A pet peeve of mine is calling anti gay bigots homophobes. They do not literally have a fear of gays. They dont have a phobia of gays. They dont go to sleep at night in fear of gays. There is no ****ing phobia for the vast majority of people with whom with the insult is directed to.
Exactly. People with arachnophobia damn near faint and/or have a panic attack when they see a spider. That doesn't happen to anyone when they see a homo. Or at least I've never heard of that. If anything, calling other people homophobes might actually make the user of said word a homo.
The term Homophobe was coined in the 1960's to describe people's irrational fear of homsexuality's attack on traditional life - man, wife and kids family set up, Christian values, and the real unease, disgust, and sometimes actual fear, some felt towards homosexuals. It was also used to describe a heterosexual man who may genuinely fear being outed as gay. In these regards, the etymology of the word makes sense. But, yeah, today with Homophobe meaning more the prejudices that some people may have towards homosexuals, the word really doesn't fit the meaning.
