When a young man leaves an enmeshed relationship with his mother, it won’t be an easy journey. The sense of self was nipped in the bud due to boundaries being blurred. But now that he is venturing into new terrain, empty feelings are bound to arise. It is so pervasive that countless men who sexualize same-sex attractions will ultimately resort back to their old state of enmeshment. Many remain there for the rest of their days. In others, enmeshment will flicker like an orange traffic light. When emptiness becomes the gut feeling, it is then that the ready-made “gay” identity sounds like a gift from heaven.

But it avoids the core issues at stake, and will not, cannot, quench the thirst of the troubled mind, the quest for understanding. The “gay” identity is appealing because it drags its followers into a pleasant state of denial.

1. Broad ways and narrow ways

There is a difference between having same-sex attractions and homosexual encounters on the one hand and adopting a ‘gay’ identity on the other. Calling yourself “gay”, which means claiming possession of (supposedly) immutable hardware, is the broad path for life. You are encouraged, these days, to do so with, for example, rainbow flags monopolizing the view of city streets in Summer. The quest for insights, on the other hand, is the narrow way with scorn and marginalization, meant to deter the seeker.

You will certainly find that people who adopt the “gay” identity are not as tolerant as they claim to be. Announcing to the entire world that you wish to be seen as “a gay man” is a one-way ticket. For over half a century, public opinion has been brought to consider sexual development as the branching of a tree in a certain direction. A tree cannot grow backward and that was a powerful image.

But the public has been fooled. For other sounds can be heard: the concept of possessing a full sexual potential. That is what this website is all about. We say “Hey, hold your horses. Not so fast. Let us take this, one step at a time”.

When you label yourself as being “gay”, or when others do so for you, then you are jeopardizing your sexual availability for the opposite sex. Many women do not prefer to become a wet-nurse for a man who is still trying to figure himself out. ‘Take your experiments elsewhere‘, so they feel. A great dilemma.

Making decisions is done in uncertainty. You appreciate women but you feel you are not quite up to it at this moment in life. Yet “coming out gay” closes doors.

Some say: men who struggle with homosexuality are struggling with their feelings. I say: they are struggling with decisions, which is not the same thing. They know their feelings very well, but they struggle with a society that, in contrast to a century ago, does not accept a fluid outlook on sexual matters anymore. You are either this kind of a guy or that kind of a guy. “He’ll come around”, you may find people giggling behind your back when you express concerns about same-sex attractions. Meaning, he will finally become “who he is”. And under all circumstances, they mean “gay” of course.

2. Being who you are

But you are always “who you are”. The moment you are still pondering on all these very private matters, you are no less “who you are” than when you yell “Guys, here I come. LGBT-community, the prodigal son is coming home”.

Coming out ‘gay’ has a serious downside. The porter at the gate is like the drummer in the ‘Eagles’ band in the song ‘Hotel California’, singing: “You can always check-in, but you can never check-out”.

The problem is not what identity must I claim, but feeling forced to align with an identity in the first place. It is not important what you are, it is important who you are.

Identities are highly overrated. They serve no real purpose, fencing you in from your social surroundings. It makes you feel as if other people have a great amount in common with each other but poor little you is being left out.

Celebrating gayness has even mutated into political campaigns, creating boundaries and setting people up against each other. A gay identity leads to an in-crowd and by definition an out-crowd. Identities are divisive political instruments. Divide and rule.

3. The proud elephant

Not to mention the elephant in the room: Pride, a disgusting concept. How chauvinistic can you get? Down with chauvinism! I am not better than you. I am just a moron, like everybody else. Nothing to be proud of, in my humble opinion.

Identity. What is so great about identity? Well, if you don’t have one or are insecure, then they come in handy. The weaker your boundaries, the weaker your sense of identity. And what leads to weak boundaries? An enmeshed life in the past and failure to get over it in the short run.

Enmeshment has proven to be a major cause of weak boundaries. A weak sense of identity is the inevitable outcome. It is an agonizing position to be in. And this makes it all the more enticing to regress, to go back to the original home-sweet-home.

Therapist Ross Rosenberg writes:

“(In such a relationship) Mom is a narcissist, while the son is codependent, the person who lives to give. Mom knows that her son is the only one who will listen to her and help her. The son is afraid of standing up to his mom, and she exploits his caregiving”.

Not only is he afraid to stand up to her, he is also afraid of leaving. It is easy to see the tell-tale signs of still clinging to mum or to mum-surrogates in many men who call themselves exclusively ‘gay’. We observe him clinging to a whole arrange of women in a non-sexual way, even worshiping her, idolizing her, screaming enthusiastically at her at, for example, a pop concert. Read: Lady Gaga, Pink, and other so-called ‘gay icons’. It is the term “outrageous” that is most often used in the gay scene to describe this unique state of joy.

The radical-gay extremist site Huffpost writes:

“Divas with powerhouse voices, gay anthems, over-the-top personalities and an unapologetic and unforgettable approach to fashion that would inspire envy in a drag queen are likely to become gay icons.”

From a psychiatric point of view, however, these bursts of ecstasy can also be seen through another lens. When we decide to see life as a never-ending process of growth, then the ecstasy constitutes a continuation of age-old coziness and home-sweet-home. Drooling has nothing to do with real sexual attraction to a woman. The enthusiasm harbors an unreal quality. It is history-driven.

The screams and yells when Lady Gaga smiles in his direction are reminiscent of the cheers and screams of infants in the playground, getting giddy on a merry-go-round. From a therapist’s point of view, we perceive echoes of the past, exposing a lonely boy who is not daring to let go of mum and cross the canyon to maleness on the rope that we discussed in part 34. He is not leaving Squaw Camp, not for a long shot.

4. Go, Gaga, go

Performers like Pink, Cher, Diana Ross, etc., have become the new projection screens onto which a long lost youth and childhood are projected. The screams are food for archeology at its finest. I dare say this because most normal men don’t faint when Lady Gaga smiles. But what is it? Why do gays almost pass out when SHE comes around?

On the site Wonderwall.com, we read about Cher:

“The singer-actress gained a significant gay following in the ’70s and ’80s with the release of numerous chart-topping songs and her penchant for flamboyant performance costumes and leather ensembles.”

To add to the riddle, in the gay scene, you may find yourself being taught to share negative feelings about men who are labeled ‘straight’ (meaning unreachable) and who are stigmatized as being boring, square, so ‘not me’. These so-called “heterosexual” dull specimens of the human race are not part of the in-crowd.

At the Eurovision Song Contest, one can observe members of the audience even rudely pushing a rainbow flag (it is against the rules to wave non-national flags, but the gay TV-directors don’t appear to mind) under the nose of the out-crowd. The in-crowd does all it can to defy. They wave the rainbow flag, and yes, some are beyond themselves in an orgy of being “who you are”. It is hysterical, meaning that it has an unreal, flamboyant, and theatrical quality. But there is more.

If one tries to understand this emotion, one can taste emotions of the past. We observe a passive-aggressive pushing away of men with whom one does not identify. Where did that emotion come from?

I stumbled upon a possible answer in an email Henry wrote to me:

“Mum taught me I was unlikable if I became like Dad or acted naughtily. I’d lose her love if I became like that, and with her as my first source of attachment, I guess my infant self just knew to give dad and masculinity up”.

5. Subliminal rage

In men sexualizing their same-sex attractions, we observe, paradoxically, a bubbling rage toward men, albeit underneath the surface. In therapy, with the client sitting opposite us, we can feel the red glow of cinders in the fireplace, still smoking of old anger towards maleness.

This undercurrent reveals the futile attempts of the infant trying to reach, to need, to attach to a father who is there, but who is also not (sufficiently) there. The child feels inadequate. A grudge grows, takes over, and then goes underground. Gone from sight. But it haunts all the same. The cellars of mind can prove to be murky places. There is a tense atmosphere of grumbling subliminal rage (‘Dad, where were you when I needed you?’)

At the Song Festival, or Gay Parade, or any other “gay in-crowd” venue, a deep desire to defy masculinity, to ‘get even’ with the traitor, creeps up again and for the men in the audience, it is exhilarating to do so with fellow gays. It is a typically gay phenomenon according to the Huff Post. Radical ideology calls it “celebrating who you are”. It is brainwashing at its finest.

Gay activist Trevor Martin, who is also a UK sales and marketing media professional, writes in the Huff Post:

“An acquaintance here in San Francisco informed me that these women are not merely icons: These heroines are veritable patron saints!”

Heroines, saints, you can feel the religious quality that this new emerging belief system represents, ‘radical gay’. But the term “being who you are” is false wisdom and a repetition of a myth.

No-one is born into defiance or outrageousness, despite the audio volume booming from the loudspeakers. The noise drowns out moderate and other dissident sounds. All the rainbow-colored flags cannot hide the scientific truths of the last three decades.

At gay manifestations around the world, hundreds appear to wave the sacred cloth. But a close look reveals that they were professionally made, paid for, handed out by activists, and coming from a big container that was flown in from the USA. The midget gay urban ghettos of LA and NYC are exporting symbols for an imaginary Western “liberation” as a logistic project. Don’t talk: wave! After all, talking is so tiresome! Don’t try to reach common ground and understanding: conquer!

The activists prefer to appeal to feelings and irrationality above sound reasoning. A rational debate with sound arguments means one can lose the debate. But one can never debate the existence of feelings. Therefore, it is wiser to twist each encounter into a clash of feelings, meaning inevitably: victory! The rational idiot with his tedious reasoning has nowhere to go.

So, in San Francisco, activist Gilbert Baker insisted in 1978 on using a subliminal message. It helps to avoid rational debate. He created a 6-striped rainbow flag because rainbows are a natural phenomenon: therefore homosexuality is natural. Such is the subliminal message. Clever. The debate about the origins of homosexual feelings was won through irrationality. And it works.

6. Radical gays and the British NHS

Radical activists would rather die than lose that time-proven subliminal message. In the UK, the National Health Service implements, as of 2020, a 7-stripe flag as a tribute of thanks to all medical staff during the Covid pandemic. Radicalized gay-crowd activists have started a petition demanding an end to the ‘rebranding’ of the rainbow as a NHS flag instead of a LGBT symbol. They feel victimized by what they call the ‘erasing of queer history’. But Gilbert’s flag was only 6 colors and the NHS uses 7. So, what’s the problem?

The activists claim that the rainbow is their private property. Job Berendsen says: how about a petition to denounce the way that the late Gilbert Baker appropriated the rainbow in the first place? The rainbow belongs to all human beings and not only to radicalized activists from tiny US gay enclaves. Every child draws it automatically. What are we to do? Are we to get rid of crayons boxes from the classroom in all kindergartens lest the infant “abuses” the colors?

Whoops, Biden may do it.

There is nothing handicraft by any local gay about it. The flags are not original, they do not stem from regional issues like, say, the demolition of houses or the construction of a new highway, stirring a spontaneous call to arms.

They are part of an organized campaign, always coming from the gay ghettos of Los Angeles and New York, disseminated by the ILGA (International Lesbian and Gay Association), heavily funded, with well-organized logistics, and displayed in rehearsed waving ceremonies. There is booming “Dance” music to go with it. Yep, it’s HER: Gaga.

7. ILGA as a cash machine

On the ILGA website, we read

“Throughout 2018, a total of €3.177.143 in expenses was incurred.”

International activism, designed to conquer the world, has morphed into a multi-million dollar enterprise. Gone are the days of women’s groups or men’s groups, discussing feelings and boozing it up at the home of the host-of-the-month. Nope, your own opinions have nothing to do with it in the second millennium. These days, we are talking cash.

The secular crowd may hate the organized Spanish “April festivals of Seville” where Catholics intimidatingly dominate the streets while Holy Mary gets herself hoisted around, but the secular activists have become pretty good at copying it in Western capital cities themselves.

This domination has a distinct religious zeal quality, to the extent that the so-called ban on what they call “conversion therapy” amounts to a modern-day Inquisition. Fear, fire, and a branding iron.

8. Fear

Speaking of fear, a survey conducted in 2018 under 150 British MP’s revealed:

“64% of MP’s belonging to the Conservative Party feel they cannot speak freely on transgender issues without undue fear of social media attacks or being accused of the new label “transphobia”.

One would imagine that all Labour MP’s experience no fear, but on the contrary, 43% of the Labour Party also fear a backlash, or attacks on social media, or being labeled hateful and hostile.”

We observe how fear coerces MP’s and professional therapists into obedience and/or self-censorship, not to mention researchers and universities.

The radicals have even created a discrimination system for US colleges to stigmatize all those institutes who dare tolerate dissident views, the so-called “Campus Pride Index“. It is a national listing of what they call “LGBT-friendly colleges & universities” and is splashed all over the Internet and social media. This typically American cult of identity politics aims to name and shame others for non-compliance in a staggering organized and well-funded way. This is not inclusiveness but conditional inclusiveness.

So, when a young man feels he has no identity, as many men who struggle with same-sex attractions do, he is then at risk of radical activists who present him a ready-made identity: the label “gay”. Coercion into the label is the way to go.

And with a seemingly medieval religious zeal, all opposition to this activism is crushed by slander, by defamation, enemy thinking, and a legalistic equivalent of the guillotine, the ban on “conversion therapy”. Ten years jail for the culprit in Melbourne (AU). The Australian Labor Party is giving the English term “chop-chop” a new meaning.

In The Guardian, we read:

“Victoria’s attorney general, Jill Hennessy, said “These views won’t be tolerated in Victoria and neither will these abhorrent practices.”

The slogan “born that way” may perhaps cover up the symptoms of identity loss for a short while but does not address the root causes. And so, sadness and emptiness will continue to creep up as the consequences of an enmeshed life prevail.

In gay life, we can observe how more outrageousness, and later drugs, are needed to soothe something inside. A tendency towards addiction sets in. It is, in our view, an array of emotions that are not done to you by an imaginary hostile outside world but stemming from the crypts and cellars of the mind.

9. Improve the world

Speaking of gay therapists, we uphold a different approach: “Improve the world, start with yourself”. But we hear a different battle cry: “Improve the world, start with the other guy”. Well, that’s a lot of other guys and a lot of change, especially when you are less than 1.6% of the population according to a 2014 UK survey. How much change? By the looks of it, the sky is the limit.

We say this because our radicalized colleagues have not named the end terms that the “change” is supposed to lead to. Since Gilbert Baker baked his flag in 1978, activism has hatched an anarchist mob with no accountability. There is enough work for the next two centuries because no final goals have been formulated or agreed upon. Millennials are being targeted by an unguided missile without a roadmap in sight.

9. Conclusion

Enmeshment and the gay identity are one and the same. Enmeshment and the idolization of gay female icons are also one and the same. In the old days, you were shunned by announcing to be gay. In the second millennium, you will be shunned for not doing so. Radical gay-lib is exploiting the vulnerabilities of young persons who are unsure about themselves.

—– —–

In an email to me, Rodney wrote:

“When I push mum out, I’m still a no-one, empty, no sense of self or identity, not a real person, because I have no role to serve when I’m not pleasing. I’m just this hollow shell who feels unsafe and unlovable. If I want to live, it is to be latched tightly to another. Breaking free feels good, but free into what? There is nothing in me, no maleness, no youth, no self… being a self seems scary; others will reject what I choose to be.”

No, they won’t, Rodney. The world loves maleness. And no, Rodney, no-one will reject your embracing it. Squaw Camp is no more, Rodney. Squaw Camp is over.

To be continued.

Job Berendsen, MD.