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For Our Opponents: Talking to Your Kids About Same-Sex Marriage
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The Daily Agenda for Sunday, June 16
The Daily Agenda for Saturday, June 15
The Daily Agenda for Friday, June 14
South Africa Teen’s Death Shows It’s Time to Ban Ex-gay Therapy Everywhere
Featured Reports
What Are Little Boys Made Of?
In this original BTB Investigation, we unveil the tragic story of Kirk Murphy, a four-year-old boy who was treated for “cross-gender disturbance” in 1970 by a young grad student by the name of George Rekers. This story is a stark reminder that there are severe and damaging consequences when therapists try to ensure that boys will be boys.
Slouching Towards Kampala: Uganda’s Deadly Embrace of Hate
When we first reported on three American anti-gay activists traveling to Kampala for a three-day conference, we had no idea that it would be the first report of a long string of events leading to a proposal to institute the death penalty for LGBT people. But that is exactly what happened. In this report, we review our collection of more than 500 posts to tell the story of one nation’s embrace of hatred toward gay people. This report will be updated continuously as events continue to unfold. Check here for the latest updates.
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"
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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Mary in Austin
January 20th, 2012 | LINK
This Jim Reynolds is an absolute creep. Nobody with the slightest degree of human sensitivity calls anybody a leper any more. Hansen’s Disease patients are called people with Hansen’s Disease. The word leper is stigmatizing from the word go, and to use it to express his disgust with others’ sexual orientations is just obnoxious.
Sharon
January 21st, 2012 | LINK
For (at least some) evangelicals, the word “leper” doesn’t trigger thoughts of “unclean! unclean!”, it triggers thoughts of “those whom general religious society despised, but Jesus embraced”. The title is definitely open to interpretation, but perhaps that is the way it was intended? Something like the idea that religious leaders have been shunning LGBT people, when Jesus would have embraced them?
At least I hope that’s what was meant… but since I haven’t read the book or gone to the conference, I don’t know.
Jonathan
January 22nd, 2012 | LINK
Before calling this man a “creep”, perhaps one should take the time to know that the word “leper” is used to describe the shameful way the church has treated LGBTs. He does not use the word to express his disgust. He has none.
I’m also sorry for the way this issue has often been approached by the church, and hope that efforts such as his will not continue to be misunderstood and miscategorized as hateful.
Jim Burroway
January 22nd, 2012 | LINK
I am always astounded at incredible hubris of those who presume to decide what names are appropriate for other people and who then try to dictate to other people whether they should be offended or not, Calling people lepers are offensive. Just ask people who have Hanson’s disease. They rejected the terms “lepers” a “leprosy” generations ago.
You say Reynolds has no “disgust” for gay people. He does however hold gay people contempt. No one I know applies a label to other people that other people find offensive and reserves the right for themselves to dismiss the offense. Please. We are not to be patronized as poor, pathetic, miserable creatures will be grateful when the church replaces its prior impulse to outcast with a new-found understanding that pity is better. It is not.
If people want to avoid what you call “misunderstanding and miscategorizing as hateful,” then the solution could not be more simple: stop talking about people in ways they find offensive. And stop being patronizing.
Regan DuCasse
January 22nd, 2012 | LINK
Thank you Jim! You took the thunder I was preparing for Jonathan. Those that have been abused, marginalized, kept from their full civil and human potential ARE given names and designations specifically to demonize, humiliate and dehumanize them.
And we KNOW what they are, and why they are used.
And it’s RIGHT to take offense, because OFFENSE WAS MEANT.
Bigots tend to have some common behaviors. I will explicate.
1. Treating their target like bad children. Condescending language, the scold, and very low expectations.
2. Quick denial that this is their behavior and cowardice in owning it and acknowledging it’s damaging and terrible result.
3. Also quick to condemn the legitimate emotions from such treatment, such as anger, pain, resentment and challenge. After all, children are not supposed to respond that way, regardless of what is deliberately inflicted on them. Abusive, controlling and violent parents behave that way. Gay people are supposed to fear and never challenge those who want to control their lives. And they don’t like it when gay adults, actually ACT like self reliant adults.
It’s not wrong to take offense at this leper analogy, it’s wrong to expect the target of the offense to NOT take it exactly as anyone would and be pissed off about it.
Timothy Kincaid
January 23rd, 2012 | LINK
Jim,
I would agree if the book is written to gay people and for gay people, it would be unquestionably offensive. But if written to the church and about what the church should do, then the offense is inferred and not implied.
Within Evangelical Christianity, “leper” has the religious connotations that Sharon and Jonathan have suggested. It has strong associations with pity and caring. Mostly in terms of healing the ones that society rejects.
Of course, there are also mounds of self-righteous “look how good I am” and heaps of superiority. And yeah, in objective terms, it is offensive to say “you are society’s rejects, but I’ll love little pathetic you until Jesus heals you”.
I suspect that Reynolds isn’t intending to be offensive. He wants to be loving, he just wants to do it in terms that justify his positions and beliefs.
And I suspect that unlike, say, Andrew Marin, Reynold’s exposer to The Homosexual is probably limited to ex-gays and their perspective.
Jim Burroway
January 23rd, 2012 | LINK
I don’t think it matters whether the offense if implied, inferred, or directed. The offense exists: people are offended. If Reynolds were serious about not wanting to offend, he could apologize. He could, further, explain to his target audience, that he has learned that comparing gay people to lepers is offensive to gay people (and, incidentally, to “lepers,” who point out that they are people first, suffering from Hanson’s disease).
Unfortunately, I see none of that. So if the offense was once only inferred, I think it is safe to say that it is now implied.
William
January 23rd, 2012 | LINK
Actually, I couldn’t care less what he calls us or with whom he compares us. His message is that gays are people who “struggle with same-sex sins” and who need to be “healed”. That pernicious message is to be firmly rejected, no matter in what terms he chooses to express it.
Timothy Kincaid
January 23rd, 2012 | LINK
As he probably only is in contact with strugglers, do you know if anyone has pointed out to him that he’s being offensive with that title? I know it may seem a bit odd, but he really might not know.
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