Straight Folk, We Need to have a Chat

The hypocrisy of churches and religious groups, deeply in denial of their own abuse record, pointing the finger at the LGBTQ community is just absurd.

By Timothy P Holmberg

The culture wars, they are back en vogue. And, as usual, us gays are front and center with other traditional groups. Exhibit A: thirty one people arrested in Idaho in full tactical gear intent on rioting to disrupt a modest Pride celebration. One notable member of this would-be riot, living in his mother’s basement no less, was intent on disrupting what he saw as a gay “grooming” operation. Good grief. So let’s just have a chat here, straight folk. 

If there is one social truth that’s a relative constant, it’s that avoiding difficult conversations only perpetuates the ills we struggle with. This is true of racism, sexism and certainly homophobia. Old hatreds and fears die hard, even among those who seldom manifest them in their own lives. One vicious trope experiencing its own renaissance thanks to Q-Anon, equates LGBTQ identity with child molesting. 

Since even before the advent of the LGBT civil rights movement, my community has relentlessly been attacked by this presumption. As a young child, I remember listing to the news with my parents as the Briggs Initiative was being debated in my home state of California. Even in the discrete language of the 1970’s it was clear to me the implication of the initiative was children could not be entrusted around those who self identified as gay or lesbian.

As a young child, that notion left an impression on me. It became part of my own struggle with accepting my identity as a gay man. I was molested as a child. I would ever wish that on anyone else. I soaked up the belief that being gay was a path to molesting children, and that fed my determination to fight against accepting my own identity. 

Only after years of struggle did I realize that my nature as a gay man had no connection at all with being a child molester. My own awareness of my attraction to men (of my own age group and older) finally vanquished the lies I’d been marinated in. 

But the notion continued to haunt me as it does every single gay man. I was continually confronted by other people’s presumptions and inherited prejudice. 

After I came out to my father, I had to face his earnest concern that I might be attracted to boys. I had no choice but to suppress the incredulousness I felt. Because I wanted my father to know that his son, the person he raised, and should have known better than anyone else, did not posses that terrible flaw in him. He asked, and listened, and that was my consolation. And yet it was I who felt violated. 

When California debated a ban on gay marriage, again I was confronted with this belief, lurking in the most unexpected places. I asked my landlord if I could place a campaign poster against the initiative in the front yard. I’d assumed the answer would be yes, after all, she was an ardent feminist and declared progressive. But, after much hesitation, she conceded that ads suggesting we gays wanted nothing more than the chance to “groom” and indoctrinate children in schools to our lifestyle had worked on her. She confided that as a therapist, she believed gay men were predisposed to molesting children. I was aghast. 

Later, I embarked on a relationship that afforded me a chance at something I’d previously presumed would not be a part of my life as a gay man. My partner had adopted a child at birth, Justin, prior to our meeting. When we began dating, his son was just over 4 years old. He was such a bright and imaginative child, and the experience of helping raise him remains one of the highest points of my life. After all the trauma and disruption in my own childhood, I had the opportunity to be a part of what I myself had been robbed of. A nurturing, loving and stable family that allowed him to grow and thrive in ways I could only have imagined. 

But here too society’s demons that haunt gay men would not relent. His biological mother, someone I respected much more than she seemed to appreciate, told my partner to watch me closely. She confided to him that she believed I was capable of being a predator. I tried to understand where this came from. Like many gay men, I tended to be more casual with sexual references. Probably after years of being single, it was just habit. She had been molested as a child, so perhaps she saw predators around corners where they may not exist. She will likely never read this article, but I do want her to know that never did even the thought of harming her child cross my mind. To the contrary, I loved him deeply. I would have given him a kidney if he needed it. It feels grotesque to even have to respond to such a sentiment. 

Even an innocent thing that probably happens to many parents, is looked on with intense suspicion. A child observes his parents kissing in the way sometimes adults do. He assumes this is the way kisses are supposed to be. The goodnight kiss suddenly gets interrupted by a child’s tongue. I reacted with more anger and intensity than I probably should have. He was simply doing what he saw his father and I do. I explained that was adult kissing and he probably felt ashamed. How many straight parents does this happen to? I told his father what had happened, and he understood. But then I had to hear from my partner’s mother that Justin’s nanny was concerned that it was something different. She was direct, and I suppose I had to be grateful it was said than left an unsaid indictment swirling around who knows where. 

Since then, the message my experiences taught me is that gay men must be sure not show a love for children. We are already suspect, and almost any interaction with children will be viewed as an affirmation of the presupposed. 

Some may think such views are not so pervasive. Especially if you are not on the receiving end of them. But there is a reason Florida Governor Mike DeSantis is willing to fight a behemoth like Disney. He knows how to mine deep unspoken fears for political gain. 

Parent’s fears in particular are being tapped to roll back LGBT rights. We are, once again pawns in a culture war that is being used to distract and divide. If we don’t deal with it head on, earnestly, as Harvey Milk did in the 70’s, we will see more hate, violence and loss of rights. And together with other marginalized groups, we will see our society change from a flawed but aspiring one, to perhaps a dystopian one more reflective of Putin’s Russia. 

As a gay man of 53 years, I would like to ask you (straight folk) to please stop putting myself and other LGBT people in the middle of this war. I’m tired of it. We are tired of it. The hypocrisy of churches and religious groups, deeply in denial of their own abuse record, pointing the finger at the LGBTQ community is just absurd. Countless research studies have shown that straight men are disproportionately the molesters in our society. This should be common knowledge by now, but prejudice will not let this belief die. It is time to stop being manipulated by unfounded fears and moral fraudsters. 

Sadly, predators come in many forms. They could be teachers, family, priests and even, yes, gay men. Yet parents still take their children to choir practice, school and family gatherings. 

Every parent wants to protect their child, and amen to that. As someone who survived that circumstance, I can only wish I’d been protected. The man that molested me was in fact a straight man. I don’t pretend to know the psychology of molesters. I can only infer from my own abuse that predators don’t care so much about the gender of their targets as they do about their empathy, trust and vulnerability to manipulation. 

And feeble politicians who have nothing genuine to offer, will seek to manipulate this issue until we voters show them it will not work on us.