Whenever I want to visit a fantasy world I check out sites like AFA, CWFA, Focus on the Family or Wing Nut Daily. The lunacy and fabrication of false story lines is often nearly breath taking. Today was no exception when I went to Wing Nut Daily and found the latest so-called book by (in my view, the seriously disturbed) Judith Reisman (pictured at left). Her latest diatribe on Alfred Kinsey is entitled "Sexual Sabotage: How One Mad Scientist Unleashed a Plague of Corruption and Contagion on America." Indeed, Reisman has made a full time job out of trashing Kinsey, gays and anyone who doesn't subscribe to her particular views/beliefs on sexuality. It would almost be funny except for the fact that as reported by the New Yorker, under prior Republican administrations Reisman made out like a bandit in terms of tax moneys received for bogus research (she was given seven hundred and thirty-four thousand dollars by Ronald Reagan’s Justice Department to study pornography). Reisman's latest screed allegedly:*
documents how Kinsey refused to hire Jews, blacks, Catholics or anyone with religious or ethical beliefs, forced his own research team to reveal their innermost sexual secrets, subjecting themselves to blackmail and humiliation, and manipulated and manufactured data to persuade Americans to abandon their sexual mores and commitments to marriage, family and fidelity.
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The sad truth, however, is that Reisman is nothing short of crazy and in need of some heavy meds and no small amount of mental health intervention. That she is a doyenne of the far right speaks volumes about the fantasy based world in which the theocrats live. The New Yorker describes her as follows:
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Most Americans no longer give much thought to Kinsey as a societal force, but his detractors believe that his significance can hardly be overstated. A recent newsletter of the abstinence-education group Why know? compared the publication of “The Kinsey Report,” in 1948, to the attacks of September 11th, and labelled Kinseyism “fifty years of cultural terrorism.” Judith Reisman is the founder of the modern anti-Kinsey movement.
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In one article, Reisman describes Kinsey as “a scientific and moral fraud, a certifiable sexual psychopath as well as a sadomasochistic pornography addict and a sexually harassing bully.” Though largely unknown outside social-conservative circles, Reisman has been influential within them. She has served as a consultant to the Departments of Education and Health and Human Services and was given seven hundred and thirty-four thousand dollars by Ronald Reagan’s Justice Department to study pornography. More recently, she has been active in the rise of abstinence-only education;
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To a reader of Reisman’s scholarly papers, it sometimes appears that there is little for which she does not hold Kinsey responsible. In her research on gays, for instance, she has written that the “recruitment techniques” of homosexuals rival those of the Marine Corps. The Kinsey paradigm, she holds, created the moral framework that makes such recruitment possible. Reisman also endorses a book called “The Pink Swastika,” which challenges the “myths” that gays were victimized in Nazi Germany. The Nazi Party and the Holocaust itself, she writes, were largely the creation of “the German homosexual movement.” Thanks to Alfred Kinsey, she warns, the American homosexual movement is poised to repeat those crimes. “Idealistic ‘gay youth’ groups are being formed and staffed in classrooms nationwide by recruiters too similar to those who formed the original ‘Hitler youth.’
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Most Americans no longer give much thought to Kinsey as a societal force, but his detractors believe that his significance can hardly be overstated. A recent newsletter of the abstinence-education group Why know? compared the publication of “The Kinsey Report,” in 1948, to the attacks of September 11th, and labelled Kinseyism “fifty years of cultural terrorism.” Judith Reisman is the founder of the modern anti-Kinsey movement.
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In one article, Reisman describes Kinsey as “a scientific and moral fraud, a certifiable sexual psychopath as well as a sadomasochistic pornography addict and a sexually harassing bully.” Though largely unknown outside social-conservative circles, Reisman has been influential within them. She has served as a consultant to the Departments of Education and Health and Human Services and was given seven hundred and thirty-four thousand dollars by Ronald Reagan’s Justice Department to study pornography. More recently, she has been active in the rise of abstinence-only education;
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To a reader of Reisman’s scholarly papers, it sometimes appears that there is little for which she does not hold Kinsey responsible. In her research on gays, for instance, she has written that the “recruitment techniques” of homosexuals rival those of the Marine Corps. The Kinsey paradigm, she holds, created the moral framework that makes such recruitment possible. Reisman also endorses a book called “The Pink Swastika,” which challenges the “myths” that gays were victimized in Nazi Germany. The Nazi Party and the Holocaust itself, she writes, were largely the creation of “the German homosexual movement.” Thanks to Alfred Kinsey, she warns, the American homosexual movement is poised to repeat those crimes. “Idealistic ‘gay youth’ groups are being formed and staffed in classrooms nationwide by recruiters too similar to those who formed the original ‘Hitler youth.’
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Once again, Wing Nut Daily has proven itself to be the platform for the seriously demented and seriously disturbed voices of the Christianist and neo-con far right.
1 comment:
More Christianist abuse of "terrorism," emptying it of meaning.
Marine Corps recruitment is an interesting analogy or fantasy given the reputation of Marines as athletic bottoms...
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