: 113 In his 2006 book Androphilia: A Manifesto, he wrote, 'I am not gay because the word gay connotes so much more than same-sex desire. : 173 He has described himself as an ' androphile', a term he uses to describe romance and sex between masculine men. : 243ĭonovan has been described as gay, though he does not use the label for himself and has criticized gay culture as effeminate.
: 243ĭonovan is a former Satanist, : 173 and became an ordained priest of the Church of Satan in 2007. He has worked as a club dancer, truck driver, and tattoo artist. Donovan has also lived in California and Portland, Oregon. He later dropped out of college and became a manual laborer. During this period, he says that he attended and worked as a dancer at gay clubs, marched in gay pride parades, and associated with drag queens. : 243 He moved to New York in the 1990s to study fine art.
Donovan was born in 1974 and grew up in a blue-collar household in rural Pennsylvania.