I am currently enrolled in a Psychology 101 class that I'm taking just to fill a Gen Ed for graduation. The class isnt that difficult, however all students in this class (several hundred I believe) are required to participate in 3-credit hours of psychology "experiments" that the department puts on. Kind of a pain, but you gotta do what you gotta do.
Today I went to sign up for one of these experiments with my psych-buddy Kristen. I met her the second class when i decided that I would get the guts to find a cute girl and sit down next to her. I made that bold move, we had some good (and awkward) conversation, and now she saves a seat for me each class :-) yeah... it actually makes me smile
Anyways, we both went to see what experiments were being offered. I just want to get this requirement out of the way so I was ready to sign up for anything that would fit my schedule. Some of them were already passed, but sure enough there was a 2-credit experiment going on tonight. Not very excited that I was actually committing to a 5:30 - 7:00 session, I just put my name on the list to get it over with. I didnt care enough to change it, but I did notice I had signed up for a study on "Human Thought towards Homosexuality." Oh great - they're gonna try to accuse me of being a conservative homo-hating radical.
I got to the room where the survey was being held. There were only a handful of people in there. After a brief description, we began this series of questions. We had to rate our response from 1 to 5 ("strongly agree" through "strongly disagree"). The first page started off with statements that I had somewhat expected.
Homosexuals are fundamentally the same as heterosexuals.
I had to agree with this because I know that we all fundamentally have a perversion that separates us from God. Theirs is just more visible and bothers more people. I need God as much as Lance Bass.
The next page threw me for a totally new loop. I knew that this survey was written from the perspective of liberal, pro gay-rights, religion-dismissing faculty at our school. I just had no idea how impossible it would be to answer the questions without supporting the homosexual agenda or looking like a complete radically-religious homo-hater. I mean, these statements I was supposed to agree or disagree with were ridiculous! I would agree with the first half of the question, but totally disagree with the second. One example:
To avoid destruction, our nation needs to return back to the laws of God, and those who do not follow these laws should be severely punished.
What?! If I agree then I'm supporting some kind of "witch hunt" for all homosexuals to burn them at the stake. If I disagree, then I believe that the laws of God aren't relevant and shouldn't be taken seriously. Most of the questions on the second 2 pages were very loaded like this. I was either
with them, or I hated them all and wanted them to pay for it. I added my own statement - "These questions are completely loaded." Of course I had to answer
strongly agree to this statement.
The last series of questions asked if I knew any homosexuals, how well I knew them, how often I attended a religious service, and if I would consider myself religious. Of course I also knew that they were gonna twist the facts that I know few gay people AND am strongly religious. This was their way to come to ridiculous conclusions about me like "I don't understand or care about homosexuals" or even "conservative Christians try to separate themselves from homosexuals because they are in sin." Of course neither is true, but the whole survey was obviously set up to come to these conclusions.
I suppose I should've expected this sort of liberal material from my public university, I just didn't think that my one chance to express my opinions in an unanimous survey could be twisted like I know it will be. I feel like I was being setup - but there was nothing I could do about it. Was it really worth the credit? I'm still trying to figure that out.
