40 thoughts on “Science of Gaydar: Open Forum”

  1. It would be foolish to eliminate anyone and their contributions.

    On this we can agree

  3. Mary,

    Go back and read what I wrote. And stop assuming that I’m asserting something that I’m not.

    My point is this: gay people have contributed significantly to humanity. Were their contributions because they were gay? I don’t know. But I do know that if you compiled a list of those who are heroes of science, literature, and the arts you would find that a disproportionate percentage were not traditionally heterosexual – certainly more than the percentage of gay people in the population at large.

    Why is this? Well it could be that whatever it is that contributes to homosexuality genetically (and there most certainly is, for some, a genetic contributing factor) may also contribute to atypical brain functioning. Or it may be that being “different” or “other” led such persons to think outside the box. Or it may be that social disapproval removed opportunities to be mundanely employed and out of neccessity they had to be creative. Or it may simply be that without a wife and kids they had more time.

    But, whatever it is, gay people have contributed more than their share. And it would be, in my opinion, foolish to take steps to eliminate homosexuality. We cannot be certain that by doing so we would not also be eliminating a significant portion of future contributions.

  5. That most genuises are gay??? Isn’t that what you assert? And I think those that are gay are just mentioned more than the others.

  6. Drowssap,

    I think you missed the fundamental issue that homosexuality is not a disease or an illness…do you ever call in “gay” to work? Therefore talks of “curing” homosexuality are pretty off-base. If you are heterosexual (which, you may not be), think about what it would take to make you gay. Orientational shift would work both ways…not just in one direction.

    So…why not get a heterosexually frustrated man, and help make him gay? It’s unethical…as it is the other way around.

  7. Yeah… same idea, it’s been around for a while and the OSHU sheep study found much the same thing when studying hypothalami of sheep.

    I don’t know why you’re into the WebArchive of Erik Holland’s site, it’s still online and updated:

    http://www.amazinginfoonhomosexuals.com/

    And Holland is nothing more than an individual with an idea trying to sell a book in which he reviews the literatuure in a way which backs up his ideas. Holland has a wierd mix of ideas. It’s biological, but gays aren’t “by design.” And from there he follows the AFA line or something like that.

  8. Drowsap…

    Just a hint for ya. If the home page claims that the “core issues of interest to anyone interested in homosexuality” are “the sexual behavior of homosexuals and mental health issues concerning homosexuality” you can be pretty sure that it isn’t going to be discussing issues of discrimination or equality under the law.

    In fact, you can rest pretty sure that Paul Cameron would feel right at home. 🙂

  9. Mary,

    Yes indeed there are. No one is disputing that. I guess I’m failing to understand your point.

  10. Mary

    I think what Tim is saying is that the confluence of events that make homosexuals might also spit out a few extra geniuses. That idea might have some merit.

    Autism looks more like an autoimmune disease with every scientific finding. The injury sets off an internal repair process that occasionally gives people amazing gifts.

  11. Jayhuck

    So……you’re basically saying you agree with things you don’t understand? Good to know

    When something is way over my head I won’t argue with it. I’ll just site quiet and let the experts hash it out, hehe.

    Aromatosis… Wha? All I understand is that hormones have an impact on sex differentiation. I’ll let scientists figure out the finer, technical points.

  12. There are many straight genuises – Arthur Miller, Mikhail Barishnikov, Steven Hawking, Carl Sagan, Einstein, Mahatma Ghandi, Martin Luther, Galileo, Queen Victoria, Pastuer, Watson and Cricke, Salk, etc…

  13. Timothy Kincaid

    Is that an anti-gay site? Ok, the name is kind of corny but I didn’t immediately catch that. What? I just liked the science stuff. Now I gotta go look at that site again.

  14. Drowssap,

    So……you’re basically saying you agree with things you don’t understand? Good to know 🙂

  15. Quo,

    Current folks always have their detracters and real contributions tend to stand out over time. I deliberately excluded living people.

    But I really don’t think anyone can argue that Turing was “less important”. Perhaps you aren’t aware of him and his contributions, but without Alan Turing you probably wouldn’t be sitting at a computer. You might not be speaking English.

    I’m not making the case that all geniuses were gay. If homosexuality were removed from the population, there would probably still be those who think outside the box or whose brain works differently. For example, those with Asperger’s Syndrome often seem to excel (Bill Gates, for example).

    But I think it fair to say that – historically, at least – a disproportionate amount were either gay or not demonstrably heterosexual (which is why I said “probably Tesla” – alternately, he might have been asexual). Personally, I think that explains why God (or evolution, if you prefer) has gay folks in the equation.

    Drowsap,

    I think you rely too heavily on anti-gay propaganda. 🙂

    The “study” about body hair seems to exist only on the anti-gay site you once referenced and I’m not familiar with it elsewhere. From my casual observations, I would think that this conclusion is laughably wrong.

    As for penis size, I think that is taken from self-reported tracking by Kensey. It may possibly be correct but it’s pretty flimsy stuff to rely on too heavily.

    Eddy,

    I think you may be on to something about the “openness”. It is certainly not always the case, but there is something about the eyes of gay men that seems more accessable and less closed off than that of straight men. It may be cultural – straight men are often taught not to express emotions as readily, or something.

  16. Lynn David

    Wait a minute, on closer examination we were talking about the same hormone theory.

  17. Lynn David

    So what do you do to a homosexual man when you pump him up with testosterone, like they do in Saudi Arabia when they find you out? Well, besides making him more hirsute – which is one thing I think Saudi Arabia is after, to take away that feminine look – you also make the guy want more sex…. with men.

    Why does the crappiness of an idea directly correlate with the force a group uses to make someone do it?

    Increased level of crappiness = increased level of force applied.

  20. We couldn’t live in a world without Timothy Kinkaids but we could live in a world without Jeffrey Dahmers and Wayne Gacys.

    Really do we know enough to discriminate anyone?? Think of the contributions of Stephen Hawking.

  21. Drowssap wrote:

    Interestingly enough I’ve read that scientists think it is TOO MUCH exposure or absorption of testosterone that makes people gay, not a defecit.

    It’s not that some gay men have elevated testosterone levels [in the womb]; the elevated testosterone is a by-product of a hormonal sequence which is blocked. That sequence includes and proceeds from testosterone, which is catalyzed by aromatase into estradiol, which facilitates androgen to create certain ‘male’ attributes such as sexual orientation. Homosexually oriented men, like women, evidently have lower levels of estradiol because the sequence is blocked by low levels of aromatase, thus testoterone levels remain at high levels.

    Or at least that’s the idea behind it. So what do you do to a homosexual man when you pump him up with testosterone, like they do in Saudi Arabia when they find you out? Well, besides making him more hirsute – which is one thing I think Saudi Arabia is after, to take away that feminine look – you also make the guy want more sex…. with men.

  22. I’ve always been a people-watcher…not sure of all of the reasons…but I’ll tend to notice nuances that others don’t. Anyway, way back (1970) when I was a college freshman I swear I used to be able to tell who was gay. (My best friend was the most notorious gay man on campus so had ‘inside’ info on many.) He marvelled that I was right about 90% of the time.

    What I found most amusing, though, was that when I mistakenly identified someone as ‘gay’, in every case, it was a ‘born again Christian’. I later learned that I was unconsciously noticing a behavior pattern. For the most part, a straight guy walking across campus would hardly make eye contact. Both the gay men and the ‘born agains’, though, would try for eye contact. Eventually, my score improved when I realized that the ‘born agains’ would remain somewhat intent on the eye contact while the gay men would give you the once over and then return to the eye contact.

    No, this isn’t the formula for ‘gaydar’…times change, people change, communities change…but I do believe that the adept can spot certain traits that MIGHT indicate a person is gay. Naturally, we notice the times we’re confirmed to be right rather than the times when we missed it by a mile. And I can think of two recent situations where my gaydar (and that of several friends) was dead wrong. LOL! I accepted the fact that the two men declared themselves to be straight; my gay friends took a ‘they’re just fooling themselves’ position. (It occurred to me that I could start claiming 100% gaydar accuracy if I assumed THEIR stand. When you’re wrong just say “oh, they’re gay, they just don’t know it yet.”)

    And, over the years, both in the ministry and out, I met men who were perplexed at why so many gay men either came onto them or assumed they were gay. The common trait I noted was that they all had a ‘genuine openness’ about them. Was this trait being read wrong? Did that ‘openness’ appeal to some of the gay men so that they WISHED these guys were potential partners?

    Did their openness indicate that a flirtation would, at the worst, garner a polite ‘no, thanks’ rather than a bashing?

    No conclusions here…just some observations.

  23. Timothy,

    There have been plenty of straight genuises, maybe even more than there have been gay geniuses, so it is probably fair to conclude that genius would continue to exist even if homosexuality didn’t.

    I can’t help noting that all your gay geniuses (Newton’s gayness is news to me) are figures of the more or less distant past – and the more distant they are from us in time, the bigger the genisues they are. The more recent figures seem to be the less important ones, so can it be that gay genius is leveling off? The irony of it is that Plato, perhaps the biggest gay genius of all and one I’m surprised you didn’t mention, thought homosexual behaviour should be forbidden, which I guess is one contribution of his genius you don’t appreciate.

  24. Timothy Kincaid

    The most likely result is disaster – the creation of monster children hyper-masculinized and anti-social.

    Interestingly enough I’ve read that scientists think it is TOO MUCH exposure or absorption of testosterone that makes people gay, not a defecit. Some studies show that gay men have larger genitals and more body hair than straight men. Some systems shut off and stop receiving testosterone, while others keep welcoming more and more of it. Theoretically this is why gay men are more feminine in some ways and more masculine in others. Obviously the problem isn’t caused by maternal hormone levels or scientists would have figured the mystery out long ago. However it is almost certainly something related.

    As for the results of a preventive measure, yeah… who knows what will happen… Less geniuses? You could be right on that one.

  25. Christine,

    I tend to agree with you more. Alot of gaydar has to do with a person’s acculturation.

  26. Drowsap,

    I, for one, don’t think it “immoral” to try and “prevent” the same-sex attraction pre-natally. I just think it’s pointless and stupid.

    The most likely result is disaster – the creation of monster children hyper-masculinized and anti-social.

    The most benign result is beige. Surely if history has told us anything about homosexuality, it is that it quite often is tied to genius. Would we really want a world without Da Vinci, Michealangelo, Turing, Newton, and probably Tesla?

  27. Christine wrote:

    “I think what the “something” is, is merely non-heteronormative behavior in our culture.”

    I agree with you Christine. As a kid I learned early on what kind of behavior would get one labeled as “fag,” and learned not to do it, how to be a chameleon.

    I was convinced for awhile that I could “tell” when someone was gay, but I now chalk that up to wishful thinking. It’s not like I ever went up to the person I suspected and confirmed one way or the other whether or not they were gay.

    I think we (all people) are social creatures, we want to connect, be affirmed, not be alone. If there is something about us that disconnects and isolates, it seems we look for ways to find others who are like us. Maybe we develop cues that are more obvious to gays than straights, and thereby connect?

    Gaydar, like radar, was ‘invented’ to find what’s hidden. My understanding is that most communication is non verbal. Maybe gaydar is just normal communication skills highly sensitized? Like a blind person who has more sensitive hearing?

  28. Adult, medical cure for homosexuality: morally correct, a matter of personal choice

    Again with the bad phrasing! You can’t “cure” what isn’t a disease. What you mean is some medical means of changing a person’s sexual orientation. If such a means actually existed, and if someone I knew wanted it, I’d put on my geek hat and tell them what Wolverine told Rogue in X-Men 3: Just make sure you’re doing it for the right reasons. (Whether they wanted to change to gay or straight)

  29. At 14 I came out to a friend, a peer, just in high school. It didn’t go well and I somewhat tried to forget myself, my sexuality, thereafter. Now a year or so later I meet someone 5 years my elder who I have become an acquaintence of over the years. He tells me later when I am coming out to him, that at that first time we met I started talking sex to him, almost flirting, and yes he is gay as I would later learn. But that an older mutual friend of ours started talking over me and shut me up.

    When I finally came out to him, he told me this story and that he knew I was gay from that day. But how did I know he was gay? And moreover, why can’t I remember this (our mutual friend remembers it)? All I can come up with is that my denial was running deep at that time…. but I guess it bubbled up every so often.

  30. My hair swishes both ways… dang hard to control. Fingers fit, not overly long index, but the ratio is supposedly in the range…. I wonder if that is why some of us are into playing the organ. Then there is the increased density on the left thumb’s print. Strange. Then there’s the size….. whoops, this may be an open forum but I don’t think Dr T wants that mentioned.

    There is even suppossed to be a Dutch study concerning certain bodies within the hypothalamus that is associated with transgenderism…. but I haven’t been able to find such a study.

  31. I hate to say it, but there really is something to gaydar. If I were to see either Alan Chambers OR Randy Thomas walking down the street, I would, rightly or wrongly, peg them as gay. There must be SOMETHING to it – what that something is, I don’t know.

    I think what the “something” is, is merely non-heteronormative behavior in our culture.

    When I was butch looking, I pinged people’s gayder (straight and gay). I went against the heteronormative standards of our culture (what a woman is supposed to look, act, talk, and walk like).

    Now, as a byproduct of my own internal work (long story), I present much more traditionally “feminine” and heteronormative in looks and certain behaviors (not on purpose, as I always felt comfortable looking more butchy, it’s just more a reflection of what I see now as my true self).

    I almost never get “read” as a lesbian, unless I spend some time with people, or say or do something that would ID me as gay. I find I have to be much more intentional and upfront about being out.

    But I think that’s what gaydar really is.

    And that’s why folks think that the gay community is made up of people who are confused about their gender, because they only “see” the butch lesbians and the femme guys. Exodus and others are not alone when they wrongly conflate heteronormative behavior with sexual orientation.

    The rest of us who fly under the gaydar *are* out there, just rarely *seen* — which is why, imo, it is very important for everyone to be out if they are able, so folks can get a sense of the broad diversity among us.

  32. Boo

    You are correct, I screwed up and didn’t include the question. Obviously you understood what I was driving at anyway. I’m just curious what people think, I’m not questioning the value of their beliefs.

    People messing with other people’s heads without their consent or selectively aborting them for socially undesirable traits: morally incorrect.

    Your position is… (if I got it right)

    Adult, medical cure for homosexuality: morally correct, a matter of personal choice

    Prenatal vaccine to stop whatever causes homosexuality: immoral because the developing child didn’t have a choice.

  33. Jayhuck

    The Simon Le-Vay’s hypothalamus study took a lot of heat but it wasn’t “debunked.” The guy was probably onto something. Recent finding in gay sheep found the exact same phenomenon, a small sized nucleus inside the hypothalamus.

    Google it if you are interested, there are a billion links.

  34. BTW, if Matt Foreman or any other leader in the gay community is out there I’d like to ask a question.

    Sex Change Procedure: Morally correct, personal choice

    Sex Orientation Change Procedure: Clear and present danger, kill this procedure before it becomes a reality, should not be a personal choice.

    That’s not actually a question, it’s a series of loaded statements. But if we treat it as a question, then here’s another series of statements:

    People doing what they want to with their own bodies: none of anyone else’s business.

    People messing with other people’s heads without their consent or selectively aborting them for socially undesirable traits: morally incorrect.

  35. I blogged about it. Gaydar whatever… what I had issue with in this article is how little researched female sexuality is and the comment somewhere towards the end that said something about lesbianism as a myth.

  36. I hate to say it, but there really is something to gaydar. If I were to see either Alan Chambers OR Randy Thomas walking down the street, I would, rightly or wrongly, peg them as gay. There must be SOMETHING to it – what that something is, I don’t know.

    I thought the hypothalamus study had been debunked? There are plenty of other credibly contemporary studies, but I don’t think that’s one of them.

  37. Head whorl is closkwise, hand and finger shapes and sizes the EXACT same as my mother, ambidextrous, probably blink more than others (chalk this up to a family of law enforcement of some type), …. and what were the others??? Oh – have not had me head examined for hypothalamus size.

  38. BTW, if Matt Foreman or any other leader in the gay community is out there I’d like to ask a question.

    Sex Change Procedure: Morally correct, personal choice

    Sex Orientation Change Procedure: Clear and present danger, kill this procedure before it becomes a reality, should not be a personal choice.

  39. Matt Foreman, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force.

    “I will bet my life that if a quote-unquote cure was found, that the religious right would have no problem with genetic or other kind of prenatal manipulations. People who don’t think that’s a clear and present danger are simply not living in reality.”

    Matt is fundamentally correct, but I think a cure or preventative measure would be popular with parents across the entire political spectrum, not just the religious right.

  40. I read about the hair whorls a couple of weeks ago and since then I’ve been staring at the backs of people’s heads. Ok, admittedly questionable behavior 😎

    Although the picture shows perfect clockwise and counter-clockwise whorles I have yet to find such clearcut examples in person. Myself, I’ve got a mostly clockwise hair whorl, with some counter-clockwise spots. That is what I seem to see everywhere.

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