Top Ten Myths About the Queer Community-Debunked!

Before we start here, let me just say how fucking stupid it is that people like me still need to explain this shit in the year of our lord 2024. Sadly, though, it seems that as the LGBTQIA+ movement continues to gain more and more ground through things such as Obergefell v. Hodges and the widespread banning of conversion therapy, American conservatives have only doubled down in their fight “against the amoral idea that gay and lesbian couples should have the same standing in law as married men and women,” in the words of Pat Buchanan’s infamous “culture war speech” delivered at the 1992 Republican National Convention.

Of course, nowadays, it’s the transgender community that is bearing the brunt of the far right’s wrath, mainly thanks to the efforts of the so-called trans-exclusionary radical feminist (or TERF) movement (endorsed by disgraced Harry Potter writer J.K. Rowling) and the various hateful social media accounts run by Chaya Raichik under the “Libs of TikTok” brand. Believe me, we’ll be getting into the lies about the trans community specifically in part two of this article.

Before we start, though, I should probably get some disclaimers out of the way. First of all, this is all coming from a tragically heterosexual cisgender white dude, so there’s a chance I may get something wrong. I’ve tried to do my due diligence, but there’s only so much I can get right with a community to which I have little to no personal connection.

Second of all, I tend to use the word “queer” a lot in this article. I am aware of its history as a pejorative. However, I feel that using LGBTQ+ every time would be a bit too cumbersome for my taste. Besides, the term has been gaining popularity as younger non-cishets have been reclaiming it for themselves, so I feel justified in using it here.

For now, though, we’ll focus on myths often applied to the queer community as a whole, and hopefully, I can help arm you with knowledge in service of queer allyship in the face of small-minded bigotry.

One: Gender identity and biological sex are the same.

The simple answer to this statement would be, “No. Sex is a biological reality, but gender is a social construct.” Let me be clear, though. When people say something is a social construct, they aren’t saying it is completely made up and has no effect on the world; they are saying the thing is something that wouldn’t exist in nature without our collective agreement to will it into existence. Other examples besides gender identity include the meaning of words, money, governments, and race.

Think about it: is there a law of nature that states that men have to like the color blue, wear pants, and work to support their families and that women have to like the color pink, wear dresses, and stay at home to raise the kids? Is there a law of nature that says men aren’t supposed to cry and that women are the only ones allowed to be emotional? You see how ridiculous these ideas sound, right?

Of course, as this article from Stanford Medicine Magazine points out, there are essential medically significant differences between the sexes. Women are more likely to develop autoimmune diseases, osteoporosis, depression, and anxiety, whereas men are more susceptible to Parkinson’s and cardiovascular disease. And, to be sure, gender identity also has some effect on health outcomes. For instance, a 2016 study from Canada discovered something interesting about patients with acute coronary syndrome: “Patients with more traditionally feminine traits, such as responsibility for caregiving, were more likely than those with more traditionally masculine traits, such as being the primary income earner for their households, to suffer another coronary episode or die within the following year, regardless of their biological sex.”

There’s just one problem:

“We don’t know how to measure gender,” says [Marcia] Stefanick, director of the Stanford Women and Sex Differences in Medicine, or WSDM (pronounced “wisdom”), Center. “Sex is generally assigned at birth, based on external genitalia, after which a broad range of biological, particularly reproductive, sex differences are assumed. Individuals are then, usually, forced into a binary model of gender — with distinct masculine and feminine categories — when the possibilities are much broader and more expansive.”
-Krista Conger, “Of mice, men, and women: Making research more inclusive,” Stanford Medicine Magazine, May 22, 2017

And for all those rushing to their keyboards to object that, “You can only have XX female or XY male chromosomes. That proves there are only two genders!” Okay, then, explain the numerous cases in which people with XX chromosomes presented with male gonads and people with XY chromosomes possessed ovaries.

The truth is that the science behind biological sex is a lot more complicated than we were taught in middle school science class. You can read this Scientific American article for more information. There, author Simon(e) D. Sun explains the numerous nuances of determining a person’s biological sex, explaining how science demonstrates that sex is not a mere male/female binary but a diverse spectrum that includes so many possible combinations.

Two: Being queer is a choice.

This myth has been the basis of several efforts to “correct” same-sex urges, either through conversion therapy or frontal lobotomies. The science is much more complicated.

You can read this Scientific American article for the full details, but the basic summary is that a combination of biological and environmental factors determines same-sex urges. Author Marcia Malory points out several possible biological determinants, like the so-called “gay gene” (found in region Xq28 of the X chromosome in several homosexual brothers), the finding that neurons in the hypothalamus are packed more tightly in gay men than straight men, and levels of exposure to sex hormones in the womb.

The article also stresses that nurture can have just as significant an effect as nature. For instance, it can be possible to have an “alcoholism gene” or a “warrior gene” yet avoid developing addiction or aggressive tendencies in societies where those types of behavior are not rewarded. Similarly to how people with gay family members learn to be more accepting of alternative lifestyles, “alcoholism runs in families not only because there is a genetic component to alcoholism, but also because children learn how to cope with stress by watching how their parents and their older siblings behave in stressful situations.”

And even if same-sex attraction is a choice, so fucking what? If it neither picks your pocket nor breaks your leg, what business is it of yours to critique what people do in their marriage beds?

Three: It’s just a phase.

I think my explanation for the previous myth can be just as easily applied to this one as well. Even if it’s “just a phase” or “just a choice,” it’s better to simply accept that it’s just the way that person is and not try to inflict any emotional or psychological damage by trying to convince them otherwise.

Still, though, I understand that it can be a shock when a person comes out to you, especially if it’s a child to their parents. It’s natural to wonder if there’s an explanation other than them being queer (“Are they just experimenting? Did something happen to them that’s causing them to act out? Are they mad at me and trying to hurt my feelings?”).

As clinical psychologist Barbara Greenberg explains in this Psychology Today article answering a letter from a distraught mother, however, “gay kids often tell their parents about their sexuality in the middle of a fight because they feel they have nothing left to lose since you are already upset with them.” She goes on to point out that the boy in question has likely known he’s gay for some time and pointedly asks, “If he told you he was heterosexual, would you wonder if it was a phase.” Greenberg concludes that the best thing for any parent to do would be to be there to support their child in a world that often makes it so difficult to live as an out queer person.

Or you could send them to a conversion therapy camp and turn them into a neurotic or suicidal wreck when they find out they can’t change. It’s your call.

Four: Children need a man and a woman as parents.

This myth gained particular prominence in the 2000s as marriage equality for same-sex couples, and the increasing public prominence of more diverse family units became a hot-button issue. Single-parent households also became caught in the crossfire during these debates.

Science, again, disagrees. In an article about the debate over California’s infamous Proposition 8 law, sociologist Timothy Biblarz of the USC College of Letters, Arts, and Sciences argues that “Significant policy decisions have been swayed by the misconception across party lines that children need both a mother and a father. Yet, there is almost no social science research to support this claim. One problem is that proponents of this view routinely ignore research on same-gender parents.”

A study Biblarz did with Judith Stacey of NYU argues that the only aspect of parenting that is affected by the gender of the parent is lactation. Otherwise, as Biblarz notes, “The bottom line is that the science shows that children raised by two same-gender parents do as well on average as children raised by two different-gender parents. This is inconsistent with the widespread claim that children must be raised by a mother and a father to do well.” Stacey concurred, stating, “The family type that is best for children is one that has responsible, committed, stable parenting. Two parents are, on average, better than one, but one really good parent is better than two not-so-good ones. The gender of parents only matters in ways that don’t matter.”

Speaking of not-so-good parents, however…

Five: Parents have a right to know.

Why is it that every time Ron DeSantis smiles, it looks like he’s being forced to do it at gunpoint? (*Douglas R. Clifford/Tampa Bay Times via AP)*

This was a common talking point during the recent discourse surrounding the Florida Parental Rights in Education Bill, better known colloquially as the “Don’t Say Gay law.” Among the several restrictions placed on discussion of LGBTQ+ issues in Florida schools by the bill, signed into law by Governor Ron DeSantis on March 28, 2022, was a provision prohibiting schools from withholding any disclosures made by students to school mental health services from their parents, including students coming out as queer.

Of course, if you’re a “family values” conservative, you probably see nothing wrong with this. The parents are the head of the house and have a right to know. But what if the parents are fundamentalists or evangelical Christians who think same-sex acts are sinful? Don’t you agree that would be putting gay kids in harm’s way, either in the form of conversion therapy, abuse, or being kicked out of the house and rendered homeless?

Even if religion isn’t an issue, homophobia still runs deep in our society, which makes the thought of coming out a challenging prospect for queer youth. Children and teenagers deserve privacy and the space to figure out how they want to handle the eventual revelation of their queerness.

But DeSantis and Republican kinsmen don’t care about that. They just care about giving the loudest and most bigoted parents license to boss everyone else around and sue anyone who objects. And they’re going to make being an LGBTQ+ child in Florida and the rest of red-state America a lot harder as a result.

Six: Queerness is a mental illness.

I could simply point to how the American Psychological Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders officially removed homosexuality from its list of mental disorders in December of 1973 and leave it at that. However, people aren’t likely to be convinced just because an old book says so, so let me elaborate.

As this Psychology Today article points out, methods of “curing” homosexuality in the 50s and 60s often resembled A Clockwork Orange in how gay men were forced to look at pictures of nude men while receiving electric shocks or vomit-inducing drugs. After the Stonewall riots of 1969, however, this led to increasing acceptance of queer people in public life. As such, the APA voted 5,834 to 3,810 to remove homosexuality from the DSM-II in 1973, with the controversial exception of “ego-dystonic sexual orientation,” meaning people whose sexual orientation was at odds with their idealized self-image. Critics decried it as a backdoor way of keeping homophobia in the DSM, which was finally completely removed in 2013. The European Union’s equivalent, the International Classification of Diseases, was slower, only removing homosexuality in 1992.

This isn’t to say that queer people don’t have mental illness. However, this has more to do with the effects of systemic homophobia than they do with actually being gay. Indeed, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration surveyed lesbian, gay, and bisexual communities throughout 2021 and 2022, and the results, as Psychology Today reports, are dire:

-Bisexual females were six times more likely to have attempted suicides in the previous year than their straight peers.

-Bisexual males were three times more likely to be dealing with a serious mental illness in the previous year than their straight peers.

-One in seven lesbian women experienced a major depressive episode in the last year.

-One in three gay males reported a substance use disorder in the past year, while one in four lesbian females also did so.

All of these results are directly the result of bigoted stereotypes about queer people, including some especially dark ones, like…

Seven: Queer people are hypersexual.

This stereotype often kicks in whenever a Pride parade comes to town, along with questions of whether or not kink belongs at Pride. Bisexual and pansexual people are particularly susceptible to this myth, even within the queer community itself, where they are sometimes ridiculed as simply being gays or lesbians who haven’t made up their minds yet.

Many studies have put this perception into question. Surveys of gay men have put the number who are in committed, monogamous relationships at anywhere between 40 and 60%. Lesbians show slightly higher proportions of steady relationships. For those who haven’t gone steady, other studies have shown that “the majority of gay men had similar numbers of unprotected sexual partners annually as straight men and women.”

As for my personal opinion as to whether kink belongs at Pride (for all this very heterosexual writer’s opinion is worth), I think a comment on this Reddit thread puts it best: “If cishets can keep putting naked women on Cosmo magazine covers, then by fuck almighty we can wear leather in a parade.” Pride is ultimately a celebration of the liberation of the queer community from the extremely closeted and private lifestyle they were forced into until the aftermath of the Stonewall riots. Is it any wonder they insist on living their lives as loudly and with as much camp aesthetic as possible?

But of course, if we’re going to talk about the hypersexuality myth, then we also need to talk about its much darker twin…

Eight: Queer people are more likely to be pedophiles.

This argument goes all the way back to Anita Bryant, who kickstarted the modern anti-LGBTQ+ movement back in the late 1970s alongside widely discredited psychologist and Family Research Institute founder Paul Cameron. They claim that gay people molest children at far higher rates than heterosexuals and that same-sex parents are more likely to molest their children.

However, as the Southern Poverty Law Center points out, little scientific research supports this. For instance, UC Davis professor Gregory Herek reviewed several studies and found no evidence that gay men molest at higher rates than heterosexuals. Moreover, as both he and leading child sex abuse researcher A. Nicholas Groth point out, contrary to conservative claims that men who molest boys should be considered homosexual, the hetero- and homosexual labels only apply to people in adult relationships. Even when pedophiles are in adult relationships, they are almost always heterosexual men married to women.

Furthermore, the statistics surrounding pedophilia are the same as any statistics surrounding rape in all its forms: Nine times out of ten, the victim is assaulted by someone they know or someone they are related to. Finally (and this is the most important part), rape is never about sexual attraction; it’s about lording your power over your victim.

Nine: Drag is inherently sexual.

Pictured: the downfall of Western civilization…somehow.

Drag performances are just as widely demonized by contemporary conservative culture warriors as trans people are nowadays. This is especially true in the case of so-called “drag queen story hours,” a public library program started in 2015 by queer activist and historian Michelle Tea, who found library reading programs in her native San Francisco to be “welcoming but heteronormative.” Of course, the more popular DQSH became, the more conservative politicians have tried to crack down on it, claiming that drag is inherently sexual and, therefore, drag queens are (you guessed it) groomers trying to seduce children into the homosexual lifestyle (alongside other ridiculous arguments, like the idea that drag is to femininity what blackface is to black people).

Now, it is true that drag can be sexual, as any art form challenging gender stereotypes can be, but this isn’t always the case. Some, like Canadian drag queen Kendall Gender, have compared it to actors acting in G-rated and R-rated films. You wouldn’t forbid your kids from watching The LEGO Batman Movie just because Will Arnett also voiced Bojack Horseman, would you? Or not let them watch Mrs. Doubtfire or Hook because Robin Williams also starred in Insomnia and One Hour Photo?

Indeed, I defy you to tell me what is so morally objectionable or sexually explicit about Synthia Kiss teaming up with the Metro Vancouver Regional District to raise awareness about plastic waste while dressed as a superhero. Seriously, you could replace Kiss with a cis woman dressed as Wonder Woman, and it wouldn’t be any different.

Ten: Queerness is a recent invention with no historical precedent.

George Catlin's painting/interpretation of Sac and Fox Nation people, which he titled *Dance to the* *Berdache* [*sic*]. George Catlin (1796–1872); Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC

One only needs to look at the Wikipedia page titled “LGBT history” to see how laughably ahistorical this statement is. Practically every culture on Earth has recorded instances of same-sex relationships and gender non-conformity since ancient times. For example, homosexuality was so normalized among the ancient Greeks that Plato argued in his Symposium that homosexuality was synonymous with democracy. Indeed, the standard terms for female homosexuality, “lesbian” and “Sapphic,” derive from the Aegean island of Lesbos and one of its most famous inhabitants, the lyric poet Sappho.

The modern “two-spirit” or “indigiqueer” movement among Indigenous Americans has roots in the respected roles that homosexual, bisexual, and nonbinary people played in pre-Columbian societies (the term that George Catlin used in the painting above, berdache, is widely considered a slur today, as it derives from a French word meaning “boy prostitute”). Several tribes have their own names for their queer members, including heemaneh (Cheyanne), winkte (Lakota), and nadleehi (Navajo).

There has also been an increased focus on the queer history of Weimar Germany in recent years, especially in regards to gay Jewish doctor Magnus Hirschfeld and his Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, founded in Berlin in 1919. Alongside pioneering research in various topics of gender and sexuality, the institute was also the site of the first male-to-female gender confirmation surgery in 1931, performed on Dora Richter. Sadly, the rise of the rabidly homophobic Nazi regime in 1933 would quickly spell the end of Hirschfeld’s dream. The Berlin branch of the German student union raided the institute on May 6th, and the contents of its library were destroyed as part of one of the first mass book burnings four days later. Hirschfeld died in exile in France two years later.

Of course, fascist weirdos would prefer to bury this history and pretend it didn’t happen or, even worse, claim that homosexuals were overrepresented in the Nazi Party. Indeed, the debate has flared up once again at the time I’m writing this, thanks to one Joanne Rowling recently posting a Tweet dismissing the idea that the Nazis burned books on LGBTQ research “because it might have been a fever dream,” and then doubling down by retweeting a thread claiming that trans healthcare was pioneered in Dachau (yes, really).

Until this moment, Ms. Rowling, I think I never really gauged your cruelty or your recklessness. Have you no sense of decency, Joanne? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?

In the end, I think the tweet Rowling was responding to in the first place put it best: “The Nazis burned books on trans healthcare and research. Why are you so desperate to uphold their ideology around gender?”

So that’s part one of this article in the bag! Stay tuned for part two, where I dig into conservative myths about the transgender community, where I’ll prove that trans athletes don’t have an inherent advantage over cis women, that trans people in public restrooms are not a safety threat, that it’s not okay to refer to someone by their birth name after their transition, and many more. So stay tuned for that!