It seems a same-sex, adult-teen relationship is either a beautiful expression of LGBT progress or an example of perversion deserving of jail time, depending entirely on whether the adult involved is a Christian.

Back in 2017, Queerty, a prominent LGBT news and advocacy site, gleefully shared a recut of the trailer for the award-winning movie, “Call Me By Your Name,” featuring clips from Disney’s “Monster’s University.” In 2018, on the site Dan Tracer lamented that explicit sex scenes between the two main characters, a 17-year-old boy and a 24-year-old man, were cut from the main release.

Describing the decision, Tracer wrote, “James Ivory, who won the Oscar for writing the film’s screenplay, says his original script called for full-frontal from both the film’s two stars. Both Timothée Chalamet and Armie Hammer’s contracts, however, nixed that plan.”

Controversy had already been swirling around the movie based on the adult-teen romantic relationship when James Woods scolded one of the main characters, Armie Hammer, for promoting that relationship. Queerty referred to this as “homophobic.” When challenged, Hammer simply waved away criticism, arguing that “in most U.S. states, the age of consent is 16. In Italy, where the movie takes place, the age of consent is 14; it was also 14 in 1983, when the movie is set.”

Struggling with the ethics of the movie, Slate writer Jeffrey Bloomer concluded his review of the movie, lamenting, “It’s not reasonable to say the movie endorses pedophilia, or really any kind of power-based abuse, just because it depicts that relationship. If we go down that censorious and unnuanced path with our art, very little will survive the trip.”

With the movie’s incredible praise from the LGBT media, and the media at large, it would seem the left considers a 24-year-old man and a teenage boy engaging in a sexual and romantic relationship to be positive and empowering. But this view sharply ends when a competing social narrative enters the story.

A Double Standard About Underage Sex

Reporting on the story of a fired and criminally charged youth pastor, Queerty tweeted, “Antigay youth pastor busted from sexting teen boy, asking for x-rated pics,” with mugshot photos of the 24-year-old man charged. The article begins saying, “Another day, another antigay preacher busted for being a pervert. This time it’s Paxton Singer, a former youth pastor at Harvest Bible Chapel in Aurora, Illinois, who allegedly asked a 16-year-old boy to send him nude pics and sneak away with him for a weekend alone together.”

Another young man, who was 17 at the time, told police of an inappropriate relationship with Singer. Singer was indicted for sexual exploitation in 2018, and his trial is set to begin in September.

So it seems a same-sex, adult-teen relationship is either a beautiful expression of LGBT progress or an example of perversion deserving of jail time, depending entirely on whether or not the adult involved is a Christian. It is common for LGBT media to revel in humiliating Christian leaders who are secretly gay by exposing them.

The article does not specify what qualifies the former youth pastor as being “anti-gay,” and glosses over the fact that the church fired him and reported him to the authorities immediately upon learning of his actions. But none of that matters. The story here is that an “anti-gay” pastor was humiliated as a hypocrite.

In a Washington Examiner article, “Why is LGBT media normalizing quasi-pedophilia?,” writer Brad Polumbo describes the relationship between a 55-year-old man and a 22-year-old man who met when the younger was 17, and argues, “Rather, it’s the disturbing attempt to ‘normalize’ 30-year age gaps that involve a middle-aged man preying on a teenage boy and possibly paying him for sex.” The younger man defended himself, saying, “I’d recommend for you to keep your mind open and know that love comes in many shapes, forms, sizes, colours, and ages.”

The leftist LGBT movement seems unable to decide if it approves.

Exploiting Minors Is the Real Problem

There are deep issues in the gay male community about this type of relationship. In 2017, the top gay porn search word, for example, was “daddy.” The Advocate titled a guide for younger men, “29 Things You Should Look for in a Daddy: It takes a lot more than bedroom prowess to make a happy and healthy daddy-son relationship.”

In Queerty, the same author referring to the former youth pastor as “perverted” wrote an article titled, “PHOTOS: Gay Daddies And Their Sexy Sons Together On Father’s Day.” Yet another Queerty article is titled, “Six Pro Tips For Being The Best Daddy For Your Boy.” The language, the culture, the fetishized sub-culture, and so on fixate on the specific idea of adult men and teenage boys engaging sexually.

While most of the criticism is dismissed as discomfort with “age-gaps” within relationships, the issue is the cultural celebration of the exploitation of teenage boys who are incapable of making adult decisions. More to the point, if the LGBT community is so determined to expose Christian hypocrisy related to sexuality, it severely needs to address its own.

There is simply no argument that society should tolerate Singer’s immoral and illegal activity. But how can one man be criminally prosecuted and another celebrated on the front of LGBT websites for identical behavior?

The left is always balancing between indignation and hypocrisy. In this particular situation, however, they should stick to their instincts regarding Singer’s behavior and apply it to all adult-teenage relationships.

As “Queer Eye” star and psychologist Karamo Brown argued regarding “Call Me By Your Name,” “I know we’re calling [Oliver] a college student, but it looks like a grown man having sex with a little boy,” he added. “And for me, I just was not OK with that. And I was like, ‘Why are we pretending like this is OK in any sense, fashion, or form?’” He continued, “But there is predatory behavior there that I see, especially in the movie, where Armie Hammer looks dramatically older than this young man.”

And he is correct. Whether the predator is a closeted youth pastor or a handsome and charming character in a romance novel, it should simply be universally accepted that he has no business pursuing teenage boys. All the indignation the left feels toward the idea of a hypocritical “anti-gay” pastor, they should channel toward the exploitation of all minors, regardless of who the abuser is.

The hatred of Christianity within the LGBT community overshadows the real issue at hand. What matters is that an adult preyed on vulnerable minors, and the same people shaming him are celebrating this type of behavior openly in media, pornography, and social progress — as long as they approve of the politics of the people involved.