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by Olin Thomas, Executive Director What comprises Affirmation? We do have a charter and bylaws, a marvelous website and a great body of work in the form of writings, speeches, and the records of many conferences and other events. Affirmation is a concept and a set of principles as well. But essentially Affirmation is a collection of individuals who have associated themselves for their common interest. It is these individuals, differing in many ways but with their shared concern for their gay brothers and lesbian sisters, who are the building blocks of Affirmation. To know them better is to know Affirmation and why it matters. There is no better way to get to know Affirmation members than to come to our conferences and to our chapter meetings, but we can also harness the power of the pen in this cause. For that purpose, I am decreeing 2008 to be the Affirmation Year of the Individual. To celebrate that concept, we will be highlighting twelve different members of Affirmation: one each month in Affinity, in a new series of articles called “Affirmation Voices.” I will be inviting some of you to write your story for this series, with an emphasis on showing the diversity of Affirmation. We are men and women, young and old, liberal and conservative, with both unique and common reasons to participate in a group like Affirmation. I hope you will be able to identify with those who are presented this year and to appreciate more fully that our strength comes from our diversity. If you know someone interesting (or incredible!) in Affirmation who you would like to see profiled, I welcome your suggestion. It could even be yourself! Contact me at www.affirmation.org/contact/ex_dir. The first “Affirmation Voice” I would like you to hear is that of Dave Melson. Dave will be joining the Affirmation Executive Committee this year, but he is not being profiled just because he is a leader. He is indeed a leader, at many levels, but it is his individual story that matters here. Why is he in Affirmation? What does Affirmation do for him, as well as what does he do for Affirmation? Dave will tell you in his own words in this edition of Affinity and I look forward to getting to know more of you a little better each month this year through “Affirmation Voices.”
Announcing the Affirmation 2008 Conference “A Pearl of Great Price” by Ricky Gilbert, Conference Chair
Well, it's time to schedule our vacation time. Please consider scheduling some time to come to Affirmation's 2008 National Conference in Los Angeles. On the weekend of October 9-12 we will be convening at the Doubletree San Pedro Hotel. That is the part of Los Angeles at the Los Angeles Harbor. The hotel is on the ocean side of the harbor, located at the Cabrillo Marina. The address is 2800 Via Cabrillo Marina, San Pedro, CA 90731. The phone number is (310) 514-3344. You will be responsible for making your own room reservation. Reservations must be made no later than September 10, 2008 at 12:00PM. The room rates are as follows: Single/double $129.00, Triple/quad. $149.00, Suites $299.00. In order to get these special rates, tell the hotel that you are a part of Affirmation: Gay and Lesbian Mormons. These rates do not include the occupancy tax of 14.05%. The hotel is 18 miles from LAX and 8 miles from Long Beach Airport. So, you can start searching for good air fares. Jet Blue flies directly to Long Beach. Hope to see you in October!
Olin Thomas, Executive Director The last four years have been a time of great stability in the Affirmation Executive Committee. This has been the longest period of time during which the same three people served: Olin Thomas, Alyson Bolles, and James Morris. As executive director, I can state unequivocally that it has been a pleasure to have had the same two assistant directors over an extended period, especially since both are of them are great fun and so easy to work with. However, nothing lasts forever. Alyson Bolles will be stepping down as senior assistant director. On behalf of all Affirmation members, I wish to thank her for her service and personally for her friendship over the last four years. I have appointed Dave Melson of the Washington, D.C. chapter to take her place on the Executive Committee. I have known Dave for five years now and he has shown great interest in and dedication to Affirmation and its members. He currently serves as the Washington, DC Chapter Director and recently completed a star turn as the conference chairman of our 2007 Conference, which was a resounding success. I am confident that Dave will be a welcome addition to the Executive Committee. Alyson will continue her service to Affirmation as the national women's contact and through continuing to organize events for women in Affirmation. James Morris, of San Francisco, will continue his service as assistant director. It is a great comfort to have the benefit of his long experience in Affirmation as I begin my final term as executive director. Beyond the Executive Committee itself are several crucial positions. Without competent and dedicated people in those roles, Affirmation would not function. The most important ones are treasurer, Affinity editor, webmaster, and membership secretary. Bruce Maughan, of Palm Springs, CA, will continue as our treasurer. Hugo Salinas will continue as Affinity editor and webmaster. Aaron Vinck, of San Francisco, will turn over the duties of membership secretary to Buckley Jeppson of Washington, D.C. Aaron was the first Affirmation membership secretary and deserves a great vote of thanks for organizing our current database and maintaining it for the last two years. We are glad to have Buckley as part of the key staff of Affirmation for 2008. I encourage anyone who is interested in seeing Affirmation continue in its mission to support and advocate for GLBTI Mormons to consider working with the Executive Committee or to nominate themselves to be members of the committee or other key positions. The two assistant directors and other positions are appointed by the Executive Director, who is elected by the membership. Affirmation will need more directors in the near future. Could one of them be you? Let me know by contacting me at www.affirmation.org/contact/ex_dir or 703-864-5527.
“I am humbled by the opportunities that I have to serve in Affirmation, grateful for the friends and for the love that I find there, proud to consider Affirmation to be my family.” The only reason that I did not come out as being gay when I was young was that in Boone County, Illinois, in the 1960’s there wasn’t any word for “gay” and no one had heard of “coming out.” But I was the kid whose favorite toy was Lincoln Logs because you could use them to build things that were just like my best friend’s sister’s dollhouses. When I was older, when my parents would go out, I would rearrange the furniture. I knew that I was something, I just didn’t know what. Imagine my delight when I went to college in that great bastion of liberalism, Ohio. (Oh my, how times have changed!) There were lots of people like me, there were words to describe it, and hey, kissing a man (and everything that came after that) was WAAAAY better than kissing a girl! When I was 28, living now in Orlando, these two incredibly good looking guys knocked on my door. I let them in, and, well, you know the next part. I was curious enough that I prayed about it, got a very strong answer, and I was baptized. Now prior to this, the only thing I knew about Mormons was what they had taught us in high school in Illinois, which was how the Mormons had marched into Illinois, raping and looting, until the Illinois militia could be formed up to chase them out and once again make Illinois a safe place for decent folk to live. It wasn’t until I was in that I found that being homosexual was frowned upon somewhat in LDS circles. Still, there was enough there that I believed in that I rationalized my way through it. (There is sufficient material here for a doctorial thesis if you want more details.) Over the next few years, I held almost every leadership position you can think of: young men’s presidency (all three positions), elders quorum president, president of seventies, high priests group leadership, branch president, clerk, executive secretary, employment specialist, and stake young men’s presidency; I was even a Relief Society president briefly in a small branch. I also took two years off to serve a mission in Asia. That is where I met Marsha. Our Mission President would set up “dates” for us. We were each older than the typical missionary, we were both from the South, we were both converts, and we loved each other. When we finished our missions, we went home and were married in the Atlanta Temple. The Mormon fairy tale. Six months later we were divorced, but no one ever again asked if either of us might have a problem with “same-sex attraction.” I found Affirmation on Google and attended my first meeting of the DC Chapter in January of 2003. It was the start of a snow storm and there were a total of three other people there; those three are now all dear friends. There were more people in subsequent meetings, and I had found a home. My first conference was that fall in Salt Lake City, and I have attended every conference since. I have been privileged to serve as the Washington Chapter leader for the past three years, and this year I join the Affirmation Executive Committee. I stopped attending LDS church meetings in 2004. The church’s massive support of anti-LGBT political groups and candidates was more than I could abide, and I could no longer justify giving any funding to an organization that that used my money to tell the world that they should hate me for being gay. There is an old Affirmation ad that bemoans the future of our children in a world that “teaches hatred and homophobia as family values.” I agree with that. In June of 2006, another Affirmation DC member, Sam Wolfe, and I accepted a challenge to come out to our wards in fast and testimony meeting. I spoke about my knowledge of the truthfulness of the gospel, of my belief in my Heavenly Parents and in Jesus Christ. I talked about the gift of free agency and how it applies to all people, even church leaders. And I spoke about how there were times when I did not always feel welcome or safe in my LDS church home, but how I felt that the greatest gift that the Lord had given me was to be sent here in this day as a gay man. The outcome of that meeting was surprising. A member of the Stake Presidency spoke, with tears in his eyes, of his love and support for me. Several members went out of their way to commend me for my words and to affirm their support. A few came out to me. But most significantly, it affected me in ways that I had not expected. I had considered myself to be out. I was out at work, out to my friends, out to my family. I have been active in speaking out in the press and in the Maryland legislature for LGBT rights. I have never denied being gay to anyone who asked. (Amazingly, in over twenty years, no priesthood official ever asked me about homosexuality during a recommend or worthiness interview.) But in my dealings with people in church, I had always avoided the subject of being gay, unless someone else brought up the subject first (which wasn’t often). Church was the one place where I was not totally out of the closet. When I slammed the door shut on that last dark corner of my personal closet, it gave me both a sense of liberation and a feeling of spiritual affirmation greater than anything else I have experienced. The members of Affirmation have amazing stories and experiences that have forged a variety of beliefs that run the gamut from one end of the spectrum to the other. We are united by the green Jell-O that courses through our veins. For good or bad, the LDS Church has helped to make us who we are. The church has taught us to not rely on the wisdom of any person, but to seek out and to choose what is right. I am humbled by the opportunities that I have to serve in Affirmation, grateful for the friends and for the love that I find there, proud to consider Affirmation to be my family.
Interview conducted by Hugo Salinas If Brigham Young University has an infamous reputation in the GLBT community, it is, in part, because of the so called “reparative therapy” experiments performed on gay students in the mid-1970s. As part of these experiments, Max Ford McBride, then a graduate student in psychology, exposed gay male students to male pornography and delivered shocks of up to 4.5 miliamperes of electricity in hope of “curing” them of their “condition.” These procedures, deemed today both ineffective and barbaric, are documented in several sources, including a documentary called Legacies, a published account written by Affirmation member Don Harryman, and McBride’s own 1976 dissertation. Fourteen students completed the experiment that earned McBride his Ph.D.—hence 14, the title of John Cameron’s new play. In the mid 1970s, you were one of the subjects of Max Ford McBride's experiments on so-called “reparative therapy” at BYU. Why did you decide to write a play about what must have been a very painful experience? The decision to write the play was a very long time coming. In the twenty-five years before I began work on the script, the idea never crossed my mind. To begin with I was not overly proud of my decision to do the therapy and told very few people about it. It wasn't a subject that I wanted to share. Also, I had spent so much of my life trying to forget and minimize what I had done that I had somehow convinced myself that most people would find it more disgusting than interesting. I thought the subject matter just wasn't worthy of attention. Then two things happened that changed everything. I stumbled onto the Affirmation website by total accident and read Connell O'Donovan’s History of Homosexuality at Brigham Young University. I was stunned by what I read. I learned that my experience belonged to a much larger community. I learned about the purge. I learned that my therapy was not an isolated event, but simply one of the more visible elements in a long history of abuse. It really shook up my very safe, insulated life. I made brief contact with Connell to thank him. That led to the second event. I was contacted by a journalist who Connell had referred, asking for an interview. At first I was very skeptical of doing it, but when I learned of Merrill Bateman's denial I was infuriated. So I agreed to it, but had no idea what I was getting myself into. As we talked by email and phone over a period of a few weeks I was forced to relive the experience in detail for the first time in over two decades. The result was a three year depression. I finally began to deal for with what I had done to my life and it was pretty hard to face. Writing the play was a way for me to work though my anger and isolation. What kind of emotional or spiritual scars did those experiments leave? Did you ever go to therapy to undo the damage the BYU experiments may have caused? I'm going to be very honest with you, so I hope I don't offend anyone. I've only recently begun to realize that I have completely shut down my sexual life for the last twenty-five years. I have never been able to maintain a long-term relationship with another man. Instead I have substituted a number of ill-advised and emotionally destructive relationships with women. Looking back I can honestly say that I was afraid of gay men. I felt true resentment and disgust for the gay community while simultaneously wishing I could somehow participate. The recognition of this and my efforts to change it have only begun within the last two or three years and I am still struggling. I recently began to make some gay friends and make my first steps into this new world. Ironically, one of my new friends was raised LDS and served a mission. He is the music director for this production. I don't think the experiment was the sole cause of my dysfunction, but I think it's fair to say it was a major contributor. Have you ever met other “reparative therapy” subjects? How did you research the topic for your play? No, I've never met another one of the 14. But I do know two men who went through similar therapy. I'm ashamed to say that I know them because I referred them to McBride shortly after my own experience was completed. It was during that time in which I chose to believe that the therapy had been successful. The result was that I deceived myself and them. The research was slow. I had to educate myself and rebuild memories. I was surprised at how much has been written regarding the church and homosexuality in the time since the experiments. Books by Michael Quinn, Carol Lynn Pearson, and others, were very helpful. Connell O’Donovan’s article was also significant. Other articles and the memorials at the Affirmation website helped. But the best source was a copy of the McBride dissertation that I acquired. As I read it, memories came back almost faster than I could process. It was amazing. Additionally, I had kept a diary during my years at BYU. I dug it out of a box and read it for the first time. Why is there so much violence in the play? The violence is there for many reasons. Here are just three. (1) The therapy itself is violent. It didn't happen in our heads, it happened to our bodies. It was not a logical event. It was visceral and painful. I don't think you can just talk about it and make the experience clear. I didn’t want to reduce it to an intellectual discussion. (2) I have put myself through a lot of emotional abuse in the last few years. The main character is based on me, and I felt it was important to physically manifest that abuse on the stage if people were to understand the scope of the therapy's effects. A picture is worth a thousand words. (3) There is a murder in the play. I can’t easily explain that out of context. But for what it’s worth, the killing is a symbolic and metaphoric rite of passage for the main character. It is something he must do to begin his journey to freedom from his past. It was very difficult to write. There are actually many more reasons for the violence, but I think they're probably too numerous to cover in this interview. Was it hard to get approval to stage the play? Did the Theatre Arts Department express concerns or suggest changes to your draft? No. Not at all! It wasn't my idea. I did a public reading of the play last year, and many of my colleagues attended. A few weeks later they proposed that we do a production. They felt it was an important topic that deserved to be heard. I was flabbergasted and thrilled. I work with some amazing artists here and I'm very proud of them. Those who are familiar with the University of Iowa know that it has a long tradition of developing new and controversial work. If anything, they have encouraged me to take the truth of the topic as far as I possibly can. Several LDS hymns are interpolated at different parts of the play. What is their function? Two reasons. First, the hymns are there in the role of a Greek chorus. They comment on the action rather than advance it. For example, the main character must decide if he should agree to an interview about the experiment. When he learns that President Bateman claimed that he could find no evidence that the experiment ever took place on campus, the cast of fourteen sings “Oh Say, What is Truth?” Secondly, for so many ex-Mormons, the hymns remain a powerful memory that keeps us connected to our past. I don't think I could have written the play without them. Ron, the main character, struck me as a cynical and bitter atheist. Would it be fair to characterize the play as an angry and bitter statement against all organized religion? Yes, I think Ron is cynical and bitter. At the end of the play he is only at the beginning of his healing journey. His anger is very present. I didn't want him to appear to be the good guy or the victim, and so we frequently see him as the abuser and the victimizer. That was intentional. As an audience member, I don't like characters who are too easily definable or neatly drawn. I love the flaws of our humanity. It would be unfair to call Ron the protagonist or the antagonist. He is both. Most of us are. Whether he's an atheist or not is up for debate. I think of him as an agnostic who rejects the silliness that most organized religions present as the work of God. He loves rationality because he feels that his emotionality is weakening him in so many ways. I think his attacks on God are the acts of a terrified man. But I don't think the play is a statement about organized religion. I think it's about a journey that has been radically impacted by organized religion. How is the process of rehearsing the play? Is it emotionally taxing on you and the actors? It's great. We're workshopping and developing all the time. The script is now in its fourth rewrite and has changed substantially. Thanks to the cast and my colleagues, I have been able to develop a healthier distance from the subject matter and really focus on the structure of the work. It is emotionally challenging, but exciting and invigorating. We have a great cast and wonderful support. McBride wrote a 100-page dissertation documenting his experiments, yet in 1997 then-BYU Present Merrill Bateman claimed that he was “unable to verify” that electroshock was ever used on gay and lesbian students at BYU. Do you think BYU will ever admit that it once sponsored these experiments? How long can you tell a lie? A mighty long time when you're afraid of the truth. They may admit to it, but I would pass out if they ever apologized. Do you believe in forgiveness? Do you think there's a place for forgiveness in the process of healing from abuse? You bet. I'm in the middle of it now. I don't think forgiveness is an event. It's a process, and I don't know if it ever ends. Sometimes I think it is too easily said. I don't believe in complete closure. Is there anything you would like to add? Not really, except that I'm very grateful to Affirmation for their interest in this project and the opportunity to talk about the play. It's very generous and kind. “We need men and women of integrity and constancy, not those of expediency and inconsistency” Jeffrey Nielsen, an author and instructor at Westminster College and Utah Valley State College, wrote an editorial in the Salt Lake Tribune criticizing a recent speech by presidential hopeful and fellow Mormon Mitt Romney. Romney was expected to deliver a speech in which he would avow that if he were to become president he would not take orders from Salt Lake City. Instead, Romney blasted what he called “the religion of secularism in America” in a speech was calculated to please conservative Christian voters who are uneasy about Romney’s religion. “[Romney’s] speech, though a masterful political performance, won't help him win the Republican nomination,” writes Nielsen. “He seems to have decided his only hope of winning is to appeal to the religious conservatives — the very people who will reject him out of religious prejudice. “The great benefit of secularism is that it has left room for religious practice in our private lives while protecting it from the intolerance of religious fundamentalism — something that hasn't occurred in governments where secularism is despised. So, for someone to praise religious toleration while condemning secularism is to be simply ignorant of our history, and foolish about the possibilities of our future, if religion and government are not kept separate.” Romney, who once declared that “we must make equality for gays and lesbians a mainstream concern,” made a 180-degree turn after becoming governor of Massachusetts, calling for the federal Constitution to be amended to ban same-sex marriage, and condemning a recent ruling by a judge in Iowa that overturned that state’s ban on such marriages. Romney, who depends on the conservative vote to be elected, now proudly proclaims that he has fought same-sex marriage “every way I have known how to,” as he said recently in Iowa, “and the fight isn’t over.” Other Stories Recently Posted at www.affirmation.org The Plan of Salvation for Me, a Gay Latter-Day Saint www.affirmation.org/voices/plan_of_salvation.shtml Reporter Confronts Romney's Flip-flopping on Gay Issues www.affirmation.org/news/2007_117.shtml Transgender Student Denied a Dorm Room at SUU www.affirmation.org/news/2007_118.shtml Gay Mormon Wins “Survivor” www.affirmation.org/news/2007_119.shtml Affirmation: Gay and Lesbian Mormons P.O. Box 46022 Los Angeles, CA 90046 National Phone Line: (661) 367-2421 To see a directory of current Affirmation chapters, visit www.affirmation.org/chapters Executive Director: Olin Thomas Senior Assistant Director: Dave Melson Assistant Director: James Morris Associate Director & Affinity Editor: Hugo Salinas www.affirmation.org/contact/affinity Send Us Your Submission! AFFIRMATION GAY & LESBIAN MORMONS is a non-profit support group serving Gay and Lesbian Mormons, their families and friends since 1977. AFFINITY is the official publication of the Affirmation National Executive Committee. Submissions are welcome and should be limited to 250 words. To contact us, visit www.affirmation.org/contact/affinity. The opinions expressed herein do not necessarily reflect those of the editors, national committee or publisher, but rather the individual writers. The Editor reserves the right to edit any material deemed offensive, libelous, grammatically incorrect or lengthy. About AFFINITY AFFINITY is available both as an email text and as a web-based document. Although both versions are free of charge, we encourage you to become a dues-paying member and thus help us advance Affirmation's important mission. If you wish to receive a text version of AFFINITY by email, simply send a request to Hugo Salinas by visiting www.affirmation.org/contact/affinity. If you are a dues-paying member and do not have Internet access, you may request a printed version that will be sent to you by mail. |
1996-2008 Affirmation: Gay and Lesbian Mormons
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