Sexuality as a Choice?

     While reading the Foreword of Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence, I thought I was in for another reading like Radical Feminism and Love by Ti-Grace Atkinson. It seemed to me that Rich was attacking men and heterosexual women, right off the bat. Luckily, her ideas and writing was not the intense radical feminism that I expected, and I ended up agreeing with many of her points.
     One of the first things Adrienne Rich says is that there is a widespread assumption "that women are 'innately' sexually oriented only toward men" (p. 13). For much of my life, I suppose I believed this, although it was not something that I was taught or that I voiced; it was just what I felt for myself, and what I had noticed all around me. Growing up, I did not know anyone who was homosexual, so naturally, I thought that women were attracted to men, and that men were attracted to women. After reading Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence, I do not think Rich would like me for this.
     Rich later says that this assumption is a "theoretical and political stumbling block for feminism" (p. 26). I agree with this to an extent. I agree because of what she said regarding homosexual women vs. homosexual men. I did not know that lesbians were more subject to ridicule than gay men, but based on our past readings regarding what a "true woman" is, I can understand this. A true woman has a husband. So a lesbian is in no way a true woman. I had never before realized that this would be an issue. Thus, it kind of makes me agree with Rich's statement that heterosexuality disempowers women.
     But at the same time, I do not agree with that. I think it is a bit hypocritical of Rich to say. To explain, I must say that I had trouble with her ideas of sexuality as a choice. She discusses how heterosexuality is a choice, and yet, I do not see her saying that homosexuality is a choice. So does that mean that she thinks women are innately attracted only to women? She cannot say this based on what she said about the assumption that women are innately attracted to men. I just do not believe that sexuality is as much of a choice as she claims. I just think that it is something innate in each individual. So she cannot say that women, as a whole, are attracted to any one group. Going back to the idea that heterosexuality disempowers women, I disagree because she makes it seem that it disempowers women because of the women.
     I am still a bit unsure of how I feel about this article as a whole. While I think it had some great points, I do not think it was complete. I felt as though Rich was only considering one side of things.  However, I do think that, as a whole, society does need to move toward a new way of think so that heterosexuality cannot be questioned for disempowering women and that any sexuality is accepted.