The “ex-gay” myth is back in the news. Interest in this subject began to percolate after Gov. Jerry Brown signed SB 1172, a bill prohibiting reparative therapy for minors in California. It intensified after the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) filed a lawsuit against Jews Offering New Alternatives for Healing (JONAH), its director, Arthur Abba Goldberg, and life coach Alan Downing. The following day, Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.) introduced the “Stop Harming Our Kids” (SHOK) resolution at a Capitol Hill press conference. The same week, a poorly produced show on the topic by NBC’s Dr. Oz added fuel to the raging fire.
In this fervent culture war battle, lines have been drawn, passionate words exchanged, and sides chosen. However, very few people actually know what reparative therapy is, whether in theory or practice.
Let’s begin with the theory, which is not scientifically supported: Gay people are genetically predisposed to be sensitive. The overly sensitive child perceives rejection by his or her same-sex parent. In a state of conscious or unconscious rebellion, they strike back at the parent’s rejection by renouncing their gender. It quickly leads to gender variant interests and making opposite sex friends. This causes a lack of social bonding with the same-sex, which eventually leads to the same-sex seeming exciting and mysterious. As reparative therapists like to say: The exotic becomes the erotic. (In the case of women, reparative therapists often blame sexual abuse as the cause of lesbianism)
The simplistic causation model has an equally shallow and unscientific solution: Gay people are encouraged to make non-sexual, same-sex friends. Reparative therapists believe that by doing so, the same sex will ultimately be demystified and the gay person will become more comfortable with his or her gender. Once the same sex is no longer mysterious and a gay man becomes “one of the guys” and a lesbian becomes “one of the girls,” opposite sex feelings will magically come rushing in. And presto – the gay person is now straight.
Getting to the point of heterosexuality, reparative therapists say, can take years. They almost always begin the process by keeping gay clients away from potential sexual partners. They are obsessed with isolating the client so they can avoid temptation and not “fall,” “slip,” or “relapse.” One technique is to have a client wear a rubber band around his wrist and snap it every time he finds himself attracted to a man. This mild stinging sensation supposedly snaps him out of his attraction trance. To help avoid pitfalls, reparative therapists demand that clients find same-sex accountability partners, who will serve as mentors, watchdogs, and emergency contacts in case an outbreak of homosexual behavior is imminent.
To fill the several year gap between homosexuality and the elusive heterosexual feelings that allegedly will develop, reparative therapists desperately work to distract their clients and keep them extremely busy. They focus, as well, on behavior modification and what they perceive to be gender appropriate activities, such as sports for men and encouraging women to act and dress more feminine.
This exhaustive obstacle course usually includes heavy doses of prayer, since most of the therapists who practice this psychological voodoo are devoutly religious. It also consists of endless exploration into the roots of one’s sexual orientation, which includes delving into a maze of childhood memories. In the immortal words of reparative therapist David Pickup, his program “helps a man dealing with homosexual issues go deep.”
A key component of reparative therapy is separating one’s identity – how an individual labels oneself — from one’s genuine sexual feelings. Indeed, such therapists do not believe that gay people even exist. To quote convicted felon Arthur Abba Goldberg of JONAH, “Every person that we work with is really a heterosexual person who may have a homosexual problem.”
Unfortunately, such cognitive dissonance often creates deep denial, where clients are urged by their therapist to publicly claim they are straight, even if they still have strong desires for same sex relationships.
In practice, Reparative therapy is simply bizarre by any objective measure. NARTH therapist, James E. Phelan (pictured), in his revealing book, “Practical Exercises For Men In Recovery of Same-Sex Attraction (SSA),” outlines the most thorough example of what occurs inside such clinics. It is a veritable, step-by-step guide on how one would attempt to transform from gay-to-straight.
This workbook is considered an authoritative model on how such programs are organized and executed, given the prominence of those who have endorsed it. This includes National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH) co-founder Joseph Nicolosi, NARTH board member Gerald Schoenwolf, JONAH co-founders Arthur Abba Goldberg and Elaine Berk, International Healing Foundation (IHF) founder Richard Cohen, and Exodus International President Alan Chambers (although Chambers renounced his support for reparative therapy earlier this year)
What one first notices in Phelan’s workbook is the great irony in how the Herculean effort to not be gay ends up consuming one’s life by placing homosexuality at the very center of it. It quickly becomes apparent that such therapists can’t change attractions, as the client truly wants, so they 
urgently focus on keeping the individual away from potentially sexual situations and filling his or her life with busy work.
For instance, Phelan offers a comprehensive list of 236 activities clients can participate in whenever they feel homosexual urges. This list includes: Bowling, singing to myself, watching the sky, reading maps, caring for houseplants, going to a revival or crusade, seeing famous people, crying, seeing or smelling a flower or plant, going to a drive-thru (Dairy Queen, McDonalds, etc.), walking barefoot, bird watching, smiling at people, playing Frisbee, and going to auctions. (Pgs. 93-97)
This is just the beginning. Phelan assigns seventy-nine interminable homework assignments including: creating a daily tracker, keeping a diary, finding a mentor, writing a personal story, and penning various letters to oneself or to “confront your abusers.”
One of the more disconcerting aspects of such therapy is the level of control Phelan suggests clients give to their accountability partner (AP). In a breathtaking act of irresponsibility, the author actually tells clients to give their APs bank “account access,” asking, “is any money going to fuel SSA?” One can easily see where this could backfire, with a crooked AP cleaning out a client’s bank account or ruining credit. Would Phelan and other NARTH therapists reimburse clients if thievery occurs? (p. 31)
The author further infantilizes his clients by demanding that they “allow your AP to monitor your [Internet] activity. Link your activities to their computer for monitoring. Give them the passwords.”
One is then asked to give the all-powerful watchdog a copy of his or her daily schedule. “Discuss down times and have plans,” the workbook demands. The intrusiveness escalates when Phelan writes, “share with your AP work stress and any conflicts. Don’t be proud. Don’t hide anything.”
This gross invasion of privacy becomes creepier and devolves into a peculiar voyeur/exhibitionist relationship between the all-powerful AP and the subservient client.
“You must be able to discuss all areas of sexuality with your AP including histories, slips, and relapses,” writes Phelan in Exercise 29. This includes what the NARTH therapist calls, in exercise 27, a “Masturbation Inventory.” According to Phelan:
“Compulsive masturbation with SSA fantasies is an area many men in recovery from SSA struggle with. Many of my clients complain, ‘Jim, you don’t understand, jerking off is the only thing I have.’ As if they will die if they don’t masturbate! However, it is not a necessity like food, clothing, and shelter. But to listen to some of these guys you would think it was. In my opinion, it’s all manipulation. It is a way to avoid true recovery.” (p. 29).
The author then urges his horny clients to “develop a [masturbation] action plan ASAP,” lest they relapse.
Phelan’s book is obsessed with sex and asks his patients, ad nauseam, for the most intimate, private details about their sex lives. Clients are asked, “With what frequency did you practice masturbation in puberty” and “Are there any peculiarities in your sexual practices or fantasies (masochism, sadism, etc.). Describe succinctly and soberly which fantasies or behaviors of others are exciting to you, for these may reveal something about the areas in which you feel inferior.” (pgs. 5 and 14)
(Or, maybe a repressed gay therapist uses this overabundance of information to get off?)
It seems the lack of intimacy and masturbation – while incessantly talking about fantasies — is not curing his clients, but potentially making them focus even more on their desire for sex. According to Phelan, his clients can’t be trusted alone in a car, so he urges them to “practice safe driving” in exercise 28.
“Keep your eyes on the road, not on other peoples’ cars,” the therapist warns. “Focus on driving, not having sex with other drivers.” He also urges clients to “avoid driving alone at all possible” and “avoid listening to those media trap radio stations and music that glorifies SSA.” If that isn’t enough, one is supposed to tell their accountability partner, “when you will be on the road and when you will reach your destination.” (p. 30)
If the patients can’t drive, they certainly can’t be trusted to go to the gym. “The worst thing to do,” Phelan advises, “is to work out alone.” (p. 11)
And, under Phelan’s plan, what should be normal travel becomes quite an ordeal:
“Never travel alone if at all possible. Man is not meant to be alone…Travel is not a time to call escort services to ‘check out’ what kinds of guys they have in the town or call masseurs to see if they do “release” techniques…Give everyone you are accountable to your hotel number. Tell them to call, especially at night…Call your hotel ahead of time and tell them to cancel all adult channels and pay per view TV…put scriptures out by the bed…if you are married and/or have children, put their pictures up in your room.” (p. 58)
Knowing that clients are often sexually frustrated and lonely, reparative therapists often suggest that they serve as surrogate parents who caress their clients. This is converted into a strange “therapeutic” practice called, “touch therapy,” which is associated with discredited “ex-gay” therapist Richard Cohen, who was permanently expelled from the American Counseling Association for multiple ethics violations. It is clear that Phelan backs this approach, which has repeatedly led to sexual abuse, with repressed therapists manipulating and taking advantage of clients.
“Ask someone to hold me,” Phelan advises in his workbook. “Someone who won’t let me sexualize the situation.” (p. 47)
The “ex-gay” industry denies it engages in brainwashing, but the vice-grip level of control they exert over participants is alarming and certainly does appear in line with what society traditionally considers cults. Indeed, Phelan has an exercise, 22, that he labels, “Retrain your brain.” He tells clients that they should be, “training your brain to not connect the thoughts of the same gender with sexuality…train your mind to think of something else in men.” (p. 24)
Phelan’s “scientific” answer is simple:
“Once you see a man you admire: Stop, count to three, and look him in the eyes. Do not look at his body; rather look him in the eyes.” (p.25)
One must remember that to buy into reparative therapy, it is imperative to adopt a hardcore fundamentalist worldview. This requires more than simply condemnation of homosexuality, but an anachronistic view of gender and the place of women in society. This is made clear in exercise 57, where Phelan advises male clients what to tell their wives:
“It is up to you to help educate her about your needs. Tell her, ‘I need to be the man of the house. Let me be the man of the house.’ Dominant women only demasculinize men. A man has got to be the lion of the den.” (p. 61)
Such retrograde beliefs is reminiscent of NARTH board member Gerald Schoenwolf, who in 2006 seemed to justify slavery on the organization’s website:
“With all due respect, there is another way, or other ways, to look at the race issue in America,” wrote Schoenwolf. “It could be pointed out, for example, that Africa at the time of slavery was still primarily a jungle, as yet uncivilized or industrialized. Life there was savage, as savage as the jungle for most people, and that it was the Africans themselves who first enslaved their own people.
They sold their own people to other countries, and those brought to Europe, South America, America, and other countries, were in many ways better off than they had been in Africa. But if one even begins to say these things one is quickly shouted down as though one were a complete madman.”
There is also a significant level of spiritual coercion in reparative therapy, which is interesting because NARTH claims to be a secular organization. According to Dr. Nicolosi:
“We, as citizens, need to articulate God’s intent for human sexuality,” he said on CNN’s AC360, April 14, 2007. At the Feb. 10, 2007 Love Won Out conference in Phoenix, the “secular” therapist told the audience, “When we live our God-given integrity and our human dignity, there is no space for sex with a guy.”
Although not as explicit, Phelan makes a strong effort to bring faith to the unchurched:
“I have found that those with a higher level of spirituality do the best in their recovery,” Phelan explains to readers. “In this exercise (#7), assess your level of spirituality and see what you can do to increase your spiritual involvement. If you are agnostic or an atheist, your exercise would be to talk with people who are spiritual and interview them. Ask them what spirituality means to them. Another exercise would be to visit a place of worship or make an appointment with a clergyman and witness the environment for yourself.” (p. 9)
Before we go any further with the specifics of Phelan’s program, it is critical to explore why people are interested in going to a reparative therapist in the first place. NARTH likes to say that it only wants to help those who are unhappy with their homosexuality. But, isn’t the group’s false portrayal of gay people as pathological and perverted a significant reason that some gay people want to be heterosexual?
Here is a quick snapshot of the disingenuous and scientifically flawed assumptions about homosexuals presented to Phelan’s patients. It is important to note that when he says “men struggling with SSA,” he is generalizing about all gay people, not just his clients:
- Men who struggle with SSA generally have had mothers who have been smothering and fathers who have been distant and hurtful. (p. 12)
- Shame is inherent in SSA (p. 15)
- Many who struggle with SSA find shame as a core issue. (p. 78)
- In public, men struggling with SSA tend to over analyze and compare themselves to other men…and then he starts sexualizing most guys he sees. (p. 25)
- One of the problems in SSA is unhealthy narcissism. (p. 26)
- Men with SSA generally lock up or cover up their feelings and expressions. And if they do express them, they do so in the false self. (p. 36)
- Men struggling with SSA find communication to be a major issue. (37)
- One problem with men struggling with SSA is passive aggressive behaviors. (p. 38)
- SSA comes with a cost. In SSA, there is much stolen. Examples include broken marriages, health, finances, emotional wellness, and so on. (p. 59)
- I’ve worked with numerous men dealing with SSA and each one has had a problem relating to women in one way or other. (p. 63)
- The problem of homosexuality is based in infantile childish complaining…So, keep a log of any self-pity parties you have and then make an action plan. (p. 72)
- Men dealing with SSA have had less than desirable childhoods. (p. 83)
Legitimate medical and mental health organizations have not considered homosexuality a pathology for decades. Yet, NARTH unethically paints a grossly misleading portrait of LGBT people, leading clients to think their sexual orientation is a pestilence that must be eradicated to find wholeness and happiness. Using a combination of guilt, shame, and junk science, NARTH manipulates potential clients into believing they have all the solutions – when they are really a large source of the problem. For this reason alone, reparative therapy should be strictly banned for minors in every state.
Now, let’s return to Phelan’s odd reparative therapy program, which is endorsed by NARTH. In one of the wackier exercises, #42, Phelan asks clients to begin “dialoguing with SSA,” which he admits “sounds strange.” Yeah, it does raise eyebrows when a man who bills himself as a therapist is asking clients to write letters to their sex drive. Even more off the wall, the author asks patients to place themselves in the role of the sex drive: “Next, be SSA and write a response to the issues you raise about it.” (p. 45)
The climax of this outlandish quackery comes in exercise 56, when Phelan instructs his clients to write “a goodbye letter to SSA.” Phelan asks his clients to “tell it what it did to you, what you won’t miss, and the new joy you’ll have. Share your grief, what you’ll miss about SSA, what adaptations it served for you. Tell it how it has been replaced. Finally, tell it how it needs to go away and how you will live your life without it.” (p. 60)
To ensure one’s homosexuality is away for good, Phelan tells clients: “Draw two pictures, one with yourself in SSA, and one without. Compare and contrast. Process this with someone.” (p. 62)
Just like that, after spending thousands of dollars and wasting years of one’s life, these outlandish, if not insane, exercises are supposed to transform one from homosexual to heterosexual.
The one thing that reparative therapy is not – is a legitimate medical or mental health procedure carried out by trained experts. It is hurting in the guise of healing and mendacity posing as medicine. I am quite confident that when people – even many conservatives — learn the facts about reparative therapy, support will dwindle to almost non-existent levels.
Reparative Therapy Survivors
Researcher Lisa Diamond Says NARTH Distorted Her Work
Dr. Robert Spitzer Renounces Ex-Gay Study
The Quacks
Real Scientists Debunk JONAH’s Junk Science
Masters & Johnson’s Ex-Gay Study Invalidated
Wow…this is just SO disturbing to me. I always knew that this so-called ‘therapy’ was damaging and disgusting but this article reveals a lot that I never knew. My heart goes out to anyone who has been subjected to this quackery.
“Just like that, after spending thousands of dollars and wasting years of one’s life, these outlandish, if not insane, exercises are supposed to transform one from heterosexual to homosexual.”
Think you mean the other way around.
Brilliant, Wayne, in cataloging Phelan’s inane requirements of his clients. Unbelievable. The testimonial videos are outstanding. This article should be published in every major newspaper in U.S.
To U.S. politicians: It’s high time you do the job for which you were elected—pass legislation to rid the country of “criminal” reparative therapy once and for all. This is long overdue. Failure to do so continues to cause untold mental anguish (and suicides) of many young people who have been led to believe that having been born gay is wrong. Wake up and smell the roses!
Thanks Boo — just updated it. :)
I appreciate your support Jerry.
Eric, as disturbing as it seems, I left a lot out so the piece would be more of magazine length and not a book chapter, which could have easily happened. There are no shortage of strange techniques from these quacks.
Holy mother. I’m amazed it took as long as it did for any of these groups to be sued. Hopefully it’s the first of many.
Wow, Wayne, this was perhaps the best pie I’ve read on the subject, and how, ahem, perverse this whole thing is. I’m going to encourage a young man over a Huffpost who wants to try this To read it, but I doubt he will.
The best paragraph in this whole article was this one, because it sums up the situation succinctly.
“What one first notices in Phelan’s workbook is the great irony in how the Herculean effort to not be gay ends up consuming one’s life by placing homosexuality at the very center of it. It quickly becomes apparent that such therapists can’t change attractions, as the client truly wants, so they urgently focus on keeping the individual away from potentially sexual situations and filling his or her life with busy work.”
Two things immediately came to mind. I used to have a friend who used to be a major alcoholic. He got out of it through AA, which was good. But the disturbing part was the twenty years after he had last had a drink, he was still going to AA meetings twice a week like goin’ to meetin’.I commented on it, and he said, “you never stop being an alcoholic. I could still take a drink.” TWENTY YEARS, and alcohol was still at the center of his life.
The other one was I think Tolstoy, writing about a club he desperately wanted to be a member of when he was a boy. The initiation into the club? You had to stand in a corner for twenty minutes and NOT think of a white bear”.
That might be the best metaphor for Reparative therapy: a white bear.
When the Kinsey study first came out, I noticed that the homosexual study group consisted of not only people on the Kinsey 5 & 6 end of the scale, but also men and women who had sexual histories reflecting the Kinsey 1-4 points of the scale. However the subjects in the heterosexual group consisted of people who were no higher than the Kinsey 1 stage.
The book noted “Obviously, there was a discrepancy in the recruitment of the men and women for the two heterosexual groups as opposed to those who formed the homosexual study group, since heterosexual volunteers leading heterosexual lives with sexual preference ratings of 2 through 5 were not recruited for the program.”
It was at this point that I realized that buying this book was a waste of money. The study was so flawed it was worthless, and any claim that it showed that people who were homosexual could become straight was ludicrous.
If I recall correctly, C.A.Tripp, who had worked with Masters and Johnson also criticized the study. A number of the homosexuals who were involved in the study did not return any follow up surveys.
I think the reason this study became so influential was that none of the reporters who heard the claims of the authors of the study ever bothered to read the study. And of course those in the antigay religious industry were interested only in studies – no matter how incompetent – that supported their belief system. The press has often been sloppy in its reporting. The antigay religious industry is full of liars and charlatans.
As a legitamate therapist, I would like to add a few things about this article, which is extremely well done and written. In “real” therapy”, there is NO touching nor nudity EVER. The only time I touch a patient is to hug them with their permission ONLY. Let me repeat: No therapist should ever touch you except to hug you with your permission. It is not only unethical, but there are some legal connotations with touching or having sex with your therapist. Next, the techniques these so called reparative therapists use are only valid with behaviors. No one can change your sexual orientation, ONLY sexual behaviors can be changed. If these so called reparative therapists would say they can help people change behaviors, that would be a more accurate and realistic description. Sexual orientation is unmutable and cannot be changed with behavioral techniques. Changing one’s behaviors does NOT change one’s sexual orientation.
I wanted to add a few more comments to what I have written. Most of these reparative therapists may not be trained therapists and therfore are not trained nor equipped to treat someone that has sex abuse history. Treating a patient that has been sexually abused takes a lot of training, education and experience. Confronting one’s abuser is NOT usually recommended by legitimate therapists. It can be very dangerous and tricky to confront one’s abuser. And, most, if not all the theories, in reparation therapy have been found invalid, unreliable and NOT true for over at least 30 or more years.
Excellent comments, Bernie. The kind of things these “therapists” do is highly unethical.
Bernie, thanks for the insights into the difference between this quackery and real therapy. I studied psychology but was not trained as a therapist, but these ‘therapies’ seem to be almost an excuse for the ‘therapist’ to engage in some unhealthy, self-serving behaviors with clients, all based on some sick need to exert control over other people, deny them privacy, and reduce them to dependency. When I first encountered Nicolosi’s books his assertions about putting the counselor into a more personally and emotionally relevant role just seemed so wrong and dangerous, and even that’s less absurd than what we see here.
This bit really enraged me: “Men dealing with SSA have had less than desirable childhoods. (p. 83)” — no such thing ever occurred to me, and I don’t “deal” with “SSA” — I’m gay.
Not to mention, these quacks don’t really earn their living curing anyone, but by fundraising. How many clients could they have? Sure, some teens brought in by parents, I’m sure. And maybe some adults pressured into it by their religious qualms or something. But not nearly enough to defray their salaries and costs. But these people couldn’t come up with 1,000s of gay men who did this therapy, and none on whom it worked. It’s such a farce as to be demented comedy.
And yes, it should be outlawed, and I’m rare to outlaw anything.
Jim:
I also had a wonderful childhood and had amazing parents. These quacks have no clue about what they are talking about. The create a phony model and hope they get people whose experience fits the model. And then they exploit religious guilt and shame to fleece these vulnerable individuals.
Reparative therapy is a classic example of consumer fraud.
This is just messed up. So you expect me to believe that homosexuality is due to a neglectful or absent parent? Or from sexual abuse? No, this has gone far enough
I think the Salem’s witches hysteria is deeply seated in the US psyche. Seen from Canada, all this is complete madness.
How is one to reason with such twarted or dishonet minds?
IN SEARCH OF MYSELF is a free e-book released by Sergio Viula, co-founder of an ‘ex-gay’ ministry in Brazil. The e-book is a translation of the book print version in which the author unveils several aspects of those ministries, their beliefs, practices, secrets. It is a book that will tease heterosexuals and homosexuals, as well as atheists and believers. Check it out here and spread the news, please. ;)
In Brazil, the Portuguese version is available in print version. Ask the author about it by e-mail: sviula@hotmail.com
http://www.foradoarmario.net/#!/2012/01/in-search-of-myself-free-e-book-version.html
HARM NO MORE! SAY NO TO REPARATIVE THERAPIES.
I’m sorry, guys. The correct link to access the e-book totally FREE of charge is: http://www.myebook.com/index.php?option=ebook&id=111704
Feeback will be welcome! ;)
Hugs,
Sergio Viula
I live in England and have just read the article and find it hard to believe that unless the gay man himself has a problem with his sexuality, that is anybody elses business, state, church or otherwise. Stonewall here have a poster (that probably came from the States) that says ” Some people are born gay – get over it!”. Which is about all that needs to be said. As I tell people I didn’t choose to be gay, the same as I didn’t choose to have blue eyes, and if they think God made them ‘perfect’. they must, by default, believe I was made ‘perfect’ too!
Why can’t you let people live their lives . Why do you have to push your idea of how somebody should live on everyone else. I hated that life.
Hannah, you’ve always asked that question, and the answering always the same. Why can’t the religious right and the anti-ex-gay industry allow people to live their lives.
As for hating that life, I really don’t understand the question. Seriously. If its the infamous gay lifestyle that’s that problem, simply don’t have one. Do’nt have ex with someone of the same sex, don’t hang around gay people, don’t go to gay venues and events. It’s all about the behavior, isn’t it. That’s what the anti exgay industry is always telling us. Stop the behavior and you’ll stop the idetification and you won’t be gay any more.
This is the first place they’re lying to you, because YOU know that’s not true. So then they try to sell you the possibility that you can change, if you only try, pray, and pay enough. You probably did that also, and it probably didn’t work.
Hannah, the problem is not and never has been your sexual orientation. The problem is that you have been very carefully taught to hate the finest part of yourself. And your self doesn’t like it one bit.
Deal with your self hatred, and I promise you, your life will be better in all aspects. Continue to blame the finest part of yourself, and you’ll keep getting the same results.
Everyone who wants out of that life can get out of it and telling people that they have to suffer a life that they don’t want because your ego wont let you see anything but your opinion is hurting people . I don’t care if you want to live like that . I wasn’t meant to live like that.
Not wanting to live a certain way is fine, but be honest. It is your side that uses these debunked, destructive techniques for your agenda: to prove that one can force a change, and by extension, force everyone you in your arrogance deem undesirable to change under threat of punishment.
Hannah, how anyone decides to live their life is entirely up to them. If they don’t like their lifestyle, then they can and should change it. But that doesn’t mean that they can change their sexual orientation; they can’t. There are cases where a person’s sexual orientation has apparently changed of its own accord – although we don’t know how or why this happens – but they are exceptional. “Therapy” to MAKE it change is quackery. Letting people know that is not hurting them. On the contrary, it is warning them against wasting their lives on a wild-goose chase. But they don’t have to listen to warnings; they are perfectly free to ignore them if they wish.
Hannah, we’re basically in agreement. If you don’t want to live a gay lifestyle, then don’t. It’s very simple.
But if you don’t want to be gay, that’s a choice of a different color, as you have probably found out.
Hannah, no one is forcing you to live in anyway that you see fit. The problem is the religious right attempting to foist a “therapy” that has a very, very high failure rate, and they are upset that the State of California outlawed its use in minors. Why do you have this need to fulminate against happy, well-adjusted GLBT people? I believe you have given into self-hatred, but that is your right. If you are so happy in this new life, why the need to cut down others who are happy in theirs?
because you can’t respect us who made it out of that life . You want to drag us down
We’re not dragging you down Hannah. You did that to yourself. We’re just trying to keep you from dragging anyone else with you. Why should we respect a lie?
Hannah, this is a respectful request. Explain how we’re dragging you down. Seriously. explain it.
I myself told you that “leaving the lifestyle” is simple. all you have to do is do it. If you have, congratulations. You’ve left the lifestyle.
But i don’t believe you are no longer homosexual, and I suspect that you know it isn’t true either. Is it dragging you down to admit the truth? Or is it just telling yourself something that you wish depserately to be true, but isn’t. What does that have to do with us? Why are you here if you’ve left the lifestyle?
Please get help to deal with your Self hatred. Please.
There seems to be a big thing missing in this whole discussion. Scripture. As a born again spirit filled Christian, I love God’s word and respect its authority completely. The trouble is that the massive majority of Christians have been mis-educated regarding verses that *seem* to condemn homosexuality. We are taught that God sees it as an abomination, therefore we (unfortunately) embrace that false idea. We MUST reveal the truth in this area. Our opinion / experience based debates won’t move the discussion very far if people are firmly convinced that they can hate homosexuality because God does. Dr Joseph Adam Pearson wrote a free online book (“Christianity and Homosexuality Reconciled”) that thoroughly discusses the verses that seem to bash gays. He goes right down to the Greek and Hebrew (the original, inspired languages) Translators will always inject their bias, but the original languages are accurate. As a teaser, consider the following: “Sodomite” in the Hebrew language DOES NOT mean “one who anally copulates” nor does it mean “a person from Sodom.” It is the word Quadesh which means “a (quasi) holy person or thing.” The people condemned in scripture were “holy” priests and priestesses of ancient fertility cults who engaged in homosexual acts, heterosexual acts, and acts of bestiality all in an effort to worship their idol gods. THIS is what God finds abominable: those who worship false gods and turn their affection from Him. Check out the online book. I found my freedom in Christ, finally. “Whom the Son sets free is free indeed.” I am a gay Christian and know that I KNOW God made me this way and DOESN’T condemn me. I am no longer suicidal, nor am I filled with self loathing. I love the new life Jesus has moved me into. :)
There is no god, weeze. It’s all myths. You have been deceived.