“It’s a more action-related response than in women,” says Savic. In straight men and lesbians, the amygdala fed its signals mainly into the sensorimotor cortex and the striatum, regions of the brain that trigger the “fight or flight” response. Gay men have higher rates of depression too, she says, but it’s difficult to know whether this is down to biology, homophobia or simply feelings of being “different”. This is significant, she says, and fits with data showing that women are three times as likely as men to suffer from mood disorders or depression. “The regions involved in phobia, anxiety and depression overlap with the pattern we see from the amygdala,” says Savic. In straight women and gay men, the connections were mainly into regions of the brain that manifest fear as intense anxiety. They found that the patterns of connectivity in gay men matched those of straight women, and vice versa (see image, above right). The images revealed how the amygdala connected to other parts of the brain, giving clues to how this might influence behaviour. The team next used PET scans to measure blood flow to the amygdala, part of the brain that governs fear and aggression. Gay men, meanwhile, had symmetrical brains like those of straight women. The results showed that straight men had asymmetric brains, with the right hemisphere slightly larger – and the gay women also had this asymmetry. By then, countless gay people had been reminded for years that their participation in the State Department was not wanted-and that they would be treated as second-class citizens if they tried to serve their country.“That was the whole point of the study, to show parameters that differ, but which couldn’t be altered by learning or cognitive processes,” says Savic.įirst they used MRI scans to find out the overall volume and shapes of brains in a group of 90 volunteers consisting of 25 heterosexuals and 20 homosexuals of each gender. Only in the 1970s was the ban on gay intelligence community members relaxed, and it took until 1995 for another executive order, signed by President Bill Clinton, to explicitly state that the government may not discriminate based on sexual orientation when it comes to granting access to classified information. The scare lasted until the 1960s, when investigations slowed. Kameny wasn’t the only person galvanized by the public targeting of LGBT people-in 1969, the Stonewall Riots made gay rights a front-page issue, and the movement Kameny helped start and the Lavender Scare helped foment has flourished ever since. He fought to counter workplace discrimination for the rest of his life. They declined to take the case, so he picketed the White House.
Fired in 1957, he petitioned the Supreme Court for relief in recognition of his civil rights.
“Both were thought to be morally weak or psychologically disturbed, both were seen as godless, both purportedly undermined the traditional family, both were assumed to recruit, and both were shadowy figures with a secret subculture.” “Many assumptions about Communists mirrored common beliefs about homosexuals,” notes National Archives archivist Judith Adkins. At the time, many people equated Communism with homosexuality-people like Senator Joseph McCarthy, who linked what he considered to be the madness of Communists to the supposed mental imbalances of gay people. As the federal government began to persecute suspected Communists, gay people found themselves being targeted. At the time, homosexuality was considered a “sexual perversion”. Eisenhower’s 1953 Executive Order #10450, “Security Requirements for Government Employment,” where it states that “sexual perversion” could be used as a fair reason to terminate someone’s job.