Working on the change of public consciousness towards LGBT people, it is important to understand preconditions of rejection the community deals with.
One of the key words can be easily found in the very term they are often being called – "sexual minorities". Here we are dealing with the powerful social mechanism: prohibition of sexual freedom. Thus, gay people demand the rights most people deprived of.
This postulate in particular proves one of the most widespread homophobic arguments: acceptance of LGBT people in society "perverts heterosexuals", because they are supposedly more willingly experiment in sex. In its turn, sexual freedom is unacceptable for all major religious movements. And while the heterosexual intercourse can be justified by the necessity of childbearing, gay people have sex only for the pleasure – and it is known to be the sin. Countries with free manners are much more LGBT tolerant than puritanical ones.
There can be several reasons for strict rules of sexual behavior. First of all prohibition of sexuality is typical for patriarchal cultures. For instance, depriving women of the right to choose the partner is dictated by the necessity to be sure of the fatherhood. While men is responsible for taking care of the family regardless of his desire.
The other important issue: sexual satisfaction decreases aggressiveness, what was undesirable for the societies with policies of active expansion. Meaning those oriented to the war as a way to gain resources. We shall not draw parallels with the present times, but any reasonable person understands that this mechanism still operates successfully including in the field of artificial inflation the level of aggression by all means available.
The development of Humanist Society made possible the sexual revolution with its peak in the 1960s. By that time grew the generation born immediately after the end of the World War II. Under the conditions of shattered economy the children felt no need for the old morality. The most important factor was the emergence of reliable and available contraceptives, which allowed to have sex exclusively for pleasure. Marriage – one for a lifetime – is no longer the only option available. Not only contraceptives, but also abortions became legally available in many states. Oral and anal sex stopped being considered to be a perversion. It is also important that sex education courses had been introduced into educational establishments as a mean of prevention of the sexually transmitted diseases and other sexually related problems.
But revolution has not been finished yet: there are still groups in the world prohibiting all the above, including contraceptives. And if only they would put these prohibitions only in their groups, but no: they demand it from everyone and to everyone! The motivation for such behavior is partly an ordinary envy disguised as high spirituality. But if you do not take into account the extremely orthodox groupings, a society with a high level of culture will always be more tolerant to the various manifestations of sexuality.
Zoya Rybachok
Photo by Corbisimages.com
Автор: Gay Alliance Ukraine
