If you’re homophobic, you’re likely hostile, and if you’re hostile, then you’re probably mentally ill. And if you’re mentally ill, well, then no guns for you.
This is how liberals turn a Second Amendment argument into a culture war to deny “unfavorable” classes of people their rights. Watch for it.
How did we get here? A quick recap:
In the debate about access to guns, the argument has centered on two core philosophies: One, there are too many guns (because guns shoot themselves) and they must be removed from society, and two, guns are only destructive when used by people who shouldn’t have them, like those with mental illness.
In ceding that some people shouldn’t have guns, supporters of the Second Amendment have cornered themselves into the position that as a condition of a declaration of mental illness, people can be denied guns.
It seems a fair argument until you get social scientists deciding what mental illness is.
How about homophobia? Isn’t that a mental illness? No, you say?
Well, here’s a thought experiment:
A recent study of 560 Italian university students concluded that immature defense mechanisms and psychoticism in test subjects were “predictive factors regarding levels of homophobia.” On the contrary, if someone has neurotic defense mechanisms or depression, then they probably are not necessarily homophobic.
The authors began the study with the notion that “discrimination toward homosexuals must be condemned and this study has investigated some psychologic aspects that predispose heterosexual subjects to have negative attitudes toward homosexual people.”
So, if you object to actions by gay people, there’s automatically something wrong with you.
The authors say that it may be that you’re conservative or religious.
In listing causes of homophobia, the authors of the study wrote:
“Religion plays a pivotal role in homophobic prejudice, and it should be always considered, because a conservative ideology assuming sexual orientation as a moral value is prevalent among the older generations.”
I’d call that a bias against old and religious people. But I’m not a psychologist.
The authors didn’t sound out the correlation between homophobia and a bunch of other psychological disorders like obsession-compulsion, anxiety, and paranoid ideation that they were looking at (that’s one messed up group of college kids, by the way). I will contend that too many people have these “illnesses” and it would muck up the conclusions of the study.
In any case, grafting the study onto America, let’s see where this is going. After all, “homophobia is conditioned by gender, political orientation, religion, nationality, and age,” the authors note.
People who have conservative ideologies or are religious (especially you old people) are more likely to be homophobic, according to the authors of the study.
People who are psychotic or have “immature defense mechanisms’ (“maladaptive coping mechanisms”) tend to be homophobic, the authors say.
It’s only a small leap in the logic pool to conclude that people who are conservative or religious tend to be psychotic and have immature defense mechanisms.
Coincidentally, people who are conservative also tend to support ALL the Bill of Rights, meaning they support the right of individuals to own guns.
Obviously, there’s a correlation between Second Amendment supporters and homophobia.
However, since we’re not yet ready as a society to classify conservatism or religious beliefs a mental illness (and it’s only a matter of time), what better way to deny those people their guns than to classify homophobia (mostly among the religious and conservative, as the authors say) as a mental illness?
Don’t worry about whether anti-gay individuals would be driven by their mental illnesses to lash out at a gay pride meeting. It’s enough of a worry to classify them as unfit to own their guns, you know, just in case.
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