The True Origins of Anti-Gay Sentiment

It is misleading to believe that anti-gay sentiment occurs because gays are merely "different". That is mostly untrue.

We all know that, in Judeo-Christian beliefs, acts of homosexuality are sinful. But the question is why?. The answer is quite simple. Gays can't have babies.

In Judaism, the oldest of the Judeo-Christian faiths, it is the duty of every Jewish person to marry a Jew and have little Jewish babies. At the time when Judaism was a small religion, with few followers, this measure was necessary to increase their numbers. Well, as we all know, you can't make babies between two men or two women. Even if you were gay, you had to suck it up and suppress your urges.

Logical isn't it?

The Torah (the old testament of the bible for Christians) explicitly forbids homosexual relations between two men (lesbianism is implied), but it says nothing about being homosexual. Then, one may ask, why is it that being gay is considered a sin in itself?

With the rise of Christianity and the New Testament, interpretations of both old and new texts began to take a turn toward homosexuality itself, rather than just acts of homosexuality, being a sin. Why this is, one can only guess, but this obviously turned the tide toward anti-gay sentiment and eventually, utter homophobia by followers of Christianity and Judaism. Islam also seemed to inherit this belief.

This evolved into the complete hatred of homosexuality by the middle ages, where gays were sentenced to death for committing "abomination". Gays were discriminated agaisnt in Christian Europe on a level higher than that of Muslims or Jews. This trend continued its way up, found its way into the Americas upon their colonization. Anti-Gay Sentiment and Homophobia persisted until the mid 20th century. Only today is it widely accepted, although there is still much of it around.

So basically, all the discrimination that Gays faced all began with their not being able to reproduce. Although homosexuality itself was not considered a sin until the rise of Christianity, it was highly discouraged and it was forbidden for homosexuals to act on their desires. Christians and Muslims extended the interpretations of religious texts to include homosexuality itself as a sin, and Anti-Gay sentiment and homophobia increased significantly, remaining in the minds of most of the world until the mid 20th century.

So, the next time somebody tells you that people don't like Gays because they're "different", you can says "You're WRONG!" and explain to them the truth behind the hatred.