Contents:
- THERE IS NO ‘GAY GENE.’ THERE IS NO ‘STRAIGHT GENE.’ SEXUALY IS JT PLEX, STUDY NFIRMS
- NO ‘GAY GENE’: MASSIVE STUDY HOM ON GEIC BASIS OF HUMAN SEXUALY
- THERE’S NO EVINCE THAT A SGLE ‘GAY GENE’ EXISTS
- THE 'GAY GENE' IS A TOTAL MYTH, MASSIVE STUDY CONCLUS
- MANY GEN INFLUENCE SAME-SEX SEXUALY, NOT A SGLE ‘GAY GENE’
- THE 'GAY GENE' IS A MYTH BUT BEG GAY IS 'NATURAL,' SAY SCIENTISTS
- SEARCH FOR 'GAY GEN' COM UP SHORT IN LARGE NEW STUDY
THERE IS NO ‘GAY GENE.’ THERE IS NO ‘STRAIGHT GENE.’ SEXUALY IS JT PLEX, STUDY NFIRMS
There is no sgle gene rponsible for a person beg gay or a lbian.
The study of nearly a half ln people clos the door on the bate around the existence of a so-lled “gay gene. In s stead, the report fds that human DNA nnot predict who is gay or heterosexual.
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.
NO ‘GAY GENE’: MASSIVE STUDY HOM ON GEIC BASIS OF HUMAN SEXUALY
“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. 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. In other words, tri to judge if a person leans gay, straight or bisexual.
THERE’S NO EVINCE THAT A SGLE ‘GAY GENE’ EXISTS
“[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. There is no one gene for beg gay, and though gen seem to play a role termg sexual orientatn and same-sex behavr, ’s small, plex, and anythg but termistic. “There is no sgle gay gene, but rather the ntributn of many small geic effects sttered across the genome,” he emphasized.
THE 'GAY GENE' IS A TOTAL MYTH, MASSIVE STUDY CONCLUS
“We know that smell has a strong tie to sexual attractn, but s lks to sexual behavrs are not clear,” said -thor Andrea Ganna, an stctor at HMS and Massachetts General Hospal om the Instute for Molecular Medice Fland.The study is part a rponse to gay, lbian, and bisexual people’s cursy about themselv, said Fah Sathirapongsasuti, a senr scientist at 23andMe and -thor on the study, who is himself gay.
I looked on the Inter for the ‘gay gene.’” Today, he noted, rearch and rmatn about sex and sexualy is among the tegori most requted by 23andMe’s ctomers.
MANY GEN INFLUENCE SAME-SEX SEXUALY, NOT A SGLE ‘GAY GENE’
Sathirapongsasuti wasn’t the only one lookg to the putative “gay gene” for self-unrstandg or validatn. Michael Bronski, profsor of the practice media and activism wh the mtee on studi of women, genr, and sexualy, and thor of A Queer History of the Uned Stat, says the allure of a “gay gene” grew om the flourishg gay-rights movement the after the Stonewall rts 1969.
THE 'GAY GENE' IS A MYTH BUT BEG GAY IS 'NATURAL,' SAY SCIENTISTS
Conservative opponents of the movement claimed that “homosexual acts are a choice, people choose to m them, or people are sced to the gay liftyle,” he explas. ’77, then a rearcher at the Natnal Instut of Health, published rults showg a rrelatn between male homosexual behavr and a clter of gen, lled Xq28, at the tip of the X chromosome. Exactly which gene this clter may be volved has proven elive—the current study found no signifint associatn between the X chromosome and same-sex sexual behavr—but the ia that a “gay gene” might lie somewhere Xq28—or elsewhere—was ptivatg.
Zeke Stok, chief programs officer of the LGBTQ advocy anizatn GLAAD, ncurred an emailed statement: “This new study provis even more evince that beg gay or lbian is a natural part of human life, a ncln that has been drawn by rearchers and scientists time and aga.”Not everyone has embraced the approach of legimizg homosexualy through geics, however.
SEARCH FOR 'GAY GEN' COM UP SHORT IN LARGE NEW STUDY
Others have warned that the search for a geic e would pathologize homosexualy the same way psychology did the twentieth century: efforts by psychoanalysts such as Irvg Bieber led to the cln of homosexualy the Amerin Psychiatric Associatn’s Diagnostic and Statistil Manual of Mental Disorrs until 1972. As noted above, the gen that rrelated wh same-sex sexual behavr also rrelated wh willgns to take risks, a nnectn that might not hold up cultur where homosexualy is ls stigmatized and those who are ls risk tolerant would therefore feel more able to act openly.