Can You Pray the Gay Away?
Asking for a Friend…
It was just a drink. Or at least, that’s what I told myself as I stared at the menu, bypassing the fancy overpriced in-house bullshit of a version of a Cosmopolitan that I actually wanted, and settling instead for something whiskey-based and painfully serious. A drink that said, I am a man who makes responsible choices- even if that choice was betraying my own taste buds.
Somewhere between childhood sermons and overcompensating for things I hadn’t even come to terms with yet, I learned that being too much- too flamboyant, too obvious, too gay- was something to avoid. And now, over a decade later, that fear had followed me to the bar, where ordering a Cosmopolitan felt like a confession.
Was it internalized homophobia, or just an outdated fear of being perceived? Either way, I was sipping on a drink that wasn’t me, wondering when I’d finally order the damn Cosmo.
Thinking over this whole Cosmo conundrum- I couldn’t help but wonder- does internalized homophobia ever really leave us, or does it just find new ways to dress itself up? Like a dress code change from conversion therapy chic to respectable gay minimalism, still designed to keep you in line.
From this, I found myself in a text exchange about statistics- specifically, the odds of being single forever. And while I’m not usually one to put my faith in numbers (I leave that to the cashier at my neighborhood café and Spotify algorithms), the conversation hit a nerve. Because when you’re a gay man raised in a religious household, there’s always a part of you that assumes you’ll be alone forever.
For me, the conditioning started early. Love was something straight people did. A husband was for a wife, and a wife was for a husband. The message was clear: my desires were a glitch in the system, an unfortunate mistake that could be corrected if I just prayed hard enough. And so, I did. I prayed. I made deals with God. I stayed up at night bargaining with the universe, hoping that one day I’d wake up and just be the person I was supposed to be. Spoiler alert: I never did.
Instead, I grew up and found myself at 18, caught in a paradox- wanting love but not believing I deserved it. Looking for a connection but feeling unworthy of it. And somehow, I found comfort in the numbers.
25% of adults stay single forever? 40-50% of gay men never find long-term partners? The statistics became a shield, something to hide behind. If love wasn’t in the cards for me, at least I’d have something to prove that it was never meant to be.
As I went to bed and scrolled on HBO to find an episode of shows I’ve already watched at least thrice, I landed on Veep. Yes, Veep, the political satire that’s essentially the gay man’s The Office (minus the workplace romance but with just as much second-hand embarrassment). There’s a character, Karen Collins, who Selina Meyer always drags out when she needs someone to stall- a person who fills the room with empty words, never committing, never deciding, just keeping the conversation going long enough until people forget why they were there in the first place.
And I realized- I had become my own Karen Collins. I was stalling. Stalling love. Stalling intimacy. Stalling the idea that maybe, just maybe, I was allowed to have the things I wanted.
So, what now? Maybe it starts with replacing those statistics with a new one: 100% of people deserve love. Maybe it means showing up for myself the way I wish someone had when I was younger. And maybe, just maybe, it means letting go of the idea that I have to earn my place at the table.
Because, as much as I love a good prayer, I think it’s time to stop asking for permission to exist.