Homosexuality & Diabetes: An Unspoken Likeness

As someone who tries to live a healthy, organic lifestyle, I have noticed more and more that in our culture today one is allowed to say things about people’s eating and fitness habits that you would never get away with saying when it comes to their sexual habits.

Take diabetes, for example. Diabetes is a too-common affliction in America today. But even if you disagree with what the following people say, what is interesting is that they are saying these things with no scolding from the usual suspects: mainstream media powers, grandstanding politicians and airheaded celebrities, et al. Nobody is calling these people bigots or haters or anything of the sort. And, in fact, there is a lot of truth in what they have to say.

To start off, there are people who say they are born with a genetic predisposition to diabetes but that is being rejected as a main cause by the burgeoning natural health movement in this country today:

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The incidence of diabetes has skyrocketed in the past couple of decades, but it takes centuries for genetic drift to occur in a population. This means that the increase of diabetes in Americans is not due to changes in the genes. Instead genes are being turned on and off all the time by the environment around them. The food we eat has the greatest impact on what is turned on and off and research is showing that exercise, toxins, and stress also have strong influence.

How amazing!  We are no longer doomed to have the same diseases as our families!  But here is the catch… many families pass down their lifestyle which will in turn impact susceptible genes. So if your parents are overweight, sugar-loving, couch potatoes who have ripe gene environments for diabetes and you also love sitting around eating doughnuts and Coke, then those genes will be turned on in you too. The nurture is more important than the nature.

In other words, your genes may make you more susceptible to fall prey to diabetes but your own actions are far more meaningful.

Even trendy organic grocer Whole Foods agrees that it is human behavior that is the culprit here:

Instead of combating plagues, we are combating a mindset of complacency about health. Many people haven’t been properly educated about their health, while others still chalk up their diabetes to: “it runs in the family.” However, research shows that while people may inherit a susceptibility to diabetes, they do not inherit the disease itself—making healthy choices and prevention more important than ever.

Thus we have a large and growing group of American citizens issuing dire warnings about a serious health condition that may or may not have a genetic predisposition but is mostly caused by correctable human behavior that a leading natural health doctor says is known to increase one’s chances for an early death:

Not only does type 2 diabetes increase your overall risk of heart disease, the condition can also bring on fatal and non-fatal heart attacks, strokes and other cardiovascular events an average of 15 years earlier than in those without diabetes.

From the above we can conclude that making poor choices with one’s food appetite has dire consequences. Changes in behavior are strongly encouraged.

Note: I am not talking about overeating per se; it is the unnatural diet itself that is seen as the main problem. The decision to go against nature in one’s food choices is the crucial error. This encompasses more than mere overindulgence. Overeating is but one negative symptom of a deeper-rooted issue. Eating processed, denatured, toxic, industrialized food will have negative consequences. Overeating is seen as a result of the body not getting the nutrients it needs, thus the urge to eat and eat while never being satisfied. We have seen the fruits of a diet based around denatured food: psychosisdisease and early death. This is an argument that is very much accepted in the natural food movement.

We can say a similar thing about homosexuality. It is the unnatural sex acts themselves that are the main problem, which is why the Church calls them intrinsic evils. Like denatured food, unnatural sex acts will never fulfill a person, as they do not provide the true spiritual and unitive-physical nutrients that come with natural, heterosexual marriage. So the unfulfilled homosexual opens the door to the compulsion to overindulge as he desperately searches for the satisfaction it is impossible to find in abnormal sexual behavior. We have seen the fruits of a sexuality based around unnatural practices: psychosis, disease and early death. This is an argument one is not allowed to make in our culture today.

But imagine if there was a growing movement in this country that applied the natural food mode of thought to those who make poor choices with their sexual appetites.

These three details that we have shown are considered to be unacceptable when it comes to diabetics are never seen as a problem when it comes to homosexuals today:

1. Homosexuals claim they are indeed “born this way” and thus powerless to change “who they are.”

2. Homosexuals choose to ignore the health consequences of their actions.

3. Homosexuals are statistically more likely to die earlier than those who engage in natural sexual behavior.

Is anyone out there going to seriously attempt to argue that the sexual urge is stronger than the urge to eat?

No?

Then it is a matter of overcoming distorted appetites.

Compulsion is not “orientation.” It is weakness that needs to be overcome.

God did not intend for us to engage in homosexual acts any more than he intended us to eat toxin-laced, heavily-processed artificial “food.”

You can do both. You can have a powerful urge to do both. But that does not make it natural or right.

I have a friend who had what can only be called an addiction to Diet Coke. His compulsion was so strong he would drink a 12-pack a day. Does that mean he was born to drink Diet Coke and any attempt to overcome this unhealthy habit kept him from “being himself”?

Of course not. That’s ridiculous.

His appetite was distorted.

My friend struggled with his compulsion, made many changes in personal behavior and eventually managed to stop drinking Diet Coke (it wasn’t easy). He is a healthier person for it today. I congratulate him.

In a similar albeit admittedly more difficult vein, encouraging homosexuals to overcome unnatural compulsions that only warp and enslave them in a world of misery does not keep them from “being themselves.” Quite the opposite.

Their sexual appetites are distorted.

We are created by God to overcome obstacles, not to give into them and embrace them.

Our modern culture rejects this. It not only embraces obstacles but self-identifies with them in a truly sick way. Homosexuality, which is a form of unnatural sexual behavior, is celebrated as a lifestyle.

So it should be no surprise that diabetes, which is caused by unnatural eating behavior, is also being pushed as a lifestyle. It has its own magazine and you can even go to the American Diabetes Association website for “Dating with Diabetes” tips.

That last bit is eerily reminiscent of those “Dating with HIV” campaigns in the early days of AIDS.

Our culture today gives more attention to managing the negative consequences of unnatural behavior than we do to encouraging people to avoid the actions that led to the negative consequences in the first place.

This is a mindset that is corrosive to the health and well-being of all Americans and it has been brought about in a substantial way by the logic that accepts and promotes homosexuality.

Self-improvement is the hallmark of a healthy society. Working to become a stronger and better person mentally, physically and spiritually is the essence of what makes a productive citizen.

Our culture has chosen the weaker way. It puts a priority on empathy because it is easy and totally disavows self-improvement because it is hard.

It is a recipe for our destruction.

Editor’s note: The image above pictures Mr. Creosote from the Monty Python film “The Meaning of Life” (1983). This article, which is reprinted with permission, originally appeared on Mr. Schaeffer’s blog “White Male Punching Bag.”

Author

  • Joseph Schaeffer

    Joseph Schaeffer is the former managing editor of The Washington Times National Weekly.

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