I Went to Church Camp to 'Pray the Gay Away'

Contents:

• 5 THGS I LEARNED AT A 'PRAY AWAY THE GAY' CAMP
• FORMER 'EX-GAY' LEARS DENOUNCE 'CONVERSN THERAPY' IN A NEW DOCUMENTARY
• ‘PRAY AWAY THE GAY’ HAS GONE AWAY. WHY ARE GOVERNMENTS TRYG TO STOP IT?
• THIS TEENAGER HAS BEEN FORCED TO A GAY NVERSN MP WH NO PE
• RELATIV LOOK TO EE TEEN WHO WAS SENT TO ALLEGED 'PRAY AWAY THE GAY' MP
• PRAY THE GAY AWAY?: THE NAMG PROJECT
• DON’T ‘PRAY AWAY THE GAY’ - WE’RE ‘BORN PERFECT’
• KATY PERRY SAYS SHE 'PRAYED THE GAY AWAY' AT J MP
• NETFLIX’S ‘PRAY AWAY’ DOCUMENTARY WILL REMD YOU THAT GAY CONVERSN IS STILL GOG ON

5 THGS I LEARNED AT A 'PRAY AWAY THE GAY' CAMP

"Wh my first weeks therapy, I was told every other gay person on Earth had been executed.... By the end of the so-lled 'treatments, ' I believed the ernment was lookg for me bee the gays had brought AIDS to Ameri and that I now had this disease ragg through me.

" That is, they assumed that bee he was gay, 's bee his ntrollg mother and adbeat dad had nfed and irreparably trmatized his genals. In fact, they uldn't fd any trma to blame Sam's homosexualy on at all.

FORMER 'EX-GAY' LEARS DENOUNCE 'CONVERSN THERAPY' IN A NEW DOCUMENTARY

4 They Physilly Torture You For Beg Gay.

Later ssns would clu pper heatg ils, needl my fgers, and electric shocks, " all while Sam was shown gay porn. Antos777/iStock/Getty Imag Of urse, no one explaed why they had a stockpile of gay porn on hand.

‘PRAY AWAY THE GAY’ HAS GONE AWAY. WHY ARE GOVERNMENTS TRYG TO STOP IT?

Obvly, spe the old sayg, you n't "heatg-il the gay away. In fact, he got so ed to reprsg his te self that, even after he me out, he wasn't entirely sure how to be: When he got to llege and first enuntered the gay muny, he immediately "me out a ball of glter.

" He embraced a sparkly, Freddy Mercury-stage-show-liftyle bee he saw a bunch of out-and-proud homosexuals and thought that was how was done. "I'm very flamboyant, and that's partly bee of how I was troduced to the ia of other gay men existg....

I found out what a gay person looked like, and realized that was how I was supposed to act. 2 There's A Reason Some Gays Are So "Flamboyant".

THIS TEENAGER HAS BEEN FORCED TO A GAY NVERSN MP WH NO PE

Go to a hardware store on the day of the gay pri para and you might hear an old du wh a beer gut lament, "Why do them gays have to be so flamboyant?

The vast majory of homosexuals are -- shocker -- jt people. But if you see somebody sportg an outlandish stume, 's not about makg homosexualy look fun to help "turn kids gay" (if Sam's gayns uld survive electroshock torture, then we're pretty sure another kid's straightns n survive a few paras and some sequ boas); 's about showg closeted gay kids that homosexualy isn't tomatilly a lifetime of misery. 1 Both Fah And Homosexualy Can Be Equally Intolerant.

I'm the middle ground: From some fah muni, I'm attacked for beg gay. From some gay muni, I'm attacked as beg Christian.

RELATIV LOOK TO EE TEEN WHO WAS SENT TO ALLEGED 'PRAY AWAY THE GAY' MP

Fally some mon ground between tolerant homosexuals and tolerant Christians: tolerance!

For more sir perspectiv, check out 5 Reali of Beg Gay a Country Where It's Illegal and 6 Shockg Reali of the Secret 'Troubled Teen Indtry'. It's a movement that's born out of a larger culture of homophobia and transphobia that still persists the majory of Christian church today. It wasn't until the suici of his iend, who was also part of the "ex-gay" movement, that he reevaluated everythg.

Interview highlights clu extend web-only answers and have been eded for length and clary: Interview Highlights Thomas on how he joed the "ex-gay" movement and Exod Internatnal I was out of the closet the '80s.

PRAY THE GAY AWAY?: THE NAMG PROJECT

They also had a group for the gays, and unrneath all of that olns there was this toxic theology that said that you need to overe homosexualy.

Stolakis on what the ex-gay and nversn therapy movement looks like today Conversn therapy and the ex-LGBTQ movement has always been practiced lolly. It's bee very lennial-driven bee there are younger people who've grown up homophobic and transphobic environments who are ready and willg to take the place of people like Randy. This was the first gay uple I'd ever seen on TV and was that moment I realized, "Well, sh, I'm gay.

I was tght that choosg to be gay was wrong, vile and agast God: "Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve. I foced on why was wrong to be a homosexual, searchg for advice to transform myself. After we were done, I explaed to the other boy that I wasn't gay.

DON’T ‘PRAY AWAY THE GAY’ - WE’RE ‘BORN PERFECT’

I had so eply ternalized the homophobia that my pastor spewed, I was bld that everythg I did was normal and healthy.

I sent her a Facebook msage sayg, "I'm gay, " admtg to someone for the first time the thg I uld barely adm to myself. " My mom asked, "Are you gay?

" I then told her I was gay.

KATY PERRY SAYS SHE 'PRAYED THE GAY AWAY' AT J MP

My iend Ryan said that when I left, the other kids gossiped about me, sayg, "Thomas is gay now! The pastor talked about needg to save the sancty of marriage at all sts, advotg agast supportg gay marriage.

NETFLIX’S ‘PRAY AWAY’ DOCUMENTARY WILL REMD YOU THAT GAY CONVERSN IS STILL GOG ON

This was siar to the stance outled earlier Mike Pence's 2000 ngrsnal mpaign webse, advotg that:"Congrs should oppose any effort to put gay and lbian relatnships on an equal legal stat wh heterosexual marriage... Oppose any effort to regnize homosexuals as a 'discreet and sular mory' entled to the protectn of anti-discrimatn laws...

Several years after my self-imposed exile om the church, their stance on homosexualy was still rigid. When my iend Ryan fally me out, he was told, "He uldn't be a Christian if he was gay, " and was asked to, I'm livg New York Cy and gog to school Greenwich Village, the first person my fay to attend llege.

I'm enjoyg beg the part of the cy where the gay rights movement started and veloped--where there are more hot men than one young twk n handle.