And Now For Something Completely Different

Michael Glatze, a gay-rights activist and former gay-mag editor (who exaggerates the importance of his magazine, something I'd never heard of called YGA that was a brother pub to the better-known XY), has announced he is now an ex-gay. Watch for him to be an ex-gay rights activist and current ex-gay-mag editor.

Glatze's story is worth reading for all gay people because it's a cautionary tale—not a caution against homosexuality, but against singling out homosexuality as the fall guy when bad things happen in your life.

Comically, Glatze specifically links his path away from homosexuality and to God to...a bout with amoebas:

"I'd developed a growing relationship with God, thanks to a debilitating bout with intestinal cramps caused by the upset stomach-inducing behaviors I'd been engaged in."

Yes, because when you get food poisoning it means eating is wrong, when you get lung cancer it means breathing is wrong and when you break your leg falling down the stairs it means attempted ascension is a mockery of G-d. I don't know what it means about the death of Matthew Shepard, whose mother the then-gay Glatze shared a podium with at Harvard.

But since Glatze feels so strongly about parasites, I find his core view of homosexuality to be tellingly parasitic in nature. Glatze explains in what can only be described as brainwashed-sounding, circular logic that homosexuality is totally lust-based and abnormal, something that attaches itself to you, like a tapeworm:

"Lust takes us out of our bodies, 'attaching' our psyche onto someone else's physical form. That's why homosexual sex – and all other lust-based sex – is never satisfactory: It's a neurotic process rather than a natural, normal one. Normal is normal – and has been called normal for a reason."

You know, it's going to take more than "normal is normal—and has been called normal for a reason" to convince me that who I am is exactly who I should not be. For one thing, he's so hung up on lust being bad. Do religious heterosexuals agree with that? I suppose they do, in theory. But in practice they indulge their lust all the time anyway—and even those who curtail it don't renounce heterosexuality, just lust. It's babies and bathwater.

And does that persistent lustfulness, shamefully indulged from time to time (oh, say, every day) make the heterosinners feel more human, more compassionate toward others who lust? No, it makes them preach all the harder against those other sinning people, and creates in them a sense of specialness: I shouldn't do this, but I'm going to because I want to. But I'll give it back to God by tormenting everyone else who we all know damn well are doing it, too.

And it's easier to torment the homosexuals because not only are they lustful, they're engaging in sexual behavior that is different. Different is so much easier to demonize. Yes, their own lust is bad—all lust, as even Glatze asserts—but gay lust? Worse.

In his earnest essay, Glatze has explained why I rejected Christianity in the same way he has rejected homosexuality. When I was little, learning about the Bible, I realized that Christianity was set up to teach you many supposed truths, and that in order to protect itself from naysayers, its Bible is claimed to be completely divinely inspired. Yes, it was written by lots of different people over many years and then translated by many more people over many more years, but all of it—every word—is straight from God. There's a lot of wonderful stuff in the Bible (it's kind of hard to pick a favorite, like how when you want to rank the songs on a cherished album you tend to penalize the most obvious hits just because they're so familiar), but there's also some total bullshit that was clearly made up by divinely uninspired contributors at some point.

Any belief system that says it holds all the truths and that to question it is blasphemous is not a belief system at all, it's a control mechanism, a cult. And a fragile one—one that knows it can not withstand critical thinking. What better way to squelch inquiry than to state flat out that questioning is inherently wrong, is the product of diabolic meddling in your mind, will lead to eternal damnation.

Or at least to a bad case of amoebas.

I reject Christianity personally, but I know there are plenty of Christians out there who are good people and whose faith does not harm me. That's the view an ex-gay should take. Maybe Glatze really believes his homosexuality—which I would argue is intrinsic to who he is—has hindered him in life, and maybe he really believes he can cast it aside through prayer and mental focus. I pity that future wife, but fair enough—buh-bye. But ex-gays are never satisfied with renouncing homosexuality, they're so fragile in their decision—just like those Christians who claim to be anti-lust but indulge themselves at every turn—that they defensively try to make all the rest of us happy gays feel that homosexuality is bad for us, too.

Gays are not the ones trying to recruit ya, it's the ex-gays you have to watch out for!

Ex-gays remind me of those pictures of animals dressed up as people. There is something abominable about it after you stop laughing. There is something abnormal. The best approach I've seen has been comic, an image showing a distraught Asian woman with the slogan, "Are you asian [sic] and don't want to be?" That humorous sign sums up why ex-gays are just cats in clothing—you can not change who you fundamentally are.

I will say this for Glatze—you can change how you behave. If Glatze feels lustfulness is a distraction that keeps him from being a better person, there's no reason he shouldn't stop focusing on lust. But I have a feeling that by deciding his entire sexuality falls under the category of evil lust, he'll be devoting more time than ever to lust—thinking about how harmful it is, telling others to avoid it, attempting to keep it off his mind, indulging in it and then feeling guilty about it.

He'll be openly gay again someday. Hopefully he'll come to realize that wanting to lick some guy's asshole doesn't have to mean you can't have God in your life, and that wanting to lick some guy's asshole doesn't mean you can't later share love and affection with the guy, too.

(Mandatory further reading. Also, I've updated with a link to one commenter's blog.)

As YGA says, "Don't let them steal your soul!"

Comments

[Ben]

Amoebas? Sounds like a chewed the wrong ass and didn't like what happened next. (Giardiasis anyone?) I suppose he then chose to view the experience as divine intervention as opposed to what it was - stupidity from which to learn.

Sad.

[Tomi]

Another horny ugly queen bitter cause they couldn't get laid.

No, seriously, I think this is so sad because apparently he was working with other entities to make people understand that alienating gay people is not OK, and now he's basically telling them that on a second though now it is.Is that what Jesus would do? I hope they don't listen, but anywho, this kind of stuff undermines social advancement of gay and lesbian issues.

On top of that, I think it might be confusing for other young gay guys who are also turned off by the mainstream gay lifestyle. In some way it does seem like it is concupiscense what binds the gay community together. I think collectively we seem to much focus on the six packs and torsos that we forget it's the emotional connection with another guy that brings us together. I could see his point, but you don't deny your own sexuality because of that.

To me his 'switch' lacks credibility. I would be less skeptic maybe if he said 'I fell in love with this girl' or 'I was a closet hetero', but in this case he doesn't seem to be changing his sexual preference for another, he's trading the one he had for an abstract concept that appeases his guilt.

[Matthew Rettenmund]

I've never understood why gay popular culture's emphasis on sex and partying would be enough to cause a gay person to question not that loud-minority culture (because there are many gay people who don't define themselves by six-packs or six-pack-envy) but his entire sexuality instead. I guess it's because we're all raised to be straight, so there is always going to be that "what if I'm doing wrong by being gay" question for some people, weak people, as Glatze himself admits he was, and that he obviously still is.

[homer]

I just feel sorry for this guy. He'll be the ex-gay poster boy for a while, and then the inevitable downfall when he gets caught in a gay bar or a bathouse or a park. Hasn't this sort of soap opera plotline already been done over and over again?

[Matthew Rettenmund]

I know what you mean, but it's like all the foreign versions of Ugly Betty (including the U.S. one, which is foreign to the original): Same thing, but it plays socko over and over. I can't feel sorry for someone who is going to be using a lot of energy (I presume) attacking who I am, who I love, what I do. I feel the ex-gay argument about anti-discrimination laws "enabling" the "gay lifestyle" is one small step away from advocating prison time for homosexuality. Why not criminalize it? Wouldn't that be the best way for a country to send the message that gay is not okay? I do pity ex-gays on some level, but I could focus more time on pitying them if they were not so busy causing harm.

[Michael]

Glatze is clearly now a major mess, but, with all due respect, your bitchy comments about YGA reflect more poorly on you than him. That you were not familiar with YGA magazine only suggests that your knowledge of gay "boy culture" is more limited than you think.

There's no defense for his present crusade, particularly in his literal demonization of gays and defense of antigay laws, but there is much to be admired and respected in his past. He and his former partner Benjie Nycum both worked for XY magazine and wrote the critically acclaimed and popular "XY Survival Guide, Everything You Need to Know About Being Young & Gay." Copies ordered by a Canadian gay bookstore were confiscated by Canadian customs.

They left XY as it devolved more and more into teen soft porn. Out of their desire to provide emerging gay kids with something more grew YGA magazine which perhaps you’d never heard of because it wasn’t about you. Its success [read survival] ironically was negatively impacted by the limits on their very target demographic, few of whom could have delivered to their parents’ home. I met them both at Equality Forum [have you heard of that?] in Philadelphia in 2005 and Nycum spoke of how difficult it often was to get some distributors/stores to carry it, particularly in places where positive messaging to gay kids was most absent. That two guys on their own were trying to bankroll and publish such a unique needed resource rather than, e.g., the rolling-in-money Human Rights Champagne fund is but further evidence of how little many national gay groups and PAID professional activists actually care about gay kids [after all they can't yet be groomed as cash cows for such groups or buy those expensive dinner tickets to watch Reichen and Lance canonized].

They also produced the moving documentary about the suicide after years of harassment in school, including being urinated on, of 19-year old Jim Wheeler called "Jim in Bold," and toured the country with an exhibit of pictures and interviews with gay kids they'd put together. In 2003, Equality Forum gave them the Tom Stoddard
National Role Model Award presented by Wheeler's mother who called them HER role models. How many of you have heard of Jim Wheeler or Tom Stoddard? http://www.equalityforum.com/2003/gallery/jiminbold/05.jpg

It appears to have been a very sad emotional slide for Glatze from that day and others such as those when he shared the stage with Judy Shepard and her message of acceptance and hope for gay kids. And the bloodthirsty antigay industry wolves have already locked their fangs around him and are shaking him in our faces.

Yes, we have every right to fight back as they do that and while he equates homosexuality with death But to trash him with so little knowledge of what came before both demeans the good that was done then as well as Nycum who as far as I know is still proudly gay, and the ongoing need to prevent others be they 13 or 30 like Glatze from falling into such pits of self-hatred. With apologies to Shakespeare, it’s not that Glatze is doing less but that the older, out gay community needs to do more.

[Robguy]

Thank you for clarifying - when I first read his article I wondered what was he doing that gave him abdominal cramps? I'm 40 years old and my faggotry has never caused illness. What a sad man, I'll "pray" for him.

[Rafael]

13 years of shame. I can't help but feel sorrow for this man. I'd hope my experiences, memories and friends of thirteen years would be of significance to me at then end. Apparently Mr. Glatze is not over his confussion. Perhaps this "ex-gay" was never gay to begin with. I can tell you that my life is not a state of lust or for that matter a state of the mind, for this I know where I stand, for this I hope Mr. Glatze finds peace at last.

[Pot Calling The Kettle]

Michael --
Funny how you criticize Matt Rettenmund for his "bitchy" comments and then proceed to

A. all but stick your tongue up the arse of a gay man who is ready to vote for any law that would encourage your demise; and

B. deliver your comments in a tone that's nothing short of ... uh, bitchy.

P.S. Matt's post read more witty than bitchy to me. The fact that you don't see the difference speaks volumes.

[Matthew Rettenmund]

Michael: I'm perplexed by your vitriol over my comment that Glatze overemphasizes the importance of YGA. I think some of your anger might come from a frustration that more in the gay community are not aware of the political and social strides some in our community are trying to make.

First, even though I'm gay and keenly aware of (commercial) magazine publishing, I simply had never heard anything about YGA, which is why I said that. That makes sense since I was ancient by the time it was published. (I did know about the fun, "what do you mean am I porn?" XY, which I was featured in just before I turned ancient.)

While I certainly commend Peter Ian Cummings and the others who put XY and/or YGA together, my point in commenting on the importance of YGA was not to belittle anyone, it was to underscore that Glatze—now turning ex-gay—is trumping up his importance in the gay community as a way to endear himself to our enemies and to make himself into a much bigger "catch" than he is. "A former rising star in the gay rights movement" (paraphrasing) is how some (anti-gay) articles have described him, and that is like Michael Jackson demanding to be called the King Of Pop. Except that Michael Jackson could arguably be termed the King Of Pop, and for all his accomplishments, I don't think Glatze could rightfully be termed an ex-rising star.

I hope this clears things up. Thanks for commenting.

[Thomas Kraemer]

I just reread Mike Glatze's XY Magazine issues that he edited from 1999 to 2001 and found he had ex-gay-like thinking back then. He also admitted to being depressed and not being gay because he liked straight things. I've quoted some examples of this, along with a picture of three covers that say 'straight antigay wacko,' next to his picture on my blog page post
"Michael Glatze straight antigay wacko XY editor" (7/5/07)
http://thomaskraemer.blogspot.com/2007/07/michael-glatze-straight-antigay-wacko.html

I also document a discrepancy in Glatze's claimed age and several factual errors in the "World Net Daily" pieces. For example, they incorrectly said he at age 22 became editor of YGA (they also got the magazine name wrong), when in fact YGA magazine didn't exist in 1999. Significantly, neither Glatze nor WND named XY Magazine even though Glatze obliquely called it "bordering on pornography." And neither provided the name of his partner Benjie Nycum even though WND mentions Glatze moving to Halifax with his "publisher" in 2004. I am unsure where Benjie Nycum is now, but he is a native of Halifax.

[Matthew Rettenmund]

Thanks, Thomas. That's fascinating stuff, tracing the origins of an ex-gay. I also found the deletion of XY's name interesting. To what end? Yes, it was very sexual in a Britney Spears not-that-innocent way, so...why wouldn't WND go out of its way to point that out? Because a legit editor is more of a catch than a porn editor. Not that XY was porn, but certainly ex-gays and their religious audience would think it was. Thanks again!

[Wirrrn]

Methinks the amoebas in his tummy migrated to his brain, and took over!

[Mark]

This whole diatribe, from both sides, seems like a polarization of sexuality. If I'm not mistaken, Kinsey was out to prove and was relatively successful at it, that sexuality is fluid and a continuum. We are at a time in our understanding of same sex orientation where we are learning so much about these varied boundaries. Identifying that sexuality and lust are overused marketing tools in society in general is not a bad thing. Some of the reaction to that today is the continued fight for marriage equality which is more about forming families. Yet, many in our culture do not aspire to be like their heterosexual brothers and sisters, but were attracted to the other-freakish, if you will in the first place and enjoy participating in that kind of lifestyle. I think we should stop trying to be one thing, but embrace the multi-variate, complexity of what makes us human, not just gay or straight. Acceptance is the key.

[Matthew Rettenmund]

Thanks for your thoughtful comment, Mark, but I think I have to disagree to some extent. I think that many if not most gay people accept the fluidity of our sexualities, and that some people are going to be non-exclusively gay, at least situationall. That's not what's going on with ex-gays, who are anti-gay. I think it's wrong to view gay as one side of the issue and ex-gay as the other with a happy middle. Ex-gays are arguing that everything about gayness is evil and something to resist. Gay people are arguing that we are not evil. I think gay people can and should certainly engage in a debate about whether or not our culture is too sexualized (compared to straight culture...which is also pretty darn sexualized!), but ex-gays should not be included in that debate—they are, in my opinion, psychologically poisonous if for no other reason than they don't see it as gay culture being too sex-obsessed, they see gayness as being 100% about lust and sex. Which it's not. And further, they see lust and sex as sinful and wrong. Which they're not.

[Tomi]

Michael:

I think all of these 'accomplishments' only make this guy the object of more scorn, because it meant he worked for causes he didn't fully believe in. He was a hypocrite for a long time. He looked people in the eye and told them thing he didn't feel. In his words, he was not confused or mistaken, he was 'performing'. What kind of value does that have anymore?

It makes me mad for no other reason that it has taken so much for us to preach acceptance and accomplish equality in homophobic societies like this one, then in comes an emotionally unstable person like this one and just blows more smoke over the whole situation. Thanks a lot.

My take is that I guess sometime in the future they could develop a method aimed at self loathing homos, to 'turn them into straight guys', i.e finding this guy's small percentage of heterosexual responses -if any- and make him cling to it. But that would entail dealing mostly with sexual and emotional issues, something the right wingers are not good at all. That would mean this ex gay seminars would have to be focused on making these guys excited by the female form, and be emotionally fulfilled with the female company as they are with the male. Would like to see a right winger teaching someone to be aroused by a nice rack.

But like Homer wrote here, we already know the outcome of this whole ordeal. When he gets busted again, maybe he will start wondering if the source of his empty drug-fueled, twink-chasing nights is to be found somewhere else.

For him to blame his downfall on homosexuality is like Ashlee Simpson blaming her bad singing on acid reflux.

[Chris]

Responding to Thomas Kraemer's comments, I had remembered reading some of those articles by Glatze years ago, and I always viewed them not as an ex-gay viewpoint, but a post-gay viewpoint-Glatze seemed, at least for a portion of his past, very obssesed with the perhaps "utopian" idea of a world where you can love who you want to love, regardless of whether it's the opposite gender or the same gender and that not being an issue at all. There are thoughts in the younger generation of queer people coming of age now (I by the way am 24), that 'straight,' 'gay,' 'bi,' 'lesbian,' can be too exactly confing to describe the emotional feelings and physical attraction that they feel, and that the aforementioned labels are paradoxically empowering (in claiming an identity that you can join in with others who have had similar experiences and fought for similar rights) and detracting (the idea that gay/straight, etc. are labels that have too much association with issues of political stances, religion used in politics, and so on, as opposed to it merely being about each individual persons' feelings and attractions. Yes, it is a naive view to think that if we all do away with gay/straight,etc. labels and proclaim a fluid sexuality, that issues of prejudice and ignorance will go away, but from what I read of Glatze's articles, I think that's a mindset he was going towards, very much in conflict over who he loved/was attracted to and how those feelings force you into political/religious arguments. Yet in both the straight and glbt communities, if someone projects a fluid/uncertain/confused sexuality, they can be vilified by either side as being confused and a traitor/naive fool. Assuming there are other issues he was dealing with, but I think if Glatze was dealing with a desire to have a 'fluid' sexuality unencumbered by political issues, he eventually fell into a place of confusion and anger over this improbably utopian ideal, and somehow did a 180 and perhaps began to equate not wanting to labeled as gay with 'I must not be gay..I must not be attracted or feel love for other guys..I must be straight..Oh, I must be straight and anti-gay now.'

I read this article Glatze wrote for XY magazine online when I was a freshman in college and in a time when I was figuring out my own sexuality, it really spoke to me:http://shermanbuck.com/why_queer.htm

[Matthew Rettenmund]

Thanks for that perspective, Chris. Personally, while I understand the motives behind post-gay, I have always, always recoiled from it because my instincts were that post-gay was secretly anti-gay. Until you pointed out the connections, I never thought how post-gay and ex-gay are literally the same thing, albeit with different supposed meanings. In Glatze's case, for sure.

[Chris]

I see where you're coming from Matthew, on connecting post-gay to possibly being submerged feelings of internal homophobia; in my own coming out, I didn't have huge issues with finding other guys attractive but instead of those feelings meaning I had to label myself gay, which I initially saw as coming with a lot of preconcieved baggage, that all these stereotypes of what gay was would be percieved as who I was if I stared labelling myself gay. Of course I eventually realized I was myself still regardless of whether I called myself gay or a guy who was attracted to other guys, or whatever. It just comes down to an individuals personal comfort level with revealing a huge, deeply personal part of themself that can cause such varying reactions still in society.
Going back to the original topic, I unfortunately came across this response post on the whole Glatze controversy on the site www.goodasyou.org, that casts a damming accusation against both Glatze and his ex-lover Benjie Nycum. Having respected these guys alot when I first heard of the Young Gay America project on the web, I really, really hope it isn't true:

Mike's decision to leave the gay lifestyle has less to do with it being a sin and more to do with what years of partying on XTC and having threeways with teenage boys will do to one's psyche.
Mike and his then partner Benjie were guests in my home during their road trip days. I invited them to stay with my partner and I for a week during Gay Days in Orlando and to speak to the local GLBT youth group that I had just started working with. A few days into their stay the topic of teens dating adults in their 20's, 30's, 40's etc came up and to say that I was shocked by their take on this topic is an understatement. They spent several days telling me things like "It is our duty and it is our right to have sex with guys as young as 14 so that they might know how wonderful and loving and beautiful it can be."
They also spent a good amount of time pushing the idea that XTC is not harmful and that the government wants people to think it is bad so that they do not try it. I, and many others in our local community, were left feeling like the two of them were wolves in sheeps clothing. They continued to try and convince me sex with teens was ok, even going as far as to tell me they would let me talk to the parents of a teen friend of theirs in the midwest who allowed and encouraged their teen son to date men in their 30's or even older.
They kept emailing me about the whole thing, emails that I still have to this day. It was only when I told them that my editor was encouraging me to write a piece on the age of consent issue in the gay community that they started to step back. They told me that I needed to study and read up on the subject and that I should not even think about writing such an article for at least 1 to 3 years. I never wrote the article but I have continued to work with our GLBT youth group and sadly I have learned that Benjie and Mike are not the only people within our community who think nothing of taking advantage of gay teens who long for guidance and unconditional love and are instead given drugs and sex in their place.
I ended up telling them that I wanted all mention of me and the youth group I worked with removed from their site, which they eventually did. Over the years I have continued to hear stories about them and what they were really into, the drugs, the orgies, the pictures they would take of young men in their underwear...young men who looked up to them and probably expected something different, something better, but never got it.
I would like to hear what Mike has to say about these things. If he is such a good Christian now he should be asking all of those young men he had sex with and did drugs with to forgive him.
I think that Mike's conversion has more to do with his guilt and shame than it does his repulsion of the entire GLBT lifestyle.
To Mike -
You and Benjie chose to live the lie and the life that you created, Mike, so stop trying to lump all of the rest of us, the ones who do good and honorable work with Queer youth, into the damaged baggage that you created for yourself.
You used the idea of doing good for the GLBT youth of the world to further your own sick and twisted desires. You had the nerve to accept role model awards and to share space on a panel with good people like Judy Shepard, while continuing to mess up minds behind the scenes. I know that if that had been my experience I would be bonkers now too.
The help that you need is not going to be found in the ex-gay movement, Mike, it is going to be found in your coming clean with what you were really up to and trying to repair the damage that you did to who knows how many young gay men.
John

[Yaz]

I will never understand...