Homophobia encompasses a range of negative
attitudes and feelings toward
homosexuality or people who are identified or perceived as being
lesbian
A lesbian is a homosexual woman.Zimmerman, p. 453. The word is also used for women in relation to their sexual identity or sexual behavior, regardless of sexual orientation, or as an adjective to characterize or associate nouns with fema ...
,
gay
''Gay'' is a term that primarily refers to a homosexual person or the trait of being homosexual. The term originally meant 'carefree', 'cheerful', or 'bright and showy'.
While scant usage referring to male homosexuality dates to the late 1 ...
or
bisexual
Bisexuality is a romantic or sexual attraction or behavior toward both males and females, or to more than one gender. It may also be defined to include romantic or sexual attraction to people regardless of their sex or gender identity, whic ...
.
It has been defined as
contempt
Contempt is a pattern of attitudes and behaviour, often towards an individual or a group, but sometimes towards an ideology, which has the characteristics of disgust and anger.
The word originated in 1393 in Old French contempt, contemps, ...
,
prejudice
Prejudice can be an affective feeling towards a person based on their perceived group membership. The word is often used to refer to a preconceived (usually unfavourable) evaluation or classification of another person based on that person's perc ...
, aversion,
hatred or
antipathy
Antipathy is a dislike for something or somebody, the opposite of sympathy. While antipathy may be induced by experience, it sometimes exists without a rational cause-and-effect explanation being present to the individuals involved.
Thus, the ori ...
, may be based on irrational
fear and may also be related to
religious beliefs
A belief is an attitude that something is the case, or that some proposition is true. In epistemology, philosophers use the term "belief" to refer to attitudes about the world which can be either true or false. To believe something is to take ...
. Negative attitudes towards transgender and transsexual people are known as
transphobia.
[*
*]
"European Parliament resolution on homophobia in Europe"
Texts adopted Wednesday, 18 January 2006 – Strasbourg Final edition- "Homophobia in Europe" at "A" point
*
*
Homophobia is observable in critical and hostile behavior such as
discrimination
Discrimination is the act of making unjustified distinctions between people based on the groups, classes, or other categories to which they belong or are perceived to belong. People may be discriminated on the basis of Racial discrimination, r ...
and
violence on the basis of
sexual orientations that are
non-heterosexual
Non-heterosexual is a word for a sexual orientation or sexual identity that is not heterosexual. The term helps define the "concept of what is the norm and how a particular group is different from that norm". ''Non-heterosexual'' is used in femi ...
.
Recognized types of homophobia include ''institutionalized'' homophobia, e.g. religious homophobia and state-sponsored homophobia, and ''internalized'' homophobia, experienced by people who have same-sex attractions, regardless of how they identify.
Negative attitudes toward identifiable LGBT groups have similar yet specific names:
lesbophobia
Lesbophobia comprises various forms of prejudice and negativity towards lesbians as individuals, as couples, or as a social group. Based on the categories of sex, sexual orientation, identity, and gender expression, this negativity encompasse ...
is the
intersection of homophobia and
sexism
Sexism is prejudice or discrimination based on one's sex or gender. Sexism can affect anyone, but it primarily affects women and girls.There is a clear and broad consensus among academic scholars in multiple fields that sexism refers primari ...
directed against
lesbian
A lesbian is a homosexual woman.Zimmerman, p. 453. The word is also used for women in relation to their sexual identity or sexual behavior, regardless of sexual orientation, or as an adjective to characterize or associate nouns with fema ...
s,
gayphobia
Discrimination against gay men, sometimes called '' gayphobia'', is a form of homophobic prejudice, hatred, or bias specifically directed toward gay men, male homosexuality, or men who are perceived to be gay. This discrimination is closely rel ...
is the dislike or hatred of
gay men,
biphobia
Biphobia is aversion toward bisexuality and bisexual people as individuals. It is a form of homophobia against those in the bisexual community. It can take the form of denial that bisexuality is a genuine sexual orientation, or of negative ste ...
targets bisexuality and
bisexual
Bisexuality is a romantic or sexual attraction or behavior toward both males and females, or to more than one gender. It may also be defined to include romantic or sexual attraction to people regardless of their sex or gender identity, whic ...
people, and
transphobia targets
transgender and
transsexual people and
gender variance
Gender variance or gender nonconformity is behavior or gender expression by an individual that does not match masculine or feminine gender norms. A gender-nonconforming person may be variant in their gender identity, being transgender or non-bin ...
or
gender role nonconformity.
According to 2010 Hate Crimes Statistics released by the FBI National Press Office, 19.3 percent of
hate crimes across the United States "were motivated by a sexual orientation bias." Moreover, in a
Southern Poverty Law Center 2010 ''Intelligence Report'' extrapolating data from fourteen years (1995–2008), which had complete data available at the time, of the FBI's national hate crime statistics found that LGBT people were "far more likely than any other
minority group in the United States to be victimized by violent hate crime."
Etymology
Although sexual attitudes tracing back to
Ancient Greece
Ancient Greece ( el, Ἑλλάς, Hellás) was a northeastern Mediterranean civilization, existing from the Greek Dark Ages of the 12th–9th centuries BC to the end of classical antiquity ( AD 600), that comprised a loose collection of cult ...
– from the 8th to 6th centuries BC to the end of
antiquity
Antiquity or Antiquities may refer to:
Historical objects or periods Artifacts
*Antiquities, objects or artifacts surviving from ancient cultures
Eras
Any period before the European Middle Ages (5th to 15th centuries) but still within the histo ...
() – have been termed homophobia by scholars, and it is used to describe an intolerance towards homosexuality and homosexuals that grew during the Middle Ages, especially by adherents of
Islam and
Christianity,
the term itself is relatively new.
Coined by
George Weinberg, a
psychologist, in the 1960s, the term ''homophobia'' is a
blend
A blend is a mixture of two or more different things or substances; e.g., a product of a mixer or blender.
Blend
Blend may also refer to:
* Blend word, a word formed from parts of other words
* ''Blend'' (album), a 1996 album by BoDeans
* B ...
of (1) the word ''homosexual'', itself a mix of neo-classical
morphemes, and (2) ''
phobia
A phobia is an anxiety disorder defined by a persistent and excessive fear of an object or situation. Phobias typically result in a rapid onset of fear and are usually present for more than six months. Those affected go to great lengths to avoi ...
'' from the Greek , phóbos, meaning "fear", "morbid fear" or "aversion". Weinberg is credited as the first person to have used the term in speech.
The word ''homophobia'' first appeared in print in an article written for the May 23, 1969, edition of the American pornographic magazine ''
Screw'', in which the word was used to refer to heterosexual men's fear that others might think they are gay.
Conceptualizing anti-LGBT prejudice as a
social problem
A social issue is a problem that affects many people within a society. It is a group of common problems in present-day society and ones that many people strive to solve. It is often the consequence of factors extending beyond an individual's cont ...
worthy of scholarly attention was not new. A 1969 article in ''
Time'' described examples of negative attitudes toward homosexuality as "homophobia", including "a mixture of revulsion and apprehension" which some called ''
homosexual panic''. In 1971, Kenneth Smith used ''homophobia'' as a personality profile to describe the psychological aversion to homosexuality.
Weinberg also used it this way in his 1972 book ''Society and the Healthy Homosexual'',
published one year before the
American Psychiatric Association
The American Psychiatric Association (APA) is the main professional organization of psychiatrists and trainee psychiatrists in the United States, and the largest psychiatric organization in the world. It has more than 37,000 members are involve ...
voted to remove homosexuality from its list of
mental disorders.
Weinberg's term became an important tool for gay and lesbian activists, advocates, and their allies.
He describes the concept as a medical
phobia
A phobia is an anxiety disorder defined by a persistent and excessive fear of an object or situation. Phobias typically result in a rapid onset of fear and are usually present for more than six months. Those affected go to great lengths to avoi ...
:
In 1981, ''homophobia'' was used for the first time in ''
The Times'' (of London) to report that the
General Synod of the Church of England voted to refuse to condemn homosexuality.
However, when taken literally, ''homophobia'' may be a problematic term. Professor David A. F. Haaga says that contemporary usage includes "a wide range of negative emotions, attitudes and behaviours toward homosexual people," which are characteristics that are not consistent with accepted definitions of phobias, that of "an intense, illogical, or abnormal fear of a specified thing." Five key differences are listed as distinguishing homophobia, as often used, from a true phobia.
Types
Homophobia manifests in different forms, and a number of different types have been postulated, among which are internalized homophobia, social homophobia, emotional homophobia, rationalized homophobia, and others. There were also ideas to classify homophobia, racism, and sexism as an ''intolerant
personality disorder
Personality disorders (PD) are a class of mental disorders characterized by enduring maladaptive patterns of behavior, cognition, and inner experience, exhibited across many contexts and deviating from those accepted by the individual's cultur ...
''.
In 1992, the
American Psychiatric Association
The American Psychiatric Association (APA) is the main professional organization of psychiatrists and trainee psychiatrists in the United States, and the largest psychiatric organization in the world. It has more than 37,000 members are involve ...
, recognizing the power of the stigma against homosexuality, issued the following statement, reaffirmed by the Board of Trustees, July 2011:
Whereas homosexuality ''per se'' implies no impairment in judgment, stability, reliability, or general social or vocational capabilities, the American Psychiatric Association (APA) calls on all international health organizations, psychiatric organizations, and individual psychiatrists in other countries to urge the repeal in their own countries of legislation that penalizes homosexual acts by consenting adults in private. Further, APA calls on these organizations and individuals to do all that is possible to decrease the stigma related to homosexuality wherever and whenever it may occur.
Institutional
Religious attitudes
Some world religions contain anti-homosexual teachings, while other religions have varying degrees of ambivalence, neutrality, or incorporate teachings that regard homosexuals as
third gender. Even within some religions which generally discourage homosexuality, there may also be people who view homosexuality positively, and some
religious denominations bless or conduct
same-sex marriages
Same-sex marriage, also known as gay marriage, is the marriage of two people of the same sex or gender. marriage between same-sex couples is legally performed and recognized in 33 countries, with the most recent being Mexico, constitutin ...
. There also exist so-called
Queer religions, dedicated to serving the spiritual needs of
LGBTQI
' is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an umbrella term for sexuality and gender identity.
The LGBT term is an ...
persons.
Queer theology
Queer theology is a theological method that has developed out of the philosophical approach of queer theory, built upon scholars such as Marcella Althaus-Reid, Michel Foucault, Gayle Rubin, Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, and Judith Butler. Queer theo ...
seeks to provide a counterpoint to religious homophobia. In 2015, attorney and author
Roberta Kaplan
Roberta Ann Kaplan (born 1966) is an American lawyer focusing on commercial litigation and public interest matters. Kaplan successfully argued before the Supreme Court of the United States on behalf of LGBT rights activist Edith Windsor, in '' U ...
stated that
Kim Davis "is the clearest example of someone who wants to use a religious liberty argument to discriminate
same-sex_couples.html"_;"title="homosexuality.html"_;"title="gainst_homosexuality">same-sex_couples">homosexuality.html"_;"title="gainst_homosexuality">same-sex_couples"
_=Christianity_and_the_Bible
=
Passages_commonly_interpreted_as_condemning_homosexuality_or_same-gender_sexual_relations_are_found_in_both_same-sex_couples.html"_;"title="homosexuality.html"_;"title="gainst_homosexuality">same-sex_couples">homosexuality.html"_;"title="gainst_homosexuality">same-sex_couples"
_=Christianity_and_the_Bible
=
Passages_commonly_interpreted_as_condemning_homosexuality_or_same-gender_sexual_relations_are_found_in_both_Old_Testament">Old_
Old_or_OLD_may_refer_to:
__Places_
*Old,_Baranya,_Hungary
*Old,_Northamptonshire,_England
*_Old_Street_station,_a_railway_and_tube_station_in_London_(station_code_OLD)
*OLD,_IATA_code_for__Old_Town_Municipal_Airport_and_Seaplane_Base,_Old_Town,_M_...
_and_New_Testament.html" "title="Old_Testament.html" "title="homosexuality">same-sex_couples.html" ;"title="homosexuality.html" ;"title="gainst homosexuality">same-sex couples">homosexuality.html" ;"title="gainst homosexuality">same-sex couples"
=Christianity and the Bible
=
Passages commonly interpreted as condemning homosexuality or same-gender sexual relations are found in both Old Testament">Old
Old or OLD may refer to:
Places
*Old, Baranya, Hungary
*Old, Northamptonshire, England
* Old Street station, a railway and tube station in London (station code OLD)
*OLD, IATA code for Old Town Municipal Airport and Seaplane Base, Old Town, M ...