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Featured Reports
David Benkof: Behind the Mask
At first glance, David Benkof appears to be a young gay man who believes that same-sex marriage will damage the institution of marriage, that there are better options for gay couples than marriage, that the community should join him in prioritizing other more pressing issues, and that the marriage discussion is harming the efforts of gay couples in red states to get recognition for their unions. He also claims that he’s a gay columnist, that he speaks for an influential collection of gay thinkers, and that he is part of the gay and lesbian community and that he shares our goals and dreams. But none of that is true.
“Repeat After Me”: The Reparative Therapy Echo Chamber
The April 2008 edition of the pay-to-publish vanity journal Psychological Reports featured a new report from NARTH. Written by NARTH president A. Dean Byrd, past president Joseph Nicolosi, and Richard W. Potts, the report carries the unwieldy but self-descriptive title, “Clients perceptions of how reorientation therapy and self-help can promote changes in sexual orientation.” While the title describes what the authors meant to show — how clients describe the benefits of reparative therapy — the report itself actually illustrates something very different: the ex-gay movement’s remarkable ability to instill an almost robot-like parroting of ex-gay rhetoric among their clients.
Testing the Premise: Is MRSA The New Gay Plague?
The Toronto Star said that a new study “discover[ed] a new strain” of a super-bug “hitting gay men.” Headlines in Britain screamed, “Flesh-eating bug strikes San Francisco’s gay community,” and anti-gay extremists across America spread the alarm that gays were introducing another plague into “the general population.” But there was a small problem with all of this: None of it is true!
Paul Cameron’s World
In 2005, the Southern Poverty Law Center wrote that “[Paul] Cameron’s ‘science’ echoes Nazi Germany.” What the SPLC didn”t know was Cameron doesn’t just “echo” Nazi Germany. He quoted extensively from one of the Final Solution’s architects. This puts his fascination with quarantines, mandatory tattoos, and extermination being a “plausible idea” in a whole new and deeply disturbing light.
From the Inside: Focus on the Family’s “Love Won Out”
On February 10, I attended an all-day “Love Won Out” ex-gay conference in Phoenix, put on by Focus on the Family and Exodus International. In this series of reports, I talk about what I learned there: the people who go to these conferences, the things that they hear, and what this all means for them, their families and for the rest of us.
Prologue: Why I Went To “Love Won Out”
Part 1: What’s Love Got To Do With It?
Part 2: Parents Struggle With “No Exceptions”
Part 3: A Whole New Dialect
Part 4: It Depends On How The Meaning of the Word "Change" Changes
Part 5: A Candid Explanation For "Change"
Part 6: The Science Of "Love Won Out"
Part 7: The Politics Of "Love Won Out"
Part 8: Hope For Parents Who Struggle
The Heterosexual Agenda: Exposing The Myths
At last, the truth can now be told.
Using the same research methods employed by most anti-gay political pressure groups, we examine the statistics and the case studies that dispel many of the myths about heterosexuality. Download your copy today!
And don't miss our companion report, How To Write An Anti-Gay Tract In Fifteen Easy Steps.
Testing The Premise: Are Gays A Threat To Our Children?
Anti-gay activists often charge that gay men and women pose a threat to children. In this report, we explore the supposed connection between homosexuality and child sexual abuse, the conclusions reached by the most knowledgeable professionals in the field, and how anti-gay activists continue to ignore their findings. This has tremendous consequences, not just for gay men and women, but more importantly for the safety of all our children.
Straight From The Source: What the “Dutch Study” Really Says About Gay Couples
Anti-gay activists often cite the “Dutch Study” to claim that gay unions last only about 1½ years and that the these men have an average of eight additional partners per year outside of their steady relationship. In this report, we will take you step by step into the study to see whether the claims are true.
The FRC’s Briefs Are Showing
Tony Perkins’ Family Research Council submitted an Amicus Brief to the Maryland Court of Appeals as that court prepared to consider the issue of gay marriage. We examine just one small section of that brief to reveal the junk science and fraudulent claims of the Family “Research” Council.
Review: The Gay Report
When Karla Jay and Allan Young published The Gay Report in 1979, it quickly a favorite source of statistics for many anti-gay extremists. But before you accepts these statistic at face value, you should examine the inner workings of this survey very carefully. What you learn might surprise you.
Daniel Fetty Doesn’t Count
The FBI’s annual Hate Crime Statistics aren’t as complete as they ought to be, and their report for 2004 was no exception. In fact, their most recent report has quite a few glaring holes. Holes big enough for Daniel Fetty to fall through.
News, analysis and fact-checking of anti-gay rhetoric
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Zeke
May 16th, 2008 | LINK
The United Church of Christ released a press release praising the ruling as well.
Here is the story from the front page of the UCC.org website:
California court decision paves way for same-gender marriage equality
Written by J. Bennett Guess
May 15, 2008
Four years after San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom briefly permitted same-gender marriages in his city in open defiance of a statewide ban, the California Supreme Court finally weighed in on the matter today by overturning the voter-approved measure and paving the way for California to become the second state, behind Massachusetts, where same-gender marriage is legal.
The court said the state’s law “limiting the designation of marriage to a man and a woman is unconstitutional.”
In the 120-page ruling, the court concluded, “There can be no doubt that extending the designation of marriage to same-sex couples, rather than denying it to all couples, is the equal protection remedy that is most consistent with our state’s general legislative policy and preference.”
The Rev. John H. Thomas, UCC general minister and president, said he is pleased by the court’s decision.
“I am gratified by the decision of the courts in California to reject discrimination and affirm the dignity of same gender couples,” Thomas said. “As recent decisions in other states makes clear, until all couples are able to marry, their separate status will never be equal status.”
Five UCC congregations in California — Community UCC of Atascadero, Mt. Hollywood Congregational UCC, Parkside Community UCC in Sacramento, Pilgrim UCC in Carlsbad and United Church of Christ in Simi Valley – as well as UCC-related Pacific School of Religion, joined an interfaith amicus brief filed earlier this year in support of the ban’s overturn.
After the court decision was announced, several UCC members in California responded positively to the news.
“As both a gay man and a Christian church professional, I am thrilled that the California Supreme Court has had the wisdom to recognize that we all should have the rights and responsibilities that go along with being married,” said Phil Porter, minister of art and communication at First Congregational UCC in Berkeley, Calif. “My church would conduct a ceremony for my partner and I any time I might choose, but how glorious that it might now even stand up in court!”
The Rev. Kevin A. Johnson, pastor of Bloom in the Desert Ministries (UCC/United Methodist) in Palm Springs, Calif., emphasized that today’s ruling is a continuation of the ways in which marriage has been redefined for the better over the centuries.
“Because of the positive ruling today in California, progress continues,” Johnson said. “Marriage equality for all continues our historical progress toward recognizing that love and responsibility are the keys to quality marriages, not unfair laws based on racial integrity, which were struck down in 1967 but remained in some states until 2000, and sexual orientation, like we have now.”
In 2005, the UCC General Synod overwhelmingly affirmed a resolution in support of same-gender marriage equality, urging its congregations “to prayerfully consider and support local, station and national legislation to grant equal marriage rights to couples regardless of gender.” As a result of the Synod’s 2005 action, it too became a signatory in the brief before the California court.
The UCC has 244 churches and 36,000 members in California.
“This is great news,” said the Rev. Ruth Garwood, executive director of the UCC Coalition for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Concerns. “Relationships need all the support that they can get. This is why it’s important to have the state’s recognition of the blessing that God has already given.”
The Rev. Michael Schuenemeyer, the UCC’s minister for LGBT concerns in Cleveland, said, “Marriage is about relationships, and the movement toward marriage equality has come in large measure because same-gender, loving relationships have been made increasingly real and visible.”
Learn more at ucc.org/lgbt/marriage.
I’m ONCE AGAIN, very, very proud of my church.
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