Homosexuality
Essay Preview: Homosexuality
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Today homosexuality is a big issue. It is and has caused controversy throughout many cultures. It is important that people are informed before they make decisions or choose sides. Many people are certain that homosexuality is a choice and most of these people are not educated on the issue. Based on scientific evidence alone I believe that it is not.
We must first start out by knowing how many people are homosexual. There have been several studies to determine the percentage in men and women. Until recently it was assumed that homosexuality was around ten percent. In a recent 2000 U.S. Census homosexuality is a low 2.5 percent (364). Think about the number of homosexual people you know. It is a rather low number, and a consistent one at that. This is not something that just came out of the 1980s or 90s. It has always existed. There is even some speculation as to whether Shakespeare was gay.
Many scientists and researchers have spent countless hours in their labs. In 1991 researcher Simon LeVay began studying sections of the Hypothalamus taken from deceased heterosexual and homosexual people. He studied a specific cluster of cells which he thought might be of importance. After a nine month study he concluded that the cell cluster was larger in heterosexual men than in women and in homosexual men (366). Our brains differ with sexual orientation. It is proven that homosexual men and heterosexual women have the same size cell cluster. Everything psychological is simultaneously biological.
Another discovery conducted by Laura Allen and Roger Gorski in 1992 concluded that brain anatomy influences sexual orientation (367). They discovered that a section of the anterior commissure is one third larger in homosexual men than in heterosexual men (367). This part of the brain is the fibers that connect the right and left hemispheres. This helps conclude that homosexual men are more likely to have female neuroanatomy than are heterosexual men.
Genes also play a major role in the selection on sexual orientation. Homosexuality seems to run in families (367). I personally have two members in my family that are homosexual, one male and one female. I also know another family that has several more homosexuals. In a study of homosexuality among twin brothers, researchers J.M. Bailey and R.C. Pillard learned that among identical twins – those from a single fertilized egg that then split – 52% of twins of homosexual men “were likewise homosexual.” Among fraternal twins – those from two separate fertilized eggs – 22% of twins were likewise homosexual, and 11% of adoptive brothers of homosexual men were likewise homosexual (1). This helps prove that there may be a homosexual gene that is passed along.
Another cause of homosexuality is the prenatal environment. During the second and fifth months after conception there is a critical hormone development stage. Exposure to hormone levels typically experienced to a female fetus predisposed the person to be attracted to males later in life (367). This was true regardless of sex. Some tests even revealed that homosexual men have spatial abilities more like those of typical heterosexual women. This pattern was consistent with the hypothesis that homosexuals were exposed to atypical prenatal hormones (367).
In other prenatal studies, homosexual men had fingerprint patterns like those of heterosexual women (367). Most people have more fingerprint ridges on their right hand than on their left. This difference was greater for heterosexual males than for females and homosexual males (367). Fingerprint ridges are complete by the sixteenth fetal week. Researchers conclude that this is caused by prenatal hormones. Homosexual women often have a male typical anatomy. The cochlea and hearing systems of lesbians develops in a way that is like heterosexual men (367). This also points to prenatal development.
A study done in 1993 set out to prove that there was a specific “Homosexual Gene”. Dean Hamer led the study that involved thirty