Obsession & Intolerance

From: Gay Patriot.net

Every now and again, I’ll meet a man (or woman) who technically qualifies as an “ex-gay.” Yet, even though these individuals once slept with members of their own sex and now have chosen life partners of the opposite sex, they don’t identify as such. Some, usually the men, only reluctantly acknowledge their homosexual past. The women occasionally do — oftentimes to their husbands’ amusement.

Those who dwell on their past seem as if they’re trying to convince themselves they’re no longer attracted to men. The more they protest (to borrow an expression), the more we doubt their sincerity. While most people who change rarely mention their past attitudes, ex-gays seems obsessed with theirs, as if their entire identity is tied up in not being gay.

Indeed, as reader ThatGayConservative informed me in an e-mail, one ex-gay group has even come up with an app for their obsession:

Exodus International, the notorious “ex-gay” organization, has just released an iPhone app that, according to its website, is “designed to be a useful resource for men, women, parents, students, and ministry leaders.” The Exodus website further boasts that its app received a 4+ rating from Apple, meaning that it contains “no objectionable content.”

Those who have successfully pushed to have Apple pull the app have called ”Exodus’ message is hateful and bigoted” (emphasis in original), might want to examine their own prejudices. Just because someone is obsessive does not mean he is hateful or bigoted. (Why must every attitude which does not correspond with the ideology of the gay left be defined as some form of hate?)

Now, Apple is a private company and should be free to pull — or provide — the app. But, one wonders at the intolerance of the anti-ex-gays, why are they so committed to suppressing this obsessive group. If they were truly confident of their own ideas, wouldn’t they welcome opportunities to contest ex-gays’ contentions in public fora and in open debate?

So, we have one side which can’t stop talking about that which they claim they are not. And another upset every time those obsessives get a public forum.

I say, let the ex-gays speak, let them have their app, the more exposure they get, the more hollow becomes their rhetoric and the more readily we can contest their claims.