Guided Imagery: The World Turned Upside Down

A guided fantasy designed to help participants understand the everyday
realities of homophobia and heterosexism

Written by Bianca Cody Murphy and Gary Drake and modified by
Mark Reed, Western Illinois University, 1996


"I'm going to read to you what is known as a guided fantasy. You'll be asked to imagine a world very different from the way the world is right now. Pay attention to your reactions while I'm reading this--whether they be in the form of a thought, image, emotion, or a sensation in your body--allow these feelings or images to pass through your mind, don't try to change them or suppress them."

"Consider reversing the world order as we know it. Think of the world's population composed almost entirely of gay and lesbian people. Only 10-12% of the entire population is heterosexual. Think of it as always being that way, every day of your life. Feel the ever-presence of gays and lesbians; the non-presence of heterosexuals. Absorb what it tells you about the value of being gay and lesbian or heterosexual.

Recall that almost everything you have ever read in your life used only gay and lesbian characters and descriptions, virtually ignoring any reference to heterosexuals. The overwhelming number of personalities on radio, in films, and on television news, commercials, and series are presented as gay or lesbian.

There have been just a handful of openly heterosexual legislators elected to national office in the history of this country. Gays and lesbians are the visible leaders, at the center of power. And rightfully so, as they have a stable character and more responsibility to be the guardians of social order. Only gays and lesbians are allowed to freely enter the military to defend our nation. At every opportunity, military officials discharge and court-martial hard-working and patriotic heterosexuals.

Consider that, long ago, before the use of alternative semination by gays and lesbians, the promiscuous sexual activity of heterosexuals violated social order and natural laws through irresponsible over-population. Not to mention the moral implications÷men actually inserted their penises into women. How disgusting. These violations gave rise to contempt for heterosexuality, and all who engaged in this abomination became outcasts. They were called...

Breeders! Weirdos! Barbarians! Freaks!

These are the names that freeze the hearts of heterosexuals. They were used as disparaging terms throughout history, even adopted by schoolchildren and used as playful insults. These terms mean you are different, unacceptable, an outcast. No "normal" person would want to associate with a heterosexual, let alone be one.

Recall how fearful you were of playmates who called you BREEDER in teasing fun. They didn't even know the real meaning of the word, but you did. And so you learned to be distrustful and wary of everyone to prevent anyone from learning your terrible secret, the most horrible secret of all: you were attracted to a person of the opposite sex.

Remember that your entire adolescence was spent learning gay and lesbian social behavior; the dating rituals, social events, and every lesson in socialization was gay and lesbian oriented. You desperately wanted to appear normal, so you went to the high school prom with an attractive gay or lesbian to avoid suspicion. You may have even kissed or had sex with this person to prove you were normal--all the while you were secretly thinking about your forbidden heterosexual infatuation.

For a while, you may have believed you were the only heterosexual in the world--you felt so alone, so distant from other people. In time, you met someone else like you. Cautiously at first, because you could be wrong, you began to develop a friendship and that friendship turned to love. You were ecstatic--you wanted to tell everyone you knew how lucky you were. But you couldn't. You had to keep it a secret from your family, neighbors, co-workers, and boss, or you could have been evicted, denied financial support from your parents, excommunicated, or fired. And no matter how happy you were, you never forgot that you could be physically attacked for any public display of affection, even hand holding.

There are statutes outlawing many sexual behaviors practiced by both gays and lesbians and heterosexuals, but in practice, they were only used to prosecute heterosexuals. Although you may be a church goer, or have an intimate relationship with a higher power, your minister uses your own loving God to condemn you to hell.

You want to make a commitment to the person you love, but there is no legal way to sanction that commitment. Even if you live together for fifty years you will have no legal right to visit your partner in the intensive care unit of the hospital, to make emergency medical or legal decisions, to keep your foreign partner from being deported, to make funeral arrangements according to your partner's wishes, or even inherit mutual property without family survivors contesting it.

Perhaps the most tragic thing of all is that you can never be yourself when in the company of most of the people you know. You cannot tell them how you feel, what you did last night, the joys you've experienced in your new relationship, your dreams for the future, or the deep pain you feel when they unknowingly make hateful remarks about you. Why can't I be myself is the question you keep asking. Why can't they accept me for who I am? Perhaps if they knew the real me, they would understand that heterosexuals aren't nasty or degrading creatures. Maybe if they got to know me they wouldn't shiver with disgust at the thought of me loving someone of the opposite sex. But they don't want to know me. If they did, they'd see I'm a real human being, not a thing, a stereotypical label. I wish they would try to understand me.

Consider now, for a moment, the tensions and anxieties you might experience from having to confront these pressures. You might, like tens of thousands of heterosexual teenagers, commit suicide every year because of their sexual orientation. Or you might simply become clinically anxious or depressed and require therapy. The therapy, of course, would be administered by a gay or lesbian therapist who has been trained to perceive all your symptoms as relating to the cause of your underlying psychological conflict, your heterosexuality. Group therapy is recommended, but you are the only heterosexual person in the group. The gay or lesbian leader will ask you to express your deepest feelings. What will you say?"

When you have finished reading, pause for a least 20-30 seconds to allow participants to digest what they have heard, then ask them to pair up or form small groups of no more than 3-4 persons and answer this question: "What are you experiencing?" After 5-10 minutes, lead a discussion of the whole group by asking these questions:


As participants answer these questions, you might hear responses which suggest that lesbians or gay men only experience fear, anxiety, pain, self-hatred, etc. If you seem to be getting only these types of responses, ask the group some of the positive, self-fulfilling, and exciting aspects of being gay, lesbian, or bisexual.

As for questions #2, participants may find it challenging to vocalize the benefits heterosexuals would experience if homophobia were eliminated. Eliminating homophobia is generally thought to be in the self-interest of gay, lesbian, and bisexual people, not heterosexuals.

But many social scientists believe that heterosexuals will be more effective in their struggles to eliminate oppression and homophobia when they act out of their own self-interest as opposed to doing it for the benefit of "the other". Therefore, it is critical that heterosexuals consider how homophobia hurts them, and how it is to their benefit to eliminate homophobia and heterosexism.

Some examples of the benefits to heterosexuals are: