What? Here are the latest crackpot theories about why we’re gay or lesbian

A trio of new bizarre theories about why some people become gay or lesbian have recently come to the fore.

In the UK, Liberal Democrat parliamentary candidate Susan King claimed that it all boils down to chemicals from plastics in the environment that are turning men gay.

“There are a lot of feminising hormones getting into the environment and that has to be taken into consideration. It’s affecting people’s sexuality basically,” she said.

Kind added: “People are at liberty to interpret how they want to live themselves.”

After her comments were met with outrage, she apologised “for the offence caused by my comments.” She said: “This was not my intention. The Liberal Democrats have a strong record of upholding LGBT+ rights which I fully support.”

Academic Rita Strakosha, however, thinks that it’s too much junk food and a lack of sleep that lead to homosexuality, as expounded in a self-published “report” titled, Modern diet and stress cause homosexuality: a hypothesis and a potential therapy.

In her outrageous document, she writes: “Homosexuals… [often eat] large amounts of high glycemic index foods and fat, or eating an imbalanced diet, leaning toward carbohydrates….

“Access to a high calorie diet and alcoholic drinks was limited to the social elite circles in the past. Homosexuality as well appears to have been more frequent among that group.”

Strakosha then says that eating and living healthily are a simple “cure” for homosexuality. “If people “steer clear of… heavy or rich foods, fatty or fried meals, spicy dishes, citrus fruits and carbonated drinks” and get plenty of sleep, this will gradually “help shift the sexual orientation toward the heterosexual end of the Kinsey Scale”.

She continues: “The effect of [improved] diet, behavioural measures and stress management on the brain areas related to sexual behaviour would normally be gradual, moving the balance of sexual attractions and behaviour toward heterosexuality over several years.”

Strakosha claims to have an M.P.S. degree in Clinical Psychology from Albanian University.

Meanwhile, Menelaos Apostolou from the University of Nicosia in Cyprus, argues that same-sex attraction between woman has evolved because it turns heterosexual men on.

These men, he says, would thus tend to have children with these women, which would ensure that the trait of same-sex attraction in women continues to exist.

“Why does same-sex attraction happen in women, why did it evolve, and does it serve some purpose? A lot of men indicate a desire to have a partner who also experiences same-sex attraction,” Apostolou told IBTimes UK.

Diana Fleischman, a psychologist at the University of Portsmouth, however, doesn’t agree. “The paper totally ignores a lot of other possible hypotheses and makes claims that are really not supported by the evidence they provide,” she commented.

For the record, reputable scientists increasingly agree that there is no simple explanation as to why some people are gay or lesbian and others are not. There is growing evidence that people who are attracted to others of the same sex develop their orientation before they are born and that this likely comes about because of a complex interaction between genes and environment.