Can Someone Be Homosexual and Not Gay? | Psychology Today

Contents:

• WHY ARE PEOPLE GAY? GAY BY CHOICE OR IS BEG GAY GEIC?
• LBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL, TRANSGENR, AND QUEER MUNY
• CAN SOMEONE BE HOMOSEXUAL AND NOT GAY?
• ARE HOMOPHOBIC PEOPLE REALLY GAY AND NOT ACCEPTG IT?
• IS A LBIAN, GAY OR BISEXUAL INTY MORE COMMON TODAY?
• HOW TO ACCEPT THAT YOU ARE GAY
• ARE ‘GAY’ AND ‘HOMOSEXUAL’ THE SAME? HERE’S WHAT WE FOUND.
• GAY SIMP

WHY ARE PEOPLE GAY? GAY BY CHOICE OR IS BEG GAY GEIC?

The Amerin Medil Associatn is agast therapy that is “based on the assumptn that homosexualy is a mental disorr or that the person should change their ’s important to know that there is nothg wrong wh lovg people of the same genr as you. In other words, 5-10% of people experience same-sex sexual attractn or behavr; of urse, this don't speak to what mak people gay.

It very much appears that same-sex sexual attractn is not a choice but actg on is; so if you fe gay as the mere prence of same-sex attractn, then om everythg we unrstand, beg gay is not a choice. If, on the other hand, you nsir someone to be gay only if they act on their same-sex attractn then beg gay n be nsired a choice pendg on an dividual's behavr.

LBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL, TRANSGENR, AND QUEER MUNY

Whether science n ultimately prove the blogy of beg gay or not, 's important to support all adults their choic no matter how they intify. lbian, gay, bisexual, transgenr, and queer muny (LGBTQ muny), also lled LGBTQ+ muny, any untry, regn, cy, or other loly, a group of persons who intify as lbian, gay ( the narrow sense of beg a male who is sexually or romantilly attracted to other mal), bisexual, transgenr, or queer and who feel some gree of empathy and solidary wh each other based on their shared experience of prejudice, discrimatn, and disrpect or their awarens of the historil and ntemporary opprsn of lbian, gay, bisexual, transgenr, and queer (LGBTQ) persons. The historil and ntemporary stggl of LGBTQ muni for equal legal and civil rights are discsed the article gay rights movement; see also same-sex marriage.

So when we therapists are nonted wh male clients, often married on, who e to wh ep nflicts about their sexual attractn to other men, we often fd that they are willg to e the word “homosexual, ” but chew the “gay” label. Unfortunately, much of our natn’s polics have long exacerbated the problem as well, shamg and vilifyg homosexualy, leadg legns of men stgglg wh sexual inty to ternalize their homophobia.

CAN SOMEONE BE HOMOSEXUAL AND NOT GAY?

I warned them of the pfalls of keepg their sexual orientatn secret: a life of creased prsn, pursug a secret life the gay unrground wh the danger of beg ught, how attemptg to supprs urg n often e them to bee even more obssed wh them.

I have treated many men who are of Mormon, Orthodox Jewish, Catholic, and other religns who thk of homosexualy as a pathology. They may need, om time to time, to seek further therapy, but wh the right therapist, one who has thoroughly unrstood the dangers of such practic of “reparative therapy” which the therapist seeks to change the client’s sexual inty om gay to straight. Bee the labels “homosexual” or “gay” rry such a stigma, some of the men seek help for their “sex addictn” and see their homosexualy as an actg out of same-sex urg.

A seri of studi recently published the prtig Journal of Personaly and Social Psychology found higher levels of homophobia dividuals wh unacknowledged attractns to the same sex, particularly when they grew up wh thorarian parents who also held homophobic attus. In the Universy of Rochter's prs release, Netta Weste, the study's lead thor, said, "Individuals who intify as straight but psychologil tts show a strong attractn to the same sex may be threatened by gays and lbians bee homosexuals remd them of siar tennci wh themselv.

ARE HOMOPHOBIC PEOPLE REALLY GAY AND NOT ACCEPTG IT?

Attus towards gay and lbian people are an important part of current polil issu like the legaly of same-sex marriage and employment nondiscrimatn. Acrdg to the team of rearchers, this study is the first to document the role that both parentg and sexual orientatn play the formatn of anti-gay attus, cludg self-reported homophobic attus, discrimatory bias, implic hostily towards gays, and endorsement of anti-gay polici. One prr study ed genal measur of sexual attractns and found that homophobic men showed an crease penile erectns to male homosexual male eroti.

They were then shown the words "gay, " "straight, " "homosexual, " and "heterosexual" as well as pictur of straight and gay upl, and the puter tracked precisely their rponse tim.

Fally, the rearcher measured participants' level of homophobia—both overt, as exprsed qutnnair on social policy and beliefs, and implic, as revealed word-pletn tasks. In the experiments, participants who reported themselv to be more heterosexual than their performance on the reactn time task dited were most likely to react wh hostily towards gay people. In other words, if a participant intified as heterosexual, but showed a reactn pattern nsistent wh homosexualy, they were more likely to exprs homophobic attus.

IS A LBIAN, GAY OR BISEXUAL INTY MORE COMMON TODAY?

This ngence between implic and explic measur of sexual orientatn predicted a variety of homophobic behavrs, cludg self-reported anti-gay attus, implic hostily towards gays, endorsement of anti-gay polici, and discrimatory bias such as the assignment of harsher punishments for homosexuals. Dpe the limatns, this seri of studi helps unrstand the roots of homophobia, specifilly that some s may reprent reprsed same-sex attractns. Recent survey data the US and the UK revealed that the proportn of the populatn who intifi as lbian, gay, or bisexual has risen slightly and that this trend is particularly salient among the youngt generatn: Generatn Z.

In the UK, only a slight majory of Gen Z members dite that they have an exclively heterosexual attractn, while the US, a Gallup poll dit that roughly 15% of Gen Z intifi as lbian, gay, or bisexual – pared to 7. 9% of the Baby Boomers surveyed the US dited they were not heterosexual, many more may have still had same-sex experienc throughout their lifpan, but they simply do not firmly intify as lbian, gay, or bisexual.

HOW TO ACCEPT THAT YOU ARE GAY

It is much easier to e out today as lbian, gay, or bisexual than was even jt 10 years ago, let alone 20, 30, 40 or 50 years ago.

There is, however, also a much darker explanatn for why we see fewer dividuals om past generatns intifyg as lbian, gay, or bisexual today than we do om the younger generatns. Gay and bisexual men om the Baby Boomer generatn were between 16 and 34 years of age at the peak of the HIV/AIDS epimic North Ameri. While is impossible to ever have accurate populatn statistics on a hidn populatn, is timated that at least 10% of gay men the Uned Stat between the ag of 25 and 44 had died by 1995.

ARE ‘GAY’ AND ‘HOMOSEXUAL’ THE SAME? HERE’S WHAT WE FOUND.

Th, any attempt to “unt” the number of gay men the Baby Boomer or Gen X generatns needs to nsir the number of people who are simply no longer alive to answer the qutn. In the US data, the percentage of dividuals intifyg as lbian or gay has creased, but not nearly as much as the percentage of those intifyg as bisexual (.

Addnally, bisexuals have always faced somewhat a tch-22 which they are both rejected by the heterosexual muny for beg a sexual mory and om the lbian and gay muny for not que beg “gay enough. ) He’s playg Barry Glickman, a flamboyantly gay Broadway has-been who, along wh a hort of other actors whose reputatns need rehabbg, head to Indiana.

) On actual Broadway, his role was played by Brooks Ashmanskas, a gay actor who would would go on to receive a Tony nomatn for his performance the short-lived show. It’s a funny song wh dry lyrics about poppg Xanax and movg to San Francis to be among the gays, but all that gets lost behd the never-endg sg.

GAY SIMP

The term “homosexualy, ” while sometim nsired anachronistic the current era, is the most applible and easily translatable term to e when askg this qutn across societi and languag and has been ed other cross-natnal studi, cludg the World Valu Survey. Dpe major chang laws and norms surroundg the issue of same-sex marriage and the rights of LGBT people around the world, public opn on the acceptance of homosexualy society remas sharply divid by untry, regn and enomic velopment.

As was 2013, when the qutn was last asked, attus on the acceptance of homosexualy are shaped by the untry which people live. Those Wtern Europe and the Ameris are generally more acceptg of homosexualy than are those Eastern Europe, Rsia, Ukrae, the Middle East and sub-Saharan Ai. In many natns, there has been an creasg acceptance of homosexualy, cludg the Uned Stat, where 72% say should be accepted, pared wh jt 49% as recently as 2007.

There also have been fairly large shifts acceptance of homosexualy over the past 17 years two very different plac: Mexi and Japan.