Why have all my boyiends turned gay? | The Spectator

Contents:

• MY EX IS GAY. HOW DO I NOT TAKE PERSONALLY?
• MY SO-CALLED EX-GAY LIFE
• ‘EX-GAY’ MEN FIGHT BACK AGAST VIEW THAT HOMOSEXUALY CAN’T BE CHANGED
• MY EX-GAY FRIEND
• WHAT COM AFTER THE EX-GAY MOVEMENT? THE SAME THG THAT CAME BEFORE.
• WHY HAVE ALL MY BOYIENDS TURNED GAY?
• WHAT ABOUT EX-EX-GAYS?
• FDG OUT YOUR SPOE IS GAY

MY EX IS GAY. HOW DO I NOT TAKE PERSONALLY?

It may not help you, but certaly helped me to take the mimosa-half-full outlook: Losg a lover bee he was gay (or straight, my se) absolv you of any of the blame. My mom is a problem solver, and the next day she hand me a stack of papers she had prted out om the Inter about reorientatn, or "ex-gay, " therapy. Joseph Nilosi, a clil psychologist California who was then print of the Natnal Associatn for Rearch and Therapy of Homosexualy (NARTH), the untry's largt anizatn for practners of ex-gay therapy.

Nilosi's rner office had emerald-green rpet and mahogany bookshelv led wh tl like Homosexualy: A Freedom Too Far and Homosexualy and the Polics of Tth. " Although I might never feel a spark of excement when I saw a woman walkg down the street, as I progrsed therapy, my homosexual attractns would dimish.

Until I had spoken wh Nilosi, I had rigned myself to the ia that, sirable or not, my life would have to acmodate the fact that I was gay. The other men-four or five altogether-were their forti and fifti and talked about their years the "gay liftyle, " which had yield only unhapps.

MY SO-CALLED EX-GAY LIFE

They were tired of the club scene, the dg e, the promiscuy; their relatnships didn't last; they plaed that gay culture was youth-obssed. I left the office wh a py of Nilosi's most recent book, Healg Homosexualy, and a worksheet that tegorized different emotns unr the brics of "te self" and "false self.

Another sheet illtrated the "triadic relatnship" that led to homosexualy: a passive, distant father, an overvolved mother, and a sensive child. The woman, Anne Plk, said that moltatn durg adolcence led her to homosexualy, but that she had been healed through the power of J Christ. My mother might not have so easily found rmatn about ex-gay therapy had the Christian right not planted this stake the culture ad appeared 23 years after the Amerin Psychiatric Associatn (APA) classified homosexualy as a mental illns.

A small group of therapists ntued to practice talk therapy that enuraged patients to see homosexualy as a velopmental disorr, but they remaed on the ge until the Christian right took up their e.

‘EX-GAY’ MEN FIGHT BACK AGAST VIEW THAT HOMOSEXUALY CAN’T BE CHANGED

Instead of fire-and-brimstone nunciatns om the pulp, the ex-gay movement allowed the Christian right to uch s nmnatn of homosexualy a way that seemed passnate.

Foc on the Fay lled s new ex-gay mistry Love Won Out and talked about healg and rg for ex-gay movement turned the rhetoric of gay rights agast self: Shouldn't ex-gays be able to pursue therapy and live the liv they want whout facg discrimatn? The two largt groups that provi ex-gay unselg are Exod Internatnal, a nonnomatnal Christian anizatn, and NARTH, s secular unterpart. Together wh the late Charl Soris, a psychiatrist who led the opposn to classifyg homosexualy as a mental illns, Nilosi formed NARTH 1992 as a "scientific anizatn that offers hope to those who stggle wh unwanted homosexualy.

Nilosi remas NARTH's most visible are no reliable statistics for how many patients have received ex-gay treatment or how many therapists practice , but the late 1990s and early 2000s, ex-gay therapy enjoyed a legimacy hadn't sce the APA removed homosexualy om s diagnostic manual. Whether or not the Christian right's alliance wh the ex-gay movement had nstuted a D-Day the culture wars, had succsfully challenged the prevailg ia that the bt choice for gay people was to accept themselv. I read one of Nilosi's books, Reparative Therapy of Male Homosexualy, that he tri to posn himself as a supportive father figure, typifyg the sort of relatnship that he believ his patients never had wh their own father.

MY EX-GAY FRIEND

While I still accepted Nilosi's unrlyg theory about why people were gay, I believed that all the talkg the world uldn't change me. When I left for Yale, my mother sent me off wh a warng: Were she to disver that I had "entered the gay liftyle, " my parents would no longer pay for my tn.

Based on 200 terviews wh ex-gay patients-the largt sample amassed-the study did not make any claims about the succs rate of ex-gay therapy.

What translated to the larger culture was: The father of the 1973 revolutn the classifitn and treatment of homosexualy, who uld not be seen as jt another biased ex-gay csar wh an agenda, had validated ex-gay therapy. Participants had been referred to Spzer by ex-gay groups like NARTH and Exod, which had an tert remendg clients who would validate their work. Spzer was drawn to the topic of ex-gay therapy bee was ntroversial-"I was always attracted to ntroversy"-but was troubled by how the study was received.

WHAT COM AFTER THE EX-GAY MOVEMENT? THE SAME THG THAT CAME BEFORE.

"Had there been no Bob Spzer, homosexualy would still have eventually been removed om the list of psychiatric disorrs, " he said. The need for that evince beme more prsg the early 2000s, when a dre of gay-rights bloggers began to sctize the movement, ready to expose any ht of hypocrisy.

Richard Cohen, the founr of PFOX (Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays and Gays)-tend as the ex-gay unterpart to PFLAG (Parents, Fai, and Friends of Lbians and Gays)-was expelled om the Amerin Counselg Associatn for ethics vlatns. Michael Johnston, the founr of "Natnal Comg Out of Homosexualy Day, " was revealed to have fected men he'd met on the Inter wh HIV through unprotected sex. Among them were Alan Downg, the lead therapist of JONAH (Jews Offerg New Alternativ to Homosexualy), who ma his patients strip and touch themselv ont of a mirror; NARTH member Christopher At, who was nvicted of "unlawfully, tentnally and knowgly [g] peratn of" a client; and Exod-affiliated Mike Jon, who asked a patient to take off his shirt and do ph-ups for movement also suffered several high-profile fectns.

WHY HAVE ALL MY BOYIENDS TURNED GAY?

John Evans, who had found the first ex-gay mistry outsi of San Francis, renounced change therapy when a iend mted suici after failg to bee heterosexual. Former ex-gay Peterson Tosno, who was volved the movement for 17 years, found Beyond Ex-Gay, an onle muny for "ex-gay survivors. " In 2007, Exod -founr Michael Bsee apologized for his role startg the as a rponse to the rurgence of ex-gay therapy, mastream profsnal anizatns also took a harr stance.

Judh Glassgold, the chair of the task force that produced the report, said the group found no scientific evince that ex-gay therapy works.

" The APA now tells s members they should not engage the the past few years, even Exod has begun to show cracks s support for ex-gay therapy. The group no longer talks about "Freedom om Homosexualy"-s motto-but about the nobily of ntug to stggle agast same-sex has also begun to distance self om NARTH. When asked about the possibily of gay people changg their sexual orientatn, Chambers-who'd once claimed that he knew of thoands of succs stori-said "99.

WHAT ABOUT EX-EX-GAYS?

I beme creasgly prsed but didn't go to mental-health unselg for fear that a well-meang therapist would rm my parents that I was livg the "gay liftyle. But the sprg of my sophomore year, the disparate parts of myself I had managed to hold together-the part of me that thought beg gay was wrong, the part that slept wh men anyway, the part of myself I let the world see, and the part that suffered silence-me undone.

FDG OUT YOUR SPOE IS GAY

While took years of unselg to disabe myself of the ias I had learned while unrgog therapy wh Nilosi, was the first time I enuntered profsnals who were affirmg of my sexualy, and the first time I allowed myself to thk was all right to be gay.