Assuming someone will screw this up but... (1 Viewer)

[Guest]

There are even some studies that say certain individuals are more likely to be gay based on how many older brothers they have. 33% increase in the possibility of being gay per older brother.

That was somewhat the point of my earlier comment about a study looking at a link to miscarriages. There seems to be a possible link between miscarrying male babies because the mother's immune system fights the "intruder". Could this immune system reaction increase the chances of homosexuality in a baby carried to full term?

 

[cstu]

Science has shown we all start out female..Therefore my guess is somewhere during development the men who end up gay probably didn't fully develop man traits and retained some female traits....It is also shown through science that the female brain and homosexual brain are very similar to each other and different from a heterosexual brain.

That doesn't explain lesbians though.

I think lesbians make a choice......I mean at least as men we can understand why...right.

Indeed.

 

[SacramentoBob]

this is kind of interesting:

While female sexuality appears to be more fluid, research suggests that male gayness is an inborn, unalterable, strongly genetically influenced trait. But considering that the trait discourages the type of sex that leads to procreation — that is, sex with women — and would therefore seem to thwart its own chances of being genetically passed on to the next generation, why are there gay men at all?

Put differently, why haven't gay man genes driven themselves extinct?

This longstanding question is finally being answered by new and ongoing research. For several years, studies led by Andrea Camperio Ciani at the University of Padova in Italy and others have found that mothers and maternal aunts of gay men tend to have significantly more offspring than the maternal relatives of straight men. The results show strong support for the "balancing selection hypothesis," which is fast becoming the accepted theory of the genetic basis of male homosexuality.

The theory holds that the same genetic factors that induce gayness in males also promote fecundity (high reproductive success) in those males' female maternal relatives. Through this trade-off, the maternal relatives' "gay man genes," though they aren't expressed as such, tend to get passed to future generations in spite of their tendency to make their male inheritors gay.

Why are there still gay people?

So only men appear to be "born that way".

 

[Ditka Butkus]

this is kind of interesting:

While female sexuality appears to be more fluid, research suggests that male gayness is an inborn, unalterable, strongly genetically influenced trait. But considering that the trait discourages the type of sex that leads to procreation — that is, sex with women — and would therefore seem to thwart its own chances of being genetically passed on to the next generation, why are there gay men at all?

Put differently, why haven't gay man genes driven themselves extinct?

This longstanding question is finally being answered by new and ongoing research. For several years, studies led by Andrea Camperio Ciani at the University of Padova in Italy and others have found that mothers and maternal aunts of gay men tend to have significantly more offspring than the maternal relatives of straight men. The results show strong support for the "balancing selection hypothesis," which is fast becoming the accepted theory of the genetic basis of male homosexuality.

The theory holds that the same genetic factors that induce gayness in males also promote fecundity (high reproductive success) in those males' female maternal relatives. Through this trade-off, the maternal relatives' "gay man genes," though they aren't expressed as such, tend to get passed to future generations in spite of their tendency to make their male inheritors gay.

Why are there still gay people?

So only men appear to be "born that way".

yes and I agree.

 

[Koya]

this is kind of interesting:

While female sexuality appears to be more fluid, research suggests that male gayness is an inborn, unalterable, strongly genetically influenced trait. But considering that the trait discourages the type of sex that leads to procreation — that is, sex with women — and would therefore seem to thwart its own chances of being genetically passed on to the next generation, why are there gay men at all?

Put differently, why haven't gay man genes driven themselves extinct?

This longstanding question is finally being answered by new and ongoing research. For several years, studies led by Andrea Camperio Ciani at the University of Padova in Italy and others have found that mothers and maternal aunts of gay men tend to have significantly more offspring than the maternal relatives of straight men. The results show strong support for the "balancing selection hypothesis," which is fast becoming the accepted theory of the genetic basis of male homosexuality.

The theory holds that the same genetic factors that induce gayness in males also promote fecundity (high reproductive success) in those males' female maternal relatives. Through this trade-off, the maternal relatives' "gay man genes," though they aren't expressed as such, tend to get passed to future generations in spite of their tendency to make their male inheritors gay.

Why are there still gay people?

So only men appear to be "born that way".

yes and I agree.

Men are "more" born that way perhaps. Again, this is not a yes/no black/white question but rather a sliding scale with a LOT of input - genetic, womb, early childhood, coming of age, social norms and mores throughout, etc.

 

[Rove!]

Because it isn't always genetic. Hth

One reason is because it isn't purely genetic. /thread

doesn't really answer the question...by this reasoning, the gentic component could still breed out....