Category: Religion and sexuality

Interview with Chasing the Devil Producer Bill Hussung; premiere on Saturday

A new documentary regarding the ex-gay world is premiering this weekend at a Birmingham, AL film festival. Chasing the Devil: Inside the Ex-gay Movement will be shown on Saturday, March 29, 2008 at 11:30am at the WorkPlay Theatre in Birmingham. 

The film bills itself in this way:

CHASING THE DEVIL: INSIDE THE EX-GAY MOVEMENT is a feature documentary film presenting an unflinching look at the personal journeys of four people who claim to have changed their sexual orientation from gay to straight. Their stories mark the first time documentary filmmakers have been allowed inside the “ex-gay” movement and provide an empathetic and, at times, devastating portrait of those who claim homosexuality is an illness that can be healed.

Although I am not sure this film is the first time filmmakers have been allowed inside the “movement,” the advanced buzz caught my eye several months ago and I have been following the development of the video since. Several familiar faces are in the movie, including Richard Cohen, who adds magnets to his magic act. You can watch the trailer here:

What follows is an email interview with Producer/Director Bill Hussung:

Throckmorton: What prompted you to take up the topic of the ex-gay movement?

Hussung: Our initial interest in the issue was sparked by the publication of the Spitzer study. We knew Dr. Spitzer by reputation, and while his study has been roundly criticized by the larger psychiatric community, it caught our attention, and we started researching ex-gay groups and reparative therapists to see if there might be a film in their stories. We’ve always been fans of documentaries about subcultures, so the ex-gay community quickly caught our interest. To be perfectly frank, there was another element at play, the first dozen ex-gay groups we contacted were so hostile to our requests for interviews that we just had to keep pushing and try to understand their point of view. Documentaries are supposed to take viewers places they’ve never been before, and this one really fit the bill.

Throckmorton: What was the biggest surprise to you in your interviewing?

Hussung: There are some real surprises in the film and we don’t want to give them away before people see the documentary. With that said, we were surprised by how many of the ex-gays we spoke to seemed to have experienced some form of abuse as children. What that means, if anything, is open to debate and we explore it in the film. We were also surprised that the distinction between the Christian ex-gay ministries and the supposedly secular reparative therapists crumbled a bit as we delved into the subject matter. The Christian ex-gay groups all seemed to offer some form of therapy, and the reparative therapists were all driven by deeply held religious convictions. 

Throckmorton: What in the film do you think will be surprising to critics of the ex-gay movement?

Hussung: Critics will probably be surprised by how open the ex-gays in are film are about what constitutes “success.” With some exceptions, we didn’t interview people who claim to be 100% “cured” of their homosexuality, we met people who talked about lifelong struggles. They don’t seem to be spewing propaganda about 100% change when their own stories involve a fair amount of struggle and failure and they still identity as ex-gay.

Throckmorton: What do you anticipate the reaction to the film will be from those within ex-gay circles?

Hussung: We have no idea. Our obligation was to follow the facts wherever they took us, and we feel as if we’ve done that.

Throckmorton: I am curious about the title of the video – Chasing the devil — it seems like many ex-gays would say they are avoiding the devil. What was behind this choice of title?

Hussung: The title comes from what we heard over and over again at LIFE Ministry in New York City. LIFE believes very strongly in the power of testimony to drive the devil out of homosexuals and they talk about chasing the devil out of people’s rectums and throats. LIFE Ministry doesn’t talk about running away from the devil, the folks there talk about chasing the devil out of their lives.

Throckmorton: That’s curious because I do not think most people would see Life Ministries as representative of the ex-gay world as a whole.

Hussung: They are the only folks we encountered who framed the issue this way, but they are a center piece of the film, so the title made sense.

Throckmorton: What promotion and distribution do you see in the future?

Hussung: We’re going to do select screenings around the country at film festivals and see what the best options are for breaking up the TV rights, dvd rights, and theatrical possibilities. We expect people will be able to see the film before too long.

Thanks for your thoughts on this new project.

Follow up on Tucker’s letter to Rep. Sally Kern

Because I was moved by the letter I described here, I have been seeking to verify the authorship (between grading papers, of course).

It is thus far a frustrating pursuit. I can’t find full names of Tucker or his Aunt Elizabeth. In response to the interest in the Tucker letter, someone posting as Elizabeth left this message on March 14, on the KWTV – News 9 forum:

Alex wrote: Hi Elizabeth, I hoping that you follow this forum and will check on this. I’m trying to contact you (and Tucker) in the hopes of getting permission to print his letter in other forums. If you do read this, would you please get in touch with the following site, http://www.pamshouseblend.com/showDiary.do… .

Thanks.

I don’t check here often but was told of the interest Tucker’s letter has caused. I want to say first that I did not make that post saying Tucker was reading the letter on the Ellen Degeneris show. I don’t know who did that.

Tucker is not seeking national acclaim, he simply wants Sally Kern to know that she is very insensitive to real victims of terrorism and how her words have resulted in the abuse of gay students.

I did gain Tucker’s permission to print his letter and sent copies of it to various media outlets and everyone may do so.

The sole purpose though is for Kern to see the letter and I am quite sure that has happened by now. But she has not responded to Tucker’s emails or made any comment about it at all.

Tucker called McVeigh a Christian extremist in the letter. McVeigh may’ve or may’ve not beein into God, it depended on who asked him whenever. There are times he claims to be with the Christian identity movement and there are other times he claimed to be agnostic. The point in this is calling Islam dangerous is wrong. Most Muslims are peaceful. Most Christians are peaceful. I hear all the time that Muslims hate Jews…well so do the KKK, Aryans, and lots of other Christians too.

Sally Kern insensitively made remarks about gays being worse than terrorists in a city that next month will remember the 13th anniversary of a terrorist bombing in OKC. Kern came to Oklahoma a year after that bombing. The ones of us who were affected by that terror event are offended by her remarks.

Kern is a cold, cold woman. That stone hard heart certainly won’t get her anywhere close to Heaven.

The original post on the News9 forum provided the following context for the letter in a comment dated March 11, 2008                

Today my nephew attempted to deliver a letter to Sally Kern but was stopped by a highway patrol man. With his permission I am distributing the letter to all news stations and thought I would include it here.

Maybe we can all stand to learn a listen from this smart, loving, young man. He more than most has reason to hate. He lost his mother, my sister, in the Murrah Building bombing.

Elizabeth

My efforts to verify this letter have been unsuccessful. I spoke to representatives of three state based gay advocacy groups, none of whom had been able to verify the identity of the author. I then sought to investigate the claim of Elizabeth that on March 11th, “my nephew [Tucker] attempted to deliver a letter to Sally Kern but was stopped by a highway patrol man.”

To do so, I contacted Oklahoma Highway Patrol Information Officer, Trooper Betsy Randolph, who spoke with the Lieutenant on duty at Rep. Kern’s office on March 11. The officer was on duty inside Rep. Kerns office and said he did not stop anyone from delivering a letter to the Representative. According to Trooper Randolph, the office conducted business-as-usual that day with no one on duty remembering any effort by a young person to deliver a letter. The patrolman was there due to reports of threats but did not prevent anyone from delivering a letter. Furthermore, additional security was on the scene from March 10-12, but Trooper Randolph could find no evidence that would verify this story. “It sounds like a false story to me. We can find no evidence that anyone was prevented from giving Rep. Kerns a letter,” she stated.

I asked Trooper Randolph if a constituent might have prevented from entering the area surrounding Rep. Kern’s office and she said this would happen only if there was a disturbance. However, there is no record of this.

If this is a fictitious letter, that would be unfortunate, as the fraud would distract from the issues it raised. I do think the report from the Oklahoma Highway Patrol requires Elizabeth and Tucker to come forward if this letter is to be viewed as credible.