by Billie Meyers

Created on: July 27, 2008   Last Updated: January 19, 2009

Not all gays and lesbians are born gay/lesbian. For some it is a choice. Why are more and more men and women, or so it seems, choosing this lifestyle? Perhaps it is evolution at work.

What is the primary reason for evolutionary changes? Survival. The human species has reached a point in evolutionary history where the greatest risks it faces are other human beings, e.g. overpopulation, war, etc. Consider China, for instance, they have limits on the number of children a couple can have. So, logically, evolutionary changes might involve decreasing procreation. Since producing offspring is now not the primary reason for couples to marry and engage in sex, it doesn't matter what gender the other person is.

John Steinbeck made this observation in "Sweet Thursday" (1947): "Man has solved his problems," says Old Jay. "Predators he has removed from the earth; heat and cold he has turned aside; communicable disease he has practically eliminated. The old live on, the young do not die. The best wars can't even balance the birth rate. There was a time when a small army could cut a population in half in a year. Starvation, typhus, plague, tuberculosis, were trusty weapons. A scratch with a spear point meant infection and death. Do you know what the incidence of death from battle wounds is today? One per cent [sic]. A hundred years ago it was eighty per cent. The population grows and the productivity of the earth decreases. In a foreseeable future we shall be smothered by our own numbers. Only birth control could save us, and that is one thing mankind is never going to practice. . . . It is a cosmic joke. Preoccupation with survival has set the stage for extinction."

So if heterosexual sex might lead to our extinction, why shouldn't we consider other options? Marriage has become more and more an institution of frustration. Men really aren't well suited for monogamy. Some cultures recognize this and allow for polygamy. A man's sex drive continues in full force, in many cases, until death. Women, however, tend to experience a decrease in libido when they are no longer able to become pregnant. Our culture really has set us up for failure in this department.

Is it any wonder that more and more people are choosing, or are willing to embrace, the gay or lesbian lifestyle? A person of your own gender is more likely to have a compatible sex drive. And there is no need to worry about birth control!

This "attitude" that men have adopted might just be nature's way of protecting the human species from itself! Now that we are not driven to procreate for our own survival, maybe we can forget the frustrating business of trying to figure out what makes the other half tick.

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