I asked Dennis Cooper in his blog about the Leroy debacle/Sluts similarities. And he responded in his blog saying this:

charlie q, Yeah, quite a lot of people have remarked on the similarities between the concerns/plot of 'The Sluts' and the details of the JT Leroy thing. I agree it's a very weird coincidence. I was friends (or rather thought I was) with JT during much of the writing of the novel, and was privy to a lot of the earlier lies, exaggerations, and manipulations he/she used to get attention and publicity, and it's possible that factored in to the novel's particular concentration, but I didn't intend any deliberate referennce to JT.

JT Leroy has been posting knee jerk support responses about the New York article in "his" blog. They are entertaining to read and just make it seem more pathetic, the holding on to this identity.