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Compulsive Heterosexuality

Texts:  Construction of Sexuality
Texts:  Heterosexuality
Texts:  Patriarchy
Used Books:  Sexuality
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Sexing the Body: Gender Politics and the Construction of Sexuality
Are you a Heterosexual?
What do you think caused your heterosexuality?
When and how did you decide you were a heterosexual?
Is it possible that your heterosexuality is just a phase that you may grow out of?
Is it possible that your heterosexuality stems from a neurotic fear of others of the same sex?
If you have never slept with a person of the same sex, is it possible that all you need is a good gay lover?
Do your parents know that you are straight? Do your friends and/or roommates know?
Why do you insist on flaunting your heterosexuality? Can't you just be who you are and keep it quiet?
Why do heterosexuals place so much emphasis on sex?
Why do heterosexuals fell so compelled to introduce others to their lifestyle?
A disproportionate majority of child molesters are heterosexual. Do you consider it safe to expose children to heterosexual teachers?
Just what do men and women do in bed together? How can they truly know how to please each other, being so anatomically different?
With all the societal support marriage receives, the divorce rate is spiraling. Why are there so few stable relationships between heterosexuals?
Statistics show that lesbians have the lowest of sexually transmitted disease. Is it really safe for a woman to maintain a heterosexual lifestyle and run the risk of disease and pregnancy?
How can you expect to become a whole person if you limit yourself to compulsive, exclusive heterosexuality?
Considering the menace of overpopulation, how could the human race survive if everyone were heterosexual?
Could you trust a heterosexual therapist to be objective? Don't you feel that (s)he might be inclined to influence you in the direction of his/her own orientation?
There seem to be very few happy heterosexuals. Techniques have been developed that might enable you change if you really want to. Have you ever considered aversion therapy?
Would you want your child to be heterosexual, knowing the problems (s)he would face?

NOTE:  From Are You Still My Mother by Gloria Guss Back. Warner Books, 1985. Questionnaire attributed to Martin Rochlin, Ph.D., West Hollywood, CA.

 

What, Exactly, is Heterosexuality?  And What Causes it?

By Alan Wakeman. Excerpted from the book Heterosexuality by Gillian E. Hanscombe and Martin Humphries. 1987, GMP Publishers Ltd.

What is Heterosexuality?

Heterosexuality is a condition in which people have a driving emotional and sexual interest in members of the opposite sex. Because of the anatomical, physiological, social and cultural limitations involved, there are formidable obstacles to be overcome. However, many heterosexuals look upon this as a challenge and approach it with ingenuity and energy. Indeed it can be said that most heterosexuals are obsessed with the gratification of their curious desires.

What Causes it?

Hormonal imbalance? Economic conditions? Fear of death? Cultural deprivation? Pathological condition? Social conditioning? Childhood trauma? Parental problems?

 

Deconstructing Origins

Essay by Danne Polk

This paper explores the relationship between identity theory and environmental philosophy in order to help conceptualize queer subjectivity in a way that would thwart an otherwise uncritical incorporation and/or recuperation of behaviors that perpetuate ecological peril. More specifically, I want to subvert what appears to be our increasing complicity in certain first-world consumerist ideologies that seem to suspiciously emulate the heterosexist, androcentric, and anthropocentric modes of social behavior against which radical ecologists and ecofeminists exert so much critical energy. In my opinion, if queer theory is already progressively involved in the deconstruction of compulsive heterosexuality embedded in western concepts of nature, the discussion -- this current moment in the deconstructive process -- offers the possibility of expanding the horizons of critique to include the specifically material conditions through which new identities might emerge...

 

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