August 17, 2005

Argh! Just, Argh!
by Jeff Langstraat

Jesse at Pandagon points to this post over at Positive Liberty, a very nice pictoral rebuttal to a letter from an "ex-gay." The rebuttal is lovely, but what I want to focus on is this dumb-ass comment:

I do think that if people know you and they want to comment on how you live your life, and you are cool with them, then that would be alright I suppose. I am not really going to choose a side here, but if this is the way that you feel you should live your life, then you have the freedom to do that, if not, you have the freedom to choose the other way. If people are ex-gay, then they have the freedom to do that as well. I just don’t think that we should be criticizing anyone for the way that they live their life. I don’t want to speak for all christians, but the ones that I know are true to their beliefs and yet don’t judge others. I feel bad that they get such a bad name around certain circles when a vocal minority make it seem like they are all judgmental when I don’t feel they are. Just in the same way that all homosexuals are not chasing after lust. I understand where he is coming from and I honestly don’t think he meant anything by it in the way of hurting anyone. If anything, if I had read it, I would take it as a compliment because of all the times that he said how intellegent I was. But, people need to noy judge others, and if someone wants to change the way they live, they will. If not, people telling them otherwise isn’t going to do the trick.

emphasis added

There was also another comment attributing nothing but good motives to the primary letter writer. I've seen it before. What folks fail to recognize, again and again and again, is that the "ex-gay" movement is not interested in "helping" gay folks who want to stop being gay. It's primary purpose is the eradication of homosexuality! The person writing the main letter wasn't complimenting the blogger on his intelligence; the letter writer was lying about an entire community and trying to get people to abandon it. Why, oh, why are people so willing to give these people and their homocidal fantasies the benefit of the doubt?! Look at their finances. Look at their connections. Look at their results. These are not people acting in good faith.

I had a student ask me to chat privately some time ago. That student was struggling with an emerging queer identity. Their religious faith strongly prohibited such a thing, and that person was determined to stick to that. I told them I understood but that I disagreed completely. About a year later, that student contacted me again, still obviously struggling, but this time asking for places where gay people meet. I tossed out a few safe suggestions and left it at that. If they had asked me for "ex-gay" resources I would have adamantly refused.

I have refused such a request, albeit not from a person struggling with their sexuality. While working as a queer organizer in rural Minnesota, we sent out some pamphlets advertising services like our speakers' bureau. We got a letter from a church asking if we also had any "ex-gays." I responded that we viewed the ex-gay movement in a similar light to the Klan's relationship to black folks. Both of those rightist groups were about the complete control over, or elimination of, the group they opposed. We never heard back from the church.

A firm believer in the fluid potentials of sexuality, I nonetheless cannot sanction such "therapy." A criticism can be, and has been leveled, that such a position stands against sexual freedom, against sexual choice, including the choice to enter such a program. The commenter I quoted above implies it is "just a choice." I call bullshit.

First, in a heteronormative--maybe that should read "homohating"--world such as ours, it is hard to say that the "choice" to be straight is unconstrained, and that the choice to live a queer life is equally available. The difficulties that obtain when living an openly queer life may be incentives to attempt to stop living such a life. However, it is not the lives that need to be changed, but the negative sanctions applied to queer folks. Such "therapies" attempt to provide the positive sanctions applied to heterosexuality. They're an attempt to force people to live "normal" lives, no matter how destructive such normality may be.

Then there's the issue of why these programs exist. It isn't for any notion of sexual freedom or choice; it's about the destruction of homosexuality. That's not really a sexually free society, and the end-goal of such "help" does indeed matter in such conversations. I'm all for freedome of sexual expression. But, I'm definitely against it if it involves the destruction of a vibrant, creative, productive community that has actually developed some different types of sexual and relational ethics that other folks might learn a thing or two from.

The compelled "choice" to become straight is one that stands against human freedom and creation. it's an inhumane denial of life.

Besides, if you really want to choose to experience something different, it probably shouldn't be so difficult or emotionally costly. If you're not feeling it for a certain type of person, why fake it? It's not fair to you or your partner.

Posted by in Bio-Power, Culture War, Ethics, Gay, Lesbian, Transgender, Homosexuality, Queer, Sex, Sexual Politics
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