Dr. Warren Throckmorton

The case of the San Jose/Evergreen Community College firing of June Sheldon is raising some eyebrows among academics, liberal and conservative . Here is the media version:

The controversy centers on an incident in June 2007, when Sheldon was asked by a student in a human heredity class about heredity’s impact on “homosexual behavior in males and females.” Among other references, Sheldon noted a German study demonstrating some link between maternal stress and homosexual behavior in males, according to the lawsuit.

After a student complained, college officials investigated and dismissed Sheldon, an adjunct professor at the school since January 2004. Court papers say the student expressed concern that Sheldon’s response was “offensive and unscientific.”

In the lawsuit and in a letter sent to the college district’s board of trustees, Sheldon, a veteran biology instructor, maintains she was simply providing students with an exchange on the “nature vs. nurture” aspect of sexual orientation. While acknowledging she was offering views that may have been controversial, Sheldon argues that it was relevant to the course work and part of important classroom dialogue.

“The textbook itself points out that the causes of homosexual behavior are a subject of debate in the scientific community,” said David Hacker, Sheldon’s lawyer. “This teacher did nothing more than explain this fact.”

The Foundation of Individual Rights in Education has taken on the issue and has a lengthy description of the case as well.

A biology professor, P.Z. Myers, who describes himself as a “godless liberal,” blogs about this at Pharyngula. He casts a somewhat skeptical eye on the complaint and makes some good points in the process. He provides links to relevant documents for those interested.

Coincidentally, this past week, I was researching for my book by reading Lisa Diamond’s new book Sexual Fluidity. By the way, this is an excellent book with a wonderful description of her research. On page 39, the maternal stress hypothesis is mentioned:

Another line of research on the neuroendocrine theory concerns male children born to mothers who were exposed to extremely high levels of stress during pregnancy. Animal research has found that such experiences can affect sexual differentiation in utero through a delay of the testosterone surge that influences brain masculinization.

Here she cites two studies, one led by Michael Bailey and the other by Lee Ellis, along with a review of biological studies with Brian Mustanski as the first author. In her account, professor Sheldon was citing Dorner’s work on hormones and brain differentiation. However, I suspect when this goes to trial, page 39 of Diamond’s book might also be presented in the court room.

Given what I have read regarding this situation, I like Sheldon’s chances in court. Professors present controversial material about subjects daily. Some (much?) of that material we do not agree with but present to help students become aware of the field as it is.

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Tony Snow, loved and respected journalist, died recently after a battle with cancer. George Archibald knew Tony Snow while they were both at the Washington Times. In this article, George remembers his friend as only an insider can.

George notes the imporatance of Snow's faith and his dedication to living it out in a tough environment for people of faith.

My colleague, Paul Kengor also provides a personal reflection about Mr. Snow here on Crosswalk.

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Recently, the Eight Circuit court of appeals ruled that a South Dakota law requiring doctors to tell women seeking an abortion that “the abortion will terminate the life of a whole, separate, unique, living human being” should be sent back to federal District Court to decide constitutionality. In the meantime, the state may begin enforcement of the law. According to an AP story, The court ruled on June 27

that Planned Parenthood, which operates South Dakota’s only abortion clinic in Sioux Falls, has not provided enough evidence that it is likely to prevail.

“The bottom line is if the state Legislature orders a professional to tell the truth, that’s not a violation of the First Amendment,” said South Dakota Attorney General Larry Long, who is defending the law in court.

Mimi Liu, a lawyer for the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, said such rulings generally take about three weeks to take effect. Long said it could take less time.

Predictably, reaction was mixed to the ruling

Harold Cassidy, a lawyer representing two pregnancy counseling centers that support the abortion law, hailed the ruling.

“We think it’s a big victory for the woman obviously to be given accurate information in order to make a decision not only for the child, but also for herself,” Cassidy said.

Sarah Stoesz, president of Planned Parenthood in Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota, said the law would force doctors to read ideological language to women seeking abortions.

“They are imposing compelled speech on doctors. It is not about providing information to women. It is about intruding in the doctor-patient relationship. It is unprecedented and extremely outrageous,” Stoesz said.

According to the AP story, the law also requires women to be told the potential mental health risks of abortion. I have addressed that informed consent issue in prior articles.

Two points are at issue: prescribing professional speech and the accuracy of the prescribed speech. Professional disclosure is sometimes prescribed by law. For instance, many states require licensed psychotherapists to provide a disclosure statement to clients regarding services and means of handling complaints. The South Dakota statement is very specific and no doubt is intended to discourage abortions. The second issue is the accuracy of the information. Pro-life advocates are united that abortion ends a life, hence their opposition to abortion. But what do pro-choice doctors believe? Do they really believe performing an abortion results in the termination of a life? To get this perspective, I consulted noted abortion doctor and friend of Hillary Clinton, Dr. William Harrison. I referred to Dr. Harrison via Dr. Paul Kengor’s book on the faith of Hillary Clinton in a former post, noting that Dr. Harrison was

Hillary’s personal OB-GYN in the early 1970s in Fayetteville, Arkansas. He has done about 20,000 abortions. He was interviewed at length for my book. He was quite candid, extremely open, and very generous with his time. He likewise is a Methodist. He says that he prays to God that Hillary will be our next president.

I emailed Dr. Harrison regarding the South Dakota law. While his prayers regarding Hillary have not been answered, he clearly does not support the Republican ticket due to his pro-choice position as will be clear from his responses to me. I asked him if the South Dakota statement was accurate, to which he replied

Life is being terminated when a male wears a condom, or has a wet dream or “spills his seed of life on the ground” or in someone’s mouth or anus. Or when he ejaculates into the vagina of a women who isn’t ovulating or is post menopausal. The sperm are alive until they die. And the egg is alive until it dies. Each is a unique human life, etc.

The only reason the S.Dakota leg passed that law was to either make a girl or woman who was not prepared to have a baby have that baby, or to make her suffer as much emotionally as they could.

It is a piece of shit legislation, designed solely to increase human suffering. A few days ago I wrote a letter to our state and local newspapers. I will send you a copy which describes exactly what I think about this type of legislation.

I wrote back and asked for clarification regarding prevention of conception and ending of life. He then provided the copy of the letter to the editor he mentioned in the first email which makes his views even more clear. He gave permission to use both email replies. The Christian acquaintance referred to in this letter is my GCC colleague and author, Paul Kengor.

Letter to the editor.

A few days ago I got a question from a Christian Pro-Life acquaintance. [What follows is a paraphrase of part of a letter I got from your friend and colleague. I sent him a somewhat longer reply. I also sent him a copy of my book, There is a Bomb In Gilead. Ask him to let you read it.]

“I understand fully that you see your work as saving women from an unwanted pregnancy that might, if illegal, lead them to dangerous “back alley abortions,” doing them great harm or perhaps even killing them. I, as a prolife Christian, don’t want to see them hurt or killed. On the other hand, by doing an abortion, you are taking a life – an innocent one that has no say in the decision. I rarely hear pro-choicers lament that decision, the loss of the unborn.

“Do you ever regret that part of the decision? How do you come to terms with that, or do you not see the fetus as a life or a person? I don’t want to see either one die, and would do my best to save both. But your work on the other hand, seeks the end of one of these lives. How do you justify that decision?”

Here is my answer: Anyone who has delivered as many babies as I have, and has seen hundreds of living and dead embryos and fetuses being spontaneously aborted as have I, knows exactly what we are doing when we provide an elective abortion for our patient. We are ending the life of an embryo or a fetus. Not the life of a person, but certainly a creature that might have become a person under other circumstances. When I am asked this question, I always go back to two of the most insightful and beautiful verses of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khyyam.

Oh, if the world were but to recreate
That we might catch ere closed the Book of Fate
And make the Writer on a fairer leaf
Inscribe our names, or quite obliterate.

Better, oh, better cancel from the Scroll
Of universe one luckless Human Soul,
Than drop by drop enlarge the Flood that roars
Hoarser with Anguish as the ages roll.

When Omar wrote his beautiful and treasured poem over a thousand years ago, mankind had no way of safely canceling “from the scroll of universe one luckless human soul” whose numbers make up that flood of howling anguish; at least, no way of canceling it without risking also the life of the woman carrying it. In this day of medical marvels and, hopefully, ever increasing social justice, we possess such a way.

Embryos and fetuses spontaneously aborted - most, but not all of those “canceled” by “God” - are just such luckless human souls. But a few spontaneous abortions occur in desired pregnancies with no discernable abnormalities. For those girls and women and their families whose circumstances would make their babies “luckless human souls,” I “cancel” them before they become babies.

Physicians who save wanted babies from being spontaneously aborted (and we can save a few now that God once seemed determined to abort), and we who cancel “luckless human souls” are doing God’s work.

Want to increase Omar’s flood of anguish? Just vote to put John McCain in the White House and Pro-Lifers in your legislatures and the U.S. Congress.

Can the worldview divide get any greater? In my view, life is sacred  and in Dr. Harrison's view, life is subject to means testing. Practically, I am quite sure there are many couples out there who would say that none of these "luckless human souls" are unwanted. Extending this thinking is chilling indeed. Who decides what "family circumstances" warrant the status of being "luckless?" Who decides who is luckless and who is not? In my view, the lucky ones are those who escape a visit to the abortion clinic.

Speaking of decisions, Dr. Harrison places his views in the context of the current election. Clearly there is an ideological divide between Barack Obama and John McCain, the religious left and religious right on abortion. While Dr. Harrison does not like the South Dakota legislation, it does appear that if the wording was changed from “terminate a life" to “cancel a soul," he would view the information as accurate. I fail to see the difference.

What would Mr. Obama and Mr. McCain say about this?

Weigh in here and/or at my personal blog on this topic.

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A new study of twins from Swedish and British researchers indicates that sexual orientation may result from the variable operation of multiple factors, both pre- and post-natal. The study, titled Genetic and Environmental Effects on Same-sex Sexual Behavior: A Population Study of Twins in Sweden, was conducted and published by Niklas Langstrom, Qazi Rahman, Eva Carlstrom and Paul Lichtenstein online in the Archives of Sexual Behavior.

Here is the abstract of the article:

There is still uncertainty about the relative importance of genes and environments on human sexual orientation. One reason is that previous studies employed selfselected, opportunistic, or small population-based samples. We used data from a truly population-based 2005–2006 survey of all adult twins (20–47 years) in Sweden to conduct the largest twin study of same-sex sexual behavior attempted so far. We performed biometric modeling with data on any and total number of lifetime same-sex sexual partners, respectively. The analyses were conducted separately by sex. Twin resemblance was moderate for the 3,826 studied monozygotic and dizygotic same-sex twin pairs. Biometric modeling revealed that, in men, genetic effects explained .34–.39 of the variance, the shared environment .00, and the individual specific environment .61–.66 of the variance. Corresponding estimates among women were .18–.19 for genetic factors, .16–.17 for shared environmental, and 64–.66 for unique environmental factors. Although wide confidence intervals suggest cautious interpretation, the results are consistent with moderate, primarily genetic, familial effects, and moderate to large effects of the nonshared environment (social and biological) on same-sex sexual behavior.

Reactions are mixed but not really along any ideological grounds that I can see. For instance, from ScienceNOW:

J. Michael Bailey, a psychologist at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, who led earlier twin studies of sexual orientation, calls the new study “good, important, and one unlikely to be bettered in the near future.” But Jonathan Beckwith, a geneticist at Harvard Medical School in Boston, says that the new work fails to overcome a number of problems faced by previous twin studies. He notes that the final sample included only 12% of the males in the Swedish registry, leaving open the possibility of recruitment bias. And Beckwith says that the failure to control for family environment could inflate estimates of genetic influence.

Co-author Qazi Rahman, was quoted by the Washington Post:

“This study puts cold water on any concerns that we are looking for a single ‘gay gene’ or a single environmental variable which could be used to ’select out’ homosexuality — the factors which influence sexual orientation are complex. And we are not simply talking about homosexuality here — heterosexual behavior is also influenced by a mixture of genetic and environmental factors,” study co-author Dr. Qazi Rahman, a leading scientist on human sexual orientation, said in a prepared statement.

I intend to devote at least one more post to this study as I agree with Michael Bailey that it is an important study. I think along with the other 2 population based studies (Bailey’s in 2000 and Kendler’s also in 2000), it provides a picture of modest genetic effects along with a major role for non-shared enviromental factors. Many roads lead to a similar result. Nothing in this study provides a clear picture of what those environmental factors are but a simple environmental explanation (e.g., poor parenting) or genetic source (single gene, or uniform action of several genes) is not supported here.

Rahman added in the Post article:

“Overall, genetics accounted for around 35 percent of the differences between men in homosexual behavior and other individual-specific environmental factors (that is, not societal attitudes, family or parenting which are shared be twins) accounted for around 64 percent. In other words, men become gay or straight because of different developmental pathways, not just one pathway,” Rahman said.

To my eye, the research over the past several years has pointed in this direction. I believe this new study as well as new brain scan work from Sweden as well as Northwestern University in the US render any exclusive environmental source of sexual orientation unlikely. In Evangelical circles, the prevailing view is that homosexual attractions derive from disrupted or perceived poor relationships with same-sex parents prior to age 6. While many who consider themselves ex-gay have had unhappy childhood relationships, these relationships are not of necessity causative in their sexual adjustment. Furthermore, there are many same-sex attracted people and their parents who are quite close without the kinds of problems described by those who hold the environmental theories. I believe Evangelicals need to come to grips with these findings and modify their perspectives in line with what we are learning about the complexity of sexuality.

To discuss the issues of sexual identity, and sexual orientation, please comment here and at my personal blog which frequently takes up these issues.

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