200 "ex" gays march on Washington

[SecularMusic]

A fundie Facebook friend posted this on her page today to "prove" that being gay is a choice and gay people can become straight. 

https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/200-ex-lgbt-men-women-rally-to-show-freedom-theyve-found-in-following-jesus?utm_content=buffer1ec80&utm_medium=WCDM%2BBuffer&utm_source=facebook&utm_campaign=WCDM&fbclid=IwAR0rTGdK0f9uXdUMghV55fmQ9FSsyjurRG_OVH5OuVmyrQoto7kpyo9heGk 

The sad part of the article is that the "ex" gays aren't saying that they no longer have same-sex attractions. They are just saying that they have learned to control them, essentially praying the gay away:

"Colon explained that the true meaning of deliverance and freedom is being able to look at temptation in the eye and say, “I don’t want you, I want Jesus.” 

A second Pulse Nightclub survivor, Luis Ruiz, said that like many of the people participating in the March the reason why he was there is ultimately because he had a "mother and a father that never compromised the Gospel.”  

“They prayed and prayed and believed not in my situation, but in my destiny, my identity found in Christ Jesus.” 

“It wasn’t a ‘gay to straight’ thing,” said Ruiz, “It was a ‘lost to saved’ thing."

It makes me angry that anti-gay Christians will use stories like this to perpetuate the myth that you can pray the gay away.

Edited May 29, 2019 by SecularMusic

[Lgirlrocks]

I’m a lesbian dating a guy and I still have sexual attractions to females. 

[AmazonGrace]

Straight people can stop having sex too. Does it mean they're ex straight?

[Ozlsn]

3 hours ago, AmazonGrace said:

Straight people can stop having sex too. Does it mean they're ex straight?

I now want all celibate religious folk referred to as "ex-straight", mostly to watch the Catholic Church's metaphorical head explode.

[JermajestyDuggar]

TAM was at the first annual march last year. She was probably there this year too. I believe she has an “ex gay” nephew. 

Edited May 29, 2019 by JermajestyDuggar

[smittykins]

I’ve been celibate since my husband passed in 2005(personal choice).  Can I call myself “ex-straight”?

[Cleopatra7]

13 hours ago, AmazonGrace said:

Straight people can stop having sex too. Does it mean they're ex straight?

I’m pretty sure St Augustine of Hippo was an ex straight:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustine_of_Hippo

However, I don’t consider him to be a reliable narrator about himself or his sexuality. This is, after all, the same man who couldn’t be bothered to give the mother of his child (whom he’d been with for 10+ years) a name in his Confessions.

 I’m still torn about whether St Jerome was an ex straight or a sex repulsed asexual who did some youthful experimenting that permanently turned him off of anything of a sensual nature:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerome

[Briefly]

14 hours ago, Lgirlrocks said:

I’m a lesbian dating a guy and I still have sexual attractions to females. 

I am bi and married to a man.  But I still like women, too.

The only "choice" I see in the ex-gay movement is to choose to be celibate or to choose to be with a specific gender.  If someone is claiming to still be attracted to the same gender but not acting on that attraction, that does not make them ex.  It just means that they have made a choice for that particular time/person/etc. But I guess that doesn't fit the narrative of being ex-gay.

Also, my opinion is that being gay, bi, straight, whatever does not mean that a person can not be Christian, Jewish, really any other religion, agnostic, atheist, etc.

[PlentyOfJesusFishInTheSea]

It's kind of telling that in a country of about 327 million people, even if a conservative 1% are gay (so let's not include bi people), there are ~ 3.27 million gay people in the US and only 200 are confident that they're 'ex-gay' enough to go to a march.

I mean, human biology is variable so maybe there are a very small number of people whose sexuality changes dramatically over their lifetimes. Or maybe these 200 people are deluding themselves because they want to fit into their church community.

[Longhairedheathen]

14 hours ago, Lgirlrocks said:

I’m a lesbian dating a guy and I still have sexual attractions to females. 

I am not sure what I am but I think both male and female are pretty and datable but just that my boyfriend is the prettiest and most datablist. It is frustrating to see the fundies go after victims of life changing event. These people are hurting 

[PennySycamore]

@Longhairedheathen,  when I've seen people that claim to be "ex-gay", their eyes are dead.  You are so right, they are hurting.  

[The Mother Dust]

7 hours ago, smittykins said:

I’ve been celibate since my husband passed in 2005(personal choice).  Can I call myself “ex-straight”?

Omg @smittykins we might be mind twins.  My husband passed in 2006 and I made the same choice as you.  You had your true love, didn't you.  *hugs* 

[Cleopatra7]

There’s also the fact that there’s really no place for celibate LGBT people in conservative Christianity. Protestantism assumes that the heterosexual patriarchal household is both the default and the ideal (women who lived in areas that embraced the Reformation lost many opportunities for education and autonomy when the convents were shuttered). Celibacy is suspect because it assumes some of the presuppositions of Catholicism but also because it goes against the default of heteronormative couples. This heteronormativity is so strong in evangelicalism that there’s no room for a celibate lifestyle of any kind, and certainly not for one who identifies as LGBT.

Although the Catholic Church has long prized celibacy as the better option, the situation isn’t much better for LGBT members. The Catholic Church like many conservative organizations doesn’t recognize the concept of sexual orientation, just acts that are forbidden or permissible. Identifying as LGBT would thus be considered akin to identifying as an alcoholic or an adulterer. Since the response of the hierarchy to the abuse scandal has been to clamp down on gay men in seminaries and monasteries, there’s no socially acceptable place in the Church to be in a homosocial environment, even on a platonic level (the same is true for nuns). So LGBT Catholics that choose to be celibate are in an unpleasant place of being unable to enter the priestly or religious life, nor marriage, and they have to treat their sexual desires like they were dangerous sex offenders who might harm the innocent. 

So at the end of the day, even celibate LGBT Christians are considered problematic by conservatives. These churches may claim that this choice is “godly” but in reality, they think LGBT Christians should just hew to gender stereotypes and find the right opposite sex spouse with whom to pretend to be straight.

[PennySycamore]

@Cleopatra7, I recall reading the statistic some years ago about how around a third of sisters/nuns were lesbian in orientation although they were likely celibate.  I can't remember what the stats were for priests.  

My oldest daughter was baptized by a gay priest.  I haven't looked recently but he was working with a  university chapter of Dignity which does NOT preach the necessity of celibacy for LGBTQ Catholics.  They're open and affirming.

[fundiefan]

11 hours ago, smittykins said:

I’ve been celibate since my husband passed in 2005(personal choice).  Can I call myself “ex-straight”?

Totally. I have not had sex since filing for divorce in 2009. For many, many reasons - all of them  choice. I am a born again virgin and now, "ex straight". 

Sure, I see men I am attracted to. I don't deny I am attracted to them though. I simply don't act based on those thoughts. It's really not even that hard. But, if not acting on those thoughts means I am not straight, well, then, I better figure out what the hell I am before I decide that I do want to have sex again so I get it right. 

 

[Hane]

I’ve been on my own since my divorce twenty years ago, so I guess I’m “ex-straight,” too. As Carrie Fisher (RIP) said when her mother Debbie Reynolds (RIP) wondered about being gay, “Mom, you’re not a lesbian. You’re just a very bad heterosexual.” Because I have lousy taste in men and tend to be co-dependent, I’m a very bad heterosexual, too.

Plus, at this stage in my life, I don’t even want to share the fucking remote.

[VVV]

I'm likely watching a "gay to straight" train wreck in real time taking place in extended family....young male relative who has struck several of us as probably gay is being pushed by his parents into marriage with a young woman who is clearly smitten with him. Photos suggest he is not nearly as smitten with her. I don't see any way in which this ends well but I am not in a position to speak up, and both parties involved are adults by the calendar if not by permission by the controlling adults in their lives. ☹️

[Smee]

I have a friend who was raised in a reasonably conservative (for Australia; it’d probably be considered liberal in the US) Protestant church and questions of sexuality came down to “resisting temptation”. It was fine to be a non-practicing gay, because basically all married couples are non-practicing adulterers making the choice not to cheat on their spouse, so making the choice not to have a romantic relationship with someone of the same sex and remain celibate for life is practically the same thing, right?

I grew up with her, and I watched her internalised homophobia and shame nearly destroy her. In the end, she literally got on a plane and went overseas for a decade, found love, accepted herself, and questioned the lessons she’d been raised with. She’s still Christian, but at a far more progressive church now, and her parents have since become huge advocates of the rights of their lesbian daughter.

But it does make me think often, because if I *hadn’t* been close to her all these years and seen how much it failed her, I probably would buy in to the “resisting temptation” narrative and preach it to other young teens. And it simply isn’t practical or fair to rely on personal experience with suffering LGBTQ+ to be the thing that changes the minds of every conservative out there.

[Beermeet]

I don't have too much to add here. But, this topic never ceases to sadden me. Who cares who one loves? There is love and that's all that matters in my mind. Zero harm. Fake God's wrath is ever present and makes no damn sense.  God smites the LGBTQ folks but children being held in captivity on US soil is no biggie?  Why is this such a focus? Why torture people by making them choose one way or another? Of all the things for people to protest or speak out on, who loves who is a non issue.  Let's be angry at the fact people die because of violence against LGBTQ human beings or suicide due to social prejudice.  Or the fact there is enough food for all of us on this Earth but many starve. Our ( no matter who you choose to date ) rights are being taken away, be angry! I know it sounds simple of me to say this but, I see it as that simple.  My view changes nothing, sadly.