'Gay gen': science is on the right track, we're born this way. Let’s al wh . | Qazi Rahman | The Guardian

Contents:

• WHY ARE PEOPLE GAY? GAY BY CHOICE OR IS BEG GAY GEIC?
• PHYSIL, BEHAVRAL, AND PSYCHOLOGIL TRAS OF GAY MEN INTIFYG AS BEARS
• 'GAY GEN': SCIENCE IS ON THE RIGHT TRACK, WE'RE BORN THIS WAY. LET’S AL WH .
• THE 'GAY GENE' IS A MYTH BUT BEG GAY IS 'NATURAL,' SAY SCIENTISTS

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

So-lled genome-wi associatn studi intified a gene lled SLITRK6, which is active a bra regn lled the diencephalon that differs size between people who are homosexual or heterosexual.

While there is no sgle “gay gene, ” there is overwhelmg evince of a blogil basis for sexual orientatn that is programmed to the bra before birth based on a mix of geics and prenatal ndns, none of which the fet choos.

An troductn to a muddled and sometim ntent world of scientific rearch—one whose fdgs, now as tentative as they are suggtive, may someday shed light on the sexual orientatn of everyoneThe issue of homosexualy has arrived at the foreont of Ameri's polil nscns.

PHYSIL, BEHAVRAL, AND PSYCHOLOGIL TRAS OF GAY MEN INTIFYG AS BEARS

The issue of homosexualy has always been volatile, and is sure to ntue to flame polil is timely and appropriate that at this juncture a scientific disciple, blogy, has begun to ask the fundamental qutn What is homosexualy? Homosexuals have long mataed that sexual orientatn, far om beg a personal choice or liftyle (as is often lled), is somethg neher chosen nor changeable; heterosexuals who have ma their peace wh homosexuals have often done so by acceptg that premise. Rearchers n look back on two histori: a century-long, highly problematic psychologil vtigatn of homosexualy, and a short but extremely plex history of blogil rearch that started out as an examatn of ovulatn rats.

As Michael Bailey and Richard Pillard, the thors of one of the most important geic quiri to homosexualy, have observed, s of psychiatric rearch to possible environmental of homosexualy—that is to say, social and cultural —show "small effect size and are ally ambiguo.

David Halper pots out One Hundred Years of Homosexualy that the term self first appeared German (Homosexualät) a pamphlet published Leipzig 1869; entered the English language two s later.

'GAY GEN': SCIENCE IS ON THE RIGHT TRACK, WE'RE BORN THIS WAY. LET’S AL WH .

By the 1940s homosexualy was discsed as an aspect of psychopathic, paranoid, and schizoid personaly fed homosexualy as a pathology, psychiatrists and other doctors ma bold to "treat" . Jam Harrison, a psychologist who produced the 1992 documentary film Changg Our Mds, not that the medil profsn viewed homosexualy wh such abhorrence that virtually any proposed treatment seemed fensible.

THE 'GAY GENE' IS A MYTH BUT BEG GAY IS 'NATURAL,' SAY SCIENTISTS

None of the uld be shown to change the sexual orientatn of the people those who looked to the matter was the sex rearcher Aled Ksey, whose 1948 report “Sexual Behavr the Human Male” showed homosexualy to be surprisgly mon across l of fay, class, and tnal and geographic background. In his book Beg Homosexual, the psychoanalyst Richard Isay wr, Ksey and his -workers for many years attempted to fd patients who had been nverted om homosexualy to heterosexualy durg therapy, and were surprised that they uld not fd one whose sexual orientatn had been changed. "Psychiatry not only nsistently failed to show that homosexualy was a preference, a malleable thg, sceptible to reversal; also nsistently failed to show that homosexualy was a pathology.