According to modern dogma, homosexuals are like sprinters: born and not made. Thus, even though psychology’s longstanding nature-nurture debate has concluded that many traits are the result of both factors, it isn’t politically correct to consider even this possibility with respect to homosexuality. But does this biology-is-destiny theory hold water with respect to same-sex attraction? And, if so, what does this say about the behavior’s moral status? Let’s examine the matter.
When discussing same-sex attraction’s cause, the first thing usually mentioned is the much touted “homosexual gene” theory. In fact, the idea has been repeated so often that many today accept it as fact. But the reality is this: Neither the groundbreaking Genome Project nor any other research endeavor has found any such gene. Moreover, it makes no sense from an evolutionary (or selective breeding, if you prefer) standpoint. After all, such a gene would greatly reduce the chances of its bearer procreating, would be unlikely to be passed on, and thus would be a dead-end mutation unable to survive many generations. And, I must say, it’s a testimonial to the emotion-oriented decision-making of secular modernists — who are generally staunch evolutionists — that they would glom on to a theory so contrary to Evolution 101.
Next we have the intrauterine development theory. It states that if a boy’s body fails to provide him with the necessary amount of testosterone in the womb, his brain won’t be fully masculinized. This, presumably, accounts for that rare boy we’ve all met who, from the word go, has very effeminate mannerisms. Anyway, the idea is that his more feminine brain will militate in favor of attraction to other males. It’s a logical theory, as far as it goes.
Yet it isn’t airtight. First, modern dogma would have us believe that all homosexuality is inborn when, as earlier indicated, those obviously effeminate boys are rarities. Second, ponder the phenomenon of feminine lesbians (not all are butch, and many appearing so have simply taken on a masculine look in response to their feelings). If a feminine woman can develop a psychological framework creating attraction to females, why can’t feminine men? Besides, the truth is that science does not claim hormones are destiny. As Dutch endocrinologist Dr. Louis Gooren stated in his 2006 paper “The biology of human psychosexual differentiation,” “A male gender identity can develop without a significant androgen [male hormone] stimulus.”
Now let’s continue. For argument’s sake, let us say that there can be inborn factors militating in favor of homosexuality. Nonetheless, we now know that many personality traits are a combination of both nature and nurture; why, a study even found that environment can influence gene expression, which, if correct, plainly means we aren’t prisoners of our genetics. Given this, is it reasonable to say that homosexuality is innate, inevitable, and unalterable in every case? Is it logical to insist that it cannot be purely psychological in even 1 out of 1,000 instances? Talk about jumping the behavioral shark.
Not just reason but also history — namely, that of the pre-Christian societies that institutionalized homosexuality — teaches that the reality seems quite the opposite. Consider the ancient Spartans. When a Spartan boy was seven years old, he would be taken from his mother and placed in a military camp where he’d spend most of the rest of his life. But the relevant thing here is what happened when he turned 12: He would be attached to a grown man who would become his mentor — and his lover. In fact, the homosexual inclination in the Spartan male would become so strong that the society developed a curious ritual designed to ease his transition into the marriage bed: When he met his wife to consummate the marriage, she would appear dressed as, and with the hairstyle of, a boy.
Given this, would we assume that all Spartans had a homosexual gene or suffered abnormal intrauterine development? Clearly, the average Spartan homosexual was made, not born.
This isn’t surprising. Man’s psychology — including his sexuality (especially, it seems, among men) — is quite malleable. Unfortunately, bending it back into shape is more difficult than twisting it.
As to these twists, we should also ask: If homosexuality is inborn and natural, what about pedophilia, bestiality, and other sexual anomalies? Is it logical to claim that only one deviation from the norm could possibly be so?
Then there is the kicker. While activists claim that science has vindicated their biology-is-destiny thesis, this is completely untrue. As Dr. Gooren also wrote, “We are far away from an understanding [of] how gender identity and sexual orientation come about in the human species.”
Despite this, modern dogma demands we accept the following: Homosexuality must be viewed as the one innate sexual deviation — and not even one homosexual must be viewed as a deviation from this. Clearly, such a radical, unbending stance that flies in the face of logic, historical analysis, and science cannot have a basis in reason, but something else: mind-shackling ideology.
Really, though, while this is quite interesting, it has no bearing whatsoever on the morality of homosexual behavior. Why? Well, consider that the same psychologists who may claim that homosexuality is innate will also usually say that sociopaths are born and not made. But this raises a question: If a person were born with homicidal instincts, would it then be morally licit for him to act upon them? Because if the logic behind the argument that homosexual behavior cannot be wrong if it’s inborn is correct, it would have to be.
In other words, such a thesis reduces morality to biological determinism, thus eliminating morality. Simply put, it states that if I have a naturally occurring feeling, it must be okay to act upon it because it’s naturally occurring. This makes God of nature and is no different than saying that spina bifida, a cleft palate, or a heart-valve deformity should neither be viewed as a defect nor corrected because it was inborn. But the operative principle here is simple: Biology doesn’t determine morality. And there is a name for a creature governed by biological determinism (BD): an animal.
Thus, whatever your position on homosexuality, trying to justify something — anything — based on a BD argument is dangerous. After all, whether you’re a Christian who believes a fallen world corrupted our physical being or a secularist who believes a cosmic accident will necessarily be imperfect, you know man is born with many flaws, both in body and character. Yet if BD carried the day, there would be no logical basis on which to label the decision to act on innate character flaws as “wrong” and thus discourage the action. People would be able to justify anything that felt right based on the principle, “My body’s inclination, my choice.”
As to this, I remember reading an explanation an anonymous pedophile used to justify his behavior (I’m paraphrasing): “I didn’t ask to have these feelings, so what do you want me to do?” Sure, we may be taken aback by cavalier attitudes toward child molestation, but understand that it is the same logic many moderns use to justify homosexual behavior. Ideas spread. Ideas have consequences. Thus, if one seeks to justify homosexual behavior or anything else and cares about civilization, he must find a more philosophically sound argument than BD.
Speaking of feelings and choice, a certain very avoidable misunderstanding exists because those who would normalize homosexuality don’t try very hard to understand and those who wouldn’t don’t do a very good job of increasing understanding. When it’s said that homosexuality is a “choice,” what should really be said is that homosexual behavior is a choice. No thinking traditionalist would claim that a person chooses to have homosexual feelings, whether inborn or induced by circumstance. Likewise, however, it’s self-evident that a choice is involved in any behavior; to deny this is to deny free will and reduce man to an animal, an automaton, a thing, completely at the mercy of his hardware (physical make-up) and/or his software (learning). It is to dehumanize him, and that is an awfully high price to pay for the advancement of any agenda.
