Special Correspondence
Special Correspondence An Exchange on Chandler Burr's "Why Conservatives Should Embrace the Gay Gene" Chandler Burr states in the Dec. 16 issue that conservatives are "unaware of the clinical...
...William Byne and is a brilliant critique of the genetic research...
...On the other hand, several reputable scientists have concluded that there may be a genetic predisposition to the type of personality that is vulnerable to the environmental factors that may produce homosexual desires, such as lack of bonding with the same-sex parent...
...The DNA tests that were done didn't even support [Hamer's] idea a bit...
...It is equally clear that, politically, this research is producing one of the most devastating contradictions of the far-left view of human nature ever, which I applaud...
...Byne and other biologists find this use of his work by FRC amusing, but conservatives should not be amused...
...Is there a heterosexuality gene, on which chromosome is it located, and how does it work...
...Ironically, preserving the genetic foundation of homosexuality may require the suppression of homosexual behavior...
...Knight's letter is a catalogue of scientific errors (and like Kramer he hasn't done his homework...
...If there is some "environmental condition," such as Goldberg describes, no one in a century of research has discovered it...
...Kramer's line of attack is as fruitless as Frank Kameny's...
...The possibility that science can find a way to reverse homosexuality poses a devastating threat to the political house of cards constructed by gay activists...
...I was hoping Knight would actually quote from the Archives of General Psychiatry paper that the Family Research Council has been spending its money mailing across the country...
...This is not to say there couldn't be one...
...The Kin-sey-derived 10 percent figure has been thoroughly discredited, but homosexual activists are steadily trying to push the estimate to 5 percent or more...
...If this man really wanted to change, his chances would be good to excellent...
...Societies that allow homosexuality to flourish ultimately self-destruct...
...It was written by neuroanatomist Dr...
...Consider, for instance, the findings of George C. Ebers, a professor of neurology at the University of Western Ontario, whose group has failed to replicate Hamer's findings...
...On the other hand, social suppression encourages latent and self-restrained homosexuals to join traditional society and have children, thereby preserving the trait...
...If Burr had been better informed or less ideologically committed, he might have informed his 38-year-old correspondent that he was misinformed about psychotherapy and that rather than only a slim chance of being helped, he had one chance in four of converting to heterosexuality...
...It is quite clear that, medically, genetic testing/engineering could conceivably lead to the elimination of homosexuality, which I don't support (Thomas Peyser is correct in warning us about the dangers of meddling with complex things we don't understand, particularly our genes...
...This certainly will create dilemmas galore, not just for pro-choicers but for some pro-lifers and conservatives who, Burr says, are "unremittingly hostile to homosexuality...
...State College, PA Chandler Burr responds: There are two main discussions in the responses above...
...And why is no one asking...
...They should instead face reality, make honest adjustments in their theories where science demands it, grab new opportunities where research provides them, and come out stronger...
...Byne believes sexual orientation is a biological trait...
...We've been collecting families that have more than one gay person for five years," Ebers says, "and we've gone through something like four hundred pedigrees...
...Franklin E. Kameny Washington, DC Chandler Burr's article is cruelly deceptive on two counts...
...Thomas Peyser Richmond, VA Chandler Burr's article is the slickest piece of sabotage since the Trojans fell for the "gift" of the horse...
...Yale Kramer makes a fundamental mistake: He doesn't distinguish between sexual "orientation" and sexual "behavior...
...Nor does Kramer understand the difference between clinical (phenotypic) data, all of which clearly point to sexual orientation's being a biological trait (this is what is accepted by biologists), and the (geno-typic) search for the genes underlying that trait...
...If (and this is the big ifhere) the gene (or genes) are passed down through homosexuals themselves, conserving both an unnecessary pleiotropic "side-effect" (homosexuality) and some evolutionarily necessary primary effect, then societal acceptance of gay people leading to fewer biological offspring could indeed create problems for the species—which argues against such acceptance...
...Witty, homosexual conservatives, for example, might awake one fine morning to discover that they have become boring, straight . . . liberals...
...Yet this trait might wither away if homosexuality is socially accepted, since bearers of this trait, free to consort among themselves, would then be less likely to produce children...
...Thus, there is an obligation upon American governments to provide active and affirmative support, encouragement, promotion, and protection of Gay people and our Homosexuality...
...Conservatives should pay heed and not feel that the only place to make their stand is against science...
...Charles W. Socarldes New York, NY As Chandler Burr states, there is no longer any doubt that heredity plays a crucial role in the causation of homosexuality...
...But for political reasons, research of that nature is virtually impossible today...
...Both of these reports are methodologically imperfect, but they are powerful enough to raise serious doubts about the immutability of homosexuality...
...Why are conservatives trying desperately to maintain a family-friendly culture, reform welfare, reduce the tax burden, and fight the scourges of pornography and illicit drugs...
...Hamer's research has also been called into doubt by articles in the journals Science and the The Scientist, which reported "not only . . . arguments over his interpretations of the data, but also . . . allegations of misconduct...
...And oh yes: The modern age has taught us that it is always best to side with the facts...
...Contrary to what he asserts, there is no universal acceptance of this notion because most biologists have no vested interest in ideology and so can understand the complexities of the issue...
...acceptance will have deleterious (but not orientation-altering) effects on pubertal heterosexuals, and the like...
...Rather than being a "defective" gene, the predisposition for homosexuality may have some beneficial role our limited knowledge cannot divine...
...No valid answers will ever be found as to the causes of Homosexuality until we also know the causes of heterosexuality...
...The homosexual researchers whose work has been publicized have been far too cautious to make the claim that Burr repeats throughout his article...
...Burr also cites Dean Hamer's "gay twins" research at the National Institutes of Health, but fails to mention that a colleague of Hamer's has charged him with distorting data...
...he certainly does not trouble himself with the idea that a transformed sexuality might set the stage for unforeseen transformations in other quadrants of the soul...
...After a calamitous century of left-wing social engineering, it would be nice to avoid a new century of right-wing genetic engineering...
...Over the past 30 years, I have been able to help homosexuals become heterosexuals...
...But the data indicate that if it exists it would be approximately as strong as the "social influence" in becoming left-handed (i.e., negligible at most...
...Since there are more women than men, this places the overall incidence at less than 2 percent...
...This view considers homosexuality as equivalent to basic skin color: The genes determine everything...
...For the devoutly religious, which would be the greater sin, abortion or bringing more gays into the world...
...If it is the second, and I hope this doesn't happen, we will be back to square one for all discussions of whether acceptance of homosexuality by society at large will increase the number of homosexuals, whether such continued...
...If amniocentesis would allow expectant parents to identify future homosexuals, how many would abort their fetuses rather than raise gay sons or daughters...
...There is one idea he may have overlooked: The genetic basis for homosexuality supports an argument for its social suppression...
...Yale Kramer New York, NY Contrary to what Chandler Burr asserts, American morality comes not from religion but from the Declaration of Independence, which guarantees, as an inalienable right, the pursuit of happiness, which unquestionably includes Homosexual conduct...
...Burr ignores the devastating refutation of gay studies in an article in the Archives of General Psychiatryby two Columbia University psychiatrists...
...Given the pro-gay propaganda on television and in the public schools, they are on the way to achieving a higher incidence in fact, as more youth are seduced into experimentation...
...Charles Darwin wrote, "We are not here concerned with hopes and fears, only with the truth as far as our reason allows us to discover it...
...In those [families] there is really no support for the idea that male homosexuality is X-linked [linked to the female sex chromosome...
...Burr tends to see the biological as determinative, as necessary and sufficient to cause homosexuality...
...Aside from criticizing the article for not addressing the "straight" gene (the article discusses it on page 23, right column), Kameny contends (in effect) that any person should enjoy the unfettered pursuit of happiness, no matter how sick or deviant...
...My success rate has been about 35 percent, and an additional third of my patients are now able to control their previously uncontrollable impulses towards same-sex sex...
...A replay of the Church's reaction against Galileo is the last thing we need...
...Knight does not want to recognize a reality that contradicts his own and Kramer refuses to recognize a reality that limits what he feels should be his unlimited freedom to grant an ever-expanding number of rights to himself and anyone else, no matter how dangerous or destructive they might be...
...Let's hope that Chandler Burr's chilling visions remain nothing more than the offspring of his twisted mind...
...It goes on to declare that "to secure [this] right, governments are instituted among men...
...16 issue that conservatives are "unaware of the clinical research—all but universally accepted among biologists—showing that homosexuality is a biological trait...
...Science at this point can't tell us which of these two possibilities is correct...
...Special Correspondence If Burr, a (self-described) homosexual, continues to report prominently and favorably about a way to zap the "gay gene," he may emerge as the Ward Connerly of this debate—bravely defying the powerful minions of political correctness while craven Republicans cower on the sidelines, in mortal fear of being branded bigots or homophobes...
...in other words, faced with Kramer's misinformed contention that homosexuality is equal to pedophilia (the scientific literature has demonstrated for years that tranvestitism, pedophilia, transsexualism, and sexual orientation are all discrete traits with completely different clinical profiles), Kameny would ignore the very research demonstrating that this is not so...
...A gene that causes men to desire male partners has not been found, and it is highly unlikely that any such gene exists...
...Steven Goldberg New York, NY As a conservative who has long thought there is a genetic predisposition toward homosexuality, I was happy to see Chandler Burr's article fleshing out the implications of this idea...
...This, in the end, was the crux of my article...
...I don't like it, and I hope the gene's transmission is otherwise, but we will eventually find out...
...An orientation is a basic biological instinct like hunger, which strongly directs us toward a behavior, eating, but which doesn't always produce the behavior—for example, during a low-fat diet (voluntary) or a famine (involuntary...
...I'll deal with the scientific debate first, then the politics...
...The real problem with the article, however, lies in the effect such talk about a gay gene has on men like the one who wrote to Burr hoping that some type of gene therapy could convert him from homosexual to heterosexual...
...And this is a scientist who is on record and in print saying so...
...That is our American morality...
...The first is his claim that there is "clinical research—all but universally accepted among biologists—showing that homosexuality is a biological trait...
...And when we find out, Deroy Murdock will see that the ultimate effects of this research are not, in fact, the offspring of my twisted mind but rather the collision of the science of molecular genetics with political and moral beliefs...
...It's that serious...
...Ostlund, Jr...
...Stein's argument revolves around what geneticists call pleiotropy...
...It bears noting that Kameny and Knight, at opposite extremes of the political spectrum, care only for hopes and fears...
...Dean Hamer has already been vindicated of the charges that the two of them repeat...
...There is no "gay gene," any more than there is an "adultery" gene, a "pornography addiction" gene, a "premarital sex" gene, a "greed" gene, or a "theft" gene...
...I note that neither Burr nor anyone else that I know addresses the question of the origins of heterosexuality...
...As for Burr's estimated 5 percent figure for the incidence of homosexuality, more than 30 surveys from the United States, France, Great Britain, Canada, Australia, and other nations indicate that the figure is closer to 2 percent for men and 1.5 percent for women...
...Ostlund easily discerns the immense political opportunity that Knight cannot see in front of his face...
...Steven Goldberg and Robert Stein, in contrast, are both standing on solid scientific ground...
...Both hate the research...
...Such results might be improved if it were possible to discover what factors are associated with mutability...
...Come again...
...But my principal reservations are based on the law of unintended consequences...
...This is a modified form of success since in the age of AIDS this may save their lives...
...Burr, however, seems to suppose that changing one's sexuality is about as deep an operation as changing one's socks...
...Now, he may very well be correct...
...Deroy Murdock New York, NY Chandler Burr's call for heterosexu-ality on demand gave me the creeps...
...This is consistent with a large systematic study done in 1962 in which 27 percent of the patients were able to change from homosexuality to heterosexuality...
...Contrary to what Burr believes and implies—that homosexuality is merely a matter of sexual orientation—homosexuality is a set of extremely varied behaviors ranging from pedophilia to transvestitism...
...Burr dismisses or disregards the criticisms of Dean Hamer's "discovery" of the gay gene...
...In twisting biology to suit the purposes of homosexual activists, Burr seeks to hasten the day when all resistance to this well-orchestrated and vicious agenda is crushed, leaving religious opponents chained in silence...
...Yet Knight and the FRC are so baffled by science (or so indifferent to it) that they do not even realize this paper they are avidly promoting is not saying sexual orientation isn't biological...
...Nor does he seem to realize that if current genetic understanding should prove faulty, the scientific reaction will be: Hmm, well, it wasn't this gene, let's look for another...
...I'm astonished that Burr, a self-described "gay person," analogizes gay genes with "rancid-yellow cancerous lesions" in rats and describes in awe the idea of doctors with syringes "loaded with millions of engineered viruses" performing "genetic surgery" on gay men...
...As for Kramer's claim, forcefully echoed by Charles Socarides, that therapy turns a homosexual orientation (not homosexual behavior) into heterosexual orientation (not heterosexual behavior), my response is the same as that of therapists, clinicians, and biologists for half a century: Show me the data...
...There wasn't even a trend toward increased sharing of haplotypes down there at Xq28" [the gay gene...
...Conservatives are dangerously misled by social engineers like Robert Knight who call themselves conservative but are really authoritarians engaged in a desperate defense of the notion that homosexuality is a lifestyle...
...Robert S. Stein Washington, DC Chandler Burr isolates one of the double-edged double helixes tied to the hypothetical gay gene...
...However, to call homosexuality "hereditary" conflates two possible etiologies that differ in a crucial way...
...Robert H. Knight Family Research Council Washington, DC While Chandler Burr offers a well-constructed game plan for conservative reaction to proof of genetically determined homosexuality, he skirts the real issue, which lies not with conservatives, but with homosexuals themselves...
...In a recent report of the treatment of 814 male homosexuals who were conflicted about their sexual orientation, 80 percent of the patients improved clinically and about 24 percent actually changed their sexual orientation...
...Aren't conservatives supposed to be the ones who remember that when we meddle with structures whose complexity eludes our understanding—like markets and DNA— even with the best of intentions, we can produce monstrous results...
...Both clinicians and geneticists agree that the cause of this complex and varied behavior is both polygenic and multifactorial—a fancier way of saying both nature and nurture...
...But there is a second possible "hereditary" etiology that sees heredity as a necessary condition that must be complemented by some environmental condition (whatever it turns out to be) that is also necessary...
...To repeat what has been repeated thousands of times, every one of these so-called conversions submitted to independent verification has proven to be behavioral change, the equivalent of forcing a left-handed person to learn right-handed behavior (writing, for example) and then claiming, "I have converted this person to being a righthander...
...His speculation is quite interesting and, I admit, disturbing to me as a gay person...
...Finally, Burr defines conservatism as "a philosophy holding that the environment has little to do with outcomes...
...One need not be a Freudian to suppose that sexuality is mixed up in many unsexy parts of our thoughts and behaviors—indeed Plato suggests as much in the Symposium and Phaedrus...
...his fantasy sounds like a cross between The Boys in the Band and The Boys from Brazil...
Vol. 2 • January 1997 • No. 17
