"D" is for Denial

Whenever I think that fringe groups in the St. Louis area could not have sunk any lower, a traveling freak show comes to town and reminds me, once again, that there are truly no limits to human ignorance and stupidity. In this case, it's a hellfire-and-brimstone "gay people can choose to become straight again" conference.

Some of my favorite quotes from this article, just to entice you to read the whole thing (bolding added by yours truly for comic effect):

"A traveling conference advocating the heterosexual lifestyle came to the suburbs of west St. Louis County on Saturday...

"...conventioneers spent the day inside, mostly listening to speakers who say they were previously gay.

"The conference is in its eighth year, but this is its first time in St. Louis. Organizers say the turnout of 1,700 was the largest of their 37 U.S. conferences. Organizers said people came from 28 states....."(sidenote: yet another reason I am never moving back to the Lou)

"There's not one set model of, 'If you do this, someone will go straight tomorrow,'" said Alan Chambers, president of Exodus, who said he dropped the homosexual lifestyle in 1991. "It's a long process."....

"A few young women chanted at cars, 'Two-Four-Six-Eight, how do you know your wife is straight?'.....

"Fryrear's presentation was typical for the day... She said she dropped that lifestyle after immersing herself in church activities in Kentucky and now works for Focus on the Family as a gender issues analyst. She told parents in the crowd not to blame themselves for their children's struggles with same-sex relationships. Sometimes, she claimed, lesbianism can be traced to "an inner sense of emptiness and longing," "a fractured mother-daughter relationship" and some type of sexual abuse....

and for the coup d'etat,

"In one small group session Saturday, [the president of the group] admitted that one of the founders of Exodus had left the group and married a gay man in a civil ceremony. "What sense do I make of it? People fall back into sin," Chambers said. "There are all sorts of reasons why people go back." (sidenote: ...yeah, dude, like maybe because THEY NEVER "LEFT" IN THE FIRST PLACE?!)

I swear, this would make SUCH a hilarious Christopher Guest film!