Merriam-Webster - “Sexual Preference” is an offensive term

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Merriam-Webster dictionary updates 'sexual preference' entry after Amy Coney Barrett hearing

Are we meant to take this as crazy? Because I do see it as logical that calling it a preference can give the impression that they think that sexuality is a choice rather than an orientation. It would be like saying someone's sexual preference is big boobs and and blond hair, which is not what non hetero orientation is.

Personally I know of some individuals who are bisexual, who, by preference would prefer a partner of the opposite sex, but who would still be happy to "pull" (to be involved with a sexual relationship) with someone of the same sex as they are.

Their logic if that being bisexual increases their odds on pulling.

Although i can also understand why some who are "hardwired" to one sexual orientation may find the concept of preference as offensive.

Its a bit like saying to most people who suffer from ASD, that we have a preference of having ASD.
Which we do not, we are born with the condition or "preference" / orientation rather than choosing to have ASD.

I speak for myself in that i really wish i did not have ASD. As if i did not have ASD, i would likely be married with a job now. Which i am not, despite my academic achievements (I am educated to Degree level).

Is not most if not every “preference” sexual or not “hardwired”?

Fetishes are often cultural, more of environment and choice rather than hardwired like orientation.

Don’t you have be hardwired for something to have the culture trigger it?

The dictionary describes how phrases are used, clearly a lot of people found it offensive in this context, so I’m certainly not mad at the dictionary.

Does the term have some slightly unfortunate connotations? Yes. Is it particularly egregious? Not really.

I understand it's offensive to use "sexual preference" as a supposed synonym for "sexual orientation".
A bit like calling autism a "mental illness" - it introduces or reinforces significant, potentially harmful misconceptions.

I didn't decide one day to like diapers and if it were a choice, I would have been over it a long time ago.

Not it's not the same as LGBT because fetishist are not oppressed and the whole world doesn't need to know what you wear under your clothes or what you do in your room.

I still do not get it. To me saying I prefer chocolate over vanilla or I am oriented towered chocolate over vanilla is saying the same thing. My preference/orientation in this regard is not a choice, whether I partake in it is. Obviously avoiding ones sexual attraction and identity is much harder then avoiding a food flavor but the concept is the same.

On the practical side I can’t envision how making “sexual preference” offensive is going to stop people from believing being gay or transgender is a choice. Making the N word offensive and replacing the original term with the euphemism has not ended racism has it?

I have no problem using one's prefered terms to show respect but the whole idea that you can successfully combat social issues with euphemisms is rather absurd.
In 1990s, there was a fad of using "able differently" instead of "disabled". The effect? Schoolkids started saying "you're smart differently" for "you're dumb". To make it even funnier - in 1990s Poland, wheelchair kids were a regular sight in mainstream schools. While they had to rely on their peers to help them with ubiquitous stairs, all of those kids I know had normal social lives.

Thought, one good thing about 1990s Polish social justice warriors: they did successfully push on building ramps and lifts in public buildings.

People didn’t choose to make those things offensive - they find them offensive.

For most people there is a semantic link between “preference” and “choice”. And for many years, the idea that people choose their sexuality, or that it is a preference at all, was used to argue against gay rights. People are therefore very sensitive to suggestions that their sexuality is a choice.

I imagine very few people think saying “I found this offensive” will magically make Barrett less homophobic.

What one finds offensive is at least partially under ones ones control. Maybe not so much ones initial reaction. One can choose to decide to be offended by less things and be offended by by certain things by a lesser degree. This is not true with who one is attracted to.

I'm orientated to using my right hand. If I use my left hand, it doesn't work properly.

Ambidextrous people might prefer one or the other hand but can use both.

I have a preference for women. Some guys are nice looking. That's one eg of how someone could be bi...

Straight people and gay people have an orientation. They can't be into the other sex. No matter how much conversion therapy they're put through. If they're put though it it's damaging to them.

And in context - sexual preference is consistently used by people who are bigots and who wish to shed gay people of it. It's language from the past or from conversion therapy etc.

LGBT people say orientation. Allies say orientation. Everyone should be an ally to gay people cos that just means not being a homophobe.

That is exactly the example I was going to use, that a bi person could have a preference for one gender, while their orientation may mean they are still attracted to both. It can be a preference like preferring short hair or whether they wear gasses. It is saying that I have a preference for these traits, but perhaps I am not against an alternative.

Going back to the ice-cream example from earlier, rather than preferring chocolate, it would be like whether you be comfortable with the ice-cream, like if you are lactose intolerant. But for the record, I am fairly lactose intolerant and will often give into temptation of ice-cream and flavored milks, even if it will upset my stomach, so whatever this says in the analogy.

Kind of feel like I can run further with connecting my taste in flavored milk to how I might be at that time, maybe more of gender. Usually I will have chocolate milk, in my mind I think of it as a more masculine flavor that I would not imagine people judging. And sometimes I will have strawberry milk, which I think as more feminine, I have occasionally abstained in the past in thinking how people might judge me. And then other times I want a completely different flavor, banana flavored milk, which I think of along the lines of something separate from the binaries of the other two (non-binary). This probably doesn't really mean much, other than what I can think preference is, where I can enjoy all the flavors while maybe having a preference.

Apparently most people prefer to us their right hand, but I am just more comfortable with my left.