The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration recently called for a national ban on gay conversation therapy. This week, survivors of this controversial practice sat down with Caroline Modarressy-Tehrani at HuffPost Live to talk about their experiences.
Related: Bizarre And Homophobic Conversion Practices Exposed In Trial Of Ex-Gay Leaders
Josh Sanders underwent conversation therapy at the now defunct Exodus International in his late-20s. Part of that therapy included participating in a gay exorcism.
“It’s not like The Exorcist,” Sanders said. “It’s not like what you see on TV, but a very intense time of prayer, holy water, a dark room with candles.”
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“It’s traumatic,” he continued. “For me, I experienced religious trauma syndrome … it’s similar to PTSD, so there’s triggers that I would have.”
Related: Judge To Ex-Gays: Sorry, But Your Conversion Clinics Are A Bunch Of B.S.
As a result, Sanders says he’s now in therapy to work on managing those emotions.
“I go to therapy now just to work through and navigate through my really unhealthy experiences I went through in conversion therapy,” he said.
Watch the interview in the video below.
Atrius
All religions are poisonous. It’s only a matter of how much poison, and the amount of sugar it has to try and make that poison more palatable, providing they even care about how it tastes, some don’t.
Brian
Why did he attend the exorcism in the first place?
gymjock298
“Conversation Therapy”???
Guy068
@Brian: Maybe the same reasons I did. I was raised in the Pentecostal faith and believed my homosexuality was wrong since that’s what I had been taught by people I loved and trusted. It wasn’t called an exorcism but was the full gospel church version of the same. They were to pray out the spirits of carnality from my body. Know the only thing they drove out? My faith in God for about twenty years. Best part? My family, whom I had assumed at the time would want me ungayed, has never treated me different or loved me less at any moment since I came out a few y ears later. Some Christians do listen to t he teachings of God and not the way it’s twisted by some to support their fears and hatred. Whether Mister Sanders returns to his faith or not, I just wanted to post this to say things do get better after an awful experience like this. You grow, heal, and love and someday it’s just another awful experience in your past that you grew past that along with the good things that happen helped to shape you into the person you can become…
Oh and it helps if the shit heels who put you through this get exposed as the horrible excuses for human beings that they are…
Ladbrook
I grew up in a large Southern Baptist church with a loud and charismatic minister. It was the mid-70’s, so the whole gay thing wasn’t on the cultural radar the way it is today, but things did happen to some of us that were wrong.
I recall a member in his 20’s who was “baptized” by our minister every Sunday for almost two months. Baptism is a one-time-only thing, so even as a 12 yr old, I knew that this was odd. I asked my Dad why he was being dunked every single Sunday, and was told that he had ‘sex sins’ and needed to be cleansed, namely that he liked “boys not girls.”
This was my first lesson on how Baptists treat people. I left the church at 14, much to father’s horror.
Kieran
According to recent court testimony in NJ, the Jewish gay conversion group “JONAH” (Jews Offering New Alternatives for Healing) required gay Jewish boys who attended “therapy” to take off their clothes and then stand naked in front of their male therapist as part of the “healing” process.
Daniel-Reader
Good to get the word out to debunk things. People swore the sun orbited the world and look what they did to try to keep that myth going for 500 years. Hopefully LGBT kids won’t have to face any trauma with this myth of conversion being debunked.
Daggerman
..why are we humans so self loathing, that we appear to attack others just because they use their bodies, SEXUALLY in different ways??
whatsaywhat
They tried to exorcise me, but I was like, Bitch, I WANT to suck c*cks in hell. DUH!!
It was quite a situation.
Atrius
@whatsaywhat: If that story is true, I would have LOVED to see the look on their faces. ROFL
billbong99
@gymjock298: I think that’s where they just talk it out. LOL. Must be CONVERSION and nobody proofed the article.
Brian
Maybe he chose to be exorcised because he really wanted to extinguish his homosexual desire. Have you ever thought about that possibility?
In any case, you can’t extinguish homosexual desire. Homosexual behavior can be avoided but homosexual desire will always be there in one form or another, hidden or not.
NoCagada
@Kieran: “WHO WANTS TO LOOK AT MY TUSHIE?!?”
Xzamilio
@Brian: And gee, I wonder why he’d even get it in his head that it was something that needed to be “extinguished”.
msfrost
@Brian:
What makes you think he had a choice?
dr35
@Atrius: Religion isn’t poison. People Are poison. And Religion doesn’t form its own organization or bigotry, people do. We all believe in something, one way or another. It’s a choice though to think of yourself as better than another. Take the Bible apart piece by piece and you won’t find a single instruction to behave that way. A religion is merely a belief of where we fit into the universe. That’s All.
alphacentauri
Meh, it was his choice to go to that place to be “cured” of being gay.
gaym50ish
@Kieran: That’s right. Alan Downing, a life coach and therapist for the Journey Into Manhood retreats for JONAH and for another group called People Can Change, was accused of getting his jollies by forcing young men to disrobe and touch their naked bodies while he watched.
When a lawsuit against JONAH reached a New Jersey courtroom just this year, men testified that they were blindfolded while the “therapists” screamed homophobic slurs at them. They said Downing asked them to masturbate in front a mirror while he and others watched, but Downing insisted that it was voluntary and was only an “invitation” to do so. But, whether they are ordered or invitational, these practices are not legitimate forms of therapy, no matter what outcomes are expected. In fact, they are often sexual exploitation that is disguised as therapy,
One of the four plaintiffs who sued JONAH also testified that he was required to cut off all contact with his mother and to act out his aggression against her — because, they told him, she was responsible for his homosexuality. Groups that preach “family values” and the need for children to have a mother and father seem to forget what they stand for when they divide families in a vain attempt to turn gay people straight.