I survived a horrible childhood, which I won't discuss here, but suffice it to say that I have had to overcome my own seemingly insurmountable odds. You think that just because I'm straight, I "don't know, from the inside, what it is like to have feared honest self-disclosure at a tender young age about a matter that could prove emotionally or physically deadly," but that is not true. No, my issues did not pertain to my sexuality, but I had secrets to keep about myself/my family that were very damaging to do so. However, this is not about who has the "best worst story."
More to the point... I just do not see the correlation that makes one who has been the victim of discrimination more open-minded or more in touch with emotions than anyone else. In fact, people who've been victimized can be even more shut down emotionally. What I was taking exception to is the almost-blanket statement that LGBT people are just more open-minded and emotionally evolved than heteros. Perhaps they are when it comes to matters of sex, sexuality, sexual identity, gender, but not necessarily love and relationships, nor anything else. You seem to be asserting that, since LGBT people have had to struggle with the issues surrounding their sexual identity and coming out that it makes them more sympathetic and sensitive overall, and therefore more in tune with their feelings and emotional development. This is similar to when someone says that poly people are more evolved than mono people.
I am not saying that LGBT folks have not suffered at the hands and attitudes of others. I am not saying they haven't been treated unfairly. I am not challenging the idea that LGBT people have had to overcome many obstacles and deep hurts to accept and overcome any issue surrounding sex, sexuality, sexual orientation, identity, etc, including the risk of danger for doing so. I am simply saying that hetero people can be just as emotionally developed, evolved, sensitive, and in touch with their inner lives than anyone else, and can have struggled with similarly devastating or radically life-impacting issues. Different paths to self-knowledge and emotional development, but pain is pain, confusion is confusion, and loss is loss. People can be marginalized for any reason. It is part of the human condition to question who we are and what we're about, so gender and orientation doesn't make one more adept at doing so in general, though one's experiences may make one more adept at such inner exploration in a particular area of life and/or personal identity.
River, I've seen you scold members here when generalizations are made about differences between men and women. Someone who says something like, "Women are just more sensitive and compassionate than men are," often gets a rebuke from you. You would tell them not to generalize, that to do so is bullshit because there are plenty of sensitive, compassionate men out there and you are one of them. But now you're doing the same thing!
This branch of the discussion started when you stated that bisexual men are more sensitive and in touch with their emotions than straight men, and I objected to that because it's my experience that hetero men can be just as deep and emotional as you described. You said women are attracted to bi men like yourself probably because "we tend to embody the full range of human emotional responsiveness. Many women desire a quality of companionship which many or most men cannot offer, simply because they are caught up in lots of masculinity training (and perhaps also some biological traits) . . . we're just what the women generally want. We're kind, sensitive, thoughtful, tender, vulnerable, feeling..., but also tough and rugged and "masculine" when the situation calls for it." Now I know you weren't making a blanket statement about all bi men (surely there are many who are bi and not very emotionally responsive nor psychologically evolved), nor about all straight men, but your statement was an implication that most straight men tend to be less than fully responsive emotionally, and that they are not able to be kind, sensitive, thoughtful, tender, vulnerable, feelingful, while also tough, rugged and "masculine."
To me, this thinking paints a picture of straight men as mostly a bunch of unevolved, insensitive clods only interested in looking like tough guys. Geez, if Al Bundy is all I have to look forward to in my attraction to hetero men, I might as well throw in the towel now. But fortunately I have known many a straight guy who is not a cave man, and is all those things you say bi men are. I doubt they were all anomalies. All I am saying is that, while it is true that most men in our culture, gay, straight, bi, or whatever, have been taught what being a man and masculine is "supposed to be," just like women have been taught about femininity and being a woman, I don't think it's accurate to assume that one's sexual orientation determines how sensitive and able to "embody the full range of human responsiveness" a person is. You yourself point to experience rather than anything else as putting you in touch with those sensitivities (having experienced brutal forms of discrimination, for example). So, I say, it's experience, curiosity, and a willingness to challenge what we've been taught that I believe will make someone more open-minded and emotionally available than anything else.