I also think that some people have deeply internalized an ethos which tells them they are terrible people for feeling the way they do. Shame goes bone-deep. They hate themselves for being gay, but at least they try to do the right thing anyhow by silencing themselves and advocating what's good and right. They see other gay people who apparently don't even care. They don't make an effort to do what's right, instead, they self-righteously justify self-indulgent, shameless behavior. They don't hate themselves and try to be better, the way they should. Weren't they brought up to know what's right? Don't they have any sense of decency? Do they think it's easy, hating yourself and rigidly censoring your every impulse? No, it's not easy, but it's the right thing to do.
People who cause themselves untold suffering for the sake of a rigid morality which they are deeply invested in, who *believe* that they are bad people who are struggling to make up for their inherent sins...surely it's no wonder that they're the least tolerant of all of people who don't do likewise?
Glg. I can't take this. Once, while I was working for a queer public education nonprofit, I was writing up brief sumaries for members on a variety of topics, and one of them was the "ex-gay" movement. I almost couldn't do it. I could hardly stand to read the literature, and felt ill, moving my fingers across the keyboard, typing it up. It's not just the hatred directed at someone like me. I can read ranting and just feel annoyed or tired or angry or even amused. It was the all-encompassing rigid self-hatred which obliterated any hope, any opening, any possibility of any other perspective.
I have started typing without looking at what I'm writing, because I find it so disturbing. Time to think about something else.
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It is very unpleasant tryin to get inside this kind of thinking.
Date: 2006-11-03 04:18 pm (UTC)People who cause themselves untold suffering for the sake of a rigid morality which they are deeply invested in, who *believe* that they are bad people who are struggling to make up for their inherent sins...surely it's no wonder that they're the least tolerant of all of people who don't do likewise?
Glg. I can't take this. Once, while I was working for a queer public education nonprofit, I was writing up brief sumaries for members on a variety of topics, and one of them was the "ex-gay" movement. I almost couldn't do it. I could hardly stand to read the literature, and felt ill, moving my fingers across the keyboard, typing it up. It's not just the hatred directed at someone like me. I can read ranting and just feel annoyed or tired or angry or even amused. It was the all-encompassing rigid self-hatred which obliterated any hope, any opening, any possibility of any other perspective.
I have started typing without looking at what I'm writing, because I find it so disturbing. Time to think about something else.