The Disease of Homophobia

Richard Ammon
GlobalGayz.com
Mat 14, 2010

Hopefully some day coming out won’t be such a big deal and won’t be news--or do we gay (LGBT people) secretly like the rush of notoriety, the fuss, the ‘news worthy’ event, by appearing to win one more to our club, gaining over the homophobes and discovering the inside thrill of breaking into freedom.

In Iraq or Palestine coming out will get you killed. But in the West it would appear that it’s no big deal.

So why the headlines when an entertainer or movie star comes out: singer Ricky Martin and actress Cynthia Nixon (photo below left) recently announced publicly they are gay. Big deal or not?

Greg Louganis, Matthew Mitcham (photo right) are famous athletes who came out, not with a bang but with whispers and gossip, not willing but not unwilling. Others were infamously outed in the press with some fanfare and scandal: “did you hear about Ted Haggard!?”

The Wall Street Journal considers coming out as noteworthy news: When Your Teenager Says She's Gay.

Coming out, regardless how it’s done, willing or unwilling, is a kind of rebirth from fear and hiding into truth and honesty. It’s a gay version of a bar/bat mitzvah going from child to adult; a step away from shame toward integrity. Even Haggard can be more honest—even while trying to affirm his “heterosexual side.”

Coming out is no small event; it’s a major rite of passage to declare oneself different from one’s family tradition, from hetero society, from religious conservancy. The world shifts for a person when they come out. There’s no going back to ‘normal’. The cut is made and can’t be undone. It’s an irreversible stage of growing up, from victim to victor.

But unlike other natural changes (voice change, crevice hair, height growth, sexual awareness) this one takes courage to embrace in most cases because of toxic social homophobia that muddles nearly all cultures with a historic pale of forbidding and cursing from long-ago, mostly based on vague religious origins that fundamentalists
now take as ‘gospel truth’.

Such blind belief, buried in mystery and codified into sanctimonious absolutes and legal codes--without close examination of the validity of the sources--is another wonder of human nature: to believe that myth is truth, that fiction is fact, that sexual varieties don’t exist, that women are less; that Jesus, Muhammad and Buddha had direct links to the Divine. All are myths solidified by habitual unquestioned retelling and surrounded by officious systems.

Human sexuality is probably one of humanity’s most mysterious and fearful forces because it exposes in overt behavior the deepest covert feelings and hidden urges of an individual. Sex reveals secrets. Observe the numerous fundamentalist male preachers who are caught with their pants down with an escort. Observe the Catholic priests imposing sexual pleasure on under-age parishioners. (photo left Cynthia Nixon with fiancee Christine Marinoni)

And it’s not just the church folks who protest too much. Homosexuality is being portrayed as a disease by notable people featured in this week’s tabloids. Anti-gay Christian activist George Rekers who has been ‘involved’ with a younger man is vehemently denying such charges: “I will fight these false reports
because I have not engaged in any homosexual behavior whatsoever. I am not gay and never have been...” (He should bite more than dust for his hypocrisy and also should be pitied for the soulful anguish his internal homophobia is causing him to suffer.)

Followed today by Elizabeth Taylor’s verbal offense against Michael Jackson’s former doctor who outed Jackson.

Such use of sexual orientation as a weapon of hostility and derogatory slander are pathetic in their shallowness and ignorance. It’s like trying to degrade a person for having freckles. Ridiculous.

Sexual desire trumps just about everything—wealth, religion, race, fame, power. Where are these predators coming from in their deep souls to fabricate such facades or auras of lies about their essential craven truth? Hiding sexual desire behind the mask of religious garb is a most shameful form of toxic internal homophobia. (Hate who you are but don’t hate others by victimizing them.)

Coming out would ‘cure’ the abuse and hypocrisy of closeted clerical cravings. Something like ‘the truth will set you free’. What do we lose by coming out? We lose a lie, a false identity, an ill-fitting mask of conformity.

In these modern times, we are seeing that the great trauma is less about revealing who we really are and more about the disease of social homophobia. We are highly social creatures and sometimes that’s not a good thing; society can kill gays, spiritually and physically. (See also how homophobic-tinged ("Hey, Speedo-boy...!") bullying drove UK Olympic diver Tom Daley to quit his school.) (photo right)

Another aphorism underlies the integrity of coming out: to thine own self be true...and it follows thou canst not be false to any man. No need to lie; how good does that feel!

Coming Out at 13 Years Old - an Eternal Truth

Westhampton, MA - September 30, 2009
Richard Ammon - GlobalGayz.com

The September 27, 2009 New York Times Magazine cover story of a 13 year-old boy who has come out at school is notable in many ways:
-it was published by America's premier newspaper
-it was made a daring headline story with photos
-it's about homosexual youth in school
-it is set in conservative Oklahoma
-it includes gay boys and lesbian girls under the age of consent
-it portrays very courageous individuals who risk homophobic behavior
-it also portrays supportive parents, as well as schools and teachers
-it acknowledges that youth well under 18 have romantic and sexual lives

Some readers will say it's been said before
others will think it's too aggressive, part of the homosexual agenda
some will not let their children read it
others will gather around it at a parents' meeting for validation

But one thing the story will not do is persuade believers in sin that same-sex attraction is not a choice. They will continue to believe that sexual orientation is a moral choice and therefore a sinful commission, a volition of behavior. Regardless of the description of children testifying they knew they were gay as young as eleven, the moralists will discredit them and cling to their scriptural position that sexual awakening is somehow proscribed and governed by religious opinion and thus political code - evidenced by some African countries' currently proposed legislation against homosexuality, adding to the 80+ countries that already criminalize it.

Despite the evidence as depicted in the story that sexuality emerges from the psyche as naturally as pubic hair emerges from the body, the nay-sayers will continue to reject the idea.

There is nothing that can be said using the framework of medical, psychological or spiritual knowledge that will ever cause such people to think differently about human nature. It speaks to the intense grip that ignorance and belief systems have on the human mind even when confronted with obvious testimony to the contrary. Willful ignorance is like willful hate that locks the mind into 'neurological knot' in the brain and cannot unwind itself - so tightly that it is willing to become violent, mentally or physically, to assert its false truth.

To counter such ignorance and biased thinking, the truth of these out young gay lives as revealed in the Times story rings of authentic lived-in truth, not a political opinion or dogmatic belief. Real life unfolds in the testimony of these gay youths and over time 'the truth will out' as modern society moves into a higher consciousness about human sexuality, beyond the denial-based ideas derived from antiquated books written by mortals who lived in ancient times.

Link to International Gay Youth Organization
Read interview with 14-year old gay boy: "Kids have sexual feelings"
See Age of Consent Index
Also see this recent report: Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Students in Post-Primary Schools - Guidance for Principals and School Leaders

An Appreciation of Gay Rights Advocates and Ellen DeGeneres

Westhampton, MA - August 18, 2009
Richard Ammon - GlobalGayz.com

This blog is a note of greeting and appreciation to the many LGBT activists - some whom I know - who made the July 2009 Copenhagen World OutGames Human Rights Conference a profound success:

I was delighted and my heart was warmed to see your faces, but more importantly I continue to be deeply appreciative of your continued gay human rights advocacy on behalf of our worldwide community. From the happy victories of Denmark's registered partnerships and the out loud support from the government for the Conference to the fearsome political defeats in Burundi and violence in Guatemala, you continue undaunted against all odds to confront ignorance and bigotry. It gets heavy and hard along the way but you are no longer alone; there are now more of us in the 'trenches' and there is more funding each year for this humanitarian work.

So to lighten your day with another victory I am enclosing a YouTube video of Ellen DeGeneres, the lesbian queen of comedy, giving a commencement speech at Tulane University in New Orleans in June of this year. She is witty and also poignant in her playful comments to the graduating students and their mostly straight families and the conservative faculty.

But there is a greater wonder here: her completely 'out' presence at a major American university talking freely and comfortably about homosexuality for all to hear. She talks about coming out as a lesbian on television and the consequent discrimination she faced as well as her ultimate public rebirth as a popular talk show hostess now broadcasted across the country. She an inspiring and fearless pioneer for gay rights--as you are.

Thank you for your devotion and courage.

Here's Ellen on YouTube.