doi: 10.1037//0021-843x.105.3.440
It’s always important in science to do the experiment or study, even if you’re pretty sure you already know the answer.
Sometimes, the result will be surprisingly counter-intuitive. And other times, like in this study, it confirms what seems blatantly obvious.
What could it possibly mean when a man who identifies as heterosexual feels threatened by the mere existence of homosexual men? What could it mean???
And then they’re like "huh… that’s weird“ and discover time travel by accident.
“Turns out all we needed to travel forwards in time is to burn homophobes!”
That’s a banger quote. Where does it come from?
I think it could be reuse with burn the kings, and burn the capital owners
I made it up.
What are you referring to with time travel? Seems interesting
And more proof is always useful. Science runs on it.
And sometimes, just sometimes, studies are framed to find what the experimenter wants them to find.
I always assumed that homophobia is about a subconscious fear of spreading diseases and stuff, as that’s more common in gay people by a lot.
Don’t conflate promiscuity with homosexuality. There are plenty of gay people who are monogamous and who are no more likely to spread disease than anybody else. And there are plenty of promiscuous heterosexual people who are spreading diseases.
Also, you shouldn’t apologize for this bigotry by saying it’s subconscious. This is learned behavior.
you’re right, i should have been more careful about this.
i just contacted an old friend of mine who had that view, and he too says that he’s changed his mind about this and no longer sees it that way.
Most of what I learned about LGBTQ came from homophobes. The ones who would not shut up about it.
For example when I didn’t know that rainbows were associated with the community. I had friend school over one time. He saw a blanket with a rainbow stripe pattern. He basically had a gay panic meltdown. He was so certain we were a family of closeted gays.
So anyways later on he got a degree from a bible college or something. And he joined an evangelical church. One where they travel around to city streets around preaching from megaphones. Kind of like that Westboro Baptist thing.
In our early 20s he sexually assault me. I found out later from another guy we went to school with that he also forced himself on that guy too.
He’s not the only person I’ve known like this but certainly the most crazy one.
If there’s any true to the saying that gays rub their identity in everyone’s face. Then it’s the homophobe ones. It’s got to be a massive projection. It’s like they’re trying to tell the world but it manifests as some kind of self-hate in denial or something.
The rubbing it in your face bit always got me. It sounds like something a jealous person would say. Like why do they get to suck dick and I can’t!
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So interesting thing here: both groups were aroused at heterosexual and lesbian stimuli.
The homophobic ones responded to the homosexual stimuli.
The guys were bi. Sort of explains why they argue “everyone chooses to be gay or straight.” Because they have decided they have to.
This also explains the more-frequent-than-i-enjoy conversation about how “no, there really isn’t a celebrity I’d go gay for.”
I feel like bisexuality is way more common than what we see. And if anything, I feel like the reason why so many women are more likely bi or willing to experiment vs men is literally just the bullshit stigma against being seen as gay.
And this may just be my experience, but being bisexual isn’t as easy as just choosing one or the other. The problem is that if you repress that much of your sexuality it only grows more… Intense. And sometimes more depraved, which is never a good thing. And I feel like that’s why a lot of those men end up getting caught doing “gay” things but it’s never just normal stuff. It’s always super crazy shit they get caught doing because it’s been repressed for so long that they make awful impulse decisions on feelings they’ve been ignoring for years. Like holding in your anger for 30 years and then going absolutely fucking mental when your coworker takes your parking spot.
I know in my case I was open to relationships with women but dating men was so much easier it just never happened. On the outside it seems I’m hetero because that’s all anyone would see.
That’s kinda the situation I’m in too. Dating women has always been easier for me so according to everyone that knows me I’m hetero even though I’ve told them that I’m bi. They just can’t see it.
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“no, there really isn’t a celebrity I’d go gay for.”
Not even for the story?
The story of being hit on by a celebrity would be plenty enough for me.
I’ve long suspected that most people are at a 1 on the Kinsey scale. Plenty of yall are 0s, but I’d guess you’re probably the second or third most common group
TIL about the Kinsey scale. It would appear that yeah, I’m definitely a 0 by the description.
But thinking about it, it makes sense. I’ve heard people say they “always knew they were gay” and “they were born in the wrong body.” And it was things that were just natural.
That’s the only way I can describe it. I’m attracted to women. I’ve always known that, and no matter how hard I try, it’s impossible to imagine non-women to be sexually (and romantically) attractive.
Like there’s just something there that stops it going any further. Like, hell, a woman that visually has a body that can indisputably only be a woman but then talks with a baritone voice it’s instant off (there’s several comedies where this sort of character is used).
What’s cool though is that if I’m that sure about myself, there is no doubt in my mind that other people know what their attractions are, and there is no reason for anyone to doubt a person’s (honest) attractions.
I really don’t like the idea of citing this study. It’s always this same one from the 90s, and if it were acurate I expect the results would have been reproduced more. It’s also not clear that the results indicate what the paper says. There’s other reasons than sexual arousal that could explain the results. It could be they’re imagining the scenario and are axious or disgusted by it. There’s this paper that indicates homophobia is usually caused by fear or hate.
I don’t like the idea of putting the blame for homophobia on closeted queer people. It’s seems extremely likely to me that most homophobic people are straight, since most people are straight. Also we should respect other people’s own identification instead of trying to force labels on people, even if they’re bigots.
I was hoping someone else articulated this better than me. When I read OP’s screenshot, I heard “Your dick got hard when we showed you sex. What are you, gay? You’re gay, aren’t you?” Which doesn’t really follow. Thats just bullying, I think. The scientists were bullying the homophobes lmao.
And, like, they’re probably sometimes correct. I conject homophobia is a mask worn by homos to blend in around homophobes, and then the paper you linked hits me with
These findings confirm the importance of considering the variability in impulsive processes to understand why some (but not all) men high in homophobia have homosexual interest.
and wow, this really does confirm my bias! Thank you for sharing
If you disagree with the science, perhaps you should do your own study?
Nah, nope, nuh-uh, that’s not how science works. A person’s concerns about the methodology or conclusions of a particular study are not invalid just because they haven’t run their own experiments.
It’s pretty easy for even a layperson to question this particular study, for a few reasons:
- The sample sizes are very small
- Some men can get erections/aroused if the wind blows the wrong way, or even for no reason at all - putting porn in front of someone and expecting them not to become aroused is a dubious assumption at best
- Using some external test to determine someone’s sexuality, instead of using the person’s self-identification, goes against the last 30 years of progress we’ve made in gender and sexuality studies
- The conclusion of the study may indicate some level of homophobic or anti-homosexual bias
Don’t gatekeep good critical thinking. Good critical thinking is the only thing you ever need to question any scientific study.
I think that you make some good points. But I take issue with your third point. People lie about things to researchers (or simply don’t know have some sort of self-knowledge) all the time. This is the whole concept of “revealed preference” in economics. Someone can say that they care about sweatshop labor, but do they actually make any effort to avoid buying products produced in sweatshops?
Not questioning the experiment subjects’ stated sexual identity just neuters the whole point of the study: is homophobia driven by repressed homosexual desire. If it is repressed, we should expect subjects to say they are straight even if they aren’t. Could the methodology be flawed? Sure! But there is nothing wrong with trying to actually measure the homosexual attraction of someone who says they are not so attracted.
That’s fair, but I get the feeling that the researchers came up with their conclusion before performing their study, and then interpreted their findings to fit that pre-supposed conclusion. The only thing this study can fairly claim is that some homophobic men may harbor homosexual desires. They’ve failed to demonstrate any causal linkage between those two attributes, but they’re heavily suggesting one exists. Maybe their abstract grossly oversimplifies things, but it seems to extrapolate their findings far beyond any reasonable conclusion in my opinion, and that makes me question their methods and motives more than I normally would. The publication date also raises flags, as the common pervasive sentiment about homosexuality was very different in 1996 than it is today. All of those things combined indicate to me that this study should be carefully considered with plenty of grains of salt at hand.
But to get back on topic a little bit - my original intent was to refute the notion that if someone has a problem with the methodology of a scientific study, then they must perform their own study and present evidence to support a contrary claim. The examples I listed are things it would be reasonable to expect a layman with solid critical thinking skills to point out as potential flaws in this particular study, potential areas to look further into, to confirm whether or not the study is scientifically sound.
I definitely agree with you on all counts there. A single underpowered study does not sound science make, even disregarding the authors’ potential biases.
Agree with your overall point, but a “revealed preference” isn’t necessarily a lie or lake of self-knowledge. A recovering alcoholic might have a revealed preference for alcohol but that doesn’t mean they’re lying when they say they don’t want it or that they’re unaware of the temptation they have for it (insane as this may sound, people have actually made this argument before). The whole economic concept rests on massive philosophical and psychological cans of worms about what defines a person’s identity and wants, which economists are happy to oversimplify and ignore. The average person can’t really be expected to track entire supply chains for every purchase they ever make, which is why we have regulations. Instead of having every individual track every part of the production of every purchase, we (as a society) assign someone the job of investigating the production process to see if there’s anything that we would find objectionable.
If a lot of people say that they have a problem with sweatshops, but then purchase goods made in sweatshops, you could argue that their behavior “reveals” their true preference, but it would be equally valid to say that what what they actually consciously express is their true preference and their failure to live up to it is driven by ignorance, succumbing to temptation, or regulatory failure.
Point 2 is covered by having a control group and point 3 seems to be missing the point: well yeah, don’t take the conclusion too far, but that doesn’t mean measuring arousal is bad science.
Bigger issues are low sample size (as you mentioned) and the fact that it’s a correlational study that hasn’t done any work to causally link them.
Someone should repeat the study. That’s all I’m saying. If the criticism is that the study was too small or done too long ago, or whatever. The anti-science crowd are the ones who reason away the results of science with no basis of fact. If you disagree with the facts, it is your responsibility to disprove them.
No, what you said was “if you disagree with the science, perhaps you should do your own study”.
“Disagree with the science” is a disingenuous oversimplification bordering on nonsensical. People are calling into question the methods of the study, and the conclusions reached by the scientists interpreting the data. All of which can be accomplished with good critical thinking, and all of which is part of the scientific process. We’re not “disagreeing with the science”. We don’t need to repeat this experiment or run our own to be able to point out that it looks like there are flaws in this study - we just need to have good critical thinking skills.
If you disagree with the facts, it is your responsibility to disprove them.
What facts? Are you implying that the content of a scientific study becomes “fact” simply because a scientist publishes it? Because that’s wrong, and any published scientist will tell you as much.
Ah, thank you for quoting my words back to me. Now kindly fuck off.
No u
Critique and analysis of a study or experiment is the default. It isn’t a religion; science thrives on repeat analysis.
Which is why someone should repeat the study to confirm or contradict it.
This whole discussion you see above is part of the process of repeating a study. You can’t just do exactly what the previous study did and expect all the flaws to magically disappear. You need to first uncover the flaws, and more eyes and collaboration means a higher likelihood that the flaws get found, hence the importance of these discussions. Then you redesign the experiment to fix those flaws, and then you can run it again.
I agree with you.
Yeah gimme a bunch of money lol
Lemme just reach into my giant money bag … Hey, who took my giant money bag!?
Do you know what peer review means?
Are you a scientist?
IIRC, this hasn’t been debunked per se, but it was a very small, very limited study, and doesn’t really do a great job of explaining homophobia in a broader population. (I mean, you’re talking about 64 people in total; depending on your inclusion criteria, that could be a meaningless sample size.) Penile plethysmography is a proxy for sexual arousal; it’s useful in some instances–like predicting whether or not someone will commit more sexual offenses in the future–but isn’t even that great in those instances. If I remember correctly, there’s strong evidence that disgust is a trait strongly associated with conservatism, and homophobia is a an extreme disgust reaction.
FWIW, I was casually–but quite virulently–homophobic when I was younger. I’d been raised in a very conservative, evangelical religious group, and I believed all the bullshit that I’d heard about gay people. That changed once I lost religion, and actually met people that were gay. That, of course, is only anecdotal evidence, and does assume that I’m neither gay nor bisexual (and I don’t believe that I am), but it fits with what I’ve seen from conservative thought.
Attraction to women doesn’t make people not misogynist.
Funny, but the sample size? Would like to see a larger study (probably would show the same results).
I also wonder if they considered bi individuals in the non-homophobic group.
If these are easily answered by reading the paper, I’ll see it now, when I actually read it.
Bi - the invisible sexual orientation.
Glad that Lower Decks has a bi protagonist. Its really sad that bisexual people just seem to be completely invisible within the broader culture.
I have not watched it. I love me some star trek, but haven’t really gotten into the “new” ones. Mainly because I need to pirate them, and haven’t yet.
It is a good point on bi individuals being somewhat invisible. It seems like most people just assume their orientation by the person they’re with, or people they most commonly “go for”.
Not sure what is up with this screenshot. Looks like someone erased something from the sides? I dunno, but the quality is not great. Here’s a new one:
Uuh that’s a very difficult thing.
It’s like wearing agressive perfume full of hormomes. It might cause somebody to get an erection but it’s still hella uncomfortable and annoying. Not really consensual and i see why it pisses people off.
Aight thats really fair
1996 sub 100 participants
Data quality is shit, and should be discarded.
That aside, I feel bad for my extremely closested buddy. We went to a rather homophobic highschool, and a mildly homophobic college, and he always tried too hard for ladies for how dedicated he was to his certain type of looks.
35 people makes it a useless study.
it was 64 people. edit: and also, even 29 or something like this is a lot, assuming that they are selected kind of randomly and not all belong to the same social group etc. If only 3 showed a reaction like described, sure. We need more data. but with a hitrate of 100%, what do you expect to happen if you 10x the number?
Waitwaitwait… The homophobic men displaying arousal: Yeah, sure, of course.
But NONE of the non-homophobic men got even a little ruffled? That’s the real surprise here.
I’ve always assumed this (and assumed that other people assumed this), because if you talk to homophobes they’ll eventually say something like “it’s a choice!” because it’s a choice for them. It’s not a choice for me because gay porn doesn’t turn me on – and if it did I wouldn’t care anyway because that’s how I was raised. But it DOES turns them on, AND they were raised in an environment where this is THE WORST THING EVER, so it upsets them and they get all irrational and punchy (lesson learned: DO NOT discuss this theory with a homophobe.)
TLDR; IMHO Homophobes who think orientation is a choice are closeted gays because logic.
It would be nice to see a better study. Interesting if one hasn’t been done in all this time…
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As someone that used to be homophobic in highschool, I can confirm this is the case. My dad is super homophobic yet all of his kids, including myself, are at least bisexual.
To my knowledge there is no hard evidence for sexuality being primarily genetical?
There is evidence. See the fraternal birth order effect for just one example:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fraternal_birth_order_and_male_sexual_orientation
And scientists have created lesbian mice:
https://bmcgenomdata.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1471-2156-11-62
(Side note: it’s hilarious they shorthanded the enzymes to FucM)
today i learned. and it alignes so well with how in medieval times, only firstborns were expected to inherit the family farm and have children themselves. At least that’s how it was in many areas.
It depends on how you’re looking at homosexuality; are you looking at it as sexual attraction, or as behaviour? If you’re talking about behaviour, then a lot of that is certainly environmental, e.g., if you’re raise a non-permissive location, you’re much, much less likely to engage in homosexual behaviour. But if you’re talking about sexual attraction, then it seems very unlikely that it could be anything other than primarily genetic.
I think that the fact that there’s a difference between how people act, versus how people feel, is what confuses so many people about being straight, gay, bisexual, transgender, etc., and why conservatives feel like there’s a ‘gay agenda’ to make kids gay (or trans) when a permissive society allows more people to act freely on the way that they feel.
Yeah, I think you are right and I couldn’t find anything. I just find it highly suspicious that my dad is hardcore homophobic when more than half of his immediate family is gay or bisexual. Like, even his brother is gay.
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