Bailey, Cochran and Sailer on Homosexuality and Eugenics

by Lynn Conway & Anjelica Kieltyka

 

Copyright © 2004 by Lynn Conway & Anjelica Kieltyka.

All rights reserved [Draft Version of 3-5-04]

 

 

 

Bailey: "Evolutionarily, homosexuality is a big mistake"*

 

*J. Michael Bailey on KOOP-FM, Austin, TX, May 2003.'

Transcribed by Donna Rose at: http://www.donnarose.com/JMBInterview.html


 

"Despite their different belief systems, in the end what the restless conservative scientists object to is the same as what religious conservatives object to: not wayward genetic evolution, but "undesirable" social evolution. Both groups abhor the idea that society could change so as to include and accommodate GLBT people. For them, this means the end of the world as they know it." - Sonia John

 

 

 


 

 

 

Contents:

 

1.   Introduction.

 

2.   Bailey's thoughts about eugenics solutions to the "evolutionary paradox" of homosexuality, in direct quotes from his book, The Man Who Would Be Queen:

 

3.   Bailey announces his thinking on the topic of "sexual-orientation eugenics" in 2001.

 

4.   Back in 1998, Bailey's co-author Greenberg tested the waters on how to present arguments for eugenic solutions to the "problem" of gay children:

 

5.   Bailey, long active in the Human Behavior and Evolution Society (HBES), in1999 expressed concern about the "evolutionary paradox" of homosexuality:

 

6.   Bailey also became active in the overt promotion of the "germ theory" of homosexuality.

 

7.   Gregory Cochran, a well-known "race scientist", recently acknowledged Bailey's strong support of his "gay germ" theory in a post to Gene Expression, 8-19-03.

 

8.   AMERICAN EUGENICS SOCIETY GOALS 1926-1956: A source of methods.

 

9.   We now see how Bailey and Greenberg used established AES rhetorical technique in their argument for a eugenics solution to homosexuality in 2001.

 

10.  Bailey’s friend Steve Sailer initiated a widespread promotion of the gay-gene gay-germ theory on the VDARE hate site in August 2003

 

 

 

 

 


 

 

1.  Introduction:

 

These investigatory notes (a work in progress) document J. Michael Bailey’s collaboration with Gregory Cochran and Steve Sailer on development and promotion of their junk-science “gay gene – gay germ” theory of homosexuality. This theory first presumes homosexuality to be genetically caused. However, this presents a theoretical dilemma, since gay people reproduce much less often than do heterosexual people. Bailey, Cochran and Sailer resolve the apparent dilemma by concluding that the gay gene must be activated by a “gay germ”.

 

Bailey is CERTAIN that there must be a gay gene and a gay germ, because his simplistic interpretation of classical Darwinian evolutionary theory somehow says these things must be so. And as we know from his views about transsexualism, once Bailey is certain of something no counter-evidence will ever change his mind.

 

Why should anyone care about Bailey’s theoretical speculations? Because it is just a short jump from aborting gay fetuses to quarantining gay people presumably infected with the "gay germ”.  

 

Also remember that these people (Bailey, Cochran and Sailer) are all active members of the same group of “scientists”, right wing journalists and pundits that brought you The Bell Curve, The G Factor, Alien Nation and other such “race science” and white superiorist books, namely the infamous Human Biodiversity Institute and discussion group founded by Steve Sailer.
 

 

 

 


 

 

2.  Bailey's thoughts about eugenics solutions to the "evolutionary paradox" of homosexuality, in direct quotes from his book, The Man Who Would Be Queen:

 

http://www.nap.edu/books/0309084180/html/

 

(p.114) "What would make avoiding gay children wrong?"

 

(p.114) "For example, some of the people raising the specter of "murdering gay babies" were the same people who insisted that abortion is no one's business but the woman's..."

 

(p.114) "Instead, the real question is whether parental selection in favor of heterosexuality is acceptable. To focus on this question, we have to assume that whatever means parents will use to do this are, in themselves, morally acceptable"

 

(p.115) "So the next question is whether selecting for heterosexual children would cause any harm?"  Certainly being straight rather than gay doesn't harm the child itself."

 

(p.115) "Homosexuality might be the most striking unresolved paradox of human evolution.

 

(p.116) "Homosexuality is evolutionary maladaptive."

 

(p.116) ""Evolutionary maladaptive" sounds like an insult, but it isn't."

 

(p.116) "The desire to have sex with members of the opposite sex helps people have sex that might result in offspring. The number of healthy offspring one leaves if perhaps the best indicator of evolutionary success."

 

 

 

 


 

 

 

3.  Bailey announces his thinking on the topic of "sexual-orientation eugenics" in 2001:

 

"Parental Selection of Children's Sexual Orientation", Aaron S. Greenberg and J. Michael Bailey, Archives of Sexual Behavior 30 (4): 423-437, August 2001

 

Abstract:  As we learn more about the causes of sexual orientation, the likelihood increases that parents will one day be able to select the orientation of their children. This possibility (at least that of selecting for heterosexuality) has generated a great deal of concern among supporters of homosexual rights, with such selection being widely condemned as harmful and morally repugnant. Notwithstanding this widespread condemnation, and even assuming, as we do, that homosexuality is entirely acceptable morally, allowing parents, by means morally unproblematic in themselves, to select for heterosexuality would be morally acceptable. This is because allowing parents to select their children's sexual orientation would further parent's freedom to raise the sort of children they wish to raise and because selection for heterosexuality may benefit parents and children and is unlikely to cause significant harm.

 

Keywords:  homosexuality, sexual orientation, genetics, abortion, eugenics, genetic selection

 

http://www.kluweronline.com/article.asp?PIPS=301061

 

You can retrieve the full PDF version of this Greenberg-Bailey paper on homosexual eugenics at the following link:

http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/Bailey/Greenberg-Bailey/Homosexual%20Eugenics.pdf

 

 

 

 

 


 

 

 

4.   Back in 1998, Bailey's co-author Greenberg tested the waters on how to present arguments for eugenic solutions to the "problem" of gay children:

 

 

Lawyer suggests abortion if a test could prove fetus has "gay gene",

San Francisco Examiner, Wednesday, August 26, 1998

 

"CHICAGO - A Chicago lawyer who has published articles about the legal and ethical issues of sexual orientation research says that if a so-called gay gene is ever isolated, parents should have the right to abort a gay fetus or manipulate its genetic makeup.

 

His stand prompted a swift response in San Francisco, where Supervisor Tom Ammiano called the idea frightening, the proud parents of a lesbian found it very painful and a gay rights attorney called it "ludicrous from a scientific point of view."

 

In Chicago, attorney Aaron Greenberg is set to present his argument Thursday at the 16th annual symposium of the San Francisco-based Gay and Lesbian Medical Association...

 

"All things being equal, I think a kid who is heterosexual would have an easier life, not for any good reason, but because people irrationally discriminate (against homosexuals)," he said, giving what he speculated would be the biggest reason parents would want a straight child.

 

He said parents who make such a decision also would probably relate better to a heterosexual child and might feel they would have a better chance of eventually becoming grandparents.

 

"It's just pure evil," said David Smith, spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign, a Washington-based gay political group. "It stems from the whole notion that being gay or lesbian is not quite worthy of a parent's love."...

 

Greenberg, a corporate lawyer who has published with Northwestern University researcher Michael Bailey said he understands that - even if one has no problem with abortion or genetic engineering - his ideas can make people very emotional.

 

"I don't want to upset anyone," Greenberg said.

 

"But I don't think, with certain conditions, that there's anything morally objectionable with choosing a child's sexual orientation."...

 

But in San Francisco, Greenberg's view raised alarm.

 

"I find it very frightening," Ammiano said. "I think that in Germany during World War II there were some of the same rationales" for the elimination of Jews....

 

At the National Center for Lesbian Rights in San Francisco, staff attorney Shannon Minter said Greenberg's view has no scientific merit and shows how ill-informed the public is on theories of how sexual orientation is formed....

 

"I think all children and all parents would be much better off if everyone concerned about discrimination against lesbian and gay children and youth spent their time and energy trying to educate people and build acceptance and love."...

 

 

Read the full article at:

 

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/examiner/archive/1998/08/26/NEWS3525.dtl

 

 

 

 

 

 


 

 

 

5.  Bailey, long active in the Human Behavior and Evolution Society (HBES), in 1999 expressed concern about the "evolutionary paradox" of homosexuality:

 

 

At the Annual Meeting of HBES, 5 June 1999, Bailey organized a Symposium entitled: "Constraining evolutionary hypotheses of human male homosexuality" (session 10.4)

 

Symposium abstract Human homosexuality is an evolutionary paradox. Homosexual people would seem to be at a substantial reproductive disadvantage, yet they exist in nontrivial numbers. These facts have motivated intense evolutionary speculation.

 

Bailey also presented a paper on "Empirical tests of two evolutionary hypotheses of male homosexuality" at that Symposium.  It is at this same 1999 HBES conference that Bailey organized and presented Gregory Cochran's  "pathogen theory" of Homosexuality in a forum comprised of many of Bailey's fellow members of Steve Sailer's HBI "Think Tank" and/or are the alleged neo-eugenicists and race scientists mentioned in SPLC's "Queer Science" report -  Kevin MacDonald (HBES sec./archivist -1998); Rushton (HBES - 1998, 2002, 2003); Buss (HBES - 1998, 1999, 2000, 2002, 2003); Pinker (HBES - 2000)

 

http://www.hbes.com/HBES/abst99.htm

  

 

 

 


 

 

 

6.  Bailey also became active in the overt promotion of the "germ theory" of homosexuality:

 

See Cochran-Ewald's paper "Infectious Causation of Disease - A Evolutionary Perspective".

Cochran thanks J. Michael Bailey for his assistance on p.1, and references Bailey's forum at HBES'99.

Embedded in the paper is the introduction of the "germ theory of homosexuality"  (see p 437-438).

 

" For helpful comments the authors thank W. D. Hamilton, J. M. Bailey, J. F. Crow, Alan P. Hudson, and R. Taylor.
 

PBM 43, 3 (2000): 406-448 © 2000 by The Johns Hopkins University Press
http://www.isteve.com/Infectious_Causation_of_Disease.pdf

See Steve Sailer's paper "Gay Gene or Gay Germ?" of 8-17-03 on the VDARE website, in which Sailer identifies "my friend Bailey" (Note that VDARE has been declared a "hate site" by the SPLC)

http://www.vdare.com/sailer/gay_gene.htm

 

 

 


 

 

 

7.  Gregory Cochran, a well-known "race scientist", recently acknowledged Bailey's strong support of his "gay germ" theory in a post to Gene Expression, 8-19-03 (bold for emphasis):

 

"I don't believe it'd be hard to find out the cause, since we have a good experimental animal, sheep. 5-10% of male sheep in some herds are totally uninterested in females: you can tie a female in heat to the fence in front of them and they don't do a thing. Males they hump. As far as I know, the only two mammals with a few-percent of males with this kind of preferential homosexual behavior are humans and sheep. The two species have often been seen together, and I doubt if this is entirely a coincidence. I'd bet money that the cause is the same, and that we contracted it from sheep. That's thought to be the case for a lot of infectious agents - acquired from domesticated animals...

 

As I said, probably not hard to solve, may even happen by accident, but almost completely unfundable. This is banned science: anyone who proved such a thing or even worked on it would likely never get any federal money ever again .. I have even had one biologist who secretly came to a similar conclusion... suggest if proven it should perhaps be kept secret forever...

On the other hand a lot of the smarter evolutionary biologists think it has a pretty good chance of being correct. Bill Hamilton thought so. Trivers thinks it is much more likely than any other model he has heard of (of course he _is_ crazy).
Mike Bailey thinks it is the only evolutionarily plausible model that has ever been proposed."

 

http://www.gnxp.com/MT2/archives/000887.html

 

 

 

Here’s more of Cochran’s thinking on homosexuality, in which he outright predicts a eugenics “solution” to homosexuality once the “infectious causation” is found:

 

"...some of the interesting variations in psychology seem likely to be caused by some kind of infectious organisms also, especially if they are more than rare, detract from reproduction, and have been around for some time ...Homosexuality? of course: biological disadvantageous, culturally consequential. Old and common enough to probably have an infectious origin....I think that not too long after we determine the etiology of homosexuality , we'll be able to prevent it, and almost all parents will... Further: in a generation or two, we're going to be able to control all these things, mutational or infectious - at least in the wealthier countries…Soooo... it might also be the cause that certain kinds of thinking become scarce, kinds of thinking that occasionally pay off. Even so, we'll do without. Damn few parents are going to choose to have a manic-depressive kid on the off-chance that he'll be a major poet someday. The human race will be more uniform... "

--  Greg Cochran

http://www.jerrypournelle.com/reports/special/germs.html

 

 

 

 

 


 

 

 

8.  AMERICAN EUGENICS SOCIETY GOALS, 1926-1956: A source of now well-known methods for sugar-coating eugenics solutions:

 

1926: Pre Hitler Goal: Race building by conscious selection -- backed with force.

 

"[Sterilization could] be applied to an ever widening circle of social discards, beginning always with the criminal, the diseased and the insane, and extending gradually to types which may be called weaklings rather than defectives, and perhaps ultimately to worthless race types."
From The Passing of the Great Race by Madison Grant, co-founder American Eugenics Society

1956: 
Post-Hitler Goal: Race building by a "voluntary unconscious selection" implemented by deception and manipulation.

 

"The very word eugenics is in disrepute in some quarters ... We must ask ourselves, what have we done wrong?   I think we have failed to take into account a trait which is almost universal and is very deep in human nature. People simply are not willing to accept the idea that the genetic base on which their character was formed is inferior and should not be repeated in the next generation. We have asked whole groups of people to accept this idea and we have asked individuals to accept it. They have constantly refused and we have all but killed the eugenic movement ... they won't accept the idea that they are in general second rate. We must rely on other motivation. ... it is surely possible to build a system of voluntary unconscious selection. But the reasons advanced must be generally acceptable reasons. Let's stop telling anyone that they have a generally inferior genetic quality, for they will never agree. Let's base our proposals on the desirability of having children born in homes where they will get affectionate and responsible care, and perhaps our proposals will be accepted."


From "Galton and Mid Century Eugenics" by Frederick Osborn, Galton Lecture 1956, in Eugenics Review, vol. 48, 1, 1956

http://www.africa2000.com/ENDX/aegoals.htm

 

 

 

 

 


 

 

 

9.  We now see how Bailey and Greenberg used established AES rhetorical technique in 2001 in their argument for a eugenics solution to homosexuality in a paper entitled "Parental Selection of Children’s Sexual Orientation":

 

"As we learn more about the causes of sexual orientation, the likelihood increases that parents will one day be able to select the orientation of their children. This possibility (at least that of selecting for heterosexuality) has generated a great deal of concern among supporters of homosexual rights, with such selection being widely condemned as harmful and morally repugnant. Notwithstanding this widespread condemnation, and even assuming, as we do, that homosexuality is entirely acceptable morally, allowing parents, by means morally unproblematic in themselves, to select for heterosexuality would be morally acceptable. This is because allowing parents to select their children's sexual orientation would further parent's freedom to raise the sort of children they wish to raise and because selection for heterosexuality may benefit parents and children and is unlikely to cause significant harm." Aaron S. Greenberg and J. Michael Bailey, Archives of Sexual Behavior 30 (4): 423-437, August 2001

 

http://www.kluweronline.com/article.asp?PIPS=301061

 

You can retrieve the full PDF version of the Greenberg-Bailey paper on homosexual eugenics at the following link:

http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/Bailey/Greenberg-Bailey/Homosexual%20Eugenics.pdf

 

 


 

 

 

10.  Bailey’s friend Steve Sailer initiated a widespread promotion of the gay-gene gay-germ theory on the VDARE hate site in August 2003:

 

Here is a link to Sailer’s important recent article on VDARE and then the concluding paragraphs from that article:

 

http://www.vdare.com/sailer/gay_gene.htm

 

“…Male homosexuality could be a similar “self-destructive” genetic defense against a major infectious disease, just as the “sickle cell gene” defends against malaria at the price of increasing susceptibility to sickle cell anemia. But nobody knows what that illness could be. It would have to be major – and, presumably, relatively modern, like falciparum malaria, which is puzzling.

 

Or, as Cochran suggests, an infectious disease itself could cause homosexuality. It's probably not a venereal germ, but maybe an intestinal or respiratory germ. If it spreads like the flu, and if it needs to strike at a particular stage of development before or shortly after birth, then more male homosexuals might be born in one season than another, just as more schizophrenics are born in late winter and in early spring, especially in cities with cold winters. This should be easily testable.

 

It's radically unfashionable to call homosexuality a disease. But you can't think rigorously about the gay gene theory without drawing straightforward analogies to genetic diseases. Both reduce the number of descendents, which is the number that counts in evolution.

 

Many have reacted with horror to Cochran's theory because it implies that homosexuality might be preventable with the right antibiotic or vaccine. Parents might decide that, since they are putting themselves through all the trouble of raising a child, they ought to increase the likelihood of grandchildren.

 

Whether that decision would be good or bad is a very personal matter—exactly the sort of dispute that VDARE.COM heroically avoids.

 

But—as with race—this fear of what the public might possibly decide in the future must not be allowed to retard research now.

 

The truth, it is reliably reported, will set us free”

 

- Steve Sailer, VDARE,

 

 

 

For further insights into Sailer, his background and his thinking, see the following links:

 

Note that Sailer is the leader of the notorious Human Biodiversity Institute:

http://www.vdare.com/sailer/gay_gene.htm

http://www.isteve.com/

http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/BaileyAssociates/HumanBiodiversityGroup.htm

http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/BaileyAssociates/HumanBiodiversityGroup-II.html

 

Steve Sailer is also Bailey’s friend, and as we saw above Bailey, Cochran and Sailer,

along with Greenberg’s help in testing public reactions, collaborated on crafting, promoting and rolling out this theory:

 

"My friend J. Michael Bailey, the chairman of the psychology department at Northwestern University,

 is probably the leading researcher into sexual orientation in America" – Sailer

 

Sailer is a frequent contributor to VDARE:

http://www.psych.nwu.edu/psych/people/faculty/bailey/index.htm

 

VDARE is now officially classified by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) as an internet 'hate site':

http://www.vdare.com/sailer/index.htm

 

 

 

 

 


 

References:

Information on the racist, homophobic elite within the HBI group, of which Bailey, his mentor Blanchard, and his colleagues and supporters Cochran, Sailer, Rushton, Pinker, Buss, Derbyshire, Brimelow, Seligman and more - are all active members:

http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?sid=96
http://www.tsroadmap.org/info/human-biodiversity.html
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/BaileyAssociates/HumanBiodiversityGroup.htm
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/BaileyAssociates/HumanBiodiversityGroup-II.html
 
Information about Bailey's friend (and HBI leader) Steve Sailer and their connections to VDARE.
Note that VDARE is now officially classified by SPLC as an internet 'hate site':
"My friend J. Michael Bailey, the chairman of the psychology department at Northwestern University, is probably the leading researcher into sexual orientation in America" - Sailer
 
http://www.isteve.com/
http://www.vdare.com/sailer/gay_gene.htm
http://www.vdare.com/sailer/index.htm
http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?aid=152
 
Articles about the Bailey controversy in the Chronicle for Higher Education:
 
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/ChronicleArticle.html
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/Chronicle-7-17-03.html
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/Bailey/The Chronicle of Higher Education 12-12-03.html 
 
Formal complaints filed against Bailey at Northwestern:
 
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/Anjelica/Complaint.html
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/Bailey/SecondComplaint.html
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/Bailey/ThirdComplaint.html
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/Bailey/McCloskey-Conway-complaint.html
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/Bailey/FourthWomansComplaint.html
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/Anjelica/Complaint.html#anchor601714
 
Websites coordinating the overall investigation of Bailey's research and professional activities:
 
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/LynnsReviewOfBaileysBook.html
http://www.tsroadmap.com/info/bailey-blanchard-lawrence.html
 
Partial listing of the many people and organizations participating in the Bailey investigation:
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/LynnsReviewOfBaileysBook.html#anchor6811

The full PDF version of the Greenberg-Bailey paper on homosexual eugenics is accessible at the following link:

"Parental Selection of Children’s Sexual Orientation", Aaron S. Greenberg and J. Michael Bailey,

Archives of Sexual Behavior 30 (4): 423-437, August 2001:

http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/Bailey/Greenberg-Bailey/Homosexual%20Eugenics.pdf

 

 


 

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