Homophobia

Homophobia

Through the years it would be delightful to believe that society has

gotten more accepting of minorities. While in many ways this is true, it

is also a false statement as well. The United States has gone through

leaps and bounds over the last century. Women were the first to win

their rights, and after that African Americans broke through the barriers

of oppression. Since both of those movements only took a good hundred

years to happen, how long will it be before the United States accepts

gays? Gays have rights, and are not faced with the same challenges as

women and blacks were, but they are not being treated as equals. There

are thousands more homosexual assaults than any other minority. Gays are

treated as outcasts, and all because why? What causes people to fear or

loath homosexuals? Are they fearing inner feelings that they hide from

the rest of the world, or is it simply the case that society has warped

their fragile minds into believing that gays are a threat?

Homosexuals are the target of harassment and violent attacks, and

the numbers of these attacks is declining, but at a minimal rate. To say

that the American people are accepting to gays is, to say at least, an

understatement. Americans use terms like "coming out" to separate gays,

and make them seem like outsiders. "About three-quarters of homosexuals

say they have been harassed one in four say they have been physically

assaulted."(Goleman 1) Gay bashing normally occurs around gay

communities, which indicates that they were hunted. "Anti-gay violence

is still acceptable because while leaders decry racial and religious

bigotry, they ignore violence against gays and lesbians."(Foreman) G...

... middle of paper ...

... that lesbian and gay people will experience both

increased acceptance and increased violence."(Berrill) That just proves

that like any rights movement, it is going to get worse before it gets

better.

Works Cited

Kantor, Martin. Homophobia: Description, Development, and Dynamics of Gay

Bashing. Westport: Praeger, 1998.

Goleman, Daniel. "Studies Discover Clues to the Roots of Homophobia." New

York Times. 10 July 1990: 1-4. Online. Internet. 11 December 1999.

http://www.bibble.org/gay/phobia/roots_of_homophobia.html

Stein, Sara Bonnett. About Phobias. New York: Walker, 1979.

Kayal, Philip M. Bearing Witness: Gay Men's Health Crisis and the politics of AIDS.

Boulder: Westview Press, 1993.

Kahn, Surina. "How the Ex-Gay Movement Serves the Right's Attack on Democracy."

Public Eye. 1998. Online. Internet. 11 December 1999.