Born This Way: Thinking Sociologically about Essentialism

Abstract

“Born this way” has become a rallying cry for many LGBTQ people, and a succinct slogan for the political logic behind mainstream US‐based gay and lesbian equality activism in the late 2000s. This short phrase—“born this way”—invokes the idea that sexual orientation is an innate, essential part of a person that cannot be changed or acted upon by others. Following this logic, homosexual people and their relationships must be incorporated as a valid part of the social fabric and be afforded the same state‐based rights and benefits as heterosexual people and their relationships. Such an understanding of homosexuality as an innate essence stands in contrast to much sociological theorizing that situates sexual identity categories—as with all identity categories—as social constructs that emerge and shift across particular political, historical, and geographical contexts. In this essay, I argue that sociologists need to find ways to think empirically about this essentialist logic. I pose the question, what cultural work does “born this way” logic perform in everyday interactions around social difference, and how does it shape popular, academic, and legislative ideas about such differences? I offer a comparative analysis of the use of essentialism as an explanatory framework for social difference in four cases—race, gender, sexual orientation, and weight. I unpack the ways in which invoking “born this way” as a frame or strategy can be used both to discount the possibility of social interventions into inequality and to make a claim that inequality can only be alleviated through social interventions. Within this analysis, I further explore how social constructionist critiques of biological determinism are taken up or dismissed. I end with ideas for an empirical agenda that highlights the variations in social reactions to different identity‐based claims of biological essentialism and illustrates the importance of using an intersectional lens when examining the social outcomes of such logic.

Has There Been a Transgender Tipping Point? Gender Identification Differences in U.S. Cohorts Born Between 1935 and 2001

“…The practical stakes of demonstrating a role for biographical availability in gender identification at the population level should not be understated. Many civil rights claims on behalf of transgender and gender nonconforming individuals employ strategic essentialism through narratives that gender minority individuals are "born this way" or "born in the wrong body," using immutability as a line of defense (Garrison 2018;Schilt 2015;Vogler 2019). Other identityrelated characteristics that are subject to non-random distribution, including religion (Voas and Chaves 2016) and primary spoken language (Tran 2010), receive various forms of protection under extant rights frameworks, while other similarly distributed characteristics, such as obesity, do not (Kirkland 2008).…”

“…In response to this period, known as the Lavender Scare, and other mobilizations against sexual and gender minority rights since then (Robinson 2020;Stone 2019), many LGBTQ groups and individuals have employed strategically essentialist narratives that claim that sexual orientation and gender identity are immutable characteristics rooted in biological factors, or randomly distributed in populations, and not a matter of individual choice (Jones 2020;Schilt 2015;Vogler 2016). However, other queer theorists and activists have long maintained that periods of dramatic social change have played a crucial role in facilitating a non-random secular increase in the number of gender and sexual minority individuals, and even speculate that the presence of gender and sexual minority individuals as share of the total population could eventually be even higher given particular historical and material conditions (D'Emilio 1993).…”

Gender Identity, the Sexed Body, and the Medical Making of Transgender

“…Martin 2007; Reardon 2017). As I discuss further below, the turn to genetic and neurological explanations has complicated implications for trans politics and has been embraced by some gay and trans activists for their destigmatizing potential (Conrad 1992; Schilt 2015) though not by all ( Guardian 2018).…”

“…The shift also reflects a broader geneticization of axes of difference (R. Benjamin 2015), increasingly understood as the unique codebooks for people (A. Martin 2007;Reardon 2017). As I discuss further below, the turn to genetic and neurological explanations has complicated implications for trans politics and has been embraced by some gay and trans activists for their destigmatizing potential (Conrad 1992;Schilt 2015) though not by all (Guardian 2018).…”

‘The fact they knew before I did upset me most’: Essentialism and normativity in lesbian and gay youths’ coming out stories

“…Because coming out relies on an ideological binary between gay and straight (coming out as one means that you are not the other), hegemonic notions of essentialism which emphasize the ‘naturalness’ of the non-heteronormative are central – this also enables the argument that there should be tolerance and acceptance towards queer people. Indeed, Schilt (2015) argues that messages positioning gay people as ‘born this way’ invoke biological determinism, which in turn allows gay people (in particular) to be positioned as deserving of the institutional rights and legal protections afforded to heterosexuals. Essentialist discourse is therefore fundamentally homonormative; by positioning sexuality as a natural phenomenon, it presents a fixed (and limited) idea of what it means to be gay and uses it to justify political and legal claims to equality.…”