Ben Appel

I’ve been coming to Barnes & Noble since I was a kid. Today they’re selling my memoir.

“What gays like me wanted was to be part of our society and to contribute to it. These queer radicals want to burn it all down.” 🔗 👇

@BatuCharlemagne Currently just hardcover and ebook (kindle, nook)

@benappel Is there any softcover versions out there? Was looking to see if there was any on amazon.

Recent reviews of my book: - "This book was an absolute page-turner. Ben's journey from living in a cult as a child to ending up at Columbia and recognizing the cult-like situation there was so interesting and eye-opening. Very well written." - "Wow, I inhaled this book. The author deftly connects things that seem disparate like a Christian cult-like childhood to attending Columbia University as an adult in the late 2010's and current gender ideology. I appreciated having my assumptions as a leftie challenged right along with him as if I were there in the room. I have been in those rooms. I too started to wonder what the heck is going on?? Appel did his work diving deep at Columbia into the literature and thought that has led the left down some dark paths. I certainly saw Michel Foucault in a new light from my grad school reading! This book is in unfamiliar territory these days, in that it's not clearly aligned with any ideology. While the terrain was at times heavy and challenging, it was thrilling to encounter Appel's fresh thinking! Thrilled to see his article based on this memoir in The Atlantic recently." - "Insightful, eye-opening, deeply personal account of mental illness, substance abuse, and long-term resilience. Ben is a great writer and a great spokesperson for the growing gender-critical movement. Whether you agree with him or not, you'll find this book hard to put down. And it's genuinely funny!"

I appreciate the kind words, but I want to be very clear that I never said gays should sacrifice anything. I was expressing how I feel sometimes. That there are days when I feel so regretful about where we’ve ended up, that I wonder what lengths I’d go to in order to make things different.

@timothyjamaal84 @benappel And I don’t hear anybody suggesting that heterosexuals give up their marriages, nor should they! That the LGB community is considering this kind of thinking just depresses the hell out of me. Of course, they’re allowed to do so & express it; doesn’t mean it’s not devastating.

Not my most hopeful contribution to the discourse, but things seem bad. Link below.

"The activist organizations I once revered now champion causes that lend credence to the right-wing claim that gay marriage was the slippery slope toward the erosion of traditional social and moral values." 🔗👇

Latest review of my book: "I haven't been this excited to read a book in a while. As a cult survivor myself who went to grad school in 2020 to study extremism ... I was alarmed at how we seemed to only talk about extremism on the left as it pertained to history (Mao, etc) and only talk about modern day extremism on the right. No one could talk openly about anti-racism or gender ideology. I had to go poking around to find other people outside of academia who would talk about the cultiness I was seeing. Tying in the rise of anti-semitism on the left is truly all of my interests being married into one book. On page 122 and had to come here to give it 5 stars. I would have eagerly read any book discussing these topics (and I have) but them being addressed by someone who has personal experience of a cult is such a gift."

@bpt326 Hi Brian, I see you are a gay man, and willing to judge me as a lesbian and my parenting based on a Twitter post - If you are willing to please read one thing today will you please read this post from my friend @benappel theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/03/…

Gender studies professor: 'If being “gay” means being a man attracted to men, it assumes “man” is a stable, inherent category, when history shows the definition of manhood is constantly changing.' I'm pretty sure we've always agreed that the males are the ones with the penises. news.ucr.edu/articles/2026/…

"On further testing," as in, after being subjected to irreversible medical harm. Also, for this analogy to work, transition would need to be life-saving, and it is not.

@pill_swallow ❤️

@benappel Maybe, but I don't think it's required to expose yourself to that unless there's some reason you feel you need to. The people who appreciate you are here.

Just went on Threads and read a bunch of really hateful posts about me and afterwards I thought, “Huh, wasn’t so bad this time.” Is that growth?

@BuckAngel 🏀 🏀 💪🏼

@benappel 😂😂😂 you have balls of steel 😂

@justinedeter I love this. Yes.

@benappel I have generalized anxiety disorder and had social anxiety pretty intensely for most of my life. Since I was exposed to social media as a more mature, stable person it actually helped me get over that. Use it as exposure therapy to increase stoicism.

Do news organizations have any idea how much public trust they're burning through with coverage like this?

@LizWolfeReason I so admire your bravery in all of this, and I’m so terribly sorry for your loss.

King Solomon died yesterday at two and a half months old. We loved him really well, and we don't have any regrets. We got nine days at home with him after 61 days in the NICU. Nine will never feel like enough, but we must accept what is given to us––we were never in control. Let's take stock of all God's mercies, how He worked through people: My OB, who heard my conviction about carrying Sol to term even with his disabilities, and supported it fully, with empathy and respect; the nurses in the Lenox Hill NICU, where he spent the majority of his time, who loved him so tenderly, like he was their own; his physical therapist, who saw extreme hope for him despite his disabilities, and tried to make it so; my mom, who put her own life on hold to come live in New York with us for the whole winter, to watch Zev and keep our household running; Zev, who wanted to wear matching pajamas with his brother each night he was home (and some of the nights Sol was in the NICU), who was eager to come to the hospital with us to play in the lobby even though he wasn't often allowed in the NICU, who chose not to be afraid of hospitals or tubes but to touch and kiss and snuggle his brother whenever he was able; @nwilliams030 and @rSanti97, who camped out at the hospital during Sol's final days so we would never feel alone, who watched Zev whenever our family had to dip back down to Texas; the people who covered us in prayer all over the country. Perhaps most of all, I'm grateful for my husband: He wasn't Catholic or pro-life when we met, but life experience has brought him to these beliefs. They ground us now; his faith is steadfast. He didn't leave Sol's side during those final, hardest days. He doesn't falter. Something tragic happened to our family, but we won't become permanently sad or dark; we really believe in God's promises. We're called to hope, no matter what, and the best we can do is serve our children with everything we've got. That's what we did, and in the process we got to glimpse the goodness of the Lord over and over again.

‘While the rest of us are trying to build upon existing knowledge by, say, determining how liver cancer progresses differently in female bodies than in male bodies, queer theorists ask, “What do you mean, ‘male body’?” 🔗 👇