CarnalNation

Exodus International, the nation's largest ex-gay organization, announced this week that it has severed ties with Lansing, Michigan affiliate ministry Corduroy Stone.  That's because it was revealed four months ago that Curduroy Stone director Mike Jones was engaging in therapeutic methods that were, well, pretty gay.

According to the Michigan Messenger, a former Curduroy Stone patient named Patrick McAlvey released a video in August via Truth Wins Out.  He alleged that Jones subjected him to bizarre treatments that included prolonged hugging sessions so McAlvey could "feel the strength" and "smell the smell" of another man.  There was also a screening of Equus and interrogations about McAlvey's fantasies; he says that Jones grilled him about his penis size, rated different parts of his body on a scale from 1 to 10, and told him to remove his shirt and do push-ups as part of his therapy.

Oh, and McAlvey met Jones when he was in sixth grade.

Jones had come to the boy's middle school to speak about the ex-gay phenomenon, and McAlvey soon began corresponding with the so-called therapist.  By age nineteen, when McAlvey felt that he needed serious therapy in order to cure his homosexuality, he officially became Jones's patient.  Now, at 24, he is openly gay and seemingly quite happy that way. 

It's unclear how many gays Jones "cured" with his methods, though his website contains testimonies from one man and one woman who both consider themselves saved by the ministry.  There's also a statement from Jones himself, titled "From Fantasy To Reality," in which he talks quite candidly about how he was driven to ex-gay therapy after a sexual encounter with his own father.  ("He was thoroughly heterosexual, but he thought all boys explored sexually with others," Jones says.)

Notably, Curduroy Stone's website is hosted by servers at Michigan State University, and the e-mail address Jones lists on the website is a university one.  (The University shut down cstone@msu.edu in April, so now e-mails are all directed to Jones's personal e-mail address, mijones@msu.edu.)  After receiving complaints about the site's content, MSU twice announced that it would remove Jones's ministry from its servers, but earlier this year changed its mind, saying they had no power to remove the ex-gay site.  Obviously, many Michiganders whose tax dollars fund the University disagree.