After I was initially creeped out by camp spokesman cum organizer “Justin Lookadoo” I quickly noticed Exodus has their hands all over this series of youth summer camps across the southeast. Exodus leaders Alan Chambers and Scott Davis are two of the four speakers listed on the camp’s website. Davis’ bio makes Exodus’ intentions pretty clear:
Scott’s goal is to encourage the evangelical church to reach out to youth grappling with their sexual identity with God’s radical grace and unswerving truth. He educates and trains college and youth leaders on this issue and currently oversees the Groundswell Conference — nationwide training seminars that equip community leaders with a powerful, redemptive response to the growing crisis of pro-gay initiatives in America’s schools.
Chambers also provides a testimonial for Ignite Student Outreach, the organization running the camps, here.
Update: An astute reader brought my attention to the camp’s “affiliates” page which had a single listing, Exodus Youth.
>> reach out to youth grappling with their sexual identity with God’s radical grace and unswerving truth
“Hey, we just want to help the grappling youth.”
>> the growing crisis of pro-gay initiatives in America’s schools
Wait a minute, wasn’t this about helping the grappling youth? Why, that almost sounds like a political agenda!
>> reach out to youth grappling with their sexual identity with God’s radical grace and unswerving truth
Oh, right, it’s not about the youth, it’s about the pawns in the big game.
You may have missed ISO’s Affilates webpage which lists just one – Exodus Youth.
I might even be tempted to go to a camp at Ridgecrest near Asheville, were I younger.
Daniel, reading this post got me thinking about the 1983 horror flick Sleepaway Camp, which had as the ultimate murderous pscycho, a trans girl traumatized by dsyfunctional parenting and the shock of seeing a gay dad in action.
I blogged about the film with its “evil” villian Angela/Peter here and discuss how Ignite’s summer camp with an ex-gay twist creates its own horror script.
Well since Peterson has brought us into the bizarre, lol. Justin’s home page pose is a tad disturbing to me.
Since you mentioned it David, some of the photos on his “Look a Do it” page seem a bit suggestive as well.
Is he really doing the YMCA dance?
https://www.lookadoo.com/doo%20it.htm
Make sure that you check out these first, original posts on the subject. I had originally received the invite in my email, made the 1st post on it and then contacted Wayne. I truly want to organize something around these camps, at least at Ridgecrest.
1st post, after receiving invite:
https://www.onlinegreensboro.com/~matthillnc/?p=1636
Follow-up post, with T.W.O. condemnation
https://www.onlinegreensboro.com/~matthillnc/?p=1639
The reviews for Lookadoo’s book Dateable are mixed and range from “teenagers should read this book” to less-than-complementary quotes from the book. One reviewer had this to say:
Repeatedly encouraging males to “be a man” and not “a pansy” while also enforcing the idea that men control relationships basically just reaffirms the old stereotypes of provider vs child-bearer, as well as telling men that it’s okay to hate women and gay people. I mean, no one wants to be a pansy, right? And making an attack on someone’s masculinity by calling them a girl (…) only shows that the people who talk like this don’t see any potential for equality between men and women.
Oh, goodie. A camp for kids where boys will be taught not to be a pansy. And for extra help in the not-a-pansy lessons, bring in Exodus with all their (ahem) newly masculine ex-pansies.
Other reviewers commented that the book seemed to believe that all guys want is to get in a girl’s pants (unless, of course, they are pansies) and all girls want is marriage.
The assertions that all boys are completely at the mercy of their own lusts and that all girls are weak commitment-crazy psychopaths (no exceptions!) perhaps would have flown in the paleolithic age, but honestly, I thought we were past this kind of schlock by now.
I suppose that if your ideal for family is a stereotypical 1950’s nuclear white family with a breadwinner and a bread-baker, then this camp might be great. However, very few people lived that existence (regardless of what TV may have said) or were happy in it.
But I haven’t read Lookadoo’s book so I really don’t know.
Apparently, a street address in Casselberry FL was listed prominently in the upper left corner of the Ignite Outreach site’s pages as recently as November 18th — it is visible in cached versions of the site via Google. The same address is listed in the contact info for the site’s domain name registration.
Casselberry is a suburb of Orlando.
So, whether by design or coincidence, perhaps being in the same area has facilitated close collaboration and sharing of resources between Exodus staff at the Orlando HQ and Ignite Outreach.
Oh, gosh, I’ve read a couple of the “Dateable” books written by Lookadoo and Hayley DiMarco. They are amazingly sexist, offer horrible dating advice to any teen – male or female – are written in a supposedly “hip” style that drove me up the wall, and, oh yeah, they throw plenty of gay-bashing in for good measure. I actually wrote to the publisher of these books – an imprint of Baker Books, a Christian publisher that I actually respect a lot most of the time – to express my disgust. I wouldn’t give these books to ANY teenager, ever.
Some classic quotes:
“Now I’m not trying to fill you full of downers and hand you a knife, but you need to understand that when you take on the role of the guy (asking out, calling, paying, etc.), not only do you mess up your dating relationship but you also mess up your spiritual relationship by telling God you just don’t trust him. Don’t get caught in the lie. It isn’t okay for girls to be guys.”
“The sexual revolution had its whack at destroying the relationship between men and women. As believers we now have the chance to restore that. Find out what God planned for guys and girls and start acting more like the girl God created–tender, soft, gentle, and lovable…In everything you do, think feminine. Think girly.”
“Whoever asks, pays. The hunter-gatherer male is fulfilled when he is allowed to hunt and gather with his wallet for the female of his dreams. The Dateable female does not take this gift away from the male, even if she disagrees with the rule. She knows that if it’s a rule, it must be right. Note: If he is not fulfilled by this part of the ritual, then he is not man enough to date her.”
“What happens is that if he isn’t finding out that he is man enough, he snaps into his feminine side. Don’t worry – it’s not a gay thing – we all have masculine and feminine sides. But this guy goes into that mode and never snaps out of it. He stays safe, comfortable, risk-free.”
“Then there is the ‘I was born gay’ argument. Well, poop on that.”
Justin Lookadoo scares the crap out of me.
Good grief, that’s hard to believe. Are these quotes from assorted books or just one? If so, which one? With the association to Exodus, we may need to review one of these.
I can’t find a single quote that makes the slightest bit of sense. And “hunter gatherer?” This guy believes in our evolution from cave men? That’s a new one.
All of the quotes are from either the original “Dateable” book, or from “The Dateable Rules”. Unfortunately, I can’t remember which quotes come from which book now, and I don’t have ready access to copies of the books right now to find out.
I should add: These books are written in a supposedly “hip”, “cool”, down-with-the-kids-these-days type of style. Maybe that’s supposed to excuse some of these obviously hyperbolic quotes, but I found it appalling regardless of whatever style they were shooting for.
Amazon says Justin Lookadoo is a juvenile probation officer? I wonder if that is still true. Not the best position from which to form an accurate view of the average guy or girl. The “hip” style seems to be part of the marketing. Hayley Morgan (co-author) put together a multi-million dollar brand for teens called “Extreme for Jesus” and is starting another venture with a similar mold.
When did ministry become so profitable? (it’s a rhetorical question, let’s not go there).
Important FYI…. Ignite Student Outreach has edited its website section on “Affiliates.”
Ignite Student Outreach re-writes the past
I’m not sure those changes are necessarily significant. It appears to be a new site so adding material at some point isn’t exactly “changing history” as is supposed in the article linked above. The original address was someone’s house so I can see why they would want to change that as well.
It does seem like an odd thing for Alan to be endorsing so openly, but then for all we know he goes to church with the guy.
Matt,
Thanks for keeping us updated on this.
I noticed that the “new friends” are really just the old friends moved from another part of the site. It may be that they think this is better layout but I think it’s more likely that they were embarrassed when it was pointed out that their only affiliated group was Exodus Youth.
If they are trying to appeal to all church youth, they didn’t want to be perceived as an ex-gay camp. Most church kids wouldn’t want to go if they thought it was just a bunch of gay kids trying not to be gay.
It’s kind of ironic. After all the effort that Alan goes through to demonize the “homosexual lifestyle” and “homosexual activists” and the “Gay Agenda”, he now has to deal with the fact that he’s helped create and sustain a religious subculture that wants nothing to do with these evil “sexually broken” people, even if they are trying to “walk away”.
What does this mean for parents who until now have been encouraged by Exodus to send their kids to Love In Action in Memphis?
Is Exodus quietly redirecting youths to camps that are more age-appropriate than LIA? Or is this just an expansion of the status quo?
Justin’s page is just really scary (and ‘gay’ imo). What’s with his favorite singers? Sinatra? Ricky Martin? Michael Jackson? (I’ll ignore the racism — of “Ricky Martin when he was still Latino.” And “Michael Jackson when he was still Black.”) But is like ex-gay as well? Or is he just a really cheesy, metrosexual? No wonder these kids are grappling with their sexuality. “He’s cute, but he says he hates me…” How long before he has a caught-with-a-male-hooker moment?