Undercover Homosexual
polaris_x
Posts: 13,559
christian conservative aspiring writer decides to be "gay" for a year in the bible belt to see what it was really like ...
http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/ar ... -a-gay-man
When Timothy Kurek told his mother he was gay, she wrote in her diary that she would have rather heard she had terminal cancer.
Most of his Christian friends stopped speaking to him. “Jesus doesn’t love you anymore,” one said. As he sat outside a café in a gay neighbourhood, a stranger yelled “Faggot!” and threw a full two-litre bottle of cola at his head.
All terrible, painful experiences for a gay man — but Kurek isn’t gay. He’s a straight, conservative Christian from Nashville.
The aspiring writer went “undercover” as a homosexual for a year to understand the adversity gay people face in the Bible Belt. His book about the experience, called The Cross in the Closet, was released last week.
Kurek said the idea came to him after a friend came out as a lesbian. She told him, sobbing, that her family had disowned her.
“While she was crying in my arms, instead of loving her and trying to comfort her, my thoughts were … ‘Maybe I should give it a go and try to save her, get her to repent,’” he said.
Kurek was raised Independent Baptist and told that being gay was a sin. He remembers learning the story of Sodom and Gomorrah, and being taught that God destroyed the cities to punish homosexuality.
But after his experiment, he realized the voice in his head wasn’t God, but religious propaganda.
“I realized I had to kill that voice inside of me, because it was only hurting me and hurting others,” he said.
The only way he could do that, he thought, was to experience what his friend had just gone through. So in January 2009, when he was in his early 20s, he “came out” to his family, got a job at a café gay men frequented and started going to gay bars.
His family was outwardly supportive, although he later found his mother’s diary entry that revealed she was struggling. “I was actually pretty fortunate, compared to a lot of other LGBT folks,” he said.
The first time he went to a gay club, he panicked when a shirtless man began grinding against him on the dance floor.
“I didn’t know whether I needed to punch him in the face or go have a cigarette,” Kurek said.
So Kurek asked a friend, who he described as a “big, burly, black teddy bear,” to pose as his boyfriend, so he wouldn’t be hit on.
He didn’t have relationships with men, but did experience what it was like to wear the label of gay in the South, he explained.
He devotes an entire chapter to the first time he was called “faggot.” To his surprise, it made him weep.
“I had to be held back from attacking the person that did it. I never felt so violated and minimized in my entire life, because of that one word,” he said.
LGBT advocates are divided on Kurek’s experiment. Helen Kennedy, director of Egale Canada, said he can never truly know what it’s like to be gay.
“He can’t see what it’s like to be a gay father, or to be an out man in a straight workplace,” she said. “He’s coming from a place of privilege.”
Irene Miller, president of PFLAG Toronto, agreed, but said she was hopeful the book would change some homophobes’ minds. “Within that evangelical culture, if they listen to his message, then it may do some good.”
When the year had ended, Kurek found his views had completely transformed.
“I went from being a very narrow-minded, hyperconservative Christian to an ally of the gay community,” he said.
His project not only changed him, but also his family and friends. When he revealed a year later that he was in fact straight, his mother said she understood that sometimes you need to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes to understand them.
She is now an avid supporter of gay rights. His new LGBT friends were also supportive, Kurek said.
And rather than destroy his faith, the experiment actually saved it. “To the conservative Christians who read my book, I say, ‘Hey, there’s a much better way,’” he said. “It’s God’s job to judge, it’s the spirit’s job to convict, and it’s my job to love.’”
http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/ar ... -a-gay-man
When Timothy Kurek told his mother he was gay, she wrote in her diary that she would have rather heard she had terminal cancer.
Most of his Christian friends stopped speaking to him. “Jesus doesn’t love you anymore,” one said. As he sat outside a café in a gay neighbourhood, a stranger yelled “Faggot!” and threw a full two-litre bottle of cola at his head.
All terrible, painful experiences for a gay man — but Kurek isn’t gay. He’s a straight, conservative Christian from Nashville.
The aspiring writer went “undercover” as a homosexual for a year to understand the adversity gay people face in the Bible Belt. His book about the experience, called The Cross in the Closet, was released last week.
Kurek said the idea came to him after a friend came out as a lesbian. She told him, sobbing, that her family had disowned her.
“While she was crying in my arms, instead of loving her and trying to comfort her, my thoughts were … ‘Maybe I should give it a go and try to save her, get her to repent,’” he said.
Kurek was raised Independent Baptist and told that being gay was a sin. He remembers learning the story of Sodom and Gomorrah, and being taught that God destroyed the cities to punish homosexuality.
But after his experiment, he realized the voice in his head wasn’t God, but religious propaganda.
“I realized I had to kill that voice inside of me, because it was only hurting me and hurting others,” he said.
The only way he could do that, he thought, was to experience what his friend had just gone through. So in January 2009, when he was in his early 20s, he “came out” to his family, got a job at a café gay men frequented and started going to gay bars.
His family was outwardly supportive, although he later found his mother’s diary entry that revealed she was struggling. “I was actually pretty fortunate, compared to a lot of other LGBT folks,” he said.
The first time he went to a gay club, he panicked when a shirtless man began grinding against him on the dance floor.
“I didn’t know whether I needed to punch him in the face or go have a cigarette,” Kurek said.
So Kurek asked a friend, who he described as a “big, burly, black teddy bear,” to pose as his boyfriend, so he wouldn’t be hit on.
He didn’t have relationships with men, but did experience what it was like to wear the label of gay in the South, he explained.
He devotes an entire chapter to the first time he was called “faggot.” To his surprise, it made him weep.
“I had to be held back from attacking the person that did it. I never felt so violated and minimized in my entire life, because of that one word,” he said.
LGBT advocates are divided on Kurek’s experiment. Helen Kennedy, director of Egale Canada, said he can never truly know what it’s like to be gay.
“He can’t see what it’s like to be a gay father, or to be an out man in a straight workplace,” she said. “He’s coming from a place of privilege.”
Irene Miller, president of PFLAG Toronto, agreed, but said she was hopeful the book would change some homophobes’ minds. “Within that evangelical culture, if they listen to his message, then it may do some good.”
When the year had ended, Kurek found his views had completely transformed.
“I went from being a very narrow-minded, hyperconservative Christian to an ally of the gay community,” he said.
His project not only changed him, but also his family and friends. When he revealed a year later that he was in fact straight, his mother said she understood that sometimes you need to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes to understand them.
She is now an avid supporter of gay rights. His new LGBT friends were also supportive, Kurek said.
And rather than destroy his faith, the experiment actually saved it. “To the conservative Christians who read my book, I say, ‘Hey, there’s a much better way,’” he said. “It’s God’s job to judge, it’s the spirit’s job to convict, and it’s my job to love.’”
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Comments
Reminds of the first time I ever went to a gay bar for the first with my brother in law at the time. I was playing baseball at the time and wore my Red Sox home jersey to the bar. He didn't exactly tell me it was a gay bar but we were just getting a drink. It took me a short time to notice their wasn't any women in there but I thought this place was interesting. At first they had men dressed as women singing up on a stage Madonna, Patti La belle etc. I have to say it was entertainingly hilarious BTW this was Dupont Circle Wash DC.
Anyway as the night went on I got separated from my in law trying to get a drink when this guy comes over and starts to talk baseball noticing my jersey. This was 22 years ago and i was a much bigger guy then so he starts to ask me about the game. He asked what position I played and told him 3rd base and anywhere else I'm needed in the infield...then he asked the technicalities of the position. Like did I have to bend over and how much did i have to bend over to play. I was gunho at the time and started to explain...that's when it hit me what he maybe getting at and I Told the guy I'm straight. I don't think he believed me and it was that time my in-law jumped in and acted as if I was his boyfriend. My in law let's say can be an hell of an actor and went off the chain that I was his man etc and so he grabbed my arm and left telling the guy it was BS he IS straight.
The experience was eye opening for me cause before that I was never up close to seeing 2 men kissing, holding hands etc. I didn't know what to think I was just trying to understand what I was seeing for the first time. i never judged them I just thought it was better than them beating or fighting with each other. I'd rather see love than fighting amongst people whether same sex or not.
i couldn't stop laughing though on the way home on how I was falling for the whole line of baseball positions and such, i gather I was a bit naive back them. I hope this book opens a few more eyes that people who are gay only want to love and be loved just like the rest of us.
Peace
*MUSIC IS the expression of EMOTION.....and that POLITICS IS merely the DECOY of PERCEPTION*
.....song_Music & Politics....Michael Franti
*The scientists of today think deeply instead of clearly. One must be sane to think clearly, but one can think deeply and be quite INSANE*....Nikola Tesla(a man who shaped our world of electricity with his futuristic inventions)
Peace
*MUSIC IS the expression of EMOTION.....and that POLITICS IS merely the DECOY of PERCEPTION*
.....song_Music & Politics....Michael Franti
*The scientists of today think deeply instead of clearly. One must be sane to think clearly, but one can think deeply and be quite INSANE*....Nikola Tesla(a man who shaped our world of electricity with his futuristic inventions)
On one side... I'm kinda tired of the gay community being used as everyone's science project.
On the other side... um... I guess the baseball team got a ringer who doesn't throw like a girl.
i can be a fake gay...you know just to see how ill treated they are and what they go through. :roll: and when the heat rises i can just come out as a hetero. one day(before i die preferably) i want to see people as people.. not gay people or straight people like thats a measure of them as a person, but just as people. what do i care who you choose to fuck?
take a good look
this could be the day
hold my hand
lie beside me
i just need to say
Yeah, Catefrances, I get that. Sexual preference- makes no difference to me. Each to his or her own. Or both. Or this-- I had a gay boss once who never talked about his sexuality except one time when he said he was tri-sexual. He said, "I'll try anything." His boyfriend rolled his eyes and said, "No he won't".
In any case, I do give kudos for the guy in the story maybe making a difference in peoples thinking. Maybe one day people will just let people be themselves that way without making an issue of it. Hopefully anyway.
Uh... just as an aside... I've been with my husband for 20 years. And I make porn for a living. We really don't fuck very often anymore.
and.... I would like to think.... that you don't also tell your straight friends who announce their weddings that "it's none of my business where you stick your wang."
Just saying. He's... a lot more than "Who I choose to fuck."
http://aggravatedjasun.tumblr.com/post/29275888669
i know theres more to partnership than sex. i was speaking generally about when someone does choose to have sex, it isnt my business who they decide to fuck. . i apologise if i caused you or anyone else any offense.
take a good look
this could be the day
hold my hand
lie beside me
i just need to say
Accepted.
(it's a very raw nerve for GLBT couples, to have to watch our straight siblings and cousins and friends have huge announcements for their engagements, notices in the news paper, months of showers and "jack and jill parties" and gifts and a mega ceremony and an expensive reception with MORE gifts and toasts that go on for hours...
...but when we ask to skip all that and just get a toe-hold of rights and protections, we hear "why do you have to make a big show of it? Can't you just live together? I don't care who you're fucking."
And just one tiny last one and I promise I'll shut up... but being gay.. not a "choice." I know you didn't say it was, but it's another term like "who you're fucking" that is often used to make gay relationships comparable to joining a bowling league.)
yuo may say "i know you didnt say it was" but by you saying that rightly or wrongly i feel the need to justify my stand. and that grates on me(a sentiment im sure you identify with.. or maybe not). it doesnt matter whether or not that is expected, the point is im put in the position where that is how i feel. all i can say is what i feel and what i think and when i do saywhat it is i think or feel, it is always with truth. when i say i dont care who you fuck, there is no hidden agenda...i do not think of it as comparable to joining a bowling league.. it is simply that i do not feel it is my business. but having said that, i do want you to make a big deal of your rights cause i see them as human rights. ALL people should make a ruckous of their rights, cause if they dont no one pays attention. if we lived in an equitable society thered be no need for gay pride parades or the push for marriage equality or take back the night parades or all the other crap we feel the need to become engaged with cause itd already be written into law. unfortunately the society we live in needs to eb reminded that privilege is not so much a privilege but a right for all.
i
take a good look
this could be the day
hold my hand
lie beside me
i just need to say
ya ... the article had comments from the LGBT community kinda saying the same thing ... personally, i think it was good as ignorance is what breeds intolerance ... and even tho this guy should have been able to figure it out just by talking to people in the community - he was also kinda indoctrinated ... what i found most hopeful was the mother ... having her opinions changed (sort of) is a bigger deal i think ...
yep walk a mile ...
stand in their shoes...
but who ever does? and when asked to who just blows it off ?
why? because it is so much easier to not feel, it's so much easier to hate, to generalize,
to not understand, sometimes understanding is to know another's pain and to admit
yourself wrong.