On Adolescent Boys’ « Natural Homophobia » : Emergence and Implications of Deterministic Explanations
Following the prevalence of homophobic attitudes from adolescent boys towards gay men, there is a tendency to presume they are a result of biological imperatives or fundamental psychic mechanisms. Some authors who have investigated the topic have come to the conclusion that these attitudes obey to the interests of sexual selection, that men are bound to develop intra-hierarchical conflicts in which a virile ideal prevails, that heterosexual desires requires the deployment of homophobia, that the fragility of masculine identity makes it inevitable, or that masculine identity formation rests on it. However, many critiques can be levelled at their analytical process, notably on the non-consideration of the diversity of data, as well as on the teleological leaps that are made. We would gain from making known a sociological perspective on the topic.