The "gay Gene"

[Craig Read]

Truly Orwellian. The entire concept of deciding that issues which are controversial is the next logical step in governmental mind control. Make that control by the little minds. As Churchill once said we did not get here by being made of sugar. In Man's journey the thought police have always been present - at least in the background. The great victories won in the struggle for knowledge and freedom have always been at the expense of the little minds of the world.

[SirRiff]

greetings,

Fastned are you a lawyer? i specifically recall someone saying you are. i think i may actually appy to law school.i got a mouth for the profession.

ANYWAYS,

i aint a lawer, but considering this part of the law

(1) Every one who, by communicating statements in a public place, incites hatred against any identifiable group where such incitement is likely to lead to a breach of the peace if guilty of

i think its obvious that the law is specifically intended to protect minorities from actual discrimination, intimidation, and persecution, and not from criticism.

just like the canadian constituation, if it was interpreted verbatum the powers are way out of whack, with teh senate, and queen, and all the bizarre leftover. however, due to custom and convention we moderate the powers and we voluntarily dont screw ourselves.

same with laws,

every cop doest charge you with jaywalking, every judge doesnt give the maximum sentance, any everyone who says homosexuality is wrong will not be prosecuted. in fact, judging by how Canada operates, i doubt this law will be accepted by the public except for teh worst cases.

thus based on every practical precident of canadian behavior, this whole law is a non-issue. as long as you dont incite a criminal act, dont intimidate by fear or similiar unacceptable acts, nobody is going to bother you.

sifRiff

[Hugo]

likely to lead to a breach of the peace

This part of the law means that nothing has to have happened as a result of what you said. All a prosecutor has to do, is to argue that what you said "is likely" to cause a breach of the peace.

Under this law, you are not innocent until proven guilty.

[Scotchneat]

Fastned

[As a flat statement, "Hate Speech" Legislation is a Prosecutors dream! There is little certainty in exactly what is covered and prohibited so any exercise of a 'controversial' or 'emotionally charged' position could lead to prosecution - if a Prosecutor wished to pursue you or has their own agenda. ]

Try to stick the topic at hand, we are discussing a specific law ie ss. 318 and 319 of the Criminal Code. Those provisions are a prosecutor's nightmare, because there is strong pressure to prosecute the Paul Fromms, Ernst Zundels, and Jim Keegstras of this world, but little hope of making any conviction. That is why Ernst Zundel was charged under s. 181 (False news) because prosecutors felt that it would be too difficult to charge him under ss. 318 and 319. They did not want to charge Zundel because they knew that he would have an excellent legal defence, however, they were under intense pressure from Jewish and anti-racist groups.

Now prosecutors in Saskatchewan have the difficult task of prosecuting David Ahenakew. I doubt that they want to do it, but if they didn't there would be some outcry about a double standard. Hugo, I suggest that you watch his trial to see how the law actually works.

Keegstra was charged under 319 (2), so you can bet that any defences to that part of the law have been pursue by Doug Christie (an extremely able defence lawyer and very questionable person) . Probably with the changes in the court and circumstances, the law would not withstand a s. 2( challenge regardless of the nature of the charge.

The situation that s. 319 (1) envisions is a rabble rouser whipping up a mob into a race riot. So unless you are planning to go to Hasting St. in Vancouver and start a harangue about the "perverted queers", you aren't going to be charged.

If you were charged you could have your pick of the best defence lawyers in Canada, Doug Christie, Eddie Greenspan etc. for free. However, after the circus like atmosphere that resulted from the Keegstra trial is very unlikely that anyone will be charged under ss. 318 and 319 especially for inciting hatred against homosexuals ( David Ahenakew aside).

However, I do not support ss. 318 and 319. I am merely stating that if we have such a law that homosexuals should be protected under it as matter of equality.

The arguments that Fastned makes against hate speech laws are against such laws per se. The inclusion of homosexuals as a protected group is just a matter of equality. If we should not have protection for homosexuals then no groups should be protected.

[FastNed]

Hello, Scotchneat - You are correct, I am against all Hate Speech Laws. They lack the certainty required to notify citizens what constitutes prohibited acts and thus inhibit free speech. Incitement to riot is, no doubt, covered under existing legislation at the Provincial/State level and special "Hate Speech" legislation is no more than pandering to special interest groups for political advantage.

I have seen people destroyed by vague laws used by ambitious prosecutors for publicity reasons to advance their careers.

SirRiff, with your scientific background and degrees, if you add a Law Degree, you can pretty well write your own ticket. Patent and Copyright are rewarding legal specialties and you might find a number of employers willing to pay your way thru Law School. But this is going further and further astray from the genetic question. Did you miss my last question to you., SirRiff?

[Scotchneat]

Greetings FastNed,

Vagueness and overbreadth are not my main concerns about hate speech laws. My main issues with such laws is that the prosecution offers a forum for the hate-monger to spread more hate and although the laws having a chilling effect on decent citizens, such laws encourage the hate-monger to spread even more outrageous lies in effort to attract prosecution.

In regard to the Hugh Owens case from Saskatoon, I hope that you are not helping spread the idea that Justice Barclay found the Bible to be hate literature or than he concurred with the finding of the Human Rights Commission.

[SirRiff]

FastNed

i did seem to loose track of your post after me and hugo got to debating gay death statistics and the CDC. apologies

I am differentiating between 'primary' and secondary' genes in looking at this because if a gay gene was a 'primary' recessive, probability theory would give us a 25% population and the figure I see most commonly for a gay male population is 3%. (Side thought - can you work back from 3% and say anything meaningful about such a genetic distribution?).

well lets just explore this for the sake of clarity so we understand each others meaning.

the genetic term for a "primary" gene is just "simple dominance". which means when two diffference versions of one gene (two "alleles") are present, the physical manifestation ("phenotype") will be that of the dominant gene alone and the other will be unseen in effect.

thus, there is a gene for eye color. there are several difference alleles (versions) of this eye color gene. each allele encodes for a slightly different protein. any particular protein folds into a slightly different 3D molecular shape, distributes it electrical charge slighly differently, and can have different reactive chemical groups attached to it, etc...

if the allele for brown eyes is B, and the allele for blue eyes is b, and if brown eyes display simple dominance over blue eyes, then the following genetic combinations (genotypes) would result in the following physical manifestations (phenotypes)

BB= Brown eyes

Bb= Brown eyes

bB= Brown eyes

bb= blue eyes

obviously, each particular B or b were inherited from each parent

this model is the classic genetic example of gene interactions. however this only really works for simple one -to-one mapping of genes and protein products, like a simple pigment for eye color. the eye color can be completely attributed to the presence of the pigment, the presence of one pigment (brown) completely masks the presence of another (blue). thus brown is dominant, blue is recessive as you said.

HOWEVER, this model is so usefull because of its simplicy. as you can see from above, each parent would HAVE to have one of each allele ("heterozygous") for the above distribution of genes to take place. THUS the above classic model of gene action ONLY occurs in "hybrid" offpring, resulting in a cross specifically between Bb and Bb parents.

Lets say that for evolutionary reasons, brown eyes gave a small advantage when our ancestors were hunters. then brown eyes would be very popular (men with brown eyes would hunt better, bring home more food, thier mates would be healthier, and have more children who survived), and blue eyes would be rare.

In this case, most of the parents would have brown eyes, mostly BB but also some Bb genotypes (both have a brown eyed phenotype because of simple dominance).

so if you cross these parents you would get

BB= Brown

BB=Brown

Bb=Brown

Bb=Brown

you would not "see" any of the recessive genes, as they would be masked by the more frequent.

how would a recessive phenotype be exposed? only by the mating of two relatively rare Bb parents.

there is an simple equation ("the hardy-wienberg equalibruim equation") that describes the relative contribution of two genes in a population (and also how they would balence if things were to change)

P^2 + 2PQ + Q^2=1

where P and Q stand for any two alleles generalized.

so lets say that the brown allele, being prefered by evolution via natural selection, is far more dominent then the blue allele.

so if we catalouged all the ALLELES in the population, we would find that the brown allele accounts for 82.7% of all alleles . the blue allele (assuming only two alleles for this simple trait) would account for the remaining 17.3%. (exactly how these were distributed about the population would depend on exactly what balence of cost/benetif ratio the recessive allele brought)

according to hardly-weinberg, the normal distribution of the alleles at equilibrium would be

B(0.827)^2 + Bb(0.827)(0.173) + bb(0.173) = 1

0.684( + 0.286(Bb) + 0.03(bb) = 1

thus the number of offspring in each generation having two copies B ("homozygous") and having Brown eyes would be 68.4%.

the number of offspring having one copy of each B and b (heterozygous), but still having brown eyes would be 28.6%.

and the number of offspring having two copies of the recessive allele b, would be 3%. (homozygous recessive)

this examples illustrates that the rarity of a recessive gene that is harmlessly carried in the population can maintain its recessive phenotype in the overall population at a low rate like 3%, even though the proportion of offspring born JUST to hybrid carriers alone would be 25%.

==========

now there actually are examples of "co-dominance", where BB could be brown, bb could be blue, YET Bb was green. this occurs because the products of each allele interact to produce a phenotype unique to that combination. flow color is a very codominant trait, as is the human blood group system. you can have A, B, or AB blood group. obviously the numbers get very complex when you are dealing with additional factors above 2X2 crosses. this is why they dont make good models for simple traits, the influence of each allele could be unequal, or they could be based in time or temperature, or there could be 5 alleles involved.

==============

now we need to realize the magnitude in difference between simple physical traits and human behaviors

we are now talking about complex human behavior, not just eye color. eye color is just the presence of a protein which reflects some part of teh visible light sprectrum and absorbs the rest. different foldings and charges will reflect different parts of the spectrum and thus will look like different colors. however the basis is just the presence of the protein, in terms of color, the protein doesnt really have to DO anything, just be there.

behavior is exponentialy more complex then that and I obviously dont have true authority on it like real researchers, but there are many simple biochemical interactions that biologists study as models, and can reasonably be used as models for complex behaviors.

If I understand what you have said, somewhere in a gene, 'sexual attraction', 'aggressiveness', 'nest-building', 'testosterone production' or something like this, there is a recessive factor (element?) which when aligned so that the recessive factors merge (mate) (compliment each other)

yes, now we know from discussions above, that a recessive trait/behavior is just the same as any other behavior, only it will be masked by a dominant trait. OFTEN in nature this applies to harmfull mutations that have been sidelined by evolution over billions of years because they reduce the success of organisisms with thier phenotype (having both recessive copies), BUT most recessive traits can be CARRIED by organisms without harm (hidden by the dominant trait providing any crucial functions). this is how harmfull recessive traits stay in populations, by the heterozygous carriers, generally not by the afflicted (who are unlikely to reach sexual maturity, and whos offspring are likely to suffer a disadvantage and not reproduce themselves.)

to further reference yoru quote

the recessive factors merge (mate) (compliment each other) the result is a desire for same sex pairing.

there are obviously genes that "prime" advanced animals to develop social networks and interpersonal interactions.

the amount of stuff that a baby monkey, or dolphin, or human has to learn as it grows is astonishing.

i read an article that say a newborn babies field of vision is operational only at about the 12 inch range. why? they think it is because that is the distance a mothers face is while she nurses her child, and it would serve the baby to learn her face as a bonding mechanism.

animal mothers lick thier newborns clean, which is a great opportunity for scent exchange, especially when both baby and mother and hormonally primed to learn a new scent, ie after birth.

almost all mating rituals (including humans) include some sort of instict supression behavior. take lions. if any animal were to come up behind a lioness it would react by instinct (not just choice) to lash out in a evolutionily protected "fight-or-flight" responce to all threats. well how do males get close enough to mate then? there are specific scents (pheramones released in urine), sounds (roars, rumbles, cries), movements (dances, postures), sensations (rubbing, grooming, bites) that specifically supress the very powerfull instincts of both sexes so they can come together and mate without killing each other or running away as thing instincts command them. as you can see by watching the natural channel, this suppressions last just long enough to mate over a period of just a few hours or days depending on the animal.

now, these mating behaviors need to be identical accross all members of the species at the same time. that is the only way a population of sucessfully interbreeding organisms (the very definition of species) can exist. if there is variation in the population with these behaviors they will loose thier effectivness to supppress powerfull animal instincs and could drastically reduce the sucess of the population.

how does all this exact uniformity over millions of years occur? mostly by genetics i would argue. there is no other way to assure the continuation of just precise and repeated behaviors which are so crucial to survival.

PS- all this must be true of the physical side of mating too. i spend a month once studying the genetic mechanisms for keeping every sperm in a population capable of fertalizing every egg in that popluation. there is a whole subscience that studies mating barriers in all stages, from behavior, to design of sex organs, to the uterous/womb environment, to the physical penetratoin of sperm into egg, to the mixing up of both sets of genes, to the expression of those genes and making the primary axis of an embro and starting growth. at EVERY stage mentioned genetic systems must keep the entire population synchronized over millions of years and massive numbers of organisms.

the result is a desire for same sex pairing

this is where we actually come to the real behavior-via gene theory.

it is reasonable to presume that say in complex social animals, such as primates, that we have many genes reponsible for social behaviors. some might be for mother-child interactions which is very imporant, some for males determining dominance, some for grooming and bonding with other non-related tribe members, some for cooperative foraging and hunting in packs, and many more i cant think of.

this is where the whole gay gene theory comes from.

a gene that can influence gayness, may not have been designed for that at all. in fact, the "gay" gene may be a general social bonding gene, that allows the brain to imprint new behaviors towards non related individuals through certain universal hardwired activities such as grooming.

it may be how it maintained itself in the population, way back in the first animals. it became specialized and populations of the first animals and allow them to survive better. most likely one gene was a general bonding gene. this gene was copied in the genome a few times, and each copy became slightly more specalized in the process in influenced. (this is how all of our genes evolved we think)

it did this by letting them learn to supress territorial instints so multiple familty units could travel together and sharing grazing land which would help them defend against preadors or hunt.

it did this by maybe reducing the infighting between related males by allowing them to imprint each other as related as youth and reducing unessessary deaths over fights for availble females.

it did this by allowing altruistic behavior of females that would continue to contribute resources to other females offspring without its own. (this is witnessed in some insects and gopher populations but is very contraversial)

it did this by allowing two subpopulations of a species to recognize each other as similiar species and integrate more easily into larger populations.

in general, a family of genes who allowed the hardwiring of certain intra species behavioral to allow the population as a whole survive better. in short, the individual benefits if the entire population benfits.

this is the predessessor for any concept of a gay gene i think. just like numberous other human genes, most notably the immune system, this primative set of a few genes, would by duplicated and specialized and increase in number nad complexity to cover alot of the intricate human behaviors we now use as the most highly social and intelligent creatures on eath. it has obviously benefited us to be able to interact in so many ways.

As same sex pairing is non-reproductive, this is obviously a genetic dead end and I do not state that as a value judgment as to the individuals who carry these genes but as a evaluation of its genetic value to the survival of the species.

well yes, but as i said earlier, CARRYING a beneficial gene would be good for the population. because the social genes for a modern human would be VERY complex there could be duplicates and failsafes, we dont really know.

however, if there were a few genes that primed people for nuerological sexual development (mating behaviors, sex drive, and so on), and there were rare alleles ("mutants") of these genes that produced relatively extreme behaviours, then these genes very well could have a huge influence in the behavior we call gay.

it would just be the way you learn about the sexes, the way you are primed to respond to sex drive, the way you imprint sexual signals and stimulation, the way your brian is hardwired to catagorize the M and F sexes relative to ourself, the way that your neurons create nueral nets as you learn about your identity.

a few rare alleles could influence each of these important and highly conserved pathways, the result of which could be a huge change in a persons behavior using this ancient systems.

your example of a dead end is correct only if we are talking about pure instinct. in ancient times, the genes may have been very narrowly expressed as part of a very rigid social system, the instinct part of the brain would still have been very strong and primative and a small genetic difference would not have made any real difference to mating behaviors as the genes were just "extras" to the core group of genes that controlled life.

as the genes got more specialized, and social behavior got more complex with mammals, the hunting instinct would have to share its existance with the instincts of complex social interations, and there would be "wiggle" room in social behavior, since it would not likely get you killed like wiggle room in huting. thus the first effects of recessive individuals could have been less specific sexual attraction, trying to make with males too, or a slightly less strong attraction to females. thus the recessive individuals may have well suffered, but the population as whole would have still greatly benefited from having more traditional versions of the genes. even then, as i said above, there would be no harm in a large subsection of the population carrying alternative versions of the genes. each gene may have only played a small part in the whole.

as early primate intelligence and creativity exploded as we developed into truely social animals and were about to walk out of africa half-monkey half-man, it was more and more intelligence that was the determining factor in survival, over brute strength or size as in other animals.

this was an opportunity for the first true complex societies to develop, with many familes traveling together, complex languange and social bonding and so on. our brains had been expanding so fast that our potential for social compexity far exceeded our use.

geneticists predict that primative humans from many millenia ago, would develop JUST LIKE modern children if placed in a modern house. genetically we have been "modern" for a relatively long time, as the evolutionary explosion of our brain size and complexity moved much faster then our behavior.

SO NOW, as modern humans have existed fort 10+ thousand years, as we were no longer slaves to our instincts and as the amount of development we require from bith is massive, NOW the same genes that were once general social bonding genes, are specialized and open for interpretation from our complex.

thus genes can now change the direction of our sexual prefernces and identity that we learn and develop from our environement.

  Ignoring any value judgment other than the survival of the species, and accepting that a 'non-reproduction' gene is a species dead end, does this number track with overall genetic theory? I ask because none of the genetic disorders (for lack of a better term) appear to have this large a population, perhaps excepting the 'malaria' gene in Black people which you mentioned.

this goes back to my basic premise. that ANY behavior gene was created in ancient times because it would benefit populations at that time. a "mutation" in that gene would have been highly suppressed by our powerfull instincts as animals. however, there would be little if any harm in populations carrying versions of social behavior genes as masked by instinct or dominant genes. also because there would be no loss of a crucial function as we see in malaria or cancer genes.

as our genome duplicated and specialized itself, and as our social behavour got more complex, multiple genes were responsable for different behaviors, each probably having a small individual contribution (codiminance most likely)

now in modern times, a little bit of social variation is not supressed by instinct as much, nor does it cause death. any lose of reproduction in gay individuals can be made up for by far by the role of allele in combination with other genes in "normal" individuals.

the gay gene may be a specific combination of genes that only a few people show. or it may be a few mutant genes. or a few hyperactive genes. i dont know for sure.

but i belive it would be part of the social network of genes that hardwire loose instincts of bonding behaviors that have been crucial in the past, and thus carried forward in evolution. they have specialized and compartmentalized in modern times. some variation in some people is tolerated and this manifests in what we consider gay behavior.

i wouldnt get too hung up on the 3% figure, any figure could be explained depending on the frequences of the allele and how it interacted with ther genes. some mutations will kill you and some wont, so that makes it hard to spot the peope who died because of genetics and realize the gene was at work there. but the bigger problem i believe is explaining how the behavior would be tolerated through evolution, how it would come to be, how it was carried to modern times, and why it would exist now or then. all of which i have tried to explain above.

warning: spellcheck was not used in the making of this document. infact no proofreading of any kind was used. some rambing may exist.

SirRiff

[Scotchneat]

Hugo, here is some real science, any comment?

Dyed in the womb

Oct 9th 2003

From The Economist print edition

A lesbian's sexual identity seems to be established before her birth

MEN and women blink differently when startled. That simple and well-established observation has led Qazi Rahman of the University of East London, in England, and his colleagues to evidence supporting the idea that homosexuality is a characteristic which people are born with, rather than one they acquire as they grow up. The team's research, just published in Behavioral Neuroscience, shows that lesbians blink like heterosexual men. That, in turn, suggests that the part of their brain that controls this reflex has been masculinised in the womb.

Anyone who is startled by an unexpected noise tends to blink. If, however, the startling noise is preceded by a quieter sound, this blink is not so vigorous as it would otherwise have been. It is this lack of vigour which differs between the sexes. Men blink less vigorously than women when primed in this way.

Given such a clear and simple distinction, testing the responses of homosexuals to noise seemed an obvious experiment to do. So Dr Rahman and his colleagues did it. Their subjects, men and women, gay and straight, were sat down one by one in a dimly lit room. The muscles that cause blinking were wired up with recording electrodes, and the subjects were fitted with headphones through which the sounds (sometimes a single startling noise, and sometimes a combination of soft and loud) were fed.

In the latter case, as compared with the former, straight men had blinks that were 40% less vigorous. In the case of straight women the drop was 13%. Lesbians dropped 33% which, statistically, made them more similar to straight men than straight women. Gay men were also intermediate, although in their case the difference was not statistically significant. Even in this apparently trivial matter, it seems, lesbians have male-like brains. So what is going on?

By default, people are female. Without the influence of testosterone in the womb, a fetus will develop into a girl. The way testosterone acts to turn a fetus male is still poorly understood. It seems likely, though, that different organs respond independently to the hormone, and may do so at different times. Hormonal surges at critical moments could thus cause particular organs in an otherwise female body to become gmaleh. (A lull in hormone production might have the opposite effect.) If the organ concerned is the brain, the result is more male-like behaviour including, possibly, male-type sexual preferences.

Previous research has provided some evidence for this idea. Lesbians, for instance, are more accurate throwers of objects such as darts than straight women. In this they resemble straight men in a way that has nothing to do with sexual preference. And tissues other than the brain's may be affected, too. On average, lesbians have ring fingers that are longer than their index fingers, a feature that is typical of men but not of heterosexual women. In that context, a difference in the blink of an eye is no surprise at all.

Qazi Rahman and colleagues' paper is published in Behavioural Neuroscience.

[FastNed]

Thank you for your response, SirRiff, while I am not qualified to judge the genetic soundness of your reply, I do not believe you would intentionally mislead so I will accept that there could be a genetic predisposition towards homosexuality in some people. Seems to make sense as you express it.

Perhaps there is truth in both positions. There have always been youngsters thought/recognized to be 'effeminate' and I have seen a few cases where this type of child was targeted by abusers which also makes sense, in a sick sort of way. Children are sexually curious at ages well below puberty and if 'part' of this is hard-wired (towards homosexuality), their glances/interest would appear to be somewhat obvious to adult observers. Self-identification as a potential 'victim' - not a nice concept but thought provoking.

I have never seen a case of 'child abuse' where the adult was female. In the few I have heard of, the 'victim' was a young male (never a female) and the prevailing attitude was "the lucky kid!".

Is there adult to child sexual contact between females with any frequency? Or is this primarily a 'male' problem? Anyone have any knowledge in this area?

[Hugo]

Scotch,

It's perfectly possible for what you have cited to be true and for my point to be correct.

As I've said, and as Riff has confirmed, virtually any complex human behaviour has a partially genetic cause. As Riff kindly explained at length, the genes that cause a certain behaviour may not even have that purpose in the first place due to the fact that human society has evolved faster than human physiology - for instance, road rage is a biologically incorrect reaction to a given situation.

So in this way, it's entirely possible for lesbians to have this blinking gene or whatever - maybe it's one of the many that will interact to produce a predisposition towards lesbianism, which when "activated" with the right environmental stimuli will produce a lesbian.

My wife's cousin began life strictly heterosexual. While in college she became a lesbian and told everyone that it was really the way she had always been. When she got out of college she became heterosexual again, showed no interest in women, and is now engaged to be married. I wonder what her blinking is like?

My basic premise here is that homosexuality is the interaction of a "vulnerable" genetic sequence and environmental influence, which is the same as any other demonstrable human behaviour. For instance, to be an alcoholic you would have to have a genetic makeup that makes you vulnerable to substance addiction, and then in your environment you would need to be both exposed to alcohol and given life circumstances which would lead you to turn to alcoholism. That, however, does not make alcoholism "right" or "natural".

And that's the basic point here. This explanation of homosexuality basically means it is like any other measurable human behaviour, and if you use this argument to justify homosexuality you must also use it to justify pedophilia, psychosis, substance abuse, suicidal tendencies, and so forth. This explanation of homosexual behaviour also means it is incorrect to compare homosexuals to oppressed women, for instance, because being a woman is purely genetic and cannot be altered by any kind of environmental influence.

[Morgan]

The major problem I see with studies thusfar that have demonstrated a possible biology link to homosexuality is that most of the studies have used a small number of participants and that the outcomes have not been reproduced by subsequent independent studies.

For example, the blink response research study conducted by Dr.Rahman, as reported in the October issue of The Economist, involved a small group of 59 homosexual, lesbian, and heterosexual participants.

http://www.healthfinder.gov/news/newsstory...sp?docID=515387.

I think in the future it is necessary for researchers to study larger numbers of homosexuals, lesbians, and controls for the outcomes of the research to gain scientific legitimacy and relevance.

[Lost in Manitoba]

Thanks for that post Scotch. I found that truly interesting. Going to look it up.

[FastNed]

Hi Morgan, welcome to the Forum.

Good post, be interesting to see if the research is replicated. This is a highly complex matter and what I am taking away from this discussion is that a theoretical basis for a homosexual gene or propensity has been advanced and some evidence of this has been demonstrated but nothing conclusive.

In my mind, at least, it's more likely that its nurture not nature that's involved but the question remains undecided.

In either event, three percent of our population has this orientation and absent criminal activity - which I would define only as child abuse - we must reach a civilized accommodation with this minority as with every other minority. The strength of our civilization is such accommodation with minorities among us and I see nothing wrong with recognition of Gay Partnerships or Civil Unions as a method of ending this civil strife. But there is another side of the coin and that is the strong belief of many (including myself) that "Marriage" is a religious term.

If someone Gay wishes to be "married" they must find a religious group which allows such and they must not be allowed to use the power of the State to intrude upon the religious beliefs or others. Neither may they use the same power to silence people of religion or censor their religious tracts by classification of their speech or content as "Hate Speech".

At an unspoken and undiscussed level, much of this has to do with money. If a Gay Union is classified as a "marriage" then a vast amount of financial benefits become mandated! The Health and Pension amounts involved are gigantic and I believe the costs to companies and taxpayers have not been considered, as they should be, in the debate.

[Scotchneat]

[if someone Gay wishes to be "married" they must find a religious group which allows such and they must not be allowed to use the power of the State to intrude upon the religious beliefs or others. ]

I am not sure that I understand your reasoning. Would civil marriages of gays per se intrude upon the religious beliefs of others? I don't know of anyone who seriously advocates that churches be compelled to perform gay marriages. Not only would such a measure be a gross violation of free religious practice, it would be a form of compelled speech which is offensive to the fundamental notions of human rights.

[Neither may they use the same power to silence people of religion or censor their religious tracts by classification of their speech or content as "Hate Speech". ]

I believe there is a misunderstanding about Hugh Owens case. It has been reported that he was charged under the hate speech provision of the Human Rights Code for merely referring to Bible passages. However, that reporting is a distortion.

The bumper sticker or advertisement thereof was a reference to Romans 1, Leviticus 18:22, Leviticus 20:13 and 1 Corinthians 6:9-10. In the middle was an equal sign and on the right was two males holding hands in a circle with slash through it. The intended message of Hugh Owen and the meaning that most people would get from such a bumper sticker is that homosexuals should be put to death. Since homosexuals are often attacked simply for being homosexuals, the sinister nature of Hugh Owens' bumper sticker is obvious.

[Hugo]

In either event, three percent of our population has this orientation and absent criminal activity - which I would define only as child abuse - we must reach a civilized accommodation with this minority as with every other minority.

I really must disagree. Homosexuality is very akin to smoking or alcoholism, and while these pursuits are tolerated, they are not endorsed. Nobody wants to accomodate smokers, or promote their habit as equal and safe.

The fact is that homosexuality is a phenomenon over which the sufferer has some degree of control, like substance addiction, but unlike eye colour. It's also strongly linked to child abuse, pedophilia, extremes of promiscuity, suicidal tendencies, substance abuse and other antisocial behaviours that are intensely self-destructive for the sufferer and often harmful for others as well.

I think that homosexuals are sufferers and need help. It does not help an alcoholic to tell him that his "choice" is "equal" and to encourage him to drink more, and it does not help a homosexual to tell him that his "choice" is "equal" and to encourage him to visit the bath-house, where his chances of contracting AIDS will be multiplied 5,000 times.

There's no reason to outlaw homosexuality or to punish homosexuals any more than there's a good reason to outlaw or punish alcoholics. But there is no good reason to endorse and praise their behaviour either, and rather than encouraging homosexuals to continue in a lifestyle which leads to early death, disease and emotional trauma, perhaps society should be encouraging homosexuals to seek help for their disorders and return to a normal life.

[Scotchneat]

Based on what you've presented here, it would seem that homosexual offer nothing to society and drain a great deal and since they do not want to change, wouldn't it be better to kill them all like the Bible demands?

[FastNed]

Hi Hugo:

Candidly, my opinions on this subject are closer to yours than to others, but...

First, much of this is a matter of moral opinion or choice and I do not believe I have the right to force my morals (such as they are) upon others; and,

Last, excluding those who target children whom I hold no compunctions against removing from this world, a group of ten million of us ( no matter how unpopular) must be accommodated if we are to remain the civilization we profess to be. I may privately believe they are a non-replicating group and consider their activities self-destructive and consider this as evolution in action but even if I am correct (which is debatable) it does not remove the requirement that we reach a civilized accommodation with them, or so I believe!

To me, the question remains how do we reach such an accommodation without risking or destroying the very civilization under which they seek shelter?

I believe you greatly added to the debate on this overall question with this thread on a "Gay" gene which I believe has been shown to have a theoretical basis but remains as unproven but possible.

[Hugo]

As I've said, homosexuals are much akin to addicts. They suffer from a condition that they can ultimately control, albeit with a varying level of difficulty. Their behaviour is harmful to themselves and to others, to varying degrees.

I would think that a reasonable accomodation to make with homosexuals would be similar to the one we make with smokers. Nobody wants to beat, imprison or murder smokers, or take away their basic rights, and we are prepared to tolerate their habit if done in private.

However, we are still going to take great pains to explain their problem to them, to encourage them to seek help and to try and ensure that that help is readily available. We will also take steps to keep their behaviour away from children and to prevent it from causing harm to unwilling third parties, and we will commit never to glamorise or promote their habit in public and to ensure that we educate as many people as we can in as effective a way as we can as to the risks and dangers of their habit.

[Hugo]

By the way, Riff,

Regarding the study of homosexual lifespan, I did some further research and found out that the FRI figures have four sources: 6,714 obituaries from 16 homosexual newspapers over 12 years as compared to a sampling of obituaries from regular newspapers, said research being complete in 1993, two later random and anonymous sexuality surveys, and a comparison of tests on IV drug users and homosexuals.

For those involved in homosexuality, the median age of death was less than 50 years.

One of those later studies, from Colorado, found that both IV drug use and homosexuality make you 10 times as likely to die before retirement age.

In the original 1993 obituary survey, median age of death for homosexuals was found to be less than 45, and only 2% died after age 65. The median age for those obituaries surveyed in the regular press was over 70, with 60% living to over 65. This would seem to validate the study, as that tallies with the general mortality figures.

Causes of early death included murder, accidents and drug abuse, but most of them involved STDs. Homosexuals were 116 times more likely to be murdered, 24 times more likely to commit suicide, and 18 times more apt to die in traffic accidents. Why that latter, I have no idea. Maybe homosexuals drive more recklessly.

[theloniusfleabag]

Dear FastNed,

An excellent post.

As to your question about preservation of societal values, while trying to be inclusive, I believe anti-discrimination laws would suffice. The rest is up to the individual. We have laws against racism, but it doesn't mean people still aren't racist. Bigotry, too, has become more 'unacceptable' due to awareness and 'political correctness' but it still exists.

[theloniusfleabag]

Dear Hugo,

'Sexual conditioning' can be applied to heterosexuals, as well, to control their 'condition'. I refer you to the somewhat tongue-in-cheek movie "A Clockwork Orange". Is it right to condition behaviour? (Mind you, the media does it 24/7 by way of advertisments).

A speech was given by William Burroughs on the subject of sexual conditioning, and of homosexuality. I will not post it here, but you can find it if you would like to look. It was very interesting, as Mr. Burroughs can sometimes be.

[Hugo]

Is it right to condition behaviour?

Is the threat of imprisonment as punishment for criminal action an attempt to condition behaviour? Have you ever been discouraged from doing something because it was illegal, and if so, was your behaviour being conditioned?

Regardless, if knowing the truth about homosexuality will "condition behaviour" in some people, fine, then it will "condition" them. The truth shall set you free.

[SirRiff]

just as one more attempt to show that genetic influences are generally misrepresented in the scope of these debates

a really interesting study just published this week shows a definate genetic influence on the brain development of rats in the earliest stages of sexually dimorphic (two versions M+F) of brain development.

Molecular Brain Research

Sexually dimorphic gene expression in mouse brain precedes gonadal differentiation

8 October 21, 2003

the abstract;

The classic view of brain sexual differentiation and behavior is that gonadal steroid hormones act directly to promote sex differences in neural and behavioral development. In particular, the actions of testosterone and its metabolites induce a masculine pattern of brain development, while inhibiting feminine neural and behavioral patterns of differentiation. However, recent evidence indicates that gonadal hormones may not solely be responsible for sex differences in brain development and behavior between males and females. Here we examine an alternative hypothesis that genes, by directly inducing sexually dimorphic patterns of neural development, can influence the sexual differences between male and female brains. Using microarrays and RT-PCR, we have detected over 50 candidate genes for differential sex expression, and confirmed at least seven murine genes which show differential expression between the developing brains of male and female mice at stage 10.5 days post coitum (dpc), before any gonadal hormone influence. The identification of genes differentially expressed between male and female brains prior to gonadal formation suggests that genetic factors may have roles in influencing brain sexual differentiation.

thus when yoy say genes alter the design of the brain at the earliest stage to reflect specfici sexual design, it is not to hard to extrapolate that those designs bring with them behavior. this is BEFORE hormones, or environmental factors, and all the learning that goes on. this could prime the brain to really learn things in a preplanned way that would shift the results to one side of the spectrum.

the purpose of the experiment

We propose to examine whether there is the possibility of a direct genetic influence on brain sexual differentiation by determining if there are any genes differentially expressed in male and female brain prior to the influences of gonadal hormones. By using microarray analysis, we have found 51 gene candidates for differential expression between male and female murine brain, suggesting that these genes may have potential roles in causing sex differences in neural function and/or development.

some of their conclusions

Using microarray gene expression analysis and setting our fold change threshold value at 1.1, our analysis has detected a total of 51 genes with differential expression between males and females

The majority of the remaining genes found differentially expressed in this study were localized to autosomal chromosomes. Surprisingly, some of these genes exhibited fold changes as great as 2.5 between males and females. This difference in expression, albeit moderate, may have subsequent effects on development of the neural system and behavior.

We speculate that the genes reported in this study may be fundamental factors that trigger differences between male and female brain development prior to the production of gonadal steroid hormones. Furthermore, these differences are present at 10.5 dpc in mice, when the adrenals, the other main source of hormonal steroidogenesis, have not yet differentiated [ 54 ]. Thus we can assume that the influences of gonadal or adrenal steroid hormones are quite minimal. In addition, while maternal placental hormones may influence brain sexual differentiation, we suggest that the effects of these hormones will be equalized between male and female embryos as long as they are from the same litter, which was the case in this study.

We suggest that some of the differences seen in gene expression are involved in the development of brain sexual dimorphisms. They may contribute functionally to the well-documented differences in task performance or even the stereotypical behaviors seen between males and females [ 10,  14,  42 ]. The mechanisms by which these genes act on neural development and behavior, either independently or synergistically with sex hormones, are still to be determined. This data argues for a shift of paradigm from the classic hormone-dependent theory of brain differentiation to one including direct genetic effects.

in case anybody is wondering how they did this...

they have a generic 'gene chip' that has the entire known mouse genome distributed accross the silicone waffer. the DNA is bound and fixed to the chip by laser energy. They then take brain samples and purfiy and extract teh DNA. when they allow the sample to bind to the localized segments of rat DNA on the chip, they can visualize the differences by UV light using a laser to read the amount of light produced by the florescense chemicals attached to the DNA. then they also biochemically reverse amplify the existing specfic DNA in another pure sample to get relative amounts in M and Fs. these two measures are compared to make sure they match and confirm the relative amounts produced in Ms and Fs.

they found that long before hormomes acted on the brain the different genetic sex influences found in M and F already was starting to differentiate the basic brain design.

interesting stuff

SirRiff

[Hugo]

thus when yoy say genes alter the design of the brain at the earliest stage to reflect specfici sexual design, it is not to hard to extrapolate that those designs bring with them behavior.

What this study does, if I read it right, is to show that genes alone play a part in determining secondary sexual characteristics, rather than gonadal hormones, as previously thought. These are physical in nature - height, build, hair distribution, brain size, etc.

I fail to see how you could extrapolate this study to claim that genes alone can determine behaviour.

[SirRiff]

What this study does, if I read it right, is to show that genes alone play a part in determining secondary sexual characteristics, rather than gonadal hormones, as previously thought. These are physical in nature - height, build, hair distribution, brain size, etc.

not secondary sexual characterists. those are just phenotypes.

this early genetically dependant action would effectivly alter the very DESIGN and neural development of the brain.

how are behaviors and instincts hardwired into the brain?

neural connections. its all neurons linked to other neurons by dentrites accross synapses with neurotransmitters released causing action potentials that propagate signals,

the design of the brain at this very very early stage would be, like all early development, very elastic and pluralistic in terms of its final configeration.

thus the very nature of the human brain, including everything that the brain does much of which is encoded by complex neural connections, would be very influenced by this kind of early genetic sex variation.

this study supports the idea that there would be truly identifiable genetic hardwiring (once we identify the genes more), that it wouldnt just be the latter effect of gonad induced hormones that alter the brain into specific m and F functions.

thus depending on certain combination of genes, the basic design of the brain maybe redesigned BEFORE traditional sex hormones take effect.

this would identify certain gender isolated behaviors. as i said somewhere before, sexual identity, sexual preference, and sexual gender may all be seperate genetic units. each can be mixed and matched to some degree.

you could have a male body, that feels female, who is drawn to men

or a female body,that feels female, that is drawn to women.

each part of these important behaviors may be strongly encoded in finite genetic units, which start acting on the brain before the physical body takes form as a specifc sex or is exposed to traditional learned behavior.

its about the basic design of teh brain as conserved by evolution to work. the design is altered by genes before the body is even developed into somethign recognizing a m or f. this genes can be mixed and matched and changed, and thus different componants of sexual behavior can be brought together in different ways, and hardwired into the brain before any of the physical manifestations of sex of environment have thier chance to input.

that is a very powerfull case for genetic influence of behavior considering it precedes hormonal input.

sirRiff