Posted on 04/12/2010 2:04:43 PM PDT by jerry557
Psychologist John Buss estimates that for most of human history, perhaps 2% of women have been lesbian or bisexual (see note 1, below). Not any more. Recent surveys of teenage girls and young women find that roughly 15% of young females today self-identify as lesbian or bisexual, compared with about 5% of young males who identify as gay or bisexual (see note 2, below).
As a physician and a psychologist, what I found missing in the noise surrounding the Constance McMillen story was any serious discussion of why a growing number of girls self-identify as lesbian or bisexual. Not that there's anything wrong with that, as Seinfeld might say. But why are young women today at least three times more likely than their brothers to identify as bisexual or homosexual? "I kissed a girl and I liked it," Katy Perry told us in her #1 hit single. Megan Fox, Lindsay Lohan, Lady Gaga, Anna Paquin, Angelina Jolie, Drew Barrymore - they all want us to know that they are bisexual. There is no comparable crowd of young male celebrities rushing to assure us that they go both ways. Imagine a young man singing "I kissed a boy and I liked it." Would that song reach #1 on the charts? Why not?
Why is it OK for girls to be bisexual or homosexual, but not boys?
Over the past seven years, I've posed this question to hundreds of teenagers and young adults across the United States. The most common answer I get isn't really an answer. "Girls kiss other girls at parties because guys like it," one teenage girl told me. "It makes the guys hoot and holler, so the girls do it again. They're just doing it for attention. It's not for real."
Female sexuality is different from male sexuality. If a straight boy kissed another boy, perhaps to amuse some girls who might be watching, he would be unlikely to undergo a change in sexual orientation as a result. But, as Professor Roy Baumeister at Florida State University and others have shown, sexual attraction in many women seems to be more malleable (see note 3 below). If a teenage girl kisses another teenage girl, for whatever reason, and she finds that she likes it - then things can happen, and things can change. If a young woman finds her soulmate, and her soulmate happens to be female, then she may begin to experience feelings she's never felt before.
Which brings me to the second point I've encountered in my interviews with young people. Twenty years ago, when I opened my practice in a suburb of Washington DC, it was rare to find 14-year-old boys who were looking at pornography every day. Today it's common, in fact it's becoming the norm. When I meet with a group of 14-year-old boys and I ask them, "how many of you guys subscribe to a porn site?", all hands go up. I don't believe them. But today, no boy wants to admit that he's the weirdo who doesn't look at online porn. Twenty years ago, hardcore pornography was tucked away in adult bookstores. Today any 14-year-old can access such photos online in seconds. Role models for young men, from pop singer John Mayer to the 2009 World Series MVP Hideki Matsui, talk openly about their collections of porn (see note 4, below).
Is there any connection between these two trends - between the rise in the number of young women who self-identify as lesbian or bisexual, and the increasing normalization and acceptance of pornography in the lives of young men? Maybe there is. A young woman told me how her boyfriend several years ago suggested that she shave her pubic hair, so that she might more closely resemble the porn stars who were this young man's most consistent source of sexual arousal. She now identifies herself as bisexual. "It was just such a welcome change, to snuggle under a blanket on the couch with my girlfriend, watch a movie, and talk about God and death and growing old, to be intimate emotionally and spiritually as well as physically. I don't know a guy who could even comprehend the conversations we have."
I wish Constance McMillen and her girlfriend all the best. But I have to wonder: Are there so many girl-girl couples out there because that's truly who they are - or because the guys are such losers?
It is called the marketing of deviance, and women like fashion, and if hollywood promotes it they will buy it. Men are not so susceptible to what passes as marketing fashion.
“the guys are such losers? “
WIMPS - THAT’S WHAT THEY ARE.
Society is quickly removing everything, every goal, every reward, every duty, that give normal males points to make them feel good and reward them for being themselves.
The major things are - women taking over men’s jobs, automation eliminating their jobs, what jobs are left they are exporting, and for those they don’t export, they are importing workers (legal and illegal) so there is no reason to study hard - example - engineering jobs are gone to India or China.
The taboos have been taken down, anything goes.
-PJ
they are weak minded.
When they get older they stay that way...... Oil of Olay, hydrating shampoo, collegen reinforcing eye tereatment, serum facials
As a woman who has been married for 20 years to an awesome man...I can still think of a few reasons. lol
“They’re just doing it for attention. It’s not for real.”
Lesbian chic is nothing but shock value - no big surprise here .
Colonel, USAFR
I’m in touch with my inner female and she is definitely a lesbian.
David Cassady??? Oh Yeah!!!
Because MTV says its Cool and Hip!
i suspect the ambiguity of modern marriage and the decline of marriage as a norm contributes a lot to the trend, especially among females.
I did not change anything. I merely asked the poster why the title was changed. ??
In a girl, up until this century, bi/lesbian tendencies were mostly irrelevant, in that most girls did not have a choice in the matter of marrying and having to keep the husband sexually satisfied. A few might become nuns to avoid that, but their choices were fairly limited.
Also, girls didn't tend to "experiment" as much. It may be that sexual orientation is susceptible to change in the bi/lez direction if the girl experiences sexual pleasure from another girl at a young age.
“Because it’s chic...it’s “the thing”.”
So true. It is encouraged and no taboo against it.
It's pure idiocy.
Why on earth would anybody want to define, as the most essential core of their personal being — that is, their own sense of self-identity — in terms of sexual practice? One's preference in this regard does not amount to a hill of beans, does not erase the fact the human beings come in only two kinds, male and female. And the two kinds are "equal" only in the sense that each is equally necessary to the other — at very least in terms of the successful propagation of the human race and its future thriving.
The "preference" people are not in the "propagation business." Which seems to my mind to suggest they think self-indulgence is preferable to taking on real, human responsibilities.
And then they endlessly proselytize their vision, aided and abetted by "elite" academe, the foundations, and the MSM, making it effectively mandatory on the rest of us. So get on board — or else the ACLU, the HRC, etc. ad nauseam, are gonna get you, and make you pay!
Sorry to grumble. Today, a person very close to me, a long-time self-declared Lesbian, advised me that she was, in fact, actually "bi-sexual." And so was her "partner" of over 30 years. Which came as a stunning surprise to me.
Well, that all sounds very lovely, I'm sure.
But what does it actually mean?
Does versatility in sexual practice make one a better human being somehow?
Given the "climate of opinion" of our age, does such question even make sense?
They see shows like “The L Word” and think that’s what being a lesbian is all about, instead it was a show about the male fantasy version of what lesbians are about.
It ain’t like in the movies.
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