There is natural ignorance and there is artificial ignorance. I should say at the present moment the artificial ignorance is about eighty-five per cent.  -Ezra Pound

Via the Log Cabin Republicans (yes…I know…) A little bit of shear brilliance from Chandler Burr:

The raging debate about gay rights ultimately turns on one simple question.  And, bizarrely, the fact that answering this question will put a definitive end to the national battle over gay rights is almost completely unknown, not only in America in general, but among gay people as well. At its core, the answer to this question is the only one that matters, the one that determines the most appropriate public policy course, and the one that will win the political struggle over gay rights: Is homosexuality a lifestyle choice or is homosexuality an inborn biological trait?  Put another way, does someone choose to be gay or are they just born that way?  You may be surprised to find out that we already know the answer to this question. In fact, surprising as it may be, we’ve known the answer for several decades.

I disagree that this is the only question that matters.  But never mind.  The brilliance I’m referring to here, isn’t in Burr’s framing of the question, but of his framing of the answer.  We’ve known the answer for several decades.  Yes.  Just so.  If the question is a pitch by the religious right, then Burr smacks it clear out of the ballpark with this…

A bit of Biology 101: For every human trait they study, clinicians and biologists assemble what’s called a "trait profile," the sum total of all the data they have gathered clinically (clinical research basically means research done through 1. questions and 2. empirical observation to answer the questions) about a trait. Researchers gather groups of subjects from different areas of the world, question them about their trait, observe the trait in them, and record the data. The various aspects of the trait are precisely described: gradations and variations in eye color are assessed, eye color’s correlation or lack thereof with gender, geography, race, or age is noted, scientists observe the way eye color is passed down through generations—all of which are clues as to whether or not eye color is a biological trait. The data are summarized in papers and charts and published in the scientific literature. That, in sum, makes up the trait profile.

Here is the profile of a trait on which clinical research has been done for decades. It is taken from the published scientific literature. The trait should be rather obvious:

1) This human trait is referred to by biologists as a "stable bimorphism"— it shows up in all human populations as two orientations— expressed behaviorally.

2) The data clinicians have gathered says that around 92% of the population has the majority orientation, 8% has the minority orientation.

3) Evidence from art history suggests the incidence of the two different orientations has been constant for five millennia.

4) The trait has no external physical, bodily signs.  That means you can’t tell a person’s orientation by looking at them. And the minority orientation appears in all races and ethnic groups.

5) Since the trait itself is internal and invisible, the only way to identify an orientation is by observing the behavior or the reflex that expresses it. However—and this is crucial—

6) –because the trait itself is not a "behavior" but an internal, invisible orientation, those with the minority orientation can hide, usually due to coercion or social pressure, by behaving as if they had the majority orientation. Several decades ago, those with the minority orientation were frequently forced to behave as if they had the majority orientation— but internally the orientation remained the same and as social pressures have lifted, people with the minority orientation have been able to openly express it.

7) Clinical observation makes it clear that neither orientation of this trait is a disease or mental illness. Neither is pathological in any observable way.

8) Neither orientation is chosen.

9) Signs of one’s orientation are detectable very early in children, often, researchers have established, by age two or three. And one’s orientation probably has been defined at the latest by age two, and quite possibly before birth.

These data indicated that the trait was biological, not social, in origin, so the clinicians systematically asked more questions. And these started revealing the genetic plans that lay underneath the trait:

10) Adoption studies show that the orientation of adopted children is unrelated to the orientation of their parents, demonstrating that the trait is not created by upbringing or society.

11) Twin studies show that pairs of identical twins, with their identical genes, have a higher-than-average chance of sharing the same orientation compared to pairs of randomly selected individuals; the average rate of this trait in any given population— it’s called the "background rate"—is just under 8%, while the twin rate is just above 12%, more than 50% higher.

12) This trait’s incidence of the minority orientation is strikingly higher in the male population— about 27% higher—than it is in the female population. Many genetic diseases, for reasons we now understand pretty well, are higher in men than women.

13) Like the trait called eye color, the familial studies conducted by scientists show that the minority orientation clearly "runs in families," handed down from parent to child.

14) This pattern shows a "maternal effect," a classic telltale of a genetic trait. The minority orientation, when it is expressed in men, appears to be passed down through the mother.

Put all this data together, and you’ve created the trait profile. The trait just described is, of course, handedness.

Yes.  What we’re all seeing with regard to human sexual orientation, is nothing new or surprising.  Burr compares the two traits, handedness and sexual orientation side-by-side and the likenesses are striking, as is the obvious conclusion.  We already know this…  I entered first grade back in 1959.  I remember vividly the sight of a classmate having his left arm tied down to his side by the teachers (two of them).  The boy’s parents had asked them to do that, if they saw the boy using his left hand to write or draw with.  The thinking being that if you just forced a kid to use their right hand, they would eventually grow out of using their left.  That was 1959.  You may notice that they’re not doing that to left handed kids anymore.  But there was a time when left-handedness was considered a mark of the devil.

It’s an image that has stuck in my mind ever since, and all the more so after I began my own process of coming to grips with my sexual orientation.  I’m gay.  You can pressure me into acting against it…teach me one lie after another about homosexuality, make me come to fear and loath my sexual nature so much I might never touch another male with desire without experiencing waves of guilt and self hatred and fear.  You can pass one law after another, penalizing and even criminalizing same sex relationships…in effect tying that part of me down.  And yet I am still gay.  The idea that you can make me not-gay by tying that part of me down is false.  You can no more make me not-gay then you can make me left handed by tying down my right arm.  That model of sexual orientation, as a learned or adaptive behavior is wrong.  It isn’t like that.  Neither was handedness.  But…we know that.

We’ve known the answer for several decades…  Burr, and many other people of good conscience, need to look at that simple fact.  I mean…really look at it.  Ironically, Burr gives it a glancing shot here:

Behavior isn’t sexual orientation, and the difference between behavior and orientation is as obvious as lying: When you tell a lie, you know perfectly well what the truth is inside…

And so do people like James Dobson, and all the others of his kind in the religious right, who routinely lie about the work of real scientists in order to incite anti-gay passions.  Because inciting anti-gay passions translates into money in the collection plate, and votes at the polls, and tens of thousands of obediant followers who jump whenever you tell them to…and more importantly, bend their knees.  You can’t distort the science the way the leaders of the religious right are, without knowing that you’re distorting it.  That’s lying.  And when you lie, you know you’re doing it.  They Know.

This is where Burr, and others, chiefly honest men and women of science and other civilized people, get it wrong.   Yes, facts matter, because ultimately you cannot fool nature.  But this isn’t a matter of convincing the opposition that they’re wrong.  They know they’re wrong, or they wouldn’t be lying.  The only question that matters isn’t whether sexual orientation is chosen or not, it’s whether the people who still insist that it is, have a conscience or not.  Because if they don’t have one, then appealing to it is utterly futile.

But…you should go read the rest of Burr’s piece.  For the shear pleasure of watching him smack the ball out of the park.  For the next time next time someone like Dobson goes babbling on about homosexuality and choice, so you can see with sickening clarity what a moral runt they are.  We don’t force right handedness on left handed kids because we know how damaging that is to them.  It’s damaging to gay kids too.  Profoundly so.  And yes…the religious right knows that too.  They’ve known for several decades.