Scared Straight?

[julialnyc]

http://pulpfaction.blogspot.com/2005/06/love-in-action-or-child-abuse.html
Scared Straight?

[HockeyMom]

1. Commit Sucide?????

rather than go back to the gay lifestyle? OMG What SICK, SICK, people.

[julialnyc]

3. how about these rules

All new Refuge clients will be placed into Safekeeping for the initial two to three days of their program. A client on safekeeping may not communicate verbally, or by using hand gestures or eye contact, with any other clients, staff members, or his/her parents or guardians. In case of a practical need, Safekeeping clients may write down their question or request and show it to another client, staff member, or their parent or guardian. Writing may only be used when absolutely necessary. Parents and guardians must enforce their child¹s safekeeping status at home or in their temporary lodging.



No television viewing, going to movies, or reading/watching/listening to secular media of any kind, anywhere within the client¹s and the parent¹s/guardian¹s control. This includes listening to classical or instrumental music that is not expressly Christian (Beethoven, Bach, etc. are not considered Christian). The only exception to the media policy is the weekly movie.

[KurtNYC]

10. I was reading down the rules and all

and was thinking (before I got to the end) 'this is a recipe for suicide.' This is like the opposite of a suicide prevention program.

[julialnyc]

11. so true

it's a program that teaches you to hate yourself and to think your thoughts are evil.

I wish there was some way to look up data of "success" rates and suicide rates. I would go march outside their headquarters with a sign of the number of kids who they essentially handed a gun to.

[Modem Butterfly]

2. Hey, I saw that movie

Natasha Lyonne was terrific as the clueless teenage lesbian, and RuPaul was fabulous as always.

Wait a minute, you mean these fuckheads are for real?

[julialnyc]

4. oh this isn't a joke

n/t

[racaulk]

13. But I'm a Cheerleader

I LOVE that movie! Although it was a little weird seeing RuPaul as a man...

What a brilliant and campy satire about the absurdity of the "ex-gay" movement. The notion that someone can "become" heterosexual through the repetition of and exposure to "proper" gender roles is absolutely ridiculous.

But campiness and humor aside, this is extremely disturbing to me. The people that run these programs may feel that they're doing the right thing, but what they're doing is very damaging to these young people. It kills their self-esteem and self-worth, creates or reinforces their internalized homophobia, and is detrimental to their ability to become well-adjusted and centered adults.

And if they are able to see these programs for the utter bullshit that they are, they will probably harbor resentment for the people who subjected them to that treatment, namely their parents. How sad that is.

[julialnyc]

14. and if they pretend

and if they pretend that this bull sh*t works so that there parents will love them, they will become self-loathing and take it out on other people.

[RaleighNCDUer]

22. And after fucking with their heads, if the kids should happen to

commit suicide it won't be because of the despair and self-hatred they engendered in them, but the program will say they took the honorable, god-loving path to redemption.

Remember when suicide was a sin?

[Modem Butterfly]

27. Who knew someone would take it as a DOCUMENTARY?

I mean, it's good, but not THAT good.

In all seriousness, these people need to be smacked down HARD.

[Moochy]

5. Scared Atheist

Unbeleivable. This is the template for america's future work camps. No secular entertainment for our Safekeeper Clients.

"I would rather you commit suicide than have you leave Love In Action wanting to return to the gay lifestyle. In a physical death you could still have a spiritual resurrection; whereas, returning to homosexuality you are yielding yourself to a spiritual death from which there is no recovery."

Big Brother prays for your queer soul.

Now why do you think that these religious folks want to gather at-risk queer youth in order to save their souls? Hmm?

Paraphrasing Jon Stewart, if you are a gay man looking to score, just cruise an anti-gay political lobby, their chock full of closeted homosexuals.

[racaulk]

16. Me too

The irony is that this type of approach seems to turn away more people that it embraces. It's people like this that have left me (and probably many other gay people) jaded about Christianity and turned off to organized religion in general. I affectionately refer to myself as a "recovering Baptist."

[Blue_In_AK]

30. It's people like this that have left me,

(and probably many other straight people) jaded about Christianity and turned off to organized religion in general. This is just sick, sick, sick. If there's a hell, they're going to be quite surprised to find themselves there. Assholes.......

[whistle]

6. This may sum up the purpose of the program....

<snip>
"I would rather you commit suicide than have you leave Love In Action wanting to return to the gay lifestyle. In a physical death you could still have a spiritual resurrection; whereas, returning to homosexuality you are yielding yourself to a spiritual death from which there is no recovery."

This is allegedly a quote from John Smid, the director Love In Action International
<end snip>

I can not image loving parents agreeing to these conditions for one of their children who says they are gay. Very sad commentary about the state of our times. I have to believe that this is some way constitutes child abuse for minors under the age of 18 and could be shut down.

[RaleighNCDUer]

9. No, that is a summary of their attitude.

Their purpose, as with most 'christian' driven enterprises, is to make a shit load of money off of people who are afraid of the real world.

On edit -- Of course, gay suicide could be a collateral purpose; there are just so many fence posts available, after all.

[julialnyc]

12. Absolutely

but what makes me so bewildered is who are all of the lower level people (so-called-councilors, administration, ect...) who choose to feel so strong about something so hateful?

[whistle]

26. I stand corrected, you are right it sums up their attitude....

...while raking in tons of faith based money.

In the 1950s communist witch hunts and the cold war a saying emerged that went something like this: "Better dead than Red!"

With regard to this group and the right wing fundamentalists, I suppose a similar saying might go something like this: "Better blown away than gay!"

What a bunch of creeps.

[Bellamia]

7. Love in action?

Define LOVE. Child abuse? Me thinks so.

[julialnyc]

8. for people who claim to be of moral greatness

Their love is quite conditional........... that doesn't seem like love to me.

[gollygee]

15. That is sick

how could someone who loves his/her child send the child to a group like that?

It's so sad.

[aeolian]

17. So...they're "solution" for horny, gay teens is to

put them all in one place together for weeks at a time?


Ya...no hanky-panky going on there. Nope. None. :eyes:



(EDIT: never mind the obviously fucked-up parents who send their kids off to a place like that...)

[kliljedahl]

18. Has anybody else got extraneous crap over the text?

What a gawd awful layout on that page, almost unreadable.


Keith’s Barbeque Central

[julialnyc]

19. I do

I thought maybe it was because I have a Mac?

[julialnyc]

20. of course!

http://www.abc24.com/news/local/story.aspx?content_id=E46B7C69-EBD7-4429-A26F-DFC31CC02016


Reverend John Smid says, “The truth is that if someone is expressing themselves homosexually, they are involving themselves in inappropriate sexual conduct.”

Smid has been the executive director of “Love In Action” for the past 19 years. He makes no apologies for his strong beliefs about gay and lesbian lifestyles. Smid says he used to be gay, and says sexual exploration by youth is out of control.



I swear that there is some serious self-loathing going on in Washington today too!

[MadHound]

21. In other words,

If your fucked up fundie household hasn't screwed you poor child's head up enough, outsouce the job to the professionals, and let them take care of the rest:eyes:

Geez, whatever happened to unconditional love for one's kid? Is that still around, or is it just a quaint old fashioned notion from my childhood?

[julialnyc]

23. article

http://www.whosoever.org/issue4/issue4_LIA.html

[julialnyc]

24. Wow

you need to check out the web-site for this group. These people are awful!

http://www.exodus.to/exodus_faqs.shtml

[Pockets]

25. "I would rather you commit suicide"

Besides being the most serious psychological disorder there is, suicide is illegal. To suggest doing it must be illegal on some level. This truly is some kind of deranged cult to say the least.

[julialnyc]

28. They are the Charles Manson's of the right

N/T

[NMMNG]

29. I saw that earlier

F-ing scary :scared:

And they call that love?

[Vladimir]

31. That is child abuse, plain and simple

the programme should be shut down, those running it sent to jail, and the social services ought to spend a fair bit of time with those parents who sent their children there. Sick and fucking wrong.