Recent Forum letters remind me of how adept good people can be at closing their minds to unpleasant thoughts, at hiding from themselves their own barbarism and pretending to themselves that, far from being unfair, they are upholding a moral principle.
No other prejudice takes more irrational forms than that of the homophobe. One sees Christians hatefully reviling same-sex love in the name of Christ, whose supreme command was to "love one another."In general, homophobes are not wicked, they are uninformed - not unintelligent but victims of misinformation. Religious zealots trumpet myths that include such buzz words as "choice," "gay agenda," "family values," equating heterosexuality with love and commitment and same-sex orientation with lust and orgies.
An LDS apostle naively mentions "confused gender," as if sexual orientation is a decision consciously made when dating begins. Misinformed heterosexuals have grotesquely distorted the image of what they are being asked to accept.
The gay subculture seen parading in Washington or San Francisco no more speaks for the gay community than the Tailhook incident speaks for the Navy, nor does Gloria Steinem speak for all feminists.
Ignorance and misconceptions perpetuate irrational fears. One sees defenders of "the family" citing gay rights as the greatest threat to "family values," as if same-sex-oriented people don't have families by whom they long to be accepted; as if anything that deserved the name of "family values" didn't include the idea of parents responding humanely to the news of their child's homosexuality; as if it somehow served the cause of "the family" to heap abuse on the idea of same-sex couples.
The religious right indignantly espouses that "marriage is for procreation." May we then assume those childless marriages or those occurring after procreative age are not viable?
Love, commitment, caring, goals, loyalty are not exclusive qualities of heterosexuals.
There is a paranoia that gay people influence the sexual orientation of children or youths with whom they work. There are erroneous beliefs that gay people are erotically attracted to every person of their own gender and they cannot control these impulses.
I submit that they have a better sense of these things than the average heterosexual. The typical homophobe would be surprised at how many same-sex-oriented individuals he deals with in the course of a day.
As a parent of a same-sex-oriented son, I am very weary and sad as I remember the years of my child grappling with his identity, desperately trying to conform to what his church and society find "acceptable."
After ulcers, depression and thoughts of suicide, he finally accepted himself and realized, as Huckleberry Finn said, "You can't pray a lie." Nor could he live a lie. My son is a fighter and has survived, no thanks to his church, his community or society. Some parents are not so lucky.
Name withheld