Box Turtle Bulletin

Prop 8 Donor Doug Manchester’s Sacred Marriage Is Ending

San Diego hotelier Doug Manchester, whose $125,000 donation to support California’s Prop 8 sparked a boycott against his Manchester Hyatt and San Diego Marriot hotels and Grand Del Mar and White Tail Club Resorts, is divorcing his wife of 43 years.

Manchester said he made his Prop 8 donation to “preserve marriage” because of “my Catholic faith and longtime affiliation with the Catholic Church” — the very same church that condemns divorce. His Catholic faith doesn’t restrain him from thumbing his nose at the Church in ending his own marriage, but it does serve as a convenient excuse for denying others the right to marry.  There’s a word for that, isn’t there?

Quarter of Iceland’s Population Turn Out For Reykjavik Pride

Imagine it:

The eleventh annual Reykjavik Gay Pride parade and outdoor concert with Pall Oskar (probably Iceland\’s biggest pop star) attracted about 80,000 people to the middle of Reykjavik on Saturday.

Involving roughly a quarter of Iceland\’s entire population, the sheer size of the party is tribute to Iceland\’s leading equal rights legislation and the citizens\’ inclusive nature.

This is what a truly post-gay society looks like:

Iceland does not have a gay village. It does not even have many gay bars and clubs at all. But that has nothing to do with Iceland being a strict, conservative society…quite the opposite in fact.

Peek into a Reykjavik gay bar on a Saturday night and you will see a clientele anything but exclusively gay. And if you think all the dozens of other bars in town are straight-only, think again. People in Reykjavik go partying in places dictated by their taste in music, their taste in décor or simply by their bossy friends. They do not need to choose a venue based only on their sexuality.

Washington Signatures “Too Close to Call”

After the confusion on validating signatures, many watching (myself included) were discouraged that the fail rate had dropped significantly below that needed to avoid a ballot referendum. But as more signatures are reviewed, that rate is slooooowly starting to increase. And it is reasonable to expect it to continue to rise.

From the Washington Secretary of State blog:

The error rate is expected to rise as the count continues, largely because the number of duplicate signatures will rise as the number of checked signatures rises. In order to qualify for the November ballot, sponsors of R-71 would have to stay below an error rate of 12.4 percent by the time the last signature is checked. State Elections Director Nick Handy said it remains “too close to call” whether R-71 will make the ballot, and cautioned against making assumptions based on the current error rate.

Currently 48,299 (35%) of signatures have been checked. Of those, 5,121 have been permanently invalidated for a cumulative fail rate of 10.60%. This is up from 10.39% fail rate at 25% completed.

But we have no way of knowing whether the signatures reviewed to date are representative of the selection as a whole.

they were bound in volumes of 15 petitions, with no particular order, either geographically or date in which they were gathered initially. Each bound volume was assigned a number and are being assigned to checkers in no particular order– luck of the draw.

What Does Ex-Gay Consolidation Mean?

Exodus International is growing. Or, to be exact, they are going to be taking over functions previously administered by other organizations.

The largest and best know of these is the Love Won Out conferences previously run by Focus on the Family. Blaming a lack of finances, Focus is reassigning the conferences to Exodus. This is a move that is logical and will probably help both organization focus on their own mission.

But there was another consolidation that occured last month that is even more interesting. on July 17, Focus’ news site CitizenLink announced:

One by One, an outreach equipping the Presbyterian and Reformed faith communities to compassionately and effectively address biblical sexuality and Transforming Congregations, a likeminded ministry to The United Methodist Church, announced plans to merge with Exodus International. Exodus is the world’s largest Christian outreach to those dealing with same-sex attraction.

Together, the ministries will form a new division under the leadership of Exodus that will equip church leaders worldwide to break the polarizing debate over homosexuality through an approach that is both biblically orthodox and truly compassionate.

One by One came out of a Presbyterian Church (PCUSA) conference in 1994. They are a ministry within the Presbyterian and Reformed faith communities and, as such, have traditions and religious perspectives that are a bit outside the fundamentalist/charasmatic/megachurch affiliations that seem to dominate Exodus’ spiritual sphere. One by One’s website expresses an intention to establish a church network, but there does not seem to be one in place. They seem, to my eyes at least, to be less harsh and less political than either Exodus or Transforming Congregations.

Transforming Congregations was founded in 1988 to address the issue of homosexuality within the United Methodist Church. At one time it had at least 75 congregations that affiliated with the organization. However, now Transforming Congregations is a national education and lobby group within the church and they have for some while left individual ministry to Exodus.

Over the years, we have found that to be impractical. A change in pastors or lay leadership often resulted in an “about face” on the issues of human sexuality. Because most of these churches did not request removal, it became virtually impossible to keep our list accurately updated. So now we refer folk to the Exodus International Church Network.

Neither organization appears to be focused primarily on individual one-on-one ministry or even on addressing the specific needs of same-sex attracted congregants. Rather, they seem to be organizations within their denominations that seek to support and encourage those who have an anti-gay theology and to encourage others who may not yet have addressed the issue of the roll of gay men and women within the body of faith.

One by One’s mission statement is:

OneByOne’s mission is to educate and equip the church to minister the transforming grace and power of Jesus Christ to those in conflict with their sexuality. OneByOne’s goal is therefore two-fold: (1) to serve as a resource for educational material; and (2) to help create and/or support local ministries to those struggling with sexual brokenness, including but not limited to homosexuality. OneByOne representatives are available to provide seminars and workshops for church leaders and/or members who want to learn how to minister Christ’s compassion without compromising Christ’s standards.

And that of Transforming Ministries is:

Our Purpose: Equipping the Church to model and minister sanctified sexuality through Biblical instruction … Personal and Public Witness … Compassionate Outreach

So it seems clear that Exodus is not merging with external collections of congregations to increase their base size. Nor are they establishing new relationships; these two organizations – along with Focus’ Love Won Out – already work closely with Exodus.

What they are getting, is two mainline denomination affiliated groups that are, as best I can tell, dropping the denomination affiliation and becoming a “project” of Exodus, an outreach to mainline churches under the Exodus label. They are picking up two voices for anti-gay theology from a mainline perspective.

Why?

I can, of course, only speculate. But here’s what I think is happening:

Mainline churches are adopting a welcoming and affirming approach to gay Christians at an astonishing rate. While neither the PC(USA) or the UMC are as fully inclusive as, say, the United Church of Christ or the Episcopal Church, they are steadily marching in that direction. “Compassionate” condemnation, such as that coming from such Presbyterians as Dr. Robert Gagnon or Methodists like Karen Booth is increasingly seen by their fellow worshipers as bigotry and outside of the message of Christ.

If I had to guess, I’d suppose that Exodus is recognizing that anti-gay activism is losing the home front. Perhaps they are wanting to let up on some of the anti-gay political activism and bolster their forces in the pews. And that may be reflected also in Exodus pulling a bit away from the highly political Focus on the Family.

So it may well be that these groups are experiencing fatigue and losing heart. Perhaps they think it best to retreat and consolidate resources so as to present one face of anti-gay protestant Christian response to same-sex attracted persons.

But that comes at a cost. Those who fight from without are never as strong as those who fight from within. I very much doubt that Exodus can be as effective a lobbyist on church policy in either the PC(USA) or the UMC as were One by One or Transforming Ministries. And neither organization was, frankly, doing that great of a job to begin with.

We’ll have to wait and see what eventually happens as a result of this transition.

It’s 2012 For California

Rex Wockner live-blogged it, and Equality California confirmed it. They hope to spend the time between now and 2012 “changing the hearts and minds of Californians” — specifically engaging LGBT communities of color and faith. Good plan. Both of those critical components were missing in 2008, and we all know where that got us.

Meanwhile, there’s a must-win campaign in Maine that really could use your help right now.

Longitudinal Ex-Gay Study Update – Can Sexual Orientation be Changed?

This week the American Psychological Association released a report that said that while religion and its value in a patient’s life should be considered and respected, therapists should not encourage clients to seek a change in sexual orientation and that there was no evidence to suggest that such efforts are successful.

This did not sit well with those organizations who build their existence on convincing their public that gay persons can “change” and that because such change is possible then public policy can be punitive to gay persons that do not submit themselves to such a change.

In response to the APA\’s Resolution on Appropriate Affirmative Responses To Sexual Orientation Distress and Change Efforts, NARTH (the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality) declared

They selected and interpreted studies that fit within their innate and immutable view. For example, they omitted the Jones and Yarhouse study, the Karten study, and only gave cursory attention to the Spitzer study. Had the task force been more neutral in their approach, they could have arrived at only one conclusion: homosexuality is not invariable fixed in all people, and some people can and do change, not just in terms of behavior and identity but in core features of sexual orientation such as fantasy and attractions.

And Alan Chambers, president of Exodus International spoke to USA Today.

Its president, Alan Chambers, describes himself as someone who “overcame unwanted same-sex attraction.” He and other evangelicals met with APA representatives after the task force formed in 2007, and he expressed satisfaction with parts of the report that emerged.

“It’s a positive step — simply respecting someone’s faith is a huge leap in the right direction,” Chambers said. “But I’d go further. Don’t deny the possibility that someone’s feelings might change.”

So it was with great joy that those opposed to equality received news of evidence of change. The Baptist Press is crowing. Just “four days after an American Psychological Association task force released a 130-page report that said “gay-to-straight” therapies are unlikely to work”, they are trumpeting some amazing results of a study on Exodus International and their ex-gay ministries.

In findings that directly contradict mainstream academic thought, 53 percent of subjects in a new seven-year study reported successfully leaving homosexuality and living happily as heterosexual or celibate persons.

These “latest findings” are actually an update of the multi-year study of participants in Exodus ministries presented by Stanton Jones and Mark Yarhouse in their 2007 book, Ex-Gays? A Longitudinal Study of Religiously Mediated Change in Sexual Orientation.

The authors were not pleased that the study which they proclaimed throughout Christian media as an evidence of change in sexual orientation did not convince the APA.

“They selectively apply rigorous scientific standards,” he said. “So when it comes to examining the evidence that sexual orientation change can occur, they apply extraordinarily rigorous standards, and those standards allow them to disregard significant evidence that sexual orientation change can occur. That’s what happens with our study. They, I think, invalidly applied several methodological concerns to dismiss our study.

Indeed, the APA did apply concerns and dismiss the study.

Dr. Judith Glassgold, a clinical psychologist who led the APA task force, said the paper was not written in response to Dr. Jones’ work, though it did dismiss his findings.

“We don’t believe the claims were proven, to be honest,” said Dr. Glassgold in an interview. “In our looking at all the research we find that people don’t change their underlying sexual attraction. What they do is figure out a way to control their attractions. And some learn to live a heterosexual life but mostly for religious motivation.”

Presented as a counter-point to the APA’s declaration that there is inadequate evidence that therapies designed to change sexual orientation are effective, Jones and Yarhouse argue that:

the findings of this study would appear to contradict that commonly expressed view of the mental health establishment that sexual orientation is not changeable and that the attempt to change is highly likely to produce harm for those who make such an attempt.

I won’t speak to the likelihood of harm, but when it comes to change in orientation, their study convinced me of exactly the opposite.

When the Jones and Yarhouse book, was released in 2007, we hosted an exchange between Jim Burroway, BTB’s editor, and Stanton Jones.

My synopsis of the results, as published in the book, was

the Jones and Yarhouse study revealed little to no statistically measurable change in orientation in the prospective sample. The much touted “successes” were either in recollection (which again were quite small) or were those who had decided to no longer call themselves “gay”. However, they still identified their orientation as homosexual (“I\’m not gay but my attractions are”).

In short, the Jones and Yarhouse study was funded and fully supported by Exodus and conducted by two researchers who were avid supporters of ex-gay ministries. They wanted to study 300 participants, but after more than a year, they could only find 57 willing to participate. They then changed the rules for acceptance in order to increase the total to 98. After following this sample for 4 years, 25 dropped out. Of the remainder, only 11 reported “satisfactory, if not uncomplicated, heterosexual adjustment.” Another 17 decided that a lifetime of celibacy was good enough.

What the 2007 Jones and Yarhouse book revealed, and what this update further confirms, is that the “change” which NARTH and Exodus loudly proclaim is not a change in sexual orientation at all and, in fact, may be nothing more that a change in identity or recollection.

Prospective v. Retrospective
In order to understand the J&Y study, you have to understand the distinction between retrospective and prospective sampling. Prospective uses currently measured data, and retrospective uses recollections about the past.

For example, if one were wanting to compare changes in the length that a student has to walk in their morning commute to school, a prospective study would select a random sample (say a selection of schools), measure the distance the students walked, and repeat the process over a long enough period of time to determine if there is change. A retrospective study would go ask Grandpa and compare today’s walking distance to “ten miles through the snow, barefoot, uphill both ways!”

Obviously, measured differences are far more accurate than recollected differences. Time has a way of providing support for what we want to believe and recollections tend to be very selective. Things were simpler then, or tougher; summers were hotter, or milder; politicians were more honest, or scoundrels.

So the best studies are prospective rather than retrospective. Oddly, the J&Y study is both.

Of the 98 participants, 57 were more-or-less prospective. These were persons who had been involved with an Exodus (ex-gay) ministry for less than a year. So while there may have been some recollection error, it was at least a discussion of reasonably recent events. These participants are called Phase 1.

Unable to get a sample size that the authors felt was sufficient, they then recruited Exodus participants that had been in the programs for one to three years. These participants are called Phase 2 and to the extent that there is a measurement from a recollected starting point, their participation is retrospective.

Fortunately, it is possible to distinguish between the results for these two groups.

The Update
The paper presented by Jones and Yarhouse to the APA is significantly less detailed than was their book, as could be expected. Specifically, the several scales of measurement were reduced to two, Kinsey and Shively & DeCecco, and while the book provided information on interim points, the paper uses only the starting point (T1) and the final point (T6).

The results in the book are based on 75 of the original 98 participants. Since J&Y presented their results in their book, an additional 14 participants have dropped out of the study, bringing the sample size down to 61. The remaining participants have now been part of the study for six to seven years.

The Results
Because the total sample is a hodge-podge of two very different subpopulations, it is informative only to the extent that it reveals information about the difference between those subpopulations.

The group that is most accurately studied, and that whose results are most revealing about the extent to which Exodus is successful is Phase 1, the prospective study. And this is what Jones and Yarhouse report about that subpopulation:

• There was, on average, virtually no change in sexual orientation on the Kinsey scale using measures of behavior, sexual attraction, emotional/romantic attraction, and fantasy.
• There was, on average, a small but not significant increase in homosexual behavior.
• There was, on average, a slight but not significant reduction in homosexual attraction.
• There was, on average, virtually no increase in heterosexual attraction.

In other words, on average, after six to seven years of participation, those who went through Exodus ministries reported over the period of their involvement no change in sexual orientation at all.

Averages v. Individuals
Averages, while meaningful to statisticians and to those who are evaluating the effectiveness of Exodus International, do not tell the full story. We must also look at individual results.

For their book, Jones and Yarhouse classified their participants into categories based on their individual reports. They came from a religious evaluation model and defined two groups as successful (conversions and chaste), two as failure (identifying as gay and considering identifying as gay), and two in the middle that were still trying but seeing little to no results. For the final report, the authors changed their procedure and allowed participants to select their own category.

As I am less interested in adherence to religious identities and more interested in sexual orientation change, I’ll group the failure and the middle two together. After time T6, J&Y report:

Success: Conversion – 14 (23%)
Success: Chastity – 18 (30%)
Non-Success – 29 (48%)

This does not, however, present an accurate story of the study participants. It does not account for those who dropped out of participation and thus overstates the success rates. One could extrapolate from this reporting method that eventually only those who are successes of some sort will remain and the authors could declare with great fanfare that 100% of all Exodus participants eventually succeed.

But that would not be truthful.

When I made the observation that drop-outs should be considered a likely failure, those who defended the skewing upward of success rates argued that because we don’t know the reasons for discontinued participation, it was just as easy to believe that these individuals were now happily heterosexually married and not wanting to be reminded of their old life as that they had embraced a gay identity. But additional information in this report reveals otherwise.

Of the 14 persons who left the study between T3 and T6, two were Conversion, one was Chastity, and the remaining were Non-success. We know from the book that one of the Conversion drop-outs reported that he had never been heterosexual and was simply reporting what he thought the authors wanted to hear. So it is rather unlikely that these drop-outs went off to live heterosexual lives. Nor is it (or ever was it) likely that any sizable chunk of those who dropped out before T3 left because they are now happily hetero.

Considering drop-outs as their own category, a more accurate reporting of the self-identified placement into categories would look like this:

Success: Conversion – 14 (14%)
Success: Chastity – 18 (18%)
Non-Success – 29 (30%)
Drop-Outs – 37 (38%)

And considering just the Phase 1 participants, the results are

Success: Conversion – 5 (9%)
Success: Chastity – 6 (11%)
Non-Success – 18 (32%)
Drop-Outs – 28 (49%)

When looking at these numbers, we should consider two things about the “conversion” category shown above.

First, much of Exodus’ efforts go into changing identity. They view a “gay identity” as sinful and contrary to a “Christian identity”.

So this change in identity may not be related to an actual change in orientation. As I noted above, the first measurement of “change” reported in the book – the one trumpeted in anti-gay press upon the book’s press release – was a change in self identification. Yet is was accompanied by a measurement that spoke of one’s orientation as separate from one’s identity and found that those who claimed that they were not homosexual were willing to admit that their orientation is homosexual. It was literally a declaration that, “I’m not gay but my orientation is.”

We should be careful to recognize that those claiming conversion at T6 may be doing so for themselves and not for their orientations. The authors do acknowledge that such success may be seen as relating more to identity than to orientation:

Some may see these results as reflecting not a change in sexual orientation for most participants who reported such change, but rather a change in sexual identity. Such a change might result from how one thinks of oneself and labels one\’s sexual preferences (that is, attributions and meaning-making).

But with Exodus placing heavy emphasis on identity, by allowing unanalyzed self-assignment the authors may have created a scenario in which there is an inflated increase in the “success” categories.

And second, this report differs from the book in that the qualifiers are removed. The book provided discussion of the non-traditional definitions of “heterosexual” used in the study and how those who were so identified also experienced wandering eyes, erotic dreams, and other situations that are most often associated with a homosexual orientation. In the paper, it is limited to

[W]hile we found that part of our research population experienced success to the degree that it might be called (as we have here) “conversion,” our evidence does not indicate that these changes are categorical, resulting in uncomplicated, dichotomous and unequivocal reversal of sexual orientation from utterly homosexual to utterly heterosexual. Most of the individuals who reported that they were heterosexual at T6 did not report themselves to be without experience of homosexual arousal, and they did not report their heterosexual orientation to be unequivocal and uncomplicated.

I don’t think that I’m alone in noting that few of the heterosexuals that I know experience much homosexual arousal. Perhaps Stanton Jones himself said it best in an interview.

“A typical hetero male finds himself attracted to a wide range of females. But among the successful people who reported conversion the typical response was I’m very happy with my sexual responses to my wife, but I don’t experience much hetero attraction to other women. Also, when asked and pressed about whether they still find attraction to men, they will say: ‘Yes, if I let my mind go in that direction.’ “

And finally, when comparing the individual with the average, it must be noted that without an average change, any individual change experienced is offset by an equal and opposite experience.

In other words, for every person who came to Exodus and found that they became one Kinsey point more heterosexual, there was a person who found that Exodus made them one Kinsey point gayer. If Exodus sees their mission as rescuing those sinking in a sea of sin, for each person they pull into the lifeboat, they hit another over the head with an oar.

Failure to report Phase 2 Results
Jones and Yarhouse report the “whole population”, a commingled combination of Phase 1 and Phase 2 as though it is informative. While they do break out Phase 1 results, they do not disclose Phase 2 results.

I believe that were Phase 1 to be visually compared to Phase 2, the variances between the two would be startling. The question jumping out from the report might shift from whether there is a significant effect size in responses to why these two subpopulations are reporting opposite conclusions.

And, indeed, the results from Phase 2 can be deduced to be significantly different from Phase 1. If we know the average response of the 29 remaining participants in Phase 1 and the total average responses of all 61 remaining participants, we can back into the Phase 2 reported change.

A comparison of the two would show:

Kinsey – behavior only
P1, -0.21
P2, 1.79

Kinsey Expanded
P1, 0.55
P2, 1.01

Shively & DeCecco homo
P1, 0.40
P2, 0.99

Shively & DeCecco hetero
P1, 0.05
P2, 0.62

As we can see, there are sharp differences in the results of these two subpopulations. And although no information on Phase 2 is directly reported, the authors somewhat acknowledge that the two subpopulations vary in results

We expected that the results of change would be somewhat less positive in [Phase 1], as individuals experiencing difficulty with change would be likely to get frustrated or discouraged early on and drop out.

That is a round-about way of admitting that the Phase 2 subpopulation does not include those who got frustrated early and dropped out in the first one to three years. It avoids pointing out that results for the Phase 2 subpopulation are already skewed towards those who either believe they are experiencing “change” or have a stronger more deeply dedicated commitment to Exodus ministries.

But even so, with such astounding results in this subpopulation, why wouldn’t the authors include this separate information. It may be that isolation of Phase 2 raises questions about the validity of including them at all and, more importantly, what it says about the claims made by Exodus members both included and not included in the study.

The real difference between Phase 1 and Phase 2 is more than just that P2 has been in the program for a few more years. It is more than that they have fewer drop outs. The real difference is that P2 is based on recollection to a much greater extent than P1.

And Phase 2 participants recalled being more gay than Phase 1 reported. Significantly, especially in the area of behavior. The Kinsey 1 report was 4.52 for Phase 1 and 5.49 for Phase 2.

There is no reason to believe that those in Phase 2, having eliminated the drop outs, actually were any more homosexually oriented than those in Phase 1. Rather, it seems likely that they simply recalled being more homosexually oriented when they established their base point some one to three years later.

So all reported change in Phase 2 – and indeed all reported change – may be attributable to this variance in starting point due to reliance on recollection. Ultimately, all of Jones’ and Yarhouse’s announced success may be nothing more than, “I remember being much more gay three years ago than I am today.”

Truly Gay
The one subpopulation that Jones and Yarhouse are excited about is what they call the “truly gay subpopulation.” These are defined as those who “scored above the scale midpoint at T1 for homosexual attraction, and for homosexual behavior in the past, and for having previously embraced full homosexual or gay identity.” This subgroup reported the most change.

It is difficult to know whether these persons are mostly Phase 1 or Phase 2, but it would appear that they are a combination of both. We know from the break out of results in the book that a number of the non-successes in the truly gay subpopulation were also Phase 1. This lends itself to assumptions that those in the truly gay subpopulation that reported progress were likely in Phase 2 and that much, if not all, of their progress consisted solely of exaggerated recollection.

This is further supported by noting that most of the change reported over the seven year life of the study was between the first measurement (often as recollected) and the second. In discussing the possibility that reported change is largely identity, the authors noted:

This might also explain to some why the Truly Gay subpopulation showed more dramatic change, as their shift was away from a more pronounced gay identity. Such a departure may have been measured as a greater movement away from something that had previously been more salient to them.

Or, more likely, a greater movement away from the recollection of being very gay three years ago.

Conclusions
Based on the Jones and Yarhouse book, Ex-Gays? A Longitudinal Study of Religiously Mediated Change in Sexual Orientation, and on their follow up report, Ex-Gays? An Extended Longitudinal Study of Religiously Mediated Change in Sexual Orientation, we can observe the following:

• The prospective sample reported, on average, virtually no change in attractions and a small increase in homosexual behavior.
• A retrospective look at ones perceptions of prior orientation from the perspective of one to three years yields a sharply different result from that seen by a prospective sample. This change in perspective may account for all reported change in Exodus ministries.
• Most change reported away from homosexuality and towards heterosexuality was in the interval between the starting point (T1) and the second measurement point (T2). This change occurred most strongly in the retrospective sample and may be due to variances in recollection.
• A combined prospective and retrospective sample experienced, on average, no significant increase in opposite sex attraction.
• A small percentage (perhaps 9%) of those who start Exodus programs may eventually self-categorize themselves as “experiencing substantial reductions in homosexual attraction and substantial conversion to heterosexual attraction and functioning. These persons will be unlike other heterosexuals in that they will continue to experience homosexual arousal and not experience much attraction to the opposite sex.
• Another small percentage (perhaps 11%) of those who start Exodus programs may eventually achieve a life of manageable homosexual attraction and chastity.
• Others may continue perpetually in Exodus programs without ever achieving any significantly reduced homosexual attractions.
• Eventually, most of those who start Exodus programs will drop out.
• On average, for each person who enters and Exodus program and finds any movement away from homosexual attraction, another will find movement towards homosexual attraction.

But these observations are not readily obvious from the media reports of either the 2007 Jones and Yarhouse book nor this follow-up report. And those seeking “proof” that homosexuals can “change” have used both to advance a false image of the results of this study. Exodus, NARTH, and many others will spin this study to come to conclusions that are far from of those I’ve stated above.

The authors have a moral responsibility to discourage those who will make false statements or who will falsely claim that this study justifies their ex-gay or anti-gay endeavors. And they have a moral obligation not to allow their wishes about the mutability of sexual orientation cloud the results of their study and give false hope to those who believe Exodus’ slogan that “change is possible”.

Gay Sex Causes Swine Flu

So says the Malaysian government’s official news agency:

Avoiding masturbation and homosexual activities are among preventive measures one could take against Influenza A (H1N1), according to an eminent practitioner of complimentary therapy. Dr. V. M. Palaniappan said that such activities caused the body to develop friction heat which in turn, produced acid and made the body hyperacidised. “Thus, the body becomes an easy target for H1N1 infection,” he told Bernama, emphasising however, that normal sexual union between members of the opposite sex was absolutely safe.

[via RawStory]

Referendum 71 Supporters Seek to Keep Donors Private

The organization seeking to stop the implementation of Washington State’s legislative enhancement of domestic partnership is seeking to do so outside the glare of public scrutiny. They successfully delayed the release of the names of signatories to the petition until a hearing in September, but that isn’t enough.

Now they are seeking to keep its donors private. (Seattle PI)

Protect Marriage Washington last week asked the PDC to hold an emergency hearing because it said there had been violent threats against churches, property and supporters of the campaign. The group said such threats had been forwarded to the FBI.

I’ve not seen these, and they may be real. But in the past, such “threats” have generally turned out to not actually be violent threats at all once reviewed but rather a “threat” of a boycott or simply hate mail of the “I hope you die and rot in hell” variety.

And the request for anonymity does not sound promising at the moment.

Doug Ellis, assistant PDC director, said the agency would not hold an emergency hearing but rather listen to R-71 backers at its next regular meeting, which is Aug. 27. Ellis said transparency is expected in election financing.

“It’s a hurdle that they are going to have to jump to be able to say that the public doesn’t have a right to know who is financing their campaigns,” Ellis said Tuesday

Love Won Out Taken Over by Exodus

The Washington Blade is reporting:

Facing a $6 million budget shortfall, Focus on the Family is shifting control of its Love Won Out conference to an outside organization.

Exodus International, a group that claims people can overcome unwanted same-sex attractions with the help of its ministry, announced Tuesday it will take control of the program starting in November.

“Exodus is the ideal organization to transition Love Won Out to,” said Melissa Fryrear, director of Love Won Out. She noted that Focus on the Family and Exodus have been closely aligned for years.

Funny. I’d noticed that also.

Washington’s New Reporting

The Washington Secretary of State has a new reporting method by which they will wait until supervisors have reviewed and corrected the rejections made by checkers of signatures before they post the results. Based on the finalized review so far, 33,214 have been checked and 3,450 rejected for a fail rate of 10.39%.

Unless the remaining three quarters of signatures are very different from the first quarter, this referendum will qualify for the ballot. And it may set a new record for cleanest petition ever submitted in the state.

At present there is no way to determine if the signatures are being reviewed in any particular order. If they are in collection order, then there is a possibility that they will be less clean as time goes on.

Tim Horton’s Drops NOM Fundraiser

According to this statement:

Recently, Tim Hortons was approached in Rhode Island to provide free coffee and products for a local event, as we do thousands of times a year across Canada and the United States.

For 45 years, Tim Hortons and its store owners have practiced a philosophy of giving back to the communities in which we operate. As a company, our primary focus is on helping children and supporting fundraising events for non-profit organizations and registered charities.

For this reason, Tim Hortons has not sponsored those representing religious groups, political affiliates or lobby groups.

It has come to our attention that the Rhode Island event organizer and purpose of the event fall outside of our sponsorship guidelines. As such, Tim Hortons can not provide support at the event.

Tim Hortons and its store owners have always welcomed all families and communities to its restaurants and will continue to do so. We apologize for any misunderstanding or inconvenience this may have caused.

Congratulations! Your calls and emails made a difference.

Alan Stang Died

You may be forgiven if you’ve never heard of him. I wrote this as an introduction when I awarded Alan Stang the LaBarbera Award two years ago:

When I was in high school, a local AM radio station in my hometown used to carry a five-minute program called the “Alan Stang Report” produced by the John Birch Society. The program began with Alan Stang\’s menacing voice announcing “This is Alan Stang… Stick Around!” before going to a brief commercial for the local sponsor (a candy and tobacco distributor). And he\’d always end his report with “This is Alan Stang… Think about it!” In between, you\’d hear another revelation from the strangest collection of conspiracy theories imaginable.

According to Alan Stang, Gerald Ford was a communist. So was his vice president, Nelson Rockefeller. Jimmy Carter and Walter Mondale were communists too. By the time Ronald Reagan was in office, I was in college so I never found out whether he was a communist or not.

Alan Stang's "Not Holier Than Thou"

I gave Stang the LaBarbera award for his book, Not Holier Than Thou: How Queer is Bush?. Communists as bogeymen was so 1990; it was now the homosexuals’ turn. Maybe if I had “stuck around” to listen to his earlier reports on the radio, I might have learned that Ronald Reagan was our first “homosexual” president, as was just about every president since then. Who knew?

And in case you had any doubts about Alan Stang’s sanity, you have Paul Cameron to vouch for him. Cameron wrote the foreword to Stang’s 2007 self-published book, in which he congratulates Stang and the reader for having “figured it all out.” Amazingly, Cameron’s foreword was the most sensible piece in the book, even though it was the same loony paranoia we’ve come to expect from him.

But where Cameron’s forward was relatively conventional as paranoia goes, the rest of Stang’s book was simply an unreadable mess. I wasn’t able to get much further than the first chapter. It reads more or less like his web site. Check out his post on McCain’s Sodomites, just to give you an idea.

But I didn’t know any of that when I sent away for his book shortly after having given him the LaBarbera Award. He may have been 78 75 at the time, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t know his Google. He left a personal inscription in the copy he sent me, making him one of the few people I’ve written about who knows how to appreciate an award.

I missed his obituary in World Net Daily. He passed away on July 19, at the age of 77 80 (WND incorrectly gives his age at 77). Lew Rockwell, the alleged ghost writer of Congressman Ron Paul’s anti-gay newsletters, eulogized Stang as a fighter who “never stopped punching. What a spirit he had.” An anonymous writer for the John Birch Society remembered him as one of their more popular speakers — as well as a former ballroom dance teacher. Interesting, the things you learn when someone passes away. It’s a shame, though, that Stang went to his grave without his own Wikipedia page. Now the larger world may never learn that the Republican Party was “red from the start.”

Confusion in Washington – Anti-Gay Petition May be Valid

We were tracking and reporting on the Washington Secretary of State’s efforts to verify signatures presented for Referendum 71, a response to the legislature’s extension of benefits to domestic partners. And we were reporting that the petitions did not appear to have an adequate validation rate to make it to the ballot.

But we were under the mistaken assumption that the Washington Secretary of State was reporting the final determination of each signature. It turns out that they were reporting tentative rejections and not those who had been validated at the supervisor level. And the supervisors have reinstated enough signatures to significantly reduce the rejection rate.

As of the Friday day shift, the state has reviewed 35,296 signatures and rejected 4,063, a rejection rate of 11.51%. If correct, this would be a rejection rate low enough to allow the referendum to reach the ballot. If what I have read is correct, it would also set a record for the cleanest petition ever.

However, I’m not puting too much faith in this calculation. Currently the state is reporting a total number of signatures checked that is lower than the sum of those checked on a daily basis. This suggests to me that the reporting process is ruled by confusion.

Popular Doughnut Chain Sponsors Anti-Gay Fundraiser

The Providence Daily Dose is reporting that Tim Horton’s, a popular Canada-based doughnut chain with hundreds of franchises in the Northeast and upper Midwest of the United States, is sponsoring the  National Organization for Marriage\’s “Celebrate Marriage and Family Day” fundraiser on August 16 in suburban Providence, Rhode Island.

Tim Horton’s is simultaneously Canada’s largest coffeehouse chain and largest doughnut chain, and has had an expanding presence in the United States for more than a decade. The chain’s corporate policy bans sponsoring “individuals, those representing religious groups, political affiliates, book endorsements or traveling sports teams.” However, there’s a loophole in that policy, which allows local franchisees to donate as they please. Which means that their corporate policy has no teeth to it whatsoever. You can contact Tim Horton’s to let them know what you think of their policy.

Update: Tim Horton’s pulls out of the fundraiser.

Thousands Defy Threats To Rally In Tel Aviv

About 25,000 people rally in Tel Aviv's Rabin Square. (Yael Golan/Ynet)

About 25,000 people rallied in Tel Aviv’s Rabin Square Saturday night to remember the victims of last week’s shooting spree at an LGBT youth center that left two people dead and injured about a dozen others. The rally took place despite threats of more violence:

The rally was preceded by a number of threats against the gay community. Earlier Saturday, a soldier in the Israel Defense Forces’ Nahal Haredi unit was arrested on suspicion that he had threatened rally organizers on an online forum.

While in custody, the soldier confessed to making the threats.

Meanwhile, operators of transportation to the Tel Aviv rally received telephone threats from an anonymous caller who warned that grenades will be hurled at attendants of the rally.

Barak Atar, the head of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender (GLBT) chapter in Be’er Sheva, who organized transportation from the southern city to Tel Aviv for the rally, said that “at 2 P.M. we got a call from someone asking where the pickup for the ride to the rally was. We answered him and asked if he was coming, and he said ‘I’ll be there – with grenades.'”

Another bus organizer in Be’er Sheva as well as one in Haifa reported similar threats of grenade attacks. Police are investigating the source of the calls.

Thousands defy threats in Tel Aviv (AFP)

The threats didn’t appear to dampen the rally. Tel Aviv Mayor Ron Huldai opened the rally with a speech that paraphrased Harvey Milk’s famous quote, “If a bullet should enter my brain, let that bullet destroy every closet door.” Mayor Huldai called for a wider impact of those bullets in Tel Aviv, saying, “We must legislate and call out loudly: No more incitement. We would like today for the bullets that pierced Liz and Nir to be the bullets that break through the walls of hatred and ignorance in our society.”

Shimon Peres speaking at the rally. (Ofer Amram/Ynet)

Israel President Shimon Peres also spoke at the rally. He called Israel “the nation of ‘Thou shalt not kill'” and added “Those shots hurt us all, as Jews and as Israelis.” Other speakers included two who were injured during the attack:

Uri Gil, who was injured during the attack on the center, took the stage at the rally together with his friend Chen Langer and said, “That place was a warm and loving home for them and they met wonderful people there.”

“This past week I have been haunted by nightly fear, especially when I think that the murderer is walking around out there,” he added. “No murderer will keep us in the closet.”

Chen Langer, a youth counselor at the center who was also injured in the attack, arrived in a wheelchair and spoke after Gil. “This is the day in which we cease to be silent, to hide, and to alter the appearance of reality.”

Langer tearfully added, “The home that was a place of security for youths became a slaughterhouse of youths.”

Also attending the event were Education Minister Gideon Sa’ar, Culture and Sport Minister Limor Livnat, and openly gay Knesset member Nitzan Horowitz. Several musicians performed at the rally, including Rita, Dana International, Ninet Tayeb, Amir Fay Guttman, Keren Peles, Corinne Alal and Ivri Lider. The rally was organized by Gal Uchovsky, a gay film producer and TV personality.

Prime Minister Netanyahu at the Tel Aviv LGBT Center (Jerusalem Post)

On Thursday, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyaho visited the re-opened LGBT center, where he said the attack “bears the mark of terrorism“:

The idea of someone entering a youth club and beginning to commit serial murder – it bears the markings of a terror attack,” he said.

The premier said he believed stereotyping and denigrating people was wrong and unacceptable.

“We are all created in God’s image. We all have fundamental rights, the first of which is to be treated with respect by others and give [them] the same respect,” he said.

“Anyone who has suffered from baseless hatred, as an individual or in a group, knows how painful and unacceptable it is. This is something we must uproot from society as much as possible,” he added. “I think Israeli society has made progress toward tolerance, and I hope and feel certain that we can make further progress.”

Nir Katz (top) and Liz Trubeshi (bottom)

Two were killed in last weekend’s attack on the Tel Aviv LGBT center, which was conducting a support meeting for gay youth. The dead were identified as 26-year-old Nir Katz from Givatayim, who was a counselor at the center, and 17-year-old Liz Trubeshi from Holom, who was attending the LGBT youth support meeting as a straight ally. They were killed when a lone gunman dressed in black and wearing a black mask entered the center and sprayed the meeting room with bullets from an automatic weapon. The gunman then fled on foot. Despite a city-wide manhunt, he has not been found.