Even in this twenty-first century, there are myths about homosexuality, whether it is in a political venue, social venue, cultural venue, or any other aspect of one's life. Cultural biases seem to be evident in almost every realm in our society. This is perhaps because of lack of education on the subject, or rather an evident ignorance on gender specific roles and stipulations put upon people because "that's the way it has always been." Until we become a society educated in all aspects and walks of life, we will always have prejudices, laws, and myths hindering us as a city, state, nation, or world to accelerate. Homosexuality has and still is to some degree a taboo subject. Many different views and myths about how, why, what, and who homosexuals are have been clearly evident and voiced throughout history. Different cultures view homosexuality in extremely different ways. The rights of openly gay and lesbian individuals are slowly becoming equal to those of heterosexual citizens of the United States. In this paper, I will focus on five issues that I found most important. The first aspect I focus on is homosexuality as a biological trait; the second point is how homosexuality is viewed by people of faith or with religious backgrounds; the third issue is that of gays in the military; the fourth topic expands on homosexual couple's and their right to adopt children; the fifth and final issue focuses on the right of kids in school to have extracurricular activities for homosexual students.
The issue of homosexuality as a biological trait rather than an environmental trait has long been debated. I have heard many of my peers speak that they always knew from the beginning that they were homosexual. Some would hide because of the unacceptance; some were brave enough to take the ridicule from early on. In Corvino's book, some explanations of homosexuality being a biological trait rather than an environmental trait are addressed.
