Local News, By kozi_kozi_kozi, 1st April, 2011

All three venues which would’ve hosted Adam “I’m straight now, you can be too” Hood this weekend have now canceled their bookings.

Melbourne’s Grattan Gardens Community Centre and Jan Wilson Community Centre today joined St. Columban’s College in rejecting Hood’s ‘ex-gay’ message.

Councillor Melina Sehr JP, the Mayor of the City of Stonnington which includes Melbourne’s Prahran district, says she represents “a supportive, inclusive and vibrant municipality that embraces diversity.”

She explains that Adam Hood’s event was not a council-sponsored one, so Council was not aware of it taking place until it was brought to council’s attention by concerned people in the community.

“Given the nature of the event and the safety concerns that have been raised, Council has requested that New Hope Foundation [who manage the Community Centre] cancel the event.”

It has now been officially cancelled, and Roz Blades, the Mayor of Dandenong, has taken similar action to block Hood’s crew from appearing at the Jan Wilson Community Centre.

Concerned Same Same 25ers Paul Martin and Anthony Venn-Brown led the charge against Hood’s events, which many saw as dangerous, and are delighted that they have been cancelled.

“Although I advocate freedom of expression, I don’t think it is appropriate when it is used to jeopardise the health and well-being of young people,” summed up Andrew Creagh, the editor of DNA magazine, who also wrote to the meeting venues.

“I receive many emails every year from young people who feel conflicted about their sexuality,” he adds. “Overwhelmingly, it’s the people who have been exposed to religious dogma who suffer the most. Adam Hood will claim that homosexuality is a condition that is curable through religion. This is, clearly, nonsense, a fact which you and I as informed adults are able to discern.

“However, young people do not necessarily have the same skills as us and this idea can be extraordinarily damaging to them. Any attempt to ‘cure’ a person’s sexual orientation will, ultimately, fail. This is a biological certainty. The experience of ‘failing’ can, in turn, lead to acts of self-harm and worse in young gay people.”