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Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!wivax!dyer
From: dyer@wivax.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.singles
Subject: Re: gay response response
Message-ID: <18563@wivax.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 30-Aug-83 12:05:02 EDT
Article-I.D.: wivax.18563
Posted: Tue Aug 30 12:05:02 1983
Date-Received: Thu, 1-Sep-83 03:54:57 EDT
References: <622@hou5d.UUCP>, <3179@utzoo.UUCP> <406@pyuxll.UUCP>
Organization: Wang Institute, Tyngsboro, Ma.
Lines: 23

I really wish these amateur geneticists would stop formulating their
theories as to why homosexuality "dies out" in one generation.

"Kinship theory", as mentioned earlier, is an attempt to explain
why certain behaviors are maintained in a gene pool even though
they seemingly work against their propagation.  In essence, an
organism does not have to reproduce in order to pass its genes
on to the next generation if its behavior increases the fitness
of its closely related relatives.  No one knows the causes of
homosexuality, and arguments as to its origin are as old as the
entire nature vs. nurture origin.  But kinship theory is a novel
(if somewhat far-fetched) application of sociobiological research
to human behavior.  If there is a "gay gene", it's carried
not only by gay people, but also by their parents and siblings.
So, given this theory, the gene survives regardless of whether
a gay individual has children.

You might argue, "How does a gay person increase the fitness of his
relatives?"  It's hypothesized that this was expressed only very early
in human societies, with gay people acting in "helper" roles,
and the gene remains today simply because there are no negative pressures
on its survival.