I am openly gay. Yet still, this is an issue that I wouldn’t touch with a ten-foot pole. Is being gay a choice? I haven’t the faintest clue. My friends have asked me before. They were all predictably surprised when I said that. After all, out of everyone, shouldn’t gay people know the most about being gay?
When I realized I was gay, it had almost no impact on my day. I was sitting in health class, we were looking at a picture of a naked man, and I realized that I found little about his body at all attractive. I’m not saying that he was ugly; I was saying that there was absolutely no appeal to me. Yet I found myself fawning over pictures of women. About five minutes after class ended, the thought struck me, “I’m gay,” and then I saw a puppy and pet it because it was cute and interested me more than thinking of my sexuality. I honestly cared that little. So, did I have a choice in this? I don’t know. On one hand, the human brain is very good at rewiring itself. If I had tried hard enough, I could have convinced myself to feign attraction to the pictures. I could have made my cheeks flush and my breath grow subtly heavier. If I did that enough, for years, it may have been possible that these symptoms would become automatic, and if so, how is that any different from real attraction?
On the other hand, if being gay was a choice, there wouldn’t be many with the mind to deal with the ridicule, the mocking, hearing your own grandmother saying that you should go to hell and that god will never love you and how I can never be a good person (that last one happened to me). I definitely don’t think that if given the choice, many gay people would keep being gay. Who wants those things for themselves? Nobody wants to be hated. Again, however, the human brain is very good at rewiring itself. They could be unable to become straight simply because it is a mental block that they are enforcing upon themselves.
Once again, I am no authority on this issue. I simply wish to get people who are of one opinion to examine another. I am gay, and don’t want to change. I love my life, and to any other gay people, it’s a hard world. Good luck! Personally, I believe that we have no choice, but I can see why some people could think that we do.