Autorentext

Wayne Besen is an author and LGBTQ Rights Advocate. He spent almost three decades researching, monitoring and debunking the "ex-gay" myth. He exposed their key leaders as frauds, helped shut down leading conversion groups and created a robust record documenting how the "ex-gay" industry is toxic and harms the very people it claims to help.In 2006, Besen founded Truth Wins Out to help put "ex-gay" programs out of business. He is a former spokesperson for The Human Rights Campaign, the nation's largest LGBTQ political organization. Besen has appeared on leading news and political talk shows: NBC Nightly News, ABC World News Tonight, MSNBC's The Rachel Maddow Show and The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell, CNN's AC360, Fox's O'Reilly Factor and The Sean Hannity Show, and Comedy Central's The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.He has been quoted in The New York Times, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, Rolling Stone, The Washington Post, The Advocate, Newsweek, The Washington Blade, TIME, The Nation, and Mother Jones. Besen graduated from University of Florida in 1993.

Klappentext

Lies with a Straight Face tells the fascinating story of the precipitous rise and fall of the "ex-gay" conversion industry in a manner that is both enlightening and entertaining. This fast-moving, fact-based book is perfect for those who enjoy the marriage of politics, history and current events. The book features the riveting story of the 1998 Truth in Love ad campaign, where the Religious Right's most prominent organizations joined forces to prove that LGBTQ people could be converted to heterosexuality through prayer and therapy. Their provocative national ad campaign created saturation media coverage, turned "ex-gay" into a household term and sparked innumerable water cooler conversations. In this book, you'll find out the shocking results of the Truth in Love campaign and learn about what happened to their outspoken "ex-gay" poster boys and girls. Lies with a Straight Face also discusses the contemporary con artists in the "ex-gay" industry and offers tangible ways for today's leaders to fight back. Lies with a Straight Face is a sequel published on the twenty-year anniversary of Anything But Straight: Unmasking the Scandals and Lies Behind the Ex-Gay Myth. Nominated for two Lambda Literary Awards, Besen's original book documents the history of conversion "cure" programs from the early 20th Century to 2002. His new book discusses what happened from 2003 up to the present day. "To prevail in our present-day battles, we must learn from our past," said Besen. "Ex-gay conversion programs are a farce that wreck families and destroy lives."