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Hey, George, How’s That Ex-Gay Hopey-Changey Thing Working Out?

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“Ex-gay.” It means someone who believes they were once gay, lesbian, or bisexual, but no longer affirms that identity, usually after intervention of “conversion therapy.” It is a widely discredited pseudo-science made popular in the early 1980s.

This week, the media is in an uncontrollable, gleeful hysteria over the Miami New Times’ report that “ex-gay” activist, professional gay-hater and Baptist minister George Alan Rekers, was caught and photographed returning from a one-week European vacation with a twenty-year old gay male prostitute he “found” on the gay sex site rentboy.com. Amusingly, Rekers initially explained that he was unaware of the young man’s vocation, then claimed his physician had instructed him to hire someone to “lift my luggage,” as he had recently had surgery, then claimed he was doing the Lord’s work.

Rekers told Joe Jervis of Joe.My.God. the following:

“I have spent much time as a mental health professional and as a Christian minister helping and lovingly caring for people identifying themselves as “gay.” My hero is Jesus Christ who loves even the culturally despised people, including sexual sinners and prostitutes. Like Jesus Christ, I deliberately spend time with sinners with the loving goal to try to help them. Mark 2:16-17 reads, “16When the teachers of the law who were Pharisees saw him eating with the “sinners” and tax collectors, they asked his disciples: “Why does he eat with tax collectors and ‘sinners’?” 17On hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” In fact, in a dialogue with hypocritical religious leaders, Jesus even stated to them, “I tell you the truth, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you. 32For John came to you to show you the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes did. And even after you saw this, you did not repent and believe him. ” (Matthew 21:31).”

There might have been something about washing the feet of Lepers in there too…

George Alan Rekers literally is a professional gay-hater. The sixty-one year old has made his living talking, writing, and testifying in court against homosexuality, homosexuals, and he helped create the “ex-gay” industry.

Rekers’ resume currently lists him as “President/CEO” of InterAct International, where he claims to have “[f]ounded and directed university-campus programs locally and internationally to present practical integration of academic disciplines such as business & psychology with Christian ethics.”

Let’s take a look at his “accomplishments.”

Rekers, along with another professional gay-hater, James Dobson, co-founded the Family Research Council (FRC) in 1983. (Remember in February when FRC’s Peter Sprigg told Chris Matthews “gay behavior should be outlawed?”) FRC is a right-wing Christian lobbying group that was part of another professional gay-hating group that Dobson founded, Focus on the Family. (FOF sponsored the controversial Tim Tebow Superbowl anti-abortion ad.)

(By the way, Dobson is supporting Tea Party extreme right-wing candidate Rand Paul.)

Along with co-founding FRC, Rekers co-founded NARTH — The National Association for Research & Therapy of Homosexuality — another gay-hating right-wing Christian group.

In The Huffington Post, Alvin McEwen (author of “Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters”) calls NARTH “an organization espousing scientifically inaccurate beliefs that gays can turn straight,” and the American College of Pediatricians “a shell group attempting to bring a level of credibility to anti-gay distortions.”

NARTH lauds Rekers with this bio:

“Dr. Rekers has served as an invited expert for committees of the US Congress, and for the White House staff, and for several presidential cabinet agencies. He is an ABPP Diplomate in Clinical Psychology, a Fellow of the American Academy of Clinical Psychology, and a recipient of the Sigmund Freud Award from NARTH. Dr. Rekers published the first empirical treatment studies demonstrating that childhood cross-gender identity could be reversed, thereby offering prevention of some forms of adulthood homosexual and transsexual development. Professor Rekers was an expert for the legal defense of the Florida law prohibiting child adoption by homosexuals, which was upheld by the US Supreme Court in 2005.”

Rekers also makes his money writing books. Lots of books. Right now on Amazon.com you can buy some of Rekers’ books:

  • “Shaping your child’s sexual identity,”

  • “Growing up straight: What families should know about homosexuality,”

  • “Gender identity disorders,”

  • “Who am I, Lord?: Discovering your spiritual gift and where God wants you to use it,”

  • “The Christian world view of the family”

Rekers self-created “expert” status on homosexuals, homosexuality, and “ex-gays” also helps him fill his wallet by appearing in court as an “expert witness.” Equality Florida this week reported,

“George Rekers, the “expert” witness hired by Attorney General Bill McCollum to defend Florida’s anti-gay adoption ban…was one of only two witnesses Attorney General Bill McCollum called in an effort to reverse a Miami judge who ruled Florida’s adoption ban- the only one in the country- is unconstitutional.

“McCollum paid Rekers and a colleague t$87,000 for testimony that called gay people mentally unstable and advised that the ban should be expanded to include Native Americans because, Rekers claimed, they are also at much higher risk of mental illness and substance abuse.

“They would tend to hang around each other,” Rekers testified. “So the children would be around a lot of other Native Americans who are … doing the same sorts of things.”

But it looks like the tide has finally turned for Dr. Rekers. (Yes, believe it or not he is a Ph.D.) Virtually all of the “ex-gay” organizations and those organizations he co-founded have been furiously pulling down and, according to Truth Wins Out, “scrubbing” any mention of Rekers from their websites.

“When news broke yesterday that ex-gay movement godfather George Alan Rekers had hired a male prostitute for a 10-day excursion to Europe, the Family Research Council — which Rekers co-founded — promptly scrubbed its website free of references to Rekers, without admitting the scandal to its readers.

“NARTH, PFOX, Exodus, and Focus on the Family have yet to do so.”

Rekers has been discredited. Sadly, it’s very possible in a few years he’ll turn up and go down the same nasty gay-hating path, this time with a new schtick.

But the real story here is not George Alan Rekers. After all the jokes and laughter, after all the tweets about schadenfreude, Facebook messages about hypocrisy, and Colbert jokes about “What boy would Jesus rent?,” what’s left, sadly, are thousands of people Rekers directly or indirectly touched. Anyone who believed in the “ex-gay” concept, anyone who paid Rekers and his organizations, or other “ex-gay” organizations, like Exodus or PFOX.

Rekers caused so many thousands great pain claiming they could be “cured” of their homosexuality. He caused countless millions more — on both sides of the issue — great pain, when they were impacted by his false claims and false research. And now, totally discredited, Rekers has caused these poor souls immeasurable pain by his actions.

Bilerico’s Waymon Hudson asks, “Celebration, Compassion, or somewhere in between?” Rekers doesn’t deserve our sympathy, or our compassion. He lost that right the day he chose to make a career out of hate. Rekers deserves the shunning and “scrubbing” from the history books that is taking place now.

The question remains: How can one man have been allowed, for so many decades, to create an entire industry of lies, and be so handsomely rewarded for it?

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'DEHUMANIZING AND DANGEROUS'

Trump Team’s Efforts to Rein Him ‘Wilted’ in Waco as He Invoked ‘Retribution and Violence’: Report

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Any hope that Donald Trump’s new re-election team may have had that they could steer him into running a more conventional campaign appears to have been swept aside as he used his first major rally to whip up the crowd with a litany of grievances and personal attacks.

According to the Guardian’s David Smith, during Trump’s appearance in Waco late Saturday, the former president used his speech to “invoke retribution and violence” at his perceived enemies, with attacks on Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) who might possibly challenge him for the Republican Party’s 2024 presidential nomination.

As Smith wrote, “Efforts by Trump’s team to steer a more conventional, disciplined candidacy have wilted in recent days as the 76-year-old unleashed words and images that – even by his provocative standards – are unusually dehumanising, menacing and dangerous,” before adding nothing the past week Trump used “increasingly racist rhetoric as he launched ever more personal attacks against Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan district attorney, raising fears that supporters could try to lash out on his behalf. Trump even shared an image of himself holding a baseball bat next to a picture of Bragg.”

RELATED: Trump is giving his ‘violent followers’ time to get organized: former FBI official

According to the Guardian report, “Wearing a dark jacket, white shirt and no tie, he said: ‘I got bad publicity and my poll numbers have gone through the roof – would you explain this to me … It gets so much publicity that the case actually gets adjudicated in the press and people see it’s bullshit.'”

The former president also, once again, called his 2024 run the “final battle.”

“Our opponents have done everything they can to crush our spirit and to break our will. But they failed. They’ve only made us stronger. And 2024 is the final battle, it’s going to be the big one. You put me back in the White House, their reign will be over and America will be a free nation once again,” he told the crowd.

You can read more here.

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Trump Desperate to Keep Any Possible Criminal Evidence From Supreme Court: Legal Expert

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Donald Trump’s decision to allow one of his lawyers to speak before a grand jury on Friday morning, instead of appealing all the way to the Supreme Court, may have been made out of fear of what the justices on the nation’s highest court might see if they reviewed the case.

According to MSNBC legal analyst Lisa Rubin, under normal circumstances, the former president would have dragged out a legal fight over attorney-client privilege that would have kept attorney Evan Corcoran from testifying under oath about Trump’s possession of government documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort that led to the FBI showing up with a warrant.

As Rubin notes, the fact that Trump let Corcoran testify over three hours raised eyebrows.

“For one, yes, it is indeed unusual, if not unheard of, for a lawyer to be litigating against a party one day and then testifying under court-ordered examination by that same party the next one,” she wrote before suggesting Trump and his legal team were looking at the long game when he might need the predominantly conservative Supreme Court to lend him a helping hand.

RELATED: Revealed: Emails show how Trump lawyers drove Michael Cohen to turn on the president

Writing, “Trump has made clear he believes this Supreme Court — controlled by conservative justices, three of whom he appointed — owes him one,” she added, “My hunch is that Trump’s team let Corcoran’s testimony happen because of what’s likely involved in any request to pause, much less, review a crime-fraud-related ruling: the evidence.”

“Put another way, if Trump had petitioned the Supreme Court to stay Corcoran’s testimony and document production, the justices would have seen some, if not all, of what Judge Howell and the three-judge panel on the D.C. Circuit have already reviewed: proof that Trump misled Corcoran and engaged in criminal conduct,” she elaborated.

Rubin went on to note that Trump would likely appeal any conviction to the Supreme Court, writing, “And for someone whose one last hope, if he is ultimately charged or tried by any of the multiple entities now investigating him, is that same Supreme Court, letting the justices see evidence of his alleged crimes now would be a bridge too far.”

“Trump can’t afford to lose the Supreme Court yet,” she suggested.

You can read more here.

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No TX Congressional Republican Will Say If They’re Attending Trump’s Rally in Waco – Will He Have Trouble Filling Seats?

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Donald Trump‘s Saturday campaign rally in Waco, Texas, falls during the 30th anniversary of the 51-day siege that community is known for, when 86 people died after a failed ATF raid on an anti-government religious cult suspected of illegally stockpiling firearms amid allegations of sexual abuse, statutory rape, and polygamy.

Experts have been warning for a week that Trump’s choice of Waco, synonymous with violent anti-government extremism, was no accident. His rhetoric this week, including most recently Friday when he warned of “potential death & destruction” should he be indicted, has been seen as encouraging violence.

NCRM was among the first news outlets to report experts’ concerns over Trump’s choice to hold a rally in Waco during the 30th anniversary of the deadly siege.

Not a single congressional Republican from Texas will say they are attending, nor has the town’s GOP mayor, according to a report from Insider, which contacted over two dozen Republican lawmakers and other elected officials.

“None of the 30 Texas Republicans Insider contacted about the event said they were going,” Insider reveals.

“Most of the 30 GOP members contacted about Donald Trump’s inaugural visit to the site of a 30-year-old standoff between cult leader David Koresh and federal authorities did not respond to requests for comment about whether they intended to rally with the scandal-plagued candidate and perhaps say a few kind words,” Insider reports.

“Rep. Pete Sessions, a Waco native who now represents the surrounding 17th congressional district, praised Trump for shining a light on his hometown but said he’d have to miss the spectacle,” Insider adds. “Aides to Rep. Troy Nehls, one of the four House Republicans from Texas who have formally backed Trump’s 2024 run, told Insider he wouldn’t be heading to Waco because of a prior commitment in Washington, DC, this weekend.”

READ MORE: ‘Utter Cowardice’: Jim Jordan Blasted for Telling Reporter He Can’t Read Trump’s Violence-Threatening Post Without Glasses

Meanwhile, in addition to guest list challenges – the campaign refused to tell Insider who the guest speakers will be – Trump may have trouble filling seats.

Mary Trump, the ex-president’s niece who opposes him, has been running a campaign to get anti-Trump Americans to “sign up” for tickets to the Saturday rally, in the hopes of being able to turn away supporters.

“Donald has a rally in Waco this Saturday,” she also said via Twitter. “It’s a ploy to remind his cult of the infamous Waco siege of 1993, where an anti-government cult battled the FBI. Scores of people died. He wants the same violent chaos to rescue him from justice.”

“But we can stop him. If we book the 50,000+ venue, we can make sure most of the seats are empty when the traitor takes the stage,” she said. “We can no longer fail to hold powerful men accountable for their crimes against our country.”

Image via Shutterstock

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