Homophobes are gay
Therefore, all homophobes are gay or have gay tendencies.
...is your logic.
Something evidently went very long in that extremely complex and intricate two-step process.
Not just some homophobes, but the vast majority of homophobes. According to this research (<-- link), the likelihood that a homophobic male person is a closet case is 80%.
So perhaps we can all agree on the following statements: Homophobia is very likely the result of suppressed homosexual desires. Studies suggest that most homophobic people are closeted gays or bisexuals.
From the above-linked study:
I think that's a pretty good definition. People are homophobic if they experience dread in the presence or at the thought of a gay person, which is solely caused by the knowledge that the person is gay.
Kraichgauer
Veteran
Joined: 12 Apr 2010
Gender: Male
Posts: 47,739
Location: Spokane area, Washington state.
A friend, who had attended the Catholic Gonzaga University in Spokane, had told me how there was a priest and instructor who was vehemently homophobic in his lectures. He told me his gay friends on campus had said this priest was hung like a horse.
-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer
More likely, they are frightened by the reaction of their peers and relatives. Imagine that you were a gay or bisexual teenager surrounded by peers who use the term gay as an insult and boast with their heterosexuality. Male kids are especially eager to do this. Anything that remotely reminds them of homosexuality or gender-ambiguity is immediately mocked, called gay, and made out to be something horrible and disgusting. Gay kids who want to fit in and be accepted (who doesn't) learn to go with the program, and fake both an interest in the opposite gender as well as greatly exaggerated disgust for all things homosexual. Ask any gay person; chances are that they went through this phase of denial and/or play-acting as an adolescent.
Now add orthodox Abrahamic religions to this picture, which teach kids long before they hit puberty that homosexual urges and behavior are a grave sin and a one-way ticket to hell. And let's not forget about parents who would be devastated if they found out that their offspring is gay. Their reaction doesn't even have to involve homophobia, it might simply be the dread that their child is somehow different from the norm and will never give them any grandchildren.
This social pressure and the contempt of gay people shown by peers, parents, priests, and large parts of society in general, can be so strong that it drives gay teenagers into suicide. Compared to that, the desperate attempt to conform to social and religious norms by denying one's sexuality (or one side of it) is an easier way out. Of course closeted gay or bi people who are trying to pass as "normal" need to constantly reaffirm and justify this difficult decision by telling themselves and others that they are doing the "right thing". Think of people like Ted Haggard, who did not only marry and had children, he also felt the need to rain down gay hatred and homophobia from the pulpit every Sunday. "If I can't have it, nobody can".
Note, too, the visceral, defensive reaction of a few people who briefly entered the discussion.
"How dare you start a topic on the link between homophobia and repressed homosexuality! You should be banned from the internet!"
If someone really isn't interested in a topic, then all he has to do is ignore it and either participate in a different discussion that does interest him, or start his own topic.
One implication of the article is that it may become more difficult for people who don't want to be suspected of a repressed homosexual orientation to come out with overtly homophobic statements. Repressed homosexuals are going to be very confused about what to do.
Rick Perry and Frothy Santorum did play to homophobia among Repugnican voters, which must mean that they were keenly aware of a very large undercurrent of repressed homosexuality within the party.
I just want to know if I can be gay without being homosexual.
having or inducing high spirits <a bird's gay spring song>.
2. a : bright, lively
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gay
Also, can a gay person have sombre sex? Or is it always "bright, lively"?
I mean, I have gay sex with my wife all the time, but it's heterosexual.
(Just a point about words. No offense intended.)
_________________
Christianity is different than Judaism only in people's minds -- not in the Bible.
Of course. You're right, as usual.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kmv3WlKa6U8[/youtube]
That was a great scene. Oh, the frustration in Sandler's character...
_________________
Christianity is different than Judaism only in people's minds -- not in the Bible.
Kraichgauer
Veteran
Joined: 12 Apr 2010
Gender: Male
Posts: 47,739
Location: Spokane area, Washington state.
Of course. You're right, as usual.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kmv3WlKa6U8[/youtube]
That was a great scene. Oh, the frustration in Sandler's character...
It's a sure sign of acting genius when a dramatic actor like Jack Nicholson can pull off comedy so perfectly.
-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer
Thanks for your explanation CatLord. You may know that public expressions of homophobia are illegal here in the UK. So any expressions of disgust are silent, or people keep their opinions to themselves. We do have the UK eqivalent of rednecks who can be violent at times. They certainly don't get that from The Bible though. I don't understand homosexuality myself. I can sympathise because we can all be born with certain things, like Asperger's for example. Then I found out that somebody who had been close to me had been sexually abused as a child. She became a lesbian after two failed marriages. I have to wonder why people single out homosexuality and smoking as the great sins of our time.
No, it is a desire to be able to breath without inhaling carcinogens.
...and to stay away from something that is noxious and stinky, as one might stay away from a skunk.
But, come to think of it, placing a phallic-shaped instrument into one's mouth and sucking in the hot fumes--that might be a manifestation of certain repressed desires.
Romney had to give the boot to another homosexual
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/open ... 51633.html
Not true. Hate speech etc is. Simply voicing homophobic views isn't. Plenty of religious leaders do it all the time.
Not the same. Homosexuality isa difference. Aspergers, whether we like it or not, is a disability.
People do not "become" gay. Have you considered that maybe her marriages failed because she was gay, rather than the other way round?
And there is no evidence to suggest that gay people are gay because they were sexually abused as a child