GAY Meang: "full of joy, merry; light-hearted, reee;" also "wanton, lewd, lasciv" (late 12c. as a surname,… See orig and meang of gay.
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GAY OLD TIME
by Jordan Redman Staff Wrer Do you know what the word gay really means? The word gay dat back to the 12th century and om the Old French “gai,” meang “full of joy or mirth.” It may also relate to the Old High German “gahi,” meang impulsive. * definition of a gay old time *
gay old time (untable and ununtable, plural gay old tim).
homosexualy, sexual tert and attractn to members of one’s own sex.
The term gay is equently ed as a synonym for homosexual; female homosexualy is often referred to as different tim and different cultur, homosexual behavur has been varly approved of, tolerated, punished, and banned.
GAY OLD TIME
Homosexualy was not unmon ancient Greece and Rome, and the relatnships between adult and adolcent mal particular have bee a chief foc of Wtern classicists recent years. Juo-Christian as well as Mlim cultur have generally perceived homosexual behavur as sful. Others—om factns wh mastream Prottantism to anizatns of Reform rabbis—have advoted, on theologil as well as social grounds, the full acceptance of homosexuals and their relatnships.
Morn velopments Attus toward homosexualy are generally flux, partially as a rult of creased polil activism (see gay rights movement) and efforts by homosexuals to be seen not as aberrant personali but as differg om “normal” dividuals only their sexual orientatn. The nflictg views of homosexualy—as a variant but normal human sexual behavur on one hand, and as psychologilly viant behavur on the other—rema prent most societi the 21st century, but they have been largely rolved ( the profsnal sense) most veloped untri. The Amerin Psychiatric Associatn, for example, classified “ego-syntonic homosexualy” (the ndn of a person ntent wh his or her homosexualy) as a mental illns 1973.
THE HISTORY OF THE WORD “GAY”
Nohels, some relig groups ntue to emphasize reparative therapy the attempt to “cure” homosexualy through prayer, unselg, and behavur modifitn.
Wherever opn n be eely exprsed, bat about homosexualy will likely ntue. Selected theori of homosexualy Psychologists the 19th and 20th centuri, most of whom classified homosexualy as a form of mental illns, veloped a variety of theori on s orig.
GAY (ADJ.)
It is likely that many stanc of homosexualy rult om a batn of born or nstutnal factors and environmental or social fluenc. Together wh a growg acceptance of homosexualy as a mon exprsn of human sexualy, long-standg beliefs about homosexuals had begun to lose crence. The stereotyp of male homosexuals as weak and effemate and lbians as mascule and aggrsive, which were wispread the Wt as recently as the 1950s and early ’60s, have largely been disrd.