Peterson Toscano's A Musing

Gay Vampires and the Ex-Gay World

Blogger Peter Varvel muses over at his blog Plastic Bubble World about his experience as a gay man growing up in an anti-gay Protestant church,

How lucky am I that I wasn't raised Catholic? I had enough guilt as it was, having been raised Protestant, especially when it came to my sexuality. So, whenever I was sexually active, both guilt and my imagination fueled my paranoia.

What if the guy I was having sex with was actually a vampire? What if while he was, um, "goin' downtown to pleasure me," he sprouted fangs and decided to slake his sudden thirst for blood, right in the middle of it all?

I have never gotten through an entire Anne Rice novel. But I have always thought that the Christianity and homosexuality conflict would make a good background for a vampire story.

Someone who spent time in an ex-gay support group, Varvel expresses some of what he got from the teachings he sat under,

In real life, it would be too simple to say that ex-gay ministry teaches self-hate. It doesn't fit into that convenient of a nutshell, at least not with the support group that I had been involved in. But I'll confess that my time with them helped to influence the view of myself as something a bit monstrous, like the poor, deformed Phantom of the Opera, a soul not quite guaranteed salvation.

I don't miss ex-gay ministry. I'm glad that I checked it out, and that I made an honest effort toward achieving their goals. But I'm also glad that I'm past that part of my life, years past the self-pity of that time, and that I have been able to reach a point of being at peace with--and acceptance of--myself.

Read all of Varvel's piece Gay Vampires for Jesus (or, Sympathy for the Evil) and check out the dramatic image he provides along side his writing.

Like many of the ex-gay survivors who have written for Beyond Ex-Gay (bXg), Peter Varvel has a much more balanced view of the movement than most gay activist and ex-gay promoters. He admits that they don't overtly teach self-hate.

It is easy to vilify ex-gay providers and say they are just money-grubby, anti-gay ministers of hate. This is not true. Many of them were kind people who unwittingly shoot out poison darts. Fortunately we can move past the negative messaging and live centered, peaceful, confident lives as lesbian, transgender, bisexual and gay people.

Check out the newest narrative over at bXg where Seth Guyettes shares The Ex-Gay Movement and The Negative Impact it Had on My Life.

Labels: blogging, bXg, ex-gay, ex-gay survivor

posted by Peterson Toscano @ 2:30 PM