IN JUNE 1998, fifteen anti-gay organizations launched the “ex-gay” Truth in Love campaign with full-page ads in America’s largest newspapers. The first ad appeared in The New York Times and featured an “ex-lesbian” who smiled under the optimistic headline, “I’m Living Proof That The Truth Can Set You Free.”
The religious right jumped on the “ex-gay” bandwagon because its traditional fire-and-brimstone rhetoric was beginning to backfire. Harsh condemnation of GLBT people started to sound merely cruel, as more people came out of the closet or were forced out due to HIV-related illnesses. The “ex-gay” concept offered a way to appear compassionate while still rejecting gay equality. Their new message: gay people don’t need equality; what they really need is sexual conversion. And since we love the sinners, though not the sin, we can help those trapped in this miserable lifestyle to escape and lead “normal” lives. Anti-gay activists were so enthralled by this campaign that Robert Knight, who worked for the Family Research Council at the time, called it “the Normandy landing in the larger cultural wars.”
But things are not looking so rosy for the “ex-gay” movement these days. Two large bombs have fallen on it so far this year. The first came from John Smid, who once led the Exodus ministry Love in Action. In a stunning reversal, Smid admitted: “I’ve never met a man who experienced a change from homosexual to heterosexual.” The second bomb went off when Alan Chambers, the president of Exodus, acknowledged: “I do not believe that cure is a word that is applicable to really any struggle, homosexuality included.” This followed his admission to the Gay Christian Network in January that “the majority of people that I have met, and I would say the majority meaning 99.9% of them, have not experienced a change in their orientation.” And there was more. Earlier this year, Dr. Robert Spitzer renounced his infamous 2001 study which claimed that some highly motivated gay people could maximize their “heterosexual potential” though prayer and therapy. “I was quite wrong in the conclusions that I made from this study,” Dr. Spitzer told me in a video that Truth Wins Out filmed at his home in Princeton, New Jersey. “The study does not provide evidence, really, that gays can change.” More bad news came in May when the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) issued a position statement condemning “conversion therapy,” because its practices “lack medical justification and represent a serious threat to the health and well-being of affected people.” And Brazil’s top “ex-gay” activist, Sergio Viula, recently admitted that such programs are ineffective: “In fact, ex-gays don’t exist—it’s pure self-suggestion.” To be sure, “ex-gay” programs won’t suddenly cease to exist—so long as there’s a profit to be made (which there is). But from now on they’ll be operating under an enormous cloud of doubt that will overshadow their outrageous claims. Without holding out the magical promise of sexual orientation change, Exodus has little value to the religious right’s political ambitions. They’ll continue to defend these programs for internal consumption, but the PR value of the “ex-gay” ideology is effectively over. It’s unlikely that right-wing organizations will continue to dump millions of dollars into splashy advertising campaigns, because they’re finding that the “ex-gay” message is starting to boomerang. Just a few years ago, Exodus ran flashy ads that exploded with hope. One ad for their national convention confidently exclaimed: “Revolution, radically change your world. Freedom from homosexuality is possible.” Their new message, as articulated by Chambers, is that homosexuality is still a sin, albeit an incurable one, so gay people should strive to live with celibacy or marry an understanding opposite-sex partner (as Chamber himself has done). The new mission of Exodus is presumably to help its clients find a way to live with sexual frustration and life devoid of physical intimacy. Good luck with that message! The fight now shifts to stopping reparative therapists from practicing their lucrative quackery on minors. This is important because at least one organization, the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH), takes clients as young as three years old and labels them “prehomosexuals.” There’s currently a bill in the California state assembly that would protect minors from their brand of black magic. Truth Wins Out would like to see similar bills introduced in all fifty states. In the coming year, we’ll be working with state representatives who are interested in drafting such legislation. As we move forward, it is critical that mental health organizations do more to eliminate a practice that gives the entire profession a black eye. The first thing they must recognize is that reparative therapy isn’t therapy at all. It is camouflaged religious indoctrination that uses scientific language to conceal its true agenda. Even the leaders of Exodus International now acknowledge that you can’t “pray away the gay.” The “ex-gay” movement is an experiment that has failed. Wayne Besen is the executive director of Truth Wins Out.
