|
OCulture
and Religion Corrupts Gay
Youths
Saturday,
November 21, 2009
Two Soccer Legends
 |
| Racheal
Nyepon |
|
The
obligation to raise children
with a strong sense of
equality and altruism is
universal, so teaching respect
and tolerance of other people
in the formative years is not
a bad idea at all. And equality,
unfortunately, is not a
commodity in this life,
either.
However,
the purest of minds in this
world, the children, have been
deprived and corrupted as far
as certain parts of
benevolence and equality are
concerned.
As soon as certain
religious, cultural, and
environmental beliefs are
introduced into the lives of
youngsters all sense and
concepts of equality go flying
out the window.
For
example, one’s sexuality is
often questioned and defined
not according to concepts of
equality, but within the
context of religion and
culture. In the beginning,
children do not understand
completely all the
ramifications of religion and
culture, but as they get older
in to their preteen years, and
even earlier, they begin to
see the contradictions in the
Bible, as well as
inconsistencies concerning
homosexuality.
As
a child I remember my catholic
school teachings that
homosexuality was indeed a
sin, and was cause for eternal
damnation. That same school
also instilled in me the
concept of equality, and the
right to be who one really
wants to be. Of course many
youths today have had the
experience of a parent telling
a child that equality is key,
and then turning around to say
homosexuality is morally
wrong. What I learned in those
crucial years still holds dear
to my heart. No matter what,
being who a person really is
or wants to be is key to
peace-of-mind. It doesn’t
matter whether one is gay,
lesbian, bisexual, transgender
or heterosexual. That person
is a person who deserves a
fair shot in life without any
other individual questioning
or disapproving his or her
lifestyle.
As
I entered high school I
realized that homosexuality
has existed for centuries
before the arrival of
Christianity. There is no
evidence of any hindrance or
acceptance of homosexual acts
during those centuries. In
ancient Japan, “the love of
the samurai” was fundamental
between an elder samurai and
his apprentice. In ancient
Greece, homosexual acts were
common among the armies, and
never hidden as though it was
a wrongdoing. The ancient
Greeks did not conceive of
sexual orientation as a social
specification, as western
society has done for the past
century or so. Greek society
did not distinguish sexual
motive or decorum by the
gender of the affiliates. If
some of the earliest men in
this world have not considered
homosexuality to be wrong,
then what is this modern world
to condemn it as an evil?
Whenever
the words of the Almighty come
into play is when
homosexuality became taboo and
a sin. The anti-homosexual
temperament’s frontier is
space and time, and derives
from moral traditions. Said
traditions are a direct result
of the worshiping of a deity
which has never been proven to
exist. The Bible exhibits
scientific and historic
errors, and expresses the
passions of the inner
experiences of every person
living with the crises of
fate, and because the Bible
reaches people on an emotional
level is why it is so
influencing. But, again, there
is no proof, and with no
proof, no one man can say that
homosexuality is a “sin”
or morally wrong. In the 4th
century when Christianity
became the state religion of
the Roman Empire, penalties
for being gay or lesbian were
carried out. Some repercussion
of such acts were castration,
hanging, burning, torture,
mutilation, all done by the
same religion that will in the
future hang innocent people
for witchcraft, and deny
anyone other than whites the
privilege of Sunday mass. It
is unfortunate that some of
these vicious acts are still
carried out not by law, but by
the citizens who believe
homosexuality to be a sin.
As
the world comes closer and
closer to the inevitable
paradigm shift, which takes
place every century or so, old
values and a number religions
as well as their beliefs will
undoubtedly gather dust while
the new age snaps into
position. In the meantime,
there is the youth and their
wellbeing to worry about. The
fight for gay rights around
the world and the mistreatment
of the LBGT (Lesbian,
Bisexual, Gay, Transgender)
community, have bruised the
lives of many young people
struggling with their
sexuality. A number of gay
youth are worried, and are
coming out of the closet to
the ones they know and love. A
multitude of gay youths I
questioned believed that if
their friends and family do
not accept them then they
undoubtedly, will perish.
Religion
in particular is a touchy
topic, especially when it
comes to homosexuality. One of
the most intriguing and
troubling questions in this
world is what happens once the
mortal body no longer
functions. There is an
abundance of people who
believe there is in fact an
afterlife, and what you do in
this life matters as to what
will happen in the eternal
life. Of course, within this
group, there are variations of
beliefs. The branch of this
belief that has the most
effect on the psychological
aspect of a youth is the group
that believes the Bible to be
a direct manual from God.
These
people tell homosexual youths
that unless they become
heterosexual they will spend
the rest of eternity in hell,
and that God does not and will
never accept them for who they
are, and the way they were
born. Although this may not
have so much of an influence
on an atheist youth,
youngsters struggling with
religion will no doubt at one
point hurt themselves or
others, emotionally or
physically, if they do not
seek guidance from a support
system.
I
interviewed ten gay youths in
Europe (France, Italy), Africa
(Liberia, Ghana) Asia;
(Japan), South America
(Colombia, Brazil) and America
(MA, Florida), asking them
various questions about their
religious and cultural
beliefs, and personal
situations involving their
lives as homosexuals. Five of
them responded and said that
they were born in Christian
households but don’t believe
in a God, saying, “because a
real god wouldn’t dismiss
who they really are.” Three
of the youths said they
believe in a higher power, and
do believe in an afterlife.
Unfortunately, the last two
believe that God and the world
abandoned them. Just like
those two, all ten of the
participants believed at one
point in their young lives
that they were “freaks”,
abnormal, or just downright
evil. Nine hurt themselves
physically in the past,
ranging from cutting, burning,
and starving themselves
because they felt horrible.
The
Western Culture has instilled
into our minds the “gay”
and “straight” labels, but
what if the hardship of
homosexuality is only a
Western creation? The Western
culture has construed gender
according to culture rather
than by biological terms. Our
interpretation of the words
“men, women, femininity, and
masculinity” draws a line to
what is acceptable and
unacceptable in society.
Dialect creates the delusion
that the words we use are
adapted to our concepts and
definitions, which is
generally not the case.
Culture utilizes words to
serve as a marker of
definitive reason so that we
may communicate to each other.
But, these interpretations are
standardized, and are loaded
down with assumptions and
expectations about how the
world operates, developing
distinct social norms of
sexuality.
In
the formative years of a
child, these words and the
assumptions that come along
with them are everything the
youth have in order to make
sense of life and the world,
and if these words are filled
said interpretations, the
child will grow up believing
wholeheartedly in them.
Because of these inferences,
the concept of homosexuality
has become lifelong
predisposition. In this time
period, if a person comes to
the conclusion that they are
attracted to the same sex,
than the person assumes that
they were born that way, and
will love the same sex for the
rest of their lives.
There
is not enough evidence that
supports that being gay is a
deep-rooted predilection that
never changes because of these
social norms that associate
with being gay, lesbian,
straight, or bisexual. If
these cultural norms did not
exist, it is uncertain how
many people would have sex or
romantic relationships with
both genders. The
predisposition is not credible
in other sexual situations.
For example, if a person
realizes that they have a
strong sexual attraction to a
person of Asian descent, they
do not worryingly wonder if
they will only be attracted to
Asians for the rest of their
life, because there is no
over-powering cultural or
social norm for racial
inclination. But, when gender
comes into play, Western
culture automatically enforces
its members to deal with a
lifelong decision.
Because
of the cultural norms, the
concept of homosexuality has
also taken on an elemental
characterization as part of
one’s selfdom, which does
not occur in other fairly well
defined terms. For instance, a
person that is perceptive does
not think of their
perceptivity as fundamental.
Perceptivity is relatively
stable in a lifetime, but a
perceptive individual does not
define it as an integral part
of their status. When that
person goes to high school,
they do not introduce
themselves to the class by
saying, “Hi, my name is
So-and-so, and I am
perceptive. I’ve known that
I was perceptive since I was a
kid.” Again, gay culture is
only a culture because it was
a counter reaction to the
Western definitions of
homosexuality. Western society
has chosen to conceptualize
and separate sexuality
arbitrarily.
When
historical characters in other
cultures, and in different
time periods are applied to
the concept of homosexuality,
the concept itself becomes
misleading. During these times
homosexuality and
heterosexuality was not
defined. It isn’t clear as
to whether a Samurai, who had
sexual relations with his
apprentices were gay because
in this culture there were no
strong cultural and social
sexual norms.
We
disconnect reality in an
arbitrary way, usually to
create standardized categories
such as, good and bad, wrong
and right, acceptable and
unacceptable, as well as to
create in-groups and
out-groups. If we were to live
in a world where the
classifications of
“gay” and
“straight” did not exist,
our culture would be much less
confining because it would
imply that those differences
are welcomed as an alteration
of human nature.
But
we live in a world where both
religion and culture play a
major role in the lives of
every person, especially the
youths who are just ceasing to
live off their mother’s
milk, and entering the world
on their own. Religion gets a
hold on the fears of the gay
youths, taunting them with
eternal life in heaven or
hell; depending on whether
they choose to do as God says
and not sleep with the same
sex. Western culture has
created the definition of
homosexuality, and because of
that there is now sexual
social norms, which would not
be present had that definition
not been introduced. Because
of these norms, a number of
gay youth struggle with
something that should be
considered a variation of
human nature and accepted as a
non-integral, non-predisposed
part of life.
|
