The Gay Gene and What It All Means

It's a growing trend in my household: every mention of a gay, lesbian, or bisexual classmate is met with a falter as my parents inquire as to whether news of the homosexuality of my friends surprises me. I consistently reply with, "of course not", but I often forget the novelty of liberty to be gay; when my parents were teenagers, hardly anyone was out of the closet. Homosexuality was repressed and seen as foreign, uncomfortable, or even slightly repulsive. The times certainly have changed, and only some have changed with them. I admire adults like my parents and even my grandmother, who are clearly unable to view homosexuality as "any old thing", but try their damnedest to be as accepting as possible. In any case, homosexuality certainly is a hot topic right now.

Generally, the issue among people with traditional (and often religious) values is that homosexuality is morally wrong because it's not transcribed in *insert religious text here*. This causes people to try to simplify the issue by determining a justification for the immorality so that "them crazy liberal folk" will finally see the error of their ways in accepting such behavior. Thus the argument foments into whether homosexuality is a decision or something you're born with. Choice or gene, essentially.

Now it's pretty apparent that viewing homosexuality as a choice is a dangerous mode of thinking; it's for this reason that there are reprogramming clinics and "pray the gay away" camps for LGB teens, as well as rampant hate crimes against homosexuals. One need only look at the comments section on any popular YouTube video to find alarming use of anti-gay language in a nonsensical context to see evidence of the anti-gay sentiment among those who believe homosexuality is a choice.

On the opposite end of the spectrum are those who believe homosexuality is genetic, that it is an inevitability and should be accepted because it's not something that's about to just disappear. Among this crowd, there is heavy support for gays, with pro-gay cries echoing just as loud as those that are anti-gay. Basically, the whole issue is a noisy, reverberating mess.

What many may not realize, however, is that viewing homosexuality as being linked to genetics is also a dangerous mode of thinking. Recently, I've read several articles about scientist Dean Hamer of the National Institute of Health, who in 1993, announced that he'd isolated the "gay gene" on the q28 allele of the X chromosome in males. While his results were never able to be repeated, and he was later accused of fabricating them, this supposed discovery brought forth a new wave of talk about homosexuality. What arose from this was the shocking quote from prominent gay community members saying that viewing homosexuality as genetic is also detrimental because it makes people both pity those who "suffer" from it (in the same way we pity someone born with a physical disability) and makes the people with traditional values desire gene therapy to modify future children to prevent this "unnatural mutation".

Everything considered, my solution, and the mode of thinking that I most often employ in regarding this issue, is to stop trying to justify homosexuality. By trying to figure out why, we lose the ability to see individual people; in this way, justification, whether pro- or anti-gay, is dehumanizing. It doesn't matter why people are attracted to one sex or another, only that homosexuality is a reality in our world and that it's not going away, no matter how much we try to break it down.

Thoughts? Opinions? Post them below!