on being ‘ex-gay’

My closet was papered over with ‘ex-gay’ propaganda. Yes, they’re generally well-meaning, yes, it’s a way of being hopeful—in a fundamentalist-approved sort of hope—but it’s ultimatly damaging and isolating. Twenty years of hiding beneath the ‘ex-gay’ moniker did nothing but savage me with guilt, shame, and an overwhelming background coloring of sadness and defeat.

I am not so certain there really is such an entity as an ‘ex-gay’—at least not in the sense that “once I had a certain orientation, and now I do not.” People closet. People find out that they really aren’t attracted to the same sex. People experiment, then happily live straight lives. But if God created you gay, then I don’t think it’s going to be a pleasing sacrifice to tell him he’s made a horrible mistake and to make you something different—no matter what your well-meaning churchy friends (whom you love) tell you (because they themselves want to believe it).

For any Christians who struggle with their orientation and are encouraged to do so by the existence of the ‘ex-gay’ movement, I recommend you peruse the following material before diving into any therapy.

• Founders of Exodus International apologize

• Same apology, but in terms of inventing the concept of ‘ex-gay’

• Beyond Ex-gay—an online community for survivors of the ‘ex-gay’ experience (they’ve also got a growing list of formal apologies from former leaders of the ex-gay movement)

• Videos, etc. from the 2007 ex-gay survivor’s conference

• An older article (2004) on the history, uneffectiveness, and damage caused by ex-gay therapies

• A personal account of one’s ex-gay experience, and the recovery therefrom

• Ex-Gay Watch—just an overall interesting and useful site

~ by flayed Hypatia on 23 February 2008.