There seem to be a number of fears-maybe it would be better to call them concerns-out there at the margins of the gay community over research on the origin(s) of homosexuality and the possibility of changing people's sexual orientation. The concern is mainly that the results of such research could be used to prevent or extirpate homosexuality.
I suspect there isn't much anyone can do about such research. Like all research, it is going to continue because people-including most of us who are gay-want to know more about ourselves and about how the world works. But I also feel sure that any concerns are greatly exaggerated.
Take the issue of research into the origins of (causes of, reasons for) male homosexuality. That would be interesting to know, just as it would be interesting to know the equally mysterious cause(s) of heterosexuality. But scientists aren't quite researching the right thing. Most researchers seem very confused about what homosexuality/homosexual desire actually is. And most seem overly impressed with the fact that most women are also attracted to men and so draw the logically invalid conclusion that male homosexuality must be caused by something female in gay men-as if desire for men can have only one cause.
Clever studies that manage to change an insect's or animal's overall behavior from male typical to female typical are not about homosexuality at all. Male homosexual behavior has no particular connection to acting like a female. It is not thinking or feeling or acting like a woman. It is about a man (whether top or bottom) being attracted as a man to other men. (In some Third World countries some gay men do imitate women as a signaling device, but that practice is being abandoned with the worldwide spread of gay liberation.)
Scientists should be doing research into the origins of homosexual desire. Homosexual desire is largely a cognitive or conceptual matter, so the origin(s) have to be sought in the cognitive (even esthetic) values of the gay individual.
What reasons are there, we might want to know, that result in our being attracted not just to men generically but attracted to (and having a physical response to) a particular man across a crowded room, and not have any response to other men (or women) in the room? What meaning does this person's appearance-and, later, other qualities-hold for us such that we feel desire?
Researchers who try to study twins to find genetic causes forget that twins raised together share a common upbringing, often look alike and have similar personalities, leading parents and others to treat them similarly, generating a similar value system and a similar response to the world in both twins. Even twins reared apart often look alike and/or share common physical capacities, leading people to treat them similarly. Twin studies are also plagued by recruitment biases-using twins who know of their twin's sexuality, which introduces a bias right away.
Studies of the human brain-including some of the most widely publicized-have not been replicated and have been vigorously criticized for methodological flaws and for ignoring the large number of exceptions and counter-examples. The same is true of "gene studies" which also depend on assuming an implausibly low percentage of gay men, to say nothing of not facing the problem of people who feel both homosexual and heterosexual desire.
So I don't mind research on homosexuality. It is just that most of it is pointless, misdirected and based on false assumptions. If researchers ever find the reasons why some men are gay (and others heterosexual), that will be interesting to know. But there is no reason to think that will enable anyone to expunge homosexual desire. The vast number of elements that go into producing anyone's personality and cognitive value system are too varied and too little understood for anyone to be able to control or change.
In fact, most of the studies of people ("ex-gays") who claim to have changed their sexuality have serious methodological problems, from recruitment bias to insufficient follow-up, to a failure to rigorously cross-examine interviewees (such as Kinsey did), to a failure to define what changing "sexual orientation" actually means. It doesn't mean just a change in behavior. It has to mean a change in desire.
Perhaps the best recent book on the topic is Ex-Gay Research, edited by Jack Drescher and Kenneth Zucker (Haworth Press, 2006). It consists of a large number of commentaries, most skeptical, on the controversial study by Robert Spitzer of men and women who claimed they had (more or less) changed their sexual orientation. It is an excellent introduction to the basic issues involved.
21 Comments for “Bad Science II: Less Than Zero”
posted by Ashpenaz on
Here’s why I’m pro-life: If a genetic trigger is discovered for homosexuality, then people will start aborting their pre-gay children the way they are aborting children with Down’s syndrome now. There was a good episode on Law and Order this week about this topic. I don’t see why more gays are not at pro-life rallies protecting unborn future gay generations.
posted by Harke Ploegstra on
^ Maybe most gay people actually have scruples and wouldn’t defend something they believe is wrong, simply to get better from it?
posted by Charles Wilson on
Ashpenaz, the minute someone identifies a gay gene your right-wing pro-life buddies will declare an exemption to their opposition to abortion. You hate yourself so much that you’ll be on their side.
posted by Ashpenaz on
Oh, that old chestnut–anyone who criticizes the gay community hates themselves. Ho, hum.
Actually, I feel strongly that the same equal rights I want for gays, women, undocumented immigrants, etc., should extend to the unborn. I don’t think a parent has the right to abort a child with Down’s syndrome or a gay child or any child. Of course, I support a doctor’s decision when it involves the life or health of the mother.
posted by Hank on
Come on – I disagree with Ash on most issues on which he comments. But “hate himself?” From what he has posted here, he seems to me to have integrated his sexuality and his life pretty well.
posted by Hob Bope on
Having sex with a man is behaviour that is normal for women. If you are a man, and you have sex with another man, then you are a man who is behaving like a woman.
Paul Varnell’s remark that ‘It is not thinking or feeling or acting like a woman. It is about a man (whether top or bottom) being attracted as a man to other men’ shows that he has misunderstood this point (it doesn’t argue against what I said because women can be ‘on top’ in heterosexual sex…)
posted by Harke Ploegstra on
“Having sex with a man is behaviour that is normal for women. If you are a man, and you have sex with another man, then you are a man who is behaving like a woman.”
Paul Varnell criticizes research based on just such flawed assumptions.
Get yourself educated, Hob.
posted by Hob Bope on
Harke, I don’t think my assumptions are flawed. I could perhaps be wrong, and I’m certainly willing to listen to counter-arguments, but you so far have not offered one.
posted by Marc on
Though interesting, Varnell’s perspective that attraction to men in women and gay men are completely unrelated has some drawbacks.
Firstly, I don’t think the assumption that there’s something female-ish in gay men derives only from their sexual behavior. That gay men are much more likely than straight men to report gender-atypical behavior in childhood, that many have tastes and interests in activities and jobs primarily enjoyed by women, etc., seems to be an indication that gay men on average are significanly for feminized than straights.
Some other traits that are not subjected to social pressure (such as puberty onset and cognitive profile) also suggest a higher degree of femininity in gay men.
posted by Hank on
I wonder what it is about people like Hob who think everything is about sex? When Varnell says “attracted to other men” he’s referring to much more than sex.
Unfortunately, it seems that people like Hob – as well as Dobson and his ilk – can only think of sex.
Too bad.
posted by CPT_Doom on
I think research into the biological origins of homosexuality, not to mention research into the similiar origins of transsexuals and the intersexed, is fascinating and important because it adds to our understanding of humanity at large. It also provides a fascinating window into the realities of human fetal development, which is apparently where the foundations of homosexuality (and heterosexuality and bisexuality) are laid (pun not intended).
However, I think Mr. Varnell is exposing his own biases in this article. To whit:
Most researchers seem very confused about what homosexuality/homosexual desire actually is. And most seem overly impressed with the fact that most women are also attracted to men and so draw the logically invalid conclusion that male homosexuality must be caused by something female in gay men?as if desire for men can have only one cause.
How can a conclusion be logically invalid when it is backed by the research? Even looking at the navigation research from a couple of weeks ago, we find another example where the physical and/or neurological processing of gay men’s brains is, in general, more similar to straight women’s than straight men’s (obviously, such research tells us nothing about any indvidual, whether gay or straight, only populations). There is also research into finger length, blink response, brain structures, hearing and many other traits that show, for lack of better terms, that there is a feminization of gay men and a masculinization of lesbians in utero.
Add to that research the evidence we have in everyday life. We all know that the stereotypes of the flaming gay man and flannel-shirted lesbians are overblown, but can anyone who has spent any time in the GLBT community not admit that gay men are, on average, more feminine than straight men and lesbians are, on average, more masculine than straight women?
And should anyone be surprised about this? We are all 50% male and 50% female, after all, why wouldn’t some of us be more of a mixture? Psychologists have long known that it is possible to test the degree of “femininity” and “masculinity” in any one individual’s personality – I remember well in college when we got our personality results back (I was a psych major) and I was on the feminine side; of course, so was the captain of the lacrosse team, who is now apparently happily married with children, so it was clearly not a measure of sexual orientation. In fact, the test is a measure of neurological processing and how an individual interacts with the world – from a more emotive, feminine, perspective or from a more structured, masculine perspective. Some people score “neither” and some score “both,” reinforcing the variety across all human beings.
If our society did not so devalue femininity, perhaps Mr. Varnell would not be so quick to denounce the current state of research. I know part of my own personal coming out involved coming to terms with, and accepting, those feminine parts of my personality, while understanding they did not dictate my future life. I can be a totally gay, shopping-loving, football fan.
posted by Hob Bope on
‘When Varnell says “attracted to other men” he’s referring to much more than sex.’
I think the context makes it clear that Varnell is talking about sex. In any case, homosexuality is basically about sex, just as heterosexuality is basically about sex. That’s why these conditions are called homoSEXuality and heteroSEXuality.
posted by MMMM on
About this article, how many of us have ever heard of a study that took the positive view, that since nature produces homosexuals, what are the mechanisms behind that successful outcome?
In-utero genetic testing – and parental selection against unborn babies with the “wrong” genetic markers – is scary for the very reason that too many people too easily make the opposite view and could slip into the mindset that science and technology could prevent an “aberration.”
And on what basis can we assume a single cause anyway? There are probably many kinds of heterosexuals (and also many kinds of homosexuals), made so by genetic switches, turned on or off by biochemicals and/or cultural and biographical influences. Ironically, the Fundamentalists who most violently insist on oversimplication could easily find the case for multiple causes – and a Biblical rationale for our existence – RIGHT AFTER Jesus’ clarification of marriage, based on procreation, which has been read aloud at weddings for centuries: (Matthew 19:12) “Not everyone can accept this word, but only those to whom it has been given…For some are eunuchs because they were born that way; others were made that way by men; and others have renounced marriage because of the kingdom of heaven. The one who can accept this should accept it.”
Perhaps the translation is unfortunate for us (eunuch) but the meaning is pretty obvious nonetheless: the characteristic those three groups have in common is that they don’t marry the opposite sex (to become one flesh) and procreate, and they don’t fit the Mosaic laws of marriage/divorce described in the preceeding passages. Those three groups are not: those who were born with no balls, those whose dads cut their balls off, and those who cut their own balls off, not unless your Bible version is a Red State American Pie movie parody. Moreover, Jesus’ words don’t cast any judgement on those three groups for not fitting the rule. In fact, some of them are cited for glorifying the word of god.
I think the best scientists probably accept the same thing, that there are multiple causes of any one outcome in adult sexuality, and that different outcomes are probably not a bad thing at all.
posted by Brian Miller on
Gosh, the trolls (“Hob”) just keep getting less and less creative every year.
At least try something original, d00ds!
posted by Ashpenaz on
Actually, there is nothing to suggest that eunuchs were either castrated or celibate. They were simply men born without the capacity for traditional marriage. Gay theologians have studied what eunuchs were and have found that many types of men other than castrated or celibate fit into this category, including those we would today call gay. What Jesus was doing here was welcoming all the sexually other into His Kingdom without requiring celibacy or healing. Which is why I go to church.
posted by ReganDuCasse on
Well, it’s certainly apparent that the prevailing assumptions are that being homosexual is a matter of gender identity as well as attraction. However, what is rarely discussed is how badly men and women get along or are treated, when they try to adhere to the extremes of gender expectations their cultures adhere them to. We’re talking brutality and constancy in the powerlessness of females. Many religious beliefs blame women for the evil in the world. Or that attraction TO women is somehow a matter of bewitchment or some other force beyond a man’s control. Some cultures have given up on women as individuals or intellectually and spiritually gifted and literally make them wear bags over themselves.
I hope fervently that what sociologists should research is how homosexuality is and could be the natural tempering factor between men and women.
It’s no accident that gay men AND women friends offer each other all the mental, spiritual, emotional and intellectual and physical comforts of male/female relations, but without the sexual tension that makes men and women nuts. I’m sure, if straight men weren’t so busy exploiting lesbians as sex objects, they’d better understand women, if they REALLY wanted to.
Men and women are having a hard time as it is. It’s no wonder that simpler cultures HAVE regarded the transgendered or homosexual as the cultural and spiritual ministers of their societies for the reasons I mentioned.
Gays and lesbians have a tremendous role to play, and it shouldn’t have to take any elaborate or protracted studies to arrive at that conclusion.
Homophobia is an acquired thing. It’s taught and highly controlled and distibuted freely, especially among the young with little relief from it.
Research on young folks untouched by such teaching WOULD be a good place to start making observations.
It’s a 2,000 year old rush to judgement on gay folks that got us into this mess, and I can’t believe that’s a standard held to this day.
With few people ACTUALLY talking to gay people about their feelings and plans.
As long as straight people dominate and control the information, it’s going to take interaction itself to blow their misinformaiton and misrepresentation sky high.
I’m in, but it’s almost pathological how some people will hang onto to that misinformation and assumption, not matter how handily it’s been proven wrong.
posted by Hob Bope on
Ashpenaz, who are the gay theologians who make that claim about New Testament passages regarding eunuchs, what are their arguments, and what do mainstream theologians think of this? It sounds like total nonsense to me.
posted by Hank on
Heterosexuality is basically about sex? Are you a guy Hob? Are you married or dating? Do you think of your wife or girlfriend only as a sex object? If so, I feel very sorry for her.
posted by CPT_Doom on
About this article, how many of us have ever heard of a study that took the positive view, that since nature produces homosexuals, what are the mechanisms behind that successful outcome?
This is one of the most interesting aspects of homosexuality I wish, too, were being studied. After all, homosexuality is part of hundreds of different animal species and is very well-known in birds, who have some of the oldest DNA on the planet, being descended from dinosaurs. Why exactly are non-reproducing members of a species selected under evolution?
I see three possibles – that being gay or lesbian is an inadvertant side effect of a different, beneficial adaptation (like sickle cell disease or Tay-Sachs), that gays and lesbians are built-in adoptive parents and helper parents for their siblings (which would maximize the number of grandchildren in a family who survived) and that gays and lesbians fulfilled a necessary role in the old hunter/gatherer communities to feed tribes when many adults were involved in child-rearing.
posted by Ashpenaz on
I believe in intelligent design. I don’t think evolution is run on random events. I think evolution responds to an overall plan. The universe was designed to include gays. We were meant to be here.
Which is why I’m pro-life–no one should have the choice to identify a gay child (or a Down’s syndrome child, etc.) and abort that child because they don’t want him/her. We have to trust that the universe is bringing us the children we are meant to have.
posted by Throbert McGee on
It is about a man (whether top or bottom) being attracted as a man to other men.
Am I the only one who found Varnell’s parenthetical clarification here sorta weird? I mean, he makes it sound as though “tops” and “bottoms” are different categories or sub-species of homosexual.