Monday, September 10, 2012

"Ex-Gay" Batshitery Stephen Bennett Style

Some years back I had a run in with "ex-gay" Stephen Bennett (pictured at left) who like most of the "ex-gay" crowd preys on the parents of gays who are embarrassed to have gay children and as a result will subject their children to "conversion therapy" horrors so that the parents can feel better about themselves.  At the time of my run in with Bennett, he was linking his website to utterly false and discredited work by Paul Cameron.  Naturally, when confronted, Bennett feigned ignorance.  As Joe Jervis notes, Bennett is still selling the same nasty snake oil to parents who lack the spine and moral fiber to place their children a head of religious brainwashing and anti-gay hate.  As Joe notes, like most of the "ex-gay for pay" crowd, Bennett is a former alcoholic and drug dealer - problems that Bennett would blame on his homosexuality.  Here a sampling of the bullshit from Bennett's website

Why don't you take the time to pray, gather your thoughts, and write your story about your loved one or situation in a private letter, and personally address it to Stephen Bennett. As a man who once struggled with the homosexual lifestyle for many years, and now has been completely set free through Jesus Christ, Stephen personally reads and responds to every letter he receives. With your letter, please feel free to include a photo of your loved one. Your photo and your letter will remain completely private and confidential here at SBM. SBM will commit to fervently pray. Prayer changes everything!

Candidly, in my opinion, a nasty prostitute has more integrity than Mr. Bennett and those like him who do incalculable harm to LGBT youth who are submitted to fraudulent conversion programs.  As for parents who place their children in such programs, in my view they need to be prosecuted for felony child abuse.

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