While speakg Sgapore at a semar sponsored by Foc on the Fay, I was asked the qutn: What about ex-ex-gays? Do their existence prove that is really impossible for people to change their sexual orientatn?
Contents:
- FORMER 'EX-GAY' LEARS DENOUNCE 'CONVERSN THERAPY' IN A NEW DOCUMENTARY
- MY SO-CALLED EX-GAY LIFE
- WHAT COM AFTER THE EX-GAY MOVEMENT? THE SAME THG THAT CAME BEFORE.
- MILO YIANNOPOULOS SAYS HE IS ‘EX-GAY,’ WANTS TO REHABILATE ‘NVERSN THERAPY’
- WHAT ABOUT EX-EX-GAYS?
- WHY ARE HOMOSEXUAL ACTIVISTS SO AAID OF “EX-GAYS”?
- EX-GAY IS HERE TO STAY
FORMER 'EX-GAY' LEARS DENOUNCE 'CONVERSN THERAPY' IN A NEW DOCUMENTARY
* o ex gay *
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. 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.
MY SO-CALLED EX-GAY LIFE
The LGBT movement is terrified to let ex-gays e "out of the closet." Why? Bee the existence of ex-gays prov that... * o ex gay *
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.
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.
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. 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.
WHAT COM AFTER THE EX-GAY MOVEMENT? THE SAME THG THAT CAME BEFORE.
My life as an ex-ex-gay man. * o ex gay *
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.
MILO YIANNOPOULOS SAYS HE IS ‘EX-GAY,’ WANTS TO REHABILATE ‘NVERSN THERAPY’
For 11 years, the Tth Ws Out webse aggrsively attacked those who claimed to be ex-gay, along wh dividuals and anizatns that supported ex-gays. Last month, Wayne Ben, the founr of Tth Ws Out, announced that he was closg shop bee, he claimed, “we acplished our major goals.” What, exactly, were those goals? * o ex gay *
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?
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.
WHAT ABOUT EX-EX-GAYS?
The gay, lbian, and bisexual people once renounced their queerns but then realized sexualy isn't somethg you jt slough off. * o ex gay *
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.
WHY ARE HOMOSEXUAL ACTIVISTS SO AAID OF “EX-GAYS”?
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. 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. 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.
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.
EX-GAY IS HERE TO STAY
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. 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.
" 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. 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.