Darwinizing sexual ambivalence: a new evolutionary hypothesis of male homosexuality

Abstract

At first sight, homosexuality has little to do with reproduction. Nevertheless, many neo‐Darwinian theoreticians think that human homosexuality may have had a procreative value, since it enabled the close kin of homosexuals to have more viable offspring than individuals lacking the support of homosexual siblings. In this article, however, we will defend an alternative hypothesis—originally put forward by Freud in “A phylogenetic phantasy”—namely that homosexuality evolved as a means to strengthen social bonds. Consequently, from an evolutionary point of view, homosexuality and heterosexuality have entirely distinct origins: there is no continuum from heterosexuality to homosexuality. Indeed, the natural history we propose shows that the intensity of the homosexual inclination has little or no predictive value with regard to the intensity of heterosexual tendencies. In fact, this may be a sound Darwinian way to understand sexual ambivalence. But if sexual ambivalence is a biological datum, one has to conclude that psychodynamic mechanisms are often needed in order to explain exclusive heterosexuality or exclusive homosexuality.