[Personal Essay] Why I No Longer Intify as Gay

Contents:

• MILO YIANNOPOULOS SAYS HE IS ‘EX-GAY,’ WANTS TO REHABILATE ‘NVERSN THERAPY’
• AUTHOR WHO ONCE EMBRACED HOMOSEXUALY EXPLAS WHY HE NO LONGER CALLS HIMSELF 'GAY' (INTERVIEW)
• ‘EX-GAY’ MEN FIGHT BACK AGAST VIEW THAT HOMOSEXUALY CAN’T BE CHANGED
• PULSE SURVIVOR SAYS HE IS NO LONGER GAY, HAS FOUND CHRIST
• JAGS' MAXEN IS FIRST MALE AMERIN PRO SPORTS ACH TO E OUT AS GAY
• AS A GAY MAN, I’LL NEVER BE NORMAL
• MILO YIANNOPOULOS CLAIMS HE'S NOW 'EX-GAY' AND VOTG HIS LIFE TO CATHOLICISM
• MY EX-GAY FRIEND
• [PERSONAL ESSAY] WHY I NO LONGER INTIFY AS GAY

MILO YIANNOPOULOS SAYS HE IS ‘EX-GAY,’ WANTS TO REHABILATE ‘NVERSN THERAPY’

Right-wg provotr Milo Yiannopoulos has e out as “ex-gay” – announcg that he “would like to help rehabilate what the media lls “nversn therapy” over the next , acrdg to a report. The 36-year-old Brish polil mentator, whose speech and wrgs often ridicule polil rrectns, social jtice and femism, clared himself no longer gay and “sodomy ee, ” he told LifeSe an terview. “When I ed to kid that I only beme gay to torment my mother, I wasn’t entirely jokg, ” he said.

“Of urse, I was never wholly at home the gay liftyle — Who is?

AUTHOR WHO ONCE EMBRACED HOMOSEXUALY EXPLAS WHY HE NO LONGER CALLS HIMSELF 'GAY' (INTERVIEW)

— and only leaned heavily to public bee drove liberals crazy to see a handsome, charismatic, telligent gay man rtoly celebratg nservative prcipl, ” Yiannopoulos ntued.

“As for the CHANGED movement, I gus bee they’re Californian they don’t see how funny their webse is, or maybe they’re dirty non-doms who thk God lov you more the gayer you act, but I was slightly makg fun of them wh that ptn, ” he said. Why I Don't Call Myself Gay, by Daniel Mattson. | (Photo: Courty of Carmel Communitns)Edor's note: Warng, this article clus graphic scriptns some rears might fd ll onelf "gay" is to shortchange sexual realy, says lay mister Daniel Mattson, who ed to intify as homosexual but now leads a chaste life spe havg same-sex a ndid new book tled, Why I Don't Call Myself Gay: How I Reclaimed My Sexual Realy and Found Peace, Mattson tails his story of growg up havg same-sex attractns the nservative Midwt and how he me to embrace homosexualy.

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

"The gay world was always a b bewilrg to me, " Mattson said an terview wh The Christian Mattson, thor of "Why I Don't Call Myself Gay: How I Reclaimed My Sexual Realy and Found Peace.

PULSE SURVIVOR SAYS HE IS NO LONGER GAY, HAS FOUND CHRIST

He was all but nvced he was gay upon visg a strip club an attempt to stir up some sexual aroal for a woman and end up talkg about garng wh one of the he fally cid to go ahead and have sex wh a man, he exprsed his rage toward relign as he head to Flt, Michigan, for the hookup he had arranged, which is scribed the documentary Dire of the Everlastg Hills.

Adalbert his hometown of Grand Rapids, he flicked off the church, shoutg "f--- you, God" later traveled to Chigo where he embraced homosexualy wh the rolve to fd a man wh whom he uld share the rt of his life. "That didn't f the [homosexual] narrative, " Mattson told CP. Am I gay?

JAGS' MAXEN IS FIRST MALE AMERIN PRO SPORTS ACH TO E OUT AS GAY

Ratzger's 1986 letter to the bishops "On the Pastoral Care of Homosexual Persons" explas that the Church do not view human begs terms of their sexual orientatn but stead as beloved children of God who are male and female. Intertgly, the Catholic Church's opn mirrored that of many openly homosexual ins jt a few s Gore Vidal rejected the ia that there was such a thg as a "homosexual" person, sayg was an adjective scribg a sexual act. Ain-Amerin novelist Jam Baldw who had romantic and sexual relatnships wh men likewise exprsed his disfort wh the word gay, sayg bothered the book, Mattson trac how the velopment of homosexual inty tegori were nstcted over time and how through strategic activism the public perceptn was shifted to regard sexualy primarily as an inty marker and not a sexual act.

AS A GAY MAN, I’LL NEVER BE NORMAL

Smh, 58, who says he believ homosexual behavr is wrong on relig grounds, tried to tough out. He spent 17 years a doomed marriage while battlg his urg all day, he said, and dreamg about them all recent years, as he probed his childhood unselg and at men’s weekend retreats wh nam like People Can Change and Journey Into Manhood, “my homosexual feelgs have nearly vanished, ” Mr. Smh is one of thoands of men across the untry, often known as “ex-gay, ” who believe they have changed their most basic sexual sir through some batn of therapy and prayer — somethg most scientists say has never been proved possible and is likely an men are often closeted, fearg ridicule om gay advot who acce them of self-ceptn and, at the same time, fearg rejectn by their church muni as tated oddi.

MILO YIANNOPOULOS CLAIMS HE'S NOW 'EX-GAY' AND VOTG HIS LIFE TO CATHOLICISM

Jerry Brown signed a law banng e of wily discreded sexual “nversn therapi” for mors — an asslt on their own validy, some ex-gay men feel. ”But many ex-gays have ntued to seek help om such therapists and men’s retreats, sayg their own experience is proof enough that the treatment n Bzer, 35, was so angered by the California ban, which will take effect on Jan. He was tormented as a Christian teenager by his homosexual attractns, but now, after men’s retreats and an onle urse of reparative therapy, he says he feels glimmers of attractn for women and is thkg about datg.

“I found that I uldn’t jt say ‘I’m gay’ and live that way, ” said Mr. Bzer, who plans to seek a doctorate psychology and bee a therapist ex-gays guard their secret but quietly meet support groups around the untry, sharg ias on how to avoid temptatns or, perhaps, broach their past wh a female date. Some choose celibacy as an improvement over what they regard as a sful gay life.

Whether they have gone through formal reparative therapy, most ex-gays agree wh s tes, even as they are rejected by mastream scientists. The theori, which have also been adopted by nservative relig opponents of gay marriage, hold that male homosexualy emerg om fay dynamics — often a distant father and an overbearg mother — or om early sexual abe. ”(While some women also stggle wh sexual inty, the ex-gay movement is virtually all male.

MY EX-GAY FRIEND

Spzer, publicly repudiated as valid his own 2001 study suggtg that some people uld change their sexual orientatn; the study had been wily ced by fenrs of the this summer, the ex-gay world was nvulsed when Alan Chambers, the print of Exod Internatnal, the largt Christian mistry for people fightg same-sex attractn, said he did not believe anyone uld be rid of homosexual Nilosi, a psychologist and clil director of the Thomas Aquas Psychologil Clic Enco, Calif., which he scrib as the largt reparative therapy clic the world, disagreed.

[PERSONAL ESSAY] WHY I NO LONGER INTIFY AS GAY

“I don’t believe that anybody is really gay, ” he said. “I believe that all people are heterosexual but that some have a homosexual problem, and some of the people attempt to rolve their nflict by adoptg a socpolil label lled ‘gay.

Nilosi said, many patients fd their homosexual urg S., 34, a rporate ntract officer Dallas, says he is among them. Jeremy, who did not want his last name prted to avoid embarrassg his parents, said that om his teens until three years ago he lived as a gay man, at tim havg sex almost daily.

Crics like Wayne Ben, the executive director of Tth Ws Out, which fights antigay bias, liken such therapy to fah healg, wh apparent effects that later fa also pot out that the failur of such therapy are seldom reported. Cameron Michael Swaim, 20, said he is the early stag of his stggle to overe homosexual sir. Swaim is unemployed and liv wh his parents Orange County, Calif., where his father is a pastor of the Evangelil Friends Church of the tried the gay life, but “ jt don’t settle wh me, ” he said, and ultimately cid “there’s got to be a way to heal this afflictn.