What makes someone gay? Science is trying to get it straight. | Alice Dreger | Big Think

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What makes someone gay? Science is trying to get it straight.
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Heterosexual people have been less interesting to scientists than gay people, in terms of where they come from, because, evolutionarily speaking, being gay doesn't lead to a higher "higher reproductive fitness" — meaning, it doesn't lead to more babies. Across cultures, gay boys tend to be more interested in spending time with their mothers. We still don't really know why gay people are attracted to each other.
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ALICE DREGER:

Alice Dreger is an historian of medicine and science, a sex researcher, an award-winning writer, and an (im)patient advocate. Dreger’s latest major work is Galileo’s Middle Finger: Heretics, Activists, and the Search for Justice in Science.
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TRANSCRIPT:

ALICE DREGER: We don't actually know the extent to which gender is socially constructed because you can't do an experiment where you remove culture and see what happens. So we don't know to what extent what we see as gendered patterns are the result of sex, biological sex, males and females. We know that gender differs according to culture, but we also know that there are patterns that appear to be fairly universal in terms of gender norms. And the ones that are more universal are more likely to probably have a sex bases to it, an evolved-to-sex basis, that is to say biological basis for males and females. So, for example, which gender serves a very important meal may be different by different cultures. So in some cultures a man will serve a very important meal versus a woman. So for example, think about it in the United States that historically speaking the father carves the turkey on Thanksgiving, but in general women prepare food historically speaking. So what we know is that these kinds of things can differ by culture, but that there are some "universals". And one of the universals we find, for example, is in childhood play that we find that children who are girls tend to do more social play, they tend to do more social role-play. Children who are boys tend to do more competitive play, they tend to do more play that mimics aggression or that mimics sport and mimics sometimes building, and so there are these kinds of patterns. But that doesn't mean everybody fits them.

And it's really interesting actually too if you look cross-culturally scientists find evidence that this may have – it's not just gender, that there's a sexuality component to it too. So boys who are going to grow up and be gay, and we know who they are because of retrospectively they grow up to be gay, they're what's called androphilic, that is to say they're attracted to males. And the majority of females are also attracted to males, so most females are androphilic and a small percentage of boys will grow up to be androphilic. We know that historically speaking, cross-culturally they tend to be more feminine in terms of their interests, they're more interested in social role-play, for example, they're more interested in helping their mothers, they're more interested in associating with girls as young children and more interested in dressing as girls, for example. That doesn't mean that they are girls, but it does suggest to us that sexuality and gender have interplayed components in them, that gender isn't just about social role but it has something to do with sexuality and that there's a reason females end up with these kind of patterns and males end up with these kinds of patterns and when you have a male who's attracted to males he ends up with a little bit more of the female pattern and in some circumstances if you have a girl and she's attracted to girls she'll end up with a little bit more of the male pattern in childhood.

So gender and sexual orientation seem to have sort of some connection to each other, but it's not a perfect connection in terms of absolute correlation and so we can't say that we can easily predict what would be somebody's gender role or sexual orientation simply by looking at some of the components.

Evolution would naturally favor heterosexuality because that's how you get babies. And so if we're thinking about genes trying to produce genes it would make no sense to have genes that would lead to people who don't reproduce, because those genes would not be reproduced. That said, we know cross-culturally gay people exist. So we know that that's a natural variation in the population. And so then scientists ask the really interesting question, why is that there?...

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Someone told me my clothes were gay. I said, "I know. They came out of the closet this morning."

DoomRulz
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She has an impressive ability to speak about a potentially charged topic without triggering anyone. Very clear analysis presented in a fascinating way. Great job.

LeCrenn
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“Scientists are trying to get this straight” 💀💀💀💀

pennypoww
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"straight people remain largely a mystery." can i please use this as my senior quote oh my god it's perfect

casanndrabetz
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I always have a ton of respect for scientists who say “we know very little about why [...] happens”

patrickhodson
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My two takeaways from this are 1) I'm going to be an awesome gay uncle and 2) straight people remain largely a mystery.

SydneyFabel
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I wish my mom would call me a genetic advantage

MAXIMUS-ykvs
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I remember when I was around ten years old, I noticed I never had crushes on boys, and I was even saddened by the idea of marrying a man when I got older. I didn’t know about queer relationships at this point, until I was around 12. When I saw a lesbian couple for the first time, I can’t even explain the way it made me feel. I just felt immensely happy and almost relieved? Like oh it’s ok to like women as a female. Then I started watching queer media, and It made me feel like I was normal for the way I felt. But then I learned about homophobia… and I decided not to be gay (as though I had a choice), because as a child I was scared. I didn’t accept that I was gay until I turned 18, but I thought about it constantly leading up to my birthday. Once it was my birthday, I decided that I might as well be myself now that I was an adult. I’m 20 now and still in the closet, and it’s very hard to not want to share a side of you out of fear while also feeling trapped and alone. I also am very feminine so I don’t think anyone would believe me if I told them I was a lesbian because I don’t fit the stereotypes…

pinksky_
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As a straight guy who was always linked with being affeminate, both straight and gay stereotypes create very confusing expectatives on people, which makes for a very confusing childhood/teenage years for those who fit the stereotype but not the label.

JSTama
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Being gay is tough, being feminine and a man people always want to slap a TRANS label on me but I don’t feel like a woman trapped in a mans body.

I just feel like me. 🤷🏻‍♂️🤷🏼‍♀️

ivantothemax
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I learned I was gay at 9. I remember exactly when it happened. My friend Donnie and me came back from lunch. I remember watching him go to his seat as I was sitting down i felt the desire to hug him. I just had a overwhelming want to hug him. I thought about it for prob a min and went “I’m a F*G!! Oh no!!! What am I going to do?!?” Then I got a crush on him. We rode the same bus and sat together. And I wanted to hug him on the bus and instead I punched him for making me gay. I didn’t want to hurt him but I didn’t want to let me having a crush on him to come out so I turned on him to keep a distance so my feelings wouldn’t come out. It’s not a choice. If it was I’d have kids. I want a kid so bad but I’m 48 and I don’t have 50k to adopt.

Christophernow
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some people argued that our sexuality preference is a choice.
To the straights have you tried liking same sex like you choose to like without forcing yourself?
Same goes to the gays, have you tried to choose to like your sex counterpart, without forcing yourself?
I rather be shunned, ignored or insult by the society rather than staying with someone I force myself to like that eventually ended up you feeling annoyed and burdened. As long as the main pillar of my life (family) accepts me. Because I rather kill myself than seeing my own mom watch me with her unwanting eyes.

mr.nolife
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Interestingly enough, studies show that saying "no homo" reduces odds of being gay by 100%.

BastiPROTON
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I wrote a 10 page paper for college on homosexuality, and she literally sited every study I did XD

alexisgill
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In my family, who ever has the fricking knife carves the turkey.

ClubMayview
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Would you guys post the cited studies?
It's important.

richardsilva
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Why the focus on gay males? Do the same hypotheses apply to lesbians?

laricasims
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Now try and explain bisexual people😂 that's an even bigger mystery

Sasha-qfeu
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The fact that I am gay was medically proven during electronic shock therapy. Happy to explain. I am gay and proud of it. A 51 year marriage to my very accepting wife did not change a thing. I am not interested in finding a boyfriend. Too old now. I am 76. It is also true that some of 1500 animal species are gay.

ronsmith
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She's trying so hard to explain this without stepping on any toes

kamiyabritton