Is it offensive to say...

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I think you misunderstand how the scientifically minded among us approach this subject, and I don't think that the quest for knowledge and understanding is ever misguided. Hatred and bigotry is rooted in ignorance, and understanding is the best medicine for that. This understanding includes the question "why does it exist", or rather, "how did it come to be". That's all proper scientists have ever been trying to find out. Why is nature the way it is, how does it work, and how did it get to be this way.

There is no value judgement or moral judgement whatsoever attached to this question. This is important to keep in mind when we examine sexual diversity against the background of reproduction and natural selection. When we (curious, rational thinking and science-minded people) ask "why wasn't this trait selected against", we're not saying that it should have been, or that people are somehow flawed for not reproducing. We're merely discussing reproduction because that's how all our biological and neurological traits came to be.

We simply can't fully understand the many traits of our incredibly diverse species without answering the Whys and Hows. I think I've provided plenty of possible scenarios towards that end in my previous post, and I also assumed I had made it clear that this evolutionary and biological perspective is not in any way judgmental. It is neither a defense of something that doesn't have to be defended or justified in the first place, nor is it an attempt to pathologize sexual diversity*. But as an LGBT member, I think it can only increase public acceptance if people are aware that the entire palette of sexual and gender diversity are biological traits that have been naturally selected for, just like hair and eye color.

*I know there are scholarly disciplines that have attempted to pathologize sexual and gender diversity in the past, and continue to do so in some cases, which is one of the many reasons that I don't consider psychology and psychiatry to be proper sciences. Both fields started out as pseudo-scientific belief systems, have done more harm than good in their history, and have yet to produce anything that holds up to scientific scrutiny.

I won't repeat Solitudinarian's excellent response, but I will add that neurophysiological studies suggest that gay men, and transgendered people born as men both demonstrate neurophysiology distinct from heterosexual and cisgendered men, respectively.

The studies are few, and of relatively small size, but the initial studies do seem to bear out that gay and trans brains are different.

Now, that's not to say that this is the only lens that can or should be brought to bear on our understanding of the etiology of quietness, but it does suggest to me that the 'biological' lens is no less valid than others.

I didn't say that it was.


I never said that there was.

None of your post has anything to do with my post. I never said anything about hatred or bigotry.

Excellent?! Solitudinarian made massively false and unjustified assumptions about my attitude toward this discussion and went off on a huge tangent.


To what end do you add this; how is it relevant to my post? And what do transgendered people have to do with the topic?


Quietness? What are you talking about?



I don't question it's validity; I question it's relevance to the OPs specific question. The OP questioned the existence of homosexuality with the specific reasoning that homosexuality defies reproductive instincts. No biological analysis is required to reveal that the premise of this question, the relationship between heterosexuality and reproductive instinct, is not borne out by reality, and such a profoundly faulty premise throws the meaningfulness of the entire question...into question.

I very much like what this individual right here says, makes perfect sense to me and I would've said something similiar (if I decided to even answer the question), although not nearly as well.

To the topic poster, I would not have found that offensive, though, I would seek your intentions for asking such a question. To me it's a question that doesn't really require a passionate answer. s**t happens.

I don't think the OP questioned the existence of homosexuality. Talk about making false and unjustified assumptions. The way I understood the OP's question is "since we can reasonably deduce that gays and lesbians were historically less likely to reproduce, how come that these sexual orientations are still around". Asking why the sky is blue doesn't draw into question the fact that it is, nor does it imply that the sky is somehow wrong for being blue. That's the huge tangent I went off on, in an easy-to-digest nutshell.

Of course I agree that straight couples do not necessarily reproduce, whereas gays and especially lesbians were often forced to do so in patriarchal societies with rigid gender norms and strong anti-LGBT sentiments. But this type of society is a relatively recent development in human history, and it often had polygynous harem systems that made it somewhat difficult for males to reproduce unless they were both socio-economically successful and highly motivated to mate with the opposite sex. Even the strictly monogamous medieval Europe allowed people to opt out of the mainstream lifestyle, e.g. by pursuing a clerical career.

The assumption that sexual minorities were far less likely to reproduce and pass on their neurobiological traits than heterosexual couples is therefore anything but far-fetched. Otherwise evolutionary biologists / psychologists wouldn't be discussing and researching the exact same question that the OP has posited. And as I've previously pointed out in my tangential ramblings, this research can only increase public tolerance and acceptance for the LGBT community by raising awareness for the fact that sexual orientation and gender identity are inherent biological traits.

Last edited by Solitudinarian on 30 Jan 2014, 4:39 am, edited 1 time in total.

The fact that you seem to think I accused you of hatred and bigotry (which I didn't do) leads me to think that you didn't quite understand where I was coming from. I could try to explain my point all over again or ask you to re-read the post in question, but that's probably a futile endeavour seeing that you're filtering my responses through a biased lens.

There is absolutely nothing in that response which demonstrates any assumptions about your attitude. Your own statement that questioning the issue through a biological lens was misguided creates ample basis for Solitudinarian's response.

As for the tangent, that's entirely within the normal posting practice in this forum, and was clearly relevant to the original post.



Because is stands as evidence that a biological lens is an appropriate basis for studying the etiology of queerness. Transgendered people are relevant because homosexuality is only one of many atypical aspects of neurological sex, and the degree to which they might or might not be interrelated is a valuable area of inquiry.



Please accept my apologies. My tablet autocorrected "queerness."



You don't question its validity? What are we to make of the statement:



That looks like questioning its validity to me.

Now, if by "biological" you mean, "human reproduction," then we are having a different conversation. But you chose the broader adjective, and we can only assume that you meant what you typed.