Bryan Fischer at the AFA is an idiot.

I hate to repeat myself, because at this point only blithering idiots make this claim, but let me repeat: there is no reason to believe homosexuality would be selected against by evolutionary pressures. None.

But Bryan Fischer at the AFA insists on trotting out the canard, despite the solid refutation, claiming

In truth, evolutionists should be even more ardent opponents of homosexual behavior than evangelical Christians, for one simple reason: homosexuals cannot propagate.

And evolution is supposed to be all about the survival of the species. For a true believer in evolution, homosexuality represents an evolutionary degrade, an lunge backward, an evolutionary nightmare, evidence of a species that is de-evolving and headed toward extinction.

For true Darwinists, homosexual behavior must be stopped its tracks so the great cosmic dance of life can continue in its inexorable climb toward evolutionary perfection.

So unless a Darwinist is a raving, irrational, self-contradictory hypocrite, he will oppose the normalization of homosexual behavior with every fiber of his being.

Well, I hate to break it to you, Bryan, but there are plenty of other conditions that happen much more often in the human organism that prevent reproduction than mere homosexuality, yet none of them have been selected out of the species. The genetic components of homosexual etiology haven't been selected out for the same reason that those for Tay-Sachs syndrome, sickle-cell anemia, low libido, or clerical celibacy (note, I am not equating homosexuality with a disease or dysfunction; I am only highlighting other human conditions that have disenfranchised some people from the pool of reproducing individuals) have been selected out.

To point out the obvious from my own work assembling the evidence:

• Homosexual behavior exists in hundreds of animal species (Bagehmil, 1998).
• Genes for homosexuality could be beneficial on the whole. In bonobo chimpanzees, homosexual interactions are a form of social cement. It is possible that homosexuality evolved to serve social functions in humans, too (Kirkpatrick 2000). After all, social cohesion is still a main function of sex in humans.
• The genetic etiology of homosexuality may come from a collection of traits that, when expressed strongly and in concert, result in homosexuality; expressed less strongly or without supporting traits, these traits contribute to the robust nature of our species. The genes for these traits persist because they usually combine to make us better at survival and reproduction.
• Genetic factors linked to homosexuality in men apparently boost fertility in women. Female relatives of gay men, on their mother's side of the family, had more children than female relatives of heterosexual men. (Corna et al. 2004)
• Homosexuals still have children. Sexual orientation is not an either-or trait but exists as a continuum (Haynes 1995). Those with some heterosexual orientation can still contribute homosexual genes (to the extent it is genetic; see above). And even the most extreme homosexuals sometimes have children.
• The most manifest heterosexuals may have homosexual tendencies, too. Homophobic male heterosexuals showed more arousal to homosexual images than did nonhomophobic heterosexuals (Adams et al. 1996). Societal condemnation of homosexuality may contribute to its genes being propagated by causing latent homosexuals to behave heterosexually.

That last bit about traits-in-concert is especially important: for millenia, polygamy has been the most common state of human affairs. Here's the sad truth: for the seven thousand years of human civilization, it's entirely possible that as much as half of all men never got to reproduce. Their access to reproductive resources was curtailed by powerful cultural forces and the power-law of primitive economics. That half went on to die in miserable ways, usually intertribal warfare. Homosexuality may even have been selected-for as a way of pacifying a dangerous population.

That Fischer is an idiot who doesn't know his science isn't news. But it bears repeating, especially when he treads on my ground.

Annoying Misogyny...

On XTube, the video site for porn, you have two basic choices: "I am a ( )Man ( )Woman, and I like [ ]Men, [ ]Women." Your sex is a singular choice, but your prefence is multiple choice. When you first visit the site, the settings default to "I am a Man and I like Women."

If you click on "[ ]Men," you get "both." The correct way to specify your preference up front is to click the other choice, to say in effect, "I don't like women." The software, confronted with the choice of not liking either, switches over to the other.

I just find that wrong, in a vaguely irritating way. The best way for a program to seem smart is to not do anything stupid. XTube hasn't done anything programmatically wrong, but it is doing something stupid.