Homosexuality: Nature or Nurture?

[blankedboy]

Nature, you can't be forced to be gay if the straight, the same way lots of gay people are forced to be straight. You either are, or your not (or bi-sexual but lets not get into all that)

I'm bi :>

Yeah, I'm going with nature on this one. Nurture might have an influence, but from my experience and sources it looks pretty nature.

I'm curious what your "sources" are. Scientifically, this is a completely open question with very, very little evidence on either side. In fact, no one even knows how to start answering the question. Hell, scientists aren't even really clear on what the question is really asking in the first place.

This thread makes me seriously sad about the state of public knowledge about these things. Everyone is just spitting out the most acceptable answer given their social beliefs. Imagine if Democrats insisted that P=NP and Republicans all insisted that P!=NP (there's probably a bad political joke to be made here...). It's absolutely ridiculous. Arguing from "experience" only makes it more completely absurd. Do you have some tremendous gift allowing you to sense your genetic structure?

And the worst part is that the people who do argue that it's nature are the people trying to be progressive. Arguing about this is very nearly the least progressive stance you could take. Your argument is akin to insisting that people should tolerate other races because, while black people might be inferior, they can't help it.

By sources I mean about 7-10 other gay/bi/lesbian people I know that have given me their opinion from their experience. And you say arguing from experience is absurd... you're not gay, are you? You can piece together stuff easily enough if you think about it, and I have about NOTHING that would have influenced me via nurture from my life before I realised I was bi. Hell, it even seems like my parents have tried to avoid the subject entirely my whole life, from my memory the subject has come up a grand total of twice in my family.

Unless you're just being a silly troll... that third paragraph sure seems like it. Sorry if you're not, but just a heads-up that you do come off as kinda troll-y.

 

[Varya]

It's a choice, just like everything else you do in life.

Humbug, emotions are not choices. We can choose to listen to them, or choose to nurture/surpress them, but emotions are reactions, not actions. Also, choices are only responses to our environment and genetic preferences, we can only choose what we think is the best option, and the best option is determined by environment and genetics.

 

[vioray]

definitely some of both I'd say, although I think different people are influenced more by one than the other. either way though, it's definitely not a choice (although there is of course choice involved in whether or not to embrace it or hide it) and neither is it something that people should be ashamed of

 

[lotrfanatic1]

Nurture, obviously. That's why there aren't any homosexuals in Iran! Derp.

Nah, seems like nature. I'm pretty sure I thought girls were cute way before my parents/teachers/etc even acknowledged that boys "ought" to like girls. So, at least heterosexuality seems like nature to me.

i know everyone is saying that homosexuality is down to nature, however, i myself am gay & reflecting back on events in my life & the way i was raised i think i can safely say it was down to nurture

wait, really? Can you elaborate?

pretty much growing up in a household of a mother & 2 sisters, playing with pretty much all girls toys with my sister (about the same age as me) till i was forced in to boy stuff when i was halfway through primary school, having girls as best friends until senior school, being brought up to see women as important high up people who should be respected rather then on the same level or equal (i know all women should be respected but still on the same level). time & time again bad experiences with girls who were cheating back stabbing whores who i never cared for emotionly... ect... it just goes on & on xD

 

[Jaime_Wolf]

Nature, you can't be forced to be gay if the straight, the same way lots of gay people are forced to be straight. You either are, or your not (or bi-sexual but lets not get into all that)

I'm bi :>

Yeah, I'm going with nature on this one. Nurture might have an influence, but from my experience and sources it looks pretty nature.

I'm curious what your "sources" are. Scientifically, this is a completely open question with very, very little evidence on either side. In fact, no one even knows how to start answering the question. Hell, scientists aren't even really clear on what the question is really asking in the first place.

This thread makes me seriously sad about the state of public knowledge about these things. Everyone is just spitting out the most acceptable answer given their social beliefs. Imagine if Democrats insisted that P=NP and Republicans all insisted that P!=NP (there's probably a bad political joke to be made here...). It's absolutely ridiculous. Arguing from "experience" only makes it more completely absurd. Do you have some tremendous gift allowing you to sense your genetic structure?

And the worst part is that the people who do argue that it's nature are the people trying to be progressive. Arguing about this is very nearly the least progressive stance you could take. Your argument is akin to insisting that people should tolerate other races because, while black people might be inferior, they can't help it.

By sources I mean about 7-10 other gay/bi/lesbian people I know that have given me their opinion from their experience. And you say arguing from experience is absurd... you're not gay, are you? You can piece together stuff easily enough if you think about it, and I have about NOTHING that would have influenced me via nurture from my life before I realised I was bi. Hell, it even seems like my parents have tried to avoid the subject entirely my whole life, from my memory the subject has come up a grand total of twice in my family.

Unless you're just being a silly troll... that third paragraph sure seems like it. Sorry if you're not, but just a heads-up that you do come off as kinda troll-y.

(1) Yes, I am gay and have been for as long as I can remember.

(2) Unless they can remember their orientation from the moment of their birth, their opinion doesn't really provide much evidence either way. Even then, you have no way of knowing whether experiences in the womb contributed to their orientation.

(3) The question isn't even very clearly defined. The last two minutes of that Dawkins video someone posted above do a nice job of explaining the problem.

(4) The fact that people can't discern experiences that lead to their orientation doesn't mean that experiences didn't. Being influenced and knowing you've been influenced are two very different things.

(5) I probably come across as trolly precisely because this issue means a lot to me and I every month or so someone makes one of these threads and everyone says the same thing. It pisses me off because:

First, it's awkward that so many people seem convinced that this question has been resolved, especially those that cite the intuitions of gay people as evidence. Do you trust me to know about the nature of subatomic particles because I'm made out of them?

Second, as I've said repeatedly, the question isn't just unanswered, it might be unanswerable. It's really, really hard to even make a sensible hypothesis about it.

Third, the overwhelming majority of people who argue that it's nature do so because they want to make a case for greater acceptance of homosexuality. In this respect, I'm right there with them. The problem is that they're shooting themselves in the feet. The question is undecided, so the argument goes nowhere. All you end up doing is seeing which side can yell loudest while you go back and forth disparaging each other's evidence (which will necessarily be pretty easy for each side to do, since good evidence either way doesn't exist at present).

And even if they did manage to prove that it was nature, so what? The opposed parties could still argue that it was unnatural (those of them that even believe in genetics). They could go back to pathologizing it: it's not as though we don't possess the concept of genetic disease. Frankly, I'm always surprised that more queer people aren't insulted by the use of genetics as an argumentative tactic. Why are we arguing that queer people should be accepted based on the cause of their orientation ("we can't help being this way, so you might as well accept us") rather than on the effects of their orientation (virtually all either neutral or positive)?

 

[Antwerp Caveman]

From what I learned in my Psych class, Homosexuality is based off genetics mainly. He actually said very clearly that it's not really contested in the psychiatric world. It's more just an accepted fact. Of course, it's up to each person to choose if they go with the feelings their bodies give them, and that does work both ways. Straight people can force themselves to be homosexual just like homosexual people can force themselves to be straight. But, it really boils down to genetics in terms of what gender your body is naturally attracted to.

So that means the gay gene(s) have been identified?
I believe that people in different circumstances will respond differently. 1 choice here and there can expose a person to different things, including sexuality.

I'm not quite sure on the details to be honest. I was really quoting from my Psych teacher. It was never really discussed more then that little bit in class. I also think you're right about reacting differently. But in the end, we can't really choose who our bodies lust after. So while different circumstances may dictate how we respond, I don't think that they'll decide how we feel in the first place.

I disagree.
1. While lust is a part of sexuality and homosexuality. There are also people in it for the sheer love oof another person. Like someone close to me, a lovely, healthy young woman, had some boyfriends, but now has a girlfriend because she just loves that person very much. Love is like a first impression of a person. Either you get the first impression right and connect to a person, or you repel them completely.
This person also makes me think that maybe the 2 catagories of gay and straight are a completely wrong way to approach the entire issue.

Also, if someone tells you that it has been determined to be genetic, keep asking questions. How, why? Have genes been identified? Is it heraditary? I'd suggest a rather impossible double-blind experiment in which gay pârents conceive a child raised by straight people and see 'how gay' the child becomes. But that is nearly inconceivable because the fosterparents will raise and nurture the child with completely different values. (let alone the moral implications of creating and mastering a life for science).

 

[Hap2]

I give you epigenetics:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epigenetics

The wondrous combination of both Nature and Nurture! Packaged in one single convenient package that, unlike it's parts, can answer a lot more questions!

Your genes aren't static. As you grow up they change and influence your body to dynamically adapt to the situation you're living in. It starts in the womb where your body registers the nutrients it receives through the umbilical cord and adapts to that by switching certain genes on and off. And it just keeps on going.

In the end your Nature influences your Nurture which influences your Nature which influences your Nurture which influences your Nature which influences your Nurture which influences your Nature which influences your Nurture which influences your Nature which influences your Nurture which influences your Nature which influences your Nurture etc.

So the answer: Both.

What this person and Verp said. There is a vast continuing multiplicity of factors at work, not just one underlying cause (despite the human tendency and desire to try and simplify it down to such a thing for comprehension and communication's sake). The mood of the parents during conception and during the embryo/fetus' development, how many children and their gender the parents have already had, the conditions the parents find themselves in (food, shelter, etc.), are but a few, and there are tons more. Simply put, it's out of our control what our sexual orientation will be and amongst all animals, it's such a fluid enough thing in its variances, that I would doubt any two people have the exact same sexuality.

The terms: heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, and asexual, are just over-generalizations to conceptualize sexuality into something we can communicate. The trouble is that humanity seems to forget that all too often and ends up trying to apply sexuality as if it were some strict sort of rules, forgetting that it is a conceptualization and a generalization of a multiplicity of feelings that in its will to be is also the result of many factors coming together at once.

I digress, though I wish more people would read Foucault's History of Sexuality (The Will to Knowledge), paying very close attention to that first volume. He does a better job of elaborating on this than I do.

 

[Fappy]

It can be both. Scientists have proven nature, while its perfectly within reason to believe that someone can develop their sexual orientation due to their development. Are people on the internet still talking about this?

 

[incal11]

Now again I will speak of denial. The denial is of that persons own sexuality. People dedicate their lives to denying their sexuality, living lives as straight men and doing everything they can to push the homosexual attraction to the side. Some wish with all their hearts that they could change their sexuality no matter how much their family or friends hate them or show support. And then you come along and say "they could change their sexuality easily by waking up" or something, well people have been working on waking up for a while now and It aint working for them.

Well, I didn't say it happened fast or easily at the beginning, I remember well my own confusion at feeling what I though I should not feel. Now I can pretty much decide what I want at the moment and have no trouble with it. I guess I was lucky to have been able to take it with some pragmatism from the start. But what allowed me to do so ?
That might be a difficult question, but easier to determine is the origin of the modern concept of sexual orientation and of it's importance: society.
The cases you mention did not exist in different societies with less taboos.

Theoretically according to you I could turn start getting a boner over women overnight, which I think would be a blast, but despite efforts by the majority simply wanting this change doesn't seem to be enough to flick the switch.
I happily invite you to tell me and the general populace how to do this if such a thing is to be possible, because I believe sexuality to be a little more rigid for most people than you're making out.

It seems expanding what you like is easier than restricting it. So if someone feels something he's convinced he should not feel and tries to deny it instead of accepting it then naturally it's not gonna be easy. If someone feels one way but is uncomfortable because they are convinced they ough to feel differently maybe they need to investigate the source of that contradiction rather than try to change themselves forcefully.
In any case, to just stop caring about those strongly rooted social norms is the best answer I can come up with. I understand how this is far from easy for most people, maybe even impossible, due to a life-long (self)conditioning. If you genuinely want women to give you boners too, and do not stress about it, then it could eventually happen.
If it does not it could mean you hard-wired yourself that way over time, especially if you're not that young. Then don't sweat it, because it'd only make you miserable. Of course, dimissing the opinion of one's own disapproving familly is often easier said than done.

What I mean is that unless something happens to that person to shift his or her preferences, once instincts will simply tell you to mate with the opposite sex, and unless it's actually questioned, you'll happily live your life that way.

At least we agree on principles.
Mating and humping for fun may well be two different things. That would be the source of the confusion.

 

[Bek359]

We already know this. It's genetic. I wish people would stop acting like this is something that is up for debate.

Can you point me to the study where this was proven?

Will this do?

http://www.apa.org/about/governance/council/policy/sexual-orientation.aspx

 

[Hollock]

NATURE.
NO parent raises their kid so that they will be hated for nothing.

 

[Olrod]

To everyone who thinks sexuality is a choice: When did YOU choose YOUR sexuality?

 

[let's rock]

Can't really say. I am bisexual, and for me it seems to be more nurture. But my current boyfriend has an identical twin brother, who isn't interested in boys at all. So they are geneticly identical, and raised in perfect equal emvironments, one is gay, the other is straight. So I really don't know, maby if it is nurture and they were in different classes once, but I can't really say that would be a difference enough to make somebody gay or not

 

[Kevin7557]

All three actually. There is a Gay gene so it is possible to be naturally gay. A good portion of others actually suffer from Gender dissociation disorder and some have retarded parents like those raising their kids genderless. Look it up it is as wrong and criminally negligent as it sounds.

 

[jesseetc]

Hey guys,

if a twin is gay, the other twin has a 70% chance of also being gay

therefore, genetics play a strong role.

 

[Pyramid Head]

Your sexuality is beyond your control. The only thing societal factors involved are whether or not you'll acknowledge said sexuality and come out of the closet like Harvey Milk or whether or not you'll go into deep denial and be driven fucking insane like Fred Phelps. That might sound like a cheap shot but believe me, the claim that the most violent homophobes are homosexuals in denial is genuine.

 

[let's rock]

I think that the gay gene may increase the chanses of being gay, but I don't think that it means you will be gay indefenetly, and vise versa, nurture still plays a part in it, at least how I see it. Every family member I have hates homosexuality, Yet I'm gay. So if nobody else in my familt is gay, and as a matter of fact hate it, it can't be genetic. So I belive in a combination where eigther can be true.

 

[TonyVonTonyus]

Bit of both. I believe it's a natural occurence but you're not BORN that way. I believe you develop it into your psyche over experience.

 

[dashiz94]

Well I find it hard to believe that being gay could possibly exsist in the genetic code purely because it makes it far less likely that your going to have offspring and therefore pass on your genetic code if you are and therefore it would've died out. Which makes me want to say that its entirely nurture. However having several homosexual friends they all think that it wasnt a choice that they made and their upbringings vary wildy.

Theory says all nurture, practise says all nature. I'm going to say its neither and actually being gay is decided entirely by whether or not you like peanuts.

Because genetics is so black and white like that it can't possibly be that the genetic code can't make mistakes, right? By that logic there wouldn't be any instances of birth defects or strange behavorial anomalies like, say, schizophrenia, right?

Genetics is so incredibly complex and the human brain is such an oddball organism that to apply a high school level scientific concept to either of them is just plain dumb.