Asterisk

Clay Aiken officially came out of the closet in the new issue of People magazine, set to be released this Friday. Sure, this is one that most people had figured out, but it’s still good to see the former American Idol runner-up come out of his closet, and on his own terms to boot. Here’s an excerpt from the article:

“It was the first decision I made as a father,” Aiken, 29, tells the upcoming issue of PEOPLE, on newsstands Friday. “I cannot raise a child to lie or to hide things. I wasn’t raised that way, and I’m not going to raise a child to do that.”

The born-again Christian singer also reveals how he told his mother Faye he’s gay four years ago. After dropping off his younger brother Brett, who was being deployed to Iraq, at Camp Lejeune, “I started crying in the car,” Aiken remembers. “It was dark. I was sitting there, thinking to myself. I don’t know why I started thinking about it … I just started bawling. She made me pull over the car and it just came out.”

So what was his mom’s reaction? “She started crying. She was obviously somewhat stunned. But she was very supportive and very comforting.” Even now, Aiken admits, “She still struggles with things quite a bit, but she’s come a long way.”

Welcome out, Clay. Hang on through the negative nonsense that you’ll get from anti-gay groups and rejoice in your newfound freedom.

Now go give that baby a hug.

I got an article from One News Now (the fake news service from the American Family Association) in my inbox last Saturday. I’m never happy to see that; they’re just so transparent in their bigotry over there it’s not even amusing anymore. So I clicked over to the article that the AFA reprinted from Life Site News (their fake news service compadres from Canada) and found that surprise, surprise, they’re lying again.

So few words, so many lies.

My blood got all boiled up and I started writing this post in my head, but before I got to it, Alvin McEwen, author of Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters, did a much better job than I could ever hope to. Rather than duplicating efforts, I’m going to be lazy and link to his detailed analysis. Here’s a brief sample:

Warning sign 3: One News Now cites the work of discredited researcher Paul Cameron:

These findings strongly support the results of similar studies conducted in the United States, which have unveiled the severe physical and psychological health risks associated with homosexual behavior. Drs. Paul and Kirk Cameron of the Family Research Institute revealed in 2007 that research shows that the lifespan of a homosexual is on average 24 years shorter than that of a heterosexual. As a health threat, even smoking pales in comparison, as studies show smoking can shorten one’s life by only 1 to 7 years on average.

No, sorry. One News Now is telling a boldfaced lie. The study in question was actually conducted in the early 1990s. In addition, the study is indicative of why Cameron has been discredited, censured, and mocked by so many legitimate physicians, researchers, and other folks (this blogger included).

To read more of McEwen’s spot-on analysis of One News Now‘s par-for-the-course distortions, lies, and other non-Christian nonsense, head over to his blog.

LifeSite News and OneNewsNow have misinterpreted our review. Evidence from around the world identifies the main stressors leading to mental distress in gay and lesbian people as discrimination, prejudice, bullying in schools and colleges, and the consequent need for many LGB people to keep their homosexual identity secret, even from their families.

Our review did not examine links between mental disorder and homosexual “behaviour” or “lifestyle”. Our work reviewed studies of the mental health of lesbian, gay and bisexual people, and sadly, those studies showed that it is people (not behaviour) that are discriminated against, and not least by religious groups and organisations.

Discrimination on the grounds of sexuality is even more devastating than other forms of discrimination such as racism, as it reaches right into families and leaves no refuge for its victims.

We suggest in our review that the availability of alcohol and drugs at gay social venues may be a factor in the greater risk of drug and alcohol misuse in LGB people. Reducing this problem is something for which LGB people must take greater responsibility. However, the fact that discrimination still exists in our societies means that many are forced to use such venues to meet each other rather than through more common ways available to heterosexuals, such as at work, during the pursuit of hobbies and past-times, or at church.

There is now abundant evidence that homosexuality is not itself a mental disorder and that it is compatible with a healthy lifestyle. We shall only begin to see a reduction in mental distress and deliberate self harm in LGB people when all sectors of society welcome them as equal and valuable citizens.

There’s more over at the Box Turtle Bulletin. Click here to read on. My thanks to Dr. King for weighing in on this gross misrepresentation of his work.

Since last Saturday’s post about Ray Boltz’s coming out, I’ve been busy on the intertubes. To a certain extent, I took it upon myself to go to the blogs that were, shall we say, less than congratulatory to Mr. Boltz and give some sort of counterpoint to their finger-wagging and oh-so-disappointed rhetoric.

That was a bad decision. Very bad.

It’s bad because I knew better than to think I could change their minds. I learned a long time ago that if someone is convinced that they know better than my first-hand knowledge and lifetime of experience, there’s nothing I can say to un-convince them. They won’t trust anything I say because at best they think I’m just trying to make myself feel better, and at worst they think I’m the devil. (And yes, I’ve gotten that one.)

I had typed up a list of 21 hateful, idiotic, and embarrassingly anti-Christ comments I’ve seen in the last six days, but after sleeping on it, I realized that I was still missing the point.

The point is this: I can spend my energy railing at and correcting the bigots to no benefit, or I can choose to spend it talking to the people who either aren’t sure or who need a nudge to be more vocal with their church or governmental leaders.

My goal must not be to shout anybody down, but to inform and educate the people who are still reachable. Those are the people who will help change the world, not the bigots who want only to maintain their superior position in society.

Still drives me nuts, though.

Contemporary Christian Music icon Ray Boltz came out of his closet yesterday in an interview with the Washington Blade. The singer/songwriter, best known for perennial Sunday School Appreciation Day anthem Thank You For Giving To The Lord, has been out to family and friends since late 2004, but this marks the first public acknowledgment of his sexuality.

So much of Ray Boltz’s story is similar to the stories of other gay men, especially ex-ex-gays, and to a certain extent, my own. I had the same conversation with myself when I realized that this is the way God made me, and that no amount of prayer or begging or trying or wishing had made a dent in 25 years. I finally accepted that I wasn’t broken, that in fact, I would become closer to God’s intention for me by telling the truth about my homosexuality. I’m so glad Ray had the same epiphany.

From Joey DiGuglielmo’s interview:

“I really had no master plan here,” he says. “I’ve just been trying to go with the idea that you can either live your life out of love or out of fear. I could just stay here in Florida and be pretty anonymous. I could go work at Wal-Mart or something where nobody knows who I am, but to me, that’s kind of living in fear.”

Even though Boltz plans no triumphant homecoming to Christian music, there may be rough days ahead. The Contemporary Christian Music scene has traditionally held its artists to much higher standards than their pop counterparts and it’s only been those who’ve shown repentance for their perceived sins, who have been able to rebuild their careers.

Even [Metropolitan Community Churches executive director] Cindi Love anticipates tough times ahead for Boltz.

“He needs to get through this initial coming-out process and just see how that feels,” she says. “A lot of people will probably throw a bunch of stuff at his family. I pray they don’t, but I bet they will.”

[Producer Joe] Hogue, who worked with Boltz on his 1991 album “Another Child to Hold” and has helped him record a few new songs for a still-evolving possible new project, says he hopes for a day when Christians will see homosexuality as no more a perceived sin than it used to be for women to be ministers or for divorced Christians to hold leadership positions in churches.

Boltz admits to some nervousness, but says ultimately, he isn’t worried.

“This is what it really comes down to,” he says. “If this is the way God made me, then this is the way I’m going to live. It’s not like God made me this way and he’ll send me to hell if I am who he created me to be … I really feel closer to God because I no longer hate myself.”

For more information on Ray Boltz’s coming out to his family, as well as what’s happened between then and now, please click through to the extremely thorough article from the Washington Blade.

Welcome out, Ray.

In a recent interview with the New York Times shortly after his 80th birthday, Maurice Sendak had this to say:

Was there anything he had never been asked? He paused for a few moments and answered, “Well, that I’m gay.”

“I just didn’t think it was anybody’s business,” Mr. Sendak added. He lived with Eugene Glynn, a psychoanalyst, for 50 years before Dr. Glynn’s death in May 2007. He never told his parents: “All I wanted was to be straight so my parents could be happy. They never, never, never knew.”

Children protect their parents, Mr. Sendak said. It was like the time he had a heart attack at 39. His mother was dying from cancer in the hospital, and he decided to keep the news to himself, something he now regrets.

A gay artist in New York is not exactly uncommon, but Mr. Sendak said that the idea of a gay man writing children books would have hurt his career when he was in his 20s and 30s.

I’m so excited that Sendak has taken the big step (rumors had apparently been circulating for ages), but there’s sadness here as well. Sadness because he’s in mourning for his partner of 50 years, and sadness that he never felt comfortable enough to tell his parents that he was gay.

But most of all, sadness that he’s probably right about the impossibility of a gay man writing children’s books, especially in the 1940s or 50s.

Depression permeates his thoughts in this interview, and I can’t help but think back to the line Mr. Sendak penned 44 years ago in his Caldecott Medal winning Where The Wild Things Are:

And Max the king of all wild things was lonely
and wanted to be where someone loved him best of all.