Two news stories have appeared in the past few days on the subject of genetics and sexuality/gender. The first was a piece in The Economist that looks at possible evolutionary advantages for non-conformant gender behavior. The other was a story about some research in Australia that claims to have found a genetic component to transsexuality (reported here and here, amongst many other places outside of the US where the story appears to have sunk without trace).

In both cases the scientists involved, and even the reporters, seem to acknowledge the complexity of the subject. For example, The Economist notes that in selecting for gender non-conformant behavior evolution can have both successes and failures – “successes” in that, for example, more feminine men may make better husbands, and “failures” in that homosexual men don’t reproduce. Equally Metro’s report on the Australian study quotes one of the team as saying, “the gene was not the reason behind all male-to-female sex change operations, suggesting multiple genetic factors were involved.”

Unfortunately much of the world still has a predilection for binary thinking, and consequently various people will doubtless be trumpeting both of these stories as “proof” or something or other, or of failing to provide “proof” (and consequently being lies and distortions, because in the Internet age nothing can ever be wrong without there being some secret conspiracy of evil causing it to be wrong). Human beings, it seems, prefer everything in black and white.

Sadly the real world isn’t black and white, which brings us to a third news story. Some time ago Mike Penner, a sports reporter at the LA Times, transitioned to become Christine Daniels amongst a great deal of fanfare. The newspaper, as far as I could see, treated the whole thing very responsibly, though the talk radio crowd were predictably unpleasant. Last week, very quietly, Christine went back to being Mike.

I have no idea what actually went on here, and in that case all I can do is take the story at face value and assume that Mike came to the conclusion that being Christine was, for whatever reason, not right for him. And this, I contend, would count as a success. Because the universe of transgender people is not divided into “good transsexuals” who should be transitioned forthwith, and “bad transsexuals” who should be prevented from doing so. Nor can any doctor, no matter how experienced, manage to correctly diagnose everyone he sees. Having a test for a “tranny gene” will not help with that. Part of the process of transsexual treatment is to encourage the patient to experiment with life in the other gender to find out what is right for him/her. Some people can (and in that case probably should) change their minds.

Idiots like Julie Bindel will doubtless be hailing Penner’s “de-transition” as “proof” that no one need transition and that those people who do have been somehow brainwashed by evil doctors. This is no more the case than the fact that some women come to regret having an abortion is “proof” that all abortion should be banned. Human beings are complex animals. While there are definitely biological and sociological influences on how we behave, no one is anywhere near close to being able to understand how humans are programmed and being able to change that programming with any degree of confidence.

So yes, scientific evidence of some sort of genetic component to homosexuality and transsexuality is very interesting, and useful in helping to debunk myths that people who are gay or transgender are simply perverts who could change their ways if given sufficient incentive. But such scientific evidence is nowhere near conclusive enough to provide hard and fast rules for treatment, or to divide people into distinct groups. Each human being is an individual, and deserves to be treated as such.