3 Ways to Behave Around Gay People if You Don't Accept Them

Contents:

• THE FACT NO ONE LIK TO ADM: MANY GAY MEN ULD JT HAVE EASILY BEEN STRAIGHT
• 10 ANTI-GAY MYTHS DEBUNKED
• WHO HAT GAY PEOPLE?WHO HAT GAY PEOPLE?
• 25 THGS I HATE ABOUT BEG A GAY MAN
• HOW TO BEHAVE AROUND GAY PEOPLE IF YOU DON'T ACCEPT THEM

THE FACT NO ONE LIK TO ADM: MANY GAY MEN ULD JT HAVE EASILY BEEN STRAIGHT

When I was young, I was told the whole world was divid to heterosexual men and heterosexual women, bar a small number of unfortunate ‘homosexuals’ of both genrs and possibly an even smaller number a third tegory, ‘bisexuals’, who ‘swung both ways’; pl, fally, a ty band of wretched creatur who were physilly not que one thg or the other. He found that almost half his male terviewe had reacted sexually to both genrs; more than a third had had a homosexual enunter; and more than one ten reported roughly equally strong sexual rpons to both men and women. 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. Acrdg to Ta Fetner, a soclogy profsor at Canada’s McMaster Universy, anti-LGBTQ activists began anizatn “not too long after Stonewall, ” the 1969 uprisg at the Stonewall Inn, a New York Cy gay bar. “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.

The sger-turned-anti-gay-activist was behd the “Save Our Children” mpaign, which 1977 helped overturn a newly passed lol ordance Miami-Da County that prohibed discrimatn based on sexual orientatn employment, hog and public servic. Reached a tippg pot for acceptance of homosexualy, acrdg to a Pew study, and by 2016, LGBTQ advot had solidified many civil rights gas, such as the legalizatn of same-sex are we seeg a surge? However, the ntued existence of homophobia—spe the obv downsis—rais qutns about s basic nature: Do psychologil theori like those above really expla why gayns, specifilly, evok such fear, the kd that n sometim even lead to vlent speech and actn?

10 ANTI-GAY MYTHS DEBUNKED

The only way to answer the qutns is to stop thkg of homophobia as a personal choice and unrstand as the evable and liberate rult of the culture which Amerin men are raised. We don’t hear about gay men disverg an tert women later life, and we rarely believe men when they say they are bisexual—the mon, if erroneo, wisdom is that any man who says he is bi is really jt gay and hasn’t admted yet.

WHO HAT GAY PEOPLE?WHO HAT GAY PEOPLE?

Cred: Getty ImagHomophob should nsir a ltle self-reflectn, suggts a new study fdg those dividuals who are most hostile toward gays and hold strong anti-gay views may themselv have same-sex sir, albe unrver on. The rearch, published the April 2012 issue of the Journal of Personaly and Social Psychology, reveals the nuanc of prejudic like homophobia, which n ultimately have dire nsequenc.

" To gge homophobia a hoehold, stunts rpond to ems such as, "It would be upsettg for my mom to fd out she was alone wh a lbian" or "My dad avoids gay men whenever possible. Participants dited their own level of homophobia, both overt and implic; word-pletn tasks, stunts wrote down the first three words that me to md when prompted wh some of the words' letters.

25 THGS I HATE ABOUT BEG A GAY MAN

"In a predomately heterosexual society, 'know thyself' n be a challenge for many gay dividuals, " lead thor Netta Weste, a lecturer at the Universy of Essex the Uned Kgdom, said a statement. Those participants who reported their heterosexualy spe havg hidn same-sex sir were also the most likely to show hostily toward gay dividuals, cludg self-reported anti-gay attus, endorsement of anti-gay polici and discrimatn such as supportg harsher punishments for homosexuals. And 2010, proment anti-gay activist and -founr of nservative Fay Rearch Council Gee Rekers was reportedly spotted 2010 wh a male rt rented om Acrdg to news reports, the rt nfirmed Rekers is gay.

HOW TO BEHAVE AROUND GAY PEOPLE IF YOU DON'T ACCEPT THEM

"If somebody tried to mpaign today on endg gay marriage, they would get so ltle tractn outsi the most ge elements, and yet, even five years ago, that wasn't an extreme posn.... "When we showed gay people, " he says, "when we elevated the voic of gay people as part of the nversatn — and I say this as someone who is gay — we wanted to show the gay people as part of a fay, the gay people as part of a workplace, the gay people this se as part of a classroom.

The chang are associated wh creased visibily of openly gay characters on televisn, the repeal of “don’t ask, don’t tell” and the Supreme Court cisn that legalized same-sex marriage. For every highly publicized act of vlence toward sexual mori, such as the recent mass shootg at a gay nightclub Orlando, there are many more physil and verbal asslts, attempted asslts, acts of property damage or timidatns which are never reported to thori, let alone publicized by the media. But when we back up and thk about this aggrsn wh the amework of sexual stigma, we n see that the of antigay vlence n eper and are more plex than a simple “prejudice” explanatn.