You really don’t understand how terrifying it would be for trans people and non-straight people if some correlation was found between not being cishet and genetics or an environmental factor like water pollutants.
That kind of data would be used to convince people that they’re “broken”. That there’s something wrong with who they are and that their existence is something that needs to be prevented or screened for. It would be used to justify conversion therapy and the medicalization of anything that deviates from being cis and heterosexual.
God forbid there be any correlation with mental or physical illnesses. That information would be used to justify eugenics and forced institutionalization of all LGBT+ people regardless of whether they’re disabled.
And what scientific value is there in knowing the “cause” of LGBT+ people existing? Who are you going to help with this information? Will you gain a deeper understanding of the universe and humanity? No. You don’t get anything tangible from this research.
Simply by looking for a “cause”, scientists show that they cannot accept our existence as anything other than a problem that needs to be erased. Every researcher who wants to answer this “question” is advocating genocide. There is absolutely no other way this information could be used.
I’m not autistic, so I might be way out of my lane here, and if so, I’m sorry. But … isn’t this basically the current status of the Autism Speaks appoach to autism research and “treatment?” A lot of people I follow and, who follow me, are both autisitic and trans, or trans and LGBQIA+ so they can speak more on this.
This just sounds so familiar. If they can paint it as a problem with a solution, then they can assert that people are also problems with a solution, and we don’t treat problems as people; we treat them like things to be solved, hidden or eliminated.
This is why I push back against the pathologization of transness and assertions that transness has any biological component, if it does and they find it, they’ll focus their energy on fixing us instead of just accepting us as we are. Transness is not a problem to be solved. It is a part of me that needs to be accepted.
Again, I apologize if I’m derailing, or speaking out of turn. It just seems to me that there’s an awful lot of parallels here.
Pretty much. They give way more money to research than resources.
I don’t want anyone looking for a “cause” for being gay/bi/ace/etc. unless they are just as intent on finding what leads people to be heterosexual. Not also having a desire to answer the latter question shows a lack of objectivity which is, frankly, unscientific.
Now, research on what leads to orientation from an objective socially-constructive approach where heterosexuality isn’t seen as a default or moral imperative does interest me. But not only would I doubt it would happen with our culture as it is now, I also don’t trust straight people with how they use this information or even to interpret it correctly.