What is your opinion when someone says being gay is a disease?

[Hotspot]

So, I was on this youtube video and it was about this very flamboyant homosexual guy freaking out because there was a cockroach on the floor. One of the commenter's said that being gay was a mental illness and that gays must see a doctor to get help, he then went on to say "all homosexuals love people of the same gender that is sick an a mental disease just like cancer and depression they need help" .

I was disgusted by this guys post and continuously posted about how ridiculous (IMO) his opinion was, but what can you do it's only his opinion really =/
It's amazing that there are people in this world that think this irrational.

What do you think about people that are like this? What would you say to a person like this if anything?

[radiantdawn]

When someone says it, I do 1 of two things:

1. I laugh (and inside, I die a little inside, I'm not even kidding. It hurts tons to hear people say things like that. )

or

2. I mildly comment how ridiculous it is, and repeat step 1 >_<

[Daniel]

I usually ask them to stay away from me. "I don't wanna go catchin' no brainless disease."

Originally Posted by radiantdawn

(and inside, I die a little inside, I'm not even kidding. It hurts tons to hear people say things like that. )

Then this.

[Nomad187]

Its not a disease unless I can call queer into work. I honestly don't take those people seriously. It does not hurt me, their ignorance annoys me

[Eric]

My reaction? I just shrug it off and go about my day. People who honestly believe homosexuality IS a disease can't be reasoned with, and you're not going to manage to change their minds. Sure, it irks me a little that people would be that ignorant but that's out of my control.

If it were a situation where I was confronted personally for being gay, however, I would stand my ground and insist that if anyone needed help, it was them. Then I'd wipe the floor with them.

[midwestblues]

The Youtube comments section has long been the podium for the shamefully ignorant. But honestly, who the fuck cares about them? They're on the wrong side of history, and they're mad about it. They pose no threat to LGBT acceptance which has been solidly progressing for decades. If they want to spout their ignorance on Youtube, let them. It's great amusement.

[thedreamwatch]

Yeah, I feel sad for a little bit because it *shouldn't* be that way, but then I think about how far human rights have come in the last few decades and realize that social conservatism and the hate and discrimination that go with it are on their way out. I hope in my lifetime, but if not, maybe in my children's.

[Zontar]

I think I can explain this.

I knew since the time I was fourteen that I had potential for homosexual attraction...I hadn't fully realized it until this past year when I had my first sexual experience with a man. My thinking all the while was that I was bisexual, and dealing with it would be as easy as dating women and just sweeping the other side under the rug as something to be enjoyed privately. When I had discovered I was less straight than I pretended to be, I was so stymied that the first thing I did was consider the possibility that I was afflicted with an illness of some sort. Some people get depressed, some people commit suicide, some people start a vicious cycle of self-hate...I, however, jumped to "Am I just sick?"

I was kept awake night after night wondering whether or not I was an individual left with an illness that medical science refused to treat. During college last semester, in-between classes, I would whip out my ipad and type extensive paragraphs trying to support the case that homosexuality was an illness in an effort to just clear my mind on what had been bothering me. I prefaced the first page with the certainties I did know: that homosexuality was not a choice and that there was no excuse for hating gays "anymore than there was an excuse for hating one afflicted with depression or anxiety," then proceeded to write out why exactly I felt this way.

Looking at what I wrote now, I can best sum up that page as "gay men engage in highly dangerous anal sex frequently due to being unchecked by traditional female resistance, and the medical establishment refuses to consider homosexuality an illness because of a general trend toward 'pride over cures' since the 1960s." I stated how increasingly blurred the line was between "different" and "ill" and basically wrote out that what made homosexuality "ill" was the fact that two men could not love each other, and therefore could not commit. I also drew a parallel to how some people wish to wipe autism off the map as an illness, despite its very real negative effects on living. I postulated that two men with high sex drives immediately nullified any possibility of commitment, and that the reason for high cases of HIV infection were the result of this "unnatural balance" of the sex drives. I read how anal sex transmits blood and wondered whether or not this was a natural and safe form of sex to begin with. I figured the only reason straight couples weren't afflicted with HIV were because they didn't practice anal sex regularly and were more likely to be monogamous because of the low female sex drive. Everything I believed about homosexuality being an illness centered on promiscuity as a result of this lack of commitment. I closed the paper I wrote by saying that religious hate fueled the apathy toward finding a "cure" by perpetuating the myth that sexuality is a choice...and that seeking "secular" help from centers like NARTH would be no better than visiting Mexico for a throughly unproven snake oil cancer treatment.

The matter was all complicated by the fact that I was, and still am, an ugly turd who can't garner anyone's attention. I wrote another paper asking myself whether or not I had turned out gay because of missed developmental milestones in dating that are normally occurred in early adolescence. Until last year, I had never even kissed anyone. This time, I drew parallels to the phenomenon of situational homosexuality (or "jailhouse gay"), and began viewing my own homosexuality as a failure state from not having dated enough girls in early youth. Basically, I wondered whether or not my sexual frustration led me to these very real and non-reluctant feelings. Keep in mind, I wasn't just sitting here telling myself I would "try" men because I failed too often with women...this was (and is) very real attraction to men, even a preference over women, and my theory was that something inside me was aligning or "adapting" itself according to my early failures and mass rejection in dating.

Unfortunately, and rather predictably when you just read the damn things, writing everything out did nothing to allay my fears. In the end, if it didn't all already sound completely ridiculous, it was all itself unproven conjecture in search of a way to change a part of myself I perceived as an unwanted weakness. I pretty much was just doing extensive rationalization that I was a failed heterosexual who was only gay because of frequent rejection. I sank further into this bizarre mix of depression and anxiety, wondering whether or not my life would consist of one dangerous hookup after another pretending all the while that men can love men.

I think the center of the problem was that I wasn't talking to the correct people. Prior to this little sexual encounter I had that started it all...I hadn't met a single gay person in my life. Not one until I was nineteen. I went to school in Sameville, USA here where everyone you know is the same young white Catholic interested in nothing more but sports and partying. I think in my twelve years of school, I had maybe two black classmates total, one asian, one athiest, and certainly no gay ones. So, of course I'm not going to know what the fuck I'm talking about.

I gave you fellas the benefit of the doubt and came here after I had googled "LGBT forum." My first posts consisted of what I was thinking at the time. I wanted to see what people who've actually been there had to say about everything I thought of.

I think what pushed me to finally get this sorted out the most though were the nightmares. I had nightmares where I was confronted by gay people I did know, good friends of mine who didn't know I was gay myself. Telling me what I was believing was hurtful. Was untrue. Was mostly rhetoric by people who failed to accept themselves...pretty much all a result of a particularly odd form of denial where you use all this knowledge you know to bend and twist reality the way you want it to be...one where you can escape having to live as a gay man through some sort of "cure."

By the time I realized that there is no boundary on love...and that we largely date within our orientation as a sort of convenience...that dissolved the glue that held all my arguments together. One day, I went into the notebooks where I typed all these rationalizations, deleted the last of them, and came to accept myself. I still fear HIV tremendously, but at least it comforts me to know that it isn't the result of "matched high sex drives" like I originally thought. It comforts me to know it's not inevitable, even if it feels that way at times. I had a psychologist explain to me that there was nothing I could have done to avoid becoming this way, no matter how many girls I dated...I just would've came to the realization earlier, apparently. Furthermore...I've been dodging the whole damned thing for the past five years and hadn't even realized it. Internalized homophobia, it makes sense. That whole attitude of just sweeping men under the rug and only dating women? Treating bisexuality as just heterosexuality with an unwanted component? If I had been comfortable with it from the start, I would have came out the moment I first noticed it at fourteen.

I think the only reason people think homosexuality is an illness is because of how it appears on the surface...something that's different from the norm with correlating higher levels of illnesses, mental and physical. But in the end, I guess that's not enough alone to make something an illness.

[Totoro]

Sadly, my uncle still thinks being gay is a disease... :\ I don't really say anything since i'm not out to him (don't plan on it either), I don't really know what I'd tell him. Probably just say that if his God is so perfect and omnipotent, why did he even bother creating this disease that can function just about the same as the straight.

[Artemicion]

Originally Posted by radiantdawn

When someone says it, I do 1 of two things:
(and inside, I die a little inside, I'm not even kidding. It hurts tons to hear people say things like that. )

Then realise they must be living in the dark ages and believe that the world is flat.

[maverick]

I'd probably counter with something snarky like, "Yeah, the gay is terminal fortunately, but luckily, prejudice can be a curable transient illness. All you have to do to cure yourself is open a couple of those little rectangular things full of paper covered with alternative opinions. They're called books, fool."

But out of all the anti-gay comments, this one bothers me the least because the most rational, scientific part of my mind knows that it's an incorrect assumption.

I'm much more bothered by the "Gays are fallen" argument than the "Gays are mentally ill" one. I don't think I have a lot of ammunition in an argument about homosexuality and religion, but I've got a much better one - backed up by major psychiatric institutions - that says being queer is not a disease.

[British Lad]

1a, laugh if I am not annoyed
or
1b, punch them if I am annoyed
2, laugh/somemore
3, tell them there a moron
4, laugh more and walk away

[Beachboi92]

Originally Posted by maverick

I'd probably counter with something snarky like, "Yeah, the gay is terminal fortunately, but luckily, prejudice can be a curable transient illness. All you have to do to cure yourself is open a couple of those little rectangular things full of paper covered with alternative opinions. They're called books, fool."

This is just to good to try and write something better

[adam88]

Originally Posted by Zontar

I think I can explain this.
*SNIP*

Astounding post. Thank you for sharing all that. I can certainly find many parallels to my own acceptance journey in your story.

[RaeofLite]

I would sprout my mouth on what a horrible idea mass producing humans is when teh world cannot feed itself and that homosexuality could be a way of counteracting that.

[Kaytee]

It disgusts me that people are so closed minded. Even though being gay isn't a disease ignorance is contagious so I ask why they think that. Sometimes they say "cuz" and that is when I try to make them see reason but when I get the "The bible says so" response I just have to back off. It's their relgion and if you want people to be accepting of you, you have to accept them.

[mnguy]

Youtube comments like that (and many on yahoo news, etc) come from people who have no grasp on reality, as described by many of the above posts, and/or they are trying to piss off people. Some really believe what they type, but clearly they are not educated. Many know the facts, yet they love to piss people off with such stupidity. It's sad really, but it's a reality of any site that allows comments. Most of these people wouldn't say such things in the general public, but they can be oh-so-brave behind a keyboard.

[QuantumBoi]

My reaction:
I tell them to look in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV). Homosexuality did used to be described as a mental illness in the DSM until the 1970s. Then the American Psychiatric Association declassified it in 1973 and the American Psychological Association in 1975. There is no unambiguous and scientifically accepted study that shows homosexuality is abnormal.


I am taking it from the direction of disease, as the thread title says. As for religious grounds and homosexuality being considered a SIN, that's a different direction that relies upon beliefs. There are so many religions, and variations of religions, that I am unable to react to every single one without more detail.

[starfish]

I think they might be onto something. I'm going to take 2 cocks and call my doctor in the morning.

[TheRoof]

errr total rubbish and i would really ignore those ignorant stupid comments. f**k off haters lol