"that's so gay"

[This is something I posted on Facebook in response to something rather insensitive]

“Gay” is a sexual orientation and not a synonym for “lame” or “stupid” or [insert negative word]. Yes, language has its own evolution and words change meaning over time. But the vast majority of contemporary homosexuals identify as “gay”. Moreover, “gay” and “homosexual” are used interchangeably in most (or at least many) psychology and sociology textbooks. Stop being so mentally lazy and put some thought into what you’re saying. If you’re a morally decent person, then you would be upset if somebody used races (“Hispanic” or “African” or “Caucasian”) as synonyms for “lame/stupid”. Obviously sexual orientation and race are separate, but my point is that they’re both innate, part of a person’s identity, and beyond the person’s power to change (don’t get me started on “sexual reorientation therapy”; it doesn’t work and is often very harmful). If you use “gay” as an insult around me after I ask you to stop doing that, then I’m not going to associate with you or talk to you. It’s disrespectful and makes you look like a jackass. Stop it.

 The fact that “gay” didn’t originally mean homosexual doesn’t make it any less disrespectful (and doesn’t make me any less irritated) when people now use “gay” as an insult. Why? Because people who comprise a relatively large percentage of the population use the word to describe an important and innate aspect of who they are and everybody who goes through public school learns that “gay” is used that way when they take sex ed in high school (or even junior high in many cases). It’s how the word is used in most textbooks that touch on the subject (including those used by religious institutions!), it’s how the word is used by both of the APAs (American Psychiatric Association and American Psychological Association), etc.

Apart from being annoyed, I’m also fascinated by the fact that some people so stubbornly cling to “gay” as an insult even after all facing all of these points-- If people want to describe something as “lame” or “stupid”, why don’t they just use those words?? That in itself is worthy of psychological research IMO. Let’s say that I tell X, “it offends/upsets me when you use the word in that way, so could you please not do that around me?” It ought to be easy for a well-adjusted and morally decent person to sympathize wth my perspective to the point where they don’t use the word that way when they’re around me. But let’s suppose that X replies by saying, “nah, I’m gonna keep using the word in the same way around you”. Why is that? I would say that X seems to have some issues he/she should work on. Even if X doesn’t have any issues, he/she would still be an unpleasant person that at least I wouldn’t want to be around.