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There have been studies made, research done and people deliberately searched for the "gay gene", and they never found it.
Before the gay community began insisting, "we're just born this way", the common consensus by psychologists and psychiatrists was that sexual orientation was a learned process.
Many psychologists still maintain that most sexual deviations are due to a fault in the learned process of what the individual is sexually attracted to. For instance fetishes like nurse outfits etc, right through to people who are only turned on by a bicycle saddle. These 'kinks' are usually explained by misplaced sexual attraction due to a childhood incident or incidents.
Somewhere along the line this way of thinking became politically incorrect to be associated with homosexuality, to the extent the American Psychological Association reclassified homosexuality so it was no longer a mental illness. There was no science involved in this decision, they just changed the description of what was a mental illness so that homosexuality didn't qualify and in doing so also ruled paedophilia as not being a mental illness.
I believe we are all born with a clean slate. We can argue this until the end of time, but no one can prove that this is wrong.
IMO everything we experience during all of the upbringing process influences the way we end up. Sure there are different actual medical abnormalities that may effect a person's development, but I am not talking about diseases or birth defects, etc.
Basically the world we live in shapes us. I don't see any other way.
I think it can be acquired but I also believe there is something in our dna or genes that controls what sex arouses us. It's like in middle school or high school when you started getting erections for no apparent reason.
Are you saying you can train your brain to get aroused only when a man is around? I don't think that's so. Again, there are circumstances for every argument but I think for the main part this is something in the chemical make up of a person that can't be controlled.
No, I am saying what arouses you or shapes your orientation is the result of the experiences that shaped your upbringing. There is nothing right or wrong about this, and there is no one thing or another that causes one result or another - it is arbitrary for everyone. But once all these "things" line up for each person you go one way or another (for lack of a better way to say it).
So are you saying raised by gay parents will result in the child being gay? Because I don't agree. I have several friends who have gay parents and are straight. I believe more people with straight parents are the ones with gay children.
MH0825 wrote: I think it can be acquired but I also believe there is something in our dna or genes that controls what sex arouses us. It's like in middle school or high school when you started getting erections for no apparent reason.
Are you saying you can train your brain to get aroused only when a man is around? I don't think that's so. Again, there are circumstances for every argument but I think for the main part this is something in the chemical make up of a person that can't be controlled.No, that's not how it works. As you point out you can become sexually aroused for seemingly no reason, being homosexual doesn't mean that you have been "trained" to only be aroused by the same sex.
The genetic part is the sexual urge itself, practically every living organism on the planet has a natural instinct to reproduce. Heterosexuals and homosexuals are no different in these instincts, the physical aspect is virtually identical. Remember, the inside of a woman's mouth is biologically identical to the inside of a man's.
The difference comes from how people focus these sexual urges, I'm not saying there's choice or training, just that from a very early age people begin to associate certain feelings with certain scenarios. In extreme circumstance this can be misplaced on inanimate objects. Considering the population is roughly 50:50 men and women, it seems acceptable that these urges could be directed to the wrong sex fairly frequently.
MH0825 wrote: So are you saying raised by gay parents will result in the child being gay? Because I don't agree. I have several friends who have gay parents and are straight. I believe more people with straight parents are the ones with gay children.I think it's much more complex than that. People don't grow up straight from knowing or seeing their parents have straight sex, in fact I think that would have a rather negative effect on a persons sexual development!
Sexual development isn't linked to specific aspects of upbringing, pheromones could be involved for example, or anything else on a more subconscious level. It's an ongoing thing which doesn't happen overnight but is probably shaped by society to a certain extent.
I believe it does have something to do with genes. From all of the studies i've heard of, being homosexual has nothing to do with the environment. We are not "shaped" as we develop. Correct me if i'm wrong but i'm pretty sure they've found homosexual behavior in other animals, and even insects such as fruit flies. I don't think any of them really "learned" it.
There is very little true homosexual behaviour recorded in wild animals. Most cases of homosexuality in animals are restricted to caged animals, which don't behave naturally or the causes have been discovered. Brain damage in homosexual rams for example.
Most other "homosexual" behaviour is in fact bisexual behaviour, or misplaced sexual urges. A dog for example will hump almost anything if it smells a bitch in heat, but it's still sexually aroused by the female.
Besides this, I find the argument regarding gay animals to be non sequitur. Infanticide is natural behaviour for some animals, does that mean eating your children should be seen as natural for humans?
The problem with research in to the causes of homosexuality is the researchers have their hands tied by political correctness. There has been research, and funding granted for research in to proving that homosexuality is genetic. The research failed, no "gay gene" was ever found. Scientists who try to research politically incorrect thesis are stigmatised and alienated. No one wants to hear that gays could be cured, and the popular opinion is it's pointless searching for a cure for something that doesn't do you any harm anyway.
Not trying to say you're wrong, I don't have much knowledge in this subject, but this is what wikipedia says:
Sexuality researchers are often interested in homosexuality because there is evidence from twin studies that there is a biological involvement in its determination. Although homosexuality does not appear to be adaptive from an evolutionary standpoint, because homosexual sex does not produce children, there is evidence that it has existed in all times and in all known human cultures and civilizations.[1]
Although a number of biological factors have been considered by scientists, such as prenatal hormones, chromosomes, polygenetic effects, brain structure and viral influences, no scientific consensus exists as to how biology influences sexual orientation.
Most scientists agree that it is unlikely that there is a single "gay gene" that determines something as complex as a (homo)sexual orientation, and that it is more likely to be the result of an interaction of genetic, biological and environmental/cultural factors. However, in the fruitfly Drosophila melanogaster, mutant alleles of the fruitless gene were found to cause male flies to court and attempt to mate exclusively with other males. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biology_and_sexual_orientation
If it exists in all cultures, it would be my impression that it is genetic as things in certain cultures do not show up in other cultures. If it shows up in all cultures that would push towards being genetic in human genetics.
That doesn't really make a strong argument, it just says it's common in humans you can't narrow it down to genetics just from that. Lots of different cultures share similarities you can't immediately blame it all on genetics. The fact it occurs in many cultures would be cause enough to suggest researching it further, which scientists have done and failed to find a genetic connection.
The common genetic factor is the instinct to reproduce, I don't believe genes have much more influence on people's behaviour. That would be like your destiny was already predetermined, you could argue criminality was genetic or bad personal hygiene. Do you really believe we're such slaves to our DNA?
The other flaw is how correct this claim is. Ancient Greece is often given as an example of homosexuality through the ages and cultures. But the truth is ancient greeks practiced bisexuality, not homosexuality. Yes, same sex relationships were very common. But most men involved in this practice were married to women, ancient Greece was very liberal but it wasn't homosexual. If that were true they would have just died out from lack of reproduction.
Your personality is about 50% predetermined. Your personality != your destiny. Your genes determine your personality, not your values. That's what families and peer groups are for. We're not "slaves" to DNA. DNA is us. My DNA says my hair is dark brown. And it is. Does that make me a slave?
Yes, some people could have a genetic predisposition towards more violent behavior. You could argue it has something to do with genes. But that doesn't make it ok.
Also, if you read that excerpt, you will see that scientists have in fact found the "gay gene" in fruit flies.
If DNA controlled things as specific as which sex you preferred then where does freewill come into anything? If DNA controls your behaviour, not just your hair colour then you are a slave to your DNA.
It is the common belief that human behaviour is a complex mix of both genetic and environmental influences. Now as a basic instinct man must have reproductive urges. Otherwise he may never reproduce. Like the basic urge to eat. But I don't believe genes control what food we prefer. Most scientists agree that food preferences are decided in a child's early years from environmental influences.
From what I've read about that fruit fly experiment the tests involved swapping a male gene for a female gene, this caused the flies to take on the behaviour of the opposite sex. That makes sense, the male instinct to reproduce is clearly different from the female instinct. But that's not what homosexuality is about. Homosexuals don't act like the opposite sex, OK they camp it up sometimes, but the actual mechanics of sex is the same for homosexuals and heterosexuals. The only difference is the object of desire.
What the scientists have found is that basic reproductive urge is different in males and females.
The reports I found didn't say anything about males being attracted to other males, can you cite your source?
