Making a choice

Ellis Thorpe seems to want to say that gay people choose to be gay. He writes (Letters, September 2): “Innate explanations of human conduct are deeply ­ideological because they deny what is uniquely human – the ability to choose.”

In general, actions are things we can choose, but feelings are not. I can choose to meet you at the station, but I cannot choose to be delighted to see you. I can choose to pretend to be delighted to see you, but that is to choose to act in a certain way and is not the same as actually choosing to have feelings of delight.

When it comes to sexuality, one can choose to engage in ­sexual acts or not, but one cannot choose the sexual feelings one ­experiences.

Elsewhere in his letter, Mr Thorpe says: “Today, to be openly gay, straight or both is because of a cultural shift in morality and the law.” He appears to be confusing what causes a person to experience same-sex attraction with those factors (the “cultural shift”) that make it relatively easy for gay people to act on their gay feelings. These are not at all the same.

PAUL BROWNSEY

Larchfield Road

Bearsden, Glasgow