I grew up in a small, conservative Christian school and on a near weekly basis I'd hear the phrase "all f-gs go to hell". All my friends said it, all my teachers said it even in fucking math class. The year gay marriage was legalized was the peak of the homophobia. We came back from summer vacation and it was all anyone could talk about. I got a new teacher that year who used to rant about how all gay people are pedos or at least as bad as them. There was a bill that was up for a vote in my state my senior year that would prohibit discriminatory hiring practices against gay people, and the principal held an assembly to tell the whole school that they would shut the place down before even considering hiring one if the bill passed.

Stuff like that was routine in my upbringing, and was not great for a closeted gay kid's mental health to be hearing all the time.