This page was created to provide information about sexuality and sexual orientation and to serve as a link to other online resources for Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals and Transgender persons. Here are some FAQs and answers that I found in the APA(American Psychological Association) Home Page.
What Is Sexual Orientation?
Is Sexual Orientation a Choice?
Is Homosexuality a Mental Illness or Emotional Problem?
For more FAQs visit the APA Home Page.
Resources PFLAG (Parents, Families, Friends of Lesbians and Gays) promotes the health and well-being of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender persons, their families and friends through SUPPORT, to cope with an adverse society, EDUCATION, to enlighten an ill-informed public; and ADVOCACY, to end discrimination and to secure equal civil rights.
COLAGE (Children Of Lesbians And Gays Everywhere) aims to foster the growth of daughters and sons of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender parents of all racial, ethnic, and class backgrounds by providing education, support and community on local and international levels, to advocate for our rights and those of our families, and to promote acceptance and awareness in society that love makes a family.
NGLTF (National Gay and Lesbian Task Force) is a leading progressive civil rights organization that has supported grassroots organizing and advocacy since 1973. Since its inception, NGLTF has been at the forefront of every major initiative for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights. In all its efforts, NGLTF helps to strengthen the gay and lesbian movement at the state and local level while connecting these activities to a national vision of change.
Sexual Orientation is an enduring emotional, romantic, sexual or affectional attraction to another person. It is easily distinguished from other components of sexuality including biological sex, gender identity (the psychological sense of being male or female) and the social gender role (adherence to cultural norms for feminine and masculine behavior).
Sexual orientation exists along a continuum that ranges from exclusive homosexuality to exclusive heterosexuality and includes various forms of bisexuality. Bisexual persons can experience sexual, emotional and affectional attraction to both their own sex and the opposite sex. Persons with a homosexual orientation are sometimes referred to as gay (both men and women) or as lesbian (women only).
Sexual orientation is different from sexual behavior because it refers to feelings and self-concept. Persons may or may not express their sexual orientation in their behaviors.
Is Sexual Orientation a Choice?
No, human beings can not choose to be either gay or straight. Sexual orientation emerges for most people in early adolescence without any prior sexual experience. Although we can choose whether to act on our feelings, psychologists do not consider sexual orientation to be a conscious choice that can be voluntarily changed.
Is Homosexuality a Mental Illness or Emotional Problem?
No. Psychologists, psychiatrists and other mental health professionals agree that homosexuality is not an illness, mental disorder or an emotional problem. Over 35 years of objective, well-designed scientific research has shown that homosexuality, in and itself, is not associated with mental disorders or emotional or social problems. Homosexuality was once thought to be a mental illness because mental health professionals and society had biased information.
In the past the studies of gay, lesbian and bisexual people involved only those in therapy, thus biasing the resulting conclusions. When researchers examined data about these people who were not in therapy, the idea that homosexuality was a mental illness was quickly found to be untrue.
In 1973 the American Psychiatric Association confirmed the importance of the new, better designed research and removed homosexuality from the official manual that lists mental and emotional disorders. Two years later, the American Psychological Association passed a resolution supporting the removal.
For more than 25 years, both associations have urged all mental health professionals to help dispel the stigma of mental illness that some people still associate with homosexual orientation.
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