Posted on 10/31/2015 2:51:04 AM PDT by markomalley
This summer, the Supreme Court narrowly redefined marriage and handed the gay-rights movement a major victory: full “equality†and recognition by the government. With that box checked, the gay-rights movement can now focus on its ultimate goal: silencing those who disagree.
One new and troubling strategy has emerged from the scientific community. Instead of vilifying those who believe in natural marriage, suggest some researchers, we should diagnose them.
It’s an ironic reversal. Years ago, homosexuality was listed in the American Psychiatric Association’s manual of disorders. But in 1986 it was removed, followed by a concerted push from Association members to normalize homosexual behavior.
In just thirty years, America went from a country where homosexuality was a diagnosable disorder to one where you can be fined for refusing to bake a gay “wedding†cake. Now things are going a step further. New research published in “The Journal of Sexual Medicine†suggests that homophobia, not homosexuality, is the psychological disorder.
“Live Science†reports that researchers at the University of Rome Tor Vergata asked 560 university students to report their feelings about homosexuality, then gave them a standard psychiatric evaluation.
Participants who exhibited what the researchers called “healthy attachment styles†tended to show less animosity toward homosexuals. They also showed more “mature coping mechanisms†in “scary or unpleasant situations,†and were generally less angry. But those who showed the highest animosity toward homosexuals exhibited a host of warning signs like inability to trust others, passive-aggressive behavior, and denial.
Lead researcher Emmanuele Jannini concluded, “After discussing for centuries if homosexuality is to be considered a disease, for the first time we demonstrated that the real disease to be cured is homophobia.â€
Well, this was red meat for progressive websites and news outlets, who gladly trumpeted the results.
I can’t help but think of C. S. Lewis’ chilling and prophetic essay, “The Humanitarian Theory of Punishment.†Lewis believed that persecution in the future would look less like jack-booted thuggery, and more like therapy: “…certain schools of psychology already regard religion as a neurosis,†he wrote. “When this particular neurosis becomes inconvenient to the government, what is to hinder the government from proceeding to ‘cure’ it,†with mandatory re-education or other forms of treatment?
Jannini’s willingness to label homophobia as “the real disease to be cured†shows just how quickly we’re moving down this path. But we can respond: First, there are a lot of problems with how this study is being analyzed, even by its authors. For example, should it surprise us that those who show animosity toward people in general also show animosity toward gay people? Bad psychological traits probably don’t discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation.
Secondly, and more importantly, a “phobia†is “an irrational and debilitating fear†of something, and Christians don’t feel this way about those who identify as gay, or they certainly shouldn’t. Ours is a rational stance based on human flourishing and God’s created order, not “irrational animus.†It’s entirely possible to object to sin, refuse to dignify it, and still love those caught up in it. In fact, that’s what Jesus commanded us to do.
So no, we don’t need a checkup from the neck up for believing what Christians have always believed. And no matter how crazy it sounds to some folks, we have got to point out the true disease, and the only cure.
“it always has to escalate”
Yes, that seems to be true of any pursuit of sensory excitement. I just read the memoir of the novelist Graham Greene (not the Indian actor ;-), and he mentioned how quickly the thrill of playing Russian roulette faded! He had to find something else to alleviate his overwhelming boredom.
“inability to trust others, passive-aggressive behavior, and denial.”
Isn’t that what happens when someone lies through their teeth
and expects you to believe it when you know it’s an outright lie.
How many of these ‘scientists’ are peter puffers themselves?
Here’s an argument I don’t see as often as “right” or “wrong:”
What if its just a bad idea, biologically and socially? It’s bad for health, and it’s bad for procreation and family. It just doesn’t work as well as the real thing. The evidence is there if you just bother to look.
Homosexuality is, essentially, coprophilia.
It’s an unnatural obsession with, or attraction to, the sight, smell, or taste of fecal matter.
Remember when psychiatrists linked many adult neuroses to improper potty training in childhood? Parents were supposed to teach their kids basic hygiene, without shaming or making a big deal of it.
It’s common in mental hospitals for some patients to smear their poo on the walls. Extreme coprophilia is still considered crazy, at least for now.
But in the LGBT crowd, it’s just another form of “sexual expression” which needs to come out of the closet. What were once mental patients are now being encouraged to take over.
We’re even beginning to see poo-hurling as a form of protest.
It’s no surprise that these nuts seek retaliation. They want to redefine themselves as the rational ones and have the non-poo-sniffers locked up.
Wonder if these are the same “scientists” that claim you can eat a jellyfish and suddenly have clear thinking? The scientific result kind of depends on who is paying the “scientists.” Find the underwriter and you will find the hypothesis.
But then some of us lived through the AIDs crisis and not in a good way...
If it was only to justify their own depravity, that would be one thing. But they have and continue to push further, insisting, even forcing us to accept and praise them for their depravity and encourage others to participate.
...so you cannot own a gun and the gub’mint will be at your home to check
Now *who* is it that's not "in their right mind"?
Yes, but the 'better' is going to be really great.
“I can remember when the old Soviet Union would use their psychiatrists to deem any inconvenient “citizens†as mentally ill. Clamoring for more individual rights? Mental hospital.
Standing up to police state thuggery? Mental hospital. Wow, we’ve really come a long way under Fredo Dogeater.”
In graduate school I had a chance to go out for dinner with a Soviet professor visiting the lab where I worked. The topic of conversation eventually became politics and he explained why the Soviets put dissidents in mental hospitals. It went something like this, “As a child you grow up hearing the party line, you learn it grade school, high school and University. If after all that you disagree, you must be crazy”. He wasn’t joking or being sarcastic.
“I became convinced then and nothing has changed my mind since that Psychology is a fraudulent science and psychologists are frauds. period.”
Psychologists should by no means be considered scientists. In fact every psychologist I have met has some fairly obvious “issues” they are trying to work out. More than one has admitted that people who go into psychology do so to try and understand/fix their own neuroses.
That’s unnatural.
Nikita S. Khrushchev would die a second death of laughter if he could be still around.
And sadly, one of the more “mild images” of their type of “scientist”.
“Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!”
Isaiah 5:20King James Version (KJV)
Without a major course correction, I (many) expect woe will befall us soon. Woe of biblical proportion.
I have wondered why we never hear much any more about AIDS. I think it’s because it stads in the way of the liberal agenda. Or has AIDS been quietly conquered. At one time, I believe they said it was the leading cause of death of men under 45.
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