SCANDAL — Praise be the lord, Ted Haggard has owned up to his second (of how many?) gay sexual relationships! Interesting, of course, only because this man once used Jesus’ name to condemn homos, and newsworthy now only because the man has a HBO documentary to promote. So it makes sense he acknowledged what everybody else knows: Once you go buttcrack, you never go back. But the new part of the story actually worth checking out is CNN’s interview with Haggard’s involuntary sex partner Greg Haas, who turned to alcohol, just like Mike Jones, to deal with the stress of having Haggard allegedly start masturbating in front of him against Haas’ will. Did we mention Haas also secretly recorded Haggard trying to convince him not to go public?
The incident occurred when the two men were in bed together, Grant Haas said in a videotaped interview played on CNN’s “Larry King Live.”
“He pretty much asked me if it was OK if he masturbated in front of me or masturbated in the bed next to me,” Haas said. “I told him no, it would make me really uncomfortable. But he grabbed a bottle of lotion and started masturbating.”
Haas added, “(Haggard) used to say to me, ‘You know what, Grant, you can become a man of God, and you can have a little bit of fun on the side.”
Haggard, 52, said the incident was “an indicator of the compulsive behavior” that ruled him at the time. However, he said he has been undergoing therapy during the two years since and “working it out.” [CNN]
Read our interview with Haggard’s first public gay lover Mike Jones.
Me
“…Haggard allegedly start masturbating in front of him against Haas’ will.” Yeah, right. If you believe that, I’ve some flying green monkeys for sale, too.
villager
Against his will my ass!
tallskin
How seedy, sordid and how impeccably repressed sky-pixie!
Classic!
How many incidents like this occur daily in religious institutions of all kinds? Gay kids told by their shamans that gay sex is evil and wrong, then “Excuse me, do you mind if I fuck you” “Get down on your knees and take this holy sacrament in your mouth” or ” come on let us praise the lord together, get out your cock!”
YUK.
BootsieGee
What a load of crap. Why not just leave the room if you were that uncomfortable? Note that he had the foresight to record the conversations. something here just does not smell right. We are not talking about a child here, this is a grown man, though the article does not mention his age. He cashed the $180K check. Again, something here does not add up.
ChicagoJimmy
Why is our first reaction to ridicule this kid? Have you guys never been intimidated by a person in authority? You sound as bad as Bill O’Reilly saying that kid in St. Louis who had been kidnapped and repeated raped was really having a good time because he didn’t have to go to school.
Haas was a kid who was struggling with his sexual orientation because of his religious upbringing. He had gotten counseling and therapy trying to repress those natural urges. In other words, he was already fucked up. Then comes along this pastor. This guy who is supposed to be totally good. The guy who is going to teach him about God. The same pastor who targeted Haas when he learned about his homosexual urges.
Try to learn the whole story before you judge, and grow some compassion.
tallskin
ChicagoJimmy
I def was NOT ridiculing this kid, far from it
read my comments again!
Berlin
Duuuude, so WHAT if that kid got some cash from the sleaze? Good for him, sheeeeeee-it.
Am I on Queerty here? Don’t you remember this guy all but casting us out into the pit of fires for our love of other men?
Pssh.
Your sympathy for the bastard shows what?– some kinda excitement/jealousy at the prospect of being in a hotel bed with him?.. I mean, what?
This guy puts his puppy face on and you start attacking the kid.
“Something’s not right here” and “..against his will? Yeah right.”
You’re goddamned RIGHT something’s not right here… a fuckin’ pastor who disses gay people loudly ends up trying to use his Jedi-powers to dissuade a dude from talking.
Two middle fingers up.
Get his ass, media. Fuck all that. Get. His. Ass, yo.
Rowen
Tallskin, I don’t think Jimmy was singling you out, the first two comments seem VERY much against the kid, which, I agree with Jimmy.
If you listen to what the clips, or if you watched Oprah yesterday, the kid makes it clear that he said No, many of the times that Haggard pulled his dick out. Haggard was also in a position of power over this guy, AND the guy was in very much a state of mental confusion about a lot of things. And Haggard abused that.
Not to mention, 180k is a lot of money. There’s a lot of things I would do right now for that sorta cash, and I’m not in as much of a state of mental anguish as this guy was.
BrianZ
@ChicagoJimmy: What a trip! So you equate being kidnapped and raped to someone masturbating in front of you? That sort of thing is classic Fox news … so I guess it’s fitting you bring up Bill O. Absolutely rediculous.
So do you know the whole story from the sources or are you allowing your compassion to fill in and make up the missing details to reaffirm your sense of victimization?
I don’t believe in making targets out of victims. I believe they need all of our compassion and understanding.
I also don’t believe that victims choose to pursue justice through tape recorders, payoffs, television interviews complete off-camera represenation.
John M
Couldn’t he find someone a bit more attractive to masturbate in front of?
EdWoody
@John M: Hey, you take what you can get when you’re a duplicitous closeted self-hater. It’s not about who’s attractive, it’s about who’s available and vulnerable.
TheWaylandFlowersPreservationSociety
Has Ted ever actually given head to another man, or let another man go down him? Or had his cock up someone’s ass or allowed someone bugger to him?
Does he only do j/o and frottage?
Mateo1970
Someone needs to look a little closer at the $179,000. Now why in the hell would an insurance company pay out money like that unless they thought a lawsuit had merit? Plus, you can guarantee that “New Life Church” pays a substantial insurance premium for their risky history. Guess who pays the cash money premium … yep the congregation.
dvlaries
@TheWaylandFlowersPreservationSociety: Read Mike Jones’s “I Had To Say Something,” published in mid-2007. Teddy-boy eventually did it all, and likey.
If fact, Jones toned things down in the book compared to the radio interviews he gave in the first days of the scandal. Then, it at least one quote, Jones describes a meth-fueled Pastor Teddy grabbing Jones’s erection exclaiming, “I can’t get enough of that cock!”
Also left out of the book, but recounted in earlier radio interviews, were the booty bumps: dissolved-in-water meth doses, shot up Teddy’s ass enema-style in their fuck sessions.
But by the time of book, Jones also recounts at least one personal visit to New Life Church and how ‘nice’ they were to him. Perhaps that, in turn, managed to shade his memory a little.
Chitown Kev
I have been wondering whether “in the closet” is even useful in describing this. It is starting to seem as though Ted’s proclivities were known in the church and, as his meth use increased, around the city. This sounds more like an “open secret” than Haggard on the DL.
Robert, NYC
@BootsieGee:
Actually, he only got half the amount and said that he has yet to collect on the remainder. He may face a lawsuit for going public but hey, this young man is clearly gay and confused. Haggard IS gay but can’t accept it. His behavior was absolutely shameful and disgusting and he has the gall to spew religion and forgiveness. Remove the financial component from all the cults, Judaisn, Christianity, Islam and others and they’d be powerless and less influential than they are. Without money which is foremost in their industry, they can’t survive, none of them. They are all in the business of making money, religion is secondary, just a front so they can get tax exemption.
Jay
WHY ISN’T THIS GUY SUING THE CHURCH ??? SEEMS LIKE AN OPEN SHUT CASE..
BootsieGee
Just to be clear, I am in no way sympathizing with that opportunistic waste of flesh Ted H. I do believe that Grant has/had some issues he needs to work through and Ted took advantage of him.
The thing that struck me as odd was the taping of a telephone call. That is something that requires some forethought. It is not something you decide to do on a whim. I have never in my life taped a phone call nor would I know how to do it so that I could get a clear audio sample. So it appears that by taping the call, he knew that he was going to eventually do something with the tape, which as we know he did. The other thing that I found odd was that it says “it incident occured when they were in bed together”. It seems as though there are missing pieces to the story. I am not trying to pass judgement on the guy, I would just like all of the pieces of the puzzle.
I do truly feel sorry for Grant and hope that he gets out of this mess and realizes his full potential. I am sorry that he did not receive the full amount of money that was due him. Regardless of the how/why of it.
ChicagoJimmy
@tallskin: Sorry to have seemed to lump you in with the other chowder heads. I was really directing my comments to Me, villager, and BootsieGee who don’t seem to have any sympathy in their cold hearts for this young man and only see an opportunist, which probably says a lot about their character.
Also, @BrianZ: No, I was equating self-hating queers on this site who would probably be the first ones to go down on Ted Haggard if they thought there was some cash in it for them with Bill O’Reilly. He also has sold his soul to the devil and blames victims first.
The kid wasn’t looking for money, he was looking for help. He was intimidated into a sexual act he did not want, and he said no. That’s rape in my book.
Andrew
My problem with this is that in the US you get paid $180k (about $A250k) for this kind of stuff. Over here, you get $50k for crippling injuries suffered at work or in violent assaults / rapes. If someone starts slapping the salami in front of us, we say “You f*ing dirty c*!” and leave. How much ACTUAL harm is suffered? The first $100 is compensation, the other $179,900 is a gift from the insane legal system.
(BTW, don’t get into bed with anyone you don’t plan on doing stuff with, ESPECIALLY the clergy!! How stupid can you be, if it’s not a setup??)
Mark
Funny. At 18 I was begging for an incident like this.
For this kid, he had to go off the deep end.
Really, you have to wonder what kind of people Haggard snares into his little karmic nightmare.
alan brickman
another ugly person claiming to be sexually harassed to prove they’re “sexually desirable”…..really….