Why Do You Hate Them? - A Three-Part Exposé on Anti-LGBTQIA+ Politics, Faith, and Culture
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Most people don’t say it out loud.
They say they’re “just concerned.”
That it’s about safety. Morality. God.
But concern doesn’t ban books.
It doesn’t get kids kicked out of their homes.
It doesn’t fuel laws that punish people for existing.
So let’s ask the real question —
Where did this fear come from?
Who taught it?
And what does it cost to keep believing it?
🏺Before Power Had a Name: The Invention of Order
How survival became control — and difference became danger.
Long before laws or sermons drew the lines,
civilization was already carving roles into stone.
At first, it was about survival,
who could bear children, grow food, build shelter, win wars.
But power soon redefined survival as something else:
bloodlines, obedience, predictability.
So they built a world where power flowed upward,
and everyone else was sorted beneath it.
Women were defined by what they could give.
Queerness, unspoken — because it defied primal roles.
And the poor, by how quietly they served.
Your worth depended on the role you were born into:
King or commoner.
Healer or slave.
Husband, wife, or no place at all.
They decided who could have money.
Who could marry.
Who could speak.
Who could eat.
And anyone who didn’t fit the plan,
who disrupted the order,
was pushed aside, punished, erased.
Not because they were wrong.
But because they were free.
Not just rebellion or “freedom” itself,
but the fear of unraveling.
Fear that if people live unscripted,
the system collapses.
Fear of chaos, of disorder,
of losing the illusion of control
that power depends on.
🏛️ It Was Never About Protection: Politics, Power, and the Profit of Hate
Somewhere along the way, it stopped being about people —
and started being about platforms.
Votes.
Fear.
Control.
Because for generations, LGBTQIA+ people weren’t just misunderstood.
They were useful.
Useful to demonize.
Useful to distract.
Useful to turn into monsters so that others could pose as saviors.
But if you peel back the slogans…
If you silence the noise and just look —
you’ll see: this was never about protecting anyone.
It was about manipulating fear into loyalty.
🔍 A Very Selective Morality
In the last decade alone, politicians across the U.S. have openly labeled queer and trans people as:
• “Groomers”
• “Predators”
• “A threat to children”
They’ve claimed that LGBTQIA+ existence is a danger.
Their identities: contagious.
Their rights: optional.
Donald Trump himself has vowed to “eliminate transgenderism from public life,” implying that people are policies — and that erasure is not only possible, but noble.
He is not alone.
State legislatures have echoed the same cruelty:
• Books banned.
• Pronouns outlawed.
• Bathroom bills.
• Doctors criminalized for offering care.
• Drag shows framed as crimes while mass shootings go unchecked.
And always — always — it is painted as protection.
But who, exactly, is being protected?
Because the data says something else entirely.
📊 The Math of Reality
If this is about safety — let’s talk safety.
Who is actually committing the harm?
According to the U.S. Department of Justice:
• 98% of rape victims who are women were assaulted by men.
• 80% of male rape victims were also assaulted by men.
• Over 90% of child molesters are cisgender heterosexual men.
Not drag queens.
Not trans kids.
Not anyone in a Pride parade.
And if the lens shifts —
Transgender people are among the most targeted, not the most dangerous:
• In 2023 alone, over 320 trans people were murdered globally — many of them Black or Latine trans women.
• Nearly half of all trans and nonbinary youth in the U.S. considered suicide last year (The Trevor Project).
• Most of the violence they experience? Committed by cisgender men.
Let that sit for a moment.
🧠 Manufactured Outrage
This isn’t a coincidence.
Hate is a product.
Fear is a political strategy.
And LGBTQIA+ people have been the scapegoat for generations of it —
from the 1980s AIDS panic to the “Don’t Say Gay” laws of today.
There’s a reason anti-LGBTQIA+ legislation spikes around election years.
It’s not about morality.
It’s about manipulation.
Politicians know outrage wins votes.
They know fear breeds allegiance.
So they tell parents their children are at risk —
from books, pronouns, inclusive teachers, rainbow flags.
When the real danger has always been the same:
• Unquestioned power
• Unexamined hatred
• A refusal to look in the mirror
🫂 To Those Still Holding On to the Lie
Some people were taught to fear this community.
But that doesn’t make it true.
They were told LGBTQIA+ people were the problem.
But that doesn’t mean they are.
Maybe some were raised on sermons and soundbites.
Maybe they believed what the headlines said.
But beliefs can evolve.
And maybe — just maybe — it’s time to ask:
Who benefits when society fears its neighbor?
Who profits when people point fingers at those who’ve never harmed them?
And who loses… when that fear goes unquestioned?
Because if anyone claims to care about truth…
they must care about who is actually causing harm.
If they care about safety…
they must stop protecting the lie.
And if they care about love —
they must make room for all of it.
Even the kind that scares them.
“It Was Never About Love: Faith, Misinterpretation, and the Cost of Mistranslation”
Before we begin, I want to say this clearly: I do not speak to you as an outsider to faith.
I am not an atheist.
I am a Christian.
I have been since I was eight years old.
That was the year I found our family Bible.
I took it outside — as I often did with anything that mattered — and laid in the grass.
I opened it not to the beginning, but by chance, to the Gospel of Matthew.
I started reading.
I didn’t understand every word, but I felt something I’ve never forgotten.
I fell in love.
And I have carried that faith with me ever since.
There are words in the Bible that have been used like swords.
To wound.
To exile.
To silence.
And yet — those same scriptures were once meant to liberate.
To comfort.
To bring the weary home.
So how did we get here?
Let’s talk about what the Bible does say.
But more importantly — what it never meant.
In ancient Rome and the surrounding world, what we now understand as LGBTQIA+ identities simply… didn’t exist.
There was no vocabulary for “non-binary.”
No cultural script for same-gender marriage.
No framework for two adults of the same sex in a loving, faithful partnership.
What was common — and widely visible — was something else entirely:
• Older men taking adolescent boys as sexual companions (pederasty)
• Free men asserting dominance over enslaved males
• Temple prostitution and religious orgies involving same-sex acts
• Sexual violence and ritual humiliation of conquered men
This wasn’t about love.
It was about power, excess, and exploitation.
When the Apostle Paul wrote in Romans 1 about people “exchanging natural relations for unnatural ones,” he wasn’t condemning what we now understand as consensual queer love.
He was condemning idolatry, abuse, and domination.
He was speaking into a culture where bodies were currency and status was asserted by taking, not giving.
And if you look closely, you’ll see:
The word “homosexual” didn’t even appear in any Bible translation until 1946 — inserted decades before the LGBTQIA+ community would be acknowledged in any honest or compassionate way.
❤️🔥 What Jesus Said About LGBTQIA+ People:
Nothing.
Not one word.
But Jesus did say a lot about:
• Hypocrisy
• Love
• Judging others
• The poor, the marginalized, the outcast
And here’s what he wasn’t doing:
❌ Paul wasn’t talking about two adults in a committed, equal relationship.
❌ He wasn’t talking about someone being trans.
❌ He wasn’t addressing the idea of loving someone of the same gender as a whole identity.
So no — you are not an abomination.
You are not a sin walking.
You are not what they said you were.
You are the product of a deep, enduring, radiant love — one that has always existed in creation, even when language failed to hold it.
And to those who’ve been taught otherwise:
You weren’t lied to out of malice.
You were taught by people who were taught by people who inherited fear disguised as faith.
But that doesn’t make the wound less real.
Or the truth less urgent.
If faith means anything at all, it must mean this:
That love — real love, honest and whole — is never the enemy.
That the God who made the stars did not make you to shrink for the comfort of the fearful.
That shame was never holy.
Nature knows no shame.
Humans were taught it.
It is time to unlearn.
It is time to return — not just to scripture, but to the heart of what it was always trying to say.
Love your neighbor.
Do not cast the first stone.
And above all:
Do not mistake mistranslation for God.
🎭 Taught To Fear: How Culture Shapes Anti-LGBTQIA+ Beliefs
Not all harm wears a badge or writes a law.
Some of it is quieter.
Older.
Learned.
Passed down not through policy —
but through parents, teachers, movies, jokes, silence.
This is cultural bias.
And it’s everywhere.
It’s in the way kids learn what a “real man” looks like.
In the way femininity is punished, mocked, or made invisible.
In every script that says love must look a certain way to be valid — or safe — or sane.
Culture doesn’t need a vote to do damage.
All it needs is repetition.
🧠 The Inheritance of Norms
Long before a politician makes a speech, society already knows who to laugh at.
Who to fear.
Who to trust.
Because for centuries, the dominant culture has centered heterosexual, cisgender lives as the only “normal” ones — the rest were punchlines, threats, or tragedies.
This mindset is called heteronormativity, and it’s so common that many people don’t even realize it’s there.
It teaches us without words:
• Boys must be tough.
• Girls must be soft.
• Love is only between a man and a woman.
• Anything else is confusing, dangerous, or fake.
These messages shape how people see themselves.
Or don’t.
And they shape how others are treated —
in classrooms, homes, locker rooms, churches.
📺 Villains and Victims
In movies and TV shows, LGBTQIA+ people were once only ever side characters — if they were allowed to exist at all.
When they did appear, they were often portrayed as:
• Predators
• Clowns
• Broken souls
• Disposable friends who die so the main (straight) character can learn something
That’s not representation.
That’s rewriting reality.
Media has the power to humanize — but for decades, it did the opposite.
And even now, LGBTQIA+ creators and topics are disproportionately censored, de-monetized, or buried online.
It’s a digital closet that reinforces the real one.
🚻 Gender Policing and Femmephobia
Cultural bias also shows up in how we treat gender itself.
Masculinity is often seen as strong, rational, and worthy.
Femininity is seen as weak, excessive, and emotional.
So when boys are soft-spoken or cry — they’re mocked.
When girls lead or speak boldly — they’re told to tone it down.
When anyone breaks the “rules” — they’re punished, excluded, or ridiculed.
Femmephobia — the fear or hatred of femininity — affects people of every gender.
Especially trans and nonbinary people.
Especially gay men.
Especially anyone who dares to blur the line.
🌍 Culture Isn’t Law — But It Feels Like It
You don’t need a courtroom to feel shame.
Cultural bias doesn’t always come with fines or prison time — but it still polices people’s lives.
It’s in the assumptions people make.
The families they’re kicked out of.
The jokes told at their expense.
The way their love is called a phase.
The way their truth is called a threat.
It’s in the way society decides who counts.
And who doesn’t.
🧩 Unlearning Isn’t Betrayal — It’s Growth
Not everyone who holds cultural bias is hateful.
Some were simply taught one story their whole life.
But just because you were taught something doesn’t mean it’s true.
The good news is: culture can be changed.
It changes every time a child sees themselves in a story.
Every time a teacher affirms a student’s pronouns.
Every time a family chooses love over fear.
Culture is just a mirror of us.
So the question becomes:
What do you want it to reflect?
Because if the answer is love —
it starts with what we choose to see.
And who we choose to see fully.
🕯️ What You Choose to Carry
Maybe you didn’t carve the lie.
Maybe you didn’t write the law.
Maybe you never raised your voice in hate.
But silence holds weight, too.
Bias passed down is still bias carried.
And fear — when left unchecked — becomes tradition.
So ask yourself:
Are you protecting truth?
Or just the comfort of the world you were taught?
Because the cost is real.
The harm is real.
And the people paying the price for your comfort —
they are real, too.
You don’t have to believe the lie forever.
You just have to be brave enough
to ask who taught it to you.
And why.
Join me next Sunday as I dive into the lie that shouts the loudest:
that it’s all “about the children.”
Because when truth is weaponized,
someone always bleeds.
Stay close.
This one matters.
— Thîrteen