Civil Unions in Hawai'i are closer

From the AP via NPR:

A bill allowing same-sex civil unions that prompted some of Hawaii's biggest protests is headed to the governor after the state House of Representatives gave it final legislative approval Thursday.....

The measure would grant gay and lesbian couples the same rights and benefits that the state provides to married couples. If approved, Hawaii will become one of six states - along with California, Nevada, New Jersey, Oregon and Washington - to grant essentially all the rights of marriage to same-sex couples without authorizing marriage itself.

Arguments in the Doe case

I've told you before about the case from Washington State, Doe v Reed, where the Forces of Evil claim that if the law is followed, and the state reveals the names of people who signed petitions against domestic partnerships, then bands of marauding homosexuals will savagely attack the signers./

Indeed, as Pam's House Blend reports, the bad guys actually accuse the state AG of KNOWING that violence will occur!

[Attorney General Sam Reed] is willing to allow access to petitions knowing that they will be used to harass and intimidate individual citizens

What evidence do they have that he KNOWS any such thing?

Fortunately, SCOTUS may not have lost its mind in this matter. the AP reports a certain skepticism:

Supreme Court justices appeared skeptical Wednesday about keeping secret the names of people who signed a petition to repeal Washington state's gay rights law, suggesting citizens cannot always hide behind anonymity if they want to be heard.

Opponents of gay rights want the court to keep the names private to avoid intimidation by the other side. But several justices questioned whether allowing petitioners to stay anonymous might imperil other vital open records like voter registration and lists of donors to political candidates.

"The fact is that running a democracy takes a certain amount of civic courage," Justice Antonin Scalia said. "And the First Amendment does not protect you from criticism or even nasty phone calls when you exercise your political rights to legislate, or to take part in the legislative process."

Unfortunately, Justice Roberts (and probably Justice Thomas) may synpathize with secrecy.

Chief Justice John Roberts compared signing a petition to voting, saying a person's vote might be chilled if it was revealed which candidate they voted for. McKenna argued that chill would be no more significant than it is for having campaign contributions or voter registration disclosed.

Look, NOTHING serious happened in CA: everyone's names were public. Oh, sure, the Bad Guys claim awful things, but there is relatively little evidence that most of it happened. There were some scuffles, but the Pro-H8 side were just as likely to be perps as victims. I was spit at, cursed, and my car had paint thrown on it. But they claim THEY are the only victims. They just want the right to hide behind their sheets.

I've written a lot about this, and I refer you to a previous post here:

The opponents of marriage equality (AND civil unions) are claiming the mantle of honor for themselves, and as they strip the rights away from a persecuted GLBT community, they have the utter audacity to compare themselves to freedom marchers in the Civil Rights movement.

It is gob-smacking: those hiding under the hoods are pretending to be forces for justice. And it is even more outrageous if the courts let them get away with it.

Update Dahlia Lithwick at Slate has more quotes from the arguments.

Prop8 case closing arguments set

Final arguments are set for June 16th.

But before that, there is another order of business. Seems master Bigot William Tam wants his testimony STRICKEN. Originally he tried to pull out because he "feared for his safety", but he testified anyway. Now, the defense is arguing on some basis yet to be heard that this testimony should be stricken. Of course he makes the case beautifully that opposition to GLBT rights is sheer wingnuttery.

Prop8TrialTracker reports,

So what happens if Dr. Tam’s testimony is taken out? Dr. Tam was powerful evidence that Prop 8 was driven by animus and a hatred of homosexuals, which would be enough to strike Prop 8 — even under the more lenient “rational basis” grounds set up in Romer v. Evans (1996.) But while Dr. Tam’s testimony is damning and it should be kept in, there was a whole lot of other evidence that our side presented. In fact, when it came time for the defense to produce their “experts,” there wasn’t a whole lot of reason they could provide.

We'll see what happens. Of course, closing arguments don't mean a decision. We're still in the waiting game.

California's "gay cure"

There's an old, old law on the books in CA mandating research into the causes and cures for homosexuality. AB2199 would repeal this law, recognizing that modern science and medicine agree that being gay or lesbian is a variant, not a pathology.

Of course, the Forces of Evil want the law to stay on the books. As EQCA says ,

The anti-LGBT right-wing is trying to kill EQCA's bill to repeal the California law that instructs health officials to conduct research into the "causes and cures of homosexuality." Why? Because they know that when people learn that sexual orientation is not a choice and cannot be changed they are much more likely to support full equality.

Head on over there and sign their petition asking the Governor to sign the bill.

As the SF Chronicle opines,

The state has far better things to do than hunt down a "cure" for sexual orientation. But the insulting language remains on the books, so Assemblywoman Bonnie Lowenthal, D-Long Beach, has introduced AB2199 to scrub it. But there's no question that it should pass..... The idea of searching for a homosexuality "cure" is insulting, absurd and rooted in ignorance.

They won't let us marry, but will they let us divorce?

Two men married in Massachusetts now live in Texas. They want to break up, but the Attorney General, Abbot, says you can't dissolve a marriage that the state doesn't recognize. From Prop8trialtracker, which has become an excellent source of news about marriage equality overall:

It’s a strange situation that this puts the couple, and the state, in. This couple simply wants to break up. And while the state might not recognize the relationship, they do need the courts to wrap up a few details. The State of Massachusetts cannot, under rules of jurisdiction, step in to the case. The couple must seek an end in the state in which they reside. However, that state, Texas, wants nothing to do with the divorce.

In effect, Abbott is forcing this gay couple to remain married. The tortured logic of this case is just a sign of the importance of not only winning recognition state by state, but we must also win at the federal level. And ultimately, that’s going to take a court ruling. Whether it’s the Prop 8 case in a few years, or if it takes a while longer. We need the entire nation to recognize our marriages, or they are still second-class imitations. Without that, we can’t travel with the same protections, we can’t move to new states with the same protections, heck, we can’t even break up with the same protections.

Get Equal (video Sunday)

Scientists challenge anti-gay group for misrepresentation

The prestigious American Academy of Pediatrics considers that marriage equality is good for children. Its policies are supportive of GLBT youth.

A small group of anti-gay activists calling themselves the American COLLEGE of Pediatrics have deliberately misrepresented scientific research on GLBT youth. That is their sole purpose: attacking GLBT youth. They are telling lies about what the research actually says. Several scientists misquoted are challenging them, including Dr Francis Collins, direcor of the National Institutes of Health.

"It is disturbing for me to see special interest groups distort my scientific observations to make a point against homosexuality. The American College of Pediatricians pulled language out of context from a book I wrote in 2006 to support an ideology that can cause unnecessary anguish and encourage prejudice. The information they present is misleading and incorrect, and it is particularly troubling that they are distributing it in a way that will confuse school children and their parents."

Don't be misled. These people of the ACP are lying homophobes, counting on the confusion of their name to lend them undeserved credence.

The American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Counseling Association, the American Psychiatric Association, the American Psychological Association, the National Association of School Psychologists, and the National Association of Social Workers, together representing more than 477,000 health and mental health professionals, have all taken the position that homosexuality is not a mental disorder and thus there is no need for a "cure." (source)

Genetics primer, 7: conclusions

The presence of homosexuality in all cultures and populations indicates that it is not simply a decadent western "choice". Additionally, same-sex behavior is well documented as a minority behavior throughout the animal kingdom; for example in domestic sheep, about 8-10% of rams are only interested in mounting other rams (and about an equal number are completely asexual, not interested in mounting rams or ewes). This can have significant economic impact on sheep farmers, but despite careful breeding, the trait persists.

So we see homosexuality very much like other complex traits, maintaining at a pretty constant level across time and populations. Which also shows us that the argument about humanity "dying out" is pretty, well, stupid. Straight people will continue to have kids. A few of those kids will continue to be gay. Since being gay is not a choice, the old canard about "recruiting" is based on ignorance.

The American Medical Association, the Psychiatric, Psychological , and Pediatric associations have all "de-pathologized" homosexuality. They consider homosexuality a normal human variation that in and of itself is not an illness or a sickness. It's a normal, if minority variant: like being a redhead, or a lefty. It doesn't hurt the people who have the trait, and it doesn't hurt the people who don't. Forcing people to deny it is harmful (and one of the reasons why the "Ex-gay movement" is so dangerous). This is another reason education is essential-- so people don't mistakenly try to cure the variant.

Gay folks are just as able as straights to make faithful and permanent commitments, and a big component of the marriage equality movement is to help people do so by providing the same social structures that support any marriage. After all, how stable do you think straight families would be without marriage? How faithful would young men be without this kind of structure? That's why in some disadvantaged communities, there is a strong movement to encourage marriage because of the support structures it provides struggling families.

What DOES cause problems for the gay community is marginalization and bias and bigotry. Fortunately for younger GLBT folks, things are a lot better than they used to be, but rejection of gay youth by their parents is still a major health issue and runaways and suicides are more likely to occur in gay kids. Let's hope we move to a point where we can be accepted simply as part of the wonderful varied tapestry of humanity, and not try to fit people into simple binaries.

A minority behavior is not wrong simply becuase it's the minority. It's not wrong to be red-headed, or left-handed.

So, what color are your eyes?



There are a couple of excellent books for those interested in this topic. First is an exhaustive record of same-sex behavior in animals from fruit-flies to chimpanzees, Biological Exuberance by Bruce Bagemihl. HIs work shows how strongly observer bias leads to value-judgment interpretations, that are not scientific. The role of the scientist is to report the observtaions, not decide to ignore some of them because they don't fit a preconceived social notion of complementarity.

Second, Joan Roughgarden's book Evolution's Rainbow is a more detailed analysis of gender and sexuality in behavior. As she points out, many species have members fulfilling multiple distinct roles, not simply a sexual binary. Roughgarden also spends some time discussing varied sexual behaviors in mammals, including our cousin-primates, the chimpanzees. While I don't agree with all her points, which have a distinct agenda of her own, she offers much to think about.


To read this entire series in order, visit the Genetics Page.

Letter to Obama: Orientation should NOT matter to Supreme Court!

Please sign this letter from the Courage Campaign:

Dear President Obama--
With the retirement of venerable liberal Justice John Paul Stevens, your decision to select his replacement will be one of the most important choices of your administration.

Focus on the Family and others on the far-right believe that you should discriminate against any potential nominee because they happen to be gay or lesbian. Employment discrimination is never acceptable, especially for one of our nation's most important jobs.

As a strong supporter of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, we urge you to reject the notion that an individual's sexual orientation should be a disqualifying factor in the nomination selection process for vacancies on the Supreme Court.

Pass it on!

Why it matters: elderly gay couple forcibly separated

From the NCLR, the case Green vs Sonoma County:

Clay and his partner of 20 years, Harold, lived in California. Clay and Harold made diligent efforts to protect their legal rights, and had their legal paperwork in place—wills, powers of attorney, and medical directives, all naming each other. Harold was 88 years old and in frail medical condition, but still living at home with Clay, 77, who was in good health.

One evening, Harold fell down the front steps of their home and was taken to the hospital. Based on their medical directives alone, Clay should have been consulted in Harold’s care from the first moment. Tragically, county and health care workers instead refused to allow Clay to see Harold in the hospital. The county then ultimately went one step further by isolating the couple from each other, placing the men in separate nursing homes......

What happened next is even more chilling: without authority, without determining the value of Clay and Harold’s possessions accumulated over the course of their 20 years together or making any effort to determine which items belonged to whom, the county took everything Harold and Clay owned and auctioned off all of their belongings. Adding further insult to grave injury, the county removed Clay from his home and confined him to a nursing home against his will. The county workers then terminated Clay and Harold's lease and surrendered the home they had shared for many years to the landlord.

Three months after he was hospitalized, Harold died in the nursing home. ..... Clay was finally released from the nursing home.

He is bringing suit against the county.

Remember, this abuse occurred in California, where we supposedly have all the respect of marriage, without the word itself. This couple was separated against their will, their belongings stolen, their lives destroyed--in a state thought of as "liberal", "friendly", "supportive."

How many Clays and Harolds are there in the US being brutalized for the crime of being old and gay?

So, ya think it matters?

Update Clay has won a settlement against the county. Of course, he was separated from Harold at the end, so it's cold comfort.

What if a Supreme Court Justice were gay?

There is speculation that some of Obama's possible short list candidates for next Justice of the Supreme Court may be gay. Part of this is the usual speculation about the sexuality of unmarried women (which I find very offensive, myself).

And part of it is the expectation that only straight white Christian men can be objective. Somehow, it is assumed that a minority, a woman, or a gay person can't see the world apart from their membership in those groups.

So there is some fuss when the White House seems upset at a rumor that Elena Kagan may be a lesbian. (Hint: the proper response to a rumor is, "so what?")

And then the American Family Association of stupidity and bigotry comes out with this (quoted via Andrew Sullivan, I will not link to a hate site):

"With an active homosexual on the bench, Lady Justice will no longer even pretend to be blind. She will be peeking out from under her blindfold to determine the sexual preference of those standing before her, then will let the fold slip back into place before ruling in every case to legitimize sexual deviancy. Bottom line: the American ideal of absolute equality before the law will inevitably be shredded by a homosexual judge. Neither the Constitution nor the American people should be subjected to that kind of judicial malpractice. We can and should expect more from those who occupy seats on the highest bench in the land,"

Now, replace the word "gay" with "Christian" and "sexual preference" with "religion" and see how offensive that really is.

Sanctity of Marriage (video Sunday)

Thanks to Ann F. for the link

Why it matters: Visiting your loved ones in the hospital

One of the many reasons to advocate for marriage equality is the numerous examples of legal partners being denied hospital access, despite having domestic partnerships or registered powers of attorney.

Cases like this one, in Florida, where a woman died apart from her partner who was denied access

Or this one, in Washington, where a woman was told "get out, you don't belong here!" as her partner died.

So we have to be happy at some level that the President has issued a memorandum that everyone should have the right to have a loved one with them, regardless of status.

Yet every day, all across America, patients are denied the kindnesses and caring of a loved one at their sides -- whether in a sudden medical emergency or a prolonged hospital stay. Often, a widow or widower with no children is denied the support and comfort of a good friend. Members of religious orders are sometimes unable to choose someone other than an immediate family member to visit them and make medical decisions on their behalf. Also uniquely affected are gay and lesbian Americans who are often barred from the bedsides of the partners with whom they may have spent decades of their lives -- unable to be there for the person they love, and unable to act as a legal surrogate if their partner is incapacitated.

And then mandates access. That's nice, isn't it?

Note sarcasm.

Of course, it's not limited to Teh Gay, so it may be a little more palatable to some. But if you think this means marriage equality somehow no longer matters? As Andrew Sullivan says,

I fear it's a way to tell gays they cannot marry. The Democrats will say: see, you can already have hospital visitation rights. Now please stop alienating people with all this civil rights talk. And the Human Rights Campaign can last a thousand years mediating these morsels of compassion from the executive branch. I favor the right to designate anyone in advance as your next of kin in hospital. But for gays, I favor merely the same rights as straights. Which means to say: no more and no less than civil marriage.

Update This WaPo article is very congratulatory. But wouldn't it have been more effective for them to say, "this is why we have to repeal DOMA?"

Kerry Eleveld in the Advocate writes,

But as I look at the list of advancements President Obama has made for LGBT Americans, I can’t escape noticing that nearly all of them fall under the heading “Too politically palatable to have a downside.”

It’s an ever-growing list of small, incremental steps toward equality that are most certainly positive but still fall far short of the campaign promises that Sen. Barack Obama ran on.....

The problem with these advances is that almost every one of them could essentially be swept away by the next administration. Just look at what kind of havoc Virginia governor Bob McDonnell has wreaked in Virginia in terms of rolling back discrimination protections for LGBT people. ...

President Obama has two glaring opportunities to create lasting change this year: the Employment Non-Discrimination Act and “don’t ask, don’t tell” repeal. Passing either one of them would mark the single biggest advancement for LGBT equality in this nation's history, but that window of opportunity narrows with every passing day.

I unequivocally applaud the president's action, but I also never witnessed a campaign rally where Obama told a roaring crowd of supporters, “And as president, I will confer certain benefits on same-sex couples!”

I am a gay, married Californian whose marriage evaporates when I leave this state. When is our fierce advocate going to give me equal protection?

GLBT cases in front of the SCOTUS, 1

We're all anxiously waiting progress on the Prop8 federal case, Perry v. Schwarzenegger, which at the moment is awaiting a series of legal maneuvers because the bad guys (the defendent-interveners, who are defending Prop8) want campaign documents from groups who opposed the initiative, even though those groups are not parties to this suit. This case will eventually be decided by Judge Vaughn Walker in US District Court, and then almost certainly will be appealed to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. After that, it may get to the SCOTUS, depending on if it is appealed there, and whether SCOTUS chooses to hear it. So there is a long, long way to go.

As that wends its way through the legal arcana, there are two other cases affecting our rights that are already on their way to the Supreme Court. I'll discuss them in turn.

The first is Doe #1 v Reed in which arguments are scheduled for Monday, 19th April. That's Doe, as in John Doe: an anonymous! We have talked extensively here about the new right-wing anti-equality meme, that it's THEY who are the victims of those EEEEEvvvvvviiiiillll rampaging homos. This appears to be based entirely on a few incidents post-Prop8, and the mean things said about them in the papers and on the internet. Most of the incidents are completely unsubstantiated, and moreover, they conveniently ignore substantiated incidents where the conservatives attacked GLBT supporters.

In the wake of California Prop8, a web site was published that contained all the donor information from the pro-H8 side. (The information from BOTH sides was published by the state and freely searchable). This led to howls of outrage from the right, and fears that they would be attacked. And you know what happened? Absolutely nothing! That's right, no one was firebombed for being a donor. Oh, I'm sure some words may have been exchanged, but there was no evidence of violence.

Still, pointing at this, the supporters of referendum 71 in Washington State (which wanted to overturn domestic partnerships--remember this next time They claim it's only about marriage) have filed suit to prevent the release of the names of those who signed the petition to put its intolerance on the ballot,

Washington's laws, like California's, have transparency rules that require the release of names. So this is nothing special. But Their Side claims they fear intimidation. There's again absolutely NO evidence that this has or would occur.

Our side has two major arguments, I think. First, there were widespread accusations of signature violations on the petitions, in which signatures were invalid, or obtained under false pretenses. It seems to me that the rule of open government works on the side of release, here. Petitioners had no expectation of privacy and there is a legitimate public interest in seeing those names.

Second, we do not allow people to wear hoods and attack the rights of others. If you are ashamed of what you are doing, you are doing the wrong thing.

The problem for Our Side is that this Supreme Court has already bought into the intimidation argument EVEN THOUGH there is no evidence for it. As Chris Geidner reports,

The broad issue — the intimidation question — already has arisen twice in recent months at the Court, when the Court rejected the attempt to allow a live-streaming of the Proposition 8 trial to other courtrooms and in Justice Thomas’s opinion in Citizens United.

. That's the stunning case in which the court ruled corporations are people and can spend freely to influence elections.

I have just about lost any respect for Justice Thomas, but I really expected better of Justice Kennedy who is generally the swing vote between the sensible liberal side and the reactionary conservative bloc.

So although it seems obvious to me that Doe should be decided in a way that maintains an open government, I greatly fear that the current Supreme Court will decide in favor of secret cabals and blackballing.

No Prop8 repeal in 2010

From the LA Times:

A measure to repeal Proposition 8, the anti-gay-marriage initiative, has failed to qualify for the November ballot.

John Henning, who heads a group that sponsored the repeal effort, declined to say how many signatures were gathered since the all-volunteer campaign got underway in late November.....

"There comes a point where the intake of signatures isn't rapid enough to make up your deficit," Henning said. "We started to realize last week that we weren't going to make it."

He said his group, Love Honor Cherish, will work with other activists to put a repeal measure on the November 2012 ballot.

This is not a surprise. The Big Groups--Courage Campaign, and Equality CA--long ago decided that 2012 made more sense. First, because of the need to educate the public and build bridges with other groups, including communities of faith and communities of color. Second, because turnout is better in a presidential year, especially among the young who are a key constituent of the repeal campaign. And third, economically--no one has any money left. So Love Honor Cherish was on its own, climbing uphill.

Several California polls have come out recently suggesting that support for marriage equality is now about 50%. That sounds great, except you have to remember that the polls also showed Prop8 going down in defeat. There is apparently a Bradley effect around marriage equality, as the polls routinely overstate support for marriage equality.

So I'd like to see that support a lot further north among likely voters before we go back to the polls. Meanwhile, educate, educate, educate.

Genetics primer, 6: how do traits persist?

Why does homosexuality persist in the population? If gay people are unlikely to have their own children, shouldn't this trait die out? Alternatively, as gay-rights opponents say "if everyone were gay the species would die out!" so if we accept gays, does that mean the demise of humanity?

Again, let us look at left-handedness. For many years, it was considered flatly wrong to be left handed. Indeed, the Latin root of "sinister" means "left" and people pointed to Biblical strictures against using the left hand. In some cultures, to use the left hand in public is an egregious insult. In my parents' generation, lefties were actually forced to use their right hands, often leading to cognitive and emotional problems; stuttering was a common side effect of this. We became more enlightened as a society and stopped forcing right-handedness on natural lefties; they do have some minor disadvantages (scissors, for example, are typically designed for the right hand) but we all co-exist perfectly happily together.

Okay, then why hasn't it died out? There is no strong selective disadvantage either; moreover, lots of right-handed people carry the gene that "allows" lefthandedness (R/r). And lefties are still able to have children at normal rates which keeps the trait present

A-HA, says the anti-gay-rights viewer, but there IS a disadvantage to being gay, they can't breed! Well, first of all, many gay people do have their own children, either from a previous straight marriage, or with a surrogate. But even for childless gays, as long as any "gay genes" persist in relatives who have children without any disadvantage (think right handed people with Rr genotypes) then there is always a reservoir. And, if there is some advantage to the heterozygote, there can be positive selection in its favor. For example, some studies suggest that straight siblings of gay folks may have higher fertility than people without a gay relative. Simply put, there may be a significant advantage to having an uncle who doesn't have his own kids, because he contributes to the welfare of yours.

In fact, even a negative trait can have a positive selection. A great example is in the gene for sickle cell anemia, which predominantly affects people of African descent. This is a recessive gene such that affected individuals are aa in genotype; thus Mom and Dad were each Aa carriers. Interestingly, you would expect that this gene would have died out in a pre-medical age given the potential lethality of this disease, but it hasn't. Indeed, there is evidence that Aa carriers actually have an advantage because they are more resistant to malaria, and since 75% of their children, on average, will not be affected by the disease (they will be AA or Aa), this is sufficient positive selection to keep the gene present in the population. The a allele neither took over the population, nor died out.

So, an important point to remember is that "Sexual Selection" actually works at the level of a population, not at the level of an individual. For animals with complex societies, it is likely that there are multiple components working towards fitness, and sexual behavior is not limited to procreation but also plays a role in the relationships that are essential to survival (A great discussion of this is in Joan Roughgarden's excellent book, Evolution's Rainbow).

Just to push this further, if you have a complex family structure, it may be to the advantage of the group to have a few offspring to whose welfare many adults contribute--the gay uncle, in our own terms. But consider in a wolfpack, only one pair breeds while the others contribute to care for the pups. Or some species of birds, where a third adult helps the breeding pair raise the chicks.

So, traits can be selected in the population even when they don't improve the reproductive fitness of the individual.


To read this entire series in order, visit the Genetics Page.

Back into the Closet (video Sunday)

Same Sex Marriage in Portugal

From Euronews:

Having won parliament’s backing for same-sex marriage, the Constitutional Court has now given its green light to the measure.....

But the tribunal’s president Rui Moura Ramos explained why no problems were found with the proposal. While it does not fit the traditional concept of marriage, as outlined in the constitution, he said this concept is open and can evolve.

Portuguese President Anibal Cavaco Silva has 20 days to either veto the legislation or sign it into law. If it is ratified, it would come into effect just ahead of a visit to the staunchly Roman Catholic country by Pope Benedict XVI.

Genetics primer, 5: the continuum

In the case of sexuality, it is likely that we each exist on a continuum that runs from strictly gay to strictly straight. And it is clear that most people are towards one end or the other, though there is clearly a range, and for some people, sexual identity is more fluid than for others. This may be more true for women than men. (The biology of physical arousal is really different in women than men as well... something that's only recently become apparent as people are finally using female subjects. Women are not men.)

The number of people who are overtly gay (as in, actively homosexual) is lower than the number who have a potential for homosexual behavior without acting on it (Hence the 2% vs 10% discrepancy). Interestingly, a substantial fraction of men who have sex with other men insist they are heterosexual.

The absolute middle position would be truly bisexual; the ones who do have a more conscious choice. Let me make a point here: many people opposed to gay-rights have a profound misunderstanding about bisexuality, thinking that bisexuals want simultaneous sexual partners ("threesomes"). This is NOT the case; a bisexual is simply someone who can orient their affections to either gender. If you have ever heard a man say, "I prefer redheads and blondes," that doesn't mean he expects to sleep with them both at the same time. It means he's likely to date either a red-head or a blonde, and not likely to be attracted to an olive-skinned brunette. Similarly, a bisexual may happily and monogamously date or marry a man or a woman. It's simply that their next date may be with someone of a different gender.

We see a range, or continuum in other traits too. Let's go back to handedness. Most of us are right handed, but it's a rare right handed person who can't do a few things with their left hand. For example, I'm right handed, but I can pour liquid from a container using either hand pretty well. And, some people are truly, completely ambidextrous and can use either hand interchangeably. (So the folks studying handedness don't use "right" and "left". They use "right" and "non-right".)

The majority of people who identify as gay or lesbian feel themselves oriented towards a person of the same gender, and not making a conscious choice. After all, given the stigma that ranges from social disapproval in our society, to imprisonment, torture and execution of gays in some fundamentalist cultures, it is not clear why anyone would "choose" to be gay.

People can suppress their orientation, and try to "pass" as straight. We certainly all know of men and women who entered a straight marriage, had children, and tried to maintain a hetero life before finally admitting that wasn't who they are. In the past this led to a lot of misery (think of Larry Craig toe-tapping in the airport men's room, or conservative and anti-gay California legislator Roy Ashburn cruising gay bars). In our more enlightened age, young gays can grow up without trying to pretend and can be honest about their sexuality.



To read this entire series in order, visit the Genetics Page.

Genetics primer, 4: what about orientation?

Okay, now we have talked about how human traits are generally complex, and result from the interaction of multiple alleles, multiple genes, the environment, and random chance.

Let's apply these concepts to sexual orientation. It is estimated that some degree of homosexuality exists at about a 5-10% rate in the overall human population; it is found in all races and all societies, although depending on the social response, gay people may closet themselves for fear of exclusion, imprisonment, or death. Not all these people may identify strongly as gay or lesbian; sexuality is fluid and on a continuum. So probably about 2-5% of the population are more strongly homosexual. This persistence suggests that being gay is a fairly constant human variant, which can't be limited to a single environment or precipitating feature.

There is very good evidence for a genetic component of sexual orientation; in twin studies, the correlation of sexuality is way higher than its rate in the population (I've read as high as 50%), although it is not 100%. A lot of gay rights opponents say, "a-ha! if it were truly genetically determined, it would be 100%!" But this ignores the complexity that we discussed before; a geneticist would never expect something this complex to be 100% determinate; there is too much variation in the system. Even identical twins in a common environment are not identical for all traits which can be affected by random chance, imprinting, and epigenetics.

Does this high correlation mean being gay is always inherited? Is there a single "gay gene"? No, not likely, and not necessarily for all gay people. Remember, in the interplay of genes, environment, and chance, the relative weight of any variable may differ from person to person. "Chance" may be a random mutation that was not present in the parents, (we are loaded with them), or a stochastic developmental pathway, as with handedness. Different combinations of different genes may contribute to a common outcome. It is likely that something as complex as sexual behavior has numerous inputs.

Consider the fruitfly, a workhorse of developmental genetics studies. Fruitflies are simple animals, behaviorally speaking. They don't live in large and complex social groups with diverse and complex behaviors. But even in the fruitfly, where sex is pretty hard wired, there are a number of genes that affect sexual behavior in diverse ways--some of which affect the wiring of the brain, others of which affect overall development of physical structures.

No one seems to have trouble recognizing that other characteristics are complex: think intelligence, or athletic prowess. We know that there are likely numerous genes that contribute to these, and that it's not simply genetic, although genetics makes a contribution. Why do some people have such a hard time with sexuality being just as complex?

So is there a component of environment? Possibly: there's a chemical environment in the womb, for example, and a psychological component in the family we grow up in. Gay men are more likely to have older brothers, for example. However, these are also variables, not absolutes, which occur on the background of the genetic variation we described. But it's not a simple cause-effect: you can't turn an infant gay by bathing them in hormones.

The genetic data are clear that there is a genetics component. It's not the whole story, necessarily, but it's certainly a big part of it.


To read this entire series in order, visit the Genetics Page.

Be counted (Video Sunday)

(H/T Paul(A))

New Poll in California: support increases for SSM

The Public Policy Institute of California, a non-profit, non-partisan research group, has polled Californians on various political issues.

For the first time in a PPIC Statewide Survey, Californians are more likely to say they favor (50%) same-sex marriage than oppose it (45%). Support among all adults had never surpassed 45 percent since January 2000. Today, a record high 49 percent of likely voters favor same-sex marriage and 45 percent oppose it. Proposition 8, passed by voters in 2008, created a state constitutional amendment revoking the right of same-sex couples to marry. This amendment is currently being challenged in federal district court. In a similar ABC News/Washington Post poll question, adults nationwide expressed divided opinions about same-sex marriage: 47 percent said it should be legal and 50 percent said illegal.

Majorities of Democrats (64%) and independents (55%) favor allowing same-sex marriage, while a majority of Republicans (67%) oppose it. Since last March, support is up a slight 4 points among Democrats, 8 points among independents, and 6 points among Republicans. Support is far from unanimous across regions and demographic groups. Central Valley residents oppose allowing same-sex marriage (51% oppose, 42% favor), while San Francisco Bay Area residents favor it (64% favor, 30% oppose). Residents are divided in Los Angeles (46% favor, 48% oppose) and Other Southern California (47% favor, 49% oppose). Most whites (55%) express support, while Latinos are more opposed (51%) than in favor (43%). Support declines with older age, but rises as education and income increase. An overwhelming majority of evangelical Christians are opposed (75%). Since last March, support jumped 17 points among Californians age 18 to 34 (49% to 66%) and rose modestly among Latinos, whites, men, residents with lower household incomes, and those without college degrees.

This is progress, of course, but it still has a long way to go to overcome the PropH8 effect. Keep working!