Disclaimer: I'm not sure if this is the right category, but mods feel free to transfer if you need to. "Still gay." "He is not straight anymore!" "Both gays." "What the hell?" "That's not cute." So, I think it's safe to say we all read the news of a straight boy asking his gay friend out to prom. A news website from my country that I'm following posted a link to their article about these guys' cute story to Facebook, which meant the post was open for comments. I saw a lot of hatred and homophobia on that comments section, and it really upsets me that about 90% of the comments are negative. Comments like "That's gay" sounds like it's so innocent and funny, but it implies that "gay" is a word tied with shamefulness and disgust. Also, I would've added more comments for you to read, but they're not in English, and since it's almost 2 AM I am too sleepy to translate anything. It baffles me that our country is a Catholic one, and these people have the nerve to claim themselves as "Children of God" while being such hateful people. I'm losing faith in our country. I fear that the LGBT community will never have rights here. All we'll receive is pure hatred, shaming, discrimination... God help our people.
Today. I feel the same. And I am through with it. Personal rights held in high regard, assertive action toward acting in my best interest. And getting connected here in EC to learn more about solidarity. It is a new day and the more connected I am to information about the facts and rights I have, I pray the more empowered and less vulnerable I am to all else.
Don't get me wrong, I am religious myself in my own little way. But historically, Catholicism (and many other religions) are not at odds with homophobia. Rather, they get along quite well. This may largely be seen in the context of the scientific revolution. When the scientific revolution came about, the Church as an institution, fearing (probably accurately so) that if it would lose its monopoly on reality, it would lose a great part of its own power. It did not approve of this. So to maintain this monopoly on reality, it launched a campaign of Literalism. In other words, from there on, the Old Testament (and parts of the New Testament I guess), would be seen not as metaphors of an uncertain reality, but as literal truth. This included making the moral statements on e.g. homosexuality eternal. And this was all very well until it started becoming quite accetable to be homosexual. In order to not lose their power, they needed to maintain their monopoly on reality, and in order to maintain their monopoly on reality, they needed to assert that the Bible was literal truth, and in order to do that, they could not stand idle againts the onslaught of queerism. Thus the propaganda machine was applied, and so on and so forth. Organized religion has a historical downside that is undeniable to decent people. It often helps fuel the fires of reactionary, homophobic, and other despicable behavior, and is likely a moral excuse for people in the Phillippinnes to dump their inner anger at other groups e.g. gays. Let it be said that we are all more or less fortunate in many ways. Being a trans* pan person, even though that is more 'extreme' if you will :bang: , I'm still probably in a better position than you. But what was, and is, the essence of the Bible? Love. What is the essence of the New Testament? Tolerance. By the will of God, Heaven shall drip its dew onto the face of the Earth and every land shall be liberated from confusion, division, fear, and unholy hate. (sorry about that peotry, I always get like that :3 ) One day, my friend! One day!
That was quite a read. I must have forgotten to type this last night, but there is more to that hate than just homophobia. The hatred to anyone is just... undeniable. You are considered a whore if you lost your virginity at an early age, people call you out for being agnostic or atheist, people spread gossip that can be very detrimental to your relationship to your friends, neighbors, family... Their thinking goes like, if you're not like me, you're lesser than me. Also, people consider going to church regularly a deed of a good Christian/Catholic, and that is the only basis. So anything horrific towards others that you do outside church will be redeemed by going to church. This is not all, but majority of the Philippines. It has been rooted to the people since who knows when. You'd be hard-pressed to find a "reasonable" Christian, because one is a treasure. Anyway, everything you said made a lot of sense (and informed me more about the matter), and that poetry is pretty darn slick. I really hope that everything works out for the better soon. I'm so sick of seeing people being judged left and right.
This is the reality of the world, I live in one of the most gay friendly countries in the world but that acceptance is only present in the major cities. People really are blind to how rampant homophobia is. I'm about 40 minutes away from downtown Toronto a place where you can be gay no problem, but my town you will have a problem. I was called a fag when out on a date with a guy at the movies, had kids snickering at us. Me and my current boyfriend get looks if anyone sees us holding hands, and have been pointed at while driving around; sitting at a light. You aren't alone, that majority of gay people go through this shit. I won't be forced to move into a city; I fucking hate the city. So you just need to develop a thick skin and deal with it, after a while you start not really giving a shit, believe me. It feels no good to feel like a stranger in my own town that Ive lived in my whole life, but it's a reality. I know not the greatest news for you, just thought I'd let you know people from progressive societies like Canada, still have problems. You basically have to live in a city here to be problem free, and if you don't like cities, you're screwed. The difference is huge, while on a dating app I found that basically everyone from the city had no problem with being gay and everyone from the outer towns were ALL closeted, some were in their 30s and still hadn't told their families, I actually was rare in the fact that I was totally open with my family. It was very comforting actually to see that my town has gay people they're just too pussy to come out. I literally am the only open gay person I know of in my town besides two other people who are transgendered; unfortunately it's harder for these people to hide this so they basically have to come out. My boyfriend is from Alabama in the U.S, and he has had his nose broken three times from getting into fights with people about being gay, he's also seen bricks thrown at gay people, and his sister dated someone who was actually in the KKK. Alabama is one of the most "christian" areas in the world, people there ask you what church you are from versus what town you are from, yet they're still racist, homophobic and violent. The world is just fucked up, and most Christians don't practice Christianity properly.
Remember when we read the comment sections of facebook, we are giving hateful people a platform to spread their hatred. If we choose not to view the hateful comments then all of the hateful people won't have an audience, which won't necessarily stop them from hating, but their power will be so small it cannot control you. The people we should give platforms to are the ones who say good things, I would give them more power because they give us the freedom to be ourselves. We are free to be ourselves without fear and judgment, we are allys with one another. I want you to feel confident in who you are, know that you are a good person and all that you contribute to society. Once you know who you are and feel confident about yourself and have some security, then their words will never get to the core of you. (&&&) We have each other for all the good and bad days.
