10 Anti-Gay Myths Debunked | Southern Poverty Law Center

Contents:

• “I’M NOT GAY NO MORE” CHURCHGOER STILL DIR MEN, ADMS HE HASN’T BEEN “DELIVERDT”
• CHURCH THREATENS LAWSU OVER 'I'M NOT GAY NO MORE' SONG
• 'I'M NOT GAY NO MORE' GUY -- I WENT VIRAL ... NOW I'M MAK' RERDS
• ‘I AM GAY – BUT I WASN’T BORN THIS WAY’
• MAN WHO CLAIMED 'I'M NOT GAY NO MORE' RPONDS TO CRICS
• WHY ARE THERE GAY MEN?
• ‘I’M NOT GAY NO MORE’ PARODY VIO
• GAY NO MORE
• IS YOUR MAN GAY, STRAIGHT, OR BISEXUAL?
• WHY DID ANDREW CALDWELL’S EX-GAY VIO GO VIRAL?
• 10 ANTI-GAY MYTHS DEBUNKED

“I’M NOT GAY NO MORE” CHURCHGOER STILL DIR MEN, ADMS HE HASN’T BEEN “DELIVERDT”

You so obvly nnot be gay, was her implitn, bee this is good was 2006, a full five years before Lady Gaga would set the Born This Way argument atop s unassailable cultural perch, but even then the popular unrstandg of orientatn was that was somethg you were born wh, somethg you uldn’t change. But what feels most accurate to say is that I’m gay – but I wasn’t born this people may fd their sir changg directn - and n't jt be explaed as experimentatn (Cred: Ignac Lehmann)In 1977, jt over 10% of Amerins thought gayns was somethg you were born wh, acrdg to Gallup. Throughout the same perd, the number of Amerins who believe homosexualy is “due to someone’s upbrgg/environment” fell om jt unr 60% to ias reached cril mass pop culture, first wh Lady Gaga’s 2011 Born This Way and one year later wh Macklemore’s Same Love, the chos of which has a gay person sgg “I n’t change even if I tried, even if I wanted to.

CHURCH THREATENS LAWSU OVER 'I'M NOT GAY NO MORE' SONG

”People who challenge the Born This Way narrative are often st as homophobic, and their thkg is nsired backwardAs Jane Ward not Not Gay: Sex Between Straight Whe Men, what’s tertg about many of the claims is how transparent their speakers are wh their polil motivatns. In fact, the homophobic and non-homophobic rponnts he studied shared siar levels of belief a Born This Way Samantha Allen not at The Daily Beast, the growg public support for gays and lbians has grown out of proportn wh the rise the number of people who believe homosexualy is fixed at birth; would be unlikely that this small change opn uld expla the spike support for gay marriage, for stance.

“It don’t seem to matter as much whether or not people believe that gay people are born that way as do that they simply know someone who is currently gay, ” Allen spe of the studi, those who ph agast Born This Way narrativ have been heavily cricised by gay activists. The efforts are potentially harmful, acrdg to the APA, “bee they prent the view that the sexual orientatn of lbian, gay and bisexual youth is a mental illns of disorr, and they often ame the abily to change one’s sexual orientatn as a personal and moral failure.

The APA, for example, while notg that most people experience ltle to no choice over their orientatns, says this of homosexualy’s origs:“Although much rearch has examed the possible geic, hormonal, velopmental, social and cultural fluenc on sexual orientatn, no fdgs have emerged that perm scientists to nclu that sexual orientatn is termed by any particular factor or factors. ”Siarly, the Amerin Psychiatric Associatn wr a 2013 statement that while the of heterosexualy and homosexualy are currently unknown, they are likely “multifactorial cludg blogil and behavral roots which may vary between different dividuals and may even vary over time. ” Acrdg to LeVay’s rearch, a specific part of the bra, the third terstial nucls of the anterr hypothalam (INAH-3), is smaller homosexual men than is heterosexual as they might, scientists have stggled to inty any particular gen that nsistently predict the directns of our love and sire (Cred: Ignac Lehmann)Read moreYou n spot the problem wh this study a e away: were the gay bras LeVay studied born that way, or did they bee that way?

'I'M NOT GAY NO MORE' GUY -- I WENT VIRAL ... NOW I'M MAK' RERDS

Bis the dividual criqu leveled agast each new study announcg some gay gene disvery, there are major methodologil cricisms to make about the entire enterprise general, as Grzanka pots out: “If we look at the raveno pursu, particularly among Amerin scientists, to fd a gay gene, what we see is that the ncln has already been arrived at. ”Gay or not, our sir are oriented and re-oriented throughout our liv (Cred: Ignac Lehmann)In fact, the straight-intified men Ward studied for her book sometim found themselv suatns that sparked the sire for homosexual sex: aterni, ployments, public rtrooms, etc.

I’m claimg that at some pot durg llege, my sexual and romantic sir beme reoriented toward menThkg back to my llege romanc wh women and men, I n beg to unrstand how my own experienc might have helped me to ‘cultivate’ my sire for homosexualy. “Limg our unrstandg of any plex human experience is always gog to be worse than allowg to be plited, ” he gay rights activists pared sexualy to relign - a ccial part of our life that we should be ee to practise however we like (Cred: Ignac Lehamann)So what are we to do wh the Born This Way rhetoric?

Queer theorist Tim Dean (2000) wr: "In view of statistics on new seronversns, some AIDS tors have begun to acknowledge that, unlikely though may seem, remag HIV-negative fact pos signifint psychologil challeng to gay men" (p. Gay men who were recently surveyed about their failure to e ndoms durg anal sex repeatedly told rearchers that current AIDS preventn msag do not feel relevant to them and do not nvey an urgency about why ndom e is important (Halkis, Parsons, & Wilton, 2003; Carballo-Dieguez & L, 2003; Mor et al., 2003). Crossley suggts that is impossible to evaluate the efficy of safer-sex msag and of themselv sce ncurrent to when they first began appearg, gay men were overwhelmed by the terror that they might be fected by the then-new disease that was rapidly killg their iends and lovers.

‘I AM GAY – BUT I WASN’T BORN THIS WAY’

As psychologist and former rearcher at the CDC Ron Stall was quoted as sayg an article the Manhattan gay newspaper Gay Cy News, "There are studi that monstrate a variety of psychosocial health issu, cludg prsn, antigay vlence, childhood sexual abe, or substance abe, n lead gay men to have unsafe sex" (Stall, quoted Osborne, 2002, p. Even when gay men posss a sophistited unrstandg of how HIV is transmted and accurate perceptns of how dangero risky sex n be, many gay men unrtimate their vulnerabily to HIV fectn (McKick, Horstman, & Coat, 1985; Bman & Siegel, 1987; Richard et al., 1988). Suarez and Miller (2001) feel that many gay youth who bareback fall to the tegory of irratnal risk takers sce they may have never known anyone wh HIV and hold psimistic attus about the future largely related to their beg gay.

The many levels of meang and special signifince that givg and receivg of semen has for gay men nnot be unrtimated as a ntributg factor to the rise barebackg -- pecially romantic upl, as will be examed Sectn 2 of this book. In ntrast to the rearchers above who have shown that for some gay men barebackg is a ratnal activy, there are social scientists who have tried to terme whether men who bareback have a documented higher level of mental disorrs than do men who do not take sexual risks.

MAN WHO CLAIMED 'I'M NOT GAY NO MORE' RPONDS TO CRICS

Even though a rrelatn has been shown to exist between high sensatn-seekers and impulsivy, this alone do not necsarily mean that all gay men who are high sexual sensatn-seekers exhib characteristics that would em them diagnosable as havg a personaly disorr, though obvly some do. Wh the mental health profsns' long history of diagnosg gay men as psychologilly abnormal and disturbed bee of their homosexualy, is important that the simple fact that a man has high-risk sex do not bee the sole crern for him to be diagnosed as exhibg psychopathology. This is where astute diagnostic skills and cultural sensivy to particular reali the liv of gay men are required orr to not appropriately pathologize men who are behavg a manner that the society or clician is unfortable wh or se as appropriate, whout nyg the possibily that for some gay men their sexual risk-takg may be part of a nstellatn of symptoms that jtifi a psychiatric diagnosis.

In discsg the multiple meangs and implitns of sex, Frost (1994) expands upon Carballo-Dieguez's fdgs, statg, "For many gay men, sexual behavr is a statement of their sense of beg gay, an affirmatn of their right to be gay, an exprsn of love, a vehicle through which to achieve timacy, and a repudiatn of the felt prohibn by the greater society.

Speakg specifilly about gay men, Yep, Lovaas, and Pagonis (2002) suggt that for many gay men the ternnectn between the sexual and emotnal or psychologil aspects of their psych speaks not only to the realy that some gay men e sex as an attempted "panacea" for their problems but also ntribut to active ristance to changg risky sexual behavr. One study nducted durg the height of the epimic found that a majory of men surveyed agreed wh the statement, "It is hard to change my sexual behavr bee beg gay means dog what I want sexually" (Aspwall, Kemeny, Taylor, Schneir, & Dudley, 1991, p. 433) All therapists workg wh gay men who bareback mt spend nsirable time explorg the numero and layered meangs that sex has for each dividual and how sex wh and whout ndoms affects the abily of var sexual opportuni and suatns to meet the needs.

WHY ARE THERE GAY MEN?

The feral ernment has risted fundg any natnal study of gay men's sexual behavrs even though the fdgs would be of great tert and e to social scientists terms of signg effective and targeted AIDS preventn programs that were culturally specific for the var subpopulatns of gay men. Have been stymied by nservativ Congrs who, rponse to vol activists of the relig right wg, have blocked all efforts to fund a natnal survey of gay men's sexual habs by eher the Natnal Instut of Health (NIH) or the Natnal Instute of Mental Health (NIMH). In today's world where the polil foc of much of the gay liberatn movement has bee gay marriage, gays servg openly the ary, and gay parenthood, the goals of anizatns fightg for gay rights have shifted om gay men radilly transformg Amerin society to now assiatg to nservative and heteronormative ways.

Crossley's observatn is keepg wh the pots ma by Crimp (1989), Rof (1996), and Moore (2004) about how the vibrant and creative sexual culture created by gay men the 1970s still exerts a powerful pull on the gay psyche and is a highly valued aspect of gay munal memory and history that ntribut to why some men bareback. "When we discs the issue of sexual risk-takg behavrs -- particularly a margalized, outlawed group, such as gay men -- is imperative to see the historil and cultural forc at work shapg dynamic unrstandg of such behavr, " wr Marshall Forste, MD, profsor of psychiatry at Harvard Medil School. One of the ways that ternalized homophobia may play out is an unnsc sense that the dividual is unimportant, unrvalued, and not worth very much, th creasg his sense that he is expendable, and so too are the men wh whom he has sex and om whom he seeks love and validatn.

For several years, studi led by Andrea Camper Ciani at the Universy of Padova Italy and others have found that mothers and maternal nts of gay men tend to have signifintly more offsprg than the maternal relativ of straight men. The rults show strong support for the "balancg selectn hypothis, " which is fast beg the accepted theory of the geic basis of male theory holds that the same geic factors that duce gayns mal also promote fecundy (high reproductive succs) those mal' female maternal relativ.

‘I’M NOT GAY NO MORE’ PARODY VIO

Through this tra-off, the maternal relativ' "gay man gen, " though they aren't exprsed as such, tend to get passed to future generatns spe of their tenncy to make their male herors no one knows which gen, exactly, the might be, at least one of them appears to be loted on the X chromosome, acrdg to geic molg by Camper Ciani and his lleagu. The androphilic pattern that we found is about femal who crease their reproductive value to attract the bt mal, " Camper Ciani told Life's Ltle out, the moms and nts of gay men have an advantage over the moms and nts of straight men for several reasons: They are more fertile, displayg fewer gynelogil disorrs or plitns durg pregnancy; they are more extroverted, as well as funnier, happier and more relaxed; and they have fewer fay problems and social anxieti. Though no statistics exist on the number of men and women who have tried to change their orientatns, Exod Internatnal, the Christian ex-gay umbrella-anizatn, timat has field 200, 000 quiri om homosexuals and their fai sce the 1970s, acrdg to director Bob Davi.

GAY NO MORE

And now we are alg wh Andrew Caldwell, a 21-year-old man whose exuberant claratn of havg been cured of homosexualy was met wh much jubilatn by atten of the Church of God Christ’s 107th Holy Convotn … and much chucklg by the gay blogosphere. In the end, I wonr if we are not so much embarrassed for Caldwell as we are embarrassed that people like Caldwell may see so ltle of value current gay culture that nyg themselv orr to fd acceptance where they n is an appealg optn.

IS YOUR MAN GAY, STRAIGHT, OR BISEXUAL?

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. And Poland, supporters of the erng PiS (Law and Jtice), which has explicly targeted gay rights as anathema to tradnal Polish valu, are 23 percentage pots ls likely to say that homosexualy should be accepted by society than those who do not support the erng party.

But even untri like France and Germany where acceptance of homosexualy is high, there are differenc between supporters and non-supporters of key right-wg populist parti such as Natnal Rally France and Alternative for Germany (AfD).

WHY DID ANDREW CALDWELL’S EX-GAY VIO GO VIRAL?

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.

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. Others have ced a group lled the Amerin College of Pediatricians (ACPeds) to claim, as Tony Perks of the Fay Rearch Council did November 2010, that "the rearch is overwhelmg that homosexualy pos a [moltatn] danger to children.

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.

On the basis of the same obuari, Cameron also claimed that gay men are 18 tim more likely to die r accints than heterosexuals, 22 tim more likely to die of heart attacks than wh, and 11 tim more likely than blacks to die of the same e. 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.