We don’t talk about sexuality very
well in the church, much less same sex attraction.
“Mormons can be gay, they just can’t
do gay”, was the title when Ty Mansfield spoked at the Fair Mormon
Congress in August.
I was there and it has been I while since but I
thought it is better that I really think about Ty´s speach before I
write about it here in my blog.
Mansfield came out in 2004, when he
co-wrote ”In Quiet Desperation: Understanding the Challenge of
Same-Gender Attraction.” The book began with the story of Stuart
Matis, who shot himself on the steps of his LDS chapel after
struggling with same-sex attraction. Ty is also the cofounder of the
support organization North Star for LDS individuals affected by
homosexuality. He has said that he, because of his
same-sex-attractions was ready to live a life of celibacy. However in
2010 he met Danielle and they fell in love, got married in the temple
and are now proud parents of two childrens.
In his speach he said: ”While I still
occasionally experience attraction to men, my desires are such that I
can’t tell you the last time I desired a same-sex relationship. I
desire only to be with my wife and family. ” and later: ”If
others refer to me as gay, I typically tolerate it for practical
purposes, but it’s not how I see myself, and occasionally it can
feel particularly oppressive when others seem to insist on projecting
and LGBT identity construct on me even after I’ve specified that
that is not how I see myself.”
Well, for me that is just fine. If Ty
is happy with his wife and his kids and if they are happy then it is
just awesome.
But I had a problem listening to him.
The subtitle of his speach was: ”Deconstructing Sexuality and
Identity from an LDS Perspective” but brother Mansfield wasn’t
deconstructing sexuality. He was deconstructing homosexuality and
left heterosexuality intact.
To deconstruct something can be very
evaporable and in my opinion you have to use it all the way if you
want to use it.
According to brother Mansfield
sexuality goes into four tiers — attraction and desire,
orientation, behavior, and identity. And at the congress he went
through each to deconstruct them. For example, for sexual orientation
Ty quoted a researcher known for her research on female sexual
fluidity who claims that because sexual fluidity is a general feature
of human sexuality we have to talk about homosexualities rather than
“homosexuality”. Ty noted that the idea that gender preference
is the primary component of our sexual orientation is a current
social construct, but still there are many factors required to make
someone desirable — after all, we are only generally attracted to a
few people of the sex to which we are attracted.
Well I agree. We aren’t attracted to
everyone of the sex we desire. I am not attracted to every man that I
stumble upon. So what is my problem listening to Ty? Well as I said:
if you want to use deconstruction use it all the way. Heterosexuality
is also a construct.
“Mormons can be gay, they just can’t
do gay- Deconstructing Sexuality and Identity from an LDS
Perspective” The title is a pejorative statement that is a
caricature of doctrine and practices; it oversimplifies. is a flawed
construction. It seems to me that Ty is using deconstructionism when
it suits him, showing that being gay is not that wiered but the tools
can´t be used elswhere when we are talking about gender and
identity.
Furthermore I have never ever in the church heard something about our intersexual members. The term intersex covers bodily variations in regard to culturally established standards of maleness and femaleness, including variations at the level of chromosomes, gonads and genitals. how do you pick a child’s gender if she or he is intersex?
The child is assigned a gender as boy or girl after tests have been done and the parents have consulted with the doctors on which gender the child is more likely to feel as she or he grows up. The parents are deciding. And what if they are not asking the Lord? The vast majority of children with complete androgen insensitivity syndrome grow up to feel female, and that many children with cloacal exstrophy and XY chromosomes will grow up to feel male.
Why shouldn’t children with intersex be raised in a “third gender”? I do not know and Ty didn´t give me an answer. Deconstruction.
I want to be humble. I think that one
could certainly develop a well-intentioned white picket fence
homonormativity in the Law of Chastity.
My Mormon pragdim is a social pragdim
and we can get back to that.
Sexual identities are socially
constructed, and are tied with competing and sometimes incompatible
social narratives and paradigms.
Be who you are.
