fact that, despite this, they tended to exhibit typically male characteristics and often identified as men. The second section deals primarily with gay men, including a suggested link between childhood gender identity disorder and male homosexuality later in life. Bailey discusses whether homosexuality is a congenitally or possibly even genetically related phenomenon. This discussion includes references to Bailey's studies as well as those of neuroscientist Simon LeVay and geneticist Dean Hamer. He also discusses the behavior of gay men and its stereotypically masculine and feminine qualities. In the third section, Bailey summarizes a taxonomy of trans women that was proposed by Ray Blanchard about fifteen years earlier. According to Blanchard, there are two types of trans women: one described as an "extreme form of male homosexuality", the other being motivated by a sexual interest in having a female body. Bailey also discusses the process by which transition from male to female occurs. Reception The book elicited both strongly supportive and strongly negative reactions. The controversial aspects included the contents of the book, whether the research was conducted ethically, whether it should have been published by the National Academies Press, and whether it should have been promoted as a scientific work. According to Benedict Carey's story in The New York Times, "To many of Dr. Bailey’s peers, his story is a morality play about the corrosive effects of political correctness on academic freedom." Interviewed by Carey, bioethicist Alice Dreger argues that "what happened to Bailey is important, because the harassment was so extraordinarily bad and because it could happen to any researcher in the field. If we’re going to have research at all, then we’re going to have people saying unpopular things, and if this is what happens to them, then we’ve got problems not only for science but free expression itself." However, critics such as Deirdre McCloskey think that the pointed criticism, including filing charges, was warranted: "Nothing we have done, I believe, and certainly nothing I have done, overstepped any boundaries of fair comment on a book and an author who stepped into the public arena with enthusiasm to deliver a false and unscientific and politically damaging opinion". The concern over academic freedom was dismissed by Charles Allen Moser, who wrote: "The death of free speech and academic freedom has been highly exaggerated. Science is not free of politics, never has been, and never will be." Positive reactions Kirkus