So what if there is a gay gene?
Contrary to what people on all sides of the homosexuality controversies apparently believe, it doesn’t much matter if sexual orientation is genetically determined or if it is developed later in life. So what if people are born “that way”? In the end, the nature or nurture argument does little to change minds or affect behaviour.
Nonetheless, an enormous amount of social, scientific–and religious–energy is being marshaled in an attempt to either prove or disprove that homosexuality is “natural.” Everyone seems to have a vested interest to protect. The dubious assumption underlying these efforts is that what occurs naturally is therefore ethically appropriate.
Surely we don’t really believe this. Babies don’t always arrive with a clean slate. All too frequently infants enter the world with diseases, abnormalities, dispositions and inclinations that medical workers, parents and any number of social institutions will attempt to remedy, shape or redirect. Just because a condition occurs naturally does not make it either desirable or unchangeable. Any reasonable examination of the evidence demonstrates that character traits are in part innate but are subject to modification by experience and choice.
Still, many within the homosexual community are eager to see laboratory evidence that their sexual orientation is biologically determined, as if scientific proof that homosexuality is “natural” also means that it should be accepted and normalized in society. Many people opposed to homosexual practice are just as eager to see the genetic argument disproved–for much the same reason.
Science falls short
The topic certainly grasps public interest. During the past decade a number of scientific studies have received prominent display in the mainstream media, which has tended to tout them as evidence of the existence of a gay gene. However, the research conducted to date is a long way from demonstrating any direct evidence of a gay gene. The most commonly cited studies (especially work by Simon LeVay, Dean Hamer, J.M. Bailey and R.C. Pillard) fall far short of acceptable standards of scientific proof.
What the studies just as easily suggest is that persons who experience same-sex attraction are not prisoners of their biology. That’s good news for same-gender-attracted people who would rather pursue other options.
Odd, isn’t it, that a community renowned for advocating freedom and diversity in lifestyles is largely content to argue against freedom and choice in their own lives, eager to have science prove they have no choice? And this same science, as some within the gay community are warning, wields a two-edged sword. The very knowledge that isolates a gene can be used against those who carry it. The possibility that fetuses marked with a predisposition to homosexuality would be aborted is, lamentably, not an idle fear.
Odder still
But it’s odder still that Christians should be at all threatened by the notion that because a characteristic is inborn it must determine a person’s behaviour. Aren’t we the ones who believe that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”? Whether we are born with perverse inclinations or just happen to pick up them up at a very early age is a moot point. Ultimately, each of us must take responsibility for our own behaviour–including how we act on our lusts. Christianity has much to teach about how to make choices that benefit both self and society.
Whichever way it bends in the end, science is nobody’s saviour in this debate. At it’s best it can only describe how things are. Morals, on the other hand, relate to the way things should be. So what if there is a gay gene? Feelings and desires may well have biological origins, but human beings are capable of making direct choices about behaviour.