A Bit Fruity with Matt Bernstein - Why Is Everyone Going Back Into the Closet？

00:00:00.140 Hello, hello, and welcome back to A Bit Fruity. I'm Matt Bernstein. Thank you so much for being

00:00:06.320 here and happy Pride. We're going to give you a little Pride episode today. It's going to be

00:00:10.540 kind of a dark Pride episode, but a Pride episode nonetheless. I'm a little hungover. As of the time

00:00:15.700 we're recording this, Zoran Mamdani won the New York City Democratic primary last night.

00:00:21.080 And so it's kind of a rare moment where on the A Bit Fruity podcast, we are in a very, very,

00:00:27.160 very good mood. And so we have to do something about that. We got to ruin it.

00:00:43.340 So there's been this weird trend that I've noticed over the last few years, and you might

00:00:49.520 have too, which is that in one way or another, a lot of people seem to be going back into the closet.

00:00:57.160 One particular instance of this that I've been paying attention to for like four years now is that of Lohanthony, the once flamboyant, out-and-proud YouTube A-lister who's now a Trump-supporting gospel musician.

00:01:11.080 Yes, more on that in a second.

00:01:13.060 But versions of this keep happening, whether it's gay influencers inexplicably becoming born-again Christians and renouncing their identities, or the seemingly never-ending stream of new de-trans Twitter personalities.

00:01:26.300 many of whom seem to be struggling with their gender identity very publicly while claiming at

00:01:32.220 the same time that they've returned to the body God intended them to live in. It's bizarre and you

00:01:38.300 know the term conversion therapy gets thrown around a lot but what does that look like in 2025

00:01:43.820 and how do we grapple with the idea that queer adults could be making these decisions entirely

00:01:51.360 on their own supposedly i want to interrogate what i've pieced together from observing this 0.55

00:01:57.300 bizarre and honestly very dark pattern that i've been noticing try to make sense of it and hopefully

00:02:03.480 create a path forward where this doesn't keep happening because i want my girls to be out 0.98

00:02:08.600 it's fucking pride why are you in the closet come back out to do that today we are joined by 0.97

00:02:14.980 one of my best friends welcome back to the podcast kat tenbard thank you so much for having me back 0.99

00:02:20.980 I am so happy that you're here. And Kat also on her newsletter, Spitfire News, just wrote an incredible piece on the misogyny of Ethan Klein. And as someone who has been recently attacked by Ethan Klein on the internet, Ethan Klein has made crazy Instagram stories about how badly I apparently want to fuck Hassan Piker. And that's why I support Palestinian humanity. I appreciated it a lot.

00:02:49.320 so you know i hope he's not coming after you too hard and i appreciate that you wrote that and if

00:02:54.440 you want to support cat's work go buy a subscription to spitfire news it is the best way to support

00:02:59.180 some of the best independent creators online right now well thank you so much it has been a wild week

00:03:05.540 uh people in the h3 subreddit were also saying that i wanted to focus on piker and i'm like i

00:03:11.720 am a lesbian and he's a very he's a very gorgeous man like he is very attractive so i get it but

00:03:18.380 it's just it's funny that that's always the default response no matter who you are 0.99

00:03:22.900 that's the line of criticism being a lesbian doesn't even stop that i want to fuck us on 0.99

00:03:28.040 piker and like that's why i'm not a zionist allegations it's wild how are you feeling 0.99

00:03:33.860 going into this episode today because i know this is something that you and i have talked a lot

00:03:37.700 about half of this podcast is just like when kat and i drink together what do we talk about and

00:03:42.540 then okay let's turn on the mic and talk about it for the podcast you know exactly yes and i'm so

00:03:47.300 excited that we're covering this topic because it's something that I've thought about a lot and 0.72

00:03:52.260 increasingly over the past several years, as we've seen the pendulum swing back away from LGBTQ

00:03:58.500 rights, away from LGBTQ acceptance. And this is an underexplored consequence of that. Like you

00:04:05.760 don't see a lot of people talking about how this actually affects LGBTQ individuals and their

00:04:11.240 self-perception and how they choose to live and whether they're out or whether they feel like

00:04:16.200 they can be out should we start with lohanthony yes because i was like telling my boyfriend that

00:04:23.480 i wanted to make an episode about like all of these people like receding back into the closet 0.87

00:04:28.340 and i was like hey remember lohanthony they're like calling all basic bitches guy from 2012 0.88

00:04:33.520 he's like a renounced homosexual like ex-homosexual trump supporter now and he was like what so some 0.87

00:04:40.280 people know this some people know this but i think a lot of people don't and i think it's an

00:04:43.740 interesting place to start. So Lohanthony was this force online in the early 2010s. He had a video

00:04:52.220 that went viral on YouTube where he was twirling his leg around. Here, I'm going to try to do it.

00:04:58.100 And he was like, calling all basic bitches, calling all basic bitches, you're basic. 1.00

00:05:05.620 Calling all the basic bitches, calling all the basic bitches, there's a new announcement. 1.00

00:05:13.740 he was like 12 or 13 years old when this went viral and it catapulted him into like early 0.99

00:05:22.520 youtube a-list stardom lohanthony as a username is a portmento of his name anthony and lindsey 0.55

00:05:30.920 lohan his iconic favorite celebrity and he just became like the archetypal like sassy gay kid

00:05:38.400 online. This is like such a time capsule of what YouTube used to be because it's like in the early 1.00

00:05:49.900 2010s like through kind of like the mid to late 2010s there was such a prominent queer culture

00:05:56.100 on YouTube where you didn't have to do a lot because the platform was still so fresh.

00:06:01.760 there was like it was not seen as a sustainable career path or aspiration the way that it is

00:06:08.500 today it was not seen as like an outlet for the mainstream the way that it is today it was like

00:06:13.620 this kind of niche place where a lot of creative queer people of all ages like could find this

00:06:19.940 audience and Lohanthony was one of those people where he was at the forefront of YouTube becoming

00:06:25.080 something more than just like viral videos or where you upload like your home videos too

00:06:30.360 because he went from like these like memeable moments and I remember watching his content like

00:06:35.360 in as a college freshman just being like it's so fun it's so like funny and enjoyable to watch

00:06:41.820 and at the same time you're seeing him and like other early queer YouTube stars like Tyler Oakley

00:06:47.120 and Hannah Hart like showing up at award shows and like getting like the first YouTube magazine

00:06:53.020 interviews he's so embedded within like early YouTube history. Lohanthony was very important

00:06:58.440 to me personally because we're like the same age I also came out very young I came out when I was

00:07:05.500 15 but more so than that Lohanthony and I both existed in what people would make fun of me in

00:07:13.320 school for but called the glass closet which is this idea that like you're not necessarily out

00:07:18.240 of the closet but it's like you're so gay that you don't need to tell us and I really related

00:07:23.880 to him like I would see his posts all over Tumblr and I was just seeing this kid like own it and 0.65

00:07:29.740 own who he was and not apologize for it and he would talk as a teenager about like wanting to

00:07:34.860 kiss a boy for the first time and his presence just meant a lot to me he also in his years at

00:07:42.080 the forefront of internet stardom he really made a lot of wild connections like he was in this

00:07:47.760 influencer group called the Fab Five, which included Rebecca Black of Friday fame, who is now

00:07:55.580 out and proud and queer herself. So it was just like an entirely different time. But he got,

00:08:01.540 you know, a million subscribers on YouTube. He moved to LA and that was all before he turned 17.

00:08:07.860 Quite the whirlwind for someone to be so young and to mean so much to so many people and also

00:08:13.520 like be at the center of this new direction of gravity which is youtube and influencers and the

00:08:18.940 internet internet's high society i feel like has existed in so many iterations at this point

00:08:23.680 that you have these like insane time capsule images and so i'm gonna send you one and i want

00:08:31.240 you to just react to it and tell me tell me what's happening here i mean i love this image

00:08:38.560 This is crazy.

00:08:41.040 You see this image pop up again from time to time on Twitter.

00:08:45.040 It will go viral.

00:08:46.260 And it's so wild that Lohanthony was the most famous person at the time that this picture

00:08:52.660 was taken.

00:08:53.420 Tell us what the photo is.

00:08:54.620 So this is a car selfie featuring four people.

00:08:58.580 And from left to right, it is Timothee Chalamet, Lohanthony, Lily Reinhart from Riverdale,

00:09:05.300 and then Lily Rabe from American Horror Story and other things.

00:09:09.800 This is crazy.

00:09:11.000 And I did not know who Timothee Chalamet was at the time.

00:09:14.020 What's so wild about this picture too is like,

00:09:16.960 Timothee Chalamet was the last person who I would be able to recognize.

00:09:20.700 Like out of all of these people,

00:09:21.980 I knew who Lily Rabe was because of American Horror Story.

00:09:24.620 I knew who Lily Reinhart was then because of Riverdale.

00:09:27.400 And then Timothee Chalamet,

00:09:28.440 who is now obviously the most famous person out of all of these people by far,

00:09:32.900 comes along a few years later.

00:09:34.400 These people were just like existing in LA alongside each other. It's so funny.

00:09:40.340 And at the time, like Lohanthony was the one who had like the most clout, the most fame,

00:09:45.720 the most name recognition, the most everything.

00:09:47.960 The concept of Timmy Chalamet hanging out with Lohanthony for clout. It's more likely than you

00:09:54.940 think. So Lohanthony is really riding high for quite a few years with this internet stardom.

00:10:02.220 He eventually, you know, in the later 2010s, he sort of recedes in his fame a little bit. He's still, you know, like out and proud and gay, but the internet changes a lot. People like me start posting. And I just add that to say that Lohanthony and I followed each other on Instagram.

00:10:21.100 And we would like message back and forth at the time, like Anthony would respond to my story sometimes. And like we'd, you know, queen out a little bit in the DMs. He was always very sweet. And if you can believe it, we still follow each other. You know, this is about to take a pretty wild turn.

00:10:38.560 but anthony would go on to unfollow most of the people that he followed before his uh sort of

00:10:47.000 conversion arc and he only follows about a hundred people now and it's like ben shapiro

00:10:52.700 donald trump and me for whatever reason he never unfollowed me and i've uh and i've never

00:11:02.480 unfollowed him either and i've actually gotten quite a number of messages from people over the

00:11:06.100 years being like why are you following this person and my answer is this I still hope and

00:11:14.620 this is probably going to become a theme of this episode but I have a lot of hope that this is a

00:11:19.520 person who will come back around one day and I don't know I just feel like even though like

00:11:28.240 Lohanthony and I were never remotely close like I feel like uh you know all you can do for someone

00:11:34.180 when they are going through something like this

00:11:36.540 is just be there the whole time.

00:11:39.040 And for me, you know,

00:11:40.740 that's not a particularly hard thing to do.

00:11:42.560 I just want to stick around on Instagram.

00:11:44.200 But, you know, I'm holding out hope,

00:11:46.420 I guess is the point.

00:11:47.680 Yeah.

00:11:48.120 And I mean, this happens. 1.00

00:11:49.540 Like you have gay or queer trans people

00:11:52.360 who throughout their lives come out

00:11:54.860 and live freely as themselves

00:11:57.520 and then retract, go back into the closet,

00:12:00.620 repress things.

00:12:01.340 But then later in life,

00:12:02.940 have this like rebound period like it is possible and i think throughout queer history it's been 0.66

00:12:09.020 there have been times when this has been more frequent because of the complexity of existing 0.63

00:12:13.300 in a society that is inherently oppressive to who you are so covid lockdown happens and anthony

00:12:21.180 starts posting some you know content that i personally as like someone who's not very

00:12:26.220 spiritual it just wasn't for me but it didn't strike me as problematic it didn't strike me as

00:12:31.280 worrying but it was a lot of like daily affirmations sort of spiritual stuff it seemed

00:12:35.720 that he had moved out of la and was living in somewhere rural he would film a lot of these on 0.51

00:12:41.460 like the back of his pickup truck but he was like you know like shout out to the woods gays you know

00:12:46.420 there's a lot of there's a lot of gays who love the woods and who love affirmations i wasn't worried

00:12:50.440 and then in late summer 2020 this is five months into covet ish he posts a 41 minute long youtube

00:13:00.480 video where he says what Kat because I know we've both seen this yeah he says he talks about how

00:13:07.940 throughout his like career on YouTube he struggled with substance abuse he's been addicted to like

00:13:14.620 clout and fame and likes and all of these things and he describes this position of turmoil that

00:13:20.580 he's been in and he connects it to his gay identity and being queer and he renounces his

00:13:27.980 queer identity and basically says like i'm choosing christian celibacy to a lot of people

00:13:33.600 it's like what what does this even mean like i remember when i first watched this i was so 0.52

00:13:37.500 confused because i was like it sounds like you've gone through something akin to conversion therapy

00:13:43.160 but he's not using those words he's just sort of saying like i used to be gay but i'm not anymore

00:13:48.700 i'm rejecting it because of god yeah a quote from the video was it's no coincidence that

00:13:54.520 through pursuing my same-sex attraction I was also addicted to alcohol I was also addicted to weed

00:14:00.260 I was also trying hallucinogenics I was also addicted to money I was also addicted to views

00:14:04.720 I was addicted to attention I was addicted to opportunity opportunity that earthly pleasures

00:14:11.120 brought to me I believe in that video he also talks about being abused as a child sexually 0.93

00:14:18.000 and associating all of this with his gay identity like he needs to shed his gay identity because

00:14:25.000 it's sort of wrapped up in all the other things he was doing that he perceived as sin and so a lot 0.99

00:14:30.840 of people immediately online first of all were like what the fuck and second of all were like 0.97

00:14:36.700 who did this to him who sent him who sent him to conversion camp and I want to come back to that 0.98

00:14:42.140 in a second, but you mentioned Christian celibacy. Can you explain what that is in relation to like

00:14:49.360 conversion therapy and all of this? So when this happened, I was working at Business Insider and I

00:14:54.940 actually wrote an article about it with my coworker, Rachel Greenspan. And what I learned

00:14:59.980 is that Christian celibacy refers to this kind of emerging ideology where it's not saying that like

00:15:07.840 being gay isn't real and it's not even necessarily saying that you can like flip that switch and

00:15:13.660 become straight it's like if you experience same-sex attraction and like the buzzwords

00:15:19.160 that lohanthony was using in this video align with this movement it's like if you experience

00:15:24.120 same-sex attraction that's viewed as like an addiction like it's viewed as this unhealthy

00:15:29.320 mental uh like physical condition that you have and so the right way to operate as a christian

00:15:37.460 is to basically not indulge in that same-sex attraction.

00:15:42.060 And that can mean remaining celibate and just not having sex at all.

00:15:46.220 And it can also mean like, okay, I'm a lesbian, but I'm going to marry a man. 0.92

00:15:50.240 I might even marry a gay man and we'll have a straight gay relationship.

00:15:54.800 And that's how we'll be Christians. 0.63

00:15:56.520 And this is such a through line with any sort of conversion therapy adjacent program.

00:16:02.140 And we're going to talk about different types of them and what they look like now,

00:16:05.220 because my god they do a good job at disguising themselves kind of but they all sort of frame

00:16:11.460 sexuality as a thing that you do and not a thing that you are so they'll talk about like you said 0.93

00:16:18.740 it's it's like you're not gay in your heart it's not part of your identity it's you're addicted to

00:16:23.420 same-sex behavior in the way that you could be addicted to like doing drugs or or drinking 0.52

00:16:28.820 alcohol and so and this is of course true outside of religion like the way that you become sober is 0.73

00:16:34.720 you stop drinking you stop doing drugs but to them it's like you can become sober from homosexuality

00:16:40.340 by just not doing homosexual acts they don't see it as like a part of you they see it as

00:16:46.460 as sex and i think it's actually interesting because that idea of sexuality is also just

00:16:51.300 really common on the right in general i mean all the time i just whenever i get like hate mail from 1.00

00:16:56.620 homophobes it's all about like sucking dick and taking it up the ass because that's all they think 1.00

00:17:00.160 being gay is which like in certain moments i'm kidding god i can't i can't have moments of levity 1.00

00:17:07.720 a lot of christian ideology around sex in general is this idea that like sex and sexuality are

00:17:18.380 tools like i grew up catholic and my earliest sexual education was in the catholic church

00:17:25.480 and they would tell you obviously like you need to be celibate until marriage but also when you're

00:17:30.700 having sex it's for procreation it's man and a woman having a baby within the catholic faith

00:17:37.140 and this is common across a lot of different religions this is common across a lot of different 0.97

00:17:41.340 denominations and when it comes to like gay sexuality it's like even if you have that urge

00:17:46.700 like we all have urges we all want to watch pornography we all want to consume alcohol 0.70

00:17:51.540 but you have to like, it's this idea of control. You have to control yourself. You have to not

00:17:57.560 indulge in these like sinful things, but the devil is always going to tempt you. And the act

00:18:02.260 of being a good Christian is to repress those parts of you. When you published that Business 1.00

00:18:06.960 Insider article about what was happening with Lohanthony, you mentioned in it, and we were

00:18:11.840 talking about this when I was preparing for the episode, that his YouTube bookmarks were public

00:18:17.300 and that he was bookmarking content from a woman named Jackie Hill Perry.

00:18:23.680 You know, the internet is so big and vast that someone can be so famous

00:18:27.520 and you can also have no idea who they are.

00:18:29.980 So who is Jackie Hill Perry? 1.00

00:18:32.560 This is a woman who grew up identifying as a lesbian. 1.00

00:18:36.000 She had relationships with women. 0.96

00:18:37.460 And then she turned her back on what she calls same-sex attraction.

00:18:42.560 she is an author and an influencer with one and a half million instagram followers very active

00:18:51.160 instagram followers like currently i was going through her content i could not believe how

00:18:54.720 popular it was and she wrote this book called gay girl good god which has take a guess right now

00:19:03.060 how many very very overwhelmingly positive reviews it has on goodreads i know i can't hear you

00:19:08.080 guessing but just take a guess 25 000 and it's just like a pretty standard ex-gay memoir here's

00:19:17.260 the blurb in gay girl good god author jackie hill perry shares her story offering practical tools

00:19:24.040 that helped her in the process of finding wholeness jackie grew up fatherless experienced

00:19:29.660 gender confusion it's my favorite kind of confusion and embraced both masculinity and

00:19:34.320 homosexuality with every fiber of her being. She knew that Christians had a lot to say about all

00:19:39.440 of the above, but was she supposed to change herself? How was she supposed to stop loving

00:19:44.280 women when homosexuality felt more natural to her than heterosexuality ever could? At age 19, 0.54

00:19:50.940 Jackie came face to face with what it meant to be made new, and not in a church or through

00:19:56.820 contact with Christians. God broke in and turned her heart toward him right in her own bedroom

00:20:02.280 in light of his gospel. This makes me so sad. One of the things that makes me so sad about this is

00:20:09.180 I went on to the Goodreads reviews because I was really curious, like who is leaving five-star

00:20:14.720 reviews on this book? And the theme that I gathered from it was it's a lot of people who

00:20:21.400 are at least claiming that they do not experience same-sex attraction. Maybe some of them have a

00:20:26.500 little bit of a thou doth protest too much vibe. But for the most part, this is people who are

00:20:31.600 saying they're not gay they've never had gay thoughts whatever and they like stuff like this

00:20:36.800 because it provides a very convenient narrative if you ever feel guilty about your bigotry this

00:20:44.180 serves a purpose within the broader christian community where it's like you don't have to feel

00:20:48.980 bad about not accepting gay people because you can just reframe that as like it's actually gay 0.55

00:20:54.680 people who need to do the work to repress that part of them there was one review in particular 0.80

00:20:59.500 though that really saddened me which was it was a five-star review and it appeared to be from

00:21:05.820 someone who was very very young because they wrote in their review that like they had stopped and

00:21:11.440 started the book because they needed to finish their homework and then they finally got back

00:21:15.760 to it and they were like this book is such a great resource for me it's awful it is so depressing

00:21:22.000 and it's like yes freedom of speech but this is so harmful to people who come into contact with

00:21:29.100 this ideology. And with the case of Lohanthony, you see a direct connection between like how this

00:21:34.100 can influence people. A hundred percent. I mean, Lohanthony was someone who ostensibly read this

00:21:38.980 book probably among other things and was like, you know what? Yeah, I am going to turn my back

00:21:43.440 on same sex attraction. Can I read? I was also reading the Goodreads reviews of this book. 0.73

00:21:50.100 There's one left by a woman named Amy Morgan. It's a four star review. And this just really

00:21:55.280 tickled me jackie's testimony is powerful also if you replace gay in the title with whatever

00:22:03.080 your personal idol is really good book about worshiping god instead of gods convincing book

00:22:09.100 no matter your particular struggle i just love the idea it's like when talking about renouncing

00:22:16.000 your homosexuality if you replace homosexuality with anything else that you like it really holds

00:22:22.740 true and being gay is no different than worshiping Britney Spears and I'm like sure okay in my case 0.99

00:22:30.540 they are one in the same what the fuck are you talking about it's also so interesting that like 0.94

00:22:37.080 Lohanthony was such a huge fan of Lana Del Rey and that was how I discovered Lohanthony is like 0.95

00:22:43.320 he had a very viral video about going to a Lana Del Rey concert and he was like he described it

00:22:47.820 as literally like a quasi religious experience and this is a video that i would like re-watch

00:22:53.240 over the years because it was just so like sweet and fun and funny and it's like you have these

00:22:58.600 really passionate queer people who find this sense of community and purpose and belonging

00:23:05.020 in pop culture and in the community that they find through social media and like when you reach

00:23:11.300 this point of inner turmoil i think christianity can be very uh attractive because it's like you're

00:23:17.460 just replacing like the pop star you love or the genre of content that you're participating in

00:23:23.040 with this like Christian faith. I remember there was a famous TikTok of this kid who like grew up

00:23:28.580 in a mega church. And they were like, I thought that I was like an evangelical Christian. And

00:23:33.680 then I went to a One Direction concert for the first time. And I realized I just like live music.

00:23:40.320 I was also reading this really interesting thread from someone who studies religion as an academic.

00:23:45.960 and she was like it may surprise people but we don't really know what religion is like there

00:23:53.880 are definitions of religion but basically within scholarship around religion it's like religion

00:23:59.900 could theoretically be like being a swifty and a lot of people have argued this a lot of people

00:24:04.360 have argued this i i have argued this and it's like i know a lot of swifties who actually grew

00:24:10.600 up in the christian faith and were like youth group leaders church multiple times a week who

00:24:16.900 backed away from religion like they were doing the opposite of what lohanthony did where it's

00:24:21.340 like they grew up in religion but it didn't ultimately like politically morally ideologically

00:24:26.160 it did not work for them anymore but they come into like music fandom as sort of a replacement

00:24:31.640 for that kind of community and if you look at a lot of people's testimonies who have at some point

00:24:37.140 been in any sort of conversion therapy program a lot of what they talk about is just like feeling

00:24:42.720 belonging within it so anyway Lohanthony has this sort of dramatic shift a lot of people online are

00:24:49.720 like who sent him to conversion therapy like was it his mom but like that didn't really make sense

00:24:56.180 because like his mom had long been featured in his content and was very supportive of him yes so it

00:25:01.840 was just kind of like this vague like something happened to him I think at some point he actually

00:25:07.420 denied outright going to any sort of camp and for all I can say like I believe him and I also don't

00:25:15.360 really think that that's the point and we're gonna get to that but a few years later people learn

00:25:23.280 through his mother's Instagram account that he's gone to the military do you remember when she

00:25:27.740 posted that that photo of him and his military guard yes i do it's unfortunately burned into my

00:25:33.080 brain yeah it's it's uh it was sad the whole thing is sad it is sad and now he's sort of

00:25:40.140 crept back onto youtube and he posts gospel music now glory to jesus christ

00:25:46.700 his situation is is revived in the internet public conscience every now and then for example

00:25:59.360 when brat came out there was like a viral tweet that was like rest in peace lohanthony you would

00:26:04.460 have loved brat and that's honestly really sad like it's a little like funny it's a little bit

00:26:09.000 of a joke but it it honestly is really really sad and i think a lot of people will look at

00:26:13.760 something like this and be like, well, he's not hurting anyone. Like this is just him. Like this

00:26:19.060 is his individual journey. He's not like hurting anyone else. That's not really the case. The

00:26:25.260 experts who I spoke to at the time in 2020 talked about this because it's like, when you have

00:26:29.600 someone with this massive following, creating this, like putting out this ideology, showing

00:26:35.740 this pipeline publicly, that does present a harm because it could easily be like the introduction

00:26:42.340 point for other young struggling queer people or queer people struggling of all ages could see this

00:26:48.800 and like start to go down the exact same path yeah well and that's and that's the thing with

00:26:53.580 most of these ex-gay communities which again we're going to talk about them the communities

00:26:59.320 themselves more in a little bit but the majority of them if not i would argue all of them are led

00:27:05.220 by people who identify as ex-gay so in a lot of situations it is people who have been victimized

00:27:12.500 by this ideology basically advertising that abuse to other people saying that saying that oh it

00:27:17.900 worked it's also like needless to say but repressing part of yourself and repressing

00:27:23.240 desires that are healthy and natural and good is not good like creating this sense of shame around

00:27:31.060 who you are and the way that you love and the way that you live your life is unhealthy like it's

00:27:37.480 often i feel like within this community and even outside of it it's framed as like well this is

00:27:41.460 just people's choice and it's like well it's propaganda is what it is the the the most out

00:27:48.900 there take yet on the a bit fruity podcast conversion therapy is bad i'm like it's actually

00:27:55.740 good to be gay they're gonna cancel me for this one this might be an unpopular take here but like 0.85

00:28:05.180 oh like gay sex is kind of a good thing well in 2025 we do kind of have to go back to basics so 0.98

00:28:11.140 let me just say gay is good yeah let's start there at square one i want to put a pin in 1.00

00:28:16.840 lohanthony for a little bit we'll come back to him and kind of what we think actually happened

00:28:21.460 because it's still sort of not clear but while we're doing this sort of internet historiography

00:28:27.480 there is another person who went down a very similar thing who i want to throw in here because

00:28:33.040 he's another person who gets kind of swept up in this viral conversation every few months online

00:28:37.780 kat do you remember staton harry aka the lady gaga boy hey monsters what's new today i'm going

00:28:47.080 to be lip syncing to to ale alejandro ale alejandro you better enjoy it keep those paws up very high

00:28:55.380 super high higher than before of course i do this is uh this this breaks my heart it is truly

00:29:02.460 heartbreaking because it's like the video that he created that went viral is so sweet and it's like

00:29:09.780 this was a child who was 11 years old at the time that he made this video and he's like wearing a

00:29:16.800 lady gaga t-shirt in a room covered in lady gaga merchandise doing like these flamboyant over the

00:29:24.300 top lip syncs as like a little monster and it went super viral it was very very cute lady gaga

00:29:30.540 herself was like i love you and he was like this is the best day of my life and you still see this

00:29:36.240 used as like a reaction video from time to time what does he say come on little monsters everybody

00:29:41.680 Everybody better be jumping.

00:29:43.020 Everyone better be jumping.

00:29:44.780 I know the intonation with which he says, everybody better be jumping.

00:29:48.260 Because it's such a joyous video.

00:29:51.040 But I remember seeing this and being like, oh my gosh, like, you're the 11-year-old who is so himself that, like, I wish that I could have been at 11.

00:30:01.240 Mm-hmm.

00:30:02.520 Do you want to take a beat, though, on, like, the topic of children going viral?

00:30:07.480 Because I think a lot of people misunderstand how scary that can be when you're a child.

00:30:12.400 And the same thing happened to Lohanthony.

00:30:13.740 I mean, Lohanthony was like 12.

00:30:15.060 Yes.

00:30:15.540 And I think that like when you look at kind of the trajectories of these stories that

00:30:20.120 we're talking about, it's not just like out of nowhere, you're renouncing your queerness.

00:30:25.820 It's like there is typically an element of like trauma and going viral as at any age,

00:30:33.200 but particularly in the vulnerability of youth when you're 11 years old, when you're 12, 13 years

00:30:39.440 old, that can be traumatic, even if at the time it feels good. Because having this level of mass

00:30:46.680 exposure is fundamentally unnatural. And like, again, people of all ages talk about this, about

00:30:52.960 how going viral is like, if there are the good parts of it, but there are also the overwhelming

00:30:56.840 bad parts of it, particularly when you have a very young queer child being pushed in this huge way

00:31:05.420 in front of so many eyes all of a sudden. They're not asking to have this massive audience. It's

00:31:10.640 like you can imagine the consequences of that, the immediate scrutiny, the overwhelming amount

00:31:17.540 of bigotry that these children are going to face. I can only imagine what like a Facebook comment

00:31:23.280 section would look like on this video today it would be horrible and at the time i'm sure it was

00:31:30.540 horrible like for on the gay internet we love stuff like this but on like the straight internet

00:31:35.940 it's like this child is being abused you know what i mean yeah oh my god totally i think the

00:31:41.800 comments would be worse now honestly because agreed he went viral before the groomer panic

00:31:45.900 started but now it would just be like i mean now like his parents would have like cps called on

00:31:50.600 them probably by like some crazy right-wing psychophant his house would get swatted unlike

00:31:55.400 lohanthony state and harry who's this boy he doesn't really become like a career content

00:32:01.720 creator he just kind of has these like lady gaga lip sync videos that go very very viral and nobody

00:32:08.240 really hears from him for a while so much so that there was actually a twitter account created

00:32:12.880 called where is state and harry and which is that's so funny it's also like he could just

00:32:19.060 disappear. It's okay. You know, COVID happens. And I mentioned that only to say, I do think

00:32:25.120 COVID and lockdown, specifically in 2020 was such a traumatizing time for so many people in so many

00:32:32.680 different directions. We saw so many people become, you know, anti-vax conspiracy theorists.

00:32:37.180 We saw so many people go down so many conspiratorial rabbit holes. And I think this is

00:32:40.880 in line with a lot of that, the amount of people who went under these like new religious journeys.

00:32:46.980 Yes. And I want to like talk about this more as we go along, but it's like the fact that

00:32:52.500 these things happened in like the 2020 era is no coincidence because you saw all of these things

00:32:58.940 that were already starting to happen on the internet. You saw the beginning of this like

00:33:02.980 pendulum swing toward conservative culture online that was already happening before 2020,

00:33:08.840 but 2020 accelerated everything. All of a sudden it went from like being very online,

00:33:14.660 being extremely online being a huge fan of youtube etc it was still somewhat niche for young people

00:33:22.580 for people who grew up online you like being in youtube culture was already sort of a majority

00:33:27.200 experience but what happened in 2020 was like you saw this massive acceleration in like across all

00:33:33.380 demographics because of like the conditions of lockdown and quarantine we're spending so much

00:33:38.380 more time online than before and because of these other like socio-political economic cultural

00:33:43.560 factors that were happening in the wider world, you saw this intense burst of conservative

00:33:49.240 content. And YouTube in particular was primed for this because in the decade leading up to the

00:33:55.980 pandemic, there were so many career influencers who were building these conservative networks

00:34:01.760 online. And this is the pipeline that was set in place that so many people fell down. And this

00:34:09.560 aspect of it this like conversion therapy aspect of it is very unexplored compared to like the

00:34:14.720 manosphere 1000% and it was something that like as I was researching and putting together notes 0.67

00:34:22.640 for this episode it was just like the fact that I came across Jackie Hill Perry who's that ex-gay

00:34:27.940 author who is currently a very popular influencer online with a husband and kids and who is still

00:34:35.240 doing sort of like biblical adjacent content but for a for a massive massive audience and it's just

00:34:41.100 like oh wait broad swaths of the public currently have accepted the idea that like you can just

00:34:46.800 change your sexuality through prayer like that is that's something that's actually very popular

00:34:50.920 again yes and i think you're right i mean as conservative politics and homophobia and

00:34:58.180 transphobia become more popular you see a direct correlation with like the belief in rebranded

00:35:03.920 conversion therapy practices, which are fundamentally always the same. But I want to

00:35:08.780 get back to Staten Harry, because he reemerges in March 2022, four years after his initial videos

00:35:15.900 go viral with a new video. And he is doing like a Bible sermon on YouTube. And it's uploaded on

00:35:24.460 March 28. And the caption is, March 28 used to be a very demonic day for me, because it's Lady 0.91

00:35:33.000 Gaga's birthday. A day I used to worship her and exalt her on so crazy much. Well, every day,

00:35:40.000 really, but especially this day. So anyways, just a little testimony of how good God is and how now

00:35:47.180 on March 28th, I'm glorifying him, not a mere celebrity. I legit had thousands of pictures of

00:35:54.120 her on my phone, pictures even on my wall, my clothes, my phone's wallpaper. My entire social

00:36:00.280 media accounts were even based around upon worshiping her. Wow. Thank you, Lord, for saving

00:36:06.260 me. Amen. This reminds me of that one interview Trixie Mattel did, where the interviewer was like,

00:36:12.020 well, what do you have to say for people who say that it's not natural and it's not God's will?

00:36:15.920 And Trixie Mattel goes, well, God's not real. I am. It's like, well, when you're worshiping

00:36:22.620 a female pop star at least she's real yes it's like this text is so like you almost have to laugh 0.94

00:36:31.400 reading it because it's so absurd but it's also like it's still so depressing because it's like 0.61

00:36:37.160 yeah you can be too extreme and you can be too obsessive we see this in stan culture like it

00:36:43.260 can become unhealthy for you and for the person you're obsessing over but having pictures of lady

00:36:48.560 gaga on your wall is not demonic that's called growing up in the 2010s yeah yeah yeah that's

00:36:56.680 right so staton continues to make like bible sermon content to this day the lord is at hand

00:37:04.600 now the amplified bible let your gentle spirit your graciousness unselfishness mercy tolerance

00:37:12.420 and patience be known to all people the lord but you know people were like kind of what the hell

00:37:19.440 happened like and he he did write at one point on another sort of bible related video coming from

00:37:25.900 someone who used to be completely part of that community and supported it a hundred percent

00:37:30.560 this is amazing god is so good so we have another case of okay he renounced sexuality he was out as

00:37:37.600 gay and uh and now he's not again like people because his like lady gaga videos still go viral

00:37:43.740 like people bring up that he is this you know basically like bible thumper youtuber now and

00:37:49.400 it's the same comments that lohanthony got it's actually sometimes people will be like oh he was

00:37:55.400 like lohanthony but people will say you know i feel horribly like someone sent him to a camp

00:38:00.920 I can only imagine what must have happened. And people harass these figures too, which I don't

00:38:08.700 think is productive. When Mayhem came out, Lady Gaga's newest album, people were commenting all

00:38:14.560 over his stuff. There was this one, please react to Abracadabra. And he said, no, thank you.

00:38:18.980 He wrote this thing on TikTok that was like, yes, I am the Lady Gaga monster child, but I no longer

00:38:23.800 associate myself with Lady Gaga and believe that her fans are demonic and I do not condone that

00:38:28.180 behavior thank you and i think regardless of how you feel about like the implications of these

00:38:33.940 people publicly advertising any sort of like conversion mindset harassing them is not gonna

00:38:41.340 help anyone involved and people do the same thing to lohanthony because there's like a semi semi

00:38:46.620 recent video of him where someone asked him and some of this is innocent like some of this is

00:38:50.780 people just like genuinely curious someone asked him if he still listens to lana del rey

00:38:55.400 and he actually said he sometimes does like he was like i don't listen to any of her new stuff

00:39:01.320 but occasionally i'll listen to like the born to die album i mean no matter what religious

00:39:06.320 transformation you go through born to die still hits he's like i'll put on a little without you

00:39:12.160 and i'm like me too and also it's kind of ironic because i'm like maybe you should listen to newer

00:39:18.720 lana del rey albums because she's kind of gone on this conservative trajectory yeah the newer stuff

00:39:23.760 Might hit too. But like people have this idea, I think, with Lohanthony and Staten Harry and sort

00:39:30.360 of all of these internet figures that they were like forcibly strapped to a table and like given

00:39:36.800 electroshock therapy or something, right? Because I feel like that is people's understanding of

00:39:40.820 conversion therapy is like you're taken to a place with an evil pastor who like shows you 0.98

00:39:45.860 images of gay porn and then shocks you so you are conditioned to fear it or something. 0.97

00:39:50.860 And chiefly, I think people don't understand why someone would do this without someone forcing them to. 0.98

00:39:58.080 Yes. And it doesn't help that like this is still a really common media portrayal of what conversion therapy is.

00:40:04.780 Like you saw this in, ironically, American Horror Story.

00:40:08.960 Yeah, yeah.

00:40:09.400 In like season two, Asylum, this was a portrayal.

00:40:13.180 And you see this like there are still to this day movies that come out about conversion therapy where it's like the evil man

00:40:20.000 straps them to a chair in the woods. And it's like, I understand this is very common and

00:40:26.800 consistent horror imagery, but it doesn't reflect the reality, which is frankly even more sinister

00:40:33.180 than that in a lot of ways. A thousand percent because a lot of people can't imagine anti-gay

00:40:40.020 violence that is through talk therapy. Yes. And that is theoretically opted for by the person

00:40:45.940 going to it. Yes. So I want to talk a little bit about sort of the modern history of ex-gay

00:40:53.180 Christian ministries in the United States, because I think something that you realize pretty quickly 0.90

00:40:59.660 when you look at the history of this from like the 70s until right now and like Lohanthony,

00:41:03.660 Staten, Harry era, is that it's actually just the same thing the entire time. And it's not

00:41:08.740 electroshock therapy. And it's not, you know, like we're going to whip this out of you. And for those

00:41:14.140 reasons it's way easier for it to fly under the radar of anti-conversion therapy laws so this

00:41:19.980 group called exodus international is founded in 1976 which is basically it's a coalition

00:41:25.840 of ministries devoted to ex-gay identifying christians and hopefuls by the way a number

00:41:32.900 of former leaders from within exodus international who all at one point identified as ex-gay were

00:41:39.040 the subjects of a netflix documentary called pray away which i really recommend watching

00:41:43.040 But notable to this is that the primary form of therapy being offered by these ex-gay Christian

00:41:49.400 ministries wasn't electroshocks. It was talking. It was group therapy. It was prayer. It was like 0.72

00:41:57.660 things that from the outside could look fun and like a community and a club and games and trips

00:42:03.940 and camps of a bunch of gay people. Sounds like a good time.

00:42:10.520 yeah honestly it actually reminds me SNL did an amazing skit about this once and it was like it 0.98

00:42:17.520 was like an ex-gay camp but the premise of the sketch was that they all really just wanted to 0.84

00:42:22.340 fuck each other and they were all pretending to not want to yes yes but the thing about these 0.99

00:42:28.860 these ministries is the adults who were participating in it opted to go themselves 1.00

00:42:33.680 And you see from the inception of these sort of ex-gay ministries that the core language and identity of the programs were the same things that we hear from ex-gay influencers now, which was this manipulative illusion of choice. 0.76

00:42:48.320 You know, if you want to change, there's a way to do it. 0.78

00:42:51.780 And they're all about, like, empowering you to make a better choice.

00:42:57.400 Yes.

00:42:58.260 And it's like, we don't, we're not telling anyone.

00:43:01.140 this is another way that they get around conversion therapy laws we're not telling

00:43:04.700 anyone that they need to be straight we're just saying that you have options and it's like well

00:43:09.840 wait do i really have options if you're putting me in an environment in a religious environment

00:43:14.820 that's telling me that only one of the options is correct yes and it's also so insidious because it

00:43:20.180 preys on vulnerable people yeah it preys on people's vulnerabilities and you see this in

00:43:25.400 the way lohanthony framed his journey because he talks about things like childhood sexual abuse

00:43:30.960 and substance abuse and like parts of his life that were traumatic and bad and what these types

00:43:37.380 of programs do is they take the real trauma in people's lives and they reframe it as a side

00:43:44.300 effect of being gay or being queer or being trans and that is so dangerous and so harmful and it's

00:43:50.060 like particularly around issues like childhood sexual abuse this idea that if you're abused as

00:43:56.620 a child it like makes you gay and renouncing that is your pathway to healing that is so sinister

00:44:03.340 it also creates like a convenient excuse to not have to confront how widespread childhood sexual 0.95

00:44:10.860 abuse actually is and the fact that most people who experience it are not later gay it's like

00:44:16.400 minimizing the issue shifting the blame shifting the fact that within religious communities

00:44:21.120 oftentimes a lot of this abuse is enabled and perpetrated and covered up and it's like the

00:44:26.360 same thing with uh with like substance abuse issues a lot of programs for treating substance

00:44:31.380 abuse kind of trick you because you come in the door thinking that you're coming into a community

00:44:36.420 space that is very welcoming that's going to help you and you're so vulnerable and primed to be

00:44:41.820 convinced that what will ultimately help you is like renouncing your sexuality these sorts of like

00:44:47.560 tricky are they aren't they conversion therapy programs like a lot of people do stuff like this 0.97

00:44:52.900 But I feel like the reason we see a lot of celebrities in particular get involved in shit like this is because, like, being famous, especially being famous when you're young, especially being famous when you're queer, is traumatizing. 0.99

00:45:04.480 Yes, 100%. 0.99

00:45:06.300 Because it's such a pattern with these people.

00:45:08.900 I mean, you've noticed, like, a number of, like, influencers, because, I mean, a lot of your career has been spent reporting on them.

00:45:14.900 Yeah.

00:45:15.340 I mean, like, there are constantly cults popping up that specifically cater to people who are in the public eye.

00:45:22.320 Scientology is always the most prominent example, but it's like another great documentary on

00:45:26.920 Netflix was like the 7M TikTok cult, where it's like you had this religious figure who was,

00:45:33.580 it's so messed up. It's like he was finding these like young people on TikTok who were really good

00:45:39.100 dancers and like bringing them into this like religious group. It's, it all feeds into each

00:45:44.400 other. He like takes their money. He benefits from their, how popular they are online. And he

00:45:50.040 also creates this controlling, authoritative environment where people are not free to be

00:45:54.820 themselves. What's so interesting to me is that from the beginning, like I said, I mean, these

00:45:59.780 programs that don't call themselves conversion therapy, they actively reject the label of

00:46:04.880 conversion therapy. All of the language is always empowering, like empowering you to make a better

00:46:10.420 choice, empowering you to overcome sin. It's not punishment. It's not your bad slap you on the wrist

00:46:19.060 with a ruler, strap you up to an electroshock machine. It's always like, let's empower you to

00:46:25.320 live a better life. That I think is a crucial part of like conversion programs, especially

00:46:30.980 modern conversion programs that people, it doesn't align with the way that they think about

00:46:34.660 conversion therapy. But the thing is the part that makes all forms of conversion therapy bad

00:46:42.020 and the same, I mean, yes, electroshocks are bad on their own. Like nobody wants to be electroshock,

00:46:46.400 But the fundamental belief is that if you try hard enough, you can change. And the abuse will ultimately feel the same, you know, whether shocks are part of that process, or it's just having to exercise self-control on your own accord over something that cannot be changed in this way.

00:47:03.000 Yeah. I also think that people shy away from having more like nuanced conversations about like how we express our sexuality and how we know what our sexuality is, you know, within liberal rhetoric around like issues like gay marriage.

00:47:19.000 this idea that you are born this way, Lady Gaga, this idea that you're just like you're born gay

00:47:25.900 or you're born straight and you just innately know and you're very secure in that throughout

00:47:30.080 your whole life. This can be helpful messaging in terms of just explaining to people like

00:47:35.080 why they shouldn't be homophobic, but it also fails to acknowledge the fact that the societal

00:47:42.460 conditions and the conditions of the community that you are in at any given point in your life

00:47:47.560 can have an effect on how safe you are to not only come out to your community, but to come out to

00:47:54.440 yourself. And people don't like to grapple with this because then they have to grapple with their

00:47:58.200 own sexuality and like ask themselves harder questions. But it's like, you are, we are

00:48:02.720 socialized in a society that is heteronormative, that assumes everyone is straight until proven

00:48:08.600 otherwise. And this contributes even outside the context of conversion therapy, this contributes

00:48:14.260 to like why it can take people 30 years to accept the fact that they're gay or to accept the fact

00:48:20.360 that they're trans and if we did live in a more accepting society then perhaps and we see this

00:48:25.760 reflected in the data when society becomes more tolerant people discover their identities earlier

00:48:32.920 they become more comfortable in accepting in their identities earlier and when you have these

00:48:37.480 repressive systems then it actually changes how people feel about themselves and it becomes

00:48:42.320 murkier and more difficult to like inhabit that perspective a thousand percent just back to the

00:48:49.160 historical timeline a little bit like i said these ex-gay programs have basically always been run by

00:48:55.100 people who identify as ex-gay themselves and so as you can imagine the inner workings of these

00:49:01.040 movements have kind of always been a total mess in a way in ways that are like it's just it's the 0.74

00:49:08.700 whole thing is built on a house of cards, you know? And there have been some really incredible

00:49:13.160 examples of that house of cards collapsing underneath itself. And so one of the examples

00:49:18.320 I want to give you is of a guy named John Polk, who was one of the subjects of that Pray Away

00:49:23.800 documentary. But he joined Exodus International, identifying as a gay man in the 80s, very early

00:49:31.020 on in the movement and he began identifying as ex-gay he married ann polk who was also in the

00:49:39.420 program and was an ex-lesbian what could go wrong the two of them were the two of them were on the

00:49:49.760 cover of newsweek and i want to send you this cover and uh and i want you to describe it for

00:49:55.900 people first thing you need to know about this cover is that if you were walking down the street

00:49:59.920 today and you saw this cover it would not even be that out of place yeah so it's this issue of

00:50:07.280 newsweek and it's the couple and they're next to each other like he's got his arm around her they

00:50:12.280 look very normal it says gay for life question mark going straight the uproar over sexual

00:50:19.060 conversion and then i'll also note there's this big yellow like banner over the newsweek logo 0.79

00:50:25.060 that's like terror bombing like the u.s embassy and i'm just like god it's time is a flat circle 0.79

00:50:31.180 time is a flat circle we're always like fear-mongering about gay people and like terror 0.69

00:50:36.560 we're back to conversion therapy and bombings yeah can you describe how they look on this cover 0.99

00:50:42.980 yes they they look so uncomfortable like palpably uncomfortable like the face that the woman is

00:50:52.240 making is like she's like I love men and my husband who loves women has his arm around me

00:50:59.140 because he loves women and I love men that's right it's very funny it's it's it's like a

00:51:07.200 it's like a 60s nuclear family cartoon but like bought off of Temu yes you know like we're not

00:51:14.440 convinced this is not the real stuff exactly you even get the sense that like the Newsweek

00:51:19.040 editorial team was not convinced everybody in the room was like i guess like all right

00:51:25.680 it's like it's like actually playing house literally yes um i also just noted underneath

00:51:32.500 this this could be me and cat cat cat if it if it gets real bad in this country under trump and

00:51:42.760 like we have are forced into heterosexual marriages could we do this together absolutely

00:51:47.020 we can even do the newsweek cover let's recreate it i'll dye my hair back you'll take the nails off

00:51:55.040 if you guys see kat and i getting married on the cover of newsweek as heterosexuals 0.99

00:52:01.460 keep your goddamn mouth shut i don't want to hear it but so john and ann polk they rise through the 0.99

00:52:10.880 ranks of Exodus International together. And in 1995, John is made the chairman of the North 1.00

00:52:17.500 American arm of this movement. Five years later, in September of 2000, amidst a crisis of identity

00:52:25.260 that John would later say would have led him to suicide if he didn't come forward as his true

00:52:29.880 self, he goes to a gay bar in DC. And this is like, this is like telenovela drama. A patron at that 0.50

00:52:38.820 bar recognizes him as like a leader in the ex-gay movement calls his friend who works at the human

00:52:45.600 rights campaign the human rights campaign guy comes to the bar and photographs john like kind

00:52:52.860 of scurrying out of the bar when john is later confronted with the photographs he first lies

00:52:58.940 and he goes i didn't know it was a gay bar i was just stopping in to pee which is awesome he

00:53:07.280 eventually confesses to knowing it was a gay bar before going. Obviously, he's fired from Exodus

00:53:13.640 International, you know, and a movement that he's at this point devoted decades of his life to.

00:53:19.100 And Ann Polk divorces him. John Polk would eventually renounce the whole movement and

00:53:24.540 apologize and admit that his sexuality never changed the entire time that he was inside the

00:53:29.740 movement. Exodus International collapses in 2013, with many of its former leaders apologizing for

00:53:36.660 their involvement but because there's still homophobia in 2013 it just morphs into another

00:53:42.740 group called restored hope network which first of all still exists these these groups they just

00:53:48.060 constantly rebrand themselves to evade accountability and criticism but guess who runs restored hope

00:53:55.000 network today tell me and polk she's still in it so classic and like the real takeaway i feel like

00:54:04.820 is that as long as there's homophobia and transphobia in a society with gay and trans people,

00:54:11.640 which is every society, this stuff will always exist. This stuff will always exploit the bigotry

00:54:19.060 and the hatred that queer people have towards themselves. There's a quote from Prey Away that 1.00

00:54:23.400 I noted here. As long as homophobia exists in this world, some version of Exodus International

00:54:28.260 will emerge. It's not the organization or the methods that were used. It's about the underlying

00:54:33.300 belief that there is something wrong and change worthy about being gay. One thing that this really

00:54:38.020 reminds me of is like a conversation that I encounter a lot, which is this idea of like

00:54:43.520 people get really confused why a lot of women are misogynistic and why like women and also people

00:54:50.240 of any marginalized community will like vote against their best interests or like behave in

00:54:55.640 a way that is counter to like their freedom. And one of the reasons why this happens is because

00:55:03.260 it's rewarded in a society that is ultimately conservative. Like these people were able to

00:55:09.320 build careers and livelihoods and get on the cover of national magazines by renouncing their 0.99

00:55:16.320 queerness. That is a really powerful incentive structure. And I also think about how like a lot 0.96

00:55:22.420 of times people make fun of bisexual women because within like the bisexual community, a lot of people

00:55:27.780 end up in heterosexual relationships but i'm like listen it's not because they're not they're

00:55:33.340 secretly not bisexual or because they're just pretending it's because it's easier to be straight

00:55:38.620 than it is to be gay you will have more options for people to date if you are like a bisexual

00:55:44.340 woman in the dating pool there are going to be more men than women you're going to have an easier

00:55:48.520 time those relationships are going to be they're uh more encouraged by society and so people make

00:55:55.140 choices, not just because of who they innately are, but because of the way our like political

00:56:00.280 culture is structured. Yeah. Wow. I just did a real Aubrey Gordon. Yeah.

00:56:08.760 I want to get people up to speed on what the current state of conversion therapy laws

00:56:13.580 is in the United States. So for what I found, 27 states have bans on conversion therapy,

00:56:20.140 But the vast majority of the bans are only for minors in conversion therapy.

00:56:25.380 So adults can still, you know, willingly participate.

00:56:29.940 There's also a number of states that banned governments from banning conversion therapy.

00:56:35.720 So in Indiana, they banned banning conversion therapy.

00:56:39.300 In Florida, Georgia, and Alabama, they ruled that bans on conversion therapy are unconstitutional.

00:56:45.740 And then basically the other 20-odd states in the U.S. have no bans.

00:56:51.480 In 2023, the Trevor Project released a five-year-long report that basically said conversion therapy is still happening in every state, regardless of bans.

00:57:01.320 That there are over 1,300 practitioners, and half of them are not licensed therapists.

00:57:06.960 they are working in churches, ministries, you know, their pastors and priests, and they will

00:57:13.280 advertise their services as like therapy for issues on sexuality and addiction and quote

00:57:20.120 spiritual ailments. Almost all of these are Christian ministries heavily concentrated in

00:57:26.220 the South and the Midwest. Can't imagine why. Hint, hint, there is a direct correlation between

00:57:31.720 the availability and desire for this stuff and homophobia in an environment. Interestingly,

00:57:36.100 the number one state with the most practitioners, over 250 of them, was Pennsylvania. But this is

00:57:42.080 happening everywhere. It's happening in New York City. The Trevor Project noted that their own

00:57:47.660 numbers were definitely deflated because so much of this is just underground. And I think

00:57:54.700 conversion therapy laws are important, but all of these programs are so good at disguising

00:58:00.640 themselves and rebranding themselves and just simply saying that they're not conversion therapy.

00:58:06.100 saying that no one's forced into our programs. Everyone opts in. And it's like, I don't know,

00:58:12.020 my take on this stuff is like, yes, we should, we should, oh, my camera got too hot. I'm going

00:58:18.500 to put my camera in the freezer. This is what I do now. Next episode, climate change.

00:58:26.740 And so my feeling about these conversion therapy laws is like, yes, it's important,

00:58:31.540 but also ultimately it's like it's like putting a band-aid on a on a broken pipe right because like

00:58:37.280 the actual thing that would stop conversion therapy is like no more transphobia and homophobia

00:58:44.300 because these people would have no one to exploit if people didn't hate themselves in this way yes

00:58:50.980 it's also like taking the pin back out of the 2020 like acceleration of people being online

00:58:57.260 a really big factor here is like when you have like a youtube series containing this conversion

00:59:03.820 therapy ideology you can transmit that into any person's home anywhere it doesn't matter if the

00:59:11.600 state has banned conversion therapy or not it doesn't even matter where the person is and i

00:59:15.760 feel like that is likely a really big conduit for sort of not only people like lohanthony but also

00:59:21.980 people who don't have big platforms like people who we aren't seeing this happen in a very

00:59:26.780 tablet facing way. If I had to guess, I would guess that over the past several years, there's

00:59:34.040 likely been a large number of people who are in this online environment that we have all seen

00:59:40.380 become dramatically more conservative, dramatically more anti LGBTQ. And then they get in their

00:59:47.060 YouTube recommended feed, something like this, and it takes them down that pipeline. And you

00:59:52.680 actually see this like broader weaponization of these social media platforms where Lohanthony 0.68

00:59:57.440 is the perfect example because YouTube went from a platform where gay people were able to reach

01:00:02.660 larger audiences to a platform where gay people are being propagandized into renouncing their gay 0.84

01:00:09.100 identity and then selling that version of gay life to other people at scale. And I think you 0.78

01:00:15.960 segued me perfectly because I think uh you know I pulled an example and you segued me perfectly

01:00:23.280 because don't you love how you can just like go on this like perfectly articulate tangent and then

01:00:27.480 I'm like well but it's all beautiful you're so kind you segued me perfectly into I pulled an

01:00:37.080 example of a very 2025 branded social media savvy conversion therapy program movement group

01:00:47.720 with a solid online presence called changed movement, which is something that I have actually

01:00:54.640 been like quietly monitoring for like, the better part of the last five years, because I've been

01:00:59.800 really interested in the way that conversion therapy looks now, which is this. So changed

01:01:05.740 movement is a modern ex-gay ministry started by two ex-gay working pastors at the Bethel 0.70

01:01:14.480 megachurch they actually don't use the term ex-gay at change they use the term once gay

01:01:21.580 again it's this like distinctions without differences thing you know they also obviously 0.82

01:01:26.260 they don't use the term conversion therapy but also its leaders advocate against laws that would

01:01:32.660 ban conversion therapy and legislation for lgbtq equality so it's like it's all the same thing it's

01:01:39.180 like it doesn't matter if we call it conversion therapy but i want you to take a look at the

01:01:43.680 home page on the changed movement website so you've got this picture of all of these like

01:01:52.080 happy smiling people wearing these like black t-shirts that say changed in all caps in white

01:01:58.280 lettering. And then the description is, we engage LGBTQ with biblical compassion and action. We are

01:02:07.260 a community of friends who once identified as LGBTQ+. Today, we celebrate the love of Jesus

01:02:14.240 and his freedom and comfort in our lives. Read our stories and learn more. And looking at these

01:02:21.980 people i can tell that some of these people we we once identified as lgbtq yeah we know

01:02:31.740 yeah we don't worry we can definitely tell well i mean the one thing that is really interesting

01:02:39.520 about a lot of people who renounce their queerness i think it's funny that you bring this up

01:02:43.280 because a lot of times like they still choose to present as very visually queer i mean i did an

01:02:50.260 episode about the D trans influencer Maya poet who still looks extremely androgynous and so do

01:02:57.320 a lot of these people especially I noticed like a lot of like ex-lesbians keep like these sort of 0.59

01:03:02.080 stereotypically lesbian haircuts a lot of the ex-gay people still wear like I don't know tight 0.99

01:03:08.160 clothes what do you what do you make of that that's a really good question I feel like it 0.87

01:03:13.400 lends to the idea that like being gay is not just in like your sex life like i think that there is

01:03:21.680 some it's also in your haircut it's also in your haircut i mean it's like like you can't stamp this

01:03:29.420 out completely because there is clearly like palpable discomfort in adhering to like the

01:03:36.340 the binary gender presentation these people have joined this community which mind you it's it's

01:03:43.740 like it's a gay community like they are just rebranding like having a bunch of gay friends

01:03:48.360 it's a pride parade like it but it's it's fascinating to me because just it takes me

01:03:55.160 back to the conversion therapy movements that we just talked about in like the 70s in the same way

01:04:01.840 that they were still secretly going to gay bars in the same way that they probably were like 0.59

01:04:07.360 secretly still being gay it's like you can't actually like stamp it out you can't actually

01:04:13.700 like reverse who you are yeah and i was looking at the changed movements instagram and one of

01:04:19.000 their most recent posts which mind you has 1800 likes i mean this is a this is a community that

01:04:24.820 seems to be doing quite well um really stood out to me it is a poster of a of a person with

01:04:32.700 rainbow tape over their mouth and it says speak out freedom can't be silenced and the caption is

01:04:39.300 in today's culture if you're questioning your identity there are countless voices

01:04:43.520 ready to affirm you well yes i'm right here my name is matt bernstein

01:04:48.200 but what if your convictions lead you in a different direction what if your faith leads

01:04:55.140 you to seek transformation but the door to counseling is slammed shut and then it's just

01:05:00.220 like we're running workshops to pray the gateway you know it's whatever but it's just so interesting

01:05:04.640 because these people are uh very smartly tapping into this like right-wing grievance culture around 0.93

01:05:11.540 like you can't say anything anymore because the rainbow mafia is gonna duct tape your mouth shut 0.84

01:05:16.380 yes you can't even practice you know abusive pseudoscience anymore without the woke mob 0.83

01:05:22.680 attempting to shut you down it's like god yeah it's this idea that it's actually revolutionary

01:05:29.420 to like be anti-gay yeah yeah yeah yeah it's always predicated like you see this with me too

01:05:37.060 you see this with black lives matter it's always predicated on the idea that we are a more equal

01:05:42.300 and just society than we actually are and i see this with like specifically being gay a lot

01:05:49.420 because there is a huge misconception that once gay marriage was legalized homosexuality ceased

01:05:57.860 to exist and it's like i grew up in ohio so wait that homosexuality ceased to exist

01:06:03.640 let me let me start over there's this misconception that as soon as gay marriage was legalized

01:06:14.240 homophobia ceased to exist and that is not true and it's like it's very obviously not true but

01:06:20.820 there's still this sense and i see it all the time even from liberals and leftists that like

01:06:25.500 homophobia really isn't an issue anymore because it's so popularly accepted but that is not the

01:06:31.120 case. Like I grew up in Ohio. And so I know firsthand that like communities, even in

01:06:37.300 progressive leaning spaces are not completely eradicated of homophobia. It is still the

01:06:42.540 dominant ideology. Heteronormativity is still the dominant ideology. Even if someone isn't

01:06:48.220 homophobic, like our society is still one that's designed around being in heterosexual partnerships

01:06:54.280 and like, you can't escape that. And so this idea that it's very revolutionary and very going

01:06:59.880 against the grain to like be pro-conversion therapy is just not true. I want to wrap this up

01:07:07.040 with a really recent example, something that just happened like in the last month or so

01:07:11.940 online with yet another influencer and their online relationship to a certain transphobic

01:07:19.460 billionaire. So someone named Hendrix who goes by, did you see this? Yes, I did. Someone named

01:07:27.260 Hendrix, who goes by the Twitter handle Legal Tweets, is a 43-year-old longtime Twitter creator

01:07:34.320 and activist for LGBT people who identified until very recently as a transgender man.

01:07:40.980 They have had a number of gender-affirming medical procedures, and they recently, very

01:07:46.340 recently, announced that they were detransitioning and now identify as a lesbian. Now, this went

01:07:52.660 very viral for a number of reasons notably that this person is claiming to detransition

01:07:57.520 but is not changing their name back or stopping taking hormones i don't really want to get too

01:08:04.860 deep into any sort of interrogation about their identity because it seems like none of my business

01:08:09.200 and it seems like yet another example many such cases of people who claim to be converting back

01:08:15.500 detransitioning going back in the closet renouncing their identity but who are also simultaneously

01:08:20.360 very clearly still struggling with that identity in front of people so i don't really want to like

01:08:26.900 pile on but what really struck me was a singular interaction this person had with jk rowling now

01:08:35.180 this twitter creator hendrix has sparred with jk rowling as have many lgbtq people online for the

01:08:42.120 last couple years and i want to show you this twitter interaction that they had with jk rowling

01:08:47.880 when they announced that they were detransitioning.

01:08:51.000 Kat, would you like for me to read Hendrix

01:08:53.620 and you read J.K. Rowling?

01:08:55.280 Let's do it.

01:08:56.280 So Hendrix tweeted that they were detransitioning

01:08:59.260 and J.K. Rowling said,

01:09:00.400 I know we've had our differences,

01:09:02.220 but this is one of the bravest posts

01:09:04.000 I've ever read on here.

01:09:05.800 Welcome home.

01:09:07.540 Thank you, at J.K. Rowling.

01:09:09.200 It feels hard, but it's the right thing for me.

01:09:11.500 I'm glad to be home.

01:09:12.920 And then she says, can you follow me?

01:09:15.120 I'd like to DM you.

01:09:16.480 And then Hendrix says yes. This was so sad to me. Because this is, you know, a queer person who has identified JK Rowling's abuse towards trans people for such a long time. I mean, they have, they tweeted calling out JK Rowling's bigotry for so long before this. And then they said, I'm not trans anymore. And again, regardless of whether or not this person is trans, it's really none of my business.

01:09:41.300 but the point is as soon as they said that they weren't jk rowling says welcome home 0.50

01:09:46.760 and i feel like it really just goes to show that these sorts of shifts around identity

01:09:54.440 will occur as long as there is an incentive to not be queer to not be gay to not be trans

01:10:03.000 how nice is it for an extremely popular billionaire to tweet at you and say welcome home that feels

01:10:10.160 good. That feels good. And being queer a lot of times doesn't. I mean, it feels good in the most

01:10:18.020 profound sense of your being your true self, but being up against bigotry all the time sucks. How 0.98

01:10:23.960 nice does it feel to be welcomed home? It's such a microcosm of everything that we've been talking

01:10:29.100 about because it's like JK Rowling bankrolled and pushed so hard for trans rights to be rolled

01:10:36.540 back in the UK, which they were. And so now we have this political, social, cultural environment

01:10:43.660 where people are discouraged from being trans. And so then you have individuals. And again,

01:10:51.560 not speculating on this person specifically, but of course, in an environment that is regressive,

01:10:57.100 that incentivizes you to go back in the closet or undo your transition, your sexuality,

01:11:03.000 people are going to do it because that incentive structure has been provided for them.

01:11:07.960 Yeah. And I want to note here, I've said in other episodes, of course, there are people

01:11:11.420 who detransition because they learn that their identity, their understanding of their own

01:11:15.260 identity has changed. It's not right for them. But also data shows that a lot of people who do 1.00

01:11:19.680 detransition, detransition because being trans and out is hard. And it's not because they're

01:11:26.440 not trans. It's because transitioning is hard. And so considering everything we've talked about

01:11:32.440 over the last hour and a half, it's like, I feel like the lines between like, did this person go

01:11:37.160 to conversion therapy? Did this person detransition? Did this person go back into the

01:11:41.320 closet by choice? It's all so blurry because it's like, again, it's like the illusion of choice in

01:11:47.900 a world that is so homophobic, in a world that is so transphobic, in a world that's telling you what

01:11:52.060 they think the right choice is. You know what I mean? 100%. And it's like, what we do know for a

01:11:57.460 fact is that bigots explicitly want this to happen. Transphobes want trans people to either

01:12:05.340 detransition or die. And the very act of being trans, of being gay, just accepting that and 1.00

01:12:12.500 admitting it to yourself is incredibly radical in a world that wants you to either conform or

01:12:19.200 no longer exist. And so where do we end this? I feel like, yes, anti-conversion therapy laws

01:12:25.040 are so important but like what can each of us as individuals do like create an environment for

01:12:31.260 yourself and for other people where like we we just have to push acceptance and we have to push

01:12:37.920 love like the best possible thing we can do in a state where so many people seem to be like

01:12:43.760 regressing back into the closet inexplicably well it is explicable it's because everyone's

01:12:48.480 homophobic and being out is hard so we just have to be louder than ever not to be like rah rah I'm

01:12:54.160 harvey milk and i want you to come out but like that is kind of how we have to be like we have

01:12:59.800 to remind each other and everyone around us that like being queer is great that we love queer

01:13:04.480 people there's such a danger to like bigotry in being proudly yourself and being publicly yourself

01:13:12.340 and so many of these movements against trans people against queer people against women against

01:13:17.020 people of color the end goal is to hide yourself from society and be ashamed so when you do the

01:13:23.140 opposite of that when you exist loudly and proudly and queer or trans then you are directly fighting

01:13:29.640 back against these structures and lohanthony and i don't even say this as a joke my dms are always

01:13:38.140 open kat thank you so much as always for joining me on this podcast i know you've had a long week

01:13:45.860 no thanks to ethan klein but uh i really i really appreciate you taking the time you're

01:13:51.420 so singular in your insights and i really hope that everyone goes and subscribes to your to your

01:13:56.640 work at spitfire news it's fantastic and it'll be linked in the episode description thank you so much

01:14:01.460 i'm so glad that we're talking about this i love you all if you made it this far thank you so much

01:14:06.900 i'm so incredibly grateful happy pride let's uh let's just let's just throw as much proud gay 0.96

01:14:13.480 shit at the wall as we can because we all need it we all deserve it i love you and until next time 0.99

01:14:19.140 stay fruity 0.96

01:14:21.420 that ended at a very hopeful place i'm happy with that

A Bit Fruity with Matt Bernstein - June 27, 2025

Why Is Everyone Going Back Into the Closet？

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