Ex-gay therapist David Pickup has told the American Psychological Association that he practices “reorientation … therapy,” despite claiming on his website that what he offers is “not therapy.”
XGW has already reported on Pickup’s bizarre testimony, which centers on his admiration for big, muscley, men and his belief that gay men cannot be truly masculine. Through Healing for the Soul, a counseling ministry led by Jayson Graves (an Exodus board member), Pickup dubs himself a “life coach,” and takes other same-sex-attracted men through the same “transformation into heterosexuality.”
At last week’s APA Convention in Boston, Massachusetts, Pickup joined other Christians, including NARTH’s Dr Joseph “Joe” Nicolosi, to protest the supposed exclusion of religious conservatives from a task force on reparative therapy:
I am an ex-homosexually oriented man who provides reorientation/change therapy for men who want this. I myself have greatly benefited from this type of therapy, so I guess I would ask the same question that the other gentleman asked: Is there a place for me in the APA?
I’m confused, David. Are you a reorientation therapist or not? Or is it just when you’re helping Joe?
Incidentally, Pickup has yet to respond to XGW’s enquiry whether he starred in the pro-gay comedy short Queerspiracy! (2002) and the soft porn film Deviant Desires (2002), as the Internet Movie Database claims.
It sure looks like him in the Queerspiracy production still and the cast bios.
https://www.resolveproductions.com/queerspiracy/cast.html
https://www.resolveproductions.com/queerspiracy/gallery/prodstill15.htm
But the movie shows up as 2007, not 2002
His testimony is so weird. Presenting stats is what people do when they want sex. What point would he have other than to want a pickup?
Intriguing.
The bios are similar as well.
From the “Healing” website:
And from the Queerspiracy site:
There’s a trailer here for Queerspiracy which seems to be mocking the idea of a “gay agenda.” He has one line at the end, and then it says it’s copyright 2006, which means he would have had to have gone “ex-gay” almost immediately afterward.
But I also see that his Workout site is copyright 2006-David Pickup.
It would seem that something queer is going on…
We were already on it 🙂
Flip….flop. Pickup either is or ain’t. Looks like mostly ain’t.
So many of these ex gay guys are performers at heart. Warren T. is a singer, so is Stephen Bennett. Seems like they go for whatever they think will get them the most attention…however untalented. Ugh.
I know Michael Kearns, he’s a marvelous actor, director and writer. Peterson Toscano performed at Michael’s theater space when he was here. Small world.
I might add, of course…that Michael Kearns is an out proud gay man, living with HIV and a beautiful daughter he adopted as a single dad.
Now…why WOULD Pickup associate himself thusly, with so many acting coaches all over Los Angeles who aren’t gay men?
I don’t know if M. Kearns made a decent actor out of Pickup, but it’s yet to be seen if Pickup made a credible heterosexual out of a gay man…even himself.
:0P
I don’t get Pickup. Masculinity isn’t an apple. It’s not some object you can loose or that can be taken away from you. The problem is that he’s looking outside of himself for something that isn’t there. You don’t need the approval of other men to be yourself. You can be gay and masculine, because masculinity isn’t about who you’re having sex with, it’s about just being yourself. That’s why the whole “macho” thing is so tired and unconvincing — it’s forced, insincere, fake.
All the things that David talks about wanting and needing from other men are things straight men don’t need or care about. It’s only gay men, who’s masculinity has been called into question by society, that fixate on this manly man macho stuff.
David feels less masculine because he’s allowed other people to dictate for him what masculinity is or should be.
Trouble is “masculinity” is entirely defined by time and culture. That’s why I have so much trouble with the passage in Corinthians that says that “the effeminate” (along with gays) will not inherit the Kingdom of God.
When I ask “Bible-believing” Christians to clarify, they really have no idea just what this passage seems to be condemning. They are clear about the gays not getting into Heaven, though.
Sometimes Christians have this obsession with being ostracized. Pickup is ignoring the fact that the APA does have room for him – they discourage but fully allow ex-gay therapy. But the ex-gay movement ignores this and wants to play the victum.
Bizarre testimony is right. That sounds like nothing more than a thinly veiled “Pickup” line to meet other men.