by Kilian Melloy / Aug 27, 2010 / Edge-Boston
A news outlet dedicated to HIV issues says that the "ex-gay industry," which is predicated on the claim that gays and lesbains can be "cured" and "converted" to heterosexuality, relies on a fear of AIDS to help spread its message--but that in practical effect, such groups contribute to the spread of the virus.
A POZ article from September, 2010, noted that despite the prevalence of AIDS in Africa as a disease predominantly affecting heterosexuals, Americans persist in believing that it is a "gay disease." Accordingly, Americans are more likely to believe that "converting" gays to straights will combat the spread of the virus because straights, according to this line of reasoning, don't get AIDS.
Proponents of so-called "reparative therapy," for their part, also harbor beliefs that are not substantiated by science or research. Some claim that homosexuality is not an innate characteristic that individuals are born with, perhaps through some combination of genetics and physiological factors, but rather the result of early-life sexual abuse. Others promote the idea that a person's sexuality is simply a matter of choice; some blame possession by evil spirits and prescribe exorcisms, the article said.
But underlying the various theories as to the nature and causes of homosexuality is the message that to be gay is to court AIDS--whereas to be straight offers some form of immunity against the virus. "They all use HIV as a scare tactic, the 'destructive, dangerous homosexual lifestyle' as a recruitment tool," the article quoted anti-"ex-gay" activist Wayne Besen as saying. "If there were a cure tomorrow for HIV, then I think these ministries would have significant trouble surviving, [because] they'd lose their largest fear-based message."
"It's ironic then, that the ex-gay movement puts everyone-regardless of sexual orientation-at a higher risk of HIV," the POZ article said. "On the surface, the movement teaches that homosexuality is a choice. But it really pathologizes gay people as threatening the family structure, harboring mental illness, spreading disease and molesting children. And it actively promotes discriminatory laws."
A basic tenet of combating HIV is the need to de-stigmatize not only the virus itself, but also homosexuality--or, in a broader sense, the activities of MSMs (men who have sex with men, many of whom identify as straight even though they seek sexual encounters with other males). Health authorities fight discriminatory laws in part because, they say, such laws would drive MSMs underground and prevent them from using condoms, getting tested for HIV, or seeking treatment if they know they are HIV-positive.
But the anti-gay and "ex-gay" movements work for the exact opposite, trying to undo decades of progress and re-stigmatize gay individuals and gay families. Under anti-gay laws, credible, fact-based information baout sexuality is suppressed, and hysterical claims about sexuality and disease flourish. The POZ article noted that even the idea that same-sex couples can enjoy a healthy and devoted monogamous relationship is simply denied by anti-gay groups; a 2000 video from the American Family Association called It's Not Gay: Former Homosexuals Tell a Story Few Have Heard flatly denies that gay couples enjoy fulfilling relationships on par with heterosexuals.
In some instances, the article noted, anti-gay religious figures even claim that they have been "healed" of the HIV virus through miraculous intervention--a claim not so different from the assurances that "ex gay" groups offer that prayer can "convert" gays and "set them free" from the "homosexual lifestyle."
Then there is the prospect of gay youth being sent by their parents for "conversion" to heterosexuality. POZ cited a report released by the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force in 2006 that states, "Parents are being lied to by ex-gay and religious leaders they trust. Parents are being told that homosexuality is a mental illness... which can be cured... and that if their sons and daughters are in the 'homosexual lifestyle' they are destined to lead short lives characterized by depression, anger, substance abuse and domestically violent relationships."
"The fact is that when parents, motivated out of genuine love and concern, reject their children's sexuality, they place them at higher risk for HIV/AIDS," the POZ article claimed, citing a 2008 study in journal Pediatrics that showed GLTB youth who endure familiar rejection go on to engage in the very behaviors and suffer the very health consequences that worried parents are told by anti-gay churches their children face unless they are "converted."
"As obvious as this may seem, it's the first study to examine this link and show that rejection, not homosexuality, causes these health risks," the POZ article said.
Anti-gay churches and "ex-gay" groups that promote the idea that gays can simply "choose" to be straight also wreak untold societal harm, the article posited, pointing out that a bill being considered in Uganda that would inflict the death penalty ion gays was the result, more or less directly, of a visit to that country by American anti-gay evangelicals.
Another part of the evangelical message is that homosexuality is not only a "choice," but is contagious: once men start to have sex with men, they may decide they prefer male sexual partners and "abandon" heterosexual relationships. "You know as well as I do how much there is in the gay community of trying to turn other people gay," an "ex-gay" man told EDGE publisher David Foucher in Foucher's 2007 series of articles examining the "ex-gay" movement. "There are plenty of guys who are interested in hooking up with straight guys," the "ex-gay" man continued, adding, "Because of that, homosexuality cannot just co-exist with heterosexuals. It doesn't work that way. In fact it is--please, if this word is hard I'm sorry--it is a cancer. It continues to metastasize further and further throughout the culture, starting with our schools, taking people away from their life-giving abilities."
But the so-called "culture of life" could have serious repercussions when it comes to the hard and cold facts of true science-based epidemiology. In the name of battling a "cancer" of sexuality--or perhaps of acknowledged sexual preference--could "ex-gay" advocates actually be advancing the spread of the virus that causes AIDS?
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