I’m sorry that we missed this last month:

Sacramento’s newsreview.com published a Nov. 27 puff piece about local ex-gay activities.

The article interviewed no former ex-gays, asked no speakers whether they or their peers remain predominantly same-sex-attracted, cited none of the ex-gay movement’s activities to deny equality to gay Californians, and informed readers of none of the mainstream mental-health community’s concerns about emotional, relational, and spiritual harm done by ex-gay “ministries.”

The article also falsely inaccurately described sexually flexible actress Anne Heche’s relationship with comedian Ellen DeGeneres as a “lesbian affair.”

The NewsReview article has a comments section. Please feel free to make constructive use of it.

Botswana’s Sunday Standard published a Dec. 13 story which begins by promoting the notion that heterosexual people can change their orientation to gay and then recruit other people into homosexuality.

The article cites only a single example: an unidentified woman who was “fed up” with abusive men and claims now to be lesbian even though she has only dated men in the past and she offers no indication of any previous attraction to women. “I can easily introduce one to the gay life and they will be hooked,” the woman says. The article adds, “She, however, is cagey and does not reveal whether she was introduced and trained in the homosexual world” — as if homosexuals lived in a different world than heterosexuals.

Caine Youngman, board president of Lesbians, Gays and Bisexual People of Botswana, tries to set the record straight.

He says there is a difference between heterosexual sex and being heterosexual, citing that homosexual people can indulge in heterosexual sex and heterosexual people can also practice homosexual sex but that’ not changing their sexual orientation. Youngman avows that his opinions are based on his personal experience, experiences of those around him, available literature and the confessions from different people.

“No, I do not believe that one can turn just like that. There are some institutions who call themselves “Ex-gay”. They believe they can turn gay people into heterosexuals. The results are questionable since some people say they just choose to ignore their emotions. I have a friend who was a member of such an institution who had to go under shock therapy as part of his transformation. He is still a gay man,” says Youngman.

Homosexuality and gay-rights groups are illegal in Botswana, and the media seem to be pressured by the government to apply an antigay spin to their articles. Besides spotlighting a confused, anonymous, and possibly fictitious woman, the article fails to ask a very basic and obvious question:

Is the Exodus Global Alliance aware of — and supporting — shock therapy in Botswana?

Citing past donations allegedly made by failed mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to pro-equality groups, the antigay parents and spouses group P-FOX on Thursday publicly — and quite seriously — demanded a share of federal bailout money.

In better economic times, the mortgage giants provided aid to countless special interests — liberal and conservative — in order to promote stable homes, foster care and adoption, and youth development. Now the agencies are being bailed out by U.S. taxpayers.

P-FOX offers no home, family, or youth services — in fact, it offers no services at all. The tiny and secretive organization’s annual budget averages less than $30,000. P-FOX refuses to identify its board members (though Family Research Council executive Peter Sprigg is known to have been one of them). P-FOX offers no membership benefits. Yet it is marketed by its few supporters as a group with growing membership (actual numbers are never disclosed) due to “thousands” of ex-gays who leave homosexuality “daily.”

P-FOX destabilizes families by encouraging mothers to harass, stigmatize, and ostracize not only their gay teen-age and adult son, but often the father who is recklessly blamed for a son’s homosexuality. P-FOX opposes granting children access to foster care and adoption at a time when many foster and adoptive parents are single or gay, and few two-parent heterosexual households are willing to accept minority or troubled children. Instead of giving children good homes, P-FOX persistently attempts to halt popular youth-development and comprehensive sex-education programs in Maryland and Virginia public schools.

According to Thursday’s press release,

Regina Griggs, executive director of Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays & Gays (PFOX), stated, “We support individuals’ rights to self-determination. We support families who have homosexual loved ones. We support those who have come out of homosexuality. We provide outreach and educate teens on same-sex attractions.”

To Freddie and Fannie, Griggs says, “We would like equal money. We want the same financial opportunity that gay groups enjoy.”

The first paragraph is blatantly inaccurate.

Since 1996, I have observed P-FOX supporting antigay discrimination, opposing factual sex-education and balanced presentations of religious viewpoints regarding homosexuality, and opposing legislative action against antigay murders and violent assaults.

• These activities do not, in any sane or logical fashion, qualify as support for “individuals’ rights to self-determination.” P-FOX redefines “self-determination” in terms of the ex-gay myth that people can choose their sexual orientation at any time. P-FOX supports a choice to deny and suppress one’s orientation, but not a choice to be sexually and spiritually honest.
• Furthermore, P-FOX’s online parental discussion groups regrettably do not “support families who have homosexual loved ones.” Despite criticism and high turnover, these e-mail and web-based forums cheer parents who angrily blame their spouses and schools — both for the fact that their teen and adult children are gay, and for the failure of ex-gay tactics to “change” sexual orientation.
• P-FOX offers no measurable support to “those who have come out of homosexuality.” That chore is handled (poorly, given its political distractions) by Exodus International.
• P-FOX does not “educate teens on same-sex attractions.” P-FOX tells teen-agers that their peers choose to be immoral, misinforms teen-agers about the pre-natal and early-life factors that determine sexual orientation, and warns antigay teen-agers and faculty that allowing any freedom of speech among gay teen-agers — or opposing bullying that specifically targets gay teen-agers — threatens their own freedom.

In a new documentary set to air on HBO next month, a disgraced evangelical pastor comes clean. “The Trials of Ted Haggard,” directed by US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s daughter Alexandra, was filmed with Haggard’s cooperation — and how.

You may recall that two years ago, Haggard stepped down from his post as president of the National Association of Evangelicals and was sacked as senior pastor of New Life Church in Colorado Springs after a former male prostitute alleged that the cleric paid him for sex and used illicit substances.

I have yet to see the documentary, but published reports say that Haggard speaks onscreen, speaks about his new life. The father of five remains in his marriage for the same of his children and apparently has been living with shame. While he doesn’t speak of his sexual improprieties in detail, he does admit to “sexual immorality” and says, “I really did sin.” Haggard tells of his longtime struggle with his same-sex desires, insisting that he never claimed to be heterosexual.

“The reason I kept my personal struggle a secret is because I feared that my friends would reject me, abandon me and kick me out, and the church would exile and excommunicate me. And that happened and more,” he says in the film.

He also reveals that while he purchased methamphetamine, he never used it.

Haggard’s wife Gayle speaks in the documentary as well, and offers what perhaps is the reason behind the couple’s participation in the production: “I know to restore the honor to our children is to help restore honor to their father.”

That may be a long, hard road. Right-wing Christian leadership isn’t treating Haggard with honor, and most GLBT people probably will say that a man who worked so hard against honorable treatment for us is not worthy of anything resembling honor. Many believe he’s getting his just deserts.

After the scandal broke, the Haggard family fled Colorado for Arizona, where the former preacher confesses thta he is having a tough time making ends meet as an insurance salesperson. “At this stage in my life, I am a loser,” Haggard says.

I suspect Haggard is a loser only if he does not come to grips with his reality and learn to embrace it. If he can emerge from this crisis a better human being, then he will deserve to be honored. He doesn’t have to abandon his family to do it: Many gay and bisexual people end up in marriages with heterosexual partners. (Exhibit A: Me.) Sometimes those marriages work; often they do not. But the real losers are the misguided ones who work to diminish others. The Religious Wrong is filled hypocrites who divide people and spead a message that does not include anything Jesus would champion — things like forgiveness, compassion, and acceptance without judgment.

Haggard could choose to re-up as a fundamentalist Christian soldier — or he could take another road, one that leads to justice for all of God’s children and could help him right the wrongs he committed. That second path leads to honor. At this point in his now-difficult life, the choice is his.

You know what? I hope he makes the honorable choice — and I wish him and his family well.

“The Trials of Ted Haggard” is scheduled to run Jan. 29 on HBO.

Updated at 7 p.m.
Ex-Gay Watch reports that Orlando, Fla.-based Exodus International has laid off two of its ex-gay outreach workers: Exodus Youth “analyst” Mike Ensley and bookstore manager Chris Stump.

Stump had only recently replaced the outgoing Kevin White in that position. It appears the move came just days ago, made necessary due to a serious reduction of donations being received by the ex-gay referral organization.

It comes as no surprise that Exodus is having budget concerns. The current world-wide economic crisis has hurt even large, well managed non-profits like Focus on the Family. Exodus may have made things worse for themselves, however, with the addition of a million-dollar mortgage for the new building they purchased last spring — bad timing to say the least. Exodus had previously leased a modest set of offices in Orlando but claimed in a newsletter that they were cramped and needed room for new staff.

Truth Wins Out has criticized some of Ensley’s anti-youth and anti-family commentaries. But most of these commentaries occurred in official Exodus and Focus on the Family publications that are edited and approved by top management. In other words, it’s his editors — not Ensley — who should be laid off or accept salary reductions if times are difficult.

The layoffs leave Exodus with a staff a bit more heavily weighted toward fund-raising and political lobbying instead of outreach to would-be ex-gays and their families.

I soon expect to hear that Exodus is subletting its overpriced and oversized office space — if they aren’t doing so, already.

Perhaps Exodus will one day become the new Kmart-Sears: a real-estate company that pretends to be a merchant of dime-store quality merchandise and suburban pop culture.

Another soldier in the anti-GLBT Christian army has left the battlefield. Paul Weyrich, co-founder of the ultra-conservative Heritage Foundation, is dead.

From the foundation’s blog:

Paul M. Weyrich, chairman and CEO of the Free Congress Foundation and first president of The Heritage Foundation, died this morning around 1 a.m. He was 66 years old. Weyrich was a good friend to many of us at Heritage, a true leader and a man of unbending principle.

Sadly, when he walked this earth, Weyrich was not such a good friend to his GLBT brothers and sisters. His “unbending principle” led him to work long and hard — using any means necessary, even deceit — for the continued stigmatization of the inclusive gay community.

As leader of the neoconservative Heritage Foundation, Weyrich became the point person for the fundamentalist/radical-Right takeover of the Republican Party. He personally served as a social-issues watchdog whose primary job was keeping anti-GLBT and anti-choice issues in the public eye. His reported ties to Nazi collaborators and neo-fascist organizations gave him dangerous access to federal agencies, including the Central Intelligence Agency. Through the Free Congress Foundation, which he led until his death, Weyrich played a huge role in formulating the plan to play upon ignorant people’s unfounded fears about gays and in using the GLBT community as the hook in fundraising, spreading propaganda and terrible lies, motivating the Christian masses to become grassroots activists, and recruiting right-wing candidates for public office. His work and collaborations with the late Rev. Jerry Falwell led to the establishment of the Moral Majority in 1979 and to the political polarization of the US between red and blue states.

Paul Weyrich may be gone, but the culture war that still rages and keeps GLBT Americans under society’s boot has much to do with everything he did during his career. After all, he fired the opening shots. We’ll hear much about his status as a “great American” and “conservative icon” over the next few days, but GLBT Americans are painfully aware that in terms of real American values — honesty, equality, justice for all — there was little that was great or iconic about him.

Bilgrimage offers a heartbreaking, first-hand account of an ex-gay nightmare: a Christian family virtually destroyed by the false promise of ex-gay cures and ex-gay myths about sexual orientation.

A friend recently discovered that his ex-partner of 20 years, who left to become ex-gay, had died a year earlier.

The ex-partner and his sister were raised by abusive preacher parents who battered, permanently scarred, and publicly humiliated the sister — not just for “fornicating,” but for doing it with a black man. When the ex-partner initially came out to the preacher parents, the father demanded surgery to remove the clitoris that (he knew for a fact) grows in gay men’s throats.

After leaving the friend to become ex-gay, the partner entered a doomed second marriage to his ex-wife. Since ex-gay programs and prayers don’t work, eventually the remarriage failed.

After that, ex-gay exorcism killed him. (Read More)

Bishop John Bryson Chane says:

Mr. Warren has been rightly praised for his efforts to deepen the engagement of evangelical Christians with impoverished Africans. He has been justifiably lauded for putting the AIDS epidemic and global warming on the political agenda of the Christian right. Yet extravagant compassion toward some of God’s people does not justify the repression of others. Jesus came to save all of humankind, and as Archbishop Desmond Tutu has pointed out, “All means all.” But rather than embrace the wisdom of Archbishop Tutu, Mr. Warren has allied himself with men such as Archbishop Henry Orombi of Uganda who seek to “purify” the Anglican Communion, of which my Church is a member, by driving out gay and lesbian Christians and their supporters.

In choosing Mr. Warren, the president-elect has sent a distressing message internationally as well. In a recent television interview, Mr. Warren voiced his support for the assassination of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. These bizarre and regrettable remarks come at a time when much of the Muslim world already fears a Christian crusade against Islamic countries. Imagine our justifiable outrage if an Iranian cleric who advocated the assassination of President Bush had been selected to offer prayers when Ahmadinejad was sworn in.

A couple of years ago, I was in Macon, Georgia to counter an ex-gay conference. I encountered ex-gay activist Chad Thompson who told me that he was a speaker at Rick Warren’s Saddleback church. This was somewhat surprising, since Warren was positioning himself as a “moderate.”

TWO’s Mike Airhart revealed that Thompson, along with ex-gay activist Tim Wilkins were also invited to the 2006 Global Summit on AIDS and the Church – which was hosted by Warren.

On Andrew Sullivan’s blog, a man wrote today about his experience in Warren’s Friday ex-gay program, Celebrate Recovery. According to this individual:

I was in full time ministry at a neighboring evangelical megachurch, where I was fighting a desperate battle against depression and despair in attempting to “cure” myself of my homosexuality. This was, without a doubt, the worst time in my life. I spent the majority of my Fridays as a young, 23 year old gay man sitting in a room with a group of men whose self loathing and struggle was overwhelming. These were largely married men, men with children, some of them former ministers, whose entire lives became consumed with undertaking the impossible act of modifying, or at least seeking to neuter, their own sexual orientation.

Far from a pragmatist, Warren is Jerry Falwell in a Hawaiian shirt. But, at least he feeds doughnuts to protesters who are upset that he has taken away their equal rights.

At Andrew Sullivan’s blog, an ex-gay survivor discusses his first-hand experience with emotional damage at evangelist Rick Warren’s ex-gay program, Celebrate Recovery.

The survivor recalls Warren’s phony 12-step program damaging the lives of married men and their wives.

Addendum: The PFLAG Blog responds:

Rev. Warren needs to clarify … if he disagrees with President-Elect Obama’s belief that there should be no place for these insidious practices in true communities of faith.

There should be no room at the inaugural pulpit for a pastor who would put young people’s well-being at risk. There is nothing to “celebrate” about endangering the lives of those we love.