A Social Construct?

At the ten year anniversary of the passage of the marriage equality law they were a bunch of ten year olds running around. One of the people that I met there was my endo, she was with her wife and ten year old son.

When the bill was being debated and when the Supreme Court ruled marriage equality was legalized many right-wingers laughed the common narrative back then was LGBTQ+ slept around with different partners and no one wanted to marry. One couple just married after a 31 year relatinship.

When I came out one of the things that struck me was so many LGBTQ+ people were in long term relationships.

People still think this is a choice and all we do all day is f**k! They think all we do are one night stands and that we chose to be LGBTQ+.

Is Homosexuality a Choice?

Scientific American

By Marcia Malory

October 19, 2012

Ask this question, and you will probably receive one of two responses:

Yes. People choose to be gay. They are making an immoral choice, which government should discourage.

Or

No. Sexual preference is biologically determined. Government should protect gay people from discrimination because homosexuality is an unalterable aspect of their identity.

These two answers have something in common: With both of them, the science conveniently supports the moral decision.

[…]

We know, from many twin and adoption studies, that sexual preference has a genetic component.

A gay man is more likely than a straight man to have a (biological) gay brother; lesbians are more likely than straight women to have gay sisters.

In 1993, a study published in the journal Science showed that families with two homosexual brothers were very likely to have certain genetic markers on a region of the X chromosome known as Xq28. This led to media headlines about the possibility of the existence of a “gay gene” and discussions about the ethics of aborting a “gay” fetus.

Nature or nurture?

The structure of the brain might influence sexual preference.

In 1991, a study published in the journal Science seemed to show that the hypothalamus, which controls the release of sex hormones from the pituitary gland, in gay men differs from the hypothalamus in straight men. The third interstitial nucleus of the anterior hypothalamus (INAH3) was found to be more than twice as large in heterosexual men as in homosexual men

This study was criticized because it used brain tissue obtained at autopsies, and all of the homosexual subjects in the study were believed to have died of AIDS.

[…]

Gay women and gay men are more likely to be left-handed or ambidextrous than straight women and straight men, according to a number of different studies. Some researchers have suggested that this difference in handedness – preference for one hand over the other can be observed in fetuses - is related to differences in the corpus callosum.

I notice that myself in a very dramatic way.

There was a LGBTQ+ youth conference here in Connecticut, it was the True Colors conference. We wanted to collect signatures on a petition for the passage of the gender inclusive non-discrimination bills so at the conference registration we had a number of people asking those inline to register so I was standing next to the registration desk and asking people to sign the petition. I noticed that there were an awful lot of left-handed people in line, it was very, very noticeable. It was like a half of the people inline were left-handed!

We know from studying rats that exposure to sex hormones in the womb during a critical period in brain development affects future sexual orientation. By manipulating hormone levels during this time, scientists can make rats engage in homosexual behavior later on.

I have no proof but… back when I was born the treatment for miscarriages was a form of estrogen  called DES now I don’t know for sure but I do know that my mother had several miscarriages between  my brother and me.

Even if gay people can never stop being attracted to members of the same sex, they can learn not to act on their desires.

But why would you want to deny who you are. The only reason that I can think of is social pressure.