This was posted September 29, 2018; was viewed only 38 times. Great Martin  commented, viz: "Very simply you are a sad uninformed man."

To which I reponded: "Hello, greatmartin! 

It is then incumbent upon the informed - such as yourself - to inform me... Looking forward to your edifying corrections! And thank you in advance for sharing your wisdom!

Sincerely, tjd"    Since Martin posted on my post regarding providing a cultural contrast and context for Scott Lively's essay, but still has not responded to my query from 2018, I figured to give him a second opportunity to correct my flawed reasoning; the 2018 argument follows immediately. tjd

Homophobia 

            The term “homophobia” is the conjunction of the terms “homosexual” and phobia. The former term “homosexual” meaning: “one who is attracted to those of the same sex;” the latter term “phobia” means to be possessed by an irrational fear… Thus, “homophobia” means: “An irrational fear of homosexuals.” This should immediately germinate the question: “How are irrational fears to be differentiated from rational fears?” It would seem that only one able to read the dispositions of souls could determine that an individual’s soul is animated by fear, unreasonable fear or by something else; for the moment we will move onto a related question, viz: “from whence did the idea that an individual is afflicted by a phobia originate…” Now psychiatry, defines the term homophobia: “an abnormal intense and irrational fear of a given situation, organism, or object;” since psychiatryis reputed to be an empirical “science” this then begs the question by what metric – or by what clinically compiled data – have these ostensible people-of-science thought to coin the term “homophobia?” Surprisingly the answer is: there ain’t no clinical data, and there ain’t no such thing as an objective metric from which the term is derived… Go figure?

We thought it strange that the term is “adorned” as if a scientific term, but is actually mere sentiment. In doing an online search for the origination of the use of the term “homophobia,” Google reveals the term originated “in the 1960’s.” The history: “George Weinberg, a psychotherapist who, in the mid-1960s, observed the discomfort that some of his colleagues exhibited around gay men and women and invented a word to describe it — homophobia — died on Monday in Manhattan. He was 87” (See: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/22/us/george-weinberg-dead-coined-homophobia.html).

The article at the link above indicates that (we paraphrase):‘Dr. Weinberg had invited a number of people to a party, and informed some of the heterosexual guests that he was inviting a number of homosexuals as guests; some of the heterosexuals asked Weinberg to dis-invite the homosexuals… Weinberg drew an inference that the heterosexuals feared the homosexuals. Moreover, Dr. Weinberg was able to discern that their fear was irrational fear…’ One wonders how Weinberg induced that the “discomfort” exhibited by his colleagues was not only fear, but irrational fear; we suggest that Dr. Weinberg’s diagnosis was likely in error, and that he may have confused “irrational fear” with visceral disgust…

Back when Phil Donahue had his daily show on T.V. (1967-96, my wife watched, daily, stopping after my incessant harangues at Donahue) – likely before the cable networks – Donahue had Massachusetts Congressman (homosexual) Barney Frank on as a guest (Note: Congressman Frank may have appeared more than once, but we happened to have viewed a particular segment which we reference…); Frank discussed homosexuality to with a sympathetic Donahue (Donahue was a practiced iconoclast Leftist; feigning “devout” Catholicism, but his Catholicism was reduced to heterodoxy he is, and was, a Lefty through and through – as are so many famous Catholics) - and a largely sympathetic audience… During the program, Congressman Frank was confronted with a guest that claimed that his conduct and attraction was a choice; Frank responded: ‘I would never to choose to be this way…’ Such a response begs a follow-up question, viz: “Why wouldn’t you choose to be ahomosexual Mr. Frank?” Our guess is that Barney Frank was disposed with self-loathing self-disgust*, as formerly was reported** as an attendant condition suffered by homosexuals – which led to the high incidences of suicide… Moreover, We have witnessed others make the same claim (it seems that at one time it was fashionable among the fashion conscious homosexuals – according to Reese Witherspoon’s character in Legally Blond - to claim that they would not choose to be homosexuals, thus, by implication: God made them that way…

*Thus, the high incidence of suicides among homosexuals back-in-the-day

** When reporting the truth about homosexuals was not denied as politically insensitive and impolitic; similarly historians - formerly - would teach the coincidence of a civilization’s impending decline-and-death and homosexuality acceptance; today a historian would lose his/her post in a University for such an outrageous – albeit true - assertion…

As an aside, we guess, that Donahue had a number of pre-selected quasi-articulate defenders of tradition, utilized as foils i.e., their argument and responses were thinly-veiled emotional bigotry which was contrasted with reasonable advocates – speaking in measured tones – as they assailed objective morality… The result of such tête-à-têtes was to present moral norms as bigotry and their abandonment as enlightened high-mindedness…

Note: Those that are young may not understand the dynamic of cultural moral collapse; objective moral principle – and whatever institutions were animated by them – came under unrelenting increasingly iconoclastic attack - from the ascendant material-nihilistic culture – beginning in the late 1960’s; initially many “dialogues” which were covered publically – as on Donahue – involved audience manipulation, sentimental appeals, and next to mention of moral principles or any rational defense thereto; reason – in such venues- was generally left undefended, and was made to appear defenseless bigotry! We do not claim such dialogues were staged, or set-ups; we claim – instead – those that could have defended the rational worldview which attends objective moral principles did not get a hearing…Any further comments upon these matters would require a separate post…

Consequentially, the term homophobia is utilized nearly as frequently – by those of social-political Left - against those on the social-political Right to characterize those on the social-political Right as hateful bigots, as the term racist. But the term was also used (and may still be used?) to intimidate and silence University students (and any others) that may have attempted to make a rational argument in opposition to homosexual acts on moral ground. The term is a political weapon; as are the terms racist, sexist, nativist, xenophobe, misogynist etc… Such practice may no longer be necessary, but was ubiquitously employed prior to social-acceptance of homosexuality - and other perverse behaviors – as a method by which such behaviors be garnered respectability and acceptance…

Why the malignant characterizations and intimidation? Well, we must guess, and our guess is that of a five-fold answer:

1.) through the decay of philosophy (actually beginning in the 13^th Century) from realism to idealism and then nihilism and materialism (ideology surmounted philosophy, among intellectual), alternative sexual lifestyles began to be advocated by intellectuals – as part of an desire to be free of the restrictions imposed – on all facets of life – by objective morality- throughout the 19^th Century as tradition, morality and the erstwhile dominant rational worldview (Christendom) was abandoned. 34 intellectuals put forward their view 1933 in Humanist Manifestoes I; views more explicitly articulated – and signed by over 2000 intellectual movers-and-shakers in the Humanist Manifesto II (1973); thus the nihilist intellectual impetus.

2.) The Church’s near supine response post-Vatican II and beyond, with the exceptions of Pope’s Saint John Paul II and Benedict XVI.

3.) A split in the APA (American Psychological Association) took place in the late 1980’s; about 15000 research psychologist left the APA – in 1988 - and founded the APS (American Psychological Society), because the APA had allowed itself to be lobbied by homosexuals so as to remove homosexuality from the official list of pathologies. The members of the APS held “science” should not be subject to lobby or any duress… But the politicization of the APA provided “intellectuals” and epigones an ostensible scientific claim i.e., the appearance of a scientific basis that homosexuality is not a mental disorder… See Paul Vitz’s Psychology as Religion (pgs 142-143).

4.) The Kinsey Report; promulgation of Kinsey’s distortions - regarding American sexual mores (many “facts” were ascribing the perverse behavior of prison inmates to the “Ward and June Cleavers” of the 1950’s USA) – provided a cultural impetus.

5.) As iconoclasts – everywhere made their arguments against the former dominant worldview, the worldview lacked its defenders which gave the impression such views may not be defensible. A fair-minded individual – thinking objective morality must be codified-bigotry (absent a rational public defense) – as a fair-minded individual would naturally abandon a position which seems to be unadulterated bigotry. Thus, because the iconoclast overwhelmed any detractors (those which would defend objective reality and its attendant objective morality) both - in sheer numbers and in volume of rhetoric; iconoclasts practice eristic i.e., character-assassination rather than dialectical discourse; note such was Nietzsche’s proposed method of the übermenschen.

Thomas J. Donegan

guildma@msn.com

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