Homophobia

My family used to voice their disgust when gay charactes on soaps kissed. Saying it normalised it for young kids.
My parents and their neighbours who they were really friendly with bullied this gay couple in our block of flats and they had to move. They would say slurs when drunk or make gestures about their orientation. One even attacked them when drunk and the police got involved.
So I grew up thinking it was impossible for me to be bi or gay or lesbian. I absorbed their homophobic attitudes without even realising.

I hear you.

LGBTQphobic discrimination and bullying is pervasive in my nation - in schools, the military, in the work force. Every year some vocal churches push "conversion therapy" with video testimonies of "ex gays", "ex transgender folks", "ex bisexuals". My father routinely viciously physically abused my transgender sibling for "acting effeminate". I get into shouting arguments with my father as I masquerade as a "straight ally". I would be disowned and kicked out of the home if I came out. My work environment is very LGBTQphobic as well.

In my part of Asia, the "It gets better" tagline is untrue for it's getting worse each year.

Fight the internalised hatred. You are not alone.

It really puts things in perspective when I hear from others and I realise I never had it near as hard as them yet I still struggle with it.
My country legalised gay marriage years ago. I think it's just a front for many people acting against it when they really don't care that much what a couple get up to in their own homes - gay or straight!.
The only reason I had to admit being gay was because a woman openly flirted with me at work and asked for my number without hiding the intent. I'm ok with it now of course.

I hear you. I grew up in a Christian household, and when I was a child my aunt took me to an anti gay marriage rally (before it was legalized in Ontario in 2003, and later on the whole country in 2005).

I remember someone from the news asking my aunt why she was at the rally today, and her answer was the typical Christian one: "I just don't believe it's natural and God is against it. Man should be with woman." Even at that young age, I remember thinking how stupid of a reason that was.

These days I rarely see homophobia, it is very much frowned upon. Fortunately where I live, those who are against it tend to keep those opinions to themselves or within their religious groups.

Yes, it's been many years since I was young. And way back then, plus where I grew up, people were prejudiced about just about anything & everything. I myself grew up hiding the fact that I had a serious struggle with gender identity dysphoria (although I didn't even understand what it was all about at the time.) Even today, so many years later, I still find myself falling back onto those old prejudices from time-to-time. It's really difficult to get this stuff out of your head completely when you've grown up with it.

Don't blame yourself, okay? Things being worse doesn't invalidate how harmful your family's homophobia is I really really never wanted you to think of it that way.

It's different degrees but still harmful and has impacted you adversely.

It's the small things going unchecked which builds up to the bigger expressions of bigotry.

The struggles with internalised LGBTQphobia which we all share matters.

I'm gender queer/non-binary(with a presentation that makes it obvious to others cause it's opposite than expected for my assigned gender)and I'm bisexual. My sexuality hasn't been an issue because I happen to more often be attracted to men than women, men never like me cause I'm so unfeminine(which hurts) and the women I was attracted to weren't queer in the first place. But my gender expression has obviously subjected me to plenty of bad looks, stupid questions and attempts to put some sense into me and dress like a woman is supposed to and act like a woman.

In Romania being non-conforming in any way(apart from like a hipster-ish thing) isn't a thing that is normalized and it's a much more conservative, homophobic, transphobic society compared to western Europe. I'm comfortable with myself when I go abroad but not here.

My own mother is homophobic and transphobic without realising it. She's pro gay marriage and rights and has no problem with gay people being together but at the same time she says she finds intimacy between gay people off putting and she'd have been disappointed if I was gay. And she's downright transphobic cause she doesn't understand it and always resisted looking into gender identity and how it's not actually a binary. She never forced anything upon me but at the same time she doesn't understand why I don't just conform a little to be happy and attractive and "normal" .

All in all, of course, the degrees to which homophobia and transphobia manifest in most of Europe, North America, Australia, New Zealand, etc are more tame compared to parts of Asia, Africa, Middle East,etc, but everything from words to action to subtle discrimination and such has an impact on the emotional/mental and/or physical wellbeing and comfort of people who aren't cis and straight.