Homophobia

I had to have two attempts at an article in the Times by Libby Purves on whether Boris Johnson was homophobic before realising I was more interested in the etymology than the opinion.

Homophobia was originally one of those hybrid words like television, part of the word having Greek origins (tele – distance; phobia – dread or abhorrence) and the other part Latin (vision, homo meaning man). It used to mean a dread or abhorrence of men.

Interestingly (I hope you find this interesting) in the latter part of the 20th century it changed to being all-Greek, and meaning dread or abhorrence of homosexuality, which itself comes from the Greek hommos meaning ‘the same’.

It appears to have changed its meaning again (but not its root) to ‘discriminating against or intolerant of homosexuality’, which is something a great deal different from being revolted by the concept; one could easily be the latter but not the former.

We need a new word: hommo-intolerant?