Whether he is flamboyantly fashionable with a body chiseled to perfection or chronically dissatisfied and without lasting relationships, the stereotypical extremes of male gay behavior are fueled by the same dark force: shame. The inevitable byproduct of growing up gay in a straight man's world, the experience of shame in childhood and adolescence sends a boy the message that he is other and that he is worthless. To avoid feeling shameful later in life--and even after he is no longer explicitly shamed by his sexuality--a gay man will quietly rage against the memory of this message and strive to excel dramatically to prove it wrong. The stereotypical manifestation of this inner battle is a gay man's success in the arts, fashion and in his body image; as with all the other forms of beauty, creativity and success, he is hiding behind the facades he creates. Building on the collected psychological research and the author's own experience of the past twenty years, Velvet Rage will help gay men profoundly understand their dichotomous extremes. Explaining the psychological underpinnings of the forces at play in their lives, it also offers helpful strategies to stop the insidious cycle of avoidance and rage. Empowering and validating, Velvet Rage will influence the public discourse on gay culture and positively change the lives of gay men who read it.

"With a title that plays on Janet Jackson's epochal 1997 LP The Velvet Rope, and its anatomy of unmet desire, therapist Downs's book describes the paradigmatic ways in which early childhood molds the future lives of gay men: scorned on the playground, disrespected by Dad, loved only by Mom until their first sex with men. Through this mechanism of rejection, gay men feel unlovable, correspondingly angry and, he says, driven to heights of creativity and 'fabulousness' — in addition to shopping addiction and obsessions with fat, muscle and penis size — in a bid to distract themselves from their inner shame. For Downs, the only thing that will bring an end to this spiral of torment is, finally, 'validation,' which produces 'authenticity.' Downs is an engaging writer, though prone to repeating the same few points in different words, while his patients, quoted in sidebars, often make witty quips that rival Quentin Crisp for dry, bitter sarcasm. While many gay readers will fail to recognize themselves here, others will find Downs's logic warming and even generous. Agent, Susan Schulman. (June)" Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

A gay psychologist demonstrates how to heal the trauma of being a gay man in an uncompromisingly straight world