Perhaps the majority of homophobes are homosexuals

Fighters against sexual minorities themselves would be happy to plunge into the delights of non-traditional sex, if not for the childish fear of parental anger.

In the never-ending struggle between homophobes and representatives of sexual minorities, there is a well-known comic plot when the most ardent enemies of homosexuality are themselves caught in homosexual contacts. This, of course, causes general gloating, and such fighters of the homophobic front are forever labeled as liars and hypocrites. Scientists from the University of Rochester (Great Britain) together with colleagues from the University of California in Santa Barbara (USA) have found out the psychological background of such contradictory behavior. The results obtained, on the one hand, help to understand those who fight for the "purity of sexual orientation", and on the other hand, they further disavow their efforts.

The scientists' hypothesis was that active rejection of homosexuality occurs due to the repression of "abnormal" sexual desires during puberty. This repression usually occurs in families with an authoritarian "management style." The study involved 160 students from several American and European universities. First, psychologists assessed the difference in sexual preferences that the participants consciously demonstrate to others and that they have in an unconscious form. The students were shown words or photographs that they had to classify as homosexual or heterosexual. But before this, each was also shown the word "I" or "others," flashing at intervals of 35 milliseconds. This was not enough for a person to consciously read what was written, but after that he associated the words and photographs with himself or with another. The program noted the speed of reaction: if after “I” the subject reacted faster to a same-sex couple or the word “homosexual” and slower to heterosexual photos, this indicated a hidden non-traditional orientation.

In the second stage, the participants of the experiment were asked about their families, with the emphasis not on open rejection of sexual minorities in the family, but on the nature of family relationships in general. It was necessary to answer how free you felt, how much you were controlled in your thoughts and actions, how much your opinion was respected, etc. Finally, in the last stage of the experiment, the participants' level of homophobia was revealed. The subjects had to answer questions that directly addressed their opinion on the social danger from sexual minorities, as well as pass another "unconscious" test. During this test, the students were shown the word "gay" in the same way as the words "I" and "others" had been shown before: so that it was perceived at an unconscious level. After this, the subjects had to write down any three words that immediately came to mind: in this case, the number of aggressive words was assessed.

As the researchers write in an article published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, high levels of homophobia, family authoritarianism, and latent homosexuality were found to be closely linked to each other.

Here we should warn against an extended interpretation of the results: strict family rules do not provoke non-traditional sexual orientation at all. Its origin in this case is taken out of the equation. But if it so happens that a person begins to be attracted to people of his own sex, then in a family with a strict attitude to upbringing, declaring one's non-traditional preferences means causing anger and rejection on the part of parents. As a result, a person suppresses his orientation in favor of the generally accepted one. But in the future, any contact with sexual minorities will threaten him with the fact that his secret attraction will come to light. Fearing exposure (and the loss of parental love), he will behave more than aggressively towards non-traditional orientations. It is known that many clashes between straights and gays are justified by the fact that a representative of a sexual minority "started it." But it often turns out that the unfortunate victim of gay harassment simply imagined it. Psychologists believe that there is no malicious intent here. The internal conflict between duty to elders and suppressed desire is transferred outward, and it seems to the person that the other is actually threatening him, although the threat is rooted exclusively in his own psyche.

As for those who grew up in families with democratic rules, their internal and external sexual preferences did not conflict with each other, and they treated sexual minorities calmly, regardless of their own orientation. It should be emphasized once again that we are not talking about a specific family attitude to certain issues of sexual life, but about a general lifestyle. That is, one can imagine an authoritarian family of gays or lesbians who adopted a child and, with joint efforts, convinced him that traditional sex is bad, and if the child dates a person of the opposite sex, the family will stop loving him. In this case, one can expect that the child will grow up to be an LGBT fundamentalist, no matter how difficult it is to imagine. All this, of course, once again speaks of the questionable effectiveness of a strict parenting style: sexual orientation is only the most colorful and unlikely to be a very common case. It is enough to think, for example, about how many people secretly hate their educational institution or their job, which was chosen for them by their parents, who knew, of course, "what would be best." If we turn to the realities of our country, then we can only feel sorry for those who have to fight their own difficult childhood at the federal level, developing the well-known bills on "banning propaganda of you-know-what."