Genetics and Homosexuality

by George Kocan

I refuse to use the g-word, in this discussion.  I prefer SAD (Sodomy Attraction Disorder) because it describes a pathological condition in clinical and descriptive terms.  The g-word is clearly prejudicial and self-serving.  I, therefore, refer to a person suffering from SAD, a ‘SADist’ or a SAD person.

SADists have boldly proclaimed that SAD is inherited.  The first person to do so was Magnus Hirschfeld, a SADist who lobbied to abolish laws prohibiting SADism in Germany in 1898 (1).  He claimed that scientific evidence proved that SAD was inborn and irreversible. I do not know what evidence he had in mind.  Nevertheless, since then, behavioral genetics has advanced greatly.  The science has shown that a great deal of human and animal behavior results from genetic influence.

However, the SADists have played a trick on the public.  By asserting that SAD has a genetic basis, they have diverted the topic into a discussion about nature vs. nurture.  In my view, this is all wrong.  It does not matter that SAD is genetic.  It is still a disorder and pathology and requires treatment.  Many disorders afflicting the human condition have a genetic basis and are difficult to correct.

Color blindness is a disorder.  It has no cure, although science understands the genetics very well.  Phenylketonuria is a genetic disorder that involves a defective enzyme, which is unable to metabolize the amino acid phenylalinine (2).  Physicians treat it by controlling the patient’s environment, by restricting phenylalinine in the diet.  Schizophrenia is a psychological and behavioral disorder.  Specialists have concluded that it has a genetic component (3). Although they have not found a cure, they have not removed it as a disorder from their Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Psychological Disorders, as they have SAD.

Researchers have found a genetic link to alcoholism (4).  Twin studies and adoption studies strongly suggest that alcoholism runs in families.  Alcoholism provides a useful model for SAD.  At least two components contribute to alcoholism, the genetics and the environment.  A person can be born an alcoholic but never develop the disease, if he never comes in contact with the alcohol.

Alcoholism has a moral dimension as well.  A genetic predisposition to alcoholism does not free a person from the obligation to act in a responsible manner.  He has an obligation to avoid alcohol rather than indulge in it, just because it makes him feel good.   

The field of behavioral genetics has found that most personality traits have a genetic basis, even criminal behavior (5). Political opinions also seem to have a genetic basis (6).  So, the possibility exists that not only does SAD have a genetic basis but so do other behaviors associated with SAD. 

A suicide rate higher that that of normal persons seems to be associated with SAD (7).  If true, this could very well be a result of the influence of SAD genetics.  Genes are not limited to a single effect.  Biologists have recognized multiple gene effects and called them ‘pleiotropisms’(8).

If students of behavior are to take the gene theory of SAD seriously, they must allow for the probability that SAD genes cause suicide and influence many of the other destructive behaviors that plague SAD persons.  Notorious SAD serial killers come to mind, such as John Wayne Gacy, who murdered some 33 young men and hid their bodies in his basement; Jeffrey Dahmer, who ate his victims and stored their remains in his refrigerator; Andrew Cunanan, and others.  The widespread use of narcotics and other psychoactive drugs in the SAD “community” may result from a genetic influence.  The extreme exhibitionism and narcissism displayed at SAD “pride” parades may also have a genetic basis.

“Homophobia” also may have a genetic basis.  This term refers to the repulsion and disgust that normal persons have to sodomy.  The term, however, carries its own prejudicial connotation in the suffix, ‘phobia.’  It suggests a psychological condition akin to agoraphobia, the fear of public spaces; arachnophobia, the fear of spiders; or acrophobia, the fear of heights. 

Suddenly encountering a spider or a snake induces in normal persons a startle response.  Obviously, this is a protective mechanism.  Fear in many cases is a friend not an enemy.  A fear of heights or spiders can protect us from injury and even death.  Fears of various kinds, in other words, are normal and natural.  In biological terms they function as adaptations to a dangerous world.  It only makes sense that they would have a genetic basis.

Therefore, an attitude or opinion, which disparages homophobia out of hand, violates sound science.   It may even reflect its own pathology, as discussed above.  Revulsion and hostility against sodomy and sodomites has occurred throughout history and many different cultures.  Such a widespread behavior must not only have a genetic basis but also have an adaptive function.  Those persons and communities, that acted on this impulse and suppressed sodomy, tended to survive and thrive, while those, which failed to do so, became extinct.

Any public policy--like for example granting legal sanction to sodomite couplings--must take such science into consideration.  Normal persons have a right to be homophobic, seeing as it is part of their genetic make-up and “who they are,” to use a popular expression.  Society and the law must recognize their right to give expression to their identities.

Notes:

1. Engel , Randy 2006. “The Rite of Sodomy: Homosexuality and the Roman Catholic

Church.  New Engel Publishing.

2. See Wikipedia entry on phenylketonuria.

3.  Schizophrenia:  (http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/330/7484/158?etoc)

4. Alcoholism: (http://www.iop.kcl.ac.uk/IoP/PRT/alcohol.htm)

5. Personality traits: (http://www.personalityresearch.org/bg.html)

6. Political opinion: (http://neuro-conservative.blogspot.com/2005/06/genetics-of-      politics.html)

7. SAD suicide rate: (http://gaylife.about.com/od/gayteens/a/gaysuicide.htm)

8. Multiple gene effects: (http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0006-341X(195912)15%3A4%3C518%3APATGVA%3E2.0.CO%3B2-7)

Comments

[Pete Speer]

George --

The word Sadist is already in common use as a person who obtains pleasure by inflicting pain. Perhaps some homosexuals are sadists. I would suggest that many more are masochists -- those who derive pleasure from receiving pain.

Better you should coin a new word to allay all confusion.

[George Kocan]

Pete: You make an excellent point. I did not, at first, intend a double meaning to "SADist." "Sadist," a person who derives pleasure from inflicting pain, comes from French pornographer the Marquis de Sade, who lived (as I recall, during the "Enligntenment" in the 18th Century). He lived for sexual pleasure, the more perverted the better. He considered women "pleasure machines." He was clearly a man ahead of his time. If he were alive today, he would probably be adulated as are Hugh Hefner and other pornographers. In light of this history, I think the pun aspect of SADist makes sense and deserves wide recognition.

[jorod]

Of course it's genetic; you can tell by all those queer cats and dogs outside.

[Pete Speer]

George --

Puns are not supposed to make sense. They are supposed to be humorous in a groaning way.

Homosexuality is in no way humorous.

Clarity of thought is somehow lost in your use. That was my basic point.

[George]

Why are you so focused on sodomy when you discuss homesexuality? Women can be gay too. It would seem that gay men and homophobes are equally obsessed by anal.

[George Kocan]

While I concede that sodomites are obsessed with anal activity, I reject the accusation concerning so-called 'homophobes.' The social problem stems not from normal persons who endure a strong visceral reaction to sodomy but from the sexual deviates who strive to impose their delusions and obsessions on the rest of society e.g. sodomite 'pride' parades. Most of these offenders are literally sodomites but, nevertheless, they gain political support from other kinds of deviates like lesbians as well. In my critique, I rely on a literary device known as a 'synecdoche' in which a part stands for a whole. So, as in common legal language, 'sodomy' stands for deviate sexual activity in general.