Hard to come to terms with my father's homophobia

LegacyUser

I'm a 29 year old woman, and I recently moved into a new house with three male friends, one of whom is gay. My parents already know the other two lads, but not the third. I was telling them all about the new house, and they were asking a few questions about him, and I mentioned the fact that he's gay.

My father's reaction was awful. I always knew he wasn't at all comfortable with the idea of homosexuality, but it was never an issue before. He said all sorts of horrible, awful things about my friend. He got very upset, and demanded that I had to move out of the house right away (naturally that won't be happening.) I suggested that he should just call over and meet the guy and that they'd get on - embarrassingly, my father made some unfunny remark that it wouldn't be safe for him (i.e. that an extremely good-looking happy 26 year old guy is automatically going to find an old fat balding homophobic man irresistable.)

My father is actually quite liberal in other ways. He's quite old-fashioned, but he's not racist - I've lived with people of all colours, nationalities and religions before and it's not been an issue with him. He's Catholic alright, but not a strict Catholic, and even if he was it wouldn't excuse his reaction.

I respect the man a lot, and have always been a "daddy's girl". I found his reaction disgusting and upsetting, though. It's hard to see him in the same way again. What's worrying me a lot, too, is that I'm bisexual myself. I've never felt the need to discuss that with my family, as the majority of my relationships to date have been with men. What if I end up in a serious relationship with a woman in the future though - I hate to think of him having a similar reaction. Of course, if I come out now, he'll probably assume I "caught" it from my friend.

Any opinions on this situation?

Elle Collins

Ignore him. You're never going to change his views.

Doogieboogie

Elle Collins wrote: »

Ignore him. You're never going to change his views.

+1.

Unfortunately, you'll not change his mind. If you ever come out as bi in the future - contact the Gay and Lesbian Switchboard for advice, but be prepared that he won't accept it or ever get ''used'' to the idea.

It's sad that in this day and age, there are still people with his caustic views around. My own mother is hilarious - my sister's gay, and is happily living with her partner of 10+ years; if my mother comes across people in her age group with similar views to your dads she wastes no time in putting them right!

Taltos

First thought that sprung to my mind is that the reason your father is so unreasonable here is because he is a repressed homosexual himself...

You aren't going to force him to change - so badgering him won't work.
Just carry on as normal - but whenever he disrespects your friend - calmly call him on it.

Until people are held accountable for their hatreds we are never going to change.

Elle Collins

Taltos wrote: »

First thought that sprung to my mind is that the reason your father is so unreasonable here is because he is a repressed homosexual himself...

This is a favourite classic for some reason. It's rarely true though from what I've seen of life.

OP, like I said he's not going to change so the best thing to do is ignore it, unless of course you're put in a situation where keeping your mouth shut would be immoral, like if he was verbally abusing your friend infront of you. That's unlikely to happen though given I doubt he'd set foot in the place!

baby and crumble

OP, there's only a certain amount of pandering you can do to your Dad. Your friends are your friends, and your life is your life.

Having said that, I can understand how it feels to suddenly see a different side of someone you love, and to really not like what you see. I love my Dad, for example, but he has a thing about most minorities you could shake a stick at, always has. Which meant I was bricking it when I came out as lesbian to him!

To give him credit though, he has changed his mind about gay people (and tbh most of his other weird minority things!) since I came out. Of course, he's had increased exposure (for want of a better word) to gay people in the last 10 years anyway, just because more people are coming out and visible. It's hard to keep hanging on to old ways of thinking when pretty much every contact he has with gay people now are showing him that they/we are no different to him, really.

My advice would be to not let him dictate who you can be friends with. You're an adult, so he has no say over it anymore. Don't get drawn into an argument if you can help it, but be very firm that you won't listen to him say horrible things about your friend within your hearing range.

However if he wants to stay thinking the way he is, you can't force him to change his mind. The only way that will happen is if his insights change ie that he meets some other gay people and sees them for who they are, not what they are.

Best of luck!

LegacyUser

Its unfortunate your father has such horrible opinions but is it really neccessary for him to meet your friend? It wouldnt be fair to your housemate to have a bigotted homophobe visiting his home. Id just say to your dad that you find his opinions very offensive and you wont tolerate him speaking like that about your friend.