Page 70 - Push Back

LeVay’s findings were inconclusive. The majority of the homosexual men whose brains LeVay
studied had died of AIDS. There was no evidence given to determine whether the disease itself
had affected these men’s brains. It has also been demonstrated that people’s brains change due to
their behavior. An area of the brain may appear different in one individual at the end of their life
because they engaged in a particular behavior, not because the brain was that way when they
were born. Despite the glaring deficiencies of LeVay’s report, and his obvious lack of
impartiality, his work was lauded widely by those who were seeking support for their claim that
homosexual behavior is not a moral choice, that people are born gay.

The media began to latch hold of this study and spread the news that a search was on for a
genetic link to homosexuality. Newsweek ran a cover story on the search for a gay gene in 1992.
It was not long before more claims of a genetic link were forthcoming.

The esteemed journal Science, in July of 1993, published a study by Dean Hamer that suggested
that there might be a gay gene. Dean Hamer, working with a team of researchers at the National
Cancer Institute, chose 40 pairs of homosexual brothers for his study. He claimed that 33 pairs of
the men shared five markers on the long arm of the X chromosome. Hamer reported that his
findings indicated “a statistical confidence level of more than 99 percent that at least one subtype
of male sexual orientation is genetically influenced.” Hamer qualified his statements by using
words such as “suggest” and “seem to indicate.” He further admitted that there are hundreds of
genes in this area, and that most of them had not been clearly identified.

It should be noted that Hamer did not claim to have found a gay gene. He merely suggested that
sexual orientation was encoded in a person’s chromosomes. Yet, even this claim could not be
proven by Hamer and his research crew. His conclusions were reaching, and demonstrated a
desire to read into his studies a predetermined result. Once again, the media suspended all
skepticism, embracing the news of Dean Hamer’s work wholeheartedly, for its conclusions, no
matter how dubious, were what they needed to promote the idea that men and women are born
gay. With the reports of LeVay and Hamer, the media now had two “scientific” witnesses to
stoke the engine of their campaign for the advancement of homosexuality.

After the Hamer article was published in 1993, the media exploded with reports on a genetic
cause for homosexuality. Kim Painter, in USA Today, was the first newspaper reporter to
distribute this information. Painter wrote, “A predisposition for homosexuality appears to be
written into the very genes of some men... The possibility of obtaining our findings by chance is
extremely unlikely’ - below 1%, says lead author Dean Hamer.” The USA Today article never