Posted on 05/21/2015 6:54:52 AM PDT by wagglebee
PRINCETON, NJ, May 20, 2015 (LifeSiteNews.com) -- For the first time, a majority of Americans say that homosexuals are "born that way."
According to the latest Gallup poll, 51 percent of Americans say that people are born gay or lesbian, while only 30 percent say outside factors such as upbringing and environment determine sexual orientation.
However, science would not bear that out. No fewer than eight major studies from around the world have found homosexuality is not a genetic condition.
Peter Sprigg of the Family Research Council says that these numerous, rigorous studies of identical twins have now made it impossible to argue that there is a "gay gene." If homosexuality were inborn and predetermined, then when one identical twin is homosexual, the other should be, as well.
Yet one study from Yale and Columbia Universities found homosexuality common to only 6.7 percent of male identical twins and 5.3 percent of female identical twins.
The low rate of common homosexuality in identical twins – around six percent – is easily explained by nurture, not nature.
Researchers Peter Bearman and Hannah Brueckner concluded that environment was the determining factor. They rejected outright that "genetic influence independent of social context" as the reason for homosexuality. "(O)ur results support the hypothesis that less gendered socialization in early childhood and preadolescence shapes subsequent same-sex romantic preferences."
"Less gendered socialization" means, a boy was without a positive father figure, or a girl was without a positive mother figure.
In light of the evidence, Sprigg said simply, "No one is born gay."
Psychiatrists William Byne and Bruce Parsons summarize the science: "Critical review shows the evidence favoring a biologic theory to be lacking. ... In fact, the current trend may be to underrate the explanatory power of extant psychosocial models." In other words, homosexuality is a psychological malady, not something people are born with.
Some homosexuals openly admit that their lifestyle is a choice. Lindsay Miller, who describes herself as a "queer woman," complained in The Atlantic monthly, "I get frustrated with the veiled condescension of straight people who believe that queers 'can't help it,' and thus should be treated with tolerance and pity.”
“I was not born this way,” she wrote. “The life I have now is not something I ended up with because I had no other options. Make no mistake – it's a life I chose.”
"It's time to send the 'born that way' myth to the graveyard of misbegotten ideas, buried in the plot next to the myth that the sun revolves around the earth,” Bryan Fischer of the American Family Association has written.
And yet, the myth continues to gain believers, even among conservatives. According to the new Gallup poll, Republicans are divided on whether Americans are born homosexual (40 percent) or whether same-sex orientation is determined by environmental factors (36 percent).
In previous polls, a majority of Republicans have said homosexuality is not innate. Now, according to this poll, they are equally likely to view sexual orientation as inherent, rather than a choice or a consequence of how people were raised. In all, 62 percent of Democrats believe homosexuals were born that way.
The issue affects Republican politicians who, like all politicians, base their public statements on the polls. Presidential candidate Dr. Ben Carson recently apologized for merely suggesting people choose to be gay or lesbian. Sen. Marco Rubio has said that, while he does not support same-sex "marriage," he believes that people are born gay or lesbian.
Fischer says our society and particularly our presidential candidates should make policy based on medical and scientific reality, not polls. "If homosexual behavior is a choice, then our public policy can freely be shaped by an honest look at whether this behavioral choice is healthy and should be encouraged, or unhealthy and dangerous and consequently discouraged," he wrote.
There is no debate over the health threats posed by engaging in the homosexual lifestyle. Fischer notes that the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association admits homosexuals are at greater risk of AIDS, substance and alcohol abuse, depression and anxiety, hepatitis, STDs, and prostate and colon cancer.
"This is not behavior that any rational society should condone, endorse, subsidize, reward, promote or sanction in domestic policy or in the marketplace,” Fischer wrote. “It's a choice, and a bad one at that."
The Gallup poll, taken May 6-10, also reports a new record high number of Americans support same-sex "marriage."
The poll is based on telephone interviews with a random sample of 1,024 adults, aged 18 and older, living in the United States. The organization says its margin of sampling error is ±4 percentage points at the 95 percent confidence level.
The twin studies definitely show that ‘gayness” is not entirely genetic in nature. But the fact that one in 7 lesbian twins who are gay will have a gay sister indicates to me that there is at least a gay tendency gene floating around in these girls. The rate is somewhat lower for males.
I conclude that since 1 in 7 is well above the normal distribution of lesbians in the population as a whole.
Is this correct? If not, why?
I am not arguing “born that way,” but why did the most recent study on this subject indicate nearly 50% of twins are both gay, not 11-14%?
Challenge: Do not answer with...
“It’s simple: politics.”
“Who paid for the study?”
“The researchers were working towards a predetermined conclusion!”
Give specifics on WHY the internals of the study differed.
Yeah but the higher income levels and fashionable clothing choices make it an even trade off. (Do I need the /SARC tag?)
Because it is still in the closet.
The jokes keep writing themselves.
No.
Home truth - there is no such thing as “settled science”. This is to neither defend nor oppose the possibility of a “gay gene”, there is simply insufficient information to make a value judgment.
But empirically, would not have simple statistics have shown a tendency toward homosexual behavior appearing at a greater or lesser degree in specific family lines? This has not been proven, and to my knowledge, there has not ever been a serious study done one way or the other.
Nor has study of what is known of the human genome ever shown up an identifiable set of characteristics that even indicate a tendency. Like many human behaviors, homosexuality is a LEARNED trait, resulting from a choice that the individual, rightly or wrongly, made at perhaps a very early age, and often on the basis of incomplete information.
Gay supporters sometimes tell stories about people who were once married normally, divorced to be with a gay partner. The belief is that they were “really” homosexual, and were only “acting” heterosexual.
If that is true, then it is also possible that someone who is “acting” homosexual is “really” heterosexual.
How would you know the difference?
People are born male/female based on XY chromosones. That’s the only sexual gene. So you can say that people are born with sexuality, but you cannot say they are born with lifestyle choices. No such lifestyle gene has been found.
Sorry to hear there’s such a barrier. Prayers for reconciliation and healing will ensue.
Studies make clear that over 50% of homosexuals were MOLESTED AS CHILDREN.
The rate is likely much higher due to deficiencies in the polling methods and lack of follow-up interviews.
Also, consider the counselors who have practiced for over 20 years and never met a homosexual who had NOT been molested as a child.
I’m actually surprised that that study was allowed to be conducted, much less have the results published.
The molestation factor!
If one sister was molested, why not the other?
My references are at another location, but I’ve posted them before.
The fact that an increasing number of people buy into the fantasy that homosexuals are born, not made, shows how successful the government schools have been over the last 40 years brainwashing students with their pro-homoscexual agendas.
Most Americans think gays are born “that way” because that’s what the MSM has been saying for years.
And you add in popular culture, all the TV shows which have homosexual characters, and idiot singers such as “Lady GAG” who sing they are born that way, and people start to believe it.
Here’s what I don’t get about the “LGBT” peoples. They say that the “Gay” people are born that way. But clearly the “T” or transwhatever people, the people who are seeking sex change operations, were not born correctly. They are seeking surgical corrections to a perceived flaw in their sex identity/orientation, whatever the politically correct term for their condition is. Why aren’t the “T” of “LGBT” born that way???
No, the family lines would have died out, as the ones carrying the recessive gene would not have bred.
Ah, but, the gay lobby will say, “They *had* to pretend to be heterosexual to avoid persecution by you intolerant eeeeeeeeevil Christians! No one would pretend to be gay! Being gay means being persecuted!”
See how easily they can twist that?
Make the argument more water-tight.
I feel for you, if your daughter says she doesn’t feel safe in your house. HOLY SMOKES...... She’s your daughter. Of course she is safe in your house. Of course you want her to visit. There is no danger to her safety in your house.
I don’t mean to be disrespectful, but your daughter is behaving in the manner of so many liberals. If you disagree with what they believe, then you are somehow hateful, or dangerous. Of course you love your daughter, and she just doesn’t see it. She is blinded by the political agenda of the liberal LGBT left.
The wife of the mayor of New York used to be openly lesbian. Then what happened? She married a man, and had children with him. The liberals never talk about her. But I would love to know more about her life journey, and what prompted her to change from lesbianism to heterosexuality and a settled family life.
I'd argue that "choice" may not be the right word. Put bluntly, old homos, troll for young uninitiated victims. So at the very least there is some heavy coercion.
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