Saturday, April 5, 2014

I was born this way.






I doubt very many people are unfamiliar with this expression.  Originally associated with the LGBT community, this sentence has been more recently immortalized by Lady Gaga to become the slogan for all things marginalized and scrutinized by society.  It has become the argument that has the ability not only to validate the individual who uses it, but also to justify whatever actions that individual chooses to associate with it.  At this point, I must take great care to clarify: this blog is NOT an attack on the LGBT community.  I do, however, believe that the specific phrase “I was born this way” represents a thought process that makes little actual sense when closely analyzed.  Whatever your walk of life, my hope is that this assessment will not appear as an appeal to discard your beliefs but rather an appeal to discard nonsensical mindsets.

A few years ago (2006), a movie was released called “Happy Feet” about a cute little counter-cultural penguin who danced instead of sang and changed his penguin community forever.  I remember very clearly going to see it and sitting in the movie theater going “WTF?” The story started out simple.  It portrayed a penguin who discovered he had a natural gift of dancing.  Only one problem: the expected skillset of every penguin in order to promote procreation was the ability to sing.  The mating thing should have tipped me off.  Instead, I watched with the assumption that they were going with the age-old plot synopsis of individuality versus status quo; peer pressure driven conformity versus artistic uniqueness.  As it turns out, the plot followed that design to a “T” until a very specific part in the film where the penguin returns home.  All of a sudden, he is confronting his estranged father who is ashamed of him and blames himself for his son’s condition.  Before you can say “this seems strangely familiar”, the Elijah Wood-voiced symbol of 21st century youth drops the line “I was born this way.”  Now, before you jump down my throat, my first reaction wasn’t disgust or even sarcasm (Impressive, considering I was still a fundamentalist at the time).  My reaction was confusion.  Why (other than the obvious reason) would they use this line here?  What does it matter if the penguin danced because he was born that way or because he wanted to?  Either way, he was good at it and he was still facing a community that disapproved of dancing no matter why he did it.  In the context of the movie’s plot, there was absolutely no reason for him to NEED to be born that way.  Similarly, his statement that he was born that way should not have made any difference in the conversation.  It is ironic that a movie with a plot that was written in part to defend this argument ended up demonstrating how pointless it actually is to the discussion.  In the end, the community of penguins was still faced with whether or not to accept the penguin and his dancing (wherever it came from) and the movie ends with what could either be called a traditional scenario of acceptance and support or a hilariously ironic demonstration of the duality of pluralism.



Why am I talking about this?  Where is any of this going?  Everywhere, apparently.  Until Lady Gaga, This phrase was an isolated concept used mostly to defend homosexuality from ignorant conservative and fundamentalist criticism.  In more recent years, however, it has emerged not as an apologetic excuse, but as a victorious battle cry for anyone who considers themselves mistreated, misunderstood, or judged in any way.  Just a few weeks ago, I ran into this statement in a very unfamiliar place.  I came across a post by an atheist group asking the question “Why are you an atheist?” I read the first 100 replies and tallied the reasons given.  To my surprise, “I was born this way” showed up as an answer more than ten percent of the time  (here's the guy who said it first).  The ironic thing about it is that, the more popular this idea becomes, the more it demonstrates that its only relevance was and is where it began; as a defense against fundamentalist attacks on the LGBT community.  Before it was widely used, all that homosexuals could hope to achieve was acceptance for their feelings and/ or possibly their actions.  This was a hope that was impossible to realize given the very specific opinions of judeo-christian influenced Americans who viewed homosexuals as people who willingly made “wrong” lifestyle choices and were responsible to “God” for them.  With the introduction and almost universal acceptance of the “I was born this way” argument, acceptance for action was no longer what was being demanded.  It was now acceptance of existence.  The argument elevated the LGBT subject to one of civil rights, demanding the same consideration as racism and sexism.  Not only do I believe this shift was necessary, given the high level of homophobia and violence against the gay community that has plagued our culture for years, I also believe it was very smart.  It enabled clear, unquestionable, unapproachable lines to be drawn; lines one does not dare cross, lest he/she be considered presumptuous and offensive.  Arguing the existence of LGBT people rather than the existence of any sort of “lifestyle” has enabled laws to be made to not only protect against discriminatory violence but also to afford privileges that have thus far been withheld from such individuals.  “I was born this way” stopped fundamentalists in their tracks with a double whammy. Not only could they not accuse this statement of not being true without it turning into a he said/ she said, God said/ science said argument, they could also now not judge any related actions take by such individuals, as they should be allowed to act on who they are just like any other individual.  In the original context which it was used, the argument worked wonderfully.

Unfortunately, there are two main flaws with the statement “I was born this way”. The first is that it is irrelevant outside of its original context.  Think about it.  We live in an increasingly secular society.  The only way the argument has any sway is when it is directed at those who would disagree with it and use their disagreement as an argument. Besides the conservatives and fundamentalists, No one cares.  It doesn’t matter if you were born this way, you chose to live this way, or aliens planted the thoughts in your brains telepathically. What is on the table is whether or not to accept and support such individuals and/ or their lifestyles.  Furthermore, conservatives and fundamentalists don’t have a problem with choice, they have a problem with what they consider to be any “alternate lifestyle” no matter what it says about itself.  You can tell them you were born this way as many times as you want and they may or may not believe it.  It won’t, however, change their mind about the subject anymore than saying “It’s my body” or “It’s not a life” has changed their views on abortion.  What needs to be decided is not the nature of certain individuals/ groups and their rights, but rather the nature of the government that presides over them and what/who guides its decision-making.  It is this conflict which will resolve all others, for better or worse. 
 
The second and more important flaw in the statement “I was born this way” is that it doesn’t actually work as an argument.  Again, think about it.  The point being made is that the individual entered this world already in that state, supposedly justifying that individuals’ actions which are based off of that state.  Funny thing is, there is no other instance where this argument is beneficial.  If the first flaw could be summed up with the question “Who cares?”, the second half of that would have to be “So what?”  Nowhere else in society do we allow “I was born this way” to be used as an excuse, much less a validation.  I’ll give you an example.  I was born with a double hernia which, due to the timing of my birth, was not discovered until I was about three years old.  At that age, I developed the inability to perform certain basic functions due to extreme pain.  Upon examining me and observing my abdominal wall, do you think the doctor at any point said “you’re on the right track, baby, you were born this way”?  Absolutely not.  I was born deformed; a state I was never intended (by God or evolution) to be in.  “I was born this way” says three separate things between the lines.  First, it assumes you were supposed to be born that way.  It also assumes you are supposed to stay that way indefinitely.  Finally, it conveniently does not clarify which original states of birth it is referring to. You cannot pick and choose based on society’s current fixations.  Are you going to tell all of the mentally handicapped people of the world not to strive for at least a fraction of the privilege given those around them because they were born that way?  Careful.  These are examples of people born genetically different, sometimes simply with a predisposition to these conditions, much like the recent research on certain forms of sexuality that is being submitted to support this argument. What sets apart one “born this way” from another?  


Since when have nature and nurture been allowed to dictate someone’s potential, much less their true nature? What about those who have rejected the way they were born?  The world is full of stories about individuals who were born without arms and grew up to design and drive cars and play the piano (like this guy). I doubt you will find many inspirational stories involving people looking at the camera and saying “I was born this way, so I can’t do as much”.  Rather, we as people have a tendency to praise those individuals who accomplished wonders IN SPITE of being “born that way”.  We don’t applaud those who are born different than society expects when they embrace their differences and do nothing, we applaud when they challenge and overcome them and even use them to their advantage.  Oh, and just so you don’t think I’m being a crouching tiger, hidden bible about this, what about socially? How does the argument “I was born this way” help the millions of people in this world who are dying almost as quick as they can be born due to their geographic location, their tribe, or their class?  If you saw a child wandering outside the slums of Cairo looking for food and you took pity on him and gave him some money, would you be annoyed if he told you he wanted to use it to go to school instead of buy food for his village?  After all, he was born this way.  Technically, we were all born without any self sufficiency or education.  Should we not strive for anything else?  The longer and harder you look at that phrase, the more it unravels.  The truth is, we have no idea what we mean when we say it, and even if we did, every possible meaning is flawed. Genetically, mentally, socially, the argument does not CONSISTENTLY apply to ANY of them.  Just because you were born a certain way doesn’t necessarily mean you were supposed to be or that you were supposed to stay that way.  One more thought to roll around: I wonder if transexuals appreciate the argument “I was born this way.” Does not their whole existence revolve around the argument “I WASN’T supposed to be born this way?”  

Since we have seen that the mindset of “I was born this way” doesn’t stand up to scrutiny on pretty much any level, Where do we go from here?  Am I trying to secretly convert the reader to a certain point of view by leaving them with no options?  Certainly not. I merely propose that we discard the phrase.  For those of you who are secular in nature, consider not how you were born but how you desire/ were meant to be.  Regardless of the source of your individuality, who you decide you are must be respected by others as much as they would expect it from you. You don’t have to be born that way to be true to yourself. To those of you who think spiritually, again consider not how you were born, but how you were created/ designed to be. These options are not just mere semantics.  They invoke a personal level to the argument, which allows for more consistency.  After all, no one can reasonably argue that you are not how you were meant to be without calling their own identity into question.  I do realize that the replacement phraseology I have proposed all but nullifies the political progress made by “I was born this way.” Just because an argument works in politics, however, does not mean that it actually makes sense, much less possess the ability to guide your life.  I doubt anyone will argue with me there.


Josh Levenhagen

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