A question about sexual orientation . . .

Is being gay caused by having an absent father or controlling mother?

Years ago, in the decade of the 1950s, psychiatrists believed that a boy "turned out to be" gay due to having an absent father and a domineering (controlling) mother. Despite the fact that this belief is decades old and comes from the days of the Cold War, it is currently what fundamentalists believe as to why some men are gay. But close scrutiny reveals that this theory simply cannot be true. Here's why . . .

 

• The psychiatric/psychological communities reject this theory outright. In fact, they do not merely reject it. They state outright that it is false. When considering a particular theory (about any subject), it would be wise to listen to the people who invented that very theory, especially if they tell you they were wrong.

 

• This theory cannot be true because it fails to explain why gay men have no attraction for women. Fundamentalists who accept this debunked theory say that having an absent father creates an emotional void in a boy, causing him to seek sexual intimacy from other males. This reasoning does not logically stand because it does not explain the absence of a sexual attraction toward females.

 

• If a gay man did have a distant father, the distance was a result of the son's sexuality, not the other way around. In other words, a distant father didn't make his son gay. Rather, a gay son made his father distant. It is common for parents to realize, often unconsciously, that their very young child is a gay person. The father distances himself (again, often unconsciously) and the mother, due to the fact that she must fill the resulting void, is seen as domineering.

 

• Since fundamentalists claim that only 2% of the male population is gay, it logically follows that they must also therefore believe that only 2% of the male population had distanced or absent fathers. The reality is that having issues with one's parents are very common amongst almost all of us. Millions of heterosexuals had distant or absent fathers.

For any of a number of reasons, a father may not be active in the life of his child. The father could be a "deadbeat dad" who is simply absent. He could be an alcoholic. He could have a drug problem. He could have died early in the child's life, and so forth. Countless heterosexual men had distant fathers and they did not become gay.

 

• If this theory were true, the sons of single mothers would be more likely to be gay. No increase in the percentage of gay men born to single ("fatherless") mothers has ever been found. If having an absent father made a boy more likely to be gay, we would have found a higher percentage of gay men born to single mothers. No such correlation has ever been found.

 

In conclusion . . .

Fundamentalists are willing to accept the "absent father/domineering mother" theory of Freudian psychiatry from the 1950s because those antiquated, debunked theories support their bigotry against gay and lesbian people.

Yet, these same fundamentalists remain unwilling to accept what psychologists and psychiatrists say about sexuality today, and that fact is a most damaging indictment. This proves that fundamentalists are willing to use non-Biblical sources like psychology and psychiatry, but only when those schools of thought serve to confirm their already pre-existing beliefs.

In other words, they have no desire to actually learn anything from psychiatrists or psychologists, but will use their findings for political gain when those findings agree with what they already believe.

When mental health professionals do contradict the pre-existing beliefs of fundamentalists (as modern psychiatrists and psychologists now do on the issue of sexual orientation), it suddenly becomes a "pseudo-science" that is not even worth simple acknowledgment.

Quite frankly, the author of this page believes that fundamentalists should be embarrassed about their use of Freudian psychiatric dogma from the 1950s.

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