On June 27, 2015, Noah Slater sent an email to the Unicode Consortium-the organization that approves new emoji-and requested that they officially add an emoji that depicted a rainbow flag. The Microsoft version of the emoji depicts the flag attached to a grey flag pole. On Twitter, the flag resembles a rectangle with rounded corners.
On most major platforms, the emoji depicts a flag waving in the wind that has, starting from the top, a red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and violet stripe. The emoji is a combination of the White Flag emoji ?️ and the Rainbow emoji ?. Clearly, there will be a lot of denial from groups like GLAAD and the left that this new study completely undermined the foundation of the gay rights movement.The Rainbow Flag emoji ?️?, also popularly called Pride Flag emoji, was added to Emoji 4.0 in 2016. “This new research also re-confirms the long-established understanding that there is no conclusive degree to which nature or nurture influence how a gay or lesbian person behaves,” said Zeke Stokes, the chief programs officer of the gay rights group GLAAD. What is the LGBT lobby to do? It appears they are trying to spin this study as reaffirming to their beliefs. But, the size and comprehensive nature of this new study ought to crush the “born that way” myth. Past studies have done little to shift public opinion on this. Will the release of this comprehensive study finally put this issue to rest? Doubtful. “So we decided to form a large international consortium and collected data for (almost) 500,000 people, (which) is approximately 100 times bigger than previous studies on this topic.” This new study “analyzed survey responses and performed analyses known as genome-wide association studies (GWAS) on data from more than 470,000 people who had given DNA samples and lifestyle information to the UK Biobank and to the U.S. “Previous studies were small and underpowered,” according to Ganna. nurture debate, but due to their small sample sizes were considered inadequate. There have been many other studies conducted in the past that have attempted to resolve the nature vs. “We scanned the entire human genome and found a handful – five to be precise – of locations that are clearly associated with whether a person reports in engaging in same-sex sexual behavior,” said Andrea Ganna, a biologist at the Institute of Molecular Medicine in Finland who co-led the research.Īccording to Ganna, these genetic variances have “a very small effect” on sexual behavior, and combined, only explain “considerably less than 1% of the variance in the self-reported same-sex sexual behavior.” This means that non-genetic factors, including environment, upbringing, personality, and nurture “are far more significant in influencing a person’s choice of sexual partner, just as with most other personality, behavioral and physical human traits,” according to the researchers. The research, which analyzed data on DNA and sexual experiences from almost half a million people, found there are thousands of genetic variants linked to same-sex sexual behavior, most with very small effects.įive of the genetic markers were “significantly” associated with same-sex behavior, the researchers said, but even these are far from being predictive of a person’s sexual preferences. A new comprehensive scientific study of the biological roots of sexual orientation released Thursday proved that there no “gay gene” and that genetic factors are insignificant in determining sexual orientation.
So, what happens when science proves that homosexuals aren’t “born that way”? Perhaps we’ll find out.