Homophobia In Publishing: Why It Matters
If you follow the YA blogosphere, you’re almost certainly aware of the recent controversy over the upcoming Wicked Pretty Things anthology. (And is it just me, or is the YA world moving from controversy to controversy at the moment?) For those who were fortunate enough to miss the whole thing, it all went down on author Jessica Verday’s blog after the anthology’s editor asked her to change her story from a gay romance to a more acceptably heterosexual one. Needless to say, the internets were not happy.
By sheer coincidence, something similar happened in the world of adult fantasy around the same time. Brandon Sanderson, who you may know as the guy who was chosen to write the last few Wheel of Time books, became embroiled in a massive Reddit debate over a post he wrote on Dumbledore and homosexuality. His blog is down as of this writing (never mind, it’s back up), but you can find the whole Reddit discussion here.
So. Two internet controversies surrounding homophobia in publishing, one involving an editor and one involving an author. I’d like to split those into separate topics. The former is about how we as budding writers respond to editors and other authoritative figures in the publishing industry, while the latter is about how readers respond to authors whose beliefs or opinions they strongly disagree with. I probably don’t need to point out that this is a touchy subject for a lot of people, but I think it’s worth discussing all the same. Your thoughts on either topic are appreciated, as always!
Homophobia and the Industry: Why does it matter?
First of all, let’s take care of a very common complaint: when I say ‘homophobia’, I do not mean a literal fear or phobia of gay people. Pointing out that you do not run screaming at the sight of two men or two women kissing is not a convenient way to sidestep responsibility. If it helps, replace every instance of the word ‘homophobia’ you come across with ‘prejudice’, because it’s what people usually mean anyway.
With that out of the way…why does it matter that Trisha Telep asked Jessica Verday to change her story?
I’ll explain with an anecdote. (Don’t worry, it’s short.) In 2009, an Irish popstar named Stephen Gately died suddenly. It was all over the news, as these things are wont to be. What I found interesting is that he had been working on a children’s book called The Tree of Seasons just before he died; predictably, it was rushed to publication and given a fairly large marketing push to capitalize on all the media buzz surrounding his death. (I realise that sounds cynical, but let’s be realistic here.)
I was in Hodges Figgis, the largest bookshop in Dublin, a few days after his book was released. It was face-out in the most visible shelves in the YA/children’s section of the story, with his name prominent printed across the top of the cover. I was browsing through the latest crop of Twilight knock-offs (this was before I stopped trying to like paranormal romance) when a woman nearby asked one of the staff members behind the counter if they could help her find ‘an appropriate book’ for her 12-year old daughter. The ensuing conversation went something like this:
Hodges Figgis Lady: Well, the children’s section is over there, and the books are sorted by age group, so…
Ignorant Woman: *looking sideways at The Tree of Seasons and grinning conspirationally.* I assume Stephen Gately’s book isn’t age appropriate!
Hodges Figgis Lady: Uh…well, it’s-
Ignorant Woman: *self-congratulatory laughter*
See, Stephen Gately was gay (twist ending), so of course his children’s book, which was bought by a mainstream publisher and sold in mainstream bookshops, must have been full of gay sex and orgies and God knows what else.
You know, because he was gay.
This was Trisha Telep’s initial explanation for why she asked Jessica Verday to change her story:
Oh dear. Might as well give you my two cents. Not that it really matters but… Don’t take it out on the publishers, the decision was mine totally. These teen anthologies I do are light on the sex and light on the language. I assumed they’d be light on alternative sexuality, as well. Turns out I was wrong! Just after I had the kerfuffle with jessica, I was told that the publishers would have loved the story to appear in the book! Oh dear. My rashness will be the death of me. It’s a great story. Hope jessica publishes it online. (By the way: if you want to see a you tube video of me wrestling a gay man in Glasgow, and losing, please let me know).
A lot of people latched on to the fact that she used the phrase ‘alternative sexuality’, which is only one step up from the dreaded ‘alternative lifestyle’. (The bizarre ‘wrestling a gay man in Glasgow’ comment also got a lot of attention.) I have a bigger problem with the fact that she apparently equates an almost-chaste gay romance story with one featuring a lot of swearing and sex. The idea that homosexuality is an ‘explicit’ topic in itself, regardless of how much sexual content might be involved, is very common and very damaging. It plays into the common stereotype of gay people being sex-obsessed and permiscuous, an image that mainstream media is disturbingly willing to accept without question.
We need more YA with gay characters. Gay teenagers need to see themselves represented properly in literature written for their age group; they need to see that, contrary to what a lot of people in their lives might be telling them, they are not morally degenerate or sinful or a deviation from the norm.
Agents and editors are constantly telling us that they’re ‘looking for’ manuscript that buck the heteronormative trend, yet gay teenagers are still severely underepresented on mainstream YA shelves. (Note that I’m talking about mainstream YA here, not the ‘issues novel’ ghetto where most of these novels go to die.) I know for a fact that these books are being written by unpublished writers – just look at the likes of Absolute Write for evidence of that – so why aren’t they making it to the shelves?
To be honest, I suspect it’s because a lot of them never get further than their author’s hard drives. If you publish a YA book with gay characters, you are probably going to get some flak for it. People will inevitably wonder if it means that you’re gay. (And if you are gay, publishing will carry with it the added stress of implicitly coming out to your family and friends…along with your entire audience. Fun times.) And, just maybe, an editor will ask you to change the story you’ve been working on for months or years so that it will be more ‘acceptable’ to some publishing house. What do you do in a situation like that – hold on to your integrity and remain unpublished, or sell out and get that contract you’ve been dreaming of for the last ten years?
Maybe you’d be better off just writing a ‘straight’ book like everybody else.
Homophobia and your favourite authors: why does it matter?
Have you ever finished a book and immediately Googled the author? I did it after finishing Ender’s Game, which I loved, and was extremely dissappointed when I uncovered this. It turns out Orson Scott Card has some…strong views on homosexuality, let’s say. I shrugged it off (yes, really) and went on reading the Ender books, convinced that an author’s personal views shouldn’t affect how a person approaches their writing.
I’ve changed my mind since then. Maybe it’s because I’m a bit more self-aware now, but I can’t look at an Orson Scott Card book without immediately thinking of the incredible bigotry he’s displayed in the past. I can’t help but remind myself that he’s been an active participant in one of the largest anti-gay organisations in America.
It doesn’t particularly matter that most of his books don’t address homosexuality at all (I’ve heard that at least one does, although at this point I don’t care enough to see what it’s like). I would rather give my money to an author who doesn’t advocate overthrowing the government as a favourable alternative to letting me get married someday.
Brandon Sanderson, like Orson Scott Card, is a well-known genre writer, a member of the LDS Church, and somebody who believes that gay relationships are inherently wrong. He says as much in the Reddit thread I linked to above:
If it helps, I’m trying very hard not to be hateful. It’s not an easy topic to deal with, however.
I believe that engaging in homosexual acts is sinful. So there is that, which may pretty much mean the issue is dead in the water, without any handshakes to be had. But, of course, it’s also sinful to be prideful, respond to someone in anger, and be greedy–all things I’m pretty much guilt of myself. So it’s not my job to point at you and say “SINNER!” Jesus is pretty clear on that fact. But if someone asks me if something is/isn’t a sin, I have to answer to the best of my knowledge.
Note, also, that I (and many I know) have a different way of looking at that word “sin.” Much like the words “sexist” or “racist” it has come to be loaded with a whole ton of meaning that almost makes it impossible to use in conversation. When I say sin, I mean one thing only: It impedes spiritual growth. And it’s not my job to do an assessment of your personal spiritual growth or goals.
As for the gay marriage issue, I have altered my stance as I posted elsewhere in the thread. One large part of the church’s worry about gay marriage (perhaps even the primary part of it) is a worry that without action, the state will be able to declare whom the church can or cannot marry, as marriage is the central religious ordinance in the church. This is as scary to us as the lack of gay marriage is to you, and I do wonder if maybe our knee-jerk reaction was hasty.” (Source)
‘Dead in the water’ is probably a good way of putting it; if you tell me that ‘engaging in homosexual acts’ is wrong (I’m going to assume that precludes the kind of intimate relationships that straight people are allowed to have), we’re done. I can get on board with somebody who’s a bit politically hesitant about gay marriage, mostly because there’s an awful lot of misinformation on the subject. I can accept that some people are just uncomfortable with the whole area of same-sex relationships. But if you tell me that you think a gay person should never have a loving, intimate and sexual relationship…well, don’t expect me to just overlook that. I can’t.
And to be frank, it’s insane that people would expect it. I said to fellow Interrobang Phoebe that reading Sanderson’s rhetoric – supposedly inoffensive, hesitant, all in the spirit of ‘finding common ground’ – is akin to being beaten over the head with a wooden stick by somebody who insists they’re only holding a piece of styrofoam. I cannot think of any other area where it is considered acceptable to expect that people will be polite and understanding towards you after you’ve expressed this kind of prejudice against them. Need I remind anybody that most states in America have passed constitutional amendaments for the express purpose of preventing gay marriage? Or that gay couples still cannot legally adopt in the majority of the USA and Europe? People like Brandon Sanderson, comfortably within the bounds of the majority, can afford to treat this as nothing more than a polite difference of opinion. Not everybody is so priveleged.
So – will I buy a Brandon Sanderson book in the future? I honestly don’t know. It helps that I’m not particularly fond of his writing to begin with (and I can’t stand the Wheel of Time series), but if he wrote something that piqued my interest in the future? I might think about it. He’s no Orson Scott Card, that’s for sure – I get the impression from his comments on the Reddit thread that he realises that his religion is wrong on this one, but can’t admit as much to himself without the whole thing unraveling on him. (I shouldn’t need to point out that I don’t see this as much of an excuse.) But to me, it matters what an author believes. We elevate writers to positions of cultural authority by supporting their work, and I believe that this does give them a kind of power in any society that values artistic ability. Why give that power to somebody who might turn it against you?
25 comments
Good post, Sean.
I understand Sanderson’s point about having to say something is wrong if he believes it’s wrong. After all, if you believe in hell, and you believe someone you care about is going to hell, then logically you should do all in your power to stop them.
However, if you take gay marriage out of Sanderson’s comments and replace interracial marriage, then you can easily see how flawed his argument is. After all, similar arguments were used.
That’s exactly my point. Prejudice against interracial couples is (mostly) no longer seen as legitimate, yet prejudice against gay couples very much still is. I suspect it’s only a matter of time until that changes.
(And I would argue that the idea of gay people going to hell simply for engaging in a relationship should be a clear argument against the logic of hell rather than against gay relationships. But I’m a godless atheist, so I guess it’s easy for me to say that.)
I agree with you again. If God told me homosexuality was wrong, I would probably choose not to believe in God. (Well, since God would have to make an appearance to tell me this, I’d have to settle for ignoring him/her/it.)
Great post Sean. Telep’s flippant so-called apology brought up more questions than it answered. The fact that her ‘old fashioned idea of romance’ was exclusively heterosexual and the assumption that anything deviating from that default mode was bound to be explicit is really sad but not unsurprising. You just know that she never would have had the guts to whitewash the story if the romantic couple at the centre of it was black for fear of ‘alternative races.’
LGBTQ community is still seen as the acceptable group to mock by a lot of people. Look at that stupid Vince Vaughn movie The Dilemma. The trailer had a stupid, moronic so-called joke where Vaughn said “electric cars are gay.” To mean that electric cars are lame and worthy of our mockery. Him and Ron Howard spewed this half arsed excuse about freedom of speech in comedy and stuff that was BS but I bet you he never would have used his free speech to say electric cars were Muslim or black. No way.
The Stephen Gately post death reporting was so tragic. This vile Daily Mail columnist called Jan Moir wrote a piece on how his death, along with the suicide of another gay man (Matt Lucas’s ex partner) were proof of the toxic gay lifestyle or something like that. I can’t remember the exact wording, I refuse to give that website anymore page views.
I will just never give my money to Trisha Telep, just like I refuse to pay money for Orson Scott Card’s work. It’s an easy decision for me to make. Dumbledore wouldn’t stand for Sanderson’s shit!
(apologies for very long reply!)
No problem, we like long replies!
I wasn’t aware of a lot of the…unsavoury (let’s say) reporting around Gateley’s death at the time it happened, so finding it all after the fact was a bit horrifying. But it’s the kind of thing that always happens in these situations – the single member of a minority group comes to stand for the entire group, and is then vilified. (Which didn’t even make any sense in this case, but people seemed to want to rush to find a darker side to his death. Because he was gay, of course.)
I think Telep’s ‘old fashioned romance’ comment was probably a partial admission to something she didn’t want to own up to completely. Which is understandable, given the huge wave of criticism she’s now facing, but I’d almost respect her more if she actually told us exactly what she thinks rather than making half-hearted apologies. (Of course, I’d respect more again if she made a real apology, and demonstrated some understanding of exactly why people are so angry, but I’m not holding my breath for that.)
Thanks for commenting!
You know, when people in my life express these sorts of prejudices about gay marriage, I often say ‘Hang on, replace the word ‘gay’ with the word ‘black’ or ‘Chinese’ or ‘Jewish’ in your mind and see if you can still say it without feeling a bit sick’. And sometimes people flinch back and say, ‘Huh, I see what you mean’.
But sometimes I get this response: ‘Yeah, but people can’t help being black/Chinese/Jewish!’.
Putting aside the insanity of the ‘lifestyle choice’ crap, this betrays a really worrying attitude on the part of a lot of straight white guys. Which is that, given the choice, of COURSE everyone would want to be *just like them*. Right? If a black guy could help being black, he’d obviously make the right choice and turn white, yeah? If that poor, sad individual who was unfortunate enough to be born Chinese had any choice in the matter he’d become a white American stat! These poor guys can’t help it, so it’s okay for them to be different. But really, of course, deep down, they all WANT to be *just like us*, yeah?
This is the dangerous, dangerous place that privileged people live in. Where deep down they believe that being them is normal, being them is best, being them is first choice, and everything else is rather tragic and pitiable. And that’s why they turn around to gay people and say, to their faces, that the love they feel for their significant others is somehow sinful. And this is why they then get hurt feelings when a gay person responds with justified anger and annoyance and says ‘Screw you for telling me who I am is wrong’.
Because in their world, YOU ARE NOT PLAYING THE GAME. You’re not admitting that you really want to be like them, that your feelings are sad and pitiable, that deep down you WANT to be *just like them*. Because the world was made for them. Didn’t you know that? It belongs to them, and you’re only here on sufferance. You ought to be thanking them for every right you have. Asking for anymore is ungrateful. And this is such an incontrovertible fact of their own internal identity that it simply doesn’t compute when people say, ‘No, actually, I like who I am and I’m not going to be filled with self-loathing and doubt just because you don’t’. It literally threatens to topple their entire sense of self.
And that is why people like Brandon Sanderson piss me the Hell off. Because for all his ‘I’m still learning’ stuff, in his heart of hearts he already has one belief which will never be touched, which is that what he is? Is the default. The superior, the perfect setting for a human being. Straight and white. And all of you freaks and weirdos with your ‘alternative’ lifestyles and religions and skin colours need to – politely! Remember your place! – attempt to convince him that you have the right to share his nice, straight, white planet’s air.
Before reading his post, I had actually bought one Sanderson book.
I won’t ever buy another.
Because the world was made for them. Didn’t you know that?
This is normativity in a nutshell. White, heterosexual, male etc. is the default, and if you don’t fit into those categories you have to politely request that you be allowed to live in any way that makes them uncomfortable. This is, I think, why coming out is still so fraught for a lot of people; as soon as you make it known that you’re gay, you put yourself out of phase with the normative society. Being in that state can be nerve-wracking even at the best of times, but it gets much worse when there’s an organised political/religious movement trying to keep you from being considered an equal citizen under the law.
(Of course, gay people do have one advantage in that we can usually masquerade as “normal”. Obviously non-white people or women can’t do that.)
I can understand not financially supporting authors like Orson Scott Card (I stopped buying his books after I learned about his bigotry), but what about just reading them in general? I borrow most of the books I read from friends. Do you feel that is still supporting the author?
I’m not sure how everyone else feels on this matter but for me, I am not able in any manner to read an OSC book, or a book written by someone with extremely public bigoted views or a history of such actions/behaviour (e.g. the films of Roman Polanski) because my opinion of the book/movies/etc will always be spoiled by my knowledge of the author. Sometimes I can separate author and work and other times I can’t. With OSC it’s impossible for me. But I’m pretty sure most people are less rabid about this than me! XD
Zeggy, that I’m less certain about. As I said in the post, I feel that ‘supporting’ an author – recommending their work, discussing it, giving it cultural significance – does inevitably hand them a certain amount of power in our society. So in that sense, yes, I feel that what you described is supporting the author.
However, I’m not for a second suggesting that we should just consign any work of literature to oblivion solely because of its author’s views (that would instantly decimate the English literary canon, after all!). A work of literature by somebody who holds abhorrent views can still be incredibly important, and can still deserve to be studied and talked about.
Of course, I wouldn’t say that that’s true of Sanderson’s work. It is (in my opinion at least) pretty forgettable, standard-issue fantasy. This post on John C. Wright (look him up) summarizes it fairly well, I think: http://yuki-onna.livejournal.com/514713.html
Basically, I am willing to overlook prejudice for truly great works of art. I am not willing to overlook it for mediocre fantasy novels.
When it comes to authors and their insanity, I have a fairly simple rule, which is that I don’t care what they (or any creative type) does/says/believes unless those actions directly contradict messages or themes in their work. So for example, I don’t recoil in horror at the idea of watching a Roman Polanksi movie, since his films don’t include anti statutory rape messages.
Orson Scott Card is another matter, though. His books frequently deal with themes of conflict between disparate groups of people (or aliens, or whatever) and the message is always the same: make peace not war, don’t generalize groups, the similarities are more important than the differences, all that jazz. Reading his books (or at least, his earlier ones) would give you the impression that he’s an open-minded, understanding guy. But it’s clear that that’s not the case in reality and as such, I feel like he’s lying in his books.
^ Just want to point out, Celidh’s reply went up as I was writing mine, so the Roman Polanksi bit wasn’t a jab at you or anything XD
I’d heard about Telep, but thanks for telling me about Sanderson. I’d never read anything of his, but one was on my recommendations list.
I think the saddest part of that whole speech was his “I’m trying to learn and make peace with everyone” attitude. Because he’s not – he’s decided that I am a sinner and that my love is unworthy in the eyes of his god. Nothing I say is going to change his mind. He pays lip service to the idea of me as his equal, “it’s okay if you disagree with me”, but denies me equal rights. How nice of him to give me permission to disagree with him on whether or not he is hurting me.
I mean, I find the “God Hates Fags” folks despicable. But at least they’re honest about their beliefs. Sanderson and his ilk have the same premise, that homosexuality is unnatural and against their god’s plan, and dress it up in concern-trolling about how it’s not their place to judge me. Like they’re actually nice people who are kind to puppies or whatever. Hate is hate.
I think the saddest part of that whole speech was his “I’m trying to learn and make peace with everyone” attitude. Because he’s not – he’s decided that I am a sinner and that my love is unworthy in the eyes of his god. Nothing I say is going to change his mind. He pays lip service to the idea of me as his equal, “it’s okay if you disagree with me”, but denies me equal rights. How nice of him to give me permission to disagree with him on whether or not he is hurting me.
Yes, and how nice of him to police the tone of those responding, as well.
That’s really what gets to me about this. That Sanderson is saying something really inherently hateful, even if he’s saying it while grinning through clenched teeth. And then insisting that the other side be nice back.
It’s a classic tone argument, but what kills me is that Sanderson is in a privileged position where the outcome in his participation in the institutionalized homophobia doesn’t actually cost him anything–he can afford to be nice and quiet and thoughtful about it, because his rights aren’t being infringed upon even as he’s being fundamentally hateful.
Which just makes me go “Argh!”
That’s it exactly – the tone argument coupled with the “high road” of his tone is nice, why isn’t yours? He can afford to be nice – he has all of society backing him up. No one is threatening to take away (or never give at all) his rights to marriage and children and job security. No one is threatening to deny his right to hold his partner’s hand as they die, or live in the marital home afterward, or keep custody of their children. No one is threatening him with anything. It’s easy to stay calm when you’re not threatened, not so much when you’re under attack. You can’t compare the two situations at all.
From that website Sean linked to:
“Fuckmuppet” is my new favourite word.
This is only tangentially related, but a similar controversy is happening in the gaming world with the game dragon age 2 including homosexual characters. This guy: http://social.bioware.com/forum/1/topic/304/index/6661775&lf=8
has a similar opinion to Sanderson, Even using the same rhetoric of politeness to justify his opinion saying:
“Despite my opinions I fully respect the opinions of those who disagree with me so please let’s agree to disagree in a respectful manner and not let this descend into personal attacks. I respectfully request that the moderators simply remove the trouble makers and trolls who make inflammatory comments rather than locking the entire thread because that’s what the trolls want. Thank you”
Closely followed by:
“I’m not here to debate the moralities of homosexuality, I personally find it to be digusting but others will feel different, that isn’t the point of this thread.”
Which I frankly find disgraceful (not just his opinion but his expression of it in a manner that precludes anyone replying to him with their opinions)
The interesting part of this conflict is that a petition has started in support of the game writer (who defending his decision to include gay characters) and and a counter-petition requesting he be fired for stereotying the gay characters he did include.
Sorry for the long post – I just thought it was interesting that parallel arguments are going on in different media
I love that Bioware debate because of David Gaider’s response!
“The romances in the game are not for “the straight male gamer”. They’re for everyone. We have a lot of fans, many of whom are neither straight nor male, and they deserve no less attention. We have good numbers, after all, on the number of people who actually used similar sorts of content in DAO and thus don’t need to resort to anecdotal evidence to support our idea that their numbers are not insignificant… and that’s ignoring the idea that they don’t have just as much right to play the kind of game they wish as anyone else. The “rights” of anyone with regards to a game are murky at best, but anyone who takes that stance must apply it equally to both the minority as well as the majority. The majority has no inherent “right” to get more options than anyone else…
…And if there is any doubt why such an opinion might be met with hostility, it has to do with privilege. You can write it off as “political correctness” if you wish, but the truth is that privilege always lies with the majority. They’re so used to being catered to that they see the lack of catering as an imbalance. They don’t see anything wrong with having things set up to suit them, what’s everyone’s fuss all about? That’s the way it should be, any everyone else should be used to not getting what they want…
…And the person who says that the only way to please them is to restrict options for others is, if you ask me, the one who deserves it least. And that’s my opinion, expressed as politely as possible.”
Yeah, I heard about that as well. I think Bioware should be commended for including gay/bi characters in games, which is still (weirdly) rare these days. I’m not really surprised that somebody got affronted by it, though, since the gaming community isn’t exactly progressive when it comes to things like this
I’m not sure what the deal is with the ‘stereotyping’ petition. From what I’ve heard, it sounds like they think one of the game mechanics (the relationship ‘like/dislike’ system) makes some of the gay characters act stereotypically if you reject them – if that’s all they’re basing it on, I think like they’re overreacting.
Sylvia, I also love the moderators response! The perfect way to deflate a pretentious blowhard
Great post. I, for one, won’t touch an author’s work if I think they’re an ass. Jonathan Franzen, James Frey, Nicholas Sparks… I don’t know that any of these men has publicly expressed any qualms with homosexuality but I feel there’s enough evidence to support the idea that they’re all full of themselves. I don’t care how brilliant a writer they allegedly are (I’ve heard Franzen described this way ad nauseam, less so about Sparks). If they’re an ass, I won’t touch them.
And I certainly won’t touch authors like Card or Sanderson. Card is obviously the more virulent of the haters. I think Sanderson’s hatred is tempered only by his fear that speaking out too loudly could hurt his career (a sort of reverse glass closet). Like when Stephen King called out Stephenie Meyers for being a bad writer, there’s a certain amount of clout you get when you’re monstrously successful: you can say whatever you want with little to no ill effects. Card may have achieved that; Sanderson hasn’t….yet.
As much as I’d like to give Sanderson the benefit of the doubt that he’s “struggling” with his thoughts, experience has taught me that only ends badly.
Anway, great post.
My own feelings echo many of the respondents, so just let me add my own thanks for a great post and the thoughtful discussion it’s inspired.
If a person is offended by someone calling him or her a sinner from the perspective of a Mormon (or any Christian), he or she might want to remember that according to Christianity, everyone is a sinner. So that means everyone is going to hell excepting forgiveness, not just for example gay people.
I think it’s often a source of confusion between Christians and non-Christians, because it seems to a non-Christian that being called a hell-bound sinner is a personal judgment and attack.
It is a personal attack if a certain group of people are reminded of their ‘fallen’ nature far more frequently than others. Yes, technically adultery and homosexuality are just as bad in theological terms, but it’s obvious which one is viewed as a bigger problem by a lot of Christians today.
(Of course, there’s also the issue of homosexuality being placed on the same moral scale as adultery in the first place, but that’s another issue entirely.)
As a Christian (well, a Catholic, which I think counts even if other Christians keep trying to tell me different), here’s my response:
The difference here is that people are supposed to struggle against sin. We’re supposed to be aware of our failings and try to rid ourselves of them, and that only truly regretting our sins can get us forgiven for them. Homosexuality is not the same as, say, adultery. It’s something people are born with, and it’s NOT something that needs to be eliminated or regretted. Homosexual people are sinners like the rest of us, yes, but not for their homosexuality. And if it weren’t for that, would anyone be going up to them and calling them sinners to their faces? (Well, yes, but a lot fewer, and it’d be a lot less hurtful.)
So, no, this isn’t simply a matter of confusion between Christians and non-Christians. It’s a matter of the nature of the “sin”. People do not take well to being told that some part of their nature which doesn’t actually hurt anyone else is a sin, and I don’t think they should.
Thanks for this response, Breda. It’s really enlightening.