
So we have all seen this quote (usually falsely attributed to Morgan Freeman) and it bothers me. In a world where we have phobias concerning heights (acrophobia), dinner parties (deipnophobia), otters (lutraphobia), sunlight (heliphobia), objects situated to their right (dextrophobia) that people suffer from, there's only one phobia that we (apparently) get to choose. We can take the fear of poor cell phone coverage (nomophobia) seriously but fear of homosexuals makes you an asshole.
In reality we don't get to pick which phobias we have. I love the idea of flying but my acrophobia really gets in the way. It's even sadder because there are people who are genuinely homophobic that support gay marriage and have gay friends that they have to manage their phobia around. That's because despite the gut reaction that they have around gay people, they make a choice to suppress it. That's not being an asshole in my books.
So in my opinion shaming people for having a psychological condition that they can suppress but never eliminate is almost as bad as shaming people for having a sexuality that doesn't conform to your beliefs or preferences. I know it's too late to stop using the word "homophobic" incorrectly (we're actually talking about bigots after all), but what can we call people with genuine homophobia?
Disclaimer: I have the aforementioned acrophobia, arachnophobia, and androphobia to varying degrees. None of these are convenient in my day to day.