It's amazing how the simplest internet search inspired by curiosity can fuel a blog post mini-rant.
Earlier today, a coworker informed me that she's taking Human Sexuality, a course that I've been considering taking in the near future. One of the reasons I have an interest in the course is I am interested in what causes us to be attracted to the ones we're attracted to. What is it that makes a person homosexual/heterosexual/bisexual/asexual? Is it genetic, something intrinsic in your personality, or something else entirely? Out of curiosity, I typed in "homosexual attraction" into the Bing search engine to see if anything pertinent would come up. Considering what I was looking for, I was surprised with what actually came up. I was bombarded with several web sites claiming to help the reader "overcome unwanted same-sex attractions," and find "healing of sexual attractions." I also discovered an article on Conservapedia, a spin-off of Wikipedia geared towards Christians, purporting the now-obsolete belief that homosexuality is a mental disorder.
While I realize that millions of Americans, especially Christians, hold to this belief that same-sex attraction is a disease that can and must be "cured," it still catches me off-guard when I see it spelled out so ruthlessly. I can't help but think that these same people who offer "healing" obviously have no idea what it's like to be attracted to someone of the same gender, and don't care enough to even research it. It's easier to just slap a label on someone and scream "repent!" then it is to actually care.
For the record, I am a Christian. I am also bisexual. A year ago, I was finally admitting to myself after years of denying it that I have strong attractions to both men and women. During that time, I wanted nothing more than for those attractions towards women to go away. I had buried them for years, after all. A friend sent me a link to a Christian forum that claimed to help teens overcome their same-sex desires, which only served to make me feel even more that God must hate me. As hard as I tried, I couldn't be rid of them, which made me feel like I must be a failure. Needless to say, that friendship didn't last much longer.
Eventually I realized that the only way I could overcome my depression was to accept that yes, I am bisexual, and it's not something I can control. When I finally did reach that point of acceptance, it was like a load had been lifted off my shoulders. Now that I had accepted who I am, I could choose my next step. Only from there could I decide if bisexuality was something I wanted to embrace or ignore. I decided to embrace who I am, but I could just as easily have gone another route after reaching that point. That's why it irritates me when people treat homosexuality like something that needs to be hidden away or cured. A person just discovering their same-sex attractions is already feeling vulnerable, perhaps even scared or ashamed. The last thing they need is a so-called "cure."
I can see how that could be infuriating especially if you are a person who is bi,gay, or lesbian. Personally I don't believe in labels. I think we give people too much by labeling ourselves as things. I haven't worked out my whole stance on the subject because obviously we have to have labels to some extent. Thanks for writing this post and sharing it. It really gives the reader food for thought even if it is a "mini rant".
ReplyDelete~M.A.H.(AKA annie6857)