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http://www.gaystarnews.com/article/how-not-react-when-your-son-tells-you-hes-gay280814

I don't really have much to say here, other than that this seems like such a common occurrence still...for some people, it still takes courage and bravery to stand up to people, including their supposed 'loved ones', and be the person that they are.

I happened to find the post on reddit, too: http://www.reddit.com/r/gaybros/comments/2erhis/how_not_to_react_when_your_child_tells_you_that/

Yeah. That is something I deal with in my depression. I have not come out to my family, and a majority of my friends.
I honestly don't know that I will.

I wish they could just accept me. :/

It makes you wonder, as someone who isn't really involved with most of my family, are relations by 'blood' all that important...or more important than unrelated people that accept you and love you for who you are? It seems to me that now that he's away from those people, Daniel will probably have a much better life with people that love him for who he is. And if his 'family' can't accept him, it's their loss. I only hope in their old age they will come to regret being intolerant fools.

They might regret it, that doesn't help anything though (aside from maybe leading to a path of forgiveness from Daniel).

What needs to happen, and is slowly, is acceptance of the LGBTQa+ community.
More importantly than even that is people accepting each other period.

I am not necessarily a Bible basher, or any religion (Christianity is the most predominant discriminator in my area) for that matter, but I think that using "scripture" to justify your fear or hatred for the unknown unacceptable. If you don't like that I am bisexual because you think it's gross, fine. But don't whore out what is essentially a book about a 'father' sacrificing his 'son' for the good of all mankind for your own personal misconceptions, hatred, or ignorance. That pisses me off. But that's me, if I believe in something I believe all the way. That's why I can not call myself a Christian. I just don't know that I can believe in the Bible. Is there a God or some higher being? I don't know. No one knows.

Sorry for the tangent, it usually goes side and side along with why I feel my sexuality is repressed.

It may not help anything, but it is what it is. For anyone to dwell on the people that hate them is unhealthy, even of those people are 'family'. What Daniel, and those that are in his position, should do once they escape is to not turn their back, and to find the people in their lives that will accept and love them for who they are. It's great that Daniel has a boyfriend that cares so much about him that he'd post what he did, and that he has a friend that he can stay with long-term while he builds an independent life. I know, we're not all that lucky. =/

And I agree, acceptance needs to happen, and it is slowly...but for now, people can only work with the cards they have been handed.

The behaviour of many Christians is probably one of the primary reasons I became an atheist. I know that there are tolerant, loving Christians out there, but especially in America the face of Christianity is one of hate, intolerance, and fear-mongering that's becoming out of step with the rest of the world. Case in point of this disparity would be Pope Francis...someone who has advocated for more acceptance of different people in general, and of more outreach in the poor. These are seen as good things in the rest of the world, but in America for that he's called a communist, a liberal, and is compared with President Obama (because President Obama is apparently the symbol of everything bad and wrong).

It's a religion problem, yeah...but it seems like especially an American problem, too.

I had a picture once that I loved, it was of a quote that said "I don't care if my children end up male, female, gay, bi, lesbian, tall, short, fat, skinny, whatever, I will support them and love them. But one thing I will NOT tolerate is bullying". And that's exactly how I'm going to raise my kids.


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I don't understand why parents think it's okay to disown their kid and basically never talk to him anymore if he's gay, even in very religious households. What happened to "love the sinner but hate the sin"? Why was St. Augustine so much more level-headed 1800 years ago compared to today's fundies? And even if your son is gay, didn't Jesus heal a centurion's servant, who is widely considered either a sex slave or a willing participant in pederasty, marking the worthiness of every human to receive Jesus' attention and love? Jesus didn't judge and didn't care - why would Christians do so? I'm not convinced that Jesus would have kicked out an apostle who turned out to be homosexual, much less his own children if he ended up having any.

All the negative shit about homosexuality comes from either the Old Testament, meaning that if you cite that famous verse to uphold your bigotry you look like the biggest two-faced cherry-picker in the Universe if you do it while wearing polyester, or Paul, who apparently talks only about weak-willed people and sodomy, not directly homosexuals. Sodom and Gomorrah also have nothing to do with homosexuality but about the lack of respect given to guests in those cities. So in essence, if you read the Bible correctly, it's pretty much just sticking your dick in an ass, male or female, that is forbidden, which is much more understandable in a society where enemas, condoms or toilet paper did not exist, since it can be construed as a matter of hygiene. As far as I know, far from every homosexual practices sodomy, in fact I think most prefer oral sex or other alternatives. So why do Christians routinely condemn all homosexuals?

Shunning, disowning and even hitting your son for being gay is terrible, doubly so when you try to justify it using a book you've probably never read and don't understand, what little morsels of knowledge you have of it being fed to you by the local reverend with an agenda. I find lovely that these sacks of shit probably think they are going to Heaven and that they are such good people and such good Christians for throwing their son in the streets because he finds males cute. I'd love to see their face, assuming Heaven and God exist, when they find out in exactly which direction they are going - that is, down and not up.

Being a fundy means being two-faced by definition, because they pretend to follow a book they know jack shit about : go to Church on Sundays, listen to propaganda twisting a message of love, peace and tolerance into hateful bile and gobble it all up either so their friends won't shun them or because they are just that stupid, yell in tongues as loud as possible so everybody knows they are speaking in tongues and thus a special snowflake, come back home, then kick their homosexual child out after beating him and telling him he's a reject then disowning him. Jesus would totally have done that, you ignorant prick. Love each other as I have loved you, what happened to that? These people can't even love their own child!

They should not be allowed to reproduce. Why? Because it's one thing to undergo that "born-again" BS when you're an adult and become a jackass all by yourself and not submit any innocent people to it, but it's a very different thing to brainwash children into being disgusting monsters and screwing over the rare one that resists indoctrination.

Seriously. Watch a movie called Jesus Camp. Poor children. I'm an agnostic and something of a cultural Catholic I suppose (having been raised Catholic, gone through baptism and confirmation and all that silly stuff) and I usually tolerate people of other religions very well, but I can't stand Evangelicals. Most I've met are functionally retarded, disgusting, hateful people and their whole demeanor looks so fake, awkward and forced. They do not have an ounce of sincerity in them it seems like. And they just cannot shut up about God when they do not know the slightest thing about Him. I've studied the Bible to be better able to engage these people with their own Scripture when I meet them. Nothing makes me smile more than stomping a fundy at his own game.

PS : Christian fundies aren't a problem only in America, but Canada as well, more and more. The Western conservative and religious rednecks were unfortunately given lots and lots of oil and the exploitation thereof allow them to have a disproportionate impact on Canada's economy. I hate Albertans.

Yeah. That is something I deal with in my depression. I have not come out to my family, and a majority of my friends.
I honestly don't know that I will.

I wish they could just accept me. :/

Forgive my very pained response.

I am 54 years old.  I waited until I was 45 to come out.  And once I did, my biggest regret was that I waited so long.

One thing I discovered - and most gay men I know agree - the fear of coming out is more crippling and more destructive to spirit than actually coming out.  It is a self-induced terror. Once I came out, it was as if years and years and tons of tons of weight were lifted off of my shoulders.  I was literally re-born.

The biggest hurdle to overcome was the subconscious belief that I should try and plan or "arrange" people's reactions.  I finally realized that even if I could, I had no *right* to control what others thought or felt.  They were entitled to their feelings and beliefs.  The only thing I had a right - and duty - to 'control' was my own authenticity.

I don't care how others react...please, take it from a man who lived way too long in the closet: Be who YOU are, and let others be responsible for how they process that information. Don't live to regret the years spent hiding and covering up and pretending.

Peace.

Seroim, it's very hard to reply to any sort of discussion after you, as you have an uncanny ability of hitting every nail on the head simultaneously. 

I'd want to add that not every Christian does not necessarily act this way.  The sort of people that do will eventually go down in history similar to those opposing women's suffrage, integration, etc.

Actually, I disagree tremendously with Seroim on this one. St. Augustine of Hippo is *precisely* the problem in the western Church, among both RCs and Fundamentalist Protestants.

Augustine was a Manchaiean, a group known for cutting off their genitals because they held that sex was evil.  He may have become a Christian, but he brought his baggage with him.  In a Church filled with Greek-speaking and writing Church Fathers, Augustine was the first to neither read nor write Greek, so he had cultural baggage plus a very poor grip on Christian theology up that point.  His particular sex-phobic approach infected the western church to an extent never seen in the east, and his progeny, John Calvin and then the Plymouth Brethren, ran with it to crazy extremes.

Forgive my very pained response.

I am 54 years old.  I waited until I was 45 to come out.  And once I did, my biggest regret was that I waited so long.

One thing I discovered - and most gay men I know agree - the fear of coming out is more crippling and more destructive to spirit than actually coming out.  It is a self-induced terror. Once I came out, it was as if years and years and tons of tons of weight were lifted off of my shoulders.  I was literally re-born.

The biggest hurdle to overcome was the subconscious belief that I should try and plan or "arrange" people's reactions.  I finally realized that even if I could, I had no *right* to control what others thought or felt.  They were entitled to their feelings and beliefs.  The only thing I had a right - and duty - to 'control' was my own authenticity.

I don't care how others react...please, take it from a man who lived way too long in the closet: Be who YOU are, and let others be responsible for how they process that information. Don't live to regret the years spent hiding and covering up and pretending.

Peace.

I'm curious, and it's a little off-topic...why did you not come out earlier? Did you live in a conservative area, with a religious family, etc? And what made you decide to come out when you did?

Yeah. That is something I deal with in my depression. I have not come out to my family, and a majority of my friends.
I honestly don't know that I will.

I wish they could just accept me. :/

Forgive my very pained response.

I am 54 years old.  I waited until I was 45 to come out.  And once I did, my biggest regret was that I waited so long.

One thing I discovered - and most gay men I know agree - the fear of coming out is more crippling and more destructive to spirit than actually coming out.  It is a self-induced terror. Once I came out, it was as if years and years and tons of tons of weight were lifted off of my shoulders.  I was literally re-born.

The biggest hurdle to overcome was the subconscious belief that I should try and plan or "arrange" people's reactions.  I finally realized that even if I could, I had no *right* to control what others thought or felt.  They were entitled to their feelings and beliefs.  The only thing I had a right - and duty - to 'control' was my own authenticity.

I don't care how others react...please, take it from a man who lived way too long in the closet: Be who YOU are, and let others be responsible for how they process that information. Don't live to regret the years spent hiding and covering up and pretending.

Peace.

Thank you...this actually made me tear up. I am sorry to hear about the regret, but am glad you had the courage to come out.
I'll take that into consideration...I live with my mind beating me up all the time anyway with anxiety.

I'm curious, and it's a little off-topic...why did you not come out earlier? Did you live in a conservative area, with a religious family, etc? And what made you decide to come out when you did?

Incredibly complicated to answer. As a kid (from elementary school on) I was always called names ("Faggot!") and beat up.  The 'safest' response was to deny being a faggot (whatever that was.) 

I grew up in a nice little pocket of conservative suburbia.  But I should caution, I did NOT hear alot of anti-gay comments from adults (only the kids who teased me.)  But the flip side of that is that there were no obvious resources, gay role models, or even gay bars or places to go.  It was a non-existent concept. 

And so, I grew up in denial.  Then, as a 16 year old, I got involved with a fundamentalist religious group.  That enabled me to tell myself over and over that I wasnt gay, and, even if i was, that i could resist, or even better, be cured.  I ended up marrying a woman (because I was supposed to) and we adopted 6 children.  And I lived much of my life fascinated with men and the idea of sex with men, but denying myself. 

Sooner or later, that comes crashing down.

By the Mid 2000s, the pressure was agonizing: Jim McGready (Governor of NJ) came out, and I was in a political family; Episcopal Bishop Gene Robinson was elected  (And I had finally LEFT fundamentalism and returned to the Episcopal Church, my childhood church); and Brokeback Mountain was released.  By this time, I was EXHAUSTED from fighting myself, and gave up fighting.

It was the best decision I ever made in my entire adult life.  I finally came to realize that the fear of coming out was actually greater than coming out itself.

I have lived the last 10 years in more happiness then the first 45 years of my life.  I am happily partnered to a great guy, my mom and kids still love me, and I've gone from the Closet to being an HIV Organizer, Pride Parade participant, and mentor for other married guys struggling to come out.

Probably more than you wanted to know, but that's me...

That's such an incredible story...it must have been agonizing for you at times, with no gay role models or even people to connect to online like we have now. It sounds like you've truly liberated yourself and that you're a happier person for it...that's just awesome.

Thank you for sharing that.  Your story is unique, to me at least, and it's a very interesting glimpse into a world I've never experienced.