Suspicious science...

There is a section from Winston Churchill's Finest Hour speech which comes to my mind and which I paraphrase here ... the whole world, including the United States ...will sink into the abyss of a new dark age made more sinister, and perhaps more protracted, by the lights of perverted science.
C

I wonder if science will ever have a test to determine at birth if someone is going to be a Baptist, Lutheran, Catholic, or Scientologist? Or maybe a Republican or Democrat...

I read a short sci-fi story where in the future most gays were catholic because when they discovered prenatal gay screening, the church still was anti-abortion.
You'd think there would be other more important things for these people to be researching. Like genetic diseases that actually affect people's health.

Here's part of the reason this article is shite:

Lesbian Mice from the Telegraph said:

Researchers found that disabling the FucM gene – which influences the levels of oestrogen to which the brain is exposed – caused the mice to behave as if they were male as they grew up.

Click to expand...

The definition of Lesbian underlying the article is "female mice who act like male mice" which then, in human terms (note the disclaimer in the article about the effects of estrogen/oestrogen) means Lesbians are women who act like men.

False​

Lesbians are women who are sexually and emotionally and romantically attracted to other women.

Women are infinitely varied in our traits, our abilities, our natures, and our skill sets.

You might almost think we were sentient.

There is so much fail in that article. Medievalist already pointed it out.

If anything, this is making transsexual mice, not lesbian mice. You'd think if they were going through all the trouble of doing this project, they'd do some very basic research into what "lesbian" means.

EDIT: It is possible that the journalists doing the article just cherry-picked a really complex explanation by the scientists and twisted it to mean what they wanted it to mean. That happens a lot with science journalism, from what I've seen.

I don't think research into a genetic cause for homosexuality is necessarily homophobic in nature. But it is easily and often turned that way.

I can't tell if that incorrect line in this article is just the journalists' misunderstanding/simplification or the scientists'.

But after all, there is a genetic reason for the male and female sex, so it stands to reason there could be a genetic reason for gender as well.

kuwisdelu said:

But after all, there is a genetic reason for the male and female sex, so it stands to reason there could be a genetic reason for gender as well.

Click to expand...

I think there are likely multiple reasons behind sex determination, and no it's not just xx and xy, and behind gender, and again, it's not just m, f, n (you know there are human languages with as many as six genders?), and yeah, sexual orientation and specific attraction.

But there's also the thing that we are sentient, (or some of us are . . . ) and we DO have volition and self-determination.

And we do fall in love, and we find we like some things, and some people, and not others. And that, I'm convinced is not necessarily genetic at all and that it's at least part experiential.

friendlyhobo said:

You'd think there would be other more important things for these people to be researching. Like genetic diseases that actually affect people's health.

Click to expand...

Article spin, after the results. They weren't interested, primarily, in the sexual behaviour of mice; they were interested in the FucM gene. (How do you pronounce that?)

Here's the study. This is what they're saying:

The most apparent abnormality was a mutant female avoiding a normal male partner in the regular mating cage, while a slight loss in body weight and minor behavioral change were occasionally observed for the hetero- or homozygous mutant animals (data not shown). Thus, we systematically analyzed the reproductive behaviors of FucM mutant mice.

Click to expand...

They were researching sexual behaviour because that's where they observed the biggest difference between altered and un-altered mice.

I didn't read all of the article, because, frankly, I don't understand half of it. But it's clear they weren't making "lesbian mice". They were replacing one gene with another and observing the difference. Also, I have trouble judging how big the effect is; I'd have to look in more detail at the statistics. It's clear that there's a continuum in behaviour, though, rather than a clear cut either/or difference.

Here's a better (= more detailed) summary than the original link (though it's probably still overstating the result).

This quote (from the above article) pretty much shows that their focus is purely biological:

Speaking about the results, Park said: "We speculate that these behavioural changes are likely to be related to a neurodevelopmental change in pre-optic area of the female mutant brain , becoming similar to that of a normal male".

Click to expand...

***

thothguard51 said:

I wonder if science will ever have a test to determine at birth if someone is going to be a Baptist, Lutheran, Catholic, or Scientologist? Or maybe a Republican or Democrat...

Click to expand...

Are we still talking about mice? (That's raw material for an Onion article, lol.)

So how long until we see hot girl-on-girl mice action?

kuwisdelu said:

So how long until we see hot girl-on-girl mice action?

Click to expand...

I wanna see Gadget from Rescue Rangers and Minnie Mouse! *gets popcorn*

Seriously though, what exactly were they originally trying to determine with this experiment? Because that joke above seems like it's almost a valid reason for something this weird.

Polenth said:

Look up Dr. Maria New giving dexamethasone to pregnant mothers. It's clear from her comments that she considers homosexual, bisexual or masculine behaviours as abnormal in girls. The drug is experimental and no one really knows what it'll do in the long term to those babies. (It's also being used to stop intersex people from being intersex before they have a say in it, which is already a vexed issue in the intersex community).

Click to expand...

Here's an article on it:
http://www.thehastingscenter.org/Bioethicsforum/Post.aspx?id=4754&blogid=140

...the use of prenatal dexamethasone treatments for CAH represents, to our knowledge, the first systematic medical effort attached to a “paradigm” of attempting in utero to reduce rates of homosexuality, bisexuality, and “low maternal interest.”

Click to expand...

That this is a goal, whether or not it works, truly terrifies me.

Shiny said:

Here's an article on it:
http://www.thehastingscenter.org/Bioethicsforum/Post.aspx?id=4754&blogid=140



That this is a goal, whether or not it works, truly terrifies me.

Click to expand...

Wow. That woman isn't just sexist but also just plain insane. Of course there's also the hypocrisy that she herself is in a non-traditional role. If she believes what she says about women, shouldn't she be home baking a pie or pumping out babies?

Polenth said:

Experiments where mice genes are damaged/mutated/replaced are done all the time. They're trying to figure out what everything does, and knocking out a gene is the easiest way to see that. It's not an unusual experiment type at all. There'll be a day when they've tested every mouse gene.

I'm sure the media latched onto this one for the 'lesbian mice!' headline potential. Most mouse gene studies go unnoticed.

Click to expand...

And despite the reporting, it's probable that the scientists were testing something else entirely. Female mice may have different behavior patterns than male mice that have nothing to do with sexuality, and everything to do with, say, maze navigation, reactions to predators, behavior in light vs darkness, how often they want to eat, whether they sleep in the left corner versus the right corner, et cetera ad nauseum. Comparative psychologists do good work, but my GOD their subject is boring.

I think the search for the gay gene will extend to the womb and then will lead to the choice of aborting the fetus. I hope it's never found if it does exist.

Shadow Dragon said:

Wow. That woman isn't just sexist but also just plain insane. Of course there's also the hypocrisy that she herself is in a non-traditional role. If she believes what she says about women, shouldn't she be home baking a pie or pumping out babies?

Click to expand...

That was my first thought, too...

You know the sexual behavior that they're specifically not referring to coyly wrt to the mice?

The lordotal reflex.

Medievalist said:

You know the sexual behavior that they're specifically not referring to coyly wrt to the mice?

The lordotal reflex.

Click to expand...

Women wearing high heels? Or ANYONE wearing high heels?

timp67 said:

Women wearing high heels? Or ANYONE wearing high heels?

Click to expand...

You do know the slang term for really high high heels?

Unimportant said:

Is it reasonable that just 2% of the population would be self-identified as QLTBAG?

Click to expand...

Sounds kind of low. But then it's been known for years that when it comes to surveys about sex then people will lie. Even if the survey answers won't be linked to their name and will remain forever anonymous they still lie. Even if they've volunteered to answer the questions knowing in advance they are about sex they still lie.

When it comes to sex people are basically big fat liars.

Unimportant said:

Is it reasonable that just 2% of the population would be self-identified as QLTBAG?

Click to expand...

That does seem low. Most of the numbers I've seen range from 8-10% for people who identify as any form of QLTBAG. This is just based on what I remember reading--I don't have any sources handy.