How has LGBTQ+ contributed to culture?
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It is quite challenging to criticize the LGBTQ+ movement, even when doing so with the best of intentions, as those who do are nearly always vilified and branded as “intolorent." Yet new voices are emerging that strongly suggest that the movement, now well over 50 years old, is changing mainstream culture in nagative ways. The allegation is that the movement that has fought so hard against intolerance and bigotry, has become itself bigoted and intolerant.
A long Painful History of Intolerance.
Since the late 1960s, the LGBTQ+ movement has been been vocally promoting equal rights and responsibilities within American society. Like with racial and religious diversity, the United States has made significant strides in accepting sexual variety. Gay marriage is legal in every state in the US as of June 2015, and, at least in Western European countries, approval has been practically universal.
Equally wide spread is the acceptance that those who do not hold to traditional views of sexuality and gender are good people. A plethora of laws and organizations have carefully helped our modern society understand the dangers of intolerance. Although there is still those who disagree with the LBGTQ+ movement, they are increasingly in the minority.
These wins have certainly come at a height price.
The American society transitioned from being gender and sexually conservative to becoming open-minded in both areas. The transition was the result of a fierce battle against intolerance. One would anticipate that such a movement’s lasting contribution would be its widespread promotion of tolerance for people who disagree with cultural standards. But, as gender and sexual diversity grow more prevalent, those who represent that diversity are undoubtedly promoting intolerance toward all who disagree with them.
Some parameters used to analyze culture.
Social scientists talk about three criteria in evaluating a society. The first is what is valued, the second is what is accepted as normal, and finally what a society does to those that are transgressors of its accepted values system. The first criteria studies such things as belief systems, values, and concepts of good and evil. The second criteria looks at such things social behaviors and mannerisms. The last set of parameters consideres how a social group treats its outcasts.
The first two categories are easy to fill in with regardes to most LBGTQ+ people. Here too is a diversity of belief systems, such as religions, and values that range within the normal, such as work ethics, self esteem, etc. It may be tiresome to over state the obvious, but a highly regarded value within the LBGTQ+ movement is tolerance. It is in the third category, the one which deals with how a culture deals with its opponents, that unfortunately shows a propensity toward intolerence.
Mainstream culture can be understood as that which is considered normal for most of the population and is represented largely through its media. That western society has adopted the LGBTQ+ movement and that norms of gender and sexualty are rapidly changing in favor of the movement seem to be obvious. Equally obvious, is our culture’s increased intolerance to those, who for whatever reason, disagree with the new social norms.
Journalism and the LGBTQ+ movement
The LGBTQ+ movement has become so culturaly accepted, it is socially abominable to report anything negative regarding the LGBTQ+ community. Type in to google “LGBTQ+ discriminates against tradionalist” and google only presents sites that show discrimination against LGBTQ+. Resverse that and punch in “Traditionalist discriminates against LGBTQ+” and you get endless pages. Even within the google search engine, gender and sexaul identity groups can do not wrong.
As a consumer of mass media I wonder: there are no bad LGBTQ+ people? Are there no egoistic gay men? No rotten greedy lesbians? Every organization that supports the movement has never cheated nor lied? The LGBTQ+ movement has been accepted to such an extent, that to even verbalize any criticism, even with the intent to help, has been deemed unacceptable. Why do companies, like google, and news outlets simply refuse to post anything negative about the movement? Because it simply is not tolerated. The movement that most fought against those who were not tolerant to social change are now showing no tolerance to those who do not accept the new social order.
To demonstrate the embrace of diversity in our culture, LGBTQ+ characters have progressively appeared in the majority of films and television shows. The producers of these programs are riding the tide of societal acceptance that the movement has so valiantly battled for. They are not only doing it as virtue signaling; they are driven by the financial benefit they get from the new social status LGBTQ+ has achieved. Or is it just a coincidence that LGBTQ+ characters never play the villains?
In 2019, GLAAD, an organization dedicated to LGBTQ advocacy in media and culture, released its Accelerating Acceptance Index showing that “most young americans felt “uncomfortable” with the LGBTQ+ movement. In 2022, the same report shows that one in every four gay men feel they are uncomfortable living in america. That people have suffered wrongly and unjustly been forced to live in fear is truly a horrible reality.
Yet, as a journalist, I am concerned at the overwhelming glitter this movement gets and the biased treatment it has amoung the press. A priest yells from the pulpit: “gays go to hell” is branded as unacceptable. A gay man yells back at the preist “go to hell”, well, that’s noble. Parents who want thier children to decide which gender they identify with, are heros. Parents who believe their children should stick with the gender they got when entering the planet, well that kind of parenting should not be tolerated.
A Culture of Intolerance
The movement has contributed to many people being free to express their lives as they feel appropriate. There is value in that. And it is a valid contribution that the LGBTQ+ movement has made to our western culture. And the cost that the movement has paid for these gains is truly very high. But now that LBGTQ+ has a normality to it, there seems to be a responsibility not to repeat what was so unjustly cast upon itself. Yet regrettably, what seems to be gifted by the LGBTQ+ movement is a heritage of intolerance.
Has one tyrant replaced another?
