Mike Haley of Focus on the Family occupies the chairmanship of the Exodus board of directors. His predecessor as Exodus chairman, John Paulk, was also Haley’s predecessor as head of Focus’ antigay political programs.
Exodus’ new spokesperson, Julie Neils, was for five years the media manager for the Public Policy division of Focus on the Family before quitting in 2003 to be a stay-at-home mom. While Exodus is based in Orlando, Neils will be working from her home in Colorado Springs, near Focus on the Family headquarters, according to Randy Thomas in Exodus’ "Impact" newsletter for December 2004.
Exodus’ regional representatives include Melissa Fryrear, also of Focus on the Family.
According to the Exodus web site, Fryrear is coordinating the "Safe Churches" affiliate network. In Exodus’ December newsletter, membership director Randy Thomas says the Safe Churches network and an exgay therapists’ network are being developed to "help us bridge the gap between someone walking out of homosexuality and the hope found in the Body of Christ." (I think it’s reasonable to suspect that these churches and therapists will eventually be mobilized to fight antiviolence/safe-schools programs.)
Other Exodus religious-right board members include Phil Burress of Citizens for Community Values and Vickie Burress of the American Family Association of Indiana.
Exodus doesn’t report where it gets its money from, but the annual dues of its referral network of 120 exgay activists are far too low to support Exodus’ $700,000+ annual budget. I think it’s reasonable to suspect that a lot of money comes from Focus on the Family or James Dobson personally, but I’m not sure how to document that. I welcome suggestions.
When I was going through therapy with Joe Nicolosi, NARTH was always soliciting my parents for donations. Nonetheless, donations made to Exodus from private individuals probably make up a single figure percentage of their income. Unless… When FoTF throws their big Love Won Out conferences does Exodus actively solicit big donations? That might boost the numbers a bit.
Quote Ministrywatch:
Founder: NA
What? They don’t want to publicize the founders who ran off and embraced their gayness?
Michael Bussee was one of several co-founders; Gary Cooper’s role is disputed.
Exodus and activists like Warren Throckmorton claim that Cooper does not qualify as a co-founder because he was not on the original board. Others maintain that Exit was a predecessor organization to Exodus and that Cooper was instrumental in the movement’s formation.
The deniers have the upper hand, unfortunately; Cooper is no longer alive to defend himself.
I know, that was a joke.
I know it was a joke. But exgays don’t have a sense of humor.
(And that’s a joke, too.)
Melissa Fryrear is a fairly recent seminary graduate from my alma mater, so I’ve followed her ministry work and employment at FoTF with some interest. Her testimony has appeared on the home page of Exodus for several months at least. When I read through it, I always shake my head with amazement that Exodus would spotlight a story that ends with such a shallow, comical focus on outward ‘change’ (and no, I don’t think it’s meant to be funny.) Here are the concluding paragraphs:
“During my years of restoration, I also began to learn about this thing called womanhood. Goodness! Who knew there was so much to learn: plucking eyebrows, hair bleaches, hair waxings, facial mud masks, eye lash curlers, manicures, pedicures, push-up bras, tummy tuckers, rear-end boosters, last year’s colors, and next year’s fashions?
I also began to learn about boys. Let me say that if anyone thinks puberty is tough at fifteen, try it in your thirties!
And the seed flowered.”
Are these dual members of FotF and Exodus all exgay? Is a good part of Exodus’ board not exgay?
Also, I’ve said this before, but the ties between Exodus and the religious right are pretty amazing to me. For an organization that claims to be reaching out to all gay people, they sure do a good job to partner up with “the enemy” (those adamantly opposed to any benefits or rights to gays and gay couples). When I read on Randy Thomas’ blog how honored he was to meet a US Senatorthat compared homosexuality to an attraction to a box turtle, I really can’t see that Exodus is the type of organization I want to get involved with. Many of these people seem to be against more than just gay rights (Senator Santorun for example), they seem to be against simple common decency. Exodus friendship with these types of people really goes against the mission of helping gay people imo.
Exodus is merely a “Front” organization, one of a plethora, for Dobson and the RR. It provides a patina of reasonableness behind their agenda of forcing all gay-identities into the closet, the ghetto, the concentration camp, or the re-education camp (Exodus). Fryrear’s “testimony” (as you quote it, Rick) is not calculated to influence those who have gay-identities. It is calculated to appeal to RR donors.
I tell you, these people have “Gott mit Uns” stamped onto the belt-buckle of their inner being. Compromise and dialogue are 4-letter words to them. They will stop at nothing to win for their side, and the truth is a weapon for them, and they get to define what truth is.
I am not overstating this threat. What else could be the rationale behind their supporting the advancement of felony sodomy laws against same-sex affectational behavior?
To conservative Christians of a certain type, correct gender performance is highly important, and verses from various epistles are often cited. However, the details of performance vary for women: the Nazarenes don’t allow makeup, hair perms, ornate jewelry, and require long uncut hair. The standard So. Baptists require makeup, perms or a decent “feminine-looking” haircut, and jewelry to fit in. Guys, however, are just guys in either denomination.
Has anybody used a standard charity website such as http://www.guidestar.org to check out Exodus’ tax filings, which by law list salaries of top 3 employees and sources of donations greater than 10K (or 5K, can’t remember which).
On the point of superficiality, I think this is actually an interesting subject that some of you have just washed over. Not everyone agrees that gender is only “a state of mind”.
I realise that, around here, he’s no doubt a farcical homophobe in thrall to James Dobson, but Alan Medinger’s book “Journey into Manhood” spends quite a while on the motives behind seemingly superficial strategies for gender identity. What are our ideas of gender BUT superficial, when we are young? How else are they to be formed? Why do boys seek out fire engines and girls tea sets when there’s no direct BIOLOGICAL reason why they should? Is it because a fire engine, in itself, somehow makes a child feel manly, or is it because television shows mostly MEN fighting fires?
I get the impression that Fryrear is simply delighting in her list of superficialities, not because of what they are, but because of what they represent – a link to a world dominated by women, and from which she has for a long time felt alienated. Why should this cause such offense? It could perhaps be called immature if she had grown up and left it behind, but it seems to be something she has never approached.
GuideStar charges a fortune for access to detailed records.
But it does make Form 990 available for free.
Exodus filed its F990 for 2002 six months late. The form lists no employees or contractors who were paid more than $50,000. The form does not list any specific donations.
A little off topic but what I find interesting is how their theories on gender identity are the same at the “radical” feminist ones of the 1970’s. I.e. gender as a social construct. I.e. if you dress boys in pink, talk with them a lot and give them dolls to play with they will be less aggressive.
Actually there are some biological reasons why girls are drawn to tea sets and boys to fire engines. It isn’t so much that they are born knowing that boys play with fire engines and girls with tea sets, but the differences between the genders as well as the learning capacity of children would make some activities more interesting for one gender than the other. Boys seem to be able to tolerate more noise and are less sensitive to touch than girls. (I.e. be more rough/tumble) Girls seem to be more interested in conversation and faces than boys. Those biases combined with the learning capacity of infants (i.e. watching other people) set us up to behave in masculine or feminine ways. To the boy the tea set is dull. To the girl the fire truck is too noisy. By the time the child can play with the tea set/fire engine the gender identity train has already left the station.
jason,
Do you really believe that most girls are only disinterested in fire engines because they’re noisy? Wouldn’t it be the case that, for many girls, it’s because the OTHER GIRLS don’t want to do it?
What then do you say to men who were interested in tea sets as boys? They weren’t really boys biologically, or they just weren’t conforming to a particular trend for their gender?
In any case, I’m not a big fan of complete social contructivism for gender, which is why I said, “Not everyone agrees that gender is only “a state of mind”.”
You characterise social constructivism with this statement:
“I.e. if you dress boys in pink, talk with them a lot and give them dolls to play with they will be less aggressive.”
This is actually the reverse of what I would say, and I imagine Medinger would be the same. There are some traits that appear to be more strongly influenced by biological factors than others – we just disagree about which ones. I would include aggression, certain types of mental acuity, perhaps some element of emotional sensitivity (though that is complex). I would not include something as massively complex as homosexuality (that state of falling in love with, and desiring erotic contact with, persons of the same sex). It is a dramatic conflux of emotional and erotic factors.
SOME boys are interested in fire trucks, and SOME girls are too.
Remember-lots of people DISCOURAGE boys and girls from things that are attractive to them as individuals.
I’m not saying that social conservatives don’t have or believe there are gender roles to play.
The problem is they think that people are MEANT to behave a certain BECAUSE of their gender and FORCE the roles on individuals regardless.
Girls are CONDITIONED to think and respond in ways people expect them to.
And when they don’t, it’s very damaging.
That conditioning goes against the grain as the conditioning people are exposed to regarding homosexuality.
Our society can be cruelly gender repressive and there is no excuse for it.
regan,
I used to think so too, but I can also see that a lot of parents are preparing their children for a childhood and adolescence where they don’t WANT to be different, and yet they still want to be special. No amount of quixotic statements like “you’re unique and special, you don’t have to be like everyone else” is going to help a boy or girl who would do anything to be included with the other boys and/or girls. I think, when we can, we should encourage tolerance of difference, and discourage obviously negative gender stereotypes (eg. some forms of macho conformity), but I don’t see the eradication of all gender norms as a realistic course.
Yes, I think that our biological basis has quite an effect on our behavior and the way we respond to our environment. I also think that socialization by parents/family also have quite an effect and it is also a two way street. Parents socialize children, but they also respond to the behavior of their children. Also, not many people give gender inappropriate toys. I think that by the time the child can choose to play with either the fire truck or the tea set, things are pretty well advanced.
One of the more interesting thing in life is watching small children say about age two. Will a two or three year old pick up a gender inappropriate toy? Yeap. But they usually don’t play with it the same way. A boy might pick up the tea set and he might even pretend to drink from it for a few then more likely than not he will probably throw the pieces of the tea set around. A girl would pretend to drink from the tea set for much longer and would be less likely to throw it about. She might go from drinking from the tea set to arranging it just so and so forth.
Do I think that children are affected by other children. Sad to say, yes. However, I don’t think that peer pressure is the biggest factor limiting behavior. By the time a little girl is playing with other children she probably already has lots of dolls given by her parents and a personality shaped by her gender. Do I think that gender norms should or even could be eradicated, nope. There are always going to be activities that one gender will have an edge in than others.
I don’t see it as an either/or proposition and I don’t see it as being something that would affect their ability to fit in as adolescents. After all if your son didn’t make the basketball team there is still chess, debating, acting, ect…
Jason,
Fully agree with you on most points there. You’re right that toys are often treated differently by boys and girls because of other factors (eg. boys may have an instinctive need to exercise their 3D spatial ability, so may throw the tea cup).
re: this one: “After all if your son didn’t make the basketball team there is still chess, debating, acting, ect…”
You assume a peer society which gives equal gender conformity value to these pursuits. eg. I have a friend who grew up in Lithuania behind the Iron Curtain. He is a superlative classical singer, talks with a cultured voice and his GIRLFRIEND recently invited me to see him perform in a major opera. Of course, many of his opera friends are gay. I imagine that, in the society of his youth, these pursuits were not as stigmatised as they are in my own anglo-celtic-dominated society.
Let me be more frank. At my school, classical music was not cool or manly. Scoring As in most of my tests, particularly English, did not win me much approval from anyone except perhaps my parents. I once purposefully got a B because I was sick of thinking of myself as “square”. That’s my problem, I know. I suppose I should have transcended these shallow perceptions with some kind of mature joy in my uniqueness and academic ability.
Just one last thing, I have often heard people counter the idea of parental distancing as an indirect contributor to same-sex attraction by suggesting that it really went the other way – that the parent somehow sensed that the child was gay and so distanced him/herself. I’ve often thought this has a lot of validity, but couldn’t it be the case that the parent was not sensing homosexuality but simply gender-non-conforming traits and behaviours, many of which might have been biologically determined? I’d be interested in your thoughts.
During my senior seminar in College, we studied the question of “Sex” (e.g., biologically derived differences) and “Gender” the social construct, trying to determine which was more responsible for the supposed differences between the genders. After all, the two genders share nearly all our genes, so are the differences really that important, or do they seem more important because they are visible?
Certainly style of dress, hair, etc. are socially constructed for genders – anatomically speaking men really should be the ones wearing skirts. But like all questions I think the answer to the nature/nurture question becomes “a little of both” – there are undoubtedly real differences between the genders that appear biologically determined – including social interactions, play choices, etc. – that are reinforced by the social construct.
I think where the fundamentalists get it wrong is taking what are general or population differences and applying them to every individual. Clearly not every girl wants a tea set, and we should not require them all do want one. But I think the rigid gender roles in fundamentalist religions are about a larger need/attempt by the belief system to make the world an ordered place. It is easier to deal with a simple idea like “everyone is either male or female” than to handle the true complexity of gender. That’s why a lot of fundamentalists (at least the ones I’ve encountered on board/blogs) will simply refuse to consider the issue of intersexed people – they don’t fit into the nice model and many people simply refuse to believe they exist.
When it comes to the issue of gender non-conformity and sexuality, I think they are like blond hair and blue eyes, they tend to go together, but don’t have to. Clearly there are gender-conforming gay people (probably the majority), but it seems like nearly all gender non-conforming people are gay. And there is clearly a range of gender conformity within gay people.
I think a theory of parental detachment because of gender non-conformity as a cause of homosexuality is ludicrous if only because sexual desire and attraction are rooted in the autonomic nervous system, and I don’t see how parental behavior of any type could re-wire a person’s nervous system.
In fact, if there were not moral outrage against homosexuality, I think the assumption that it is a choice/character flaw, or the result of bad parenting, would never have been adopted. Given what we know about fetal development, in which genes are turned on by hormonal triggers at precise times, why would either sexuality or gender ever be considered different? We know that all babies start out female and must be “masculinized” if they have XY chromosones, and we know that every human being is a product of a male and a female – why is it considered strange that there are those people who are more of a mixture of the two than others? – it’s really to be expected.
CPT_doom,
“I think a theory of parental detachment because of gender non-conformity as a cause of homosexuality is ludicrous if only because sexual desire and attraction are rooted in the autonomic nervous system, and I don’t see how parental behavior of any type could re-wire a person’s nervous system.”
I have to say – I think this is overly simplistic. Let’s take someone who becomes sexually aroused when he/she thinks of, or looks at, boots. Does this mean the boot fetish was always rooted in the autonomic nervous system (“God created me to love boots”), or isn’t it more reasonable to suggest that it got there somehow?
“why would either sexuality or gender ever be considered different?”
Because nobody even wants to define sexuality very clearly, and, unlike the usual decision over biological “sex”, it develops through infancy, childhood, adolescence and even adulthood. The fact that, as you point out, there are apparently gender-conforming people who are identify as gay, as well as gender-non-conforming people (though these are likely superficial observations) suggests that there is not an obvious relationship between gender and sexuality.
“In fact, if there were not moral outrage against homosexuality, I think the assumption that it is a choice/character flaw, or the result of bad parenting, would never have been adopted.”
Regardless or not of moral outrage, I would have thought any scientist, particularly a Darwinist, would be interested in the causes behind the widespread occurance of a behaviour that doesn’t appear to benefit the individual in procreation.
Actually, there are a lot of traits that do not benefit the individual’s procreation, but benefit the specie’s survival. Sickle-cell anemia would be an example, and there is a fair amount of interest in studying homosexuality. However there isn’t much grant money in it and so the process is slow (i.e. which is more important finding the cause of homosexuality or improving crop yields?). The real trouble is that biology’s understanding of the brain is still very limited. They know there are differences between the brains of men and women and they know there are differences between homosexual men and heterosexual men, but what do those differences mean?
I have to say – I think this is overly simplistic. Let’s take someone who becomes sexually aroused when he/she thinks of, or looks at, boots. Does this mean the boot fetish was always rooted in the autonomic nervous system (“God created me to love boots”), or isn’t it more reasonable to suggest that it got there somehow?
But you’re confusing fetishism with sexual orientation – fetishism is all about sexual release and satisfaction, but orientation includes emotional attachment – you can’t “love” a boot, even if you are sexually attracted to it. Our attractions to other people are based on physicality, personality and, where true love is concerned, compatibility. Those emotional responses are not under conscious control, and are therefore part of the autonomic nervous system.
The analogy I would use is that thumb-sucking is liekly biologically determined, it is one way fetuses and newborns learn to feed, although it can become a comfort for the newborn as well. That same newborn can also learn to rely on a teddy bear or blanket for comfort, but that “fetish” does not have a specific biological determinant, even if the desire for a comfort object does.
“Those emotional responses are not under conscious control, and are therefore part of the autonomic nervous system.”
I really think this is even harder to argue for biologically. You’re saying that because something is “sub-conscious” it must be biological?
I could think of dozens of emotional attachments and compatibilities for which people have identified (though not confirmed of course) non-biological causes. If there weren’t, psychiatrists would all be out of work!
How can you show which attractions are in the “thumb-sucking” category and which are in the “blanket” category?
That depends. Only certain psychological theories deal with the subconscious. The subconscious is something that has never been proven to exist or even to work in a Freudian way. You really can not look at a brain and determine here is the id, ego, and super ego. Psychiatry is a science that you have to take with a grain of salt.
I can think of dozens of things that have a large biological component. It used to be thought that cold and distant mothers caused schizophrenia. Now it is realized that it is mostly caused by genetics. Impotence was once thought to be a sign of repressed homosexuality. Now it is realized that most cases of impotence are caused by biological factors not repressed homosexuality. Asthma was once thought to a psychological condition, until better knowledge of the immune system developed. Mood disorders likewise have a strong biological component.
The brain controls a lot of things that we do not have to think about such as heart rate, blood sugar levels, egg/sperm production, and the flight/fight response. Our emotions are likewise controlled by parts of the brain that we have no direct control over. There are certain mood altering brain chemicals that are released in response to touch so it is not a great leap of faith to go from “thumb sucking” to “blanket”.
You’re saying that because something is “sub-conscious” it must be biological?
No, I’m saying that if it is part of the autonomic nervous system, it is beyond our conscious control. I am also arguing that being gay has a strong emotional, not merely a sexual component, and I know of no research that claims emotions are not biological.
“I know of no research that claims emotions are not biological.”
To be honest, I haven’t studied an awful lot of research on this topic, but I would have thought that there’s plenty. Grief, for example. Obviously there’s biological elements affecting how people grieve, but you really don’t GRIEVE unless somebody dies or goes away. Even afterwards, you may have emotional reactions (beyond conscious control) when you see something that reminds you of that time of grief.
Loneliness would be another. Yes, there are different responses depending on a person’s particular make-up, but loneliness will still generally happen because of non-biological reasons – ie. someone is alone or feels alone for some time. Depression is known to have some biological factors but it still usually has a social or personal context.
The existence of psycho-somatic illness as well as our increasing understanding of how the state of mind and will affect the health of the body show, to me, that we are not slaves to every biological gadget built into us, and especially not when it comes to emotions. Rather, the reverse is often true.
I just don’t think we can classify “love” in the same realm as things jason cites which the brain controls without our conscious effort (heart rate, flight/fight response). It seems far more complicated and involved. Some people, for example, cannot go for a couple of months without finding another partner. They drift from one person to another, perhaps because they are scared to live life alone for awhile. Now, I wouldn’t presume to say that what they have with their latest partner is not “love”, but I could also have suspicions that it has to with the satisfying of a number of other feelings (a need for protection, a continuing loneliness, etc.). I certainly wouldn’t say that their entire emotional condition is just part of their autonomic nervous system.
Well nathan, apparently you are able to dictate what emotions you have and when you have them – bully for you. I know of no one else who can make that claim. Although certainly emotions must have triggers (my current emotion – frustration, you can figure out the trigger), the entire emotional system is in-built to the human species.
The fact that I emotionally respond to other men – that I desire and love them (on occasion – I’m not a slut), is something organic that arose in me with puberty – it was certainly not something my football-playing, truck-driving father or my elementary school teacher mother instilled or created in me (I mean, could my parents get more stereotypical – they even were married until my mother’s death).
To me the idea that sexuality, in any form, is the product of parenting or “immoral” choices, or any other non-biological reason, is nonsensical, because it belies the very way our brains and bodies are formed. To believe that parents, particularly, somehow cause homosexuality, that a parenting style could have such a specific and directed effect on a child’s personality (and I know of NO parents who claim to have created their child’s personalities – they typically describe responding to the personality that emerged naturally) makes no sense from a biological or psychological viewpoint. And I don’t believe the theory that this could happen (a theory that is itself, at best, a bastardization of Freudian concepts) would ever have arisen without the concerted effort of a small group of “christians.”
cptdoom,
I never claimed to have the exact control of emotions that you seem to think I have.
I suppose we will have to agree to disagree. I remain unconvinced, seeing no proof at all that complex emotional response patterns like the ones you describe develop from biology with no outside stimuli.
re: parents, you seem to want to oversimplify some of the theories. This is certainly not just about “parenting style”, but a host of interactions and emotional developments over many years. I think any parent is crazy if they believe they had no part at all in the development of their child’s sense of self, sense of gender, self esteem, ability to relate, etc. Having supposedly stereotypical parents doesn’t really say much either. My parents are fairly typical too, I suppose.
I am willing to allow for some biological input into the system, but you are unwilling to allow for any environmental input. On top of everything else, this is frighteningly deterministic – why should parents take any responsibility for a child’s emotional wellbeing if they’re going to turn out exactly as written in their genes?