Chris Ammon is the hunky pansexual cast member on Real World: Go Big or Go Home. Now in its 31st season, the MTV series has returned to Las Vegas, a city Chris is familiar with from his days as a Mormon. Today, Chris no longer considers himself a Mormon and is instead a big advocate for LGBTQ rights. We spoke with Chris about his time on the show, what it was like being a queer Mormon, how he thinks the Mormon Church can do better by its queer members, and more. 

How did you begin this journey? How did you end up being selected for Real World? Well I think we both know I got chosen as probably the token queer character, which was actually just such an honor. So as much of a motif as they made out of me in some ways, it really was an honor to uphold that legacy.

I had just dropped out of Brigham Young University, came out to my family as being queer, and then just picked up everything and moved to New York to try and get a fresh start. The second week I was there I met another girl here who was also queer – she was my first queer friend in the city. And she heard my story and she actually submitted me. Three or four months later when I heard from MTV and they’re like, “We’re interested in hearing more from you,” I was very, very stressed.

How old are you and at what age did you come out? I’m 24. I’ve come out and come back in several times. I came out to my family I think the first time was when I was 22.

Had you been to Las Vegas before? I had lived in Vegas before the show. The first time I started kind of doubting my religion, my parents moved me to Vegas because my grandparents and my aunt and uncle lived there. And they kind of like ushered me back into Mormonism before I went to BYU. So I hadn’t lived in Vegas since that.

Were you familiar with downtown Las Vegas? No. When I had lived there, the downtown area had still been not quite the safest place to be. So I was amazed by the changes that have been made. It was beautiful.

The suite that you folks on the Real World were staying in, is that in the Gold Spike? Yes, in the Gold Spike. People who go to the Gold Spike have open access to Oasis’ pool, so we got to use it. It was great. 

This was filmed last year, right? Yeah, we filmed October through December of last year.

What conversation are you looking to have through your appearance on the Real World? I think the thing that the Real World really allowed me to do was, for the first time in my life, truly become comfortable in my own skin and, as a part of that, embrace my sexuality. While we were filming, I don’t know if many people know this, but November, in the middle of filming, was when the Mormon Church came forward and said that all same-sex couples are considered apostates and their children can’t be baptized before they’re 18 and disavow their parentage. It was horrible. It was an issue that I have been dealing with forever. Like understanding and trying to come to terms with my sexuality. But then something so personal from this Church that I had been a part of for so long, I think that is the conversation that I would like to start. Whether we want to admit it or not, discrimination in this country against LGBTQ people is so very, very real, and it’s something that we still need to talk about and fight against.

Tell us what it was like for you coming out as pansexual as a Mormon. When I came out to my parents, it was in a text message. I don’t think I was brave enough to say it out loud yet. I was at Brigham Young University, which was very scary because if you’re gay at Brigham Young University then you get picked on. But I had reached a point where I just needed to start being more honest with myself and with others because due to the lack of transparency I had very, very deep, deep depression. It was heartbreaking because my dad, I didn’t really hear anything from him and he just sent me a text of love and support. He told me a month later, he said, “I cried all night long when I got that text from you because I thought my son is going to die of AIDS.” And when I spoke to my mother about it later, she said, “It just breaks my heart that I will no longer get to see you in heaven.” I think through coming out I realized it really is just a lack of education everywhere that is perpetuating stereotypes and hatred against LGBTQ people in America.

Those stereotypes are incredibly divisive and damaging. Yeah. It’s the same problem that I think has been created in minority communities where we’re taught that looking a certain way or acting a certain way is more appropriate or it’s more right. And the problem is that when we do that in our own community as well, all we’re doing is dividing ourselves and taking the focus off of the people who are really perpetuating the hatred against us.

A short while ago, a 22-year-old gay Mormon committed suicide. Lincoln Parkin. He was a respected LGBTQ activist. This is known to happen quite often within the Mormon community. I know you’ve stated you’re an atheist now, but given your past experience with the Mormon community, what do you think can be done to bring about change? First of all, it’s important to recognize that this is, I believe, the 36th suicide of an LGBTQ Mormon since the Handbook, the new doctrine, was leaked in November of 2015. Thirty-six people are dead. That is so intolerable to me. I think what needs to happen is there needs to be conversations had in the Mormon community about what this really is. This is not a choice. This is not a test. And this is not a plague from God. This is a person being a person and everybody deserves to feel like they are human.

Do you think your life would’ve been different if you were born Mormon 100 years from now? I absolutely think so. Just seeing the change that has taken place in my family. Even since my exit from the show, it’s been amazing. But it took having really, really hard conversations. And a lot of them. And a lot of them really hurt. But I see it now. Especially in my father – well only in my father. My father really has made incredible changes, in both his own life and our relationship. So in 100 years from now if all the Mormons are like my father, I think they’ll be just fine.

Elder Bednar actually recently said I think in a church conference several weeks ago, he said, “We do not have any homosexual members of our Church.” And what that says to so many people in the church is that, “You do not exist.” I think that’s the conversation that needs to stop. We need to start realizing that these are people.

The Real World flew me to Salt Lake to speak at that rally where they had the mass resignation at Temple Square. And I got to give speech. It was the most incredible moment of my entire life.

How was that? Was it more about you sharing or listening? The biggest reason that I came onto the Real World is that – and I think people will see this on the show – I always have just loved to listen to people’s stories. I have heard wonderful stories and I have heard terrible stories. But so many of the stories that I heard about since coming out at BYU were of just this rampant discrimination against LGBTQ individuals. And none of it was being talked about. I had a friend get drugged and raped by an ex-boyfriend. He reported the rape to a bishop and the bishop promptly expelled him from the school, never reported the rape, and publicly outed him to his family. I have so many friends who had put a picture of themselves up on Grindr or SCRUFF and people within BYU were trolling – straight people were trolling the pages to try and find gay men to turn into the school. You are literally trying to end someone’s education because they are gay. That is just truly horrible to me.

There have been some pretty big names pushing for equality in the Mormon Church though. I think it’s important to recognize that Tyler [Glenn] and Gladys [Knight] and Brandon Flowers, these are Mormons who do a lot to just start conversations about equality within the Church. I think that that’s important too, that both people who are out of the Church like me and people who are still in the Church like them, who are people of influence, if the Church is not going to, they start having those conversations on a grander scale. 

Jenna is a fellow Real World house member. She’s from South Carolina and was raised Mormon, but I don’t think she’s the kind of Mormon a lot of Nevadans have come to know. I think something that’s really important to bring up about Jenna too, and something that I know it was hard to represent on the show because of the circumstances, but she not only came from this very, very small town, but she came from a trailer park on meth row with an abusive stepfather and a mother who was dealing with a drug addiction. She has seen everything. And unfortunately, those aren’t things that we learned about Jenna until well after this process. But I think when people start to understand this, the combination of ingrained and societal racism and then the idea of like it’s just cultural the sentiment against homosexuality, a lot of that is religion, it’s upbringing, it’s culture, and it’s also just how some people are raised. I think that was an amazing takeaway for all of us, is realizing like, at her core, Jenna is truly a sweet girl. But there’s a lot of conversation that remains to be had. 

She was entering the “real world”.Absolutely. You know, more so than any of us. To your comment about Mormonism, I think that the thing that was so personally affronting to me was that I think when she and I started having these conversations where we began really arguing against each other about LGBTQ issues – damn, wow. It’s so weird to reflect on all this.

It hit a very personal place for you.It really is. I think the thing that I realized about Jenna is that the things that she said were the things that I had heard so many Mormon people say behind closed doors. Like when they thought that they were just with each other. And it took me back to a very personal place – sitting there in those circles and just not being able to say anything because the things that people were saying about gay people or different races, even while I was in the midst of the Church, I knew were wrong. I think that’s what was scary and so, so sad about Jenna, was that she had just never had the opportunity or, I guess, the learning to tell her like these things are just not true anymore, or ever, and they’re not appropriate or considerate to say to people. 

Having left the Real World, do you continue to talk to your housemates? Yeah. I talk to every single one of them almost every single day. I think that’s unique to me, which I feel really blessed. They are all, in their own ways, incredible people, and I’m just so, so lucky to have made friends with them.

And you did drag for your first time, so that was pretty cool. Yes! And then when I got back from Real World I saw my first episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race.

Did you know any of the Brooklyn queens before watching the show? No, no. And I actually got to go to a viewing party with Thorgy Thor a few weeks ago. And she said the most wonderful thing, she said, “Michelle Visage told me that I needed to tone it down. But if we’re going to tone it down, why are we even doing this?” I just thought that was beautiful.

Being pansexual, was it easy for you to get along with Dean and Dione on the show? They actually were two of my biggest advocates on the show and I wish that this was better represented on the show because I think it’s very powerful. It was funny. I went essentially the whole season without really hooking up with anybody. I had hooked up with a couple of girls, but I had not hooked up with a guy yet. And the last party that we all went to together, I met a guy there and we were out on the dance floor and I looked over and I remember being so scared because of the experiences that I had in my own coming out before being on the Real World. I remember looking up and being so scared that they were going to look over and be uncomfortable, but they looked over at me dancing with this guy and they both made eye contact with me and started cheering for me like they would have each other if they were picking up girls. I realized, “This is so powerful that if you give someone the opportunity, you get to know them as a person before you get to know them as a label or a sexuality.” What kind of relationships can we be forming from there?

So, did you have any crushes on Dione or Dean initially? There was actually this cameraman and I thought he was so cute. We’ll leave it at that.