How are people gay?

Question

It can't always be same sex attraction. Is it hereditary? Are there any scientific facts?

Answer 1

Their is no know cause. Science has show that being a homosexual is not a choice though. Their are many theories like genetics and the hormonal balance in the womb. It has been proven that the brains in gay people respond to someone of the same sex and they don't to the opposite sex. That is not something that one can control.

Answer 2

It IS partially hereditary, but it's a very loose correlation. Like other people have said, the most likely theory is hormone rushes in the womb, but some of it is in the upbringing. However, it is NOT that if you rasie a boy like a girl he will become gay- there was a study where they botched an operation on a baby boy so badly that they just turned him into a girl and he never knew about it till he was grown up. Even though he thought he was a girl, he became "a lesbian" and had alot of gender issues and I think he eventually labeled himself transgender- all this before he knew he was born a boy. So raising a boy as a girl or a girl as a boy has less effect on their sexuality or gender identity than everyone seems to think (which is, by the way, a major point in the argument to let homosexuals adopt kids).

Something interesting they've found though, that only seems to work in gay men but not lesbian woman- if they have an older brother, they're more likely to be gay. How weird is that? XD

Answer 3

On 60 minutes they did a whole study on homosexuality and what makes people gay. There were all these theories, the most credible being hormone levels in the womb, but there are identical twins who have different sexualities. So they came to the conclusion that there is no scientific reasoning for being gay, it is just a part of nature.

I know that it's not hereditary, though.

Answer 4

It's not a case of how - more of why.

There are some baffling scientific theories - but they will continue to be hotly contested, probably forever. This is quite a controversial issue - IMHO there are two camps:

One says it is a learned response or somehow inborn as a coping mechanism for life's trauma - whether the have already occurred or are yet to be.

The other says it is genetic - that some are born with a predilection for 'gayness', that somehow the genetic make-up or the 'gay' gene exists and has somehow been switched 'on'.

In either case, some would argue strongly that people who are different are always under threat in our collective society.

(Gayness can't be hereditary for fairly obvious reasons - heh-heh-heh)

Francis Edward Smedley sums it up nicely - "all's fair in love and war"

Answer 5

The answer lies in evolutionary psychology.
Exactly because gays are not likely to reproduce themselves, they are of priceless value for the children of their brothers and sisters. In the history of our species, families with genes that apparently favour homosexuality, were more stable than families with heterosexuals only, because the last ones had increased risks of competition, conflicts and wars. It's as easy as that. We are all descendants of these families.

Heterosexuals are likely to have offspring, yes. And when they have a homosexual brother, sister or cousin who is not likely to have any offspring - they have an extra familymember who is not a competitor in any way; who can help their own offspring, who can acquire resources that will benefit their children.
Genes travel a long way; everybody can be a carrier of genes, genes that are not apparent in their kids, can be apparent in their grandkids.
A heterosexual person with a homosexual brother can have heterosexual kids, and a homosexual grandson. The kids have a better chance to survive because of stability, and so will one of their kids, who could then be homosexual. Families with homosexual familymembers every now and then, were and are likely to be more stable.

Answer 6

well, the cause of homosexuality has been debated for so long, before, it was thought of as a mental illness, but after some studies it was concluded that it does not result from mental illness or moral depravity but an expression of sexuality, but recent studies, however, concluded that homosexuality may have its biological determinants, the researches found significant differences in homosexual and heterosexual brains, but still others insist of the effect upbringing and environment have in the development of homosexuality... but for me, i think, it's a compendium of the two, upbringing and/or events trigger biological factors in the development of bringing, however, some say that homosexuality is a choice, that you decide if you will be a homosexual or not... it's a difficult thing to discuss

Answer 7

Oh my goodness, I can't believe some of you were implying that "gay" is taught. LOLOLOLOL. Whew. You can teach your child to be gay all you want, doesn't he/she will decide to be that way. We all have free will. Some people make a decition to be gay because of a traumatic experience, and other's free wills are compromised by an imbalance in the brain. However, tell a gay person they are only gay because of a chemical imbalance, they will take that as an offense. Then it becomes their decition to remain gay even if they know its only because of a chemical imbalance.

Answer 8

some scientists say they are born that way. a genetic "malfunction" similar to depressives who have malfunction of some kind of fluid that runs to the brain, making them depressed. in that idea, you think theREd be a drug to "fix them".. others say they can't be changed....were they really 'gay' all their lives...from any age...that means from birth...so were they 'gay' at age 3? i dont think so, i think most kids have an interest in the same, say at 13 when you 1st see other kids newd in gymlockeroom, that doesn't make you gay. men naturally get along better with men and women w/women, that helps lead to gay i think-its easier to communicate and that's were regular relations have failures.

Answer 9

it is because of how their parents treated them when they are still babies.maybe they treat them like a baby girl even if they he is a boy and vise versa.

Answer 10

How are people straight?
How are people abstinent?