nah Anthony i wasn’t. I became a Christian in 2000 after a friend of mine was murdered.

I was right into ‘the scene’ for about two and a half years. Partying and taking drugs from Friday till Monday every week and eventually started mid week too because I got so down.

I didn’t have much respect for myself and put myself at risk often, and there is a lot of hurt from those days that I only really feel when I go back into those places and see the same things.

It really doesn’t change. The clubs get darker, the drugs get harder, and people seem to get swallowed by the false sense of freedom it creates.

I remember one morning standing on the corner of Chapel St and Commercial Rd in Melbourne in my outfit from the night before, covered in sweat and smelling like club smoke – chewing the crap out of a two hour old chubba chub stick. I was surrounded by shoppers out with their kids and I suddenly felt reality hit me.

I had been doing this for two years and I couldn’t remember a thing. It was just party hard and forget everything else. The people I met were all the same as me. The thing we shared was our love for the scene and the drugs. When i gave up drugs, I lost lots of friends. They didn’t have anything in common with me anymore.

Many of them are still doing the same thing today they were doing back then. And I am glad not to be there.

I love to dance and have a good time, don’t get me wrong here. But in the times since then that i have been out to dance, I can only have a good time so long as i keep to myself. It makes me so sad to see people wasting their lives away on a lifestyle that offers no returns: 4 hours of ecstacy and a week of feeling like death.

There is a little of my story to give a backgorund to my strong dislike for ‘the scene’

this extract from ch 18 evolution is probaly relevant here.

Deciding to march in the 1995 Mardi Gras Parade was my opportunity to extinguish my last fears regarding people’s reaction to me being gay, knowing the parade would be seen by a live crowd of over 750,000 and a viewing audience in the millions on national television. After failing two

auditions (just couldn’t get that five, six, seven, eight! thing right) I saw an announcement on the noticeboard at the gym: ‘Guys wanted to form a group called “Locker Room Boys”’. I knew at this late stage they would be more willing to take someone who lacked coordination.

Becky, my daughter, now nineteen, was somewhere in the crowd watching her first Mardi Gras Parade but I knew it would be almost impossible to see her among the crowds twelve deep along each side of the road. My eyes scanned the crowd looking for her familiar face at any opportunity, then at the halfway point as we turned at Taylor Square into Flinders Street for the last stretch, I saw her in the crowd. Her face beamed; she was totally distracted by the overwhelming variety of things vying for her attention. Then she suddenly saw me and threw caution to the wind. She jumped the barricade, pushed past the marshals and ran out to me. ‘There’s my Dad, there’s my Dad!’ I could hear her scream above the Village People booming from the speakers on the truck in front of us. We ran into each others arms like a scene from some old time movie and hugged over and over again in front of all those people. The emotion was overwhelming and with tears streaming down our faces, she said, ‘Dad, I’m so proud of you. I love you.’ I was proud of her that she was proud of me and thought that at last my little girl’s broken heart was healed. No-one in the crowd would have known why we cried and danced or been aware of the pain we’d both gone through and the price we’d paid to arrive at that point where pride had replaced shame. My pain had become her pain and she’d continued to love me through confusion, humiliation and embarrassment. Suddenly I realised that we were holding up the whole parade and the marshals were yelling ‘move on’, so I ran up the street to catch up with the group and jumped back into the routine. Neither of us will ever forget that moment.

Sounds to me the misunderstanding here needs to be sorted out face to face or something…..Im not getting involved just a suggestion. Sounds like some wounds r still maybe raw? (my tone which writing cant portray is that of concern, discernment, understanding and compassion)

Anthony – I don’t get it.

I have a valid and authentic experience. I am not in denial, I am at peace with who I am and with my maker.

From my ‘perspective’ it is you who is taking offence to everything I say, and calling me an attacker of the gay community. I’m not stupid nor blind. I know there is plenty of promiscurity in the hetro world.

But have you driven down the most notoriously gay district in Sydney, known also for its fabulous shopping and cafes? There is a tool shed on just about every block!!! Umm I’ve shopped in Melbourne in Chapel st – one of the greatest shopping and cafe district – and it isn’t until you turn into commercial road – the notoriously gay area of south melbourne, that you come across ‘Beat Books’ etc…

I don’t understand why you are shooting down everything I say.

I choose not to go to those places, and i am stating my reasoning, and I’m entitiled to. What you do is your business and no one is judging you for it. I have a problem with the scene, and I have no way condemned the souls that choose what they choose. You have miss read.

This is the end of my discussion, I am sick of being labled as a gay hater, when I am very happily gay myself.

I’m sorry that there seems to be so much misunderstanding here.

My experience is different to yours, and I can’t say that my time in the scene added anything to my life; infact it took away – if anything. I am here reflecting on that nearly 6 years after. I lost a lot of dignity and self respect. Things I have gained back again. This is MY experience.

i dont think that you are in denial Phil…I dont think I ever suggested that or that your experience was invalid. we have both had the same experience.

For my 22 years as a christian in the church all I ever heard about was how evil, immoral, perverted etc etc. homosexuals were. no one ever told me anything different nor did I ever want to get close to find out anyting different. When I came out……I guess in some way I adopted that belief about myself as well…….and took me some time to find out that what i’d heard and believed was not true at all.

I do feel that the churches often generalisations and stereotyping of G&L people has not helped thier cause. You and I dont fit that mould do we…..and there are 1000’s like us. Christian and non christian G&L’s who live good lives. thats why the christian church should embrace gay christians…..but in many cases especailly from our pente background we are being rejected…not because we are immoral but because we are gay…….which I guess you have just experienced that in your teaching career. you are a good teacher. you love the kids you work with…..so why wont they let you teach. its sad Phil….very sad.

i think Maggs thread on Gay Scene/ Gay Community…..is there a Difference? gets down to the crux of the issue. When people start making statement that are derogatory about G&L people I could now ask them the question. “do you want to talk about the gay community or the gay scene….they are two very different animals.”

discussions on this forum have helped me in my understanding. The more people post the more i get to know them and the way they think…….and it helps me form my understanding so I can speak more intelligently about these issues to individuals who are in churches and struggling accepting thier sexuality….and with church leaders who are heterosexual.

I hope this post helps bring some more understanding and not misunderstanding. 😀

Thanks Mags and Anthony.

I think we are getting things lined up. It is hard on the net. I did feel a bit hurt but after your remarks, I feel better.

Anthony, I do agree that we have had similar experiences, but perhaps not the same, since people deal with things differently. It has been a hard road for me at times, as it has for you, but in those journey’s we have had very different obstacles to overcome even though they are similar.

For instance I will never know the level of rejection you have had as such an established leader in Church, but can relate in some of the experiences in my professional Chrisitan teaching career.

I don’t know about the struggles with adding family and abuse into this scenareo, but have seen how my partner’s family have treated him, and how some of my friends who have suffered abuse are learning to rise up through it.

It is so good to be able to talk openly about our journeys and learn from each other, but we all carry our different battle scars, some that have faded and some that are still quite raw.

But we are one in the same in the way that God accepts us no matter what, and I hope that we can all learn more about that. It is the most liberating thing ever.

Thanks again,

Phil