10 Anti-Gay Myths Debunked | Southern Poverty Law Center

Contents:

• NSW POLICE LOSE URT BID TO EXCLU STT JOHNSON KILLG OM GAY HATE QUIRY
• STUDY HELPS EXPLA WHY HETEROSEXUAL MEN ARE LS PASSNATE TOWARD MASCULE VICTIMS OF ANTI-GAY HATE CRIM
• THE SOLUTN TO "GAY" INSULTS: FREEDOM OF SPEECH
• ‘I WAS TOTALLY GRIPPED WH FEAR’: QUIRY EXAM 40 YEARS OF GAY HATE CRIM
• SELF-LOATHG AMONG GAY PEOPLE IS NOTHG NEW. WE’RE OVERWHELMED BY
• 10 ANTI-GAY MYTHS DEBUNKED
• SAN DIEGO MAN BTALLY BEATEN ANTI-GAY HATE CRIME
• GAY RIGHTS
• THE MYTH OF THE VLENT, SELF-HATG GAY HOMOPHOBE

NSW POLICE LOSE URT BID TO EXCLU STT JOHNSON KILLG OM GAY HATE QUIRY

A bid by New South Wal police to exclu a high-profile killg om a gay hate quiry has been ath of US mathematician Stt Johnson is one of dozens of s unr the spotlight at a special missn of quiry to spected gay hate crim Sydney between 1970 and 27-year-old died after he was punched at a gay beat on Sydney’s northern beach. In the latt velopment, Stt Phillip Whe plead guilty to throwg the punch that ultimately ed Johnson to fall to his month, jtice Robert Beech-Jon dismissed “what appears to be an absurd suggtn [by police] that Dr Johnson killed himself” when sentencg Whe to ne years past newsletter promotnafter newsletter promotnNSW police had argued Johnson’s ath was outsi the current quiry’s terms of reference on the basis the matter was not unsolved, the man rponsible for his ath intified as gay and a sentencg judge did not fd the ath to be motivated by gay the quiry’s missner, jtice John Sackar, on Tuday led s terms of reference were much wir and answers to qutns such as how and why Johnson died were still not urt did not make a fdg beyond reasonable doubt that Whe was motivated by gay hate, but did not le out the possibily, he is due to hand down his fal report next month.

STUDY HELPS EXPLA WHY HETEROSEXUAL MEN ARE LS PASSNATE TOWARD MASCULE VICTIMS OF ANTI-GAY HATE CRIM

“As I dug to the lerature on hate crime, pecially ncerng the LGBTQ+ muny, beme clear that there was a certa level of fixatn on ‘homophobia’ as the flt explanatn for almost any sort of uneasy relatns between this muny and straight dividuals, ” explaed study thor Chuma Owuamalam, an associate profsor of social psychology at the Universy of Nottgham Malaysia. ”In three experiments, which clud 1, 475 participants, the rearchers found that heterosexual men displayed ls passnate attus toward gay victims of hate crim who were scribed as beg mascule pared to those who were scribed as beg the experiments, the participants read a fict news article about a hate crime that occurred 2019.

THE SOLUTN TO "GAY" INSULTS: FREEDOM OF SPEECH

M was scribed g feme stereotyp — he liked to go shoppg for cloth and operated a makp channel on the mascule ndn, heterosexual men were ls likely to agree wh statements such as “If gay men need my help, I want to offer , ” “I am heartbroken for Mr. “Inty threat might not also be the only explanatn for the ‘passn downplays’ that we found – is possible that homophobia uld play a role too, although we show that the procs we speak about were visible when homophobia was statistilly held nstant.

In the 1950s he moved to Sydney to take up teachg 1956, 28 years before homosexualy was crimalised NSW, he was arrted by a police officer posg as a gay man at a North Sydney ‘beat’, a public toilet or other public place equented by men seekg ntact, often sexual, wh same-sex attracted men. Parrabell also looked at the ath of 33-year-old Rsell Payne, who was found ad his home at Inverell 1989; and the ath of 36-year-old Graham Paynter, whose body was disvered at the base of a cliff at Tathra on the state’s far-south ast the same ’s ath was tegorised as a spected crime of “bias”, but the Parrabell report stated that evince of gay hate was eher not found the other ral s, or there was sufficient rmatn llected durg ial police quiri to now tegorise any motive for them. A 2020 parliamentary quiry report stated that the NSW police had “failed s rponsibili to properly vtigate” gay and transgenr hate current special missn will quire to unsolved Parrabell s, and unsolved aths where the victim was om the LGBTQ+ muny and the cint was prevly vtigated by NSW police.

Sadly he wouldn’t be the gay people know the most homophobic school bully often pops up the lol gay bar a few years later, but there are wir exampl: Hollywood agents who bar clients om g out, historil figur such as Senator McCarthy’s anti-gay lawyer Roy Cohn, who mataed till the end that the Aids-related illns that killed him was liver ncer, the untls homophobic policians ught wh male rts. So much foc has been on changg laws and enuragg footballers to e out or on promotg sexual eedom – all important thgs – that we’ve missed the huge ground-level sufferg of those stgglg wh the legacy of society’s gay shame, right unr our may not f the narrative we wish to promote but there are huge numbers of people gettg themselv to ser suatns whout enough support.

‘I WAS TOTALLY GRIPPED WH FEAR’: QUIRY EXAM 40 YEARS OF GAY HATE CRIM

Ever sce born-aga sger and orange juice pchwoman Ana Bryant helped kick off the ntemporary anti-gay movement some 40 years ago, hard-le elements of the relig right have been searchg for ways to monize gay people — or, at a mimum, to fd arguments that will prevent their normalizatn society.

But addn to hawkg that myth, the legns of anti-gay activists who followed have add a panoply of others, rangg om the extremely doubtful claim that sexual orientatn is a choice, to unalloyed li like the claims that gay men molt children far more than heterosexuals or that hate crime laws will lead to the legalizatn of btialy and necrophilia.

SELF-LOATHG AMONG GAY PEOPLE IS NOTHG NEW. WE’RE OVERWHELMED BY

Depictg gay men as a threat to children may be the sgle most potent weapon for stokg public fears about homosexualy — and for wng electns and referenda, as Ana Bryant found out durg her succsful 1977 mpaign to overturn a Da County, Fla., ordance barrg discrimatn agast gay people. Gregory Herek, a profsor at the Universy of California, Davis, who is one of the natn's leadg rearchers on prejudice agast sexual mori, reviewed a seri of studi and found no evince that gay men molt children at higher rat than heterosexual men.

10 ANTI-GAY MYTHS DEBUNKED

The Amerin Amy of Child & Adolcent Psychiatry affirmed 2013 that “[c]urrent rearch shows that children wh gay and lbian parents do not differ om children wh heterosexual parents their emotnal velopment or their relatnships wh peers and adults” and they are “not more likely than children of heterosexual parents to velop emotnal or behavral problems. The Amerin Amy of Pediatrics (AAP) a 2002 policy statement clared: "A growg body of scientific lerature monstrat that children who grow up wh one or two gay and/or lbian parents fare as well emotnal, gnive, social, and sexual functng as do children whose parents are heterosexual. The Amerin Psychiatric Associatn noted a 2000 fact sheet available on the Associatn of Gay and Lbian Psychiatrists, that alg wh gay, lbian and bisexual issu, that sexual abe do not appear to be any more prevalent among children who grow up and intify as gay, lbian or bisexual than children who grow up and intify as heterosexual.

Siarly, the Natnal Organizatn on Male Sexual Victimizatn not on s webse that "experts the human sexualy field do not believe that premature sexual experienc play a signifint role late adolcent or adult sexual orientatn" and add that 's unlikely that anyone n make another person gay or heterosexual.

Anti-LGBT anizatns, seekg to promote heterosexualy as the healthier "choice, " often offer up the purportedly shorter life spans and poorer physil and mental health of gays and lbians as reasons why they shouldn't be allowed to adopt or foster children. Anti-LGBT anizatns have also tried to support this claim by distortg the work of legimate scholars, like a 1997 study nducted by a Canadian team of rearchers that alt wh gay and bisexual men livg Vanuver the late 1980s and early 1990s. Anti-gay activists, who have long opposed addg LGBT people to those protected by hate crime legislatn, have repeatedly claimed that such laws would lead to the jailg of relig figur who preach agast homosexualy — part of a bid to ga the backg of the broar relig muny for their posn.

SAN DIEGO MAN BTALLY BEATEN ANTI-GAY HATE CRIME

Anti-gay groups have been adamantly opposed to allowg gay men and lbians to serve openly the armed forc, not only bee of their purported fear that bat reads will be unrmed, but bee the ary has long been nsired the purt merocracy Ameri (the armed forc were succsfully racially tegrated long before Amerin civil society, for example).

At the same time, gays and lbians have served openly for years the armed forc of 25 untri (as of 2010), cludg Bra, Israel, South Ai, Canada and Atralia, acrdg to a report released by the Palm Center, a policy thk tank at the Universy of California at Santa Barbara.

Dpe the fact that gay men and lbians have been servg openly the ary sce September 2011, anti-LGBT groups ntue to claim that openly gay personnel are g problems the ary, cludg claims of sexual abe by gay and lbian soldiers of straight soldiers.

GAY RIGHTS

Though is te that LGBT people tend to suffer higher rat of anxiety, prsn, and prsn-related illns and behavrs like alhol and dg abe than the general populatn, that is due to the historil social stigmatizatn of homosexualy and vlence directed at LGBT people, not bee of homosexualy self. A report prented by the Council on Scientific Affairs to the AMA Hoe of Delegat Interim Meetg wh regard to reparative (“ex-gay”) therapy noted that most of the emotnal disturbance gay men and lbians experience around their sexual inty is not based on physlogil , but rather on “a sense of alienatn an unacceptg environment.

Mark Hatzenbuehler, a socmedil scienc profsor at the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia Universy, said that the data gathered the study suggts that “sexual mori livg muni wh high levels of anti-gay prejudice have creased risk of mortaly, pared to low-prejudice muni. Qazi Rahman, study -thor and a leadg scientist on human sexual orientatn, said: "This study puts ld water on any ncerns that we are lookg for a sgle 'gay gene' or a sgle environmental variable which uld be ed to 'select out' homosexualy — the factors which fluence sexual orientatn are plex.

The Amerin Amy of Pediatrics stated 1993 (updated 2004) that “homosexualy has existed most societi for as long as rerd scriptns of sexual beliefs and practic have been available” and that even at that time, “most scholars the field state that one’s sexual orientatn is not a choice … dividuals do not choose to be homosexual or heterosexual. A number of "ex-gay" relig mistri have spng up recent years wh the aim of teachg gay people to bee heterosexuals, and the have bee prime purveyors of the claim that gays and lbians, wh the aid of mental therapy and Christian teachgs, n "e out of homosexualy.

THE MYTH OF THE VLENT, SELF-HATG GAY HOMOPHOBE

Sce the 2013 “gay propaganda” law was passed  Rsia – a law that bans anyone om “spreadg propaganda of non-tradnal sexual relatns” among mors – the Rsian ernment has ntued to crack down on LGBTQ rights the untry the name of prervg “tradnal valu”. Glenn Bishop, one of the 12 who sought to fly the flag, told CBC that the group was “not agast the gay pri people at all” and that “anybody’s sexual preference is their choice” – echog nservative sentiments about gayns beg a matter of personal choice rather than an herent inty. In late June, the Castro Lbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgenr, and Queer Cultural District (CQCD) San Francis voted to remend to the Castro Merchants, the bs associatn that has jurisdictn over the flagpol, that replace the origal Pri flag Harvey Milk Plaza wh a new versn of the flag that’s more clive of Black, brown, and transgenr members of the LGBTQ muny.

“[I]t was mostly low-e street queens, aga many of them Black and brown, who fought the ps the streets outsi the Stonewall Inn three years later, ” they ntued, addg that most Whe lbian and gay activists at the time nmned any type of fightg back agast police favor of a more “rpectable” image. Among those exampl are a parison of same-sex marriage to a marriage between “a man and his horse”; llg the “It Gets Better” project, an iative signed to help LGBTQ young people pe wh bullyg and margalizatn, “disgtg” and a “ncerted effort” to rec kids to the gay “liftyle”; and claimg that the “blood” of “young Mar” would be on the hands of lawmakers who voted to repeal the ary’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” Fay Rearch Council did not rpond to a requt for ment. Another “anti-LGBTQ hate group” named the report is the Alliance Defendg Freedom, a nservative Christian legal group wh attorneys across the untry and a long track rerd of ligatg agast LGBTQ a lawsu that ma natnal headl last year, ADF reprented Jack Phillips, a Christian baker who refed to make a ke for a gay weddg, a narrow victory at the Supreme Court.

“Along the same l that you see today, they put forward stereotyp and vilify, pecially gay men, as predators and predators of children, and e that to jtify the tactics of takg rights way om LGBTQ people, ” Fetner ced as an early example the activism of Ana Bryant Florida. Army service World War I, Gerber was spired to create his anizatn by the Scientific-Humanarian Commtee, a “homosexual emancipatn” group ’s small group published a few issu of s newsletter “Friendship and Freedom, ” the untry’s first gay-tert newsletter. Ernment signated Gerber’s Chigo hoe a Natnal Historic Pk TriangleCorbis/Getty ImagHomosexual prisoners at the ncentratn mp at Sachsenhsen, Germany, wearg pk triangl on their uniforms on December 19, gay rights movement stagnated for the next few s, though LGBT dividuals around the world did e to the spotlight a few example, English poet and thor Radclyffe Hall stirred up ntroversy 1928 when she published her lbian-themed novel, The Well of Lonels.