MovieChat Forums > Chasing Amy (1997) Discussion > Her sexual orientation bothers me

Her sexual orientation bothers me

posted 11 years ago by New_malkatrazzz
22 replies | jump to latest

I was a bit bothered by her sexual orientation. She is all "I'm gay! I'm gay!" Okay, fine.

Then she is into a man. Okay fine, it happens. Sometimes orientation is a moving target.

Then she gives this whole speech about how she forgot why she became a lesbian in the first place:

Alyssa: You know, I didn't just heed what I was taught, men and women should be together, it's the natural way, that kind of thing. I'm not with you because of what family, society, life tried to instill in me from day one. The way the world is, how seldom it is that you meet that one person who just gets you - it's so rare. My parents didn't really have it. There were no examples set for me in the world of male-female relationships. And to cut oneself off from finding that person, to immediately halve your options by eliminating the possibility of finding that one person within your own gender, that just seemed stupid to me. So I didn't. But then you came along. You, the one least likely. I mean, you were a guy.
Holden: Still am.
Alyssa: And while I was falling for you I put a ceiling on that, because you were a guy. Until I remembered why I opened the door to women in the first place: to not limit the likelihood of finding that one person who'd complement me so completely. So here we are. I was thorough when I looked for you. And I feel justified lying in your arms, 'cause I got here on my own terms, and I have no question there was some place I didn't look. And for me that makes all the difference.

It's possible I'm reading too much into this, but for one thing. it seems like she chose to date women because she sat around and thought about it because it was a logical decision. Second, she thought choosing just men was going to cut her choices in half, so she opened things up. I'm not sure that sexuality is that easy to choose, but I'll go with it. If that's the case, wouldn't she be bi? I mean, if we're going to numbers, how does dating women instead of men open up your options?

It just feels like it doesn't take the issue of sexual orientation very seriously. Like, it's a choice that people make. And given this is something that homosexuals fight every day, it bothers me.

I wish I could bake a cake made out of rainbows and smiles and we'd all eat and be happy!

[–] MaximusXXX 8 years ago

She's bi. I can understand the OP's frustration but answer is she's bisexual.

Her logical rant is simply covering up any issues she has herself.

Although there are arguments made hunans are primarily bisexual and we lean one way more than the other.

[–] crypticanomaly73 8 years ago

I think she is trying to find herself and at the moment she meets him she sees herself as Gay but obviously he challenges her and she is attracted to him so she isn't as Gay as she says she is. I think she liked being with women because she felt safer with them and it gave her an exclusive community.

Sometimes a movie or tv show plot is so stupid that only the stupid can understand it.

[–] cyguration (3951) 4 years ago

It just feels like it doesn't take the issue of sexual orientation very seriously. Like, it's a choice that people make. And given this is something that homosexuals fight every day, it bothers me.

That's because it is a choice.

Men and women are typically hard-wired as gender dimorphic mammals for procreation purposes. Without the hard-wiring the human species would have died out a long time ago. The whole "biological clock" isn't just some "social construct" that Post Modernists like to throw around, it exists because women have eggs, ovulate, and most (not all) want to be pregnant as part of a biological map for human DNA, not unlike many other animals.

However, that map is developed over time and it can change and be influenced by environmental stimuli.

This comes back to the original discussion about choice.

You can't be born homosexual because it's physiologically impossible.

The organs in humans that allow us to perceive sexuality aren't developed for sexual attraction until puberty. The gonads secrete hormones that creates the neurotransmitters, which connect our neurological perception of attraction/sexuality with our gonadal functions. Babies aren't born with these hormones, and the neurotransmitters aren't activated for perceptual attraction unless stimulated, which can occur before puberty, usually found in cases of childhood abuse or molestation (there's a study that also found ties to this, but it's difficult to find on Google. You can find it on Yippy/Yandex, though).

In essence, the "fight every day" line relates to cases of (mostly) gay men fighting urges that may have been disoriented due to some experiences, potential medicines,r injections, drugs, or even some kind of hereditary trait that alters neurological functions when nurtured or stimulated over time. It's why even in majority gay societies (such as San Francisco) homosexuals still have higher rates of depression and substance abuse than heterosexuals.