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Somehow this remains monetized, but it's probably from tweaking the name/metadata of the video, so only temporary. Thanks for watching, and please consider supporting the channel by buying merch: teespring.com/stores/the-cynical-historian Or by donating to my Patreon: www.patreon.com/CynicalHistorian See following replies for corrections and additional info, but first, here are some related videos to check out: Tristan's video: ua-cam.com/video/4IWvGhlRiIY/v-deo.html 5:40 - Bronze Age archaeology: ua-cam.com/video/xSDn0HSXjgo/v-deo.html 8:00 - Cal Gold Rush: ua-cam.com/video/W1dmyx6LBKA/v-deo.html 8:10 - The Novitiate: ua-cam.com/video/sixkn-tderM/v-deo.html 14:45 - About Joan Scott's type of history: ua-cam.com/video/IK-Qechh_Ec/v-deo.html
*references and errors* *errata* 10:45 - mammals are a class, kingdom is the next taxonomic rank above that (thx CambrianPinniped) *Bibliography* Judith C. Brown, _Immodest Acts: The Life of a Lesbian Nun in Renaissance Italy_ (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1986). amzn.to/2Zy6w4O Louis Compton, _Homosexuality and Civilization_ (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2003). amzn.to/2T1qQcj Jack Drescher, “Out of DSM: Depathologizing Homosexuality,” _Behavioral Science_ 5, no. 4 (December 2015): 565-575. Michel Foucault, _The History of Sexuality, Volume I: An Introduction,_ trans. Robert Hurley, new edition (1978; New York: Random House, 1990). amzn.to/2T3eNv7 Susan Lee Johnson, _Roaring Camp: The Social World of the California Gold Rush_ (New York: W.W. Norton, 2000). amzn.to/2NEFcMC Maria Elena Martinez, “Sex and the Colonial Archive: The Case of ‘Mariano’ Aguilera,” _Hispanic American Historical Review_ 66, no. 3 (August 2016): 421-443. Mary Poovey, _Making a Social Body: British Cultural Formation, 1830-1864_ (Chicago, Ill.: The University of Chicago Press, 1995). amzn.to/2YJgoao Joan Wallach Scott, _Gender and the Politics of History_ (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999). amzn.to/2Zx31vc Joan Wallach Scott, “Gender: A Useful Category of Historical Analysis,” _American Historical Review_ 91, no. 5 (December 1986): 1053-1075. Joan Wallach Scott, "History in Crisis? The Other's Side of the Story," _American Historical Review_ 94, no. 3 (June 1989): 680-692.
Reminds me of the Supreme court case in Germany, where they decided, that fleeing prison can't be made illegal, cause seeking freedom is natural. (That is the reason why prison break isn't illegal in Germany. Of course you still have to serve your time, but the act of seeking freedom doesn't increase your sentence.)
@@TheMissileHappy Yes and no. In a classic prison break you are right. The case that was in front of the court was different if I remember correctly. In Germany at the end of your prison time you can get "vacation" from prison. Spend time with the family over a weekend. Or find a job and work outside of prison 9 to 5, but you have to be at the prison on time etc. One of the guys being "on vacation" didn't come back. He didn't break any other laws.
@@Samrules888 That's not a real thing. I have to imagine it's isolated to the most fringe of fringe groups. Nobody realistic feels like that. That said, I'm a straight guy who really wants to date a lesbian buddy of mine.
the japanese have created everything under the sun as hentai... including infantophilia, zoophilia, necrophilia etc etc.... it shows something about humanity that most humans are unwilling to accept.
I think it's important to keep in mind that eg in ancient Greece acceptable sexual behavior wasn't so much determined by the "sexes" of the partners, but by their role: Being "active", the one who penetrates, or "passive",the one who is penetrated. Adult men were not supposed to be the passive partner, younger men and boys were still "allowed" to take on the part "of the woman". This also informs how same-sex ... sex was seen between men of the same age: For adult men being the passive part was ostracized, being the active one wasn't. Slaves and metics were generally able to prostitute themselves as bottoms without much social repercussions (though they obviously didn't have a high social standing anyway). Same-sex relations between young men or teenagers, though by no means as encouraged as pederasty, seem to have mostly been tolerated independent on who was "the bottom" and who was "the top".
Plus Spartan women had to jump through hoops to get their husbands to make love to them they would have to shave their heads bald and wear boys clothes and have sex in a dark room to trick the men who were always used to having sex with males. Also lesbian sex was encouraged between spartan women since they were equal and strong compared to the men.
So Its basically monkey politics in action. Looks like Franz de Waal was right. But we also had to adress an elephant in the room. Its the fact that said monkeys, having homosexual behaviour, still procreated. Thus, sexuality is more than "just social construct", just as it is more that a "procreation instinct". So author of the video is factually wrong.
Same in Rome as well. Many high ranking Roman officials (and I believe some emperors as well) were in same-sex sexual relationships without any loss of social status, but only because they were the active/dominant role. Meanwhile, if they had been submissive in heterosexual relationships (being pegged, for example), they would have experienced a similar loss in social status to subbing for a guy.
I've met people at parties who've unironically argued that homosexuality isn't "natural", while wearing synthetic garments and drinking beer out of an aluminum can.
I always say that looking at other cultures in different time periods is the best way to get an understanding of the true variety of human behaviour. Thanks for taking on a task I’m not sure I’ll ever be brave enough to do though.
I am... skeptical of your claim that the category Mammalia was named as a means of pushing for breast feeding rather than a reference to one of it's defining physical traits.
Linnaeus was known to have believed that it was unhealthy for babies to drink milk not from their mother's. However, it is true that lactation is one of the more defining characteristics of mammals.
that's understandable. but i advise you to actually look for yourself. i remember hearing from an paleonthologist who was talking abt how they make pictures of extinct animals from fossils that there are other characteristics are exclusive to mammals, such as eyelids or fur. you can tell if an animal is a mammal or not by the shape or its skull, no need to see if it has mammal glands. so idk if any of the distinct characteristics we have are as ubiquitous and easily observable as breastfeeding but either way, i think ch's point still stands that there were other motives behind that name
@@d.o.m.i. This is especially true when you consider the synapsids, commonly held to be the predecessor to all mammals. If you instead focus on other considerations, they could very reasonably be considered the same class as mammals, except that from what we know, they lack mammary glands. Many taxonomists now consider all mammals synapsids but the same doesn't work the other way around and because of this deference to this "old traditional" form of taxonomy, with now have a nauseating amount of subdivisions of taxonomic ranks including super- and infra- divisions of most categories as well as new internal division such as clades which can be placed between every such subdivision and can then also be subdivided. Tldr: Taxonomy is an unfortunately backwards part of biology bogged down in semantics and really should be reconfigured in a major way to account for more recent developments.
Fun fact, the class mammalia in German is called "Säugetier," which literally translates to "sucking animal," also referring to breast feeding. The video is awesome by the way. I definitely learned a lot and will probably refer to it a few times as I forget details.
I read to sucking animal and my mind went straight to a different place. I was about to think germans were VERY dirty. I mean breastfeeding can also be dirty but that's not usually the way it's thought of.
another fun fact: mammalia comes from the latin word mammare which also means sucking ... so not really that different. Also the mammary glands is the scientific term for the breasts of humans and all other mammals. It may surprise you, but that's why we call our mothers mama, mom, or mummy ... it comes from sucking. all of it.
@@vayman666 Very cool, although I'd debate the 'etmomogy' there; some psychologists speculate that mom is mom because M is one of the first letters infants are able to produce, since mom has mostly Ms in many different unrelated languages.
I was hoping to find someone making this point. The etymology of the word is very clear and since all mammals must have mammary glands (two don't even have teats!) it doesn't have anything to do with encouraging breast feeding. I would love to see a source for this claim, because I couldn't find it and seems odd.
@@Michael-Willis are mammary glands the only unique characteristic? I thought giving birth to live young was also one, though I could be wrong. Anyway, I think the insinuation is that choosing mammary glands as the defining characteristic when there are other unique identifiers was politically influenced at least (assuming there are other unique identifiers).
@@0oShwavyo0 Not all mammals give birth to live young, since the monotremes lay eggs. Linnaeus didn't know about monotremes though, so he could've made that the characteristic (although there are other animals with live birth as well which he might've known about). However, mammals are also distinguished by their hair, and also by the fact that some of their jaw bones have shrunken down to fit inside the ear. It is thus not out of the question that Linnaeus picked breastfeeding as the defining trait of mammals because men at the time saw it as a somewhat primitive function which females of all mammal species clearly shared. Since it was controversial to list humans as mammals, Linnaeus likely wanted to pick something everyone would know linked humans and other mammals.
@@Michael-Willis Two articles I found on Linnaeus's motivations: daily.jstor.org/the-gender-politics-behind-why-were-mammals/ fromshanklin.wordpress.com/2013/08/30/linnaeus-and-the-breast/
The take of ancient Rome on homosexuality was completely different from the Greek one: To Roman society sex was less about gender and more about dominance and submission. For a Roman male it was considered unmanly to be in a relationship that put him in a position of being submissive, e.g. getting penetrated. So it was socially acceptable to have sexual relationships with any group of people considered submissive/powerless - women, slaves or infames, that is, people who had been stripped of their legal standing - but not acceptable to have one with another free Roman male. Homosexuality for females was generally frowned upon because to the Romans' understanding it would necessarily mean that one of them would have to take the active/dominant part, which was considered indecent.
Broke: Only heterosexuality is normal and natural. Woke: All sexualities are normal and found in nature. Bespoke: SEXUALITY IS A SOCIAL CONSTRUCT AND YOU'RE A FREAK. Jokes aside, loved the video.
Did Plato at the beginning just give the "It's actually LESS gay if it's a Femboy!" argument?? Good video. I hate topics like this, but it's good to learn your history and facts. This video was digestible and understandable for a guy like me who just wants to grill.
I think we just don't have enough conclusive research yet to say for certain what the "Cause" of sexuality is. I'm willing to bet that it's influenced by all 3 big factors: Biological, Social, and Environmental. And the balance of those is probably different in different cases. I think you're right that sexuality is probably more fluid than many modern-day activists (On both the Right and the Left) would like to believe it to be. But I would hesitate to discard biological factors, or even just random chance/personality, as causes of legitimate sexual preference differences. Personally, I grew up with zero access to any "gay culture." There were no "gay role models" in my life, and nobody I knew was gay. There were no options for sex with my friends who were boys. Everybody just assumed I was straight because that's what everyone else was. And I assumed that, too, because "straight" sexuality was pushed on me from every angle in society. I even had "girlfriends" in middle school and even high school, because I didn't even entertain the possibility that I was gay. But now, looking back, I realize that I never once really wanted to have sex with a woman. I've always, subconsciously, found men more attractive. I had just chalked these feelings up to "Confusion" or "Coincidence," when they happened, rather than treating them for what they were: A hint at my innate sexual preference. If sexuality were "Merely" a social construct, I would have turned out to be a straight man. I was raised in every capacity to be a straight man. The society around me was purely heterosexual, and opportunities for straight sex were abundant, while opportunities for gay sex were ENTIRELY non-existent. But, still, I don't like women that much. I never really have. I like men, a lot more, and I have since I was fairly young. So... yeah, I don't buy your thesis that sexuality is entirely a "Social construct," if that is what you're trying to say. I think for some, maybe many people it may be, but for some people it is a truly innate part of their personality, rather than a response to social pressures or sexual opportunities.
I don't think he's saying that sexuality, or rather who we are attracted to romatically, emotionally, and sexually, its self is a social construct. He is saying that how we think about it and talk about it is. And being openly LGBTQ used to be a lot more common and it is perfectly common.
Very well said and I believe it to be the truth. Indeed the whole simplified myth that everything in society is formed by social pressure and ideas is the old which came first, the chicken or the egg thing. As you say different forces are indeed in play but the truth as far as I can see it is that there are more bisexuals than is acknowledged and it is this factor that confuses and makes the unbiological view that everything is a social construct SEEM more plausible than it is. As bi sexuals WILL respond to social ideas. I have had gay friends all my life, even Broadway drag queens but I am utterly hetero SEXUAL. Men smell bad to me. Women smell and feel wonderful. And I LIKE women too, very much (my best friend Ariane was lesbian who loved me but not sexually, which I got, after failing to seduce her. She became my 'sister' and she told me her relationship to me had been more long lasting than any of her romances. I don't find men sexy and I find the idea of kissing a man revolting but that is MY problem if I do not like something, not some else's wrongness. I LOVE my gay friends as brothers but I don't want to kiss or fuck them. The only thing I reject are those trans folk who undergo surgery to escape our societies bigotries but are themselves part of that bigotry (think ex Bruce Jenner). One of my friends did an operation but now regrets it AS I had warned him he would. Let 'feminine men be and masculine women too. They ARE natural. I see doing these operations as an abuse of science for power and money not healing, nevertheless there is NO excuse to treat others badly accept in self defense just as with violence. You and I have more in common as human beings and that is what matters to me. Peace and love to you!
@Vlad Drakul "I can't be homophobic, my friends are gay!" Also, no one is forcing you to kiss or like other men if you don't want to. The LGBT community simply wants to be normalized, not treated like taboo.
Doesn't that mean that every sexual orientation is "normal". It all depends on what your definition of normal is. Purely going off the numbers, heterosexuality blows everything else out of the water, but that doesn't mean the other orientations are unnatural.
@@Lyendith And, if it does, has the characteristic of "normal" any value by itself? Should we prioritize a group over others just because it's the "normal"?
A HUGE part of the problem of the "normalization" of social categorization - or anything in general - is that nothing is really "normal" to begin with. The word "normal" is like everything else, subjective. When the vast majority of people talk about doing things that are "normal" or adhering to the "normal" way of life or thinking, they are imposing a fixed ideal that has been for far too long become commonly accepted, which in turn represses the need for more evolved thinking and progressive action. They tend to think of "abnormal" as anything that contradicts a way of life or thinking to which they have been too long accustomed and/or conformed to, and therefore many things that challenge what is often referred to as the "status quo" are viewed as an aberration and/or a threat to that fixed pattern. The real aberration/threat is the fixed state of "normality" to which the vast majority is expected to follow/obey at the expense of a far more evolved state of thinking and living.
Yeah, I mean like, I'm into women sexually and not men, and so what, right? it seems to me that anyone who gets all wound up about that, as if anyone who isn't into what they're into and are into something that they aren't (because it's "wrong"), might be protesting too much... If you know who you are and aren't desperately trying to be something you're "supposed" to be, it's a lot easier to exist in a world in which there are all other sorts of people.
@Dmitry Terek cool joke, but I'm going to use it to get nerdy. A class does not exist as a thing in itself; it is a social relation. The class of capitalist - owner of means of production, extractor of surplus value from labor - only exists in relation to the class of worker - who must sell labor-power to a capitalist for a wage in order to survive. Analogous to the classes of slaveowner and slave, feudal lord and serf, etc. Thus, it is not possible to abolish a *single* class; instead, it is to transform the structure of society as a whole such that those socio-economic power divisions no longer exist at all.
Complicated issue. For instance, various European cultures would have Pederasty not due to legitimate sexual attraction but more due to power dynamics and establishing authority, which I wouldn’t want to lump together with homosexuality as there’s a difference between the two. (Ie genuine attraction vs establishing dominance) There is some evidence to suggest most humans are bisexual to varying degrees, especially women, but most will primarily be attracted to the opposite sex in order to reproduce and spread their genes, as an evolutionary mechanism. Exceptions exist, like asexuality and homosexuality, but romantic and sexual relationships between those of opposite sexes would be the primary of those relationships through most of human history just because people need to have children to continue the species.
While I agree, I don’t think the common instances of there being attraction in those pederasty relationships can be waved away either as there where times where that was clearly the case
He explicitly does not lump homosexuality in with Pedrasty. He calls attention to how those were different, and makes a point that homosexuality is a social invention of the 19th century
Bridget McConaughy Never claimed he did but it’s an association often made so I thought I’d address it more in-depth Also “invention” is a misnomer. A more accurate word would be “classification,” and it’s where you begin to see a shift away from the idea that homosexuality as a choice to the more scientifically accurate idea that it tends to be an involuntary aspect that you can’t change nor control.
@@Le-cp9tr My apologies, when you stated " I wouldn’t want to lump together with homosexuality as there’s a difference between the two" I interpreted it to be a critique of the video. Thank you for clarifying what you mean.
Hey, a cooperation with Step Back. I really liked that you gave him the space in your channel which is considerably bigger. As a fan of both i was really excited with these videos. And it's a very contentious topic, which i think is very brave of both of you. Awesome video, seriously.
It doesnt have to be normal 🤦♂️ you can be accepted and not be normal. We should strive for that mindset. Quite frankly, it's not normal. It's a statistical minority. That's ok. We should be able to say "that's ok". Why cant we? Why is "not normal" treated as synonymous with "not good"? I'm not normal. That doesnt mean I'm not good. That's ok.
I think what his trying to say is that categories based on sexual orientation is a modern invention. Although, I do question some of his specifics, I do think he has a point at least generally speaking.
You miss one point about anal sex. For centuries it was used in hetero sex as a form of contraception. That was why anal sex was not associated with gay men. For decades after contraception became easily available, there was a sharp decline in the number of hetero couples in the Western world having anal sex. It was not until the internet and the ready availability of porn that the number started to rise again. There is also the broader question that could be asked of many civilisations: was homosexuality tolerated because it was the means of avoiding hetero sex outside of marriage and procreation.
There is another question avoided altogether: is there a connection between the societies that ban homosexuality and imperialism, either in the form of nations that seek to conquer others or religions that seek to increase the number of believers?
I don't really agree with JBA as "revelation". I think many people watch it or talk about it because it was pushed to be a meme. People has short attention span and JBA is flashy, it has good production and mature content. It's amazing how much they can milk the same one meme over and over and people still are tuning for it. It's funny when you consider that they tried to create new meme with their latest season and it died (the one where they dance while torturing the guy and sun is melting his brain through eye or whatever it was).
Sexual orientation is like food, they are certain foods that we like and they are certain foods that we don't like for example they are people who don't like tomatoes.
I dont get why mammal is wrong to use about our class within the animal kingdom. I cant think of a single mammal that doesnt produce milk for their young.
@@CynicalHistorian Maybe it is politically loaded in America and not the rest of the world? I just cant wrap my head around how it is politically loaded. I mean maybe it was created with certain political intentions in mind?
@@CynicalHistorian O I see. Well does it actually need to change? Im kinda "conservative" when it comes to changing words, maybe because Im influenced by my mother tongue (Danish language) and words has historical connections in the way they are written and pronounced. For example we have "borrowed" the word Mayonnaise by pronouncing it differently. A Dane can be looking at the word and immidiately see that it is a borrowed word from French.
That quote in the intro makes me think of how as children, boys almost exclusively hang around with other boys (and vice versa). While we don't think much of it (and even discourage it ), perhaps the ancient Greeks considered it a virtue.
Normal and natural aren't the same thing. When most people think 'normal', they think 'what is most common'. And in that sense, heterosexuality is the most common. Because that's how babies are made. The issue is when someone tries to condemn other sexualities for this, which is wrong.
It's like Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy says don't Panic, bring a Towel, and holding your Thumb out long Enough will eventually bring about a Sweet Reward
You should do a video on the history of re-enactments. I heard that civil war re-enactments started before the actual conflict was over. Soldiers would stage Re creations of different battles with snowballs or so I’ve heard. Another video topic that I think would be interesting would be on Holocuast denial (or genocide denial in general) yes, such a topic would cause a shit show of a comment section but I’m curious as to how this “trend” first started. Please don’t take this as a “you must do these videos because one fan on a comment section said so” but rather just potential ideas. Keep up the great work
Atun-Shei Films Hmmm, Atun-Shei Films? The name sounds familiar Isn’t he that one chap who once said he shat his pants after seeing the battle of the bastards? There are rumors he has a gay crush on Brandon F too. Yes I know you, keep up the fantastic work as well.
it took me a tiny bit longer than I thought, and I thought it would be almost immediately, to see something truly bad but yeah. Are my expectations a smidge lower than they should be or is youtube very slightly better?
It seems my comment disappeared for some reason, so I guess I’ll have to re-post again... I don’t understand why people have to over-complicate this. You’re either attracted to the opposite sex, the same sex, both, or neither. I agree with the title. Heterosexuality isn’t “natural”, whatever that means. Homosexuality and bisexuality exist in nature, that is a fact, and anyone who argues that has no place in intellectual discussion. But then I saw where the rest of this was going, and... Cypher, I’m going to have to disagree with you here. I just think whether it’s a social construct or not is the realm of biology, not sociology. And stuff like this also gives the type of people who say that raising kids a certain way makes them gay ammo. It’s not a matter of heterosexuality or homosexuality not existing, it’s a matter of society interpreting them differently. Just because ancient societies had different names for them or perceived them differently doesn’t mean they didn’t exist. If there was a society where no one differentiated between skiing and snowboarding but the sport of one sliding down a snow-covered hill using boards on your feet still happens, that doesn’t mean that skiing and snowboarding didn’t exist. It just means they considered it the same thing. Not to mention, modern does not equal invented. Our modern understanding has changed also due to advances in understanding our world. History proves nothing here. It just shows that society throughout history has had different interpretations of it.
UA-cam seems to be censoring this comment section. I can see the original comment in my list, but can't click on it. Normally that means it's been flagged for review. But your original is not in my review box
The Cynical Historian I’m glad you’re willing to discuss this, Cypher. Weird, I swear I saw it show up, someone even gave it a thumbs up... See the examples I cited of a theoretical culture that doesn’t differentiate between skiing and snowboarding. What they’re doing is still skiing or snowboarding, one cannot do both. A better example though might be that just because at one point it was thought that various diseases were caused by imbalance of humors, that does not mean that health is a social construct because modern medicine is, well, modern. Or if in a certain society, no one batted an eye if someone was deaf and had no word for “deaf”, a deaf person is still deaf; i.e. they still cannot hear. Just because at various points in history same-sex attraction existed and was openly expressed does not mean that the state of being attracted to the opposite or same sex wasn’t a thing. It was always a thing. Human biology is not bendable. If it was that’s basically saying stuff like telling a lesbian “You just haven’t found the right man yet!” has validity to it. Even if you’re looking at something through different windows, it doesn’t change that you’re still looking at the same thing. Also, there’s another commenter which highlighted sources which serve as a counterpoint to some of the points said here. I just need to find it though.
The Cynical Historian So basically what I’m trying to say is that homosexuality, heterosexuality, bisexuality/pansexuality, and asexuality have always existed biologically. It’s just that at different points in history people didn’t necessarily make a big deal of it or the distinctions, and didn’t have the modern scientific knowledge we do. Humans are still animals at the end of the day. This mind over matter stuff has no place in studies that should be in the realm of biology.
Based on what was said, I believe a quick summary of sexuality would be, "It's complicated" because most topics with a history this rich are always complicated (history of lawmaking, warfare, rights and freedom, religion, etc.). Simplifying them isn't easy, and how they're simplified depends on the person. Have you done your research? It may be easier to condense it in a way anyone could understand. Haven't done the research? Well, the facts will have to be checked because some things were omitted or glossed over. Also, based on this video, the word "normal" suggests that it's somewhat symptomatic of social constructs. Not only has it been applied to what is considered common for a specific culture, the history of cultures clashing the world over suggest that the term doesn't really mean much. What a culture considers normal is likely to be unnatural or foreign to another and vice versa, especially if those outside said culture lack the desire to learn the customs.
I'd really like to see a study or essay on how the Victorian Age redefined so many things in such a way that came to be taken for granted by the 20th Century. A lot of how we view the world was invented in Victorian times, and we have largely viewed the past through a Victorian lens. It wasn't the only age that redefined things, but I think it was a profound age of inventing and reifying ideas about the world.
I've said it before and I'll say it again. The human brain is the most complex thing in existence and it was built from scratch by trial and error by an idiot, the best thing you can say about it is that most of the time it works fine. Nothing with neurological and psychological aspects to it will ever be neat, easy or accurately describable in less than a thousand words. Biology is complicated, people are complicated, societies are complicated, life is complicated.
Talking about the emergence of homosexual identity and not even mentioning my boy Karl Heinrich Ulrichs or how his approach to sexuality often included aspects of gender fluidity.
Usually you’re political perspective and mine clash but I generally enjoy hearing the history. There is a substantial overlap in our experiences and I served in afghanistan as an infantry marine and I am currently in graduate school. However, this video gets into a realm I know a great deal about and I believe you are butchering. Sexuality is objectively not a social construct. To begin with you start by describing how elites in previous societies should be used as an example for those societies. Do you sincerely believe that actors and writers and politicians in the current era truly represent the view or sexual proclivities of the average person in the us? So it is a mistake to believe that simply because the elites are having weird sexual adventures that that was true for the rest of the population. Further, in order to make the claim that sexuality is a social construct there would have to be no biological link to stereotypic sexual behaviors. Unfortunately for you, there is not only a link but a causality. Current studies demonstrate an ability to force mice that would traditionally only mount female mice to start mounting other male mice by altering the activity of microglia (neuron support cells) in the brain during development. Although many poop poop on the notion that mice studies are translatable, these same ideas can be seen in numerous case studies in humans. I find it in poor form for an academic to make such a claim from a historical perspective only to spend zero time understanding the scientific evidence. There is clearly a lot of places in the developmental cycle where sexuality predicting events can be altered to produce a plurality of sexualities however these are exceedingly rare both in the human world as well as in the animal kingdom. Finally, you ignore all potential changes in humans due to evolution. It is completely possible that teens in antiquity had fully developed brains by 14 which is different than current humans. You have clearly misrepresented human sexuality and it is disappointing to see someone spread anti scientific beliefs.
Madeleine Takam I may have been unclear. I am in full support that there is a plurality if sexuality but this is purely biologically based. Not socially constructed as is argued. The classic example is of David Reimer. During circumcision his penis was burned off. During this time psychologists believed in the blank slate hypothesis of human psychological development. In keeping with this theory, they decided to raise the child as a girl because his penis could not be saved. Year and year of trying to convince this child that he was a girl proved fruitless. The child ultimately reverted to assuming a masculine identity and seeking sexual interaction with women. During development in the womb, there are various masculinizing Hormonal influences that appear to be irreversible. You may argue that the hormonal influences may vary and there is biology to back that up but to state that sexuality is a social construct is bad antiscientific perspective. I really do hope you respond with more evidence to your point because I am open to having my mind changed.
@@mattis2489 To my understanding Cypher wasn't arguing that sexual/romantic preferences were constructed, but that the categorizations we're so used to using to describe them are. If you told Plato that based on his writings you think he was bisexual, he wouldn't have understood it because to him it was normalized that men can have sexual relations with men while also being married and producing offspring. The gay/straight division would have sounded completely alien to him, because the Greeks didn't classify people that way. Also I'm fairly convinced that evolution of the brain takes more than 2300 years to show visible change.
@Oxtocoatl I watched the video too, and I agree with Scott here. Cypher seems to be denying the categories themselves, not just that they were called differently.
Out of interest, how do we know that Linnaeus was trying to push breastfeeding, rather than observing that mammals have mammary glands in contrast to other organisms?
@@CynicalHistorian Thank you. I will see if I can find a copy. Considering the topic of your thesis, I was thinking you might enjoy reading a book called "A Fiery and Furious People" by James Sharpe.
My main problem with people describing things as "just a social construct" is that you could basically argue anything described in human words is a "social construct." It's not particularly scientific. Heterosexuality, Homosexuality, Bisexuality, etc, are specific words that use to simply describe particular things, that being tastes. On normality, the number I see floating around is that around 4-5% of the population being LGBT so yes by technicality heterosexuality is typical and by definition "normal"
sexuality is very odd, biology a fact, however people will always confuse to two to suit their own narrative. Just be who you are, attraction is as bizarre as sexuality.
how do you do your hair curl also your content is p dang sweet thank you for uploading it but legit i have never seen hair do that before what are you doing what are your secrets
I agree with the video, but it is an educated opinion, not "facts". While some of the downvoters are surely butt-hurt angry folks, there are also some that just do not agree with his conclusions. You trying to dismiss all opposition as triggered, and claiming this opinion is a fact, is a large part of why it is difficult to have constructive discourse that people can grow from. You may be supporting an opinion I agree with, but you're doing it all wrong. Human sexuality is a very complex issue that has no simple answer or facts to look at. The data is highly contradictory, meaning there is no "one truth for all". Stop being a part of the problem, if you can't help just stay out of the way and try not to make it worse.
Mammary glands and milk are the defining evolutionary characteristic of mammals, after they diverged from birds and reptiles. I’m not sure about the political point you’re making, but I think it’s misleading to say that the name was chosen because of a fad. It’s clearly a logical biological choice just like how vertabrata is named after having vertebrae.
Except, they aren't quite that. There are other biological traits that are just as defining marks of that diverging point as the mammary glads. Moreover, the common ancestors to mammals - at a point they already were distinct from the branch of evolution that led to modern reptiles and birds - those being the synapsids, share many traits with modern mammals, but not always the mammary glands. In fact, the temporal fenestra (a skull feature we mammals have) is a much more relevant mark of divergence from the rest of the chordates. The choice of the mammary glands as the defining characteristic is, yes, in part due to the fact they are one of many traits that can mark the distinction, don't get me wrong; however, claiming that choosing that specifically was a deliberate choice to emphasize breastfeeding is nowhere near as absurd as you're painting it to be.
@@henriquepacheco7473 Show me a primary source of Linnaeus saying he named it after breasts to promote breastfeeding, or you have no evidence of the claim and this is retroactive way to inject gender politics into science where it doesn’t belong.
I'm not against having politics in history--that's where it should be explained in vivid context--but I prefer to learn about it as it occured in that timeframe and not how barbaric it is compared to now. Politics and history can be a entertaining combo.
@@allgodsnomasters2822 more or less. I'm just against modern standards and politics being shoe-horned in. But the politics of the time can be very interesting.
I like this video my guy, my only comment is that I always viewed heterosexuality as the normal one because that's the one that can continue the species. If that makes sense?
@@friendlywobbly9903 All my original comment stated was that I thought heterosexuality was the norm because it was the one that continued the species out of being gay and straight.
I agree with your broader point that there's no such thing as "normal" when it comes to human sexuality, and that gender, sexuality, race, etc. are socially constructed. But here's where I have to start adding caveats to the extent of my agreement. "Natural" does have meaning outside what we socially construct. And we can try to look outside of the layers of our recorded history to understand what "natural" might mean. To the extent that human sexuality has biological factors causing it (and it does), it is natural, as in... from/of nature. And this becomes even more obvious when we look at the thousands of non-human animal species that also have male-on-male or female-on-female sex. And this isn't even scratching the surface of the complex sexual activity of even our closest evolutionary relatives. (Yes, looking at our evolutionary family tree offers clues as to what "natural" human sexuality could be like.) This is not, of course, to say it is *purely* biological. Like the full spectrum of human genders, human sexuality may have strong biological causative factors, but biology interacts and is influenced strongly by the environment. (Which is why we now look not solely to genetics, but to epigenetics for biological components to answers to questions about ourselves.) And for a species as complicated as us, our environment definitely includes our socially constructed cultures. Which is why, unsurprisingly, so much of how we understand gender and sexuality is socially, historically constructed. But my point is that it is meaningful to discuss whether something is "natural" outside of anything we've constructed. Look to science and to natural history.
10:59 that’s... not how kingdoms work. There aren’t “various animal kingdoms”, animals are a kingdom, along with plants, fungi, archaea, protists, and another one I forget the name of that contains non-Archean bacteria.
Your thumbnail says ‘natural’ but your title says ‘normal’. They are different words that mean different things and you should be careful to not conflate them. Natural means occurring in nature. There is no doubt that homosexuality occurs in nature. But normal just means average and the average person is straight even if homosexuality is becoming more common today. So both homosexuality and heterosexuality are ‘natural’ but only heterosexuality is ‘normal’.
I think the use of scare quotes is meant to signal how the two words are used interchangeably by those who insist that only one kind of sexuality is "normal"/"natural". But also, your premise is incorrect because "heterosexuality" as we understand and define it today is only "normal" in our time and place, and not throughout human history, as one would understand by watching this here video. The idea itself is relatively modern.
@@dwc1964 the video shows how homosexuality is natural, as in that it's natural for humans being homosexual, however in history the normal was being heterosexual, since they are the majority not only for humans but also any other mammal species.
@@totagamefull No, he explicitly mentions that in history heterosexual is not normal because the concept is a 19th century invention. Ergo in Ancient Greece, Heterosexuality is not normal, because they do not have a concept for it.
@@BillyOfOrange the "term" was invented in the XIX century, but it doesn't mean that it wasn't the norm (China and Persia for example was for norm heterosexual, as well as all mammals that exist), to say that heterosexuality wasn't the norm is the same to say that no object was affected by inertia before isaac newton discovered it and created the term.
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Somehow this remains monetized, but it's probably from tweaking the name/metadata of the video, so only temporary. Thanks for watching, and please consider supporting the channel by buying merch: teespring.com/stores/the-cynical-historian
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See following replies for corrections and additional info, but first, here are some related videos to check out:
Tristan's video: ua-cam.com/video/4IWvGhlRiIY/v-deo.html
5:40 - Bronze Age archaeology: ua-cam.com/video/xSDn0HSXjgo/v-deo.html
8:00 - Cal Gold Rush: ua-cam.com/video/W1dmyx6LBKA/v-deo.html
8:10 - The Novitiate: ua-cam.com/video/sixkn-tderM/v-deo.html
14:45 - About Joan Scott's type of history: ua-cam.com/video/IK-Qechh_Ec/v-deo.html
*references and errors*
*errata*
10:45 - mammals are a class, kingdom is the next taxonomic rank above that (thx CambrianPinniped)
*Bibliography*
Judith C. Brown, _Immodest Acts: The Life of a Lesbian Nun in Renaissance Italy_ (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1986). amzn.to/2Zy6w4O
Louis Compton, _Homosexuality and Civilization_ (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2003). amzn.to/2T1qQcj
Jack Drescher, “Out of DSM: Depathologizing Homosexuality,” _Behavioral Science_ 5, no. 4 (December 2015): 565-575.
Michel Foucault, _The History of Sexuality, Volume I: An Introduction,_ trans. Robert Hurley, new edition (1978; New York: Random House, 1990). amzn.to/2T3eNv7
Susan Lee Johnson, _Roaring Camp: The Social World of the California Gold Rush_ (New York: W.W. Norton, 2000). amzn.to/2NEFcMC
Maria Elena Martinez, “Sex and the Colonial Archive: The Case of ‘Mariano’ Aguilera,” _Hispanic American Historical Review_ 66, no. 3 (August 2016): 421-443.
Mary Poovey, _Making a Social Body: British Cultural Formation, 1830-1864_ (Chicago, Ill.: The University of Chicago Press, 1995). amzn.to/2YJgoao
Joan Wallach Scott, _Gender and the Politics of History_ (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999). amzn.to/2Zx31vc
Joan Wallach Scott, “Gender: A Useful Category of Historical Analysis,” _American Historical Review_ 91, no. 5 (December 1986): 1053-1075.
Joan Wallach Scott, "History in Crisis? The Other's Side of the Story," _American Historical Review_ 94, no. 3 (June 1989): 680-692.
@@CynicalHistorian If it does get de-monetised, sue. Because it was interrupted THREE FECKING TIMES by adverts
Where's the promised list of sources?
How are you connecting on the thread that has it? Look at the third comment
Drapetomania was the "medical" "illness" wherein a slave would want to run away from their master.
Reminds me of the Supreme court case in Germany, where they decided, that fleeing prison can't be made illegal, cause seeking freedom is natural.
(That is the reason why prison break isn't illegal in Germany. Of course you still have to serve your time, but the act of seeking freedom doesn't increase your sentence.)
@@TBFSJjunior Plus you probably commit other crimes, while escaping prison. Like damage of property.
@@TheMissileHappy
Yes and no.
In a classic prison break you are right.
The case that was in front of the court was different if I remember correctly.
In Germany at the end of your prison time you can get "vacation" from prison. Spend time with the family over a weekend. Or find a job and work outside of prison 9 to 5, but you have to be at the prison on time etc.
One of the guys being "on vacation" didn't come back. He didn't break any other laws.
@@Samrules888
No the earth isn't flat.
Stop claiming so!
@@Samrules888 That's not a real thing. I have to imagine it's isolated to the most fringe of fringe groups.
Nobody realistic feels like that.
That said, I'm a straight guy who really wants to date a lesbian buddy of mine.
The amount of people misunderstanding the title or being triggered that lgbt people have always existed is unsurprising but hilarious.
Every society that places more wieght in its minorties. Will eventualy face revolution.
@@namenloss730 mexican revoltion, hatian revolution, 1848.
@@coastalcapybara You can click the gear, go to subtitles, click "Add subtitles," type in "Russian," and you can translate.
@@namenloss730 not indians, mestizos and criollos, but yes, they were the majority
@@timvanrijn8239 an attempt at sounding intellectual, while lacking any actual knowledge or careful thought!
"Having sex with women is gay." - Plato, probably
Saint Paul says the same thing, sans the "with women."
Mark Hoover LOL
"Sexuality is complicated"
Haha...yeah!
*worringly looking at the hentai folder*
Futa, yes
@@teslashark i think gender bender is more what they're talking about.
the japanese have created everything under the sun as hentai... including infantophilia, zoophilia, necrophilia etc etc.... it shows something about humanity that most humans are unwilling to accept.
@@teslashark gross
I think it's important to keep in mind that eg in ancient Greece acceptable sexual behavior wasn't so much determined by the "sexes" of the partners, but by their role: Being "active", the one who penetrates, or "passive",the one who is penetrated. Adult men were not supposed to be the passive partner, younger men and boys were still "allowed" to take on the part "of the woman". This also informs how same-sex ... sex was seen between men of the same age: For adult men being the passive part was ostracized, being the active one wasn't. Slaves and metics were generally able to prostitute themselves as bottoms without much social repercussions (though they obviously didn't have a high social standing anyway). Same-sex relations between young men or teenagers, though by no means as encouraged as pederasty, seem to have mostly been tolerated independent on who was "the bottom" and who was "the top".
@@ShinigamiInuyasha777 where are you from?
Plus Spartan women had to jump through hoops to get their husbands to make love to them they would have to shave their heads bald and wear boys clothes and have sex in a dark room to trick the men who were always used to having sex with males. Also lesbian sex was encouraged between spartan women since they were equal and strong compared to the men.
So Its basically monkey politics in action. Looks like Franz de Waal was right. But we also had to adress an elephant in the room. Its the fact that said monkeys, having homosexual behaviour, still procreated. Thus, sexuality is more than "just social construct", just as it is more that a "procreation instinct". So author of the video is factually wrong.
Same in Rome as well. Many high ranking Roman officials (and I believe some emperors as well) were in same-sex sexual relationships without any loss of social status, but only because they were the active/dominant role.
Meanwhile, if they had been submissive in heterosexual relationships (being pegged, for example), they would have experienced a similar loss in social status to subbing for a guy.
Angry frogs: “Keep politics out of my history”
Historians: “History = politics (of the past)”
Angry frogs: * visibly angry and confused noises*
is that what happened in frogs? i only read clouds
Well there are other parts of history outside of politics as well, but it's always finding its way into everything.
fyi our kingdom is Animalia, Mammalia is the class ;)
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Order: Mammalia
Class: Primates
@@sleekoduck Order and class are reversed.
There's a quote I like to use every now and then, "Heterosexuality and homosexuality are modern day inventions."
Way to tackle this subject!
Thank you for plugging his channel in his videos!
Hello mr. Beat!
if the internet has taught me anything about sex, it's just never stops being weird
WHAT? I'LL HAVE YOU KNOW
*ANGRY MOTH NOISES*
I've met people at parties who've unironically argued that homosexuality isn't "natural", while wearing synthetic garments and drinking beer out of an aluminum can.
And they probably also think penguins and koalas are all natural as well.
Cypher: "I'm sure this is going to get demonitiz..."
Ad: INTRUPT!
Bro... I'm literally procrastinating a school assignment about the symposium by watching this video and it's the first thing he mentions
I always say that looking at other cultures in different time periods is the best way to get an understanding of the true variety of human behaviour. Thanks for taking on a task I’m not sure I’ll ever be brave enough to do though.
Don't sell yourself short, so far ur videos have been pretty awesome
Ktamb 2007 thank you :)
Qwerty im an african history channel so i already skirt the edges of getting backlash from certain elements. Would rather not tip the scales.
Variety can amount to the mixing of tares and wheat. Comes the harvest, you don’t want the tares baked into the bread.
@@januarysson5633 idk if the video says otherwise, but i havent seen it in a bit.
So Plato composed What is love?
don't hurt me
no more
he had a way ...
@@dwc1964 You won internet today!
@@PobortzaPl thanks! just riffing on @Julian G's OP - credit where it's due
Great video. Damn, should have included a boom cover trade joke in my recent video about Yankee sailors... oh well
I want a video on the Union Navy please
i love it when historians say something that people dont like because you see the true colors of those people fast
Leigh Foulkes is your favorite movie perhaps Scanners?
it actually shows the color of historians most of the time
I still don't get what he's trying to say in this video
You sure do. These types are videos show you who are really freedom loving patriots and who are really authoritarians and theocrats.
@@j.2512 No it doesn't. It shows the true colors of the triggered commenters.
I am... skeptical of your claim that the category Mammalia was named as a means of pushing for breast feeding rather than a reference to one of it's defining physical traits.
Linnaeus was known to have believed that it was unhealthy for babies to drink milk not from their mother's. However, it is true that lactation is one of the more defining characteristics of mammals.
that's understandable. but i advise you to actually look for yourself. i remember hearing from an paleonthologist who was talking abt how they make pictures of extinct animals from fossils that there are other characteristics are exclusive to mammals, such as eyelids or fur. you can tell if an animal is a mammal or not by the shape or its skull, no need to see if it has mammal glands. so idk if any of the distinct characteristics we have are as ubiquitous and easily observable as breastfeeding but either way, i think ch's point still stands that there were other motives behind that name
@@d.o.m.i.
This is especially true when you consider the synapsids, commonly held to be the predecessor to all mammals. If you instead focus on other considerations, they could very reasonably be considered the same class as mammals, except that from what we know, they lack mammary glands. Many taxonomists now consider all mammals synapsids but the same doesn't work the other way around and because of this deference to this "old traditional" form of taxonomy, with now have a nauseating amount of subdivisions of taxonomic ranks including super- and infra- divisions of most categories as well as new internal division such as clades which can be placed between every such subdivision and can then also be subdivided.
Tldr: Taxonomy is an unfortunately backwards part of biology bogged down in semantics and really should be reconfigured in a major way to account for more recent developments.
Come on man, he’s trying to form a narrative here
Now Hamlet's "Get thee to a nunnery" comment makes sense. I always thought it was strange way of saying brothel, as all my teachers said.
Fun fact, the class mammalia in German is called "Säugetier," which literally translates to "sucking animal," also referring to breast feeding.
The video is awesome by the way. I definitely learned a lot and will probably refer to it a few times as I forget details.
I read to sucking animal and my mind went straight to a different place. I was about to think germans were VERY dirty. I mean breastfeeding can also be dirty but that's not usually the way it's thought of.
another fun fact: mammalia comes from the latin word mammare which also means sucking ... so not really that different. Also the mammary glands is the scientific term for the breasts of humans and all other mammals. It may surprise you, but that's why we call our mothers mama, mom, or mummy ... it comes from sucking. all of it.
@@vayman666 Very cool, although I'd debate the 'etmomogy' there; some psychologists speculate that mom is mom because M is one of the first letters infants are able to produce, since mom has mostly Ms in many different unrelated languages.
Same in georgian "ძუძუმწოვარი" literaly means someone (something) that eats out of breasts.
Mammals wasn't political, It was descriptive. Giver of milk is the distinctive facet of the three types of mammals that exist
I was hoping to find someone making this point. The etymology of the word is very clear and since all mammals must have mammary glands (two don't even have teats!) it doesn't have anything to do with encouraging breast feeding. I would love to see a source for this claim, because I couldn't find it and seems odd.
@@Michael-Willis are mammary glands the only unique characteristic? I thought giving birth to live young was also one, though I could be wrong. Anyway, I think the insinuation is that choosing mammary glands as the defining characteristic when there are other unique identifiers was politically influenced at least (assuming there are other unique identifiers).
@@0oShwavyo0 Not all mammals give birth to live young, since the monotremes lay eggs. Linnaeus didn't know about monotremes though, so he could've made that the characteristic (although there are other animals with live birth as well which he might've known about). However, mammals are also distinguished by their hair, and also by the fact that some of their jaw bones have shrunken down to fit inside the ear. It is thus not out of the question that Linnaeus picked breastfeeding as the defining trait of mammals because men at the time saw it as a somewhat primitive function which females of all mammal species clearly shared. Since it was controversial to list humans as mammals, Linnaeus likely wanted to pick something everyone would know linked humans and other mammals.
@@Michael-Willis Two articles I found on Linnaeus's motivations: daily.jstor.org/the-gender-politics-behind-why-were-mammals/
fromshanklin.wordpress.com/2013/08/30/linnaeus-and-the-breast/
The take of ancient Rome on homosexuality was completely different from the Greek one: To Roman society sex was less about gender and more about dominance and submission. For a Roman male it was considered unmanly to be in a relationship that put him in a position of being submissive, e.g. getting penetrated. So it was socially acceptable to have sexual relationships with any group of people considered submissive/powerless - women, slaves or infames, that is, people who had been stripped of their legal standing - but not acceptable to have one with another free Roman male.
Homosexuality for females was generally frowned upon because to the Romans' understanding it would necessarily mean that one of them would have to take the active/dominant part, which was considered indecent.
Well said. You know your stuff. Unfortunately not to many do.
It reminds me of that time everyone was making fun of some important Roman guy for being a bottom.
Broke: Only heterosexuality is normal and natural.
Woke: All sexualities are normal and found in nature.
Bespoke: SEXUALITY IS A SOCIAL CONSTRUCT AND YOU'RE A FREAK.
Jokes aside, loved the video.
Baroque: society is a sexual construct
Society lives in us
@@varangiangaming7178 Society is right inside you and you need to get it out using sexual constructs.
And no not Frey but Theory
@@mrwalkway4740 maybe society are friends we find along the way
"Talking about sexuality, there's a LOT of things to imagine!"
S-stop looking at me like that, Cypher. 😳
Did Plato at the beginning just give the "It's actually LESS gay if it's a Femboy!" argument??
Good video. I hate topics like this, but it's good to learn your history and facts. This video was digestible and understandable for a guy like me who just wants to grill.
I think we just don't have enough conclusive research yet to say for certain what the "Cause" of sexuality is.
I'm willing to bet that it's influenced by all 3 big factors: Biological, Social, and Environmental. And the balance of those is probably different in different cases.
I think you're right that sexuality is probably more fluid than many modern-day activists (On both the Right and the Left) would like to believe it to be. But I would hesitate to discard biological factors, or even just random chance/personality, as causes of legitimate sexual preference differences.
Personally, I grew up with zero access to any "gay culture." There were no "gay role models" in my life, and nobody I knew was gay. There were no options for sex with my friends who were boys. Everybody just assumed I was straight because that's what everyone else was. And I assumed that, too, because "straight" sexuality was pushed on me from every angle in society. I even had "girlfriends" in middle school and even high school, because I didn't even entertain the possibility that I was gay.
But now, looking back, I realize that I never once really wanted to have sex with a woman. I've always, subconsciously, found men more attractive. I had just chalked these feelings up to "Confusion" or "Coincidence," when they happened, rather than treating them for what they were: A hint at my innate sexual preference.
If sexuality were "Merely" a social construct, I would have turned out to be a straight man. I was raised in every capacity to be a straight man. The society around me was purely heterosexual, and opportunities for straight sex were abundant, while opportunities for gay sex were ENTIRELY non-existent.
But, still, I don't like women that much. I never really have. I like men, a lot more, and I have since I was fairly young.
So... yeah, I don't buy your thesis that sexuality is entirely a "Social construct," if that is what you're trying to say. I think for some, maybe many people it may be, but for some people it is a truly innate part of their personality, rather than a response to social pressures or sexual opportunities.
I don't think he's saying that sexuality, or rather who we are attracted to romatically, emotionally, and sexually, its self is a social construct. He is saying that how we think about it and talk about it is. And being openly LGBTQ used to be a lot more common and it is perfectly common.
Very well said and I believe it to be the truth. Indeed the whole simplified myth that everything in society is formed by social pressure and ideas is the old which came first, the chicken or the egg thing. As you say different forces are indeed in play but the truth as far as I can see it is that there are more bisexuals than is acknowledged and it is this factor that confuses and makes the unbiological view that everything is a social construct SEEM more plausible than it is. As bi sexuals WILL respond to social ideas. I have had gay friends all my life, even Broadway drag queens but I am utterly hetero SEXUAL. Men smell bad to me. Women smell and feel wonderful. And I LIKE women too, very much (my best friend Ariane was lesbian who loved me but not sexually, which I got, after failing to seduce her. She became my 'sister' and she told me her relationship to me had been more long lasting than any of her romances. I don't find men sexy and I find the idea of kissing a man revolting but that is MY problem if I do not like something, not some else's wrongness. I LOVE my gay friends as brothers but I don't want to kiss or fuck them. The only thing I reject are those trans folk who undergo surgery to escape our societies bigotries but are themselves part of that bigotry (think ex Bruce Jenner). One of my friends did an operation but now regrets it AS I had warned him he would. Let 'feminine men be and masculine women too. They ARE natural. I see doing these operations as an abuse of science for power and money not healing, nevertheless there is NO excuse to treat others badly accept in self defense just as with violence. You and I have more in common as human beings and that is what matters to me. Peace and love to you!
@Vlad Drakul "I can't be homophobic, my friends are gay!"
Also, no one is forcing you to kiss or like other men if you don't want to. The LGBT community simply wants to be normalized, not treated like taboo.
In Polish mamals are called "saki" (which means "suckers") because they suck milk.
Doesn't that mean that every sexual orientation is "normal". It all depends on what your definition of normal is. Purely going off the numbers, heterosexuality blows everything else out of the water, but that doesn't mean the other orientations are unnatural.
I like to compare that to being right-/left-handed/ambidextrous. The last two are obviously the minority, but does that make them "abnormal"?
@@Lyendith And, if it does, has the characteristic of "normal" any value by itself? Should we prioritize a group over others just because it's the "normal"?
Don't tell Ben Shapiro this. He might call you anti-Semitic
McMurray How're ya now HA
Oy Vey my foreskin
He might do an interview with a conservative commentator about it and storm out of the interview after calling everyone a leftist.
Ben Shapiro DESTROYS my childhood and hentai collection WITH FACTS and LOGIC
Or any nonbinary twitter account and Dave Cullen aka Computing Forever
A HUGE part of the problem of the "normalization" of social categorization - or anything in general - is that nothing is really "normal" to begin with. The word "normal" is like everything else, subjective. When the vast majority of people talk about doing things that are "normal" or adhering to the "normal" way of life or thinking, they are imposing a fixed ideal that has been for far too long become commonly accepted, which in turn represses the need for more evolved thinking and progressive action. They tend to think of "abnormal" as anything that contradicts a way of life or thinking to which they have been too long accustomed and/or conformed to, and therefore many things that challenge what is often referred to as the "status quo" are viewed as an aberration and/or a threat to that fixed pattern. The real aberration/threat is the fixed state of "normality" to which the vast majority is expected to follow/obey at the expense of a far more evolved state of thinking and living.
Wow, so much butthurt in this comment section. Like I’m straight, but I’m secure enough in my sexuality to not feel attacked by historical facts
Yeah, I mean like, I'm into women sexually and not men, and so what, right? it seems to me that anyone who gets all wound up about that, as if anyone who isn't into what they're into and are into something that they aren't (because it's "wrong"), might be protesting too much... If you know who you are and aren't desperately trying to be something you're "supposed" to be, it's a lot easier to exist in a world in which there are all other sorts of people.
@Dmitry Terek I'm a class abolitionist. Down with non-consensual power dynamics!
@Dmitry Terek cool joke, but I'm going to use it to get nerdy. A class does not exist as a thing in itself; it is a social relation. The class of capitalist - owner of means of production, extractor of surplus value from labor - only exists in relation to the class of worker - who must sell labor-power to a capitalist for a wage in order to survive. Analogous to the classes of slaveowner and slave, feudal lord and serf, etc.
Thus, it is not possible to abolish a *single* class; instead, it is to transform the structure of society as a whole such that those socio-economic power divisions no longer exist at all.
Dmitry Terek you’re an idiot
@@dwc1964 wait, is that three arrows as your pfp.
Good job comrade!
Complicated issue. For instance, various European cultures would have Pederasty not due to legitimate sexual attraction but more due to power dynamics and establishing authority, which I wouldn’t want to lump together with homosexuality as there’s a difference between the two. (Ie genuine attraction vs establishing dominance)
There is some evidence to suggest most humans are bisexual to varying degrees, especially women, but most will primarily be attracted to the opposite sex in order to reproduce and spread their genes, as an evolutionary mechanism. Exceptions exist, like asexuality and homosexuality, but romantic and sexual relationships between those of opposite sexes would be the primary of those relationships through most of human history just because people need to have children to continue the species.
You summary is really precise well done.
While I agree, I don’t think the common instances of there being attraction in those pederasty relationships can be waved away either as there where times where that was clearly the case
He explicitly does not lump homosexuality in with Pedrasty. He calls attention to how those were different, and makes a point that homosexuality is a social invention of the 19th century
Bridget McConaughy Never claimed he did but it’s an association often made so I thought I’d address it more in-depth
Also “invention” is a misnomer. A more accurate word would be “classification,” and it’s where you begin to see a shift away from the idea that homosexuality as a choice to the more scientifically accurate idea that it tends to be an involuntary aspect that you can’t change nor control.
@@Le-cp9tr My apologies, when you stated " I wouldn’t want to lump together with homosexuality as there’s a difference between the two" I interpreted it to be a critique of the video. Thank you for clarifying what you mean.
Hey, a cooperation with Step Back. I really liked that you gave him the space in your channel which is considerably bigger. As a fan of both i was really excited with these videos. And it's a very contentious topic, which i think is very brave of both of you. Awesome video, seriously.
There is a big difference between normal and natural. Normal is a statistical term. Natural is not statistical.
It doesnt have to be normal 🤦♂️ you can be accepted and not be normal. We should strive for that mindset. Quite frankly, it's not normal. It's a statistical minority. That's ok. We should be able to say "that's ok". Why cant we? Why is "not normal" treated as synonymous with "not good"? I'm not normal. That doesnt mean I'm not good. That's ok.
I think what his trying to say is that categories based on sexual orientation is a modern invention. Although, I do question some of his specifics, I do think he has a point at least generally speaking.
You miss one point about anal sex. For centuries it was used in hetero sex as a form of contraception. That was why anal sex was not associated with gay men. For decades after contraception became easily available, there was a sharp decline in the number of hetero couples in the Western world having anal sex. It was not until the internet and the ready availability of porn that the number started to rise again. There is also the broader question that could be asked of many civilisations: was homosexuality tolerated because it was the means of avoiding hetero sex outside of marriage and procreation.
There is another question avoided altogether: is there a connection between the societies that ban homosexuality and imperialism, either in the form of nations that seek to conquer others or religions that seek to increase the number of believers?
Man the walls, The Orcs are coming!
industrial capitalist germans, where?
Let them in. Don't be Orcphobic.
@@slashbash1347 I am an Ork-sceptic not -phobic, and would appreciate if you remember that distinction, thank-you-very-much.
;)
@@PobortzaPl yeah, let the orcs have their -stakes- states, and us NORMAL humans have our own
Ofc /s so some fash doesnt respond.
@@shannon510butno.3 is there any book or game (beside The Elder Scrolls series) that considers Orcs to be not Always-Evil?
Cypher, I really respect you making quality content knowing it will be demonetized.
Thanks. Somehow, this was actually re-monetized after review, BTW
6:53 Brothers in arms in each other arms
Dont mind me. Just here before the storm comes. Good luck my friend. Nice vid tho.
6:38 Gore Vidal was a really interesting example of this fairly recently. Dude refused to call himself gay even though he was pretty well known to be.
Just coming to see the like to dislike ratio lol.
Same
Give it a minute
Yup a lot of triggered conservative snowflakes
This is why Jojo's Bizzare Adventure is such a revelation for so many young men.
@Qwerty Its a high art because its awesome \m/
IS THAT A JOJO REFERENCE
True, Dio advances the “gay agenda” far more than the “evil liberal globalists”
I don't really agree with JBA as "revelation". I think many people watch it or talk about it because it was pushed to be a meme. People has short attention span and JBA is flashy, it has good production and mature content. It's amazing how much they can milk the same one meme over and over and people still are tuning for it. It's funny when you consider that they tried to create new meme with their latest season and it died (the one where they dance while torturing the guy and sun is melting his brain through eye or whatever it was).
finally someone gives a good take on this subject. 10/10
Sexual orientation is like food, they are certain foods that we like and they are certain foods that we don't like for example they are people who don't like tomatoes.
I dont get why mammal is wrong to use about our class within the animal kingdom. I cant think of a single mammal that doesnt produce milk for their young.
politically loaded =/= wrong
@@CynicalHistorian Maybe it is politically loaded in America and not the rest of the world? I just cant wrap my head around how it is politically loaded. I mean maybe it was created with certain political intentions in mind?
@@Munchausenification you've got in the end there, yeah. It's loaded with political meaning from the 18th century
@@CynicalHistorian O I see. Well does it actually need to change? Im kinda "conservative" when it comes to changing words, maybe because Im influenced by my mother tongue (Danish language) and words has historical connections in the way they are written and pronounced. For example we have "borrowed" the word Mayonnaise by pronouncing it differently. A Dane can be looking at the word and immidiately see that it is a borrowed word from French.
Why would it need to change? Remember: politically loaded =/= wrong
That quote in the intro makes me think of how as children, boys almost exclusively hang around with other boys (and vice versa). While we don't think much of it (and even discourage it ), perhaps the ancient Greeks considered it a virtue.
Awesome video man, I really love your content. Well thought out, well researched, and well reasoned arguments.
I was wrong. THIS is your best episode.
Normal and natural aren't the same thing. When most people think 'normal', they think 'what is most common'. And in that sense, heterosexuality is the most common. Because that's how babies are made. The issue is when someone tries to condemn other sexualities for this, which is wrong.
Trey the Explainer has a really good video about sexuality in nature and how heterosexuality definitely isn't the norm in the animal kingdom.
Well there is a sexual reproduction and some homosexuality but hetero sexuality is the norm just not exclusively so.
It's like Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy says don't Panic, bring a Towel, and holding your Thumb out long Enough will eventually bring about a Sweet Reward
Thanks for covering that topic. Very insightful.
You should do a video on the history of re-enactments. I heard that civil war re-enactments started before the actual conflict was over. Soldiers would stage Re creations of different battles with snowballs or so I’ve heard.
Another video topic that I think would be interesting would be on Holocuast denial (or genocide denial in general) yes, such a topic would cause a shit show of a comment section but I’m curious as to how this “trend” first started.
Please don’t take this as a “you must do these videos because one fan on a comment section said so” but rather just potential ideas.
Keep up the great work
Hey I know you
Atun-Shei Films Hmmm, Atun-Shei Films? The name sounds familiar
Isn’t he that one chap who once said he shat his pants after seeing the battle of the bastards? There are rumors he has a gay crush on Brandon F too.
Yes I know you, keep up the fantastic work as well.
Seeing this video made me happy.
Seeing this comment section took that away from me.
it took me a tiny bit longer than I thought, and I thought it would be almost immediately, to see something truly bad but yeah. Are my expectations a smidge lower than they should be or is youtube very slightly better?
It seems my comment disappeared for some reason, so I guess I’ll have to re-post again...
I don’t understand why people have to over-complicate this. You’re either attracted to the opposite sex, the same sex, both, or neither.
I agree with the title. Heterosexuality isn’t “natural”, whatever that means. Homosexuality and bisexuality exist in nature, that is a fact, and anyone who argues that has no place in intellectual discussion. But then I saw where the rest of this was going, and... Cypher, I’m going to have to disagree with you here. I just think whether it’s a social construct or not is the realm of biology, not sociology. And stuff like this also gives the type of people who say that raising kids a certain way makes them gay ammo. It’s not a matter of heterosexuality or homosexuality not existing, it’s a matter of society interpreting them differently. Just because ancient societies had different names for them or perceived them differently doesn’t mean they didn’t exist. If there was a society where no one differentiated between skiing and snowboarding but the sport of one sliding down a snow-covered hill using boards on your feet still happens, that doesn’t mean that skiing and snowboarding didn’t exist. It just means they considered it the same thing.
Not to mention, modern does not equal invented. Our modern understanding has changed also due to advances in understanding our world. History proves nothing here. It just shows that society throughout history has had different interpretations of it.
UA-cam seems to be censoring this comment section. I can see the original comment in my list, but can't click on it. Normally that means it's been flagged for review. But your original is not in my review box
Also, if society has different interpretations, then that proves that there have been different constructions. You're contradicting yourself
The Cynical Historian I’m glad you’re willing to discuss this, Cypher.
Weird, I swear I saw it show up, someone even gave it a thumbs up...
See the examples I cited of a theoretical culture that doesn’t differentiate between skiing and snowboarding. What they’re doing is still skiing or snowboarding, one cannot do both. A better example though might be that just because at one point it was thought that various diseases were caused by imbalance of humors, that does not mean that health is a social construct because modern medicine is, well, modern. Or if in a certain society, no one batted an eye if someone was deaf and had no word for “deaf”, a deaf person is still deaf; i.e. they still cannot hear. Just because at various points in history same-sex attraction existed and was openly expressed does not mean that the state of being attracted to the opposite or same sex wasn’t a thing. It was always a thing. Human biology is not bendable. If it was that’s basically saying stuff like telling a lesbian “You just haven’t found the right man yet!” has validity to it. Even if you’re looking at something through different windows, it doesn’t change that you’re still looking at the same thing.
Also, there’s another commenter which highlighted sources which serve as a counterpoint to some of the points said here. I just need to find it though.
The Cynical Historian So basically what I’m trying to say is that homosexuality, heterosexuality, bisexuality/pansexuality, and asexuality have always existed biologically. It’s just that at different points in history people didn’t necessarily make a big deal of it or the distinctions, and didn’t have the modern scientific knowledge we do.
Humans are still animals at the end of the day. This mind over matter stuff has no place in studies that should be in the realm of biology.
@@wannabehistorian371 those categories are themselves interpretations though. That's the whole point of the Foucault part of this video
Based on what was said, I believe a quick summary of sexuality would be, "It's complicated" because most topics with a history this rich are always complicated (history of lawmaking, warfare, rights and freedom, religion, etc.). Simplifying them isn't easy, and how they're simplified depends on the person. Have you done your research? It may be easier to condense it in a way anyone could understand. Haven't done the research? Well, the facts will have to be checked because some things were omitted or glossed over.
Also, based on this video, the word "normal" suggests that it's somewhat symptomatic of social constructs. Not only has it been applied to what is considered common for a specific culture, the history of cultures clashing the world over suggest that the term doesn't really mean much. What a culture considers normal is likely to be unnatural or foreign to another and vice versa, especially if those outside said culture lack the desire to learn the customs.
8:06 lesbian nuns were a thing ? I guessing now there is a porn of that
rule 34
I'd really like to see a study or essay on how the Victorian Age redefined so many things in such a way that came to be taken for granted by the 20th Century. A lot of how we view the world was invented in Victorian times, and we have largely viewed the past through a Victorian lens. It wasn't the only age that redefined things, but I think it was a profound age of inventing and reifying ideas about the world.
Don’t tell Ben Shapiro about this...
He might tantrum off the set again
I've said it before and I'll say it again. The human brain is the most complex thing in existence and it was built from scratch by trial and error by an idiot, the best thing you can say about it is that most of the time it works fine. Nothing with neurological and psychological aspects to it will ever be neat, easy or accurately describable in less than a thousand words. Biology is complicated, people are complicated, societies are complicated, life is complicated.
I think you are all misunderstanding what the title of the video means
Very interesting video! I've always wondered why it isn't covered that much in school because it's a really interesting subject.
The title is perfect because it probably gets the people who need it the most to watch it, yet it isn't a lie at all
Talking about the emergence of homosexual identity and not even mentioning my boy Karl Heinrich Ulrichs or how his approach to sexuality often included aspects of gender fluidity.
Usually you’re political perspective and mine clash but I generally enjoy hearing the history. There is a substantial overlap in our experiences and I served in afghanistan as an infantry marine and I am currently in graduate school. However, this video gets into a realm I know a great deal about and I believe you are butchering. Sexuality is objectively not a social construct. To begin with you start by describing how elites in previous societies should be used as an example for those societies. Do you sincerely believe that actors and writers and politicians in the current era truly represent the view or sexual proclivities of the average person in the us? So it is a mistake to believe that simply because the elites are having weird sexual adventures that that was true for the rest of the population. Further, in order to make the claim that sexuality is a social construct there would have to be no biological link to stereotypic sexual behaviors. Unfortunately for you, there is not only a link but a causality. Current studies demonstrate an ability to force mice that would traditionally only mount female mice to start mounting other male mice by altering the activity of microglia (neuron support cells) in the brain during development. Although many poop poop on the notion that mice studies are translatable, these same ideas can be seen in numerous case studies in humans. I find it in poor form for an academic to make such a claim from a historical perspective only to spend zero time understanding the scientific evidence. There is clearly a lot of places in the developmental cycle where sexuality predicting events can be altered to produce a plurality of sexualities however these are exceedingly rare both in the human world as well as in the animal kingdom. Finally, you ignore all potential changes in humans due to evolution. It is completely possible that teens in antiquity had fully developed brains by 14 which is different than current humans. You have clearly misrepresented human sexuality and it is disappointing to see someone spread anti scientific beliefs.
ok boomer
450 species do homosexuality
Madeleine Takam I may have been unclear. I am in full support that there is a plurality if sexuality but this is purely biologically based. Not socially constructed as is argued. The classic example is of David Reimer. During circumcision his penis was burned off. During this time psychologists believed in the blank slate hypothesis of human psychological development. In keeping with this theory, they decided to raise the child as a girl because his penis could not be saved. Year and year of trying to convince this child that he was a girl proved fruitless. The child ultimately reverted to assuming a masculine identity and seeking sexual interaction with women. During development in the womb, there are various masculinizing Hormonal influences that appear to be irreversible. You may argue that the hormonal influences may vary and there is biology to back that up but to state that sexuality is a social construct is bad antiscientific perspective. I really do hope you respond with more evidence to your point because I am open to having my mind changed.
@@mattis2489 To my understanding Cypher wasn't arguing that sexual/romantic preferences were constructed, but that the categorizations we're so used to using to describe them are. If you told Plato that based on his writings you think he was bisexual, he wouldn't have understood it because to him it was normalized that men can have sexual relations with men while also being married and producing offspring. The gay/straight division would have sounded completely alien to him, because the Greeks didn't classify people that way.
Also I'm fairly convinced that evolution of the brain takes more than 2300 years to show visible change.
@Oxtocoatl
I watched the video too, and I agree with Scott here. Cypher seems to be denying the categories themselves, not just that they were called differently.
Thank you!!!! But a lot of people are SO not ready to have this convo!!! Keep it up 🖤🖤
Thanks for doing this and trying your best to explain it. I and many others in the world are grateful for you bringing up/explaining this concept
This video is amazing! Thank you so much for making this!
Out of interest, how do we know that Linnaeus was trying to push breastfeeding, rather than observing that mammals have mammary glands in contrast to other organisms?
There's a book called "natures body," linked in the references that lays out the argument in far greater detail
@@CynicalHistorian Thank you. I will see if I can find a copy. Considering the topic of your thesis, I was thinking you might enjoy reading a book called "A Fiery and Furious People" by James Sharpe.
Well, I like that you use Bodoni.
You're the first to say anything about it since i started using it two years ago. Quite a historical font
I'm sorry, but hasn't mothers breastfeeding their own children been pretty normal outside of the rich elite and maybe *very* close knit communities?
Biology kinda does though if we're being perfectly honest. That isnt to say normal is necessarily better however.
My main problem with people describing things as "just a social construct" is that you could basically argue anything described in human words is a "social construct."
It's not particularly scientific.
Heterosexuality, Homosexuality, Bisexuality, etc, are specific words that use to simply describe particular things, that being tastes.
On normality, the number I see floating around is that around 4-5% of the population being LGBT so yes by technicality heterosexuality is typical and by definition "normal"
11:06 “childs” lol
you're the first to point that mistake out
Tristan sent me here. Good video! ⭐️
Alas, 3 years later and white America is under mass hysteria about sexuality
is black America tolerant towards LGBT as a whole?
Most pushback against homosexuallity comes from black amaricans. Stop lying about things that are so easy to Google.
Another great video man!
sexuality is very odd, biology a fact, however people will always confuse to two to suit their own narrative. Just be who you are, attraction is as bizarre as sexuality.
Based video
*Oh boy, here comes the Kenny Logins Soundtrack....* 🤣😹
how do you do your hair curl also your content is p dang sweet thank you for uploading it but legit i have never seen hair do that before what are you doing what are your secrets
Someone is hiding in a closet and his names rhymes with clinical Nestorian.
I didn't know Nestorians could be clinical, LOL
all those downvoters are so triggered...but facts don't care about their feelings
I agree with the video, but it is an educated opinion, not "facts".
While some of the downvoters are surely butt-hurt angry folks, there are also some that just do not agree with his conclusions.
You trying to dismiss all opposition as triggered, and claiming this opinion is a fact, is a large part of why it is difficult to have constructive discourse that people can grow from.
You may be supporting an opinion I agree with, but you're doing it all wrong. Human sexuality is a very complex issue that has no simple answer or facts to look at. The data is highly contradictory, meaning there is no "one truth for all".
Stop being a part of the problem, if you can't help just stay out of the way and try not to make it worse.
Mammary glands and milk are the defining evolutionary characteristic of mammals, after they diverged from birds and reptiles. I’m not sure about the political point you’re making, but I think it’s misleading to say that the name was chosen because of a fad. It’s clearly a logical biological choice just like how vertabrata is named after having vertebrae.
Except, they aren't quite that. There are other biological traits that are just as defining marks of that diverging point as the mammary glads. Moreover, the common ancestors to mammals - at a point they already were distinct from the branch of evolution that led to modern reptiles and birds - those being the synapsids, share many traits with modern mammals, but not always the mammary glands. In fact, the temporal fenestra (a skull feature we mammals have) is a much more relevant mark of divergence from the rest of the chordates. The choice of the mammary glands as the defining characteristic is, yes, in part due to the fact they are one of many traits that can mark the distinction, don't get me wrong; however, claiming that choosing that specifically was a deliberate choice to emphasize breastfeeding is nowhere near as absurd as you're painting it to be.
@@henriquepacheco7473 Show me a primary source of Linnaeus saying he named it after breasts to promote breastfeeding, or you have no evidence of the claim and this is retroactive way to inject gender politics into science where it doesn’t belong.
11:20 or could it be that nipples are actually one of the most distinct features that all mammals share?
not all mammals have nipples, and nipples are just modified sweat glands.
People did things they weren't biologically designed to do? Who would've thought.
[Asmodeus is pleased]
I'm not against having politics in history--that's where it should be explained in vivid context--but I prefer to learn about it as it occured in that timeframe and not how barbaric it is compared to now. Politics and history can be a entertaining combo.
History is just old politics
@@allgodsnomasters2822 more or less. I'm just against modern standards and politics being shoe-horned in. But the politics of the time can be very interesting.
For people saying you only have sex to reproduce, do you not have sex for fun? Cause I'm not trying to have a kid, I'm trying to have fun.
If not mammary glands, what would you distinguish our class by?
I like this video my guy, my only comment is that I always viewed heterosexuality as the normal one because that's the one that can continue the species. If that makes sense?
bisexuality can continue the species
@@friendlywobbly9903 but not homosexuality.
@@kaiserwilhelmii674 your comment implied that heterosexuality was the only one. Don't change the goalpost
@@kaiserwilhelmii674 and yes, homosexuality can result in offspring by donors or people willing to impregnate/carry
@@friendlywobbly9903 All my original comment stated was that I thought heterosexuality was the norm because it was the one that continued the species out of being gay and straight.
I agree with your broader point that there's no such thing as "normal" when it comes to human sexuality, and that gender, sexuality, race, etc. are socially constructed. But here's where I have to start adding caveats to the extent of my agreement.
"Natural" does have meaning outside what we socially construct. And we can try to look outside of the layers of our recorded history to understand what "natural" might mean. To the extent that human sexuality has biological factors causing it (and it does), it is natural, as in... from/of nature. And this becomes even more obvious when we look at the thousands of non-human animal species that also have male-on-male or female-on-female sex. And this isn't even scratching the surface of the complex sexual activity of even our closest evolutionary relatives. (Yes, looking at our evolutionary family tree offers clues as to what "natural" human sexuality could be like.)
This is not, of course, to say it is *purely* biological. Like the full spectrum of human genders, human sexuality may have strong biological causative factors, but biology interacts and is influenced strongly by the environment. (Which is why we now look not solely to genetics, but to epigenetics for biological components to answers to questions about ourselves.) And for a species as complicated as us, our environment definitely includes our socially constructed cultures. Which is why, unsurprisingly, so much of how we understand gender and sexuality is socially, historically constructed.
But my point is that it is meaningful to discuss whether something is "natural" outside of anything we've constructed. Look to science and to natural history.
10:59 that’s... not how kingdoms work. There aren’t “various animal kingdoms”, animals are a kingdom, along with plants, fungi, archaea, protists, and another one I forget the name of that contains non-Archean bacteria.
His errata already corrects that
I thought mammals were called mammals because the young were breastfed by their mothers.
I'm home now. Thank you. Philadelphia USA
14:25
Let me timestamp that for you.
Your thumbnail says ‘natural’ but your title says ‘normal’. They are different words that mean different things and you should be careful to not conflate them.
Natural means occurring in nature. There is no doubt that homosexuality occurs in nature. But normal just means average and the average person is straight even if homosexuality is becoming more common today. So both homosexuality and heterosexuality are ‘natural’ but only heterosexuality is ‘normal’.
Normal for animals, normal for humans, or normal for humans in a specific time period?
I think the use of scare quotes is meant to signal how the two words are used interchangeably by those who insist that only one kind of sexuality is "normal"/"natural".
But also, your premise is incorrect because "heterosexuality" as we understand and define it today is only "normal" in our time and place, and not throughout human history, as one would understand by watching this here video. The idea itself is relatively modern.
@@dwc1964 the video shows how homosexuality is natural, as in that it's natural for humans being homosexual, however in history the normal was being heterosexual, since they are the majority not only for humans but also any other mammal species.
@@totagamefull No, he explicitly mentions that in history heterosexual is not normal because the concept is a 19th century invention. Ergo in Ancient Greece, Heterosexuality is not normal, because they do not have a concept for it.
@@BillyOfOrange the "term" was invented in the XIX century, but it doesn't mean that it wasn't the norm (China and Persia for example was for norm heterosexual, as well as all mammals that exist), to say that heterosexuality wasn't the norm is the same to say that no object was affected by inertia before isaac newton discovered it and created the term.