Gay Bra Science: Homosexualy a Birth Defect? – Outsi the Beltway

Contents:

• THERE IS NO ‘GAY GENE.’ THERE IS NO ‘STRAIGHT GENE.’ SEXUALY IS JT PLEX, STUDY NFIRMS
• WHY ARE PEOPLE GAY? GAY BY CHOICE OR IS BEG GAY GEIC?
• THERE’S NO ONE ‘GAY GENE,’ BUT GEICS ARE LKED TO SAME-SEX BEHAVR, NEW STUDY SAYS
• IS THERE A 'GAY GENE'? THE PROBLEM WH STUDI NNECTG GEICS AND LGBTQ INTY

THERE IS NO ‘GAY GENE.’ THERE IS NO ‘STRAIGHT GENE.’ SEXUALY IS JT PLEX, STUDY NFIRMS

The study of nearly a half ln people clos the door on the bate around the existence of a so-lled “gay gene. It is worth keepg md that this study only vers some typ of sexualy — gay, lbian and cis-straight — but don’t offer many sights to genr inty.

Humans have tried to unrstand human sexualy for centuri — and geics rearchers joed the ay the early 1990s after a seri of studi on tws suggted homosexualy ran fai. “As a teenager tryg to unrstand myself and unrstand my sexualy, I looked at the ter for “the gay gene” and obvly me across Xq28, ” said Fah Sathirapongsasuti, a study -thor and senr scientist at 23andMe, which he joked once led him to believe he hered his gayns om his mother. “We worried a lot about volunteer bias, ” said Bailey, whose rearch clus a wily publicized study on Xq28 and gay brothers om 2018.

Sanrs llaborated wh Bailey on those earlier studi and said their work had always admted that there was no sgle “gay gene.

WHY ARE PEOPLE GAY? GAY BY CHOICE OR IS BEG GAY GEIC?

The rearchers had members of the same-sex muny review the study’s sign and language, and they adm that their termology and fns for gay, lbian and heterosexual do not reflect the full nature of the sexualy ntuum. “[Our study] unrsr an important role for the environment shapg human sexual behavr and perhaps most importantly there is no sgle gay gene but rather the ntributn of many small geic effects sttered across the genome, ” Neale said.

Specifilly, many aspects of the velopment of homosexualy (both the male and female varieti) are not as well unrstood as they should be to make some of the claims that many people felt nfint exprsg. There's a lot to discs regardg the rults of the paper (Skorska et al, 2016): The rearchers were examg the possibily that a maternal immune rponse might play a key role the velopment of a homosexual orientatn mal.

Effectively, then, the mother's immune system would (sometim) treat certa male protes produced by the fet as a foreign pathogen and attempt to attack , rultg out that uld clu a homosexual orientatn, but also fetal loss if the reactn was strong enough (i. Already there is a lot to like about this hypothis on a theoretil level, as don't pos any hidn adaptive benefs for a homosexual orientatn (as such proposed benefs have not received sound empiril support historilly). The rearchers reced approximately 130 mothers and classified them on the basis of what kd of children they had: those who had at least 1 gay son (n = 54), and those who only had heterosexual sons (n = 72).

THERE’S NO ONE ‘GAY GENE,’ BUT GEICS ARE LKED TO SAME-SEX BEHAVR, NEW STUDY SAYS

The mothers were then classified further to one of five groups: those wh gay male only-children (n = 8), those wh gay male offsprg that had no olr brothers (n = 23), those wh gay male offsprg wh olr brothers (n = 23), those wh heterosexual male only-children (n = 11), and those wh heterosexual male offsprg wh siblgs (n = 61). As predicted, the average number of fetal loss were higher the first group (mothers of gay male only-children; M = 1. When nsired terms of the rat of misrriag to live to births, a siar picture emerged: mothers of gay male only-children reported more misrriag to live births (M = 1.

As birth weight tends to crease over succsive pregnanci, the parisons were limed to first live-born sons only (n = 63); this left 4 gay male only-children, 7 gay mal wh no olr brothers, 14 heterosexual mal wh gay younger brothers, 10 heterosexual male only-children, and 28 heterosexual mal wh siblgs. The rults mirrored those of the fetal-loss data: mothers of gay male only-children tend to give birth to fants that weighed signifintly ls (M = 2970 grams), than all other groups (d = 1. In sum, then, mothers of gay male only-children tend to have a greater number of misrriag and give birth to signifintly lighter offsprg than mothers of other kds.

IS THERE A 'GAY GENE'? THE PROBLEM WH STUDI NNECTG GEICS AND LGBTQ INTY

While 's important to not get rried away wh this fdg given the relatively small sample size (I wouldn't put too much stock an N of 8), there is some suggtive evince here worth pursug further that somethg is atypil fetal velopment the se of gay male offsprg. The first qutn that to md is why this effect seemed to be specific to gay male only-children, rather than gay male children wh siblgs?

Skorska et al (2016) pos that this might have somethg to do wh some mothers showg a greater immune rponse agast male offsprg, rultg more fetal loss, the rult beg that such mothers are both ls likely to have any children at all and more likely to have gay male children particular. In other words, mothers wh gay male offsprg should be expected to have proportnately more female children owg to a greater male fetal loss. If mothers of gay men do not tend to have a greater rat of female-to-male offsprg, this would st some doubt on the explanatn (and, sce the only data I've heard reports that gay men tend to have more olr brothers, seems they would have noticed the sister pot by now if existed).

On the other hand, if this is a more general immune reactn agast fetal bodi, regardls of their sex, we would not expect such a pattern ( might also predict that mothers takg immunosupprsants would be ls likely to have gay offsprg/misrry, but thgs are unlikely to be that simple owg to the fact that other effects would rult too). Intil male tws—those who share both their geics and maternal fetal environment—only show a nrdance rate of homosexualy of approximately 30%. As far as I'm aware, homosexual preferenc (not the ocsnal behavr) do not appear to be well documented nonhuman speci; the only exceptn I'm aware of is Rams.