Ban Abuse
By: Emilio San
Tags: Representation, Queer, Lgbtq Rights, Conversion Therapy, Child Abuse

In case you don´t know none of these films, you might be wondering “what do these three films have in common?

Well, one thing is for sure. If there´s a word that these have in common is “ABUSE”

How come?

All of these three films have a different representation of one of the most controversial subject matters of the 21st Century; “Conversion Therapy”

What´s Conversion Therapy?

According to the Trevor´s Project, “conversion therapy is any of several dangerous and discredited practices aimed at changing an individual´s sexual orientation or gender identity”

What do they do?

“Conversion therapists use a variety of shaming, emotionally traumatic or physically painful stimuli to make their victims associate those stimuli with their LGBTQ identities” (The Trevor Project, sf)

As a queer person, I was a little bit reluctant of watching those films, because even though they were being made by people who had studied about the subject or even educated themselves, it was something that I didn´t really know what my final reaction would be.

So first of all I decided to start with the one who had that comedy aspect of it and was the lightest of all of them.

But I´m a Cheerleader (1999) Dir. Jamie Babbit

Okay, if I´m honest the idea of having a film with Natasha Lyonne and Clea Duvall was something that was actually very appealing to me since the beginning, but the truth is that I was quite scared of the context of their roles in this.

The plot of the film is Lyonne´s character who as the title says is a cheerleader who comes from a Christian family, living in a conservative lifestyle. She has a boyfriend who she doesn´t really like and has “a lot of friends”.

However one day they stage an intervention in order to make her realise she might be “a homosexual”. Obviously they tell her that based on ridiculous observations they make like: you´re a vegetarian, you touch a lot your girlfriends and you don´t like to kiss your boyfriend.

YEAH RIGHT 🙄🙄🙄

Once she listens to them, she is told by RuPaul, YES RUPAUL, that there can be a “solution” for this in a conversion therapy camp called “True Directions”. And this is where the gender roles thing starts.

The moment we meet “True Directions” we find a group of kids being brainwashed that they´ll be able to find their true direction and stop being homosexuals if they follow a series of steps like:

Admitting you´re a homosexual Rediscovering your gender identity Family therapy Demystify the opposite sex Simulated sexual experience

Of course, through all of these steps we find most of the kids struggling with them and even though this is shown in a satirical, comedy form, some of these scenes are actually pretty tough. In more than a way heteronormativity and gender roles are ridiculed, this makes us see that the members of the own center have no idea what they are doing and it is also implied that they have their own struggles that they don´t want to face.

Lyonne´s character, “Megan”, focuses and trusts the program, but in the way Duvall´s character (Graham) shows her that she doesn´t need to change who she really is, she just needs to make them think that the program is working and once she graduates she does whatever she wants. Through the course of the film we see their forbidden love story and how the encourage each other´s goals.

What I loved about this film is that it was one of the first depictions of conversion therapy shown in the film industry, it was directed and brought to the audience by a queer woman and it also showed various depictions on labels, stereotypes and repression. By the way the performances of the whole cast is A+ and it also let the audience see the huge problem centers like these are and how a lot of hate factors contribute to it.

Happy 20th anniversary But I´m a Cheerleader! 💟🏳‍🌈

The Miseducation of Cameron Post (2018) Dir. Desiree Akhavan

This one had been on my list for a while for a lot of reasons. From being in love with Quinn Shephard (BLAME) to being in love with Moretz performances and Sasha Lane´s “American Honey”, there were just so many reasons for me to watch this film.

The Miseducation of Cameron Post is a coming of age film directed by Desiree Akhavan based on the 2012 novel of the same name written by Emily M. Danforth which was influenced by Zach Stark´s story, who when he was 16 years old came out to his parents and was sent to a Christian conversion therapy program. He documented his experience in “Love To Action” through his MySpace blog in 2005, where he would describe what was actually happening there and because of this, it became an international scandal and a lot of protests for the programs abolition started.

This story not only influenced The Miseducation of Cameron Post but also a documentary film called “This is What Love in Action Looks like”, which shows interviews with ex members of the program, with Zach himself and with the ex former director “John Smid”.

The Miseducation of Cameron Post tells the story of Cameron (Moretz) , a highschooler who is discovered making out with her best friend (Shephard) by her boyfriend. After this incident she is sent by her very religious aunt to a conversion therapy camp called “God´s Promise” where she befriends two other teens called Jane Fonda (Sasha Lane) and Adam (Forrest Goodluck), the three of them don´t believe in the camp´s purposes and fight to get through it. During her time in the camp she finds herself hating the way she is and relating her homosexuality to her parents deaths. There they make every kid feel ashamed and terrible about themselves.

There is a lot of repression and self-loathing coming from them, specially from Cameron´s roommate, Erin (Emily Skeggs). Another one of Cameron´s peers in the camp, Mark, struggles a lot with his masculinity and the way he feels alienated to his father because of this, his emotional consequences end up showing in the film.

We see everyone in the film hopeless about their lives and how the camp is affecting them in various ways, even one of the siblings who runs the camp doubts on what they are doing and is manipulated by his sister, who claims to have cured him of his “homosexuality” (he might be loosely based on John Smid)

One of the things of the film that is related to the real life events of “Love To Action” is the part where officials and investigators go to check the camp based on evidence that it might imply what´s happening there. However the investigation is dropped because they didn´t find evidence of child abuse.

In 2008 John Smid left the program.

The film itself is a big achievement for director, Desiree Akhavan, a queer woman herself who was fascinated by the book and wanted to focus on the conversion therapy part excluding Camerons early life as a child. It has elements of Todd Haynes film “Safe” which is starred by Julianne Moore and it also shows the reality of the program´s intentions and misleading purposes.

Boy Erased (2018) Dir. Joel Edgerton

Boy Erased is a biographical drama film based on the Garrard Conley´s memoir of the same name, which tell us his story living as an only child of a Christian family, his experience in “Love in Action” and everything that came with it.

Boy Erased is basically his story being told through a fictional character named Jared played impeccably by Lucas Hedges, who goes through the same things he went in real life. At the beginning of the film we get to see a lot of familiar queer faces like my idol Xavier Dolan 💙 and Troye Sivan, though their characters are based in real life people Garrard met, we witness their shocking and powerful performances.

Dolan´s character for example believes in the program´s purposes though it´s imply this is because of the emotional and physical abuse he has gone through in his household, he goes that extreme that he rejects to have any physical contact with any man, not even for a handshake.

In the other hand, Sivan´s performance is actually regular until he steals one of the film´s scenes where he tells Hedges character (Jared) that he only needs to play the part and make them think the program is working even though he knows is not.

“Become the man you are not”, “Fake it ´til you make it” these are some of the things they tell the program attendees. The emotional and verbal abuse they go through is something that is seen a lot through the course of the film, from classifying masculinity to insulting them with slurs like “faggot”, it´s non stoppable all the terrible things they do to them.

To make sure they don´t lose the kids, they force them to remain silence of the activities, “in order for them to properly help them”. Through the film´s running time we also get to see Jared´s past and experiences with his own sexuality in his college years, one of them showing a very traumatic scene with Joe Aldwyn´s character, a horrible experience the same Gonley went through but also we get to see a beautiful scene with a guy he met in an exposition and how he finally felt in peace.

He expresses as part of his “recovery” how these might have influenced his homosexuality and how he “sinned”.

In contrast with the other films, Boy Erased actually has something authentic about it and it´s the fact that this is the real life story of a man´s life and experiences finding out his sexuality. We feel what he feels, we suffer what he suffers and we see what he sees. Although the film shows us a raw reality and very disturbing scenes, all of these never feel forced or just put there for shock but to make the audience think about the reality of these centers.

I think we need to give a big shoutout to both Nicole Kidman and Russell Crowe as the conservative religious parents, because out of the labels and stereotypes of their characters, they push the limits and give raw and real performances. Their character developments through the film are that powerful and human in the sense that they were portraying real people´s feelings on how they might feel when their kids are facing their own identities.

One of the similarities this film and The Miseducation of Cameron Post have is the fact that both of these films are based on real cases related to “Life in Action” and John Smid. In Boy Erased, he´s portrayed by Joel Edgerton who also wrote and directed the film, I want to recognize his amazing work in this because he wanted to make sure he was telling Garrard´s story and by this, he did not only work behind the camera but also as an actor, he had to prepare to play a real man who caused a lot of pain based on his own repression and self-loathing. It really helped a lot to clarify by the end where all the people involved are now.

Overall, Boy Erased is a must see film everyone should see in order to fully understand the damages these centers do to people and also really knowing what to do if someone they know or love is suffering because they are afraid of showing who they really are. Also witnessing Garrard Conleys experiences through his coming of age is something so personal, human and neccessary that might help people who are going through the same.

Epilogue

Films are a powerful way of communicating a subject in various ways, whether if it´s a cheesy comedy or an autobiographical coming of age , all of these help us to understand and empathize with the characters and face a global problematic. I can´t imagine myself being in their situations, fortunately I´ve been surrounded by people that love and accept me no matter what and I must admit that I´m privileged, we´re all living in this world where everyone is facing their own battles and we keep learning everyday new things, we keep adapting and we never really stop growing up.

Fortunately we´ve come a long way through in history, LGBTQ rights are happening through the whole world and I´m really proud to say as an example that in my country, Mexico City has already banned conversion therapy. But this isn´t it, it´s far from over. There are a lot of countries around the world allowing conversion therapy, not measuring the damages and consequences it has on the members of it.

If we really want this to come to an end, we need to keep raising our voices and show people that this is happening and we will not remain silent. We will keep fighting so the future generations can live in an environment where they feel freedom to be themselves, accept and respect each other´s differences.