News, analysis and fact-checking of anti-gay rhetoric
|
|
Study Identifies Link Between Rejecting Parents and Negative Health Among LGB Youth
New DNC Chair No Friend of LGBT Rights
Sean Kennedy's Murderer Up For Early Parole
Loss for Anti-Gay Ex-Episcopalians
FRC, Focus Battle For Soul of the GOP
Christian Reconstructionist Decries "Christian Bashing"
Vandals Strike Pro-Gay Catholic Church
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.
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.
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!
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.
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
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
© Box Turtle Bulletin. All Rights Reserved.
Posts 
Posts via daily email:
David Malcolm
September 30th, 2008 | LINK
honestly I think you’re just looking for something to complain about. I don’t think she’s being malicious, I just think she’s not too bright. She’s not asking you to do anything differently.
El Rose
October 1st, 2008 | LINK
This comment has been deleted for violations of our Comments Policy. Not only was the comment off topic, but it was deleted specifically for:
Eddie89
October 1st, 2008 | LINK
Someone may need to check that YouTube video. I tried to view it and got an error message: “We’re sorry, this video is no longer available.”
Bad link? YouTube deleted?
Wow. She’s scary « Jack Mackenroth
October 1st, 2008 | LINK
[...] As Couric pointed out, Palin’s church, the Wasilla Bible Church, also takes the position that homosexuality is a choice. In fact, it has sponsored a conference by James Dobson’s Focus on the Family to help gays “overcome” their homosexuality through prayer and covert them into being straight. These programs are also opposed by every major medical association. [...]
Jim Burroway
October 1st, 2008 | LINK
I just now clicked on the video and it seems to work for me. What browser are you using?
Johno
October 1st, 2008 | LINK
David, look at Palin’s LGBT record, keeping in mind that the one thing that went in our favor was forced upon her, and tell me again how this is sincere and no big deal.
Timothy Kincaid
October 1st, 2008 | LINK
Johno,
She doesn’t have much of an LGBT record. She’s opposed same-sex couple benefits - and not very agressively.
Beyond that, it’s all myth, speculation, and extrapolation of attitudes from the cherry-picking of a word.
quo III
October 2nd, 2008 | LINK
For the record, there is no scientific proof that homosexuality is not a choice. The neuroscientist Simon LeVay has admitted this; see the Wikipedia article about him.
Ben in Oakland
October 2nd, 2008 | LINK
Quo’s back.
Although that statement is not a true one quo– google francis collins– where is the proof that it is?
Oh yes. randy thomas. Larry Craig. alan Chambers. Ted Haggard.
Jim Burroway
October 2nd, 2008 | LINK
Quo III
I have no doubt that for a small minority (some bisexuals as an example), homosexuality may well be a choice. But to say that such a blanket statement applies to everyone flies in the face of logic and, yes, science.
But more personally, I think the proof is in the experience of those who are gay. I have never chosen to be homosexual. That is an absolute fact. In fact, there was a time in my life in which I desperately wanted to be anything but gay.
I find comments like yours dismissive of the reality that many people experience. I know it’s not your experience, but then I suspect there are many things in life you haven’t experienced, just as there are many experience in life I haven’t experienced.
But at the risk of sounding flippant, I do have to wonder if perhaps there was a time in your life in which you “chose” not to be gay. If so, what did that look like? Because I cannot find such a crossroads in mine. In fact, if there had been such a crossroads, the pressures to take a different path would have been overwhelming.
They are Talking about Ex-Gay Stuff « Peterson Toscano’s A Musing
October 2nd, 2008 | LINK
[...] Gonzales (Box Turtle Bulletin), drawing on his own ex-gay past, recently posted a YouTube video responding to Republican Vice Presidential canidate Sarah Palin’s comments that assumed being [...]
Yuki Choe
October 2nd, 2008 | LINK
“For the record, there is no scientific proof that homosexuality is not a choice. The neuroscientist Simon LeVay has admitted this; see the Wikipedia article about him.”
Before you say anything, I did not choose to be transsexual either. Really, I can vouch for my fellow brothers and sisters here. Hey, why choose to be a “minority”? Gays, lesbians, transsexuals… wow. So much choice. And before you say “sexual deviation”, I had not had any sexual experience whatsoever for years. And I know a celibate gay brother. Yes, so….
Bill S
October 2nd, 2008 | LINK
If you believe being gay is a choice, then doesn’t that mean you believe there’s an advantage to being gay? Because otherwise what would motivate that choice?
quo III
October 2nd, 2008 | LINK
Jim,
I wasn’t trying to say that homosexuality necessarily is a choice, only that there’s no proof that it’s not. That was LeVay’s point. There’s a longer quote from LeVay about that in the Wikipedia article on sexual orientation (or at least there was the last time I looked).
Timothy Kincaid
October 2nd, 2008 | LINK
Quo,
There is also no proof that homosexuality is not caused by Gerber strained peas. Or by space aliens. Or by the Hokey Pokey (after all, that’s what it’s all about).
Yet we all know that homosexuality is not based in strained peas, flying saucers, or funny childhood dances… or choice.
quo III
October 3rd, 2008 | LINK
Timothy,
“We” have fairly serious disagreements over what causes homosexuality, it seems. Actually, relatively more gay women than gay men appear to regard their homosexuality as a choice (according to Simon LeVay, 15 per cent of lesbians in an Advocate poll thought choice had something to do with their sexual orientation; that’s on page 6 of Queer Science).
MR Bill
October 3rd, 2008 | LINK
The new Evangelical line on homosexuality is that orientation may be somehow innate, but you can choose not to act on it (sorta like the Catholic’s position), or at least, that’s what some of these folks I know are sayin’.
In my own life, I knew I was attracted to men, but didn’t do anything about it. The woman I would marry (a strong willed country girl)said, when I said “I think I’m bisexual” replied “Of course you are. Just don’t present me with a scandal, and keep it out of the county, and we’ll be ok.” After a few unfortunate episodes, and the birth of my daughter, I didn’t touch a guy for over 10 years, but I always wanted to.
When it became clear that my wife was in a long term affair at work (and got me to do threesomes with the dude), I met a man (a Log Cabin Republican btw) who wanted me for a mostly sexual relationship, and insisted I stay married. That ended this year, four years after my wife’s death, when he told me “we don’t have a relationship”….
I’ve come to think a lot of men’s sexuality has to develop: most bisexual men eventually end up in male only relationships. I truly felt ‘bisexual’, enjoyed the woman and making love to her, but there was always this itch for a man’s love..My current partner was the same: a thirty year old virgin (and his name is Timothy Kincade too!) who was more of less grabbed by a strong willed woman, and didn’t come to terms with wanting men till his divorce 10 years later..
I’ve met an number of men who married and then came to terms with their sexuality. The evangelical line will encourage gay men like myself to marry, with bad results. I think this might be part of the fallacy of “don’t ask don’t tell”: 18-19 year-olds might not be aware of their sexuality, or not know themselves well enough to act on it.
They set it up for failure, and then blame Teh Gay.
Timothy Kincaid
October 3rd, 2008 | LINK
Quo,
You are right, we disagree.
I tend to follow the school of thought shared by all major mental health and medical organizations, all secural researchers (along with many religious ones), all gay organizations, and every gay person I’ve ever met in my life in thinking that orientation is not something one chooses.
You agree with 15% of lesbians in a non-scientific survey that choice may be involved.
Perhaps it was involved to some extent for those lesbians (whatever it was that they meant by “choice”) but otherwise I feel perfectly confident in stating that one does not choose one’s sexual orientation.
If you have some empirical evidence that one does choose their orientation, please provide it. Otherwise, we’re going to let this stream of discussion come to a halt.
Timothy Kincaid
October 3rd, 2008 | LINK
Mr. Bill,
Thank you for sharing that. I agree that much of the evangelical community no longer sees “being gay” as a choice, only behaving gay.
Ultimately, when that fully happens it is only a short time until we’ve won. Americans are a fair people, they don’t like mistreating folks for “what they can’t help”.
Mark
October 4th, 2008 | LINK
Yes, it’s pretty ignorant to think that having homosexual feelings is a “choice.” Ask any straight person if they could choose to be gay. Go ahead. Most will laugh. Of course, acting on feelings is certainly a choice.
12 New Stomach-Turning Revelations About Sarah Palin « Politics or Poppycock
October 10th, 2008 | LINK
[...] choice, sponsoring a conference to, ahem, pray the gay away. Such conferences are widely opposed by major medical associations. But good for you Sarah, for that one gay friend you’ve got that you totally don’t [...]
Leave A Comment