Source 1:
“Two Directions: Why Harry Styles’ New Song Is a Breakthrough for Bisexual Music Fans.” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 22 Mar. 2018, www.theguardian.com/music/2018/mar/22/both-directions-why-harry-styles-new-song-is-a-breakthrough-for-bisexual-music-fans.
Harry Styles has been a global icon since his One Direction days in 2012. Since going solo in 2016, Styles has used his rising fame to become an ally to the LGBTQ community through his songwriting, gender-fluid fashion, and rainbow flag waving dance-breaks during his tour. In one of his unreleased songs, titled “Medicine” Styles confidently projects, “The Boys and the girls are here / I mess around with him / and I’m OK with it”. Although many of his songs have become LGBTQ anthems, Styles himself has declined answering questions about his sexuality. During an interview with The Sun last year, Styles said, “I don’t feel like it’s something I’ve ever felt like I have to explain about myself”. Styles has become a beacon of light for young boys who have previously felt uncomfortable with their sexual preferences. “Hearing your idol sing about your people means more than you can imagine”. Fifteen-year-old Even, remarked. “I think it’s really cool and brave,” he added. “There are not many male bisexual celebrities, so people think bi boys don’t exist, but they do”. Styles also invited the queer trio, Muna, to join him on his world tour. Harry has filled an important role of becoming a massive supporter for all the LGBTQ communities, but bisexuals in particular. Bisexual boys, specifically, are often overlooked and feel left out of both the straight and gay male communities. According to the lead author of a 2017 study, bisexual men experience “double discrimination” and put them at a higher risk of struggling with mental health issues than other LGBTQ members.
Although this article is very specific in its focus on Harry Styles effect on bisexual fans, it is incredibly useful for my research essay; this is because I plan to include a small section of my essay explaining the effects of LGBTQ+ becoming more prevalent in popular culture and celebrity identity. The information is very credible and even includes links to read more from Styles’ interviews and any research mentioned in the article, for readers to further investigate. Harry Styles was the main focus of my Exploratory Essay, so this will be a wonderful way to organize my bridge over to my research essay.
Source 2:
Falomir-Pichastor, Juan Manuel, et al. “Perceived Men’s Feminization and Attitudes Toward Homosexuality: Heterosexual Men’s Reactions to the Decline of the Anti-Femininity Norm of Masculinity.” Sex Roles, vol. 81, no. 3/4, Aug. 2019, pp. 208–222. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1007/s11199-018-0985-6. Accessed 4 March 2021.
Men’s rejection of everything considered feminine is at the heart of traditional masculinity. This anti-femininity standard has become one of, if not the most powerful, motivators of men’s animosity and prejudice against homosexuality. Pichastor and Manuel explore how these preconceptions and gender roles are changing in today’s culture in this article. “However, egalitarian societies are undergoing a significant change: Gendered roles, stereotypes, and norms are evolving. Accordingly, many believe that men are becoming more feminine than before, and this change might have consequential effects” (Pichastor & Manuel 232). Due to rise of LGBTQ community members being open about their sexuality, supportive men are growing more accepting of their feminine characteristics. As a result, heterosexual, homophobic men’s unfavorable attitudes about femininity have increased.
The authors of “Perceived Men’s Feminization and Attitudes Toward Homosexuality: Heterosexual Men’s Reactions of the Decline of the Anti-Femininity Norm of Masculinity” are extremely credible, and the article has been peer reviewed. The research and statistics in this article have also been fact checked. These authors do an excellent job of including several pieces of data from research that demonstrate the rise of anti-femininity among heterosexuals. This article will be a great source for me to use in my research paper because it has an incredible amount of current data showing the how the decline of gender norms can also lead to the incline of homophobia, when individuals fail to change their viewpoints on the LGBTQ+ community at large.
Source 3:
Wang, Chien-Chuan, et al. “Effects of Traditional and Cyber Homophobic Bullying in Childhood on Depression, Anxiety, and Physical Pain in EMERGING Adulthood and the Moderating Effects of Social Support among Gay and Bisexual Men in Taiwan.” Neuropsychiatric Disease and Treatment, Dove Medical Press, 22 May 2018, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5973463/.
This article presents a study that examined the levels of mental health disorders, such as anxiety and depression, among young males in the LGBTQ community who have been victims of traditional or cyber bullying due to homophobia. The study also examines the effects of support from family and friends when combatting homophobic harassment in young boys. Between August 2015 and July 2017, 500 gay or bisexual men were gathered. They were then tested on levels of depression and anxiety. Those who have been bullied for their sexual orientation were compared to those who have never felt alienated due to their preferences. As a result, they found that victims of homophobic bullying had much more severe mental health issues than those who do not identify as victims. Family support was shown to be a tremendous factor in helping to combat these mental health disorders. The results of this experiment support the idea that homophobic bullying and harassment, of any sort, must be prevented or intervened at an early age with support from the LGBTQ members’ family, to prevent emerging severe mental illness.
This article by Chien-Chuan Wang is a very credible and reliable source, as it is from the Neuropsychiatric Disease and Treatment center of Dove Medical Press. It also presents some very interesting research that relates directly to my topic. I may use some of the data from this source, however, I am still unsure because the research was conducted on men in Taiwan. This article will be of immense value to me if I decide to open my research essay up to the entire LGBTQ+ community across the nation. At this point, I am thinking I am going to limit my research to the US, but if I did change my mind this article would present crucial information backing my data across the globe.
Source 4:
“Stigma and Discrimination Affects Gay and Bisexual Men’s Health.” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 29 Feb. 2016, www.cdc.gov/msmhealth/stigma-and-discrimination.htm.
People who have homophobia project negative attitudes or actions toward gay and bisexual men. More often than not, men who identify as members of the LGBTQ community experience difficulties with homophobia circling within their friends and family. This type of discrimination can affect your income, place of work and the ability to keep health insurance. This stigma around LGBTQ men also makes it much more difficult to feel confident about sexual orientation, which increases mental health disorders and leads to a tendency to decline support. Homophobic bullying often starts out as “teasing” in elementary school systems, which later leads to violence, physical assault, and suicide-related behavior.
Due to family members’ rejection of their homosexual children, around 40% of homeless youth identify as LGBTQ. Researchers have found that those who experience homophobic bullying or rejection were nearly:
8 times more likely to have attempted suicide
6 times more likely to show severe levels of depression
3 times more likely to use illegal drugs
3 times more likely to have unprotected sex
Studies show that gay and bisexual men who feel supported by their friends, family members, and the wider community have: a higher self-esteem, a more positive group identity, a more positive mental health.
I believe this article is extremely valuable in my research because it contains credible data that is cited at the end of the essay for readers to further look into. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is dedicated to using high scientific standards to guarantee that research findings are accurate and reliable. The CDC has also created information quality guidelines, to preserve the high quality of the information it delivers to the public. The statistics presented in the article were overwhelmingly shocking to me and I firmly believe that my readers will understand the severity of my topic if I include this data in my essay. This article also concludes by diving into the effects of support from friends, family, and the community at large. This will be very helpful for the conclusion of my essay, as I plan to offer suggestions of how we can all be of value in the support for LGBTQ+ youth so that we may see a positive change in their mental health.
Source 5:
Priess, Heather A, et al. “Adolescent Gender-Role Identity and Mental Health: Gender Intensification Revisited.” Child Development, U.S. National Library of Medicine, 2009, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4244905/.
Gender intensification is defined as “an increased pressure for adolescents to conform to culturally sanctioned gender roles”. Through a long-term research study by Priess, Lindberg and Hyde, girls reported higher femininity than boys at ages 11, 13, and 15. However, girls and boys had no difference in levels of masculinity among any age. Females projected much fewer depressive symptoms due to their ability to express both their feminine and masculine characteristics openly. Males projected severely higher levels of depression due to their inability to express their feminine characteristics, due to fears or experiences of homophobic bullying from peers. Even at this young of an age, males are expected to only portray themselves as masculine and shut down any feminine attributes of themselves. This leads us to the bigger question of what society deems as feminine. Among school age children, the smallest details down to the color pink or simply sitting with your legs crossed is enough to be bullied for femininity.
“Adolescent Gender-Role Identity and Mental Health: Gender Intensification Revisited” by Heather Priess is a wonderfully written article filled to the brim with research presented in an organized fashion. This source is also extremely credible as it was written for the Child Development section of the US National Library of Medicine, and the research sources are available to read in more depth. My only complaint about this source would be that it is from 2009. Although much of this information about gender-norms in society remains true, I understand that statistics of depression among men who experienced this type of harassment have grown immensely since the introduction of cyber-bullying. I believe this article still has very crucial information that will give my readers a bit more background information on how long this has been a concern and how little people have done about it. However, I know I will need to accompany this source with a much more recent one to present the most up-to-date data that includes the effects of technology as it relates to homophobic cyber-bullying.
Source 6:
14, Tyler Lehner Updated October, and About the author A gay millennial accompanied with a proud agenda for social change. “Hypermasculinity Is TOXIC: My Story of Being Bullied for Being Different.” Thought Catalog, 14 Oct. 2018, thoughtcatalog.com/tyler-lehner/2016/08/hypermasculinity-is-toxic-my-story-of-being-bullied-for-being-different/.
In this article, Tyler Lehner, gives readers an inside view of how he experiences bullying for allowing his peers to see his feminine side. Tyler’s harassment began around fourth or fifth grade, when fellow students began to bully him over his nice and clean penmanship. He claimed that girls were very positive about it saying things like, “Your handwriting is so much better than mine! It’s so neat!”. However, boys were very negative, taunting him saying “You write like a girl”. His neat handwriting began to snowball him down a trail of homophobic bullying of how he spoke, walked, and dressed. Tyler thinks back on these times, saying “I was dragged into a severely self-conscious adolescence from said behavior, which consequently transformed my expressed identity”. The bullying only became worse in high-school, as boys were trying to prove they were the “alpha-male” of their friend group. As Tyler grew older, he could not put up with the harassment of society any longer. He changed everything about himself, from the way he dressed, his voice, his walk, and his choice of words. He completely masked his personality in order to fit in with what society deemed masculine. Tyler says, “The uniqueness I felt comfortable with expressing was eliminated in middle and high school because of these boys and I diluted into this pool of masculinity.
Tyler has since graduated from college and feels confident to openly be himself whether that’s deemed masculine, feminine, gay, or straight. He encourages other young boys to remain true to themselves and not allow the bullies of younger years to deter your identity. He also calls all of us to action to no longer be a bystander of homophobic bullying and to raise children who will not deem qualities and traits with a matching gender. He closes his article with an encouraging, powerful statement, “Don’t let people put out your shine, whoever you are. It does indeed get better”.
This article was definitely my favorite source to read through. The author did an amazing job telling his own personal narrative as it relates to homophobic bullying and gender stereotypes. I think this article will allow me to take a new and exciting turn in my research essay that lets the readers hear someone’s real-life experience with the subject at hand. There were many uplifting quotes Tyler Lehner used throughout his story that I plan to include in my essay, especially in the conclusion paragraph. I understand my topic is very heavy and can leave my readers feeling dejected. However, I’m hoping through showing how Tyler overcame his mental health disorders this will leave my readers feeling hopeful and light a fire within them to become an ally to others like Tyler in their everyday life.
Synthesis
The overall goal of my research is to give a full profile of how homophobia affects men’s mental health and how support from family, friends, and celebrities can help counteract the effects of discrimination. I chose my articles in an attempt to create a clear view of the effects both of a lack of support and of receiving support, and what in close personal relationships as well as in the media creates such sources of support. Sources 2 and 5 give background on what qualifies as discrimination and toxic masculinity and expands on the meaning of such bullying. Source 3 shows the possible negative effects of what children see in the media, such as cyberbullying for LGBT youth, while Source 1 shows the positive effects of celebrities supporting and representing LGBT identities. Source 4 shows the negative consequences of this bullying on LGBT youth as well as men in general who are pressured into presenting a certain way. Sources 3 and 4 also emphasize how family can help mitigate the effects of homophobia and bullying on young men. Source 6 offers valuable support to the other articles through a focus on one young man’s story of being bullied for his identity. Sources 1 and 6 especially discuss ways that men have learned to love their identity in spite of struggles, in order to help understand what can be done by readers and the world at large to help solve the issue of homophobic pressures on men.