What do existentialists think of homosexual/gender compulsions?
Posted: Fri Mar 17, 2023 12:54 pm
Existentialists like Sartre taught that "existence precedes essence"- meaning that people do not really have an essence, or true nature; that we are free to make any decisions we wish at any time. Such freedom is so radical that many of us don't want to face it. It gives us a "sense of vertigo" when in those rare moments we see the full extent of that freedom. Anyone who makes any claims that some option is not open to them because of appeals to some supposed inner essence or nature is acting in "bad faith". It is just an excuse.
"What is vertigo for Sartre? Vertigo is the realization of the totality of our freedom. And the realization of the totality of our freedom is necessarily related to the recognition of the fragility of our freedom. In other words, at any second I could decide to end my own existence. I have the absolute freedom to do so if I so wanted. And that is what makes the vertigo moment so unhinging. I realize I am in complete control of my life. That also means I can choose to end my life at any moment. Freedom includes the freedom to end freedom."
hesiodscorner.wordpress.com
Sartre: Vertigo (On the Fragility of Freedom)
One of the most famous sections in Sartre’s Being and Nothingness is his commentary over the moment of vertigo—dramatized with a person on the edge of cliffside looking down to his death below or h…
hesiodscorner.wordpress.com hesiodscorner.wordpress.com
But one of the arguments we hear from homosexuals is that they never chose to be homosexuals (or transgender, etc...). This seems to suggest that there is an inner compulsion, an inner nature, which makes them adapt that lifestyle. They do not have the freedom to choose their actions because it is part of the essence of who they are. To use existentialist terminology, their essence precedes their existence.
Is this, from an existentialist's perspective, acting in a sort of Sartrian "bad faith"? Any existentialists out there? How would Sartre, or any existentialist, respond to that claim by the homosexual?
"What is vertigo for Sartre? Vertigo is the realization of the totality of our freedom. And the realization of the totality of our freedom is necessarily related to the recognition of the fragility of our freedom. In other words, at any second I could decide to end my own existence. I have the absolute freedom to do so if I so wanted. And that is what makes the vertigo moment so unhinging. I realize I am in complete control of my life. That also means I can choose to end my life at any moment. Freedom includes the freedom to end freedom."
hesiodscorner.wordpress.com
Sartre: Vertigo (On the Fragility of Freedom)
One of the most famous sections in Sartre’s Being and Nothingness is his commentary over the moment of vertigo—dramatized with a person on the edge of cliffside looking down to his death below or h…
hesiodscorner.wordpress.com hesiodscorner.wordpress.com
But one of the arguments we hear from homosexuals is that they never chose to be homosexuals (or transgender, etc...). This seems to suggest that there is an inner compulsion, an inner nature, which makes them adapt that lifestyle. They do not have the freedom to choose their actions because it is part of the essence of who they are. To use existentialist terminology, their essence precedes their existence.
Is this, from an existentialist's perspective, acting in a sort of Sartrian "bad faith"? Any existentialists out there? How would Sartre, or any existentialist, respond to that claim by the homosexual?