

“Velvet rage is the deep and abiding anger that results from growing up in an environment when I learn that who I am as a gay person is unacceptable, perhaps even unlovable,” he explains. Man orders fifth pint at the bar: “It’s OK, it’s just my velvet rage.” Boyfriend finds partner trawling through the thousands of profiles on sex-on-demand website Gaydar: “But it’s my velvet rage.”ĭowns coined the phrase to refer to a very specific anger he encountered in his gay patients – whether it was manifested in drug abuse, promiscuity or alcoholism – and whose roots, the book argues, are found in childhood shame and parental rejection.

Its snappy title is slipping, sometimes ironically, into the gay lexicon.
