Science Shows Homophobia The Domain Of Stupid People

A University of Queensland study that utilised data from the 2012 Household, Income, and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) survey to measure cognitive intelligence, which was then linked it to the 2015 version of the survey that asked respondents attitudes towards LGBTQI rights, has confirmed what every LGBTQI person who has ever experienced discrimination, violence or homophobia already knew in the very centre of their being – homophobic people are stupid people.

While it seems bizarre that there needed to be a study to confirm this, take comfort in the fact that all of your prior, unstudied suspicions were correct – findings from a high-quality, national Australian dataset (n = 11,564) indicate that individuals with low cognitive ability are less likely to support equal rights for same-sex couples.

It seems like a no brainer, pun intended, that if people with low cognitive intelligence don’t read very much, or work very hard to change the pre-conceived notions that they’ve been carrying with them since childhood, or even question that which doesn’t affect them, that they would think like that.

Is it because they are so insulated and ignorant that anything different to them or what they know in their immediate bubble is to be feared, because that is how they were raised?
To never question, to only fear that which is different?

 Participants in the survey were asked to agree or disagree with the statement, “Homosexual couples should have the same rights as heterosexual couples do.” The people that responded in the negative generally scored lower on cognitive intelligence abilities and this was most pronounced for those with poor verbal ability to express themselves.

“There are well-known correlations between low cognitive ability and support of prejudicial or non-egalitarian attitudes,” the authors conclude. “Individuals with low cognitive ability are less likely to support equal rights for same-sex couples.

“Our results suggest that cognitive abilities play a critical, albeit under appreciated, role in prejudice,” they continued. “Consequently, we recommend a heightened focus on cognitive ability in research on prejudice and a better integration of cognitive ability into prejudice models.”

And it’s not just stupid people that use homophobia to keep the LGBTQI community in the dark ages – homophobic policy at all levels of Australian government engage in the practice as well, as evidenced by the continued restrictions on men who have sex with men from donating blood in Australia or the continued refusal of South Australia to outlaw the totally discriminatory and homophobic ‘gay panic defence’, despite it being the only state in Australia to refuse to do so in it’s entirety. Queensland mostly banned the defence in 2017, while still leaving the door open for it to be “used in exceptional circumstances if permitted by a magistrate”, as reported by the Star Observer in June 2020.