such a "luck": other men skin and fluids give us plain repulsion:D...in fact I cannot even keep on watching homosexual male intercourse (Almodovar films, homo friends trying to normalize it by kissing themselves in public) without getting really sick.

[Curtis24]

Also, has anyone heard of the "LUG"(lesbian until graduation) syndrome? In America, many girls say they are lesbians in college, but then as they get older become heterosexual. The popular theories are that the girls identify with lesbianism because they don't want to deal with the pressure and expectations of dating, or are just social late-bloomers or shy.




[edit] Disparaging usage
In recent usage, the term is generally used pejoratively, suggesting that a woman's same-sex sexual activity is somehow inauthentic or illegitimate.[2] One negative suggestion is that the relations are consciously elective or temporary, or that they are primarily based on convenience. This usage suggests the participants are:

Concentrating on studies without the distraction of "genuine" romantic relationships
Avoiding unwanted male attention
Avoiding the risk of unwanted pregnancy while remaining sexually active
Another negative suggestion is that the behavior stems from a desire for attention, sometimes described with a new usage of the older term "bisexual chic". This usage suggests the participants are:

Trying to increase their sexual desirability among heterosexual men
Surprising parents or relatives with news presumed to be undesirable
Surprising friends and acquaintances with news presumed to be shocking
Attempting to cultivate a progressive, radical, or countercultural image
Developing or feigning solidarity with an oppressed community
Resorting to women due to a lack of male attention
Having trouble relating to the opposite sex romantically in a healthy manner

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lesbian_until_graduation

[Curtis24]

There has been some research suggesting that sexual orientation is much more fluid for women than for men.

I'd like to see that research. I believe many women may think they are lesbians for a number of reasons unrelated to sexuality. This is not to say that heterosexual women can't be bisexual or feel sexuality towards other women, but quite frankly I think many heterosexual women who claim to have become lesbian or bisexual are just trying to manipulate their social identity. For instance, to increase attractiveness in the eyes of men(since men see bisexual women as being exotic); to escape expectations to date men when they are shy; because they have been hurt by men; or just for attention.

[Loki]

Ps. Heterosexual man have not such a "luck": other men skin and fluids give us plain repulsion:D...in fact I cannot even keep on watching homosexual male intercourse (Almodovar films, homo friends trying to normalize it by kissing themselves in public) without getting really sick.

I'm absolutely the same. I find the touch of other men repulsive. So much so that I won't even have my hair cut by a male.

[Loddfafner]

Also, has anyone heard of the "LUG"(lesbian until graduation) syndrome? In America, many girls say they are lesbians in college, but then as they get older become heterosexual. ....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lesbian_until_graduation

I think LUG syndrome is a by-product of Women's Studies classes and infatuation with feminist ideology. They are indoctrinated with such rants as Adrienne Rich's "Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence (http://www.terry.uga.edu/~dawndba/4500compulsoryhet.htm)" that claim that all women would be lesbian if it were not for social pressures from their families and the media. LUGs and political lesbians must be intensely frustrating and irritating for real lesbians who feel used and even objectified for their partners' smug politics, only to be ditched for some stud with a real cock and a lucrative job offer after the Women's Studies final exam.

Nowadays, ideologically impressionable students tend to fall in love with transgenderism and demand their classmates use clumsy, made-up pronouns and protest the injustice of gender-segregated bathrooms.

[Curtis24]

Still, even if you are right, it shows to what extent people are willing to use their sexuality to manipulate their social identity.

[Eldritch]

Maybe I should start givning answers in a column of my own.;) But this was indeed a pretty easy one to answer.

The more the merrier. I love agony aunt columns. It's a sort of acceptable psychological voyerism. :p

[la bombe]

I'm not sure how flexible sexuality really is, barring extreme situations of isolation. To me, it seems inconceivable that I would wake up one day feeling homosexual, or gradually find myself developing homosexual feelings.

When people do change sexuality, my inclination is to believe that they were always just closeted from the beginning, and didn't actually change. But I do believe its possible that some people could be so repressed that they actually were gay and didn't know it(this seems more likely with women, being a man it seems inconceivable that a man would be that out of touch with what ever gave him erections).

Just because you can't personally conceive of it doesn't mean it's impossible. I have a feeling that for women much of it is hormonal. I actually thought I might be a lesbian for a long time, but the older I get, the more "heterosexual" I become. I have no idea how or why, but it did somewhat coincide with puberty. Perhaps it has something to do with the production of progesterone (which is low in prepubescent children and post-menopausal women). There really just needs to be A LOT more research on female sexuality before any of this moves beyond speculation.

[Curtis24]

This is true, and the more I've thought about it, the more it does make sense. Faking sexuality for reasons of manipulation probably only represents isolated examples.

[Norse Sword]

This is not anything more than social acceptance of behavior designed to weaken a target group.


Suppose you had two islands.

On one island, all notions and media depicting homosexual relations as just another lifestyle, trendy, and the in thing.

On the other, held such unproductive and social denigration,is never practiced, allowed, or shown, ever,on TV shows, and movies,as some gay couple who are the (life of the party).

On what island would you have experimentation and adaptation?

How many more murderers do you think societies would have if such behavior was completely acceptable?

Most behavioral norms are learned and dictated by societal acceptance and saturation.

Homosexuality is nothing more than a acute behavioral disorder brought on by many factors of a failing society.

Like any mental disease, it should be eradicated, Not promoted through endless, non stop media saturation.

Monkey see monkey do.Everyone stands around and wonders why the western world is going down the shit hole.

The facts are facts. In rare cases such behavior could be attributed to hormonal or glandular deficiencies, modern science should be able to treat such rare anomalies with hormone replacement therapy.

However, much of the activity of homosexuality you see today is nothing more than people who are no longer restricted by ethics, or proactive societal norms.

[Grumpy Cat]

I'm absolutely the same. I find the touch of other men repulsive. So much so that I won't even have my hair cut by a male.

But males give better haircuts. They're more daring/aggressive.

Women are too scared that you won't like the cut so they go for standard boring cuts.

I always get my hair cut by a male, they give me better cuts.


But yeah, I'm like a lot of the guys here... the idea of being with a woman disgusts me. I was once offered $100 to kiss another girl in university, and I seriously considered it, but then I said "no" because I was afraid I would throw up in the other girl's mouth.

But seeing other women do it doesn't bother me at all.

[The Ripper]

I'm absolutely the same. I find the touch of other men repulsive. So much so that I won't even have my hair cut by a male.

Don't go on business trips to Finland. :thumb001:


Finns take customers, suppliers and competitors to a wooden room heated to 180 degrees, and schvitz with them in the nude.
:eek:

http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/technology/maney/2003-10-28-sauna_x.htm

[Aemma]

I only have my personal experience being a man to go on, plus there doesn't seem to be a late-blooming homosexual male syndrome. , what examples are you thinking of?

Oh it's out there. You're just not looking hard enough.

[Moonbird]

But yeah, I'm like a lot of the guys here... the idea of being with a woman disgusts me. I was once offered $100 to kiss another girl in university, and I seriously considered it, but then I said "no" because I was afraid I would throw up in the other girl's mouth.

Actually kissing another woman's mouth wouldn't feel very repulsive to me. It's touching and kissing the other bodyparts that would be disgusting.

[Aemma]

Here is my verdict: they go there for that, since they simply lack social skills and confidence to pull a good white man locally. Or perhaps too fat and ugly for that. So the result is the easy way out for them to satisfy their unattended sexual cravings.

By far the most decent English women here would rather meet a handsome white guy, but just don't know how to go about it.

Well, perhaps the opposite is true? These women do have social skills and confidence and it is European men who don't want them since they are seen as too self-confident and knowing what they want? I don't know.

Don't care either.

[Loddfafner]

I was about to post about how amazing it is that this thread has gotten this far without the kind of superstitious ranting that plagues the sort of fora many of us fled and then I find this:


This is not anything more than social acceptance of behavior designed to weaken a target group.

Suppose you had two islands.

On one island, all notions and media depicting homosexual relations as just another lifestyle, trendy, and the in thing.

On the other, held such unproductive and social denigration,is never practiced, allowed, or shown, ever,on TV shows, and movies,as some gay couple who are the (life of the party).

On what island would you have experimentation and adaptation?

How many more murderers do you think societies would have if such behavior was completely acceptable?


Probably the second island where individuals do not have room to come to terms with themselves. On the first island, natural heterosexual instinct would ensure the survival of the population while those with variant impulses would not become head cases by trying to fit a mold they were not made for.



Most behavioral norms are learned and dictated by societal acceptance and saturation.

If behavior really does follow from the instincts we have developed as a folk, then the effects of the media and the like should be comparatively trivial and temporary.



Homosexuality is nothing more than a acute behavioral disorder brought on by many factors of a failing society.

Like any mental disease, it should be eradicated, Not promoted through endless, non stop media saturation.

Monkey see monkey do.Everyone stands around and wonders why the western world is going down the shit hole.

The facts are facts. In rare cases such behavior could be attributed to hormonal or glandular deficiencies, modern science should be able to treat such rare anomalies with hormone replacement therapy.

Ah yes, the quaint superstitions of early modernity.


However, much of the activity of homosexuality you see today is nothing more than people who are no longer restricted by ethics, or proactive societal norms.
They are following their own norms, insipid they may seem. There were other norms for homosexuality a century ago, and yet others in ancient times.

[Svanhild]

I think LUG syndrome is a by-product of Women's Studies classes and infatuation with feminist ideology. They are indoctrinated with such rants as Adrienne Rich's "Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence (http://www.terry.uga.edu/~dawndba/4500compulsoryhet.htm)" that claim that all women would be lesbian if it were not for social pressures from their families and the media.
I don't care for Women's studies classes, Gender mainstreaming or feminist ideologies. Truth be told, I find the increasing ideologization of sexual matters redundant and worrisome. As a matter of fact I'm just getting...horny for someone/something every once in a while and then I seek satisfaction. Sexual lust needs no ideology. I don't have any with respect to my sexuality. That I like both genders just happened and has no ideological background. When I began to feel how I feel I was barely capable of describing what ideologies are. Or how to write the word in English language. :wink

[nisse]

May be they are not actually lesbian (i.e. aren't looking for a sexual partner) but just want a relationship of convenience (which is what a lot of long marriages become) and find that that's easier to find with a female partner who might understand them better?...But since they need a short and sweet name for it (and there isn't one, to my knowledge, other than "cat ladies") they call themselves lesbians.

TBH, gay people of both genders bother me when I see them. I don't mind the idea of it, but the physical reality makes me want to look away :ohwell:.

[poiuytrewq0987]

Here is my verdict: they go there for that, since they simply lack social skills and confidence to pull a good white man locally. Or perhaps too fat and ugly for that. So the result is the easy way out for them to satisfy their unattended sexual cravings.

By far the most decent English women here would rather meet a handsome white guy, but just don't know how to go about it.

When I was eating at this one restaurant in the great city of London and it was pretty full so I shared a table with a pretty British girl but she was with an Armenoid-looking guy with an unibrow. I don't think she could've went any lower.

[antonio]

When I was eating at this one restaurant in the great city of London and it was pretty full so I shared a table with a pretty British girl but she was with an Armenoid-looking guy with an unibrow. I don't think she could've went any lower.

Maybe academical students or coworkers...sharing same high-grade knowledge and contributing hand-by-hand to the progression of Science (ironic) create strong links -for what I know since my almost voyeurish position of academical paria- modern days Universities are such a fucking melting-pot that I am considering on my assault into power to implement genetical policies to evaluate student excellence by mental capabilities and not by plain rude effort.:D

[Loki]

Don't go on business trips to Finland. :thumb001:


You mean they actually like touching each other regularly? :/

I would go to Finland, though, as I find the women to be rather attractive. :D But any man who tries to "feel me up" would be met with violence. :coffee:

[Megrez]

I don't think a woman in her 40's will suddenly become lesbian out of a sexual urge. I think it's more an emotional urge. As Svanhild stated, women in their 40's are starting to lose sexual lust, and I don't see them suddenly finding a new lust, and getting laid with other women and even using dildos, vibrators and other lesbian related paraphernalia. Perhaps they just find more emotional and affective support from a long time female friend than from their everyday boring husbands.


Cynthia Nixon, for instance, who plays Miranda in Sex and the City, was in a heterosexual relationship for 15 years, and had two children, before falling for her current partner, Christine Marinoni, in 2004.
Cynthia Nixon actually is still in love for a man. Do you think Christine Marinoni looks like a woman at all? She's just a different kind of man, with no phallus and other manly stuff which perhaps Cynthia didn't find interesting in her previous male partners (?).
http://static1.purepeople.com/articles/9/10/87/9/@/49412-christine-marinoni-compagne-de-cynthia-637x0-1.jpg


[...] As a matter of fact I'm just getting...horny for someone/something [...]
ò.Ó

[Beorn]

I don't think she could've went any lower.

I bet she did later that evening. :coffee:

[Moonbird]

MONTREAL -- In winter, a tourist woman’s fancy lustily turns to thoughts of sex.

By the thousands they descend on the Caribbean every year, women driven by one urge: to spend a week or two sleeping with local "beach boys" and paying them back in drinks, meals, gifts, and cash.

And it is Quebec women— with reputations as financially generous and uninhibited — who are among the best established in the island flesh trade.

Sex tourists, they’re called. Or as some prefer it, "romance travellers" looking for "love" and a little tenderness in the tropics.


I saw a program in TV about this same kind of phenomenon in Sweden. Women in their forties and fifties travel down to Gambia in Africa on holidays and enjoy themselves with young black toy boys.:p This has apparently been going on since the 60s.

[Osweo]

I saw a program in TV about this same kind of phenomenon in Sweden. Women in their forties and fifties travel down to Gambia in Africa on holidays and enjoy themselves with young black toy boys.:p This has apparently been going on since the 60s.

Yay! Disease! :rolleyes2:

[poiuytrewq0987]

I saw a program in TV about this same kind of phenomenon in Sweden. Women in their forties and fifties travel down to Gambia in Africa on holidays and enjoy themselves with young black toy boys.:p This has apparently been going on since the 60s.

Well... :D

[Loki]

I saw a program in TV about this same kind of phenomenon in Sweden. Women in their forties and fifties travel down to Gambia in Africa on holidays and enjoy themselves with young black toy boys.:p This has apparently been going on since the 60s.

These old hags whose skin looks like a piece of leather after decades of sunbathing on the Mediterranean probably have nothing better going for them. I mean seriously, who else would go there? :coffee:

[Tony]

I don't think a woman in her 40's will suddenly become lesbian out of a sexual urge. I think it's more an emotional urge. As Svanhild stated, women in their 40's are starting to lose sexual lust, and I don't see them suddenly finding a new lust, and getting laid with other women and even using dildos, vibrators and other lesbian related paraphernalia. Perhaps they just find more emotional and affective support from a long time female friend than from their everyday boring husbands.
I quite think so , there's must be a period in woman's life , perhaps after years and years , when she easily get bored of having to deal with a male partner , not only the genitalia related part but especially the emotional-psychic one.
So she will tour the place for some femininity...
maybe...



Cynthia Nixon actually is still in love for a man. Do you think Christine Marinoni looks like a woman at all? She's just a different kind of man, with no phallus and other manly stuff which perhaps Cynthia didn't find interesting in her previous male partners (?).
http://static1.purepeople.com/articles/9/10/87/9/@/49412-christine-marinoni-compagne-de-cynthia-637x0-1.jpg


ò.Ó
That image speaks volumes...
Honestly if I were a lesbian I would try and find some decent feminine woman , how is it that she instead got engaged with this poor copy of a man?doesn't make sense.:confused:

And this makes me speculatin' about the condition of being gay.
I'm a hetero man and are attractetd to women , and consequently I will find a female partner who will be , since she's hetero , attracted to me , and we'll perfectly match , right?
this matin' system seems to work perfectly.

Now suppose I were homo...
for first I should get turned on by the very same image of myself at the mirror and this is already gross :eek:
for second , I'd be in search of manly males , are you following me?
but since the manly males are hetero I will only find other gays like me , who are mostly effeminated...
so I won't find , never , my ideal partner.

I'd want a real man but will find only sissies and he'd be upset the same as me , because I'd be a woman intrapped in a man's body , not the real man he's lookin' for , right?

And I will be depressed for ever , and blame the society for this.

Moreover , since gays are a minority and they can't identify in a society that's shaped on heterosexuality they feel alienated , and when one feel alienated the only way to get relief is to cure himself (i.e.become hetero) or to cure the others , that is trying to turn the hetero shaped society into a homo-shaped one.

So in the end , the condition of being gay is a condition of permanent alienation and abnormality.

[hereward]

That article appeared in the Times. Their report induced much laughter, the language of the 'intellectual’s' was much employed, and it was portrayed as a most regular occurrence. I could even picture their flock choking whilst grazing.

[Baron Samedi]

Oh it's out there. You're just not looking hard enough.

But Aemma obviously is. :thumb001:

[Eldritch]

You mean they actually like touching each other regularly? :/


Bathing in the sauna has nothing to do with sex. This is something that foreigners unfortunately don't often understand. When you're sitting in a cloud of steam in a 95C sauna, sex is the last thing on your mind anyway.

I've been in the same sauna with my then fiancee's younger sister and her three female friends, I've been in a huge platoon sauna with 30 other blokes in the military, I've even bathed in a sauna together with three gay men. Need I even add that nothing "inappropriate" or sexual took place and I doubt it even ran through anyone's mind?

I also would not have any problems taking any Aprician who wanted to try it to the sauna. ;)

[Megrez]

Saunas are cool :)

[Eldritch]

Saunas are cool :)

http://www.rapukartano.fi/uploadkuvat/sauna3.jpg

----->

http://www.kuusamon-era-safari.fi/images/avanto3.jpg

[nisse]

A few years ago I randomly read someone's sociology thesis on the significance of the sauna in Finnish ethnic identity...it was very informative :thumb001:

I don't mind the sauna, but I don't really like sweating and would rather sweat working out.

[Moonbird]

Bathing in the sauna has nothing to do with sex. This is something that foreigners unfortunately don't often understand. When you're sitting in a cloud of steam in a 95C sauna, sex is the last thing on your mind anyway.

I've been in the same sauna with my then fiancee's younger sister and her three female friends, I've been in a huge platoon sauna with 30 other blokes in the military, I've even bathed in a sauna together with three gay men. Need I even add that nothing "inappropriate" or sexual took place and I doubt it even ran through anyone's mind?

I also would not have any problems taking any Aprician who wanted to try it to the sauna. ;)

Where I come from, the Swedish speaking Ostrobothnia, people aren't totally naked in public saunas or in saunas together with strangers. Towels or swimsuits are being used.

[Eldritch]

Where I come from, the Swedish speaking Ostrobothnia, people aren't totally naked in public saunas or in saunas together with strangers. Towels or swimsuits are being used.

Towels are okay imo, but not swimsuits. Besides looking aesthetically unpleasant in the sauna, in public swimming halls they spread chlorine fumes in the air.

[Tony]

Saunas are cool :)
Cool or cul?:rolleyes:

I'm jokin' eh , I have taken some sort of sauna here in the city where I live and Slovenia , and it's been refreshin' despite the high temps and humidity , sometimes we need to recharge our batteries.

By the way , how much time it'll take for this lesbian to find funds for her film about Leni Riefenstahl?:rolleyes2:

http://img2.timeinc.net/people/i/cbb/2008/03/25/jodie_foster_218639cbbjpg.jpg

[The Ripper]

A few years ago I randomly read someone's sociology thesis on the significance of the sauna in Finnish ethnic identity...it was very informative :thumb001:

I don't mind the sauna, but I don't really like sweating and would rather sweat working out.

Its not the sweating that is pleasant, it is the cleansed, euphoric feeling you experience after the sauna and swim, sitting on the terrace wrapped in a towel, drinking a cold one and listening to the sounds of nature and your cottage neighbour's chainsaw. ;)

[Susi]

I love sauna <3 I agree entirely with Eldritch's point of view.

[Odin]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95YbC3XTdi4

[happycow]

late blooming lesbians lol....right... it just means they've consumed too much tv.