However, I do agree the story is not newsworthy on a national level.

From your post, it also appears that what little work he has done is also poorly sourced and reported. I laughed as I read your critique.

By errors in Sorba’s book, I mean things like this, from page 14, ‘Kinsey’s study is the
basis for the enduring myth that ten percent of American men engage in sodomy.’

I don’t know that there has ever been such a myth. There has been a myth that 10 per cent of American men are homosexual, and this may be what Sorba means, although in real life being homosexual and engaging in sodomy are not necessarily the same thing. Kinsey in fact made neither of these claims.

And this, from page 16: ‘Each and every one of these social problems is
a direct consequence of embracing the “pansexual” “anything goes” attitude of sexual license popularized by Kinsey.’ The social problems mentioned include violent crime and declining SAT scores, which surely have numerous complex causes, and thus cannot be blamed simply on Americans’ attitudes toward sex.

And this, from page 18: ‘Following the Stonewall riots, the Mattachine Action Committee of the Mattachine Society’s New York chapter clamored for “organized resistance.” However, control of the movement was
taken out of their hands by a still more radical group of activists, the “Gay Liberation Front” (GLF), so titled “because it had the same ring as National Liberation Front, the alliance formed by the Viet Cong.” At the heart of this new circle of power was Herbert Marcuse, a long time Socialist who had learned his politics (and perhaps sodomy) in pre‐Nazi Germany.’

This is an especially funny error. I am not aware that Herbert Marcuse was ever involved in any way with the Gay Liberation Front, and there is no evidence that he was anything other than heterosexual.

And this, from page 27: ‘Indeed, LeVay’s study was part of a massive public relations campaign designed to convince the public to believe that individuals are “born gay.”’ The study might have been used by some people that way, but LeVay himself did not claim that his study showed that people were born gay; he clearly stated that it didn’t.

And this, from page 37: ‘Pro‐sodomy activists capitalized on multiple pseudo‐scientific studies to mislead the public. The following analyses will expose these illegitimate studies and the men who conducted them, beginning with the three most cited.’ The studies in question may have been flawed or limited in numerous ways, but calling them ‘pseudo-scientific’ and ‘illegitimate’ is a somewhat hysterical over-statement.

Also on page 37, ‘LeVay publicized his study in an effort to convince the world
that same‐sex attractions are fixed, and caused by the size of the hypothalamus in the brain.’ As with what Sorba wrote on page 27, this misrepresents LeVay, who did not insist that the brain area he studied must be responsible for men’s sexual orientation; he acknowledged that this may not be the case. Sorba makes the same misrepresentation on page 38.

And on pages 38 and 39: ‘Third, Simon LeVay himself admitted in 2001 that
the study was inconclusive, “It’s important to stress what I didn’t find. I did not prove that homosexuality is genetic, or find a genetic cause for being gay. I didn’t show that gay men are born that way, the most common mistake people make in interpreting my work. Nor did I locate a gay center in the brain.”

This is one of the worst errors; it makes it sound as though LeVay failed to admit something that he should have admitted at the time. I believe however that LeVay made this admission when his study was published, and not, as Sorba makes it sound, many years later.

There may of course be other errors I didn’t notice. I won’t mention the minor errors, spelling mistakes, etc. Sorba is probably right that people aren’t born gay, but this book, in its current state, looks pretty sloppy.

How do you correct all the errors in a book that purports to prove that gay people can change if they want to and still end up with a book that proves that gay people can change if they want to?

The book contains a number of errors, but in fairness it is only a draft. It will be interesting to see whether the errors get corrected.

:-)

The section where he purports to take apart genetic etiologies for homosexuality? It’s Hammer and Levay — and that’s it. None of the early, foundational research conducted from the 50s forward. Nothing after Hammer.

It’s nothing close to Stein’s Mismeasure of Desire. It doesn’t even rank as a Freshman Psych 101 report.

It’s laughable, and a sign of their desperation, that MassR and the like are touting such poor scholarship as an “expert” on sexual orientation.