Ex-Gay Watch

Here is a typical letter I receive from those who have “successfully” completed Nicolosi’s Reparative Therapy. This just came into my box today from an article I was mentioned in here http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061116/NEWS01/611160322&template=printart on Thursday November 16, 2006.
____________________

Dear Joe,

Thank you for your article. I am one who went to therapy with Joe Nicolosi. I can tell you that I was fortunate to have found him.

While you don’t agree, is there possibility in your thoughts for those for whom it does work? Those who choose, for whatever reason, that that lifestyle is not one for THEM?

Furthermore, what is the threat? There are 30,000,000 gays in this country, according to the 10% formula frequently used for determining percentages. If there are 30,000 individuals working in reparative therapy nationally, that would be a huge number. I think it is more like 10,000. So that is 3000 to 1. What is the risk. Gays are going to believe and act and do what they want. Is there no room to allow for those, for whatever reason, choose not live the so call gay lfiestyle?

Signed,

What the heck

My response:

Dear What the heck,

I am not sure where you get the impression that I am against those like yourself who choose not to live the gay lifestyle. Nothing in that article mentioned anything like that.

I have helped many homosexual men choose to live heterosexually through therapy. They do not change their orientation just their lifestyle. I have no problem with those like yourself who choose heterosexuality.

But since you raise the issue I will tell you my stance on Nicolosi’s work:

The problem I have with Nicolosi’s work and those in his area of work is the hate toward gays. Even you say, “the so called gay lifestyle” as if you are diminishing it. I have read every word that Nicolosi has published and he says things like, “there is nothing gay about being homosexual”. That is hateful and offensive.

Now if he said, “For the men I treat there is nothing gay about being homosexual” that would be different. But he consistantly bashes and puts down the gay life as if it is inherently pathological and troubled which it is not.

If you or others choose to live heterosexually and no longer have self-hate than more power to all of you.

If the rest of us choose to live our lives as the gay men we were meant to be then it is offensive for anyone to come forward saying there is something wrong with that.

Again I have no issue whatseover with what you have done in terms of living your life heterosexually as long as hate and self-loathing. is kept out of it toward yourself and others. That would make room for us both.

Warmly, Joe Kort
http://www.joekort.com
www.joekort.com

Hi Everyone,

I just wanted to share with you that on Tuesday, April 11, 2006 I will be the expert psychotherapist on the Montel Show on Mixed Orientation Marriages when one spouse is gay and one spouse is straight. The show’s focus was on what to do with couples who want to stay married and do not want to leave.

For more information go to www.montelshow.com during the week of April 10, 2006 to read the description for 4/11/06.

For more information on straight spouse networks go to www.ssnetwk.org.
Read more…

It is my hope that this book might be used to challenge those who use the “gender impaired” argument to promote the ex-gay movement. Yes gay men have issues around gender but that does not make them gay–or ex-gay for that matter!

This book turns the expression “a man among men” into a love story.

For Immediate Release: December 2, 2005
Contact: Jeff Theis, Publicity Manager
212-242-8100 ext. 38 / jtheis@alyson.com

10 Smart Things Gay Men Can Do to Find Real Love
Release date: January 2006
Softcover • ISBN 1-55583-898-7
Alyson Books

Do you always end up with Mr. Wrong? Are you constantly dissatisfied with your intimate relationships? Has the passion between you and your partner fizzled after just a few months? In his groundbreaking new work, best-selling author and gay-affirmative therapist Joe Kort reveals his own Top Ten list on how you can make the best possible choices in finding and keeping a partner. Among them…
Read more…

How Tony Orlando and Dawn Saved My Life
by Joe Kort, MSW

When I was in middle school, I fell in love with a singing trio that protected me for the rest of my school years. Nowadays, I have to wonder how Tony Orlando and Dawn (hereafter, TOAD became such a strong interest of mine and why I was so obsessed with them —and I do mean obsessed– throughout my young school years.

The 1970s were a time for iron-on decals pressed onto your t-shirts. I went crazy and purchased every TOAD decal and differently-colored shirt I could find and even wore a different one to school every day. My peers—and even some teachers—made fun of me for wearing them. But I wore them proudly. I would tape their audiotape their shows on my tape recorder and listen to them shows over and over at night until I fell asleep. When their albums and records went on sale, I was the first in line to buy them. I became a card-carrying TOAD groupie.

Even back in the 1970s, their biggest fans were adult women and the elderly. In fact, when the group finally reunited in the 1980s after a long break-up, their audiences’ average age was 65 and above. So why was I, a young gay male teenager, so taken with them? They weren’t even gay icons—except that by ironic coincidence, they renamed the second season of their TV show “The Tony Orlando and Dawn Rainbow Hour.” The opening segment to the show featured various rainbows as did the set.

You cannot get gayer than that! But I digress.

After much reflection, I’ve come to realize that at the tender age of 11, my very public, outspoken interest in TOAD drew my peers’ harassment and ridicule off my homosexuality and onto my love of TOAD.

I was laughed at, bullied, spat at, and beaten by my peers,(both male and female—and even some teachers—for being gay. I had effeminate mannerisms and, played only with girls. I was very much a gay little boy, and everyone knew it—even me.

In order to survive their childhood, children unconsciously make decisions on how to adapt to those who care for them—or neglect and abuse them. In my case, I now see, I made an unconscious decision to become obsessed with TOAD—to draw people’s fire toward that and not my homosexuality.. Let them heckle and abuse me over my love of TOAD, but bullying me over my homosexuality was too painful and traumatizing, and too close to my core.

Today I am a proud member of the TOAD fan club and yahoo Web site. Alerts from Yahoo and Google tell me everything that’s going on with them. It’s so much fun watching these three group members—Tony Orlando, Telma Hopkins and Joyce Vincent—sing together, then and now. They’re often criticized for their songs being mostly bubble gum and pop, and that they’re a group for the “older folks.” But say anything you want about this pop group, it will never change that for me, they were my saviors.

Recently they released a DVD of their 1970s TV series and have re-released their albums on CD. Now reunited, they and are coming out (no pun intended) with a Christmas album. I am in TOAD heaven! I cannot get enough, and if they decide to tour, I’m taking the first flight to wherever they perform their first concert together.

Who were your “shield heroes” from childhood and what did they mean to you? What do they mean to you still today? I would love to hear from you through email to tell me your stories to me at joekort@joekort.com.

An open letter to my 6th grade gym teacher which I mailed today. I believe as gays and lesbians we should go back and confront those who harmed us for being different in our childhood when we can and when it is safe to do. This letter is one way to do it. To not do this is to either carry the shame and trauma around from what others gave us or to take it out on others. I know that it is from experiences like my own–one of which is described in this open letter–that can contribute to those who stay in the closet and/or enter reparative therapy.

I read the _______ News today and saw the article about you. You were my gym teacher in sixth grade in 1975-76 when I was 12-years-old. I have actually never forgotten you.

The memory of you which stands out for me is of my walking into gym class late with my best friend and having the students burst into hysterical laughter from something you said to them before we walked in. I discovered later you told the class that you anticipated that Max and I would walk in together and that we were probably “fags”. A number of my classmates told me what you said to them prior to our entrance and it became a running joke toward me for the rest of my junior high school years. I remember this like yesterday it was so traumatic for me.

You could not have humiliated me more than what you did to me publicly amongst my peers. In my judgment what you did to me was cruel, insensitive and immature. You were an adult male authority figure who should have been protecting me—not hurting me.

In fact, Mr. _____, I was and am a gay male. I was probably in love with my best friend back then but did not know it. I did not know what being in love was and I certainly would not have known or understood what it meant to be gay. I was a young impressionable boy of 12-years-old and gym class was an over stimulating place for me as I was being sexually aroused having hit puberty and then put in showers and locker rooms with the very gender which aroused me. I was also not athletic at all so gym was nothing more than a nightmare for me.

Imagine for a moment if you were to put a heterosexual boy in a female locker room and showers. I think if you imagine that you can understand the enormous struggle I was having.

The one thing I took note of in the article is that you are retired. I am relieved to know that young children are no longer under your care and will not suffer at your hands the same thing I did. It caused me so much pain during such an important and difficult time of my life.

It really was a rotten thing you did to me. You are either the same man today that you were then and will just laugh off this letter or you will have some remorse for something you did to another human being who did not deserve being picked on by a guy like you! You didn’t even pick on someone your own size.

The shame I felt from what you did to me was really meant for you to wear and I hereby give it back to you with this letter.

Sincerely,

Joe Kort, MSW

Tell CNN to Cover The Facts About “Reparative Therapy”!
Joe Kort, MSW

This is from the PFLAG 7/28 e-newsletter. Please consider sending an email to the CNN folks listed at the bottom.

Last night CNN’s show Paula Zahn Now aired a story on “reparative therapy” organization Love in Action.

CNN completely ignored vital information on this issue. Here are some examples:

The story did NOT include statements by the American Medical Association and American Psychiatric Association denouncing “reparative therapy.”

The story did NOT talk about the virtually non- existent success rate of “ex-gay” programs.

The story did NOT discuss the serious emotional damage that “reparative therapy” can cause or the self-destructive behavior, including suicide, that “reparative therapy” can induce.

What did Paula Zahn’s story include? An interview of Love in Action director Reverend John Smid s trolling through a yard, extolling the virtues of his “ex- gay” program.

The story also included interviews with two young “Love in Action” graduates, one gay and one straight – making it appear to the viewer that the chances of success in reparative therapy are 50/50.

We at PFLAG know the chances of long-term emotional damage are very real for young men and women forced into “reparative therapy.”

We must tell the media to accurately and comprehensively report these facts!

Please send an email to the CNN employees listed below.

Tell them you expect them to report the facts and tell the truth about all issues, especially an issue like “reparative therapy” that endangers families across the country.

Please send your email to the following CNN employees and please send a copy of your email to tthompson@pflag.org:

Victor.Neufeld@cnn.com
Mark.Nelson@cnn.com
Debra.Goldschmidt@cnn.com
Deborah.Feyerick@cnn.com
Paula.Zahn@cnn.com

If you’d like to see the story, go to www.cnn.com and look for the video called Going Straight.

Warmly, Joe Kort

CRUISE CONTROL: A Book for Gay Men
by Robert Weiss, MSW, CAS
Review by Joe Kort, MSW
July 25, 2005

No, this book isn’t about how to control Tom Cruise—although he needs some, given his ignorant advice that no one should be on prescribed medication for depression. This is a long-awaited and much-anticipated book for gay male sex addicts.

After specializing in sexual addiction for over 20 years, finally I have a resource to give to my gay male clients struggling with sexual compulsivity. Twenty-five years ago, Patrick Carnes wrote his book, Out of the Shadows through a heterosexual male lens.

Following that came a book by Charlotte Kasl for sexually addicted women. And now, Robert Weiss, MSW—author, psychotherapist and a colleague of mine in the field of sexual addiction— does a fine job illustrating how this addiction manifests among gay men.

Sensitive to how the gay male community will receive this book, he makes it known quickly in Chapter One that he is not pathologizing gay sex and that “sexual addiction is not really about sex at all.”

This is important, because as a sexual addiction specialist myself, I often hear gay men dismiss the whole idea of sexual addiction as simply a bigoted ploy to further marginalize gay men and their sexual behavior.

Weiss defines sexual addiction in terms of what healthy sexuality is not about—namely, obsession, compulsion, trance-like-states, and repeated poor judgment for one’s physical, emotional and legal safety. Sexual addiction leaves the sufferer feeling lonely and ashamed, disconnected and isolated—the exact reverse of what healthy sexual expression will provide. As Weiss explains, “Anyone can experience negative consequences that relate to sex; bad things sometimes just happen. But sex addicts are risk-takers. The law of probability dictates that the more frequently you take risks, the more likely it is that you will reap severe consequences as a result of your sexual behavior.”

Cruise Control helps gay readers determine whether or not they are sexually addicted, why some gay men are at risk to become sex addicts, and what the compulsion is really all about. The second half of his book is about the recovery process—individually and with a partner. The partner also needs to recover from his feelings of betrayal and deceit at his partner’s behavior; his recovery process includes rebuilding trust.

Weiss’s book also addresses love addiction, which in the 1980s, was being used as a label for those jumping from one new relationship to another. Both personally and professionally, I thought they had gone too far and that the term addiction was losing its meaning.

But today, I understand exactly why behavioral problems involving sex, love and gambling are described as addictions. Individuals can become addicted to the internal pharmaceuticals that exist within us all, and which releases when we acting out certain behaviors. These internal mood-enhancers including adrenaline, phenylethylamine, and dopamine, provoke feelings of being high and euphoric. You literally are in an altered state, because your have released a host of internalized drugs into your bloodstream. In all too many cases, the release of these natural drugs becomes associated with the specific behaviors that triggered them. . The more risk, fear, and danger people experience, the stronger some of these chemicals become.

To this chemical high, add negative beliefs and shame about one’s self based on internalized homophobia, low self-esteem, poor body image (gay men do tend to strive for the perfect body), and you become vulnerable to a sexual addiction. Sex becomes the means for coping with (and distracting from) stress, so that daily life begins to be viewed through a testosterone screen.

Weiss addresses gay men’s increasingly widespread use of methamphetamine — “crystal meth,” or “Tina” — and how that highly addictive substance can accelerate or even provoke sexually compulsive behavior. This is a crucial part of his book for me, since I see crystal meth’s negative effects every day in my practice. Gay men coming to me after having risked HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases and ruined their lives, losing their partners, their jobs, often their families and even themselves.

Weiss argues that while individual psychological issues and a neurological predisposition to addiction contribute to sexual compulsivity, there are still cultural risks contributing to the gay sex addict’s continuous acting out. He states it is not homosexuality itself, or how we behave sexually as gay men. “Instead he writes “with a cultural background of dramatically greater sexual freedoms than those usually enjoyed by his heterosexual peers” … the urban gay man is in some ways a prisoner of his own freedoms.”

I recommend this book to every gay man who wants to rule out the possibility that he — or a potential partner — might be sexually compulsive. I also recommend it for partners of sexual addict is to learn about their own recovery process, knowing that they, themselves, have issues as well. Cruise Control should be on the bookshelf of every gay man as well as any therapist who works with gay men.

For more information on sexual addiction go to www.joekort.com and click on “Are You A Sex Addict?”

I was contacted by Penn & Teller last January, 2005, and asked if I conducted Reparative Therapy. I told them no and they asked if I knew of someone who did. Well I sent them to Richard Cohen of course knowing who Penn and Teller are and what they would do by featuring him.

Sure enough my partner and I watched Penn & Teller: Bullshit! on Showtime July 18. It featured Family Values and showcased Richard Cohen’s non-sexual MANLOVE advice!

They did not refer to Richard Cohen as Richard–but rather Dick. If you know anything about this show it very humorously illustrates things in our culture that do not make sense and they make fun of things very similar to the Daily Show with John Stewart.

If you can catch the show it is very entertaining. “Dick” really looked the part. It was very good exposure for the ridiculousness of Reparative Therapy.

In some weird way I feel proud of referring Penn and Teller to Dick Cohen.

Warmly, Joe Kort

This article at 365gay.com http://www.365gay.com/newscon05/07/071405childMurd.htm is an illustration of the damage that Reparative Therapy and the ex-gay movement does to children–particularly males.
In Preventing Homosexuality by authors and RT’s Joseph Nicolosi and his wife they encourage restrictive gender roles for the children. It is my strong opinion that this is gender abuse to believe that men and women should only act a certain way. It fosters this type of abuse that this father did to this poor child who is now dead!

Joe Kort, MSW

Insurances DO pay for Reparative Therapy!
by Joe Kort, MSW

I was recently asked how psychotherapists get paid for providing Reparative Therapy (RT) if most mental health organizations have identified it as an unethical and harmful form of treatment.

The way these therapists and treatment centers get around this is by using a diagnosis known as Sexual Disorder Not Otherwise Specified (302.9). This is in the DSM IV which is the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders Fourth Edition in the mental health field. These therapists also use depression and anxiety disorder diagnoses which insurance companies will pay for.

In other words, if a client comes in and want to “change” from gay to straight many therapists would say this person is “depressed” or “anxious” and give them codes for those mood disorders. Insurances rarely check to see what is contributing to the depression they simply want to know what they are paying for and monitor the depressive symptoms.

In terms of Sexual Disorder NOS, this diagnosis applies to the following individuals according to the DSM IV:

1) Marked feelings of inadequacy concerning sexual performance or other traits related to self-imposed standards of masculinity or femininity.

2) Distress about a pattern of repeated sexual relationships involoving a succession of lovers who are experienced by the individual only as things to be used.

3) Persistent and marked distress about sexual orientation.

So you can see that number three would cover those who do Reparative Therapy. The Sexual Disorder NOS diagnosis is in the DSM IV for those gays and lesbians who are closeted and struggling with coming out. It is used wrongly by those doing RT for those trying to “behave as heterosexuals”

It would be great to see a group of folks start challenging insurance companies demanding that they get more information on what Sexual Disorder NOS is being treated for.

Sadly, these RT’s could still use depression and anxiety disorders claiming that these folks need RT because their orientation is causing them their mood disturbances.

In truth as most understand that it is not the sexual orientation that is causing them distress but rather what is “done to them” regarding their homosexuality. Reparative Therapists simply continue the homophobic and heterosexist acts on these poor people and make a living from it.

Joe Kort