Most of the material below is published in an analytical report. “The rhetoric of the homosexual movement in the light of scientific facts”. doi:10.12731/978-5-907208-04-9, ISBN 978-5-907208-04-9

Key findings

1. The hypothetical “gene for homosexuality” is not known, it has not been discovered by anyone.
2. The studies underlying the statement about the “innateness of homosexuality” have a number of methodological inaccuracies and contradictions, and do not allow us to draw clear conclusions.
3. Even existing studies cited by activists of the LGBT+ movement do not speak of the genetic determination of homosexual inclinations, but, at best, of a complex influence in which a genetic factor supposedly determines the predisposition, in combination with environmental influences, upbringing, etc.
4. Some prominent figures in the homosexual movement, including scientists, criticize claims about the biological predetermination of homosexuality and say that it is caused by a conscious choice.
5. Authors of LGBT propaganda methods «After The Ball» recommended lying about the innateness of homosexuality:

“First, the general public needs to be convinced that gay people are victims of circumstance, and that they no more choose their sexual orientation than they choose their height, skin color, talents or limitations. Despite the fact that, apparently, sexual orientation for most people is the product of complex interactions between an innate predisposition and environmental factors in childhood and early adolescence, we insist that for all practical purposes it should be considered that gays were born that way.

<..>
Homosexuals did not choose anything, no one ever fooled or seduced them.”

Introduction

The argument that homosexual attraction is innate - the so-called the hypothesis of the biological determinism of homosexual attraction is one of the fundamental ones in “LGBT +” movement. The slogan "Born This Way"¹, actively disseminated in popular culture, led many non-specialists to think that the biological genesis of homosexuality is something indisputable and proven. This is not true.

The most reliable facts regarding homosexuality do not indicate a biological, but a socio-ecological causal relationship. The efforts of recent decades to find data that would support biological theory have only heightened doubts that such data exist.

The thesis of the biological genesis of homosexuality is not entirely specific in itself - within its framework there are at least two assumptions explaining the mechanism of the “innate nature” of same-sex sexual preferences: (A) homosexual attraction is caused by a “special gene” or genetic mutation, in other words homosexuality is encoded in human DNA and is transmitted from generation to generation; (B) homosexual attraction is caused by any abnormalities during pregnancy (hormonal or immune) that supposedly affect the fetus in the womb and result in homosexual preferences in the baby.

Thus, the discussion of the biological determinism hypothesis will be divided into three parts. The first part will critically examine the arguments about the relationship of homosexuality and genes, the second part will critically examine the arguments about the development of homosexual attraction due to intrauterine hormonal disorders. In the third part, the theory of the autoimmune genesis of homosexual attraction will be critically examined.

Part One: Gay Genes?

The statement about the genetic nature of homosexuality is based on the selective presentation of some data and the suppression of other data amid the vast majority of people who do not have specialized knowledge about genetics. Science does not know the “gene of homosexuality", it has never been identified anywhere, although there have been many attempts.

Consider the studies on the basis of which LGBT + activists put forward this argument. First of all, it is worth briefly describing with what basic methods scientists can determine whether a person’s property (trait) is genetically determined. These methods include twin research and molecular genetic analysis.

Twin studies

Examination of identical twins is an adequate research method to assess whether any traits have a genetic basis. To begin with - what does the term “identical twins” mean? Such twins develop from the same fertilized egg, which is divided into parts, from which separate organisms develop, which are genetic copies of each other. Their genes coincide on 100%, you can call them natural clones. Identical twins are also called identical or monozygous (homozygous) twins. Different twins are formed from different eggs, fertilized by different sperm. Their genes coincide on average by 50%, there may be different sex, height, color of eyes, hair, etc. Non-identical twins are also called non-identical or dizygotic (heterozygous) or double-twin.

In the study of twins, concordance (coincidence) is studied. Concordance of a trait is the probability of the manifestation of a trait that both twins have. If the identity of any trait in identical twins is high, then we can conclude that this trait is probably due to genetic factors. If the concordance of the trait in identical twins does not exceed the concordance in twins of identical twins, this indicates that for the formation of this trait the general environment may be a more important factor than the common genes (Yarygin 2003).

It is necessary to clarify exactly what concordance shows. It in no way indicates the presence of any gene. The concordance of a trait in twins indicates the degree of inheritance of this trait. Here it is worthwhile to dwell on the meaning of the word “heritability” in twin studies. Inheritance is a measure of how much the variability of a particular trait in a population (that is, how different this trait can be from individual to individual) is related to the variability of genes in a given population. However, in twin studies, heritability is not a measure of the genetic determinism of a trait.

Traits that are almost completely genetically determined can have very low heritability values, while traits with virtually no genetic basis can show high heritability values. For example, the number of fingers - five on each limb - in humans is almost completely determined genetically. But the number of fingers in a person is characterized by low variability, and the observed variability in most cases is explained by non-genetic factors such as accidents, which results in a low coefficient of heritability of the trait. That is, if you find thirty pairs of twins in which one of them will not have five fingers on his hand, then the same number of fingers of the other brother will be observed in an extremely small number of pairs, if any.

In contrast, some cultural traits may be highly heritable. For example, if we were considering wearing earrings in America in the mid-twentieth century, then we would see that it is characterized by a high degree of heritability, since then it was highly dependent on gender, which, in turn, is associated with the presence of pairs of XX or XY chromosomes, therefore the variability of wearing earrings is strongly associated with genetic differences, despite the fact that this is more a cultural rather than a biological phenomenon. For example, if you would examine thirty pairs of twin girls in which one of the sisters wears earrings, then in 100% of cases the second would also wear earrings. Today, the coefficient of heritability of wearing earrings would be lower than in America in the mid-twentieth century, not because there have been changes in the gene pool of Americans, but because the number of men wearing earrings has increased (Block xnumx).

One of the pioneers of behavioral genetics was an American psychiatrist of German descent, Franz Joseph Kallmann. In an article published in 1952, he said that in 37 pairs of identical (monozygous) twins he studied, if one of the twins was homosexual, then the second was also homosexual, that is, the degree of concordance was a staggering 100% (Kallmann xnumx) Kallmann did not indicate exactly how he tested the monozygosity of the participants in his study. Also, the author did not indicate how he conducted the recruitment of participants for the study, while the publication stated: “the search for potential participants was organized not only with the help of psychiatric, correctional and charitable organizations, but also through direct contacts with the underground homosexual world” (Kallmann xnumx) Therefore, Kallmann's study was severely criticized (Taylor 1992): Rosenthal indicated the predominance of individuals with psychiatric problems among Kallmann respondents (Rosenthal xnumx), Likken noted the disproportionate predominance of monozygotic twins in the Callamanne sample compared to the general population: (Lykken 1987).

Professor Edward Stein concluded that the Kallmann sample “was in no way representative of the homosexual population” (Stein xnumx) Moreover, Kallmann himself admitted that he considers his results to be nothing more than a “statistical artifact” (Rainer 1960) In statistics, samples like samples in the Kallmann study are called “convenient samples” - they include the selection of objects according to criteria that are convenient for the researcher. Using such a sample, one cannot scientifically generalize, because the properties of such a sample do not reflect the properties of the general population.

For example, if the survey is conducted in the mall in the early morning for only one day, then its results do not represent the opinions of other members of society, as would be the case if the survey was conducted at different times of the day and several times a week. Or if you ask customers at the store whether they will buy alcohol, then on Friday night, the result will not coincide with the results on Sunday.

In 1968, American scholars Heston and Shields examined the concordance of homosexuality in 7 identical twin pairs. Study participants were found in the Madsley Twin Register (Heston xnumx) All respondents were psychiatric patients. The authors revealed concordance in identical twins in 43%. This study was also criticized, including by the authors themselves, because of the participants' psychiatric illnesses and the extremely small sample size (Taylor 1992; Heston xnumx).

The study of Bailey and Pillard

The next study of sexual attraction among twins was conducted in 1991 by Michael Bailey from Northwestern University and Richard Pillard from Boston University in America (Bailey 1991) They examined the concordance of homosexuality in brothers of varying degrees of kinship. 56 pairs of identical twins, 54 pairs of identical twins, 142 siblings and 57 pairs of stepbrothers were examined². The table below shows the results of their analysis.

Homosexual Concordance
depending on the degree of relationship (Bailey 1991)

Relationship type	The percentage of total genes	Concordance
Identical twins	100%	52%
Non-identical twins	50%	22%
Twin brothers	50%	9,2%
Stepbrothers (not relatives)	No significant similarities	11%

Bailey and Pillard stated that since in 52% of cases the second sibling in an identical pair of twins also had homosexual preferences, then "... homosexual tendencies are due to genetic influence ...".

The Bailey and Pillard study, as in previous twin studies, has fundamental problems. Firstly, if homosexuality were genetically determined, the concordance among identical twins would be 100%, not 52%, because their genes are identical at 100%, and not at 52%. In a commentary on Bailey and Pylard’s article, Riesch also noted that the level of coincidence among genetically alien people - half-brothers - was even higher than among biological non-twin brothers, which indicates the significance of environmental influences. (Risch 1993) According to the principles of genetics, in addition to the 100% coincidence of sexual desire in identical twins, the percentage of coincidence in identical twins and non-twin brothers should be higher than, respectively, 22% and 9,2% (see table below).

In addition, the identity of identical twins (100% of genetic similarity) differs from the identity of identical twins (50% of genetic similarity) by 2.36 times, but if we compare the identity of identical twins with the concordance of twin brothers (50%) the difference is: 2.39 times, which, again, indicates a more pronounced influence of the environment than genetics (see table below).

Comparison of concordance between categories (Bailey 1991)

Compare Categories	Difference in genetic similarity	The difference between concordances
Identical twins and opposite twins	Twice as many common genes	2.36
Twin brothers and twin brothers	There is no difference in the percentage of total genes	2.39

Secondly, Bailey and Pillard did not select an arbitrary sample of homosexuals. That is, they did not include people in the study according to the standards of unbiased academic research: not interested in the results, not familiar with each other, etc. As researcher Baron writes:

“... Instead, the participants were recruited by posting ads in gay magazines. Such a selection of participants is very doubtful, because it depends on the readership of such magazines and on the motivation of those who agreed to participate. Such a fact leads to a distortion of the results, for example, to the fact that the number of homosexual twins will be overestimated. Why? Because the participants took into account the sexual behavior of their twin brothers before they agreed to participate. And this casts doubt on the randomness of the sample. For scientific evidence, the sample should be as random as possible, that is, it was necessary to include all the twins in the examination, and then conduct an analysis of sexual behavior ... ”(Baron 1993).

Thirdly, as the researchers Hubbard and Wald write in their analysis:

“... the fact that the concordance among the twin brothers - 22% - more than doubles the concordance among the simple brothers - 9,2% - indicates that the reason for the development of homosexuality is not genetics, but the environment. Indeed, the genetic similarity of heterogeneous twins is similar to the similarity of ordinary brothers. And if environmental factors and upbringing have such a big influence in the case of heterogeneous twins, it is not surprising that among identical twins, the influence of the environment is even higher. After all, the psychological perception of a person who has an identical twin brother is inextricably linked with this twin ... ”(Hubbard xnumx).

Researchers Billings and Beckwiers wrote in their review "... although the authors interpreted the findings as evidence of a genetic basis for homosexuality, we believe that the results, on the contrary, indicate that factors of upbringing and environment influence the development of homosexuality" (Billings xnumx, p. 60).

Have the results of Bailey and Pillard been repeated?

Did anyone manage to repeat (replicate) the results of Bailey and Pillard - to find concordance among identical twins at least in 52%? In 2000, Michael Bailey himself tried to repeat his research in a large group of twins in Australia. The concordance of homosexual inclinations was even less than in his first study. Among identical twins, it was 20% for men, and 24% for women, and among identical twins - 0% for men, and 10% for women³ (Bailey 2000).

In 2010, the Swedish epidemiologist Langström conducted a complex large-scale study of sexual orientation in twins, analyzing the data of several thousand pairs of same-sex identical and identical twins (Långström 2010) Researchers have identified homosexual tendencies in terms of the existence of same-sex sexual partners throughout life. They calculated concordance by two parameters: by the presence of at least one homosexual partner during life, and by the total number of homosexual partners during life. Concordance indicators in the sample were lower than those obtained in both studies by Bailey et al. (1991) and (2000) In the group of participants who had at least one partner of the same sex, male concordance was 18% for identical and 11% for identical twins; in women, 22% and 17%, respectively.

For the total number of sexual partners, the concordance indicators in men amounted to 5% for identical and 0% for identical twins; in women, 11% and 7%, respectively. In men, 61% and 66% of variance are explained by environmental factors that affect only one twin of a pair, respectively, while variance is not explained at all by environmental factors common to twins. Unique environmental factors accounted for 64% and 66% dispersion, respectively, while general environmental factors accounted for 17% and 16%, respectively (Långström 2010).

In 2002, researchers Peter Birmen of Columbia University and Hannah Bruckner of Yale University of America conducted an extensive and representative study with a large number of participants (Bearman 2002).

They got even more insignificant levels of concordance of homosexual inclinations: 6,7% in pairs of identical twins, 7,2% in different identical twins, and 5,5% in ordinary brothers. Birmen and Bruckner concluded that they were found:

“... substantial evidence in favor of the model of socialization at the individual level ..., our results suggest that raising children on the principle of gender neutrality, without clearly establishing the gender of the child, has an impact on the formation of homosexual inclinations ...” (Bearman 2002).

Unlike the works just reviewed, the psychiatrist Kenneth Kendler and his colleagues conducted a large twin study using a probabilistic sample consisting of 794 pairs of twins and 1380 ordinary brothers and sisters (Kendler xnumx) The authors concluded that their findings "suggest that genetic factors can have a strong effect on sexual orientation." The study, however, was not adequate enough to draw such serious conclusions about the degree of influence of genes on sexuality: in all, in 19 of 324 pairs of identical twins, a person with homosexual inclinations was identified, while in 6 of 19 couples, homosexual inclinations were concordant (observed in second brother); at least one person with homosexual tendencies was found in 15 of 240 couples of same-sex twins, while 2 of 15 couples were concordant. The fact that only in 8 of 564 twin pairs did homosexual inclinations coincide (1,4%) limits the possibility of using these results for a serious comparison of identical and non-identical twins.

It should be borne in mind that identical twins are surrounded by almost the same environment - early affection, relationships with other children, etc. - in comparison with non-identical twins and ordinary brothers and sisters. Since identical twins are similar in appearance and character, the same attitude to them is more likely than to identical twins and ordinary brothers and sisters. Therefore, in some cases, a higher concordance coefficient can be explained by environmental rather than genetic factors.

According to psychiatrist Jeffrey Satinover (Satinover xnumx) factors that comprehensively affect the formation of the sexual behavioral type of a person can be divided into five categories:
1) intrauterine (prenatal) effects, such as the concentration of hormones;
2) extrauterine (postnatal) physical effects such as trauma and viral infections;
3) extrauterine experiences, such as family interactions, education;
4) prenatal experience, for example, the reinforcing effect of stereotypical repetitive behavior;
5) choice.

The absence of 100% concordance in identical identical twins suggests not only that the influence of genetic factors is negligible, but also that non-genetic factors cannot be exclusively intrauterine. After all, if this were so, then concordance would still be close to 100%, since identical twins are affected by the same factors of the intrauterine environment ”(Satinover xnumx, p. 97).

If genes play a role in shaping people's predisposition to certain sexual desires and behaviors, then all these studies allow us to say with confidence that this topic is not exhausted by the influence of genetic factors. Summarizing the research of the twins, we can safely conclude that science has not proved that sexual desire in general and homosexual inclinations in particular are determined by human genes.

Molecular genetic studies

Studying the question of the participation of genetics in the formation of homosexual inclinations and, if possible, the degree of this participation, we have so far examined studies in which the genetic inheritance of a trait (in the particular case of homosexual attraction) is determined by classical genetics, but they did not set the task of determining which specific genes are responsible for this trait. At the same time, genetics can be studied with the help of the so-called. molecular methods that make it possible to determine which specific genetic variants are associated with physical or behavioral traits.

Dean Haymer Study

One of the first attempts to conduct a molecular genetic analysis of homosexual inclinations was made by Dean Haymer and his colleagues at the National Institute of Health in Maryland, in America (Hamer 1993) Haymer investigated families with identical male twins, in which at least one of the twins had same-sex attraction. Among the total number of families, Haymer identified 40, where the homosexual brother had a different brother who was also homosexual, and examined their DNA for similar sites. A similar study is called “linked inheritance research” - in English “genetic linkage study”.

In the study of linked inheritance, the following is done: in a group of subjects having a common known attribute, an analysis is carried out for the presence of similar DNA sections - they are called markers. If it turns out that in the group of subjects the high number of markers is located in the same DNA region, then it can be assumed that all these markers are inherited “together” - linked — that is, they may be part of some gene (Pulst 1999).

Haymer said that in 33 pairs from 40, homosexual brothers have the same sex region on the X chromosome, which he called "Xq28." Heimer concluded that the Xq28 region contains genes for homosexual tendencies.

First of all, it should be noted that Haymer’s results are very often misinterpreted. Many people think that Haymer found an identical DNA region - Xq28 - in all 33 pairs, in all 66 men, but in fact, the nucleotide sequences of the Xq28 region were found to be identical between brothers in each twin pair, and the Xq28 sequence in all pairs was not identical - Haymer did not find the notorious "gay gene."

This study has a number of significant drawbacks. Haymer did not check the coincidence of Xq28 in twin couples with heterosexual attraction, but only among homosexuals (Byne xnumx) If he did not find this site among heterosexual brothers, but only among homosexuals, this would speak of a result in favor of his conclusion. However, if he had discovered Xq28 among his heterosexual brothers, his conclusions would have acquired zero value (Horton xnumx) Also, as researchers Fausto-Sterling and Balaban noted, the Heimer sample contains an incomplete amount of data: of 40 cases, only in 15 DNA heterozygosity characteristics were directly measured; in the remaining 25 cases, the data were indirectly calculated (Fausto-Sterling 1993) Only in 38% of cases did Heimer et al directly measure the level of heterozygosity of the maternal X chromosome, and in 62% they simply calculated it based on the available databases.

Mention should be made of the following episode related to the publication of Haymer 1993 of the year. In 1995, the New York Native magazine published an article entitled “Research on the“ genes ”of homosexuality did not stand the test: journalist John Krudson of the Chicago Tribune uncovered a probable scientific forgery committed by a researcher” (Chicago Tribune 1995) The article indicates that Haymer’s work was severely criticized by various scholars for the fact that Haymer did not carry out a verification check for the presence of Xq28 among heterosexual brothers. Critics included renowned biologists and geneticists Richard Levontin and Ruth Hubbard of Harvard University (Chicago Tribune 1995) Moreover, the same article states that the Federal Bureau of Ethics of the National Institute of Health is studying the complaint of one of the young employees of the Heimer laboratory, whose name is not known, who reported the rigging of the results made by Heimer in his study: according to the statement of this officer, Heimer deliberately excluded from the publication the results indicating the unreasonableness of the theory of the genetic predetermination of homosexual inclinations (Chicago Tribune 1995) A few months after the publication of the article in the New York Native, Scientific American magazine published another article confirming the fact and reason for the investigation of the Federal Ethics Bureau against Heimer (Horgan xnumx, p. 26). The National Institute of Health did not disclose the results of the investigation, but Haymer was later transferred to another department. It should also be noted that Haymer conducted his research on the “homosexuality gene” using a grant, which was actually allocated to study Kaposi’s sarcoma, a skin cancer that often affects homosexual patients with AIDS (Mukherjee xnumx, p. 375). The validity of Haymer's publication depended on whether an independent team of researchers could get the same results. This did not happen.

Replicability of Haymer results

In 1999, a group of researchers from the University of Western Ontario, led by a scientist by the name of Rice, conducted a similar (using the “genetic linkage” method) study among 52 gay men (Rice xnumx) The authors were not able to repeat the results obtained by Haymer and concluded: "the results of our study did not reveal any evidence of a connection between male homosexuality and genes."

Then, in 2005, a new study was conducted with Dean Haymer (Mustanski Xnumx) The authors did not find a statistically significant relationship between Xq28 and homosexual inclinations, but claimed to have found an “interesting correlation” for other sites (on the 7, 8 and 10 chromosomes).

However, these results could not be repeated in another study in the 2009 year, when a group of researchers from Oxford in England and the University of Ontario in Canada conducted a study of 55 families with male homosexuals: genetic material was collected from 112 participants and a genome-wide association search was conducted with the inclusion of 6000 gene markers (Ramagopalan 2010) The analysis did not reveal a statistically significant relationship between genetic markers and homosexuality.

In 2015, a group of authors from various scientific centers in America, according to a genome-wide search for associations, stated that they found a significant relationship for the site on the 8 chromosome and less significant for Xq28 (Sanders xnumx) In the conclusions in their article, the authors admitted that "the genetic effect on homosexual tendencies is far from being decisive ... most likely this effect is part of a multifactorial cause."

In 2017, the same group of authors applied a more modern and accurate method called the genome-wide search for associations⁴. The search for genome-wide associations is based on the use of genome sequencing technology (reading information from DNA) to determine the specific features of DNA that may be associated with the trait under investigation. Scientists are exploring millions of genetic variants in a large number of individuals with a common attribute, and individuals who do not have this attribute, and compare the frequency of genetic variants among both groups. It is assumed that those genetic variants that are more common among owners of a trait than among those without it are somehow related to this trait. This time, statistically significant relationships were found for regions on the 13 and 14 chromosomes (Sanders xnumx).

A study by Sanders and colleagues (2017) did not find a gene for homosexual tendencies, and did not prove their genetic condition (the authors themselves disavow it), nor did it confirm the results of Haymer 1993 of the year, which laid the foundation for a long spree with homosexuality genes. One of the conclusions of this publication was the assumption that all of the above genetic variants may affect predisposition homosexual inclinations (Sanders xnumx, p. 3).

Francis Collins, project manager for decoding the human genome, writes the following:

“The likelihood close to 20% that the identical twin of a homosexual man will also be homosexual (compared to 2 – 4% in the general population) indicates that sexual orientation is influenced by genes, but not incorporated into DNA, and any genes involved represent a predisposition but not a foregone conclusion ... ”(Collins xnumx).

A particularly large study on the method of genome-wide search for associations, which aimed to determine the genetic variants associated with homosexual inclinations, was presented at the annual conference of the American Society of Human Genetics in 2012 (Drabant 2012) As a result of a genome-wide search, no significant relationships were found for homosexual inclinations in both sexes. At the same time, many thousands of individuals from the 23andMe company database were examined.

Authors of the most recent and largest research on the genetics of homosexuality told about its results:

"It is virtually impossible to predict a person's sexual behavior based on their genome,"

says Ben Neal, a professor in the Division of Analytical and Translational Genetics at Massachusetts General Hospital, who worked on the study.

According to University of California Genetics Institute professor David Curtis,

“There is no combination of genes in the human population that has a significant impact on sexual orientation. It is virtually impossible to predict a person's sexual behavior based on their genome."

Epigenetic

In 2015, a group of researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles presented a summary at a conference of the American Society of Human Genetics⁵which claimed that researchers were able to identify sexual preferences based on epigenetic markers with an accuracy of 67% (Ngun et al. 2015). To attract maximum attention to their work, the authors even organized a press release involving the press (ASHG 2015) The news immediately spread over the headlines of the mainstream newspapers, despite the open contradictory nature of the study and the dubious method of mediation (Yong xnumx).

Epigenetics is a science that studies phenomena in which the expression of genes changes due to the influence of mechanisms that do not affect the change in the DNA sequence in genes. In other words, epigenetic processes are those processes in which other factors influence the degree of gene expression (that is, the physiological properties of the body). The spatial configuration of a DNA molecule can influence gene expression (expression), and this configuration is determined by special regulatory proteins, enzymes associated with DNA. One of the mechanisms of influence is DNA methylation. The combination of regulatory proteins and DNA is called an epigenetic marker.

Young and colleagues stated that the main purpose of their study was to test the possibility of determining the “sexual orientation” of an individual by epigenetic markers. To this end, they studied DNA samples of 37 pairs of identical twin brothers, in each of these pairs one brother was homosexual, and 10 pairs of identical twin brothers, in each of which both brothers were homosexual. As stated in the summary, the researchers studied a variety of classification models (heterosexual vs. homosexual) using the FuzzyForest computer statistic algorithm and ultimately selected the best-performing model including 5 epigenetic markers that correctly classified objects in 67% of cases. The authors suggested that sexual preferences are controlled by 5 epigenetic markers. However, such an interpretation caused, to put it mildly, a flurry of criticism from experts (Science Media Center 2015, Greally xnumx, Yong xnumx, Gelman 2015, Briggs 2015) The methodology (extremely low sample power, dubious statistical approach with a high risk of false positive results, etc.) and its interpretation caused great doubts. John Grillie of the Center for Epigenomics at Albert Einstein College of Medicine noted, commenting on the hype surrounding the study by Ngun and colleagues:

“… Without talking personally about him or his colleagues, but if we want to preserve this area of ​​science, we can no longer allow bad epigenetic research to be trusted. By "bad" I mean uninterpreted. ... "(Greally xnumx).

In the end, the objectivity of reviewers who skipped this resume for presentation at the conference was even questioned, and the article, of course, was never published anywhere.

Why are the results of molecular genetic studies so contradictory - variable and variable?

The limited role of genetics

Evidence for the genetic nature of homosexual inclinations is untenable. Science does not know the “homosexuality gene." At the beginning of this century, a large-scale international project “Human Genome Project” was launched - the Human Genome Project. Within its framework, the compilation of human genetic maps was carried out - which gene, on which chromosome is located, which proteins it encodes, etc. Anyone can check - no homosexuality genes are indicated there (Human genome resources at NCBI).

Here is what Mayer and McHugh write in their work:

“... As has been repeatedly confirmed in relation to the behavioral properties of a person, the influence of a genetic factor on the tendency to homosexual inclinations or behavioral patterns is possible. The phenotypic manifestation of genes usually depends on environmental factors - a different environment leads to the formation of different phenotypes even for the same genes. Therefore, even if some genetic factors influence homosexual tendencies, sexual preferences and tendencies are also influenced by a number of environmental factors, including such social stress factors as psychological and physical violence and sexual harassment. To get a more complete picture of the formation of sexual interests, desires and drives, it is necessary to take into account the factors of development, environment, experience, society and will. (For example, social geneticists have recorded an indirect role of genes in behavior with peers, indicating that a person’s appearance can influence acceptance or rejection in a particular social group (Ebstein 2010).
Modern genetics knows that genes affect the range of interests of an individual and his motivation and, accordingly, indirectly affect behavior. Although genes can thus trick a person into certain behaviors, their ability to directly control actions, regardless of a wide range of other factors, is very, very unlikely. Their influence on behavior is more subtle and depends on the impact of environmental factors ... "(Mayer 2016).

Congenital factors that can affect orientation include qualities of temperament such as a mild and vulnerable character, increased emotional sensitivity, shyness, passivity, etc. Researchers themselves, the results of which are used in the rhetoric of LGBT + activists - movements, do not dare to claim that homosexuality is determined by genes, at best they believe that same-sex attraction is associated with a combination of biological and environmental factors, where the latter play a major role . The fact that homosexuality is “innate”, we hear mainly in Hollywood films, rating talk shows, songs or in comments on social networks. However, in the scientific community, in fact, there is not a single conscientious researcher who will say that he has found a genetic or any other biological cause of homosexual attraction.

Studies aimed at trying to determine whether genes (in particular, on the Xq28 site) exist associated with same-sex sexual desire. Compiled by V. Lysov (2018)

Source and  sample	Method анализа	Results according to publication	Is there evidence of a relationship between Xq28 markers and homosexuality?	Other results
Dean Hamer et al. Xnumx 40 families, each of which consisted of a homosexual proband and homosexuals selected from among his relatives	linked inheritance studies	in 33 cases from 40 families, the genetic markers located on the site q28 of chromosome X coincided	conditionallyHowever, methods and interpretation are criticized by colleagues: Baron 1993; Pool 1993; Fausto-Sterling et al. Xnumx; Sharp 1993; Byne xnumx; McLeod 1994; Norton 1995, Haymer himself was suspected of forgery: Horgan xnumx	—
Jennifer Macke et al. Xnumx  36 families, each of which consisted of a homosexual proband and his relatives, among whom was at least one homosexual brother	search for candidate genes - androgen receptor gene (X chromosome)	no statistically significant relationships were found in the sample	—	no connection with the androgen receptor gene (X chromosome)
Stella Hu et al. Xnumx (scientific group Dean Hamer)  33 families, each of which consisted of a homosexual proband and his relatives, among whom was at least one homosexual brother	linked inheritance studies	in 22 cases from 32 families, the genetic markers located on the site q28 of chromosome X coincided	conditionallysee Hamer 1993	—
George Rice et al. Xnumx 46 families, each of which consisted of a homosexual proband and his relatives, among whom was at least one homosexual brother	linked inheritance studies	genetic markers located on the q28 region of chromosome X did not match	no	—
Michael DuPree et al. Xnumx  (scientific group Dean Hamer) 144 families, each of which consisted of a homosexual proband who had at least one homosexual brother	search for candidate genes - aromatase gene CYP15 (15 chromosome)	no statistically significant relationships were found in the sample	—	no connection with the aromatase gene CYP15 (15-I chromosome)
Mustanski et al. Xnumx  (scientific group Dean Hamer) 146 families (including families from the studies of Hamer 1993 and Hu 1995), each of which consisted of a homosexual proband who had at least one homosexual brother	genome-wide study of linked inheritance	a statistically significant relationship with a marker on the 7 chromosome was found in the sample, and, according to the authors, “proximity to criteria of probable significance” for markers on the 8 and 10 chromosomes.	no	communication with markers on the 7 chromosome according to the criteria of Lander and Kruglyak (1995) the best indicator of LOD* equaled xnumx
Sreeram Ramagopalan et al. Xnumx (George Rice Science Team) 55 families, each of which consisted of a homosexual proband who had at least one homosexual brother	genome-wide study of linked inheritance	no statistically significant relationships were found in the sample	no	no associations were found with markers on the 7 chromosome according to the criteria of Lander and Kruglyak (1995)
Binbin Wang et al. Xnumx a group of Xnumx homosexual men and a control group of Xnumx heterosexual men	search for candidate genes - sonic hedgehog (SHH) gene (7 chromosome)	no statistically significant relationships were found in the sample	—	a statistically significant intergroup difference was found in the ratio of mutations in the position of the rs9333613 gene, which was interpreted by the authors as "the presence of a possible connection between mutations in the gene and same-sex attraction"
Emily Drabant et al. Xnumx 7887 men and 5570 women (not related to kinship) who have been identified as having sex drive and self-identification according to the Klein questionnaire	full genome association search	no statistically significant (5 × 10 − 8) associations were found in the sample	no	no statistically significant associations were found
Sanders et al. Xnumx 384 families, each of which consisted of a homosexual proband who had at least one homosexual brother	genome-wide study of linked inheritance	a statistically significant association with a marker on the 8 chromosome and a probable association with Xq28 were found in the sample	conditionally: according to the criteria of Lander and Kruglyak (1995), the best LOD indicators for Xq28 markers were equal to 2,99, which corresponds to the supposed value ("suggestive significance")	communication with markers on the 8 chromosome according to the criteria of Lander and Kruglyak (1995); the best LOD score was 4,08
Sanders et al. Xnumx a group of 1077 homosexual men and 1231 heterosexual men (the same subjects as Sanders et al. 2015)	full genome association search	no statistically significant (5 × 10 − 8) associations were found in the sample	no	no statistically significant relationships were found. The authors noted that values ​​approaching significant were obtained for markers on the 13 and 14 chromosomes

* LOD = multipoint logarithm of the odds see Nyholt DR. All LODs Are Not Created Equal. Am J Hum Genet. 2000 Aug; 67 (2): 282 – 288. http://doi.org/10.1086/303029. The statistically significant LOD in genetic research is ≥3,

As one of the American bloggers aptly put it, "... attempts to biologically explain homosexuality are similar to iPhones - a new one appears every year ..." (Allen 2014) In the end, probably, from the point of view of the promoters of homosexual inclinations, the slogan "Probably born predisposed"⁶ has a completely different propaganda effect.

Attempts have been made to detect the “alcoholism gene” (The recovery village 2017; NIAAA 2012), and the “killer gene” (Davis 2016; Parshley xnumx), however, as in the case of the “homosexuality gene”, no evidence was found in favor of the claim that “such are born”. An adequate person would not have the idea, on the one hand, to justify alcoholism and murder by the influence of genes - after all, these phenomena are determined by choice, not predetermined. The pioneer of the story with the “homosexuality gene” Dean Haymer has, obviously, an excellent commercial talent, skillfully acting within the framework of public fashion. Having waited a short time after the publication of his 1993 article of the year, Haymer publishes the book “The Science of Passion: the Search for Homosexuality Genes and Behavioral Biology”, which made a splash among the LGBT + movementHamer 1994) and brought him considerable profit. Ten years later, Haymer makes a new sensation by issuing a book entitled “The Gene of God: How Faith Is Preordained by Our Genes” (Hamer 2004), in which he expressed his opinion that believers are almost genetic mutants (V.L .: it is funny to observe such selectivity with respect to two genetic hypotheses: the alleged genetic conditionality of homosexual inclinations is presented in a positive light, as a given , and the alleged connection of genes and religion is negative, like a mutation.). Naturally, no confirmation of Heimer's hypotheses has been found to this day, however, his theory was also very warmly received in the LGBT + community, the American magazine Time even published a special cover for this occasion.

Subsequently, Dean Haymer left science and focused on socio-political activities: together with his "husband" Joseph Wilson (The New York Times 2004) he founded the film studio "QWaves", specializing in products focused on the movement "LGBT +" (Huffpost 2017).

The famous biologist and popularizer of science Richard Dawkins philosophically characterizes the hypothesis of genetic determinism of homosexuality:

“… Some things conditioned by the environment are easy to change. Others are difficult. Think about how strongly we are connected to the accent of our childhood: an adult immigrant is labeled a foreigner all his life. There is a much stricter determinism here than in the action of most genes. It would be interesting to know the statistical probability that a child who has been exposed to a certain influence of the environment, for example, religious education in a monastery, will subsequently be able to get rid of this influence. It would be equally interesting to know the statistical probability that a man with a certain gene on the X chromosome in the Xq28 region will be homosexual. The simple demonstration that there is a gene that "leads" to homosexuality leaves the question of the significance of this probability almost completely open. Genes do not have a monopoly on determinism ... "(Dawkins xnumx, p. 104).

One of the most prominent figures in Russian sexology, Professor Georgy Stepanovich Vasilchenko, speaking about the reasons for the formation of homosexual inclinations, points to the following:

“... However, disturbances in brain differentiation and hormonal shifts do not predetermine the formation of homosexual attraction, but become the basis for distortions of sexual identity and sex-role behavior, which increase the risk of homosexuality. Neuroendocrine supply is only an energy component of libido. The formation of homosexuality is also facilitated by etiological factors and pathogenetic mechanisms inherent in perversions in general ... "(Vasilchenko 1990, p. 430).

The hypothesis of the genetic factor of male homosexuality, providing an evolutionary advantage to women

It is worth mentioning the bizarre hypothesis of Italian researchers, which, according to them, “Does not fit into any existing genetic model of homosexuality”. The presumption that homosexuality is caused by genes is contrary to the principle of natural selection, according to which the number of gene carriers that impede the implementation of the heterosexual functions necessary for the production of offspring should steadily decrease until it disappears completely. However, as shown statistics, the number of people who consider themselves homosexual is increasing with each generation. The reason is clear: homosexuality is not genetically driven, but not wanting to put up with the obvious Camperio-Ciani and colleagues came up with a sophisticated explanation that was supposed to cope with the “Darwin paradox.” Their hypothesis suggests the existence of a certain “X-chromosomal factor”, which, transmitted through the maternal line, can increase androphilia (sexual attraction to men) in both sexes, thereby leading to increased fertility of women, compensating for the decreased fertility of men (Camperio-Ciani 2004).

This hypothesis could claim some degree of credibility if scientists found appropriate levels of compensation - for example, if a mother with heterosexual offspring had an 2 child, and a mother with a homosexual offspring had 4. In fact, the difference turned out to be insignificant: on average, the 2,07 of the child in the first and 2,73 - in the second (by 34% more) and this despite the fact that the levels of reproduction of homosexuals and heterosexuals were almost 5 different: 0,12 and 0,58, respectively (on 383 % less) (Iemmola xnumx). The researchers explain the unusually low fertility of heterosexuals by the fact that as a control group they were supposed to be as similar as possible to homosexual probands, and therefore most of them were unmarried. But even if we take these unrepresentative data, it turns out that in order to achieve adequate compensation, mothers of homosexual offspring will need more than 7 children ... In addition, there was no significant difference in the fertility of the previous generation (grandparents), which also does not agree with the thesis about genetic transfer.

Trying to explain the obtained data, the authors note that homosexuals have a tendency to exaggerate the number of non-heterosexuals among relatives, and heterosexuals, on the contrary, decrease, which could lead to a difference in results. They also say that differences in fertility can be explained by physiological or behavioral reasons, such as lower abortion rates or increased ability to find partners. Finally, the authors emphasizethat increased maternal fertility explains less than 21% of discrepancies in the sexual orientation of men in their sample.

“This is consistent with theoretical and empirical studies that show that individual experience is a powerful factor in determining a person’s sexual behavior and self-identification. It is possible that a higher level of maternal homosexuality stems from cultural rather than genetically inherited traits. In many societies, such as northern Italy, mothers spend a lot of time with their children, especially in the early years, which is crucial for the development of sexual identity and orientation. This suggests that the mother and her family can be the main source of some patterns of behavior and attitudes of the child, including traits related to future sexual preference and behavior ”(Camperio-Ciani 2004).

After conducting 3 studies, the authors were forced to admit that the data they received “They do not allow us to establish to what extent the putative X-chromosome factor leads or even predisposes a man to homo- or bisexuality” (Ciani xnumx) In short, the contribution of these studies to understanding the genesis of homosexual attraction is zero.

---

The largest ever genetic study published by 30.08.2019 in an authoritative scientific publication Science, based on a sample of about 500 thousand people, found that more than 99% of homosexual behavior is determined by social and environmental factors. According to David Curtis, professor at the University of California's Institute of Genetics, “This study clearly shows that there is no such thing as a gay gene.” In the human population there is no such combination of genes that would have a significant impact on sexual orientation. In fact, it is impossible to predict the sexual behavior of a person by his genome. ”

Part Two: Hormones?

In addition to the influence of genetics, activists of the “LGBT +” movement point to supposedly intrauterine exposure as an alleged mechanism of the biological genesis of homosexual attraction. It is understood that during the period the fetus is in the mother’s womb, a factor (hormones or immune antibodies) acts on the fetus, which disrupts the normal process of its development, which further leads to the development of homosexual attraction.

To test the hypothesis of hormonal effects on the formation of sexual preference, we study the relationship between the concentration of intrauterine hormones on physical development and the formation in early childhood of behavior typical of boys or typical of girls. Experimental modeling of hormonal intrauterine imbalance, of course, for ethical and practical reasons in humans is not carried out, since hormonal disorders lead to significant anatomical and physiological abnormalities, this is possible only in laboratory animals⁷. Nevertheless, a certain percentage of people are born with hormone-related pathology - sexual development disorders (NDP), and in their population it is possible to study the relationship of hormonal imbalance with behavior. To begin with, we should briefly list the main points of intrauterine hormonal effects.

It is believed that periods of greatest reaction to the hormonal environment occur during fetal maturation. For example, it is known that the maximum effect of testosterone on the male fetus occurs from 8 to 24 weeks, and then repeats from birth to about three months (Hines xnumx) During the entire maturation period, estrogens come from the placenta and the circulatory system of the mother (Albrecht 2010) Animal studies show that there can be many periods of sensitivity for different hormones, that the presence of one hormone can affect the actions of another hormone, and the sensitivity of the receptors of these hormones can affect their actions (Berenbaum Xnumx) Sexual differentiation of the fetus in itself is an incredibly complex system.

Of particular interest in this field of research are hormones such as testosterone, dihydrotestosterone (a metabolite of testosterone and more potent than testosterone), estradiol, progesterone and cortisol. It is considered normal if the hormonal effect on the development of the fetus in the uterus occurs in stages. At the very beginning, embryos differ only in their chromosome composition — XX or XY — and their sex glands (gonads) are the same. However, quite quickly, depending on the chromosomal combination, the formation of testes (testes) begins in carriers of XY and ovaries in carriers of XX. As soon as the differentiation of gonads is over, they begin to produce sex-specific hormones that determine the development and formation of external genitalia: androgens secreted by the testes contribute to the development of male external genital organs, and the absence of androgens and the presence of estrogen in women leads to the development of female external genital organs (Wilson 1981).

The scheme of sexual differentiation. Compiled by V. Lysov Violation of the balance of androgens and estrogens (due to genetic mutations and other influences), as well as their presence or absence at certain important periods of the development of the fetus, can cause disturbances in sexual development.

One of the most thoroughly studied disorders of sexual development is congenital adrenal cortical hyperplasia (VGKN), associated with a mutation of a gene encoding an enzyme that is involved in the synthesis of the hormone cortisol (Speiser 2003) This pathology leads to an overabundance of cortisol precursors (cortisol and androgens share a common precursor), from which androgens are formed. As a result, girls are born with varying degrees of virilization⁸ genital organs - depending on the severity of the genetic defect and the degree of excess of androgens. Severe cases of virilization with the development of deep functional defects sometimes require surgical intervention. In order to neutralize the effects of an excess of androgens, hormone therapy is prescribed. It was noted that women with HCV have more risks of developing a homosexual attraction (Speiser 2009), and those who suffered from HCV in a more severe form are more likely to become heterosexual than women who have had the disease in a milder form (Hines xnumx).

In addition, there are impaired sexual development in genetic men suffering from a lack of sensitivity to androgen. In men with androgen insensitivity syndrome, the testes normally produce androgen testosterone, but testosterone receptors do not work. At birth, the genitals look like women, and the child is raised as a girl. The endogenous testosterone of the child is converted to estrogen, so that it begins to develop female secondary sexual characteristics (Hughes xnumx) Pathology is detected only when puberty is reached, when, contrary to due course, menstruation does not begin, and, of course, such “women” are infertile, like “infertility” and “men” with VGKN.

There are other sexual dysfunctions that affect some genetic men (i.e., individuals with the XY genotype) whose lack of androgens is a direct result of the lack of enzymes involved either in the synthesis of dihydrotestosterone from testosterone or in the production of testosterone from the hormone precursor. Persons with such disorders are born with genital deformities of varying degrees (Cohen-Kettenis 2005).

Obviously, in these examples, homosexual attraction and / or choice of behavior specific for the opposite sex is associated with functional and morphological pathologies. However, such pathologies are not detected in homosexuals. The assumption that hormonal imbalance in any way only leads to the formation of a homosexual preference (that is, affects a behavioral trait) and in no way affects morphological and functional traits is not supported by empirical observations.

Various attempts have been made to identify any anatomical and functional features associated with homosexual preference. Consider the studies cited by LGBT + activists.

A study of Simon Levey

Several studies have been conducted on the study of neurobiological differences depending on sexual inclinations. The first was the publication of the neuroscientist Simon LeVay in 1991 (LeVay 1991). LeVay conducted his research on the results of autopsies of deceased people. He divided the subjects into three groups - 6 “heterosexual” women, 19 “homosexual” men who died of AIDS, and 16 “heterosexual” men (these parameters are given in quotation marks because the sexual preferences of the deceased were largely speculative).

In each group, LeVey measured the size of a special area of ​​the brain called the interstitial nucleus of the anterior hypothalamus.⁹. In the hypothalamus, several such nuclei are distinguished from 0.05 to 0.3 mm³ in size (Byne xnumx), which are numbered: 1, 2, 3, 4. Normally, the size of INAH-3 depends on the level of the male hormone testosterone in the body: the more testosterone, the larger the INAH-3. LeVey stated that the size of the INAH-3 in homosexuals was much smaller than in men with attraction to the opposite sex, almost the same as in women. Since the structure of the human body is determined by genes, LeVey suggested that if the size of INAH-3 correlates with the direction of sexual desire, then "... sex drive is due to the structure of the brain ...", and therefore genes correlate with sexual desire.

It should be noted that LeVey fully devoted himself to this work and very much hoped to get just such a result. After his homosexual partner Richard Sherry died of AIDS, LeVey was depressed for some time (Newsweek xnumx, p. 49). He told reporters after his publication made a splash: “I felt that if I didn’t find anything, I would completely abandon science” (Newsweek xnumx, p. 49).

LeVey’s study had many methodological flaws, which he himself had to repeatedly state, but the media stubbornly ignored them. What did LeVey really discover or not find? What he did not find unequivocally is the connection between the size of INAH-3 and sexual inclinations. As far back as 1994, researcher William Byne from New York subjected to serious critical analysis of the statement about the genetic cause of homosexuality (Byne xnumx): firstly, this is the problem of selecting research objects. LeVey did not know exactly what sexual inclinations the people he studied during his lifetime had. It is well known that in patients with terminal AIDS, low levels of testosterone are observed both due to the influence of the disease and due to side effects of treatment (Gomes 2016) From LeVay’s data, it’s completely impossible to determine how large the INAH-3 was at birth and exclude the fact that it could decrease during life. All subjects identified by LeVay as “homosexuals” died from AIDS complications. LeVey himself, in the same article, makes a reservation:

"... the results do not allow us to conclude whether the size of INAH 3 is a cause or effect of an individual's sexual orientation, or whether the size of INAH 3 and sexual orientation mutually change under the influence of some third unidentified variable ..." (LeVay 1991, p. 1036).

Secondly, there is no reason to say with certainty that LeVey discovered anything at all. Researchers Ruth Hubbard and Elijah Wald in their book Destroying the Myth of Genes: How Scientists, Doctors, Employers, Insurance Companies, Educators and Human Rights Defenders Manipulate Genetic Information, questioned not only the interpretation of LeVey’s results, but also the fact that any significant differences (Hubbard xnumx, p. 95). Although LeVay pointed out that in the group of individuals whom he considered homosexuals, the average size of INAH-3 was smaller than the average size of INAH-3 in the group of individuals whom he considered heterosexual men, it follows from his results that the maximum and minimum scatter of values ​​is perfectly same in both groups. There is a statistical concept - the law of normal distribution. Simplified, this law states that the largest number of owners of the attribute has the parameters of this attribute in the middle range, and only a small number of owners have parameters of the extreme value. That is, of 100 people, 80 will have 160 – 180 growth, 10 less than 160, 10 more than 180 cm.

According to the rules of statistical calculations, to identify a statistically significant difference between the two groups of subjects it is impossible to compare a parameter that does not have a normal distribution. For example, if in one of the groups of people below 160 cm there will be not 10%, but 40% or 50%. In LeVay's study, INAH-3 was the smallest size for some heterosexual men and most homosexuals, and the maximum size for some homosexuals and most heterosexual men. It follows that for each individual individual it is absolutely impossible to say anything about the relationship between the size of INAH-3 and sexual behavior. Even if the presence of any differences in the structure of the brain were convincingly demonstrated, their significance would be on a par with the discovery that the muscles of athletes are larger than in ordinary people. What conclusions can we draw on the basis of this fact? Does a person develop larger muscles while playing sports, or does an innate predisposition to larger muscles make a person an athlete?

And thirdly, LeVey did not say anything about the relationship of sexual behavior and INAH-3 in women.

In an 1994 interview, LeVey said:

“… It is important to emphasize that I have not proven that homosexuality is innate and have not found its genetic cause. I have not demonstrated that gay people are “born that way” - this is the most common mistake people make when interpreting my work. I also did not find a "gay center" in the brain ... We do not know if the differences I found at birth were present or appeared later. My work does not address the question of whether sexual orientation was established before birth ... "(Nimmons xnumx).

LeVey's reservation is very important, since any specialist in the field of neuroscience knows such a phenomenon as neuroplasticity - the ability of nervous tissue to change its function and structure during a person’s life under the influence of various behavioral factors.

In 2000, a group of British scientists published the results of a brain study in London taxi drivers (Maguire 2000) It turned out that for taxi drivers, the brain area responsible for spatial coordination was much larger than for individuals from the control group who did not work as taxi drivers, in addition, the size of this section directly depended on the number of years spent working in a taxi (Maguire 2000) If the researchers pursued political goals, they could have stated something like: “These taxi drivers need to be issued with the right-hand drive and wherever they work, it’s worth changing the left-hand drive to the right-hand drive - because they were born that way!”

To date, a convincing evidence base has been accumulated in favor of the plasticity of both brain tissues in general and the hypothalamus in particular (Bains xnumx; Sale 2014; Mainardi 2013; Hatton xnumx; Theodosis 1993) Brain morphology changes under the influence of behavioral factors (Kolb 1998) Brain structures, for example, change after pregnancy (Hoekzema et al. 2016)staying in space (van Ombergen et al. Xnumx) and after regular physical activity (Nokia et al. Xnumx).

Therefore, in confirmation of the words spoken by LeVey himself back in the 1994 year, the contribution of his study of the 1991 year to the hypothesis of the innate nature of homosexuality is zero.

A more detailed criticism of LeVay's work, as well as other neuroanatomical hypotheses, is given in a review publication in the journal Current Science (Mbugua 2003).

The replicability of Levay's research

Nobody managed to repeat LeVey's results. In the 2001 publication of the year, a group of researchers from New York conducted a similar study - the same sections of the hypothalamus were compared as in the LeVay study, but with much more complete data and an adequate distribution of the studied (Byne xnumx). They did not find any dependence of the INAH-3 size on homosexuality. The authors concluded that "... sexual orientation cannot be reliably predicted based on the volume of INAH 3 alone ..." (Byne xnumx, p. 91).

Later, there were attempts to detect the dependence of sexual inclinations on other parts of the brain. In 2002, the psychologist Lasko and colleagues published a study of another part of the brain - the anterior commissure (Lasco 2002) It was shown that in this area there are no significant differences depending on gender or the nature of sexual desire. Other studies aimed at establishing structural or functional differences between the brain of heterosexuals and the brain of homosexuals due to their inherent limitations are almost unremarkable: in 2008, the results of some of these studies were summarized in an article published in the journal Proceedings of the US National Academy of Sciences (Swaab xnumx) For example, one study used functional magnetic resonance imaging to measure changes in activity in the brain when subjects showed photographs of men and women. It was found that looking at the female face enhanced the activity in the thalamus and orbitofrontal cortex of heterosexual men and women who are homosexual, while in homosexual men and heterosexual women these areas were more responsive to the man's face (Kranz 2006) The fact that the brains of heterosexual women and homosexual men especially react to male faces, while the brains of heterosexual men and homosexual women especially react to female faces, is hardly a big discovery, given the etiology of homosexual inclinations. Similarly, another study cites different reactions to pheromones in non-homosexual men and homosexual men (Savic 2005).

Finger length

The ratio between the length of the second finger (index) and the fourth finger (ring) of the hands, which is commonly called the ratio “2D: 4D”, differs for most men and women. Some evidence suggests that this ratio may depend on the level of intrauterine testosterone, resulting in men with a higher level of testosterone exposure, the index finger is shorter than the ring finger (i.e., the low ratio of 2D: 4D) and vice versa (Hönekopp 2007) According to some researchers, the 2D: 4D index is associated with homosexual inclinations. Attempts to somehow relate the ratio 2D: 4D and sexual inclinations are inconsistent and controversial.

According to one hypothesis, homosexuals may have a higher ratio of 2D: 4D (closer to the ratio of women than the ratio of heterosexual men), while another hypothesis, on the contrary, suggests that hypermasculinization with prenatal testosterone can lead to a lower ratio homosexuals than heterosexual men. A hypothesis was also put forward about the homosexual tendencies of women as a result of hypermasculinization (lower ratio, higher testosterone level).

Several comparative studies of this trait in homosexual and non-homosexual women and men have yielded mixed results. A study published in the journal Nature in 2000 showed that in a sample of 720 adult Californians, the ratio 2D: 4D on the right hand in women with same-sex preferences was significantly more masculine (i.e. lower) than non-homosexual women, and significantly did not differ from the ratio in non-homosexual men (Williams 2000) This study also did not reveal a significant difference between the average 2D: 4D ratios between gay men and homosexuals. In the same year, another study that used a relatively small sample of homosexual and non-homosexual men from Britain showed a lower value of 2D: 4D (i.e., more masculine) among homosexuals (Robinson 2000) In an 2003 year, a study of a sample of Londoners found that homosexuals had a lower rate of 2D: 4D compared to non-homosexual men (Rahman xnumx), while two other studies of samples from California and Texas showed higher values ​​of 2D: 4D for homosexuals (Lippa xnumx; McFadden 2002) In 2003, a comparative study was conducted of seven pairs of monozygotic twin women, in all pairs one of the twin women had homosexual preferences, and five pairs of monozygotic twin women in which both sisters had same-sex preferences (Hall 2003) In pairs of twins with different types of sexual attraction, in individuals who identify themselves as homosexual, the ratio 2D: 4D was significantly lower than that of their twins, while the concordant twins did not find any difference. The authors concluded that this result indicates that "the low ratio of 2D: 4D is the result of differences in the prenatal environment." And finally, in the 2005 year, as a result of a study of the ratio 2D: 4D in an Austrian sample of 95 homosexual men and 79 non-gay men, it was found that the indicators 2D: 4D in non-gay men did not significantly differ from those in homosexual men (Voracek 2005) After reviewing several studies of this trait, the authors conclude that “more data is needed to be able to conclude with confidence whether there is a relationship between the ratio 2D: 4D and the nature of sexual desire in men, subject to ethnic differences.”

Eye blink

In 2003, a group of English researchers announced that they had found "new convincing evidence that sexual desire is due to the characteristics of the human brain" (Rahman xnumx) Katsi Rahman and co-authors said they found a difference in reaction speed — blinking eyes — in response to loud noises. The authors found that women have less so-called "Pre-pulse inhibition" (PPI) - a decrease in the body's motor response to stimuli, in the presence of a weak preliminary stimulus¹⁰... That is, women blinked faster than men, and women with same-sex preference blinked more slowly than non-homosexual women. It should be noted that, firstly, the authors conducted a study in a small group of subjects, and secondly, they did not find any differences between homosexual men and non-homosexual men. Despite this, the authors decided that their results prove that homosexuality is an innate phenomenon. Nevertheless, the researchers did make a few reservations: they noted that the question of whether the differences found are due to the specificity of sexual attraction or are the result of a particular sexual behavior remains unresolved. They pointed out: "... the neuroanatomical and neurophysiological variations between heterosexuals and homosexuals can be due to either biological factors or the influence of learning ...". Dr. Halstead Harrison of the University of Washington analyzed this study and noted such an important shortcoming as the small size of the tested groups (14 homosexual women and 15 heterosexual women, 15 homosexual men and 15 heterosexual men). Harrison concluded: "Rahman et al. Did not provide conclusive evidence to support the conclusion that homosexual women exhibit PPI parameters similar to those of men."Harrison xnumx) Harrison also questioned the statistical adequacy of the methods.

The twin studies discussed above can shed light on the degree of influence of maternal hormones, since during intrauterine development, identical and identical twins experience their effect in the same way. Weak indicators of concordance in twin studies indicate that prenatal hormones as genetic factors do not play a decisive role in the formation of sexual desire. Other attempts to find hormonal factors that significantly affect sexual desire have also been inconclusive, and the significance of their results has not yet been comprehended.

The effects of maternal stress

In 1983, Gunther Dörner et al conducted a study to establish a link between maternal stress during pregnancy and the subsequent sexual identity of their children. They interviewed two hundred people about events that could cause stress in their mothers during pregnancy - that is, the intrauterine development of the respondents themselves (Dörner 1983) Many of the events were related to the aftermath of World War II. Of the men who reported that their mothers experienced moderate to severe stress during pregnancy, 65% were homosexual, 25% were bisexual, and 10% were heterosexual. However, in later studies, either much smaller correlations or the absence of significant correlations were observed (Ellis 1988) In 2002, after conducting a prospective study of the relationship between sex drive and prenatal stress during the second and third trimesters, Hines and colleagues found that maternal stress during pregnancy was “only slightly related” to the typically male behavior of their daughters at the age of 42 months “ and no relation whatsoever ”to the typically feminine behavior of their sons (Hines xnumx).

Part Three: Immune Disorders?

The Big Brother Effect

“The effect of the older brother” (ESB) or “the effect of the order of birth of the brothers”¹¹ - this term was proposed by Canadian-American researchers named Ray Blanchard and Anthony Bogert - it is that according to some observations, in comparison with normal heterosexual men, homosexual pedophiles, homosexuals and rapists have more older brothers, but not older sisters (Blanchard 1996; Bogaert 1997; Blanchard 1998; Lalumiere 1998; Blanchard 2000; Cote xnumx; MacCulloch 2004; Blanchard 2018).

At the moment, there remains an open discussion about whether (1) whether an ESB really exists, and (2) if it exists, whether it has a biological or social cause (Zietsch 2018; Gavrilets 2017; Whitehead 2018).

Despite the contradictory results in the field of ESB and its causes, some researchers and public figures, trying to find biological justifications for homosexuality, so clearly accepted the biological explanation of ESB that they completely excluded any other possible explanations (the influence of upbringing, etc.).

(I.e.2023 addition:
Scientists from the Department of Psychology at the University of Vienna carried out mathematical processing of data on the big brother effect. They concluded that, when properly analyzed, the specific association between the number of older brothers and homosexual orientation is small, heterogeneous in magnitude, and apparently not specific to men. Moreover, existing scientific evidence exaggerated due to the effects of small studies.

Vilsmeier JK, Kossmeier M, Voracek M, Tran US. 2023. The fraternal birth-order effect as a statistical artefact: convergent evidence from probability calculus, simulated data, and multiverse meta-analysis. Peer J 11:e15623 https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.15623

Disadvantages of the ESB hypothesis

The ESB is not an unconditional axiom, the fact of its existence is the subject of ongoing scientific discussion for many reasons.

Firstly, this effect is not detected in all studies. Brendan P. Zietsch noted that proponents of the ESB hypothesis include in their analyzes only the results of published studies that are consistent with their ideas, and ignore studies, newsletters, dissertations, presentations at conferences in which ESB is not detected (Zietsch 2018) This problem is especially important, given that in six of seven correctly similar probability samples, the ESB was not confirmed (Bearman 2002; Bogaert 2005, 2010; Francis xnumx; Frisch xnumx; Zietsch 2012) The LGBT + activist, mentioned above, of the Simon LeVay movement, in his work also gives an overview of studies in which the ESB was not detected (LeVay 2016).

Secondly, those studies in which ESB was detected are based on a dubious sampling methodology. Supporters of the ESB hypothesis apply such criteria for population analysis that lead to the exclusion of all available probabilistic samples (i.e., those samples that are randomly selected with respect to the studied independent variable - sexual attraction in this case). This means that the meta-analysis includes only those samples in which the proportion of homosexuals does not resemble the share of homosexuals in the general population (for example, samples from the Blanchard analysis of 2018 of the year contain on average 51% of homosexuals, while in the general population of them, according to various sources, the maximum is 2 – 3%). In the case of such nonrandom samples, the risk of selecting homosexual and heterosexual groups increases, which differ not only in predictor variables. The Blanchard 1 table 2018 shows that most of the samples included in the meta-analysis are taken from extremely unrepresentative populations: sex criminals, transgender people, pedophiles, psychopaths, etc. It is noteworthy that none of these problems of sample selection was discussed in the article. On the contrary, Blanchard’s inclusion criteria were applied in such a way that excluded large studies with probability samples (in which the ESB was not confirmed). The large heterogeneity of the size of the effect between the individual studies in the meta-analysis shows that the fact how the groups are selected for the study has a great influence on ESB. This increases the likelihood that the features of the sample create the ESB, especially considering that large probability samples do not show the ESB at all.

Thirdly, another methodological problem is that the analytical methods for finding ESBs seem biased and aimed at detecting the desired effect. For example, some researchers used a one-way statistical test to measure the effect (e.g., Bogaert 2005; Poasa 2004; Purcell 2000) or interpreted the results of other researchers who did not actually detect ESB as significant, saying that one-way tests should have been used (Blanchard 2015) - although it is known that one-way tests can be used only in very rare cases that do not fit the conditions of the meta-analysis (Lombardi xnumx) Researcher Bartlett writes the following:

“… Given the relative scarcity of homosexual men in the population, it is difficult to find balanced groups of homosexual and heterosexual men for the study. The sampling of homosexuals and heterosexuals from populations with different family sizes poses a problem in measuring ESB. The likelihood that the study will find a spurious effect with all kinds of siblings, not just older siblings, increases if homosexuals from larger families are selected in the sample, while the effect disappears if heterosexual men from larger families are selected in the sample. ... "(Bartlett xnumx).

Fourth, the ESB is based solely on the results of correlation analysis. The detection of actual correlations is identical to the detection of the cause creating this correlation. Any correlations also need a mechanistic explanation of what was not fulfilled (Gavrilets 2017).

Fifth, ESB is not universal. The ESB is not able to explain homosexuality in men who do not have older brothers, nor is it able to explain the lack of homosexual attraction in younger brothers who have an older brother of homosexuality, cannot explain the discordance of sexual preferences among twin brothers¹². ESB does not occur in bisexual men. Bisexual attraction can be understood as a sexual attraction to both the opposite and to one's own sex, therefore, within the framework of the ESB paradigm, bisexual men should have less ESB than homosexual men, but more than heterosexual men. However in the study Bogaert (2006) ESB was the same for bisexual and homosexual individuals. McConaghy and colleagues (2006) conducted an ESB study in “predominantly heterosexual individuals” (individuals with a slight same-sex attraction) in comparison with a control group of exceptional heterosexuals. ESB has been observed for both men and women. In addition, the effect of the older sister was also observed in men, although less strong. According to the authors, their results indicate that the biological causes of ESB are less likely than social. It is estimated that the ESB hypothesis explains only 17% of the total number of cases of homosexual attraction and only in men (Cantor xnumx) ESB does not explain homosexual preferences in women. Supporters of the ESB hypothesis have tried many times to find this effect in women with homosexual preferences, but without results (Blanchard 2004).

Sixth, ESB does not work in real cultural-ethnic predictive models. Assuming the existence of an ESB, according to its paradigm, one can predict (the model according Bogaert 2004) that a large prevalence of men with homosexual preferences is observed in: (a) religious families, in which the likelihood of a large number of children is higher; (c) Eastern and Muslim cultures, traditionally distinguished by large families; and lower prevalence - in Western societies with a high standard of living, in which the birth rate is significantly inferior to Eastern societies (Caldwell 1997) A similar trend, to put it mildly, does not correspond to reality.

ESB hypotheses

There are several assumptions that explain the ESB found in some studies (James xnumx), among them two main ones can be distinguished: (1) biological prenatal exposure (maternal immunization hypothesis) and (2) socially psychological postnatal (exposure to environmental conditions). Below we will analyze both assumptions.

Maternal immunization hypothesis

Blanchard and Bogert, as the biological basis for ESB, put forward the hypothesis of maternal immune conflict, which was that the female immune system is supposedly capable of producing antibodies to certain “male antigens” of the male fetus, and supposedly similar antibodies accumulate with each subsequent pregnancy by the male fetus, increasing the risk of intrauterine immune damage for each subsequent boy (Blanchard 1996) The hypothesis of maternal immune conflict is trying to explain the development of the boy’s homosexual preferences by analogy with Rh-conflict pregnancy (Bogaert 2011).

Rhesus-conflict pregnancy is a pathological condition caused by the presence in the fetus of a gene encoding a specific protein on blood cells and the absence of such a gene in the mother (that is, the mother in this example is Rh-negative and the fetus is Rh-positive). During the first pregnancy of a Rh-negative mother with a Rh-positive fetus, the cells of the fetus penetrate the bloodstream of the mother and cause an immune reaction - the formation of antibodies to blood cells. In subsequent pregnancies in this mother with a Rh-positive fetus, antibodies from the mother’s bloodstream will penetrate the fetal blood and destroy its red blood cells, causing hemolysis and yellowness at birth. That is why obstetrician-gynecologists control the Rh status of the pregnant mother and father of the child.

The Blanchard and Bogert hypothesis is based on the same principles as Rh-conflict pregnancy. In this case, the factor that causes the formation of antibodies (Rh positivity in the above example) is the presence of a play chromosome, that is, the male sex of the fetus. The Y chromosome encodes the formation of proteins and hormones that are present in the male fetus (but not in the female!) Already at the earliest stages of embryogenesis. According to the hypothesis discussed, particles of fetal tissue that carry the “male antigen” enter the bloodstream of the mother and cause the formation of antibodies, which supposedly, during subsequent pregnancies by the male fetus, cross the blood-brain barrier, penetrate the fetal brain and attack specific nerve cells containing the “male antigen” ", Allegedly preventing the development of the embryonic brain" by the male type ", as a result of which the boy is born with a" female brain "and supposedly becomes homosexual or transgender. Maternal immunoreactivity increases with each new pregnancy by the male fetus, therefore, the likelihood of deviations allegedly increases with each older brother.

According to the hypothesis of Blanchard and Bogert, confirmation of intrauterine immune damage is a decrease in body weight at birth in homosexual men who have older brothers.

Disadvantages of the maternal immunization hypothesis

William H. James (2004) critically examined the basic tenets of the hypothesis of maternal immune conflict.

Firstly, the assumption that during pregnancy the mother is immunized only with specific antigens of the male fetus, but not the female - to put it mildly, it is doubtful. Mothers may develop immune reactions to the fetus, both male and female, that is, not “male antigens”, but specific paternal ones have immune reactivity in these cases, and such pathologies are well studied (Dankers xnumx) Three such reactions are most common: (a) the aforementioned RCH, in which fetal red blood cells are affected, which have a positive Rh factor on their surface, frequency 10 – 20%; (b) alloimmune thrombocytopenia of newborns affecting platelets, frequency 4% or 12%, if asymptomatic forms are also taken into account (Turner 2005); neutropenia of newborns, affects neutrophils, frequency 4% (Han 2006) In all these cases, antigens are individual paternal, not common male. They develop to subsequent children of any gender from the same father. They affect blood components (and not certain organs and tissues) during the contact of the fetal blood (umbilical cord, placenta, etc.) with the mother's immune system (due to trauma to the external genital organs, the inner surface of the uterus, etc.) during childbirth.

Maternal alloimmune antibodies supposedly penetrate into the mother’s milk, like any other antibodies (Gasparoni xnumx), for example, alloimmune maternal antibodies to the Rh factor, which penetrate the mother’s milk, can lead to hemolytic disease of the newborn (Beer 1975) Similarly, it can be assumed that milk containing hypothetical antibodies against “male antigens” will be poorly tolerated by later brothers, which will lead to problems with breastfeeding and its early cessation, as well as to allergic colitis. However, a review of the medical literature gives a completely opposite picture: the birth order is not related to the duration of breastfeeding or generally correlates positively with it (Martin 2002) The frequency of allergic colitis in newborns ranges from 0,01% to 7,5% (Hildebrand xnumx; Pumberger xnumx; Xanthakos 2005), while newborns of both sexes are affected. Also included in these statistics are reactions to cow's milk.

We repeat that from an evolutionary point of view, the intrauterine immunogenicity of the male fetus is absurd for the mother. Human phylogenesis as a mammal lasts many millions of years. Why for such a long time in the human body have not developed effective ways to prevent so costly from the point of view of evolution of immune responses? Hypothetical immune responses of the female body during the evolutionarily so routine and inevitable process for a healthy female body as pregnancy with a male fetus, which accounts for 50% of all pregnancies, would lead to significant gender imbalance and evolutionary problems. Phylogenesis always leads to selection and preservation of the most optimal traits for the species. For example, there is significant evidence that the choice of a male partner is associated with a major histocompatibility complex (GCS) (Chaix 2008; Millinski 2006; Wedekind xnumx), that is, at the phylogenetic level, species processes are maximally aimed at increasing diversity on the basis of GCS and increasing the viability of offspring (Williams 2012; Guleria 2007).

In defense of his theory, Bogert gives as an example such a pathological immune response as Rh-conflict pregnancy (RCH) (Bogaert 2011), leading to hemolytic disease of the newborn - supposedly this phenomenon (at risk is about 15% of the population (Izetbegovic 2013)) did not disappear during evolution. However, it should be borne in mind that the frequency of FC in the past of humanity as a species was significantly lower. At the present stage, such an evolutionary factor as the confusion of humanity is observed, therefore it does not seem paradoxical that the natural mechanisms of blocking the Rhesus conflict have not yet developed. With the development of transplantology, mankind has encountered such a factor that was previously absent as the immune rejection reactions (in almost 100% of recipients), it is not surprising that humans have no natural mechanism for their suppression. In the case of RCH and transplant rejection reactions for a person as a species, not much time has passed for the development of compensating mechanisms¹³. On the other hand, the stable maintenance of the immune incompatibility of mothers with 50% of their offspring would be paradoxical.

In general, it seems doubtful that there are certain structures or substances of the male fetus that have antigenic properties specific to the male only. Free testosterone, a sex hormone-binding globulin or cell membrane androgen receptor, is not immune-reactive to the mother because all of them are also present in the female body.

Secondly, the assumption that specific maternal antibodies selectively damage the brain of the male fetus (leading to its “feminization”), but at the same time they do not disturb any other brain functions and do not affect the testicles (containing much more products of Y-chromosome genes ) - is, to put it mildly, controversial.

If, in fact, an immune reaction occurred against “male antigens”, then hypothetical maternal antibodies would primarily and mainly or at least simultaneously affect the testes, which contain much more “male antigen” than the brain. Many male-specific genes are known (i.e., located on the Y chromosome) (Ginalksi xnumx) The expression of these genes - that is, the reading of information and the synthesis of proteins and structures - occurs not only and not so much in the brain, but mainly in the testes, which should be the primary goal of the “anti-male” specific immune attack, and not the brain (Ginalksi xnumx) In homosexual men, an increased prevalence of testicular pathologies would be observed: hypospadias, cryptorchidism, testicular cancer, etc., however, no connection of testicular disorders with homosexuality or ESB was found (Pierik xnumx; Flannery xnumx) Moreover, it is interesting to note that men with hypospadias, despite low testosterone levels during prenatal development, have slightly higher levels of psychological masculinity (Sandberg 1995) It would also be expected that in individuals with homosexual attraction, puberty will occur later due to immune testicular lesions, however, large studies did not reveal differences in the age of puberty depending on sexual preferences (Savin-Williams 2006).

In addition, the entry of hypothetical maternal antibodies through the bloodstream into the fetal brain would be impossible due to the blood-brain barrier (BBB), which is formed already at the 4-th week of pregnancy (Zusman 2004) Such antibodies would be able to overcome the BBB only with serious pathologies of the latter - with a violation of protective functions, which would lead to significant neurological damage to the brain. However, if the fetal BBB is in normal condition, then even violations of the mother’s immune system do not lead to neurological pathologies of the newborn - the BBB prevents antibodies. In a large study covering the 17 283 pair of mothers with children, no relationship was found between increased maternal immunoreactivity and cerebral palsy, mental retardation, convulsions, etc. (Flannery xnumx).

Also, the hypothesis that hypothetical antibodies damage the brain in such a way that they cause its feminization is untenable. At the stage of embryogenesis, anatomical gender differences in the brain are weakly expressed, and the final morphofunctional formation of the brain, according to sex, occurs during the puberty, when a hypothetical immune effect is impossible (Lenroot 2007; Paus xnumx) The very idea of ​​the presence in the brain of an embryo of a neural organization characteristic of a particular sex is very doubtful and has never been convincingly demonstratedLauterbach 2001; Nunez 2003) MRI scans showed only insignificant statistical rather than dichotomous differences in the brain structure of newborns, with significant matches between the sexes (Zanin xnumx; Mitter 2015).

According to the hypothesis, we should expect that homosexuals with older brothers, possessing a “feminized” brain, will invariably belong to the phenotype with typically female interests and behavior, since it is extremely speculative to believe that the “demaskulinization” of the brain will affect only the boy’s sexual preferences, but will bypass other specific male qualities. It should be noted that in some studies, same-sex attraction in adults correlates with more “female” brain structures, but brain development, in terms of size and function, occurs mainly after birth, and therefore such structures, according to the authors themselves, are the result of postnatal experience, not prenatal factors. Research by Bogaert et al. (2003; 2005); Kishida et al. (2015); Semenyna et al. (2017) did not reveal correlations between ESB and the severity of feminine signs in men.

Thirdly, the relationship between a hypothetical intrauterine immune lesion, the number of older brothers, homosexual attraction and weight loss at birth is, to say the least, dubious.

As evidence of a general immune attack, proponents of the ESB hypothesis and immune damage cite data that men with older brothers had lower birth weight (Blanchard 2001) The decrease in body weight at birth in boys who have older brothers, in Blanchard's studies was about 170 grams (5% of body weight) (Blanchard 2001) According to the hypothesis under discussion, a similar decrease should be observed for boys with a homosexual preference who have older brothers, and should not be observed in girls. However, this is not so - in a Norwegian study that examined the hypothetical relationship of immune responses and weight loss at birth, 181 000 birth cases were studied, and weight loss at birth was observed in both girls and boys (Magnus 1985) Moreover, the hypothetical “big brother effect” was noted for both sexes and was extremely low - 0,6%, expressed in the difference of 20 ± 4,5 grams with respect to the standard birth weight in 3 500 grams (Magnus 1985).

According to these data, the role of immune factors in general in reducing body weight seems doubtful. It is noteworthy that Magnus and colleagues in their study also studied the effect of paternal antigens on the weight of newborns - in this case it was suggested that if weight loss is caused by immune antibodies to paternal antigens, it will be noted in both boys and girls .. Magnus and colleagues studied the body mass of children of both sexes at birth in mothers who entered into a new marriage and gave birth to new children - if the weight loss was due to immune responses, the birth weight in children of another man should have been to return to the standard initial indicators, since the other father is a carrier of new antigens and a progressive immune process is necessary for the accumulation of immune antibodies (several pregnancies) (Magnus 1985) However, the body weight at birth of children from another father remained reduced, and the authors concluded that the relationship of any immune processes with a decrease in body weight at birth is not confirmed in their sample (Magnus 1985).

The cause of weight loss at birth may be: (a) prematurity; (b) placental insufficiency; (c) maternal autoimmune diseases, for example, systemic lupus erythematosus (combined with a number of congenital pathologies at birth); (d) a complex of pathologies associated with testicular disorders. None of the above has been noted for gay men who have older brothers.

The relationship of weight loss at birth with immune responses has not been clarified and remains a very speculative issue. According to James (2006) a marked decrease in body weight at birth may be due to the influence of testosterone (Manikkam 2004) In addition, increased levels of testosterone in the female body are associated with an increased likelihood of giving birth to a boy (James xnumx; James 2004b) Blanchard, in developing his hypothesis in the quality of evidence supporting it, referred to a study Gualtieri and Hicks (1985)who stated that the sexual proportion of children born is shifting toward the female sex depending on the number of children (in other words, the more children were born in the family, the less likely the boy was to be born). However, there was an error of interpretation in this study (see James xnumx, p. 52; James xnumx) In contrast, the two largest studies: an analysis of 4 million births in France (James xnumx) and 150 thousand births in the USA (Ben-porath xnumx) revealed that the probability of giving birth to a boy increases with an increase in the number of older brothers and decreases with an increase in the number of older sisters, which contradicts the ESB. Biggar et al. (1999) Based on these data, we conducted a statistical analysis of 1,4 of one million births and found that the probability of having a boy increases with an increase in the number of older brothers.

Fourthly, the assumption that the first born boy in the family should not have homosexual preferences and, accordingly, the risk of their development increases with the increase in the number of older brothers, is, to put it mildly, speculative.

Not every homosexual man has older brothers, on the other hand, some older brothers or only boys in the family are homosexual. Supporters of the hypothesis put forward a counterargument that the mothers of such men allegedly had spontaneous abortions of male fetuses prior to their birth, which triggered the immunization process. The prevalence of couples with spontaneous abortions is 1%; in about half of these cases, the fetus has a normal karyotype, that is, it can be assumed that half of spontaneous abortions are caused by immune reactions (Lee 2000) However, studies on the sex ratio of embryos dying as a result of spontaneous abortion show that more than half were female: the male / female ratio is 0,76 (Eiben xnumx) 0,71 (Eiben xnumx) 1,03 (Be xnumx); 0,77 (Smith 1998) 0,77 (Evdokimova 2000) 0,83 (Morikawa xnumx) 0,35 (Halder 2006) 0,09 (Kano xnumx).

On the other hand, according to the immune hypothesis, the brain of each male fetus in the womb should be attacked with increasing intensity in all subsequent pregnancies, that is, undergo more and more “feminization”, but this is not so. Not all younger brothers of a gay man have homosexual preferences. Interestingly, the younger brothers of men with a violation of gender identity - whose brain, according to Blanchard's hypothesis, should undergo "feminization" - develop normally (Green xnumx).

Also, according to the hypothesis, it would be expected that brothers born later would suffer from many physical problems due to increasing immunological attacks from the mother, however, the opposite is true: the later birth order is mainly associated with an improvement rather than a deterioration health (Juntunen xnumx; Cardwell xnumx; Sorenson 2005; Richiardi xnumx).

Social Impact Hypothesis Explaining ESB

The authors of the maternal immunization hypothesis themselves noted:

“… There are, of course, other possible explanations for the big brother effect besides the hypothesis of a maternal immune response. The most popular competing hypothesis is that sexual interaction with adult men increases the likelihood of a boy developing homosexual attraction, and that a boy's chances of engaging in such interactions increase in proportion to his number, the number of his older brothers ... "(Ellis 2001).

Wellings and colleagues (1994, pp. 204 – 206) found that men who attended boys' boarding schools were more likely to report any homosexual experience during their lives than men who did not attend such schools, but there was no difference in the proportion individuals reporting homosexual experiences later in life. ” Blanchard (Ellis 2001) referred to publication Wellings and colleagues (1994) as evidence that the social hypothesis is irrelevant. However, they interpreted this data in a peculiar way. Wellings on page 206 provides a graph showing that about 1,5% of 7925 men who have not attended boarding school reported more than one homosexual contact in the last 5 years, and 2% of 412 men who attended school boarding school. Obviously, these data (disproportional size of groups) speak more likely in favor of the social hypothesis. Consider other studies in connection with social theory.

Blanchard himself indicated that among male pedophiles, about 25% were homosexual pedophiles (Blanchard 2000b). This is about ten times the proportion of homosexuals among men whose sexual interests are directed towards adult men. It has been suggested that among men, homosexuality and pedophilia have a common cause, and this cause is sexual (or quasi-sexual) experiences at an early age (James xnumx). According to this idea, early homosexual experience will suppress the formation of sexual interest in the opposite sex in adulthood. Rimafedi (1992) found that in adolescents, uncertainty about their own sexual preferences decreases with age: these authors suggest that sexual identity develops during adolescence and is influenced by sexual experience.

Moreover, more frequent cases of sexual violence in childhood are observed among gay men than among heterosexual men (Paul 2001; Finkelhor xnumx, 1984); there was a significant association between a male sexual assault and sexual offense (Glasser 2001); significantly higher proportions of adult male homosexuals reported being encouraged or forced to have sexual intercourse up to 19 years (Cunningham 1994); Compared with the control group, higher rates of homosexual preference were observed in young men who suffered sexual abuse in childhood (Johnson 1987; Finkelhor xnumx, 1984; Wyre in Tate xnumx; Cunningham xnumx; Glasser 2001; Rind xnumx; Garcia xnumx; Arreola 2005; Beitchman xnumx; Jinich xnumx; Laumann xnumx; Lenderking 1997; Paul 2001; Tomeo 2001; Freund xnumx) It can be concluded that homosexual interest, regardless of the age of the object of attraction, has a common cause. Blanchard’s studies have shown that SBE is also seen among homosexual and bisexual pedophiles, that is, such individuals have older brothers (Bogaert 1997).

Lee et al. (2002) attempted to establish which of several risk factors — childhood emotional abuse, behavior problems, and childhood sexual abuse — was associated with the following: pedophilia, exhibitionism, sexual abuse. Child sexual abuse was a specific risk factor for pedophilia. Other related factors (emotional abuse and behavioral problems) were not so closely associated with pedophilia. In addition, given the clear correlation between the presence of several homosexual siblings in the family and incest, incest should be considered as a possible alternative to biological explanations. When one brother (usually the older one) shows homosexual tendencies, other brothers run the risk of being seduced or raped, which can fix their homosexual activity (Cameron 1995) According to British statistics, 38% of cases of sexual violence in the family occur on the part of the brother (Cawson xnumx) According to the researcher Bartlett (2018), discussions in popular psychology about whether an adult's personality is formed depending on the order of his birth is a long story with a large amount of scientific literature covering thousands of published works (Damian xnumxa; Paulhus 2008; Salmon xnumx) Over the past few decades, research on this issue has been built on the notion that competition between brothers and sisters for the resource of parental attention leads to the fact that the birth order of children in the family affects the individual qualities of children. Since children adapt to the use of various niches in the family, as a rule, older children are more dominant and take over part of their parental powers, while later children are more extroverted and sociable (Sulloway 1996) It should be noted that since the varying family size and socio-economic status in combination with small samples significantly affect the results of statistical calculations, studies in which it is possible to more or less adequately study ESBs comparing should contain at least 30 thousand sibling comparisons, while how studies that compare relatively uniform samples from families are considered adequate starting from 500 families (Paulhus 2008) Although studies with small samples show conflicting data on ESB, in large studies (e.g. Rohrer xnumx, n = 20 000; Damian xnumxb, n = 377 000), the influence of the birth order on individual qualities (Damian xnumxa) What these empirical data show is a well-reproducible effect in which the intelligence indicators of each subsequent child fall by about one tenth of the standard deviation if the child lives to adulthood (Kristensen 2007), which clearly shows that the cause of the effect is a decrease in parental investment, and not biological intrauterine processes. Large-scale studies also reveal the effect of birth order on qualities such as academic performance, financial success, and suicide risk (Bjørngaard 2013; Black xnumx).

Thus, the biological basis of same-sex attraction, promoted by the hypothesis of the order of birth of the brothers, does not have any empirical support, while there is a lot of empirical evidence against it.

Duality of LGBT + Attitude - Blanchard Movement

Suppose that ESB and maternal immunization do occur and do cause changes in behavior. In this case, Blanchard’s hypothesis combines homosexuality and transsexualism (as well as homosexual pedophilia) - and in the modern “LGBT +” movement this is blasphemy. For example, according to the American Psychological Association, sexual desire and sexual identity are completely unrelated phenomena (APA 2011 / 2014) According to Blanchard’s hypothesis, transsexualism is a pathology that is caused either by (1) an extreme manifestation of homosexual attraction, in which the “feminization” of the brain is so pronounced that it also affects sexual self-identification; or (2) a mental deviation in which sexual attraction is directed not at the opposite sex, but at oneself in the image of the opposite sex (Blanchard called the last condition “autogynephilia”¹⁴) (Blanchard 1989; Bailey 2003) Blanchard unequivocally considers transsexualism a pathological phenomenon. Moreover, in an interview, Blanchard noted:

“... I would say that if it were possible to start from scratch, ignoring the whole history of the exclusion of homosexuality from DSM, normal sexuality is all that is associated with reproduction¹⁵... "(Cameron 2013).

Such a bold position causes dissatisfaction among the representatives of “LGBT +” - the movement, especially in the part of it that represents “T” (Wyndzen xnumx; Troadsmap; Dreger 2008; Serano 2010).

Activists of “LGBT +” write about Blanchard - movements:

“… Blanchard is often quoted by anti-LGBT groups (…) And why not? Blanchard grew up a Catholic, he has a very traditional view that any sexual intercourse that does not involve the penis and vagina is abnormal (...) If Dr. Blanchard were some kind of nutcase without position and authority, he could easily be discredited. But this is not the case - on the contrary, he was on the JSM committee responsible for paraphilias and sexual dysfunctions (...) He openly opposes LGBT people ... "(Tannehill xnumx).

On the other hand, confirmation of Blanchard's hypothesis casts doubt on one of the fundamental dogmas of “LGBT +” - movement - the concept of normativity of the diversity of sexual attraction by gender of an object. Indeed, in this case, the reason for homosexual attraction will be revealed - PATHOLOGICAL immune response. Otherwise, activists of the “LGBT +” movement will need to distort the understanding of medicine and biology in such a way as to calculate the immune response that causes miscarriages, weight loss, reduced reproductive chances, a change in the psycho-intellectual state that requires hormonal drugs and surgical intervention, as well as pedophilic preferences and a tendency to violence are the norm option.

In addition, there will be prospects for the prevention of homosexual preferences in boys by analogy with the use of anti-Rhesus immunoglobulins in Rh-conflict pregnancy. What part of future parents, even those who are loyal to the “LGBT +” movement, will consciously refuse the opportunity to reduce the risks of homosexual attraction in their boys? Indeed, in today's time, every woman is carefully explained about the admissibility and routine of abortion. Will the right of a woman to influence the life of the fetus also extend to the right to influence his future sexual behavior, or will there be an election ban and prosecution of those professionals who will provide such an opportunity?

One way or another, at the moment, these issues are probabilistic.

Interpretation problems

There are some significant internal limitations to the results of empirical studies, similar to those discussed in previous sections. Ignoring these limitations is one of the main reasons for the misinterpretation of research in public space. It is quite tempting to assume, as was shown by the example of the structure of the brain, that if a particular biological profile is associated with some behavioral or psychological trait, then such a biological profile is the cause of this trait. This reasoning is based on error.

We briefly illustrate some of the limitations inherent in this area of ​​research using the following hypothetical example. Suppose we have to conduct a comparative study of the brain of yoga instructors and bodybuilders. If you search long enough, then in the end there will be statistically significant differences in any area of ​​the morphological structure or brain functions between these groups. But this would not mean that such differences determine the characteristics of the life trajectories of a yoga instructor and a bodybuilder. Brain characteristics may be the result rather than the cause of distinctive patterns of behavior and interests. Studies of neuroplasticity show that despite the presence of critical periods of development during which the brain changes faster and stronger (for example, during the linguistic development of young children), the brain continues to change throughout life, responding to patterns of behavior (for example, juggling or playing on musical instrument), life experience, psychotherapy, drugs, psychological trauma and relationships. For a useful and accessible overview of neuroplasticity studies, see Doidge 2007.

Determining whether something has a biological reason is an extremely complex process, and identifying a specific genetic link is an even more difficult task. Studies that declaratively provide undeniable “evidence” that homosexuals are “born that way” are inconsistent at best, and their results are largely correlated in nature.

In some cases, for example, in twin studies, evidence suggests that early environmental factors have a dominant influence on the occurrence of homosexual tendencies. The correlation between the two factors does not mean at all that there is a causal relationship between them. Basketball players are tall - playing basketball certainly correlates with high growth. However, there is no “basketball gene”. Obviously, some interesting correlations are presented as allegedly causal factors for political and propaganda purposes.

Ultimately, suppose that some people may be predisposed to homosexual tendencies due to genetic, prenatal, hormonal influences, or other physical or brain characteristics. Does this mean that homosexuality is a congenital phenomenon? Not at all in the understanding of how this is represented by the media and popular culture. Shy and artistic young boys whose father did not pay attention to upbringing, were not an example of the proper masculine type of behavior, may be at risk of developing homosexual inclinations. This is not due to the homosexual “gene”, but because of the disturbed mental process of the formation of sexual identity. Such boys have an emotional need for self-affirmation and male attention. A similar picture is observed in girls who do not correspond to classical sexual profiles. The problems and emotional needs of such children are often played by current trends in the sexual and sexual worldview.

These examples illustrate one of the common problems that arise with the widespread interpretation of such studies - the assumption that neurobiological factors determine a specific behavioral model.

If nature endows someone with same-sex attraction, then why doesn’t it endow it with physical characteristics necessary for its realization? For example, a dense and multilayered epithelial membrane of the rectum, capable of withstanding prolonged friction, with glands that release copious lubrication, a thinner penis for penetration into rectum, etc. Now, if these characteristics were present among homosexuals, then one could speak of congenitality. If, having a normal set of chromosomes and a normal reproductive system, they are attracted to an object with which it is not possible to use it for its intended purpose, then the talk about the biological condition of this phenomenon seems very speculative.

The opinion of some representatives of the “LGBT +” movement

The American Psychological Association in 2014 issued a guide to psychological illnesses and sexology. Here are direct quotes from it:

"... Currently, no genes have been identified that could be associated with homosexuality ..." (Rosario in APA 2014, p. 579)

"... The undeniable reality is that human sexual behavior is determined by a combination of many factors: biological, social and the factor of choice ..." (Kleinplatz in APA 2014, p. 256).

The author of several chapters from the APA leadership is a member of the APA expert committee, Professor Lisa Diamond, who does not hide her homosexual preferences. Diamond is opposed to the theory of the genetic conditioning of homosexuality. She is sure that the thesis “homosexuals were born that way and cannot change” is erroneous. In the 2013 year, in a lecture at Cornell University, Diamond stated:

“… I believe that the queer community should stop saying“ we were born this way and we cannot change ”and use this slogan in our struggle… I think that we no longer need this argument and even hurts, because today a convincing volume has been accumulated scientific data known to the “other side” as well as to us ... ”(Diamond 2013).

The author of many books on art and philosophy, who does not hide her same-sex preferences, American Camilla Paglia, bluntly states:

“... Homosexuality is not the norm. On the contrary, it is a challenge to the norm ... Queer theorists - this shriveled bunch of swindlers of freeloaders - tried to take a post-structuralist course, claiming that there is no norm, since everything is random and relative. This is that stupid dead end where people obsessed with words fall when they are deaf, dumb and blind to the world around them. Nature exists, whether scientists like it or not, but in nature procreation is the only and implacable rule. This is the norm. The bodies of the sexes are made for reproduction. The penis fits the vagina, and no bizarre juggling of words can change this biological fact ... Nobody is born homosexual. The idea itself is ridiculous ... Homosexuality is an adaptation, not an innate property ... "(Paglia 1994, pages 70 – 76).

Another prominent American activist, Cynthia Nixon, was attacked by LGBT +, a movement for openly expressing the view that her same-sex drive is driven by personal choice, not biology (Witchell 2012).

LGBT + American activist - movement journalist Brandon Ambrosino also stated that he was not born, but consciously chose a homosexual lifestyle (Ambrosino 2014), which provoked the indignation of some of his colleagues in the “LGBT +” movement (Arana xnumx).

Feminist and LGBT + Activist - Karl Mantilla Movement in his article writes:

“… I have long thought that the LGBT + strategy - the movement to use the argument about innateness is incredibly lame… Of course, this is a choice - how could it be otherwise? … For a while I attended a support group for women who decided to become lesbians in a traditional marriage. At some point, I asked the question: "How did you understand that you are lesbians?" One woman responded that she never felt emotionally close to men and that she was always better understood by women. Another immediately said that she, too, felt that she could only be emotionally open with women. The others nodded in agreement. What was wrong in that situation? Almost all women feel this way! Every heterosexual woman I've ever known felt more comfortable trusting her friends, felt closer to them, felt better understood and more open to women. If that's what it takes to be a lesbian, then all women are lesbians. This is as old as the world ... the complaints of women that their men do not speak to them, do not understand their feelings and are not interested in what they say. Some of the most common articles in women's magazines are how to get your husband to open up and talk to you ... the feeling of emotional closeness to a person has no biological basis, it is due to the emotional and psychological characteristics of a person ... over time it became clear to me that women in this support group simply felt tremendous guilt for leaving their husbands ... So the idea that they could not do anything about the fact that they were lesbians, that there was a biological reason, freed them from guilt and responsibility for their actions ... "(Mantilla xnumx).

LGBT + activist, a California-based movement named Gail Madwin, has even created a whole site that argues that homosexual behavior is not innate but due to a conscious choice (Queer by choice). Former LGBT + activist, David Benkof’s movement also substantiates the fact that a homosexual lifestyle is in no way determined by any biological factors (Benkof xnumx).

Notes

1: we were born that way
2 Generally not related to each other
3 By the "strict" criterion of homosexual inclinations: 2 and more by the so-called Kinsey scale.
4 English GWAS, Genome-Wide Association Studies
5 in the scientific community adopted the practice of submitting resumes at conferences - a short article, usually 150 - 250 words in size - followed by the publication of a full article in a journal
6 English: probably born with a predisposition
7 In this regard, the distribution of results per person may be limited
8 virilization - a medical term for a violation in which female sexual characteristics develop into male
9 English: “interstitial nuclei of the anterior hypothalamus (INAH)”
10 English: “prepulse inhibition of the human startle response (PPI)”
11 English: “fraternal birth order effect (FBO)”
12 See the Twin Research Section
13 In addition, antigens in the case of PK and graft rejection reactions are individual (paternal in the case of PK), and characteristic of the male.
14 from Greek autos - “self-”, gini - “woman” and filia - “love”; "Love for oneself as a woman"
15 I would say if one could start from scratch, ignore all the history of removing homosexuality from the DSM, normal sexuality is whatever is related to reproduction

Additional Information

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