{"id":287103,"date":"2020-01-25T20:27:51","date_gmt":"2020-01-26T03:27:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/b1115809"},"modified":"2020-01-25T20:27:51","modified_gmt":"2020-01-26T03:27:51","slug":"snl-star-bowen-yang-opens-up-about-his-experience-with-gay-conversion-therapy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kidn\/music-news\/snl-star-bowen-yang-opens-up-about-his-experience-with-gay-conversion-therapy\/","title":{"rendered":"SNL Star Bowen Yang Opens Up About His Experience With Gay Conversion Therapy"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"Bowen<\/p>\n

Dia Dipasupil\/Getty Images for Vulture Festival<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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Saturday Night Live<\/em> star Bowen Yang<\/strong> is opening up about his past.<\/p>\n

In a candid interview with The New York Times<\/em><\/a>, the 29-year-old comedian shared heartbreaking details of his experience with gay conversion therapy. It was something, he explained, that his parents made him do once they found out he was gay.<\/p>\n

At the time, he was only 17-years-old.<\/p>\n

He recalled the turning point in his youth, which was when his parents learned about his sexuality after they found an AOL Instant Messenger conversation he was having with someone.<\/p>\n

“Me sort of having lewd conversations with someone, just revealing that this was who I was, that I was gay,” Yang shared with the publication. “They just sat me down and yelled at me and said, \u2018We don’t understand this. Where we come from, this doesn’t happen.'”<\/p>\n

“I’d only seen my father cry when my grandpa died and now he’s sobbing in front of me every day at dinner,” he continued. “And I’m thinking, \u2018How do I make this right?’ This is the worst thing you can do as a child of immigrants. It’s just like you don’t want your parents to suffer this much over you.”<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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Bowen went on to explain that after coming home one day, his father told him that he arranged eight sessions with a specialist in Colorado Springs. The “sessions” ended up being gay conversion therapy.<\/p>\n

“I allowed myself the thought experiment of: \u2018What if this could work?'” he expressed. “Even though as I read up on it, I was just like, \u2018Oh, wait, this is all completely crackers.'”<\/p>\n

“At the first session, he asks me, \u2018Would you like this to be Christ centered or a secular sort of experience?’ And I was like, \u2018I guess nonreligious.’ But even for him to ask that question means that there was this kind of religious agenda behind it anyway,” Yang said.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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He explained that the first few sessions were “talk therapy,” something that he enjoyed. However, things drifted into another area that was “crazy.”<\/p>\n

Bowen said: “The first few sessions were talk therapy, which I liked, and then it veers off into this place of, \u2018Let’s go through a sensory description of how you were feeling when you’ve been attracted to men.’ And then the counselor would go through the circular reasoning thing of, \u2018Well, weren’t you feeling uncomfortable a little bit when saw that boy you liked?’ And I was like, \u2018Not really.’ He goes, \u2018How did your chest feel?’ And I was like, \u2018Maybe I was slouching a little bit.’ And he goes, \u2018See? That all stems from shame.’ It was just crazy. Explain the gay away with pseudoscience.”<\/p>\n

For the Saturday Night Live<\/em> star, he revealed that he wanted to meet his parents “halfway,” however, he quickly learned that there wasn’t much “middle ground.” Bowen recalled having a “second coming out” with his parents when he was finally away at college.<\/p>\n

“I had this second coming out with them while I was in college and went through this whole flare-up again with them, where they couldn’t accept it,” he shared. “And then eventually, I just got to this place of standing firm and being like, \u2018This is sort of a fixed point, you guys. I can’t really do anything about this. So either you meet me here or you don’t meet me.'”<\/p>\n

He added that his parents “are doing a lot of work to just try to understand” his sexuality. “I can’t rush them,” he said.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

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Despite his teenage experience, the 29-year-old actor appears to be living his best life.<\/p>\n

In 2019, Bowen made history on SNL<\/em> as the first Asian cast member<\/a> on the show’s long-running series. Moreover, his parents cheered him on and attend his first SNL <\/em>show as a cast member last year.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

via:: E! Online<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dia Dipasupil\/Getty Images for Vulture Festival Saturday Night Live star Bowen Yang is opening up about his past. In a candid interview with The New York Times, the 29-year-old comedian shared heartbreaking details of his experience with gay conversion therapy. It was something, he explained, that his parents made him do once they found out he was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[55],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-287103","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-music-news"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-10-04 19:40:35","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KIDN - The Lift FM","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kidn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kidn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287103","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kidn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kidn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kidn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kidn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=287103"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kidn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287103\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kidn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=287103"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kidn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=287103"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kidn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=287103"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}