Views on homosexuality - crossover post from Main EQ forum :: World of Warcraft

#1 Mar 26 2004 at 6:02 PM Rating: Decent

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405 posts

In order to continue what I believe to be a very important conversation, I'm starting a new thread that was originally posted in the Main EQ forum. Originally the conversation thread was about character inspection, however, the discussion took a different course which is probably better suited for this forum.

Damn#### wrote <correct grammar>- "The original meaning of gay was happy, then an additional meaning of lame was accepted. The homosexual community started to call themselves gay and the additional meaning has now come into common use"
The term gay as a pseudonym for homosexual was coined approximately in the late 1940's to early 1950's. The term was derived from flamboyant/effeminate homosexuals or cross-dressers. The term was never chosen by the homosexual community, but rather derived as a slang word by the general public. [Side note: the NY homosexual community was particularly known for their eccentricities and mannerisms. The voice and mannerisms of Bugs Bunny was actually derived from a very well known person in this community.]
The usage of gay as a pseudonym for lame is actually not very widely used. My first encounter with this usage was on EQ and on these forums. Bringing this up at a convention almost no one in a group of 250 people were aware of the pseudonym. It appears to be a newer usage being used by our younger generations. Because this is an uncommon usage of the word it may cause offense, particularly since the usage is to connotate a negative

Chasteen wrote - "It is not a genetic reason why people are homosexual. Many people are mislead to thinking this because the symptons and feelings of homosexuality begin very young. The reasons and causes however are developed while a child is very young due to environmental/nuture reasons"

This is not an uncommon perception which actually has its roots in the phyciatric profession (not one of their more stellar moments). I once had a professor in college who called all of psychiatry a pseudo-science. Although this opinion may have been a little harsh, the psychiatric profession is rather new (under 150 years old) and is prone to make glaring mistakes.
Throughout WW2 the psychiatric profession believed that homosexuality was a mental disease and considered it highly abnormal behavior (some even labeled it the equal to necrophilia). Prior to the rise of Adolph Hitler, Berlin was known to have a very strong homosexual community. During **** Germany homosexuality was considered an abomination against nature, and gay men and women were placed in the same concentration camps as the jewish citizens. The Star of David armband was used to identify the jewish citizens, while the pink triangle was used to identify the homosexual members.
Post WW2 and into the 1960 the psychiatric profession reclassified homosexuality from a mental disease to a life style choice. The belief at the time was the early childhood years to adolescence a lack of a strong male/female role model created homosexuality because of deprivation. The person subconsciously chooses homosexuality because they replacing the strong father or mother figure in their lives.
Many psychology text books written in the 1970s still classified homosexuality as a life style choice. Significant strides were made in human sexuality research due to the lessening of culture stigmas. It should be noted that electro-shock therapy was still the recommended treatment for curing homosexuality
Into 1980 and 1990s studies amongst twins and the genome project does indicate a possible genetic link for homosexuality (I believe chromosome #24 but I may be wrong). The gay community has always strongly believed that homosexuality is genetic and a person's sexualal preference is determined at birth. Recently the psychiatric community has denounced conditioning treatments used to reverse homosexual tendencies - announcing that the treatments are almost entirely ineffective.

-Vaanan's story of working at the convience store (I'm running out of time here)
You were definitely wronged and should never have been sexually harassed. It was wrong for your co-workers to make you feel highly embarassed and single you out. It was wrong for them to make unwanted sexual advances. In this day and age behavior like this normally leads to termination.
Usage of illegal drugs is immoral and in the workplace should have lead to termination.
Being HIV positive requires a great amount of individual responsibility in order to prevent the spread of the disease, honor life, and protect the people you love and care about. I truely hope that some of what was said at work was "lockeroom bragging." Amongst the gay community knowingly transmitting HIV to another person through unsafe intercourse is one of the most immoral and apprehensible activities you can do. In all communities we always have a percentage of people that refuse to live their lives responsibly...and this behavior is NEVER condoned.

Views on homosexuality - crossover post from Main EQ forumFollow