Gay Conversion Therapy in Minnesota

Zach is a gay, 16 year-old Myspace user (pre-Fox News' News Corp. takeover) who used the blog feature on the website to let his friends know that his parents were forcing him to attend a Tennessee camp called Love In Action with the purpose of 'curbing' his homosexuality. The program is a six week course and began in mid-June. He was set to be released sometime this past week. Towleroad and Law Dork have excellent background on Zach.

The story has kicked off national attention about these 'ex-gay ministries,' both the forcible kind for teenagers, such as Zach's case, and the overall phenomenon itself. The New York Times had a write-up several weeks ago, and Crooks and Liars currently has a video of the second part of a 2-part interview by Paula Zahn with a current staff member who compares 'conversion therapy' of gay teens to parents taking their kids to music lessons(!). AmericaBlog has a good analysis of both interviews, and major kudos to Zahn who really took the staff member to task.

One huge admission by the Love In Action staff member is that same-sex sexual attraction is ingrained and natural, which departs from the conservative christian argument that gays can change, and get married to heterosexual partners, and leave 'the lifestyle.' The urges will still persist, he says, and it's up to faith and god to help ex-gays stay away from hot gay sex. This idea of ingrained sexuality is, of course, something we queer folk have been saying from the beginning of time. Love isn't about choices; it's about love. Attraction happens. Deal with it, homophobes!

And let's not get caught up in the idea that this kind of forced 'anti-gay-ing' only happens in the South. Minnesota has several of these same programs set-up to prey on the oppressed, the confused, and those that don't know any good and happy GLBT people. They are oppressed and confused, because these programs and churches(!) tell them that all GLBT people are lonely, diseased, and suicidal. I wonder if these programs and churches actually realize that their rhetoric is what causes some in the GLBT community to become lonely, diseased, and suicidal. That's a book to be written on another day!

Minnesota has 5 programs (that I know of) dedicated to tearing down GLBT people by indoctrinating them with rhetoric about sin, disease, and abuse. They are Eagle's Wings Ministry in Minneapolis, Oasis Ministries in Hutchinson, Outpost Inc., in Robbinsdale, Simon Ministries in Minneapolis, and Keys Ministries in Wykoff.

If you found this page searching for one of these programs looking for help, please reconsider. There are many, many churches that welcome GLBT members, and many social and faith based groups for GLBT people statewide. Don't believe everything your church says; people make mistakes. And if you don't believe me, just ask John Evans, the co-founder of Love In Action, the camp that Zach was sent to:

"In the past 30 years since leaving the 'ex-gay' ministry I have seen nothing but shattered lives, depression and even suicide among those connected with the 'ex-gay' movement," Evans writes in his letter to John Smid, Love In Action's current director. "I challenge Christians to investigate all sides of the issue of being gay and Christian. The Church has been wrong in the past regarding moral issues and I'm sure there will be more before Christ returns."