User: tallactorguy

I could have written this message myself in almost every respect (though I was closer to 30 before I accepted my sexuality). As for the majority saying they hated being gay, though, since there is a difference of about 200 votes between the answer to that question and the one about why people are gay and the answers to the other questions, I think some homophobic person or persons came in and tried to sabotage the poll by skewing the results the way they wanted to see them. Up until that point the majority of respondents were saying they were happy being gay. So i'm not sure I'd take the numbers on the last too questions too seriously.

========== In Reply To ========== I see that the majority responded that they hate being gay. I completely understand that because as a teenager I struggled very hard with my homosexuality. I grew up in a fundamentalist Christian home with no exposure to homosexuality yet my immediate interest was in other guys, I was not molested, I was not seduced, it was something natural about myself that I hated. But as I came into my 20's, I learned to accept it and now I love it. Don't mistake that it still isn't hard for me sometimes because my family doesn't know and they would never be understanding, I also have a lot of friends that don't know, but I am who I am and I have learned that I only have one life to live and I must learn to live with and love myself for who I am or else live a very miserable life. I hope that all gay teenagers reach that point in their life where they learn to accept and start enjoying the life they have to live!

There is an awful lot of ignorance, as well as bigotry, in many of the messages posted so far on this subject, so I think some clear thinking needs to be put to the matter. Sexual orientation is probably caused by a variety of factors, many of them innate, some of them possibly environmental (including the environment inside the womb). But it is an orientation, like right- or left-handedness: one can learn to write with the other hand, but it is never a natural behavior. What sexual orientation is NOT is a matter of morality. One can be morally good and gay, morally good and straight, morally bad and gay, or morally bad and straight. For the vast majority of us who are gay it is not a matter of choice but something we either accept or don't accept, and accepting our true selves is much better psychologically than refusing to accept it.

Hatred of gay people is not based on morality but on fear, much of it brought on by the brainwashing of those who use religion as a way to gain power. Yes, brainwashing, or accusations therof, can go both ways. But the term "homophobia" is an accurate one, because most prejudice is based on fear, and hatred of gay people and the demonization of them are nothing but prejudice.

========== In Reply To ========== The term "homophobia" was created by the liberal news media in order to make it appear that people who still have good morals only hold on to their good morals because they are "afraid." Terminology is a very effective tool in brainwashing and changing people's beliefs.Unfortunately, a lot of people are being taken in by this form of manipulation.