Why Is Seemingly Every Anti-Gay Activist a Closet Case?

[Lemur]

I'm not even sure these things bear mentioning any more, but this one is particularly awful:

Big-time gay "curer," anti-gay activist and Baptist minister ... well, do I even need to say it? Oh, and he co-founded the Family Research Council, once again proving Lemur's law, that any organization with the word "family" in the name is psychotic.

The pictures on the Rentboy.com profile show a shirtless young man with delicate features, guileless eyes, and sun-kissed, hairless skin. The profile touts his "smooth, sweet, tight ***" and "perfectly built 8 inch **** (uncut)" and explains he is "sensual," "wild," and "up for anything" — as long you ask first. And as long as you pay.

On April 13, the "rent boy" (whom we'll call Lucien) arrived at Miami International Airport on Iberian Airlines Flight 6123, after a ten-day, fully subsidized trip to Europe. He was soon followed out of customs by an old man with an atavistic mustache and a desperate blond comb-over, pushing an overburdened baggage cart.

That man was George Alan Rekers, of North Miami — the callboy's client and, as it happens, one of America's most prominent anti-gay activists. Rekers, a Baptist minister who is a leading scholar for the Christian right, left the terminal with his gay escort, looking a bit discomfited when a picture of the two was snapped with a hot-pink digital camera.

Reached by New Times before a trip to Bermuda, Rekers said he learned Lucien was a prostitute only midway through their vacation. "I had surgery," Rekers said, "and I can't lift luggage. That's why I hired him." [...]

For decades, George Alan Rekers has been a general in the culture wars, though his work has often been behind the scenes. In 1983, he and James Dobson, America's best-known homophobe, formed the Family Research Council, a D.C.-based, rabidly Christian, and vehemently anti-gay lobbying group that has become a standard-bearer of the nation's extreme right wing. Its annual Values Summit is considered a litmus test for Republican presidential hopefuls, and Sean Hannity and Ann Coulter have spoken there. (The Family Research Council would not comment about Rekers's Euro-trip.)

He has also influenced American government, serving in advisory roles with Congress, the White House, and the Department of Health and Human Services and testifying as a state's witness in favor of Florida's gay adoption ban.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

I guess they hate being gay.

[PanzerJaeger]

Because reaching that level of hatred for something so innocuous requires at least a certain level of self loathing. Sure I can understand disliking gays, but to get out in the streets and make it one's life goal to hurt them requires a deeper level of intimacy with the subject, no pun intended. That's my guess.

I do disagree with the article on one point, the linkage of these activities to the right wing in general. I believe this is based more specifically on evangelicals. Many right wing people do not hate gay people. They may have principled disagreements with the legal specifics of something like gay marriage, but the real hatred comes from the religious (I do realize there is significant overlap, though).

[Vladimir]

I guess they hate being gay.

Pretty much. Thread closed.

Chances are that they're ashamed that what they are is so far from what they want. It's a sad situation. The same rule also applies to those who ridicule them.

Maybe they're just trying to deflect attention?

[Beskar]

You got to think of ingroups and outgroups.

In their little bible belt area, homosexuality is the big sin. They have these homosexual thoughts and they go "oh no, I might be infected! I know, I will hate on teh gay".

Then they go around hating homosexuals and making their life awful, that way, they can go "I am definitely not one of those homosexuals, ho ho ho".

They continue and continue till they grow weary of fighting it and go "This sucks, I am going to join in the gay!" so one minute superhomophobe, next minute "Hello Boys!".

Classic self-denial case.

[Lemur]

Maybe they're just trying to deflect attention?

There's a whole theory of this, something like the "shield of virtue," or some such formulation, about how people who harbor "shame" behaviors can make up for it by posting more and more aggressively as the virtuous. My Google-fu is failing me, though, and I can't locate either a summary of the theory or the name of the author. Shame on me.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

I imagine that a fair number of former alcoholics who preach about avoiding alcohol, end up drinking again. We don't really charge them with hypocrisy though--it doesn't make much sense to criticize someone who knows what is right, and preaches what is right, but has trouble doing it because it's hard.

The difference is, they are correct that being an alcoholic is a bad thing, and the priests are wrong.

[drone]

I am reminded of an ancient proverb: He who smelt it, dealt it.

[G. Septimus]

Pretty much. Thread closed.

Chances are that they're ashamed that what they are is so far from what they want. It's a sad situation. The same rule also applies to those who ridicule them.

Maybe they're just trying to deflect attention?

lol you say "Thread Closed" and it's still opened

[Hosakawa Tito]

Not sure, but the comic relief is much appreciated.

[Cute Wolf]

gay or not gay, that was the basic human rights in sexuality... when you didn't agree about that, you can close your eyes, and watch your behind...

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

There's a whole theory of this, something like the "shield of virtue," or some such formulation, about how people who harbor "shame" behaviors can make up for it by posting more and more aggressively as the virtuous. My Google-fu is failing me, though, and I can't locate either a summary of the theory or the name of the author. Shame on me.

Partly true.

I imagine that a fair number of former alcoholics who preach about avoiding alcohol, end up drinking again. We don't really charge them with hypocrisy though--it doesn't make much sense to criticize someone who knows what is right, and preaches what is right, but has trouble doing it because it's hard.

The difference is, they are correct that being an alcoholic is a bad thing, and the priests are wrong.

Also partly true. These men believe being homosexual is wrong, and just like any other addict they try to "get clean" and then help others.

This is not to say, of course, that some of them aren't haters as well; and generally quite vile.

[Rhyfelwyr]

I think this is a phenomenon for American evangelicals, as has been pointed out.

As to homophobia in general, meh. I used to hate a lot on teh gays. Maybe this sounds stupid to y'all here, but to me, terms like gay/pedophile/rapist were basically interchangeable. You were either normal or a deviant, once they were different in one respect they could be pretty much anything else. When we had these debates in the past, I used to think everyone was bs'ign me when they insisted that gay people really weren't all these things as well.

As to why I thought this, well its what pretty much everyone else in RL believed, and it was confirmed by limited personal experience (the only gay person I ever knew in RL was the weird queen type, really creeped me out, plus police vans had to regularly patrol a local park you can guess why, confirmed the idea of them being like the 'badman' kids are told to look out for). And yes you can all go into a leftist moral outrage over this, but that's just what the world is like outside of the liberal circles of the enlightened few.

I guess I changed me views when I went on a work experience thing, and the guy I worked with one of the days was gay. I didn't even know until I heard after, and he was the nicest guy I met on the trip. The other workers weren't hostile to him or anything, but there was a lot of jokes etc behind his back, made me feel sorry for him.

I still think homosexuality is wrong, but I suppose I don't hate on them as much now.

[Spartakus]

If you are a repressed homosexual I imagine it must be intolerable to watch other homosexuals enjoy life in harmony with their nature.

[Strike For The South]

uncut you say?

How exotic

[Scienter]

I suppose I should feel bad for Rekers because his anti-homosexual actions are probably a result of his own self-hatred, but I don't, really. But, when someone makes a career out of promoting bigotry and discrimination, I'm glad when these scandals break because it damages their cause.

[Beskar]

I suppose I should feel bad for Rekers because his anti-homosexual actions are probably a result of his own self-hatred, but I don't, really. But, when someone makes a career out of promoting bigotry and discrimination, I'm glad when these scandals break because it damages their cause.

Agreed.

If we lived in an more open and tolerant society then these issues wouldn't happen in the first place.

[al Roumi]

I suppose I should feel bad for Rekers because his anti-homosexual actions are probably a result of his own self-hatred, but I don't, really. But, when someone makes a career out of promoting bigotry and discrimination, I'm glad when these scandals break because it damages their cause.

Well said.

[Lemur]

Colbert can't leave well enough alone. Although, in fairness, the cameraman is a stroke of genius.

[Major Robert Dump]

Maybe his nickname for his testicles is "my luggage." In which case, he is technically not lying and therefore still a good, gay christian.

[KukriKhan]

I feel a Poll coming up: "Have you ever used a nickname to refer to your private parts?"

[Crazed Rabbit]

Reached by New Times before a trip to Bermuda, Rekers said he learned Lucien was a prostitute only midway through their vacation. "I had surgery," Rekers said, "and I can't lift luggage. That's why I hired him." [...]

Oh come on now, Lemur. Who hasn't hired a gay prostitute to haul luggage around for them?

Semi-seriously, in answer to the thread title, I suspect it's because we only hear about these anti-gay types when they turn out to be gay.

CR

[Lemur]

This is not a parody, repeat, this is NOT a parody. And this is the gayest dude ever to declare that homosexuality is an abomination.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

A "straight man who used to be gay?" I know that sexuality is, at best, a continuum and not an on/off switch. However, even absent conclusive research as to homosexuality as a nature/nurture trait, my own experiences and interactions suggest that "nurture" is, at best, the smaller of the two "causes" for this. If it is naturally occurring, however rare, how can it be an "abomination?"

[Lemur]

A "straight man who used to be gay?"

In a fabulous ascot, too. Mmmm.

[Beskar]

He is still gay, he just doesn't act on it or does secretly.

Probably more of a case that he doesn't practise in homosexual acts, so he won't go to hell, but it doesn't stop him spending time with the boys in his dreams.

[drone]

This guy is obviously a fifth column attack by GLAAD on the self-hating "family values" closet-residents within the religious right. He will run through them like a combine driver on meth, exposing them all as the hypocrits they are.

[Vladimir]

Don't worry about it. Worrying is a sin.

[Louis VI the Fat]

There is something so sad, so tragic, about watching that gay. Uh, guy.


He is obviously homosexual, but his doubt and guild has convinced him otherwise. He is so troubled by it, tries to push the genie back into the bottle so hard, that he now devotes his time hunting gays. Sad.

But it really shows in a nutshell why so many 'family values' men are closet gays. (Or is that why closet gays are family values men)

[Lemur]

He is obviously homosexual, but his doubt and guild has convinced him otherwise.

As per usual, South Park nailed it completely and utterly.