GAY FEARS

[Guest ppyvabw]

Are we still arguing about this.

i cant believe this kicked off with my post on saturday morning on gay anxiety spike, and its now monday afternoon almost and its still going on. Just give it a rest. I wish i'd kept my bloody mouth shut now.

If posting about genuine obsessional fears and behaviour (Even if I don't have OCD which im unsure about anyway, my thoughts are certainly obsessional, gay or straight) on an OCD forum causes so much upset, whats the point in an OCD forum. Its gettin to a point where people can't post about their sexuality concerns because of the upset it will cause to them. I will certainly think twice in future.

As it happens, if someone did have an obsession that they were going to wake up one morning a different race to the one they identify with, then 'black fears' is a perfectly acceptable term. If a black person woke up and thought they were going to suddenly become white, the term white fears wouldn't conjure up any racial feelings. Call stuff what it is for pity sake and stop tip-toeing about.

I don't feel the term black fears is rascist at all in this context.

Paul, as a helpfull suggestion to you, why don't you post about what causes you to trigger and what the thoughts are that you have rather than continueing this argument. There a lots of nice people here and they will understand.

Edited November 20, 2006 by Guest

[Rachie]

We want everyone to be able to discuss their OCD fears on here. We know that a lot of OCD fears are embarrassing and do not want anyone to feel they can't mention them for fear of offending someone.

I totally agree with ppyvabw that if someone did have fears about becoming black or white, then those terms would be used.

It is nothing to do with homophobia. I strongly abhor homophobia but I have had this kind of OCD myself. Maybe some people are homophobic and have this type of OCD, but as has been said many times, we would not allow any kind of discrimination or insults to be made on these boards.

Paul, it seems as though you are unable to understand what we are saying, so I don't know what to say to you. But as suggested above, why not use the forums to discuss your OCD rather than this?

As to your remarks about the forum not being supportive, I find this quite upsetting as the moderating team all put in a lot of spare time trying to be just that as do many forum users and I do believe lots of people find the forums very supportive.

Take care

Rach xx

[Guest miep]

Are we still arguing about this.

i cant believe this kicked off with my post on saturday morning on gay anxiety spike, and its now monday afternoon almost and its still going on. Just give it a rest. I wish i'd kept my bloody mouth shut now.

If posting about genuine obsessional fears and behaviour (Even if I don't have OCD which im unsure about anyway, my thoughts are certainly obsessional, gay or straight) on an OCD forum causes so much upset, whats the point in an OCD forum. Its gettin to a point where people can't post about their sexuality concerns because of the upset it will cause to them. I will certainly think twice in future.

As it happens, if someone did have an obsession that they were going to wake up one morning a different race to the one they identify with, then 'black fears' is a perfectly acceptable term. If a black person woke up and thought they were going to suddenly become white, the term white fears wouldn't conjure up any racial feelings. Call stuff what it is for pity sake and stop tip-toeing about.

I don't feel the term black fears is rascist at all in this context.

Paul, as a helpfull suggestion to you, why don't you post about what causes you to trigger and what the thoughts are that you have rather than continueing this argument. There a lots of nice people here and they will understand.

Hi ppyvabw,

Hope I spelt that right? I can't believe how heated the conversation got last night. I logged in just to have a read and all that was going on :confused1:

I do have hocd as it is called. I've been battling with it for nearly 10 years and it is wearing me down. I'm trying not to battle with it anymore. After all they are just thoughts ha ha ah :clapping: they are not real, so hard to believe isn't it?? How are you doing today?

Miep :original:

[Ashley]

because if it where it would be more attentive to the individual... as well as the whole ....which would surely be the true mark of care

Paul,

We have 2,746 registered members on this forum and whilst myself and the moderators sometimes do make mistakes, we always do what we feel is right for the majority of forum users and to be fair we generally get most decisions right. If we gave every single user the right to say what they want and allow on the forums we would be here all year and never come to an agreement with everyone.

Paul, you must start to see the big picture about what we can and can't realistically do.

This is a genuine trigger for me...

But it is not an OCD trigger is it? You are objecting a 'term' which is widely and commonly used on all OCD forums, not just this one. We have tried to explain to you it is not an attack on your sexuality yet you can't see that.

But if it is an OCD trigger, I must point you to the forum terms and conditions which you were asked to read and accept before joining.

Please also be aware that by joining this Bulletin Board you will be exposing yourself to potential OCD triggers. It is not acceptable to accuse any user or moderator of triggering your OCD, self-harm or making you ill. We recommend if you do find yourself easily triggered by comments not to use the forums.

This form of OCD is and will continue to be discussed, with or without the term 'gay fear', I am happy to suggest people use a different term if you or anyone can provide an alternative suggestion which fits thew bill. So because this form of OCD will continue to be discussed YOU need to decide if the forum is helping you enough to stay around and face the triggers or if it is causing you more harm than good and if that is the case do not use the forums. This is a message I am not just saying to you, I have said it several times over the years to people getting upset by certain OCD topics.

In life we have to take responsibility for our own actions and if these threads or forum are upsetting you, you have to decide what is best for you. You can not expect 2745 other people to change the forum just for you when the term you are offended by is not actually offensive.

But it would be interesting to see what would be allowed if someone posted "black fears" or such like.........certain posters on here have openly insulted me.. when i was trying to have a decent good mannered discussion albeit i was angry sometimes...

You hit the nail on the head, you have approached some threads in an angry and arguably aggressive manner, so people will be equally as confrontational back. However, this is the second time you have made such a comment and last night I invited you to point these users out to me and the threads and I will review them with my moderating team and if someone as been insulting to you, we will act. You are very much a valued member of the forum and we will protect you as much as anyone if we need to.

i am not going to be the only one offended by this term and rather than resolving the issue i think it is merely being avoided as skillfully as possable.

Once again Paul you are missing the point. If we wanted to avoid this issue myself and my mod team would either delete this thread, lock it or just totally ignore it. We are engaging you and have invited you to help provide an alternative solution but instead you just want to use the thread to attack other users who disagree with you and the moderators for not agreeing with every word you say and backing you.

This thread is proof that we are not ignoring the issue and happy to discuss it to see if anyone can provide a good alternative for the term 'gay fear'.

[Guest ppyvabw]

Hi ppyvabw,

Hope I spelt that right? I can't believe how heated the conversation got last night. I logged in just to have a read and all that was going on :confused1:

I do have hocd as it is called. I've been battling with it for nearly 10 years and it is wearing me down. I'm trying not to battle with it anymore. After all they are just thoughts ha ha ah :clapping: they are not real, so hard to believe isn't it?? How are you doing today?

Miep :original:

Hello. ppyvabw is the user name i used to have on the university computers, its just easy to remember. Im not too bad today. Ive decided to try doin some self directed behaviour therapy. Soemone gave me some exercises to try which ive been doin for a few days and they seem to work ok ish. Today as ive walked in town ive tried to label men from 1 to 10 on how good looking they are. It seems to take the edge of the thoughts a bit but not sure if its the right thing to do. Ile see how it goes. Don't know wheter I should do the same for women cos they cause me to get upset as well, but this isn't really the right thread to discuss it so PM me if you wish.

I hope paul is not getting upset about comments i made on a thread about a month ago, which were taken as being homophobic and which i apologised for, because they weren't meant to be. They were made in haste when i was cross and worried and were not aimed at gay people but were aimed at the media coverage of homosexuality which is a trigger for me.

Edited November 20, 2006 by Guest

[Guest marky1982]

Bloomin' heck I been away for the weekend and it's all been happening!

I don't find the term "gay fears/gay OCD" etc offensive at all...there is no term of abuse or derogatory remark about gay people in that term and so I don't understand how that can be construed as offensive.

As I've said before this term refers to people who have anxiety about being gay not out of prejudice but because it is the opposite of who they really are (as all types of Pure O are).

ppyvabw - I think the exposure exercise you've come up with is excellent - by purposefully exposing you to the thoughts and anxiety you're really fronting up to your OCD. It's really tough as it's almost like a forbidden train of thought but it's the right idea.

Edited November 20, 2006 by Guest

[Guest ppyvabw]

ppyvabw - I think the exposure exercise you've come up with is excellent - by purposefully exposing you to the thoughts and anxiety you're really fronting up to your OCD. It's really tough as it's almost like a forbidden train of thought but it's the right idea.

except it don't allways work, as i discovered this afternoon in my lecture. Theres a very good looking guy in the lectures and its sent me into another spiral of depression the instant i thought of it. Managed to control it this morning but not this afternoon.

[Guest marky1982]

It won't always work but the idea is the more you do it the more it does

[Guest matt]

why don't we call gay fears, "the artist formerly known as prince"?

lol

there is a serious point here which is OCD, people who have problems with "finding their sexuality" or "gay rights" have about a million forums and websites to air their views on.

This is not the place to get hung up on a description, which is

Gay --- Homosexual

Fear---- a distressing emotion aroused by impending danger, pain, etc., whether the threat is real or imagined; the feeling or condition of being afraid.

Now if we are going to direct the blame for those words and their discription then should it not be directed at the Oxford English Dictionary

Now there are many many other discriptions that people could have used that are not in the english dictionary that are offensive so lets just be glad that everyone is respectfull and not using them.

I have the fear of "the artist formerly known as prince" but I also fear that the real "artist formerly known as prince" will now get offended

I guess you can't please all of the people all of the time

[Guest paulstriker]

I am posting here for the last time.

Still feel very upset by the adverse treatment i received here and from ocd uk.

Just wanted it down for the record... i think it has become like many places on earth... a tight knit little community.... and even here a person can be marginalised.... many a time i needed to post here after the disagreement i had here recently, but feel totaly unable now to feel i will be taken seriously.

I am very hurt .

There must be some people somewhere who just dont see things as text book cases... and actualy sees how an individual real man on the ground feels.....my feelings were just pooh poohed on here.

i just dont care any more, i have had some tough **** to deal with in my life this is small fry. painful though it is.

[Biccy]

I am posting here for the last time.

Still feel very upset by the adverse treatment i received here and from ocd uk.

Just wanted it down for the record... i think it has become like many places on earth... a tight knit little community.... and even here a person can be marginalised.... many a time i needed to post here after the disagreement i had here recently, but feel totaly unable now to feel i will be taken seriously.

I am very hurt .

There must be some people somewhere who just dont see things as text book cases... and actualy sees how an individual real man on the ground feels.....my feelings were just pooh poohed on here.

i just dont care any more, i have had some tough **** to deal with in my life this is small fry. painful though it is.

paul

sorry you feel that way its a shame i am sure you have alot to offer the users

please doont let a disagremnt on on thread stop you from continuing to post on here

take care

biccy

[Rachie]

Hi Paul,

I'm sorry you feel this way. I honestly find it hard to know what you mean, though, as I do not believe you have been marginalised at all. You are always welcome to post here. A disagreement over one issue does not mean your views and experiences are invalid, and we are committed to helping all of our forum users equally.

If you do leave us, I wish you the very best of luck in your fight against OCD, but I really would urge you to think again.

Take care,

Rach xx

[Guest Lizbeth]

Dear Paul,

I'm very sorry to hear you feel unable to post. As I have expressed on the board and privately, none of us would want to make you feel marginalised or ignored and I have every respect and sympathy for the experiences you have lived through. I would urge you not to look at this disagreement as a personal attack on yourself or your beliefs. Your opinion is entirely valued but it may not always be agreed with.

I hope you will feel able to post again and remain part of our community because I strongly believe it has a lot to offer.

Take very good care,

xxJadexx

[Ashley]

Still feel very upset by the adverse treatment i received here and from ocd uk.

Paul,

Lets get the record straight, OCD-UK allowed you to express your opinion on your own thread, you only feel upset because nobody else agreed with what you were saying, but I and the moderators gave you the opportunity to express your opinion, so please do not say you recieved adverse treatment.

The fact of the matter is, 'a fear of being gay' is OCD and we can not stop people talking about that just because it upsets you. Be realistic, do you want us to delete a thread every time someone talks about being gay upsetting them?

[Guest paulstriker]

Paul,

Lets get the record straight, OCD-UK allowed you to express your opinion on your own thread, you only feel upset because nobody else agreed with what you were saying, but I and the moderators gave you the opportunity to express your opinion, so please do not say you recieved adverse treatment.

The fact of the matter is, 'a fear of being gay' is OCD and we can not stop people talking about that just because it upsets you. Be realistic, do you want us to delete a thread every time someone talks about being gay upsetting them?

For the record.. you are very simplistic in your analysis of the situation.......I suggested another term for this ... and at no point did i think that anyone should stop posting re;this particular ocd........it was only the wording which upset me and still does.... it cojures up bullying and prejudice from my past.... now it may not be very important to you , as you havent lived thru the hell i have, but it just so happens to be important to me!

Whats the use, its always the same..

[Ashley]

For the record.. you are very simplistic in your analysis of the situation.......I suggested another term for this ... and at no point did i think that anyone should stop posting re;this particular ocd........it was only the wording which upset me and still does.... it cojures up bullying and prejudice from my past.... now it may not be very important to you , as you havent lived thru the hell i have, but it just so happens to be important to me!

Whats the use, its always the same..

Paul, we are more than happy to listen to alternatives, but the one you suggested was too broad and could have referred to people with any form of sexuality OCD which would not accurately describe this particular form, but by all means if we can come up with a compromise alternative I am sure we would all be willing to help introduce the term.

You keep talking about the hell you have lived through, I don't know you, or know your life, but then you don't know the hell that the other 2800 forum users have gone through. OCD-UK provide a forum for people with OCD, we have to do what we think is best for the majority, not one user. That may sound like I am having a go at you, I am not, it is just the reality of the service we provide.

[Guest paulstriker]

Paul, we are more than happy to listen to alternatives, but the one you suggested was too broad and could have referred to people with any form of sexuality OCD which would not accurately describe this particular form, but by all means if we can come up with a compromise alternative I am sure we would all be willing to help introduce the term.

You keep talking about the hell you have lived through, I don't know you, or know your life, but then you don't know the hell that the other 2800 forum users have gone through. OCD-UK provide a forum for people with OCD, we have to do what we think is best for the majority, not one user. That may sound like I am having a go at you, I am not, it is just the reality of the service we provide.

So why not call it sexual identity fears?

[Ashley]

So why not call it sexual identity fears?

Why not indeed, that certainly could work, but you must understand if someone writes a thread titled 'gay fear' or 'fear of being gay' we can not stop that.

[Guest paulstriker]

Why not indeed, that certainly could work, but you must understand if someone writes a thread titled 'gay fear' or 'fear of being gay' we can not stop that.

SO if i wrote a post in capitals intitled "BLACK HATE"(i hope i will be excused i merely cite an example)

you would never stop that thread after the initial posting?

[Ashley]

SO if i wrote a post in capitals intitled "BLACK HATE"(i hope i will be excused i merely cite an example)

you would never stop that thread after the initial posting?

Yes because that is a racist comment. At no point as anyone on this form written GAY HATE, that would be homophobic and that person would be dealt with by the moderators.

It is totally different to say 'fear of being gay' and many of those people who write that will have gay friends and it is their OCD that is the problem, not the fact they have anything against gay people.

Because of your thread I have discussed this with several gay friends (who dont have OCD) and not one of them said they would have been offended by the term 'gay fear' if it was in relation to OCD. I have also discussed the issue with a leading OCD expert, so for you to say that OCD-UK have dismissed your concerns is unfair and unjust.

But instead of asking what OCD-UK can do for you, why not ask what you can do for OCD-UK?

[Guest paulstriker]

Yes because that is a racist comment. At no point as anyone on this form written GAY HATE, that would be homophobic and that person would be dealt with by the moderators.

It is totally different to say 'fear of being gay' and many of those people who write that will have gay friends and it is their OCD that is the problem, not the fact they have anything against gay people.

Because of your thread I have discussed this with several gay friends (who dont have OCD) and not one of them said they would have been offended by the term 'gay fear' if it was in relation to OCD. I have also discussed the issue with a leading OCD expert, so for you to say that OCD-UK have dismissed your concerns is unfair and unjust.

But instead of asking what OCD-UK can do for you, why not ask what you can do for OCD-UK?

You constantly miss the principle.........i could be in a room with 1000 gay people and not one would understand me and besides i never fully intregated into the "gay world"

ok then if i suggested the words "BLACK FEARS" , "english fears", IRISH FEARS. chances are someone will wonder why this is... and might feel even more on a limb...... even though they wont post it here............

Are you totaly sure of EVERYONES... opinion on here?

[Biccy]

You constantly miss the principle.........i could be in a room with 1000 gay people and not one would understand me and besides i never fully intregated into the "gay world"

ok then if i suggested the words "BLACK FEARS" , "english fears", IRISH FEARS. chances are someone will wonder why this is... and might feel even more on a limb...... even though they wont post it here............

Are you totaly sure of EVERYONES... opinion on here?

hi paul

i think that would be ok to post that if its like the term being discussed an ocd fear then i see no harm in it

after all thats what we are doing discussing our ocd arent we.

take care

biccy

[Guest paulstriker]

hi paul

i think that would be ok to post that if its like the term being discussed an ocd fear then i see no harm in it

after all thats what we are doing discussing our ocd arent we.

take care

biccy

cheers biccy...... :a1_cheesygrin:

[Ashley]

Are you totaly sure of EVERYONES... opinion on here?

Paul, I am not sure what that is meant to mean, but I allowed your thread to remain so that we could get people's opinions on the matter, that is what this thread was for, to give you the opportunity to put your opinion across and allow others to join the debate.

Remember, I have been running OCD Forums for over 7 years now and you are the first person to bring this issue to my attention, and we do have a big gay base on the forum, so I am sure someone would have let us know before now had the term 'gay fear' been offensive. But like I said, thats why I wanted to let your thread stand so we could get people's feedback.

besides i never fully intregated into the "gay world"

Forgive this if this is a too personal question and you do not have to answer this but I am trying to understand. This whole issue you have about the term 'gay fear' more to do with your own sexuality then, that you don't feel able to integrate with the gay world as you put it?

[Guest Footprints]

I think this is really sad. We should be a community who supports others, and if its fear of being gay its gay fears nothing offensive there. I dont agree or like the term POCD being used for abuse fears but sometimes we have to be adults and understand people are entitled to refer to their OCD however they need to. How can you understand when this type of OCD obviously doesnt affect you? I had fears that I was gay when I was younger and I understand that the important thing here is not the terming its the suffering these people go through. Surely you can handle people calling it that instead you are making it an environment people will be scared to open up in for fear of antagonising you. The terminology isnt about you its just that, terms used to described this hellish illness, you have OCD you should understand

xx

Edited December 3, 2006 by Guest