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Nadal (2013) defined sexual‐orientation microaggressions as brief, everyday insults and invalidations that communicate heterosexist and homophobic slights toward gay, lesbian, bisexual, and queer individuals. These microaggressions occur across social and physical locations—nobody is immune. Common examples involve comments in the classroom or schoolyard. For instance, a gay adolescent was frequently made to feel uncomfortable when fellow classmates described silly or stupid behavior by saying “That's gay.” The hidden message is that being gay is something negative or deviant. In another example, during a conversation among a group of male fraternity brothers, one guy said, “I love you man,” followed by “No homo” as a way to reassert his heterosexual masculinity. The hidden message is that it is not okay to be gay.

Other examples often are evident in health care settings. In a mental health counseling context, for example, a lesbian client reluctantly disclosed her sexual orientation to a straight male therapist stating that she was “into women.” The therapist indicated he was not shocked by this disclosure because he once had a client who was “into dogs.” The microaggression involves the implication that being a lesbian is abnormal and akin to bestiality.

In response to burgeoning scholarship on microaggressions and research addressing their effects on targets, critics have emerged. We have observed three common misunderstandings among critics about microaggressions theory and research: (a) making mountains out of molehills, (b) everything's a microaggression in this climate of political correctness, and (c) your analysis is flawed. We describe these below and also refer readers to Monnica Williams’s (2019) incisive article.

Critics have accused researchers of exaggerating the detrimental impact of microaggressions. As we explain throughout this book, microaggressions are constant and continuing experiences among members of marginalized groups in our society. If they happened just once or twice in a lifetime, perhaps targets could laugh or shrug them off. However, as Essed (1991) and others have suggested, these subtle exchanges are daily experiences. They are commonplace. Their cumulative nature assails the self‐esteem of targets, produces anger and frustration, depletes psychic energy, lowers feelings of subjective well‐being and worthiness, affects sleep duration, produces physical health problems, shortens life expectancy, and leads to suicidal ideation (Hollingsworth et al., 2017; Nadal, Griffin, Wong, Hamit, & Rasmus, 2014; Nadal, Wong, Griffin, Davidoff, & Sriken, 2014; Ong, Cerrada, Lee, & Williams, 2017; Solórzano et al., 2000; D. W. Sue, Capodilupo, & Holder, 2008; Williams, Neighbors, & Jackson, 2003; Wong‐Padoongpatt, Zane, Okazaki, & Saw, 2017; Yoo & Lee, 2008).