Ex-Gay Watch

PFOX publicly declares that it favors tolerance for gays and exgays.

But PFOX’s own Yahoo-based e-mail discussion and “support” list, advertised on the front page of its web page, tells a different story:

In dozens of messages every month, several parents and peers of gays vent their anger at their gay relatives and friends, and claw for ways to make virtues out of discrimination, prejudice, and hatred of all things that they deem “liberal.” PFOX list moderators make no effort to discourage the rants.

Here’s a brief, very typical glimpse. Typos were made by the letter-writers. When reading the messages of these parents and friends such as these, it becomes apparent before too long that the only “gay right” they support is, as PFOX puts it, “the right to choose change.”

– Mike

From: John [no last name; e-mail address omitted by XGW]
Reply-To: ex-gay@yahoogroups.com
To: ex-gay@yahoogroups.com
Date: May 20, 2005 11:51 AM
Subject: [ex-gay] Discrimination

I find that so much of what we see in today’s world in the ultra liberal whatever feels good do it socciety, absent any absolutes, is in reality an attempt to change the meanings of words. This has a profound effect on society, and it always seems to be to all our detriment.

Here is my catch on what the word “discriminate” is being used for in the world of the liberal (this goes FAR beyond the discussion of SSA)..

Webster’s New Politically Correct Collegiate Dictionary

Discrimination: noun a.) Unwillingness to participate in another’s misguided thoughts, b.) refusing to further another’s agenda, c.) adhering to a belief system that has moral absolutes d.) compassion and love, viewed through the skewed prism of a person’s bent and damaged view of life and love.

Meanwhile TRUE discrimination marches on…unseen and unknown by so many.

From: Natalie [no last name; e-mail address omitted by XGW]
Reply-To: ex-gay@yahoogroups.com
To: ex-gay@yahoogroups.com
Date: May 21, 2005 10:02 PM
Subject: Re: [ex-gay] Discrimination

Yeah, John.

The thing about discrimination is that it’s GOOD!

Discrimination simply means that you are sorting out the differences. As long as it is used in moderation, it is fine. The gay world loves to stereotype things and say that all straight men are like this….all gay men are like this…. and of course they won’t admit at all that not only are they discriminating but they are taking it a level higher and are unwilling to see that discrimination can only be good to an extent. Just like any other tool, you must understand and respect it’s limits or it will make things worse. We all know that even old ladies can be terrorist, but the thing is they are far more unlikely to be. But in today’s politically correct world, they will randomly pick old ladies who are native to this country out of a crowd, but they ignore all the foreigners walking by her who look like they come from the middle east. Anyway, the same thing happens in the gay community as well. I think we need to be aware that we cannot just try to win the battle in the gay arena. We need to get to the roots of the problem as well. One of the reasons all this political correctness is so powerful in our country is because the liberals knew how to undermine us. They started simply with taking prayer out of schools while preaching soft principles of political correctness. If we are just shooting at the gay community but don’t get involved with teaching out children, voting, etc, then we will lose. We must go for the foundation, get morals and absolutes back in our countries through as many avenues as we can. Onward Christian Soldiers…

Natalie

Because of a deluge of spam in the past couple days, I’ve turned on comment moderation, which means that readers may comment as follows:

1. You may comment on any post immediately by signing in via TypeKey.

2. You may comment on a post without signing in, but your comment will not appear until someone at XGW has cleared it.

Obviously, it’s better if you can sign in via TypeKey, but some people have had difficulty registering or signing in, especially via AOL. If you have any difficulties with TypeKey, please e-mail me at editor /at\ exgaywatch.com and describe the problem you are having, and the browser that you use.

Sorry for the inconvenience. As time permits, I will try to make time to implement a spam blacklist and a couple other steps that would allow unmoderated comments to resume.

Alert reader Scott Hutcheson brought a story of the gay-teen-suicide of Jeffrey Price to my attention. Excerpts:

His battle, involving his sexuality and his depression led to two suicide attempts, five stays at psychiatric wards and a constant feeling he let his father down. Just when Jeff seemed to find some comfort within, his life was ended in May 2004 by what police call an accidental self-inflicted gunshot wound to the face. [paragraph] Although the existence of a “gay gene” is a battle still fought between the religious, the political, the scientific and the homosexual, many researchers and gay people believe they are born gay. Jeff’s mother believes so too. She said her son was gay, even if he tried to date girls. She feels his failure to convert to heterosexuality only compounded his depression.

For all of the spiritual guidance that the church brought to Jeff, his inability to convert to a heterosexual lifestyle was to him just another form of failure, his family said.

“Please understand why I chose to die,” he wrote. “I have suffered way too much. I would have suffered the rest of my life, so I had no choice at all … No matter what, no one could have helped. I was still gay and no one could change it.”

Not that another testimony of a gay-teen suicide would make any difference to Melissa Fryrear at Focus…

Soulforce’s recent protest at Focus spotlighted testimony of Mary Lou and Bob Wallner, parents of a lesbian daughter who killed herself after enduring years of arrogant demands for “change” in “mind and attitude” from Mary Lou, based on beliefs derived in part from Focus on the Family.

Fryrear’s belittling response to Mary Lou and Bob Wallner:

Melissa Fryrear, Focus on the Family gender issues analyst, said White’s suicide allegation is untrue. A former lesbian, Fryrear has ministered to ex-gays for more than a decade. While she agreed some homosexuals are suicidal, she strongly disputed the reason given for it.

“From my vantage point,” she said, “the people that I found were suicidal are those who thought they were trapped in homosexuality, who thought they had to live homosexually. And so they actually had been filled with hope when we shared with them that, ‘No, you can come out of this.’”

Fryrear essentially turns around and blames gays for promoting suicide by somehow denying people hope for “change.” This response totally ignores any claims made by the Wallners which is insulting, demeaning and downright ugly. I doubt another tragic loss, this time Jeffrey Price, will have any effect on her darkened heart.

I’ve read Stephen Bennett’s blog entry about an inappropriate booklet found by antigay activists a Boston-area sex-ed program. (Previous XGW coverage.) I’ve read Bennett’s quotations of GLSEN and public officials, the blog comments, and the linked news articles:

Boston Herald, May 18
Boston Herald, May 19
Boston Globe, May 19

Some quick observations:

• The booklet’s wording does seem to be directed inappropriately at youth, despite Fenway Community Health’s claims.
• As for claims that the booklet is pure pornography, I note that antigay activist Brian Camenker, of the Article 8 Alliance, is only showing the public a few offensive pages from the book, so I can’t determine whether the booklet, overall, is as offensive as what Camenker is spotlighting.
• I see no apology or retraction from Bennett, Camenker, Throckmorton, and the other antigay activists behind the current scandal, for their effort to blame GLSEN for the action of some pathetic idiot at Fenway Community Health.

If I have more thoughts later, I’ll add them here.

Addendum, May 20: Bennett, Camenker, Throckmorton et al may be reluctant to share their own agendas for sex education for a reason: Few Americans would sympathize with these gentlemen if it were publicly known how extreme some of their closest allies are.

The Washington Post on May 19 profiled Michelle Turner, one of Throckmorton’s allies in a battle to overturn comprehensive abstinence-plus sex education in suburban Washington, D.C.

Post reporter Paul Duggan offers a flattering look at Turner, a divorced-and-remarried Mormon. According to the Post, Turner has exercised total control over her children’s access to friends, culture, and the media, ensuring that they are never exposed to TV, movies, music or people that she deems objectionable. This includes a TV device that automatically mutes televised speech and substitutes a caption containing her own selected words.

Now, it seems, she wishes to extend that control — much of her strict Mormon way of life — over the public-school children of Montgomery County, Maryland.

Conversion-therapy themed art film Fixing Frank (2002) will be showing at the Laemmle Sunset 5 for the week beginning May 20th. If you don’t know what the Laemmle Sunset 5 is then you’re either not gay or not in SoCal.

Oh and Long Beach Pride is this weekend and yours truly will be staffing the ExGayWatch booth. Ok just kidding we don’t have a booth but I’ll definitely be cruising scampering about all weekend.

Mike did an excellent job of discussing Throckmorton’s reaction to a GLSEN brochure in his previous post. Today I noticed Stephen Bennett joined the fun at the Agapepress. On first reference Bennett [the individual] is described as a “former homosexual.” On second reference Bennett and his organization, Stephen Bennett Ministries, are described:

Bennett is the executive director of Stephen Bennett Ministries, an organization that works to educate the public about the dangers of the radical, extremist homosexual agenda being carried out all over the U.S.

I’m not making that up. That is word-for-word the only description of Stephen Bennett Ministries given in today’s Agapepress article. Where’s the mention of ex-gays you ask? Good question. Can the Agapepress at least remember to pretend Bennett’s ministry is supposed to be about ex-gays? The AFA is being awfully open here about admitting ex-gay ministries such at Bennett’s are more concerned with battling happy-healthy gay Americans than actually ministering to ex-gays.

Anyone wishing to discuss this matter with the editor of the Agapepress may email them here.

Exgay movement pundit Warren Throckmorton protests sex-ed literature that was allegedly distributed at Brookline High School on April 30 at an event hosted by GLSEN Boston.

Throckmorton calls the literature “pornography” — and it’s not difficult to see why he would call it that: Excerpts from the booklet Little Black Book: Queer in the 21st Century contain pictures of penises — some exposed for artistic purposes, some to demonstrate the application of a condom.

While I have some serious disagreements with this booklet (I will get to that in a moment), I don’t have a problem with explicit pictures and frank language in sex-ed literature for adolescent and post-adolescent males:

• Sex is, after all, the topic.
• The pictures do not portray sex acts.
• Healthy sexual development and smart decisionmaking requires that men become comfortable with the sight of their bodies.
• Here’s a dirty secret: Even Christians use the f word to describe intercourse. Some male Christians even use a sexist c word to describe “vagina.” So the frequent use of a b word to describe the anus is, quite simply, an honest use of the common language in a context that is, by definition, adult and sexual. Should sex-ed literature promote respectful language? Absolutely. But not exclusively, given the topic and the audience. Sex-ed experts seem to agree that frank language is sometimes more effective at promoting healthy behavior than polite or clinical language.

I also object to a misrepresentation made by Throckmorton.

He complains, “Contrary to public health warnings about the dangers of risky sexual behaviors, this booklet glorifies the riskiest of behaviors and then suggests that the students get tested for STDs every three to six months.” But that claim is not reflected in the booklet’s content. The booklet clearly spells out the risks of dangerous sexual behaviors — without burying the dangers in encyclopedic statistics.

All that being said, I am disturbed by the booklet’s insults against abstinence; its treatment of boyfriends as mere sex objects, perhaps picked up in a park; its failure to acknowledge any ethical decisionmaking; and its promotion — among minors — of bars as an alternative the only social outlet besides Internet chat rooms.

So, Throckmorton’s objections are not without some merit.

[Addendum: The antigay web site that is hosting pictures of the booklet has only posted a few out-of-context pages that depict explicit photos and portray sex-ed educators as encouraging youth to explore bars and to use condoms when having sex. If the booklet details specific STDs; cautionary or ethical considerations to think about; or social alternatives to bars and Internet chat rooms, then the antigay web site is not sharing them with its readers.]

Unfortunately, Throckmorton misleads as often as he leads. According to Throckmorton’s press release, “These descriptions of bars suggest where adults can pick up minors for illegal sexual encounters.”

That is not what the booklet suggests; it (unwisely) recommends bars as a place to socialize. Assuming these bars are legally operated, these bars card and reject minors at the door. (I’ve always been carded at bars, on the rare occasions when I go to one.)

For reasons that he does not explain, Throckmorton seems less concerned about underage alcoholism than the imagined danger of minors being molested at bars by gay adults, whom he seems to assume are pedophiles.

(Hat tip: QueerDay)

A resolution is being proposed at this year’s Southern Baptist national convention, demanding Southern Baptists investigate their local public school systems and withdraw their kids from any school that allows a gay/straight alliance to meet, discusses sexual orientation in class, or implements an anti-bullying program inclusive of sexual/gender minorities.

The resolution organizers imply, but do not explicitly state, that the measure enjoys support from these pundits of the exgay movement:

Peter LaBarbera, founder of Americans for Truth and Executive Director of the Illinois Family Institute,

Linda Harvey, President, Mission America, Columbus, Ohio

Robert Knight, program director, Concerned Women for America

Dr. Jeffrey Satinover, M.S., M.D., Department of Politics, Princeton University

Dr. Warren Throckmorton, Associate Professor of Psychology, Grove City College

The American Family Association is rallying consumers to think twice before their next shopping trip, and then write letters to Wal-Mart demanding that the retailer discriminate against its gay employees.

(And, in the same AFA news briefing, PFOX complains that the National PTA keeps rejecting the antigay parent group’s efforts to put scientifically unbalanced literature on exhibit at PTA conventions. PFLAG won the National PTA’s favor with its opposition to bullying; PFOX opposes antibullying programs.)

From an interview in the April edition of the American (Anti)Family Association “Journal.” (Hat tip: Freedom Of….)

Exgay activist Stephen Bennett says:

But overall, the media ignores our claims to have left the homosexual lifestyle. And this is all based upon the demands of the National Gay and Lesbian Journalist Association, which has provided a stylebook to everyone in the media, telling them what language to use when addressing the issue of homosexuality. And this influential organization tells the media not to give any credence to the claims of ex-homosexuals.

That claim appears to be false (and Bennett got the organization’s name wrong, to boot). Bennett cites no incidents where the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association has actually said anything about exgays. Furthermore, the stylebook supplement is available here as a PDF file. Its only reference to exgays is this glossary definition:

“‘ex-gay’ (adj.): The movement,
mostly rooted in conservative religions,
that aims to change the sexual
attraction of individuals from samesex
to opposite-sex.”

Bennett appears not to have checked his facts. And he neglects to disclose his own work assignments on behalf of… the American Family Association.