Dr. James O’Keefe MD -- a Cardiologist and director of the Charles & Barbara Duboc Cardio Health & Wellness Center -- has a message for all the homophobes out there: stop your hatin' because gays are important.

 

He explained his position at a TEDx Talk in Dublin, Ireland, detailing how evolutionary science can explain the presence of homosexuality. For him, queerness is about survival.

 

“If this were a genetic error, natural selection should have long ago culled this from the gene pool,” O’Keefe said. But in reality, "homosexuality gives advantages to the group by specialized talents and unusual qualities of personality. So a society that condemns homosexuality harms itself.”

 

O’Keefe argued these special talents included things like higher emotional intelligence, and the ability for compassion and cooperation. (Obviously he has not watched some of the guys on Finding Prince Charming!)

 

“Homosexuality is like a catalyst to help emotionally connect groups of people together,” he said, adding that “for heterosexuals to disapprove of gays is kind of like the white flour in bread disapproving of the yeast.”

 

His bottom line: "Nature prescribes homosexuality at specific times and places and endows these people with special traits to help the people around them flourish. What is against the order of nature is the ongoing persecution of the sexual minority. These are not confused or defective people that need to be cured, or punished or ostracized. They need to be accepted for who they are and embraced. They make us better."