The aforementioned narrative has persisted for decades and impacted how many view the LGBTQ+ community to this day. However, perhaps its most interesting aspect is how it’s permeated into different types of media. More specifically, the genre of horror. 

It’s worth mentioning first that there’s a long-standing connection between queerness and the annually celebrated day of horror; Halloween. Historically referred to as “bitches Christmas” by members within the community in the ‘50s and ‘60s, it allowed many to dress up and express themselves in a time period where they would have been otherwise  punished. Furthermore, many queer people today feel a kinship towards the “otherness” displayed by typical Halloween monsters. 

However, not all associations between queerness and Halloween are positive. It was also a time for the community to be further demonized by the public. This was especially common in the duration of and aftermath of the HIV/AIDS epidemic; a period of incredible personal and public turmoil for the queer community. As hundreds of thousands died as a result of the disease, heightened visibility resulted in heightened violence and messaging. One example of this are “Hell Houses”; haunted houses orchestrated by churches on Halloween that used dramatized depictions of sin in order to scare their audiences. In a 1997 article published by Associated Press, journalist Ron Harris specifically mentions one Hell House in California that depicted the funeral of an AIDS victim. When questioned, the pastor who created Hell Houses noted that “Nobody said that the church is supposed to be tolerant… Homosexuality is perverse. It is wrong.” 

The pastor's words are, unfortunately, the tone that most horror media in the 20th century took when approaching its queer or queer-coded [1] characters. Instead of reflecting the genuine joy that horror brought to queer people, most horror media that included queer themes were homophobic or transphobic in nature, serving only to further harmful stereotypes. In other words, many villains of 20th century American horror media are a reflection of the association of queer people with perversion and sacrilege that was popular at the time.

Winner of a 1951 Halloween drag competition • Digital Transgender Archive

Movie scene depicting AIDS-related Hell House attraction • Hell House (2001)

References 

[1] Kim, Koeun. “Queer-coded Villains (And Why You Should Care).” Dialogues @ Ru, 2017. Dialogues @ Ru, https://dialogues.rutgers.edu/images/Journals_PDF/2017-18-dialogues-web_e6db3.pdf#page=164.