Study Shows Homophobia May Be a Sign of Unacknowledged Attraction to Same Gender
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Do you remember of the story of mega pastor Bishop Eddie Long of New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Atlanta? If you’re unfamiliar with his story, an abridged version is below.
Bishop Eddie Long is a mega pastor out of Atlanta that was mostly known for his anti-gay sermons. At one point, he ministered “homosexual cure” programs to recruit gays and lesbians for what he called “Sexual Reorientation” conferences. His church offers an ongoing “Out of the Wilderness” ministry to help convert homosexuals into heterosexuals.
In 2010, five young men came forth with allegations that Bishop Long has coerced them into having s*x with him when they were 16. The case garnered a plethora of attention from national media outlets, and challenged the reputation of Bishop Long when it was settled out of court for an undisclosed amount. Bishop Long was obviously suppressing feelings of his own desire to be with the same gender by promoting homophobia. This behavior is not uncommon. According to a study conducted by the Univ. of Rochester, the Univ. of Essex England, and the Univ. of California Santa Barbara, homophobia is more pronounced in people with unacknowledged attraction to the same sex.
“Individuals who identify as straight but in psychological tests show a strong attraction to the same s*x may be threatened by gays and lesbians because homosexuals remind them of similar tendencies within themselves,” explains Netta Weinstein, a lecturer at the University of Essex and the study’s lead author. “In many cases these are people who are at war with themselves and they are turning this internal conflict outward,” adds co-author Richard Ryan, professor of psychology at the University of Rochester who helped direct the research. In addition, the series of psychology studies demonstrates that people who grew up with authoritarian parents who forbade such desires may be more prone to homophobia as well. (Read the full details of the study here.)
Do you agree with the study?
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13 Responses to Study Shows Homophobia May Be a Sign of Unacknowledged Attraction to Same Gender
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That study is so flawed it does not worth the time or the result. We all have the tendency to sin, but not all of us do. It is not about sex or skin, it has always been about sin. if I had to put my life the online between God and Man, I choose God because He is the only Person who can harm both, body, mind, soul, and spirit( in hell), man can only harm the body. If God said,” No” that is good enough for me and as for me and my House (God’s Temple),I will choose the Lord.
Remember mankind does have hell to put you in or a Heaven to keep you out, but God does.
maxwell
January 13, 2013 at 10:37 pm
Whoever this lady is she needs to go on with that one. I could see if that’s all you concentrated on or you where always using excuses to why you are around someone you don’t like because they are gay, but just because you express your negative feelings about Homesexuality and don’t feel it’s right that does not read off as a sign that you are secretly Gay or want to be Gay.
Tawnymarie
January 14, 2013 at 1:00 am
You are missing the point TawnyMarie. This isn’t about people that dislike Homosexuality. The study is regarding people that escalate their “dislike” for Homosexuality by taking it up a few notches. It’s one thing to simply state you dislike homosexuality and leave it at that.There are people out there in the world who do just what you said…they concentrate on homosexuality. There are people out there, like “Bishop” Long, that try to take things to the next level. Remember Ted Haggard in Colorado Springs? He was the white version of Bishop Long. Megachurch, megamoney,and mega fellatio with a male prostitute in Denver. He’s “straight” again……
One thing that gets me about these men is that they clearly thought that they would not get caught. Their arrogance had them believing that they could preach the word of God, and not follow the rules they preach in their sermons.
Nicholaus
January 14, 2013 at 3:50 am
So in other words only gay men protest homosexuality? Straight men don’t have a problem with it? Just closet gays?. So a normal straight man should have no problem wearing pink or having a gay man come on to him? Wrong. A normal straight man should be totally comfortable with the idea of gay man around his children?. Wrong. Do straight men allow gays to define their heterosexuality?. No they don’t. As a straight man I reject the gay community’s efforts to re-define heterosexuality. To pretend that there are no straight men against homosexuality is silly. This article is a just another silly tactic from the gay media. Propaganda. The fact of the matter is that gays molest minors 11 times as much as straight men. The only thing good about this article is that it shows that most gays males do molest minors at some point. At the end of the day they only make up 2% of the population so whatever…Instead of studying straight men, they need to do a study on how come 1 out of every 4 gay men has HIV.
Lamont Walker
January 14, 2013 at 6:22 am
Way to go lamont. Your words are more powerful than any band of sexually confused, bitter, predators can counter. You are a true Afrikan warrior. Stay strong and focused. You have the history of creation on your side.
Kwame
January 19, 2013 at 11:53 pm
Stupid article,does,nt prove anything.
marcus davis
January 14, 2013 at 2:23 pm
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What a crock of shit people are born gay its just the way it is some people are gay or lesbian and some are straight . its not a choice its how you were born some choose to live a true life and come out as gay or lesbian and some choose to live a lie ….FACT….
lynne squires
January 24, 2013 at 8:33 pm
I thought People felt that way about Gay Men, because God/Jesus said He/They felt that way. God did not say being a Gay Man was a Sin, No, He said it was an “Abomination”. An Abomination is different from a Sin. To imply that people are homophobic because they are attracted to that lifestyle is an Abomination. You may need to come up with another Lie. Peace!
David (Future U.S. Senator)
January 25, 2013 at 2:20 pm
Who cares about what you like or dislike! If you are confident in your sexuality, then walk in it. But at no time do you or anybody else have the right to promote hate to the point of violence (many times)just to “express” their disdain. God loves us all; otherwise we would not be here. He would have kept His son right there beside Him and destroyed the world (because WE deserved it). It is hard for “straight” people to believe that there are people that are born attracted to the same sex, but there are. From my own experiences and encounters in life, there are people who have never been attracted to the opposite sex (visually, intellectually, emotionally, or sexually). Since everything God is incapable of making mistakes, we must surmise that He did not make one. Some will say that these people are like this because they were sexually violated as children, and some were. However, most times those people end up sexually distant and gender confused. The reason why there are so many HIV cases in the male gay community is because there is a lot of cloak and dagger behavior because of societal, familial, and spiritual pressures. Especially, when it comes to the black community and our idea of what a man should be and act like. God created people just the way they are and THAT’s IT! You have to learn to keep your biases to yourself. By the way, there are just as many, if not more children molested by “straight” me. Problem is that they are generally family members or authority figures and the incidents generally go unreported until these children become adults and their actions are raising questions.
Rjatta
January 25, 2013 at 2:50 pm
Rjatta,
No, the reason why there are so many cases of HIV/AIDS in the male gay community is because they screw each other in the anus – no more and no less – and the anus is a delicate enviroment which was created on the human body as a route for expelling defecation or human waste. It was never meant to use as a chamber for “continuous, vigorous penile (or other objects) thrusting” be it through homosexual or heterosexual activity.
Why is that when someone presents facts from institutions or bodies that conduct reputable studies and have been on the front lines of these diseases, some people want to dispute or discount them as if there is not an iota of credence to the findings?
Yet, they continue to make excuses for gay male behavior when many gay (and bisexual) men refuse to curb their behavior and continue to pick up men and even have sex with strangers “in the raw” and seem to have “an aversion” to using condoms and practicing so-called “safe sex.” And, what about the ones who practice “equal opportunity sexuality” and have sex with both men and women, not because they are “oppressed” but because they INSIST that they are attracted to both sexes and, of course, must take advantage of every opportunity to get their freak on!!!
At some point, individuals cannot blame society for their sexual behavior choices. I feel that in this liberal climate where we are spending millions of dollars on HIV/AIDS research, prevention and treatment and in some groups, particularly of color, the information and cultural efforts are still falling on deaf ears. And, why is that? Because some people choose to do what “feels good” and play “Russian Roulette” with their lives and, sometimes, with the lives of unsuspecting victims!!!
There have always been people like that and there always will be. Sticking our heads in the sand to excuse these people is tantamount to enabling of the worst kind, perpetuates a “culture of sexual irresponsibility” and puts innocent lives at risk.
You are right. Straight men molest children. But the difference is that society will excoriate a “straight” man for molesting a young girl or teen and will emphasize the “heterosexual factor” in those incidents. But conversely, if a gay or “straight man under cover” (still gay or bisexual) molest a young boy or teen, there is a tendency to de-emphasize his homosexuality because of the fear of correlating homosexuality with pedophilia. IMHO, the bottom line is that if you are attracted to the same sex and you seek out sexual release with the same sex, you are acting on a homosexual attraction or compulsion.
All of this extracting ages and the like is all in an effort to attenuate the cultural demonization of gay men but actually does a disservice when millions of gay men “groom” and molest young boys and teens all over the world and just because they may “appear straight” by using women as “covers” or “beards” does not make this practice any less unpalatable to the world culture or detrimental to their victims.
So, since you asserted that God is incapable of making mistakes, are we now to openly accept people who feel that they have been devinely given a “natural attraction to children” as there “natural sexuality?” And, of what do we do with those who have a “natural attraction to animals?” Are they all now just “normal” expressions of sexuality on our ever expanding continuum of human sexuality? Has God given man a blueprint to live his life? Does man not exercise his “free will” or makes “conscientious choices” in how he chooses to live his life? Is man completely helpless and hapless when it comes to choosing good or evil or right or wrong? I think not.
I could go on and on but I think you get the big picture by now. But, just in case you don’t, a people – a culture – has a right and a moral duty to define what is good for and in the best interest of maintaining and sustaining the culture. Everything prevalent in vast numbers or practices is not necessarily in the best interest of or healthy for a culture and homosexuality with the prevalence of HIV/AIDS spread across groups that now makes it “our problem”, promiscuity that is spread across all sexualities and groups that now makes it “our problem”, the mass killing of our unborn in the form of “abortion on demand” now makes it “our problem”, the culture of immorality and the demonization of Christian faith and traditional values that now makes it “our problem” and the perfidious moral leadership at the top in the form of our president and his Democratic party now makes it “our problem” BECAUSE the values that we espouse and the way we exercise those values in our lifestyle choices AFFECT US ALL!!
And, the real shame and GREATEST PROBLEM OF THEM ALL is that we have abdicated our collective moral conscience and duty to walk in the light of the heavenly father and have chosen the immoral shadows of gray and yet we wonder why we are caught in a tautology of never ending quagmires of which we cannot extricate ourselves.
Jalen
February 4, 2013 at 12:02 am
there is also a study that suggest that every person at some time in life has thought about having sex with the same sex. that would mean everyone is gay, if thinking about it makes you gay. some acted on those thoughts and became gay, the others didn’t. some of those others are homophobia but some except the gay lifestyle but choose not to act on the thougts bought on by idle time. It is also thought that before society was formed, there was no homesexuality and no suicide either. society brings about idle time and these other things are born of it.
Crystal Washington
January 25, 2013 at 3:45 pm
To me Idle time has nothing to do with homosexuality, it’s just a fact of life for some….we seem to find an excuse for every so-called ill of society—— so we can keep pretending to be so-called normal —we are all lacking in some society oriented way and the more we try to be so-called normal the less so-called normal we become—– We walk around asleep while wearing our own mask—–fitting in on one hand and complaining on the other—the WAR within never ceases because we are always TOLD how to think.——PEACE!!!!!
black jones
January 25, 2013 at 8:23 pm