Quotes on Homophobia

The roots of homophobia are fear. Fear and more fear.

Whatever your issue is, whether it's racism or homophobia or policy issues or taxes or urban decay or health care, you're not going to go anywhere with it if we don't focus on the concentration of power.

Part of the problem is we had so far to go, given the deep homophobia in our society. But, the movement is very real. The movement is very real.

I think as a whole America is dealing with the issue of homophobia. We got to be really honest about whether we believe in civil rights for all people or not. As Black people we need to remember the moment that we say it's okay to disenfranchise one segment of society, we're opening the door to move backward on ourselves.

There are two or three ways to combat homophobia - one is through humor. The second is to put a face on it.

Patriotism threatens free speech with death. It is infuriated by thoughtful hesitation, constructive criticism of our leaders and pleas for peace. It despises people of foreign birth. It has specifically blamed homosexuals, feminists and the American Civil Liberties Union. In other words, the American flag stands for intimidation, censorship, violence, bigotry, sexism, homophobia and shoving the Constitution through a paper shredder. Whom are we calling terrorists here?

This is an industry rife with racism, sexism and homophobia. It is so closely woven into the fabric of the business that we have become snowblind to the glaring injustices happening every day.

The pursuit of otherness, the sense that we are somehow different than our brothers and sisters, no matter where we find them, allows for all the other great evils: racism, sexism, homophobia, violence against gay people and against women.

I hate the word homophobia. It's not a phobia. You are not scared. You are an asshole.

Homophobia hurts our league. Racism hurts it. Sexism hurts it.

A huge part of what animates homophobia among young people is paranoia and fear of their own capacity to be gay themselves.

Whether it's racism, homophobia, misogyny, transphobia, xenophobia, religious intolerance or other bias - we demand to live in a country where we can be safe to be who we are, believe what we want and love whomever we want.

We call for the end of bigotry as we know it. The end of racism as we know it. The end of child abuse in the family as we know it. The end of sexism as we know it. The end of homophobia as we know it. We stand for freedom as we have yet to know it. And we will not be denied.

If you belonged to a political party or a social club that was tied to as much bigotry, misogyny, homophobia, violence, and sheer ignorance as religion is, you'd resign in protest.

Racism and sexism, misogyny and homophobia, they're so visible. They're out in the open. When they're visible, it's a lot easier to deal with them.

We don’t come out of the womb filled with prejudice, racism, and homophobia. Kids are taught to hate, so we have to protect our young people’s minds from those evils.

People who think I'm gay, some part of me thinks it's wonderful. Because I want to challenge people on their homophobia. I love seeing on Twitter when someone says I'm gay, and I say, 'So what does it matter if I am? So be it. I hope you are not voting for me because you are making the presumption that I'm straight.'

We struggled against apartheid because we were being blamed and made to suffer for something we could do nothing about. It is the same with homosexuality. The orientation is a given, not a matter of choice. It would be crazy for someone to choose to be gay, given the homophobia that is present.

Probably, the nature of homophobia will never be widely interrogated, while we will continue to be excluded from school curricula, subjected to vicious media distortions, or entirely ignored, denied basic civil rights while our demands are ridiculed and derided. But in the midst of all this only one thing has changed for certain. We have changed. We will never go back into the closet.

Homophobia and the closet are allies. Like an unhealthy co-dependent relationship they need each other to survive. One plays the victim living in fear and shame while the other plays the persecutor policing what is ‘normal’. The only way to dismantle homophobia is for every gay man and lesbian in the world to come out and live authentic lives. Once they realise how normal we are and see themselves in us….the controversy is over.