Well, now I've seen three of my current areas of interest collide: queer issues, vegetarianism/animal rights, and brain science. And not in a good way.
Researchers at Oregon State University are experimenting on 'male-oriented rams' (about 5-8% of all rams apparently are uninterested in mating with female rams, though not all of them try to mate with male sheep). Essentially, they are conducting experiments to alter their male orientation to be female oriented. This is done through various heartless methods, and of course ends with the death of the rams and the dissection of their brains.
Read details in the Oregonian.
Because there is no reason on the planet to try and 'fix' a 'problem' with 5% of all male sheep, it doesn't seem like to large a stretch of the imagination that these experiments may have intended impact on humans at some point, not just sheep. In fact, the researchers have said exactly that, in a 2004 journal article (Physiol Behav 83:233-245): "This research also has broader implications for understanding the development and control of sexual motivation and mates selection across mammalian species, including humans..." (cited in a PETA letter picking apart the Universities' lame excuses for doing these experiments)
As a gay person, I'm offended by this research. I can't say why it'd be worth anyone's time to try and change the way that only 5% of all rams are? Can you? I don't want to think that these researchers have an alternate agenda against gay humans, but it's hard not to suspect that that is someone's goal here. Gay people have been belittled, degraded, and treated inhumanely, including attempts to exterminate us, in the past -- so please forgive me if I'm seeming sensitive about experiments that are supposed to make any creature 'un-gay'.
I've been having this nagging little thought in the back of my brain, as I read more about neuroscience, genetics, and brain research: will it really be a good thing if a genetic or biological basis (or even tendency) for homosexuality is found? One the one hand, it completely vindicates what most gays and lesbians feel: that they were born this way -- and punishing us for an fact of birth is wrong (and immoral). However, people being what they are, and science being what it is, we can all be sure that if there is a 'test' for homosexuality that can be given in utero, some (maybe most all at this point in time) parents will get that test, and most (maybe all) I'd guess will stop that pregnancy. [out, I'm sure, of what they feel is a good motivation, to 'save' their prospective child from what they misunderstand to be a lifetime of strife]
And so, voila! No gays and lesbians. Extermination through birth selection. Hello, eugenics, been a while since we saw you last.
A long ways off? Wrong. Genetic screening for fetuses is already here. Sex can be screened for, and in effect, selected for legally. Screening for genetic diseases will be next. If the 'gay' markers are known, how would anyone stop anyone from exercising their own right over their own bodies? [Science and technology is already paving the way to the potential elimination of one group of people -- the deaf culture - see Sound and Fury.]
There are going to be tough times ahead, with some hard choices to make: are we against all genetic screening? are we against a woman's right to control her own body? should we begin a campaign to make sure the genetic/biological basis of homosexuality is never found? Will it all come down in 5 years or 20? No way of knowing. Where will gays and lesbians be by that time? Accepted by society? Enough not to be screened out at birth? Will we shrink to .5% of the population?
For me, it creates even more urgency about the public education that needs to be done about gays and lesbians, because if by the time this all comes to pass, we're still viewed as having a problem that needs to be fixed, we're going to get fixed, and good.
Sign the PETA online campaign.
More information on the bad science behind this work, and the connection to intersex issues.
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