how do people become gay?

I know next to nothing about the actual science.
But reasonably speaking, I think that when certain people are developing in the womb, the parts of the brain that would attract a female to a male, and a male to a female, are switched up. Thus, some men will be born with the built-in attraction to other men that women would normally have, and vise verse if they are a woman.

Bisexuals, like myself, carry an equal attraction to both, perhaps because there is an overabundance of connections with very little delineation in the part of the brain that dictates physical and sexual attraction.

I'm sure genes have something to do with how the developing brain is coded, and it could also be related to chromasomes, but again, I'm not even a mild expert.

Funny enough, my sister is both aromantic and asexual, meaning she doesn't want to have a serious relationship with anybody beyond a heartfelt friendship, and she has absolutely no interest in sex. Whereas I have a rather strong interest in both, including an attraction to men, which she also lacks.

 

Not sure anyone has any clear answer to this. Its like asking what is the meaning of life!

 

one of life's sweet mysteries. I don't think anyone is really sure it may be a genetic thing, it may be the balance of estrogen to testosterone in the womb, it may be a combination of those two or some other factors. the fact of the matter is we don't know, I sort of hope we never find out because some hater will then be looking for a 'cure'.... and there's nothing wrong with me, and in truth I am just as I was intended.

hope this helps.

 

There is no clear answer to this burning question, but there is one tantalizing detail that suggests it is biological. It has been found the last son of a series of boys born to the same mother sequentially is slightly more likely, in a statistically significant sense, to be gay.

 

Not at all.

A hypothesis is just some idea that pops into one's head as a possible explanation for some observed phenomenon, a hypothesis is NOT evidence of any kind, nor is logic a prerequisite for coming up with such explanations.

There is, however, plenty of hard evidence to demonstrate that other possible causes of being gay such as sexual abuse have been thoroughly debunked.

I would ask at this point whether the OP is one to be swayed by scientific evidence of any kind that refutes his hypotheses, or whether he is of the type who, mesmerized by the simplistic assumptions that underlie homophobia, will stick with the pernicious assumption that equates homosexuality with sexual abuse...just asking...

 

This a conversation that we have often in my family as several of us are gay or bi. And, in our extended family, there are other gays. We all have different experiences as children. My parents methods of parenting, family economics, influence of birth order...all of these argue for a nature vs nurture model. At least there seems to be some underlying biological basis for homosexuality and possibly an environmental trigger (overpopulation..large family?).

There are risks in understanding this too. What if we could isolate the gene and the gay gene could be eliminated or modified? We could biologically "fix" gay?

Many, if not all, of us have gone through the "wishing I wasn't gay" period of our lives. But, when we look deep into ourselves do we see something that is a biological mistake or is it a biological miracle? Is there an evolutionary necessity to having homosexual members of a society that we don't understand? Do we need to understand?

 

No one knows for sure. I saw a study the other day that was interesting, but i cannot be convinced for sure of its validity and have no idea how it was conducted. Here is a copy of the article i found, but i was not able to find the original one i saw that had the brain scans in the article again. BBC NEWS | Health | Scans see 'gay brain differences'

But it is my belief and the belief of many that you are born gay. You can't control who or what turns you on, can you? Its natural. I remember checking out girls in early middle school before i knew the significance of my actions. I was raised southern baptist christian in a very conservative, rural area so i was quite naive at that age. I remember being very confused on why i didn't find boys appealing like my classmates did but instead automatically looked at girls, which i knew they would think of as weird.

 

Greatwhale can certainly fight his own battle on this, but I do want to make a few comments as it relates homophobia and the question posed. This is a very sensitive topic overall. Read the news and hear how religious groups push for "conversion therapy", read how some politicians still express views that being gay is a choice, and listen to others express the belief that homosexuality is not natural. These are all homophobic viewpoints.

Right, wrong, or indifferent, the question you posed can easily be viewed as one that is being asked due to some form of internalized homophobia. If it is not, then great! And even if it is, it is ok! Internalized homophobia is bitch to deal with and requires a lot of thought, discussion, reflection and question asking.

People on the forum are here to help them on their journey of self acceptance. Part of that journey is dealing with shame and internalized homophobia. It is fantastic that you asked the question because the discussion is important and helpful for everyone reading to resolve feelings of shame and internalized homophobia.

No one is trying to be critical. Everyone is trying to work through their emotions.

 

I think there is evidence that it is probably a combination of a hard-wired trait or preference combined with environmental factors. For example, I think studies of identical twins (those who share the exact same genotype) has shown that it is not a certainty that when one twin is gay the other will be also, which would be expected if homosexual attraction were purely caused by genes. Other studies have noted some differences in brain structure between straight and gay men, but assuming that those differences have anything to do with sexuality you are still left with the question of which caused the other. Some studies suggest that biological but non-genetic influences while the fetus is in the womb could be involved, which would explain why gay men tend to have older brothers ... the theory being that the mother develops an antigen to the male sex hormone while she is pregnant with the first boy and the antigen somehow affects the second boy she carried to birth. And sexuality is tied into our emotions and subconscious as well, both of which can be affected by life experiences, although how those factors might combine to create homosexual attraction would seem to be really difficult to parse out.

Since our understanding of what causes sexual attraction is so rudimentary I think we would be better served by getting rid of the rigid "gay" and "straight" labels that developed in the 20th Century and instead return to the more fluid understanding of sexuality that predated our times, during which people could have same-sex attractions and encounters without being labelled thereafter as something. There was an interesting article to this effect published in The Atlantic magazine just a few weeks ago that can be found here https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/03/before-straight-and-gay/513812/.

 

Great answer. As a lesbian natal female, I have to agree that all kinds of experiences and biological things may cause it. I still have no answer as to why I knew from around age 6 that I was attracted to girls but it has stayed with me, despite trying to fit into a straight life mold. So far it hasn't worked. So I'm going with; this may be nothing more than a spectrum of "normal" sexual orientation, despite the way society has to label people. Going to check out that article.

 

We aren't sure yet.

 

I understand that drinking Zima causes guys to be gay. I drank half of one in my early twenties and BAM! bisexual at 35ish.

Ok kidding aside. It definitely seems inborn for a lot of people. Those who report having attraction or crushes at an early age. For us who figure out they aren't quite straight or gay it seems less definite to me. Nobody knows what the mechanism is.

 

Wish I could tell you, early40s. I came out late--in my early 50's--but I knew for many decades that I didn't feel the same things other guys felt. I grew up in a family full of married couples, no one gay (well, out, at least), and only one elderly maiden aunt who had never married. I just assumed getting married was what you did, regardless of any feelings, especially since most of the married couples in our family basically tolerated each other and really didn't seem very loving or (God forbid) sexually attracted to one another.

My working-class dad could be a real pain a lot of the time, but I give him credit for not being too outwardly horrified that I liked show tunes and played with my sisters' dolls and was uninterested and clumsy at anything athletic, even at a very young age. (He suspected my kid sister was a lesbian and went over the top telling her about famous lesbians in an effort to get her to come out to him.) If I met a kid like myself today, I'd think, wow, that's one gay kid. But I didn't really understand "gay" as an orientation that you have from birth or very early childhood on, more like a behavior that you picked.

But I definitely didn't pick it. I came to understand it, but even at that, I still got married and had kids. I don't know what made me gay, but my memories go back very far, to even age 2 or 3, and I know that even then there was something different about me. Genetic, some fetal developmental thing, or environmental, I really don't know, but if it was environmental, it had to have started basically at birth, because now that I can name it, I know I was this way as long as I can remember.

 

We got lucky.

Lex

 

My 5 cents, i think that the church came up with the view of that a person is gay because they were abused or even because there was no father present, etc.. amongst other arguments. I say this because i had been in church and they feel as thought they have the authority to have answers. I feel these view have been taken on by the wider society. i may be wrong here but its just my opinion, that society has this homophobic take on anyone who is anywhere on the LGBTIF spectrum, which ironically is nearly the same lens as most churches.

 

Reasonable question. Consider: we don't quite know how the moon got there, but we can reject that it's made of green cheese. We don't quite know how consciousness works, but we know there isn't a little mini-me inside our heads. We don't quite know how to cure cancer, but we know copper bracelets don't work. Etc.

However, your phrase "other environmental causes" is worth noting. They are not ruled out, because of course they are such a large category. Small categories, like early sexual abuse, can be studied and ruled in/out. (In this case, out.)