A Prod Toward Compassion

A disturbing picture of gay life

Twenty-five years ago, I launched an occasional newsletter with the cumbersome title Of Mercy & Reason. It was an honest attempt to serve as an apologetic for the traditional view of homosexuality while also being a cattle prod to conservatives huddled like cows under a tree waiting for the storm to pass.

Printed on sheets measuring 17” X 22”, it had to be folded, sealed, sorted, and sent out under a nonprofit mailing permit to over 600 United Methodist pastors. Took a team effort, actually.

That title continues as a theme for this blog. Some of us still need prodding toward mercy. But increasingly, conservatives also need sound reason to continue to surf the Sexual Tsunami, searching for survivors.

Mercy is what I hope this article stirs up within you. A renewal of God-given compassion.

In scanning my archive of saved stuff, I found this article from the Huffington Post: “Together Alone” by Michael Hobbes. Well-written and rigorously researched, he wrestles with this question: With all the advances in gay rights, why does loneliness persist? Note this from page one:

Jeremy and I are 34. In our lifetime, the gay community has made more progress on legal and social acceptance than any other demographic group in history. As recently as my own adolescence, gay marriage was a distant aspiration, something newspapers still put in scare quotes. Now, it’s been enshrined in law by the Supreme Court. Public support for gay marriage has climbed from 27 percent in 1996 to 61 percent in 2016. In pop culture, we’ve gone from “Cruising” to “Queer Eye” to “Moonlight.” Gay characters these days are so commonplace they’re even allowed to have flaws.

Still, even as we celebrate the scale and speed of this change, the rates of depression, loneliness and substance abuse in the gay community remain stuck in the same place they’ve been for decades.

His deep dive into the research revealed many heartbreaking stats:

Gay people are now, depending on the study, between 2 and 10 times more likely than straight people to take their own lives. We’re twice as likely to have a major depressive episode.

And this is not just an American phenomenon. Gay people in the Netherlands have enjoyed legal marriage since 2001, but still are ten times more likely to exhibit suicidal behavior than heterosexual men. Studies in Sweden have yielded similar stats.

The article is incredibly honest and insightful about the issues which plague gay men even today. (Note, this does not address in any way the relationships or emotional health of gay women.)

The extremely high rates of depression and anxiety disorders were thought to be the result of living life in the closet. If one would come out to friends and family, it was reasoned, the newfound acceptance would lessen the stress of life. For many, coming out has been absolutely exhilarating. But disillusionment can soon creep in as young men enter the gay scene.

A study in 2015 found the rates of emotional disorders among men outside the closet door were just as high as when closeted. And a list of health issues dogs them as well, including cardiovascular disease and cancer.

Later, “minority stress” was considered the culprit. Every missionary knows the stress of cross cultural living. People of color in our own country daily face the feeling of not fitting in and/or having to prove oneself in school or the workplace.

But further research doesn’t seem to bear this out either. He spoke with Travis Salway who works for the British Columbia Centre for Disease Control. Salway had this to say:

“When you ask them why they tried to kill themselves,” he says, “most of them don’t mention anything at all about being gay.” Instead, he says, they tell him they’re having relationship problems, career problems, money problems. “They don’t feel like their sexuality is the most salient aspect of their lives. And yet, they’re on an order of magnitude more likely to kill themselves.”

Interestingly, gay men often exhibit symptoms of PTSD. The source of this disorder is not in one or two wounding experiences, such as soldiers experience in combat. Rather it is from a prolonged stress which is experienced in the closet, especially between the years of 11 and 17. As boys attracted to men travel through adolescence, there is a constant fear of being discovered, the disillusionment of knowing a “normal life” is beyond their grasp, and a continual feeling as though one simply doesn’t fit in. This is true even for those who grow up with progressive parents that are completely accepting.

Psychologists call this type of trauma “Sustained Duress”. It is a Chinese water torture type of experience. At first, the drip, drip, drip is simply annoying. But after many days, the taunting dribble is all you can think about. Such trauma is difficult to unravel and heal.

What is heartbreaking about Hobbes’ article is the sad and maddening chase gay men undertake to find true acceptance, intimacy, and connection. The initial euphoria of acceptance by the gay community dissipates as one tries to hook up. Gay bars and bathhouses are losing ground to dating apps, especially Grindr. As with many such apps, one puts their best pic out there and hopes for the best. But here’s the problem:

[The apps] are almost perfectly designed to underline our negative beliefs about ourselves. In interviews that Elder, the post-traumatic stress researcher, conducted with gay men in 2015, he found that 90 percent said they wanted a partner who was tall, young, white, muscular and masculine. For the vast majority of us who barely meet one of those criteria, much less all five, the hookup apps merely provide an efficient way to feel ugly.

The comments from anonymous prospects can be deeply insulting. We, of course, see that in comment sections on many other formats. But here the barbs thrown are about your appearance: too fat, too dark, too skinny.

Sadly, if you are slight in frame and at all effeminate, you will be told that you have to be the bottom, i.e., the one receiving anal sex. Some men will work, diet and do all they can to look the part of a “top”. But in the end, this sets them up for inevitable failure because no one can maintain their looks forever. (OK, maybe Dwayne Johnson is an exception.)

This article is certainly not the whole picture. There are gay couples who are happy. But the stats, stories, and confessions certainly paint a grim picture.

What they long for is what we all long for: unconditional love and acceptance.

Again, this post is simply a prod for us. Please read Hobbes’ article with eyes of compassion. May God pour out his reckless love into our stone-cold hearts, driving out all judgment and hypocrisy. And may they see the love of Jesus in our midst.