Why are we gay bi or whatever o.o?

[Ralphtruco]

(first of all XD i dont know is this goes here so if doesnt sorry :S) Well that is a question that i dont think any can answer but i been have too many coincidences with friends just to be called a "coincidence". And obviously im not saying it on a rude way because, duh it happened to me too so..
Well first of all me: my relantionship with my father was practically non existent until like idk 3-4 years of something and had a semi close or close relantionship with my mother
Friend A: his relantionship with his father has always been bad and the same as me with his mother
Friend B: his father left his house when he was a baby
Friend C: never knew his father
Friend D: distant relantionship with both parents
So...Idk is kinda weird :S just something that i been thinking about o.o what do you think?

[VampConspiracy]

I don't know... It is odd, because I have a horrid relationship with my father... Good thing I moved over a hundred miles away several years ago with my mother.

I think bad relationships with parents are becoming, if they weren't already, rather common. I don't think it's coincidence - I think it's common in a facepalm-deserving way.

[Revan]

I don't know either. I'd say born that way...but that could lead into a debate and I don't care to start one. All I can say is...we are what we are

[AnneChaos]

I think that's just how life is now-a-days...

My relationship with my parents is great but almost all of my friends parents are divorced (gay and straight friends). It's just a thing that happens a lot, unfortunately...

And love is actually a reaction in the brain so I think we must be born this way...I'm not an expert in this matter or anything, but I think we are born with somekind of change in that part of the brain or something like that. Wow saying it like this seems kind of bad :/ But there must be something in that part of the brain that makes us like different people so I guess this is the only way...

So, my opinion: parent's relationship don't affect if you're gay or not.

[NickT]

If bad paternal relationships were what caused homosexuality there'd be a lot more gay people in the world.

[Steve712]

Originally Posted by NickT

If bad paternal relationships were what caused homosexuality there'd be a lot more gay people in the world.

Indeed.

Sexual orientation is something which people develop before birth. It's useless and fallacious to consider whether relationships with parents cause it.

[theJosephDean]

Originally Posted by Steve712

Indeed.

Sexual orientation is something which people develop before birth. It's useless and fallacious to consider whether relationships with parents cause it.

This.

Also, I don't really think that my horrid coexistence with both my father and step-father contributed to my sexuality, nor do I think anyone's parental relationships (paternal or otherwise) lead to their sexuality.

I think we all just like our own genitalia, and we want more of it.

[Davy]

Yeah exactly, have an excellent relationship with my parent's at the moment. (Hopefully will continue to have)

I think we all just like our own genitalia, and we want more of it.

[TheEdend]

There can be a lot of explanations to it. One thing that is certain though is that sexuality isn't changed by how good of a relationship you have with your dad.

Are we distant with our dads because we are gay or are we gay because we are distant with you dads?

Sexuality is too complex and we really don't understand the whys. We just know that it has ALWAYS been there and we just have to learn how to deal with it.

Also, I have 3 straight friends that have never even met their dads and they don't have a stepfather. I'm kinda just thinkings out loud here.... I should stop that xD

[Katherine]

I've had a lot of issues with my mom over the years, whereas I've always had a pretty close relationship with my dad. I don't think it has much to do with my sexuality.

[Chip]

I was doing some research on this and apparently it is not quite as cut-and-dried as "sexual orientation is determined before birth." The best research out there seems to indicate that there is a genetic trait that makes one more inclined to be gay (which, of course, is determined before birth) but there are environmental factors that seem to influence it as well.

For example, if it was purely genetic, then identical twins should be 100% identical in sexual orientation. But they aren't... the correlation is high (70% or something, don't remember for sure) but not exact.

And if it were entirely environmental, then you would see no correlation among family trees, but that, too, is incorrect; someone who is gay is disproportionately likely to have other family members (aunts/uncles, siblings) who are gay.

But there is also research showing that there is a pretty high correlation between being gay and having a distant, emotionally unavailable, or absent father.

And finally, there is also a disproportionately high correlation between being gay and being left-handed... further supporting the idea of a genetic trait.

So... when you add all that up, what I think you have is the idea that there's a genetic predisposition to be gay, and it is more likely to express (or at least, to express early) in the presence of certain environmental factors, such as lack of connection to one's father.

By the way: I am not aware of research looking at daughter-mother in lesbian relationships. There may have been some which I haven't seen, but as far as I know, the correlation between being gay and having a distant parent has only been shown to exist between male children and male parents.

[Steve712]

I didn't say that it was all genetics, I said that it was determined before birth, which simply means while they are a fetus. Neurodevelopment during this period is a major factor; specifically, the levels of testosterone which contact the hypothalamus. There is also the epigenome, which controls which genes are actually active, thus allowing for two people with extremely similar genomes, such as twins, to have different sexualities.

me and my dad have a pretty good relationship. i mean, we're not like best friends or anything cause that's just not how i operate, but there's never been a time where i thought i'd be better off with another.

i do have a gay great uncle (or something) so i would support the idea that it does run in family's as i seem to have a lot of traits that come from that side.

i also heard some study (though it's probably not very well supported) that if your mother is the only girl and has a lot of brothers, you're more likely to be gay..my mom had 5 brothers.

and i heard another obscure study about the direction your hair grows (that little swirl on the back of your head) may have something to do with sexuality, but i have 2 swirls lol and they seem to fight cause my hair changes directions every year or so lol.

i'm pretty sure there's gotta be a genetic factor involved (even if nothing can prove it for certain), but i'm willing to believe it can be triggered. but that doesnt necessarily mean it's an behavioral trigger. i know identical twins that aren't identical because one twin got more nutrients in the womb. a different influx of any chemical we're not aware of could cause homosexuality, or just the way our bodies or brains develop, who knows just a tiny change in hormonal levels as we grow up could change everything and no one could really measure it. there are just so many tiny things that could make such a big difference i don't know if we'll ever really find the answer.

but i don't know if we really want to find the true cause(s). detecting homosexuality might mean preventative measures, and that idea really frightens me.

[Taylor]

What's odd is, I have a pretty good relationship with both of my parents but my dad and I end up fighting a lot. However, we fight because we are both too similar.
Also growing up I took a lot of cues from my dad as to what i was really interested in. We never watched sports growing up and I dont watch them now. But also whenever a naked woman was on the screen during a movie or anything my parents would make me and my brother close our eyes. I never once tried to peek or anything. For a long time I thought not being exposed to it early enough was what caused me to be gay. but I dont think that's true anymore. I think I'v always been gay and nothing could have changed it, no matter how my life worked out.

I heard somewhere that they think it might be that when you're in the womb the mother's body sees the male embryo as hostile so it attacks it with estrogen to try and change the sex to female. When this doesn't happen completely you might have someone who has specific tendancies towards feminine things or even a guy in a girls body or vice versa.
It sort of makes sense. Female sexuality is more fluid than male sexuality and this could be the reason why, but who knows?
To be honest, the only reason I see for wanting to know what makes someone gay is to prevent it, and i'm not sure that's a good thing to pursue. Not only am I happy being gay, but I think it's essential to the human race. If we all were to have kids when we got older, the world would be over crowded, like what happpens to bunnies if you let them mate too often. Eventually they eat all of the resources in the area and the whole lot dies off.

[Steve712]

I heard somewhere that they think it might be that when you're in the womb the mother's body sees the male embryo as hostile so it attacks it with estrogen to try and change the sex to female.

Yeah, that happens after a woman has so many male children. That is one reason why it is purportedly more likely for, say, a third or fifth son to be gay than a first and second.

[IsItSo]

Originally Posted by Chip

And if it were entirely environmental, then you would see no correlation among family trees, but that, too, is incorrect; someone who is gay is disproportionately likely to have other family members (aunts/uncles, siblings) who are gay.

Political mindsets are often (but yes, not always) shared in families, so families that have several openly gay members are probably just more likely to be socially progressive than conservative. I don't really believe in any "gay gene."

[Revan]

Biological dad was never around much but my step-dad stepped in like when I was 1 1/2, 2 years old. I've always been close to both.

[Phoenix]

Originally Posted by Steve712

Yeah, that happens after a woman has so many male children. That is one reason why it is purportedly more likely for, say, a third or fifth son to be gay than a first and second.

This process is called aromatization. Testosterone is very similar to estrogen and it gets converted to estrogens during the feminization process of female fetuses. If a woman has many male children, her body has a "memory" of sorts of the androgens used to masculinize those fetuses and those excess androgens get converted to estrogens and feminize the developing male child's brain which may cause homosexuality. Also as I mentioned in another thread, in 1991 Simon LeVay indentified the third interstitial nucleus of the anterior hypothalamus in gay men was smaller than in straight men. The INAH-3 is also larger in men than in women; this further brought proof that there are biological components to different sexualities. This study was criticized however because there were some who thought that it couldn't possibly be an objective study given that LeVay himself was gay.

Finally, we know that genes account for 50% of the variability in sexual orientation. What the other 50% is isn't well understood and could arguably be provided for by socialization factors which goes along with what Chip was saying about how it can't be totally genetic but it's not totally environmental either.

[Beachboi92]

First thing you have to say when you get instances like this where people point out instances like the one you have is
1) Correlation does not equal causation
2) One few set of observable circumstances are not a valid way to determine a rule

In addition i have an excellent relationship with my mom, and a generally good relationship with most family who all know i am gay. I have a good relationship with my macho, football jock brother, and a bad one with my possibly gay younger brother xD. My relationship with my dad is non-existant. I personally think it would make more sense to say the reason we find LGBT people having issues with relationships with family is because they are LGBT not that the relationship equals LGBT. I was never able to get along with the members of my family that i don't have a relationship with, they believed in me fitting gender norms, they didn't like this and that about me and low and behold didn't like the fact that i was gay.

The root of the problem is people who are narrow minded and un-accepting when they should be (especially of family). Family should love and accept unconditionally and really all people should, when they don't i don't get along with them :P

[Chip]

Originally Posted by IsItSo

Political mindsets are often (but yes, not always) shared in families, so families that have several openly gay members are probably just more likely to be socially progressive than conservative. I don't really believe in any "gay gene."

Well... one doesn't have to believe in gravity either, but that doesn't mean it isn't real

The data is really solid that there is a genetic trait associated with homosexuality, and that it is NOT only environmental. The APA and just about every other reputable organization who has examined the issue has gone on record as saying this, and as several posters in this thread have indicated, there's a lot of evidence of genetic co-factors as well. While the genetic elements may not be 100% causative, they cannot be ignored.