# People who are born gay.
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [December 30, 2002, 11:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662 "2002-12-30T11:53:50Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@maralinn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/maralinn)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2002, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/21 "2002-12-30T18:31:11Z")
1. To me, humans seem to be sort of omni-sexual. There are people who desire sex with children, with animals, with inaminate objects, and with nothing at all but their own hands. And many other things I haven’t thought of or heard of. 🙂
2. Additionally, humans seem to have a hugely complex psychology, so much so that we don’t have an adequate psychological explanation for many of the things we observe in ourselves. And desires, needs, and drives may all be partially psychological.
3. So maybe the question is not “Why is there so much deviance from the norm of heterosexuality?” but “Why is there so much heterosexuality?” (I’ve always suspected that humans are primarily bisexual, myself.)
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### Author:  [@Enderw24](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enderw24)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2002, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/22 "2002-12-30T19:11:26Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Meatros \*
> \*\*Also according to Snopes, humans have sex for pleasure, not necessarily to procreate:
> [http://www.snopes.com/critters/wild/pleasure.htm](http://www.snopes.com/critters/wild/pleasure.htm) \*\*
Snopes is designed to confirm, deny, or just bring to light urban legends. Whether pigs have sex for pleasure could be considered a UL but not whether humans do. We’re humans! We can confirm or deny that ourselves, can’t we?
I’m not going to argue about the truthfulness or accuracy of the information contained in the link. I’m just saying that when I saw the sentence “according to Snopes, humans have sex for pleasure” my first reaction was “according to Snopes? who cares what they have to say? There are probably 100 other places on the internet alone with more authority on human sexuality than Snopes will ever have.”
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### Author:  [@FunLvnCriminal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FunLvnCriminal)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2002, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/23 "2002-12-30T19:30:07Z")
Who the hell cares where it comes from, who thinks its right or wrong. You like guys? Go get you a guy. You like girls? Go get you a girl. Funny, My views have changed as I get older.
What does bother me is generalizations.
## quote:
## People don’t chose to become homosexual. They are born that way. It may seem like they chose to become gay, but that only means they were already gay from the start and were trying to hide/deny it.
Im sorry but, as someone else already said, you can’t put humans in a nice little package. It is my opinon that some people are born gay. Otherwise why on earth would you have a kid who commits suicide because he is gay and doesnt want to be. I also feel that some people choose to be gay. But then again these people are probably born with a predisposition to be attracted to both sexes. Just like a people are born to like the oposite sex. I know I didn’t wake up one morning with a choice. I have just always liked women.
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by DMark \*
> \*\*I usually find rabid homophobics are trying to hide something, otherwise why would they give a damn? \*\*
They did not choose to be rabidly homophobic, they too were born that way. Seriously, I hate that staement right there. Its not about someone being guy so they question why others are, IMO, but it is about a person brought up with steriotypes that says being gay is wrong, evil and icky. When you see a “flaw” in someone, don’t you wonder why it is like that? Thats all it is, theses people have been tought that being gay is wrong, something that can be fixed and they want to know why.
Just my opinon, I’m usually wrong. Just ask my wife.
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### Author:  [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2002, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/24 "2002-12-30T19:31:04Z")
I’ve reviewed the literature for a journal article I wrote, and there’s no evidence that sexual abuse causes homosexuality. There is some evidence that children who don’t fit their gender role stereotype may be more abused than kids who do, though, so it may be that homosexuality causes abuse rather than the other way around.
Sexual abuse is highly correlated with mental illness and poor adjustment. Homosexuals do not score any differently on psychological tests than do matched samples of heterosexuals. This argues against homosexuality as psychologically aberrant.
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### Author:  [@Meatros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meatros)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2002, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/25 "2002-12-30T19:36:37Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Enderw24 \*
> \*\*Snopes is designed to confirm, deny, or just bring to light urban legends. Whether pigs have sex for pleasure could be considered a UL but not whether humans do. We’re humans! We can confirm or deny that ourselves, can’t we?
> I’m not going to argue about the truthfulness or accuracy of the information contained in the link. I’m just saying that when I saw the sentence “according to Snopes, humans have sex for pleasure” my first reaction was “according to Snopes? who cares what they have to say? There are probably 100 other places on the internet alone with more authority on human sexuality than Snopes will ever have.” \*\*
To tell you the truth, I was going to write something like all animals do it for pleasure, but I couldn’t find it and had to make a hasty change. I could’ve sworn that Cecil wrote a column stating that almost all animals do it for pleasure.
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### Author:  [@nani](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nani)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2002, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/26 "2002-12-30T21:27:56Z")
Well, I happen to believe that homosexuality is not normal(in the sense of being a statistical anomily, such as a warm, sunny day in Stockholm), but for the life of me, I can’t understand why anyone in their right mind would choose to be homosexual. To those who respond with, their are a lot of crazy people out there, I say, well, most homosexuals I know tend to be more sane than most, so what about them?
According to a book I skimmed over a few months ago (I don’t remember what is was called, though it was about the differences between men and women. As such, I cannot at present provide a cite, and will submit to any corrections you may have), Homosexuals happen when in the womb, a male baby develops, but something gets mixed up, and a female brain is developed rather than a male one. For Lesbians, a male brain develops. So a gay guy is a male body with a female brain.
Now, This seems to me to be a description of transvestites rather than gays, but I suppose you could work out environmental influences that could affect how these people act.
Final (ugh) disclaimer: Maybe the book WAS talking about transvestites. I don’t remember. Please take the above two paragraphs with a grain or two of salt.
Thanks.
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### Author:  [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2002, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/27 "2002-12-30T21:28:48Z")
Even if orientation is not set at birth, but developed later, it doesn’t mean it is a choice. I’m a hetero guy, and I don’t even choose which women I’m attracted to, let alone that it is women at all.
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### Author:  [@Fiddle\_Peghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiddle_Peghead)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2002, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/28 "2002-12-30T21:35:31Z")
There’s “no point in it”?! Perhaps you feel this way (from a male perspective) because you’ve never had the “point” in “it”. 🙂
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### Author:  [@Audrey\_Levins](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Audrey_Levins)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2002, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/29 "2002-12-30T23:40:28Z")
I used to work at a bar that attracted a lot of strippers; they considered it a “low key” after work hangout. (Which gave me a great front-row seat in the minds and lives of strippers.)
And what interested me is that most of the strippers I encountered were, if not lesbians, then at least bisexual. They had a pathological dislike of men, based on the men they danced for, and seemed to think women were a much safer alternative.
None of the strippers I met were lesbians before they began dancing.
Which leads me to my theory that more people would be gay if the situation arose where they felt emboldened enough to try it. In other words, people are afraid to try it because they might, like these strippers, end up liking it as much as, or more than, heterosexual sex…and that once this barrier is eroded–by the opposite sex, by opportunity, by simple curiosity–you will end up with a much wider scope of sexuality than you had before.
I do also think that there were psychological factors at work here…human sexuality is based on such a wide range of factors that it’s difficult to pinpoint the “why.” Ever.
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### Author:  [@Lissa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissa)
#### Post date: [December 31, 2002, 12:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/30 "2002-12-31T00:07:48Z")
Well, if the Raelians have done what they claim, a cloned baby will be born any moment to a lesbian couple.
If the baby turns out to be gay, will this support the “nature” argument, or will people say that it was “nurture,” in that the lesbian parents nudged the baby in the direction of being gay?
If the baby is straight, would this totally defeat the “nature” argument?
It could turn out to be very interesting.
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### Author:  [@ffabris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ffabris)
#### Post date: [December 31, 2002, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/31 "2002-12-31T00:17:20Z")
Being gay a choice? Not in my experience.
I grew up in a very “Victorian” family. Or to be more precise, my mother and her parents were very “old school” in their views. They were open about sex (for instance, I recall once asking my mother whether she enjoyed oral sex and getting a very honest answer). However, in their view, homosexuality was abnormal, immoral and ranked along with child molestation. I was brought up with this, even before I really knew what sex was.
My environment was likewise very homophobic, even though in my high school years, I discovered that a lot of the boys my age were “fooling around”. Through this all, I was struggling with my realization that I was one of them, one of those “horrible perverts” who prefered boys over girls. For several years I tried to fool myself into believing that I was attracted to girls just as much. But in the end, I had to stop kidding myself. There were signals everywhere… like when dancing a slow dance with a girl, all I wanted to do was move away, to stop feeling her breasts on my chest.
I finally came out to _myself_ at age 19. I came out to my mother about a month later, which was a big mistake since she could not deal with it, and nor could I yet. It took me about a year before I was able to say words like, “I am no different than I was, just because I am attracted to men.”
I am now nearly 40, and I still have huge self esteem issues which stem from my difficulty, in adolescence, in accepting myself as being gay.
A choice? I think not. I would never have made such a choice.
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### Author:  [@spathiphyllum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/spathiphyllum)
#### Post date: [December 31, 2002, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/32 "2002-12-31T00:30:31Z")
Personally, I am convinced that genetics or hormone exposure in the womb play the main role in forming sexual orientation for most people, but I doubt it is the only factor–or that
_everyone_ is influenced to the same extent.
Even if it were shown that people have some degree of choice in their sexuality, that doesn’t mean that being gay is wrong. There are some gay people who feel they were able to “choose” their orientation to some degree. Check out [http://www.queerbychoice.com/](http://www.queerbychoice.com/) for their reasoning…which I think is a very intriguing new defense of gay rights.
Their argument is that _choosing_ to be gay is no worse than _choosing_ a different religion. Now, personally, I’m not sure if it’s truly possible to become “queer by choice”, but I definitely agree with the view that even if it is a choice, that doesn’t make it okay to discriminate against gays.
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### Author:  [@Badandi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Badandi)
#### Post date: [December 31, 2002, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/33 "2002-12-31T01:14:39Z")
A choice? No. The only choice that I’ve made was to tell people that I’m a lesbian.
I first realized that I liked girls when I was about 9. It wasn’t really a conscience choice, I really didn’t even know what the concept of homosexuality was. All that I knew was that I liked girls more than boys. It isn’t a matter of choice, but a matter of realizing who you are.
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### Author:  [@Thylacine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thylacine)
#### Post date: [December 31, 2002, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/34 "2002-12-31T01:33:00Z")
No cite but I heard a theory on a religious show not long ago I really liked:
If there is a gay gene the only reason why it is still in the gene pool is because it has been too hard throughout history for gays to be out so they have been forced into situations of passing on their genes so as to cover their shame. So many gay men and lesbians have hidden their whole lives in unhappy marriages because that is just what you did. Grew up, got married, had a family. If you didn’t there was something very wrong with you.
Of course now western society has changed so much we can have kids becuse we want them, not just because we should so there is no way we will be dying out soon.
I do love the idea that the Godhatefags and exodus type folks are possibly just causing more of us to be created 😉
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### Author:  [@kimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kimera)
#### Post date: [December 31, 2002, 3:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/35 "2002-12-31T03:13:06Z")
1. So maybe the question is not “Why is there so much deviance from the norm of heterosexuality?” but “Why is there so much heterosexuality?” (I’ve always suspected that humans are primarily bisexual, myself.) \*\*
[/QUOTE]
Religion. Most people are actually bisexual. If you look at societies where homosexuals are accepted, you will find that most people have homosexual experiences in their lives.
“During this great age of discovery, travellers returned from their voyages to report that homosexuality was “rife” on every continent and among many indigenous peoples. Repeatedly in the chronicals the shock of the Europeans is due not simply to the fact that homosexuality was tolerated and unashamedly practiced, but that is was practiced by great numbers of people.”
“It has been estimated that as much as 30 percent of the male population in modern Brazil are predominantly homosexual.”
-The Myth of the Modern Homosexual. Rictor Norton.
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### Author:  [@JerseyDiamond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JerseyDiamond)
#### Post date: [December 31, 2002, 5:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/37 "2002-12-31T05:56:08Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Lissa \*
> \*\*Well, if the Raelians have done what they claim, a cloned baby will be born any moment to a lesbian couple.
>
> If the baby turns out to be gay, will this support the “nature” argument, or will people say that it was “nurture,” in that the lesbian parents nudged the baby in the direction of being gay?
>
> If the baby is straight, would this totally defeat the “nature” argument?
>
> It could turn out to be very interesting. \*\*
I never thought of that. This will be interesting.
Another possible argument will be that maybe ‘gayness’ skips a generation, if the child doesn’t turn out to be gay. I guess we’ll see…
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### Author:  [@Lissa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissa)
#### Post date: [December 31, 2002, 6:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/38 "2002-12-31T06:36:28Z")
> [@](#):
>
> . Further investigation found that the guy was fired from a job working in a lab or some sort in africa. He lost that job because he was cought having intercourse with a lab monkey.
Oh, boy. Where do I start with this?
1. The first known case of AIDS, as we know it, was logged was a flight attendant who was extremely promiscuous, thus starting the rapid spread of the disease. This part you are correct about.
2. However, there is absolutely no evidence, other than conspriracy theorist mumbo-jumbo, that his sexual preference included both man and beast.
3. You posit that he made a rapid career jump from lab tech to flight attendant? And the airline did not look with askance at his termination for monkey-fucking? Surely, there must have been more qualified applicants.
4. Monkeys are just too difficult to screw. Ever seen how fast those monkeys can move? The little buggers are strong, and they bite! I sincerely doubt that no matter how many banannas you offered it, a monkey would allow you to have sex with it.
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### Author:  [@MrVisible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrVisible)
#### Post date: [December 31, 2002, 6:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/39 "2002-12-31T06:44:36Z")
Wow, **Rebelman** , that’s a big heap of misinformation you have there. Let me take that off your hands.
First of all, you got a cite for the AIDS origin story? 'Cause, from what I’ve researched, the first recorded victim was a norwegian merchant seaman, some ten years before the flight attendant was recognized as having an immonodeficient disease. [From this site](http://www.aidstakecare.com/medical/AllaboutHIV/originof.html):
> [@](#):
>
> The Norwegian sailor died of AIDS in 1976, at the age of 29. As did his wife and youngest daughter, born in 1967. Since the debunking of the case of the sailor from Manchester who died in 1959 with symptoms of immunosuppression (but not, it would appear, HIV infection) the members of this Norwegian family now represent the earliest confirmed cases of AIDS. The first symptoms appeared in 1966 in the sailor, in 1967 in his wife, and in 1969 in their daughter.
Yep. Straight sailor. And he probably picked up the disease from a woman in Douala. The page goes on to theorize that the disease was active in that area for around forty years at that time, and that the slaughter of chimpanzees and a monkey known as the sooty mangabey by hunters was probably responsible for the first transmission from animals to humans.
But even so, I don’t blame the straight community for the disease; it’s not like they manufactured it, or decided to transmit it. I’m pretty sure that if you’d asked them, they’d have been pretty adamant about not getting it at all. Even if I wanted to, it wouldn’t be right to blame them, since nobody in their right mind wants a potentially fatal disease.
> [@](#):
>
> As far as saying someone is born with it is not true. And I also find it hard to say that some guy just woke up one morning like an idiot thinking “well I’ve been with women all my life I think I will go to men now” It has to be something in their minds ticking out of tune with something else.
Thank you so much for this incisive, cogent psychological analysis. I’ll be sure to advise the [American Psychological Association](http://www.apa.org/pubinfo/answers.html)that your careful research has invalidated every study they’ve done on homosexuality, and that you’ll be happy to take over leadership of the organization posthaste. Their stance on homosexuality reads a bit differently than yours:
> [@](#):
>
> What Causes a Person To Have a Particular Sexual Orientation?
>
> There are numerous theories about the origins of a person’s sexual orientation; most scientists today agree that sexual orientation is most likely the result of a complex interaction of environmental, cognitive and biological factors. In most people, sexual orientation is shaped at an early age. There is also considerable recent evidence to suggest that biology, including genetic or inborn hormonal factors, play a significant role in a person’s sexuality. In summary, it is important to recognize that there are probably many reasons for a person’s sexual orientation and the reasons may be different for different people.
>
> Is Sexual Orientation a Choice?
>
> No, human beings can not choose to be either gay or straight. Sexual orientation emerges for most people in early adolescence without any prior sexual experience. Although we can choose whether to act on our feelings, psychologists do not consider sexual orientation to be a conscious choice that can be voluntarily changed.
>
> Can Therapy Change Sexual Orientation?
>
> No. Even though most homosexuals live successful, happy lives, some homosexual or bisexual people may seek to change their sexual orientation through therapy, sometimes pressured by the influence of family members or religious groups to try and do so. The reality is that homosexuality is not an illness. It does not require treatment and is not changeable.
So, have you got any data to back up your claims? Any reliable sources, any cites?
The kind of ignorance you displayed in your post, fortunately, isn’t gentic. It is curable, through education. And maybe by teaching people like you, we can turn this world around, and can eliminate this sort of hateful ignorance forever.
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### Author:  [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)
#### Post date: [December 31, 2002, 7:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/40 "2002-12-31T07:01:11Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Rebelman \*
> **you may find it interesting that some doctors looking for a cure for HIV/AIDS once tried to trace it back to the very first case and they actually did. It was a homosexual flight attendent on a flight from the UK to NY. and for its first 2 or 3 years it was exclusively in the gay community. Then it spread into the normal comunity.**
Leaving aside your use of the word “normal” to mean “everybody but gay people”–You’re talking about the first _US_ case of HIV. There was plenty of HIV in Africa–among **“normal”** people.
\*\*
> [@](#):
>
> Further investigation found that the guy was fired from a job working in a lab or some sort in africa. He lost that job because he was cought having intercourse with a lab monkey.\*\*
Oh, _please_ provide a reputable citation for this nasty idiocy.
\*\*
> [@](#):
>
> So it is easy to blame the gay community for such decieses.
> \*\*
Even if it were true, which it’s not, please explain how a man having sex with a monkey has anything to do with gay people. I would interpret your data to say that **MEN WHO HAVE SEX WITH MONKEYS** are the problem.
\*\*
> [@](#):
>
> And people have the right to blame them. \*\*
Which people are those? People who have sex with monkeys?
\*\*
> [@](#):
>
> As far as saying someone is born with it is not true.\*\*
Citation? The American Medical Association, The American Psychiatric Association, The American Psychological Association, and many other reputable organizations studying human behavior dispute you.
\*\*
> [@](#):
>
> I think its something phychological and so far this has been what has shown the most proof. So if it is psychological then theres a way of treating these mixed up people possably by education. \*\*
Citation? Are you a psychologist? A doctor? A scientist? A researcher? Search the SDMB archives and you will find plenty of citations that _nobody knows what causes people’s sexual orientations, and that it is impossible to tell gay people from straight people on psychological tests._
\*\*
> [@](#):
>
> By teaching people while they are young that this idea is wrong. Maybe we can turn this world around and phase out the gay community. \*\*
Don’t do us any favors.:smack:
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### Author:  [@Lissa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissa)
#### Post date: [December 31, 2002, 7:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-are-born-gay/145662/41 "2002-12-31T07:26:23Z")
> [@](#):
>
> By teaching people while they are young that this idea is wrong. Maybe we can turn this world around and phase out the gay community.
Well, everybody knows that if you tell young people that something is wrong, they will immediately cease to do it. Witness the glorious success of the War on Drugs, not to mention the various abstinence and anti-smoking movements.
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