To preface and disclaim, I am a naturally sarcastic woman. I will talk about homosexuals as individuals, and sometimes as a group of people. I will also employ potentially offensive, definitely politically charged wording in this. Still I would like the religious and nonreligious, queer or basic bitch, black, white, bond or free to read. Everyone in my stories is given a new name. In the immortal whining of Hoobastank, “I'm not a perfect person.” Also, please educate yourself and click the hyperlinks. don't be a little b*tch, your testimony can handle it right? right?! RIGHT!??
More accurately “the gay agenda” got to my mom first. I can always look to her example for how to treat 'the gays'. She instilled very strongly in me how wrong, harmful and absolutely horrid it is to throw a child out of the family home for being gay. How you should treat your gay friends exactly like your other friends. That you should try to find common ground in them. Human connection type things. You know, treat people as equals because WE ARE. Always focus on your actions, actually BE kind to gay people you don't know, and those you do. She strongly imparted in me that struggling with “same sex attraction” was not a struggle at all, it was an innate part of your humanity. My mom was an example on how to validate and love “the gays”. Thanks for that. Happy Mother's Day forever, now go away.
How did my mom come to these conclusions? First, when a man and woman wanna feel sexual pleasure with the body of the opposite sex, consenting (coercion especially in marriage is bad), a baby may come nine months later. That baby will have unique and different experiences beyond the knowledge of their parents. In families, the actions and traditions of those parents are diluted, and often replaced or adjusted. So if my great grandparents might have been completely outspoken racists willing to cause harm, that dilutes to to my grandparents racist “jokes”, to my parents generation “having” black friends, to my generation wanting to walk alongside our black friends in protests for true equality. That was more than a little bit of a tangent, but it explains so much.
Further in the past to set the stage: Rock Hudson is a stud muffin and a half, old school actor. No doubt about it, he is a very attractive, and tall, man. He and Doris Day played with perfect chemistry in all their romance movies. He was charming, and he was rumored to be kind in reality, and he was also known to be gay. He tragically, died of Aids. His death was mourned by the nation, and most notably his costar, Doris Day. And Doris Day took to the world to humanize him. She praised his life and how meaningful their friendship was to her. . He deserved respect, he was worthy of this eloquent and beautiful woman's admiration. Being homosexual was who he was and the world could truly know him. I'm of the belief that to know anyone is to love them.
My mom had nice, gay acquaintances. She was a kind manager to a couple gay high school aged employees. My mom also condemned members of the church who threw out their gay son who was in my mom's words; sweet, cute, kind, lovable, bouncy baby grown man. She genuinely loved seeing this kid grow up at church. She still gushes to this day about him. We saw him together at a family function, and she couldn't have been more delighted to see him.
Do you notice anything particular? Other than my very persuasive writing. Was there an undercurrent of evil? Do you feel like all of these moments were planned, orchestrated, and directly connected even by an omnipresent force? Can you point for me to the places on the doll where the above gay people in the story hurt you? No, but you can point in history books and see where the belief that being gay is wrong, has hurt homosexual people. You can see in history how otherwise kind people voting with their beliefs get homosexuals thrown out of airbnbs, thrown out of their homes, and otherwise harmed. You can see it in modern day passive aggression and being the butt of jokes in movies. Adoption agencies closing their doors to avoid allowing gay parents to adopt children. Mom groups(I will not allow comments with links to them) organizing petitions to ban homosexual people even appearing in the background of movies, being side characters. As if seeing someone different from you is the greatest evil to exist.
Ideas harm, are neutral, or help those around us. People believe these ideas and then act on them.
You are welcome to believe in “the gay agenda™”, but I wanna say I'm not seeing much evidence for it. Mostly just experiences of normal people, doing people things. I do see connections in institutions that teach harmful ideas, and the trickle down effect that has had on me, my family, and those around me.
Oh wait, the gay agenda just sent me an email. They needed some pro-gay writings which is great! I replied: “All my favorite people are gay! This will be so easy” Do you want me to write about gender or the fluidity of sexuality?
And if you believe that, I have a bridge to sell you and a venmo for fast cash. No refunds, returns or exchanges.
So here's how the gays helped me! Firstly, they were really REALLY patient with me. If you are gay, and we were friendly in the past...I'm so so sorry. I asked a lot of ignorant questions. In general every queer person I met was an absolute angel to me. Esther, my first bisexual bubbly buddy, she showed me Brokeback Mountain and introduced the male gay community for me. Also, best laugh ever winner for sure. Moses who introduced me to swing dancing, good musicals, and Rent (badumtss). Fredrick who could point out the inherent beauty in every woman. We would sit at the cafeteria and try to come up with the best compliments to share with people. Girls and Women alike swooned over this guy. He would reassure me, “not a spark” every single time. Probably to reassure me that he was valid, he was definitely a homosexual, he was fine just as he was. I knew him to be a great guy, and I'm sure he still is. Then the liberal brother, sister super squad who patiently re-explained civil political discourse to me. They explained their liberal positions from a loving, and unapologetic way. There are at least more than ten positive people who each have many positive impacts on me. They had no agenda. They were normal people, just like me. People who wanted to be accepted, loved, and understood unconditionally as they were then and there.
The Family to the Proclamation never lingered on my mind very long. It was doctrine, the end. Like I was taught, it hung dutifully and beautifully on my dining room wall. It was never more than a passing thought, until I had said to a dear sweet friend, “I'd still love you if you're gay. I know you're like going through stuff and I just want you to know I'm here for you.” Shortly thereafter she came out as queer to me! I was honored, and proud to see she was changing in beautiful and amazing ways. She came out of her shell when she came out of the closet, and she was quite the pearl. I was fine not knowing intimate details of her life. I don't need all the answers. Fingers in ears my beliefs are intact. Even pat myself on the back for being a real ally, real Christian, we'll get into the mormon superiority complex later. A few months later I was driving a member kid around in my car, then suddenly he was screaming. Knocked from my driving focused-disassociaton, I asked what the problem was and immediately felt out of my depth. This sweet child was yelling that my daughter was wrong, “girls can't marry girls and boys can't marry boys, IT'S WRONG!” I tiptoed my way around both points by saying “God's laws aren't the same as man's laws. Yes legally boys can marry boys and girls can marry girls.”
Done right? Beliefs unshaken. The church is perfect the people aren't, God's laws are higher. Stop thought. Stop Thought. Red herrings. Bad Faith arguments notwithstanding. Yes yes yes. No trauma to be found here whatsoever.
Wrong! Would my kids do that from my teachings? Is this how I sound to the world? What if my daughter is already attracted to girls? What if my son is attracted to boys? How did I define evil? How is any of this exclusion teaching Christ-like? My God was unconditional and "his" church teachings of “being gay is fine, but never act on it or be condemned” sounds conditional to me. Is that what I was teaching? I don't know exactly when it clicked for me, but at some point in my life it occurred to me that every queer person I had ever met might truly have been born that way and I should believe them. Devout gay members like Josh Weed who sold the Mormon and Gay dream, with updates that life didn't work out the way we all hoped. As my towers of babylon fell, realizations crumbled all around me. Or as the exmormons call it, my shelf started to crack.
I wanted to be excited and supportive if my kids ever came out to me. I wanted to treat them like I treated my friend and see photos of the girls she went on dates with, and talk about how cute people she is attracted to are. I wanted to send gay friends profiles to her. I wanted to be there for it all. I wanted my friend to have no troubles getting married, having kids, adopting, home ownership! I wanted this friend to experience every thing I enjoyed. There is no gay agenda, people just want their fellow community, neighbors, friends, and family, to be themselves. I want my friend to be as happy with someone who loves them as much as they deserve. That was the kind of Christian I was. It's still the person I am. I want all to have happiness according to the dictates of their desires as long as they don't hurt others.
I do recognize the irony in saying there is no gay agenda, yet I'm writing an entire post about how the gay community strengthened my empathy and slowly but surely lead me away from my faith. My ability to mourn with those that mourn didn't never went away, it just noticed who was crying the most. I don't know what to tell people of my folks generation. I've never been to a meeting that talked about how to entice and draw people to the gay community, how to insert the gay agenda into natural conversation, how to share the love of gays with all in an organic way. I've been to hundreds of church meetings exactly like that. The Jesus I worshipped would hang out with the sinners, the dirty, the poor, the ostracized. He wouldn't hang out in the multi-million dollar whispering masonry club, but that's just my interpretation of Jesus. He'd probably love a multi-million dollar homeless shelter that we staffed full-time with volunteers. When the sarcastic God on Twitter starts to align more with the God you actually worship than the one you've been taught to worship....you might be on the way to godless apostasy.
But honestly, I still feel that spirit™. I'm still filled with hope. I still feel comfort when I see a butterfly. I still feel like a positive beam of sunshine sometimes. Like in the church and out, my mental health is still something I have to constantly cope with. I want to paint, draw, write, and create! I mean, even now I could find all sorts of things and feel peace. And I know there is another life after Mormonism, so many have reached out to lend a genuine helping hand. I had a wonderful experience the other night out dancing. Everyone was kind to me, and I had lots of fun conversations. I enjoyed watching the older couples dance and thinking that could be me in twenty years.
This is part one of a series of stories about how I radicalized myself with the ways of the world, how the world is good, and you can know me.
