Good friends

It's a point I've made before, but it's worth saying again: we queer folks are not "pushing our lifestyle in other people's faces" simply because we'd like (1) some acknowledgement that we exist, and (2) the same rights and respect that everyone else gets automatically.

In the current regime here in the United States there are places of employment where people in same-sex relationships aren't allowed to display photographs of their partners, or even mention them.  "It's okay, I guess, as long as no one knows who you actually are," is the general gist.  There seems to be a real fear that just being around openly queer people will cause straight men and women to switch teams.  But really -- do you honestly think that's how all this works?  I mean, think about it.  Some one hundred percent straight guy finds out his coworker is gay, and suddenly gets this dazed look on his face and says, "I shall go out and kiss a man immediately"?  Seriously?

After all, it's not like it works the other way, is it?  As a teenager I was exposed to dozens, probably hundreds, of books, movies, and television shows depicting couples in straight relationships, and not a single one about queer people, and I turned out queer anyhow.  Funny thing, that.

Almost like it's inborn and hardwired, or something.

The result of this mindset is that we not only have to deal with out-and-out homophobia, but a whole array of attitudes that don't wish us active harm, but just would prefer it if we were invisible.  Take, for example, the article about a monument built by Alexander the Great for his lover Hephaestion I just stumbled on a couple of days ago.

There, I said it, didn't I?  They were lovers.  Alexander was either gay or bisexual, and he was deeply in love with Hephaestion.  They were described as "one soul inhabiting two bodies" by Aristotle, who knew both men well.  Their relationship was compared more than once to that of Achilles and Patroclus, which is not exactly a chaste allusion.  Plutarch recounts that they paid a visit to the tombs of the two Greek heroes, where Alexander garlanded Achilles's tomb and Hephaestion Patroclus's -- then ran a race, naked, in their honor.

Totally straight behavior, that, right?

Of course right.

Then there's the incident -- also related by Plutarch -- where Alexander allowed Hephaestion to read something he'd written but wanted to remain secret, and to symbolize this touched his signet ring to Hephaestion's lips.  The moment has been depicted many times in art:

Alexander Touches His Ring to Hephaestion's Mouth by Johann Heinrich Tischbein (1781) [Image is in the Public Domain]

When Hephaestion died suddenly of what was probably typhus in Ecbatana (now in Iran) in 324 B.C.E., Alexander was inconsolable.  The historian Arrian says that upon seeing Hephaestion dead, Alexander "flung himself on the body of his friend and lay there nearly all day long in tears, and refused to be parted from him until he was dragged away by force by his companions."

Oh, what good friends they were.

Alexander commissioned a massive tomb in Hephaestion's honor at Amphipolis in Macedonia -- the Kastas Tomb -- which is the subject of the article I linked above.  [Nota bene: Alexander didn't live to see it completed; he died himself the following year of uncertain causes.]  The tomb is filled with symbolic representations of the spiritual and physical bonds of love, and the hope for being reunited in the afterlife.

Despite all this, when the two were depicted as lovers in the 2004 film Alexander, there was an outcry that "Oliver Stone turned Alexander the Great gay!" and how dare they depict this heroic figure as perhaps having same-sex attraction.  It's apparently hard for some people to imagine that a guy could be a brilliant king and military leader, and still be queer. 

What's striking, though, is that there's a much more subtle aspect of this, beyond the predictable snarling from the overt homophobes.  What I noticed about the archaeology article was that never once was it explicitly mentioned that Alexander and Hephaestion might have had a sexual relationship.  Throughout, they're referred to as "friends" or "confidants" or "companions;" the closest the writer comes is saying that they clearly had a "strong emotional bond" and that the tomb is a "tribute to love and loyalty."

Why the hell are they afraid of saying it?  I mean, if you want to err on the side of caution, at least admit that it was possible.

Apparently even that is a bridge too far.

It's all part and parcel of the "don't ask, don't tell" mentality, isn't it?  "We're fine as long as we can pretend you queer people don't exist and never have."  Well, allow me to point out that this, too, is homophobia.  I spent decades in the closet out of fear and shame from this kind of thinking.  And, straight readers, if you don't think this is damaging, I want you to imagine what it would be like if your employer told you that you must never mention you are in an opposite-sex relationship.  Oh, it's fine, as long as no one knows.  Don't bring your spouse or significant other to the company picnic, don't be seen holding hands in public, don't have a photograph of you as a couple on your desk.

Now imagine if your government was saying the same thing.

Yes, I know that there are places in the world that have it much worse, where being openly queer can get you imprisoned, tortured, or executed.  But we here in the west need to keep in mind that there are ways to oppress people that are subtler and more insidious.  How is this sort of thing any different from putting Jews, Romani, and Blacks (just to name three of many groups this has happened to) in a position where they feel like they have to hide who they are in order to "pass?"

If you think that's wrong, then so is this.

I'm out publicly, so it's far too late for me to hide even if I wanted to.  But honestly -- I wouldn't go back to being invisible even if I could.  All those terrified years did a lot of damage to me emotionally, damage I doubt I'll ever completely heal from (and that's not even counting the regrets over the richer, more honest life I could have had).  To make it clear, I'm not unhappy where I am today; despite all I've been through, I've arrived at a good place.

I just wish I'd had a happier past, is all.

And I will continue to speak out against this kind of straightwashing.  Because it not only is an inaccurate view of history, but does damage to queer people right now.  I've often wondered if there had been honest, positive depictions of LGBTQ+ people in the fiction and nonfiction I read as a teen, maybe I'd have come out as bi when I realized it (age fifteen or so) rather than hiding for another forty years.  Maybe I still wouldn't have, I dunno; southern Louisiana in the seventies wasn't exactly a congenial place for people who were different, and I'm honestly not a very brave person.

But if by speaking out, I can help other people who are still in the closet -- well, don't expect me to shut up.  It's the least I can do after maintaining my own personal silence for four very long decades.

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The fight continues

September is Bisexual Awareness Month, which ironically I only became aware of on September 1.

I guess I must have known that at some point, but given that my entire approach to life has been one long tug-of-war between "please notice me" and "OH NO SOMEONE JUST NOTICED ME," I'm not sure how comfortable I am adding to my own visibility.

Be that as it may, and notwithstanding how many days and months are set aside to commemorate ridiculous stuff (January 21 is National Squirrel Appreciation Day?  Really?), overall I think Bisexual Awareness Month is a good thing.  When I was a teenager and first figured out that I was equally attracted to men and women, I had no idea there was even a name for that, much less that it was normal and okay.  The fact that we're now able to talk about this stuff will -- I fervently hope -- save the current generation of shy, scared, confused fifteen-year-olds from going through the hell I endured.

However, in the past ten years we've seen a staggering upsurge in anti-LGBTQ+ legislation in the United States, and as we queer people and allies have become more vocal, the bigots have, too.  Just last week Baptist minister Dillon Awes, of Watauga, Texas, said that another minister -- Andrew Stanley -- should be shot in the head for allowing two gay men to deliver a sermon at his church.  The fact that there was a single person in the congregation willing to sit there and listen to his vicious diatribe shows that we are far from eradicating homophobia.

When Awes is screaming his ugly invective into an empty room, I'll be satisfied.

However, we're also far from done as far as legislation goes.  Anti-LGBTQ+ bills are like the Hydra -- defeat one of them, and nine more spring up in its place.  Here are a few current battles:

• Arizona -- House Bill 2657, which forces school employees to out queer children to their parents -- even if that would put the child in danger.  Parents, the bill says, have "inalienable rights" to know everything about their children, including information given to school employees in confidence.
• South Carolina -- Senate Bill 3728 -- places all authority over the teaching of "morals, ethics, and civic responsibility" into the hands of parents, allowing them carte blanche for prohibiting undefined "certain concepts" from being mentioned in the classroom.  It doesn't take much imagination to guess what "concepts" they're talking about.
• Delaware -- Senate Bill 191 -- defines sex and gender as binary (contrary to known biological science) and restricts athletes from competing on teams split by gender according to "sex as determined at or near birth."
• Oklahoma -- House Bill 3120 -- prohibits any mention in public schools of "sexual activity that deviates from a traditional family structure" and "non-heterosexual orientation."
• Florida -- Senate Bill 1382 -- allows employers to use whatever names and pronouns they see fit, irrespective of the employee's request.

And so on and so forth.

I have to state for the record that there's a discussion to be had about age-appropriateness of any educational material surrounding sexuality (and anything else, honestly).  That is not what this is about.  No one -- no one -- is recommending placing sexually-explicit or age-inappropriate material of any kind into public school classrooms.  The characterization of legislation like South Carolina SB 3728 as "protect the children" is a smokescreen, designed to deflect criticism and re-marginalize queer people, returning us to the closeted, terrified environment I grew up in back in southern Louisiana in the 1970s.  If you doubt this, ask yourself seriously how long it would take for Oklahoma HB 3120 to be used to prevent a gay teacher from being out publicly.  Is having a photograph of him and his husband on his desk "promoting sexual activity that deviates from traditional family structure"?

Yes, we queer people have much to be thankful for.  We've come a very long way.  Had the general tolerance and acceptance we have now been present when I was a teenager, my life would have had a very different trajectory.  And if you look at the list of current and proposed anti-LGBTQ+ legislation, it's heartening how many of them are labeled "defeated."  Just the fact that I can post Bi Awareness Month stuff on my social media, and have nothing but positive responses, is encouraging.

But the fight isn't over.  

So buckle up, friends and allies.  We still have work to do.

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Damage control

The human psyche is a fragile thing.

I was going to start that sentence with, "At the risk of being called a snowflake...", but then I decided I don't give a flying rat's ass if anyone does call me a snowflake.  Or "woke."  "Snowflake" has become some kind of jerk code for "someone who cares deeply how others feel," and "woke" for "awareness that others' experience and perceptions are as valid as my own, even if I don't share them," and on that basis I'm happy to accept the appellation of Woke Snowflake.

The fact is, all of us, even Un-Woke Non-Snowflakes, can be hurt.  It's all too easy.  Whether we react to that hurt by crying, retreating, laughing it off, or getting angry, the fact remains that none of us are impervious to what others say and think.  It's why dealing with bullying is so critical, and the correct response is not to tell the victim "toughen up, develop a thicker skin, grow some balls," or whatever, all things I was told repeatedly when I was a child.  Unsurprisingly, none of that sage advice had the slightest effect, other than letting the bullies know that no one was going to do a damn thing about it.  It's amazing the number of people who don't recognize this for what it is, which is a game of "blame the victim."

For what it's worth, the correct response is for someone with appropriate authority to tell the bully, "This stops, and it stops now.  I will be watching you."

It's why when I was asked a while back what were the three most important words you could say to someone other than "I love you," my response was, "You are safe."  I never felt safe when I was a kid.  And if you don't think that leaves a mark on someone that persists into adulthood, you are sadly mistaken.

It's why I was sickened by the revelation this week that British actor Kit Connor, best known for playing the character of Nick Nelson on the lovely coming-of-age series Heartstopper, was being harassed online by "fans" who accused him of "queerbaiting" -- pretending to be queer (or being cagey about it) in order to benefit from the cachet of being associated with the LGBTQ community without committing himself outright.  Connor ignored the accusations for a while, but they became so strident that he got onto Twitter on Halloween and posted:

The number of ways this is fucked up leaves me not knowing where to begin.  Apparently part of the firestorm started with photographs of him holding hands with actress Maia Reficco, which adds a whole nasty gloss of "bi people in straight-presenting relationships aren't actually queer" to a situation that is already ugly enough.  I find this infuriating (for obvious reasons); we bisexual people are under no obligation to meet some kind of queerness litmus test set by someone -- anyone -- else.

The deeper problem here, of course, is that nobody should ever push someone to come out before they're ready.  Ever.  This sort of thing happens all too often with actors and musicians, and not just about sexual orientation but about everything.  Fans become desperate to peer into their lives, as if somehow enjoying their skill, talent, and hard work when they perform justifies forgetting that they are real humans who need privacy and have the right to reveal about their personal lives exactly what, when, and how much they choose.  At the far end of this horrible scale is the phenomenon of paparazzi, parasites who are fed by fans' insatiable appetite for lurid details, accurate or not.

The worst part in this particular case is that the lion's share of the accusations of queerbaiting Connor faced came from people who are LGBTQ themselves.  People who should fucking well know better.  People who themselves have undoubtedly faced harassment and discrimination and unfair social pressures, and now have apparently forgotten all that and turned on someone whose only crimes were (1) playing a bisexual character in a television show, and (2) wanting to come out by his own choice and at his own time.

How dare you force someone into this situation.

I can only hope that Kit's trenchant "I think some of you missed the point of the show" drove the message home with these people.  I also hope that the harm done to Kit himself, and potentially to his relationships (whatever those are), doesn't leave a lasting mark.  To the fandom's credit, there was a huge groundswell of people supporting him unconditionally and decrying what had happened, and with luck, that did enough damage control to lessen the pain he endured.

So for heaven's sake, people, start thinking before you speak, and realize that words can do incalculable harm.  Keep in mind that humans are fragile creatures who deserve careful handling.  Always err on the side of compassion.

And if you can't do all that, then at least have the common decency to keep your damn mouth shut.

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How to prove you exist

Let me say right up front that I don't mean any of what I'm saying here as criticism of the researchers themselves.

But there are times that it is damn frustrating that the research has to be done in the first place.

This comes up because of a paper that was published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences a couple of weeks ago, by a team led by Jeremy Jabbour of the Department of Psychology at Northwestern University.  In "Robust Evidence for Bisexual Orientation Among Men," we read:

The question whether some men have a bisexual orientation—that is, whether they are substantially sexually aroused and attracted to both sexes—has remained controversial among both scientists and laypersons.  Skeptics believe that male sexual orientation can only be homosexual or heterosexual, and that bisexual identification reflects nonsexual concerns, such as a desire to deemphasize homosexuality.  Although most bisexual-identified men report that they are attracted to both men and women, self-report data cannot refute these claims.  Patterns of physiological (genital) arousal to male and female erotic stimuli can provide compelling evidence for male sexual orientation.  (In contrast, most women provide similar physiological responses to male and female stimuli.)  We investigated whether men who self-report bisexual feelings tend to produce bisexual arousal patterns.  Prior studies of this issue have been small, used potentially invalid statistical tests, and produced inconsistent findings.  We combined nearly all previously published data (from eight previous studies in the United States, United Kingdom, and Canada), yielding a sample of 474 to 588 men (depending on analysis).  All participants were cisgender males.  Highly robust results showed that bisexual-identified men’s genital and subjective arousal patterns were more bisexual than were those who identified as exclusively heterosexual or homosexual.  These findings support the view that male sexual orientation contains a range, from heterosexuality, to bisexuality, to homosexuality.

So basically what they did was to show naked pics of both men and women to self-identified bisexual guys, and check to see if they got hard-ons from both.

Like I said in the first sentence, I'm glad this research was done, because there is doubt out there.  I've heard that doubt go two ways -- that bisexuals are straight people looking for attention or for a kinky thrill, or that bisexuals are gay people who are afraid to admit it.  I remember clearly being told by a student -- long before I was out of the closet -- that she could understand there being homosexuals and heterosexuals, but she couldn't see how there could be bisexuals.  "How can they be attracted to both at the same time?" she asked me.  "Why don't they just make up their minds?"

I fell back on the research -- that bisexuality and the spectrum-nature of sexual orientation was well-established -- but even after seeing the data, she wasn't convinced.  "I just don't believe it," she said.

Not only was I appalled by this because, in essence, she was talking about me -- telling me that my own identity was an impossibility -- but because even presented with evidence, she went with her "feelings" on the topic rather than (1) the conclusions of the scientists, and worse, (2) people's assessment of their own orientation.

Because that's the thing, isn't it?  How does anyone have the fucking temerity to say, "No, that's not who you are.  I know better.  Here's who you actually are."?  People in the trans community know this all too well; how often are they told that someone else knows their gender better than they do?

And here, we're told we have to prove we even exist.

How about just believing us?

[Image licensed under the Creative Commons Peter Salanki from San Francisco, USA, The bisexual pride flag (3673713584), CC BY 2.0]

I've known I was bisexual since I was fifteen years old.  There was never any doubt about my attraction to both men and women.  Hell, I knew it before I'd ever even heard the word "bisexuality."  The fact that now, over forty years later, there has to be a study published in a major scientific journal to convince people that I actually know who I am -- that I'm not delusional or lying -- is nothing short of infuriating.

So thanks to Jabbour et al. for establishing peer-reviewed research that I hope and pray will put this question to rest once and for all.  I know it won't convince everyone -- my long-ago evidence-proof student as a case in point -- but maybe we'll move toward accepting that gender and sexual orientation are complex and completely non-binary, and better still, toward valuing people's understanding of who they are over society's pronouncements of who they should be.

And as I've said before: I wish I'd been strong enough and fearless enough to claim my own identity when I first realized it as a teenager.  I have often wondered what trajectory my life would have taken if I'd spent all those years free of the humiliation and fear I was raised with, and proud of who I was instead of ashamed of it.  You can't change past mistakes, more's the pity, but at least I can state who I am now and hope that my voice will add more volume to the call that each of us should be free to celebrate who we are without having to prove anything to anyone.

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This week's Skeptophilia book recommendation of the week is a brilliant retrospective of how we've come to our understanding of one of the fastest-moving scientific fields: genetics.

In Siddhartha Mukherjee's wonderful book The Gene: An Intimate History, we're taken from the first bit of research that suggested how inheritance took place: Gregor Mendel's famous study of pea plants that established a "unit of heredity" (he called them "factors" rather than "genes" or "alleles," but he got the basic idea spot on).  From there, he looks at how our understanding of heredity was refined -- how DNA was identified as the chemical that housed genetic information, to how that information is encoded and translated, to cutting-edge research in gene modification techniques like CRISPR-Cas9.  Along each step, he paints a very human picture of researchers striving to understand, many of them with inadequate tools and resources, finally leading up to today's fine-grained picture of how heredity works.

It's wonderful reading for anyone interested in genetics and the history of science.

[Note: if you purchase this book using the image/link below, part of the proceeds goes to support Skeptophilia!]

The closet's a fine and private place

Yesterday I got a DM on Twitter that left me scratching my head a little.

Here's the body of it, verbatim:

I don't mean to be offensive, but why do you make such a big deal of being bisexual?  What your preferences are and who you like to go to bed with are nobody's business.  But because you and other people like you want to push it in everybody's faces, you make it our business whether we want it to be or not. 

Then you complain when people are rude or discriminate, which they wouldn't have done if you didn't put it all on the front page in all caps. 

Think about keeping your private matters private out of courtesy to everyone else who would rather not hear about it.

So there's a lot to unpack here in only three paragraphs.

First, in my experience, when someone starts with "I don't mean to be offensive, but..." they're about to say something offensive.  (Analogous rules apply with phrases like "I don't mean to sound racist, but..." or "I don't mean to sound homophobic, but...".)  But leaving that much aside, there are still a few things that jump out at me.

First, I really didn't think I was "making a big deal out of being bisexual."  It's in my profile, okay. (Nota bene: it's not in all caps.)  I retweet LGBTQ awareness stuff when I see it -- maybe once or twice a day, if that.  Last week I got in a quick, lighthearted exchange with a friend about actor Tom Ellis's role in the series Lucifer, and I said that if the real Lucifer is as gorgeous as Tom Ellis, it really doesn't give me much incentive not to sin.

And that's kind of it.

Mostly what I get involved in on Twitter are discussions with other fiction writers, and (unfortunately) posts about politics.  So it's not like I'm waving a rainbow flag in front of people's faces.

Which brings up the question of why it would be a problem even if I was.  The subtler bit of subtext here is that the writer thinks it's fine for me to be queer as long as no one else knows.  The message is that she's only comfortable when she can pretend that people like me don't exist.  Because the assumption in our culture is you're straight unless you say otherwise, it's not that she thinks all identification by sexual orientation should be a closely-guarded secret; she's perfectly fine assuming that everyone is 100% straight, and therefore engages in the behavior associated with sexually-active 100% straight people.

But my even mentioning that there are folks who don't fall into that category is apparently a problem.  Or, more specifically, it's a problem that I'm one of them and I'm not ashamed of it.  Well, let me say this as explicitly as I can, and as politely as I can manage: that's how I lived for forty-some-odd years, after I realized I was bi when I was fifteen years old and suddenly found myself goggle-eyed over a handsome friend who took his shirt off on a hot day.  That's forty years of shame, coupled with a desperation that nobody must find out about that part of me, that the only way to live was to pretend to be someone I wasn't.

Now?  I have the 100% support of my wonderful wife, friends, and family.  My public coming-out last year spurred at least two people I know of to proudly claim their own identity (something that makes me choke up a little every time I think about it).

So re-enter that closet?  Not just no, but fuck no.

Because you know what?  Now that I'm out, I like being bi.  It gives me twice as many opportunities to openly appreciate the beauty of the human body.  It hasn't damaged my relationship with my wife; if anything, it's strengthened it.  So if you expect me to sink back down into shame and self-loathing because you're uncomfortable with the fact that I'm not uncomfortable...

... it's your problem.  Deal with it.

So anyway.  That was how my day started yesterday, and I decided instead of getting angry, to respond publicly.  Maybe it'll open a few eyes, and if not that, at least it might shut a few mouths.

Because I'll be damned if I'm expected to pretend Tom Ellis isn't drop-dead beautiful.  Yowza.

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This week's Skeptophilia book-of-the-week is brand new -- science journalist Lydia Denworth's brilliant and insightful book Friendship: The Evolution, Biology, and Extraordinary Power of Life's Fundamental Bond.

Denworth looks at the evolutionary basis of our ability to form bonds of friendship -- comparing our capacity to that of other social primates, such as a group of monkeys in a sanctuary in Puerto Rico and a tribe of baboons in Kenya.  Our need for social bonds other than those of mating and pair-bonding is deep in our brains and in our genes, and the evidence is compelling that the strongest correlate to depression is social isolation.

Friendship examines social bonding not only from the standpoint of observational psychology, but from the perspective of neuroscience.  We have neurochemical systems in place -- mediated predominantly by oxytocin, dopamine, and endorphin -- that are specifically devoted to strengthening those bonds.

Denworth's book is both scientifically fascinating and also reassuringly optimistic -- stressing to the reader that we're built to be cooperative.  Something that we could all do with a reminder of during these fractious times.

[Note: if you purchase this book using the image/link below, part of the proceeds goes to support Skeptophilia!]

Sex, choice, and genes

Sometimes a piece of research makes me simultaneously think, "Okay, that's pretty interesting," and "Oh, no, this is not going to end well."

That was my reaction to the latest study of the genetics of sexuality and sexual orientation, which appeared in Science this week.  The paper, entitled "Large-Scale GWAS Reveals Insights Into the Genetic Architecture of Same-Sex Sexual Behavior," was the work of a huge team headed by Andrea Ganna of the Center for Genomic Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital, and looked at genetic correlations amongst almost 500,000 individuals with their self-reported same-sex sexual behavior.

Before we launch off into how this is being spun, let's look at what Ganna et al. actually wrote:

In the discovery samples (UK Biobank and 23andMe), five autosomal loci were significantly associated with same-sex sexual behavior.  Follow-up of these loci suggested links to biological pathways that involve sex hormone regulation and olfaction.  Three of the loci were significant in a meta-analysis of smaller, independent replication samples.  Although only a few loci passed the stringent statistical corrections for genome-wide multiple testing and were replicated in other samples, our analyses show that many loci underlie same-sex sexual behavior in both sexes.  In aggregate, all tested genetic variants accounted for 8 to 25% of variation in male and female same-sex sexual behavior, and the genetic influences were positively but imperfectly correlated between the sexes [genetic correlation coefficient (rg)= 0.63; 95% confidence intervals, 0.48 to 0.78]...  Additional analyses suggested that sexual behavior, attraction, identity, and fantasies are influenced by a similar set of genetic variants (rg > 0.83); however, the genetic effects that differentiate heterosexual from same-sex sexual behavior are not the same as those that differ among nonheterosexuals with lower versus higher proportions of same-sex partners, which suggests that there is no single continuum from opposite-sex to same-sex preference.

To put it succinctly, and without all the scientific verbiage: sexuality, sexual orientation, and gender are complex, and the differences we see amongst humans are not attributable to a single cause.

Which you'd expect, I'd think.  The old binary divisions of male vs. female and heterosexual vs. homosexual are so clearly wrong it's a wonder anyone still thinks they're correct.  Transsexual and anatomically intersex individuals are hardly rare; and I know for a fact bisexuality exists, because I've been equally attracted to women and men since I was aware of sexual attraction at all.

[Image licensed under the Creative Commons Benson Kua, Rainbow flag breeze, CC BY-SA 2.0]

But this doesn't square with how some people want the world to work, so immediately this paper was published, it began to be twisted out of all recognition.

First, there was the "we wish the world was simple" approach, as exemplified by Science News, which for the record I'm about fed up with because for fuck's sake, they should know better.   Their headline regarding the study was "There's No Evidence That a 'Gay Gene' Exists," which is one of those technically-true-but-still-misleading taglines the media seems to be increasingly fond of.

No, there is no single "gay gene."  But reread the passage from the original paper I quoted above; the gist is that there is a host of factors, genetic and otherwise, that correlate with sexual orientation.  Here's a more accurate phrasing of the paper's conclusion, from Melinda Mills, writing about the study in the "Perspectives" column of Science: "The genetic correlation identified in the GWAS of whether a person had ever engaged in sex with someone of the same sex and the more complex measure of proportion of same-sex partners was 0.73 for men but only 0.52 for women.  This means that genetic variation has a higher influence on same-sex sexual behavior in men than in women and also demonstrates the complexity of women's sexuality."

Even the lower 0.52 correlation for women is pretty damn significant, considering that correlation runs on a scale of 0 to 1 where 0 means "no correlation at all" and 1 means "perfectly correlated."

But that didn't stop the next level of misinterpretation from happening, predictably from the anti-LGBTQ evangelicals and other crazy right-wingers, who would prefer it if people like me didn't exist.  All they did is read the headline from Science News (or one of the large number of media outlets that characterized the research the same way) and start writing op-ed pieces crowing, "See?  No gay gene!  We told you homosexuality was a choice.  Now science proves we were right all along."  Add to that the alarmists who went entirely the other direction and suggested that the Ganna et al. research could be used to identify non-heterosexuals for the purposes of persecution, or even eugenics, and you've got a morass of hyperemotional responses that miss the main conclusions of the study entirely.

So can I recommend that all of you read the fucking research?  For the Right-Wing NutJobs, let me just say that if you have to lie about what a study actually says to support your viewpoint, your position must be pretty tenuous from the get-go.  And while I sympathize with the alarmists' fears, it's hard to see how the Ganna et al. research could be used for any sort of nefarious purposes, when the best genetic correlates to homosexuality numbered around a half-dozen, not all of them showed up in every LGBTQ person studied, and even aggregated only predicted correctly around half the time.

So the whole thing got me kind of stirred up, as measurable by the number of times I felt obliged to use the f-bomb to express my frustration.  Which you'd have predicted, given my (1) bisexuality, (2) background in genetics, and (3) hatred of popular media mischaracterizing science.

In any case, the take-home message here is threefold:

1. The universe is a complex place.  Deal with it.
2. Wherever human sexuality comes from, it isn't a choice.  If that offends your sensibilities or conflicts with your worldview, you might want to re-examine your sensibilities and worldview, because as far as I can tell reality doesn't give a rat's ass about what you'd like to believe.
3. Don't trust headlines.  Always go back to the original research before forming an opinion.  Yes, reading scientific papers is challenging for non-scientists, but that's the only way you'll know your understanding is on solid ground.

So that's the latest highly equivocal piece of the nature-nurture puzzle, the outcome of which you'd probably have expected from knowing the history of the question.  As much as I'd like it if these matters were simple, I'm much happier knowing the truth.  I'll end with a quote from the inimitable Carl Sagan: "For me, it is far better to grasp the universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring."

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This week's Skeptophilia book recommendation is about a subject near and dear to my heart; the possibility of intelligent extraterrestrial life.  In The Three-Body Problem, Chinese science fiction writer Cixin Liu takes an interesting angle on this question; if intelligent life were discovered in the universe -- maybe if it even gave us a visit -- how would humans react?

Liu examines the impact of finding we're not alone in the cosmos from political, social, and religious perspectives, and doesn't engage in any pollyanna-ish assumptions that we'll all be hunky-dory and ascend to the next plane of existence.  What he does think might happen, though, makes for fascinating reading, and leaves you pondering our place in the universe for days after you turn over the last page.

[Note: if you purchase this book from the image/link below, part of the proceeds goes to support Skeptophilia!]

The power of identity

It's a strange thing, identity.  How we see ourselves, how others see us -- and the parts of us we deny, sometimes even to ourselves.

I'm a writer.  I'm a musician.  I'm a white man of western European descent.  I'm a Louisianian by birth, a New Yorker by choice.  I'm a dog lover.  I'm left of center politically.  I'm a tattoo enthusiast.  I'm a runner even though I've been benched for the last few months from a back injury. I'm a teacher even though I'm soon to retire.  I'm a Francophone even though I haven't spoken French in years and am pretty rusty.

I am bisexual.

This last one might come as a surprise to anyone who knows me.  I have been happily married, in a cis/hetero relationship, for almost seventeen years.  I have only had cis/hetero relationships my entire life, in fact, but that's probably due to my being so shy it's a wonder I've had any romantic liaisons at all.

Nevertheless, I'm bisexual and always have been, and always will be.  I first realized it when I was a teenager, and when I went to the public swimming pool I would look at swimsuit-clad girls and go, "Whoa."  And then... had the same reaction when I looked at swimsuit-clad guys.

But I was raised in a traditional, conservative, strictly Roman Catholic family.  At that point, I didn't know the word "bisexual" existed.  Even if I had, I probably would never have admitted it.  I still recall being herded into a room in the church at age fourteen or so -- separated by gender, of course -- and being given "the talk" about sexual morality, wherein I learned that lust was a sin, sex outside of marriage was a sin, and masturbation was a sin.  (At that last statement, the guy next to me leaned over and said, sotto voce, "We're all fucked, aren't we?")

But being turned on by another guy, or worse still, acting on that impulse?  That was a mortal sin.  That was one that you might not get absolution for even if you asked for it.

That was fiery furnace material, dude.

So I squelched that side of me.  Squelched it so completely, in fact, that even when I moved to a much more liberal part of the country (Seattle, Washington), I didn't come out, and would have heatedly denied my orientation had anyone asked.

But in the last few years a few things have cracked my determination to keep that part of me hidden.  First, a few years ago I had a student tell me (apropos of the International Day of Silence), "I guess I can understand homosexuals, but I don't believe anyone can be bisexual.  How can you be attracted to both men and women?"  I did my usual fallback on the science -- bisexuality is well established as a real phenomenon, and isn't just a case of someone not being able to make up his/her mind -- but the kid still said, "I just don't believe it."

And I thought, "She's talking about me.  She's denying that people like me even exist. "

Pride Months came and went.  Coming Out Days came and went.  I still vociferously argued for LGBTQ rights and equality, and still stayed silent about myself.  A few years ago, I came out to a few folks, including my wife (who is a completely amazing person and was entirely cool with it.).  A few selected responses, which should cheer you up about the potential for goodness in humanity:

"C'mon, I live in Ithaca.  Half the people I know are LGBTQ.  Rock on." 

"No questions, no comments.  Only love." 

"Thank you so much for trusting me enough to say this to me.  I know it must have been hard." 

"I have no idea why anyone would look at you differently because of this.  You are who you are, and you're a beautiful person.  Kudos for having the courage to speak your truth aloud." 

"Really?  So am I." 

"You have my love and support no matter what.  Nothing has changed that, and nothing will change that."

The funniest one, though, was my dear friend and writing partner, the inimitable Cly Boehs (whose recently-released novel Back Then is a must-read), who smiled and said in her Okie drawl, "Honey, you think I didn't know that?  Every one of your novels has a scene with a gorgeous shirtless man in it."

It took me a good five minutes to stop laughing.  That'll teach me to take myself so damn seriously.

This year, the clamor I've seen about Pride Month has left me feeling angry and hurt -- the demands for a "Straight Pride Parade," the claims that heterosexuals are a persecuted minority, Tomi Lahren's bizarre comment that it's "open season on straight white men."  And the feeling has been rising in me that I couldn't continue to strike back against this sort of bigoted nonsense while still being afraid to admit who I am.

So that has brought me here.

Let me clarify a few things, which (in a sensible world) I shouldn't have to clarify.

First, my coming out as bisexual does not mean anything is going to change between myself and my wife.  This announcement is not a prelude to anything else, merely a statement of what is.

Second, it doesn't mean that I'm looking for a relationship with a guy on the side.  "Bisexual" doesn't mean "unfaithful" or "disloyal."  I'm deeply in love with my wife and would never, will never, betray that.

Third -- it doesn't mean anything else about me.  I did not become an ally and advocate for LGBTQ issues because I'm bisexual, but because I am a caring, moral person who believes that your rights should not depend on who you're attracted to.  I would still be an ally and advocate if I was 100% straight.

Last, and listen closely if you have any doubt on this point: this was not a choice I made.  I did not sit back at age fourteen and think, "Let's see... guys, girls?  Guys, girls?  How about... both?"  Wherever sexual orientation comes from, I was built this way.  And as a trans student of mine put it to me, "Why would anyone think that I would choose this?  To face prejudice, ridicule, denial of who I am, on a daily basis?  Who in their right mind would choose that?"

So there you have it.  My only wish is that I'd come out sooner (like, when I realized it as a teenager), rather than denying such a fundamental part of me for decades.  I wish that, not only because of what it would have done for me personally, but because of the role model I would have been for students -- "Look, here's who I am.  You can be who you are, too.  I understand."

But you can't reverse time, nor undo decisions you made in the past; all you can do is act now.  As Maya Angelou put it, "Do the best you can until you know better.  Then when you know better, do better."

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Aptly enough, considering Monday's post about deciphering scripts, this week's Skeptophilia book recommendation is Steven Pinker's brilliant The Stuff of Thought.  Here, experimental psychologist Pinker looks at what our use of language tells us about our behavior and neural wiring -- what, in fact, our choice of words has to do with human nature as a whole.

Along the way, he throws out some fascinating examples -- my favorite of which is his section on the syntax of swearing.  I have to admit, the question, "Just what does the 'fuck' in 'fuck you' actually mean?" is something I've never thought about before, although it probably should have given that I'm guilty of using the f-word a lot more than is generally considered acceptable.

So if you're interested in language, the human mind, or both, this is a must-read.  Although I'll warn you -- if you're like me, it'll leave you thinking, "Why did I just say that?" several times a day.

Involuntary conversions

New from the "They Needed A Grant To Figure This Out?" department, we have: a study showing that LGBTQ individuals who have undergone "conversion therapy" or other attempts to change their sexual orientation have a higher incidence of depression.

Whodathunkit, ya know?  Amazing what happens when you take a person and tell them in no uncertain terms that a part of their personality over which they have zero control is bad and they have to fix it, and woe be unto them if they don't.

A study done at the Family Acceptance Project at San Francisco State University tracked the outcomes for LGBTQ students, comparing ones who had experienced attempts to alter their sexual orientation with ones who hadn't.  The results were unequivocal.  Students who had been through "conversion therapy" or some equivalent had:

• over twice the likelihood of a suicide attempt;
• over twice the likelihood of depression (if the student had experienced these attempts both by parents and also external agencies, that number rose to triple the likelihood);
• lower socioeconomic status five years after leaving college;
• lower educational attainment;
• and lower average weekly wages.

Honestly, I get why the study was done.  If you have hard data behind an argument, it's a lot more difficult to refute it.  But here's the problem; the people who are arguing for conversion therapy are not, by and large, arguing from a standpoint of evidence.  The vast majority are basing their stance on religion, or the simple fact that thinking about gay sex makes them feel squinky.

[Image licensed under the Creative Commons Benson Kua, Rainbow flag breeze, CC BY-SA 2.0]

As far as the first one goes, people need to wrap their brains around the fact that their religion tells them what they are supposed to do, not what I am supposed to do.  As my mom used to put it, my rights end where your nose begins.  As long as what you are doing is in no way harming me -- such as what gender(s) you are attracted to -- I should have no right whatsoever to dictate your actions.

As far as the second, my response is: grow up and get over it.  I detest cooked carrots, to the point that I can barely stand to look at someone eating them.  (It is just about the only food I really dislike.  As my dad once quipped, my favorite two kinds of food are "plenty" and "often.")  But if I started telling people they couldn't eat cooked carrots because I can't stand the thought of it, my guess is that they would (quite rightly) tell me to go to hell.

Same thing here.  Maybe you find same-gender relationships disgusting.  Then don't have one.  Which is what I do when someone offers me carrots.

What's more, don't spend your time thinking about it.  Is it just me, or do these rabid evangelical types ever think about anything else?  Seems odd to me that people who claim to be so completely repulsed by the thought of a same-sex relationship talk about them to the exclusion of every other topic, with the possible exception of "Trump is the messiah," and if you don't do whatever Trump wants, you will be on the receiving end of a divine smite.

So this is in truth a huge problem, and I don't want anyone to interpret my first paragraph as dismissive.  I began that way because I have such a difficult time imagining how it's not so self-evident that it would appear obvious to everyone in the world.  If you have a child, and you set out to systematically destroy a fundamental part of their being, it's going to do horrific damage, and in the end, very likely be unsuccessful.  You might convince these poor young people not to seek out a relationship, which is bad enough; it's dooming them to a future in which they're alone, in which to fall in love is seen as succumbing to evil.  But you're not going to change their sexual orientation, because that's hardwired into our brains.

No one asks a heterosexual when they "chose to be straight."  Why should the situation be any different for LGBTQ individuals?

In short, conversion therapy is child abuse, and it inflicts permanent harm.  How it is not illegal, I have no idea.

But maybe this study will bolster the case that it should be.

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If you are one of those people who thinks that science books are dry and boring, I'll give you a recommendation that will put that misconception to rest within the first few pages: Sam Kean's The Disappearing Spoon: And Other True Tales of Madness, Love, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of Elements.

Kean undertook to explain, from a human perspective, that most iconic of all images from the realm of chemistry -- the Periodic Table, the organized chart of elements from the simplest (hydrogen, atomic number 1) to largest and most complex (oganesson, atomic number 118).  Kean's sparkling prose shows us the personalities behind the science, including the notoriously cranky Dmitri Mendeleev; tragic, brilliant Henry Moseley, a victim of World War I; and shy, self-effacing Glenn T. Seaborg, one of only two individuals to have an element named after them while they were still alive.

It's a fun read, even if you're not a science geek -- maybe especially if you're not a science geek.  Because it allows you to peer behind the curtain, and see that the scientists are just like the rest of us, with rivalries, jealousies, odd and misplaced loyalty, and all the rest of the faults the human race is subject to.

[If you purchase the book from Amazon using the image/link below, part of the proceeds goes to supporting Skeptophilia!]