Yeah, yeah, I hear all the complaints.I thought about it for a few minutes, then posted this response:
What I don't understand is why so many people seem to feel *threatened* by it?
I'm straight, and happily married for 40 years, next month, and somehow, I don't feel the slightest bit lessened ot threatened by the thought of same-sex marriage!
Maybe it's just me...
[Name], IMHO, it's not a matter of "feeling threatened." My objection is to their intentional corruption of our language as part of their larger agenda of achieving societal approval. Not acceptance, which they already have, but approval.
They've already succeeded in co-opting and corrupting the words "gay" and "straight." "Gay" used to be a perfectly good synonym for "happy," and "straight" used to be the opposite of "crooked." Now, they're after the word "marriage," which has a very specific meaning – not just in our culture, but in nearly all other cultures throughout the world.
Words have meanings. You can call a Hampshire sow a Thoroughbred mare, but she remains a Hampshire sow regardless. Those behind the "gay marriage" push are trying to redefine the word "marriage" to the extent that the concept of marriage will become meaningless. They view that redefinition as part of their quest for the approval which they will never achieve, any more than that sow can transform herself into a mare.
As long as they don't hurt anybody else, I have no interest whatsoever in what consenting adults do to each other in the privacy of their homes. However, I draw the line at two things: going public with their perverted practices, and involving children in any manner whatsoever.
When they get in my face about their "alternative life style," they've lost me. And when they involve children, either by so-called "gay adoption" or by those circumstances whereby some sick individual who's married and has children, then suddenly decides that he or she is "gay," they have earned my undying enmity – not because I "feel threatened," but because I feel so disgusted I want to barf!
To that, I would add (and I am certainly not the first to notice) that the currently popular word "homophobia" is yet another corruption of the English language – a bastardization of two perfectly good Greek roots with well-established meanings in professional literature. "Homo -" means "like oneself," while "- phobia" means "fear of -", and in particular, "illogical or unreasonable fear of -".
Therefore, the term is incorrect on two counts. The emotion which normal people experience when the question of so-called "gay marriage" comes up is certainly not directed toward those like ourselves, and it is most assuredly not fear, either reasonable or unreasonable. Frankly, the emotion is far more likely to be disgust than fear.
I know nothing about Greek except for the etymological roots I learned in school many years ago, but to my knowledge, there is no Greek root for "disgust" in common use. The Greek word "apostrophé" translates as "revulsion," or "a turning away," but I can't come up with a catchy way to use it in a word. Somehow, "homoapostrophia" lacks that certain something that triggers the acceptance of new words.
So, unfortunately, we're probably stuck with "homophobia," not only because it has entered common usage, but because despite its flawed derivation, it is euphonious, and rolls trippingly off the tongue.
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