Peterson Toscano's A Musing

Since coming back out of the closet (ex-ex-gay) in April, Marvin Bloom, a devout Jew for Jesus, has been making the rounds at various podcasts. His gay-friendly rants have been heard on Spanking Bee Arthur , The Flatus Show and more than once on Joe G's Bored Beyond Belief . Currently you can hear Marvin on Episode 81 of Mila and Jayna's Trans-ponder . In fact, you will also get to hear me too since in his new segment, Moments with Marvin, he interviews me. In other news, I have a boyfriend, and he is not Marvin.

So much good stuff out there that has come to my inbox recently. Candace Chellew-Hodge, the creator of Whosoever.org , has a new book out, Bulletproof—A Spiritual Survival Guide for Gay & Lesbian Christians . You can hear a public reading here . Check out what Desmond Tutu has to say about the book. Gay and lesbian Christians are constantly demoralized and told they are not children of God. In Bulletproof Faith , Chellew-Hodge reassures gays and lesbians that God loves them just as they were created and teaches them how to stand strong, with compassion and gentleness, against those who condemn them. -Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu Allyson Robinson gets quoted in a great piece that appeared in yesterday's Washington Post, Ruling Inspires New Hope for Transgender People . But for transgender women such as Robinson, the County Council's passage of the law was a key reason she chose to live in Montgomery when she moved to the area this year from Texas to take a job at the H...

I adore Bitch Magazine , which provides a feminist approach to pop culture. I've been a subscriber for the past two years and never fail to learn something each issue. Well written, funny, insightful and at times outrageous, Bitch provides an excellent resource for creatively exploring women's issues, gender and the media. In the current edition, Loud , they offer a bunch of great topics including an article about women in comedy, the untold story of the beauty secrets the cosmetic companies don't want you to know, and a piece about New Jersey 4 with the injustices faced by a group of young lesbians of color who responded to a hate crime against them and ended up incarcerated . Bitch serves a well needed purpose and speaks directly to the inconsistencies and injustices that women face. I received a call tonight from the Bitch offices. They need money to keep the magazine afloat. If you want to receive an excellent magazine and help out a worthy cause, visit the Bitch sit...

It's my international radio weekend! Although I am in Western Maryland right now taking part in Quaker gathering, I will also be on the radio in Canada and beyond. Tonight at 10:00 PM (Eastern Standard Time) I will be a once again be a guest on Vancouver's Queer FM CiTR 101.9fm where I will talk about my recent trip to Lambeth, my upcoming trip to Vancouver, Canada in October and whatever else Heather, the show's enthusiastic host, gets me to talk about. You can listen live here . Also, last week while at Lambeth Conference, George Arny of BBC World Service interviewed me for the Reporting Religion program . I talk at length about my ex-gay experiences, Beyond Ex-Gay, my faith journey and being a Quaker today. You can listen to the program here .

This Thursday, in a conference call open to the public, Darlene Bogle and Christine Bakke will share their experiences as lesbians in the Ex-Gay Movement. For a while I have been considering how the Ex-Gay Movement is an anti-fem movement. Most of the participants in it are male with curriculum and treatment plans geared towards "male issues." Many of the men involved have felt the need to "change" after years of taunting for being sissies. They learned both on the playground and from the pulpit that the world does not value feminized men. The cornerstone teaching of nearly every ex-gay program takes a swipe at women while also reinforcing the belief that women must be subservient to men. What makes a boy gay? According to most of these ex-gay providers and proponents gay boys are a bi-product of an "overbearing mother." This false teaching infers that once a woman usurps a man's authority and no longer remains submissive, this transgressive act alters...

I sat for a long interview the other day with Ariadne Massa, a journalist with the Times of Malta. She seemed fascinated with the ex-gay portion of my life and asked many questions about that experience. Of course she on my never dying adoration with the a lovely compliment in the opening paragraph. With his infectious smile, spirited remarks and positive energy, it's hard to imagine how Toscano suppressed his true being for 17 years to fit in society's pigeonhole of 'straight' people. At 43, the long traumatic journey has failed to etch wrinkles in his flawless complexion, which he attributes to daily moisturiser and veganism. See I am a living breathing billboard advertisement to the wonders of being a vegan. Shoot if the environmental impact doesn't move you or the reality that it is a more humane choice, surely I can appeal to your vanity! What I like about sitting for interviews is that it forces me to think about places in my life that I might not normally con...

Jack Drescher sent me a link to the following article, a story that moved and encouraged me greatly. MANCHESTER, NH – In the first grade, 6-year-old Nicholas stood up one day and told his teacher he had something important to say. Not just to her. But to the whole class. “My name is Nicholas, but I want to be called Nikki because I’m really a girl,” he told his classmates at Parker-Varney School in Manchester. News of the incident did not come as a surprise to his mother, Diana. By the time Nicholas reached preschool, it had become obvious her foster son was never going to be “one of the boys.” Nikki turned out to be a very insightful and aware young girl. And then there was the issue of the “two hearts” – a pink one and a blue one. A young Nicholas insisted he had both, and then woke up one night and said he dreamed a monster took the blue one away, Diana said. Nikki is now 11 years old, and with her mother's help, she has been able to live as a girl at her school. It took work...

Here are some videos for you (cause I'm too lazy to do any proper blogging, but I do have enough energy to maintain a raw vegan diet this week. Yum) 1. Announcement about my upcoming trip to Malta (shot in the courtyard at the St. Albans during European Forum of Lesbian and Gay Christians.) Check out Drachma's blog here . 2. PFLAG protests Love Won Out 3. Vincent Cervantes talks about the impact of ex-gay treatment and theories on his creativity. 4. Jayna (of the fabulous Trans-Ponder podcast ) talks about the importance of coming out of the closet 5. Grisno goes Under NYC! (Which reminds me of when Pastor David Wilkerson exhorted the Times Square Church congregation to pray for the C.H.U.D.s ) 6. And finally Mittymoo has some great zany video's with someone who must be a close relative to Marvin Bloom. (starring John Roberts). In My Son is Gay a mother comes to grips with the gayness of her son. And if you liked that one, check out this year's Mother's Day video ...

I got news yesterday that the DVD of Doin' Time in the Homo No Mo Halfway House (edited by Morgan Jon Fox with designs by Christine Bakke--click on images for larger view) is now fully produced and ready for sale on-line. I have yet to see the final product, but the president of the company that did all the printing and copying sent me an e-mail to say how impressed he was with the final product and what a dream it was to work with Christine and Morgan. Quaker Books Friends General Conference will be distributing the DVD which you can get at their site by clicking here . After 15 years of submitting to reparative therapy, ex-gay support groups and even three exorcisms, Peterson Toscano enrolled in the ex-gay residential program, Love in Action. He graduated successfully from the program nearly two years later, but in January of 1999 decided he just needed to accept himself as a gay man. He weaves together humor, program jargon and outrageous eye witness accounts to form a piece tha...

I announced yesterday that Christine Bakke will be interviewed live tomorrow (Sat) on Blogtalk Live at 8:00 PM EST. She will talk about the Beyond Ex-Gay and her own story in a program about the Ex-Gay Myth. On Sunday I will appear on BBC Radio Ulster in Northern Ireland on the Sunday Sequence Show with William Crawley . We taped the segment last week when I was in London and talked about The Re-Education of George W. Bush, living la vida ex-gay, Quakerism and other random topics. The program runs from 8:30 am- 10:15 am but I don't know in what portion I will appear. I think they also archive most programs. You can have a listen here .

Christine Bakke , co-founder of Beyond Ex-Gay will appear as a guest of Blogtalk Live on-line radio program. This week on 'Talk Back Live' we will be discussing 'The Ex-Gay Myth', our special guest will be Christine Bakke from Beyond Ex-Gay . We will be discussing the half truths that come out of the ex-gay world, including those who have survived the false claims of Ex-gay Ministries. I will also share my story, of how I got involved in the Ex-Gay world, and how it was Ex-Gay people like D.L. Foster and Charlene Cothran that really showed me, that this whole ex-gay thing was false. The fun gets started on May 17th, at 8pm EST. As always feel free to call in and join in on the conversation. You can listen live here (and the show will also be archived)

Since going public with the story of my ex-gay journey (odyssey?), one of the most encouraging signs I have seen is the large number of people who have come forward to tell share their own stories. In addition to ex-gay survivors , we see many concerned citizens writing and speaking out against the de-gayification process and the forces behind it. (Just this week former ex-gay Noé Gutierrez added his own perspective.) Pam Spaulding , the guys at Good as Gay , Jim at Straight Not Narrow , Joe Brummer , Bruce Garrett , and of course Jim Burroway along with Timothy Kincaid and Daniel Gonzales over at Box Turtle Bulletin , and so many others have consistently reported on the ex-gay movement. Two individuals who have contributed tremendously are Mike Airhart, (founder of Ex-Gay Watch, which continues to serve as an ex-gay watchdog under the management Dave Roberts) and Wayne Besen, who heads up Truth Wins Out . Besen is also the author of Anything But Straight—Unmasking the Lies and Scan...

Gay Christian Network Radio offers program entitled: Formerly Ex-Gay Ann Phillips was a leader in the ex-gay movement, heading up the women's ministry at one of the most prominent ex-gay Christian ministries in the world. Her story of "becoming straight" has been used by many to "prove" that ex-gay therapy works, yet now she's out of the movement and admits that she's still gay (and Christian!) after all. In the interview, she talks about her ex-gay experience and in particular how quickly became the head of Love in Action's women's ministry. She also shares about being a subject in the Spitzer Study and the blurred line between truth and fiction when it comes to ex-gay testimony. Listen here .

Gabriel Arana spent three years as a patient of Joseph Nicolosi, former president of the National Association for the Research and Treatment of Homosexuality. Gabriel, a Cornell University 2006 PhD graduate in linguistics, recently chose to tell his story in the Cornell Daily Sun. For three years I had weekly sessions with Dr. Joseph Nicolosi, president of the National Association for the Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH). Dr. Nicolosi thought that homosexuality was a pathology, a sublimated desire to reconnect with one’s lost masculinity. The theory: under-attentive fathers and over-attentive mothers create gay children. The purpose of therapy was to put me in touch with my masculine identity and thereby change my sexual orientation. I would like to say that I resisted therapy throughout, but the truth is that I liked and respected Dr. Nicolosi. And the theory sounded plausible (I was too young to know that plausible does not mean true). It is a period in my life that I do...

For the first time since the 2005 summer protests in front of Love in Action, Zach Stark, who was 16 at when he was placed in LIA, is now 19 and speaks out in this new clip from Morgan Fox's film, This is What Love in Action Looks Like . Morgan first showed this clip in February during Deconstructing the Ex-Gay Myth—A Weekend of Action & Art in Memphis, TN. Daniel Gonzales at Box Turtle Bulletin posted a video about how he believed his orientation had begun to believe he was changing when he received reparative therapy. Oftentimes when I meet someone who’s been through ex-gay therapy I ask them if they ever reached the point where they believed they were beginning to change — It’s how I gauge just how deeply they got into the whole “ex-gay thing.” Ex-gay leaders often assert, “change is possible and I’m proof because I changed.” In my opinion the strongest response is “I too once believed I had changed.” Here’s my own explanation of how I believed I had changed: Daniel also u...

The LOGO program Be Real will feature ex-gay survivors and me in their second episode. I won't get to see it myself, but I know my dad will be featured in it along with Christine Bakke , Scott Tucker and John Holm . If you see it, let me know how it came out. Episode 2 - New Beginnings Peterson Toscano spent the better part of 17 years in the "ex gay" movement struggling to change his sexuality. Now, after 5 years of performing his one person show, aimed at inspiring other ex-gay survivors to come out and tell their stories, he is ready to pass the torch and move on. Stephen, a 45-year-old former Mormon, decides to attend an all men's workshop in central Utah to learn how to confront his past and heal painful family memories. Mon 05/05 10:00 PM Wed 05/07 7:00 PM Sat 05/10 10:00 PM Mon 05/12 7:30 PM (Oh, and to see some photos of Auntie Doris and Me in St. Albans and Windsor and on the party boat last night, go here .) UPDATE: You can now view on-line vid...

It is just lovely here in St. Albans, England with so many cool LGBTIQ Christians from all over Europe . (I got an invite to Malta in July!!) I got LOADS of time with Auntie Doris (in fact I will hang out with her next week after my trip to visit John Henson in Southern Wales.) I also got to hang out with Nancy Wilson, the moderator of the Metropolitan Church. She had come to the Ex-Gay Survivor's Conference last June, so we were finally able to catch up. Last week I performed my last performance of Doin' Time in the Homo No Mo Halfway House and tonight I made my UK premiere of Transfigurations—Transgressing Gender in the Bible . These are such different pieces that my fear has been that people who have seen Homo No Mo come in expecting much of the same zany, piled on humor. Transfigurations is nothing like that. It functions more as a drama than a comedy with a slow, steady, meditative pace to it. As a performer, I don't have the advantage of hearing the audience laugh,...

I leave tomorrow night for London and will not have time to blog until sometime next week. Some updates: I performed Queer 101—Now I Know My gAy,B,C's at a high school outside of Boston today. The first session had about 350 students and the second session had at least 500. They listened deeply and asked excellent questions. Tomorrow morning I perform the same play at Manchester Community College. Beyond Ex-Gay will co-host two conferences in Barcelona at the end of May. I have some info up at our site , but it is in Catalan. I hope to have info in English soon. I will give a keynote address (in Castilian). I mean I can do dinner and directional Spanish, but this is going to be a stretch. I love a challenge. On May 5 Beyond Ex-Gay will be featured in LOGO TV's Be Real Program . (Tom D left me a snarkily sweet text message saying he saw me in the trailer for the program) They interviewed Christine and me as well as my dad, and ex-gay survivors John Holm and Scott Tucker. I thi...

In his latest video, replete with an appropriate cuckoo clock sound effect, Daniel Gonzales took on the anti-gay, pro-ex-gay campaign, inaccurately titled, The Day of Truth . By the end of Daniel's video, I think you will agree that "Day of Truth" misleads and misinforms on the facts about people who are gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender. The Day of Truth people can't even come up with 30 seconds of truth. How do they think they will actually fill up a whole day of truth?

Tonight on Canada's Global Television Cure for Love , a documentary about the Ex-Gay Movement will air. Cure For Love is a new documentary about the " ex-gay " movement - a religious network whose goal is to help their members renounce homosexuality. The ex-gay movement now encompasses 120 ministries in the US and Canada and is active in 56 countries world wide. The film follows two men who have experienced the ex-gay movement in different ways. One gets married, though he admits he is still attracted to men, and another struggles to embrace his homosexuality. The film premieres on Global Television, at 7pm Saturday April 12 . With startling honesty, the men tell their stories of struggle to reconcile their sexual orientation with their Christian values. At least one ex-gay survivor I met through Beyond Ex-Gay and this blog will be featured in the film. The Canadian crew also attended the Ex-Gay Survivor Conference in Irvine, CA this past summer. The picture above shows...