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Feminist theology, with relatively new institutional standing within the field of Christian theology, has become divided and enriched (from it's white feminist author's perspective) by difference — especially in light of womanist, mujerista, lesbian, two-thirds-world, and other self-named women's theologies. This chapter introduces the challenge of difference by examining one of the most historically central yet hotly contested feminist methodological themes today — the appeal to women's experience. This is followed by a discussion of two markers of difference (and sites of privilege) that will be an ongoing focus: race and sexuality. Illustrations are given of how white racial privilege and heterosexist privilege can manifest even in contexts of collegial feminist theological dialogue.

This introductory chapter lays the groundwork for future chapters by suggesting that feminist theorizing must make a methodological shift from thinking that heterosexism is just a by‐product of sexism, to thinking of lesbian and gay subordination as a separate axis of oppression that intersects with gender, race, and class axes of oppression. It also introduces the two central features of lesbian and gay subordination. The first of these is that the principal damaging effect of a heterosexist system is that it displaces lesbians and gays from both the public and private spheres of civil society so that they have no legitimated social location. The second is that the principal ideologies rationalizing lesbian and gay displacement are that there are only two natural and normal sexes/genders; that lesbian and gay sexuality is excessive, compulsive, and disconnected from romantic love; and that, for a variety of reasons, lesbians and gays are unfitted for marital and family life. The last part of the chapter makes general remarks on how the book fits into the essentialist–constructionist controversy.

All biblical interpretations, including traditional ones, “pick and choose” texts and meanings according to the particularity of the interpreter. The dominant interpreters have failed to acknowledge their particularity as the “mythical norm” (the white, affluent, heterosexual male head of a nuclear family). As a result, that norm has become equated with “authoritative” interpretations and those who fall outside that norm have been harmed. A responsible ethics of biblical interpretation must reject a model of “authority as domination” in favor of “authority as partnership.” In a genuinely self‐critical biblical interpretation, (1) the particularity of the dominant, traditional interpreters will be recognized as particular and not imposed on others by colonialist means; (2) readers will take responsibility to consider the actual consequences of their interpretations on others; (3) readers will honestly reflect not only on how meaning is derived from Scripture, but why one of several candidate meanings is chosen.

Heterosexism, an ideological system that refuses, derogates, and labels any non-heterosexual form of identity, behavior, relationship, or community, is one of the emerging issues associated with lesbianism, homosexuality, and heterosexuality whether at individual or cultural levels. This chapter intends to describe and explicate psychological heterosexism in the United States using empirical research and social science theory. Belief and attitudinal mechanisms of psychological heterosexism are explained in the first part of the chapter with particular attention given to motivational and cognitive activities. The second part tackles behavioral characteristics of psychological heterosexism which exhibits predominant manifestations of violence against lesbians and gay men while the third part discusses the outcomes of psychological heterosexism. The chapter ends with the implications of empirical research on the concept of heterosexism.

This chapter discusses the political economy of sexual oppression. It maps the diverse social and cultural spaces of female and male sex work, and studies the intersecting structures of economic marginalization, racism, sexism, and heterosexism that shape the possibilities for risk reduction on the part of sex workers in Durban, South Africa. It notes that sex work and sex workers have been often treated as no more than vectors of infection and danger. This chapter focuses on the ways various forms of sex work in different parts of Durban slowly take shape as part of a broader range of survival strategies by poor and marginalized men and women.

American Christians have writ the modern ideological hegemony of the two-sex model (that humans naturally come in two genetic sexes) into the corpus of scripture, controlling both its meaning and the terms by which morally legitimate sex is determined. This chapter “outs” the unsettlingly androgynous and queerly erotic body of Christ harbored within the Pauline corpus, thereby implicitly challenging Anders Nygren's representation of the apostle Paul as the poster child of an agapically asexual theology while also explicitly challenging more contemporary invocations of Paul that support the oppressive politics of heterosexism. The chapter argues that the inscription of the two-sex model into scripture as a warrant for heterosexuality is destabilized at its scriptural foundation in the Pauline corpus. Paul depicted the Christian practice of communal sex, seminally incarnated in the androgynous body of Christ, as disruptive of stable gender identities.

Since 1981, when previously healthy young adults were first stricken with a mysterious illness that was eventually described as “a new acquired cellular immunodeficiency” (Gottlieb et al., 1981), understanding of HIV and AIDS, both the in the medical community and general society, has come a long way. There remains, however, an unfortunate degree of stigma that persists since its development in the early days of the illness (Cohen and Weisman, 1986; Cohen, 1987, 1992; Cohen and Alfonso, 1998;Cohen, 2008). Early in the course of this epidemic, as it became evident that the immune deficiency had an infectious etiology and could lead to rapidly fatal complications, many became fearful of the possibility of contagion. An “epidemic of fear” (Hunter, 1990) thus began to develop along with the AIDS epidemic. During the first decade, even many physicians surveyed had negative attitudes toward persons with HIV and AIDS (Kelly et al., 1987; Thompson, 1987; Wormser and Joline, 1989). At the beginning of the HIV epidemic some persons hospitalized with AIDS experienced difficulty receiving even minimally adequate care, including getting their rooms cleaned, obtaining water or food, and receiving proper medical attention. Psychiatric consultations for AIDS patients with depression, withdrawal, and treatment refusal often revealed the heightened feelings of isolation and depression experienced by the patients, in part as a result of the reactions of staff members to their illness, including the palpable fear of contagion. Holtz and coauthors (1983) were the first to describe the profound withdrawal from human contact as the “sheet sign,” observed when persons with AIDS hid under their sheets and completely covered their faces. Thus, since the beginning of the AIDS epidemic, people with AIDS have been stigmatized. They have felt shunned and ostracized by not only medical caregivers but also the general community and even by their own families and friends. In some areas of the world, persons with AIDS have been quarantined because of the irrational fears, discrimination, and stigma associated with this pandemic. In the United States, persons with AIDS have lost their homes and jobs, and some children and adolescents have been excluded from classrooms.

This chapter examines the mascotting of young black men in southern collegiate athletics. Despite the apparent progress of racially integrated college sports in the South, this chapter argues that collegiate sports fandom in its current state—particularly in the American south—is a central mechanism in the reproduction of whiteness as a hierarchizing racial category. Moreover, because the mascotting of black male athletes depends on the racist association of blackness with hyper-masculinity, it is instrumental in reinforcing heterosexism, homophobia, and misogyny. Analyzing the examples of three prominent black stars at predominately white institutions, this chapter shows that black masculinity is often positioned by fans as at once desirable, disposable, and potentially dangerous—as both an object of fantasy, and a convenient scapegoat for the social ills to which the current organization of collegiate athletics gives rise. Yet, the mascotting and exploitation of these athletes is troubling not only because of its representation of blackness, but because it conversely reproduces whiteness as dominant, respectable, and cultured, and figures women (particularly black women) as objects of sexual exchange.

This chapter examines the formal and informal barriers that gay men encounter as they seek to build their families through adoption. It considers how broader social and legal inequities, such as state laws regarding gay adoption, influence the path to parenthood of gay men, as well as the ways that gay men negotiate and respond to such inequities. It also explores gay fathers' ideas about and valuing of marriage and the degree to which they view marriage once they become parents. Finally, it discusses the impact of geographic and economic privilege on gay men's ability to resist or circumvent heteronormativity in the adoption process. It shows that gay men are vulnerable to heterosexism and sexism at many stages and levels of the adoption process, from the legal system to adoption agencies and birth parents.

Molly Youngkin’s essay investigates the heterosexism of a fin de siècle feminist newspaper, the Women’s Penny Paper (1894–99, later retitled the Women’s Herald and the Woman’s Signal), highlighting its treatment of three controversies: the Oscar Wilde trials, the death of poet Amy Levy, and the emergence of Sappho as a model of lesbian new womanhood. When the paper did address these controversies it ‘reshaped narratives about this [same-sex] desire to fit its own heterosexist agenda,’ responded in a disapproving way, or avoided a discussion of sexuality entirely (p. 543). The overall effect of this editorial bias was to pursue an ‘overarching agenda of advocating for heterosexual women’ and to reinforce social purity debates about ‘the effects of men’s sexual practices on heterosexual women and their families’ (p. 544). These feminist papers thus constructed the ‘other’ in ways that upheld restrictive conventions of race and sexuality while claiming to be vehicles of progressive thought.

Discussion about LGBT issues in social work needs to take account both of the wider context, which has an impact on the lives of LGBT people and also of public debates, which construct social perceptions about them. Before focusing on LGBT issues in Italian social work, the chapter first gives an overview of the current social and political context in Italy. The chapter then examines the integration of LGBT people in social work in relation to its coverage in academic social work journals, map its inclusion in social work curricula and through a case study, analyse social worker’s practice with a young lesbian in residential care. The chapter concludes by highlighting that the ethical code of Italian social work states, that social workers are obliged to challenge discrimination in all its forms. However, social work education and social work practice must go beyond such ‘universal’ formulas in order to recognise and to understand the many faces of discrimination and oppression. Heteronormativity is a key concept in the understanding of oppression related to LGBT issues in social work, and must be introduced and handled in Italian social work education.

In this chapter we demonstrate how Christian nationalists are deeply invested in ensuring family life in the United States reflects a particular order prioritizing patriarchy, heterosexuality, and cisgender identification. The family is viewed as the building block of society and the ultimate litmus test for any moral decay within a society. Using attitudes toward gender roles and identity, divorce, and same-sex marriage, this chapter illustrates the diversity of attitudes among the four responses to the Christian nation narrative. Using multiple waves of national survey data, we also explore change over the last decade concerning how Christian nationalism is related to views of the family. We show that Christian nationalism is concerned with ensuring families in the United States reflect a particular order. Finally, we show that contrary to prior chapters, Christian nationalism and personal religiosity can at times work in the same direction but for differing reasons.

Otherness is an experience that greatly affects the lives of all gay men. Feelings of otherness are fueled by the heteronormative structures ranging from families to society at large, and through the macro- and microaggressions that gay men experience in numerous contexts. Otherness experienced by many gay men throughout the course of their lives exacerbates loneliness and social isolation, which has been endemic in the gay population throughout the generations. The power of otherness also acts as a deterrent for some gay men in disclosing their identities. While advances in society and depiction of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) individuals in media may have impact in “normalizing gay identity, the experience of otherness continues to be incredibly powerful, first taking roots for gay men when they are young boys, creating emotional distress in childhood that perpetuates into adult lives even after coming out. Some young gay men turn to intergenerational love as means establishing feelings of normalcy as gay men and combatting otherness.

The introduction argues that examining the history of abortion in South Africa during the apartheid era reveals the power and pervasiveness of heterosexist and patriarchal norms in apartheid culture, and their effects on the intimate, everyday lives of women. It explains the book’s focus on the importance of regulating gender and sexuality in the creation and maintenance of apartheid culture, which led to state regulation and disciplining of white female heterosexuality. It also emphasizes that the oppression of women cut across racial and ethnic divides.

Many contexts of injustice demand resolute action—action that is purposeful, decisive, confident, and unwavering—but this chapter argues that in some contexts of injustice, irresolute actions can be called for. The chapter begins by identifying what characterizes irresolute action in such contexts. It then introduces three kinds of irresolute action against injustice and defends their effectiveness in some contexts of injustice and activism, taking as examples contexts of heterosexism, mass incarceration, North American colonialism, and post-industrial poverty. It differentiates such contexts from other cases of structural injustice, oppression and moral dilemmas where one can fulfill one’s responsibilities resolutely. Finally, it argues that we need to understand the importance of irresolute action against injustice in order to further understand the position of disorientation in moral life.