Gay and Bisexual Men's Health Issu | Johns Hopks Medice

gay is a sickness

Robert E Gould article on homosexualy; c recent cisn by Amer Psychiatric Assn to remove homosexualy om tegory of mental illns; revs Sigmund Frd's theory of homosexualy, based on 'verted Oedipal plex'; says Frd viewed homosexualy as sentially ed by nstutnal factors and also as a perversn; summariz theori of homosexualy by Edmund Bergler, Irvg Bieber, Charl Soris, Lawrence Hatterer, Lnel Ovey, Clara Thompson, Judd Marmor, June Hopks, Evelyn Hooker and the Wolfenn group GB; not many fdgs have not been nfirmed other labs and some s have been refuted; revs theori on female homosexualty by Frank Capr, Helen Dtsch, Cathere Ban and Clara Thompson; article qutns how psychiatrists, who see only small number of 'disturbed' homosexuals, n reach nclns about all homosexuals, when vast majory do not e for treatment and appear to be livg well-adjted liv; not that few studi parg nonpatient homosexuals and nonpatient heterosexuals have not borne out theory that homosexuals are sick or even different, except for their sexual preferenc; scrib 3 'typ' of homosexuals as those whose homosexualy reflects mental disturbance, those whose homosexualy is not related to psychiatric problem and those homosexuals who live happy, productive liv; ments on physil heterosexual matg as opposed to homosexual matg; ill of gay upl, Natl Gay Task Force dir Ron Gold, Dr Howard Brown and newly married gay uple

Contents:

GAY AND BISEXUAL MEN'S HEALTH ISSU

Rearch has shown that the followg are some of the most mon health ncerns faced by gay and bisexual men. * gay is a sickness *

There are a few optns for gay men and bisexual men same-sex relatnships who aspire to have children, cludg surrogacy, where sperm is ed to fertilize a donated egg, which is then rried to term by a surrogate mother.

"The trial, EHVA PO1, is beg n by specialists London at the St Stephen's Centre and Wtmster Hospal as well as wh partner s source, Dan HarryImage ptn, Dan Harry marched wh Terrence Higgs tst at London pri this year to raise awarens of their work to end HIVMr Harry said that due to the lack of tn school he was left anx about HIV and left him sred to e out as gay.

In this, the DSM followed a long tradn medice and psychiatry, which the neteenth century appropriated homosexualy om the Church and, what mt have seemed like an élan of enlightenment, promoted om s to mental disorr. Meanwhile, the World Health Organizatn (WHO) Geneva only removed homosexualy om s Internatnal Classifitn of Diseas (ICD) wh the publitn of ICD-10 1992, although ICD-10 still rried the nstct of "ego-dystonic sexual orientatn.

JAGUARS ASSOCIATE STRENGTH ACH OUT AS GAY A FIRST FOR US-BASED PRO LEAGU

Dan Harry, om the UK's first gay datg show, is volved tts which uld eradite the vis. * gay is a sickness *

The Substance Abe and Mental Health Servic Admistratn (SAMHSA) today released a new data report Lbian, Gay, and Bisexual Behavral Health: Rults om the 2021 and 2022 Natnal Surveys on Dg Use and Health (PDF | 2.1 MB), ditg that lbian, gay, and bisexual adults are more likely than straight adults to e substanc, experience mental health ndns cludg major prsive episos, and experience ser thoughts of suici.

“We know that statistilly, lbian, gay and bisexual Amerins face creased risks for mental health and substance e issu, which is often related to strs ed by stigma, discrimatn and harassment,” said HHS Assistant Secretary for Mental Health and Substance Use Miriam E.

IN HONOR OF CHILD GROOMG MONTH--GAYS ADM THEY'RE SICK

Kev Maxen, an associate strength ach wh the Jacksonville Jaguars, has bee the first male ach a major U.S.-based profsnal league to e out as gay. * gay is a sickness *

SAMHSA’s approach to addrsg the behavral health needs of LGBTQI+ people wh, affected by, or at risk for mental health and substance e ndns, builds on the Print’s Executive Orr on Advancg Equaly for Lbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgenr, Queer, and Intersex Individuals (EO 14075). Spzer, a Columbia Universy psychiatrist and spokman for the nomenclature mtee rponsible for the text of the rolutn, when qutned about the term “sexual orientatn disturbance, ” hedged: “We're not sayg that homosexualy is eher ‘normal’ or ‘abnormal’...

*There are several ways to fe “homosexual, ” but the saft is still the simplt: A homosexual is any dividual whose sexual object choice is someone of the same to the gay activists who lobbied for the cisn, psychiatry is a prime source of persecutn. Silverste charg that when treatment is directed only toward the victim of environmental strs (the homosexual), and not toward the e of the strs (social stutns), the effect of the treatment is polil—“to strengthen the stat quo.

GAY IS A SICKNSGAY IS A SICKNS

* gay is a sickness *

Frd believed that all humans were nstutnally bisexual, and that if a boy had a strong female ponent (a more “feme” and “passive” nature), he might fail to work his way through the Oedipal nflict, and th might bee homosexual. In general, a fear of women due to unnsc stratn anxiety, or fear of punishment by other mal for sirg a woman sexually, all stem om a poor rolutn of the Oedipal phase of, as well as everyone after him, was much ls clear about the explanatn for female homosexualy, but he did put forth siar plex dynamisms for .

The sential differenc rrpond to the differenc stratn plex for boys and girls, and the theory of unrolved “penis envy” was advanced as a motivatg force for “mascule” behavr a Frd viewed homosexualy as sentially ed by nstutnal factors, and also as a perversn, he saw ltle hope for “curg” the ndn through therapy. Most analysts today view homosexualy terms of a nrosis or character disorr; they therefore nsir briefly summarized versn of a brilliant theorist's plited visn was dutifully absorbed the thkg and practice of many of his discipl, but Frd's largely unproved and undocumented assumptns ma evable that later psychiatrists would add to, subtract om, and modify the great man's the leadg morn thori on homosexualy, the followg subscribe to the “mental illns” theory, based, more or ls, on Frd:☐The late Edmund Bergler, a noted Vienna‐born psychiatrist who clared that all homosexualy reprented ser pathology. Bieber and ne associat nnected wh New York Medil College piled data on 106 homosexual patients (pared to a ntrol group of 100 nonhomosexual patients) and found several distct patterns the fay backgrounds of the homosexual group.

Unrstand health ncerns for gay men and other men who have sex wh men, and learn how to promote good health. * gay is a sickness *

☐Charl Soris, another New York Cy psychiatrist who has treated many male homosexuals private practice, claims that fear of “engulfment” by the domant mother is the key factor preventg the boy om beg pennt and progrsg to heterosexualy. Soris believ that the boy's failure to separate om his mother, which pots him toward homosexualy, occurs the pre‐Oedipal phase (between ag 2 and 5) Soris and Bieber have spent years, clil rearch on homosexualy and are well‐known among psychiatrists—and also among homosexuals — for their theori. 1 and 2 (their rpective posns change om year to year), bee of their firmly held beliefs that homosexuals are severely stunted their psychosexual velopment, and that, if possible, they should unrgo therapy to “cure” their ndn.

Prev studi have dited creased risk of mental disorr symptoms, suici and substance mise lbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) adults, pared to heterosexual adults. Our aims were to terme an timate of the associatn between sexual orientatn inty and poor mental health and wellbeg among adults om 12 populatn surveys the UK, and to nsir whether effects differed for specific subgroups of the populatn. Individual data were pooled om the Brish Cohort Study 2012, Health Survey for England 2011, 2012 and 2013, Sttish Health Survey 2008 to 2013, Longudal Study of Young People England 2009/10 and Unrstandg Society 2011/12. Individual participant meta-analysis was ed to pool timat om each study, allowg for between-study variatn. Of 94,818 participants, 1.1 % intified as lbian/gay, 0.9 % as bisexual, 0.8 % as ‘other’ and 97.2 % as heterosexual. Adjtg for a range of variat, adults who intified as lbian/gay had higher prevalence of mon mental disorr when pared to heterosexuals, but the associatn was different different age groups: apparent for those unr 35 (OR = 1.78, 95 % CI 1.40, 2.26), weaker at age 35–54.9 (OR = 1.42, 95 % CI 1.10, 1.84), but strongt at age 55+ (OR = 2.06, 95 % CI 1.29, 3.31). The effects were stronger for bisexual adults, siar for those intifyg as ‘other’, and siar for 'low wellbeg'. In the UK, LGB adults have higher prevalence of poor mental health and low wellbeg when pared to heterosexuals, particularly younger and olr LGB adults. Sexual orientatn inty should be measured routely all health studi and admistrative data the UK orr to fluence natnal and lol policy velopment and service livery. The rults reerate the need for lol ernment, NHS provirs and public health policy makers to nsir how to addrs equali mental health among the mory groups. * gay is a sickness *

To such an hibed pc:son, the “choice” of homosexualy seems safer and allows him to pe wh his broang the ncept of homosexualy, Ovey ed the term “psdohomosexual” to scribe dividuals whom the predomatg dynamics of homosexual behavr were not herently sexual, but had to do wh power and penncy.

Whe Instute of Psychiatry New York Cy until her ath 1958, also viewed homosexualy as a symptom of var unrlyg nonsexual problems such as fear of adult rponsibily, a need to fy thory, an attempt to pe wh hatred for or extreme petivens wh members of one's own sex, or a child's awarens that his (or her) parents would have preferred a child of the oppose sex.

Marmor disunts the disturbed‐fay theory on the ground that many nonhomosexuals had siar childhoods, yet grew up “straight, ” and nversely, that many homosexuals e om fai that did not nform at all to the classic homosexual ‐ producg “type.

Sexually Transmted Diseas (STDs) have been creasg among gay and bisexual men. * gay is a sickness *

”Marmor also fends homosexualy as fallg wh the blogil norm for mamels, and c the work of parative psychologist Frank Beach, whose studi dite that bisexualy occurs “naturally” many mammalian speci bis man. Prophetilly, the only new fdgs of the last two years are beg offered by theorists who claim to have found signifint hormonal differenc between hetero‐ and is a small but growg body of rearch ditg that hormonal imbalanc may be volved the explanatn for at least some homosexualy. In a study reported om the Masters and Johnson sex rearch stute (1971), rearchers found that young men who were predomantly or exclively homosexual had lower levels of the male hormone, ttosterone, Than those of young heterosexual men.

There have been no analytic studi of dividual s where hormonal imbalance occurs, nor is there as yet any ditn of how mon such imbalance may be among the homosexual populatn as for theori about female homosexualy, very few studi have ever been done. Bieber, Hatterer, Soris, Ovey, Marmor—all the big guns who have been dog clil rearch on homosexualy for many years, have worked almost exclively wh mal, and virtually all their published work relat only to male meager lerature on female homosexualy, wrten predomantly by male psychoanalysts, emphasiz disturbanc the mother‐child relatnship. Another equently ced pattern volv parents (or the preferred parent) wantg a son stead of a dghter, so that the girl renounc her femalens and tri to bee a boy orr to w Thompson saw some of the differenc between male and female homosexualy our culture as the rult of different norms for male and female monstrativens.

BackgroundThis study exam the extent to which gay, lbian, and bisexual young people are at creased risk of psychiatric disorr and suicidal behavrs u * gay is a sickness *

”Thompson nclud that society's more tolerant attu about monstrative iendship between women extends also to overt homosexualy, pecially if the partners rea om flntg their homosexualy (adoptg male drs or displayg sexually aggrsive behavr) of the theori — particularly those relatg to Lbianism — have been based on narrow and skewed studi. ” Others blame a mother who is too aloof or “stratg” to the boy or to her such differg—if not nflictg—claims are ma to “expla” the homosexual, and when the claims are based on studi of psychiatric patients rather than the general populatn, one mt qutn the “illns” theory self.

Another qutn gay activists jtifiably raise—and psychiatrists fail to answer satisfactorily—is how psychiatrists, who see only a small number of “disturbed” homosexuals, n reach nclns about all homosexuals, when the vast majory do not e for treatment, and when many appear to be livg well‐adjted, nstctive, Soris, Hatterer, Ovey and others datg back to Frd may have seen an aggregate total of several thoand homosexual patients, but none of them have ever done ntrol studi parg their homosexual patients wh nonpatient homosexuals or parg nonpatient heterosexuals wh nonpatient the theorists who view homosexualy as pathologil do unrtake parative studi wh “healthy” (nonpatient) homosexuals, this ser charge nnot be dismissed, eher by the profsn or by the public.

The few studi that have pared nonpatient homosexuals and nonpatient heterosexuals have not borne out the theory that homosexuals are sick or even different, except for their sexual the body of psychiatric theory do not prove that homosexualy is an illns, neher do refute another possibily — that homosexualy exists to a certa gree all people, and that is reprsed by cultural forc favor strong cultural taboos agast homosexualy exist our society is beyond qutn. In a prehensive and wellknown study of other cultur, anthropologist Clellan Ford and psychologist Frank Beach found that 49 of 76 societi homosexual activi were nsired both normal and socially acceptable.

*BEAR-MAGAZINE.COM* GAY IS A SICKNESS

In Honor of Child Groomg Month--Gays Adm They're Sick .

TOP